 |
| |
|
|
Moderator
of Candle'Bre
|
Apr 1999
time: 00:12
| |
|
|
Per Leland's request to know more about what's going on under the hood of the game's development cycle, I'll say this:
* Our coder is still hard at work putting the vision in place in its permanent form, and I have just about gotten myself into the position of being able to continue my work with the prototype (which is where I can go off and experiment with fun/funky stuff without bugging the code people, or innundating them with requests to "see something that looks a lot like this or that (insert the name of the latest thingamabob here)
* The "next big thing" I'm working on where the prototype is concerned is...social dynamism.
What is Social Dynamism, exactly?
Well...it looks a lot like this:
In civ, we have citizens.
Citizens are represented by "population points" and they're generic.
They all like the same stuff, right?
You build a temple, and guess what? Categorically, right down the line, EVERYBODY in civ-land is happier (temple = + 1 happy face)
And that's good as far as it goes, but....
(and I love doing this...thinking about this stuff)
....wouldn't it be cool if there was more to it than that?
What if some people got pissed off when you built a temple? (maybe they're atheists? who knows!)
The point is...it would add another layer of realism to the game.
So I got to thinking...now, obviously, we don't want to introduce fifty-'leven different splinter groups in society, so we'll stick to just the basics.
The basics, in my head, came down to five groups:
The Aristocracy
The Clergy
The Acadameans
The Merchants
The Peasants
Okay...so cool. We got these five groups.
It's easy enough to take each population, take its (known) population number, and break it down into some combination of any or all of the above.
So...let's make a hypothetical province called "The Dutchy of Leland"  and give it 10,000 stalwart citizens.
For the sake of argument, we'll say that Leland is a very pious land, and the Church has great sway here, so the population might break down thus:
Aristocracy: 900 (note that this figure includes not only the lords and peers of the realm themselves, but their heralds, henchmen, friends, favored servants, and so forth, so this figure isn't totally outside the realm of believability).
Clergy: 3100 (again, this includes priests, bishops, a cardinal or two, deacons, movers and shakers and other prominent folks in the church, wards of the holy church who may live here, and a host of other pious individuals for whome the church is the biggest, most important part of their daily life)
Peasants: 5,000 (lots of these guys in every province, and it's not surprising that they'd make up a good chunk of the population)
Merchants: 500 (not many merchant folk here)
Acadameans: 500 (again, some, but not many of these type folk here)
So that's the Duchy of Leland. 10,000 souls strong.
We can do some fun stuff here, and come up with a demographic breakdown, too, which would look like this:
Aristocracy: 9%
Clergy: 31%
Peasants: 50%
Merchants: 5%
Academics: 5%
Now…these demographics are interesting by themselves, yes, but they don’t really “do” anything for us in terms of defining the dynamics of the province.
To do that, what we need to do is to acknowledge that each “group” as defined above, has some amount of social power. The interesting thing here is that the tiny Aristocratic group has a social power all out of whack with its sheer size.
Likewise, the poor peasants might be the most numerous group in raw numbers, but from a social power standing, they got nothing, or next to nothing.
For purposes of these discussions, we’ll also consider (broadly) the notion of social class.
The Aristocracy will represent the upper class. The Peasants and the Clergy (vows of poverty and all that) will represent the lower class, and everybody else will represent the “middle class” such as it is.
The creation of the “social power scale” in any given province will be accomplished by assigning some arbitrary (to start with) value for each group, and simply multiply that number by the number of people in each social grouping.
This would happen mechanically each turn, and a running total kept (at game start, a calculation is done for the entire previous year to give some “weight” behind the numbers, so that it’s not so easy to change them).
Whatever group has the highest cumulative total, is considered to have the most influence within the province. (in this regard, the actual execution is not dissimilar to the cultural influences in CIV), such that any given province can be said to be socially dominated by either the Aristocracy, the Clergy, the Peasants, the Academics, or the Merchants.
Depending on which group dominates, it will trigger certain bonuses (and penalties) relating to that groups social control of the province.
Further, provincial improvements built by you, the player, will serve to make certain groups happy, but they’ll anger others (ie., the Clergy would be thrilled at the addition of a new temple, while the Academics might scoff at it…thus, the Temple would not only improve the loyalty of the “Clergy contingent” of the province, and serve to increase their social power, it would damage your standing with the Academics, and begin to marginalize them as a social group in that particular province).
