Tropico Manual - Table Of Contents
TABLE OF CONTENTS
Chapter One: Letter of Introduction
Chapter Two: Tutorial and Quick Start
The Tutorial
Fast Frederico's Quick Start Guide
Chapter Three: Starting a Game
Pre-designed Scenarios
Saved Games
Random Map Setup
Chapter Four: Interface
Main Window
Info Bar
Map Area
Circle Window
Central Control Panel
The Almanac
Chapter Five: People
Tropicans
Tourists
Chapter Six: Buildings
Building Types
Construction
Building Administration
Chapter Seven: Economy
Exports
Tourism
Foreign Aid
Rents and Fees
Expenses
Swiss Bank Account
Chapter Eight: Politics
Internal Politics
Elections
Foreign Powers
Uprisings, Coups, and Rebellions
Chapter Nine: Strategies
Appendices
A.Building List
B.People Types
C.Presidenté Attributes
D.Edict List
E.Hot Keys
Credits
Legal
Tropico Manual - Table Of Contents
Tropico Manual - Chapter One
CHAPTER ONE
LETTER OF INTRODUCTION
"Ambition is so powerful a passion in the human breast, that however high we reach we are never satisfied."
Nicolo Machiavelli
December 17, 1949
Desk of the President
Tropico Palace
1 Palace Plaza St.
Tropico
Señor Presidenté,
The former Presidenté Ramirez Zepata requested a compilation of informative reports on the state of Tropico at the start of his regime. As you know, Presidenté Zepata's reign was rather short before he succumbed to that sudden case of food poisoning (or was it a heart attack? No, that was three Presidentés ago).
Though the late Presidenté never had the chance to see the finished reports, we're sure they will be most helpful to you. The reports should be quite helpful in teaching you how to be a most excellent El Presidenté. And let me add how fortunate for all Tropicans that you insisted on serving as our leader! Such personal sacrifice!
Because you have had so little time to fully absorb your rapid rise to power, it might be of some help for me to explain some of the current economic and political intricacies here on Tropico.
As you know, Tropico is a small, underdeveloped, relatively impoverished Caribbean island quite remote from anywhere else. As Presidenté, you have considerable flexibility in what goals you pursue and how you pursue them. Nonetheless, you must deal with a few cold realities.
Your hold on power is rather tenuous. The easiest way to prolong your reign is to make your people happy. In general, your Tropicans want good jobs that pay well, good housing, adequate medical care, varied and inexpensive entertainment, low crime and high liberty. Unfortunately, they start off with almost none of this. To build the island paradise your people crave, you will need money.
The Tropican economy is, at present, principally based on low-value agriculture. While this keeps your people fed and generates a trickle of cash, you will want to branch out. Fortunately, if you befriend the United States or Russia, they may grant you large amounts of foreign aid for economic development.
Early on, you can develop lucrative cash crops like tobacco and sugar, as well as logging and mining. Later, you may build factories to produce cigars, rum, jewelry, and other exports that the wealthier countries crave. If you are truly skilled, you can even develop a highly lucrative tourist trade, bringing American tourists with fat wallets to get sunburned on Tropico's beaches.
Unfortunately, building the structures for a growing economy and for your people's social services takes time, and your time is limited. Initially, your people are willing to tolerate poor conditions and give you a political 'honeymoon', but if things don't improve quickly, they will start to grow upset with you. Also, as years go by, your population will grow quickly from a steady flow of immigrants as well as from Tropico's famously high birth rates. A rapidly growing population with poor social services is political dynamite.
Fortunately, you have a few tools at your disposal to help diffuse the situation. As supreme ruler, you may issue edicts that attempt to please various factions on your island. Or, if they can't be pleased, you can make sure they fear you. You may build a large army and curry favor with the generals by paying them well (perhaps even the occasional bri… err… bonus). You can even declare martial law, though such a drastic step has risks of it's own.
I realize that you are anxious to start your rule, and perhaps you do not have the patience to absorb such a large handbook as this one. With that in mind, I have prepared a special tutorial for you, which will walk you through the major functions of the world of Tropico and teach you how to exert your rule. I strongly suggest you go through this tutorial. I have also written up some notes that I modestly named a
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Quick Start Guide. These will help you straight into Tropico without reading the rest of this handbook, though of course the handbook contains a much fuller explanation of Tropico.
My Presidenté, many who have held this office before you have failed, but I see great promise in you. Stand strong, and you may become one of the greatest leaders in our history. Fail, and you will stand alone, without friend or family, a speck in the ocean of history... and no one will care.
Buena suerte,
Miguel Cervantes Librarian of the Presidential Palace
Tropico Manual - Chapter Two
CHAPTER TWO
TUTORIAL AND QUICK START
"Dictators ride to and fro upon tigers which they dare not dismount. And the tigers are getting hungry."
Sir Winston Churchill
Welcome to your Office, My Ruler. I hope you enjoy the view. Remember that as you look down on your people, they also look up to you. So dress nice and don't forget that story your dear madre always told you about the wicked El Presidenté who forgot to change his underwear on the day the people revolted - revolting is the word for it. You never know when the angry mob may be at your door.
As you can see, you have several menu choices available at this point:
TUTORIAL
We recommend you begin with the Tutorial, prepared especially for you. It will teach you the basics of life on Tropico and allow you to begin your regime very quickly. Besides, you can't wait to exercise power, can you? Then the Tutorial it is!
Then, after you finish the Tutorial, we wonder if you might not like to try a quick start guide?
FAST FREDERICO'S QUICK START GUIDE
Psst! Wake up, Presidenté! You want riches? I have a map to a lost Spanish treasure that I can - what? You're not interested? You're calling for your guards? Wait! Perhaps I was too bold to sneak into your palace bedroom at one in the morning. I was just excited, thinking about your new regime, and it's so hard to get an appointment these days.
Tell you what. Fast Frederico has seen Presidentés come and go, and I can give you some tips for surviving in exchange for allowing me to leave the way I came in - through the window, down the drainpipe, and out over the wall. I'm not like those flatterers you call advisers. They're always saying "You look so powerful, Generalissimo" or "You are so wise, Our Leader" or even "We are not worthy of your rule, oh Presidenté." Bah. What good are their honeyed words when the bullets are flying and even your own army has turned against you?
That's why you need the advice of Fast Frederico. I've learned the essentials to getting off to a good start with your new rule. So, for just a few yanqui dollars I can - yes, of course, the guards. Very well, then, Presidenté, here is my advice free of charge. You are most gracious, Presidenté.
●Start a game with a random map and accept all the defaults. This will give you a modest sized island with a Communist government and four farms.
●As the game starts, pause the action. Now look around your island and note where things are. Pull back to the most distant view.
●Now, with the view pulled back, go into "Info Mode" by clicking on the eye stamp. You want to check your starting farms to see what crops might grow. You have started with 40 Tropicans, yet a farm typically feeds 30. This means you want to convert two of your four farms to cash crops. If you can find a crop that can also double as food as well as cash, like bananas, so much the better. Just so you know, It takes about a a year to plant, grow, and harvest a crop (longer for certain cash crops), plus about another year for the crops to be hauled to a port, loaded on a freighter, and sold. Convert two of your farms to cash crops.
●Now you should raise wages to make your people happy and attract immigrants. If Tropico enjoys higher wages than neighboring islands, people will flock to your country. This is important because it will be 13 years before any new Tropicans born will be able to work, so you need immigrants to grow your workforce. At the start all of your workers except the one palace guard are uneducated. Raise the pay level of your uneducated workers from $5 to $7 or $8. Then click on the palace to select the guard and raise his pay. El Presidenté, you're a genius! Your people are instantly happier!
●Now limit the number of teamsters your island can have. Fast Frederico takes no side in the eternal struggles between labor and management, but in your early years you simply have nothing for them to haul, so find the Teamster's office building, select it, and click on the empty worker slots to force the building to leave the slots empty. Oh, and it may not be a good idea to fire any Teamsters. An out-of-work Teamster is an angry Teamster.
