Buyout balancing

[Frankschtaldt]

I've been thinking about the buyout mechanism and it's dismal failure rate a bit of late so I thought I'd start a thread to offer some suggestions for balancing it and possibly to start discussion on if other people agree that's it's too hard.

So, since the buyout/share mechanics were adjusted I think they've been made too hard. It's just annoying to offer a max buyout bid to a company for 12 consecutive months (that has lost value consistently for even longer) only to have them be bought out buy an opponent. Now, I realize this happens in real life but since the changes I've only ever managed to buy out 2 companies, and I've tried well over 20 times (20 companies, not 20 offers) over a number of different games.

I think the answer isn't simply to make it easier. I think rather there should be a series of tweeks here and there that introduce some variety and encourage some tactics.

My suggestions are:
(Note: where I say harder I mean less likely to accept an offer, and easier I mean more likely to accept an offer. All numbers are just examples as I have no idea what the actual numbers at the back end of the system are currently)
1) Game difficulty has an effect - 1% harder (than currently) for Hard, 2% easier for Normal, 5% easier for Easy.
2) Double what the current maximum bid is but with diminishing returns - Offering 50% more than the current max increases the chance of acceptance by 8%, offering 100% more than the current max increases chance of acceptance by 10%.
3) Owning shares in a company you are trying to buy out increases the change of accepting a buyout offer - each 1% you own adds a cumulative 0.0001% bonus to the chance of accepting an offer every month.

Plus, some other related ideas:
1) Whenever a company that another company has shares in goes bankrupt, all companies that have shares should be offered the chance to make a buyout bid. Starting with the company with the most shares and calculating offers as normal but adding the value of the shares you own to the total bid for determining the % chance of acceptance. (I realise something similar has been suggested before)
2) When another company makes a bid to buy out a company you have shares in that would be successful (and possibly on hard mode, have the same thing happen when players buyout as well). You should get the opportunity to make a counter offer. You're not told what their offer is but if your offer (+ the shares you own) is higher than their offer (+the shares they own) then you get the buyout instead.
3) Randomly, have companies that are losing value (consecutively for at least 6 months) invite offers for buyouts (give the player a notification? Or just a story in the news paper?). For the next six months, the chance of a bid being accepted by this company are doubled.

[Eric.B]

Sorry for the late reply, I read this, this morning but I'm also trying to maximize my programming time. So I did not respond because it's a longish post.

1) Game difficulty has an effect - 1% harder (than currently) for Hard, 2% easier for Normal, 5% easier for Easy.
2) Double what the current maximum bid is but with diminishing returns - Offering 50% more than the current max increases the chance of acceptance by 8%, offering 100% more than the current max increases chance of acceptance by 10%.
3) Owning shares in a company you are trying to buy out increases the change of accepting a buyout offer - each 1% you own adds a cumulative 0.0001% bonus to the chance of accepting an offer every month.

1)Probably the best solution is to work in difficulty. The main issue is preventing quick, cheap, expansion like it used to be.
2) Acceptance is linear with slider amount.
3) Not very realistic imo. From my days owning stocks, most shareholders resent anyone who owns large chunks of the company taking them over. As typically said large company will pay less per share than a completely fresh take over.

1) Whenever a company that another company has shares in goes bankrupt, all companies that have shares should be offered the chance to make a buyout bid. Starting with the company with the most shares and calculating offers as normal but adding the value of the shares you own to the total bid for determining the % chance of acceptance. (I realise something similar has been suggested before)
2) When another company makes a bid to buy out a company you have shares in that would be successful (and possibly on hard mode, have the same thing happen when players buyout as well). You should get the opportunity to make a counter offer. You're not told what their offer is but if your offer (+ the shares you own) is higher than their offer (+the shares they own) then you get the buyout instead.
3) Randomly, have companies that are losing value (consecutively for at least 6 months) invite offers for buyouts (give the player a notification? Or just a story in the news paper?). For the next six months, the chance of a bid being accepted by this company are doubled.

1) If memory serves me the top 5 highest AI share owners have a chance to merge. Other than that it's random assuming merging companies can afford it. Player takeover of bankrupt companies is too exploitable.
3)Again this probably becomes either spammy or exploitable.

Maybe after I get some obligation expenses in the game it will be become less exploitable. As it is now, there is not much variation in market cap and book value. And the variation that is there Is mainly tied into margins. This means the player would always gain more by merging with a dying/bankrupt company than playing the game normally. Thus causing what we had long time ago when I tried to make it 100% dynamic market cap, Players buying companies out just to expand the company thus 30 years later they own 50marques and playing against no one!

[Frankschtaldt]

Sorry for the late reply, I read this, this morning but I'm also trying to maximize my programming time. So I did not respond because it's a longish post.

T'is all good, I was asleep anyway =P
(for once)

1)Probably the best solution is to work in difficulty. The main issue is preventing quick, cheap, expansion like it used to be.
2) Acceptance is linear with slider amount.
3) Not very realistic imo. From my days owning stocks, most shareholders resent anyone who owns large chunks of the company taking them over. As typically said large company will pay less per share than a completely fresh take over.

1) I thought so too, that's why I started with it =)
2) Was just a thought, would it be possible to just increase the maximum offer? So players with a bucket load of cash can make ludicrous offers to failing companies and actually have a reasonable chance of success?
Perhaps reduce the chance of success per $ even more but greatly increase the maximum offer? That would make it all but impossible to buy out companies that are actually profitable until you'd had a few decades to amass a giant fortune but it would actually be possible to brute force smaller failing companies.
3) I defer to your better judgement on this. I've never been a shareholder so I have no experience in this.

1) If memory serves me the top 5 highest AI share owners have a chance to merge. Other than that it's random assuming merging companies can afford it. Player takeover of bankrupt companies is too exploitable.
3)Again this probably becomes either spammy or exploitable.

1) I didn't know that, perhaps I should start buying shares in failing companies and see what happens.
2) I still think this is a good idea but it could be difficult to execute.
3) I was thinking a very low probability of making the offer to prevent spam/exploitation. Maybe also use a hard cap of no more than 2 companies (or a set fraction of the total number of companies in the game) making the offer each year? Once the two offers have been made the game stops checking until the next year ticks over. Also, it adds flavour I think without really making things overly exploitable. The current chance of acceptance is 2/10's of stuff all (either that or I'm just ludicrously unlucky, which is generally the case with most randomizes. Ask my RPG group about how the dice love me), double that is still only 4/10's of stuff all.

Maybe after I get some obligation expenses in the game it will be become less exploitable. As it is now, there is not much variation in market cap and book value. And the variation that is there Is mainly tied into margins. This means the player would always gain more by merging with a dying/bankrupt company than playing the game normally. Thus causing what we had long time ago when I tried to make it 100% dynamic market cap, Players buying companies out just to expand the company thus 30 years later they own 50marques and playing against no one!

I totally agree that it was far to easy back in 1.12-1.13 but I think now it's just too hard. It's quicker, easier and cheaper in a lot of cases now to just create a new marque and design (or contract) new models for it.


Also, does a companies profitability effect the chance of accepting a buyout offer? So, if a company is loosing share value, each month they do so could add a small consecutive bonus to the chance of accepting a buyout bid. Also, maybe that bonus should stay for up to 12 months after making profit as well (or maybe even keep increasing if the loss period was long enough), many companies (including the one I work for) have deliberately gone looking to sell quickly after turning a profit following a long period of loss. "Quick, sell now while we're profitable and will get a good offer before things turn bad again."