Cities

From: yorkaturr
Date: 2002-06-14 13:04:01

- Each city is made up of a central City Hall, the heart of the city, and buildings are attached to it by registering at the City Hall. Buildings that are already parts of a city can't be registered under another city from the city hall of the rivalling city. Instead, the city that owns the building must release the building from under its power, and then it can be registered by the other city hall. The only way to forcefully change the ownership of a building into another city is by invading the city hall. Therefore, city halls should always be protected.

- Each city has an area of influence that determines, to the game engine, where certain city-specific events can occur. This can be determined in many ways. However, the amount of buildings and the location of buildings should be the primary factors.

- The advantages of being a part of a city include access to a city's resources, protection from city guards, and work, which yields money. As an example, players might go out chopping wood for the new city hall, after which they get payed, the city gets a new city hall, the mayor is able to buy more guards, the city's influence increases, and a new guy who just moved to the city can get his hands on the spare wood left over from building the city hall by paying a certain amount of gold.

- City Halls, and cities in that effect, are governed by players that have been assigned the power of deciding of the matters that affect the city. It is intended that this power be invested upon them by other players. Ultimately, however, this comes down to country politics, and I would say that the leader of a country (the largest of the political entities) has to be assigned his position by a Sage or a God. Therefore, each individual in power is ultimately there because of the Gods or Sages. It also adds a mythic touch, and contributes some authority to political leaders. Some of the tasks that the governing players must decide upon include, but are not limited to, the registration/removal of buildings from the city's influence, buying NPC guards, assigning guard policies (for example, a player governing the city could decide that if a building in the city is invaded, the guards will kill the invaders, or that the city gates are closed, or that nothing is done).

These are suggestions based upon the con discussion

From: raeky
Date: 2002-07-26 03:10:38
In-Reply-To: 1635

My idea would be that the starting areas, where new characters come into being are relatively safe, and quite a few "quests" can be completed in that area solo. (quests being created/rest/assigned by a sage possibly.) This will increase the players strength and knowledge of the area where they first started the game. Possibly these starting areas will be the majority, or even the only "cities" in the game.

I like the idea of players being able to start there own city by assigning a "city hall" tag to a building. That way a player could build a vast empire. The game should offer many levels of game play. It SHOULD be possible for a fair amount of play to be done solo or small groups of friends (3-4 max). It SHOULD be possible for players to become vast rulers of empires that they've build/conquered.

When the game starts in nemen for players there should be at least one city already in existence, controlled by sages, and thus it would contain all the necessary elements in a city, banks, hotels, stores, training guilds, whatever… And players can then trade and work, then adventure outside the boundaries of the city on quests for wealth or fame. Even form bands of friends who go out and make surrounding settlements. The main city(s) would include an “area of influence” that if you reside in that area you will get announcements from the “leaders” and can be forced to pay taxes on purchases/buildings. Taxing wouldn’t be automatic, it would be controlled by players/npcs that go around and demand that you pay tax on your building/horse/field/etc at threat of death/imprisonment.

Groups shouldn’t be hard coded, but mutual benefit from being in a group should be coded. Learning should be accomplished in groups. If you stick around and watch a blacksmith make a sword you should learn a little about blacksmithing and sword making. If you where to create a sword WITH a knowledgeable blacksmith at the same time, your knowledge will increase much faster from the direct teaching/aid of the experienced. Doing tasks such as building buildings would be exponentially faster the more people helping. Attacking a monster/person/army would be just logically more effective the more people helping.

