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- - By ala [de] Date 2011-02-09 09:42
Just opening up a discussion about the function of the base, a few general thoughts while I'm having breakfast:

The main reason to have a base in strategy games such as Age of Empires or Stronghold for example is the supply of fresh new man with which you can expand your settlement scenario, or with which you can battle other players. The second common aspect is to use it as a store room in which the resources are gathered and protected.

In the Settlers 3 there is no base: Each section of the players settlement is protected by a tower or another military structure which controls and protects the area. Resources just lie around - and can be stolen with thieves (actually very nice detail, my multiplayer opponent is faster and starts producing army - to avoid defeat I move thieves to his forge and steal his weapons).

Another thing are the supply buildings for example in Sim City which provide energy and water to the settlement. In some strategy games they are the weak point of the players. The base won't be attacked at all - the enemies just attack the settlements supply and defeat their opponents in combat, because of the advantage which came from these supplies.

In a jump and run, the bases most important function is protection from all the monsters.
Finally: The base's trading possibilities comes from settlement games like Anno 1602, where trading is one of the most important things for a working economy.

In space strategy games a base or a planet provides fuel, protection, repairs, stores at cetera. In RPG games the function is similar: "Cities" provide protection, new quests and new items.

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This implies: The base is a direct design decision for the game. For example: Peters building concept without entering buildings is very unpopular because it eliminates the safety function of the base.
But we can probably do this: In some games, the bases functions got seperated: For example in: A market, a place for sleeping and houses, whitch would provide new clonks instead.

Breakfast finished, here you go.
Parent - By AlteredARMOR [ua] Date 2011-02-09 14:57
Well, the discussion about separating the functions of the base (in the meaning CR base was) raside from time to time quite often. A lot of people agreed on not having the base building (wooden/stone/hay hut) concolidate protection/trading/clonk-making functions. Now the only thing left is to actualy define which buildings would serve which function (that is the problem which have been discussed with no explicit success for a long time) :-)

Any relevant ideas are still highly appreciated
Reply
Parent - - By Zapper [de] Date 2011-02-09 17:34
The most important functionality of a "base" was to buy and sell stuff in Clonk Rage in my opinion. I know we want to change the buying&selling functionality so that the focus should become to build a working production/infrastructure instead of buying and selling everything.

But one plus that the old base functionality had should not be forgotten: You could actually drop the player right into any landscape.
He is in a cave and has to work his way out to find trees and produce wood? No problem, you can buy 5 wood for your start if you need to.
He is stuck between some rock formations that are blocking both sides of the base? No problem, you can buy a limited amount of explosives in the beginning to help you surpass those starting difficulties.

While I have nothing against the change of the focus of the trading system, I am of the opinion that we should not throw ot the you-can-buy-everything-with-gold functionality. Make it more expensive, make it limited, make it getting more expensive the more you buy, make it really unattractive for the player, but put it into the game.
Also I think that Clonks should be dropped into the landscape with a temporary base: A tent for example. Nothing more annoying than when your first base is in a very bad location.

TL;DR: Make the "base" a market place that provides you with stuff that you could need in the beginning of a game to get a decent infrastructure/settlement going.
Parent - - By Ringwaul [ca] Date 2011-02-09 17:59
I agree with basically everything in this post, and I especially like this:

>Also I think that Clonks should be dropped into the landscape with a temporary base: A tent for example. Nothing more annoying than when your first base is in a very bad location.

Reply
Parent - - By Kizzurazzgabi [us] Date 2011-02-09 21:19
Support the idea
tents are mobile, where you start out most likely isn't where you want to stay.

Also this may not be exactly on topic, but i think rain puddles should evaporate over time. i love the idea of weather, but not if rain just sits there. Not only does your starting home have a chance to get flooded(At the bottom of a hill) and IF you DONT start off with a tent, that poses a little issue.
Reply
Parent - - By Ringwaul [ca] Date 2011-02-10 04:05
A cloud system using evaporation was the first thing I created for OpenClonk. ;)
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Parent - By Kizzurazzgabi [us] Date 2011-02-24 03:28
WOOT WOOT!
Reply
Parent - By PeterW [de] Date 2011-02-13 14:28

> No problem, you can buy a limited amount of explosives in the beginning to help you surpass those starting difficulties.


