Thursday, November 29, 2007

Design story - Dak craft a big chest

Dak wants to use his new skills he learned earlier. He will craft a big chest.

He open his skills window and right click on the "Craft big chest" skill and select "Use" from the context menu (he could also double click!).

The crafting window then opens. On the left, his inventory is shown and on the right, empty slots showing him the needed items to craft a big chest.

He sees that to craft a big chest, he needs 1 small chest, 3 units of wood and 1 unit of iron. "A small chest?" he asked shocked. Yep, a small chest is needed to craft a big chest and here's why.

As characters gets new skills, previous skills become less important if not useless. What's the point of buying a small chest if you can get a big chest for just a little bit more money. New players might feel the first skills they're learning are quite useless since they won't be able to compete with others. Here comes the grind...

By creating the need of lesser items to craft better ones, we then assure that even new players are able to participate in the economy. New players can be recruited by veterans to craft for them the items needed for their own crafting.

While this might not be realistic, I feel this is a good way to make sure no skills just become part of some boring grind and that even new players can feel useful.

So Dak check the items needed to first craft a small chest. Two units of wood and one unit of iron are needed. He could go cut some wood himself and mine some iron but it would then take him too much time and he really wants his chest now (and he's really lazy). So he find a merchant and buy the items needed.

Again, he opens the crafting window and put the corresponding items
in the empty slots. He make sure he has enough time points to craft the chest (crafting requires X amount of time points) and press the "Craft" button.

The used items are removed from his inventory and a small chest is added. Dak will then be ready to craft his big chest!

edit: On second thought, instead of using a small chest to craft a big one, maybe a notion of generic wood (iron, ...) modules could be introduced. Those would just be items only used to craft other items.

That way, new players could still play an active role in a more realistic model. Those generic modules would just items like any others. Anyway, at that point it's easy to change this.

2 Comments:

Poo Bear said...

So is this correct then:

A veteran player walks up to a newbie and says "hi, could you help me out with some wood and metal? I'll give you a silver coin for 10 units of each." The newbie has 20 units of "time" available so he agrees. He uses his wood and metal mining skills, spends the points and generates the items. He then trades them with the veteran.

Does the newbie have to go to the mountains to generate the metal and to the forest to generate the wood? Does he need a pick and an axe equipped? If he has the "time" points can he just instantly generate what he wants or does he need to go through the motions of clicking the pick on the rock, etc? Does 20 "time" units guarantee a certain amount of wood/metal or does it give you 20 attempts and it depends on your skills?

Interesting stuff, certainly makes me think of lots of questions. I'm sure the answers will emerge as things develop :)

Over00 said...

Yep, you're example is right. That way, the veteran player doesn't have to waste time points on less exciting things and the newbie becomes an active player.

Does the newbie have to go to the mountains to generate the metal and to the forest to generate the wood?

Something in this line would be my intention but not at the cost of just adding something boring to do. So there's probably always be 2 options: either get the wood from the forest (request time points) or buy it from a merchant (only request money). That way, someone not wanting to waste his time with woodcutting wouldn't have to go through a boring task. The cost from the merchant should also be a bit high to allow players to create their own wood market.

Also, I'd like to have something that allow players to battle for resources. Maybe a forest could provide 100 wood units before running out of wood (it could regenerate X units per day). That way, resources would play an active part of the world and not just be useless graphics that you must click on. But this is just early thoughts.

Does he need a pick and an axe equipped?

The way the system works, I can link skills with some types of equipment. So there could be the need to use an axe to cut wood. My mind is not set on this though but the possibility is there.

If he has the "time" points can he just instantly generate what he wants or does he need to go through the motions of clicking the pick on the rock, etc?

Unless I find a fun way to handle resources gathering (like a mini-game), it will be just a window asking how many time points you want to spend cutting wood or mining iron (or something like that). If it's not fun, it will be a click once action.

Does 20 "time" units guarantee a certain amount of wood/metal or does it give you 20 attempts and it depends on your skills?

It will depends on skills. A character with "Woodcutting level 1" (just made up the name) will be able to cut 2 units of wood per 20 time points (those are just random numbers I'm throwing just to show my thoughts).

A character that trained "Woodcutting level 2" would be able to cut 2 units of wood per 15 time (or 3 units for 20 time points) points and so on. That way, players that only wants to do trading and crafting could specialize just like anyone, making them better at their task.

Interesting stuff, certainly makes me think of lots of questions. I'm sure the answers will emerge as things develop :)

Questions are always welcome! It helps me to think about things I might have not yet thought about and helps me to develop my design.