Week of February 9, 2014
Posted: Mon Feb 10, 2014 7:57 am
Sunday, February 9, 2014
Another day of many focuses, but I'm most excited about working on the constants and balancing math of the game, so I want to talk about it!
Today I started to replace arbitrary constants in the code with combinations of the 'fundamental' constants, which are coming together nicely. These fundamental constants - much like the speed of light, gravitational constant, and charge of an electron in our universe - will define the most basic relationships that will go on to derive most of the other constants in the game, as well as answer most of the questions that involve quantities and relationships. All of my constants are written in terms of something I call a 'resource unit', RU, which is the abstract unit that I use for balancing. From this, we can derive a whole system of units and equivalences with which to perform balancing. For example, we can define a measure of power to be RU / time (much like a Watt in the real world). Already, with these two units, an interesting fundamental constant comes up - I call it the 'temporal ratio,' and it's the answer to the question "how much RU is contained in an object that provides x units of power output?" Answering that question would answer a lot of other questions, such as "how much RU is in a production unit relative to it's RU output?" Perhaps a bit confusingly, although I call it a constant, the way I have framed this question, it could actually be a function! This will be useful for controlling the balance of the world as the player gets more powerful. We could say, for example, instead of f(x) = 10x, which would simply make the RU value of a production unit equal to 10 times the RU / unit time output of that unit, that f(x) = 10x^2, which would mean it takes increasingly more RU (hence, increasingly more raw materials) per unit of power to build production units of higher output. That would be an easy way to model something like technological barriers with respect to fabrication processes.
Another interesting balance question: how much RU is contained in the blueprint of an x-RU object? Again, we could say, for example, f(x) = 100x, which would mean that a blueprint would be roughly 100 times as valuable (in units of raw energy) as the item that it represents. Or, once again, we could get a little fancier, and say f(x) = 100x^2. Then, blueprints would become increasingly more valuable in contrast to the object they represent. That would have interesting implications for research, since a research unit is assumed to produce RU at a constant rate - so if the blueprint-object RU ratio increases as items get more valuable, it means that research slows down non-linearly with valuable items, putting a higher curb than usual on vertical progression. It would also mean that research would fall out of balance with production - in the end game, it would be near-impossible to develop a new technology, but comparatively trivial to produce any existing one. Altering the powers involved in these fundamental constants could change not just the balance of activities, but also the way that the balance changes over time. Cool
Overall, I think there are going to be a lot of really cool possibilities for defining these fundamental constants to provide the optimal balance of challenge and fun. I'm already more excited than I thought I would be at the concept of balancing procedural systems. The result remains to be seen, of course, but so far I feel great about all of it, and feel a whole lot more confident about actually being able to produce some content, since the numbers will be meaningful and not arbitrary
Another day of many focuses, but I'm most excited about working on the constants and balancing math of the game, so I want to talk about it!
Today I started to replace arbitrary constants in the code with combinations of the 'fundamental' constants, which are coming together nicely. These fundamental constants - much like the speed of light, gravitational constant, and charge of an electron in our universe - will define the most basic relationships that will go on to derive most of the other constants in the game, as well as answer most of the questions that involve quantities and relationships. All of my constants are written in terms of something I call a 'resource unit', RU, which is the abstract unit that I use for balancing. From this, we can derive a whole system of units and equivalences with which to perform balancing. For example, we can define a measure of power to be RU / time (much like a Watt in the real world). Already, with these two units, an interesting fundamental constant comes up - I call it the 'temporal ratio,' and it's the answer to the question "how much RU is contained in an object that provides x units of power output?" Answering that question would answer a lot of other questions, such as "how much RU is in a production unit relative to it's RU output?" Perhaps a bit confusingly, although I call it a constant, the way I have framed this question, it could actually be a function! This will be useful for controlling the balance of the world as the player gets more powerful. We could say, for example, instead of f(x) = 10x, which would simply make the RU value of a production unit equal to 10 times the RU / unit time output of that unit, that f(x) = 10x^2, which would mean it takes increasingly more RU (hence, increasingly more raw materials) per unit of power to build production units of higher output. That would be an easy way to model something like technological barriers with respect to fabrication processes.
Another interesting balance question: how much RU is contained in the blueprint of an x-RU object? Again, we could say, for example, f(x) = 100x, which would mean that a blueprint would be roughly 100 times as valuable (in units of raw energy) as the item that it represents. Or, once again, we could get a little fancier, and say f(x) = 100x^2. Then, blueprints would become increasingly more valuable in contrast to the object they represent. That would have interesting implications for research, since a research unit is assumed to produce RU at a constant rate - so if the blueprint-object RU ratio increases as items get more valuable, it means that research slows down non-linearly with valuable items, putting a higher curb than usual on vertical progression. It would also mean that research would fall out of balance with production - in the end game, it would be near-impossible to develop a new technology, but comparatively trivial to produce any existing one. Altering the powers involved in these fundamental constants could change not just the balance of activities, but also the way that the balance changes over time. Cool
Overall, I think there are going to be a lot of really cool possibilities for defining these fundamental constants to provide the optimal balance of challenge and fun. I'm already more excited than I thought I would be at the concept of balancing procedural systems. The result remains to be seen, of course, but so far I feel great about all of it, and feel a whole lot more confident about actually being able to produce some content, since the numbers will be meaningful and not arbitrary