Add in sales and maintenance costs and pre-690 expenses - you probably had a little less gold after that, then your thefts brought your total to 5201 before enemy thefts…
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-----Original Message-----
From: ‘David Crane’ dazedandconfused@blueyonder.co.uk [mepbmlist] mepbmlist@yahoogroups.com
To: mepbmlist mepbmlist@yahoogroups.com
Sent: Wed, Jun 19, 2019 12:45 PM
Subject: RE: Re: [mepbmlist] Re: ME Gold Thefts
Hi Guys
Firstly, Brad/Clint, I never said anything about this being a new issue. This has been happening for at least 25 years.
I understand that when several characters try the same orders they are processed in a random sequence… The point I’m trying to make is that for stealing gold, there seems to be something else at work. I’ve played this game for at least 25 years and, without checking back at all my previous turns (which I don’t have anyway), I’m pretty sure that when one of my nations has stolen gold and had gold stolen from it, that nation has “never” been left with any of the gold.
In the greater scheme of things this is not major issue. I just wondered if anyone else had noticed it. Maybe it’s just me.
Just as an aside and without any suggestion that it should be investigated; for the turn that arrived yesterday:
My starting gold plus the gold I stole amounts to 5,301;
The four thefts from my nation amount to 5,210;
Yet my nation still finished the turn with no gold.
David
From: mepbmlist@yahoogroups.com mepbmlist@yahoogroups.com
Sent: 19 June 2019 17:13
To: mepbmlist@yahoogroups.com
Subject: Re: Re: [mepbmlist] Re: ME Gold Thefts
Also, from a “realism” standpoint, remember that there is theoretically more gold available to be stolen than is in the treasury, because for instance you can steal more gold from a pop center than it actual sends to the treasury. And in terms of turn resolution, the pop center already sent its taxes off to the capital in the 300s… So technically you’re stealing gold from the people of the pop center AFTER they’ve already paid their taxes - and I’m pretty sure the king isn’t going to make up the loss
Despite this “fact”, thieves cannot steal gold from you when your treasury is 0. So you steal gold at a town, it disappears from the capital, and when there’s no gold at the capital, you can’t steal gold at the town any more. One might think the gold doesn’t actually go to capital, but instead is stored locally until needed to pay fortification maintenance, local troop costs, etc., ie that the treasury is distributed, but that doesn’t work either, because enough thefts can clean out the treasury no matter whether the thefts are distributed or concentrated. Plus, the capital IS the one place where the upper limit on a theft is not determined by pop center size but by the total amount available in the treasury.
Meh. It’s a game, reality is sacrificed for playability all the time.
But if you wanted to implement a more realistic 690 order, I’d break it down into two cases:
A) Thefts at non-capital pop centers: gold stolen at these locations are impacting local reserves, not the treasury. Instead of lowering the nation’s treasury reserves, such thefts get gold but lower loyalty a small amount, maybe 1 point per 5000 gold or fraction thereof. (Hey, most of the population is unaffected directly, because you’re gonna steal from the richest residents, they’re the ones who have the gold.)
B) Thefts at the capital: as long as there remains gold in the treasury, thefts draw down those reserves. Once the treasury is drained, revert to case A, steal from the public, especially the merchants and aristocrats.
Now, this makes agents more powerful, which I’m not a fan of, because they can get more gold AND impact loyalties, though not as much as emissaries. To counter that, I would drop the typical quantity of gold available per theft when stealing from the public; only at the capital would the really big scores be likely, though at non-capital cities and major towns could still get some decent funds. It means successful thefts always have a positive result, but individual thefts at non-capital locations don’t drain the treasury, just the people’s loyalty to the realm for not protecting them. Only at the capital can you drain the treasury, potentially preventing character naming, army hiring, etc. It means capital guarding may be more useful because if the enemy agents truly want to cripple a nation, they have to steal there to prevent it from recovering.
That, in my opinion, is a lot more realistic, and could be doable. But it isn’t likely to happen, so you just have to accept that not everything in the game is…realistic. 
-----Original Message-----
From: Brad Brunet brad.brunet@gmail.com [mepbmlist] mepbmlist@yahoogroups.com
To: mepbmlist mepbmlist@yahoogroups.com
Sent: Wed, Jun 19, 2019 07:14 AM
Subject: Re: [mepbmlist] Re: ME Gold Thefts
That’s the the “realism” of your 690 sending gold to your treasury from a far flung enemy pop instantaneously, it is therefore available to be stolen. One must assume that the “nation order” is at play here. It is rumoured that at some point, the program determines which nation goes first for either Each Order or, in my opinion, once at the start of the turn processing… Imagine emissaries from 3 different nations issuing 525 on an enemy pop. Who takes it from Good to Fair? Who ends up owning it? I’ve noticed over time that when my Sinda ally ends up owning the pop, he’s also left holding the bag when the 2 of us are stealing gold from another pop - I get the gold and he get’s nothing. This tells me that my Nation is ahead of him in line for order processing.
If that be the case, you were ahead of the nations who stole from you - such that the proceeds of your actions were available for them to steal.
On one hand, you said this is a new phenomenon, which the above would explain as an unlucky turn, on the other hand, you complain about being “constantly unlucky”. Which is it?
Brad
On Wed, Jun 19, 2019 at 7:01 AM jchalmeta@gmail.com [mepbmlist] mepbmlist@yahoogroups.com wrote:
David,
I think the answer is easy…
You are issuing X amount of Stealing gold orders and your enemiens Y.
Probably Y > X. so it’s seems logical that you end up with no gold at the end of the steal gold orders.
The only way for that not happienning is that one of your orders being the last one proceesed. The bigger the difference between X and Y the less probable that would be the case.
Hope that helps
Cheers,
Jordi.