Re: Olympia workers and Earning Power

From: skrenta@cbnewsg.att.com (Rich Skrenta)

Date: Fri, 17 Apr 1992 16:32:40 +0000

gl8f@fermi.clas.Virginia.EDU (Greg Lindahl) writes:
> Well, there is one easy way to earn lots of money in Olympia today --
> kill off lots of newbies and take their money ;-) Perhaps Rich should
> start off everyone with 5 armed guards or something.

This would just make the carnage 5 times bloodier!  I'm considering
ways to protect new players, but nothing has really gelled for me yet.

So far the idea I like most is to put a protective aura around new
players which lasted 3-5 turns.  If they attacked anyone, it would
cease, but while they had it, they couldn't be attacked.  This would
only apply to their PC's, not to formed units.

> But seriously: yes, it does make sense to have more of an economy
> where people harvest various sorts of raw materials and then trade
> with each other.

This is definitely in the works.  This turn mining skill should
be operational, so you can scrape various elements from the earth.
Forestry is still on the to-do list; farming sounds promising.
Equestrian can already be used to "harvest" wild horses, although
I think it's a bit too lucrative at the moment (watch out, D'Arc! :-)

> But I've yet to see a commercial game which had a
> satisfactory economic system, so do keep in mind that it's very hard.
> Things you want to avoid:

>   o  letting the people with the most money earn more, so they get
>      richer and richer and run away with the game

This is a serious problem.  I need to think of some ways to
limit growth of large factions without simply imposing limits
(you can only run 40 units, for example) as some PBM's do.
I'd rather it be more natural.

>   o  making the system have a lot of luck involved (gee, I found a
>      gold deposit 100 times richer than normal, aren't I special?)

Randomness in Olympia is pretty tame.  Usually I pick a target
value or range and allow some random variation within it, such as 20%.

Of course, things like rare deposits must still be rare!

>   o  making economic activity much more profitable than exploration
>      (or much less, for that matter)

A player recently complained that Olympia was too economic,
and there weren't enough fantasy elements (monsters, quests, etc.)
Some additions this turn should begin to remedy this.   :-)

--
Rich Skrenta

References

Re: Olympia workers and Earning Power
gl8f@fermi.clas.Virginia.EDU (Greg Lindahl)
Fri, 17 Apr 1992 04:18:37 +0000

Referenced By

Re: Olympia workers and Earning Power
gl8f@fermi.clas.Virginia.EDU (Greg Lindahl)
Fri, 17 Apr 1992 04:18:37 +0000