Early feedback & Suggestions

from Offworld Forums

Hi Mohawk devs!

First of all you did a great job on this game! I will try to provide constructive feedback on what i liked and disliked on my early games. It will mainly concern some design aspect. I know it is late in development for this type of feedback but i will write it down anyway.

The Martian market & colony

The main assumption of the game is that there is a resource market on Mars from which players buy and sell. This market need some goods to live and prosper and it is the players job to provide it.

Now my concern is that we know anything of that market except the exchange price. The market is a resource sink from a design point of view, but for player to provide the offer, there must be demands. We don't know anything about the demand of the market or why there is a demand at all.

If a player sells 500 units of food, we can assume the colony will take some time consuming it and while the colony stockpile is diminishing, the price is slowly going up again. What i would like to see is a colony market status including:

  • Current amount of resources the colony posses
  • Current consumption rate of resources
  • Is the colony growing or shrinking (no food, no people i guess)

I see the market needing the following: Water, food, air, fuel, Al, steel, glass, chemical, electronics. A stagnating colony will need less building resources than life support and vice versa.

With this type of colony market, you can specialize yourself in providing goods to the colony at a good price no matter if the other players need it or not. Or course, it does not change the fact that of the other company does need it, the price will skyrocket =)

Company stock buying

Right now buying company stock (or having your own stocks bought) does not feel fun or rewarding. In fact it put an impression of impotence on the player being bought, you cannot react in any way to it. In a late game scenario, it is a blind race to the first who buy the other.

I totally get that the stocks game is to invest more than others in the rival company so you get a big 2 times the price when the guy get bought, but in the main time you just thrown some cash at a "+" button and it does not bring anything to you. In real life market, when you have stocks of a company you gets cash from its profit.

What if you get a percentage of the player current amount of money each day for each stock you own of him (effectively subtracting it from the player total). It would be an incentive to keep the money low and it would prevent the «i have one million and i will buy everyone right now».

Runaway snowballing

In its current state, the game mechanics encourage snowballing a lot. If you are the first one to buyout someone you will probably win. You are now twice as big with no drawbacks and if the other players do not buyout someone in the next minute they will get incredibly behind. This effect is amplified when the number of player is high.

Great fun games needs two thing, a way to build up an advantage in a clever way but also a way of coming back in an even more brilliant way. It need to be possible to throw your advantage if you are careless and to come back in the game if you are really dedicated.

An upkeep on the size of the company (non linear, e.g. 2x bigger -> 4x upkeep) would create more strategic choices. Do i really want to buy that guy now? Is his build synergistic enough with mine so it is worth it to pay the increased upkeep? It would also create a way for a small company to put up a fight until the end.

TL;DR

Add more information on the market we are selling stuff to, make the stock buying more rewarding and dynamic, prevent over-snowballing by adding an upkeep on the company size.

 

xCoffee

5,673 views 6 replies
Reply #1 from Offworld Forums Top

Something like upkeep is a bad way to implement an anti-snowballing mechanism. Simply slowing down the leader only slows down the game without making the game more interesting. Instead, you want to implement a variety of strategies, with a variety of required skill and risk, so that a leader can be overtaken if someone chooses a risky strategy and executes it well while the leader executes their own strategy less-well.

In truth, you want a degree of snowballing. Early good play should provide a persistent advantage, otherwise there's no purpose to playing well early on (or even a way to define what "playing well early on" means). What you want to avoid is having that early advantage be insurmountable, otherwise there's no purpose to playing well in the mid- or late-game.

And finally: If a leader consistently outplays the rest, their advantage should continue to grow. However, when that advantage gets close to being insurmountable in practice, the game should come to a rapid conclusion rather than being drawn out. Otherwise, there's no point in continuing to play.

OTC uses the offworld market as a game-ender. In my opinion, though, the game could do with a longer build-up period, more ways to overcome a leader through skillful play, and a quicker resolution once the tipping point is reached. Right now when the race-to-get-the-buyout-cash is down to two players, the winner is a forgone conclusion, but it still takes a few minutes to actually get the cash and end the game.

Reply #2 from Offworld Forums Top

A strait upkeep is probably not a good solution i agree. And in general i also want a game that can conclude in a reasonable time.

But right now i feel like the early-mid game is the only game that exist, past that the game is pretty much settled. The final face to face should be the culmination of excitement in the game, unfortunately right now it is not.

Maybe we should check into something like poker where face to face is the real game. The guy with the big stack have an higher chance to win, but the challenger always have a shot to victory.

Ashes of the Singularity II
Reply #3 from Offworld Forums Top

The Martian market & colony

Agree there should be some more information revealed on what is consumed in the background. Unless it is revealed, someone will measure it and it will be public knowledge anyway. Perhaps the colony should not consume the same amount of every resources in every game? This would require players to consider the colony consumption in their strategy.

Company stock buying

Disagree with the "dividend mechanic" suggested. I think it's fine as it is. Companies going for heavy growth normally reinvest their cash in the business rather than giving it as dividend.

Runaway snowballing

Again, disagree with the exponential upkeep model. As I wrote in another post, I consider the snowball effect a good thing. What I could agree to, however, is that higher level HQs should consume some higher level resources. For example, a maintenance of +0.1 steel/carbon, aluminium or glass per upgrade after L1 would not be unreasonable. Perhaps even +0.1 electronics and chemicals for level 4 and 5. Seasoned to flavor of the HQ type, naturally.

Reply #4 from Offworld Forums Top

I really like the idea that higher level HQs consume trickles of higher-tier resources, flavored to go along with different HQ types. I also agree that more information should be available about the colony, and the local colony should be a bigger driver of the local market.

Reply #5 from Offworld Forums Top

I don't really find that the leaders snowball as much as suggested. I'm winning most of my games "from behind" since I'm playing on a high handicap. Often I buy out the "snowballed" despite not having bought anyone yet nor have off world's of my own. I don't believe anything needs to change with the endgame mechanicsother than more clarity on whose got cash to buy people out. Its too difficult to tell when someone is going to lose with all the stock purchased. 

Are you guys playing on huge maps with excess resources? Ifsothats probably why you run into snowball problems since nothing sells locally the Offworld is the only way to make money since everything gets surpressed to zero.

 

 

Reply #6 from Offworld Forums Top

I find playing huge maps with scarce resources and tighter debt makes the local market very interesting and helps prevent snowballing. Although, hacker arrays and the teleportation patent become OP under those conditions. If someone snags the teleportation patent and is playing competently, often that person will go on to win.