Finite Resources - a question...?

[Ahriman]

Could making a more complex resource system (in terms of luxury resources) badly affect the AI players decision making?
Would it be easy/hard to get the AI using it properly? If not it would suggest an 'exploit' like mechanic for the human player to abuse.

Though there are many issues with trying to implement finite resources (read the thread above), I don't think AI concerns are a major one.

The main problems are in conveying how a system works to the human player through the UI, but the AI doesn't need a UI, and is perfectly capable of optimizing over some complicated functional form. The city allocation problem is an annoying one for the human, but the AI could deal with it if coded appropriately.

Aussie seems to have degenerated into rageposting so I will refrain from commenting further and just let people make up their own mind.

 

[loliologist]

This my first post and I hope it's not too much of a flame ...

But I think everyone here is vastly over-thinking the whole luxury resource thing.

What I think we might see is that the bonuses that buildings gives (like the +% money from markets) will depends on the amount of luxury resources you have.

For Example:

A base market give you +5% money
If you have access to fur it gives you an additional +5%, so a total +10% money
If you have access to fur and ivory you'll get an additional +10%, so a total +15% money
And so on ...

What I think the devs will do is make luxury resources much rarer and have them occur in clusters (much like real life). Thus a civilisation will likely only have 1 or 2 luxury resources, but they will also have multiples of the resources to trade for resources they don't have, which will be necessary to ensure that their buildings are getting the maximum bonuses.

This will model will make trade imperative, and without trade you'll likely fall behind.

 

[Ahriman]

This my first post and I hope it's not too much of a flame ...

Hiya! Welcome to the forums.

What I think we might see is that the bonuses that buildings gives (like the +% money from markets) will depends on the amount of luxury resources you have.

This seems entirely reasonable to me. Very simple, logical and transparent.
Though the first resource might give you more than the others; eg 5% for the first and 2% for each other. This would help encourage trade, because you're better off with a range of resources than with multiple copies of a single resource.
Much cleaner than corporation mechanics too, which are a fail IMO.

What I think the devs will do is make luxury resources much rarer and have them occur in clusters (much like real life).

Agreed. This is what I was describing above.

 

[loliologist]

Thanks for the welcome.

This seems entirely reasonable to me. Very simple, logical and transparent.
Though the first resource might give you more than the others; eg 5% for the first and 2% for each other. This would help encourage trade, because you're better off with a range of resources than with multiple copies of a single resource.
Much cleaner than corporation mechanics too, which are a fail IMO.

What I would personally rather see a system where you expand markets to be able to "sell" more goods available through an upgrade system kind of like in colonisation.

For instance a standard market would let you "trade" (ie get benefits from) up to 3 resources. For like 60 production you could expand a market so it could "trade" 2 more items, then another 60 production for each expansion letting you "trade" 1 more item (maybe put a cap on possible trade items).

What I find attractive about this system is in each market you would have to choose which items to trade and rather than a generic luxury effect there could be more flavour based effects.

For instance:
Spices would provide happiness but also healthy (since many spices, like turmeric, contain antioxidants like curcumin)
Whale could provide happiness (ambergris for purfume), but also food (meat), production (oil) in addition

I think this system would be nice, since it would mean each resource has different effects, so you'd consciously have to choose which resource benefits you want in a city and may have to actively try to trade for a certain resource.

 

[Dragonxander PR]

Regarding the resource benefit allocation system, how about having it as similar to the citizen designations for city tiles & specialists? The game already assigns them (another question is if the computer distribution suits our goals), but it's still modifiable by the player.

For instance, let's say that we have a resource (i.e. gems) that provides 12 benefit points. You would get all cities up to the 12th with the benefit, additional cities won't get it instantly. In terms of basic priority, the net unhappiness is OK for me as an automatic allocation factor. But, since I want to favor a metropolis, I can do the following:

- Get more of that resource (war, trade, culture pressure, peaceful expansion)
- Check for a city which won't need much happiness in the short-run (say, a city with a small workable area available). I then can assign the benefit point to the metropolis & set an option to keep the existing benefit points locked (i.e. like it can be done with prevent growth on Civ IV).