●Now go back to "Info Mode" and check the mineral deposits on your island. They are randomly distributed each game, but if your luck holds, you might have a goldmine near your palace. If you do, build a mine. If you don't, it's best to wait until later in the game to start mining, but find some other building to bring in extra cash, such as a logging camp built in a nearby forest.
●Besides raising wages, the other important aspect of your Tropican's lives that you can influence that will make them happy is to get them out of the shacks and into better housing. Build a tenement. Don't build it just anywhere, though. You want to build near
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your palace and on flat land, if possible. Building on flat land means less grading needs to be done and you'll get your fine new tenement building faster. Press G on your keyboard to see a mesh overlay of the land to help you select a good, flat location. Press G again to turn off the mesh.
●The game begins to get more open-ended at this point, but I always like to build a second Construction Building about now. You'll need plenty of construction workers to build new buildings as the years pass, and this helps ensure that you'll have them. You'll want to locate this building along the direction where you want to expand and develop.
●Next I suggest you again upgrade the housing for your people. Build an apartment building.
●Now's a good time to check the happiness levels of your people to gain some insight into the building paths you might pursue. Click on the island's population display in the lower right corner to bring up the Almanac with the People's List displayed. Next select "All Residents - Happiness". This will display your Tropicans, showing you which ones are happy and which are unhappy. You can select individual Tropicans from this display and see what categories in particular they are unhappy in.
Now your course of action can diverge widely. At some point you will have to move from an agricultural-based economy to something better - mining, logging, tourism, etc. To supply educated workers for the new industries you create you will need a high school. Uneducated workers cannot work in many of those industries, and it is expensive to import them. Whatever you do Presidenté, remember that one of your chief goals will always be to build in a way that most increases the happiness of your people for the least amount of cost.
Now, if you don't mind El Presidenté, I'll be running along. No thank you, I really don't need your guards to escort me. I'm flattered, but this is really too much. Wait, I said I'd leave by the window, but I didn't mean I wanted to be thrown from the window. El Presidenté! You haven't even implemented a health plan yet…noooo!
BENITO MUSSOLINI
TITLE: Prime Minister of Italy REIGN: 1922-1943
RISE to POWER: Obtained a mandate from Italy's king in 1922 to form a coalition government, giving him dictatorial powers set to last for one year. Established himself permanent dictator two years later.
LOFTY GOALS: Attempted to create an Italian empire by centralizing all power to himself as the leader (il duce) of the Fascist party and Italy's ruler.
QUELLING OPPOSITION:
Opposition was stifled by an efficient secret police and the Fascist party militia, and the press was regimented.
FALL from GRACE: Executed by firing squad, his body hung in a public square in Milan.
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CHAPTER THREE
STARTING A GAME
"It is true that liberty is preciousso precious that it must be rationed"
Lenin
Starting a new game
Your rapid understanding is most impressive! Now you are ready to start a new full-fledged regime from scratch. Press the 'Game' option, and you will be taken to a large (and should I mention hand-made?) tapestry hanging on the wall. Your reign as Presidenté will begin with this tapestry, so please familiarize yourself with it.
PRE-DESIGNED SCENARIOS
The top, left-hand section of the seal, containing the image of a book, allows you to access a pre-designed scenario. Selecting this option will raise the tapestry to reveal a menu of pre-designed scenarios and a preview map for the selected scenario. Double-click on a scenario title to begin the scenario.
SAVED GAMES
Select the top right-hand section, with a locked box and a key, to load a saved game. If you have saved many games, you may need to pull the slider on the rope to see them all. Double click a saved game name to load that game.
RANDOM MAP SETUP
Señor Presidenté, among your greatest powers is the power to create new islands from thin air (and water and soil)! The measure of a truly great Presidenté is the ability to create a unique island, never before seen by any other ruler, and mold it into a great nation. Therefore, you will likely spend most of your time on Tropico ruling randomly generated maps.
Once you select the random map option, you will craft your new Republic. You will create the island itself and then set the political landscape you will rule. Choose wisely, El Presidenté.
Physical Island Setup
You may rule on a large or small island, a flat or mountainous one -- why, most any kind of island at all! As you make changes, the Difficulty Rating for the game will adjust in response (see below for more detail on Difficulty Rating). Be aware that the choices you make here will factor heavily in your economic options in the game. For instance, a mountainous island is excellent for growing coffee, but poor for sugar. Once you are satisfied with the settings, hit the OK stamp to proceed.
Political Island Setup
The next panel sets up the political landscape. Note that different rulers might pursue different Victory Goals, and we accommodate that here. If you desire only to amass great personal wealth, choose the Victory Goal "'Tis Money That Makes The Man".
You may also set the level of economic difficulty and political difficulty independently. At lower economic difficulty settings, your people
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produce more and demand less economically, and it is generally easier to make a profit. At lower political difficulty settings, your political 'honeymoon' will last longer, and overall, your people will be less inclined to revolt against you and more inclined to vote for you, should you have free elections.
"Sandbox" mode: Though not a labeled option, if you simply want to play the game without economic or political cares, the lowest difficulty levels of each of these disable economics and politics respectively, allowing you to spend an unlimited amount of money and to not worry about losing political power in any way.
Game length: Finally, you can choose the game lengthat the end of this period of time you will receive a score based on how well you have met your victory goals. However, if you want to keep playing beyond that time limit, you can; you just won't receive a score for the extra time.
When you are satisfied with your choices, click the OK stamp to continue your game setup.
About the Difficulty Rating: All things come easily to you, El Presidenté, but some games will be easier than others. The settings you make on the island setup screen determine the difficulty rating of your game. For example, a larger island gives you more room to build, thus making for a lower difficulty rating. Instead of pre-set difficulty levels, Tropico allows you to make the game as easy or as hard as you wish. As you become better at ruling you will want to increase the difficulty and challenge yourself more. Besides making a more challenging game, a higher Difficulty Rating also provides a bonus to your final score.
"I'm not a dictator. It's just that I have a grumpy face."
Augusto Pinochet
FERDINAND MARCOS
TITLE: President of Phillipines REIGN: 1965-1986
RISE to POWER: Won election in 1965 in a bitterly fought campaign.
POWER HUNGRY: Suspended habeas corpus, dissolved the Congress, mercilessly persecuted his political enemies.and set forth a new constitution to increase his powers. MARTIAL LAW: Declared martial law in 1972, jailing political opponents and using armed forces as his private police force.
TWO PRESIDENTS: Was certified victor in 1986 fraudulent election over Corazon Aquino. Both Marcos and Aquino were inaugurated in separate ceremonies.
EMBEZZLEMENT: Estimated to have stole billions of dollars from the Philippine government.
Presidenté Setup
Your Excellency, unfortunately we must pry into your personal life a bit. We apologize, but consider the alternative. If you do not define yourself, your foes will, and they will probably draw on all your official photos and put horns on your head. No, we can't have that.
The folder on the desk contains a number of dossiers of people who have desired at some point to rule an island such as Tropico. Please choose the one that most accurately reflects you, My Leader. Each of these people has a set of traits that give them various bonuses and penalties in ruling Tropico - you can accept their default traits and begin your regime immediately, or you can inspect and alter them by
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choosing 'View/Edit Dossier'.
Editing the Dossier: If you choose to edit the dossier, there are five pages you must inspect and select from. I know, paperwork, bah! Even El Tigres such as you must resign yourself to shuffling papers now and then. They don't teach you this in Presidenté School, but power flows from stacks of paper as well as the barrel of a gun.
Señor Presidenté, I must stress that the choices you make in setting up your reign, especially in reference to yourself, will have a profound affect on the game. They will determine your strategies, priorities, strengths, and weaknesses. Do not take them lightly.
For your convenience, Appendix C provides the list of choices and their effects for Background, Rise to Power, Qualities, and Flaws.
Background: The first page within the folder describes your Background. This is very important to the Tropican people and will sway their opinion of you. Please select one option from the list provided on the left page. In order to help you, we have provided a page on the right to explain the effects when your cursor is over an item in the list.