In my kind of system, this would look like follows:
1. Build flagpole from flag (free)
2. Use hammer, build a chemical lab directly next to it (for gold)
3. Use chemical lab to build flints (for gold)

Therefore, a hammer, a flag and a bit of gold are still enough to bootstrap you out of whatever situation you are in.
Parent - - By PeterW [de] Date 2011-02-13 14:23
In my opinion, the main problem with the base is that it is a very cluttered concept. We have:
* Movement restrictions for enemy
* Healing
* Buying / Selling

For tactical reasons, I would try to move as many functions as possible out of the base concept:
* Movement restrictions are done by structural buildings (castle-style), becoming more costly but also a lot more powerful.
* Healing could also extend more (area effect?)
* Buying/Selling would require buildings, which could be balanced by making them cheaper.

On top of that, I'm thinking about giving it other effects too, like transmitting electricity to get rid of those horrible power lines.

> Peters building concept without entering buildings is very unpopular because it eliminates the safety function of the base.


Uhm, elaborate? I'm not eliminating anything, I just associate it with an extra cost, therefore giving it strategical value.
Parent - - By Zapper [de] Date 2011-02-13 14:55

>* Healing could also extend more (area effect?)


I don't like that. That does not seem to fit in my opinion. Mainly because it is some "magical"/random effect that does not really fit into the new steampunk-ish style and because the definition of a base is a bit vague in Clonk: Do you heal in front of all your buildings? Do you heal in X range of your flagpole? Why is it X and not Y range?
I have nothing against removing the "magic" healing functionality from the base. But I would exchange it for the possibility to buy cookies/potions there that you can use to heal yourself - and, that you can produce yourself once you have a decent infrastructure.

>* Buying/Selling would require buildings, which could be balanced by making them cheaper.


So the buildings would even be cheaper if you do not want to buy/sell stuff there? That sounds like it would be setting up a infrastructure/production lines a lot more boring.
How would that work with faster melees? Where you will want to buy 90% of the stuff without setting up an infrastructre but, if you have a sulphur vein below your base, may want to produce specific items yourself.
Parent - - By PeterW [gb] Date 2011-02-14 12:08

> Do you heal in X range of your flagpole? Why is it X and not Y range?


Funny that you should mention it - that's actually what I'd prefer right now. Whatever definition I come up with, it's still more cumbersome and leads to more corner cases than the simple "everything in X radius" rule. Yet again kind-of stolen from CX. And hey, the Settlers did it and I don't consider it to be the worst thing in their games.

The design would look something like this: Each constructed flagpole has two areas:
* Radius X: Structural buildings block enemies, open for friends. You can build and produce from gold. Maybe slow healing (see below).
* Radius 2X: Enemies can't construct anything (especially no flagpoles!)

The main idea is to never allow one area to belong to two bases at the same time. The nice thing is that the "blocking zone" also elegantly solves the whole "Someone can just build another tower in front of my castle to get inside" problem. Big castles would have to have multiple flags, which I consider to be a good thing - this means you can have a fight over parts of it.

Following this, a conquered flagpole would have to deconstruct - because it might be in the blocking zone of another flag of the same color. This means that conquering big bases isn't as trivial as flying your own flag: After removing the enemy flag, you still have to get rid of the blocking flags before you can claim the terrain. Removing it is still a very good idea as it might disable structural buildings and therefore make entry easier. If the base is big enough, this makes it possible to have proper fights over its parts.

The really tricky part is how the visualization could work. I would propose to show the "borders" once you have the proper tools in your hand (building hammer, flagpole, anything else that builds something). As only the own "base" zone and the enemy "block" zone are directly interesting, we should get away with only showing those two.

On top of that, we might give Clonks some sort of feedback when they are in a proper base zone - so they can see when passive effects like healing apply to them.
Parent - - By Zapper [de] Date 2011-02-14 17:42 Edited 2011-02-14 17:50

>Funny that you should mention it - that's actually what I'd prefer right now


I know, you already mentioned that ;)

I don't like the whole flagpole thing :/
What do you want to solve/achieve with it? The only issue I can agree with in CR was that you could build a tower (only when construction material was deactivated!!!) to get into the enemy base (walk there->activate conkit->build tower->jump into base). But I do not think we could not solve that another way than restricting construction by introducing some magical flagpole-base-radius.

