A medieval (around year 1200-1400) browser MMO, with higher focus on realism and immersion. I got stuck in the middle of design...
You can check a very early alpha here: http://europe1300.eu but that's not needed, also don't get fixed on how it looks right now, it's on an early stage and I'm willing to redesign most of it.


Core design decisions:
- there are historical predefined kingdoms (players can not create new ones), also historical cities
- the game is multilingual with all players in the same game world (the concept is that players who speak certain language will gather in their national country) (yes, I know, problem with US players, I guess they will have to join England or something; also the size of kingdoms will be highly imbalanced)
- no resets, the game goes on "forever" (the only reset is after finish of Beta test)

Secondary design decisions:
- players play certain roles in the kingdom, each kingdom has elected king who has most to say on how the kingdom is organised and run
- the game should have higher level of realism and immersion than other games, I'm willing to sacriface *a small bit* of gameplay for it
- I'm fine with the game being a niche game (but that's not my goal, I just can accept it)


The 3 big parts of the game:
* kingdom (cooperation) - each kingdom is a group of players that cooperate to make it thrive, kingdoms compete with other kingdoms
* your place in the kingdom (politics, social interaction) - what is your social position in the kingdom, how big your influence is among fellow citizens
* personal assets (individual) - everything that belongs personally to you

Basic mechanic:
You get action points each hour (optimized so you should login once per 18 hours to not waste anything). You spend action points performing various actions.


So far I got the mood and immersion right. There is the map, kingdoms, cool cities to visit, colourful kingdom crests, noble titles. I have several ideas for kingdom cooperation as well. The biggest problem is the individual part. I got really stuck on it. How the player "advance"? What a player builds for himself (estate)?

Some kind of Fable? Super fable? Being able to build your own "zone", some kind of a small town for yourself, a villa or something like that that you can upgrade. And of course, quests, if they're kingdoms you should be able to speak to the "king" or whatever to ask for quests so you earn money prizes, collection items and all this stuff.

I don't know if the level idea is a good idea, so I wouldn't make the player have levels, but just be able to buy/build better weapons or things like that.

¿Don't you have a slight idea of what do you want? I don't think it's good for you having people making your game, because you will lose interest on it, give your idead so people can improve them.

Good luck

No, no. The king is a real player. He can't give out quests (also, I don't have budget for a quest system, it takes way too much time to implement enough quests).

I'm not sure I can make "personal town" for a player when there already exist predefined cities inhabited by players. Players could have estates, even castles, but cities and towns are shared.

Being the king makes it a little bit difficult, but you should check out a WiiWare game called FF King Chronicles (or my life as a king), you're the king there. Anyway, if it's a MMO, then you could have unexplored lands outside the towns with active quests (you should try to implement quests, even if they're very very simple, they could repeat or something, it wouldn't make the game look rpetitive if it's a MMO), and you can hire explorers or something to go there investigate, kill, get treasures, etc...

I don't know... Am i giving you ideas?

Security advice:


Unknown user: arxor1 does not exist
Invalid password for arxor



Never point out difference. It only helps bots to crack passwords since they can guess username and password seperately.

Dunno if you have thought about it as well, but maybe it would be nice to instead of giving the highest ranked player the king rank, you get real elections every <N period>, so you simulate real life even more. But that also includes that kings must have real great influance since the choice of king should be important.

Anyway, goodluck with the project,,

~Arxor

hi Acharis,
first of all, nice basic idea. as much as i understand and like the medieval ground rules you layed down as much i think that you are limiting and getting yourself stuck with these rules.
if you want player-progression than its not a good start by giving them the highest "jobs" right away. i understand that players will not be able to build their own cities, but why not giving them a bit of a smaller task at the beginning. let them start as a say rich salesman in a harbor district, in that way you could implement classes:
e.g. class-advantages/disadvantages : merchant-skills + 2 / behaviour -2. the player going for the salesman could say : "hey i dont like what the current king is doing and thats why i have to extend my popularity/influence so i can become the spokesman for the district. After that i can further increase my influence and be the head of a council that administers a big part of the city, etc."
in that way players can start gathering experience on how to play well, if you make a mistake on that level you want be punished by a revolution of the whole city but just by some angry neighbours.
i also like what arxor said. let them be rivals with the other players inhabiting the city. so in one legislation term you have to get your district to be the most influencial of all and then when you have been elected, you have to choose between beeing a good king and doing what is best for the whole city, maybe even to the disadvantage of you own district, or beeing selfish and only securing your own & allies interests....both of the choices must of course have different but equal rewards.

hope my jibberish makes sense ^^
cheers

Oh but problem with the election system is that you have to be careful that a player doesnt create hundreds of alts or bots and vote for himself
I would otherwise >: )

So the "worth" of a single vote should be based on player level/advancement/whatever how you implement difference

This actually looks like it could be fun one day, and educational at the same time!

