Heroes of Westhaven

[Tom]

The first heroes have arrived in Westhaven, and by pure chance (well, I warned about duplicates) two groups have both been hired by the same guy for the same tasks. Seems he really wants his daughter back.


The quest is "The Missing Daughter" and the summary is:

A wealthy trader is missing his daughter and has hired the characters to find her.


That is what you know when these guys enter your shops soon:
http://shopkeeper.lemuria.org/api/parties/1
and
http://shopkeeper.lemuria.org/api/parties/2


Since they are new in town, they will select where to shop at random. They intend to spend about half their gold in the first shop, and the rest in the second they visit, and after that they will go and attempt the quest.


Since the buying-AI part is not yet done, I will simulate it like this:

   
• they will buy everything that you offer them at reasonable price, where "reasonable" is up to 20% above the buying price (they players have read the price lists in the manual, you know?)
• after the first quest, parties develop "needs" (this is already coded) - based on what they were lacking last time, they want to buy more of that. For items "in need", they are willing to pay up to 50% more than the buying price.
• based on how useful the stuff you sold them was, they will develop customer loyalty (this is also already coded) - on the next round, they will visit shops in order of their loyalty. So sell them something good and they will likely come again.

I will let you know when a party enters your shop and how much money they are willing to spend. You then tell me what you will sell them and for how much gold.

[Tom]

Group #1 has decided to visit:

   
• Zakky's Best Gear Shop
• Rax's Rocks & Random Regalia

Group #2 has decided to visit:

   
• The De-Legro Family Emporium
• Tom's Shop

Ok, it wasn't really completely random. I wanted to make sure everyone gets a chance.

Zak and DeLegro, you are up. Both groups intend to spend about 50 gold in your shop. Tell me what you are going to sell them.

[Zakilevo]

Forget about potions! You only leave once!

club 5G - priest
staff 10G - wizard
axe 10G - thief
scale armor 25G - priest

Total: 50G

[Tom]

Ok, I'll send them on to James then.

Reminder: I'm doing this by hand. In all your postings, please include at the very least your shop ID #. It really helps me a lot.

Output:

Sold club to Franziskus for 5 gold
Sold scale armour to Franziskus for 25 gold
Sold axe to Chuck for 10 gold
Sold staff to Timothy for 10 gold


Your shop status can now be seen online, at least the part that is public (your inventory, anyone can count just by walking in). But I will post here what you would see if the game were more functional, this is a playtest anyway:



Zakky's Best Gear Shop
======================

Gold in Chest: 210


Inventory
---------

0 club (1 sold, total profit 0 gold)
0 staff (1 sold, total profit 0 gold)
1 sword
0 axe (1 sold, total profit 0 gold)
1 +1 staff
1 +2 staff
1 +1 axe
1 +1 sword
1 Staff of Fireball
1 leather armour
1 +1 leather armour
0 scale armour (1 sold, total profit 0 gold)
1 chain mail
5 Healing Potions
5 Mana Potions



James, your turn. The group proceeds to your shop. Now one thing you need to know is that you can't sell them things if the "slot" in their inventory is already full. I will later add replacing things, but the priest will not buy a 2nd armour, for example.

Limits are:
        'weapon' => 2,
        'armour' => 1,
        'ring' => 2,
        'item' => 3,
        'potion' => 10

[Zakilevo]

Mine is Shop #3

[James]

Is it all being done here now or would you prefer it done through email?

[Tom]

At the moment, having it in one place is just so much more easy for me. Anyway it's a playtest, no need for secrecy. And this allows you to comment other peoples moves. For example it's interesting to note the Lapallanch decide to make no profit at all, apparently he is looking to build customer loyalty.

[James]

I'm guessing I am shop #4 (which has moved on the map from when I looked earlier!)

If they've just got another 50 to spend, I'll sell:
(15) +1 Leather Armour
to Chuck for 50 gold.

(as I am certainly after profit, and hoping that the benefit they get from this item will make them want to come back to me!)

[James]

I see the shops on the map are now clickable so we can view their stock.

[Tom]

Yes, you can click and check things. I'm working on putting a few things online so you don't have to ask me about them.