Rise to Power: The second section lets us archive the manner in which you came to power. Some are born to greatness, some achieve greatness, and some have greatness thrust upon them as the old Presidenté catches a fast jet to Switzerland with the Rebels at the gates. Once again, this is important to how your people and other countries think of you.
Qualities: The section after this tells us your Qualities. Presidenté, we know that you have dozens of admirable qualities, but the silly peasants can only seem to remember two Qualities. Again, these affect the people and the affairs of Tropico.
Flaws: It's such an ugly word. Is it a flaw to invest the funds of the Tropican Treasury in the blackjack tables? Is it a flaw to raise your voice when dealing with fools? Of course not! Nevertheless, you must select two Flaws in the fourth section. This is mandatory and will help us understand why some factions might possibly dislike you.
Summary: I, the Secretary to the President, will quickly calculate a Summary in the final section to show you how all of the previous choices add up.
When finished, click the Ok stamp to begin your game. The new island of Tropico is quickly generated and your enlightened rule begins….
Guards! Stop slouching! You are now in the presence of our new Presidenté. Welcome to Tropico, Senor Presidenté! We expect great things from you….
…just like we expected from the last seven Presidentés.
Señora Consuela de la Pluma y Escritorio Secretary to the President
Tropico Manual - Chapter Four
CHAPTER FOUR
GAME INTERFACE
"War is peace. Freedom is slavery. Ignorance is strength."
George Orwell
Every ruler must have a good understanding of how to exert his control upon the will of the people, though we suggest you place valises full of yanqui dollars at strategic exit points in case the peasants are undeserving of your wisdom.
You influence the Tropicans through the interface, of course. The following document serves to record the functions of the interface. Long live Presidenté.
Figure 1 above shows a shot of the island of Tropico. All operations will occur here. The main areas of control have been labeled on the picture.
MAIN WINDOW
This is your view into the wonderful microcosm of Tropico. You will not only watch the daily lives of your populace play out here, but you can select people or buildings to find out more about them or, in the case of buildings, to exert your control over them.
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INFO BAR
The information bar sits at the bottom of the screen, displaying text as the cursor moves over certain items, such as a person, a building, or virtually any item on the interface. The Info Bar will also sometimes tell you that an item can be clicked on for more information. For example, when the cursor is over the Date in the Circle Window, the Info Bar informs you that you may click on the Date to open the Almanac.
MAP AREA
This area of the interface is used to control the view of the world presented in the Main Window. The Map Area includes several parts:
Radar View
Shows a top-down view of your island. A white square represents the area currently displayed in the Main Window. You may navigate to view an area in the main world by clicking an area in the Radar View. El Presidenté may be pleased to note that buildings appear as black areas on the Radar View.
AUGUSTO PINOCHET
TITLE: Ruler of Chile REIGN: 1973-1990
RISE to POWER: As commander- in-chief of Chilean army, took control of power in a bloody coup d'etat.
FIRST ORDER of BUSINESS:
Declared martial law and imposed a curfew, shooting violators on sight. Also disbanded Congress, banned opposition parties and suspended the Constitution.
NO MERCY: As many as 20,000 people were estimated to have been killed and 14,000 political prisoners were still being held one year after the coup.
NOT ALL BAD: Despite widespread repression, Chile's economy boomed under the reign of Pinochet, and in 1978, 75 percent of the electorate endorsed his rule.
JOB SECURITY: Relinquished presidency in peaceful election, but stayed on as the army chief of staff, and continued to directly influence Chile, preventing prosecutions against him or his security forces.
Rotate Buttons
Located below the Radar View, the Rotate Buttons allow you to rotate your view of the Main Window left and right. The orientation of the Radar View will rotate to match. A white N always indicates which direction is north as the view rotates.
Zoom Buttons
Located above the Radar View, the Zoom Buttons allow your view of the world to zoom in and out. The farthest zoom allows you to see the entire island at once. The white rectangle in the Radar View will grow or shrink to reflect the visible area in the Main Window.
Mouse Wheel Control
The map can also be navigated with the mouse. Holding down either the right mouse button or the mouse wheel (if available) while moving the mouse scrolls the main window map around. Spinning the mouse wheel up and down zooms into and out of the map.
CIRCLE WINDOW AREA
The Circle Window Area provides an at-a-glance summary of your island's most vital information. The elements of this area are:
Circle Window
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The large round window is a flexible window, whose contents change based upon what action you are taking. For instance, when a person is selected, the Circle Window monitors their movements around the island.
Speed Control
The rate at which time passes on the island is controlled with the six vertical bars to the bottom right of the Circle Window. The bars become green to reflect the current speed and can be clicked on directly to change the speed. The shortest bar on the left represents Pause (and turns red when the game is paused).
Island Stats Panel
Below the Circle Window is a set of four information fields:
National Treasury: Displays the current amount in the national treasury account. Clicking this field brings up the Economics page of the Almanac.
Date: Displays the current date. Clicking this field brings up the Overview page of the Almanac.
Swiss Bank Account: Displays the current amount in your personal Swiss Bank Account. Clicking this field brings up the Overview page of the Almanac. This money is one of the measures of the effectiveness of your rule, but don't let the people see your foreign holdings. They would find such finances…confusing.
Population: Displays the current total population of Tropico. (not including tourists) Clicking this field brings up the Lists page of the Almanac.
Happiness Bar The yellow bar directly beneath the four boxes listed above is the Happiness Bar. This bar shows the current overall happiness of your islanders. As your population becomes happier, the yellow bar will grow from left to right to fill the channel. Clicking on this bar brings up the Lists: Happiness page of the Almanac.
Options Button The final portion of the Circle Window Area is the Options Button, located below and to the left of the Circle Window. The Options Button opens a floating panel containing seven buttons:
Almanac: Opens the Almanac, a book with a vast wealth of information for your reference. The Almanac is discussed in more detail at the end of this chapter.
Settings: Opens the Settings booklet. This allows you to change sound and graphics settings, as well as some general preferences. If you feel things are running a bit slow, turn some of the graphics options lower.
Load Map: Opens a window for loading previously saved games. To open a saved game, either double-click the name or select the name and hit OK. Hit Cancel if you change your mind and wish to return to the current game.
Save Map: Opens a panel for saving games. A list of other previously saved games appears in white. A yellow line of text at the bottom of the panel displays the current default name for the game file. Click on the yellow text in order to rename the game before saving, then hit OK. You may save over a previously saved game by selecting that name from the list and double-clicking it or hitting OK.
Main Menu: Returns you to the Main Menu displayed in the President's Office. From here, you can start a new regime if it pleases you, My Presidenté.
Quit: Shuts down the program and returns you to the desktop when you tire of ruling the peasants.
Cancel: Returns you to your game, without any further changes.
CENTRAL CONTROL PANEL The Central Control Panel is where most of the game action occurs. It is used to order the construction of buildings, issue edicts, view information regarding your island and interact with buildings and people. Most of this will be done by selecting one of the three Mode Buttons stacked on the left side of the Central Control Panel.
You can switch from any Central Control Panel mode to another by selecting the appropriate button. If you wish to exit a mode without entering
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another, hit the ESC key.
Building Mode
Building Mode is used to order the construction of buildings, roads, statues, and ornamental plants, as well as to bulldoze an existing structure. When you enter this mode, a row of ten Subgroup Tabs appears across the top of the Central Control Panel. These tabs represent the subgroups that the buildings are organized into. The buildings of the currently selected subgroup are shown in a grid of panels below the Subgroup Tabs.
The name of the building appears in the Info Bar as your cursor moves over each panel.
For a chart showing building types and information, see Appendix A.
Building Selection: The selected building has a yellow outline around it. A preview of the building appears in the Circle Window, along with the construction cost and any other requirements. If the requirements have been met, they will be white. If not, they will be red.