Not talking about the healing here, because that is not necessarily linked to the flagpoles.

I am currently all for letting the player do stuff as freely as possible (sandbox like) and try to build an interesting and fun game experience around that.

PS: Why can the player not build a building at that position? Because it makes sense gameplay-wise? Because it is not appropriate to have that building at that position? No, because someone decided at some point that you should need a magic flagpole to build stuff.
Parent - - By PeterW [gb] Date 2011-02-14 17:59 Edited 2011-02-14 18:11
I don't understand what you're saying. We had flags in CR, we would have them in OC for the very same reason: So there's a method of transferring ownership. Something to fight over. When you remove the need to have a base building, what's left is the flag itself. We still need some sort of delaying element in there so ownership doesn't become purely twitch-based, therefore the building part. I feel like making bases about regions could introduce strategic depth, that's the only new part. That's the reasoning in a nutshell. What's the alternative?

> No, because someone decided at some point that you should need a magic flagpole to build stuff.


It's the other way round: You can't build because a magic flagpole is blocking you. Not having an own flag nearby just means that you need to bring the materials or temporarily fly your flag until the building is finished. Bases are magic anyway, we just need to make sure it's the right kind of magic.

(mind the edits)
Parent - - By Zapper [de] Date 2011-02-14 18:12

>What's the alternative?


The alternative would be to allow access to all the buildings for everyone who physically CAN access them.
What would be the examples?
The enemy can use your sawmill/furnace/anvil? Why not if he brought charcoal and ore? Unlike in CR he cannot hide in there anyway.
The enemy can open your tower/drawbridge? Why not if he made it into your castle in the first place. If he somehow made it in there he should as well be able to open the drawbridge for his teammate.

The only tricky thing is the trading (buying/selling) building. And I think that trading outpost could be linked to our old CR flag. That would actually make sense for the player without any magic :)

I am assuming that there is no building that you can enter and that automatically denies access to enemies (like the CR "base"). And I think that issue is basically what your worries are about?
Parent - - By PeterW [gb] Date 2011-02-14 18:22 Edited 2011-02-14 18:25
Physical access is a very, very shaky concept. It practically means that every castle with a hole belongs to everyone. Both teams would essentially open up everything in order to not get locked out - at which point the castle might as well not exist at all.

Plus the whole access thing creates a lot of overhead on the team that's using it. You need to keep Clonks that open and close doors, etc. If one Clonk is inside a castle, he effectively can't exit it without either locking himself out or leaving it wide-open for an enemy. He can just wait until an enemy puts a proper hole into the castle and walzes in. That's not fun.

> The enemy can use your sawmill/furnace/anvil? Why not if he brought charcoal and ore? Unlike in CR he cannot hide in there anyway.


Seriously? You're attacking, why on earth would you want to do that before removing the enemy flag?
Parent - - By Zapper [de] Date 2011-02-14 19:31

>Seriously? You're attacking, why on earth would you want to do that before removing the enemy flag?


Why I would want to use the enemy anvil? I dunno, you made it sound like your buildings needed a protection ;)

>Physical access is a very, very shaky concept. It practically means that every castle with a hole belongs to everyone. Both teams would essentially open up everything in order to not get locked out - at which point the castle might as well not exist at all.


So your main doubts about that would be that A) you cannot enter your own castle from the outside and B) while the enemy is inside your castle your gates are useless (assuming he actually opened all of them manually instead of doing whatever he wanted to do in your base).
I think we should try to think of interesting solutions without a building restriction (and some magic radius). That could for example be keys that you use to open doors that you set up with locks (but you lose the key on death), "sensor" mechanisms (think of dwarf fortress pressure plates) that allows you to link certain doors to sensors and whatever more.
Parent - - By PeterW [gb] Date 2011-02-14 20:22 Edited 2011-02-14 20:30
I'm actually way beyond doubts - pretty sure that this is a far superior system. Conquering is something that's essential to base combat, and we need to put effort into it working as cleanly as possible - no implicit stuff.  A few more arguments off the top of my head, before I need to start repeating points from older posts:

It might be nice to have very complex and open-worldy things at your disposal with which to fight. But your goals should be as clear as possible. Get to the flag, fly your own. Otherwise you end up with newbies like me being glad to have managed to get into the enemy base, only realizing that I have no idea how to proceed from here.