Sold +1 leather armour to Chuck for 50 gold


Rax's Rocks & Random Regalia
============================

Gold in Chest: 110


Inventory
---------

6 clubs
2 +1 clubs
2 staff
1 +1 staff
1 +2 staff
4 axes
1 +1 axe
1 +2 axe
2 swords
5 leather armours
0 +1 leather armour (1 sold, total profit 10 gold)
2 Girdle of Toughnesses
5 Healing Potions
5 Mana Potions



The adventurers are complete now, let's send them on their first quest and see what happens...

[Zakilevo]

Well these guys are going to survive and come back to buy more expensive stuff right?

[Tom]

The quest result as the game will show it:

The young daughter of a wealthy trader has gone missing and nobody has seen her for two days. Her father is worried and has hired the characters to investigate and bring her back.

They begin by looking into her room and the house, checking for clues.
They find the flyer of a wandering circus that is in town, making their show on a field just outside the walls.
Visiting the circus, they meet the wandering folks, people free but shunned, living in their waggons, constantly on the road, welcome in many towns on the first day for the news and entertainment they bring, but disliked soon after. The wandering folks are hesitant to talk to strangers.
But the characters charm them and soon find what they suspected, the girl living in one of the waggons, having fallen in love with a juggler.
Finally, they meet the girl herself, and decide to talk some sense into her.
She objects to most of what they say, but at least she agrees to come with them to see her father and talk to him.
They return the girl to her father, as promised, and collect their reward.



Now here is what is going on behind the scenes:

Hero group Mighty Heroes runs quest daughter
Hero group Mighty Heroes tries challenge clues
...requires wisdom of at least 10 (scaled from 12)
...they have 18 plus 0 from items
...success
Hero group Mighty Heroes tries challenge folks
...requires charm of at least 17 (scaled from 20)
...they have 16 plus 0 from items
...using magic - they have 6
...success
Hero group Mighty Heroes tries challenge girl
...requires charm of at least 9 (scaled from 10)
...they have 16 plus 0 from items
...success
Quest Success
evaluating usefulness of club
...not needed (-3)
evaluating usefulness of scale armour
...not needed (-17)
evaluating usefulness of axe
...not needed (-2)
evaluating usefulness of +1 leather armour
...not needed (-8)
evaluating usefulness of staff
...not needed (-2)



Mighty Heroes
=============

Gold: 80


Characters
----------

1 - Franziskus, lvl. 1 priest (450 xp)
2 - Chuck, lvl. 1 thief (450 xp)
3 - Timothy, lvl. 1 wizard (450 xp)


Needs
-----

wisdom - 0.1
charm - 2.1


Loyalties
---------

Shop Zakky's Best Gear Shop: Loyalty -24
Shop Rax's Rocks & Random Regalia: Loyalty -8



So, what's going on here? The quest is light on combat, having only one and only if the heroes mess up the "talking to the wandering folks" part. In this case, they avoided combat, so all the battle gear they bought was useless, resulting in a drop in consumer loyalty. Why the overpriced +1 leather armour lead to less of a drop than the fairly priced scale armour is interesting, I will check that in detail.

The characters got some gold from this, and experience, but not enough to make a level. However, they have developed two needs: They understood that wisdom is important and while they had enough, a little bit more would be fine. They also had to use magic at one point because their natural charm was not enough, and they will now be actively looking for items that can raise charm, and will be willing to pay more for them.

Now here's the tricky part of the game: When done, you cannot stockpile immediately. All items will have delivery times. So when the characters are in your shop to buy stuff, knowing this won't help you if you didn't already get it.

I will simulate this here by not allowing you to buy additional items when a group of heroes is already in your shop.


These heroes will now go and get some drinks and enjoy their life before looking for the next quest. In the final game, they will spend gold on healing and such as well, if they suffered wounds or other damage.




Now let's give DeLegro and me a chance to play and then we will run a second round. The final game will not be in rounds, of course.

[James]

Could it be the +1 Leather Armour may have still counted as fairly priced as it was at the 20% mark-up that you mentioned?

[Zakilevo]

Blast! Useless fools! They should have dragged her back to her father not talk to her! What is this? A lecturing party?

Also, there should have been more item options! I expected combat not talk!

Also, they should have shields available too :o

[Tom]

evaluating usefulness of club
...not needed (-3)
evaluating usefulness of scale armour
...not needed (-17)
evaluating usefulness of axe
...not needed (-2)
evaluating usefulness of +1 leather armour
...not needed (-8)
evaluating usefulness of staff
...not needed (-2)

This was a bug, with the scale armour. I've now fixed it. The correct value should have been -5. I'll update customer loyalty.