Goblin Squad Member
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You're conflating supplies on the character level and supplies on the settlement/camp level.Supply should be a critical consideration for besieged towns and armies on the march. The need for supply argues strongly for significant effects accruing buffs for the well-supplied and negative effects for the starving and thirsty.
Without supply rules in War you are eliminating the meaning of interdiction and trade in war. You eliminate the disadvantages of a long supply route for invaders. You eliminate the entire supporting mechanism of logistics.
It seems ludicrous to me that people should argue against both positive and negative effects for food, drink, granaries, and wells/cisterns/reservoirs.
If you want these things removed from individual adventurers fine, but do implement them for armies and settlements. Improve your settlement morale by building granaries and give the farmers and cooks some reason to raise crops and herds and prepare provisions. Give meaning to the saboteur's ability to poison or foul water supplies and set fire to silos. Give interdiction and supply importance in the conduct of a siege or offensive.
How do you imagine I am conflating tactical and strategic supply, Dario. Check that last paragraph.
Analysis that fails to complete scope is suboptimal.
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Goblin Squad Member
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The majority of the people here are arguing "making my character consume food every X hours is not beneficial to the game". The things you're talking about are directed against a settlement, not a character. There aren't many people arguing against that. You seem to be calling it ludicrous to argue against food on the character level because it has settlement level implications.
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Goblin Squad Member
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The majority of the people here are arguing "making my character consume food every X hours is not beneficial to the game". The things you're talking about are directed against a settlement, not a character. There aren't many people arguing against that. You seem to be calling it ludicrous to argue against food on the character level because it has settlement level implications.
To the contrary the topic is Farming, not individual character nourishment. Farming has impact not only at the character level but at the strategic level whether you narrowed the scope of your analysis overmuch or not.
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Goblin Squad Member
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I haven't seen anyone arguing against farming, or against food as a settlement resource, so I'm not really sure what the relevance of that comment is.
However, your comment:
"It seems ludicrous to me that people should argue against both positive and negative effects for food, drink, granaries, and wells/cisterns/reservoirs."
Is not about farming. It's about food and drink. It is either referring to the arguments actually made against character-scale food, and thus citing settlement level effects as a reason for character-scale hunger/thirst, or is referring to an argument against settlement-scale supplies (granaries, cisterns), that no one has actually made. Maybe I'm misunderstanding you, so can you clarify for me?
Also, this thread has been about character-scale hunger/thirst, not farming for about two thirds of a page. If you've jumped back to the original subject without warning, that would explain part of my confusion.
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Goblin Squad Member
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To me personally it makes better sense for logistics to have impact at the strategic level if it has a counterpart at the individual level, but if it is determined that it is one of those arbitrarily designated 'unfun' things at the character level it should still be a factor at the strategic level. Frustrating, but there it is. Democratic policy overrules fact by popular acclaim.
Wargames have always had 'out-of-supply' rules, and sieges historically were often a matter of starving the defenders out.
I believe it is shortsighted to rule out character-level supply rules, but I am neither the designer nor average, and adjudicating based on the preference of the majority will usually result in decidedly average outcomes. Unfortunate I'm seeing signs that if majority rules, if subjective valuations of 'fun' rule, then RP will not be 'done right' yet again.
Forgive me, I am grown a bit cynical this week. I think it is the whole Boston marathon things that has me depressed and angry.
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Goblin Squad Member
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It seems ludicrous to me that people should argue against both positive and negative effects for food, drink, granaries, and wells/cisterns/reservoirs.
I am only arguing against negative effects related to food and drink on the Character scale. I am all for it at the Settlement scale.
Just out of curiosity, did anyone actually make this "ludicrous" argument? Or are you speaking in a more general, less grounded-in-reality sense?
