Gold/Food re-balance

[vonGenf]

In the end though, the real answer to your complaint is, strive harder. If your character's goal is to make gold and boost his family wealth, then start scheming your way toward a better lordship.

Actually, the answer is not to strive harder, but to strive different. His character's goal was to make more gold, and he took the very sensible route of becoming a region Lord given the stats as they were. Now the rules are changing under his feet.

Rules change sometimes, especially on the testing islands, so this shouldn't come as a surprise. Still you can't tell people who get screwed through bad luck that they would have been better off if they just worked harder. They already work hard.

[Anaris]

The notion that a region would be systematically dependent upon another for food is a gameplay construct. Any 'region' in medieval Europe could feed itself because the primary occupant of peasants was agriculture - up until you had inreased efficiency such that peasants could go to do something else.

And every region that can support agriculture to that level can, in fact, feed itself.

Cities can't. And we're not going to change the entire geographic structure of the game just to make sure that each "region" is defined as being a unit that can feed itself.

Deserts and other badlands-type regions can, in general, also not feed themselves, because there just isn't enough good arable land there.

It sounds to me, Scarlett, like you're simply trying to use a different definition for the word "region," one that makes sense in terms of an actual medieval society, rather than a game like BattleMaster. In fact, it sounds very much like your definition of "region" matches the BattleMaster definition of "realm."

[Anaris]

I have now made a post on the Development board giving an official explanation and rationale for the rebalance and some of the other stuff going on around it.

Please read it and understand it before posting any more objections.

[Scarlett]

In fact, it sounds very much like your definition of "region" matches the BattleMaster definition of "realm."

As I said, I'm merely pointing out a historical perspective, not demanding (or even suggesting) that BM be done that way. I have never made the claim that just because something 'was' a certain way in history that BM ought to be the same. BM is a game, not a historical simulator. I point this out whenever I make a historical comment because it seems that you need to be reminded that other humans besides yourself are capable of making this distinction.

But your assumption is false anyway: my definition of 'region' is the same because otherwise the analogy makes no sense. If you had an area in medieval Europe that you'd define as badlands - maybe the Scottish moors - it would still feed itself barring external factors like draught or war. The logic is pretty straightforward: if the arable land supports X people, then the max population is only very slightly above X. Sure you had tradesmen who didn't produce their own food, but not very many of them outside of cities.

In BM you have a lot of examples of regions with things like 'mining' where the miners come home every day and there is no food. This serves a useful gameplay purpose because these regions are also rich in gold. But it is a construct: you did not have, for instance, 4,178 square miles (the region of Pates) of medieval land where the primary activity was mining. The primary activity was pretty much always farming, whether or not you had mines or textile manufacturing going on as well. These secondary activities did have to eat the food made by the agriculture sector, but you just didn't have thousands of people moving to an area all depending on someone else for food - unless those thousands of people were in an army.

As a gameplay mechanism, what you're doing is not only necessary but very smart: you're moving from a largely arbitrary system to one that is logically consistent based on values under your control. This adds depth and consistency and forces everyone (players and the dev team) to be more aware of their medieval economy, aka 'all the stuff that goes into the calculations producing the gold and food count.' That certain regions are better or worse than they were before doesn't concern me at all. I haven't even run the numbers for my realm. They'll deal with it.

My angle here is specific to the food sector of the economy. Rural lords should have more food than gold: a quick glance at 13th century economics will show you only a handful of really rich cities, and they weren't even really London or Paris but centers of trade like Bruges, Ghent, or Constantinople. But you also shouldn't really have a region that can't feed itself, because a 'region' for the most part is 'a bunch of people living somewhere because that's where the food is.' A desert with little to no arable land might be a BM region but it would have an effective population of zero, or else a few hundred nomads ... but the nomads aren't paying taxes because they're nomads.  Badlands would be better off but they'd just have low populations and income rather than higher populations that can't feed themselves (as in BM). Badlands could also be cleared or drained to add more arable land.

But if the way BM does it is a necessary construct, none of that really matters. It's just a choice you ought to make consciously rather than assuming that a very old gameplay mechanic is a solid basis just because it's what already exists any more than the historical basis is solid just because it's historical.

[Astinus]

Umm... did you really just kind of complain that the game is too feudal? Or am I just not understanding what you're saying here?

The game is not intended for everything to be equal, or equivalent, or whatever other word menas that every character has the same opportunity. Some characters will be richer than others. A very few will be filthy stinking rich, and have units of 150 cavalry that cost as much to maintain as another duchy's entire army. Don't like it? Kick his ass to the curb and take it for yourself.

Most of the people will end up somewhere in the middlex though.

I was complaining that the game seems going to less feudal, my poor english made you misunderstood me.

Keep in mind that the whole compalaint is just theory since I can't say how in the end the game will change, but while I understand and can second the choice of making region stats more dependants on population and densitiy I'm concerned that those change might lead to more boring relationship between lords of the same realm.

I'm not asking for equality, it's quite the opposite in fact: I fear that with the rebalance we'll have very few wealthy and powerful Margraves while all other lords lose importance.

I think that in the end we'll just get 2 kind of Lords: who owns a city and usually gets load of gold and who doesn't, making the game more equal by removing something in between like are some big rural and townsland now.

[Cren]

The first time I saw what my regions would after rebalance, I literally went on like WTF the devs do? But after slowly going through the other regions and continents, I understood the purpose and I am really in love with it!

