Cheap Items in the Shop

[SeriousToni]

Hello there.

 

I just wondered why you decided to make the items, which you can buy in the shop before the mission, just so cheap?

That would mean if there's a campaign, you start with 150 Gold before Mission 1 and buy your items. Then, after gaining 1500 loot in Mission 1, you can buy everything.

It was a great fact of thief, that you were able to use your loot to buy better items. But here it wouldn't make sense anymore because the items are so cheap.

 

Why did you decide to set the prices that low? Is this changeable by the mapper maybe?

This shall be no critique, I just wonder why you made it this way.

[Springheel]

In previous Thief games, the cost of things made absolutely no sense. A single broadhead arrow cost more than stack of coins. How on earth would hunters make a living? A single water arrow was worth more than a gold cup, yet they could be found lying around in toilets or sinks. Garrett could make more money stealing from equipment shops than he could from mansions in some cases. The cost of things in TDM is also artificially high, but we've made them as economically feasible as possible, after addressing gameplay concerns.

 

Also, the previous games created the unrealistic assumption that Garrett never spent his money on anything but equipment. Make 1500 on a job, have 1500 to spend for the next job. What about rent? Food? Entertainment? Bribes? Etc.

 

If we wind up creating a campaign, a player would only bring over a certain percentage of their overall take for equipment purchases--probably 10%.

[SeriousToni]

If we wind up creating a campaign, a player would only bring over a certain percentage of their overall take for equipment purchases--probably 10%.

 

Okay, sounds logical to me! Never saw it this way - now this does make sense.

Are there allready the possibilities for mappers to build missions that are connected to each other and the player will take a percentage of his loot for the buying process before the next mission?

Edited December 20, 2009 by SeriousToni

[Springheel]

Are there allready the possibilities for mappers to build missions that are connected to each other and the player will take a percentage of his loot for the buying process before the next mission?

 

Not yet, though it's certainly possible to add.

[SeriousToni]

Would be worth to consider. It would make it more necessary for players to collect much gold and jewels, because they really need it for the success of the next mission, instead of just fulfilling a "collect 2000 loot"-task. And it could give mappers the impulsion of creating little campaigns with more complex stories.

I am not able to evaluate how much work this means to include into the mod, but I am sure it's worth it.

[Ladro]

If we wind up creating a campaign, a player would only bring over a certain percentage of their overall take for equipment purchases--probably 10%.

 

Very interesting.

 

Connected with this subject in some way: is the crew or anyone working on a *ingame* shop, like in "Horn of Kanzo" T2 mission from Sterlino?

 

I think it's not a bad option. With an ongame shop (of course in a big city or campaign), you need to get gold to buy equipments and proceed on the current mission (not only the next one).

Edited December 21, 2009 by Ladro

[Springheel]

Would be worth to consider.

 

Oh, it's definitely something we've talked about and would like to do. It just comes down to manpower. We only have a couple active coders at the moment, so there's a limit to what they can do.

[plasticman]

I wouldn't stretch my head too much about wether prices are "reasonable" or not.

 

Partly because it is not an economic simulation, partly because it seems wrong to me to project the economic system of our society today on something so different like the TDM world. This is like putting cars in game because you can't think of any other way to travel long distances.

 

IMHO.

[SeriousToni]

I wouldn't stretch my head too much about wether prices are "reasonable" or not.

 

Partly because it is not an economic simulation, partly because it seems wrong to me to project the economic system of our society today on something so different like the TDM world. This is like putting cars in game because you can't think of any other way to travel long distances.

 

IMHO.

 

Hehe what an example

Simply, there should be an "economic system" that underlines gameplay and still makes sense. And this hasn't to be Sim City, just like you allready said.

[etdarkb]

Moreover if we want to speak about `realism' a fixed percent is plain wrong.

Some expenses are more or less fixed (rent, food) others are related to how much money you have (bribes, entertainment).

If you want to take money from the player you should follow some kind of logarithmic curve.

Why so complex? Just leave the player alone a la thief

[SneakyJack]

I really enjoyed that the items cost much less - even if you can afford everything in the shop you can still leave items behind to give yourself more or less of a challenge and to make you approach the mission differently. The prices for things in the Thief series never made much sense to me either.

[SeriousToni]

The prices for things in the Thief series never made much sense to me either.