I agree that the game should offer a much varied array of game play. One can conquer entire continents or be a simple lone woodcutter… Whatever one wants to do in this range should be allowed for in the game. :P

From: hook
Date: 2002-06-15 03:46:23
In-Reply-To: 1635

This might be seen as counter productive so take it with a grain of salt. I would really like to see what would happen if no hard coded political system was put into the game. I honestly belive that if the game is done right these orginizations (city states, kingdoms) will self orginize them selves. People as in PC's are already "hard coded" with a tribal hierarchy in thier brains. If given things like good ( or at least adiquite) means of communication such as messanger birds in game and alert and character management clients (ie phone messages and telnet access to characters) they will tend to a hierarchy sytem on their own. Anyway all I am asking is when a basic game is ready for some sort of testing we try so experiments to see if tis possible. Like if we get nemen at a reasonable stage allow like 300 charcters in the game then see what happens. The whole time sages pushing for the spontanious generation of these political systems. Anyway just an idea. I know it might be completely unworkable.

From: Archantes
Date: 2002-06-14 13:45:53
In-Reply-To: 1635

This consept is all right. (Though the Rulers being assigned by a sage -thought needs a bit time to get used to.. but I can get over it;)

The city consept makes me wonder, should there be some public buildings, controlled by the city ruler by the help of the NPCs, to make it more.. say, SimCity-like; or should them be controlled by PCs and by instructions from the city ruler?

The public buildings might be a training hall maybe, a library, watchtowers, a bank, a city storehouse of some kind, a jail, if needed; a place for hangings(?), a cemetery, church or chapel..

Or simply, no 'public' buildings, but normally, if someone brings there a training hall, so be it. Hmh, for there being some cemetery build by a PC sounds a bit odd to me.. And question about necessity for a graveyard.. I say it is something that brings atmosphere.

This reminds me about discussion of illusion. Illusion of working world in computer RPGs. If we have these small but visible things, like graveyard being expanded when people die in that city etc, the feeling of being in a living and non-coulisse world will be strong.

And since this game is also about communication between people and social intercourse, not only the economy ;), this came to mind: Having a possibility to have several rulers and a place for convocations and possibility to arrange a voting in city hall.

Then we have question about founding citites. Who can found a city? What makes the city hall to be a city hall, not just a house built in forest? From who you need to ask to found a city? The ruler(s) of the current land?

From: darshan
Date: 2002-06-14 13:53:00
In-Reply-To: 1635

I stand behind that. However I don't like the notion of country
you imply.

I think countries don't need to even exist. I wouldn't
mind seeing Majik as a world of city-states which battle
each other, make alliances and stuff like that. But the
city hall system alone actually lets us create countries or
kingdoms: a city leader conquers other cities and gains control
of their areas of influence, and builds new cities to cover
new areas - think Civilization. A city leader could simply
have a fort built out in some significant wilderness location
and then define a city hall into it, producing a border
outpost.

From: darshan
Date: 2002-06-14 13:54:56
In-Reply-To: 1638

No. There won't be hardcoded public buildings. Even the
city hall is just a name tag that you can put into some
specific building that you or someone has built.

A city is founded by defining a building as a city hall.

From: yorkaturr
Date: 2002-06-14 14:00:23
In-Reply-To: 1639

Yes, I stand corrected. I agree with this. This way, each dictator actually has to work to earn his position ;)

From: Nahl_Shadore
Date: 2002-06-15 19:16:06
In-Reply-To: 1640

maybe just when you decide to combine X buildings into a town, you'd have to declare the town hall then

if you only have 3 houses in the community, you could just link them as a community, but when you get 10 or so you'd need a hall

"public buildings" are just normal buildings, with decided-upon uses that leave their doors unlocked
they should be run by PCs, though

I agree fully on the question of atmospheric touches like a graveyard. this would also prevent bodies piling up in the town square after a brawl
maybe some NPC guards would come and haul away the bodies ("Bring out your dead!!!")

