Thanks for the comments!
The "Game by..." info shouldn't cover stuff; if it does, the layout broke. I will look into it.
The idea about engineer improvement is nice, thanks! Might include it in future.
Stock market manipulation is already a research, but maybe some added complexity won't be bad. Thanks for the ideas!
That info thing only happens on the Power and Alternat Tabs, I think it's cause the power station stuff isn't scaling... I have to scroll to see it all.
And I get that theres's a research but as far as I can tell that's not a way to "actively" play the game, that's a click the button and done... my suggestion was that the player could manipulate the stock market through their actions within that section of the game, or ignore it if it doesn't interest them. I think I may have also worked out how to implement it in sudo code:
//HR = HiddenResource
HRAmmount += HRSpeed
HRSpeed += HRAcceleration/10 * PlayerUsageHR
If HRSpeed < 0.5 * PlayerUsage then HRSpeed = 0.5 * PlayerUsageHR
If HRSpeed > 1.5 * PlayerUsage then HRSpeed = 1.5 * PlayerUsageHR
//HRSpeed is capped between 0.5 and 1.5x Player Usage
HRAcceleration += Random(-1,1)
If HRAmmount < -1 then HRAcceleration += log(abs(HRAmmount))/3
If HRAmmount > 1 then HRAcceleration -= log(abs(HRAmmount))/3
//HRAcceleration gets a random flux and a Bias to Accelerate to HRAmmount to 0, uncapped to allow long-term consequences (but could be capped by multiplying by 0.9999 for example gently bringing the acceleration closer to 0). This would be the place where you can slow or speed one resource based on another having a shortage, so:
//if CoalAmmount < -1 then IronAcceleration -= log(abs(CoalAmmount))/10
//allowing the iron price to react to the coal price but requiring time for the effect to come into play rather than instantly
HRActualPrice = HRBasePrice / (( HRSpeed / PlayerUsageHR ) + random(-0.25,0.25)
If HRAmmount < -1 then HRActualPrice *= (2 ^ log(abs(HRAmmount)))
If HRAmmount > 1 then HRActualPrice /= (2 ^ log(abs(HRAmmount)))
//This is how you could turn an amount of resource into a price, the base price gets modified by speed, if the production of a resource is slow then the price should go higher and vice versa, with some wiggle room for tick to tick price fluctuation when resource speed is pegged to max or min (which will be most of the time). And then this price is affected by the stockpile, for every order of magnitude increase in the stockpile the price halves, if there's a "negative stockpile" the price doubles for every order of magnitude. This is also where you can make one price a factor for another
//IronActualPrice += CoalActualPrice/100
//UraniumActualPrice += ElectricityActualPrice * 100
//Allowing for more instant buying of one thing affecting the price of another.
All in all, this keeps the near-term fluctuations, but would allow for the long-term price to be directly manipulated by player actions, and make for all sorts of different strategies.
There's quite a few algorithms out there for economic simulations like that, ranging from simple "the more you buy, the more it cost; the more you sell, the less it costs" to complex ones that modify based on any number of point-in-time history elements, with older history items having progressively less of an impact until they simply disappear. I think for a game like this, the economy portion of it is not a major game component, so a simpler approach should be suitable: If the player buys, that would drive the price up. There is no selling done of anything but energy to counter that, though.
