Organizing the first player-run city with a crafting and trading theme

Great! Thanks! PM'ed you.

This puts us community pledged funds at $250, which is a great start.

If folks want to post how much they are posting that's fine, although pledges can be "anonymous" via PMs too.

 

Definitely. Let's see where fund raising takes us. If we have enough for the original idea plus another smaller town then it would be cool to place it at another strategic location on the map. We would have the option of keeping a very similar theme, or diversifying a bit. This options / decisions will become clearer as more of the map is revealed and the devs tell us more about the nature of the game.

 

To honest, i was really drawn in by your Venice like city idea. I have some thoughts that have sprung from that start i may chat with you about later, perhaps on your website. BTW, im totally lost in this game so far - lol. I have gathered a bit and made a first combat deck but i really don't know where to go for crafting and gathering now. Learning curves...

 

Feel free to ask questions. Either to me or of the other players. The community is helpful (provided you don't open a thread with "hey morons" or similar ;-) ).

I'm also forming a mega-reply to the other thread where you and Stile are discussing player towns. Watch that space!

 

Thank you for the info, I'm pretty interested in this. Still need to pay for my pledge upgrade, so I need to think this over. Mostly I'm crippled by horrible indecision! However, your town sounds like an excellent place to reside.

Regarding providing protection for other players - smaller communities in nearby areas might not have the resources to protect themselves against major onslaught, but a large regional force residing in say, your metropolis, might be established. Such a protectorate could be advantageous to establishing agriculture, manufacturing and commerce. This could be provided for by a system of tithe or tax, or by pricing advantage / first-choice. Relationships like these will help to build a stable and functional society.

 

I'd never ask anyone to do anything financially irresponsible: "sorry kids, no dinner tonight.... But Jat is designing this really online cool town." :-D

PM with what you are thinking. Perhaps we can work something out.


Your suggestion is cool, hadn't thought of that! Definitely worth exploring. A larger town ought to have more muscle / influence: that is part of the design. Hadn't considered the aspect of protection.

 

Update


Embassies
There are plans to place an embassy in the Phoenix Republic (probably Port Phoenix). Conversely, they will be invited to place one in this town. Aiming for much synergy between our towns.
There is an agreement with Paxlair to allow them to place an embassy in this town too.
Discussion is on going to collaborate with Blackstone, such as setting up an embassy and establishing a trade route.


Stock Market Idea
I posted an idea to the Items & Economy sub-forum of the dev+ area and starting to get feedback on it. There is a public copy of the information here: http://rsfie.com/phpBB/viewtopic.php?f=3&t=17


Mechanics of a Player-run Bank
While discussing the stock market idea I came up with a way that player-run banks could work. I think this will be possible and is something I'd like to try.

A player deposits 10,000 gold at my "bank" (they give me the coins). At the same time they create a book and list it on my vendor for the same amount of money (10,000 coins). Whenever they want to take money out then they instruct me to buy the book. This will immediately transfer their money from my account to theirs.

It wouldn't be necessary to have a single book but in fact there could be several books. If the player gives me 10 books of 1000 coins each then they'd be able to keep some coins in the bank but also redeem partial amounts.

 

Update

There have been a lot of activity since my last post so I figured it was time to provide an update.


Rent Your House
In the recent "Q4 Schedule" thread Starr mentions that the game will have a mechanic for formally supporting rent:
https://www.shroudoftheavatar.com/forum/index.php?threads/q4-schedule.15280/


This enables a greater possibility of players running their own inn, as well as being able to rent out rooms and houses for other purposes (with great ease!). This is a feature that I keenly support as a town leader and welcome any fellow community member into this town that shares an ambition of participating in the rental market.

As previously stated I'm keen to empower the citizens of this town to grow their own in-game businesses and wish to offer whatever protections and forms of support I can. In return I ask for some help to build the town and for prospective members to strongly consider a small investment into the town. Take a look at the fund raising post in this thread:

https://www.shroudoftheavatar.com/f...ng-and-trading-theme.11472/page-7#post-234516

The town already 'exists' and is a Crossroads Village, with your help it will be a Metropolis by game launch.



Community Hangout
Duke Violation has been running some Google hangouts to discuss various aspects of the game. These are player-run hangouts for the benefit of the community. I've signed up to attend the next hangout which is on Player Towns.

Find the details here:
https://www.shroudoftheavatar.com/forum/index.php?threads/community-hangout-towns-housing.15082/


Q4 and many new gameplay features
I'm positively excited by the new features coming out in the Q4 pre-alphas. If you haven't already then check out the thread linked to above. In particular I'm looking forward to the following features:

Banks -- this is an important part of trading so I'm keen to figure out how this works and what limitations it might have. Very important for our town.
Housing / Rent -- First chance for us to test the rental system and provide important feedback.
Books -- probably the most exciting feature for me. A lot of my ideas for emergent gameplay rely upon a player's ability to create books, so I'm keen to see how this works (and provide feedback). This will give us a chance to test out all sorts of contracts as well as a simple stock market.


