It doesn't actually do the same thing. The things you get paid to build up on timed dispatches now are less powerful and the rewards are smaller. You have to pay to do the dispatches that actually make a big difference, now. Maybe we have totally different playstyles or something, but the new patch is a huge upgrade IMO.
That has nothing to do with the timer aspect, though. THOSE are actual number-changes.
But it has no bearing on how the game handles the thing that leads TO the results created by those changes.
In other words, those numbers would be exactly the same as they are now wether the "timed" element was there or not. No different.
Again, the one and only difference is that it's now annoying trial-and-error VS "just pick number of months". What exactly each month DOES and affects is irrelevant. This is pure interface I'm speaking of here, not gameplay-related numbers. Not concerned with the gameplay bit; that's fine. I"m concerned with the irritation of how the game currently lets me HANDLE the gameplay element. I'd rather not have to keep reloading the game to get the results I want just because it wont let me say "Do this action for 12 months, that'll get me what I want, since it says I'll get/lose exactly this much of this thing if I do it that long, and that's the right amount". Instead it's "Okay, let's try 12 months.... nope, not quite right, reload, this time I'll stop it at 20 months.... nope, that's too much, reload.... 15 months? .....nope, STILL not quite right, reload....". Either that or look at the numbers and actually do math, and.... yeah, there's a better chance of the sun suddenly turning into a donkey than there is of me voluntarily sitting down to do math. Wheras the previous incarnation would just have you select a number of months, and tell you "This is how much you will earn/pay. This is how much of such-and-such will occur during this time". It doesnt matter at all what the numbers it was telling me are. Again, purely a UI thing.
Heck, one of the biggest complaints with the game overall that I've heard is "it doesnt give the player enough information". THIS is an example of that. It's not telling you what these different numbers are going to do, expecting you instead to just sit through the dispatch, stop at some arbitrary point that you likely already decided on beforehand, and THEN look at the numbers to see if they did what you want. Not a good thing. This change actually makes the game give the player LESS useful info than before, when it needs MORE.
