CLOK BBS

Just putting this poll out here. I'm looking for results this weekend, so the sooner you vote/comment the better.

It might be good to have a refresher of both how mines were previously and what the overhaul might entail so people can make more informed votes.

Current player mines have a ore and gem distribution based on the number of the rooms. You can dig new rooms infinitely, though current number of active rooms in the mine affect the stability of the mine (more cave-ins and gas leaks with more rooms). Rooms that are collapsed and removed from the mine in turn increase stability but potentially decrease the overall variety and rarity of ore and gems. In any room, when you exhaust a vein, a new vein spawns in its place, which is based on the number of non-collapsed rooms in the mine. So that if you have an X room mine, but only mine in the entrance, you could still potentially get the best possible ores and gems there.

Initially, the planned overhaul was to involve creating more variety of common low-value ores and gems for filler, having a table of ores and gems based on region and using just that to populate the veins. Exhausted veins would not be replaced, and instead you'd have to dig deeper to discover new rooms with new veins. At some point the mine would be too big to maintain and have to be abandoned and a new mine in a different location be dug out. Rarer high-value ores and gems would be extraordinarily rare in the new system and you'd be better off visiting a monster-populated hunting area mine to gather anything of significant value like diamond or cobalt (risk vs reward).

Jirato wrote:Rarer high-value ores and gems would be extraordinarily rare in the new system and you'd be better off visiting a monster-populated hunting area mine to gather anything of significant value like diamond or cobalt (risk vs reward).

What about maintanence vs reward? If I'm going to spend all this time laboring for what I want, why can't I have the stuff I'm looking for? If it's just risk vs reward, player mines are pointless; I'll just have someone go with me to the monster populated mines.

I like the concept of player mines a lot, but there *should* be a way for us to appropriate the rare resources. It's our time, our riln, our effort that is going into it that can be spent somewhere else. In the game or out. Why would I settle for putting forth the effort in procuring sub-par resources? Also, while the risk vs reward thing works in theory, the way the trend in players seems to me lately is (1), there are five or six players (eight on Friday), that are on regularly. (2), a lot of those players don't play for any length of time (myself included), or it seems to me. And (3), Is that working out so far? How many artisans have stated that they don't have anyone to help them get anything that's only populated in the infested mine vs the ones that actually have had success?

It is a great thought, but I just don't see it working in Clok at the current moment. It would be great if we had 30 players/night and several different mines that we could go raid for Cobalt, but we don't. It would even be fine with me if I had to pay someone a metric crap ton of riln to prospect an area and tell me that "There is diamond and cobalt here, at my estimation, I'd say about 300 pounds." Probably an over-exaduration of course, not to menschen numbers just yanked from my brain.

merin wrote:

Jirato wrote:Rarer high-value ores and gems would be extraordinarily rare in the new system and you'd be better off visiting a monster-populated hunting area mine to gather anything of significant value like diamond or cobalt (risk vs reward).

What about maintanence vs reward? If I'm going to spend all this time laboring for what I want, why can't I have the stuff I'm looking for? If it's just risk vs reward, player mines are pointless; I'll just have someone go with me to the monster populated mines.

I like the concept of player mines a lot, but there *should* be a way for us to appropriate the rare resources. It's our time, our riln, our effort that is going into it that can be spent somewhere else. In the game or out. Why would I settle for putting forth the effort in procuring sub-par resources? Also, while the risk vs reward thing works in theory, the way the trend in players seems to me lately is (1), there are five or six players (eight on Friday), that are on regularly. (2), a lot of those players don't play for any length of time (myself included), or it seems to me. And (3), Is that working out so far? How many artisans have stated that they don't have anyone to help them get anything that's only populated in the infested mine vs the ones that actually have had success?

It is a great thought, but I just don't see it working in Clok at the current moment. It would be great if we had 30 players/night and several different mines that we could go raid for Cobalt, but we don't. It would even be fine with me if I had to pay someone a metric crap ton of riln to prospect an area and tell me that "There is diamond and cobalt here, at my estimation, I'd say about 300 pounds." Probably an over-exaduration of course, not to menschen numbers just yanked from my brain.

That's precisely why I'm asking people if they want me to bring back mines as they are currently. I'm not looking to debate the details of the overhaul plans here.