You can also see my response in full here:

https://www.shroudoftheavatar.com/forum/index.php?threads/q4-schedule.15280/page-3#post-248980


Alliances / Embassies / Trade Routes
Discussion is on going with other player towns. Keep watching this space for further details.

Now in discussion with Mayor Spoon of Lux Sanctuary. Enthusiasm is high and the exchange of ideas has been rapid. Looking forward to working with him and the other town leaders.

POT IRC channel
There is now a player town IRC channel:
https://www.shroudoftheavatar.com/forum/index.php?threads/playerownedtowns-a-new-irc-channel.15191

 

Update

Community Hangout on Towns / Housing
So it happened and thanks again to Violation for hosting. I was one of the contributors and so far I've had pretty good feedback on my points. I didn't have a great connection so my contribution was not as much as I would have liked. If you haven't already seen it then catch it here (only 2 hours long!):

​

There are a lot of great points in there and there has been some follow up chat in that thread: https://www.shroudoftheavatar.com/forum/index.php?threads/community-hangout-towns-housing.15082/

Really looking forward to working with these guy in the future.


Location of player towns
There has been a good debate about where to place a player owned town in a thread within this sub-forum: https://www.shroudoftheavatar.com/f...my-shop-looking-for-a-pot-to-call-home.15430/
I suggest having a look at page 2 and page 3 have the more interesting comments.

@Budner makes a great point which is relevant to this town: "Best location for POTs interested in trading should be adjacent to a big city, or between 2 big cities. A POT placed far away from major roads/routes will see much less traffic."

That's very true and is a factor in my analysis of location but it isn't the only factor. Traffic alone is not the only factor, i.e. amount of footfall, but rather the value of the traffic is more important. Additional players visiting the town is not in itself what's needed to make player businesses thrive but good quality traffic where the players have coin. We really can't know this until we can explore the mainland. If you are interested in my town but have questions about this then don't hesitate to post a reply or send me a PM.

If you'd like to see some of the very basic analysis that I presented then see page 3. I will copy and paste the map again here. The circles are my doing while the stars were added by Drocis. He puts forward a compelling argument for considering the starred locations, but rest assured that they are not the only place.

​

Lux Sanctuary / Embassies
Mayor @Spoon has finally posted a thread for his player town, I recommend checking it out: https://www.shroudoftheavatar.com/forum/index.php?threads/lux-sanctuary.15447/

Our two towns will be working together to provide numerous co-hosted events.

Talks with other towns are on-going. There is a lot of behind the scenes chat. Unfortunately a lot of it is not ready for prime time, or not currently repeatable.



Pro-business
This town will have an emphasis on trading so I want to make it worth your while to set up a vendor /shop in this town.

As noted above in the embassy section: discussions has been started and is on-going. Collaboration will be a big part of town success and I have started early communicating with the other key towns. If you have an idea and want some feedback then send me a message, I'm happy to help. If you want to live in a town that will pro-actively advertise your business then I'd recommend looking no further. In my talks with the other town leaders I can put your name forward to promote your business. We can also look at using the paper in game to create flyers. Collaboration at the inter-town level will also be encouraged at the intra-town level.


Pro-crafting
As a reminder, this town will also be very welccming to crafters and resource gatherers. These players are the backbone of the economy.

As such I can promise to provide open and free access to expert level crafting stations.


New idea / emergent gameplay
New ideas are welcome, especially if you can think of a new way to use an existing mechanic.

Got an idea? Hit reply or send a message!

 

Well you have definitely sold me on your town. Expect a substantial contribution to your POT one way or another before the Black Friday sale ends.

 

Many thanks. Always nice to receive positive public feedback! This is welcome news.

Q4 is looking great to test out many of the more important features too.


EDIT:
Original post has been updated (25th Oct 2014).

 

Nice plan and good lay out.

here is a interesting real place (Quebec fort/old Quebec city on the saint Lawrence river)... you might want to take a look at the over head.
possibly line up some water front houses then build rest around either a huge /round or square common area. (in which in the center a stone tower could be build (if that is even possible. one that can see from the coast to the other side of your town.)

 

Thanks!

At the moment design plans are on hold until we can find out more details from Port about how it will work. I don't want to put everything into one central square if it can be avoided. The arguments for multiple town-squares is that it means many people can access some necessary / useful centralized (NPC) services. The arguments against is that people find it harder to find one particular service is it can only be found in one of the central squares.

I'm also hoping they will allow us to designate some of the land for civic use (but also allow us to place structures). I'm thinking of plots which would normally be used for housing can be used for town purposes.

 

how about a hunting area? like leave one area for live game. if that is even possible.

 

Towns won't be able to have any areas for killing NPCs or gathering resources. Whether there is the opportunity to place tress and RP some hunting it is another matter.

 

Good work!

