Economy talk

[wannyboy]

i would rather say like you ask Kiev major if he is sending caravans. He won't always have one but right now he does so he says he has one to Perekop. Then you get the option to invest in the caravan. This costs you lets say 500 for a place and then you can just fill up with goods just like you did in regular game.
The only thing that changes is that the destination is already decided and that you have to pay 500 extra for each caravan you run. You can pay extra money to reinforce the caravan, so if decide to pay 1000 instead of 500 the caravan has higher tier and more troops protecting it.
Maybe adding a caravan inventory, so instead of letting the mayor ask you what good you want to transport, you get a shop like screen, a inventory of 40 and you can just buy the items. This lets you pick your own balanced merchandise to sell, instead of only using 1 product.

 

[lotsofpaper]

But if the destination is already decided, then that mechanic wouldn't work wannyboy. It would be nearly impossible to make a reliable profit, ESPECIALLY if you had to buy the materials yourself.

 

[yehrom]

Well, I fear you only consider trading as "a support task" in the game... Trading is another Way to play, not a "mini-game".
M&B is more than a Rules_the_World game. And there is his richness and interest.
Even from a "conquistador" point of vue, it is far more interessing to be is a deep and consistent world.

With too basic economic mechanics, we lose it. Player has to "feel" them, not to immediatly "know" them. If your goal is that player can mostly planned exactly what he wants, so where is the interest to play ? That dont mean "hidden mechanics", just more deep in the mechanics concept, more deep in the game world, more "life" here.

There are already some tools ingame to let player learn economic's mechanics (and other), but there are badly almost all broken/unused :
- people's rumors => mostly inconsistent
- asking about prices (market option) => broken
- city's rumors (when entering city) => inconsistent
- merchant's guild (a lot of possibility here) => unused

Over auto-dynamic's rules, events that could impact economic system are unused (siege, army deployment/supply). That combined with a more coherent bandit's behaviour (against caravans considering their goods) could really improve the economic place and involve the trading aspect.

As the economic part was presented in WFAS features, I really had great hope on it. I am a bit disappointed at this time.

 

[nox]

Then the best you can do is make your suggestions. 

I agree - the system should be complex but intuitive so that a player gets the impact they expect, without necessarily knowing exactly what the numbers are ahead of time.

 

[wannyboy]

But if the destination is already decided, then that mechanic wouldn't work wannyboy. It would be nearly impossible to make a reliable profit, ESPECIALLY if you had to buy the materials yourself.

Why would buying your own goods give you less profit? When you start a caravan like it is now you also buy the goods yourself. The only difference is that you can only pick 1 kind of good the way it is now while buying the goods would allow you to have some more variation. Only thing that i dont realy know yet is what goods this caravan merchant should sell. The same goods as the regular goods merchant? Some fixed goods specific to each city?

 

[original]

Ok I am going to indulge in some brainstorming.  Be aware this is just me thinking out loud so if it's dumb, that's the point of it really.  To just throw an idea out.

It really wouldn't be hard to make 'investment' something sensible.

A few basic things as rules -

Interest rates are a reflection of risk.  When times are bad, interest rates are high.  In good times, they're low.

The player who 'invests' in a town would be lending money to the town's merchant guild, and would get a return based on how profitable the town was.  If the town gets sieged, loses caravans or whatnot then the player could lose some of their investment.  If the town does very well, the player could get whatever return was negotiated.  The merchant guild master would be the one offering terms.

That would give the player a very high incentive to defend things they had invested in and look after their well being.  That village getting sacked might otherwise cost you 20k. 

Also I think that rather than the player running these caravans, the player will be able to invest in the caravan - and can then escort it... or not.  If they don't and it gets wrecked, then the player doesn't get their money back. 

Grindy != fun.  I know if it's there, people will do it but they won't enjoy it and I can't balance around something with infinite income no matter what the effort.

* apologies to all of the MMO players out there.  I know some folks love grindy, but that's not the design intent here.

Grinding should be optional
No I don't like grinding either. There is unfortunately "renown" grinding now because it is the only way to get a large army. It's quite tedious for me during that phase which you coined, where the player doesn't have a place to house troops yet.

The idea is to give players the option to grind, but don't force it on us.

