Comprehensive list of economy changes?

Well, since you posted in the TA general area and not Modding, I'd encourage you to bang your head on the changes a bit more before you work hard on mods to undo them.

I was really thrown during the beta and still felt disoriented by the time the bits went gold, but I've managed to adapt my playing to get back to what I think of as "my level" in terms of both enjoying a game and scoring kind of like I expect.

If I was a more hardcore player, I'd try to back this sentiment up with a faux change log like you want, but I'm just not that disciplined. I can say that the major changes I've noticed include: starting funds reduced almost 50%, tourism income potential increased, and trade income talked up a lot but still not seeming like much for my taste in game settings (largest maps, generous colonizable worlds, maximum major & minor civs). There are also some increases to maintainence costs for both ships and planetary improvements.

I took all that as a push to be more "fiscally conservative" in the early game. I develop planets more slowly than I did in DL and DA, and I suspect that if I was war-win oriented I'd be building fleets a bit more slowly, but my old habits there seem to be a bit pre-adapted to TA.

Truth be told, I like to mod games and frequently spend about as much time fiddling with them as I do playing them. As mentioned, I've adapted to the changes and can get through a ToA game just fine these days, but I realized that I would have more fun with a DA-style economy plus all the lovely gameplay additions of ToA and I'm willing to hack away at the game in order to reconcile the two. I'm sure it will cause all kinds of strange balance problems, but breaking the game and fixing it again will be part of the fun.

I'll start taking a look at the factors you mentioned. If anyone else has more precise figures, however, I'd appreciate it.

The simple solution is to edit your race in notepad. Instead of changing the number on the lower line use the "hardcoded" number between the <ECONOMICS>0</ECONOMICS>.

Exp:

  <ECONOMICS>0</ECONOMICS>
  <Ability0>10</Ability0>

This will give you a 10% bonus, BUT at a cost of ability points. This occurs 'in the game' when you add on to your abilities in the race creation window.

<ECONOMICS>20</ECONOMICS>
  <Ability0>0</Ability0>

This will give you a 20% bonus at no ability point cost. You can add on to this by going into your race and add ability points to your race.

I don't have any list, that's for certain, but if you wish to see that changes, just make a ship with the same equipment in both DA and TA and see the difference there.  Starting funds dropped from 5000 to 3000, a huge colony rush throttling point coupled with higher planetary maintenance costs for some races.

There may be maintenence costs notes in the beta journals for TA...

One change to econ that has a big impact on the way I play is the fact that the econ bonuses have been dropped from the higher levels of government. Now you just get diplo and influence bonuses (I think - I don't go for advanced govt any more).

Of course I may have got this wrong; I'm basing this on the info you can see in the tech research window.

Cheers

Can we get some confirmation or correction here? I'm not the most careful observer while I'm playing, but I'm pretty sure I've been getting the econ boost I expect each time I adopt a more advanced gov't. I've been playing the Thalans, so I'm also pretty sure what I've seen is not some massive population spike from a bunch of world's hitting the growth sweet spot together. My peeps just don't breed like the bugs they are...

I think that's  the huge difference here.  The tech itself doesn't give a econ bonus, the government being active gives it.

I think GW Swicord got most of them.

- starting funds reduced almost 50% (you now start with 3000 bc)

- tourism income increased (I think)

- trade income increased (with the most recent ToA)

- increased maintainance costs for both ships and planetary improvements (race dependent)

Add to these:

- increased base colony maintenance

- race dependent considerations such as the Thalan's lack of spammable econ structures and different ones for different races with different characteristics

I'm sure there are more.  You've got lots of work to do.

I'm also pretty sure that the econ boost is still associated with advanced governments.  If not, the Thalan would be completely unplayable.  I spend a lot of early research points getting to star republic.

Glideslope, the Thalans have spammable econ structures, it's the Yor that don't.  The Thalans just lack the econ buildings until a bit into their tree.

I thought that by "spammable," Glideslope meant things like the Black Market (low-to-no maintainence). I can't "spam" econ buildings as the Thalans until well past mid-game on a gigantic or immense map.

And I should note that I scoff the implied scoff in this jargon use of "spam" and refer folks to the authoritative Spam Statement.

Still, they can "spam" econ buildings better than the Yor...Heck, in the beginning of the game, they can spam just as well as the Yor.

Thanks Loupdinour, I did mean the Yor.  My multiple personalities are conflicting again.

LOL

Gross understatement, if you're talking about the skit I linked. I'm trying to transcribe some database nattering today, and ever since I rashly looked up that skit, I'm having a hard time not hearing "Spam, spam, wonderful Spam..." in my head...

I would like my economy without the spam please.  "Spam, spam,spam,spam,spam, spam"

Brings back the days when comedy was funny.

I'm *almost* positive the econ boost has always come from having the government active, not just having the tech. The influence and diplomacy boosts came with having the tech, but not the econ.