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Posted: Sat Apr 03, 2004 2:59 pm
by korexus
In WoK 4/5 the spyer has a chance based on EFF to succede in a covert mission and the spyee has a chance based on the spies he has around to reduce the impact of this.

Convert this sort of idea into WoK Species and I see a new skill on the horizon.

ALERTNESS: Cost, 50-100 sp. Depending on how strong we make it.

Effect: When a species spies on you you have an (instinct) chance to find out who it was and, if the spying was long distance, the direction from which it came. If you manage this you lose no instinct for being spied and the spyer gains none.

Notes:
1) We could make this harsher by allowing the spyee to gain instinct and the spyer to lose instinct. But considering the penalties already in place for failing a spy roll, that may be going too far.

2) 3/4 instinct may be fairer as otherwise 99 instinct makes you virtually immune to spying.

3) We could make a simpler version of this which just reduces the chances of success for any species spying on you.

As as side note, should "long distance" (square to square) spying have a reduced chance of success? Or are the extra turns required enough of a penalty?



korexus.

Posted: Sun Apr 04, 2004 11:17 pm
by GoatHerder
[quote="Guest"] ... [/quote]

That was me.

Goat Herder

Posted: Mon Apr 05, 2004 12:10 am
by korexus
Not really, I see the instinct gain from spying to be modeling the fact that if I watch how your species behaves before attacking it then I'll probably attack it more efficiently. Unless you happen to notice me spying on you. In which case I'll be worse at hunting you.

From a game balance perspective you could make an argument for higher gains but I see this skill as something to deter people from spying on you so much. You could equally well say that an alert species loses more instinct when succesfully spied as it doesn't expect to be spied out. But who would buy a skill like that?


korexus.

Posted: Mon Apr 05, 2004 2:01 pm
by Egbert
I just had a brief encounter with a fellow omnivore. It was brief because we both attacked each other, and I saw that to keep doing that would destroy both of us. So I moved on. I thought that this game was supposed to discourage "sleeping"? It seems that attack results like that will only encourage it. Why would 2 score leaders try to decimate each other.

Is there a way to change the attack/defense values to be more pronounced, depending on your arms, legs, instinct, etc.? As it is now, everyone's attack and defense seem to be too similar. The "sleeper" will win.

Posted: Mon Apr 05, 2004 2:40 pm
by Saladin
I've got 2 arms and 2 legs and they both seem totally useless to me...it takes a long long time to get an arm or a leg and you jsut get a itsy bitsy increase in your patt and deff and your movement cost goes down 1 or 2 turns...not really worth it is it. :(

Posted: Mon Apr 05, 2004 7:36 pm
by gm_al
Bla bla bla.... I didnt really have much time at hands lately, but Ill just pop in to say a few words to all you whiners that keep criticising... 8) (ah that felt good, had to say it)

Its BETA. Its not fully "finished" yet, not totally balanced. With every new game we test we will get more into the direction we look forward to.
Overall mutations will be cheaper and therefore easier to get, new skills will make ARMs more useful etc. LEGs "totally useless" and "only" reducing movement cost ? Gimme a break, it helps defense and the decrease of movement is VERY important once resources will get scarce. Wont probably happen in this game though, ok.

Ill be collecting the tidbits for Runes coding comeback after eastern (poor guy) while we will try to do some work on the mobile side. Still a long way to go....

Posted: Mon Apr 05, 2004 8:06 pm
by Dameon
I agree with Al that legs are about where they need to be, I have to keep migrating my pack around so I don't overeat in any one square, and the reduced movement cost has been very helpful. I will grant you that arms don't seem to be nearly up to that same usefulness level, but if there are skills/abilities that make them more useful in the works that's pretty cool. I think making mutations cheaper overall would be a positive thing, as well.

Posted: Mon Apr 05, 2004 11:20 pm
by korexus
Not only making them cheaper. But offsetting them from the bodysize/brainpower mutations, so a bit of careful planning can lead to much more influence over what you get.

Bete 4th (and hopefully final) should definitely be the best yet! :D


korexus.

Posted: Tue Apr 06, 2004 12:04 am
by Egbert
gm_al wrote:Bla bla bla.... I didnt really have much time at hands lately, but Ill just pop in to say a few words to all you whiners that keep criticising... 8) (ah that felt good, had to say it)

Its BETA. Its not fully "finished" yet, not totally balanced. With every new game we test we will get more into the direction we look forward to.
Hmmm. I guess I'm confused. I thought that the purpose of BETA was to get feedback and critique from the players, so the game could become better. Apparently, the players are supposed to keep quiet? :?

I guess I will keep quiet for awhile, since it appears that my suggestions are just getting ignored. I think this game needs more action, and so do a lot of players. But apparently, Al and the development team don't think so. At the present time, there is no good reason for any 2 players with high scores to fight each other, since they will both take each other out of the game by doing so. There needs to be a better fighting system. Okay, I'm done.

Posted: Tue Apr 06, 2004 12:40 am
by Underdog
Thats OK Eg, I am sure they at least hear your plea.
I just remember the time I saw an early form of the PATT/PDEF formula.

The steamrolling tactic was pretty vaible back then because the number of armies was calculated in there somehow so the more armies you had the higher your PATT/PDEF was. Kinda like this one. The more species you have the more attacks you get.

HMMM. I see some steamrolling in my future. Better start increasing my fertility again.

