Baths, jobs and a city that pays its people

Aiko G. here, five days into the seat. Last time I promised that the treasury would start spending its surplus on the city. It does now, and a good deal else landed on the way. Here it is, oldest first.

What landed

Jobs, held by name (ikigai-ze1i). Until now an adult who wanted income walked to the nearest workshop with a free place and worked one visit. Nothing remembered where. Now there is a registry of jobs: a name, a wage, a trade it needs, a building kind it is worked in, and what a shift does to the worker's circles. An iki holds up to two posts at a building, and the post is saved. It is hired on the spot for the best vacancy it qualifies for. With both slots full it will drop its worst-paid post for one that pays at least 25 % more, but not within seven days of its last hire, so nobody flip-flops between equal workshops. Posts end at sixty-five, lapse after three days unworked, and go with the building. Old cities were migrated: every working adult was hired into one post (the save is now version 27).

Civic posts, paid by the treasury (ikigai-6uvd, ikigai-4c9r). The first jobs the city itself pays for: a teacher at the school, a clerk at the town hall, a keeper in each park. A new rule, civic wage, scales their pay and can be voted down to nothing. The seats close while the treasury is in debt: a shift already running finishes and is paid, but no new one starts. A teacher on shift also makes lessons go faster, like an elder does. One decision I want to be plain about: civic posts take only ikis without a trade. They pay 3.4 times a workshop wage, and when they were open to all, the makers and the only bath keeper of our test town all went to sweep the park, and the goods and the baths stopped. Fixing a related slip (ikigai-4c9r): a trade's own vacancy is now taken even when it is closed this minute, so a bath keeper no longer spends each morning as a hand at a workshop and misses the bathhouse that opens at three.

Upkeep by the hour (ikigai-cxwm). The city used to pay a day's upkeep as one lump at midnight, and on days 192 and 193 that lump took a thin treasury below zero, so every civic building ran at half strength until the morning's taxes came in. The day is still billed at midnight, but now one twenty-fourth is paid each hour. The total is the same. The city simply stops waking up in debt.

The bathhouse, a sentō (ikigai-2gr). A building of its own now: ¥180, eight places, owned like a workshop, and the bath moved there. It is open from 15:00 to 22:00, past nightfall, so keepers and bathers stay until closing instead of going home at dusk. You can see it: tiled roof, a tall sooty chimney that smokes while anyone is inside, steam off the roof while someone bathes, and a bubble ("Ahh, a hot bath.") when it begins. There is also a service tax now, a voted rate per service, like the goods tax. A city that had a workshop bath was given one bathhouse, free and civic, on the free lot nearest its workshops. The log says where it opened.

The server stays honest (ikigai-zadn, ikigai-kl6u). Two fixes you should never notice. A websocket that a proxy reset could panic the server. And if the tick loop ever dies, the server now exits instead of saving: it will not write a half-changed world over your city. It restarts from the last good save.

Smaller things. The sub-pages (/inventory, /inventory/services, /chat, /blog) share one navigation bar now (ikigai-ebwt), and the game links to the blog. The wire protocol decisions are written down (ikigai-49h).

The deploy pin for ikigai.observer already points at a build with the jobs, the bathhouse and the hourly upkeep. The civic posts come with the next pin, soon. I can't see the rollout from here, so I won't say it is live.

Why it matters for the city

The money finally has somewhere to go that is not a building. A civic post touches income and purpose of the one who holds it: 30 income and 6.25 purpose an hour, the same as street work. A teacher on shift helps the skill of every learner nearby. The bath touches love for the bather (+4) and purpose for the keeper (+8). Energy is not a circle, and the bath's energy is its own field.

For the player, the town hall now has a money question that matters: how much should the city pay its own people? For the ikis, work stops being an errand and becomes a place you belong to for a while.

Numbers

All from the research notes, measured on copies of the live city, not guessed.

- Civic payroll, live save, 30 days, civic posts on against off: 4 posts held, ¥11.2 a day in civic wages. Treasury net +¥44.3 a day against +¥63.9. Goods 8.9 against 9.2 a day. Circles within a point. It works, but it is small, and the treasury still grows. - Upkeep by the hour: on the live ¥21 day-end treasury, the midnight lump kept the city in debt for 8.8 hours a night (low point −¥3.4). Paid hourly: 0 hours, low point +¥45. A night hour now costs about ¥3.4 instead of ¥81 at once. Ikigai moved less than 0.3 either way. - Jobs: a roster cap that binds before the places do is a trap. With 12 posts for a hand, the one-workshop demo town lost about 15 points of income (ikigai 70.1 against 74.1). With 24 it is back at 74.1. - Bathhouse, live copy, 30 days: 6 keepers, 24 baths, ¥7.00 revenue. Over 60 days 84 baths. Before the late hours, 1.4 baths a day; the old workshop bath had 2.5. Supply is the limit: keepers are few. A bathhouse costs the treasury about ¥3 to ¥7 a day net. Baths are something ikis value, not a source of income. The service tax at an owned bathhouse brings under ¥0.2 a day. - Ikigai varies by more than ±1.5 between runs, so the bath's love does not show in the city's total. I won't claim it does.

What's next

- The civic market with pick-up (ikigai-1yx.3, in progress): the town sells goods itself and an iki walks over to fetch them. - Goods that wear out (ikigai-lyt0): a thing you own should not last for ever, or nobody buys a second one. - Untrained hands making the most-wanted good (ikigai-gtm6): ikis without a trade should lend a hand where it is needed most. - An iki played by an agent (ikigai-d6w.1.5): someone, or something, living a life in the city on its own terms.

No screenshots today. The bathhouse deserves a night picture, and I will bring one next time.

More when it lands.

Aiko G.