Re: PBM design: give away the formulas? (*FORMULAE !)

From: ulim@coli.uni-sb.de (Ulrich Mayring)

Date: Wed, 23 Jun 1993 11:03:11 +0000

sjc@cs.purdue.edu (Steve Chapin) writes:

>Consider this scenario where the exact formula is not known: everyone
>knows (roughly) the above relationship for demand and supply.  It's
>common sense, and it's stated in the rules, but you don't know the
>exact formula.  The current price for an item is listed in your last
>turn report, so you have a rough idea how much you'll get for what you
>sell.  You can estimate how much you'll make by selling your goods.

The problem with this is:
Right now I can in one turn buy something, move somewhere else and sell it
there. This is a very sensible and important thing to do provided I buy
cheap and sell expensive. I can also sell something, move somewhere else,
and with the money I made buy something.
Now, if I didn't know exactly how much money I made I may end up with not
enough money to buy all the wares I wanted to buy. This means that I get a
very low price, but don't cash in on it, because I buy only half as much
as is available. The whole economic system of Gladius et Pilum works
because of monopolization and because everything can be calculated. I can,
for example, buy up all the ore I can get and thus take it away from
others who need it for their military. If it weren't computable that I get
ALL of it, it wouldn't make much sense to buy at high prices etc.

I grant you, though, that a game is conceivable, where your tactic of
hinting at formulas is conceivable. Only, I don't know such a game. But it
may exist.

>The exact formula won't help you any if you don't know the current
>availability.  In a large-world simulation with imperfect knowledge,
>players won't know the exact availability (especially if other players
>are selling at the same time, thus changing the availability on the
>fly).  If everyone hordes their Melf Pelts or Psychotic Sculpture and
>watches demand skyrocket, they'll be disappointed when everyone sells
>at once, and their resulting profits are low.

This is not an argument against my (well, not mine to be pedantic) formula
and against making known all parts of it. What I see in my game turn is
the situation last round, or, if you will, the situation at the beginning
of this round, before the players make their moves. Of course I have to
calculate what the other players do and they may well come before me, if I
don't assign high priorities to my plans.
It is entirely possible, and in fact quite frequent, that I move somewhere
to buy up some good and find that before I even started to move, someone
else, who already was there, bought it all up.
All the above only holds for Gladius et Pilum, of course.

Ulrich

References

PBM design: give away the formulas?
skrenta@rt.com (Rich Skrenta)
Sat, 19 Jun 1993 18:12:59 +0000
Re: PBM design: give away the formulas? (*FORMULAE !)
rob@ccc.govt.nz (Rob McNeur)
Mon, 21 Jun 1993 12:00:33 +0000
Re: PBM design: give away the formulas? (*FORMULAE !)
ulim@coli.uni-sb.de (Ulrich Mayring)
Tue, 22 Jun 1993 10:41:26 +0000
Re: PBM design: give away the formulas? (*FORMULAE !)
sjc@cs.purdue.edu (Steve Chapin)
Tue, 22 Jun 1993 11:36:35 +0000