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2017-01-08, 10:15 PM (ISO 8601)
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- Jan 2005
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- Eberron
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Re: Erfworld Thread IX: By the Flower and Gray Skull
Man this thing was full of outdated stuff.
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2017-01-08, 11:10 PM (ISO 8601)
- Join Date
- May 2007
Re: Erfworld Thread IX: By the Flower and Gray Skull
The system doesn't even really make any sense. We've been told that sides can't make a profit or be self sufficient without taking money from other sides. Where does money come from in the first place then? Will everyone just stop making new units forever once they've mined out their natural resources?
In real life money doesn't just disappear when you spend it like it does in Erf. The system is not sustainable unless natural resources re-pop over time or something else happens that we haven't been told.Last edited by Anteros; 2017-01-08 at 11:11 PM.
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2017-01-08, 11:16 PM (ISO 8601)
- Join Date
- Sep 2015
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2017-01-08, 11:34 PM (ISO 8601)
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- Nov 2014
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Re: Erfworld Thread IX: By the Flower and Gray Skull
If I remember correctly, Ferals pop randomly, and very rarely a Barbarian Warlord or something, so it's not entirely out of the question to extend that to resources.
On the other hand, mining seems to not be an infinite venture. So, it is very possible that Erfworld has a finite lifespan.The stars predict tomorrow you'll wake up, do a bunch of stuff, and then go back to sleep.~ That's your horoscope for today.
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2017-01-09, 12:27 AM (ISO 8601)
- Join Date
- Mar 2012
Re: Erfworld Thread IX: By the Flower and Gray Skull
Yeah, it's weird that war apparently produces net schmuckers. My best guess is that how much money you get from razing is dependent not only on city level but on how many enemy units you croaked taking it. My second best guess is that you aren't supposed to think about it.
Never been mentioned in comic, but someone on the Erfworld forums claims he heard from Balder that yes, hexes eventually return to their original state over time.
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2017-01-09, 12:42 AM (ISO 8601)
- Join Date
- Sep 2014
Re: Erfworld Thread IX: By the Flower and Gray Skull
It's possible that, like in some games, having cities nets resources that count as money. Gems already can be turned into Schmuckers and back. Rations are a thing, one could very well sell them or use them as barter.
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2017-01-09, 03:28 AM (ISO 8601)
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- Jul 2012
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Re: Erfworld Thread IX: By the Flower and Gray Skull
Don't the first few cities a side controls provide enough money to support it while it's small? I thought it was only after you had a few cities under your control that they stopped producing enough money to support everyone you needed to keep them safe and maintain the side, which is why they occasionally mention the diminishing schmucker return on conquering more territory.
Sanity is nice to visit, but I wouldn't want to live there.
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2017-01-09, 03:39 AM (ISO 8601)
- Join Date
- Sep 2014
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2017-01-09, 04:36 AM (ISO 8601)
- Join Date
- May 2007
Re: Erfworld Thread IX: By the Flower and Gray Skull
I dunno about that. Ansom called a self sustaining kingdom completely impossible in book one, and even Faq had to do mercenary work to sustain themselves. Large kingdoms seem to compound the problems, but even small ones have to fight to sustain themselves.
Has there been another example of an side that was actually self sufficient I'm missing?
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2017-01-09, 04:52 AM (ISO 8601)
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- Feb 2007
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Re: Erfworld Thread IX: By the Flower and Gray Skull
I thought I remember Parson speculating on how he might make a self-sustaining side work, but I can't even remember if that was a text update or just a fan theory. Either way it wouldn't matter because that's not what Stanley would want.
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2017-01-09, 04:58 AM (ISO 8601)
- Join Date
- Oct 2015
Re: Erfworld Thread IX: By the Flower and Gray Skull
Well, thinking about it, a city produces a certain amount of income based on its level, but doesn't it produce units of some kind constantly? Unless you can turn off production of units, their upkeep will eventually overwhelm your cities' income at some point. If you do stop growing your army, then you're easy pickings and profit for a side that does.