I like this , and is interrested to put main or secondary plot here, will follow this for a little while i ponder different stuff

 

If we pledge do we get to pick our lot? Sorry didn't read through the whole post.

 

Thanks for the interest!

You are welcome to join. Second house is absolutely fine.

Feel free to send me a PM with any questions / comments. I've had quite a lot of messages from interested players already.

Thanks for the continued interest.


Yep, you do. We would need to confirm a design with Port first then show the final layout to the pledgers. Those who pledge money will obviously get a priority lot selection over non-backers. While there has been a lot of interest, there has only been a handful of backers (so far). So you'd at least get a high placement on the list. Depending what lots the guys ahead of you take means you could be closer to the top of one list or the other.

Depending when / how we confirm designs with Port then you might be able to get some input on that too (you know the usual caveats here).

 

Update

=== Agenda ===​

Thanks Blake​

Progress​

Player run vs player owned​

R11 Feedback​

R12​

Town name​

Town Play style compatibility​

Taxes​

Map placement​

R13 - Books Testing​

Final note​

*===***===*​

Thanks Blake
Thanks goes to Blake for donating to the town. A village lot will be reserved for you. As you are high on the list then you will be among the first to pick. The usual caveats apply for the reasons you know: town design customization is likely to be more limited than first suggested.


Progress
There has been a lot of progress made in the planning of this town since the topic was posted on June 5th this year. Almost all of the design content appears in the first few posts which has been frequently updated. Much of the discussion in this post has been about the town and lot of that has been fed back into the design. In other words, town design has been public from the beginning and players in the community have already contributed to making this a better town.
The overall direction is still the same, but the feedback has helped to secure the finer details.


Player run vs player owned
This is a player owned town.

The topic title has a typo. This was due to the time when the thread was created. I wrote the topic with the belief that a player owned town was a player run town. It wasn't until the Player Town deep dive that the devs outlined their thinking of what a player run town is. This thread pre-dates that deep dive.

Thanks to @Spoon for pointing out this and suggesting to me that I point out the difference.


R11 Feedback

• R11 was the best pre-alpha release so far. If you missed it then you really missed something special. Not long now until R12.
• Managed to catch up with a few Phoenix Republic players. Mostly with Jack Knyfe. Had great fun teaming up and running the challenge dungeon. Spending in game time is a great way to meet other players and get a flavour for their character. I also hung out with these guys on IRC. If I wasn't doing my own thing they'd probably be at the top of my list of places to live.
• The welcome quest was good fun. It brings a lot of players together and then explore some of the player run towns available. Worth trying at least once. Thanks to all who organized.
• POT owners meeting -- it was good to meet other town leaders and listen to their plans. Most of whom I had already read about their town but there was a couple of new comers I hadn't heard from before. Thanks to Paxlair and OoV.

R12
Should open up for a dev+ test tomorrow (18th Nov). With the servers opening up for all on Thursday (20th Nov).


Town name
Prospective town member Brian suggested the name Vanguard. I'm leaning towards that and believe it could be lore consistent with one particular region. That said I'm thinking of tweaking it to Vangardium.


Play style compatibility
ALL play styles are welcome.

Let me reiterate that incase there is any confusion or someone is saying something malicious and trying to make you believe something fallacious:
Absolutely all play styles are welcome.

Don't cause grief and don't break the SotA T&Cs.

How does this affect the crafting / trading specialization? It doesn't. I've received many messages from potential crafters who like this town idea. So there is no worry at all that you as a potential resident are not a crafter. We need non-crafters too.


Taxes
The ideal is zero tax. The principle is minimal tax.

I do not know what future burdens will be placed upon a town. It could be that part or maintaining the success of the town requires hiring (say) a bunch of NPCs. It could be that such services are expensive for one person (e.g. me). Therefore it could make sense to have a tax.

If that situation arises then I'd want the town council to discuss and then present me with the outcome. If a vote is needed then that can be facilitated.
As the principle is minimal tax then there is no intent for it to be onerous. This principle is stated on a public forum and can be checked at moment. Therefore there is some level of accountability.

In reality, NO ONE knows what the future will hold. Only arrogant community members would suggest otherwise. Fortunately, most POT owners seem humble, honest and wise.


Map placement
I've discussed this issue privately since the previous update post. There has been progress but none of that can be posted publicly (not yet). There are further nuances that have been considered which will greatly affect placement. There has been interesting speculation but testing is required.
This is something of a science experiment: we make an assertion and then we test it as best we can.


R13 - book testing
Books will be released in R13 and I really want to test out the functionality I've proposed on the guild website and in the following thread: https://www.shroudoftheavatar.com/forum/index.php?threads/r12-testing-books-as-contracts.16732/


I made a mistake and thought books were due in R12. My bad.


Final note
Don't let fear or coercion scare you into inaction.

Any questions then just reply here or send a private message. I've stated this before and have already answer many messages. I think the same is true of many town owners.

 

Interesting...