A few questions I would like to pose on resources....
Should an iron mine ever play out? The mine startw with a set amount of iron and can eventually be depleted. Maybe a minor spell could reveal the total amount available. I personally like the idea, but it isn't anything I would get to worked up about either way.
Should resources come in different qualities? Not just the total amount of resource that is there, but the amount of resource it can produce at a base level. Some mines might produce 5/turn with no upgrades to the mine, others might be able to do 10 or 15. Again, I like the idea of some diversity between same type resource nodes, but not something I would really freak about either way.
Should there be mixed resources? To mine Adamantium you would have to have the relevant research done, but might it be possible for your iron mine to also produce a small amount of adamantium per turn? or even crystals? Just throwing ideas out there.
Any rare/unique resources like meteorite shards for making a one-of a kind sword? Should that type of thing jsut show up randomly at your regular mine, should they be found lying around on the ground, or should they be a random event? Or combinations of all these or other ideas?
Sorry, I was bored. Gonna go check survey monkey to see if more people have taken the survey.
Keep resources separate. No copper from iron mines. Too annoying, pretty rare in actuality as well. We don't bother mining shit that isn't abundant, and when it's abundant, there usually isn't much else around. It was even more of an oddball find back in the dark ages when mining operations only happened where it was so thick you found the stuff sticking out of the ground.
Alloys should either be just research, or a combination of the actual resources you're mining along with the research. Probably just research, the materials that go into steel are numerous. If you're getting up into high carbon stainless, you need carbon, silicon and manganese, all in trace levels. For rust proofing, you'd need chromium and nickel to make good knife steel. Most of the advances in swordsmithing have come from advances in forging though, not alloys themselves. Folding and annealing are probably the two most important discoveries. Before the blast furnace, folding was the only way to get good high carbon spring steel, which is the end all be all of swords outside of damascus steel, a feat we still aren't sure how they managed.
I really don't want a dozen mine types to make steel, and the realistic way of doing it means your alloy is based on the trace elements in the mine, so...
I'm good for differing resource concentrations. I don't know about a depletion system though. Depletion systems tend to be a wall the game runs into where you go from fun to fucked. Even just a mild decline will simply slow the game down over time when it really needs to be speeding up as time progresses. If the action doesn't get increasingly furious in nature and quantity, it's excessively common to stalemate against anyone near your skill level. Realistic, but game killing quite often.
Random event meteor shard being forged into a sword, etc, I like. A unique item that you can wield personally or pawn off on a hero. Any and all of the above ideas on how you find em sound good to me.
Hmm, I like the idea of diversifying mines (and possibly other resource 'nodes'). I'm not the biggest fan of limited resources - I don't think I've ever played a TBS game with limited resources, but plenty of RTS's there. Although at the same time, in most/many games I've played with limited resources, choosing the "abundant resources" option and/or a map with lots of resources pretty much solved that issue for me. However I think I'd dislike it even more in a TBS game - if the whole world runs out of important resources, it could pretty much force the game to end without anyone winning (or you losing). It kind of reminds me of Einstein's quote: "I know not with what weapons World War III will be fought, but World War IV will be fought with sticks and stones."
That said making some mines richer than others by varying their base output isn't a bad idea. Being able to find small quantities of other related resources is interesting, too; but there are potential problems with that. If they produce too little of said resources, they'd just be an annoyance, sitting in a warehouse somewhere taking up space and not being enough to be productive. If it's too much, well the problems of that are obvious. I guess that's not much of an argument against it though ("if it isn't done well it would be good" is kind of obvious, after all ).
I'm not sure about one-off things like meteorite shards. Well I wouldn't want to find a meteorite shard in a mine, that'd just be wrong. But some types like special crystals could be found in mines. But in general I think I'd rather those things be quest rewards, dungeon 'loot', that type of thing.
Fuck.
Post dropping forums...
No, mines shouldn't play out. Stalemate from hell ensues. Different qualities, yes. Mixed resources, no. Trace amounts of what are basically byproducts are either mixed in with the rest of the ore, or ignored. You don't build mines where there isn't a good solid vein of the stuff you're after, it's way too much work.
