Taking all your peasant's gold!

To further examine the tax potential I'm going to compare all 4 general tax plans including the use of the two available comforts.


The base optimal plan again:
100% down to 50 loyalty (loyalty change in parens)
t1 - 9500 (100 -> 90)
t2 - 8500 (90 -> 80)
t3 - 7500 (80 -> 70)
t4 - 6500 (70 -> 60)
t5 - 5500 (60 -> 50)
total for first sequence = 37500

The Pray comfort (cost max pop gold, for 25 loyalty)
t1 - 9500 (100 -> 90)
t2 - 8500 (90 -> 80)
t3 - 3750 (80 -> 75) (use comfort -10000 gold)
t3.5 - 9500 (100 -> 90)
t4.5 - 8500 (90 -> 80)
t5.5 - 3750 (80 -> 75) (use comfort -10000 gold)
total for this sequence = 43500 - 20000 = 23500

The Disaster Relief comfort (cost max pop in food, for 5 loyalty)
t1 - 4750 (100 -> 95) (use comfort -10000 food)
t1.5 - 4750 (100 -> 95) (use comfort -10000 food)
t2 - 4750 (100 -> 95) (use comfort -10000 food)
t2.5 - 4750 (100 -> 95) (use comfort -10000 food)
t3 - 4750 (100 -> 95) (use comfort -10000 food)
t3.5 - 4750 (100 -> 95) (use comfort -10000 food)
t4 - 4750 (100 -> 95) (use comfort -10000 food)
t4.5 - 4750 (100 -> 95) (use comfort -10000 food)
t5 - 4750 (100 -> 95) (use comfort -10000 food)
t5.5 - 4750 (100 -> 95) (use comfort -10000 food)
total for this sequence = 47500 - (100000 food ~5000g) = 42500

The do nothing but keep it steady at 50% all the time
t1 - 2500
t2 - 2500
t3 - 2500
t4 - 2500
t5 - 2500
total for this sequence = 12500


The differences become more apparent after the second segment which I won't elaborate on but just show the data. (Over a 10 hour period, all starting at 100 loyalty and ending there (except the 50% all the time)


The do nothing but keep it steady at 50% all the time
total for first sequence = 12500
total for second sequence = 12500
= 25000

The base optimal plan again:
total for first sequence = 37500
total for second sequence = ~6000
= 43500

The Pray comfort (cost max pop gold, for 25 loyalty)
total for first sequence = 43500 - 20000 = 23500
total for second sequence = 43500 - 20000 = 23500
= 47000

The Disaster Relief comfort (cost max pop in food, for 5 loyalty)
total for first sequence = 47500 - (100000 food ~5000g) = 42500
total for second sequence = 47500 - (100000 food ~5000g) = 42500
= 85000


Those were ordered from worst to best as far as gold income. And oddly enough they are ordered from best to worst as far as micromanagement is concerned, using Disaster Relief every 18 minutes for 10 hours of play for however many cities you may own can be quite a task.

The Disaster Relief plan is also the only one that can be highly variable. I've used a food rate of 0.05, but even now I cannot buy food for cheaper than 0.065.
Food prices would have to move quite a bit to detract from this ones place as the highest gold earner but it may require one to be market savvy as well as a heavy micromanager.
(Although if you can sustain the food cost by your own production it true cost is only what you could have produced instead. I used 0.05 to keep it simple but the true cost would be a balanced market price which we don't have yet. For example, you could have produced 200k lumber, sold that for 10k gold, and purchased 200k food for 5k, instead of just producing your own food. This is only true because the market hasn't quite balanced out yet.)


I think a typical user will take advantage of all of these possible strategies depending on their goals and how they are playing. I hope this helps.