Tuesday, July 14, 2015

Proposal: Shall we throw in a little Catan?

Timed out 3 votes to 1. Enacted by Kevan.

Adminned at 16 Jul 2015 14:57:56 UTC

Remove the second paragraph of rule “Fuel”.

Add the following subrule, “Drilling Days”, to the rule “Resources”:

If no Tribe has done so in the previous four days, any Tribe may announcing a Drilling Day. Upon doing so, they shall randomly select zones by rolling DICE25 8 times. The numbers rolled correspond to the order of the zones in the source code in the wiki page The Wasteland. (For example, if a 1 is rolled it corresponds to the first zone in the source; a 10 corresponds to the 10th code in the source.) The Tribe who announced the Drilling day will then place a resource in each zone selected; zones selected multiple times receive a resource for each selection.

The resource to be added is determined in the following manner:
* If the Zone contains a settlement or is empty, it receives debris; otherwise
* If the Zone contains a single type of resource, it receives that kind of resource; otherwise
* If the Zone contains multiple kinds of resource and does not have oil, metal, or radiation in equal quantities, then it receives whichever of these it has in the greatest quantity (if such a resource exists); otherwise
* Specifying the name of the Zone, the Tribe will roll DICE4 in the GNDT, adding oil in the case of a 1, metal in the case of 2, radiation in the case of 3, and debris in the case of 4.

In the rule “Resources”, replace “Remove two Debris to add any single Resource of any type, to any Zone they control” with “Remove four Debris to add any single Resource of any type, to any Zone they control.”

If the proposal “Phased Expansion” passed, replace “previous four days” in the rule “Drilling Days” with “current phase”.

Trading mechanics optional.

Comments

Kevan: he/him

14-07-2015 17:42:21 UTC

So under this rule, the only way to gain fuel would be to find oil (or build it from debris) and destroy it?

redtara: they/them

14-07-2015 18:18:30 UTC

That’s the idea. Or you could trade for it. The point is to make resources scarce and worth fighting over.

Tantusar: he/they

14-07-2015 22:28:49 UTC

against The game is going slowly enough.

Kevan: he/him

14-07-2015 22:50:39 UTC

for Tentatively in favour of scarcity.

redtara: they/them

14-07-2015 23:56:17 UTC

Tantusar: I think that’s more for want of mechanics than resources.

Darknight: he/him

16-07-2015 01:13:56 UTC

imperial

Tantusar: he/they

16-07-2015 05:53:27 UTC

Before this hits the top of the queue in nine or so hours (assuming Phased expansion doesn’t end its stalemate) consider this:

This rule will require between eight and sixteen rolls every time it becomes relevant. This proposal massively slows down the Debris conversion process, to the point where you will need to make at minimum three Convoys to any one place (with 1 Debris or other resource already) in order to make one conversion. And this all assumes you have some Oil lying around to make more Fuel. If you can’t your hands on Oil, you are absolutely and royally screwed. And guess what, you need Oil to get Oil.

<h3>Bottom line, this gets enacted, this game will grind to a halt.</h3>

Another problem is: What happens if somewhere has two or more Settlements? Does it get more?

Kevan: he/him

16-07-2015 07:49:22 UTC

Nomic never grinds to a halt! (Not over gameplay mechanics, at least.) We can always propose to swap this rule back out if a majority of players end up stuck and can’t do anything. I think a little scarcity might sharpen people up.

(Two Settlements would trigger the first bullet point and generate Debris.)