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[GavJ]

On the second, it often comes in the form of npc price fluctuations

There are no npcs buying or selling anything.

The rest of it -- dynamic algorithms and changing some values after playtesting, sure. I'm just trying to get a general gross idea of feasibility before coding major things and making major choices. Like "Taxes vs. decaying machines" for instance, are fundamentally completely different solutions. One is embracing accumulation of junk, and just bringing newbies up to speed with it. The other is fighting accumulation of junk.

I need a basic concepts nailed down. I'm not talking about the level of how many units of this do blah blah yet, definitely not, without a working prototype.




Edit: New concept. Security-based limitations
Following the idea of "automatons as sheriffs," let's say the game has no built in hardcoded anything stopping you from stealing, for example. As in it won't physically prevent you in the form of a popup message that says "action canceled, owned by Joe" or whatever. Instead, if automatons catch you, they all turn on you and hunt you down or exact some other punishment.

This can limit amount of stuff people accumulate. You only get one automaton, and although you can build contraptions to extend its eyes and ears while you are offline (intruder alarm shindigs), these won't stretch for miles very easily. You can therefore only really secure one area while you're not there. Anywhere else is relegated to cruder things like booby traps probably, unless you can afford umpteen mile networks of telegraph cables etc. for your automaton to be satisfied with enough evidence to "convict" somebody from far away.... which you can't.

So if you try to run multiple sites all over, you're opening yourself to Robin Hoods. UNLESS perhaps you get some other players to agree to lend their automatons to guard other sites. But they're going to want you to pay them for that. Which also redistributes wealth, so fine!

[McDonald]

This sounds like Factorio with scarce resources and trading.

[Knit tie]

Wouldn't allowing stealing lead to great animosity and possibly revenge wars among the players? Or the formation of various "criminals" that engage almost exclusively in stealing? Although that would be a truly effective way to destroy and redistribute wealth.

[Leafsnail]

If you're going with limited resources it might make sense to adopt a 'clans' type model where there's a clear goal and one player or group can win, ending that world and starting a new one.  That way you'd get a reset every now and then to prevent early players getting an eternal advantage.  It would also shift the emphasis back to exploration which seems interesting.

[Sergarr]

Allowing stealing in a game with finite resources is basically just asking the Goons to destroy your game. That has happened many times btw.

[GavJ]

But you can't justr steal anything. You will almost certainly get caught in the zone around a player's automaton-protected area and stand almost no chance of surviving if you do.

Also, you can't carry much, nor can you rip up stuff with your hands easily. And your automatons will refuse to steal or vandalize. You can use contraptions to break things, but those will get heard/detected by sheriff automatons much further away than a human running around will. I would even consider the ability to build little amplifiers on your tracks to pass a current through them and detect when broken, perhaps. You can also build indiscriminate booby traps anywhere on your land, but it's more expensive. ("your land" is just a place you can build booby traps, etc. without sheriffs accusing you, not a hardcoded force field)

Anyway, assume that you pretty much have one base and some associated rail lines effectively protected per automaton. The theft can only easily occur if you overextend yourself to multiple sites and don't convince anybody to lease you extra automatons.

That way you'd get a reset every now and then to prevent early players getting an eternal advantage.

Yes I'm thinking more along the lines of local 10-100 player servers. They can reset whenever they're bored, and there would be some game conditions where it would hint that that is appropriate / not just arbitrarily pissing off your players. Like soft goal conditions, or tapping out your world before reaching goals.

[Sergarr]

Protip: if something is theoretically possible to exploit, the players will exploit it.

It's impossible to stop the dedicated griefers from ruining people's lives. Even in EVE Online, which does have the "safety zones" which spawn police if anybody attack anyone, large clans can kill you by just attacking you simultaneously and taking you instantly with an alpha strike.

Don't ever think you've made a system foolproof.

[GavJ]

What other possible explanation could you give anyway, though, for being magically unable to steal, etc? (Also not super concerned about elaborate workarounds, since if it's a shorter term game world setup, then game updates can fix those without changing the rules mid game)

Plus I have played EVE, and the people who get ganked in the secure space are virtually 100% of the time revenge for something you did specifically or political targets with purpose, not just "watching the world burn" attacking random dudes.  They give bounties on people with giant hulk mining vessels who represent the worst of the worst in mindless automated farming, which is a playstyle that PVP players hate and are effectively protesting/terrorizing to discourage it. This fact is very well advertised.

In general though, I think that game represents an actually very successful system of safety zones, and is pretty much foolproof against encouraging anybody to frivolously harass newbies. I never got attacked once as a newbie in safe space nor did anybody i personally knew.

[ChairmanPoo]

I was thinking that an in-game-rewards for real world money system could be set in place. That way the more affluent players would contribute to maintaining the databases, and get something in return.

[miauw62]

How many people can one automaton take on at the same time? Because the goons could probably become a large wave of looter-migrants and just strip everything clean.

[GavJ]

How many people can one automaton take on at the same time? Because the goons could probably become a large wave of looter-migrants and just strip everything clean.

In the moment, maybe 5, I dunno. If they any of them catch you, though, ALL the automatons will be hostile toward you until proper punishment has been served. Including your own back home. It's only if you can sneak by without being identified that you stand any chance of getting away with it in the long run. Such as at abandoned sites.

It is possible that you could live with other bandits without your automatons with you, steal fuel as you go and rove around Mad Max style, but I don't see it as being a very feasible lifestyle. It'd be really hard to do anything with just your hands and whatever fits on a mobile truck thing and no permanent base, and you're losing men and equipment each time. And if you do have a perm. base, it is by definition more poorly protected than your victims', since the outlaws can't have their automatons with them. But if it became an issue anyway, it could be tweaked down.

[Fniff]

I don't griefers would really care about having a sustainable lifestyle. It would be more similar to a viking raid or a locust swarm then actual banditry.

[Knit tie]

So, if I am understanding everything correctly, the limited, player-based resource you talked about earlier would be the automatons themselves, right?

[GavJ]

If it's not sustainable, then it's much less of a big deal.

You can't go and build your fleet of tanks and sudden ripper building destroying machines and stuff without like a week of preparation. If you can only raid one or two places before the whole thing falls apart, then you just wasted a week of time to accomplish almost no griefing. Whatever.

[Fniff]

They don't need a fleet of tanks or ripper destroying machines. If they can just exploit a bug or even a cheaply manufactured weapon, then they're set. Fifty players running up to other players and beating them with stones tied to sticks is still pretty disruptive.
MMO players are very cunning when it comes to dicking each other over. One player in a game where slimes split in two when you struck them managed to fill his house with slimes, then crash the server by releasing them and causing them to split using low-damage methods. Repeatedly, until the devs had to remove that feature. Cracked has a very entertaining series of articles about things like that.