If you are one of those players whose region got pounded pretty hard, please don't get angry. Its part of the game and you have to deal with it. Why don't you assassinate/rebel against/kick out/duel to death the lucky region lord who got richer in both gold and food? You want to get better, then you gotta fight.

[Cren]

Oh and disclaimer, I am not one of those lucky dudes, this is what my regions would be like:

Gold: 361 gold
Food: 396 bushels
Post-Rebalance Gold: 249 gold (-31%)
Post-Rebalance Food: 256 bushels (-35%)

Gold: 460 gold
Food: 529 bushels
Post-Rebalance Gold: 429 gold (-7%)
Post-Rebalance Food: 499 bushels (-6%)

[vonGenf]

I think that in the end we'll just get 2 kind of Lords: who owns a city and usually gets load of gold and who doesn't, making the game more equal by removing something in between like are some big rural and townsland now.

That's a point I wanted to make but made poorly. I'm all for inequality, but this inequality does not need to always be in the direction of cities always being on the good end. Diversity in the way inequality is implemented is good.

As I said before, at least on Dwilight the rebalance actually achieves that. There will be rurals richer than cities, while there were none before.

[Geronus]

This is misleading, and incorrect.

Available food was increased only on Dwilight.

Everywhere else, it was found to be in incredible excess, and decreased. All islands will now have approximately the same percentage net surplus available.

Ah, my mistake. I did not intend to mislead, that just happened to be what I thought I had read.

[Cren]

Something I forgot in my post

Gold: 1310 gold
Food: 33 bushels
Post-Rebalance Gold: 2039 gold (+56%)
Post-Rebalance Food: 188 bushels (+470%)

This is exceptional, right?

[Dante Silverfire]

Well Cren, I assume that the region is still *far* from able to feed itself. Most likely it has a large number of peasants, so those peasants SHOULD be producing some measure of food to feed itself, even if it is a city.

[Vellos]

Something I forgot in my post
This is exceptional, right?

Note the percanteg change: it's a percentage change from a fairly low base in a huge region, suggesting that the nominal AMOUNT of change was both absolutely small and small relative to the region's demand: just small in percentage terms.

[egamma]

I think it's a good change overall. It's nice for coastal regions to get a boost to food, it's much more realistic.

[Cren]

Well Cren, I assume that the region is still *far* from able to feed itself. Most likely it has a large number of peasants, so those peasants SHOULD be producing some measure of food to feed itself, even if it is a city.

Its everyone's favourite Madina! Seems to be natural in a RP as it gets a lot of seafood. I hope no other region have got such a large boost.

[Galvez]

The exact numbers per realm on Dwilight:

Rogue      
Gold   7202   
New gold   6102   
Gold change   -1100   -15,3%
Food   2300   
New food   2414   
Food change   114   5,0%
         
Astrum      
Gold   15480   
New gold   17802   
Gold change   2322   15,0%
Food   5313   
New food   5869   
Food change   556   10,5%
         
Asylon      
Gold   9115   
New gold   9187   
Gold change   72   0,8%
Food   2192   
New food   2348   
Food change   156   7,1%
         
Aurvandil      
Gold   6325   
New gold   7190   
Gold change   865   13,7%
Food   3253   
New food   3366   
Food change   113   3,5%      
      
Barca      
Gold   4949   
New gold   5150   
Gold change   201   4,1%
Food   1616   
New food   1619   
Food change   3   0,2%
      
Corsanctum      
Gold   7956   
New gold   9529   
Gold change   1573   19,8%
Food   2388   
New food   2533   
Food change   145   6,1%
      
D'Hara      
Gold   9322   
New gold   10707   
Gold change   1385   14,9%
Food   1891   
New food   2291   
Food change   400   21,2%   
      
Farronite Republic      
Gold   5820   
New gold   7738   
Gold change   1918   33,0%
Food   2390   
New food   2765   
Food change   375   15,7%   
      
Grand Duchy of Fissoa      
Gold   4211   
New gold   4340   
Gold change   129   3,1%
Food   1688   
New food   1702   
Food change   14   0,8%
         
Libero Empire      
Gold   4504   
New gold   5327   
Gold change   823   18,3%
Food   1928   
New food   2113   
Food change   185   9,6%
         
Luria Nova      
Gold   16614   
New gold   17736   
Gold change   1122   6,8%
Food   7451   
New food   7897   
Food change   446   6,0%   
      
Morek Empire      
Gold   15385   
New gold   18256   
Gold change   2871   18,7%
Food   6859   
New food   7604   
Food change   745   10,9%      
      
Niselur      
Gold   9087   
New gold   10038   
Gold change   951   10,5%
Food   3343   
New food   3873   
Food change   530   15,9%      
      
Phantaria      
Gold   2460   
New gold   2252   
Gold change   -208   -8,5%
Food   780   
New food   753   
Food change   -27   -3,5%
            
Saffalore      
Gold   2060   
New gold   1988   
Gold change   -72   -3,5%
Food   365   
New food   363   
Food change   -2   -0,5%      
            
Swordfell      
Gold   5279   
New gold   6594   
Gold change   1315   24,9%
Food   2072   
New food   2368   
Food change   296   14,3%      
      
Terran      
Gold   819   
New gold   745   
Gold change   -74   -9,0%
Food   13   
New food   31   
Food change   18   138,5%      
      
The Falkirkian Freestate      
Gold   1310   
New gold   2039   
Gold change   729   55,6%
Food    33   
New food   188   
Food change   155   469,7%