Meteor shard bit, all of the above. Material for a badass unique sword/armor to be equipped on your channeler/hero sounds excellent for a random event or preplaced goody on the map.
I think that mines should be able to be depleted by the user. I don't think it should be easy but it would be good that slowly but steadily the mine runs out of "essence" and you have to close it. In smaller maps wouldn't be a problem (except that you could scalate the effect) but in bigger maps it would be quite interesting.
The possibility of running out of resources of this kind could be countered with scavenging of battlefields (I already asked about this but too soon for an answer I suppose) or lot from old dungeons (or merchants?). There could be also hidden resources that could only be found by specific magic spells (being mines I would suggest earth based spells) or someone specialiced in such task (Hero/Champion or maybe the leader of the miners... need more info about the game!!!) that given time could discover new veins of mineral (in the same mine, increasing its life, or maybe in some other place).
Quality of the ores could be nice. As long as it used only "high", "normal" and "low" quality. I'd just make it that you need different amounts of an ore depending of its quality. Maybe a short sword needs 2 normal iron to make but would need only 1 high quality iron and 3 low quality iron. Problem would be setting "prices" of construction and the possible rounds up/down: My dagger cost 1 normal quality iron so if I try to use 1 high quality iron, what happens? Do i get 2 daggers? Just one? Just one of better quality?
Quality about mine production should depend on personnel employed and the place of a mine. The place of a mine could make it easier or more difficult to extract the ore. But if you don't have the proper personnel, don't expect much progress and even maybe some casualties (that should happen anyways because mining isn't a joke of a job). Some magic spells in this area could help the extraction of ore as well as the protection of the poor miners.
I don't think you should be able to mine adamantium unless you have proper tools for it. Or at least, if you could, it should be a pain in the ass and really slow. It's not the same to extract using stone tools than iron ones, for example.I'm all for events that can add new resources on map (be meteors, mines discovered, new ruins discovered,...). Just make them not very common, scarce I'd say.
I like you ideas. They can add interesting situations to the game without making it more complicated.
I like the idea of a mine (or other resource) running out but it needs to be a rather rare event. I think the Civ games had the right balence. Perhaps the longer you work a mine (the deeper you dig) the more likely you will find a vein of rarer metals. This would also make longer held mines a bit more valuable.
If the game calendar will span many decades or (preferably) centuries for an 'average' game, it would be good detailing to have any non-renewable resource modeled as such. But I would also want to have a method for discovering new (replacement) resource supplies for bulk-use things like iron. If the game calendar is closer to the level of abstraction in GC2, it will probably feel weird to have mines play out with any frequency (the common longer games in GC2 only run around 30 years).
A mine with some useful byproducts also sounds interesting, but my guess is that the micro-phobes won't like the idea. (Beg pardon, but I've got my 'micro-phile minority' hackles raised a bit on account of the saga econ talks and the unfortunate turn twoards Camp 3.)
I was thinking along the same line GW, that if mines could indeed play out, that maybe weathering over time or something would expose new sources. There are lots of fun ways they could do that, including placing all the resources at game start with a turn timer before they became exposed. I also like how Civ has new resources pop up after you gain the tech to utilize them.
Lol at your microphobe comment! I'm with you, give me complexity until my heart or more likely my brain, explodes. There should be ways around it for the microphobes, but I really want the ability to dig down deep into the nuts and bolts of my empire. There should obviously be an "opportunity cost AND benefit" to doing so - i.e. a microphobe should not be FORCED to micromanage in order to compete. How do you feel about timed turns, that if someone micro managed too much they might not get a chance to do all the macro stuff they wanted? I am not a big fan of that idea...Maybe allow more micro on the single player games only? (SO that micros won't cry about being forced to micro to stay competitive?
Oh, holy shit on the 3.5+ hour posting delay... Ignore that second one.
I would like things like a meteor core falling as part of a random event, then letting you forge a special sword from it.