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Goblin Squad Member
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Ah, an argument for symmetry makes more sense of the initial statements, thank you. I wholely support the idea of supplies on the settlement scale, with appropriate penalties to DI and NPC effectiveness for lack of settlement supplies. But there is a point where character scale consumables cease to add anything beneficial to the game, and become a chore. We already know there will be consumables for weapons/armor, and there will, no doubt, be combat consumables like potions/scrolls/etc. We shouldn't be shooting for realism. This isn't a simulation.
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Goblin Squad Member
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...Is not about farming. It's about food and drink. It is either referring to the arguments actually made against character-scale food, and thus citing settlement level effects as a reason for character-scale hunger/thirst, or is referring to an argument against settlement-scale supplies (granaries, cisterns), that no one has actually made. Maybe I'm misunderstanding you, so can you clarify for me?
Of course. Food is produced at farms whether it is individual portions or many bushels. Cisterns/water supply goes hand-in-hand with supply considerations. Whether feeding an individual or an army you should have farming. You should also have a water supply of some kind for every settlement.
Also, this thread has been about character-scale hunger/thirst, not farming for about two thirds of a page. If you've jumped back to the original subject without warning, that would explain part of my confusion.
I can understand you were caught up in the current state of the thread conversation, and I imagine you were happy with the trend in the conversation that declaimed the 'bother' and the 'boredom', subjective player flaws that don't want to have to deal with things they dislike.
I am, as usual, on the opposite side of the fence, and would prefer nourishment requirements were implemented at both the individual and strategic level. I think it is shortsighted to leave logistics and supply out of the picture strategically, and I am arguing toward a different end than you are. So I weighed in on the strategic end because the trend in the conversation was to me unsatisfactory and short-sighted and I really believe the conclusions you guys are making is an error. Not game killing, but also only mediocre.
So the more probable reason you 'misunderstood' is that you preferred things to end up agreeing with you, just as I am still arguing against voting by desire rather than reason by pointing out the reasons I think supply and logistics are important, hoping that in consequence I could sway the conversation round to my point of view that it would be better to also have nourishment rules at the individual level as well.
Is that clear enough?
~~edit: I underestimated the trend of the thread and apologize for some of the sentiments expressed above.
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Goblin Squad Member
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It seems ludicrous to me that people should argue against both positive and negative effects for food, drink, granaries, and wells/cisterns/reservoirs.I am only arguing against negative effects related to food and drink on the Character scale. I am all for it at the Settlement scale.
Just out of curiosity, did anyone actually make this "ludicrous" argument? Or are you speaking in a more general, less grounded-in-reality sense?
First instance I came across:
I really don't think that having to explicitly take care of basic survival necessities is particularly cool or immersive. Should we have a slider for controlling inhaling & exhaling, too? The more strenuous activity you do, the faster you have to move the slider from "inhale" to "exhale" and back, or you pass out....
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Goblin Squad Member
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Reading back over the thread it appears more favorable toward individual nourishment requirements than I recalled, possibly due to expectations I held that haven't really been borne out in the sentiments of the community.
I apologize for expecting worse, but very pleased at discovering my fault in underestimating us.
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Goblin Squad Member
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Player characters will make up a small fraction of the populated world. There will be far more invisible NPCs that actually do stuff and need to be fed. As such, it stands to reason that food should be one of the primary requirements for establishing and maintaining a camp or settlement of any kind. This would also take up the majority of the production from a farmstead, proportional to the ratio of PC to NPC and also be one of the best points to strike to weaken a settlement.
The higher the development index, the more food would be required due to a greater number of people residing within the settlement. Some towns devoted to highly specialized trades may even elect to import food from more agrarian settlements.
A siege would prevent the food required for settlement maintenance from flowing in (and indeed the farmstead itself may be destroyed), and as the settlement's reserves deplete it's various indexes would begin to fall, especially Morale.
On the character level, yes eating is important, but most people beyond the hardcore roleplayers will balk at any negative or draconian approaches to this. They want to play the game they want to play, not the game the elitists want them to play. It is a sandbox after all. This means that basic maintenance tasks such as consumption to survive should be assumed to have been handled automagically. It doesn't mean remove the action entirely though, you give bonuses that would become essential to anyone who wishes to remain competitive.