They were set that high to force the player to choose from the list of items (he could never buy everything) and to make him trying to collect as much loot as possible in each mission so that he can buy more of the available items in the next mission.

This doesn't make sense in a realistic seen way. But it does in gameplay.

[New Horizon]

They were set that high to force the player to choose from the list of items (he could never buy everything) and to make him trying to collect as much loot as possible in each mission so that he can buy more of the available items in the next mission.

This doesn't make sense in a realistic seen way. But it does in gameplay.

 

Yes, but in gameplay terms it would make just as much sense to price the items more realistically and then lower the value of loot acquired by the player in the mission. Instead of a vase being worth 20, it could be worth 10...rent, living expenses, and the period of time passing between missions would then account for the main character always striving to stay afloat.

[Crispy]

Yep... it's still a simplified model, of course (who always spends exactly 90% of their budget on rent and living expenses?), but it's better than Thief's highly inflated equipment prices, and it avoids the weirdness of Garrett not needing any of his loot to live on (despite his constant moaning about the landlord).

[Melan]

To be fair, it would have been likely that he pawned off the more valuable pieces of loot he found (e.g. Lord Bafford's sceptre, the two mystic gems - these did not have a monetary value in vanilla TDP) and used the rest to buy equipment, which was understood to come at very steep prices for an independent.

[etdarkb]

I think the solution is just: `let the mapper decides'

 

If between two missions there is not time lap, for example: `find the lost city' and `rob the lost city'. You can assume the thief just went to the nearest shop with the whole loot before entering the lost city. Or worse yet, you have the whole loot... but no shop.

If between the two missions there is short time lap you can use a percent as Springheel suggested: you had few expenses for living and kept something for the next mission.

If between the two missions there is a long time lap, like weeks or even years then you will give a fixed amount of gold to the player: the main character continued his life and when the moment come had that money.

[Springheel]

which was understood to come at very steep prices for an independent.

 

Well, it's no wonder Garrett can never retire if he has to spend more than half his income on tools for the next job.

 

Though really, the "steep prices" argument might work for flashbombs or mines, but crystals can be found growing all over the place. If you're a peasant famer, why break your back all year to raise enough grain so you have a little excess to sell if instead you could just search through people's toilets and make hundreds of gold selling water crystals?

[Melan]

Well, but elemental crystals did not grow in common faucets in The Dark Project, nor I think in The Metal Age. Their abundant availability is more of a fan mission thing.

[Springheel]

Are you sure? I never really played that many FMs, but I have distinct memories of finding them in toilets and sinks. To this day I still check toilets to see if there's anything interesting inside them (in the game, that is).

[bardic]

The water arrows don't grow in the sink, the owners of the arrows put them there to keep the freshness.

 

If we are going to complain about anything it should be getting some money back for all the equipment we didn't use or carrying those forward. I always have so much equipment that I don't use in case I need it later, and then the mission is over.

[Springheel]

The water arrows don't grow in the sink, the owners of the arrows put them there to keep the freshness.

 

And the toilets?

[Neb]

Haha, I check every toilet too.   

 

As for crystals in water - I seem to remember that the crystals were originally meant to be found before you could attach them to the end of arrows in order to make them into moss, water, fire arrows, etc. Therefore it's plausible that they were initially intended to grow in their native environments like pesky elemental limescale.

[etdarkb]

In Thef the water arrows disappear completely, so I always thought they were made completely out of water without any part of wood or metal.. A magically enchanted piece of water.

[stumpy]

Well originaly the elemental arrows would just exist as the elemental part, that you would then attach to broadhead arrows. Think it said something like that in the original document of the first game. But got changed when thief gold came out and replaced the original game. In thief gold and thief 2 you could find elemental arrows in the missions, there were some water arrows in the lost city to bypass a bug caused by using all your water arrows up on the fire elementals, before using one to release the water key.

[SeriousToni]

In Thief and Thief 2 (and fan missions of course) there were fire arrows in the chimney, water arrows in the pools, moss arrows in the green house, gas arrows in the sewers. I don't believe that they magically appeared there, but they were pit there by the people for a certain use (e.g. let the fire in the chimney burn longer).

 

I allways liked this idea of magic elementar arrows. Was another nice part of this fantasy world.