Oil problem

General discussion related to the game goes here.

Moderators: Balthagor, Legend, Moderators

Post Reply
Rhaycen
Major
Posts: 153
Joined: Mar 11 2014
Human: Yes

Oil problem

Post by Rhaycen »

I'm playing as Germany (1936), and have conquered all of Lithuania because they attacked me (and there my conquering days ended)

As is know, Germany doesn't have much in the way of oil and in very dependent on imports and Coal to Oil Synths.
My economy is running fine, I have plenty of resources and plenty of everything except oil.

Oil is scarce around the world, so even paying max money for oil I can't really get enough oil to just meet the basic needs of my population. (Who are paying 200% for it)

So I started trying to built my way out of trouble, but for every 1000 oil I produce from the Oil - Coal Synth plants, my population grows enough to make demand rise by 1500-2000. At around 1000 oil per factory they just don't produce enough to be of any use to me.

I have 63 of those things costing around 300 million each, and they have increased my oil production by about 50000-65000 oil, costing me about 158000 coal each day. Is there any way the production of individual oil-coal plants could be increased, because right now they just aren't useful enough to built.

A single Oil well produces about 5000 oil, and for a factory to be somewhat useful it would need to be in the same range. (Multiply the amount of coal they use too) ...
MrRipper

Re: Oil problem

Post by MrRipper »

wOOt another economy issue topic xD

As you said supply/demand isnt calculated correctly :wink:
Aragos
General
Posts: 1431
Joined: Jan 13 2005
Location: Washington, DC

Re: Oil problem

Post by Aragos »

Problem #1: The AI doesn't build new Oil Fields. Consequently, Saudi Arabia, Egypt, Iran and Iraq just sit on these huge deposits and do nothing with them.

If I play Germany, I invade Egypt in 1936, Saudi Arabia and Iran soon thereafter...and build like crazy. That is the only way (until you get the techs that lower population Petrol demand) that you can meet your needs.

Ahistorical, but it works.
amynase
Lt. Colonel
Posts: 212
Joined: May 02 2014
Human: Yes

Re: Oil problem

Post by amynase »

Aragos wrote:Problem #1: The AI doesn't build new Oil Fields. Consequently, Saudi Arabia, Egypt, Iran and Iraq just sit on these huge deposits and do nothing with them.
+1 we need better building AI :)
Rhaycen
Major
Posts: 153
Joined: Mar 11 2014
Human: Yes

Re: Oil problem

Post by Rhaycen »

As Germany, I usually ally myself with Albania and go to war with Italy. And develop the Libyan Oil fields ... same effect as taking over Egypt. Not very historical, but it works ... sometimes. :)
Aragos
General
Posts: 1431
Joined: Jan 13 2005
Location: Washington, DC

Re: Oil problem

Post by Aragos »

Funny. If you do 36 Sandbox, and set the Vol to Very High (and Diplo to Very Easy), you often get a German invasion of Italy if France falls. Leads to super-mega Germany, which is always a fun game as the USA.
User avatar
Anthropoid
Colonel
Posts: 416
Joined: Dec 10 2012
Human: Yes

Re: Oil problem

Post by Anthropoid »

Aragos wrote:Problem #1: The AI doesn't build new Oil Fields. Consequently, Saudi Arabia, Egypt, Iran and Iraq just sit on these huge deposits and do nothing with them.

If I play Germany, I invade Egypt in 1936, Saudi Arabia and Iran soon thereafter...and build like crazy. That is the only way (until you get the techs that lower population Petrol demand) that you can meet your needs.

Ahistorical, but it works.
In my 1936 Sandbox I am up to June 1944. I annexed Czech and Poland and about 1/3 to 1/2 of Yugoslavia (Hungary gobbled the eastern chunk). I have now fully tapped all of my oil fields (79 wells). I have a military of 1300 units (500 active from like 1939 to 1944). I keep taxes quite high most of the time, and domestic markup also high on petrol (just low enough that my Minister doesn't send me messages about it being too high).

I've bought all the oil produced on the planet several times since game start in 1936 and kept a surplus of 220M barrels up until I war decked Poland. Since then, the U.S. asks exorbitant prices so I only buy from the lesser producers and my reserves have gradually dwindled into the 50 m ballpark.

With all those fields tapped (79 in total), and 28 oil-coal synths (still building more as of June 1944), I produce 475,000 per day and my demand is 502,000 per day. Markup is 196% right now.

So I still have yet to meet all of my demand even at peace time with military quiet. But once I build another 10 or 15 oil-coal synths I think I will have it very close to peacetime demand. Then it is a matter of annexing all of my neighbors who have oil fields and I should be good to go.
Aragos
General
Posts: 1431
Joined: Jan 13 2005
Location: Washington, DC

Re: Oil problem

Post by Aragos »

Take over China. It will destroy your economy just from the Oil demand alone.

Playing as the USA, I just can't do it--the demand jumps so high that you can't supply it all. Even if you take out Saudi Arabia, Iran, Iraq, Egypt, Canada, Mexico and build all the wells in the USA that you can. The production simply isn't there.

