Banker can change tax settings too quickly

[AlexR]

This is some combination of complaint and feature request.
As it currently stands, banker can *really* surprise the realm with new taxes, collecting a few thousand dollars before running off somewhere or otherwise transferring the gold to the family.

We just had a banker hike up all taxes (wealth/property) to 25% and set the wealth/property taxable amounts to 1 and 2 gold respectively.

1.  It should not be possible to tax gold in excess of 25-50 coins.  Minimum of 1 gold makes little sense.  A noble that only has 25 gold coins would likely kill any tax collector.

2.  Changes to the tax code should be announced to the realm - particularly the major ones. That's the kind of thing that would start lots of rumors among the nobles.

3.  It shouldn't even be possible to make such a quick change!  In the region taxes, as a Lord, I can only raise taxes by 3 percent every turn.  The banker should be similarly limited to 1-3% every day and maybe even in how much the taxable limits can be changed too (ours was several thousand before he changed it to 1.).

[Bedwyr]

1 and 2 are intentional for a variety of reasons (the Banker has the option to announce tax changes or keep it quiet).  3 has significant merit, though.  Even just limiting it to the flat 5% per day raise like on the taxes for duchies would make sense.

[LilWolf]

1 and 2 are intentional for a variety of reasons (the Banker has the option to announce tax changes or keep it quiet).  3 has significant merit, though.  Even just limiting it to the flat 5% per day raise like on the taxes for duchies would make sense.

If the announcement to the realm isn't mandatory then it won't prevent anything since the banker can still raise the taxes to the max without anyone necessarily noticing.

edit: Also, hiking up the tax rate isn't really the biggest issue with the banker walking away with lots of gold. It's that he can change the distribution so pretty much all the gold goes to himself. Limiting that isn't really practical either.

[Tom]

All of this is intentional. An action like the one posted about should create major in-realm trouble, and trouble is always good.

[Bedwyr]

All of this is intentional. An action like the one posted about should create major in-realm trouble, and trouble is always good.

What about limiting the rate of change?  Taxes the Banker imposes on duchies can only go up by increments of five percent a day (though that's still bugged if I remember aright) but taxes on the realm can move arbitrarily?  I'm all for Bankers stealing tons of gold, but there should have to be some skill involved rather than thirty seconds before turnchange on tax day setting it up to steal tens of thousands of gold.

[Foundation]

To be honest, Bankers are under-appreciated and overworked in almost all realms.  Any food problems and it's "the Banker's fault" even though he has no direct control over food flow.  It's about time people realize that they need trustworthy people as Bankers and to keep them happy.

[Bedwyr]

Heh.  This isn't the first (or second, or third) time I've heard of a Banker making off with half the realm's gold, and a properly sneaky banker could still steal quite a lot.

[Foundation]

Yeah, I've heard plenty of stories, and even one in which the Banker got away with multiple taxes (spanning a few weeks) in which tax was maximum for himself... I don't know why he was allowed to do so, but that was when I first found BattleMaster, so it means I didn't do anything about it.  But what's surprising in hindsight is why no one else did anything at the time.   :o

[Draco Tanos]

And it seems the banker also made both his characters in the realm priests so he could quickly flee the realm with minimal risk of interception.  Heh.