Developer Blog: Work Parties
New Government system: Constitution
New Government system: Elections and Elected Titles
New Government system: Demographics and Wages
New Government system: Laws Part 1: Using the system
New Government system: Laws Part 2: Taxes, Ownership, Property, and Wealth
New Government system: Laws Part 3: Tour of different actions, and Executive Actions
New Government system: Districts
New Crafting: Work Parties (This blog)
New Crafting: Labor System
New Crafting: Modules and Efficiency Redesign
New Crafting: New Tech Tree
New Building System: Hammer and new Building Styles
New Mining System: Mineral Dispersion and Drill Usage
New Mining System: New Processing Path and Pollution Info
New Animal System: Attacking Animals
New Ecopedia System
New UI
New Audio
New Hosted Worlds System[/olist]One of the biggest factors behind designing the economy of Eco is that I wanted there to be a very rich market for both goods and services. That means a labor market that easy to use, super-helpful for the success in the game, and fun to boot. They should be the games quests, but unlike typical quests in game, they are not artificial (added by designers for NPCs to give endlessly), but actually arise from other citizens with real needs in the game.
Lets take a look at how they work.
Work Parties are similar to contracts (which already exist in Eco) but are expanded in a lot of ways to make them fit the game better (eventually, contracts and work parties will likely be merged together, but for 9.0 theyll both exist).
Here on the Work Party you can see clearly everything in three sections: the laborers attached to the party (currently just me), the work to be done, and the payment that will be given. Before posting you can customize this if you want. Because I checked the setting expand slots when full, extra open slots will become available as people join. We can also make slots for a limited group if thats preferred. Lets make a special slot for workers who have the mining skill, since thats needed to perform the labor:
This restriction could be anything: members of a demographic, holders of a title, non-admins, people who have chopped 5 trees in the last week, whatever. It uses the same logic system we created for laws, so theres tons of flexibility there to design who can join your team. Down in the payment section, it defaults to 100 of my currency, and 10 reputation from me. We can have other types of payment too:
Payment can grant a title to a user upon performing some percentage of work, or grant knowledge as well. Granting knowledge is especially useful, as a citizen can setup a project to create a skillbook and then get contributions from the whole village, and when the skillbook is complete they will automatically receive the knowledge.
Note that you can grant knowledge of either a skillbook in your possession, or a skillbook that is being crafted. This can become a really powerful work-for-knowledge tradeoff that will let newer players work for older players in a meaningful exchange. Once set, you can post the work order, locking its settings into place. Any work party youve joined will show on the right side of the screen in a pull out menu:
This gives a quick reference as to the work left to be done and who the other laborers are. A world marker is also created in game showing what you need to do:
If another player comes along they can see this work party in the economy viewer, and if they travel to the contract board join the team, even if Im not online.
Being part of the work party, theyll get special access to contribute to the project even if they dont have permissions on the object:
Then as they contribute to the work party, it will increase their percentage worked:
Notice the weights along the right, this lets you designate some jobs as more important than others and give them higher rate of pay. Once all the work items are satisfied, payment is disbursed based on how much work each person did:
Here Dennis did 100% of the work so he gets 100% of the rewards. Nice job Dennis. You can also configure it to pay as-you-work, instead of a lump sum at the end. And now Ive got some nice Geology Research Papers to enjoy, waiting for me when I come back:
One of the cool things about this system is how it interacts with our new labor system which Ill be talking about in a future blog. Basically, many craft recipes will now require specialized labor, and the citizen performing them will have to possess the specialty to do it. This means that having the ingredients isnt enough, youll also need someone skilled to do to the work, and this will create a great need for other peoples help. One can imagine a top level laborer coming online and traveling around the world taking jobs for labor they can perform, collecting payment, and then using that payment to setup work parties of their own for ingredients and specialized labor they dont have. The citizens and economy both grow richer, and an interesting game dynamic is added. Work Parties can also work quite well with the government system, allowing for government contractors. Say a village has collected a lot of money in taxes, and wants to put it to good use. They can create work parties that pay out of the town coffers to fund research that will benefit all citizens, and citizens from around the globe (inside the town and out) will be drawn to help contribute by the prize.