Jirato wrote:

merin wrote:

Jirato wrote:Rarer high-value ores and gems would be extraordinarily rare in the new system and you'd be better off visiting a monster-populated hunting area mine to gather anything of significant value like diamond or cobalt (risk vs reward).

What about maintanence vs reward? If I'm going to spend all this time laboring for what I want, why can't I have the stuff I'm looking for? If it's just risk vs reward, player mines are pointless; I'll just have someone go with me to the monster populated mines.

I like the concept of player mines a lot, but there *should* be a way for us to appropriate the rare resources. It's our time, our riln, our effort that is going into it that can be spent somewhere else. In the game or out. Why would I settle for putting forth the effort in procuring sub-par resources? Also, while the risk vs reward thing works in theory, the way the trend in players seems to me lately is (1), there are five or six players (eight on Friday), that are on regularly. (2), a lot of those players don't play for any length of time (myself included), or it seems to me. And (3), Is that working out so far? How many artisans have stated that they don't have anyone to help them get anything that's only populated in the infested mine vs the ones that actually have had success?

It is a great thought, but I just don't see it working in Clok at the current moment. It would be great if we had 30 players/night and several different mines that we could go raid for Cobalt, but we don't. It would even be fine with me if I had to pay someone a metric crap ton of riln to prospect an area and tell me that "There is diamond and cobalt here, at my estimation, I'd say about 300 pounds." Probably an over-exaduration of course, not to menschen numbers just yanked from my brain.

That's precisely why I'm asking people if they want me to bring back mines as they are currently. I'm not looking to debate the details of the overhaul plans here.

Fair enough! :).

Jirato wrote:Rarer high-value ores and gems would be extraordinarily rare in the new system and you'd be better off visiting a monster-populated hunting area mine to gather anything of significant value like diamond or cobalt (risk vs reward).

Just for clarity, is it already the case that monster-infested mines can have rare ores and gems like diamond and cobalt gathered from them, but not the standard mines that are in cities which players can access? Or, is it currently not possible to mine cobalt and diamond in those areas and the overhaul would include that change?


That question aside, while I haven't gotten much into the mining business (yet) in Clok, I have taken part in some ways and I have talked a lot with those who do. So here's my thoughts on those two voting options.

Have player mines back as they were previously when they were available (Reimbursing players who lost mines from our decision to close/overhaul them), with subtle tweaks here and there over the course of the next year or two.
Pros:
Players can immediately start "enjoying" their own mines again, which I think is a good thing. It's neat to be able to have your own impact on the game in a way that even means something mechanically.
Mines will still be able to be tweaked over time.
Player Mines will remain at their current level of strength without being weakened (I view this as a good thing).
Cons:
This option seems to be closing the door on a more "realistic" and perhaps more sprawling rewrite of player mines.

Wait another 6 to 12 months (or longer) for a mining overhaul.
Pros:
More diversity in player mines adds more context and thematic elements to the game, and potentially more chances for roleplay around mine locations.
Presumably with a different codebase mines would be more extensible later?
Cons:
Longer wait time to get off the ground.
Player mines will be less impactful and less rewarding.

While I might be missing some important points here, I'm hard pressed to want to delay implementation of a player mine overhaul if the goal is still going to be for player mines to be less desirable than monster-infested areas. As such I'm currently voting to put mines back and start making tweaks.

That said, if the goal of the rewrite was instead to make player mines potentially just as useful and even as varied (I wouldn't mind if player mines started spawning their own monsters the deeper they got for example) as monster-infested mines, I'd be all for waiting a bit longer. I just have a hard time justifying waiting on player mines for an overhaul that will ultimately cause player mines to be underwhelming.

I voted for waiting for the overhaul, but it seems I am if not alone close, so that being said I do have a suggestion, perhaps over time the mine should vanish completely, just so we don't run the risk of having them everywhere and so there will always be a reason to do it again someplace new.

I also really like the idea that the mines might start spawning monsters, maybe with each room there is a chance, that you come across something, a infested tunnel, a swarm of long berried nethrem, or something else horrible, I have faith in the staff to work out something new and unsettling.

Maybe it should even be possible to open up a new chamber, and accidentally flood the mine, forcing people to rebuild someplace else, obviously this shouldn't be something that would happen often, but I sort of like the idea that it's a possibility, makes mining feel dangerous, and gives even more to worry about when considering expanding or not.