Another angle: Physical access is not something good to fight over ultimately. It is something you will end up fighting over anyway, just with the way Clonk combat works. So why make it the end of all things? That just kills interesting situations where one side has the high ground but doesn't have a flag. Sure, scenarios might provide such goals on their own, but our goal here is to make something that works out-of-the-box.
Parent - - By Zapper [de] Date 2011-02-14 21:22
Okay, I see your points and maybe we could meet somewhere halfway (even though that probably also needs a lot of discussion ;)  ).

What currently bothers me most is the healing thing and restrictions on building locations/usage of buildings that are not made as defensive structures.
My proposal right now would be: You can use every production building without restrictions everywhere. Defensive structures on the other hand (towers) and maybe some special structures (gun turret that you can enter/grab) can only be used/entered when inside your or an allied homebase zone (your flags) - or better: When not inside an enemy zone ("neutral" buildings).
Only those structures would have building restrictions inside enemy zones. Those buildings could visually be marked with some kind of flag as a "military building" - the flag would also show the color of the owner of the homebase zone.

That would probably keep what you want (the flags as an ultimate goal to conquer the enemys' base or parts of that base) and still would keep the you-can-do-everything-in-your-sandbox (in pure settlement scenarios without enemies mainly) charm
Parent - - By PeterW [gb] Date 2011-02-14 21:56

> My proposal right now would be: You can use every production building without restrictions everywhere.


I don't mind. Note that my post didn't even mention that anymore - just that structural buildings block enemies. And that you can't buy stuff, because it's not your base.

> or better: When not inside an enemy zone ("neutral" buildings).


Yep, that's exactly how I intended it to be. Neutral buildings may be used by all, as long as it makes sense. Not sure what this means for doors, for example: Should they open by default to anybody, or stay closed? Maybe open just from the inside? I'd hate if we had to implement manual door control just for this...
Parent - - By Newton [de] Date 2011-02-14 22:22

>had to implement manual door control just for this...


func Interact() { if(open) Close(); else Open(); }
Done.
Parent - By PeterW [gb] Date 2011-02-14 23:40
Do you need to be close for Interact? You wouldn't be able to stand on the doors in order to open them, because of solid mask and stuff. You could implement some sort of exception for Clonks standing on the inside... but this is all very awkward. Having all doors remain closed would seem most natural to me right now. That way an abandoned castle would still be an obstacle of sorts.
Parent - - By Zapper [de] Date 2011-02-15 06:29
Now that I slept on it I really think again providing the player with a bunch of mechanisms to set up his castle so that he and only he can open it from the outside would be a lot more intuitive/better. Than that random flag.

What convinced me in the first place was that you said the players would automatically have a goal in a melee scenario (get to the next flag and conquer it).
But now after thinking about it (especially with the Caedes thing in mind that I am going to post) such a goal could be counterproductive.
Parent - - By PeterW [gb] Date 2011-02-15 12:07

> Now that I slept on it I really think again providing the player with a bunch of mechanisms to set up his castle so that he and only he can open it from the outside would be a lot more intuitive/better.


Exactly my thinking. Hence the flag.

> Than that random flag.


... what?
Parent - - By Zapper [de] Date 2011-02-15 17:30
"mechanisms" as in "see dwarf fortress"
(levers, locks, gears, keys, whatever)
Parent - By PeterW [gb] Date 2011-02-15 17:39
That sounds way to complicated. Do you really want to force players to have to think about which key opens which door? Do you really want to have to replace all locks if one of your Clonks gets killed? That's insane. Instead of letting the player build the same "let only my Clonks in" implementation over and over again, we should provide a robust implementation ourselves.

Apart from this, levers do sound interesting. You could try to flood parts of your castle with acid at the right moments...
Parent - - By Newton [de] Date 2011-02-14 22:19
Talking about magic radius... weren't you part of the Caedes team? They had something like this, no?
Parent - - By Zapper [de] Date 2011-02-14 22:47
Yepp, Caedes was something completely different though.