This is the first iteration of Work Parties, and were planning to expand it to many other types of work: building roads, farming, constructing houses, mining, and basically everything else you could want to hire people for in your world. Thanks to our community playtesters who have been putting this through the ringer and looking forward to seeing what kinds of cool projects your citizens and governments will fund. Ill give a live stream demo of this on Tuesday, drop by our Discord to get details if youd like to watch. Cheers and as always thanks for the support from our awesome community, one of the most positive and helpful communities Ive seen in an online game! Keep the feedback coming and thanks for your support. - John K, Eco Designer, CEO Strange Loop Games
[ 2020-03-17 10:24:23 CET ] [ Original post ]
Hey Citizens, hope everyone is staying safe with the global pandemic going around, here at Strange Loop were a remote team already so theres no interruption in our development (if anything an acceleration as we all become shut-ins). Stay safe and take care of yourselves and those you care for. Our small contribution is providing a game world where you can socialize remotely and slow down the spread.
Today I want to debut our latest update on whats coming for 9.0, with one of the new features Im most excited about: Work Parties.
[olist]
Work Parties
Work Parties are similar to contracts (which already exist in Eco) but are expanded in a lot of ways to make them fit the game better (eventually, contracts and work parties will likely be merged together, but for 9.0 theyll both exist).
- A work party can accept any number of workers, paying based on how much they contribute.
- Payment can take many forms.
- Research (crafting skill books) has special support to share the gained knowledge.
Here on the Work Party you can see clearly everything in three sections: the laborers attached to the party (currently just me), the work to be done, and the payment that will be given. Before posting you can customize this if you want. Because I checked the setting expand slots when full, extra open slots will become available as people join. We can also make slots for a limited group if thats preferred. Lets make a special slot for workers who have the mining skill, since thats needed to perform the labor:
This restriction could be anything: members of a demographic, holders of a title, non-admins, people who have chopped 5 trees in the last week, whatever. It uses the same logic system we created for laws, so theres tons of flexibility there to design who can join your team. Down in the payment section, it defaults to 100 of my currency, and 10 reputation from me. We can have other types of payment too:
Payment can grant a title to a user upon performing some percentage of work, or grant knowledge as well. Granting knowledge is especially useful, as a citizen can setup a project to create a skillbook and then get contributions from the whole village, and when the skillbook is complete they will automatically receive the knowledge.
Note that you can grant knowledge of either a skillbook in your possession, or a skillbook that is being crafted. This can become a really powerful work-for-knowledge tradeoff that will let newer players work for older players in a meaningful exchange. Once set, you can post the work order, locking its settings into place. Any work party youve joined will show on the right side of the screen in a pull out menu:
This gives a quick reference as to the work left to be done and who the other laborers are. A world marker is also created in game showing what you need to do:
If another player comes along they can see this work party in the economy viewer, and if they travel to the contract board join the team, even if Im not online.
Being part of the work party, theyll get special access to contribute to the project even if they dont have permissions on the object:
Then as they contribute to the work party, it will increase their percentage worked:
Notice the weights along the right, this lets you designate some jobs as more important than others and give them higher rate of pay. Once all the work items are satisfied, payment is disbursed based on how much work each person did:
Here Dennis did 100% of the work so he gets 100% of the rewards. Nice job Dennis. You can also configure it to pay as-you-work, instead of a lump sum at the end. And now Ive got some nice Geology Research Papers to enjoy, waiting for me when I come back:
Using Work Parties
One of the cool things about this system is how it interacts with our new labor system which Ill be talking about in a future blog. Basically, many craft recipes will now require specialized labor, and the citizen performing them will have to possess the specialty to do it. This means that having the ingredients isnt enough, youll also need someone skilled to do to the work, and this will create a great need for other peoples help. One can imagine a top level laborer coming online and traveling around the world taking jobs for labor they can perform, collecting payment, and then using that payment to setup work parties of their own for ingredients and specialized labor they dont have. The citizens and economy both grow richer, and an interesting game dynamic is added. Work Parties can also work quite well with the government system, allowing for government contractors. Say a village has collected a lot of money in taxes, and wants to put it to good use. They can create work parties that pay out of the town coffers to fund research that will benefit all citizens, and citizens from around the globe (inside the town and out) will be drawn to help contribute by the prize.
This is the first iteration of Work Parties, and were planning to expand it to many other types of work: building roads, farming, constructing houses, mining, and basically everything else you could want to hire people for in your world. Thanks to our community playtesters who have been putting this through the ringer and looking forward to seeing what kinds of cool projects your citizens and governments will fund. Ill give a live stream demo of this on Tuesday, drop by our Discord to get details if youd like to watch. Cheers and as always thanks for the support from our awesome community, one of the most positive and helpful communities Ive seen in an online game! Keep the feedback coming and thanks for your support. - John K, Eco Designer, CEO Strange Loop Games
Eco
Strange Loop Games
Strange Loop Games
2018-02-06
Indie Simulation Multiplayer Coop
Game News Posts 189
🎹🖱️Keyboard + Mouse
Very Positive
(10235 reviews)
https://www.play.eco
https://store.steampowered.com/app/382310
The Game includes VR Support
Enter the world of Eco, where you must team-up to build civilization and prevent a disaster, using resources from a fully simulated ecosystem, where your every action affects the lives of countless species.