From: hook
Date: 2002-06-15 04:02:42
In-Reply-To: 1643

i just thought of something. Well its not that original.Anyway , one way to encurage political self orginization would be to give a large advantages to groups over say an individual. A simple example would be say a high level fighter PC (I know no levels but this is just of example sake) would be able to beat any level PC below him but say two low level individuals would be able to kick that high level guys ass. Armys beat individuals everytime. We could put these advantages though out the game. Two carpenters could finish a house in 1/5th the time it would take an individual to make the same house. In other words the whole (political orginations, guilds, etc) would be stronger, by far, then its constituant parts. Finding the right percentiages of abilities would take some tweekingbut could be done. If we gave a big advantage to cooperation then then political econonmic, and cultural institutions would just genrate themselves. Not only that but they wouldn't be constrained by what "WE" could imagine they would be more diverse and strange and well fit better in a dynamic fantacy world. Anyway just soem ideas. Please digest this and take or leave it as you will. My rant mode is off :)

From: darshan
Date: 2002-06-15 10:29:32
In-Reply-To: 1644

I was originally convinced also that we could get by with non-hardcoded cities, but I think Yorka's model is better after all in the end. I think I had some grounds for thinking so but I forgot them as soon as I'd made up my mind. ;)

From: Nahl_Shadore
Date: 2002-06-15 19:23:30
In-Reply-To: 1644

I agree that people would make their own government. yorka's idea, however, is also based on this

the system he talked about is just for defining what a "city" is, and thus where "city-specific" actions can take place (ie. the announcements).

the actual governmental structure will be decided by the players.

.....maybe, then, we shouldn't make it necessary to have a town hall.....if people want to make a communal village, they can, they'd just need to declare a "message board" in, say, the local tavern

From: yorkaturr
Date: 2002-06-16 05:33:24
In-Reply-To: 1644

The optimal situation would be if we wouldn't have to make any hard-coded socio-political structuring whatsoever. However, one considerable problem is that such a system would be only based on common agreements, and without anyone really enforcing these established agreements, the organization of power would be loose at best, non-existant at worst. The latter should never happen.

In addition, we will need to define a city in several ways to the internal game engine if we want any features related to cities.

We will need to cheat a little to make this all work, and the problem is doing it as gracefully as possible.

From: hook
Date: 2002-06-16 09:53:56
In-Reply-To: 1651

"We will need to cheat a little to make this all work, and the problem is doing it as gracefully as possible."

I am pretty sure you agree with me when I say "as minimally as possible."

Anyway regardless of the extent we Hardcode cities I was wonder if anyone wanted to comment on the ideas i posted on Message #1644. I feel the ideas i put there would add to the stability of cities and other orginisations such as guilds, adventure groups, churches, merchants, etc. Essentialy the idea is give dispaportianate advantages to groups over individuals. Also make the world dangerous for loners and safer for groups...ie wild animals and monsters tend to attack small groups and individuals more then larger groups. Plus make these fauna hard to kill by One individual but alot easier with 4 or 5 PCs. I am sure there are more ways we could use this basic idea.

Do you guys dissagree with trying this or not? or do you have things to add to to it?

From: Rakel
Date: 2002-06-16 10:23:42
In-Reply-To: 1652

I somewhat agreee with this, after all a group trainded to work together accomplishes more than an individual, but the problem arises when we think what makes a bunch of people into group and how a group functions together.

If we take some individuals and tell them to work together it is likely that they will get in eatchothers way and general mayhem will follow :) If this aforementioned group however works together for a long time they will start to function more efficiently as a group. This "fusing together" will be quicker if the individuals have worked in groups earlier. Perhaps we could have some GroupWork -skill :)

But this is getting complicated again. The point is that I'm agreeing with Hook and I think giving groups some advantages is good idea.

From: darshan
Date: 2002-06-16 15:21:04
In-Reply-To: 1653

The issue of groups was brought up in the convention.

One single blow from someone sneaking up behind you
can/will kill you. This is why players must
group together, right from the moment they begin to
play the game. This must be made explicit in the
possible newbie help and introduction texts. Players
need a social network around them to provide security,
and joining up with others right at the start is the
way to construct it.