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2017-01-09, 05:16 AM (ISO 8601)
- Join Date
- Sep 2014
Re: Erfworld Thread IX: By the Flower and Gray Skull
This is a world based around strategy games. The world requiring conflict to keep moving does fit with that theme rather heavily wouldn't we agree? That is the reason Parson is in Erfworld to begin with, to change that paradigm. Everything in Erfworld is designed around war. There aren't even Civilian units. Every unit directly effects the side and its ability to wage war with other sides, even non-combat units like Nobles. They have a function, they have stats. They give the side they're apart of some bonus. There are no peasants, there are no neutral units caught in the crossfire who would otherwise have lived peacefully and content if it weren't for those troublesome Sides doing their wars. Every unit popped is either a fully function unit used in direct or indirect overworld combat or they serve the side's city by helping production or rations or Schmuckers.
Do we really want Rob to sit down and explain market theory in this world when so many here think he can't even handle a fairly paint by numbers Chosen One story?
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2017-01-09, 05:42 AM (ISO 8601)
- Join Date
- Dec 2014
- Location
- Tron Spacetime
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2017-01-09, 06:27 AM (ISO 8601)
- Join Date
- Dec 2009
Re: Erfworld Thread IX: By the Flower and Gray Skull
I'd guess you gain more by killing stabbers than by growing an equivalent amount of chickens? Gaining levels shown to work that way. Killing stabbers for a few turns give you new level it would take thousands of turns of (peacetime) training to gain the same.
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2017-01-09, 06:36 AM (ISO 8601)
- Join Date
- May 2007
Re: Erfworld Thread IX: By the Flower and Gray Skull
Last edited by Anteros; 2017-01-09 at 06:42 AM.
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2017-01-09, 08:17 AM (ISO 8601)
- Join Date
- Sep 2015
- Location
- London, UK
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Re: Erfworld Thread IX: By the Flower and Gray Skull
Do we count the backer stories? Because if so there's the So-be-it Union.
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2017-01-09, 08:32 AM (ISO 8601)
- Join Date
- May 2008
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- Orlando, FL
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Re: Erfworld Thread IX: By the Flower and Gray Skull
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2017-01-09, 08:50 AM (ISO 8601)
- Join Date
- Jan 2009
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2017-01-09, 10:21 AM (ISO 8601)
- Join Date
- Dec 2014
- Location
- Tron Spacetime
Re: Erfworld Thread IX: By the Flower and Gray Skull
And since thousand turns would probably make you unimportant to your side or Fate, your Signamancy would decay. Wanda looks nice because Fate has need of her. Charlie doesn't, because he is fighting his Fate.
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2017-01-09, 12:11 PM (ISO 8601)
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- May 2008
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- Orlando, FL
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Re: Erfworld Thread IX: By the Flower and Gray Skull
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2017-01-09, 01:12 PM (ISO 8601)
- Join Date
- Nov 2014
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Re: Erfworld Thread IX: By the Flower and Gray Skull
The stars predict tomorrow you'll wake up, do a bunch of stuff, and then go back to sleep.~ That's your horoscope for today.
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2017-01-09, 01:16 PM (ISO 8601)
- Join Date
- Feb 2016
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- Canada
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Re: Erfworld Thread IX: By the Flower and Gray Skull
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2017-01-09, 01:25 PM (ISO 8601)
- Join Date
- Mar 2007
- Location
- Oregon, USA
Re: Erfworld Thread IX: By the Flower and Gray Skull
I think it's a combination of a side's city-shmucker production being diminished past a certain point, unit upkeep, and the general violent nature of neighbors.