EDIT: In the case of the problem of players not understanding this system, its general working should be explained in the Civiliopedia, & there should be a pop-up alerting you when the phenomenon first ocurrs (i.e. like first city connection & first resource of each type acquired).

This process can be done in a resource distribution table; & it can actually allow to controll the amount you would want to trade with foreigners. For instance, a colony would often have to trade out more resource points than the ones their cities would consume, in addition to all excess points.

 

[KrikkitTwo]

Well there are a few issues

1 Copy of a resource...(empire wide benefit to unlimited number of cities or benefit to limited number of cities)

Extra copies of a resource (same thing)

Probably the best is to keep them working the same way, so that if
1 Incense gives +1 Happy to all of your cities, then 2 Incene gives +1 Happy and +1 Culture to all of your cities.

That could be the mechanism encouraging trade, declining returns (but constant returns)

1 Copy. +1 Happy + 1 Gold +1 Culture
2 Copy. +2 Happy + 2 Gold +1 Culture
3 Copy. +3 Happy + 2 Gold +1 Culture
4 Copy. +3 Happy + 3 Gold +2 Culture
5 Copy. +3 Happy + 3 Gold +2 Culture
6 Copy. +3 Happy + 4 Gold +2 Culture

N>6 Copies +3 Happy +4 gold +N-4 Culture


Might be simpler ways of doing it, but that was just an example (and asuming Happy>Gold>Culture)


Also I tend to agree that complex formulas are BAD. Math is the basis for what civ does but the Math should be Simple. Civ IV Combat being a key example of what not to do.


If they are Finite, then the allocation should be done the same way it is with Strategic resources for units... by Buildings.

Ie if You have 3 Copies of Incense you can Build 3 "Incense Temples" each providing 1 Happiness (as long as you have sufficient Incense to power all your Incense Temples)
Of course then you need a way to
1. Easily locate the cities that have a certain type of building (this would be good anyways)... so I could Click on the resources tab, click on "Incense" and have the map show me all the cities that had "Incense Temples" or "Neural research Labs".
2. Be able to tear them down (you lose some sources of Incense... so none of Your "Incense Temples or "Neural Research Labs" provide their benefits until you get the number back down)

 

[chongli]

No. The best way to encourage trade is for additional copies of the resource to give no benefit.

As far as food resources go? I think they are pretty absurd in their present form. We didn't find "wheat" growing in one little spot. It was spread all over the continent. Same thing with rice and corn. The only difference with wild grasses is that they aren't naturally found in a monoculture the way crops are cultivated, they grow amongst many other plant species.

I would like to see Civ 5 take a bold approach and separate resources into renewable and non-renewable categories. Non-renewable resources would have to be gathered in the traditional way but renewable resources would be cultivable anywhere that is suitable for them.

 

[Dragonxander PR]

No. The best way to encourage trade is for additional copies of the resource to give no benefit.

As far as food resources go? I think they are pretty absurd in their present form. We didn't find "wheat" growing in one little spot. It was spread all over the continent. Same thing with rice and corn. The only difference with wild grasses is that they aren't naturally found in a monoculture the way crops are cultivated, they grow amongst many other plant species.

I would like to see Civ 5 take a bold approach and separate resources into renewable and non-renewable categories. Non-renewable resources would have to be gathered in the traditional way but renewable resources would be cultivable anywhere that is suitable for them.

How about some form of limited resource replanting? It could require a special & costly unit. This is how I'd make it work:

- Once you get some key tech for the resource (i.e. agriculture for grains, calendar for plantations & animal husbandry for farm animals), you could build a resource planter to gather the resource & then move it to a location lacking it. The chances of success of this should be relatively low (i.e. ca. 25-33% would be OK IMO), there should be a limit on how many planters of each type to use at a time (i.e. 3 on a standard map would be ok, & it would scale with the map size) & it should be capturable--you'd have to get protection for the planter, or otherwise a rival empire may use it for their own purposes.

