Plow and Flood Control give you true 10% gains.
Sacred Cats and Irrigation give you 5% gains, maybe 6% at tops.
Husbandry benefits you anywhere from 7%-10% depending on when you research it. The more upgrades you have the better it works.
Farm animations are not the reason for the difference. I had a sneaking hunch that the time to walk 1/2 to a quarter of a square was not the reason why Sacred Cats lost so much of the 10% gather rate bonus. Hence why I did this test. It is now pretty conclusive (i hesitate to say this with too much conviction) that some upgrades work better than others. Some dont give you 10% gather increases, some do.
Test setup:
1) 2 granaries were placed on the map. Each granary had 4 farms surrounding it, adjacent to the building.
2) Each farm had a villager placed on its outside edge. Care was taken to ensure the villager started right beside the farm, and not a few steps away.
3) Each farmer was activated in a controlled manner (even more than before) and left to farm for 3 minutes.
4) After those 3 minutes they were taken off the farms, and their excess food dumped into the granary. The change in food was then calculated.
5) For each upgrade 10 tests were performed
Initially, I just wanted to test to verify that the plow, irrigation, and flood control were similar to Sacred Cats. Being similar meaning that because of the distance they walk while farming (on the farm)and the time spent putting the food in the granary, they suffer a penalty that makes your true gains less than 10%. As I found out earlier, the penalty was anywhere from 30-70% of the gains.
I also wanted to find out the effect of Husbandry, so i saved that for last. I assumed that if the gains for the 3 granary upgrades + sacred cats were similar, that it would give us an unbiased estimator of Husbandry. Didnt turn out that way.
I also was extra careful in how I sent them off to work. If i took an extra second to send them off (like 10 seconds instead of 9) I gave them an extra second to work. The Standard Deviation that resulted was far tighter than the first test.
I'm going to list the data below, its long so i dont want to force people to read it unless they are interested. Here are the results:
***TEST RESULTS***
Test 1:
a) No upgrades at all. Average food gathering 764.
b) Plow upgrade only. Percentage increase? 9.8%, within .7% of this 99 times out of 100.
c) Irrigation upgrade. The gain from this over the plow? 5.4%, within .8% 99 times out of 100.
d) Flood Control. The gain from this over the plow plus irrigation is 11.4%, within .7% 99 times out of 100.
e) Sacred Cats. All upgrades minus husbandry, and our gain is 5.5% within .7% 99 times out of 100.
f) Husbandry. Note that this gain is accurate only within the context of this particular case. As you will see in Test #2, the gather rate affects this. With all upgrades though, husbandry will garner a gain of 9.6% within .8% 99 times out of 100.
g) Empowered + all upgrades. Net 20% bonus (priests not pharaoh), was consistent with both test cycles. Tested 10 times overall. Will not be included with the next test data because it really doesnt need to be.
Analysis of Test 1:
Obviously these results defy common sense. Plows essentially net you 10% food gains. This flies in the face of the conclusion of the first test (or many explanations of it) that you dont gain an actual 10% because the farmer is roaming around and he has to drop the food off.
Irrigation provides a bonus similar to Sacred Cats. If movement is the cause of this loss it requires explanation of why this doesnt not happen with flood control and the plow. Some may after viewing this first test think its a one 10% bonus one 5% bonus cycle. However the next test discounts that and demonstrates the gains for the gather rate upgrades are consistent regardless of the situation.
Husbandry gains are dependent on how fast you gather. The faster you gather, the higher the benefit. This becomes obvious in the next test.
Test 2:
a) Boring base test done. 766 food gain. Only tested 5 times because i was just confirming the first round.
b) Husbandry only. Net gain over the base was 6.8% within .6% 99 times out of 100.
c) Plow + Husbandry. Net gain over husbandry only was 12.1% within .7% 99 times out of 100.
d) Plow + Irrigation & Husbandry. The addition of Irrigation results in a net gain over c) of 5.8%, within .8% 99 times out of 100.
e) Plow, Irrigation, Flood Control & Husbandry. Addition of FC results in a net gain over d) of 11.1%, within 1.0% 99 times out of 100.
f) Add sacred cats to all of this. Net change of 6.3%, within .8% 99 times out of 100.
Analysis:
As you can see it is very plausible that when you start with husbandry, your initial gain is not as much, but then its effects influence each next level to some degree. Test 1 shows smaller bonuses for each gather upgrade, and the difference is made up once you upgrade to husbandry at the end.
It is worth noting that for both tests when all upgrades are taken into account (minus empowering) your total bonus vs no upgrades at all is 49.7% within .5% 99 times out of 100. With empowerment, this turns out to be an 80% bonus. Note that the cumulative nature of these bonuses is that they accrue on to the next one. So a 20% bonus from empowerment to the base also extends to the other bonuses as well, and it is easily calculated that 20% of 50% is another 10%, which is why you get 80% instead of 70%.
That being said, it is strikingly obvious that the bonuses are not equal. The Plow and Flood Control are twice as good as Sacred Cats and Irrigation. Husbandry, which affects holding amounts, is a progressively better effect. For example, if you choose just one upgrade, choose the plow. (If you were just speaking about farming that is.) The best bang for your resources is clearly Husbandry and the Plow combined, which garners around 10 extra food per minute per 8 farms for a smaller cost.
It cannot be understated that the overall effect of these bonuses is cumulative as well; they are not only cumulative on the base rate but act much like compound interest. This gives the very distinct possibility that to achieve a true 50% gather rate (cumulative) they lowered the gains of Irrigation and Sacred Cats to 5%.
The only problem is if you choose them alone (you cant do this with irrigation)you lose half your value.
Other side notes:
As for animation while gathering, i noticed that each uggrade results in a change in the gather cycle. If you count rythmically with the numbers, after one upgrade, you will notice a pattern of 1-4, break, 5-7, break, 8-11, break, 12-15. Another upgrade and then it becomes 1-4, break, 5-8, break, 9-11 break, 12-15. Its not female/male dependant either; it is a result of the particular number of upgrades you have.
Loicenick
***BORING DATA STUFF*** (reference above to find out the test parameters)
Test 1:
a) 763,765,767,760,762,664,771,761,767,760
b) 837,840,839,833,841,844,834,844,829,836
c) 882,882,883,876,871,888,879,880,878,873
d) 987,983,981,980,994,979,977,985,986,980
e) 1040,1052,1056,1038,1044,1047,1049,1042,1050,1039
f) 1144,1146,1149,1143,1145,1136,1139,1145,1150,1143
g) 1369,1350,1361,1364,1353,1371,1368,1366,1368,1358 (combo of test 1 and 2)
Test 2:
a) 768,761,759,756,765
b) 816,813,815,817,821,820,813,816,818,823
c) 914,916,911,905,909,918,914,911,920,915
d) 966,968,974,970,974,972,962,967,962,967
e) 1071,1077,1075,1074,1058,1061,1082,1075,1078,1062
f) 1150,1145,1141,1138,1142,1155,1152,1148,1152,1144
End