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Doctor Dread Administrator Posts: 1478
12/30/2017
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I am considering making some changes to the products value which might shake the game a little bit.
There used to be a time where all products were valued the same, but the higher tier factories would produce more of them, thats why they were more profitable. I don't recall the argument to change that, might have revolved around civilian services, but in the end we instead made them produce the same but made the higher tier products themselves worth more. This kind of broke the game in a couple places because there are a LOT more end products then components and more comps then raw material products. The game was expecting 3-5x increase in quantity of End products over the raw materials to supply the 5x volume of the entire end product category. Now that is no longer the case, it takes 5x as many players to produce enough end product to meet demand.
I don't think we can revert back to the more quantity version of the game but what I might be able to do is adjust the demand increase rate for the different tiers or perhaps it would be less confusing if I dropped the VOLUME on the higher tier products. This would effectively be the same as increasing the quantity produced. Corps would be able to meet the demand of End Products because the volume is much lower then before. You also wouldn't be able to buy/sell as much in high tier products either.
There is also another issue, the tier product value used to be something like 100, 250, 500, 750. And then it was upped to 100,325, 750, 1000. On the complaint that you can't buy lower tier materials to make higher tier products. This also kind of breaks the game. The game was designed so that Raw materials is something you can always get steady sells in, moving up tiers is more profitable ONLY IF you can get a good infrastructure of cheap materials or deal with another corp who was specialized in it. making all end products was impossible unless you were dealing with other corps But by making the products so much more valuable we've made End products the best tier to go straight to, its better in every way then trying to make money in Raw materials for example. We also upped the corp HQ production bonus to 50 a while back and we've added megastructure bonuses on top of that. These bonuses are too large, they multiply on each other when you are making raw mats, and comps and then end product in the same place.
So...
I want to bring the values of products down to 100,250,500,750 again. And I also am considering lowering the Corp HQ and level bonuses as I bring in the megastructure bonuses so you don't walk in on +100 production bonus in every city,. And lastly. I want to tweak the volume on Components and End Products to be maybe 0.75x and 0.5x of what they are now and see how that goes.. I'm not sure about civilian services, maybe keep the same.
I want to give like a week notice on doing this,so it might be something I push next week. I still would like to hear thoughts on this,outside of "OMG my INFASTRUCTURE!1111"
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ChaChaCharms Posts: 167
12/30/2017
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As long as my logistics cap can increase when you do this I can live with it and make it work. These caps are killing my sustainable profits
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Never trust anything that can think for itself if you can’t see where it keeps its brain..
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+1
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EdwardBishop Posts: 15
12/31/2017
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I'm going to have to agree with CCC above, I can handle this as long as it comes with an increase to logistics capacity.
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EventHorizon Posts: 23
12/31/2017
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I support this in large part because I think it will encourage more guilds, more cooperation and coordination. Instead of increasing logistics so each corp can continue to go it on their own, I would argue you should hold them where they are to force corporations to look for longer term supply contracts so that Raw Materials producers specialize in supplying Components producers who in turn specialize in supplying End Products producers. More interaction and exchange is good for the game. Ideally prices balance out so that a player who produces only Metals can earn just as much as a corp that produces only Clothing etc and Guilds that are well organized with a good division of labor can minimize costs and maximize efficiency.
One other issue I see is that players who specialize in Raw Materials face a basic problem, they have no votes in city elections because all their production is outside the city. I think this needs to be amended. Guilds can get around this by encouraging free account players, who can't vote anyway, to develop as raw material suppliers, but if you're off Earth under the current account restrictions you'll need to level the playing field for upgraded players so they're not unfairly punished in the electoral process for being Raw Materials suppliers.
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EdwardBishop Posts: 15
12/31/2017
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Without increasing logistics, all you really encourage is more alt accounts, and even with increased logistics guild cooperation and coordination will always give enough of an advantage to encourage it.
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Jamers Posts: 12
1/1/2018
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I don’t think the logistics should be more. That is defeating some of the purpose. Seren has said in the past that the game was made for millions not billions. I don’t think we can or should go that far back, but I don’t think that a step in that direction isn’t a bad idea.
As for alts, I disagree that it encourages more alt accounts. Even if it does, what is so bad about alts? As long as they are used properly and it is very hard to do anything bad with alts. People will catch on pretty quick.
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EventHorizon Posts: 23
1/3/2018
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Yeah agreed on the Alts question. One of the good things about the game design in BotG is that we can all see pretty much everything about what other corporations are doing. That makes it very easy for the player community to spot alts, and in particular those that are being used unfairly.
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EventHorizon Posts: 23
1/6/2018
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Seren, I just discovered that when you instituted the price multiples you didn't adjust the production costs for the relevant buildings. This makes End Produciton proportionally 7.5 times cheaper than raw material production. I think this, more than anything else is where the problem lies. It effectively blows a giant hole in the logistics penalty if you keep your resource buildings lower level, mine and basically put all your big buildings in End Products (and components to a lesser degree). If support your move to flatten the price tiers but I think the most important thing you need to do is scale the upkeep/production costs for the buildings in each tier so that an End Product building is proportionally just as expensive to run as a resource mine. If you don't fix that I think you'll see a small impact from flattening the price tiers but it will still basically be the same problem on a slightly smaller scale.
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EventHorizon Posts: 23
1/6/2018
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Even with that fix you've got another problem on your hands. The small number of players who benefited from this easy money scheme are going to be able to lord it over new players who will never have the same opportunity. This is the kind of problem that really can only be fixed with a relaunch of the server. Hate to say it but its true.
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EventHorizon Posts: 23
1/6/2018
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If you had an accelerated test server you probably could have spotted this problem before implementing such a fundamental change to the core game mechanics. I realize that's probably an issue of cost but I think it's kind of essential. I worry that with every new feature you introduce that hasn't been run through a test server there is more potential for problems like this that won't be spotted until it's had unintended consequences that can't be fixed on a live server without basically restarting it.
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Doctor Dread Administrator Posts: 1478
1/8/2018
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EventHorizon wrote:
If you had an accelerated test server you probably could have spotted this problem before implementing such a fundamental change to the core game mechanics. I realize that's probably an issue of cost but I think it's kind of essential. I worry that with every new feature you introduce that hasn't been run through a test server there is more potential for problems like this that won't be spotted until it's had unintended consequences that can't be fixed on a live server without basically restarting it.
I can barely get enough people playing the normal game, I don't know if an accelerated test server would have even half the population =)
The bad bugs and wobbly changes is something I have to risk as a one man operation making a game that is designed for thousands of players interacting at once. I try to manage risk versus time when I make pushes I can't test everything forever and as one guy I can't really test what happens when 100 players in their unique setups get a hold of it.
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EventHorizon Posts: 23
1/10/2018
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Ah ok. I suspected that was the case. I really want this game to work. Just have to keep playing and do what we can to help new players feel welcome. Thanks for you all your hard work.
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