Old Faq only had three cities, but had an array of casters to support; Haffaton had a lot of cities, but maintained minimal garrisons for most of them. Traditional sides maintain armies to fend off and take over their neighbor's; Faq avoided conflict by having Jack hide entire cities from scouting parties, while IIRC Haffaton's general defense strategy involved leaving poisoned rations in their cities for invaders to eat, so hopefully they didn't live long enough to threaten a small recapture party.
I've seen it theorized that sides split off satellite/colony sides for the express purpose of avoiding the diminishing returns point, since two "half-sized" sides would outproduce a single "full-sized" side above a certain point.
Parson considered the viability of using unit harvesting to produce enough rations to offset upkeep, potentially leading to a self-stable side, and of course Decrypted have no upkeep.FeytouchedBanana eldritch disciple avatar by...me!
The Index of the Giant's Comments VI―Making Dogma from Zapped Bananas
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2017-01-09, 02:16 PM (ISO 8601)
- Join Date
- Mar 2012
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2017-01-09, 02:46 PM (ISO 8601)
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- Dec 2014
- Location
- Tron Spacetime
Re: Erfworld Thread IX: By the Flower and Gray Skull
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2017-01-10, 11:06 AM (ISO 8601)
- Join Date
- Nov 2006
Re: Erfworld Thread IX: By the Flower and Gray Skull
That was what I originally assumed, but Parson said that if every side in the world was forced to make peace, Erfworld's total population would be decimated. It's annoying that he didn't say why.
War is expensive, you constantly has to let your cities work to produde soldiers, you need to maintain as big an army as you possibly can. And cant let those soldiers do anything but guard/fight.
And so it simply dont make sense that a sudden peace is going to break that.thnx to Starwoof for the fine avatar
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2017-01-10, 11:35 AM (ISO 8601)
- Join Date
- Dec 2009
Re: Erfworld Thread IX: By the Flower and Gray Skull
The world is built with semi-artificial rules. If there's a rule: Slaying an enemy stabber gives you 100 schmakers while creating and maintaining stabbers costs 3 schmakers, war and fighting are the big money makers.
Last edited by guttering flame; 2017-01-10 at 11:36 AM.
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2017-01-10, 11:44 AM (ISO 8601)
- Join Date
- Aug 2005
- Location
- Mountain View, CA
- Gender
Re: Erfworld Thread IX: By the Flower and Gray Skull
Yes, but no such mechanic has yet been revealed. It's been implied that war is necessary to sustain most sides, but there's no official explanation for why.
The best guess I have right now is a combination of "everyone does it" and Signamancy decay - a side that doesn't actively make war gets beaten by its neighbors who do, and in the mean time deteriorates into fat, complacent, incompetent slobs who are easy pickings to whoever finds them.
Then again, that bit about Parson analyzing the ration-harvesting mechanic for making a self sustaining side makes me think there has to be an economic component - that war somehow produces net positive resources - which would pretty much have to have an artificial mechanic such as you suggest.Last edited by Douglas; 2017-01-10 at 11:47 AM.
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2017-01-10, 12:26 PM (ISO 8601)
- Join Date
- Mar 2007
- Location
- Schllaand
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Re: Erfworld Thread IX: By the Flower and Gray Skull
Maybe the dwindling resources are the death clock for Erfworld? The net income is negative, and only mining gems puts in new money in the system, but that will run out some day too, and becomes more and more difficult. Small sides may have slight surplus, but have to defend themselves against bigger ones, so they waste that money on units and war and try to become bigger so they can steal from smaller sides themselves.
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2017-01-10, 01:04 PM (ISO 8601)
- Join Date
- May 2015
Re: Erfworld Thread IX: By the Flower and Gray Skull
Right. That mechanic is razing cities. It's apparently a big money maker for some aggressive sides. There are apparently other ways, though. When it was stronger, TV made a bunch of money through extortion and kidnapping. I don't know how many other sides depend on that.
The Digdug story made it seem as if the economics are in dispute. One side believed in building up cities and maximizing production; the other believed in building up the military and attacking and razing other people's cities. I don't think the story resolved which side was right.