I'm sure we could think of similar ideas
Event related monster appears, and you can make especcially effective potions from its blood
Event related locust swarm appears and eats a bunch of crops, but you can somehow kill them in mass (magical insectiside) and for whatever reason the released life energy of each insect is comparable to a human, giving a boost to necromany works.
I am strongly opposed to mines/resource nodes being depleted unless an equilibrium is more or less maintained with new mines being discovered at about an equal rate as older ones deplete. It could cause some very unhappy scenarios, though, where you're forced to totally reorganize your empire when key resources vanish out from under you... Still, as long as overall resource levels on the map remain more or less constant I'll be satisfied. Though Swicord has a good point - if each turn is just a day it would be silly for mines to become depleted.
A much better way of doing this is just through abundance, not quality. For one, having different qualities would mean even more resources to deal with (with little meaningful difference). But seriously, just have higher quality mines produce more resources per turn.
I don't want to manage personnel, unless it's at a very high level (like advisors to my channeler). Having to manage personnel at mines and the like would be dismal...
What about having upgrades on mines so that they don´t go depleted? Like an ore mine has 1000 resources at lvl 1, and if you upgrade it itgets +500 ore and +10% income rate.
If we have an abundance system, one player might have "better" mines around him and that would unbalance the game, wouldn´t? Like player 1 with 3 "abundant" mines and player 2 with only 2 "abundant" and one "poor".
For rare resources, like adamantium for example, we can have a tech research system, so players could choose what path to follow. Something like "If I want my warriors with adamantium armor, I should first research armor upgrades and then research mining upgrades, that would lead me to produce those armors."
I´m not sure "people qualified" working on mines would be interesting. That could be done with researches, I don´t know if that level of specialization is necessary.
Regards,
Kata
I agree. I'm not entirely sure there should BE meteors in pure fantasy settings: I would rather have a geocentric view of the world with an actual spirit plane as opposed to space.
It's no more unbalancing then the fact that one player might have 3 mines and another might have just 1. Resource distribution, unless constrained to put equal resources near every player's starting point, will always be a little bit 'unbalancing', but it's all good. The only time I'd really care about this would be if playing a cut-throat ranked multiplayer game (which I don't think I'll ever do...). Other than that, as long as the RMG doesn't totally screw over a player resource-wise, I'd be happy.
That's a big question mark for me. On the one hand, I like Civ IV's approach where you can't see a resource until you've researched the Tech to use it. But on the other hand, how would you ever figure out how to use it if you don't even know what or where it is? Having to find a resource and implement basic utilization of it (by which I mean, say, build a mine) before being able to research techs to improve your ability to mine it and to actually use it and turn it into MR would be a new and interesting twist. But at the same time this could just result in a huge rush to find the best resources as soon as possible, which would kind of suck, and which Civ IV's way does away with...
I think that there should be different resources that can be used for the same thing i.e iron=weapons and armor, steel=weapons and armor (but obviously steel is better)
They should also have different qualities but this should be based on your miners' skills. Also when you make different metals into armor they have different color options (this would create diversity)
You should also have to do research to mine different ore but instead of creating a tech tree, when you build a first mine at a different ore your miners take time to figure out how to mine it efficiently. afterwards your civ now knows how to mmine that resource. this prevents you from having to research an ore thats not in your area and makes civs use metals that are native to their area.
Even though certain ore will be better than others, if you have good miners and blacksmiths you could create better bronze armor and weapons than steel.
This can be applied in many ways ie. wood into structures or bows and arrows.
It wouldn't be the first game where resources run out and the only remaining one if wood. In this game it would be: "Time to go back to stones and sticks." Consider it an incentive to go to war.
You have an ecosystem with some mines already discovered of various types plus some still undiscovered. For now lets forget about the Channeler and friends.
In this scenario, my dear Winty faces Toadboy in a game. Soon in it, Winty takes control of an iron mine near her city. Once the mine structure is built (the same you would build a farm for food), automatically one of her citizens is sent as miner. Mines, as any other building you have, needs population to work and these have a minimum and maximum of population that can be used. Lets say that Winty's iron mine allows between one miner and nine miners. As long as there is at least one miner, the iron mine will produce 1 iron ore.
