More expensive stuff

[Rusalka]

This suggestion is about a general strategy for adding new items/vehicles/etc.

I hope I'll manage to show my point of view clearly on this.

I have a feeling that if we make a function where x is a cost of an item, and y is benefit the graph usually will be more less linear.

I would like to have this graph much more expotential. I'll explain this on the example below (numbers made up):

Linear function:

skateboard
cost: 250
speed: 5

bicycle
cost: 500
speed: 10

motorcycle
cost: 2000
speed: 40

etc.

Expotential function:

skateboard
cost: 250
speed: 5

bicycle
cost: 1000
speed: 10

motorcycle
cost: 4000
speed: 40

etc.

Does it make any sense?

The idea here is to keep benefits growing linearly , and costs expotentially.

Just to be clear, I don't really want to mess with vehicles and other stuff we already have, just thinking about adding some better things (better cars, buildings etc.) which won't be much better, but their cost will be much higher (building cost, not operating cost).

The goal here is to let some wealthy chars/societies advance to the next level - much more difficult level, which makes them just a little bit more powerful. I see to many chars that kind of "finished" the game, and then they quit.


Some ideas to achive that:

Fancy builidings (made by upgrading existing ones)
New ships
New cars (not sport cars, but some useful ones)
Better engines (extremely complicated)
More uses for gold and gems
Some really longterm and difficult projects e.g. Huge Tombs like ancient piramids (10 tons of stone, and few other resources, 1000 days to finish it )
Some new alloys, or composites (reinforced concrete? - buildings will need steel! )
Better quality and more expensive items

There is a point when a player has everything he can in the game and then doing anything became pointless. Don't let them get there so easily!

[Cogliostro]

Agreed 100%, that's another superior suggestion.

[Piscator]

Actually, I'm sorry to say, it's not.

I see to many chars that kind of "finished" the game, and then they quit.

This is a very true and also a very important point, but if we just raise the cost for new items, all we will achieve is that it takes a little more time to reach the point where everything is built. Regardless whether your marble palace cost 100 days of work or 1000, in the end you will have finished it and you will start looking for something new to keep you occupied.

(building cost, not operating cost)

I find this statement especially odd as the operational cost is the type of cost that actually matters. If there are no operational costs involved, an item could as well cost nothing at all, at least if you think in decades.


In other words, all your suggestion would achieve is delay the final economic collapse by half a century and in two or three RL years we'd be back where we are now. The only difference would be that we'd be up to our necks in jewelery, pyramids and sportscars that will have been built for no other reason than to fight our boredom.

[Miri]

I like this idea, but I agree with Piscator too. Making expensive things itself is just postponing what will happen anyway, unless we introduce operational costs. Right now the only consumables are food (very easy to get), medicines and fuel. maybe if we could make repairs require some resources...?

I don't know if you know a game called Haven&Hearth. It's basically a Cantr + tibish graphics - role play. I particularly like the manufacturing and exploatation system there - for example every structure (buildings, containers, vehicles, furniture) needs some resources of which it was made (in case of multi-resources items only 1 is chosen).
If you're interested, you can check it here: http://www.havenandhearth.com/portal/
Unfortunately, the server is very unstable and the game itself (java app) is laggy as hell.

[Rusalka]

Actually, I'm sorry to say, it's not.

I love your refreshing responses Piscator

You are absolutely right - we'll just delay the catastrophe that way, and I thought about it a bit already.

My motivation was to find something that will:

1. Encourage players to do more team work (building piramids in ancient Egypt was actually a brilliant strategy that kept the whole country united)
2. Make some more diversity
3. Keep them busy until the whole deterioration system will be implemented.

(building cost, not operating cost)

I meant here that operating cost shouldn't go so expotentialy like building cost. It is of course a matter of balancing it properly. Nobody will drive vehicle that produce more costs then benefits.

[Chris]

I don't think that there would be a motivating effect for most people. My character who has built a van isn't thinking about building a bus. Decisions are based on what is useful, not on keeping up with the Joneses. More stuff is only good if it does something different, not just +1 bonus on this or that stat.

[Rusalka]

Because your char doesn't need a bus. Bus is not an upgrade of Van. But would you build a bigger and faster car if You could, considering that it is 2 or 3 times more expensive?

[Arlequin]

Well, at some point the total item decay would exceed the item production rate, and then the economics of scarcity would kick in again.

[Rusalka]

I believe that proper balancing of expensive items would be about having stuff that is impossible to afford by just one char on it's own. But that probably requires another level of items.

One more suggestion: What about making all the most primitvie items unrepairable? It's so easy to make them anyway. Then it would be more logical to make their more expensive equivalents.

[Piscator]

We're actually considering making all items unrepairable, or at least take resources.

The concept of "being able to afford something" is something you should be careful about. If you have to pay for an item only once, a char can afford everything. All he needs is time. For something not being affordable, it needs to consume more than you are ready/able to spend.

[Rusalka]

Exactly. I'm not negating that.

Another idea about repairing items: Every item could have his repair points, consumed by repairing. When it runs out points, it can't be repaired anymore.
Then it would be possible to regain it's repair points with resources.

[Piscator]

I'm currently favouring a system that works exactly like that, with the difference that repairs are supposed to be done automatically. In other words, we wouldn't keep track of the actual repair state (it would be always at maximum), but only of the permanent damage. If we disregard the part about restoring the permanent status points, this could even be done without programming.

[Keegan Ingrassia]

So...in order for repairs to automatically continue and permanent damage not to happen, a character would need to carry a supply of wood, iron, steel, bones, leather, etc. just to keep their things from falling apart?

[Piscator]

No, only day to day repairs would be assumed to happen automatically. All a character would notice is that the quality of his items slowly degrades when he uses them (and only when he uses them) due to the maintenance work he performs to keep his tool in a working condition.

You would only have to invest resources to remove the permanent rot, or, even simpler, build a new item.

[Rusalka]

I would still make them rot, when left outside on the ground, and even faster then now. That way we would remove from the game all the items left at the end of the world.