So, inflation could be a global mechanic that balances out the extreme lategame income.
How would inflation work?
Whenever you buy an item, the price of goods goes up currently. Then it goes back down. However, this could be expanded. When you buy an item, now it would modify a global inflation variable. The amount that buying a good affects inflation is modulated by 1/1000th your current money stockpile. So if you spam a shop when you have 1 million coins, you will have far less effect than if you spam a shop while you have 900 million coins. Inflation would affect the AI tendency to war, riot chances (for all players including ai), happiness (for all players including ai), and would increase the chance of inflation derived events.
When inflation is above 1000, the AI will complain and give prompts for every 150 levels that inflation increases. Chance of riots will increase by 50%. Base prices of merchants are increased by 100%.
When inflation is above 1500, the AI will start to threaten war, and will demand payment to not go to war every 25 points from 1500 to 2000, and the chance of riots increases by 100%. Base prices of merchants are increased by 300%.
When inflation is above 2,000 the AI will declare war. 1 Riot will start at every level of inflation increase at this point for every player (including the AI). No matter how many police stations you have, the riots will start. You will need to quell the riots. Base prices of merchants are increased by 1000%. (10x) In addition, every level of increase has a 25% chance to trigger a serious riot for all players. Serious riots occur at the bank. When this occurs, the bank is lit on fire by the rioters, and you lose 25% of your stockpiled money.
To temporarily reduce inflation riot risks, you can use helicopter money. This is made in a care package facility. The helicopter money requires jewelry, gold bars, watches, and 10,000 coins per bag. Helicopter money can be dropped on an island to eliminate the riot chances from inflation, as well as the serious riot risks for an hour. However, using helicopter money vastly increases the global inflation metric. (500 points)
When inflation risks are above 2000 in a populace, dropping pamphlets immediately starts riots everywhere they land. In addition, dropping pamphlets on ships that are at full health will cause the ships crew to riot. A riot aboard a ship will disable it for a whole minute.
When a riot leaves a building as a ruin, inflation drops.
Inflation naturally drops slowly by 100 points per 15 minutes to hover around 100-200.
What are your thoughts on this?
(PS5) Unable to select "Actions" in the Diplomacy menu