By giving players a variety of contextual events, in game choices (like building options), and other means of making incremental adjustments to a given group’s social power, it becomes possible (over time) to dramatically alter the character of your entire realm, which can (and should!) have far reaching implications for your game. This is ultimately where I am seeking to go.
The real test/trick here is to come up the “right” numbers, so that we wind up with realistic/believable outcomes, and then, allow those numbers to be tweaked by the player as the game unfolds (such that we create something of a metagame here…where you, as the ruler of your realm, can take an active hand in shaping the population of your kingdom in a way that, to my knowledge, has not been seen in any game to date…for example, your policies might increase the social power of the Aristocracy, which will lead to bonuses for that group, but at the expense of the commonors, or you might seek to foster the expansion and growth of the middle class, but doing so, you may find yourself facing angry nobles, who have a vested interest in the status quo), etc.
My next post will outline the particulars of “where I am” in terms of defining all of this in the prototype…I just wanted to post this as a place of beginning, to show Leland some of those particulars he was asking about. 
-=Vel=-
|
|
| |
|
|
Prince
|
Jan 2000
time: 02:12
| |
|
|
Thanks. Very interesting.
If you don't mind feedback... gameplay-wise, I think that what civ did well was to keep things discrete. If you have numbers down to 1% it might turn some people off or turn the game itself into a statistical simulator. Have you considered having "population points" of your own, maybe one per 1,000 citizens? It doesn't seem as if the fine granularity is necessary here, especially since the social power multiplication will probably result in a lot of possible combinations anyway.
|
|
| |
|
|
Moderator
of Candle'Bre
|
Apr 1999
time: 00:12
| |
|
|
Hey man, and not at all...feedback is where it's at, especially for this type of project!
I had given some thought to the notion of population points, and I'm still on the fence about it.
IF we go that route, then the pop points will likely represent fairly small units (50 per point, 100 tops), to allow for a relatively high degree of flexibility in terms of what you can do with your various points.
Originally, I was adamently against this idea, because I like the EU2 approach (which uses extreme granularity to great effect, and one of many things they really nailed, IMO), however....the notion of "pop points" does simplify a number of things, so....
-=Vel=-
|
|
| |
|
|
Moderator
of Candle'Bre
|
Apr 1999
time: 00:12
| |
|
|
Hello sir!
And yes! You make an excellent point re: the warrior caste.
In my head, I envisioned the Aristocracy as being the "stand ins" for that, but I could certainly be convinced otherwise!
Here's where my head is:
The Aristocracy in Candle'Bre (like our own in Medieval history) is essentially responsible for keeping order in each province (raising troops, taxation, keeping general order, etc). The buildings that they are positively affected by would be the Fort and Barracks in the current build (which would be the same buildings that such a warrior caste would be drawn to).
IMO, here would be another way to view the warrior caste:
Again, using various in-game decisons/builds/contextual events, it may be possible to nurture any of a number of "traditions" (martial tradition, academic tradition, etc)...and these traditions (once available to a player) would enable certain advantages to the player (example: let's say that you hit upon the certain combination of events and political maneuvers that brought about the creation of a warrior caste in your realm (be it an order of knighthood or some other manifestation of the tradition).
On doing so, you might get:
* Some new military unit, unique to you
* price reduction(s) on one or more types of troops
* greater % chance to gain great leaders
or other stuff...whatcha think?
-=Vel=-
|
|
| |
|
|
King
Nashville, TN
|
Mar 1999
time: 18:12
| |
|
|
Ah I see. I was reading "Aristocracy" to mean purely the nobility, not the nobility + knights. The way you describe it does make sense.
And there may be a side benefit here. You have been somewhat critical of how many games have abstracted supply lines into non-existance. Perhaps, your upper limit on forces, or the length of time they can be away from home without desertion kicking in, can be limited by your Aristocracy percentage. Or at least influenced by it.