Will you and your fellow builders collaborate successfully, creating laws to guide player actions, finding a balance that takes from the ecosystem without damaging it? Or will the world be destroyed by short-sighted choices that pollute the environment in exchange for immediate resource gains? Or, do players act too slowly, and the world is consumed by a disaster that could have been avoided if you developed the right technology? In Eco, you must find a balance as a group if the world is to survive.
Enter humans into this equation, and things get complicated. It is the role of players to thrive in this environment by using resources from the world to eat, build, discover, learn and invent. However, every resource they take affects the environment it is taken from, and without careful planning and understanding of the ecosystem, lands can become deforested and polluted, habitats destroyed, and species left extinct.
In the extreme, the food supply of the ecosystem can be destroyed, along with all human life on it, resulting in server-wide perma-death. Eco is a game where the player’s actions have meaningful consequences.
Will you and your fellow builders collaborate successfully, creating laws to guide player actions, finding a balance that takes from the ecosystem without damaging it? Or will the world be destroyed by short-sighted choices that pollute the environment in exchange for immediate resource gains? Or, do players act too slowly, and the world is consumed by a disaster that could have been avoided if you developed the right technology? In Eco, you must find a balance as a group if the world is to survive.
A world-survival game
Eco is a survival game in a global sense, where it is not just the individual or group who is threatened, but the world itself. The world of Eco will be home to a population of thousands of simulated plants and animals of dozens of species, each living out their lives on a server running 24 hours a day, growing, feeding and reproducing, with their existence highly dependent on other species.Enter humans into this equation, and things get complicated. It is the role of players to thrive in this environment by using resources from the world to eat, build, discover, learn and invent. However, every resource they take affects the environment it is taken from, and without careful planning and understanding of the ecosystem, lands can become deforested and polluted, habitats destroyed, and species left extinct.
In the extreme, the food supply of the ecosystem can be destroyed, along with all human life on it, resulting in server-wide perma-death. Eco is a game where the player’s actions have meaningful consequences.
- Everything you do affects the ecosystem, and players can destroy their food supply and world (server-wide permadeath)
- Create a player-run government to make decisions as a group, proposing and voting on laws
- Use data gathered from the world to propose and vote on laws as a group. Debate with scientific argumentation.
- Create a player-run economy that allows you to sell not only good but services in the form of server-enforced contracts (simulating a player driven quest system).
- Your food level determines your skill-increase rate, making food very important and tying players directly to the ecosystem from which it comes.
- A game with goals higher than entertainment. We plan to build it for schools as an augmented classroom world students share.
MINIMAL SETUP
- Processor: Intel Dual-Core 2.4 GHz or AMD Dual-Core Athlon 2.5 GHzMemory: 2 GB RAM
- Memory: 2 GB RAM
- Graphics: NVIDIA GeForce GT 440 or AMD Radeon HD 5850 or Intel HD Graphics 4000 with 512 MBNetwork: Broadband Internet connection
- Storage: 2 GB available space
- Processor: Intel Core i5-2300 or AMD Phenom II X4 940 or betterMemory: 4 GB RAM
- Memory: 4 GB RAM
- Graphics: NVIDIA GeForce GTX 570 or AMD Radeon HD 7750 with 1 GB VRAM or betterNetwork: Broadband Internet connection
- Storage: 2 GB available space
GAMEBILLET
[ 5951 ]
GAMERSGATE
[ 3198 ]
FANATICAL BUNDLES
Time left:
0 days, 10 hours, 36 minutes
Time left:
23 days, 10 hours, 36 minutes
Time left:
5 days, 10 hours, 36 minutes
Time left:
36 days, 10 hours, 36 minutes
Time left:
42 days, 10 hours, 36 minutes
HUMBLE BUNDLES
Time left:
3 days, 4 hours, 36 minutes
Time left:
3 days, 4 hours, 36 minutes
Time left:
12 days, 4 hours, 36 minutes
Time left:
19 days, 4 hours, 36 minutes
by buying games/dlcs from affiliate links you are supporting tuxDB