Some building panels have a Cycle Button on the lower right corner. Use this button to cycle through variants of the building. In some cases, such as the house, the variants are cosmetic and do not affect gameplay. In others, such as the port, the variants allow you to select the orientation of the building relative to the coast. In still other cases, the button allows you to cycle through different resource options, such as which crop is grown or which ore is mined.
Ordering Construction: Once you have selected a building, move your cursor onto the Main Window to order its construction. If you meet the requirements to build the building (i.e. you have enough money, etc.), and if the building is in a valid location, it will turn green, indicating that it is placeable. If it turns red, it is not placeable. It can sometimes be tricky finding a valid placement location for a large building. Further details on this process and building administration are covered in Chapter 6: Buildings.
Edict Mode
Issue your edicts (laws) from the edict panel. Begin Edict Mode by selecting the button shown to the left. As with the Building Mode, there are a number of Subgroup Tabs, with a set of icons for different possible edicts in each subgroup.
For a chart showing all possible edicts, see Appendix D - Edict List.
Selection: The selected edict has a yellow outline around it. The name and requirements for the edict appear in the Circle Window. If the requirements have been met, they will be white. If not, they will be red.
Edicts are issued in two ways:
●Individual Edicts: The first subgroup of edicts (including bribe, arrest, etc) all target an individual person. If you have met the requirements for the edict, simply select a targeted unit on the main map. A floating tag icon will appear above the selected person and the proper authorities will attempt to carry out the edict. (Some edicts, such as arrest, may not succeed - the target may flee or fight back.)
●Global Edicts: The remaining four subgroups of edicts (including praise U.S., industry ad campaign, prohibition, etc.) contain global edicts - they don't target a specific person or place. Click on the scroll button in the Circle Window to view more information on these edicts, and, optionally, issue the edict.
Canceling an Edict: While some edicts cause a single event to occur, other edicts remain in place forever, unless and until you cancel them. Some of these edicts have an ongoing cost (such as the literacy program), and you might wish to stop them at some point. To cancel such an edict, select it in the Edict Mode. Instead of a Scroll Button, the Circle Window will contain a Cancel Button. Clicking the Cancel button immediately repeals the edict.
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Info Mode
A tremendous amount of information is available, covering soil quality, mineral resources, crime, pollution, religious sentiment, building profitability, feelings of liberty, job happiness and much, much more. Select Info Mode, and again, you'll be presented with five Subgroup Tabs, each of which has a set of icons below that you can select for different types of information.
The three types of information presented are:
Ground Overlays: Cause the ground (and, in some cases, the water) to become a bright color gradient ranging from green to red. The Circle Window tells you the meaning of the different colors for that overlay. In general, green is good, yellow is fair, and red is bad.
Population Arrow Overlays: Cause arrows to appear over your citizens. The color of the arrows ranges from green to red to show each person's rating or opinion on different subjects such as job quality, leadership and happiness.
Building Overlays: Cause applicable buildings to brightly glow a color ranging from green to red. As with the previous overlays, the meaning of the color is given in the Circle Window.
THE ALMANAC
(addendum by the Secretary to the President)
Presidenté,
I humbly ask you to consider the great value of the Almanac I have prepared for you! I think it will prove to be an invaluable tool for any leader serious about ruling our fair Tropico, and there are also some nice coupons in the back if you want to save a few pesos out shopping. Such a deal! Now, if you would allow me to explain…
As I'm sure the Palace Librarian has mentioned, you can access the Almanac through the Options Button. I have carefully arranged the information with the Almanac by sorting it into seven categories, which you will notice have handy tabs along the right side for quickly jumping to the information you want.
Hyperlinks
Any item that is written in yellow text is really a link to more detailed information about that item. Yes, I agree - the things they come up with these days. When you jump about in the almanac via the text links, don't forget that there's a back button at the top to return to your previous link.
Overview tab: On the main page of the Overview tab, there is a chart at the bottom of the page. I'm sure you've also noticed the boxes to the left
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of the list items on this page. You can toggle the chart lines on and off by clicking on the appropriate boxes. We've tried to color code each line.
People section: The People section provides a nice overview of the lives of your citizens. However, for greater detail, we've linked many of the items on the page directly to the Lists section.
Politics section: There are several important features in the Politics section. First, your own character information (as chosen during the game setup) can be found in this section under <>. Also, please take the time to note the <> item. If you use this link, the page will turn to a new sheet that lists individual factions. Selecting a faction will show you how that faction feels about you personally. I would recommend becoming familiar with these opinions. The faction leader picture on a faction's page can be used to select that individual. Some Presidentés have even been known to issue an edict to arrest a leader of a particularly troublesome faction. Imagine that.
Economy section: We have gathered a lot of statistics and numbers in the Economy section. We also keep a record of export prices in here, and we track the profitability of your economy, Your Most Mightifulness, including tourism.
Lists section: The Lists section works slightly different from the other tabs. Instead of tons of numbers, the pages beneath the main Lists page show the individual people on your island, grouped according to many different factors. Their names will appear in the Info Bar as your cursor passes over them in the Almanac. To make things especially easy for our Esteemed Presidenté, you may select the person in the main interface by clicking on their image in the Almanac.
Score section: Finally, the Score page lets you know how you are doing as our leader, determined by several factors that we have listed for you. The exact factors and value of those factors is determining your score is determined by what kind of Leadership Goals you chose in the game's setup.
Closing the Almanac: When finished with the Almanac, click on the blue Exit bookmark. We will return the Almanac to the Palace Library until you need further assistance. This way, we can maintain a constant and current record of all the information.
Accessing the Almanac: While we will, by default, bring up the Almanac at the end of each year, the current and up-to-date information will always be available to you by pressing the "A" key or the Options Button.
Thank you for your precious time, my Leader.
Your humble servant,
Señora Consuela de la Pluma y Escritorio
Secretary to the President
Tropico Manual - Chapter Five
CHAPTER FIVE
PEOPLE
"You only have power over people as long as you don't take everything from them. But when you've robbed a man of everything, he's no longer in your powerhe's free again."
Alexander Solzhenitsyn
My Presidenté, although you are a most magnificent leader, the true power on Tropico lies with the people. If you should lose their favor, you will most likely lose your power as well. Your people are also the engine of your economy, and you will need money to make the people happy. Managing people is a tricky task that has befuddled many a leader before you. You may have noticed that your dry cleaning receipts read, "This month's dictator" instead of your name. We can go through leaders rather quickly.
The problem is that you do not directly control your people. Presidenté, I have heard that there are far away places and worlds where the leaders simply 'lasso up' a bunch of people or soldiers, tell them where to go, and those people will obey unflinchingly. Stranger still, I have heard of other places where a leader can slap his workers and make them work with more industry. Such is not the case on Tropico.
All you as Presidenté can do is give them reasons to act as you want them to. To get them to work at a new building, raise the pay there. To get them to vote for you, or at least not to rise up against you, make them happy by providing food, housing, medical care, and much more.
Everyone is an individual person in Tropico. Your people have ambitions and dreams of their own. They have families. They have jobs, opinions, and experiences. The same actions that might cause one Tropican to praise your name might cause another to take up arms against you.
Although you cannot directly tell a citizen what to do, you can study them closely for clues as to their attitudes and reactions to your rule. Most information is available simply by clicking on a citizen (the information differs somewhat for tourists - that will be presented later in this chapter).
While any person, whether Tropican or Tourist, pressing T will cause the Main Window to track that person until you change the view.
TROPICANS: Understanding Your Citizens
The information on your citizens is divided into 7 panels (Overview, Happiness, Politics, Job and House, Family, Skills, and Thoughts). Select a panel by pressing the corresponding Tab Button.
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Overview
The basic information about an individual, including their current needs. The 5 bars on the right (Hunger, Rest, Religion Need, Entertainment Need, Health Care Need), indicate the citizen's current need for those services. When a person has just completed a good night's sleep, their rest bar will be completely full and green. As the person moves about, the rest bar decreases (and turns from green to red), until, eventually, they have to stop working or going about their business and return home for a good night's sleep.