Say I want to grind my relations with Lords to 100 by doing quests, so that when you port Warband features over, I can just talk to Lords and ask them to vote for me for the place. I should have that option to grind quests with them, the very safe but grindy route to get high relations.
But grinding relations with Lords to 100 though questing shouldn't be the only way. It should be one of many choices the player can make. A player can also join in sieges and then get relation boosts with all Lords (Warband feature), the more risky but less grindy route to getting high relations.

Similarly, the economy you propose should be flexible enough to encourage many ways to get income, with varying grind and risk.

Interest rates
I think the interest rates reflecting the danger is a good idea. So during peace times, the interest rate is low. But during war times, the more factions the town wars with, or the more the town is being sieged, the higher the interest rates to reflect risk.

Caravans
Caravans being changed to make the escorting optional is a good change. The suggestions being proposed may make it more balanced:
1. Dynamic economy (either Warband's or your new formula) - Prices will vary so much that the player has no choice but to invest in the Trade skill to make a nice profit.
2. No infinite trade goods - Even if the player has found a place where Velvet sells cheap, the quantity may prevent you from selling too many of it.
3. Maybe cap the number of caravans you can send? Once every 3 days?

People have some interesting ideas about caravans. Keep them coming.

Trading should be optional!
When you create a new economy, it should be from a "choice" point of view. It should be one of the many ways to get income, something that isn't forced but is an option.

To make trading an optional source of income, the other methods of income should be balanced:
1. Income from prisoners (active) - Needs to be increased a lot, because it is an active way of getting income. The higher the risk and difficulty, the higher the income should be. Maybe make it easier to get income this way, by increasing the number of prisoners you can hold with Prisoner management, and giving a small chance for troops to be knocked unconscious despite being hit by a non-blunt weapon.
2. Income from enemy Lords (active) - The ransom amount is probably high enough, but wouldn't hurt to increase it for non-trading players. Or, make it so that the Prisoner Management skill increases your chances of capturing an enemy Lord. Or a 100% chance to capture the enemy Lord if he is knocked unconscious by a blunt weapon during battle.
3. Income from lands (passive) - Needs to be increased a bit, but not too much, due to passive income.
But make it so that it is very sensitive to prosperity and relation, so that the player has high income for actively defending his lands, and average income for not doing anything. If your village is being attacked, but you don't defend it, make it also suffer a relation penalty, but never dropping below 0. So the higher the relation and prosperity, the higher the income.
4. Income from banks (passive) - Definitely needs to be decreased to a meaningful number.
5. Income from quests (active) - Should they be increased for the quester?

Thus trading won't be the only way to get income, it is one of many. If a player doesn't want to do any trading, he doesn't have to. He can always just keep fighting to get and ransom off prisoners. That way everyone can be happy.

But trading should be the best way to make income, since it will be more challenging and time-consuming once you make the dynamic economy.

Others
I feel Persuasion or Charisma should increase your relation boost with either NPCs, or places. Right now the grind can be quite long.

 

[Achilla]

Interesting thread Nox, I'll give my input, though I'll not constrain myself only to technical aspects of in-game economy.

What I'd like to see personally is an economic-military 'complex' which is complete and inter-connected.

I. The current situation

Speaking of Warband, activities such as:

- goods trade & enterprise development
- army management/leadership
- slave trade
- fief development
- political career
- grand-scheme kingdom management

all feel largely like separate mini-games, which very loosely connect with each other.

Selling prisoners is simply a function of how often and whom you fight, your prisoner management skill and how often you visit slavers - all it does is increase your income (there is no impact on the world at all, just your purse).

Goods trade is another blatantly obvious means of acquiring income, and having to compete with other money-making activities it's more of a 'time vs money' choice (whether it actually pays off to do at any given moment) than a career to pursue with it's own unique benefits.

Enterprise development, just like slave trade and goods trade, is completely detached from the world of politics, and your personal development as a living character in the world - there is absolutely no impact on your reputation with other lords, it doesn't open any political venues and it has no bearing on the grand-scheme economy (other entrepreneurs? these don't even exist! other lords? they have passive income from simple money script, they don't care about economy at all, just their fief holdings!).