Perception is reality, and if someone perceives that they are performing an action because they choose to, they will be more willing to execute it. Have food give a small increase to an essential stat and you will soon have people gorging themselves because they choose to. Most people also expect a buff to wear off, so when they need to eat again, that's perfectly normal and they will once again stuff themselves to maintain their buff, all because they choose to.
On the more 'refined' side (pun intended) cooking and brewing now become important skills, and a master chef or brewmaster become essential individuals due to the quality or duration bonuses, however minor, their product grants. Those positions in a settlement would also likely give a morale boost, and if the town's resident brewmaster happened to be assassinated, that would be a cause for a national day of mourning, not to mention a precipitous morale and productivity drop.
For characters, players recognize, and some even relish, the fact that alcohol grants a negative effect, so in this instance a debuff is the desired result. For some, even (or especially) the less hardcore players, getting falling down drunk may even be a session goal every time they log in. I say, "Let them eat cake!"
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Goblin Squad Member
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For characters, players recognize, and some even relish, the fact that alcohol grants a negative effect, so in this instance a debuff is the desired result. For some, even (or especially) the less hardcore players, getting falling down drunk may even be a session goal every time they log in. I say, "Let them eat cake!"
Didn't EQ have a "drunk" effect that distorted your screen, slurred your speach (text), and caused you to stagger around? I seem to recall regularly getting together with the other guild officers after a guild meeting and getting sloshed in-game somewhere dangerous.
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"Drunk" debuffs, or states are fairly common in the MMOverse, but I think it would be interesting if getting wasted actually had some deeper effects than "You can't walk strait."
Sure a weird filter to your screen works on one level, but people who are drunk also mis-hear things, see things that aren't there, are less prone to indecisiveness or fear.
If anyone here is familiar with the PFRPG spell Confusion, I think at a certain point these kinds of rules and tables would be fitting if a PC consumed "too-much," and they begin to lose some direct control of their characters actions. Example of this would be kind of like a "Crowd Control" effect that would either prevent you for sucessfully doing certain tasks, make you perform different tasks than you actually ordered the PC to make, or simply not respond in a comprehensible way to whatever situation they are in. An example of this would be John Drunk, he gets in over his head at the tavern and after habitually ordering another drink, automatically reaches out and slaps the beer-wenches rear, and sloppily tips half of his mug on her. In game that could have been as simple as you prompting your PC to "talk" or "interact" with the maid, but the end result was something altogether different and directly influenced by your inebriated state. Also, Drunk Spellcasters might have a chance to fail at spellcasting, or accidentally even use the wrong spell, or hit the wrong target if they decide to get wasted before combat.
This even opens up options like in the PFRPG where you can take feats (Or Slots w/e) to help you hold your liquor better (And resist poisons) and perhaps even provide you with some benefit when drinking such as temporary fearlessness at some level.
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RPG Superstar 2012 Top 16
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I'm a supporter of supplies being meaningful at a settlement strategic level. This should be at a level of abstraction that fits the rest of the settlement mechanics. That probably means they have an effect on Development Indeices and on the NPC sims, rather than being concrete in-game items that need active transportation and logistical management.
At a personal PC level I am filled with ennui at the thought of micromanaging food in my inventory. It is simply not something I want to spend any significant time on, whether I'm off banditing or merchanting or exploring or fighting. Much less when I'm playing my crafter / seneschal character happily ensconced in a thriving settlement with plentiful inns.
I have never played in a tabletop game that spent any time at all on provisions, supplies, starving, freezing, lighting fires, staying dry. Other people may, to their taste, but in my experience it is routinely handwaved away, and rightly so.
The heroic fantasy books that the genre descends from rarely deal with food beyond a nod to establishing the setting. When they do linger on the pleasures of the table it's for literary thematic reasons, as in Brusts wonderful Dragaera series.
