Might it be worth using the existing Housing resources for this, rather than tying it into the Repairs/Components system?

It does use the existing Housing resources. The first type, Shack, has a cost of 1 Housing, in addition to 5 Panel.

I debated on whether or not it should just use Housing, but I thought it might be interesting for Machinists to “acquire” Components as part of building or upgrading their Dwellings. I’m not married to the idea, though.

Ah right, sorry, missed the first item in that. Still, it kinda feels like it will distort the demand for components if everyone is going to want endless supplies of panels.

Fair enough. Based on the economy created in “Surge Pricing”, I see your point. I’ve removed the Components aspect and made it clear that the Cost is only Housing.

i like this, but like i’ve stated i’m preferring the introduction of new keys to the advancement of old ones!

@lemon, the problem with just introducing new keys is that if there’s absolutely no rules associated with them, then there won’t be any agendas for them. At that point, you might as well not have the key in the first place.

“Housing” being a resource that you can spend to build Dwellings feels a bit tautological.

@Kevan: would it be better to simply possess a certain amount of Housing to have the right to then have a Dwelling of a certain type? I’m just trying to discover what would be the acceptable mechanics here. The end goal is to make Construct Housing useful, but without some way to make that action work with the Housing resource, I’m not sure how to resolve it.

The narrative gets shaken out by consensus, so I’m not really sure.

I’d read the explicit Coal/Housing/Valves Motion/Dwelling/Control setup as meaning that these three resources are parts of the Machine that Machinists have ownership rights to, in the different Megasystems: there’s a distant hopper of Coal with your name on it, you’re the landlord of a unit of Housing, and you have some server time on a bank of Valves. Rather than literally carrying around a lump of fuel, a collapsible tent and a single valve.

I’d maybe go for making Housing much more expensive, and serving little or no purpose. When you buy one, you’re investing in making a chamber of the Dwelling System habitable, and that’s your “Construct Housing”.

Withdrawn

With a better understanding of what “Resources” means, I may come up with a revised solution to this, and maybe introduce another Initialisation Key to get lemon’s buy-in. That probably means I’ll wait for a little while to let the other rules settle in so I don’t accidentally trigger Initialisation Phase Two too soon.