Fun Fact: The building system was why Caedes died ;)
Parent - By B_E [de] Date 2011-02-14 22:52
And everybody still keeps blaiming pluto :)
Parent - By Zapper [de] Date 2011-02-15 06:37
PS, I would like to elaborate that a bit:
In Caedes you had a Hazard-like shooter with the possibility to build buildings that would need energy. You would set up energy nodes to transmit that energy to where on the map you needed it, making those energy nodes a fragile point in your security to protect.
While sounding cool in theory, the problem was the following:
Capturing/destroying the enemy buildings was important, too important. Killing an enemy on the other hand would only provide you with a very short time advantage. So you would naturally carry weapons/gadgets to kill buildings fast and try to sneak throught he enemys' base and blow up stuff (instead of guns/pvp weapons).
Still nothing wrong with that, in theory. Fact was that the fun part about Hazard-like shooters is to fight your opponent with the various weapons you have at your disposal. If you actually try to dodge fights the whole time just to get to that building, blow it up and run away the whole time, the player-versus-player aspect (that is the fun part about a melee) was not really important anymore.

I currently think the goal of a melee should be to kill the enemy crew - just because that enforces player-vs-player combat! (for example: Every player has X Clonks at his disposal, if all are dead or the cannot afford more he is eliminated)
You would naturally want to weaken your opponents defense and get into his castle - but not to conquer some magic flag but to actually have an advantage while fighting the enemy!
Parent - - By Kizzurazzgabi [us] Date 2011-02-24 01:34
Why would access be a problem if you have multiple clonks? if one gets locked out then you should have a few more in the castle.

If someone removed ALL their clonks out of their castle then i think they would deserve to be taken over lol
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Parent - - By Zapper [de] Date 2011-02-24 06:23

>Why would access be a problem if you have multiple clonks? if one gets locked out then you should have a few more in the castle.


Well, PeterW would like to remove multiple Clonks ;)
But I think there are enough vetos so that this is not going to happen anytime soon :)
Parent - - By PeterW [gb] Date 2011-02-24 11:09
Well, now it's essentially in the hand of the scenario designers.
Parent - - By Kizzurazzgabi [us] Date 2011-02-25 05:55
Is it official?
Personally reading through the forums i haven't found any convincing reasons to remove that from clonk.
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Parent - By Zapper [de] Date 2011-02-25 06:22
No, it's not official, see "But I think there are enough vetos so that this is not going to happen anytime soon :) "
Parent - By Newton [de] Date 2011-02-25 11:29
I also think that it wouldn't make sense to remove that feature from Clonk. But I agree with Peter that for most scenarios, more than one clonk is not really needed. So, see PeterW, essentially it's in the hand of the individual scenario designer.
Parent - - By Günther [de] Date 2011-02-14 23:25

> It practically means that every castle with a hole belongs to everyone.


Just like in real life everybody can ransack your home if you leave the door open. (Except that the real barrier is the law enforcement, and the door just a mostly symbolic gesture.) Assuming that law enforcement is unavailable and you can't hire security guards for some reason, what do you do? Traditionally, dogs. Well, dogs might or might not work, but since we're using fictional technology, all kinds of other automatic defense mechanisms are thinkable. Not being able to build a building because that gun is firing at you is a little more intuitive than mere distance to a flag. And it wouldn't even need to be a particularly effective gun - just effective enough to slow building down a lot, but not so good that you would use it for offense.
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Parent - - By PeterW [gb] Date 2011-02-14 23:36
We aren't really talking houses here, but heavily fortified castles, probably built with invasion in mind. Those could actually be designed so that until you hold a central location, you would not be able to really control the building.

The concept would be to implement similar mechanics, without the player having to think about the tricky details of actually implementing this reliably...
Parent - By Günther [de] Date 2011-02-15 01:17
Placing one or two automatic cannons in your base shouldn't be too tricky. They just have to be annoying enough to make the enemy want to destroy them before building stuff, not provide airtight security. Sure, a flag which enforces a no-building-rule via the metagame is simpler, but I think the nuances of slightly annoying at the edge of the cannons range to more annoying near the cannon could create interesting tradeoffs.
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Parent - - By Clonkonaut [de] Date 2011-02-13 15:39

> Healing could also extend more (area effect?)


