Developers requesting feedback: Warfare Points (Return of Points)?

[x4000]

Okay, so I've been hearing some rumblings from some folks about how it's still not possible to see "how well you did" in a game.  That clearly bugs them, and it bugs me that it bugs them, because if it bugs them it will bug other people, and in general I don't like people being bugged because it bugs me.

Points were bad because:
- They were super unbalanced, and all sorts of things gave you points in kind of an unbalanceable way.
- I think there was something else, but I forget.

Points were good because:
- High point-value crazy god tokens would actually make you use them to help you win the game.  This was why the god tokens were so crazy to begin with; score was central to the game.
- They helped you tell if you were "winning well."
- In theory we could have made it so that you could win the game before the clock ran out, although I'm not sure that I want to do that.
- In general they gave you a secondary goal other than just "do whatever it takes to survive," which I think is interesting.

My proposal:
- In the top bar, there will be a count next to "Warfare."  So it says something like "Warfare: 500" or whatever.
- Red or blue dues killing red or blue dudes through combat leads to 1 warfare point.
- Red or blue dues killing red or blue buildings through combat leads to 10 warfare points.
- A town flipping sides from red or blue to red or blue through combat leads to 50 warfare points.
- The less-savory mythological tokens and god tokens would have a certain nontrivial number of warfare points associated with their use, again leading those to helping you win.
- Depending on your chosen difficulty, you would have to reach a certain warfare count before the game ends or else you lose.

Thoughts?

[Pepisolo]

Love the idea of a scoreboard. Hate the idea of it being a winning condition.

Scoreboards should be optional, just to see how well you are doing. Maybe brag a bit to friends to etc. In my mind, anyway. This game just doesn't need extra winning conditions now that Woes are in.  As a winning condition it made sense when Woes weren't in as a way to strong-arm the player into unbalancing their own game -- now that Woes are in there's no need. Sorry about rushed posting, gotta be off in a little while.

[Teal_Blue]

Don't know if this will catch you after .903 and what seems to be the players lowering the boom or not, but i like your suggestions alot, they make sense to me and make the game varied in how each piece fits and plays against other parts, it makes the game interesting in several ways and tracks and plays in several parts instead of me just playing one way, or concerned with one thing.

I'm not a players player like Mick, I don't know how to game the system, and i'm not real big on figuring out a games weak spots because i'm a very casual player not a pro, but i still like your games a lot, even the ones over my head that kick my... all the time. But anyway, take heart and do what you feel you need to, to get a great game. I'm sorry for everyone dumping on you here at the close to launch, that must be exasperating!

It'll work out Great! I have Faith!
-Teal

[Mick]

I'm not a players player like Mick, I don't know how to game the system, and i'm not real big on figuring out a games weak spots

But the thing is, I haven't been sitting down thinking "What cheesy tactic can I use this time!". I've simply been playing the game in a very natural manner.

1) "Hey my guys want <RESOURCE> to make more units, but I'm low on that" - Throws down 3 <RESOURCE>

2) "Hey I can't build anything now" - Creates a bridge, makes a new town.

3) "Hey, <COLOR> is getting pushed back" - Throws down more military buildings for <COLOR>

4) goto step 1.

[Teal_Blue]

    'Players Player' wasn't meant to sound like an insult, but more like 'A Man's Man' is meant, like 'Top of the Heap'. 
Not meaning you cheese all the time, just that you play extremely well. 

Anyway, its players like you who help make the game a better game, because the top players will enjoy the game more if it isn't too easy to play.

Take care, hope my explanation makes sense,
-Teal

[x4000]

The score being a win condition was a key part of the original game design, though -- that's what I keep coming back to.  When you take away legs from the stool, the stool starts to fall down, and that's what's happening here.

[orzelek]

I think that with woes etc actual getting to the end can be only winning condition.

Warfare points would simply show how much chaos you managed to survive

[x4000]

All right, fair enough -- you're the biggest proponent of score, so that makes particular sense if that's your feeling.

[Penumbra]

Any point system also goes to show that a "cheesy" victory is undesirable. Without actually failing, you can just win poorly. Scores can be used to direct players to play a certain way.

Requiring town buildings to be near centers makes sense. The new rule of "keep towns 8 spaces from the enemy" seems strange from a restriction standpoint. Arbitrary even. If, however, close towns gave a score boost, and maybe isolated towns reduced the score, you could influence player behavior in a more subtle way. And, let people who want to play "cheesy" just win with a negative score.

[x4000]

Any point system also goes to show that a "cheesy" victory is undesirable. Without actually failing, you can just win poorly. Scores can be used to direct players to play a certain way.

