As an aside to the previous article, there are some economic means of maintaining social integration in the tension between a faction and the virtual world. As should be remembered, factions can and have simply packed up and moved between worlds en bloc, all at once. This movement is destructive to the virtual world being left in specific, and all virtual worlds in general. This movement only happens because the players of a faction are divorced, socially, from the rest of the virual world. Economics is but one means of maintaining social ties between the players of a faction and the rest of the virtual world, and the ties between factions as well. There are some political options, but these are not as universal as the economic alternatives.
Limit Total Economic Integration of Factions
No doubt you intend to integrate these factions with your overall economy. Crafters will need benches or forges or anvils and such, and gatherers will need farms or orchards or herds and such. It is a common mistake to let a faction aquire many or even all such resources. Some designers even advertise their mistake as a feature! If the faction can do this, then it has effectly removed itself and all her members from the greater economy of the virtual world, and therefore from the virtual world itself. If I never need to go to the market for anything because I can always get it, whatever ``it'' is, for free or at-cost, then I simply do not participate in the market. If I never need to brave the wilds to harvest apples because we have our own private orchards, then I no longer participate in the market. If I never need to use or visit a community forge because my corporation owns one, then I simply never will use or visit one, which means I am no longer participating in the market. If a faction can acquire all or even many the different means of production, then you have removed that faction and all her players from the market and, by extension, from the virutal world itself. Do not do this. Strictly limit how many of these resources any faction can aquire.
Limit Vertical Economic Integration of Factions
Even if you have to hand-tune a series of specific cases, you must never let any particular faction control all steps of production for the various goods and services available. To give an example, if I owned all the coal mines, steel mills, and rubber plantations, then it would be trivial to open a car factory and undercut my competitors. Great care must be taken to examine the crafting and trade systems of your Mud to ensure there are no loopholes either. There is no time to ``patch it later''; the moment your Mud launches, someone will identify that path and exploit it. They will regard it as a feature and complain loudly when you correct that ``bug''. If the shortest production path is three steps, then limit faction participation to only two. If any faction can control even a single production path they are not removed from the market (monopolies do not participate in markets; they dictate markets) but they are causing serious harm to the market as well.
Limit Horizontal Economic Integration of Factions
A starship requires phaser banks, shield generators, warp transduction coils, and multiphasic variacs, etc. If any faction can operate a factory producing each subcomponent of starship, they bottleneck an important path of your economy via monopolistic power. They are not only removed from the economy but are actively causing great harm to it. This one is a bit more tricky to work out, but some effort should be made nonetheless.
Just Simply Limit Economic Integration
By including factions within the economy you establish ties between the players outside of the faction. By limiting the faction's integration into said economy, you strengthen those bonds. So if your crafting system is along abstract skills, such as ``Tailoring'' or ``Baking'', then limit each faction to specialize in a single trade. My faction, The Weft Coast, specializes in weaving cloth from thread and yarn. Your faction, Tailors R Us, sews garments from cloth. Don't make a trade declaration required either. If someone doesn't know what they want, then don't make them decide. If your crafting system involves modern theories on harvest->processing->intermediateGood->finalAssembly->service, then limit a faction to one and only one tier in that chain. If any tier has multiple options, such as hard rock mining vs vegetable farming, then further limit the faction to chosing only a few or even just one within that tier. Again, if a faction can make all subassemblies for a starship then they effectively operate outside the economy wrt starships.
Limit Political Influence
If your virtual world has any sort of player-based Government, the preclude officers/leaders of factions from holding public office. By forcing them to chose between leading the faction and leading the kingdom, for example, they are hampered in attempts to use political clout to aggrandize their host faction, which could simply pack up and leave at any moment. Either they represent their faction or they represent their Government, but cannot do either. If a faction is ever permitted to set up a ``factory town'' then that town is lost to you. Do not let this happen.
Encourage Political Involvement
If your virtual world has any sort of player-based Government, then extend any sort of privy council, legislature, etc, to include one delegate from each of the factions registered at that place. This ambassadorial position should be a leadership position like any other within the faction system, it's only purpose should be to represent the faction to the council, and the person appointed to this position should not be eligible for any other position within Government or their home faction. If they have absolutely no say in matters then the position is insulting and meaningless, so by all means grant these representatives suffrage.
Do Not Implement Instanced Content
If your players' sessions consist mainly of hanging about the guildhall and running instanced raids, then your players are not invovled in any sort of world at all. To make an analogy, they are playing Instance of Warcraft not World of Warcraft. The players have quarantined theirselves into tiny little pocket universes shaped just like their guild. They are not part of your world and therefore they could be doing this anywhere, so they will have little reason to stay here. If you need to support 100,000 simultaneous players then just make more dungeons and add more land area. There are procedural techniques available, so you don't need to hire a team of writers.
These are a few options which can mitigate the potential for an Uberguild to abscond in the dark of night with a sizeable portion of your player base. They are not the only solutions, and I hope there are better solutions forthcoming, but they will work as a decent start.
Posts
No comments:
Post a Comment