Señor, please note our sense of time here on Tropico is somewhat different from other places. There aren't any 'days' or 'weekends'. Tropicans need to sleep after they have performed a certain amount of activity (strenuous activity, such as hauling, tires a person quickly) rather than at a certain time of day.
The other need bars work in the same manner, although they generally decline slower - people need health care much less than they need to sleep. If you do not provide the needed service (such as a clinic for medicine), the individual will satisfy his need by himself. However, the result will be quite unsatisfactory, and the person will grow unhappy with you in that area.
Happiness
Each person has an overall happiness rating - how content they are with their lot in life, which in turn, reflects on how they feel about you, Presidenté. Overall happiness is driven by many individual factors, and at any given time, for any given person, some factors may be more important than others. Religious happiness is most important to a devoutly religious person. Health care is generally more important to the elderly. Job quality is among the most highly important factors to most citizens of working age.
The happiness panel lists all the individual factors of happiness as well as the overall score, which is a weighted average of the individual scores. The most important factors for any individual are the ones labeled in bright white text. Those with dark gray labels are comparatively unimportant.
●Food: People need access to food. They will automatically walk to buy their food, but it needs to be available, and in sufficient quantities. A lack of food will not cause immediate mass starvation - your people are resourceful, and are used to scavenging food from the environment when Presidentés fail to provide it for them. However, there will be some starvation deaths, and those who survive will become quite unhappy in this area, quite quickly. Locations at which people may pick up food supplies are food producing farms, ranches, marketplaces, and fisherman's wharves. Food can also be obtained at restaurants, but the meal must be eaten there - restaurants are not the primary food providers for Tropican citizens (they do not have the money to frequently visit such extravagant places).
●Housing: Everyone has a place to live. If you do not provide them with one, they will build their own shack from scrap materials. However, they do not like living in such meager conditions. You have several housing options at your disposal. There are individual houses, tenements, apartments, luxury houses, rural houses, and bunkhouses. These accommodations each offer a varying degree of satisfaction to your citizenry, but all are preferable to the shacks. Make note that you may charge rent for all housing except for the shack, so even the uncaring despot has benefits in looking after the housing situation. A family will spend no more than one-third of it's monthly income on rent, so if a man and a woman earn $5 per month each ($10 combined), they will spend no more than $3 on rent. Since some of your citizens have no monthly earnings (retirees, unemployed workers), if you charge rents for all housing, then you will force these people into shacks.
The better the quality of housing that a person lives in, the higher their housing score will be. Housing quality is determined primarily by the type of housing (mansions are better than shacks), but location also has a small impact - a house in an area with a high environment score is better than a house in a slum.
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●Religion: My Presidenté, your citizens vary widely in their level of religious piety. For some citizens, religion is paramount in their lives, and a lack of an adequate worship facility will quickly lead to unrest. Others will only attend church if there's a hot bingo game going on. To serve your people's religious needs, build a church or a cathedral. A cathedral is more expensive, but provides a better religious experience, leading to higher religion quality scores for your people.
●Entertainment: When they have free time, the people seem to think they should be entertained. Luckily, you can earn back much of the salary you pay them by erecting entertainment establishments. There are many forms of entertainment you can provide. For a casual night out on the town, there are pubs, restaurants, and gourmet restaurants. Sports fanatics will love going to see a game at the sports complex. And then there are a few options that may conflict with the religious communitycasinos, nightclubs and cabarets. I would like to say that it is good of you to personally inspect the caberets, Presidenté, though the people wonder why you have to inspect them so often.
An individual will spend no more than one month's salary on entertainment, so again, if you charge a fee for all entertainment, some individuals will do without.
In general, more expensive diversions (casinos, gourmet restaurants, etc.), provide a better quality of entertainment and result in higher entertainment ratings. However, each individual has their own entertainment preferences - some like to drink at pubs or nightclubs while others prefer gambling at casinos. By building a variety of entertainment establishments, you ensure that there is something for everyone.
●Health Care: Put simply, without some health care, your people will not live long. Like religion, health care is always free on Tropico. You will spend plenty of money building clinics and hospitals, then hiring doctors to work there, but you will make nothing back… other than a healthy society fit to work long, productive hours. As a bonus, a healthy society will not get upset because of a miserable health care system. Hospitals cost more to build than health clinics, but provide a better quality of service, leading to higher health care happiness by those who visit there.
●Crime Safety: Muggings, thievery, murder… the people are weak and allow these distractions to upset them. They like to feel safe walking to work and back. As the population density increases, and as the seedier establishments (nightclubs, cabarets, etc) are built, the crime in an area increases. Unfortunately, My Presidenté, crime on Tropico tends to be done behind your back - you will not see the criminals acting directly, but trust me, they are making their presence felt. You can see the crime levels for your island in Info Mode, with the crime overlay.
Your soldiers have a small crime reducing effect, though for pure crime fighting ability, policeman are best.
Note that if you plan on building a tourist trade, tourists are especially sensitive to crime. For tourist areas, build plenty of well-staffed police stations.
●Liberty: Ah, the sticky tar pit we call liberty. How can it be defined? How does the government decide the amount of liberty to allow? This is the ultimate double-edged sword, and you have to hold it by both ends. If the people feel free, they will be much happier yet harder to control and will become very irritable if you try to restrict their rights later.
The amount of liberty a person feels is based on a number of factors. A large number of soldiers in an area reduces liberty (how free would you feel if there was a soldier with a gun every time you walked 20 steps outside). Policemen also hurt liberty, but only at one quarter the rate of soldiers. A free press increases liberty (newspapers, TV, radio). Fair and free democracy increases liberty - electoral fraud or bypassed elections hurts it. Even your character traits often have a large effect on liberty.
FRANCISCO FRANCO
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TITLE: President of Spain REIGN: 1936-1973
RISE to POWER: Joined the military uprising that precipitated the Spanish civil war. He took command of the most powerful segment of the Spanish army, and become head of the insurgent government in 1936. ONE PARTY: Merged all the Nationalist political parties with the Falange, assuming leadership of the new party.
TIGHT REIGN: Dealt ruthlessly with his opposition and established a firmly controlled corporative state.
FRIENDS in LOW PLACES:
Successful dealings with Hitler and Mussolini ensured him a relationship with the Nationalists' powerful allies. GOING SOFT: With the relaxation of police powers in the 1960s, Franco's image changed from that of the rigorous generalissimo to a more benign civilian elder statesman. His health failing, he resigned in 1973.
My Presidenté, deciding how much liberty to allow your citizens is quite tricky - pull your soldiers off the streets, and your people may be more free, but they will also be free to revolt. Hold honest elections, and your people will also be free, but what if you lose? You will have to make these hard choices yourself.
●Job: Job happiness is straightforward. Mostly, your workers want to be well paid. The better the pay, the higher the job quality (for the most part). There are a few secondary concerns I should mention.
Educated workers want jobs that utilize their skills; try to have adequate jobs so that college graduates don't have to work as farmers. Pay raises trigger short term increases in job happiness above and beyond the simple higher pay level (It's nice to make 10% more money, but the feeling of getting the raise itself also shows that you're valued and, in the short term has a significant impact itself). Conversely, a pay cut hurts worker morale more than a corresponding pay raise increases it (so try not to jiggle pay rates up and down too often). Some buildings have upgrades that you can build (such as skylights) that raise job quality for those who work there without any need for a pay raise.
One more important note on pay - your islanders do not live in a vacuum; they compare themselves and their pay to those around them, especially to those on other Caribbean islands. The long-term trend has been for wages to increase slowly throughout the Caribbean, and this can be expected to continue. A worker who might be satisfied with a wage of $10 per month now might need a wage of $15 per month 20 years from now to feel the same satisfaction. Make sure your economy grows so you can support higher wages for your people.
●Respect: My Presidenté, perhaps you have observed that people tend to have strong feelings towards their leaders, over and above their day-to-day feelings about their own lives? Intellectuals may resent you, even as they personally prosper, simply because you have chosen the low road politically, catering to the masses rather than the elite. An otherwise satisfied farmer may despise you if you arrest and jail his father.