This would also provide a natural counter-balance, as having too large an aristocracy percentage would mean that your ability to trade and produce would be impacted since you have fewer peasants working the land and merchants engaging in commerce.
|
|
| |
|
|
Moderator
of Candle'Bre
|
Apr 1999
time: 00:12
| |
|
|
Yes yes! Which could set up another interesting metagame. I like that!
Extending that thinking further, you could do stuff like:
The more power the Aristocracy has, the better your overall military organization level, which means, better supply limits in Aristocratic leaning provinces, and a better % chance for great generals and war leaders to emerge. The downside would be that the Aristocracy would be a drain on your coffers, as they must be supported according to the dictates of their lavish lifestyle, so a balance must clearly be struck (they provide lots of good advantages, but are quite expensive).
I was thinking (toying with...undecided at this point) the notion of making a rule where you can, at your option, train knights (uber cavalry), with the caveat that these folk are drawn directly and exclusively from the ranks of your nobility. Doing so would, however, reduce the number of "Aristocrats" in the province, and erode their social power, so again...a tradeoff, and a potentially dangerous one, at that.
-=Vel=-
|
|
| |
|
|
Moderator
of Candle'Bre
|
Apr 1999
time: 00:12
| |
|
|
Social Dynamism, Part Two
Natural Allies, Natural Rivalries
In order to build on the concepts described earlier, we should put some “teeth” into things…begin to talk specific effects and numbers.
The first thing we should look at is the web of dynamic relations and tensions that exist between the various groups previously mentioned.
The best way to do this is to look at the back of a “Magic: The Gathering” card, and take note of the position of the different colored “dots” on that card.
Place one of each of our five groups at each “dot” position, and you get the basic setup, which looks (crudely) like this:
..........Aristocrat
Clergy.....................Academic
Peasant....................Merchant
Each group is adjacent to two groups (shares things in common with them) and has two “oppositional” groups which it usually finds itself at odds with, thus:
The Aristocracy finds common ground with the Clergy and the Academics, but finds itself at odds with the Merchants and the Peasants.
The Clergy finds common ground with the Peasants and the Aristocracy, but is at odds with the Merchants and Academics.
The Academics find common ground with the Aristocracy and the Merchants, but are at odds with the Peasants and the Clergy.
The Peasants find common ground with the Clergy and Merchants, but are at odds with the Academics and the Aristocracy
And the Merchants find common ground with the Peasants and Aristocrats, but are at odds with the Clergy and the Aristocrats.
This sets up the basic dynamic and tensions in the realm, and goes quite some distance toward explaining how the rest of the system will work (for example….we could infer from the relationships above that any building that increased the power of the peasants, or did something that peasants would like, would be dimly viewed by the groups that opposed the peasants—namely, the Aristocrats and the Academics).
For the moment, we’ll say nothing further about these built in tensions and group dynamics, but they will color and shade most of what follows, so it’s important to understand how and why they exist.
Putting some numbers into the equation
As promised, one thing we ought to do is to put some numbers behind the stuff mentioned earlier, so we will return now to the Dutchy of Leland, and see exactly what the social power structure “looks like.”
These numbers are not set in stone, and I would welcome any discussion on what precise values to use here, but what follows are the numbers I’ve currently settled on:
Social Power (abbreviated SocPow from here on)
SocPow, Aristocracy: 0.05
SocPow, Clergy: 0.02
SocPow, Academic: 0.02
SocPow, Merchant: 0.01
SocPow, Peasant: 0.005
Now, keep in mind that on “turn one” of the game, we calculate the starting value of The Social Dynamic in the Dutchy of Leland by figuring these numbers for a whole year, so, the calculation would look something like this. Using the previously defined population numbers for the various groups, we get:
Aristocracy: (900 * 0.05) * 12 = 540
Clergy: (3100 * 0.02) *12 = 744
Academics: (500 * 0.02) * 12 = 60
Merchants: (500 * 0.02) * 12 = 60
Peasants: (5000 * 0.005) * 12 = 144
Those values represent the total amount of social power each group wields in the Dutchy of Leland, and, as mentioned previously, the group with the highest value wins the province and is considered socially dominant there, so right off the bat, we can see that Leland is a religiously dominated province.
Additionally, these values increase each turn of the game, thus:
(for the sake of simplicity, we are holding the growth rate of this province to zero…obviously, the formula changes slightly in-game to account for whatever the prevailing growth rate of the province actually IS).
