Game survey

[Captain Deathbeard]

I need to balance building costs, but I also need to think about balancing money in general and I need to know how its working out so far.
Specifically, I want to hear from players who have made tons of money in-game, and how did you earn it (eg trading, looting, killing traders..) and how long were you playing, how much time and effort did you put in to making that money.
What are your opinions on the various ways of making money so far, and how it is balanced? Is trading too powerful? Or useless compared to something else? Do you think certain things are too expensive or too cheap? How much do you think a small building should cost?

[nuget102]

I need to balance building costs, but I also need to think about balancing money in general and I need to know how its working out so far.
Specifically, I want to hear from players who have made tons of money in-game, and how did you earn it (eg trading, looting, killing traders..) and how long were you playing, how much time and effort did you put in to making that money.
What are your opinions on the various ways of making money so far, and how it is balanced? Is trading too powerful? Or useless compared to something else? Do you think certain things are too expensive or too cheap? How much do you think a small building should cost?

The way I always earned my money was through trading, I would buy an item when the price mark up was in the greed (usually around 60-70%) and sell the same item in a different place that had the price marked up higher (usually I tried for at least 105%) this could be very time consuming, but it was pretty easy... it's also REALLY boring xD but when repeatable quest/missions are added (like hunting down a certain bandit or capturing x amount of bandits for interrogation for the military or something like that) I would gladly do those instead I figure a small building should probably cost at least um...I dunno, 30k or so? maybe i'm setting the price to high? ^.^ we should have a vote on that maybe? probably be the best way I think :3

[txfirefighter]

well, i named myself a weapons a dealer.


i rarely ever looted armor from mobs. weapons seemed to stack better and sell for loads. i had roughly 30,000 kats but when i imported after a patch i lost it all. no big deal since there was nothing much for me to buy anymore. my squad of ten has the best that i could find. it took me quite a while to get the gear, from killing to running to going from vendor to vendor since there inventories dont reset. weapons sold for good amounts i feel. its balenced pretty well. one sell would usually buy a set of armor per guy maybe a little more. weapons seemed to be rather expensive if i remember correctly.


trading supplies from one town to the next was tedious and boring for me. im more of the fighting/looting/selling.

i think buildings should be something to work hard for. not sure what amount but something that should not be obtainable to everyone. mid stage goal or somthing?

maybe have the choice to where different buildings give different bonuses. if you build a trader, items are cheaper as the trader becomes more profitable. if you want a first aid building then first aid is cheaper. etc etc.

[UltimaVirus]

Barring looting cities and merchants, I am typically not rolling in cash unless I do a few good trading runs.

Buying trading goods and selling them the town over can be extremely profitable (triple your money on rum!). In my opinion, the most basic building should probably costs upwards of 50,000. That's a nice hefty sum that will take a few trade runs to get. However, if someone loots a city they'll easily have over 200,000 in goods.

[Captain Deathbeard]

Buildings are going to be a major part of the gameplay though, they open up the way for business, research and crafting, I don't want the player to have to play for ages to earn enough to get started. I want it to be not to hard to start off a little shack and start mining, and slowly work your way up from there. Facilities will also cost a lot, eg medic equip, storage, as well as research and upgrades. Getting your first building won't make you badass uber powerfull, quite the opposite in fact.

I'm thinking the cheapest building (a small shack) will be around 10,000, maybe less and you will be able to scrape out a living with it to get started on to bigger things. The biggest buildings (the round ones) maybe around 70,000.

[1337]

Exactly what i was thinking.
A small shack should not cost a lot, it's realistic that way since the walls and such don't cost a lot but special equipment and further upgrades are the costly stuff.
Also it allows to start on building our fortress fairly early and not only after playing for ages to scrape all the money needed for it.

Considering a bandits basic katana sells for 400-800 and his gear 200. You need to loot 2-3 bandit squads for one hut, that's pretty reasonable for starters. Fine tunning can come later i guess^^

[nuget102]

I forgot about all the other stuff you would need... so yea, 10k does sound good when you add it all up xD

[txfirefighter]

good pint with fine tuning.

i see where you want to take this-and i agree. starting off with a small shack to do just the very basics should be affordable. then once that generates some income (im guessing at a slow rate?) supplemented with killing a looting you can upgrade the shack to a better shack.

the buildings will have upgrades right?

[Captain Deathbeard]

Yes, the idea is it won't be too expensive to get started, but very expensive to build up a mega-base

[Prezo]

I still maintain that (even if not immediately) the cost should be in resources as opposed to cash, you could of course buy the resources from the traders but there are only 3 things you need to build a building, knowledge, manpower, and resources. In the modern day cash can obtain all of those, but if you already had the manpower who know how to build then all you need is resources, which could if you were established be sourced from your other endeavors.