I expect there'll be some buff-granting consumables that are labeled with foodlike names. I suppose that's OK. But meh.
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Goblin Squad Member
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I expect there'll be some buff-granting consumables that are labeled with foodlike names. I suppose that's OK. But meh.
Personally, I feel the same way. I don't really like "clickies", or Consumables as Ryan calls them. But I've come to accept that they'll be there, and be (sort of) necessary.
I've often pondered the feasibility of allowing players to "opt out" of Consumables. For example, their character might only receive a partial effect (or no effect at all) from a consumable, but in exchange they receive a minor permanent improvement to their character. It's probably not feasible, and is probably something that defines the "feel" of a particular game.
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Goblin Squad Member
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In tabletop fantasy games, I've always been one of those folks who saves potions forever, thinking "I know I'm going to need them worse later than I do now", whether I actually do or not. Result: I never remember to use consumables, in essentially any game, no matter how they're implemented.
I look forward to trying...again...to break the old habit.
In tabletop fantasy games, I've always been one of those folks who saves potions forever, thinking "I know I'm going to need them worse later than I do now", whether I actually do or not. Result: I never remember to use consumables, in essentially any game, no matter how they're implemented.
I look forward to trying...again...to break the old habit.
Unfortunately, I do the exact same thing.
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Goblin Squad Member
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Some of us, me included, look forward to "having" to ocnsume food and drink, and to have other stuff to consume to get rid of debuffs, and to provide buffs. I carried food around always, and if I had not consumed any I'd eat just to change the items in my pack. (I do tha same thing in my fridge, for I am loathe to throw good food away!)
We'll see how they implement it. I vote "Need to drink and eat to live" but not constantly digging through my pack like a raccoon foraging. If you live in town, go to the inn, in the woods, be prepared. It seem to me to be part of the game. But I suspect it will not be implemented at the start regardless. With the pics presented, it looks good, but core stuff is priority.
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RPG Superstar 2012 Top 16
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@Hardin: Yeah, very much a matter of taste on which reasonable people can disagree. Probably a good candidate for an eventual crowdforging vote if they can identify other equally peripheral subsystems requiring equal effort.
@Jazz: Sometimes in TT games we've come up with a specific plan requiring consumables - "OK it's a night stealth assault. We need a potion of darkvision each, a potion of invisibility, and two potions of fly, one to get in and one to get out, plus one for the prince". That's the only time they get used, the rest just get dropped in a bag along with the random arrows of animal bane and dust of desication and what have you.
@Nihimon: I'd like that option, but while it's balanced from a capablity perspective it doesn't do anything for the poor crafter toiling to make a living from brewing up potions of slightly improved attack. So I don't expect Ryan to implement it.
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Goblin Squad Member
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Weren't the consumable rations and water flasks in EQ consumed from your backpack automatically over time?
Thank you Being. That gave me a wonderful vision of bandit's killing me and getting a loot window:
CHOOSE ONE:
loaf of bread
loaf of bread
loaf of bread
loaf of bread
loaf of bread
loaf of bread
Needed a good laugh after the sparse Blog Post.
And is there any hope for the poor farmer protecting his stuff when the world is literally flooded with bandits that never seem to die.
I love the idea, but I think there will be soooo many people wanting to 'roleplay evil' that you have no hope of preventing your sheep from being violated daily. This is all a consequence of the 'massive' part of the game design...too many people on the server means there is no real social consequence for being a jerk, so the world will be rife with them. Think Mogadishu with tights and capes. On a smaller server (of a couple hundred people) the jerks would become obvious and eliminated quickly.
So no, I don't think farms can work in PfO as it will be essentially a third-world country. People starve in third-world countries largely because the jerks gank the farmers.
A wise bandit will recognize the central role which farms play in putting food on his own plate...
And one shouldn't imagine that farmers are incapable of hiring swords, themselves.
Weren't the consumable rations and water flasks in EQ consumed from your backpack automatically over time?
Yes.