Fief development, given it's semi-random nature of actually paying off (if at all), plus the amount of time, money and baby-sitting (you'd often finish game 5-6 times already by the time you fully upgraded all your fiefs) - and being just another detached mini-game (with the only goal of giving you income!), it simply loses out in the 'time vs money' rat race introduced by competitive rivals! It's not necessary to maintain positive balance of payments, it doesn't really compensate for your loses when trade goes off (because enemy faction invading/pillaging your lands is your most common and most severe threat!) and it gives you absolutely nothing in terms of political prestige, army/kingdom management and personal development.

I won't go into detail with political career and kingdom management, because they suffer from the very same problems (and likely deserve their own thread) as the 'player's income-based economy' - they are separate mini-games, which all 'fight' for the player's time, give very little in return and are completely unnecessary/redundant to win the game or develop your character to a stage that you are satisfied with it, and want to simply meet the victory conditions.

To cut the crap short - what is the ******** problem, you ask? Two things!

The player's success is a function of how much money he has, and little else (time? time is money!).

Everything else comes secondary, tertiary or is completely redundant. Did you just start the game? Your equipment is poor, your funds are scarce, your character is weak. Bandit encounter? Hah, run for your life, miserable fool! 3 months later? Accompanied by 100 Swadian knights, you ride to battle on Swadian charger and cut through the rabble with your vicious morning star like there was no tomorrow! The difficulty doesn't scale properly/at all, there is no interesting character development. 99% of your effectiveness comes from your bottomless jar of gold.

Did you find a Philosopher's stone, perhaps!? Immortality and endless money!?

Well, no, you didn't. But the game's system is broken, and that's why there is so little to do in the game once you have the money. Now you can only steamroll or quit, because there is nothing else worth your time and dedication necessary to win the game, or develop your character (in meaningful and interesting ways) further.

Lack of consequence.

It doesn't matter what you do, unless it gets you money. And if it gets you money, it is completely pointless and redundant unless it has the best reward/risk or reward/time ratio.

Did you just loot this caravan? Yeah, nice loot. Is the caravan's owner angry? No, not at all! Whether he is a wealthy merchant (he doesn't exist?) or faction's lord (he doesn't care?), there is absolutely NO consequence of your actions.

So what should happen?

Merchants should get angry with you, cut their own crap and form a merchant league against you. They should ruin your trade, refuse to sell you food and equipment or sell at extraordinarily high prices and send mercenary war-parties, either after your caravans, or after your head! Poisoning your fiefs, rousing your peasants and sending assassins & thugs after you would do nicely as well.

But it doesn't happen! There is no alternative cost involved with looting that caravan, besides the alternative cost of doing something that brings you more money in the same time span!

But the same goes both ways - destroy lord's party, catch him prisoner, then sell him back for family ransom's worth ... and what?

Yeah, he just re-spawned with a full army out of nowhere. He didn't even move his fat ass to recruit fresh cannon fodder to his army, or go after his fiefs to collect rents. He might well be broke and fiefless, but he still has money without moving a finger! He doesn't trade, he doesn't take loans. Frankly, he doesn't care! Apparently he is a wizard, and with magic wand's one move he is able to walk on water and turn blood to wine!


II. Proposed changes

1. Go away with 'scripted' AI economy.

I want AI lords which go through exactly the same hurdles as the player does.

Some lords have a faction, some don't (they just arrived to Calradia? they lost their sovereign's favour? they 'quit' the business after all their belongings were happily raided by enemy war party?). Some lords are military specialists, others indulge only in beer, wine, women, gossip and politics, the other ones prefer to build their own, little 'trade empires' and are largely unconcerned with war, as it tends to bring more ruin than profit in the long run. This basically calls for more individualised 'AI profiles' which actually mean something besides player-NPC dialogue preferences, loyalty to own liege or attitude towards lords with a different personality or goals in mind.

I want to see Lords which have their own goals and priorities in mind, and which build their own enterprises, send their own trade caravans, go on their own trade expeditions and pro-actively develop their fiefs. I want to see lords go broke after losing their fiefs, losing their caravans and losing their army, only to be thrown to jail for next 5 years and see their own wife pledge 'vows of fidelity' to another man. This also means lords which actually recruit from their kingdom's fiefs (recruitment system would need reworking to accommodate this many recruits), instead of being given near-instant 'AI reinforcements' each single time they got their arse whooped hard by the player.

So why is it important?

