Topic: Improving default economy settings

WorldSavior wrote:

Maybe the default economy settings of each tribe should be optimized a little bit. For example the settings of many tools could be zero or one (I mean, for what do barbarians need 5 axes in their warehouses?) or the settings of weapons and armor could also be much lower (notice that we now have also settings for soldiers which has not been taken into account). In general it can be very useful to have low economy settings, even on big maps, and the AI and many players would get an advantage.

I'd know how to change the right lua files for this, but I would also like to know what others think about it.

Makes sense. I would keep the Atlantean miners' pick target at three, though. What else? Lower the target amount of planks, for example? In early-game, wood can be scarce, and lower target count might boost the early game.

Another minor optimization. IMO, for barbarians and empire the taverns and alike should use meat whenever both meat and fish are available, since barbarian/empire fish does not replenish. This is achieved by exchanging the order of (fish, meat) in one of the configuration files.

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teppo wrote:

WorldSavior wrote:

Maybe the default economy settings of each tribe should be optimized a little bit. For example the settings of many tools could be zero or one (I mean, for what do barbarians need 5 axes in their warehouses?) or the settings of weapons and armor could also be much lower (notice that we now have also settings for soldiers which has not been taken into account). In general it can be very useful to have low economy settings, even on big maps, and the AI and many players would get an advantage.

I'd know how to change the right lua files for this, but I would also like to know what others think about it.

Makes sense. I would keep the Atlantean miners' pick target at three, though.

If you think so... At the other hand it takes always some time until food is in the mine, so mines don't always have to be manned immediately. This principle is also valid for other buildings which need ware input in order to produce.

What else? Lower the target amount of planks, for example? In early-game, wood can be scarce, and lower target count might boost the early game.

Yes, planks/blackwood are a good example

For Atlanteans:

• smoked meat and fish could be lower, because wood is expensive

• flour could be lower, because mills are cheap and fast buildings, but corn is expensive.

• gold thread should be reduced, because gold weavers are very fast and cheap, but gold is not.

barbarians:

• cloth, because weavers are much faster than shipyards with that ware.

empire:

• Cloth and wool, because the wares are expensive, but their producing buildings are also fast.

• granite, because granite is anyway like a free ware, so why does it need a high setting?

for all tribes: coal, ores and metal should be lowered, as well as weapons and so on. And maybe even more wares...

Another minor optimization. IMO, for barbarians and empire the taverns and alike should use meat whenever both meat and fish are available, since barbarian/empire fish does not replenish. This is achieved by exchanging the order of (fish, meat) in one of the configuration files.

Maybe this would be better for barbarians, yes. Fish would pile up in taverns and if there is some more fish it is useful at training buildings. This can be a good advantage, the disadvantage is only that fish piles up and doesn't get used sometimes...

At the other hand the empire should prefer to consume fish IMO because fish is much cheaper than piggery-meat. Or am I wrong?

king_of_nowhere wrote:

I am for keeping them as they are, because they are targeted at a noob audience, and they won't use every resource to the best.

If you've ever been a Widelands noob it was many many years ago, so how do you know which economy settings are best for beginners?

they'll feel more comfortable with bigger stocks anyway. A skilled player can start low and grow the stock over the course of the game, but most people probably won't even notice the setting.

Maybe they don't notice it, but it could be good for them

I'd rather suggest that stock setting could be decided before the game, as a preference setting. that would let anyone pick his own.

I had already suggested that once. But I don't know how to code that. And even then the default settings would stay meaningful because they are also the default preference.

Wanted to save the world, then I got widetracked

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WorldSavior wrote:

If you think so... At the other hand it takes always some time until food is in the mine, so mines don't always have to be manned immediately. This principle is also valid for other buildings which need ware input in order to produce.

If you ask for other peoples' opinions. there is a risk that their preferences differ from yours.

For Atlanteans: .....

Generally, I agree with your list.

Another minor optimization. IMO, for barbarians and empire the taverns and alike should use meat whenever both meat and fish are available, since barbarian/empire fish does not replenish. This is achieved by exchanging the order of (fish, meat) in one of the configuration files.

Maybe this would be better for barbarians, yes. Fish would pile up in taverns and if there is some more fish it is useful at training buildings. This can be a good advantage, the disadvantage is only that fish piles up and doesn't get used sometimes...

At the other hand the empire should prefer to consume fish IMO because fish is much cheaper than piggery-meat. Or am I wrong?

Yes, fish is cheap for empire, while meat is expensive. Still, the production of fish stops at some point, and then one does not need to consult all the statistics to know the "burn rate" of remaining fish, and can prepare for a future with lots of saturated fat. As long as both fish and meat is around, the economy is slightly more robust against traffic jam -like disruptions.

Because of all these reasons, I want the Empire folks to prefer meat over fish, having choice. I fully understand that others opinions could differ.

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WorldSavior wrote:

Yes, fish is cheap for empire, while meat is expensive. Still, the production of fish stops at some point, and then one does not need to consult all the statistics to know the "burn rate" of remaining fish, and can prepare for a future with lots of saturated fat. As long as both fish and meat is around, the economy is slightly more robust against traffic jam -like disruptions.

Is the effect on the transporting system really so big? And anyway: As long as fish is available, piggeries are not needed. And if fish isn't available anymore, you need to produce meat anyway. So it's better for empires if fish is preferred to meat.

No, the differences are small.

Maybe this is since you probably know by heart the ratios of different buildings needed.I have not bothered to learn these ratios by heart => need to iterate a bit before having it right. Preferring meat would make all this easier.

The benefits might be small, but since I no point preferring fish over meat (except Atlanteans), the benefits still outweigh the drawbacks.

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I think the default setting for fur could be increased to 15 or 20, 10 is a bit low IMHO. And I´d also suggest to increase coal target for Frisians a bit because of the high importance for bricks.

What I always found strange is that the settings for iron/ironore and gold/goldore are identical, in my opinion gold is less important than iron and should therefore be lower.

Because one thing I noticed from the tournaments is that the stronger the players, the smaller the stocks in the early game. A pro player spends everything immediately. So, going on the other side I ffigure that a weaker player willl want more things in stock.

Whether the settings should generally be high or low is a matter of taste and gameplay stile. I for one don´t care about getting supersoldiers as fast as possible, so I don´t need to spend spend spend everything at once; but I like having high stock levels to make shortages less likely, so I set the targets usually a bit higher than the defaults.

I'd rather suggest that stock setting could be decided before the game, as a preference setting. that would let anyone pick his own.

+1

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