Brainstorming Auto-Incrementing Strategic Turn Options.

[x4000]

This has been brought up by a number of players, to the point where we're thinking this needs to be some form of option.  To just collect a lot of the parts of the discussion so far in one place:

Problem is, that breaks down completely when you go to multiplayer;
...
The separate strategic and action parts (where you can do each for as long as you want independently of the other without ill consequences in the neglected side), but where the strategic and action side enrich one another if you choose to play both of them, is one of my and Keith's core design goals for the game.  I really don't think there's any way that auto-incrementing strategic turns would ever fit with that, or with multiplayer.  Part of the reason for no auto-incrementing turns is that this isn't an RTS game, it's a TBS game.  Having time pressure to do something before something else happens is absolutely counter to where I'd want to take this.

You're right that making it so that only having it auto-increment when you go back to settlements would handle most of those complaints, except multiplayer would be badly broken by that, but even in solo play that would lead to some undesirable consequences.  Having to avoid town when you're low on supplies or just need to craft something new, because there's something bad that will happen when the turn auto-increments, creates a really unpleasant situation and I think that would be extremely common.
...

I hear what you're saying. My issue is that I don't see (in the current iteration) much synergy between the action and strategy parts. I think that a blend of genres needs to be justified in the sense that it needs to be more than the sum of its parts. Otherwise, separate the blend into 2 games where each could be better on its own. For example, the turn-based strategy in the game isn't really turn based. In a turn based game, the turns are your minimal time unit. So when a monster is next to a town, you better have some strategy to deal with that in the turn based realm because there's nothing else. The tension builds up over turns for that very reason. But in the current version, when a monster approaches the town, you have infinite chances outside of the turn-based space to eliminate said monster. Reacting to said monster is equivalent to a chore.

I really like the connection you made between exploration and the turn based game, since that connects the 2 parts in a way that enriches both: if I want to explore further, I need to move ahead in the turn-based game. The turn-based game gets a reason for you to play it (finish turns) and face the consequences of playing it (monsters, attacks, resource usage etc) and the action part gets new, interesting challenges as a result. However, if there's no feedback ie. if there's nothing within the action realm that will cause the turn-based game to advance, then all the turn-based game is doing is setting up static situations for the action parts to deal with. Within the action part, you can try as many times as you want to defeat the challenges set up in the turn-based part. The turn-based part then loses all tension, and the action part becomes a repeated loop.

I think it makes a lot of sense that going to craft stuff or heal fully will start a new turn. You're getting something you need, so there's a cost involved in terms of time. You can think of it as making the turn-based game more realtime, or alternatively, as putting the action into the turn-based realm. Each 'turn' then involves an expedition out into the world. More importantly, it makes the turn-based game relevant and intertwined with the choices of the player. Rather than seeing it as unpleasant, I see it as creating choices.

I think the critical point here is that it shouldn't be unpleasant because once the turn-based game becomes relevant, you're not going to try to fight a bunch of approaching monsters when they're right next to the town. That's something you'd never do in a turn based game because you'd know that you're not leaving yourself enough strategic depth to deal with the monsters in case you lose. It is something that's currently done in the game though, because the strategy isn't very relevant. What you'd do instead is go out there and try to nip it in the bud as early as you can (or as is reasonable) knowing that you need to leave yourself room to go back to town and heal perhaps several times, which could take a couple of turns.

I'm not sure what the plans for multiplayer are, but there are probably ways to translate this dynamic into multiplayer. For example, you could make it such that a turn advances every X visits to the towns, where X is the number of players. Alternatively, you could have it be such that if one player visits the town, all other players can have a chance to access the town's resources via that one player. It simplifies the alternative, which is one player taking gems from other players, then going to a town to craft it for them, and finally delivering the results to those players. Instead, each player gets a direct instant link to spell crafting.

BTW another idea (in general) is to enable you to visit each town once per turn. This creates a big incentive to find more towns.

Then my response:

Re: the monster stuff not really being turn-based yet, that's quite true, but mainly because we haven't started implementing macro-game combat yet.  That's a pretty cool and pretty involved thing the way Keith has it planned, and we've not talked about it yet just in case something doesn't work out there, but it actually adds a whole extra genre into the mix if we can pull that off (and no, it's not tower defense).  Right now the wandering monsters are just water-down tiny foes that you can easily defeat alone and on-foot.  That was never the plan for long-term monsters that are more directly related to the overlord and such.  You'll be seeing some monster bands that veritably feel like an army, and dealing with those yourself in adventure-mode would be night impossible. 

