We got asked a few times to add depth to the economic system of the game campaign and sandbox mode. We did gather a few months of feedback now, and here's what we boiled out of that. The instant-buying system was already planned for the province assets (btw, sneak a peek at the upcoming provinces management screens too!), but the Tribute and the Market, were designed during the last couple of months and they are now in pre-beta phase. 1-2 weeks and they will enter public beta and then go into the main branch soon after that!
If you guys are interested into being part of the design process, don't hesitate to contact us on Discord or write us on the discussions forum and we'll be super happy to hear your feedback/contributions/ideas (be realistic though, we can't apply everything we hear :heimer: )
Here's some of my design notes about what's coming! PS there will still be some changes in some details and specs, based on testing and feedback of course!
Tribute System design notes
Description: In order to see the progress in taming the rebelling provinces, the Crown demands to see the tithes restored from the Western Marches. Therefore the Commander will have to send, periodically and in growing size, a tribute in gold and resouces to the capital. Succeeding at it will reinforce its authority and the morale of men, failing at it will have the opposite effect, up to leading to the removal of the Commander from the campaign lead and his hanging. After being introduced by a dialog with Sgt.Vunstenberg, a new recurring timer will be following the player for the whole duration of the campaign (In sandbox mode the timer begins on turn 10).
Timer: Every 30 turns (i.e. 15 days) the Player HAS to pay a tribute in Gold, Wood, Stone and Iron of growing entity with each iteration.
Enity: To be decided yet.
Gameplay conditions:
* IF a Tribute is paid timely, for the next 30 turns the player will benefit of a +5% to Authority in all the Controlled provinces, and a +5% Morale to towers in battle (Morale increases the chance of a tower of causing double damage with a hit).
* IF a Tribute is not paid timely, for the next 30 turns the player will receive a -5% to Authority in all the controller provinces and a -5% Morale to towers in battle (Very low morale provides towers with a chance to cause halved damage in battle with a hit)
* IF the player fails to pay 3(5?) Times a tribute, the campaign is over and the Commander is removed from his position.
* Relations with the crown do influence the entity of the tribute ( above 50 each point provides a -0.5%, below 50% each point provides a +0.5%)
UI Elements:
* On-screen UI timer to next tribute with clickable button.
* Detailed tributes window (Accessible through the on-screen button) with details about: Current modifiers, Paid and Failed tributes, Entity of the Next Tribute and missing/exceeding resources.
* Interactive UI to Pay or to Refuse to Pay (or to confirm the lack of resources and the failure in paying the tribute).
Instant Buying System for provinces
Description: Allow the player to use globally gathered resources to instantly buy a province asset already in production queue.
Gameplay conditions: ONE asset per turn can be instantly built in a province upon paying a fairly high cost in resouces (approximately 10 times the normal value of the asset).
UI Elements:
* Button added to the building queue near the Currently Built asset
* UI Panel with details on next/current payment, prediction of achieved resources with current economy, payment option and displayed failed payments.
Market System
Description : Once the player builds at least one Market in one of the provinces, he has access to the Marketplace to exchange resources for gold and viceversa.
Gameplay conditions: Only activates when the player has built at least one Market asset. The default exchange ratio is 2:1 (resources to gold) and 2:1 (gold to resources). With each market tier built, this exchange rate improves (in favor of the player) by 2% to a maximum of 2:1.9.
UI elements :
* UI button to reach the market from the main campaign screen, and from the Tribute system.
* UI panel with sliders and methods to exchange resources (gold vs resources and viceversa)