Basically, the per turn formula is as above, minus the “*12” part, so we see that each turn, each group gets points added thus:
Aristocrats: + 45
Clergy: + 62
Academics: + 5
Merchants: + 5
Peasants: + 25
So if absolutely nothing ever changed in this province, the Clergy would, forever and always be the dominant power group here, but….
Buildings, and tying their effects to the Social Dynamic Equation
The next piece of the puzzle to consider would be buildings (formally referred to as Provincial Improvements). This is the player’s first, best way to begin to influence the social dynamic mix of any province in question.
Now, keep in mind that as the game expands, the number of buildings will be greatly increased. For the moment, we have all the base level buildings in play, and they are:
Watch Tower
Shrine
Focusing Sigil
Tavern
Barracks
Market
We can associate these buildings with the previously mentioned power groupings, thus:
(normal effects added parenthetically)
Watch Tower (+2 siege counters added to province) (Aristocrat)
Shrine (+10 Influence per turn) (Clergy)
Focusing Sigil (+10 Mana per turn) (Academic)
Tavern (+6 Espionage per turn) (Peasant)
Barracks (increase training limit in province by +2) (Aristocrat)
Market (+10gold per turn to provincial income) (Merchant)
So in addition to each building’s normal effects, we could add additional effects to allow these buildings to mingle with the social dynamic, and such changes could look like this:
Watch Tower: +1% (annual) growth rate for Aristocratic class. +0.005 to social power rating for the Aristocracy.
Shrine: + 1% (annual) growth rate for Clergy. +0.003 to social power rating for the Clergy. Decreases Academic power by 0.001
Focusing Sigil: +2% (annual) growth rate for Academics. + 0.005 to social power rating for the Academics. Decreases Church power by 0.003
Tavern: +2% (annual) growth rate for the Peasants. +0.0001 to social power rating for the Peasants.
Barracks: +0.002 to social power rating for the Aristocracy.
Market: +2% (annual) growth rate for the Merchants. +0.0075 to social power rating for the Merchants. Decreases Church power by 0.002
With the above in mind, let’s say that the Duke of Leland doesn’t care much for the clergy, and wants to dilute their power. His best bet in doing so would be to do what he can to nurture the power of the second strongest group in the realm (the Aristocracy). If the Duke orders the construction of a Watch Tower and a Barracks.
When both of those buildings are complete, the new social power rating for the aristocracy is:
0.05 + 0.005 + 0.002 = 0.057 per turn.
Again, holding population growth at 0 for the moment, this would increase the monthly contribution of power that the Aristocrats hold will increase from 45 per turn, to 51.3 per turn.
If a Focusing Sigil is also built here, it would further erode Church power, limiting them to 0.18 from their normal 0.2, which would reduce their power growth from 62 per turn, to 55.8.
Thus, we can draw the conclusion that using level one buildings only, it is not possible to change the equation sufficiently (by buildings alone) to dislodge the Clergy from their position of social dominance. Keep in mind however, that as we add more advanced buildings (Watch Towers become Forts, which become Keeps, which can later become Castles)….these advanced buildings will have cumulative positive and negative effects, so again, this is a long term process, which can be further aided by contextual and scripted events, and other in game mechanisms….long term, if you keep at it, it is entirely possible to unseat the clergy in this province, and install a new social power group.
(also keep in mind that if we go the route of allowing Knights…and since we’ve also got the option to disband troops (adding them back into the population of a given province), then we have an easy means of “relocating” the Aristocracy from province to province, which in turn, could quickly and radically alter the power structure of any province.
So what does it mean?
It’s all well and good that we put this stuff in place, but the real question is….what the heck is the point of it all? So we know that the Clergy are the socially dominant group in the Duchy of Leland…so? What does that “do” for you? If it doesn’t do anything, or if the bonus isn’t compelling, then there's not really much point.
Again, this stuff isn’t finalized, but this is sorta what I had in my head. As always, comments are welcomed!