What about the "there is no need for it in CR" food? Thus adding a whole new (and long wanted I think) line of production to the settlement part of the game and in quick base melees you still could make it cheap to buy.
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Parent - - By PeterW [gb] Date 2011-02-14 12:25
Well, I'm not completely sure. This would fall into line well with my general philosophy, but I feel like healing is something you positively want in all possible situations. Whether it is from accidental lava baths or enemy attacks: You will need it sooner or later. So at this point, building the buildings or even a whole production line becomes more of a chore that you have to do instead of an actual strategic choice.

Also note that I am talking about really slow healing here. Say, 2 minutes to heal a Clonk completely. That means that in the dreaded multiple Clonks cases, you might want to have one standing around and healing up, while the other one attacks. It also means that food could still have its place, for when you really need the healing to happen quickly.

And finally, the whole thing is intended to help with defense: When you are attacked, you don't have the time to think about getting some ingredients to heal yourself up. It should act as a passive bonus working in your favor. When balanced right, this could even lead to interesting capture-the-flag-situations arising spontaneously in the field when two teams build flagpoles in the open for the bonus alone.
Parent - - By Zapper [de] Date 2011-02-14 17:48

>So at this point, building the buildings or even a whole production line becomes more of a chore that you have to do instead of an actual strategic choice.


Like a sawmill or a furnace? ;)
Cookies are actually even more of a strategic choice compared to wood/metal: You can actually decide to life without it. Are you good enough to survive only with the occassional mushroom/berry you find? Do you think you will have to face dangerous situations or do you rather play and work around them?
If you DO work around them - do you need food at all?

As I see it now you cannot do those choices with a sawmill

>When balanced right, this could even lead to interesting capture-the-flag-situations arising spontaneously in the field when two teams build flagpoles in the open for the bonus alone.


What bothers me most at the moment is the "woooh magic healing party" aspect of it - it would not be there because it is fun or it enhances gameplay. It would be there because someone decided that the flagpoles have a magic healing aura. At least that is how I see it now.
Parent - - By PeterW [gb] Date 2011-02-14 18:08

> Like a sawmill or a furnace? ;)


Easy: You only need those if you don't want to buy all buildings.

> it would not be there because it is fun or it enhances gameplay.


You have to think where to put your flagpoles so they can't be removed by a quick counter. Such a counter might earn the enemy an extra flagpole on top of you losing you passive bonuses. If that's not interesting strategic gameplay, I don't know what it is.
Parent - - By Zapper [de] Date 2011-02-14 18:13

>You have to think where to put your flagpoles so they can't be removed by a quick counter. Such a counter might earn the enemy an extra flagpole on top of you losing you passive bonuses. If that's not interesting strategic gameplay, I don't know what it is.


Or you would have to place your buildings/fortifications and several defenses in a way so that the enemy cannot just walk in and open your tower from the inside or use your anvil. If that is not interesting strategic gameplay, I don't know what it is. ;)
Parent - - By PeterW [gb] Date 2011-02-14 18:26

> Or you would have to place your buildings/fortifications and several defenses in a way so that the enemy cannot just walk in, take your flag, open your tower from the inside or use your anvil. If that is not interesting strategic gameplay, I don't know what it is. ;)


... I haven't removed anything, just added another one.
Parent - - By Zapper [de] Date 2011-02-14 19:34
The enemy could still control towers from the inside without having to blast through that concrete layer around your flag?
If he still can use all your buildings - what is the flag for?
If he can not, you did not "just add another one". Because you actually removed any worries about the placement of buildings other than the flag. Except for "build everything as close as possible so that you can cover it with 10 flags fused in concrete"
Parent - By PeterW [gb] Date 2011-02-14 20:25
Hm, good point. You don't require physical access to the flag anymore. I might have to think about that.
Parent - - By PeterW [gb] Date 2011-02-15 12:49 Edited 2011-02-15 12:55
Okay, step back. Zapper and Günther are now attacking my concept on grounds that I think are integral. So here's the stripped-down reasoning.

