One Hour One Life Forums

I like it, makes yum less stressful.

I agree with the whole big biome, specialization towns = trade routes idea. I understand that it might be tough to diversify every necessary resource in every biome, but apart from some changes, you don't need to diversify resources in every biome. You can use your chance mechanism here, things like milkweed, carrots, wheat etc have a chance to pop up in most biomes, with different spawn rates/biome.

As for the workload, maybe you can outsource some of the tasks, like creating assets, textures for items to people in the community? I've already seen some cool skins for pies. A contest maybe? For a cash price? Just throwing out ideas.

On the subject of player market/economy, To be honest Jason I have a hard time seeing how private property will start any kind of meaningful or lasting trade between players. I understand that you seem to like the idea, but currently it does not work in a game sense. A typical scenario, eve town grows enough to have general farms, water production, smith and bakery. All these are considered public property and is worked by everyone for the survival of the town. However, one person decides, to use your example, to put up a fence plot and start farming milkweed. A random guy needs milkweed, wants to "buy" some, how does he do that? What does he "pay". Does he pay with something already available in town? Then why the need for the exchange in the first place? Milkweed farmer can just leave the fence and get it themselves. Randon guy can just plant some milkweed in town farm as well. As it stands now, economy on a micro level does not work, it's just a bother, waste of space and resources.  Multiple properties inside the same town only serve to stagnate lineage and town development. What I have learned from games like Civcraft is that you absolutely have to use currency if you want people to work for self-interest with a byproduct of contributing to society. So unless you plan on introducing currency I would imagine the correct path to be economy on a macro scale.

I already see some key building blocks in place to make this happen. Language barrier/learning was a great incentive for people to mingle in some areas. We already see this now, the community have shown, even though the spike in violence because of swords/ clan antagonisms, people still work hard to unite and work together, in order for their children to coexist in a more united future (they learn speech, is able to understand and work together better in later generations). Touches like this give people hope and make them care. Just Imagine if this worked like a trade hub where multiple towns were connected, where commodities could flow from one town to another. In the real world, the Viking town birka formed in a similar way. Another thing I noticed is how the property fence is being reappropriated to serve as town walls. I see this as a sign of people seeing the only real value it has for towns atm. It gives towns a little control and protection against invaders, with an added bonus to keep bears out. I don't think this is a bad thing, might be the start of something more interesting.

As I said in the beginning, Big biomes, specialist towns, should be the way to go, even if it's long term, especially if we are going with a finite map. A resource superstructure is needed to create this kind of meta. I have some ideas on how to push for this development.

- Quality
There is a low chance of everything spawning everywhere, but some things have a "home biome". Wheat farmed on yellow tiles produce 50% bonus value threshed wheat of but farmed on other biomes produces way less. Same for other things, Carrots rows gives you fewer carrots in the jungle, fewer berries in the desert, Iron deposits in grasslands yields 6-7 iron instead of 30 in mountains.  Every biome would get a surplus of some items but will have a shortage of others. All towns have some items they take for granted and others that are always needed.

-Trade mechanics and means of transport
I could see clay crocks and baskets filled with commodities serve as the basic framework for trade between towns. If I can fill crocks with 10 bowls of wheat and throw in a cart/horsecart, I can run on the stone road to the other town and trade one crock wheat for one basket of iron ores in the mining/mountain town. A "store" mechanic would be helpful, maybe letting customers be able the browse my cart, if they want crock wheat, they have to place a basket of iron ore on cart/horsecart, and trade happens automatically.

-More Multipurpose
With biome towns, it would be hard for everyone to use the same mechanics to get compost, fur, fruits. Even now with the springwater update, it's still really hard to establish a town in a mountain biome for example. It's just easier to find a spring near clay and grasslands. That's why 99% of towns are in the same type of areas. People need more alternatives to get basic town setup going before going for higher tech. I think this a great opportunity to give some items additions uses. Compost in the jungle? Crock with 10 banana peels + 1 worm = 5 baskets of soil. Dead lambs/milkweed seeds, carrot seeds + bowl of soil in a dug hole gives a pile of soil. Carrot + Berry gives you by-products like mutton and wool so it's still superior. I think crocks are underused as an item and should be able to store bigger quantities of foods, banana peels, dung, flour, wheat, soil etc, as an easy means of transport but also for town organization. Let us turn papers into books, let us use paper and pine as juniper tinder. Let us get fur from bison and boar with same properties as rabbit fur. Sheepskin and goat fur could be turned into coat like seal skin. Use the same skin with different colors for minimal effort. Let us stack more things and eat tomatoes, chilies and onions. Big biomes or not, we need more quality of life updates as messy towns mean doom more often than you think. 

Look, I'm well aware that I'm coming off as arrogant, all this would that would require a lot of work. To be clear I'm not expecting anything here. I'm just throwing out these ideas as examples of things that might actually create a player economy instead of hoping that current mechanics will do the job. I'm not even being that critical, I thought the language, spring and even sword updates were necessary. But we got plenty of ways to grief and kill each other as it is, I think people are craving for a bigger picture here. Let us organize, build infrastructure, create unique towns in different biomes. I'm looking forward to seeing how this game evolves, I'm sure you will figure it out, but I can't shake the feeling that you are moving away from big picture civ endgame and moving closer to family drama gameplay. Trust me, we will get those kinds of stories no matter what, but I for one need to feel like I'm contributing to the world in a more interesting way than surviving wave after wave of greffiers with swords and knives I'm while trying to make compost.