Anyway, since it's medieval, why not go feudal all the way? As a player grows more powerful he will have more lands than he can control with the action points available to him. Therefore he will have to recruit another player as a vassal to manage that land for him. If many new players arrive causing a shortage of land, new settlements could be built on the fringes of civilization. If there is too much land available (and if it's a problem) then plague, bad crops and other events could make the pool of lands shrink.

So a player would advance by showing his skills as land manager or as a warrior in battle. The most reliable and trusted vassals would be promoted by their lord when new resources or lands become available. You could also make it so there is a maximum number of vassals that a player can handle given the maximum action points available. But have no fear! Your vassals can recruit vassals too, so after awhile you will have a truly feudal web of loyalties, pledges and alliances. To make it even more complicated (and realistic) this does not have to be a strict tree structure. Lord A can rule over some lands that pays taxes to Lord B while Lord B is a formal vassal to Lord A and have to answer his call to arms. You can make it as complicated or simple as you want, basically.

But what would a player do then? As a general rule, you want to keep local troubles from bubbling up and annoy your liege lord. So keep crime low, order high and troops well trained. And when war comes, be useful! I'd love to see battles being lost because a player is too eager to impress their commander and charges into a trap. The lord could also dispatch various "quests" to his vassals, like arranging hunts/feasts, training troops, gathering resources or building structures. The key to good leadership is delegation.
As a lord, you must protect and help your vassals when they need it. Certainly it's your duty to protect them if they're attacked.

Other random idea: Spy networks. I wanna recruit spies among my enemies, my superiors, my vassals and just everywhere in general. This would be a social game, so better keep an eye on them.




This would definitely be a niche game if it would depend so much on player interaction, but it sounds fun to me.

I kind of got stuck at "focus on realism" and "people elect the king".

Rather than having this be something that people vote on, let players make up their own factions, and let factions fight each other for control of resources. That way, the 'King' is whoever has the clout to hold the title and keep his faction on top of the others.

As Kekko points out, vassalage is a great tool to model this. Only, don't force the players to comply with whatever their duties are. They are free to ignore orders, and their lieges and vassals will have to figure out how to handle it, whether by tolerating a disruptive element or punishing them in whatever way they can. Maybe a vassal is more powerful than his liege, and would see their positions reversed.

Cooperation
You are overlooking the existence of other kingdoms and think too much into terms of internal kingdom affairs. Yes, there will be internal conflict of some sort and internal politics, but, because there are so many kingdoms (20-25) the key is cooperation with kingdom mates and confict with other kingdoms. A kingdom can not concentrate on fighting internally, kingdom has to concentrate on fighting with other kingdoms, otherwise the kingdom will end up in trouble. Generally, the people in your kingdom are your friends, the people outside the kingdom are enemies.

Hierarchy
"when you have been elected, you have to choose between" - ignore it. Kings will be a small minority, they are not important And please do not think in terms "if I become king" because statisticly it will be "when someone else become a king" The game has to be fun for those who are not kings, the fun of kings is not important (because they get ego boost, if they find it boring to be a king then can always abdicate, there will be hordes of players who would want to be kings no matter how boring, tedious, uneventful it would be ). Non kings are the ones the game should be designed for.

The same goes for "your vassals". As in each pyramid scheme the majority are at the bottom and have no vassals at all. And they can not gain vassals. It does not apply to all, but still to at least 50% of players. The game has to be geared toward the very bottom of the food chain. Those players are to have fun, that's the key (because, if you have any real players you rule over then you enjoy the game no matter how crappy the game is, because you have real power, therefore the high hierarchy players will accept almost anything and it is a waste of time worrying if they will like something )

In theory, the pyramid hierarchy is bad and will not work in multiplayer. I still decided to go for it because of immersion and realism. But even then I will try to make the hierarchy rather flat and not gamechanger. The worst thing that would happen is if everyone set their personal goal "to become a king".

Note also that I estimate some smaller kingdoms might have like only 10 active players (I'm an indie dev, my promotional budget is very limited). Only bigger kingdoms will have enough players to build a real hierarchy system.

Progression
This is where my biggest obstacle is. This would be my first game with no resets, I have no experience with that part. So I have to be careful what permanent assets players get (avoidance of snowball effect). I guess, over time the gameplay will degenerate (like to reach next level you need to play a year), but well, I can live with it. The choice I need to make is either short term fun and fast progression or longterm balance and longevity. I don't know how to bite it.

"if you want player-progression than its not a good start by giving them the highest "jobs" right away." - yes... I went the "everyone starts as a noble" route which has disadvantages. Generally, I dislike the whole titles/rank to be an indicator of progress. Probably some sort of personal estate which you care for and improve would be best as the focus of the game.