Having to figure out how to deal with them in the strategic side so that you can get past whatever they are blocking in the adventure mode has been a goal for us from the start.  And being able to use your NPCs, in the macro game, to "soften up" an overlord keep that is vastly more powerful than the current versions currently are, is another similar thing.  Send in the army, bash up their army, then send in the lone hero to kill the leader.  Etc.  Like I keep saying, right now what you're seeing with the strategic parts of the game is something like 10% of what we have planned for even 1.0.

The exploration side of things for the macrogame is the one part that is really fully fleshed out, I'd say; and you're right, that really ties across in both sides much better than the rest because of that.

In terms of the monsters advancing toward your town, you're right you'd never go fight them on foot if they were too strong, but by the same token those monsters wouldn't even exist or be advancing on you in the first place if you weren't playing the strategic side of the game.  And if you just hate strategy games and want to spend hours overleveling them by 20 levels... well, that certainly is another way to play, right?  Not a particularly fun or rewarding way, but there's no reason that shouldn't be valid.  And if someone has "uber skills" and wants to try to level an army with their one dude, well, that's an interesting challenge that I guess they ought to be allowed to try their hand at a few times, too.

It is true, of course, that with AI War one of the things that is really compelling is that any action you take isn't something that is cost-free.  Since the AI reinforces over time and aggresses against you periodically, if you're spending a lot of time overpowering the AI piece by piece, that's just letting the AI build up somewhere else.  And obviously that's a key mechanic to AI War.  With AVWW... at core this is meant to be a more relaxed game than that.

The above all said, Keith sent me an email this morning talking about some ways he was thinking your ideas, or something very similar, could work in multiplayer or solo as an optional thing that players can toggle on kind of like the difficulty toggle settings.  The key features of his ideas were: 1) it's an optional thing that hardcore strategy fans can turn on (ideally to some reward, or else just for the extra interest/challenge), and 2) it still doesn't cause things to happen invisibly behind you when you're out adventuring, it just forces you to stop adventuring and take a strategic turn when you've reached the end of your counter.  There were a couple of specific variants he'd suggested based on your comments, and I'll make another brainstorming thread where that can be discussed separately.

That whole thing really is against the core design of the game, but then again so is any hardcore platforming component, and I want to have those as an optional thing you can do in this world, too.  Lots of things can be done, from all sorts of genres, that conflict with the core design of the game -- so long as they are optional.  In this specific case it will be difficult to make it optional and yet still meaningful as a way to play, but I think it can be done.  Minor factions and such in AI War are all optional, of course, but they are really a lot of the spice of that game.  I guess I'm coming around to seeing this -- essentially -- variant of the core game being kind of like an AI Modifier or a Minor Faction, just not something you select in a central lobby.

[x4000]

Reserved for Keith's comments.

One thing I'm seeing very strongly from a certain portion of the playerbase is a desire for finite time (auto-turn when dying, going back to town, whatever).  That doesn't fit the core design at all, as you've noted multiple places and at some length.  But I think we may be able to make those particular players happy:

1) Either:
- Have something like the difficulty-setting-monument, probably in some dangerous dungeon rather than in the settlement, where you can activate some ancient and/or high-tech and/or magical device that will try to begin the reconstruction of time.
Or:
- Have some trigger based on linking a certain number of consciousness nodes or a particular kind of node or some other macrogame escalation (the nodes currently cause a lot more rampaging monsters) that also gets time sort of haltingly going again.

Sure, some sort of option to play like that could be an interesting thing.

2) Once that switch/trigger has been tripped, a time counter is started, but only changes:
- +X when entering a region from the world map.
- +Y when you select a new character.
- Possibly some other events.

3) When time counter reaches Z, you may no longer enter a region from the world map or select a new character without ending the turn first.  This would require allowing access to the strategic map once the time counter is at Z (probably not at all times, just to keep it from getting totally non-special) so that they could make any last-minute changes to npc assignments, etc, but I think it would work.
- One special case is that if rampaging monsters are in a settlement region then normally a turn cannot be ended, so we'd need to let the player warp directly to that settlement to fight that battle or auto-resolve it somehow or whatever; but it could be worked out simply.