Food being important because it allowed regeneration of health and mana, and then became more important as a "buff slot" because consuming better food gave you... buffs.
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Goblin Squad Member
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I don't expect Ryan to implement it.
Oh, I definitely don't either.
Perhaps there's a middle ground where we can automatically consume consumables? My major objection to them is having to dig through my bags (or have a ridiculously over-filled hotbar) to actually click on them.
Maybe we can get something like a Spell Component Pouch that's a Utility Pouch. Any Consumable in the Utility Pouch is automatically consumed when appropriate. This could include Food, Drink, Weapon Buffs, etc.
That would actually be really, really good for me. I very much like the idea of having the effects from consumables, and I very much want to support the crafters, I just don't want to have to micromanage when I click the consumables.
This particular solution seems really good to me because it allows the players who want to micromanage that the option to do so.
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Goblin Squad Member
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Maybe during our 'resting' phases (when spellcasters stop to recover expended spell-resources, and non-casters recover health and stamina), the food 'resources' are automatically expended by a lesser or greater extent, depending upon how much of the current resources have been expended?
Ie, casting non-stop or fighting till your stamina runs out will require an equally large supply of food 'resources' to fuel the body.
And since I am assuming that encumbrance will be making an appearance, that means most people aren't going to be running around with 6 or 7 different 'stacks' of food and feasts like in WoW.
Do you stockpile rations, which while nutritious and light-weight for their size, also don't provide quite as much food 'resources' as larger, bulkier 'resources' that require time and an application of a Cooking Skill/Badge to truly be useful, or do you take the heavier, bulkier food 'resources' instead and supplement them with what you forage for in the wilds/cities?
Assuming that each 'farm' is specialized to a certain type of food production, we could have 'animal' farms, split into sheep/goats (wool, meat, milk, leather, but not very high yields of the latter two), Piggeries (meat and leather, but very high yields and much sought-after produce at that) and stations for Cattle and Horses (Meat, Leather, Milk and mounts/beasts of burden, but very high setup costs and rather pricey to maintain) as well as Orchards (plant-based fruits with seasonal yields of expensive produce) Grain-Fields (Wheat, barely, Oats, basic level food sources but come with incredibly high yields due to the sheer volume of bread used as a basic food source by, well, everyone!) and vegetable-farms (varying from season to season what is produced, high yield much as the Grain-fields version).
I see Chickens/Geese being a 'freebie' thrown into every farm, a small, constant supply of meat and eggs (and feathers, I guess!), helping to keep down insects on the Farm.
Fisheries might be heavily dependant upon location, such as needing to be next to a river to have a fishery 'farm', and having the right sort of fish too. Trout might do horribly in a fish farm near a slow, shallow river, but freshwater crabs might thrive, depending upon where the setup is.
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Goblin Squad Member
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@Being, I see you quoted my post, and I'd reply to you if only I could figure out what the heck you're actually trying to discuss... your writing is a little too abstract for me to grok at the moment :) However to clarify my own stance, as I suspect you mistook it:
* I'm fine with settlement-level supplies.
* I'm fine with optional character-level food/drink (whether buff or debuff)
* I'm fine with settlement-level supplies affecting characters (positively or negatively)
* I'm against a lack of either character-level food/drink or settlement-level supplies being sufficient on its own to kill a character (i.e. mandatory character-level food/drink)
Oh, and +1 for being able to toggle automatic consumable consumption.
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Goblin Squad Member
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@Tuoweit: Affirmative I get that a lot about my use of language but if I try and make everything simple I end up having to interpret my own words into someone else', which makes them either clumsy, just as obscure but using many more words, or occasionally oafish. I also get the 'pedantic' complaint quite a bit. Other hand I think it should be okay to use English the way that is natural to me when I'm not composing a formal piece. I write the way I speak. I have to attend to intelligibility when writing my book and when communicating at work: allow me my relaxation here please.
You should pity my poor poor children who have to listen to my lectures, grown adults though they are.