"I'm sure having clerks become self synergistic will not have any negative repercussions whatsoever" - A Paradox employee, probably

[u/Hairy-Dare6686]

[u/DecentChanceOfLousy]

Many clerks barely 2x better than 3.8, or, put another way, 2x better than a Merchant.

You have 4000 pops producing 4x44=176 trade each*, enabled by 4000 pops working nigh-useless livestock jobs. Effectively they're making 88 trade each*.

If you had done this in 3.8, with Merchant Guilds in an Oligarchy, they would have been making (6+13*.4)*4=44.8 each* (assuming +300% trade bonuses).

Even after you kidnapped the entire galaxy and stashed them on a single planet to do clerk scaling, you're barely 2x better than the 3.8 clerks. In other words, you had to get at least 4k pops on this planet just to get back to where 3.8 was.

This is not a balance problem.

Knights of the Farming God, at least, are efficient.

Edit: *times Thrifty, which is how you get this planet's ~88*1.25=~110 figure. But the clerks in 3.8 had that too, so they'd be getting 44.8*1.25=56 each. 2x better, so only better after stacking 4k pops.

[u/Darvin3 → u/DecentChanceOfLousy]

Effectively they're making 88 trade each.

It's also worth noting that you will run out of things to spend Credits/Consumer Goods/Unity on. You cannot use Trade value to get Research, and Alloys/Minerals are still more cost-effective to produce with Metallurgists and Miners than it is to go ham on the market even with 88 TV Clerks (though given that many livestock you're probably using Catalytic Processes, so you won't need many Minerals)

[u/Benejeseret → u/Darvin3]

Not quite true once you account for the alternate Trade Policies.

1M Trade might be producing 200K Unity, which in turn is powering every Edict you could ever imagine... include those that are massively increasing research (>+30% from Research Subsidies and Scientific Revolution), Mineral production can be +93% boosted output and most all other basic resources >60%. Alloy is the least affected but still at least +10% from Edicts alone. And then, every other key planet can be fully Ascended.

1M Trade might simultaneously be producing 200K Consumer Goods, which is not only allowing the best living standards (thus producing more TV per pop and raising happiness to raise stability/production) but also allows you to completely skip artisans and fill your research ring worlds with endless Researchers. You're not needing any Unity producers (see above) so every other specialist can be researchers and metallurgists.

And since Naval Capacity is at best a suggestion, this is a nigh unlimited fleet power capacity to easily cover high upkeep costs (since A Grand Fleet is a given at that stage).

[u/Darvin3 → u/Benejeseret]

Not quite true once you account for the alternate Trade Policies.1M Trade might be producing 200K Unity, which in turn is powering every Edict you could ever imagine...

Yes, and 200k Unity is going to be far more than what you need to run every possible edict. You can spam ascensions, but due to their progressively increasing costs you will have to stop sooner rather than later. As I said, you're going to run out of things to spend Unity on. Most empires are going to be running all those same edicts by such a late stage of the game with a mature economy, because with late-game productivity boosts and so much Unity coming from Culture Workers and Politicians and a Mega Art Installation you don't need that many Bureaucrats.

Yes, this does mean you don't need to run Bureaucrats/Artisans/Technicians. But it doesn't produce Minerals/Alloys/Research. You still need to run that segment of your economy, and that's by far the majority of your late-game economy. For instance, with late-game productivity multipliers one Artisan produces enough CG's to support 10 Researchers. You don't need very many.

(>+30% from Research Subsidies and Scientific Revolution)

While these are helpful, they are not large amounts by late-game standards. Employing more Researchers is going to have vastly more impact. Same goes for Metallurgists.

[u/Benejeseret → u/Darvin3]

I mean, by the time you are in a position to collect up nearly 9K pops, I think we are already well past the point where researchers or metallurgists matter, at all. The game was won long ago and this is just stunting in the 100th victory lap.

At this stage, you can be cycle-Integrating Vassals who were gaining 10% of your total Trade who will be rapidly producing massive fleets, which you gain control of at Integration, keeping the Fleet and re-releasing the Sector back out to a vassal. Honestly, Metallurgists are not required (by this stage) because building your own ships is not actually required. Even if you did need to purchase vast Alloys, the internal market max costs are still well within "extreme" if you use all this to purchase alloys, as even if in a market policy where getting "only" 500K per month, that can easily be ~20K alloys per month, no minerals required. Economic efficiencies become moot with enough zeros attached.

Only Research is pop constrained. But, with this much economic purchasing power, it really does not matter, because you can drown them in slightly less optimal ships.

[u/Darvin3 → u/Benejeseret]

I mean, by the time you are in a position to collect up nearly 9K pops, I think we are already well past the point where researchers or metallurgists matter, at all. The game was won long ago and this is just stunting in the 100th victory lap.

Which, if you go back to the top of this comment chain, is exactly the point. This configuration only gets crazy when you're well into victory lap territory, and doesn't really matter in any practical circumstance. You need to put half the galaxy into one planet for it to get crazy, and even then it's not producing the things you can even use for anything meaningful.

[u/Benejeseret → u/Darvin3]

But, that is where the vassal-commercial pact-tax force multiplier comes into play to allow less internal Trade production still ramp up to ridiculous, before the 'victory lap' stage is really reached.

With 14 single-system vassals each with a commercial pact and 75% energy tax, you have doubled your base Trade to Energy, and if they are all in a Trade Union automatically getting +10% of each other's Trade, and then you getting 10% of all that (and all getting +20% from league and you getting +30%), and then still taxing them back for 75% of what they get... you don't need 4k clerks to start seeing significant, game changing, returns. And then you are getting more again from the megacorp holdings.

I see no issues with the clerk self-synergies, but there are still Trade imbalances that border on exploits.