If by any reason Winty decides that she wants more iron ore production, she would only need to send more miners to it. In this case, lets say that Winty's iron mine (Mines of Loria) admits between 1 and 9 miners and that for each 2 miners above the first, its production is increased by 1 (making up numbers, don't take them too seriously). If she has enough population she could order her advisor to send 8 new miner to Mines of Loria for a total iron ore production of 5 each turn. If later Winty had to recall 3 miners for the army, leaving 5 miners there, Mines of Loria would produce 3 iron ore each turn.
As technology/science advance, Winty can decide to promote one of the miners into an engineer (making up names...). Or maybe recruit one from the proper building (the same building that allows you to construct/recruit catapults may as well let you produce some engineers). The engineer increases production of the mine by 1. Because of balance (perfect excuse to put caps on things), lets say that only 1 engineer in each mine. That ingeneer doesn't only increase your extraction rate a bit, he also has an cummulative % of discovering new veins of mineral in that same mine. So if Mines of Loria has a iron deposit of 1000, yourengineer may eventually find an extra 250 iron deposit for it. All mines would have a minimum and maximum number of times that this "event" could happen. Maybe a mine in the plains would have between 0 and 1 but a mine in the mountains could have between 3 and 6. This engineers can also do some sightseeing out there and discover new mines in other lands.
There could be different kinds of mines and not just about their base resource. Maybe they need a minimum of 2 miners to produce 1 ore each turn because of a difficult location but it's the only Mithril mine in miles that you control. Or maybe because of location, the mine produces 2 ores each turn with just 1 miner.
Later, Winty sends 3 more miners to Mines of Loria, having now a production of 6 iron ores each turn. Some turns later, Winty's civilization makes a new discovery and improves mining techniques, increasing every iron mine's production by 2. Those new techniques also allow Winty to extract ore from adamantium mines, which always come in handy.
We don't truly need quality in our ores so scrap it.
So the game continues and suddenly Toadboy notices something. Winty controls most part of the iron mines. Her military isn't the best (lazy ass diplomacy dependant Winty) and toadboy's iron reserves are still good but... well, in the long run she has all the advantage because if the game drags and he cannot take her out, in the end he will be the one that will start using stones and sticks sooner. What to do? Maybe trade as much iron as possible to increase the reserves. But that's expensive and doesn't solve the problem. What then? Obviously... war!!
Just some random ideas, don't sue me.
I like those thoughts olp33. That is one thing that I never reconciled in Civ IV but I didn't worry too much about it because I liked it - that was that resources would suddenly appear when you researched a certain tech.
I really like the idea that when a new resource is found, that some "research" has to be done to determine how to mine it. I also think it would be cool to have all resources visible from the start, but you still need to research (in the tech tree) the proper research to know how to use the material. So you might stockpile a decent bit of adamantium before you developed the technology to forge it properly. In fact, discovering and mining a resource could be a pre-requisite to being able to research the tech to use it! This is a lot more sensible to me and I think that is also a unique direction to go with it - I have never seen a game that went that direction with resources anyway.
And yes I tend to use ores in my example, but similar things could apply to all types of resources. Good ideas!
edit: you too Winter, I like a lot of those ideas! We obviously were posting at the same time
Damn, I forgot to post the last part.
Magic. Always magic. This is Elemental: War of Magic.
Spells that change normal terrain into mines of different kinds. That is one of the counters to natural end of resources. We could talk about types of spells that can create mines, which some would have an essence cost asociated,... But magic would be an alternative.
I know someone could say: Why have the mines to be depleted if you can have spells to create new? Well, those spells wouldn't be free and... you know, you would have to actually get those spells to use them... or conquer the ones that your enemy create.
Just finishing my random ideas, sorry for my... unprofesionalism.
Oh, glad you liked the concept, Denryu.