It is important, because the player's actions have fundamentally no meaning. It is pointless to trade. It is pointless to catch prisoners. It is pointless to develop fiefs. The only thing that matters is securing your income the easiest & fastest way possible, 'feasting' your kingdom lords to a state of drunken loyalty and then dividing own kingdom by half through rebellion. After that you simply steam-roll all other factions and 'buy' enemy lords through promises. There is little strategy, cunning and choice-making involved - it all comes down to grinding your enemies down.

tl'dr

Lack of player's sense of accomplishment comes from the sources of flawed game design - player's military-political-economic development is completely detached from 'the game', and the individual parts of this development are connected very loosely.

Cause and effect.

I grinded particular lord to the ground with his army, then looted all his belongings? I want his peasants to hate him for all the pillaging & looting I've done upon them, to support my army on the march. I want his wife to hate him for having my soldiers indulge in a drunken sex orgy with her in the bedchamber. I want his liege to hate him for bringing him great shame, ridicule and dissent throughout his kingdom.

I want him to rot in prison for the next 15 years, until he dies of old age, famine or disease - and if I decide to release him, I want him to pledge undying loyalty to me, only to pierce my back with a knife when I'm not looking, escape by the next full moon thanks to bribed guards or have a love affair with my own wife - in rare occasions he could indeed remain loyal, as long as I've titles and lands to bestow under his protection, or at least guarantee him a safe 'retirement', far away from political intrigue and atrocities of war.

Was he a son of influential, wealthy noble? Powerful noble lineage, or perhaps his king's most trusted man? I want my caravans to be pillaged and looted by unnamed assailants if that's the consequence. In the same vein I might secure a profitable trade agreement which will last for as long as my prisoner is well-fed and protected from harm. Or better yet, I might blackmail the royal family itself into giving me what I want for this valuable prisoner?

Cause and effect people.

Your personal character development shouldn't be detached from grand-scheme economy and politics, but be an integral part of it, competing with other lords under even rules & conditions, but uneven starting ground.

2. Introduce 'the people' to the game

What is that?

The peasant, you miserable fool!

The noble.

The city rat.

The merchant.

I want the rulers to be truly dependant on their vassals to wage war and oversee their fiefs, to an unseen extent. I want the rulers & vassals be on merchant's class mercy in order to buy their luxuries, fund their military expeditions and develop their belongings, as well as their political careers. I want the peasants to be in grim situation, but determined enough to actually rebel under a courageous rabble rouser, or even become bandits themselves!

Your character's cultural & social background should have a much more profound effect on your character development as well, and it should really make a difference whether you are a vassal of kingdom A or kingdom B, or from which kingdoms your own vassals are from.

 

[infinitegamer]

It would be cool to see you being able to create work camps. for slaves.

 

[wannyboy]

dont think there were much slaves in those ages but if there were, i would love to see the take slaves option at enemy villages, letting you attack the enemy while they are unprepared meaning you won't have to fight a force of villagers but just pluck unexpected farmers from the field

 

[nox]

dont think there were much slaves in those ages but if there were, i would love to see the take slaves option at enemy villages, letting you attack the enemy while they are unprepared meaning you won't have to fight a force of villagers but just pluck unexpected farmers from the field

I am pretty sure there was plenty of forced labor and there are historical records of forced military service.  I think in this period we're still dealing with the post-roman emancipation, so slave trade is largely nonexistent ... I think.  I might be wrong about that.

The game already has ramun and slave dealers, which are probably not really that big of a stretch.

One of the things I do want to add is to permit the player to force villagers into service at the expense of his political standing.  Obviously these troops won't amount to much, but sometimes that's all you need.

 

[yehrom]

Well, I share the same wishes that Achilla perfectly explained.

About the HowTo, it is in my mind in the good layer's structure instead of actual separated parts (ak mini-game).
It would work for economic as strategic (military) as politic fields, and you can easly cross them then.
Layers can be player-friendly or game mechanic friendly (ak hidden or unlighted), you can manage them as you want. They can act also as bridge for a progressiv knoweldge about inside mechanic that player can dig without being a forced way.

Sorry if my english is not clear as the Achilla's one 

 

[Auldman]

Slavery plays a part in the novel "With Fire and Sword." The claim is the main motivation for the Tatars to aid the Cossacks was the promise of slaves. I checked on this and a major part of the Crimean economy in the period was selling slaves to the slave dealers in Istanbul.