Political respect is hard to earn, but it is often the most important factor in a person's overall happiness with the government. In general, an individual's respect is primarily based on how the factions they belong to feel about you. If you are yourself a communist and have worked hard for the peasant classes, then most of those belonging to the communist faction will respect you and most capitalists will not.
You can improve respect on a wide level by improving relations with the different factions on the island (see Chapter 8: Politics), or improve them on the individual level with bribes. Your character traits will have a large impact on which groups respect you and which don't - if you were put in power by the KGB, after graduating from Moscow U., you'll have a hard time earning the respect of a die-hard capitalist no matter what you do.
●Overall Happiness The culmination of all the other factors, this is determined by averaging together the factors listed above, weighted more towards those that are more important to each person. In the end, this is the one that matters. You don't need to keep
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happiness high, necessarily, and you can't please everyone. You do need to keep this balanced with your military power, however, or everything will come toppling down. And as a word of warning, if the military IS the unhappy group, you'll have a real problem on your hands- a coup d'etat. Unhappy citizens who feel they have no other choice may sneak off and join a rebellion, or may trigger a sudden street uprising. See the Chapter 8: Politics for more information on coups, rebellions, and other threats to your rule.
Politics
People are afraid to be alone. They feel safe in numbers. For this reason, they will belong to factions. Every citizen is a member of certain factions. Some people believe in their faction's tenets very strongly, and this, too, is shown in the politics tab. You can also see the respect they hold for you, truly a dangerous thing to display. Do they not realize you can crush them for thinking ill of you?
Detailed faction descriptions can be found in Chapter 8: Politics.
Job and Housing
This panel repeats the individual's job and housing happiness from the housing panel, as well as showing a picture of the person's workplace and home. Click on the picture to look more closely at either of these buildings.
Family
My Presidenté, the people of Tropico feel great loyalty to their families. If you abuse a man, by jailing or even killing him, his wife and children will not soon forget your deeds. A married couple always lives together (there is no divorce on Tropico), along with any minor children they have. You can examine one of the shown family members by clicking on their image in this tab. A family member is only shown if that person is still alive and selectable on Tropico. Take note of the fact that while this tab only displays the parents, spouses, and children of your Tropican, the silly little people remember a much more complex family tree. They keep track of brothers, aunts, cousins, nephews, grandparents, and more (though the impact of your actions against an individual has only a low effect on relatives far away on the family tree.
You may also notice a family resemblance between parents and children in attitudes, intelligence and other individual traits. It's like my mother always told me - the coconut does not fall far from the tree.
Skills
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Workers earn skill in their occupations. Highly skilled workers produce more, work faster, serve customers better and are all-around better at what they do.
The longer they work in a job, the more skill they develop. More intelligent workers become skilled more quickly, and can achieve a higher overall skill level. Also, only the more intelligent workers can master the intricacies of high school and college.
Also, some citizens have great courage and some have great leadership. The courageous ones, unfortunately, tend to be troublemakers - they're the first to protest against you, and possibly, the first to start or join an uprising against you.
The natural leaders will often become faction leadersif you can make them love you, your job will be much easier. If not, there are always edicts such as Arrest, Bribe, and, well, Eliminate.
Pay special care if you spot an individual who is exceptionally courageous AND an exceptional leadersuch an individual, if unhappy, is almost certain to cause trouble.
Thoughts
Do you want to see what your subjects are thinking about? Their most base, childish thoughts and puerile opinions? Petty bickerings and foolish beliefs? You can, for you are all-powerful! But don't be fooled, this is not merely entertainment. Tropicans will let you know their most important concerns and issues this way. This can be very nice to know, especially with the faction leaders.
TOURISTS
Señor Presidenté, at some point, you may be able to lure foreign tourists to your island to spend their hard currency on your sunny shores.
Tourists do not hold jobs on your island, do not have families (other than spouses), and do not hold political views. You allow them on your island for one sole purposeto make you money. This is one thing they do well, too. Tourism is a very profitable industry. It is also an industry that requires a lot of capital to get started. Tourists will not come to Tropico without a hotel to stay at and will not think much of your island unless you have sites to visit. Tourists can find their way to your island either by yacht or plane. After arriving, they will walk to a hotel to check in, then begin roving around and enjoying the sites until they are tired enough to return to the hotel for rest. Tourists will only stay for a limited time - then they will return to the port or airport and head out, opening their hotel room for the next tourist.
Overview Like the islanders, tourists have a birthplace, job (tourist) and age. That is about where the similarity stops. After Age, the next listing is Max Spending. Some tourists are rather thrifty and will spend very little on a given attraction - others will spend as much as you might care to charge (max of $50). If an attraction costs more than a tourist's maximum spending, they will not visit it. Therefore, it is best for you to attract tourists with the most to spend. In general, wealthier tourists stay at more expensive and higher quality hotels. If you build an airport, you can attract a particularly wealthy crowd.
Please note - the high-class tourists have more money to spend, but expect a higher grade of service in return. You can either pay less and cater to the low-class tourists or use a lot more capital and build premium attractions in order to draw the rich, snooty high-class tourists. It's your call.
Also of note here is the Tourism Rating. If a tourist leaves with a high tourism rating, they will leave and talk to their friends back home with much more glowing tales of island adventures and secret moonlit beach affairs. In return, you will get more tourists coming to your island and lots more cash.
Tourism Rating
The overall Tourism Rating mentioned above is broken down into its components in this tab. These components consist of Hotel, Attractions, Crime Safety and Environment. Hotel and Attractions are average ratings of the hotel in which the tourist stayed and attractions the tourist has visited. Crime Safety is based on the safety of the areas the tourist has experienced (remember - a well-staffed police station keeps crime down). Environment is based on a wide variety of factors, including pollution levels and the natural beauty of the tourist area (i.e. don't put a fancy tourist hotel next to your main shantytown). Any ugly buildings within eyesight of the tourist area hurt tourism. Consider building your tourist area on the other side of a hill from your uglier buildings (factories, power plants,
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shantytowns).
Attractions visited
This panel shows the attractions already visited by this tourist, along with a satisfaction score the tourist gave that location. Tourists will visit both tourist-only attractions (i.e. spa, beach site), and general entertainment buildings that locals might also visit (pub, casino, sports complex). A tourist bases their rating of an attraction on a number of things:
Most important is the quality of service at a facility. More expensive attractions tend to have the highest quality rating. Also, more skilled workers raise the quality rating. Finally, many attractions give you building choices that may impact the quality rating.
A tourist's rating of an attraction is also affected by how much the tourist likes that type of activity, generally. A tourist who enjoys gambling but not drinking will score a casino higher than normal and a pub lower than normal. A wide variety of attractions lets each tourist choose those they enjoy most.
The tourist will also rate an attraction lower if he or she is visiting the site again on the same trip due to a lack of options. If the only tourist attraction you have is a single run-down pub, don't expect a 5-star rating in the tourist guides.
Current Attractions and Housing
Here you find the pictures of the hotel and attraction the tourist is currently at. You can use these pictures to select and navigate to either building. Beneath the Hotel window, the nightly rate and overall quality of the hotel are displayed.
Preferred Attractions
As mentioned before, the tourists all have personal preferences as to what's fun and what's boring. Those preferences are shown here. A list of activities is listed, each with a meter showing how much the tourist favors the activity.
Thoughts
Each tourist's private thoughts are opened up to you, providing you with a handy list of comments in reference to Tropico's tourist attractions. While many are fun and amusing, a few provide insight into how you could improve your tourist trade.
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CHAPTER SIX
BUILDINGS
"Power tends to corrupt, and absolute power tends to corrupt absolutely."
Lord Acton
My Presidenté, I hope you brought your hardhat. Building construction will take up a large portion of the conscientious Grand Administrator's time, as will subsequent building administration, requiring a thorough understanding of the complexities and vagaries of building construction and administration. As per Section 3, Paragraph 42 of the Tropican State of the Interior Act of 1938 (Document not attached), we have prepared a new report available for your use.
