The glitchiness in the wacky math of cancerous calculations :-)

Perhaps this thread helps to clear up the issue; especially my 2nd post in same thread explains why a 10% reduction of, say, 500 is not equal to 450 but rather to 454.54... .

Let me know if this helped.

Cheers
P.

Not sure what you mean. Let me give you my exact numbers from 2nite. I was doing the final increase on "Instant Offensive Units" and it showed I still had 5 days 6 hours and 59 means remaining. This means once I activated the bonus I should have only had to wait 63 hours and 29 minutes However, instead it showed me a completition time of 73 hours and 56 minutes! Now I know that when calculating the rewards (or loans) from persian positions you have to factor in room for interest which at least is based on a principal I have bumped into in reality, paying interest on a loan. However, I haven't ever seen something advertised as %50 off then get "fees" heaped on after making the final cost well above half.

I am terrible at math so I can't figure out if there is some kind of formula to derive an equation that would allow me to actually KNOW what day I would reach my goal, At least, in the ballpark (since I know it is impossible to have the bonus running the entire time period. There will always be some gaps, even if small, where I am not at my computer to reactivate the bonus right away.

Hope these specs can get me some clarification.

XPusher32

Not sure I follow your example as you described it above but let's, if I may, go through one realistic sample step by step: On the right, you'll see a straightforward sample of the calculated "time to complete" values with and without an active Phylarch pushing skills development. Click here for a high-res zoomable copy of the image on the right.

You're right in assuming that the "time to complete" values will always assume that whatever bonuses, boosts or enhancers are active at the time, will continue to be active until the end of the update process, not taking into account the time it might take to reenable the bonuses. If a three-hour Phylarch activation runs out at 3 a.m. and you are fast asleep, then obviously the projection will be a bit off, but there's no good way to take that into account if you cannot quantify the duration of these periods.

Cheers
P.

Wow. I have to commend you on a truly wonderful job helping me to understand that since I achieved my degrees in English and Philosophy and lack the type of brain that works well when dealing with equations. That is a fact that I frequently wrestle with while playing this game as the designers usually take the difficult path to their solution. Yet, I don't give up and seek a different game. But usually I simply have to accept the answer is beyond me, and forge ahead blindly. Much as I do when it comes to the Persian Position Loan System.

Maybe someday we can discuss that over a few POTS of coffee ;)  I to am an over-kill-coffee-person. Example: At the present time I have not slept in 63 hours! True not all of the hours were spent playing this game, but I learned very quickly after my accident and the resulting law suit freed me from the drudgery of a work week that when you don't HAVE TO BE somewhere all the time...... it becomes a very blurry conscept.

XPusher32

You're welcome :-)

The upside to understanding how the game handles Phylarch boosts is that all percentage values embedded in boosts, enhancers and all other building and agreement upgrades are calculated in similar fashion. Although it might seem counterintuitive, applying this method has decided advantages. If all these values were calculated the "normal" way as [New Value] = [Old Value] x (100% - [Boost%], the developers would have to be extremely careful never to allow boosts greater 100% since that would then mean that for example, the production of unit would be a negative value, which would be silly (or we'd be discussing Einstein-Rosen bridges in quantum mechanics :-).

There are for example around a dozen boosts, enhancers and upgrades that influence resource production and consumption, and having to make sure that no combination of boosts adds up to a value greater than 100% can get real tricky. The table below contains 8 examples (lines 2 to 8) showing how even 1000% speed increases do not pose any difficulties if one does the math the way it is handled in SWOE.

Philosophy was my major and post-grad subject as well, though in my case leaning much more towards mathematical logic (set and model theory, symbolic logic, ...). Considering the scarcity of jobs in these fields, one would think that skipping the "having an accident" part and moving directly to unemployment, thus also forgoing the drudgery of a work week, would have been an option as well, it was for me :-).

Cheers
P.

PS: If game math is still giving you trouble, remember: "Do not try and bend the spoon. That's impossible. Instead... only try to realise the truth: there is no spoon."