Soren Johnson on events

[The_J]

Soren has again published an entry in his blog about the design decision in Old World.
Read the full blog post here: https://www.designer-notes.com/?p=1733

An excerpt:

Thus, I had the basic blueprint for an event system – it would be a virtual deck of event cards which each had a potential trigger (such as meeting a new nation), a set of requirements (a childless leader), and possible effects (a foreign spouse). When a trigger occurs, the game finds all events in the deck valid for the current game state and then chooses one randomly based on the weight, probability, and priority values of each event. The backbone of the event system are the subjects, which are a set of game objects randomly chosen for each potential event. Subjects can be anything from a character to a city to a family and even to a law or technology. Each subject can have multiple tests to find the perfect one – an adult child of the leader who is NOT the heir but IS a bloodthirsty schemer is a good example of a very specific subject that might mean bad things for the current heir. Further, the system can test for relationships between subjects, such as two nations that are at war with each other, the religion of your spouse, or a character who is vengeful against another. The event options can affect any of the subjects and can also be unlocked based on the current ratings or traits of the leader.

I think it ties in well with #7 and #8 of his blog series. The evens make the game somewhat more personalized, and they also add a semi-random value to the leaders/diplomacy, making them more relatable. It's just another flavour piece to make your foreign relations understandable, and to make each game different. Very nice IMHO.

 

[PiR]

Yes, as the conclusion says:
"A common theme of Old World’s design is avoiding predictable and boring games where the same actions lead to the same results, and the event system is an important tool to ensure no two games are ever the same."

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