Food/Trade Revamp

[Anaris]

...you've already got to be screwed before it matters. And if it did matter, then it would become overpowering.

This, I think, is the fundamental problem with food in general. There are really only three possible situations for it: Either you have plenty, you're starving (and thus dying), or you're balanced on the knife-edge in the middle constantly stressing out about it.

I have some ideas that should change that—the core of them being that regions that are capable of producing a surplus will never, themselves, be starving except in times of famine and immediately after a vicious looting raid.

But I think it may need more refinement before it's ready to be implemented, and in any case, it'll have to wait until after the rest of the WIP is finished, which will be a while yet.

However, De-Legro's suggestion of location-independent food transfers gave me an interesting idea for a different kind of change to the way food is handled, which I will present here for critique:

1) Lords can set up buy and sell offers for regions at any time, wherever they are—they don't have to be at a market. Bankers, similarly, can order food bought and sold to and from anywhere within their jurisdiction and range without being at a market.
2) But in order for any region's offers to be visible, it needs a market. (Markets can be made less expensive if need be to ensure no one has trouble constructing them, and other steps can be taken to ensure the transition to this system will be smooth.)
3) Markets can be disabled by sufficient damage from reaving enemy troops (using the Demolish option).
4) Traders can make deals with regions without markets, as long as they are present in the region. In other words, if your region has no market, but has a buy offer set up for 1000 bushels, and there's at least 1000 bushels for sale nearby, you just need a Trader to be in your region to be able to get your region fed.

...And I think I'll probably also make it possible to set up buy offers that draw from tax money, which would work for offers the Lord sets up while not present and automatic buy offers.

This would remove the requirement for Lords to stay in their regions, while keeping food as being something of a strategic resource.

[Indirik]

Those sound like good general ideas for the regular islands.

Having to build marketplaces everywhere is a bit of a bitch. Also, it seems a bit, I don't know, half-hearted? Ineffectual? It's trivially easy to circumvent by just posting orders the opposite way, and having the other region post an offer the lord/steward/banker can accept on behalf of the region that doesn't have a marketplace. IOW, the only thing this would affect is the visibility of automatic orders. So long as the region's lord, the region's steward, or the realm's banker are available to do the trade, the marketplace restriction is irrelevant. So, why bother?

One idea to deal with looting might be to completely disable trades into or out of a region that is occupied by enemy soldiers that are actively looting the warehouses. Or maybe have a chance for shipments in or out of the region to be intercepted based on how many enemy soldiers are in the region. That would be a nice bonus plan. The banker tries to shift 1000 bushels of food out of the occupied region, and it gets intercepted and stolen by the invaders.


For the war islands, I think we should go even further, and just abstract food to the point where you don't need to manage it at all. So long as your realm produces enough food, everyone is automatically fed. When you start running short, regions start to suffer. How much each region suffers should be based on how much food they produce vs. how much they need. Regions that produce a surplus should never suffer, barring looting. Regions that have a 75% shortage should suffer more than regions that have a 25% shortage.

Looting food away from a region can be figured in by reducing the region's production, and therefore how much food is produced that day. Looting the other way, stealing food to feed yourself, is just lumped in as extra production for your own realm on the next day. Seems like it shouldn't be too hard to come up with some kind of system to support this. It allows food to still be important, but completely removes the need for people to actually *manage* it.

[Anaris]

Those sound like good general ideas for the regular islands.

Having to build marketplaces everywhere is a bit of a bitch. Also, it seems a bit, I don't know, half-hearted? Ineffectual? It's trivially easy to circumvent by just posting orders the opposite way, and having the other region post an offer the lord/steward/banker can accept on behalf of the region that doesn't have a marketplace. IOW, the only thing this would affect is the visibility of automatic orders. So long as the region's lord, the region's steward, or the realm's banker are available to do the trade, the marketplace restriction is irrelevant. So, why bother?

Because then one of them needs to be in the region any time you want to move food around.

One idea to deal with looting might be to completely disable trades into or out of a region that is occupied by enemy soldiers that are actively looting the warehouses. Or maybe have a chance for shipments in or out of the region to be intercepted based on how many enemy soldiers are in the region. That would be a nice bonus plan. The banker tries to shift 1000 bushels of food out of the occupied region, and it gets intercepted and stolen by the invaders.

I like that :)

For the war islands, I think we should go even further, and just abstract food to the point where you don't need to manage it at all. So long as your realm produces enough food, everyone is automatically fed. When you start running short, regions start to suffer. How much each region suffers should be based on how much food they produce vs. how much they need. Regions that produce a surplus should never suffer, barring looting. Regions that have a 75% shortage should suffer more than regions that have a 25% shortage.

Looting food away from a region can be figured in by reducing the region's production, and therefore how much food is produced that day. Looting the other way, stealing food to feed yourself, is just lumped in as extra production for your own realm on the next day. Seems like it shouldn't be too hard to come up with some kind of system to support this. It allows food to still be important, but completely removes the need for people to actually *manage* it.

I'm still not sure about this. For one thing, this would require extra code specifically for the WI; for another, I'm not convinced it would achieve my goal of keeping food as a strategic resource.

I'll keep it in mind, though. Maybe it'll spark something useful—some further compromise. Not sure yet.

[Indirik]

Because then one of them needs to be in the region any time you want to move food around.

Why? If I'm the lord of a rural without a marketplace, I can go to the city, and *accept* the city's buy offer. I don't have to post an offer of my own. If I'm a banker, I can do the same thing: Post a buy offer for the city, then take control of the rural region and accept the offer.