- For this to work, it's necessary to have map scripts that allow for 'New World' regions--being a region with much less population & less advanced civs (think of LoR's barbarian civ mechanism--later civs can appear in-game by having barbs develop into fully-fledged civilizations); & that also has a rather different set of resources.

EDIT: Of course, this would need a map with fewer starting resources, in order to make the development of civilizations limited to the "ancient nuclei" early on; then make the players wage war or race towards spreading resources throughout the map.

 

[Aussie_Lurker]

Sorry Chongli, but my experience is exactly the opposite. In CivIII & CivIV, all trade opportunities were lost if your neighbours had even 1 copy of the same resources you had (which happened more times than not). Funny, though, how all these "waste" resources suddenly had value-both domestically and in trade-once you started getting Corporations (which usually grant secondary bonuses based on the number of resource copies you have). I am not saying that we should not cap the maximum benefit accrued from multiple copies of a resource, but the current binary situation created by infinite resources is definitely stifling the trading component of the game!
I also still want some kind of city number effect on any secondary benefits, largely to further counter the Bigger=Better situation which still tends to arise in too many civ games (even with the advent of CivIV Maintenance).

Aussie.

 

[Aussie_Lurker]

Oh & Krikkitone. I would concur that *complex* formulas would be bad, but I don't see any problem with a simply Resource Copy No./City No. ratio that effects the size of any 2nd benefit you get from the resources.

So though 2 copies of a luxury resources might grant +2 culture to 4 cities, it should only grant +1 culture to 8 cities, forcing you to obtain a new copy of that resource to restore the original bonus.

Aussie.

 

[Craxymaxy]

Regarding the resource benefit allocation system, how about having it as similar to the citizen designations for city tiles & specialists? The game already assigns them (another question is if the computer distribution suits our goals), but it's still modifiable by the player.

For instance, let's say that we have a resource (i.e. gems) that provides 12 benefit points. You would get all cities up to the 12th with the benefit, additional cities won't get it instantly. In terms of basic priority, the net unhappiness is OK for me as an automatic allocation factor. But, since I want to favor a metropolis, I can do the following:

- Get more of that resource (war, trade, culture pressure, peaceful expansion)
- Check for a city which won't need much happiness in the short-run (say, a city with a small workable area available). I then can assign the benefit point to the metropolis & set an option to keep the existing benefit points locked (i.e. like it can be done with prevent growth on Civ IV).


EDIT: In the case of the problem of players not understanding this system, its general working should be explained in the Civiliopedia, & there should be a pop-up alerting you when the phenomenon first ocurrs (i.e. like first city connection & first resource of each type acquired).

I like this, it makes sense and it gives value to trading resources without auto-crippling large nations for the fact that they are large.
Sometimes its nice to play as a big juggernaut nation

 

[KrikkitTwo]

Oh & Krikkitone. I would concur that *complex* formulas would be bad, but I don't see any problem with a simply Resource Copy No./City No. ratio that effects the size of any 2nd benefit you get from the resources.

So though 2 copies of a luxury resources might grant +2 culture to 4 cities, it should only grant +1 culture to 8 cities, forcing you to obtain a new copy of that resource to restore the original bonus.

Aussie.

That would work.

I think That finite copies of resources can

Either

Resource #/City # (and working in "Remainders" based on largest cities should work fine"

ie 8 copies (2 sources of 4 each)->8 total +1 culture/gold, spread evenly throughout cities with larger ones getting the extra

so
1: +8
2: +4
3: 2 at +3, 1 at +2
4: +2
5: 3 at +2, 2 at +1
6: 2 at +2, 4 at +1
7: 1 at +2, 6 at +1
8 or more: 8 cities at +1

OR

Special buildings that use resources ("Incense Temple") A key thing with those buildings is they should have 0 benefits without the resource, so you aren't inclined to build them in all of your cities.