4) Multiplayer remains a sticking point, but there are couple ways we could make it at least tenable for those who _really_ want this kind of gameplay:
- Divide all time-counter increases by the number of active players.  This allows gaming the system by careful control of how many players are connected at once, etc, but again this is an opt-in feature to begin with: if you like cheating, cheat.  If you don't, don't.
- Don't make any special consideration for multiplayer: having multiple glyphbearers running around increases what you can get done, but also increases the rate at which bad things may happen.  This would make it so that you'd have to be very careful about who you worked with on your server and you'd need to be pretty coordinated, and you probably wouldn't want more than a certain number of active players ever, but I think it could suit the needs of a lot of people who want this kind of hardcore challenge.


Anyway, I think it would work, I think it wouldn't interfere with players wanting the "normal" experience, and I think I would play with this on.  If it went well we could actually develop the theme of reconstructing time or making progress towards some bigger goal but that's not really part of the core idea as I don't want to squirrel away important content under a hardcore option unless it becomes some kind of big hit.

Of course, just adding this on top of what already exists wouldn't be a very compelling experience, there's a need for more to the game in other areas too.

Yeah, that all makes sense and I'm on board with all that.  Making it optional in this fashion meets all the core design goals and provides basically another genre of game (RTS, sort of) on top of the existing layers. 

Possibly another way to handle this would be to make it some sort of special event, rather than a whole other game mode.  What I mean is, normally when you end a turn that just ends the turn and then you get to take another one, no time pressure.  Sure, that's great.  But what if there was also some sort of "End Turn And Start A Special Turn" mode.  Bad wording aside there, a "Special Turn" would basically work like you described with having a counter that limits the number of adventure-mode things you can do before the turn automatically ends.  Heck, it might be a literal timer rather than a timer counter, too, to make it so that it's more compatible with multiplayer in an inherent fashion (since someone would have to be present to start the special turns, they wouldn't just compound on themselves constantly).  Anyway, the idea of doing a special turn rather than a regular one is that it gives some benefits... maybe in the macro game, maybe in the adventure mode, or maybe in both.  But the downside is that now there's this time pressure.

It could be made to work a variety of different ways, so long as its optional and something you actually feel interested enough in to design.

[Dizzard]

If turns do pass automatically in the game I think it's important that it moves forward a turn after a certain period of time has passed rather than a situation where the game will move forward a turn if you do something (like enter a settlement or region)

Otherwise you'll just have people being scared to go anywhere or do anything if it means mobs might attack a settlement. It'll just end up with a situation where people are "ooohing" and "ahhhing" about things they wouldn't normally be worrying about doing. (it could get annoying quick)

Actually, I always thought the game was heading in this direction....it seemed so obvious I didn't even bring it up. The game needs to have progression running in the background, it feels really odd at the moment where we're in control of time passing. I don't particularly want to be the lord of time.....I want to be bending to it's will rather than it bending to mine. That is what would make the game really exciting for me.

So I would vote for a turn passing every 24hours. (ingame time) (and possibly with the advanced option to increase or lower this value, make it so a turn passes when a particular action is committed or possibly even disable it completely) (by disable I mean the current turn system) This seems like something you could give people a lot of choice with and mold the turn system into what fits in with their playstyle. The entire vibe of the game could change based on it.

[x4000]

One more quote from the other thread:

With AVWW... at core this is meant to be a more relaxed game than that.

It seems like a real contradiction to describe a game that involves trying to survive in a strange dangerous world where time and space has been ripped apart as a "relaxed game". That's totally not the perception I was building of this game...

I suppose you mean in regards to AI War, AVWW is a relaxed game? I haven't played AI War (well actually I tried the demo but couldn't really get into it...I'll try again though) but I'm guessing it's pretty ruthless in terms of the AI harassing you?

Perhaps "relaxed" is the wrong choice of words.  I guess I feel like AVWW should be relaxed in the same sense that Silent Hill, Zelda, Mario, Metroid, Civilization, or most FPS games are.  In those games, nothing happens without your instigating it (in solo play).  Even if the world is horrific and stressful, or a warzone, you can hang out in some area and nothing really happens except some predictable scripted events or maybe a few smaller enemies walking by.