Unless, of course, you remove all remote control from a region that has no functional marketplace. That seems kind of excessive. It would mean you couldn't trade between two regions unless one of them had a marketplace.

I'm still not sure about this. For one thing, this would require extra code specifically for the WI;

True. Which is one of the main regions that the original WI were canceled. Still, the infrastructure to support separate code is already there.

for another, I'm not convinced it would achieve my goal of keeping food as a strategic resource.

It does still allow food to be present and important. It also allows looting food both to damage your enemy, and to supplement your own economy. It does, however, remove the ability to stockpile food, making it more of a "here and now" kind of thing. Starvation effects would have to be slowed down, in order to allow reaction times, and prevent quick death spirals.

[vonGenf]

Those sound like good general ideas for the regular islands.

Maybe many of the objections concerning the War Islands could be waived if every region started with a built-in Marketplace? Then right at the start you can start fighting and setting up automated orders, you don't need to have an initial period where everyone needs to build a market place first. On the other hand, it would remain possible to actively destroy the marketplace by looting, therefore keeping the tactical side of localized food management.

[Anaris]

Why? If I'm the lord of a rural without a marketplace, I can go to the city, and *accept* the city's buy offer. I don't have to post an offer of my own. If I'm a banker, I can do the same thing: Post a buy offer for the city, then take control of the rural region and accept the offer.

Unless, of course, you remove all remote control from a region that has no functional marketplace. That seems kind of excessive. It would mean you couldn't trade between two regions unless one of them had a marketplace.

...That was the idea, yes. And if one of them doesn't have a marketplace, then the Lord has to go to the other to accept the offer.

That way, looters disabling the marketplace becomes something meaningful. It's only an annoyance if they disable one, but if they can disable a half-dozen all at once, you're looking at a problem.

And as for "having to build marketplaces everywhere [being] a bitch," if we made this change, I would seriously consider just adding them to every region that doesn't have one. Basically, it would just be part of the standard infrastructure of every region.

It does still allow food to be present and important. It also allows looting food both to damage your enemy, and to supplement your own economy. It does, however, remove the ability to stockpile food, making it more of a "here and now" kind of thing. Starvation effects would have to be slowed down, in order to allow reaction times, and prevent quick death spirals.

Well, that's partly what the changes I've already made to food management were meant to be about—reducing rations before true starvation kicks in. But that's pretty much the opposite of the kind of changes I'm looking at for food: I want to make it more about planning, less about "here and now."

[Indirik]

Better starting infrastructure is definitely something that will need to be discussed for the next round.

[Anaris]

Better starting infrastructure is definitely something that will need to be discussed for the next round.

Especially defensive infrastructure.

[Kai]

The problem is the conflict between the mechanisms of: seasons, trade

Seasons: fluctuations in food output causes uncertainty, encouraging stockpiling

Trade: by the time a food surplus region knows exactly how much they can afford to sell, a food deficit region is dead

Possible solution: play the rate only, like with supply in Starcraft. That is, trade contracts are set up for some rate or fraction of a region's food output, and insufficient net food gives a corresponding reduction in income and population tending to that fraction of maximum.
Problem: dealing sensibly with seasons. Workaround is per-season trade contracts.

Possible solution: change the impact of insufficient food to act mostly on income and not much on population. This could represent redistribution of labour to food production. This is kind of like automatic rations.
Problem: what should happen when food is injected (assuming retaining lump food purchase)? On first glance it seems the sensible thing to do is allow the lord to set a cap on the rate that food is turned into money. This in fact already occurs, the cap being 100% of the full consumption. However, this would allow 80% production all winter instead of 100% for a week followed by death.


Defence:
Returning ability to build fort on mountains would be good.

Secondly:
Nobody seems to dig in anymore? This used to be the standard defensive advantage. Do Marshal settings automatically un-dig people?

[Bedwyr]

I like both the ideas of playing off the rate and looting disrupting trade.  What if we say that when everything is running smoothly, the "well-fed" percentage of all regions in a realm slowly ticks up to, say, 200% (number variable with granaries), where anything over a 100% means you are fine.  When looting disrupts trade, you start to get a drop in the rate proportional to how much of local trade is disrupted?  So if you get mild looting over a large area, it hurts every region a bit.  If you get intense looting in the one big rural next to your city, your city's going to be hurting, but trade from the rest of the realm can still help limit the damage.  If you have all the regions around a city intensely looted, though, then very little is getting into that city and you are in trouble.

Bankers can help mitigate damage and prioritize which trade lanes are fixed first.  Traders can circumvent the damaged trade lanes by setting up their own caravan of food, at a personal risk of being captured.  The more marketplaces you have the better your trade network is able to route around limited damage (if you have a marketplace in every region, then as long as there's some way to draw a line from surplus to deficit you'll probably be fine; if you have only a few marketplaces, then only those regions will be able to route around damage easily).

[Anaris]

Whoa, whoa, whoa. Slow down, guys.

It would actually be significantly easier for me to code up a bit of AI for regions to automatically trade food between each other whenever one needs it and another has extra than it would to move food to the level of abstraction you're talking about right now.

[Kai]

Auto-sell above X bushels at Y price would be cool.

[Anaris]

Auto-sell above X bushels at Y price would be cool.

You can already do that.

No, I'm talking about letting the region actually accept buy and sell offers when it's either low or has a surplus. (And place such orders if there aren't any available to accept.)

I'm not at all sure Tom would approve, but it would definitely simplify things, without removing food as a strategic resource, or removing the ability to transfer it manually. It would even be trivial to add a checkbox to turn automatic management on and off for a given region.