If a province is socially dominated by:
The Aristocracy
Max Loyalty of the province increases by +5%
-20% to Provincial income (supporting the lavish lifestyles of the Aristocrats)
+ 2 to the training limits in the province in question
Halves the negative morale impact of troop training in this province
Rebellion Threshold: -5% (so if the normal rebellion threshold is 30%, then in Aristocratic provinces, it would be 25%)
The Clergy
Max Loyalty of the province increases by +10%
-10% to Provincial income (Tithe)
+ 2 Build Points in the province (build improvements faster…strong work ethic among the population)
+0.05 to Loyalty Recovery Rate (the people here bounce back more quickly from hits to morale)
The province by itself generates +2 Influence per turn
The Academics
- 1 to troop training limits in this province
- 1 build point in this province
+50% effectiveness of all research oriented buildings built here
The province by itself generates +2 Mana per turn
The Merchants
Troops raised in this province costs an additional 10% (maintenance costs are unchanged)
The province generates a bonus of +25% income (calculated after all buildings and other additions are taken into consideration).
The Peasants
Max Loyalty of the province decreases by –5%
Loyalty Recovery Rate decreases by –0.025 (takes the province longer to recover from hits to morale)
Rebellion Threshold increases by +5% (if Rebellion threshold is normally 30%, it becomes 35% for this province)—more likely to rebel
Each turn, the province generates (0-3) * (pop/500) research points in a (random) research field.
+2 Build Points in the province (enterprising population)
+1 free siege counter for the province (Citizen’s Defense Force)
+10% to Provincial Income
+1 Additional Provincial Improvement allowed in this province
-=Vel=-
Last edited by Velociryx on 05-02-2008 at 19:58
|
|
| |
|
|
King
Nashville, TN
|
Mar 1999
time: 18:12
| |
|
|
Hmm... a lot there to digest. Need to think through this some more. At moment, all I can offer is:
quote:
Social Power (abbreviated SocPow from here on)
SocPow, Aristocracy: 0.05
SocPow, Clergy: 0.02
SocPow, Academic: 0.02
SocPow, Merchant: 0.01
SocPow, Peasant: 0.005
|
Thinking in terms of a SocPow graph, we see a linear progression until Aristocracy which tracks up dramatically. It takes two peasants to equal the standing of one merchant, two merchant equals one academic or cleric, but it takes two and a half academics/clerics to equal one aristocrat (my, my, what would Academician Prokhor Zakharov (and you know you have to say the whole title and name!) say about that...). It also "feels" like Peasants have maybe too much SocPow, but I can see how lowering that value would be imbalancing for the game.
I'm not saying those values are off necessarily, I am just wondering what gameplay effects you wish to acheive by using that particular distribution curve?
Delving just a bit further, I very much appreciate the ability to affect the SocPow curve by my building choices.
quote:
So in addition to each building’s normal effects, we could add additional effects to allow these buildings to mingle with the social dynamic, and such changes could look like this:
|
I would vote, though for trying to keep the effect simply calculated. That is, only apply positive modifiers to one (or more) group, don't use negative modifiers for opposing groups. I think this is a case where keeping the calculus simple will pay dividends in several areas: application speed (simpilier logic calcs), gameplay balance, code maintainability, modability.
I'll reflect more on the rest of the info...
|
|
| |
|
|
Moderator
of Candle'Bre
|
Apr 1999
time: 00:12
| |
|
|
More thoughts along these lines:
* I'm definitely game for further reducing the social power of the peasantry. Historically, they had next to no power anyway, so this would certainly be easy to further reduce (and, IMO, would be a good argument in favor of strengthening the benefits if you finally make the peasantry the dominant group in a province, which would be a BIG milestone)
* I like the idea of streamlining the calculus re: only having positive or negative values assigned to various buildings, but what do you think of this:
What if we have ancillary buildings associated with each group that are specifically designed to induce a negative impact on some other? (example: You build a Shrine...this increases the social power of the clergy in the province. You later upgrade the shrine to a temple....further increase in the social power of the clergy. Later still, you upgrade the temple to a cathedral (yet more social power to the clergy, and it also opens up a new ability. You gain +1 building slot, and the option to build an office of the inquisition, which (in addition to having some suitably wicked effect, also lowers the social power of the academics....  )
-=Vel=-
Edit: While I love the idea above, I'm not entirely sold on the idea of eliminating all negative impacts against specific social groups...I don't necessarily think we should have negative effects on ALL buildings, but could totally see it in some cases....but again, I can be convinced!