Not to say that there aren't more harried parts that are more kill-or-be-killed, but that's very different from a game where you lose the ability to control the tempo if you don't act.  The auto-scrolling stages in Mario games are a good example of a less-relaxed gameplay style, actually.  If you just stand there, you will be pushed off a cliff or squashed on an obstacle, so you have to keep moving at least at the minimum pace the game dictates.  In AI War, or really any RTS game, if you just sit there doing not much of anything then the enemies are still using that time to actually build up and come for you, so you can't afford to waste time just sitting there thinking, or playing around with the units, unless you pause the game.

So it's really not a question of relaxed or not, it's a question of who sets the tempo: the player or the game itself.  In AVWW, the idea is that overall you set the tempo as you play, with some exceptions.  Even Mario has the occasional forced-scrolling segment, of course; and even in a relaxed game like Minecraft, the day/night cycle is out of your control and the night is a lot more dangerous until you learn the basics.  But overall in Minecraft, I'd still say that you set the tempo, as if you choose to spend your whole session exploring, building, or mining, it doesn't matter: you can mix and match or specialize in one activity as much as you want.  Also with Mario, those forced-scrolling stages are usually somewhat optional, so that if you really hate them there is some mechanic where you can skip them (all the way back to Smb3, even).

So that's all I meant.

[x4000]

Actually, I always thought the game was heading in this direction....it seemed so obvious I didn't even bring it up. The game needs to have progression running in the background, it feels really odd at the moment where we're in control of time passing. I don't particularly want to be the lord of time.....I want to be bending to it's will rather than it bending to mine. That is what would make the game really exciting for me.

The thing is, that pretty much kills any ability to have side quests.  Think about any Zelda game, or Chrono Trigger, or Red Faction: Guerilla.  ALL of those have the same structure, in that there are central missions and side quests.  You are the Lord of Time in all of them, in that if you don't complete missions then the story doesn't advance in any way.  Between each central story mission, you also have the chance to do as many side quests as you want to do -- pretty much all JRPGs that I can think of use this structure, too.  It also lets you level up if you are feeling too weak for the next story mission, and so on.

At core this game isn't a strategy game, though it does have strategic components.  At core it's action-adventure, with some bare hints of RPG in some spots.  But, like the classic game Actraiser, I think that the macrogame elements can really enhance that even if you are the lord of time.  And being lord of time is really pretty important to being able to get the best flow out of the game.

Keith is likely to bring up Din's Curse as a good counter-example to all that, but I've not played that game.  Though it sure does sound intriguing, I must admit.

[keith.lamothe]

My preference for basing the increment on world map travel and picking-a-new-character rather than real-time-passage is pretty strong.  Not that we couldn't allow the latter as an option, but the point I see in all this isn't to make the second-by-second gameplay more hectic.  Personally I shudder to think of the kinds of crazy things players would come up with to minimize the amount of seconds it takes them to do things, rather than minimizing the number of region or character transitions or whatever involved.  Also, a literally automatic end-turn would be more problematic compared to having the player have to end the turn themselves (after making any order changes they need to) before they could move on with the other stuff.

But the only root point in any of this is addressing the desires of players who want the game to actively threaten/oppose them as opposed to let them be the controller of time.  Story-wise you are almost exactly that: the controller of time.  Time no longer flows naturally in Environ in a world-wide sense, it's very local to specific people and places.  But game-wise I do understand if some prefer it otherwise.  Anyway, so I'm interested to hear what people are interested in

[keith.lamothe]

And yes, if you want a game that doesn't let you be the lord of time, play Din's Curse ( http://www.soldak.com/Dins-Curse/Overview.html ).  My more memorable experiences with it are from its beta phase and I think they nerfed how fast stuff hits the fan since then, but it's still pretty awesome in terms of making it matter which quests you prioritize and how fast you can get them done.  That's a good example of hectic-second-by-second being fun, but your scope of activity is also relatively limited compared to AVWW.

[Dizzard]

I still think it feels unnatural to have to progress turns yourself. Maybe I'm wrong but it feels like a game that follows this system will have trouble feeling dynamic or alive. (and that it will be more like a static painting that occasionally gets a part of it added in as opposed to a live video that's always moving) (not necessarily moving at the speed of light, but still moving)

I'm not sure what dangerous hostile world you envision where the foul beasts and merciless overlords of ultimate power just sit there waiting for you to click a button. It seems like an oxymoron. It seems like you're giving me the ability to be cool and collected in a situation where I really shouldn't be or that it doesn't make much sense to be. Like in RPGS with turn based battles where the fighters stand there staring at each other until you decide to make a move.

