a multiplayer game of parenting and civilization building
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Hello ya'll. I've noticed that the consensus on these forums appear to be that players would prefer it if character race gave people advantages/disadvantages in certain areas rather than outright limiting them, and that players would prefer it if nations could form in other biomes than pastures. However, Jason does not want to do such a thing, for it would involve creating multiple different early-stage tech trees for different biomes and this would cause eves to suicide until they found the optimal tech tree.
But there might be an easy way to achieve all these goals with no additions to the tech tree, simply a redistribution of biome placement. How about this. Ordinary biomes (pastures, praries, badlands, swamps) spawn randomly all over the world. However, exotic biomes (deserts, jungles, tundra) only spawn in certain sections of the map. In order to find a desert, you would need to look in a hot area in which deserts can spawn. Outside this area no deserts can be found. The race of Eves would be determined by what kind of area they get born into. For example, an Eve might be born into a pasture green, but that pasture might also have a jungle nearby. This would make it a "jungle-area", and cause the Eve to spawn with brown skin. As this Eve would then have greater tolerance to the hot temperatures of the jungle, their descendents would be able to harvest the resources of this jungle more effectively. In order to advance up the tech tree, they will need to expand outwards and trade/raid/colonise their way to getting the exotic biomes they need. However, no matter how far this family expands, their natural tolerance will encourage them to work with those of different races so as to more easily gain access to exotic resources. In this way we could see the development of regional cities with their own niche products that make them valuable to the other nations without needing to add any new items. If an Eve spawns in the gaps between these exotic biome areas, then they would spawn with the polylingual race.
What do you think of these ideas? It just seemed to be the simplest way of implementing the suggestions already made.
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So being close to jungle allows you to spawn as a brown Eve. But how do I find out where the jungle areas are located, if I am not brown?
Would there be some kind of visual indicator on the map?
I have a simple idea. In areas that are close enough to jungle to allow a brown Eve to spawn, bananas can spawn in the green zone. It is a "warmer" region. Near deserts, cactus plants would spawn inaturally in the nearby prairies. Near artic, penguins can spawn in the badlands. This would make it easier to spot these regions while hunting for the appropriate skintone, without affecting racial superiority.
Last edited by DestinyCall (2019-11-19 16:42:11)
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Oh yeah, good point. Such markers would be very useful for explorers. However banannas in pastures might be a little overpowered, since it is a food source, and penguins in the badlands seems a little out of place even in a colder climate. Perhaps the pine trees in colder regions could have snow on them even outside of the tundra instead, for example? As a society develops, it would need to expand outwards in different directions before its water supply runs out. Polylingual families might be able to assist in any resulting negotiations, but long-range supply routes would become more likely. However, unlike with the current specialisation system, you would not necessarily need to find somebody of the right race to access the right biome. Instead, you'd have to find a way to access a distant biome that may be controlled by a different race more suited to the terrain than you. That way peeps of different races aren't constantly trying to repopulate other towns. Even if one race is missing in the world, it dosn't mean it is impossible to advance up the tech tree, just harder.
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Well I don't know what to think of it, because I don't understand. Particularly, this throws me off:
... a hot area in which deserts can spawn. ...
Are you suggesting that temperature changes so that areas of the map are hot or cold before the biomes spawn? Like hot grassland would be warmer than it is not, and a cold grassland would be even colder?
Danish Clinch.
Longtime tutorial player.
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Hot areas are not actually hotter than elsewhere (although that could be added if Jason fancies). The main idea is that there are some areas in which exotic biomes can spawn, and some where they can't.
Imagine you had the map of OHOL and drew a bunch of non-overlapping circles on it with the inside of each circle representing a certain region. In each region only one type of exotic biome can spawn, along with all the other common biomes. This means that you could get a "jungle empire" without needing a means of farming jungle-products early-game. Gaps between the exotic biome zones would prevent the creation of border towns and create places for polylingual eves to spawn.
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Having looked at some of Jason's earlier comments concerning the specialisation update, I'd also argue that this change might tick the boxes that the update was aiming for. If players have an ill-fitting race for, say, collecting oil, then they won't be merely disadvantaged as they run into the biome, quickly get some oil and move out. Instead that actual ability to find that oil would be much more difficult. A civilisation would have a bunch of choices. They could mount an expedition and set up an outpost in a distant tundra via which they gain oil and export it, despite the fact that this tundra would likely have a few ginger people who might take issue at this tapping of their specialty resource. Or, they could trade with the snowy civ and gain their oil that way. Perhaps some polylingual pasture-dwellers could act as a go-between for negotiations (or a war supply camp, of course XD).
However players deal with resource shortage, interaction with other players and exploration of the map would still be necessary. It's just that families born far away from a certain race wouldn't necessarily be doomed. If eve spawns were brought closer together then this would also help the implementation of this feature, as civilisations would almost always encounter another family on their quest for oil/rubber/sulpher. What's more, this tweak of the update might do a better job than the original of encouraging widespread communication across the map. Whereas before all a family needed to do would be to create a diverse enough city, with this change every city would need to spread its tendrils of influence across the map. When such tendrils meet those of other civilisations, there would surely be some cool role-play as the families try to co-exist and share resources like respectable nations rather than just killing each other.
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