Economy status?

[Pat in the desert]

Could somebody explain to me how the status of the economy works in RT3? You know the boom - good - normal - recession - crash of the economy. Is it random or what? I have not noticed if the events in a scenario set it.
I have twice been playing a scenario - most recently New Beginning - and I'm well along in the game. And the economy goes into a recession. And it just stays there for years. Which means the profits drop, and the stock price starts declining. Looks like the stock price takes an immediate drop whenever the status makes a negative move. Then in a recession it continues to drift downward. So the players equity drops and goes negative and the margin calls start coming. So I try to prop it up with paying a good dividend and doing stock buy-backs. Eventually reaching the point where either the bonds are maxed out or the credit rating has dropped below B.
So in frustration 2 times now I have gone back to a save game before the company got all loaned out. And jumped into the editor and added an event. Which I called Economic Stimulus. Set it to trigger in a month or 2 from the current calendar. Handed out some player cash and some company cash. And set a variable for Economic Status with a plus 1. Then jumped back to the game.
Which worked, but it amounts to a cheat. But I just could not wait any longer for the economy to rebound. (Sounds almost like a current events discussion instead of the game).

[EPH]

The economy will move up and down during a game, influenced partly (I believe) by how much the players borrow for bonds and stock purchases and by new resource centers/factories opening up.

Events can also set the economy to a particular level, with 0 being the worst and (?) 5 the best. Modeling the Great Depression of 1929 (or the many other recession/depression cycles of the US economy) usually calls for setting the economy to a low number.

The state of the economy impacts production, stock prices, bond interest rates and credit rates. I believe low economic numbers also make trains run slower and crash more often but I don't have proof of that.

[Gandar]

The economy will frequently go from boom to bust and back again, if you get yourself set up for it then it plays into your hands. Max out on bonds when it is booming and the interest rate is only 5% and always try to buy as much stock as possible when you are in a recession. The balancing act of spending money on rails or industry, or to make your position secure by holding 51% of the company is what makes the game so interesting. One of the best ways to get through a a bad patch is to own industries, they are affected by economic downturns but not as badly as rail traffic. Try not to jump into the editor for temporary fixes for cash or cargo, there is no sense of achievement if you have given yourself the win via the editor. The game is simple inasmuch you build rail and run trains from A to B, but it can be surprisingly complex which is why so many of us still enjoy the game.
There was a strategy guide I think Hawk has it from the H&P railroad, and I seem to remember it saying that the amount that you were in debt on your stock purchases had an effect on the boom bust cycle. That of course has never stopped me from being deep in the red. I have also found that building rail has a tendency to fend off or shorten recessions.

[Pat in the desert]

Try not to jump into the editor for temporary fixes for cash or cargo, there is no sense of achievement if you have given yourself the win via the editor.

In the one case, I did not have any alternative other than giving up. No more bonds could be issued. Issuing stock would only make it worse. No more stock buybacks could be made with no company cash. And I finally failed to make a margin call and lost most if not all the stock. Also a recession that has gone on for 6 years is not a 'bad patch'. So to me it was a worthwhile experiment to see if the outlook could be changed.

It seems to me that It is a fine line on using margin on buying the stock. Too conservative and the objectives of 51% ownership of your company's stock or of an AI competitor cannot be met. Too close to the limit on the margin buying and it is one negative event away from losing control of the whole scenario. But in some scenarios the risk/reward is to buy as much of your company's stock as possible right away as it gets to owning 50% of the company stock much sooner. Sometimes that does not work out and one has to start over. I'm sure most here have done that.

[Gandar]

In the one case, I did not have any alternative other than giving up. No more bonds could be issued. Issuing stock would only make it worse. No more stock buybacks could be made with no company cash. And I finally failed to make a margin call and lost most if not all the stock. Also a recession that has gone on for 6 years is not a 'bad patch'. So to me it was a worthwhile experiment to see if the outlook could be changed. .

If you have reached this situation, then it means that you took the wrong approach to achieve the scenario objectives and yes you should start again and try a different strategy That is why its good to save every 5 years or so, then you don't have to restart the whole thing. If you are playing on expert mode then some of the scenarios are pretty darn tricky especially if you are in a map that has a 6 year recession coded in as one of the conditions. A lot of maps have strategy threads and they wouldn't have them if it was easy. That's where the fun comes in, when you figure out how to conquer a map that has been giving you problems.

[Hawk]

There was a strategy guide I think Hawk has it from the H&P railroad,

It's part of this web site now.

http://hawkdawg.com/rrt/rrt3/rrt3.htm

Scroll down the page a little and you'll find a link to it.

[Sugus]

From my point of view, the economy state is changed (by RT3 itself and at least partially) by random. While testing my own maps, I mostly was going on in the same way. Do this first, do that next, etc. But never the economy state behaved identically! Therefore, it also seems not to depend on the way I'm doing a map. (If I had programmed RT3, sure I would made some random influence on economy state, of course. It's boring to know everything in advance, isn't it?)

[Hawk]

It's boring to know everything in advance, isn't it?)

I don't know if boring is the right word but it is more real life like. Ya' just never know how the economy is going to act from one day to the next.
'Course with the current controlling factors in the US it is somewhat predictable. We know it's going to get worse.

[Pat in the desert]

From my point of view, the economy state is changed (by RT3 itself and at least partially) by random.

It is clearly random or at least partially random. My original question was if anyone knew what controls it. Seems to be a mystery. There is a variable available in the events to move the economy status up or down. Not sure how often the scenarios use this option.
The gripe is that when it's an extended recession then it becomes impossible to meet goals. The profit for the trains drops by 50% or more. So building more track or stations, adding new trains, buying new territory has to stop and what profits are being made have to be saved for stock buy-backs and dividend payouts.
Which brings me to another point. Does the dividend system work correctly? Dividends appear to be paid out quarterly. That's when it gets subtracted from the company cash at least. But when I have tried to watch the players debt it does not seem to be decreased by the expected amount. It is hard to watch in the middle of a game. May have to setup a situation to test this.

[nedfumpkin]

Dividends are offset by any interest paid on the margin.

It does depend on the scenario, and in some cases recessions are set to occur, and when it is during a natural cycle, then it gets prolonged, or worse than the event called for.

For the most part, the game seems to go in 5 year cycles with a bit of randomness thrown in.

[OilCan]

There is some good information regarding the game's economic condition at this post:

viewtopic.php?f=5&t=1504#p14265

[WPandP]

I like the idea of coding in a set of events that trigger "too big to fail" style bailouts if a recession lingers for too long. Maybe use an available territory variable to keep track, with one annual event that checks whether economy status is below a certain threshold, and if so, add +1 to that variable. Another event can check for economy status above a threshold, and if so, reset the variable to zero. Finally, the Bailout event checks that variable against a set target value, and if it exceeds that target then the bailout happens. The bailout could be done in the form of an artificially good credit rating (such that bonds can be issued), or it might be just a plain old cash infusion. If cash is given, then maybe it could be a "gov't loan" with repeating events to reclaim monthly loan payments for the next 20 years or so.

But if bond debt is actually a factor in determining economy status, then I like the artificial credit rating best. This gives the player a way out, in the very short term, at the cost of carrying even more interest payments, plus it may well mean extending the recession cycle. In other words, the bailout might prevent the immediate collapse, but it won't do anything to help the overall economy. The cash infusion, on the other hand, might enable a company to retire a bond or two, which might favor economic rebound. Pay close attention to the year just expired (2009) and tell me which of those two outcomes seems the more realistic.