New Game Ideas

    I think that each game should start with everyone on a level playing field.


    1. 2 month games not 3.


    2. Remove QL for all players at the start of each game


    3. QL can be gained at the rate of 10 QL per product per building per 12WU's.


    4. Cost of QL to be dropped (amount to be discussed as regards buildings etc.).


    5. Any product can be researched for QL whenever a player wants


    6. Limit purchasing advertisements to 20 in play at any one time.


    7. Increase the points for Events (amount to be discussed).


    8. Put the Best Vendor calculation back to what it was.


    9. Review the pricing (to be discussed).


    10. Do not let ACTUAL selling price for goods drop as much as it has done in this game.


    Currently players who have high QL in many products will [should] always win if they know what they are doing. Oakville (a new player) played the best game of anyone for the first 4 weeks of this game. He then took his foot off the pedal. I presume that the reason was that he realised that he was never going to be able to beat the players around him in the table because they had QL in the top products and could increase their scoring.


    This would illustrate that a new player can compete. But ultimately only a handfull of players can win the game. I think that each player should have a chance.


    The Market is the heart of the game, particularly if we shorten the length of the game. Too many advertisements on a single product can stiffle the market. So limit the number of buying adverts for each player to 20.


    Removing QL for each player will be a contentious issue. But it will open winning the game up to everyone rather than a small elite. This will be increased by shortening the game. It will give more chance to players concentrating on early products and upgrading their buildings.


    The game needs a wild-card element. It already has it in the Event Manager table. Increase the point scoring from 1 per 1% to 10 per 1%. That would make it worth going for.
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    I realise that there is a hell of a lot of QL points for current players to lose on this, but the game is getting stale and we need to make the game attractive to new players. A shorter game encourages new players to stick with the game and gives them the opportunity to try their new found skills.


    For the older players (like us) it gives us all a chance to really test our game strategies against each other.

    I can tell you what happened. After about the first month, I started doing
    a significant amount of QL research. I don't know if you've noticed, but QL research is not
    counted in the ROI score, but it IS counted in the company value for
    lowering your ROI score. Just why this is deemed a desirable
    mechanic, I can't explain. Punishing new players who don't have a
    chance to win anyhow for doing the research they so desperately need
    in order to have any chance just seems to me to be heaping insult on
    top of injury. For the past week or so, I've been making about 7M/WU
    with about 7M/WU of research and an ROI of near zero. After about 6
    weeks, when Auto tree prices were well into collapse, I looked around
    and saw 100 QL goods selling for 3-4x what I could get for mine, and
    decided to toss in the towel and focus exclusively on research and
    the Manufacturer score. It really isn't worth even trying for the
    overall score for about a year or so, until you can build up your QL
    levels, and I intend to make no attempt whatsoever at any of the
    medals in the next round.



    I would expect that people feel
    strongly about keeping their QL levels, and I don't think it's really
    necessary to get rid of them, just so long as there is some change so
    that other players have a chance. What I would do is make research
    for the current round be 1 RL/1WU, with only the 500k/building
    level/WU cost. Buildings stay working on the same thing until
    changed or finished. The starting research level is based on the
    total research spent on the good, and does not change from the
    current formula of Cost = 8x10^3x(QL)^3/3+4x10^6*(QL)*Lab Building
    Level, so most of the RL levels gained in the current round will be
    lost at the game reset.



    I would also make the desired QL for
    factories selectable, multiply production cost by (1+desired QL/100),
    and have demand be 1 consumer at each desired QL who chooses the good
    with the cheapest value of an effective price of price (for
    QL>=Desired QL) or price + normal price * 4 * ((Desired
    QL-QL)/100) (for QLto normal price/effective price for a price below the normal price,
    and (normal price/effective price) ^ 0.5 for a price above it. This
    turns the job of selecting a QL to sell into a rock/paper/scissors
    game, since if everyone sells at the highest QL, they're throwing
    money away on production costs and getting nothing for it.



    Re:#1,#10: I'm not completely decided
    on this, but I tend to think that the challenge of finding a new area
    where you can still make profits after the auto tree fully saturates
    would make the game more interesting, and that a 3-month game is a
    good idea. The problem currently is that even when the auto tree is
    saturated so that the QL 0 people make nothing, the QL 100 people are
    still pulling in money hand over fist , so the auto tree never
    saturates for them, making the same thing work every game. This
    would no longer be the case after a major change to the QL system. I
    do think it's good that the price for some goods drops to the point
    that it forces people to move into a different tree.



    Re#7: Without a change to the QL
    situation, this enhances the current reliance on QLs to win.



    Re#6: If they're limited to 20, I'll
    just have bigger offers. In any case, I think having the market
    become saturated is an intended game mechanic. The game would feel
    much different if the price actually adjusted fast enough to balance
    the market. I've already posted a bit about the January rush which I
    think is undesirable.



    Re#8: As I understand it, the way to
    get a high vendor score under the current system is to have one store
    of each type, plus a ton of auto stores, so the change hasn't really fixed
    the problem it was intended to solve. I'm actually kind of
    interested to see what would happen under the scoring system of the
    previous round, plus quick QL gains for the current round only.
    Everyone would pile into autos, and with the top players no longer
    insulated from price fluctuations, it would turn into a red-ink
    bloodbath, and then they'd have to move a lot of production out in
    order to actually make money.

    Interesting post Oakville.


    As you say, doing QL research virtually destroys any chance that you might have of winning because it hammers your ROI score. A couple of games ago I managed to reach RL 50 quite quickly and decided not to do any QL research. I ended up doing quite well in that game, but was helped by the fact that players at the time did not understand ROI as well as we do now and prices in auto industry did not drop.


    Basically, the situation now is that a player can play the game better and harder than anyone else, but those few players with high QL will always be able to play the long game and gradually grind you down.


    I have several reasons for thinking that a shorter game might work better.


    Firstly I notice each game that some players concentrate on lower level products (with big building upgrades) and do quite well for a while. Then they get overtaken gradually by those who get to auto industry (usually around 4/5 weeks). A shorter game would make the rush for RL50 less desireable. It would lead to different strategies with some chosing to concentrate on Fridges or Keyboards, etc.


    Secondly, new players find the game whilst a game is in progress. Generally they take another game to sort their tactics out and are then ready for a good run at it on their thrid game. That could take 6 months before a new player would feel comfortable with a shot at the top 10. And even then s/he would probably have no meaningfull QL levels.


    As regards removing QL, I thought that that idea was pretty much a none starter as soon as I posted it because there are a large number of players with too much QL to lose. But I still stand by that idea as the way forward for a good game.


    Regards


    TB Ltd.

    Regarding item # 10


    The prices fall so much because we are too few players. The virtual market is too small for the large amount of manufactured end products

    I don't understand how fewer players should cause prices to rise. If the demand is based on the number of players, wouldn't prices drop as the fraction of active players rises? If demand is static, wouldn't they drop when the number of players was large? In neither case does a small number of players cause the prices to rise. Maybe the game is doing something weird that I don't know about?

    The fewer players will be the smaller of the virtual market. So the market equilibrium is reached faster. Many players cut prices further to 100% of the goods to sell. This is a spiral that pushes the price down.