hmmmmm pouyak, interesting idea, though I''m not sure how well it would work in real life.

What you should do is make a small text based version of your trading cycle, where it simlates, say, the movement of three industries (say, Miner gets the ore, someone turns the ore into metal, then the Tool smith turns the metal into tools for the miner to get more ore), then try out different scenarios - such as if one of these people run out, or die. This will see if your scheme will work well - then try to scale it up a bit.

The big problem I can see is that the entire industry of several towns will be entirely dependent on individual people - so if say the miner dies, eventually all industries in several towns will stop; not good news.

Also, because of this death issue, it means you need some way to replenish workers - ie make children, who turn into workers of one industry. This will be quite tricky, I imagine.

But Good Luck!

The game can cheat off course... ^_^

When certain chains get lost (the mine is taken over by bandits), the economy suffers, yes. That is what generates some quests for the Player: solve the problem. If the player DOESN''T solve it in good time (or actually caused the problem), and the player isn''t actually standing around (probably somewhere else, or sleeping), the game can cheat a bit... If the player is there, bunch of soldiers will appear to guard the place and a new bunch of miners will arrive. If the player isn''t there, the bandits simply "move on" to a new place, new miners are stuffen in the town, and life goes on.

Note one thing: this isn''t an exact simulation of a world... It''s a simulation of a Dungeon Master. If a Dungeon Master planned to disable a mine, so that the players have a quest, and the players don''t react to it, he will shrug, repopulate the mine in his notes, and think of a new quest ^_^

And yeah, I''m going to work this out text-based first... since most of it isn''t going to appear in the graphics of the game anyway I just want to bounce around the idea, and see if anyone can add more things to it, before I go out and code it :D

quote: Original post by Pouyakatka
Note one thing: this isn''t an exact simulation of a world... It''s a simulation of a Dungeon Master.

But isn''t a dungeon master trying to simulate a world? I admit to being into D&D when I was younger. =b When any of us played as DM, we had to be strictly fair. There was even an instance when a DM actually LOST his entire world (I might add that he spent months preparing it).

Knowing that we, as players, had unlimited power was the real fun of the game. If your game cheats the player, the player will be disappointed (or they may even quit playing).

You should let the blacksmith die. You should let the town starve to death. If you don''t, what''s the point of your game? Okay, you have a game that''s smart enough to create its own quests. I see your logic here and it''s GREAT! Now, the player happens upon an oppurtunity to help a town. He tries his best but it isn''t good enough. The people of the town... go on like nothing happened? "Huh?! I tried to help these people and failed but my efforts had no effect anyway? Why did I even try in the first place?" See what I''m saying? At this point, you''ve failed to suspend my disbelief. These people should have died because of my failure but they go on like nothing happened.

On the opposite side of the coin, let''s say I just got home from work and I''m pissed at my boss. I fire up your game and decimate half a town to make myself feel better... and the game cheats, taking my chance to vent my frustration away from me for the better of your creation.

I''ll be honest with ya, your idea seems to contradict itself. You are trying to create an open ended game by having quests generated on-the-fly but the world is locked in any way you play it. I''m missing the point of why you are going through the trouble to create this. Don''t get me wrong, it''s a great idea. I just think the player''s actions should come with consequences.

- Jay

There''s an old saying in Tennessee... well, it''s in Texas but probably in Tennessee. It say''s, "Fool me once, shame on... shame on you... uh... ya fooled meh uh can''t get fooled again."
- George W. Bush

Get Tranced!

No no no, I don''t mean cheating as in cheating against the player ^_^ Just cheating against the system.

Everything the player does, and sees, is a constant. Those things actually happened, and will continue to affect the world.

HOWEVER events that have only existed in the AI Database, but haven''t been seen by the player (as in, a quest was generated in a town but the player never got there), the system can discard the quest and return the situation to normal, as in "Player doesn''t know about it anyway, so won''t miss it".

Same goes for the Dungeon Master. If the player kills the blacksmith, the blacksmith is dead. However, if the DM killed the Blacksmith in town A on paper, but the player go to town B instead, nothing is stopping him for bringing the blacksmith in A back to life again, so that he can figure in a quest later on ^_^

A thing isn''t a fact until the player(s) noticed it.

There''s still a problem with that. What if the player affects town A in hopes that town B will suffer and thereby making his current quest in town C easier? The player doesn''t see town B so the game doesn''t allow the change. Therefore, the player arrives at town C, waiting for the change to happen which never comes.

Intervening with the logical dynamic of your game may risk losing the player. Let''s go into this further. You say towns A & B may trade. How are they trading? Do you have actual merchant NPC''s traveling between towns? How do they know that they are to be merchants and where to go? Is that set in stone? Let''s say the bandit kills the merchant that was sole provider of fabrics. Now Town B is in an uproar because all the women are forced to run around nekkid. =) So, the player has to fill in that role. Does that mean that every time an important person dies in the game, the player has to fill in the role? I see that you can control the WHEN and the WHO of what goes on in your world, but what if the player accidentally kills that same merchant. Is the game going to quest him with the role of the person he just killed to keep clothes on the women''s backs?