[nuget102]

I still maintain that (even if not immediately) the cost should be in resources as opposed to cash, you could of course buy the resources from the traders but there are only 3 things you need to build a building, knowledge, manpower, and resources. In the modern day cash can obtain all of those, but if you already had the manpower who know how to build then all you need is resources, which could if you were established be sourced from your other endeavors.

at first I disagreed with you...then I thought about, odds are using resources would add up to be more expensive then straight cash, then why not for the shack you use just cash, then for the higher up building you use maybe straight resources (maybe a lot of resources?) or a mixture of cash and resources? or just straight cash...i'm cool with any of them as long as I eventually get my slaves :3

[Mattk50]

I'd answer but i used a shopkeepers backpack, essentially meaning without a weight system i could loot everything then sell it. Most money was from looting tho. Would be nice to get missions or a production/crafting/mining system soon.

[nuget102]

I'd answer but i used a shopkeepers backpack, essentially meaning without a weight system i could loot everything then sell it. Most money was from looting tho. Would be nice to get missions or a production/crafting/mining system soon.

unless i'm mistaken, that will be in soonish

[Blxz]

Trading is dead boring so far. It is far too easy and far too tedious. Also can be too profitable depending on the local game price conditions (which can be tweaked with repeated restarts).

Having said that, looting is a hassle at time too. Selling equipment can be difficult because of the shape of items. And requires travelling further and further a-field just to find vendors with space to fit a katana.

Currently, money in the game is hard to get early on (which I think is good) but then you hit what appears to be a tipping point in which it suddenly becomes too easy. Suddenly you are swimming in money and the change feels very abrupt. Having something to do with it might negate that change (ie. the next step beyond mere survival) but it still feels very sudden to me. Is there a way to change this? Even by nerfing the resale price of non-trade goods.

[Captain Deathbeard]

Then what we need is to figure out the exact cause of that tipping point.
Maybe its when you get strong and start looting vast amounts from dead traders or whole army squads?

[nuget102]

Then what we need is to figure out the exact cause of that tipping point.
Maybe its when you get strong and start looting vast amounts from dead traders or whole army squads?

For me, since I trade to make money, it's when I get past the point of buying just one or two items then going to another town to trade those items for a profit, which in turn allows me to buy more items that I can then sell for a profit and eventually I get enough money to fill my bag with items... I dunno if there really is a way to fix this...except maybe increase the NPC count in the desert?

[Mattk50]

Well, weight slowing you down would be a major factor. As would a dynamic economy where you might even take a loss if you bought and sold at the wrong time would also be pretty good. And maybe if bandits could specifically lay an ambush for you if an informant in a town told them you were weak and holding lots of cargo. Also, if they could spot you from the distance you can spot them, and then see you moving abnormally slowly due to lots of cargo, they should try to take you on.

[SilentHill]

Just about all my money is from combat, At first its quite slow. First (biggest?) major change is when you no longer need to (lure) use allies to kill for you. Second, when you have the bags and banddages to not have to go back to town.
I havent got to attacking towns yet and I only have 4 guys but money is easy to get right now.

[Blxz]

Then what we need is to figure out the exact cause of that tipping point.
Maybe its when you get strong and start looting vast amounts from dead traders or whole army squads?

[Well my internet spazed out and I lost my post but will try and re-write it.]

The problem I mostly see is merchants in the 'TRADE' buildings. They carry insane amounts of very liquid assets. Since endurance and weight are not a factor I can go from 0 cats to 70K+ cats in a single 'smash and grab run'. I've done it with a single moderately powerful character a few times but it can be done with 3 brand new guys (possibly 2 also). The trading hub northwest of Clownsteady has a merchant and 2 guards. I need to distract the guards while another character runs in, knocks out the unarmed TRADE guy in a few swings and takes his backpack. An easy run or a save and import new squad means this is essentially finished. (NOTE: Even without gaming the system a few mildly powerful characters can do this the proper way). At this point money is no longer a barrier to anything.

My solution is that merchants have some sort of locked chest. The merchant would draw from this stock in order to sell things. If I rush in and kill him I would require a lockpicking skill in order to break through his chest/container.

Now that buildings are almost complete this could be the next logical step in development. Also, I understand that you want goods and items to be real and pre-existing so they don't magically appear when I click the 'buy' button, hence this suggestion. There are other arguments for this as well like the absurdity of these crazy strong merchants carrying all this shit in their backpack all day, along with other gameplay issues. I won't elaborate anymore for now though due to the 'wall of text' risk I am about to run into.

[txfirefighter]

not every item is lootable?