 

[wannyboy]

hmm then slave hunters should also be reintroduced. They were nice in warband but think they need a bit polishing:
-They belong to a faction(including bandits)
-They should attack villages for slaves
-They should attack villagers who are going to a market or if they are strong enough try to attack a caravans
-If they bring prisonners to a city, it grows in wealth making them quite usefull
-They should attack player if he has small enough army. When this happens you can be ransomed if you are with a kingdom or if you are on your own, you are sold into slavery. After some time, they say you succeed to escape and then you are given the option to try to just run away, however being naked and only having a hatchet or you can decide to try and gather your belongings. If you do, you spawn naked with your hatchet and have to kill 2 or 3 guards to reach the storage room where you find all your equipment that has been sold together with you. This would be a bit like the russian prison escape quest.


Anyone likes this?
Just spamming each idea that i come up with like usual

 

[original]

What Achilles wants is basically a brand new game. 

Jokes aside, yes those are very nice ideas to make the world more alive. They're actually more for the sequel Mount & Blade 2.

 

[yehrom]

Nothing there requier a new engine. It was design in this way, they just have stop to push forward theses parts since a while... badly. But the stone still there. 

 

[nox]

I am not at all afraid to try new things.  That's what I get paid to do. 

I believe it's possible to create an economy model that is both complex enough not to be obvious but simple enough to produce results that make sense and intuitive enough that the player can affect it and achieve a plausible outcome.

 

[Noudelle]

hmm then slave hunters should also be reintroduced. They were nice in warband but think they need a bit polishing:
-They belong to a faction(including bandits)
-They should attack villages for slaves
-They should attack villagers who are going to a market or if they are strong enough try to attack a caravans
-If they bring prisonners to a city, it grows in wealth making them quite usefull
-They should attack player if he has small enough army. When this happens you can be ransomed if you are with a kingdom or if you are on your own, you are sold into slavery. After some time, they say you succeed to escape and then you are given the option to try to just run away, however being naked and only having a hatchet or you can decide to try and gather your belongings. If you do, you spawn naked with your hatchet and have to kill 2 or 3 guards to reach the storage room where you find all your equipment that has been sold together with you. This would be a bit like the russian prison escape quest.


Anyone likes this?
Just spamming each idea that i come up with like usual

in fact : man hunters are now soldiers of the secret department or something... but theyre still there I KNOW IT

 

[wannyboy]

those secret department dudes what are they?

 

[lotsofpaper]

What, the "marksmen of the secret department"? They are marksmen. They work for the secret department.

What is the secret department you ask?

it's a secret.

As a side note, ranged units like them are fun to run over while they're reloading. Haha, reload that again sucker, my horse kicked you. Now I got off my horse and kicked you. Haha.

 

[original]

I feel the best way to start having more of the cause-and-effect feel would be to change how Faction Relation works.

New Faction Relation
As I've mentioned in one thread, currently increasing honor will increase your reputation with good-natured NPC Lords.

Make it so that increasing your Faction relation will increase your relation with all villages, fortresses and towns of that faction.
The maximum faction relation is currently 100, so to prevent it from being too good, you can only increase it by 1 for every 2 faction relation. So with a 100 faction relation, the highest you can increase a place's relation in this manner is +50. You you can even make it harder by only increasing places' relations by 1 for every 4 faction relation (+25 at 100 faction relation).
Also make it more difficult to increase like Honor and renown.

This isn't the best "cause-and-effect" method, but it's a small change that adds a bit more meaning whenever you help your faction.

How to increase Faction Relation
You can add new ways to increase Faction Relation. Faction Relation involves helping your entire nation, as opposed to helping individual entities.

I'm not too clear, but currently it increases if you defend patrols and caravans (maybe villagers too?).

1. Through Fighting. How about increasing it whenever you participate in a successful siege? You are helping your nation by increasing its lands.
2. Through Trading/Money. Donating money to the war effort. This will not only increase faction relation, but also have additional effects by giving your Lords more money to recruit soldiers.
3. Through questing. Helping your ruler. Back then helping the ruler = helping the nation, because the ruler = the nation or something.

That way everyone can increase faction relation.