My main meta idea is to clean up the meaning of "ownership". It springs up often enough that we can't just remove it. Base doors would only open to one player. Paxhill had elevators that were only usable by one side. Günther is nonchalantly proposing cannons that favor one side. And ultimately, it just feels good to own something, this is essential gameplay.

Now bases are the cleanest representation of ownership we have in the game. My core design decisions to make it better would be to have it:
* Complexity-bound: You can't consider the ownership status of every room/cannon/door/building/whatever you come across. You have more important stuff to do than to go around working out the kinks of your freshly-conquered castle. We want a complexity bound here. Hence flags being (expensive!) items and having regions.
* Transferrable: Having to destroy something to gain ownership lessens its value to you. The more you're able to take over enemy stuff, the higher its value - for both sides, considering re-conquering. Base melees would work because the stakes automatically get higher all the time, as more and more valuable infrastructure gets fought over. That's in contrast to CR, where many games end in a stalemate of neither side having any resources left to spare. Thus constructing new flags giving you automatic ownership of everything.

I'm more or less open to discussing what ownership should then mean. Opening doors automatically? Buying stuff? Healing? Automatic sentries? NPCs working for you? Whatever you can come up with. But we really need this concept, otherwise we will have to invent a worse version of it later on.
Parent - By Newton [de] Date 2011-02-15 15:36 Edited 2011-02-15 15:38

> Okay, step back. Zapper and Günther are now attacking my concept on grounds that I think are integral


The concept-battle has begun. Ding-ding, round one: "How will Peter react to the fatal blow from Günther that shake the very integral grounds of his concept? Peter positions himself for a counter-blow aandd... oh no, just retreats into explaining meta-ideas around the theoretic concept of ownership..."

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ur5fGSBsfq8
Parent - - By Günther [de] Date 2011-02-15 15:54 Edited 2011-02-15 16:08
What I'm arguing against is rules that are enforced by the meta-game, like Clonks being unable to build stuff just because the rules say that Clonks cannot do that when an enemy flag is near. Rules that are enforced by in-game-robots, like doors that only open for some Clonks and not for others can be a lot more arbitrary. If the robot that works the door decides to switch allegiances because some flag changes colors, that's fine. If you don't like the rule, you can take your anger out on the robot and throw some flints at it. You can't take your anger out on the game designer that decided that X pixels were too near to a flag.

Hm, I think the reason that other games have made the eternally-loyal robots work is via a virtually endless supply of destructive powers that are only limited by the enemy, not by neutral forces on the map. As long as you have some troops, you can attack the enemy, even if you don't have any resources left to produce new troops. In Clonk, there's the destructible landscape, a huge neutral force that hinders both sides. Perhaps your concept solves that problem, perhaps we need some other mechanism to ensure that at least one side always has enough might to conquer the landscape.
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Parent - - By PeterW [gb] Date 2011-02-15 16:54 Edited 2011-02-15 17:30
I'm unsure what to make of your argument... You have an in-game representation of the building restriction: The enemy flag. You can and should take your anger out on that one. It's obviously harder to reach than the door - but that's exactly how it should be as well. Your opponent building a base near you should be an enormous nuisance. Peaceful co-existance is a non-option, that's just reinforcing that.

But apart from that, I suppose we could limit the building restriction to only the essential bit, flagpoles. Still doesn't solve the "building in front of your castle" problem...

Edit

Note that this kind of gameplay is very usual for strategy games: We have "magic borders" in Settlers, where a tower will keep you from building. Same thing in Civilization, where it's the cultural borders or the pretty arbitrary "x tiles apart" rule. Or the creep in Starcraft.

Neither of those is really explained that well, and still gets accepted without much thought. As I said, the tricky issue here is how to represent it to the player. Once we have a suitable visualization showing you exactly what you can and can't do, it will feel quite natural.

The strategic angle: If you can't build at a location, it's a position that you haven't currently claimed with your flag. As the only thing that you would build in contested territory would be a structural building, this means it would be nigh-useless to you anyway. In the worst case, it might get claimed by your enemy moving one of his flags. The game is effectively saving your frustration there.
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