It's probably something (your plans) I have to see in full effect before I can be sure though.

I'll have a look into Din's Fire, thanks.

[keith.lamothe]

Perhaps it feels unnatural to you, and perhaps we can still accommodate folks with preferences like yours, but my preferences are heavily in the direction of games where the challenge is in making the right decisions rather than not making manual-dexterity errors, speed, quick-thinking, etc.  So I tend to design turn-based stuff, where you can think as much as you need to but there's a limit on how much you can do and if you do the wrong stuff you're going to get hurt.

[x4000]

Like in RPGS with turn based battles where the fighters stand there staring at each other until you decide to make a move.

See, and that's exactly what, in a macrogame sense, we're going for.  The combat in those RPGs tend to be vastly more involved and interesting, in the main, compared to RPGs where you have to be constantly thinking in realtime before your enemy next hits you.  It sounds to me like you just don't like turn-based games, and that's cool, but a lot of other people do like them.  I think that's one of those taste things.

[Dizzard]

Like in RPGS with turn based battles where the fighters stand there staring at each other until you decide to make a move.

See, and that's exactly what, in a macrogame sense, we're going for.  The combat in those RPGs tend to be vastly more involved and interesting, in the main, compared to RPGs where you have to be constantly thinking in realtime before your enemy next hits you.  It sounds to me like you just don't like turn-based games, and that's cool, but a lot of other people do like them.  I think that's one of those taste things.

I wouldn't go as far as saying I don't like them, I just find realtime more fulfilling overall. (not just from a gameplay side but also an atmospheric "life" side) (Xenoblade Chronicles :3) On the other hand I feel that defeating bosses is more rewarding in turn based games whereas general battles are morefun in real time.

Both have their strengths.

There could always be more trivial or optional aspects to AVWW that happen in realtime, as opposed to things that will get on peoples nerves if they are real time.

[Bluddy]

I think the main issue is the insertion of a strategy element into the mix of genres. Once you have strategy involved, the strategy needs to have bite, or it's not contributing much. Strategy implies a flow of time. If I can pause time and do whatever I want in an RTS, then it's not much of an RTS. The same applies to turn-based strategy, except that time is discrete. I understand that much of the strategy is missing right now so it's a little hard to hypothesize about what it'll play like once it's there, but I think the basic principle is sound.

I've never played ActRaiser, but from what I can tell from reviews, it was mainly a strategy game, with 2 mandatory action stages thrown in once in a while. That's very different from the design of AVWW. In fact, I can't think of too many games that integrated strategy and retained an easy-going (ie non-time-limited) feel. Actually GTA Vice City Stories tried to do that and pretty much failed at it precisely because GTA is the kind of game you're aiming for, where you can pick up either the driving, or just try to run over pedestrians, or play one of the countless mini-games. The strategy clock ticking in the background forced you to go back and deal with things other than what you were dealing with at the time and that was annoying.

I do think that a clock (of some sort, even if it's my going back to town idea) is needed to keep the strategy game relevant, but there are many things that can be done to make the game easy going in other respects. If you guys have plans for side missions, those could suspend the clock (whatever form it might have) while you're busy with them. Also, perhaps if you adventure in areas that are lower level, the clock could be deactivated. Or maybe if you die a few times in a row the game will pick up on the fact that you're struggling and give you bonus 'points' which could be used to slow down/deactivate the clock for a while. Just focusing on the town incrementation idea for the sake of the example, dying could give you a 'free town visit' or two.


Also, most turns seem to go by fairly quietly, so it's not like advancing turns inherently punishes the player. If monsters move slowly enough, the player can have sufficient time to notice them while they're still not a threat. The strategy game would then go by in something akin to slow motion, which would still be pretty easy going. You could then play with this element and have spells/powerups/quests that speed up/slow/freeze and perhaps even reverse time.

Oh and yeah, Din's Curse is awesome. I happen to have been working on a mod for DC for the past several months. But as an example of a more relaxed game that still has time constraints, you may want to check out the Depths of Peril demo. It's got a far slower quest system than DC, but makes up for it by adding competitive factions. The game comes up with stuff for you to deal with, but at a fairly relaxed pace.

Oh and I agree that decision-making is better done with turns, which is why I also prefer the turns to advance due to doing something such as entering a town or some other regions rather than a real clock. I don't think dying should increment the clock automatically though. That would punish the player twice for his mistake.