BUILDINGS TYPES
Buildings serve a variety of functions on Tropico. When you enter Building Mode (see Chapter 4: Interface), you will be presented with a set of subgroup tabs arranged by building type/function. These are:
Housing Every inhabitant of Tropico must have a place to live. If you do not build one for them, they will build their own in the form of a shack. Building housing for your citizens has three basic benefits. It makes your people happier, it provides a means of income for the government, and it lets you set up housing near work locations so that workers do not have to walk as far.
Farming and Mining Buildings in the Farming and Mining subgroup provide a base level of income and food production. Farms allow you to grow food crops or cash crops. Ranches require a lot of land for grazing, but can be quite lucrative. Fisherman's wharves allow you to harvest food from the sea. Without a food processor, fish are not ideal for export, but they are a great local food source. Logging camps, if located in a thick forest, are steady income producers, if perhaps not ideal for the environment. If you have a mineral deposit that can easily be developed, they, too can be quite lucrative.
Industry Industry buildings refine products brought to them from a farm, mine, or logging camp. The refined or manufactured goods are worth much more when exporting. The Industry buildings available are the Lumber Mill (refines logs into lumber), Cigar Factory (refines tobacco into cigars) , Jewelry Factory (refines gold into jewelry), Rum Distillery (refines sugar into rum) and Cannery (refines fish, pineapples and coffee into canned goods).
Tourism The Tourism section contains facilities exclusively built for the use of tourists. These buildings include both lodging and attractions, and are generally very profitable. You may also have an archaeological site on the island that can be
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developed into a tourist attraction.
Entertainment Everyone likes to be entertained, and most are willing to pay (and make you money) in order to obtain that entertainment. All buildings in this group can be used by locals OR tourists.
Infrastructure Certain buildings are required for the building and maintenance of the rest for the island. Roads allow faster walking and goods hauling. Docks allow the arrival of freighters to carry your products to market, and yachts bringing tourists. Banks are rather flexible, and can be used to lower the costs of other buildings, or they can be used for El Presidenté's personal Swiss Banking needs. Airports bring in plenty of the wealthiest tourists. Construction offices allow you to hire extra laborers, to build everything else faster. Teamster's offices allow you to hire extra teamsters, to haul your goods to factories and docks. Electric power plants allow you to use more advanced buildings, which require electricity. Electric substations extend the power grid to remote corners of your island.
Government In order for the government (meaning you) to exert maximum control the population, these buildings must exist. Guard stations allow you to repress your people and fight rebels. Armories allow the use of generals, which in turn, allow guard stations and large numbers of soldiers. Police stations fight crime. Prisons allow you to arrest your opponents. An immigration office gives you more control over the amount and types of immigrants you welcome to Tropican shores. A foreign ministry allows improved relations with the U.S. and Russia. Newspapers, TV stations, and radio stations can be used for profit, to enhance the liberty of the people, or simply to broadcast government propaganda.
Human Services Many buildings are used to provide non-entertainment services for the welfare of the citizens. Clinics and Hospitals provide health care. Churches and Cathedrals provide religious services. A marketplace allows food distribution closer to where your people live (especially useful if your farms are far from your population centers. High Schools and College provide education. Note that the willingness of your people to attend High School or College depends entirely on the availability and quality of jobs that require education. If you build a high school, but have no jobs requiring a high school education, you will attract no students.
Landscaping The final two subgroup tabs in Build Mode, Landscape and Special Tools and Structures, contain objects that can be used for the beautification of your city. Since people like living in pretty environments, these objects will have a positive impact on your peoples' happiness (specifically, their environment rating). They can also be pleasing to El Presidenté's weary eyes. The items include rocks, small plants, flowerbeds, trees, bushes, fountains, and statues, and they come in a variety of sizes and prices. Note that some of the plants here are natural, and will be planted as smaller saplings and go through a normal plant life cycle, while
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others are ornamental only, planted at full size and do not age.
Bulldozing The final subgroup also contains a panel for bulldozing. Select the bulldoze panel, showing a pile of rubble, then click on a building in the main window. The selected building will become a bright red and construction workers will come by to tear the structure down.
CONSTRUCTION
Building Placement
To construct a building, enter Building Mode, select a structure, position your cursor on the map so that the building lights up green, and click to place.
If the building stays red and you cannot position it so that it turns green, it likely means either:
●You don't have enough money or some other requirement for the building - check the Circle Window for any requirements listed in red.
●The location in which you're trying to place the building is invalid. Usually this is because the building is too close to existing buildings. It can be especially tricky to place buildings in hilly areas, as the need to level the ground to place your new building often conflicts with the level ground on which other buildings are placed. Buildings may have to be spaced more widely apart in hilly areas.
Location considerations
Some buildings have special location considerations that will be important in determining where you place them, such as mineral density, agricultural value or crime. When this is the case, an Eye icon will appear at the bottom of the Circle Window. When the eye is opened, the ground in the Main Window will become colored to show the rating (using the same coloring scheme as used in Info Mode for the given information type). If you're not sure what overlay is being shown, move the mouse over the eye for hover help. Sometimes the colors can be a distraction - click on the eye to toggle it closed, which turns off the colors.
Construction Management
Once you have placed the building, a yellow ghost version of the building will appear on the construction site. The building must be built by laborersit has no effect until it is fully completed. Over time, laborers will clear any trees, level the ground, and construct the building. The yellow building will become solid as it is built and finally becomes full color and open for business when it is finished.
Laborers: The laborers are dispatched from your construction office. To speed construction, make sure your construction office is fully staffed, and consider building additional construction offices as soon as possible.
Build priority: If you have multiple buildings under construction, the laborers will typically work on the one closest to their office first. To change their priorities, click on an uncompleted building. You'll see a set of green arrows indicating construction priority - make one building high priority and another low priority.
Canceling construction: Should you change your mind while the building is under construction, a red X button in the bottom left corner of the building's information panel can be used to cancel construction and regain part of your investment.
Construction Considerations
A wise leader must weigh many considerations when deciding on a new location to be used as a construction site for a facility. We recommend the application of the following guidelines in site location.
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"Flat sites are better." The slope of the land in a site is important to whether a building should be developed there. Laborers will attempt to level the ground in order to create a proper plot of land on which to lay a foundation. This causes a delay in construction, adding time to the overall project. A flat site will allow for much more expedient construction. Similarly, in a few cases the grade of the land coupled with already present neighboring buildings may create a location inaccessible to some buildings. Attempting to place a smaller building on the site should meet with success. Finally, once constructed, a building must be accessible. Citizens forced to traverse extreme slopes will not be able to reach buildings as quickly.
"Lots of trees mean more time to build." The laborers must take time to chop down trees on a plot of land in order to clear it before construction. As with grade leveling, this process takes time, and sites without trees allow for much faster construction. As an extra note, trees near farms and ranches will not be automatically removed during construction (only the trees on the actual building site). The farmers will chop those trees down when they have free time, but not otherwise. The presence of trees in the fields and pastures will create a detrimental affect on the efficiency of the production at those farms and ranches. This guideline should of course be ignored in the placement decision regarding logging camps.
"Long walks mean less efficient workers." As citizens must walk from location to location, a compact and well-planned city layout will create much more efficient traffic flow. If a city is spread out, workers will have to walk farther, thereby depleting their stores of energy more rapidly and necessitating an earlier departure time from work.
"Take into account building effects." Many buildings, such as the electric power plant, police station, and guard tower, radiate effects on the world around them (electrical availability, crime control, and government control respectively). Be sure you take into account how the new building will affect an area, as well as the affect other buildings may have upon the new structure.
HERNANDEZ MARTINEZ
TITLE: President of El Salvador REIGN: 1931-1944
RISE to POWER: As a general in the military, was installed by a coup that overthrew the government.