I personally like the special buildings because they make it a 'declining returns' (once you have enough for all your cities, then extra copies are worthless) and because the player gets to manage the resources in a sensible way... allocating it to this city.

 

[SJSerio]

Ahhh! So that is what happened to this thread... it was killed by math!!!



Well, it seems to me that the one advantage that computers have is that they can calculate complex formulas. While I understand that, from a modding perspective, that formulas can be a pain, but one thing I would say (though I am not really for or against the idea of them) that having complex formulas could improve gameplay when remaining background to the player.

 

[KrikkitTwo]

one thing I would say (though I am not really for or against the idea of them) that having complex formulas could improve gameplay when remaining background to the player.

Actually generally I would say they don't

If the result of the complex formula is important for game play it needs to be easily understandable, otherwise it complicates game play because the player doesn't know Why X is happening, they don't know how to affect it precisely.

Complex formulas are good for Graphics, they are good for AI behavior, they are bad for Gameplay rules

That's why something like "Incense Temples" "Coal Plants" "Goldsmith" etc. would probably be better.

 

[Shurdus]

I liked it the way it was, i.e. that double corn does not provide additional bonusses. Ancient economies were not really thriving on making the most out of excessive resources. In the present, we may be able to use resources in manufacturing to transform those things into something useful, but certainly a thousand years ago in the dark ages no one had a use for more grains once there was enough to feed everyone.

Modern corporations can maybe change that, as it was in Civ IV. Before the industrial revolution everything was much, much different. I can see the merits of the more resources = more returns school of thought but that is something best left for modern era's, or at least for the post-corporation era. That being said, maybe there needs to be more options in terms of corporations. Maybe more corporations with more competition, or more diverse corporations, or both.

 

[SJSerio]

Actually generally I would say they don't

If the result of the complex formula is important for game play it needs to be easily understandable, otherwise it complicates game play because the player doesn't know Why X is happening, they don't know how to affect it precisely.

Complex formulas are good for Graphics, they are good for AI behavior, they are bad for Gameplay rules

That's why something like "Incense Temples" "Coal Plants" "Goldsmith" etc. would probably be better.

I'll concede that, at least in the case of Civilization. Well, I guess other genres and games would fall into that as well. However, I really don't think that the player needs to know exactly how every little thing works. I think most players don't really pay attention to that. Mostly just the hardcore gamers and the modders need to know that.

Still, your point stands as stated.

 

[Aussie_Lurker]

Sorry Shurdus, but you're dead wrong. Many ancient empires/nation-states-right through until the Industrial Age-had sufficient surpluses to trade with neighbouring empires. Indeed, it was this trade which lead to the development of both writing & a system of currency. Of course, even *before* inter-empire trade, there was sufficient surpluses within a given city/town to allow trade at local markets for goods that they lacked-often from towns which had a surplus in said goods. All corporations (& their predecessors in the various Trading Houses) did was to centralize & organize it. Even Trading Houses date back to the late Medieval Period. So you see that surplus resources have long had an impact on the economy at both a domestic & international level, but without some kind of bonus for multiple resources, then there is no representation of this.

Aussie.

 

[Disgustipated]

finite resources? We aren't going back to civ3 disappearing resources are we?

 

[Ahriman]

We aren't going back to civ3 disappearing resources are we?

No. We're going to a system where a single strategic resource on the map only gives you X copies of the resource. So for example one horse resource might give you 5 horses, so you can build 5 horsemen but to build a 6th you will need a second horse resource.

[5 is an invented arbitrary number for explanatory purposes only. The actual number will no doubt depend on game testing.]

 

[RickInVA]

Ahriman,

I like a lot of your points, which you present well. It does seem that you have an overriding aversion to having to make city by city decisions such as "does City X get the Silk resource or not". Is that micro-management? Possibly, but some of us might just call it management. Personally if there was a limited luxury resource system I would like a check box in every city for each resource. IIMHO that is no more micro-managing than choosing which units or buildings to construct at a given city.