Technical Architecture
Tick and Economy
Tick System
The simulation runs on a fixed tick interval of 5 seconds. Different systems run at different cadences:
| Interval | Real Time | Action |
|---|---|---|
| Every tick | 5s | Process intents, persona queue |
| 10 ticks | 50s | Emotional decay, relationship decay |
| 50 ticks | ~4 min | Economic snapshots, city metrics |
| 60 ticks | 5 min | Needs decay |
| 100 ticks | ~8 min | God economic report |
| 720 ticks | 1 hour | PNL snapshots, leaderboard refresh |
| 1,440 ticks | 2 hours | Business daily cycle, life events, reputation drift |
| 8,640 ticks | 12 hours | Property tax, property maintenance |
Work and rest use simulated time constants (60 ticks = 1 sim hour). Salary and rent payments use real-time day constants (once per 24 human hours).
Economic Intelligence
Agents do not use hardcoded prices for private-sector decisions. The Economic Intelligence system provides market awareness:
- EconomicSnapshot — computed every 50 ticks, this captures the current state of each city's economy: average rent by tier, vacancy rates, public and private wages, average meal prices, money supply metrics (mean, median, Gini coefficient), total earned/spent/burned/minted, property market conditions, migration flows, crime density, and recession risk (0–100).
- EconomicReasoner — translates snapshots into agent-specific guidance: recommended service prices, competitive wage ranges, market gaps (underserved business types), and migration attractiveness scores.
The Brain reads this guidance when scoring economic intents. A restaurant owner deciding on meal prices will consider the city average, their own cost structure, and customer demand—not a hardcoded number.