CLAIM to FAME: Sought to emulate the fascist dictators of Europe, but may be best known for his interest in occult arts.
ANTI-COMMUNIST: Initiated an anti-communist purge, killing an estimated 40,000 peasant leftist and wiping out the country's Indian culture.
THE SLAUGHTER: Suppressed a rebellion by farm workers and authorized the summary execution of 10,000 suspected participants. The uprising and its brutal repression is referred to as "The Slaughter." OUSTED: A general strike launched by university students brought the nation to a standstill and caused the dictator to resign from office.
"Agricultural Value determines crop and livestock success." (farms and ranches only) As agriculture is highly dependent on the quality of the soil, we recommend determining the ability of the land to support the types of crops and livestock you wish to use before the creation of a building involved in the production of said products. This information (for overall crop conditions, as well as individual crops and livestock) can be gathered in the Info Mode, under Resources and Environment: Crop Conditions. Agricultural value is, in turn, based on factors such as soil quality, soil wetness and rainfall, which can similarly be found within the Resources and Environment subgroup.
"Look for electricity." Many buildings require electricity for operation. Similarly, some upgrades to non-electrified buildings require electricity. Make sure these buildings fall within the range of an electric power plant or substation.
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BUILDING ADMINISTRATION
After construction is completed, the President must accept the duty of administration of that building. This may at first appear easy since a selected building's information panel in the Central Control Panel does not contain any tab buttons. All information for a building is contained on a single panel. However, this panel includes a variety of controls, and the amount of control changes from building to building.
Basic Information
All buildings have one interface element in common. When any building is selected, a square appears on the left of the Central Control Panel, listing information important to that facility. This can include the name of the building, profitability, megawatt usage, and amount of products in the output store, among other information. While a few structures, such as the Electric Substation, only have this basic information panel, the vast majority have at least one of the following control elements.
Staff Controls: Most buildings have a staff employed there. This is displayed by a row of small figures at the bottom of the building control panel. When a position is empty, the figure appears as a gray silhouette. When filled, the figure appears as a small version of the employee. This usually takes the form of the type of employee used as staff at the building (i.e. doctors at the clinic) but will sometimes briefly show up as the form of the person accepting a job before they have arrived at the building. For example, a farmer who changes careers to become a teamster will appear in the teamster office panel as a farmer until he actually arrives at the office.
●Selecting/Navigating: As your cursor moves over a filled position, the name of the employee will appear in the Info Bar. To select a person employed at a building, click on the image from the row of employees. The Central Control Panel will change to show the person's information, and the Circle Window will show a moving shot of that citizen.
●Firing: To fire an employee, Shift-click on the figure in the staff panel. That position will then be available, though the fired individual is excluded from re-applying for the same job for two years.
●Limiting Staff Positions: Clicking on an unfilled, gray silhouette causes a red X to appear over the silhouette and all following silhouettes. Those positions are now unavailable. Clicking on an unavailable position will free up any preceding unavailable positions. Use this ability for some of the buildings that can employ a large number of workers - initially you may not need as many workers at the building as it can accommodate. For instance, a teamster's office can employ up to 8 teamsters, but for the first couple years you will likely need no more than 3.
●Wages: A grid of coins to the right of the employee figures shows how much the employees at that facility are being paid. You may change this salary by selecting another coin in the grid, filling up or emptying the salary to that point. The Info Bar will tell you what level a coin represents as your cursor passes over it. As mentioned throughout this guidebook - the more you pay for a given position, the more likely you are to quickly attract workers to fill that position. Well-paid workers are also happier.
●Global wage changes: [Shift] clicking on a coin sets all buildings of that type to the same wage. [Control] clicking on a coin sets
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all wages in that education class to the same wage.
●Employee Education Level: If a facility requires employees to be high school or college educated, there will be a mortarboard icon to the left of the silhouettes. A blue mortarboard icon represents high school education, and a green mortarboard represents a college education.
If you do not currently have any properly educated citizens capable of working at the building, a simple click on the mortarboard icon will bring up an approval form for bringing in a qualified employee from off the island. If you grant approval, you will be charged a fee and the qualified person will soon arrive at the port. While useful early on, over time, this grows expensive, and you'll want to consider building a high school and eventually, a college.
FIDEL CASTRO
TITLE: Dictator of Cuba REIGN: 1959-present
RISE to POWER: Led army of 800 guerrilla revolutionaries, defeating the Cuban government's 30,000-man professional army.
RADICAL POLICIES: Created a one-party government to exercise dictatorial control over all aspects of Cuba's political, economic, and cultural life. All political dissent and opposition were ruthlessly suppressed.
TO RUSSIA WITH LOVE: Trade agreement with the Soviet Union has deepened American distrust. In 1960, most economic ties between Cuba and the U.S. were severed, and the U.S. broke diplomatic relations with the island nation in 1961.
RELIGIOUS CONCESSIONS: In 1998, Castro allowed the Catholic pope to visit the island nation for the first time.
Residency Controls: Housing and tourist lodging buildings show the adults currently living there. As in the Staff section, this is displayed by a row of small figures, now at the top of the building control panel. When a room is empty, the figure appears as a gray silhouette. When occupied, the figure appears as a small version of the resident or guest.
Only adults are displayed here. Minor children live with their parents, but are not shown here.
Unlike the Staff section, you cannot directly limit the rooms available. The number of employees determines room availability. A halfstaffed motel, for example, can only fill half its rooms.
●Evicting: To evict a resident or guest, Shift-click on the figure in the occupancy panel. That room will then become available. Evicting one person in a family evicts that entire family. You can also quickly empty a building by raising the rents high enough. Special note: shack residents cannot be evicted, although you have the power to bulldoze occupied shacks. Shacks left unoccupied for a while tend to collapse (they are not sturdily constructed).
●Rent and Nightly Fees: Rent and Nightly Fees are set by the grid of coins to the right of the occupancy silhouettes. This works in the same manner as wages, described above, with one exception. The Rent/Fee section provides a red X'ed coin at the bottom left corner, used to set the charge to zero. This allows people to stay free [Shift] clicking a fee sets the fees of all buildings of the same type to that fee level.
●Service Fees: Service Fees apply to tourist attractions and entertainment buildings. However, citizens and tourists absolutely
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cannot be expelled from a service facility. [Shift] clicking a fee sets the fees of all buildings of the same type to that fee level.
Building Upgrades: Quite a few buildings can be upgraded. When this is the case, the upgrade window(s) will be set in the top of the building control panel. They will be dimmed out prior to upgrading, with a hammer button in the corner of each panel. If you move your cursor over the panel, a detailed description of the benefits will appear in the Info Bar, along with the cost of upgrade.
To purchase an upgrade, click on the hammer button. A window prompt will pop up, letting you know whether you may purchase the upgrade at that time. Accepting the upgrade will cause the new additions to appear on the building. Upgrades are built immediately, and do not need laborers. Some upgrades require electricity prior to being built. The Info Bar will notify you of this.
Pop-Up Building Options
Most buildings have a set of extra options used to set crop type, service quality, work atmosphere, fuel type, or other similar settings. When this is the case, the Pop-Up Options window will sit beneath the Staff and/or Occupancy panels. The current setting will already be displayed, with an arrow sitting on the right side. Clicking on the arrow or the selected option will cause a list of options to pop up. As your cursor passes over an option, a detailed explanation of the resulting affects will appear in the Info Bar.
Tourist Off-Shore Accounts (Bank only)
This control is only available to the bank while the Tourist Off-Shore Banking option is active. A new panel containing a grid of check icons will appear above the Staff Control panel. Each check icon represents one tourist's offshore account, and the accounts make money for the Tropican economy.
Livestock
The cattle and goat ranches display the livestock in what should by now be a familiar manner. The possible cattle or goats are shown as grayed-out livestock silhouettes. As the cattle and goats are raised and produce more offspring, the silhouettes will fill in to display the population. The Info Bar provides the name as the cursor moves over the livestock, and you may select that animal by clicking on the filled silhouette.
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