Ah very cool concept for a spell - so it is like the spell pulls all of the scattered ore from the surrounding land and makes it a "vein" of concentrated ore - I REALLY like that concept
The scenario you pointed to, Wintersong, is appealing but it is only one scenario of many that would result. And in every game I've ever played with limited resources, I have always at some point experienced the "well, there are no more resources and no one is strong enough to do anything" problem. Age of Empires (while RTS, not TBS) is a perfect example. Resource depletion often leads to boring stalemates. And often even if it doesn't result in a stalemate, things get sort of boring when everyone is just pumping out basic un-armored club-wielding troops to see who can swamp the other first.
And the concept of allowing magic with essence cost create new resource nodes could, depending how essence and magic work, just tie two limited resource models together in which they are both bound to dwindle into nothingness anyways, which doesn't at all solve the problem.
And you don't need finite resources to encourage resource-related wars. In a system with quantifiable resources, the person with the largest resource income is at an advantage. If I get 10 iron per turn and my opponent gets 30 per turn, but our military strengths are currently about equal, it could very well be a good idea to go to war now on equal footing rather than in 100 turns when his military is twice the size of mine and better equipped.
Not to be nit-picky, but I said pretty much exactly that in my previous post And I also brought up some potential concerns with a system like that. If you can see all resources on the map from the start, then there would probably be an early rush to control the most high-end resources. That's one thing I like about Civ IV - you have no idea where those resources will be found, so you can't go establish a power base there in advance. It's also more realistic - why would people fight over an adamantium mine before they have any clue of its worth? Or over bears before anyone thought of riding them?
What about expanding the idea of new resources being discovered throughout the game, with lower end stuff more likely to be found towards the beginning and higher end stuff largely being found once the game has been underway for some time. This would make the early rush to advanced resources less important (as even if you don't get ahold of any in the beginning you're likely to have many more chances in the future). This, combined with having to first mine and stockpile resources before being able to develop methods of actually using it, would be a very nice system, imho. It could also be combined with resource depletion, and the rate of discovery of new resources could be directly related to the rate of consumption to avoid the equivalent of Heat Death.
Indeed you did, and although I did not intentionally plagiarize you, I do remember reading your post, and when I posted it seemed "vaguely familiar"...
And I agree with your concerns for the system as well. I like the idea that resources are going to be popping up throughout the game, both new sources of early NR but as you say, as the game progresses more of the new discoveries should be of the later-game resources...
Yeah, having spells to keep up with mines is a very nice thing! And if essence is limited, and those spells cost essence, you would have to choose between using essence for fighting or for expanding resources.
I'm an IT analist and thinking about the programming part of this game, it drives me nuts! There community have some really good ideas, and implementing them will be a challenge. That's exciting and I can surely congratulate the dev team for working on it.
My example was based in one of my preferences, the same other people want Bear Cavalry and uses it as such, but the fun for the mayority is more important so I'll gladly accept any system. Using my preferences as example allows me to have fun writing and maybe it can help somehow (even if it's to point out the things that shouln't be done ). Spells in "my system" (damn, that sounds bad) wouldn't become obsolete because you may still find usefull to create a type of mine to which you have no access, for example. And if the mines don't deplete from resources, engineers instead of being able to discover new veins, they would just have a chance of increasing the production value of the mine.
About encouraging wars.. well, any system that can encourage certain styles are not bad as long as they are balanced. Anyways, it was just a comment.
I like your idea in the last paragraph of reply #21.
Yes, same. I'm sure that many of the times I came to a stalemate I could have prevented it by being more aggressive. But that forces you into one kind of gameplay. Anything that imposes some sort of time limit to the game forces you to use strategies that come to fruition relatively quickly. And even then things don't always go your way - especially if you and your opponents happen to be very well matched. I'm a fairly casual gamer as well (I don't care about scores, I often play on difficulty levels below what I can win on just because sometimes it's fun to be so much better than the rest ).
So I don't agree that it's the player's fault - I think that it's the game's fault for not providing versatility.
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