Posted: Tue Apr 06, 2004 1:39 am
by Dameon
I don't know Eg, I've yet to find another omnivore. I am certainly trying, though. I have a LOT of wolves running around, and if I do find another omni I am going to try to take them out. My bet is that I will eat a whole lot more of their specimens than they will of mine, and when you have high numbers and high fertility it's pretty easy to repopulate. I could be wrong and it could be too expensive to fight, but we shall see soon enough.

I do agree that the game could use more action overall, and I think fixing carnivore so it is a viable alternate to omnivore is a good place to start. I will say the dev team has taken a lot of the suggestions that I have given, and seem receptive in general. Those of you that know me and of my past relationships with Al can testifty to that I have felt that was not always the case, the CCG being a case in point. Now though I feel my voice as a beta tester is at least being heard- possibly because I am trying to work within the existing framework instead of reinventing the wheel.

Yes, the game needs to be faster- and Al said he is reducing mutation costs and possibly skill/ability costs in the next beta. I don't think Al's response here is the best way to answer the issues y'all have brought up, but don't let that put you off- if you have been tracking the changes made in the game, they are almost all originated from player input. Things may not be happening at a lightning pace, but they are changing, slowly but surely for the better.

Posted: Tue Apr 06, 2004 3:10 am
by Underdog
Hey Dameon, The biggest problem I see with becoming a Carnivore is that after awhile it will get hard to find food. right now there aren't very many species left on this map and I haven't seen many Neighbors since I moved to my new area that is plentiful with plants. I have 3 squares with white plants and 1 with Blue and they are all staying up close to 5000. I just can't hunt them fast enough. Of course 2 of them are water squares so some of the players probably can't get to those. and the other 2 are on my preferred terrain so I feel VERY happy to stay in this general area. Otherwise I would go looking for some meat to add to my diet.

Posted: Tue Apr 06, 2004 4:10 am
by Dameon
I can only support my large pack because I am in an area that has 4 BS2 squares that are pretty full on plants, all within a five square radius. It took a lot of scouting to find them, but it was worth it. Anybody who comes into my territory, and I am going to hunt down. I may expand my range shortly to find some other omnis if I cannot soon. Anyway, my species requires very large amounts of saturation (over 400 a step), and at the current carnivore saturation rate (five times the amount of specimens* BS you hunt), I could not even come close to feeding them, especially when other species are not exactly an unlimited resource and it's not like they don't have defenses, both things which are not problems with plants.

Posted: Tue Apr 06, 2004 9:37 am
by gm_al
Fully agree here - CARNIVORE needs to get more attractive to make it worth aiming for it. Of course HERBIVORE and OMNIVORE also need to remain viable strategies, in a sense that any feeding type could win the game.

Id suggest to increase saturation output for carnivores to (BS x 8) for a start and add some skill that would require/improve carnivore further.

I promise that the new skills will increase interaction a lot and make the game more fun. Im also looking forward to the next beta once Rune is back on track, possibly with just 30 Players and more "real" conditions.

And Eg... Im listening ! :P

Posted: Wed Apr 07, 2004 3:28 am
by Allister Fiend
I have a suggestion that may be dumb or maybe not, I think it would be nice to have.
I don't suggest many things but....

:idea:
What are your thoughts on being able to see where players are on the map but only in the spots that you have exposed the terrain in? :arrow:

I currently have about 65% of the map "opened" or "exposed".
Since I am able to see the terrain, why not be able to see if someone is camped out in one of them. Just the ? mark is fine but that way you can see if someone is headed towards ya. and at least have a chance to "flee".

Any thoughts or positive reactions :?:

Allister

P.S. Maybe this was talked about in an earlier post but I am not going to read through them all to find out.

Posted: Wed Apr 07, 2004 7:51 am
by yngvarr
Allister Fiend wrote::idea:
What are your thoughts on being able to see where players are on the map but only in the spots that you have exposed the terrain in? :arrow:

I currently have about 65% of the map "opened" or "exposed".
Since I am able to see the terrain, why not be able to see if someone is camped out in one of them. Just the ? mark is fine but that way you can see if someone is headed towards ya. and at least have a chance to "flee".
You don't actually see the whole terrain. You just remember terrain you've visited so far. You can see just stuff that's near to you, adjacent fields and current one.

You might remember that you saw someone somewhere, but as soon as you move away, you don't know whether they are still there.

Posted: Wed Apr 07, 2004 8:21 am
by Saladin
I find it weird that if you 'hunt' another player that isn't actually in the square the order reverts back to your standard order.

However if you hunt a plant that isn't there any more, you simply lose the turn. This doesn't make sense to me. Why do plants still stay in a square even if you've eaten them all?

Posted: Wed Apr 07, 2004 8:44 am
by gm_al
I agree Sal - when trying to hunt a plant with 0 specimen it should also revert to the default order.

*takes note*

@Allister: probably would mean more traffic and checks, not sure if its "worth it".

@Yngvarr: is that sig taken from "The 13th warrior", hmmmmmm ?? :thumbsup:

Posted: Wed Apr 07, 2004 11:15 am
by Lowebb
Just a message bug/suggestion, the "Number of flesh/plant eating species" will not be very clear when a few carnivors starting roaming the plains, surely the number should follow

If there were 40 player ins a game.....

Herbivore (plant eating) ==15
Omnivore (plant AND flesh eating ==14
Carnivore (flesh eating) == 11

The "Number of flesh/plant eating species" would read 25/29 even though there are only 40 in the game, you can work the rest out yourself