This.  Very this.  I hadn't thought about it that way, but that's something I've been learning from players' reactions in this and other threads.

Requiring town buildings to be near centers makes sense. The new rule of "keep towns 8 spaces from the enemy" seems strange from a restriction standpoint. Arbitrary even. If, however, close towns gave a score boost, and maybe isolated towns reduced the score, you could influence player behavior in a more subtle way. And, let people who want to play "cheesy" just win with a negative score.

Well, the rule is now 16, so it's unlike to come up very often.  But it's one of those things that prevents you from just building super-stacks way out into nowhere.  It's more of a "total board size" sort of thing in this regard, and I think it feels a lot more natural and certainly prevents cheese.  We'll see, though.  8 was definitely too harsh and felt awkward to me too after a bit more reflection.

Often something bugs me on some level, but it doesn't quite raise to the level of consciousness until somebody else points it out.  Then it's like "oh yeah, I think that too!"  Seems to happen with others here as well.

[Penumbra]

Well, the rule is now 16, so it's unlike to come up very often.  But it's one of those things that prevents you from just building super-stacks way out into nowhere.  It's more of a "total board size" sort of thing in this regard, and I think it feels a lot more natural and certainly prevents cheese.

I still think I would like a meteor to hit towns that are isolated or, really, anything in the game over the UI just not letting me click there.

[chemical_art]

Why not bring back crime-ish, but make it say it is directly relevant to the number of openings.

Or in other words, if towns are isolated on any difficulty, they eventually get destroyed somehow. You don't even have to call it crime, but maybe famine, or unhappiness. People are social creatures, and being socially isolated is a fate worst then death to some...

This way you prevent the worst offenses of isolation.

In addition, on very high difficulties, you can make it so you need 2, or even 3, tiles of open path to ensure happiness.

[Penumbra]

Actually, new idea. This game is starting to remind me of that downhill snowboarding game from the PS2, SSX. I bet you weren't expecting that!

In that game, you have to win a race against a clock. The only thing that mattered is if you could reach each checkpoint before the timer went down. You could just go straight through the whole thing, seeing the sites and "win".  Or, you could take the long way, go over jumps and do all sorts of tricks. Then, you would get a huge score, but a score that wouldn't matter at all if you couldn't finish the race.

That's what Skyward is like. The goal is to simply "beat the clock" of everyone killing themselves. The tricks are all the carnage that occurs.

I say really pump up the "middle management" angle on the game. Your "boss" wants carnage, that's you whole purpose. Maybe it's because the boss likes testing humans? Creating an army of souls? Looking for someone? Whatever, but it's your job. Instead of a goal, it could be a bonus!

It takes energy beyond your abilities to start from scratch, so if you fully "break" your toy of a world, you get fired. If you can make it to the end of a "work shift" without destroying everything, you get paid. If you play it safe and the boss doesn't get what he wants, no bonus! However, the more death and war and destruction that occurs increases your bonus.

Really doesn't change anything beyond story points, but might make the player want to play "right" more with a better connection to the scoring system. 

[x4000]

@Penumbra:

The problem is opacity of that sort of thing.  "Why do meteors keep hitting my towns?"  Etc.

This has pretty boardgame-like rules, so I think this makes a certain amount of sense.  It's kind of like how you can't build outside of a certain radius in AI War.  Back when that was allowed, people would put some stuff like a million miles out and it was untouchable.  So the area was confined to something large but sensible.  That's more or less the goal here.

@chemical_art:

I addressed that in another thread in terms of my thinking, but basically I think it's a bit opaque and as was recently demonstrated by Keith and others with Social Decay, it's totally cheesable anyhow.  I tried that basically last night, and it didn't really work out well.

Interestingly, most of this becomes moot with the new changes to how buildings get destroyed in the next version.  There was a happy stalemate in a particular savegame that I've been using for testing for a long time.  I think it was one of Cinth's.  You could just click End Turn until the game was eventually won.  Now Blue destroys red inside 20 turns, usually less.  So the secondary factors seem to be becoming less of a big deal, but we'll see.

@Penumbra #2: Yeah, that was the idea of score originally.  And then the idea of the warfare points in another thread.  Folks didn't bite, although I liked the idea.

[chemical_art]

I see Chris, but I have one more idea.

If a town is totally isolated, it decays. The only result of this decay is all buildings lose between 5 and 10% of their health. Since there is no repairs and ruins, it is a generally invalidate tactic but can be used to prevent faster destruction.

It is simple, easy to see, and not all or nothing but makes a very meaningful method to prevent complete isolation.