- Jay

There''s an old saying in Tennessee... well, it''s in Texas but probably in Tennessee. It say''s, "Fool me once, shame on... shame on you... uh... ya fooled meh uh can''t get fooled again."
- George W. Bush

Get Tranced!

Actually, the change would remain.

The player changes something in town A (say, kill the blacksmith), so that town B no longer gets weapons. Because itwas the player who did this, it is considered "known" to the player that town B recieves no more weapons.

Now, if town B was training soldiers to help town C, town B can''t help town C anymore, because of the direct actions of the players.

HOWEVER, as in any world, after a few gameweeks a new Blacksmith might pop up in town A. I mean, they had a good trade deal going on with town B, no?

Also, it''s pretty much possible that the merchant AI in town B goes and check all the databases, and strikes a deal with town D to buy weapons ^_^

As for "Are there actual merchants in the game?". Well, yeah. Each town has a bunch of merchants dudes around who are the Avatars of the local Trade AI. Kill the merchant, and the city can''t trade that certain good for a while (until a new merchant arrives). The trade itself is purely statistical. Statistical in the sense that, if player travels between A and B, and A sends gold to B, if the player waits long enough a caravan with gold will Pop up, and if the player destroys the caravan, a note will be send to town B "OI! No more gold!"

And the player isn''t always taking the NPC''s position. Only if he earns it. As in, when the player kills the mayor of a town, a new Mayor is needed. The Mayor was the Administrator AI of the town. Now, if the Fear or Love factor of the town for the Player is high enough, he can be offered the job. If it isn''t, another NPC will be put in that place after a while (or if the player refuses).

Thus, killing a Knight won''t make you a knight. Unless you got a powerfull group behind you ''causing the local servants and peasants to fear you. Or unless you got a good reputation and have helped all the people and the Knight was evil. And it''s still just an option "Hey! Want to be a knight?" "Nope". ^_^

HAHAHAHAHA THAT is a statistical nightmare! =D I totally dig your idea but I just don''t see the purpose of "cheating". I see what you are trying to do but I think that, in the end, you''d only be taking away from the game and adding to your work load.

If Town C is out of view of the player and something happens there, why not clue the player in instead of trying to stop the effects? Perhaps the player is enjoying a cold one at the Inn and overhears a conversation that Town C is... being raided by bandits... or... women are running around undressed because the fabric merchant got killed. Now the player, who may be getting bored of the quest the game has recently played out for him, will decide that he''d rather go watch naked women in Town C. Viola! Your system has served it''s purpose!

On the other hand, changing events, even in small ways is accident prone, requires much more design and development time and just takes away from the experience. (Remember the proverb: less is more)

- Jay

There''s an old saying in Tennessee... well, it''s in Texas but probably in Tennessee. It say''s, "Fool me once, shame on... shame on you... uh... ya fooled meh uh can''t get fooled again."
- George W. Bush

Get Tranced!

Well, it isn''t really cheating... it''s basicly "Well, that town has been having problems with bandits for weeks now, and the player hasn''t done a thing. It''s only reasonable that the local Duke has solved the situation by now"

But hey, I know, there are still a lot of holes in this idea... That is why I posted it here ^_^ Oh, and before I forget, a lot of thanks for your input ^_^

My pleasure =)

This is a problem I''ve been trying to solve for a long time now. There''s a lot of things that have to be accounted for when you want to have a virtual dungeon master (so to speak). I''ve given up and gone with a micro-managed agent-based system... not because a macro-managed system wouldn''t work but because it''s a better solution to my particular problem.

I only stress against work-around''s because I''ve tried that route and the results have never been desirable, not to mention that it complicates code. If the local duke should have solved his own problem, perhaps that should be worked into the game mechanic. Give the Duke a means to solve his own problem but let him favor the player (depending on the fear or love factor). The player would be left hanging if the bandits just disappeared. The player may not have done anything about it but there may have been a reason for that.

This would mean that your world would have to be destroyable. Perhaps it should be creatable as well? If it is destroyed, the survivors rebuild. More people immigrate to the city... those people could come out of thin air. That would be a believable "cheat". The character could be created in the middle of nowhere and travel to the city. No one''s the wiser. Town C now has a new blacksmith. Hmmm, no matter what the player does, in time, everything will be undone... ooooh! I like that! =) I know this is your baby so tell me to shut up whenever you feel necessary =b

It''s gorgeous outside... I''m leaving work early and goin'' bike ridin''. I''ll be back in a couple hours =)

- Jay

There''s an old saying in Tennessee... well, it''s in Texas but probably in Tennessee. It say''s, "Fool me once, shame on... shame on you... uh... ya fooled meh uh can''t get fooled again."
- George W. Bush

Get Tranced!

Well, the thing is, it can indeed not be done using macro-managing, simulating a whole world... That is why the Macro-Manager doens''t run in real time, but in the background, and all it does it present the Micro Manager (that I haven''t designed yet ^_^ ) with data ^_^

And this isn''t exactly "my baby"... I''ve created most of the ideas I''m pouring in here, by looking at what the Guru''s here have been talking about. Thus, I don''t want you to "shut up"... No, I want you to tell me more ^_^

... I''ll talk more later. But I allready have all the odd posts on this topic, and really need my sleep... I''ll also be back in a few hours ^_^