SIMCITY 3000 Financial/Budget Department FAQ Version 1.0 By: Karl Jobst E-mail: faq_god@hotmail.com I though it would be easier and faster just to do one department at a time. This way, I can just send in one FAQ at a time, as soon as I finish one. This chain of Simcity FAQs will be very basic, but more in-depth than most others. ------------------------------------------------------------------------ CONTENTS ************** 1. Revision History 2. Financial/Budget Department -The Financial Advisor -Simoleons -Taxes -Finding Departments -Neighbouring Deals -Business Deals -Loans 3. Closing Statement, thanks, etc. ------------------------------------------------------------------------ RIVISION HISTORY 1.0 (4/6/00) First release of this FAQ. ------------------------------------------------------------------------ FINANCIAL/BUDGET DEPARTMENT The Financial/Budget Department deals with spending and receiving money. It includes taxes, business deals, loans, neighbouring deals and funding all the cities needs. THE FINANCIAL ADVISOR: Mortimer Green Biography: The Financial advisor is Mortimer Green. Mortimer Green received his Ph.D. in Post-Classical Economics from Grendletown University and accepted a teaching position there. During his tenure, he worked to turn the Economics Department into a now widely respected model of idealised application. His book, "Tightening The Belt: A Primer for Parsimonious Pro Formas" is considered the definitive book on frugality theory-Green left the Ivory Tower to follow his dream of public service. He rarely regrets the decision. This guy will help you handle your cash. If a neighbouring city wants to make a deal, he usually makes the right decisions. He will keep you up-to-date on all of your deals and tells you if taxes are too high and what not. He will also tell you if you are losing money or gaining money each year. SIMOLEONS: Ah, the precious simoleon. Without simoleons you can't build anything which would ultimately end in disaster. The simoleon is Sim Cities' currency, you, as mayor, should try to get your hands on as many simoleons as possible. Laying zones and building roads and anything you place on your map will cost you simoleons. Your total amount of simoleons is shown on the bottom of the screen. When you start a new city, you will have the opportunity to decide how many simoleons you want to begin with. The more simoleons you have, the better. If unfortunately you run out of simoleons, you go into debt. While in debt you can not build buildings or roads, or plant trees or what not. You can however take out a loan to get some quick money, but if you're not earning enough income you will fall straight back into debt. While in debt, the budget is still going strong. If every year you loose money and you're in debt, you will continue to loose money. At a certain point, the game senses that you have no hope of ever getting out of debt, therefore, it tells you to start again. Just before you reach your doom your financial advisor will tell you to get some money. If he warns you, it's time to get some money fast! TAXES: Taxes are your biggest source of income. The taxes are split into three parts; Residential, Commercial and Industrial. Raising the taxes will give you more money, but less sims will move to your town, and some might even move out if the taxes are too high. If you lower the taxes you will receive less money, but more sims will move to your city and it will increase aura. A good thing about the tax system is that you can raise or lower taxes for separate areas. If People aren't moving into your city, you can lower the residential taxes so more people move in, but you can also keep the commercial and industrial taxes up so you don't loose to much money. It also goes for commercial and industrial too. If there is no demand for commercial or industrial, lowering taxes will make more businesses move to your city. Sims are always complaining about taxes being to high, even if they're on 1%! I don't listen to complaining sims, if you do, you're going to be bankrupted very soon. However, sometimes the sims don't just complain, they leave. When sims start leaving it's a good idea to lower taxes. When you start your city, it's a good idea to keep taxes up a little. The smaller the town, the fewer people there are to complain, so even if the taxes are up a bit, the sims won't mind. But when the city starts to grow, and more people move in, more and more people rebel against taxes. When there are about 250,000 people on a city, the sims will ALWAYS complain, no matter how low the taxes are! The more people there are in a city, the more money you will receive from taxes. When there are very few people living in your town, you will get a small amount of money. This is why is good to slowly decrease the taxes once the population rises. FUNDING DEPARTMENTS: As mayor, it is your job to fund all of the cities needs. The more money you give a department, the better it performs. There are six departments in all that you must fund. If you do not give enough funds to a department, it can't do everything it wants to. People complain and you end up with bad areas, decreasing the aura. The Education Budget: This pays for all of the schools, colleges, museums and libraries. It is good to have high funding for this department. With higher funding the schools and colleges can buy better equipment and give the teachers more salary. With a higher salary the teachers will perform better, raising the I.Q of the children. The libraries and museums will keep the older sims smarter. With higher funding they can buy more artefacts and books, raising the I.Q of the older sims. The Health Budget: This gives money to the hospitals. A hospital with more money can buy better equipment and more beds. With better equipment the doctors can perform better, raising the health and life expectancy of the sims. Higher