Edit #2: One thing that I HAVEN'T listed out yet, is the specific positive/negative "happiness" effects to morale re: certain buildings (touched on in my first post), and this would be another area where I could really use your collective help!
So in looking at this model, there are really four core issues:
1) (and clearly most important): Is this worth the time to develop? Does this "do enough" or "add enough" to the game to warrant its inclusion? IMO, the answer is yes, but I'm curious to hear your thoughts.
2) Are the numbers right? (social power numbers)? If no, what numbers would you recommend?
3) Are the building effects good? If not...recommend something, and we'll kick it around!
-V.
Last edited by Velociryx on 05-02-2008 at 21:17
|
|
| |
|
|
King
Nashville, TN
|
Mar 1999
time: 18:12
| |
|
|
quote:
Originally posted by Velociryx
More thoughts along these lines:
1) (and clearly most important): Is this worth the time to develop? Does this "do enough" or "add enough" to the game to warrant its inclusion? IMO, the answer is yes, but I'm curious to hear your thoughts.
|
A resounding yes from me. A game of many layers is a fun game (to me anyway). Someone that doesn't particularly want to worry about the deeper game can simply build the improvements they need based on their primary attributes. Those that do want to delve deeper have a whole additional level to play with.
quote:
Originally posted by Velociryx
2) Are the numbers right? (social power numbers)? If no, what numbers would you recommend?
|
Still not sure. It's somewhat hard judge the raw values versus the likely overall effects of the buildings. What I mean to say is that evaluating the effects of building a temple vs a school and the impacts to the overall SocPow graph is one thing. But how many temples vs schools is a player likely to build over their whole empire?
Actually, that brings up another question. Are these effects calculated empire-wide, or per province?
quote:
Originally posted by Velociryx
3) Are the building effects good? If not...recommend something, and we'll kick it around!
|
Conceptually,yes. I would like to know though, how large of an effect you are envisioning through the SocPow effects of the buildings. If you really want people to use them to make structural changes to the power graph, then perhaps you should let them directly do so?
In other words, if people HAVE to play the meta game here, then I would suggest you just expose the mechanics more directly.
Not to say that I think you should go this way, but just something to consider.
quote:
Originally posted by Velociryx
* I like the idea of streamlining the calculus re: only having positive or negative values assigned to various buildings, but...
|
I am likely overly sensitive to this at the moment because we are going through some pain on my current project around a similiar issue. This insurance company uses both positive and negative modifiers in rating the potential insureds. Their current model is horribly complicated and nearly impossible to easily modify.
We have agreement from all the business users to replace the model with a "positive values only". The underwriters though, don't wanna go for it.
Anyway, it is certainly workable to use positive and negative values, it just makes the calcs more complicated. Certainly gives more flexibility to the model.
|
|
| |
|
|
Moderator
of Candle'Bre
|
Apr 1999
time: 00:12
| |
|
|
I agree wholeheartedly re: the many layers that something like this exposes/makes possible.
If you don't care....cool...it's easy enough to build buildings for their primary effects, and largely ignore the other stuff...there's a balance to be struck there, obviously...we don't want to make the provincial social dominance bonuses so overwhelming that they drive the game, but at the same time, we don't want to marginalize them either....just potent enough to be worth investigating, but not game breaking if you choose to ignore them, either.
Where the buildings and their effects on social power are concerned, perhaps the best way to experiment with that will be to open the prototype up to some limited public betatesting?
It will be some span of time before I get everything working, and bear in mind that the prototype is not the game per se, but an engine that allows me to experiment with stuff like this. Still, it would give those who are interested a tangible taste of where we're headed. Just thinking out loud here. If there's interest, I can certainly do something along those lines once I get the social dynamic model fleshed out and working in some fashion.
Come to think of it, that (a firsthand peek at exactly what's going on) might be the catalyst to take the discussions to the next level as it were...
-=Vel=-
Last edited by Velociryx on 06-02-2008 at 06:48
|
|
| |
|
| |
All times are GMT. The time now is 00:12.
Apolyton Time is 19:12. |
top of page
|
|
|
|
|
|