IMHO, this may be an issue with historical demand and technology. For example, why would China (even US occupied) have the same Oil demand for the population as the USA? Does conquest by the USA suddenly mean every Chinese family gets a car? :D
User avatar
Anthropoid
Colonel
Posts: 416
Joined: Dec 10 2012
Human: Yes

Re: Oil problem

Post by Anthropoid »

I agree to some extent. I have quite often kept my taxes in the 60% ballpark and sometimes jacked them up to 90 for intense building periods. Oil markup has also been consistently high, 180+.

I've noticed that if I lower anything that will increase civic demand for petroleum, it does increase rather dramatically.
Kristijonas
Brigadier Gen.
Posts: 884
Joined: Nov 11 2011
Human: Yes

Re: Oil problem

Post by Kristijonas »

I control oil demand by reserving (or scrapping) all active units, manually increasing domestic prices of oil, and locking it that way (reduces demand dramatically) and by making personal deals with top oil manufacturers from around the world. Not sure if the latter would work for a huge country. Worked for my pan-baltic Lithuania.
User avatar
Anthropoid
Colonel
Posts: 416
Joined: Dec 10 2012
Human: Yes

Re: Oil problem

Post by Anthropoid »

I would reserve all of my military but I'd be concerned to get bumrushed by France :lol:

I did after all annex their "ally" as well as attacking Yugoslavia totally unprovoked, and they (and pretty much the entire world) have 100% cassus belli against me.

Actually it would make for a pretty interesting experiment, to see if they DO declare war when I put everything on reserve. Might have to try that.
Kristijonas
Brigadier Gen.
Posts: 884
Joined: Nov 11 2011
Human: Yes

Re: Oil problem

Post by Kristijonas »

Only leave entrenched infantry and some artillery at the borders and reserve all the tanks/mounted infantry/ships/airplanes. Wondering if it'd make a big difference.
User avatar
Anthropoid
Colonel
Posts: 416
Joined: Dec 10 2012
Human: Yes

Re: Oil problem

Post by Anthropoid »

Kristijonas wrote:Only leave entrenched infantry and some artillery at the borders and reserve all the tanks/mounted infantry/ships/airplanes. Wondering if it'd make a big difference.
That is more or less what I already have going. about 8/13ths of my army are my "home defense" portion, mostly infantry, towed arty, and towed AA. I do have a few interceptors active. My combat "Corps" comprising tanks, mech inf, mech AA, and that sort of thing are all in reserve already.
nicholas70
Lieutenant
Posts: 73
Joined: Mar 06 2015
Human: Yes

Re: Oil problem

Post by nicholas70 »

I've also noticed this problem and I kinda like it seeing as I love playing OPEC countries, but yea the economy needs to be tweaked a bit in my opinion to help correct this and other resource issues. As others have stated the problem as I see it is the AI doesn't seem to respond much to prolonged periods of high oil prices and low supplies. On the flip side a lot of AI countries continue to produce large surpluses of metal ore which is a big money loser during this time period. Bottom line the AI should be more aggressive about reducing consumption of oil more then major producers should worry about increasing production. After all why would I want to drive down the price of oil when some countries will pay 4x the market price for it? I do think some of the smaller producers should increase production somewhat(brazil, colombia, eygpt, argintina, peru and the saudi kingdom.), but few of them ever seem to, and I think part of that is their unwillingness to barrow money, lack of industrial supplies or both. I've also noticed it doesn't seem the AI builds structures that increase supply in key production areas or try to move key production from low supply areas to high supply areas. This would also account for part of the problem with shortages as the efficiency of production isn't increasing much at all relative to population and gdp growth. I wouldn't be shocked if 100,000s of barrels of oil a day are being wasted by mid 1941 due to major production taking place in areas of low relative supply. You also don't want me to get started on how major oil importers continue to try producing tons of power for export while not having enough oil to do so in a cost effective manner.
Cutlass
Major
Posts: 187
Joined: Sep 09 2008

Re: Oil problem

Post by Cutlass »

In my 1936 Sandbox I'm running Romania. Oil isn't a problem. :D

However, that is at least partially due to my region being relatively small at the current time. As well, in terms of military units, I am careful to build only what I need and keep reserves to a minimum. Right now my active military, having overrun most of the Ukraine and all of the Crimean Peninsula, is only about 180 units, with about another 70 or so units in reserve.

As far as the AI building more oil wells (or much more of anything else for that matter) there are two problems. The first is the basic programming to give the AI the ability to decide where to build entirely new complexes and facilities. For us humans that's relatively simple to do, but I understand that it's also a programming nightmare to try to give an AI the ability to do that. And when it does build a new facility, it will be at an already existing complex. I have yet to see the AI build a whole new complex in a virgin location. Without the ability to do that the AI is severely handicapped when it comes to expanding resource production.

The second problem, speaking as somebody running a relatively small region, is the difficulty of building anything given the way the economics in 1936 work. It can be an obnoxious juggling act trying to build what you need without crashing your economy. Building Industrial Goods facilities and especially Military Goods facilities is an incredible resource drain. And without a lot of Industrial Goods facilities nothing much of anything can get done. These are the two areas right now that are my current bottle neck.
Proud member of the Spherical World Association. An organization dedicated to encouraging game designers to create state of the art strategy games in which the actual shape of the world is used.
Post Reply

Return to “General Discussion - SRUltimate”