[Dizzard]

I also prefer the turns to advance due to doing something such as entering a town or some other regions rather than a real clock.

What if you were in a position where you needed to head back to a settlement before you can take care of a mob that's about to attack the settlement? (to prepare, low on health etc)

Sort of like a car keys locked in the car situation.

[keith.lamothe]

I also prefer the turns to advance due to doing something such as entering a town or some other regions rather than a real clock.

What if you were in a position where you needed to head back to a settlement before you can take care of a mob that's about to attack the settlement? (to prepare, low on health etc)

Sort of like a car keys locked in the car situation.

I addressed that in the original email I sent to Chris that he pasted above:

One special case is that if rampaging monsters are in a settlement region then normally a turn cannot be ended, so we'd need to let the player warp directly to that settlement to fight that battle or auto-resolve it somehow or whatever; but it could be worked out simply.

[x4000]

This sort of above commentary by Bluddy is exactly why I like to keep track of the immutable design goals.  Because it really helps us to evaluate commentary like that in light of the core thing we're going for here.  Nowhere in our list of immutable design goals does it ever say "there will be a strategy game grafted in here, and citybuilding too."  Or that the strategic parts will be turn-based.  What it actually says is this:

6. AVWW should have some form of "macro game" to it, which provides longer-term goals and choices, and lets the player guide their whole civilization to a degree, rather than just one individual.

...

12. AVWW will be a platform for having multiple gameplay modes (and even genres), with more being able to be added at later times through free DLC, expansions, or otherwise.  Each of these modes should tie into the central action-adventure gameplay in some fashion, and consequences throughout the world should be as cohesive as possible, but progress in any of the modes should not be penalized if the player ignores them for a while.  In other words, no "crop withering" or anything close.  Players should be able to sit down and feel like Environ is an interesting place to go to do a variety of interesting things, and when they choose to go to Environ their first question is "what do I feel like doing today?"  They should be able to play any subset of the game to match their mood, while the other subsets of the game remain safely in stasis until they feel interested in them again.

And our interpretation of the above, for first implementation, has been a strategy game plus citybuilding, plus a combat model for the macrogame that we've not yet revealed but nonetheless is a third genre.  Sometimes it's good to take a few steps back from the current implementation, though, which is what we seem to be doing a lot of this week.

When it comes to the macro-game, it seems like the turn-based aspects of that are giving some folks heartburn.  On the other hand, I don't want to be rushing around like Din's Curse (awesome game or no) trying to put out fires constantly. 

At core, in all aspects of the game, I want to see some goal, figure out how to achieve that goal, and then set about it until I succeed or give up.  Then on to the next.  That's the flow that I'm personally interested in.

And it's true, I do have a lot of fondness for TBS games, and would like to build one.  But, this isn't the last project we'll ever do, so perhaps it's worthwhile to think about if those aspects really need to be in this game.  Keith's combat model for the macro game is really interesting and I think the thing he is most excited about.  And the turn-based strategy game was one way to go about making those sorts of encounters happen.  The enemies advance on you, you advance on the enemies, etc, etc.

But perhaps having the enemies aggressively move on you in a turn-based fashion when you're able to just circumvent the turns and run around at will just isn't compatible with the game.  Maybe it needs to be that the enemies NEVER aggressively move on you unless you stir them up in some fashion, and then they aggressively move on you based on some form of counter.  And likewise, when you want to send out your forces to deal with the enemies, there's nothing to stop those sorts of encounters from being initiated without the larger TBS strategy game framework.

Of course, that would royally screw with the scouting model that we have, which I'm not thrilled about losing.  And I'm sure that it would monkey with other plan's of Keith's, too.

But in the interest of brainstorming, it's an interesting thought experiment at least: if the TBS bits don't graft in as well, is there a way to accomplish the other bits connected to them that doesn't rely on the TBS framework, which still makes Keith happy and interested in his part of the design?

And Keith, for that matter, since you're so much MORE interested in some of the other bits (pathos and conflict as you put it) of the macrogame, is there basically a way we can crop out a lot of the bits you're less interested in -- putting them on a less-involved framework, for instance -- so that you can spend a lot more percentage of your time working on the bits you think of as most desirable?  That's another way in which rethinking or removing some of the TBS bits might let you work on the bits you're actually more excited about.  Or it could just wreck everything.