funding also raises the doctors and nurses salaries. A happy doctor makes an excellent doctor. The Fire Budget: This gives money to fire brigade. Giving money to the fire brigade allows them to buy better trucks and stations. This lowers the overall flammability of the city. Higher funding also means a bigger salary. With bigger salaries the firefighters will enjoy working more and will be better at putting out any fires. The Road Budget: This pays for the maintenance of the many roads you have in your city. With low funding the roads will crack and eventually disintegrate. Low funding also increases traffic, cars will move slower and cautiously over cracked roads. The Police Budget: This pays for the police in your city. High funding enables the police to buy more cars, hire more police, and pay hire salaries. When policemen have high salaries, they arrest like they've never arrested before! The higher the funding, the less amount crime. This also pays for the jails in your city. It enables jails to hire more guards, get better equipment, and gives the warden a better salary. The Mass Transit Budget: This pays for things like bus stops, train tracks and stations, subways and stations, and subway-rail connections. With higher funding bus stops can purchase better buses, and make their bus stop better. Train stations can buy accessories on their trains like better seats and free food; this makes more people use them. In every case, raising the funds for each department will raise the overall aura of your city. With a good aura, more people will want to live in your city. Raising funds has more advantages than just getting better equipment; it makes the whole city a better place to live. NEIGHBOURING DEALS: If you are producing excess power or water, a neighbour might ask you to sell your power or water to them. They will tell you how much power/water they want, and how much money they will give you for each month. For a neighbour to propose a deal, you must have a connection to their city. A connection can be made just by clicking a road or power line right on the edge of the map. It will ask you if you want to make a connection to the neighbouring city. Say yes and it will automatically connect for you. When you make a deal, money will automatically go into your treasury. You can cancel a deal anytime you want, but you will usually have to pay a penalty. When the neighbouring city wants to ask for more power/water, it gives you the opportunity to quit the deal without paying the penalty. To make a deal you will need the following connections: Power: At least one power line leading into a neighbouring city Water: At least one water pipe leading into a neighbouring city Garbage: At least one road or rail leading into a neighbouring city If there is water that leads out of you map and into another city, building a seaport would support a garbage deal. If a city wants to give you their garbage, they will tell you how many tons of garbage they will give you and how much money they will give you. Garbage equals pollution, I would only accept a garbage deal if I had enough incinerators to totally get rid of all my garbage plus the neighbour's. If a neighbour buys power of you but the supply cannot be met, then they cancel the deal and you have to pay the penalty. Also make sure that you read how much power/water/garbage they are giving you, and check to see if you can handle it. A neighbour might also ask you if YOU want to buy water/power of THEM. They will tell you how much they will tell you how much it cost to buy so much. They will also tell you the minimum fee, which you MUST pay while the deal is up. Even if they don't sell you anything, you still have to pay the minimum fee. I don't like making deals like this because in the long run it's not worth it. It would be cheaper just to build one more power plant or another pumping station then to be locked in a deal. BUSSINESS DEALS: A business deal is similar to a neighbouring deal but is slightly different. A business deal is when a petitioner comes to you and asks if they can build something in your town. They pay you a monthly fee for having the building in your town. The building must have a road connected to it, it must be powered, and it must be watered or you will not get paid. If you cancel the deal and destroy the building, you will not be faced with a penalty. The payments will stop immediately; there are no expenditures. Although it may seem like it's just an easy way to make cash, you're wrong. Every building has very bad down sides. Here's a list of the buildings and they're down sides: Maximum Security Prison: The prison attracts a lot of crime. It also creates a fair amount of pollution. No sim will want to live anywhere near this. It also decreases aura. Gigamall: This mall decreases your demand for commercial industries. Why would sims need commercial buildings if they've got the Gigamall? This building does nothing to the area around it so stick it wherever you want(that is, if you want it in your city). Casino: This place also attracts a lot of crime. It also increases the amount of traffic around it. Try not to put it right in the middle of your city. Chemical Waste Disposal Plant: This baby is the worst of the lot. It creates massive amounts of pollution. No matter HOW far away it is, it will lower the aura of the entire city. Sims just don't want to live in a city with this one. But it is does give you A LOT of money and if you're having money problems I suggest you take up the offer for A SHORT PERIOD OF TIME. If you leave it in your city for too long the sims complain. LOANS: Don't you just hate it when you've done everything humanly possible to get money but the yearly budget is still in the red? Well this is where the loan comes in. If you're in debt and you're losing money every year, you can take out a loan for some (or a lot of) easy money. There is