From: hook
Date: 2002-06-17 05:26:14
In-Reply-To: 1655

So....you don't want to have it that groups have a definate dispropotionate advantage in skills and fighting then individuals?

note: my suggestions are not to be used in spite of yorka's ideas but in conguction with them so they compliment and support one another.

From: darshan
Date: 2002-06-17 20:46:05
In-Reply-To: 1660

You're insinuating that we should define "player groups" in code? No way in hell. That would imply the 'create party' ' join party' 'party say' routine. Or what? Please elaborate so I know what exactly to flame. ;)

From: hook
Date: 2002-06-18 03:05:45
In-Reply-To: 1662

no, not a create party or anything like that. Just if two people are doing the same task at the same time together then they get benifits so it happens invisible to the player. They only thing they should notice is that jobs get done quicker, swords are made by them of higher quality, monsters die easier when they work in groups.

simple as that...well i am sure the code is hard but to the player it should be seemless.

From: darshan
Date: 2002-06-18 09:43:34
In-Reply-To: 1668

But my point was that monsters die easier when people fight in a group, without any kind of coded systems whatsoever. There is no need to forcibly tweak things like teaching to work best in groups - the risk of death (and also the desire to kill lots of people) is alone sufficient to coax people together.

From: hook
Date: 2002-06-18 11:11:25
In-Reply-To: 1672

"the risk of death (and also the desire to kill lots of people) is alone sufficient to coax people together."

Personally i don't think that is sufficient. Even so, let us assume that you are right just for arguments sake. People will be coaxed together against physical threats. But that is all. I mean do we only want large murauding bands of PC's running around killing smaller bands? No. I mean we do want some murauding bands but we also want guilds, trade groups, churches, cities, townships, countries, etc. In order to coax these groups together we need more encuragement then just wishing them to exist, or hoping them to just spontaniously form out of the bandit groups. There needs be a reward for working together not just fighting together. Otherwise loners will make their own swords not trade anything and just go off to war with help of the nearest person...then drop off line until the next time they play. No cities, no trade, no kings, no guilds, etc.

From: hook
Date: 2002-06-18 11:20:19
In-Reply-To: 1674

Actually this just gave me an idea. Maybe we don't want cities and guilds and large scale trade. Or at least very little of it. Nothining says that we have to have the vast majority of the population living in cities. Maybe a hunter gather type setting might be more desirable. With only a few cities that are formed and kept stable by force of will by the sages. The rest of humanity ( demi-humans included) live as tribes, bandits and under chiefdoms. Anyway just an idea.

From: darshan
Date: 2002-06-18 13:24:59
In-Reply-To: 1675

That's been my vision all along. Urbanization rate would be much less than 20%. IMO it would be a major anachronism (not to mention boring as hell), if the majority of the people was urban in this medieval setting.

In fact, if we didn't provide the people with any hard-coded social systems, I think the society would turn out as resembling Earth at about 4000 BC, with independent "hunter-gatherers" or the equivalent, some minor farming and few cities.

From: hook
Date: 2002-06-18 13:39:33
In-Reply-To: 1676

I have absolutly no problem with this. In fact i would prefer it. The trouble is convincing everyone else to go along with it.

All my suggestions for group formations have been an attempt to keep a "natral" dynamic feel to the tyrany of hard coded GUI implemented systems of groups. If we negate the need for quantity over quality then most of those suggestions drift away as useless and hindering. You should have stated this desire awhile ago. :P And we could have been using all this wasted time we used argueing with each other to convince other people.

From: yorkaturr
Date: 2002-06-18 15:24:45
In-Reply-To: 1677

Please note that the society system we have sketched does in no way make the game impossible to play for individuals and loose groups of hunter-gatherers. It's just that some people will want to form formal societies, because that is the only way they can stick that bloody, tattered war standard in conquered ground, and have that "King of Thalamon" text in their list of merits when they look at their character sheet.