Breaks in BBGs

[CygnusX]

All the games on my all-time favorites list have a common design element.  Namely, there are breaks in gameplay.  Example:

Secret of Mana - Large breaks between dungeons where you can go to town and upgrade
Zelda - see above (for earlier versions, just being on the surface was considered a break!)
Diablo - See above, plus ways to warp back to town to refill HP, MP, while exploring.  
Halo - Breaks between PvP vs. Matches,
Starcraft - See Above
League of Legend - See above, plus IP earned from playing that can be used to slightly boost the power of your account.

In all of these games, there are breaks between major fights in which you can upgrade your character, get a new quest, or simply rest and regroup.

In BBG's however, I am having difficulty designing/finding a system that has similar type breaks.  Namely, most BBGs I've played give you a steady stream of turns, and you're in constant jeopardy of someone hitting you for big gains for keeping too much cash on hand.   Yes, there are resets, but if anything, your account is downgraded after a reset, not upgraded.

To combat the lack of breaks, players will often save up turns, use them all in one gigantic tour-de-force, and then quickly spend the spoils.  However, this model has grown stale with me over the years. With no way to halt the game, its inevitable that you will be unable to play for some period of time, only to come back to see your account thoroughly plundered.  And frankly, its simply not practical to ask players to be glued to their computer to be competitive.

So what are some solutions to this?  How can we give players breaks in which they can upgrade without fear of being plundered?  The only solution I have thought up so far is that when you attack an opponent, you gain resources in proportion to how much land they own (or based on rank, etc), not how many resources they have on hand.

This may seem illogical, but think about the typical NPC or quest in other games.  Every player in WoW, Maple Story, etc can complete the same quest or kill the same NPC with virtually the same rewards. My thought this a game in which other players act as NPC quest/minions should produce similar results.

My worry with this, though, is inflation and possible abuse.  What am I missing?  What are other options?  Or am I the only one that sees this as a problem?

[pixlepix]

As for breaks in constant gameplay, I find a casualty model works good for that. You fight a bit, then rebuild. I think that the solution is also giving the defender a good chance to defend the city, or to give a time where you can see incoming attacks

[Chris]

I have trouble understanding the premise of this topic...
Do you:
a) Think breaks are cool and want to find some use and purpose for them.
b) Have a problem for which breaks might or might not be a solution.

[CygnusX]

@ Chris:  Both, but mostly B.

I'm going to talk in terms of Lords, because it has many features typical of a BBG, and its something we're both familiar with.  Hopefully you don't mind me discussing it here 

In Lords, players are given gold and turns every hour.  As a competitive player, I desire to take gold from other players while minimizing my own gold losses.  This is a fairly common approach and a typical design for many PvP bbgs. 

Now, in Lords, there are three ways I can prevent players from stealing my gold.  First, I can convert gold into diamonds.  Diamonds cannot be stolen, and the cost to convert is seen as minimal compared to the cost of gold being stolen.  Second, I can prevent players from stealing my gold by spending it.  But since many things I wish to spend my gold on cost several turns worth of resource accumulation, it is not viable for me to just let the gold sit in my account.  Third, I can have a superior defense compared to my opponents.  But this is problematic as well as the best theoretical tactic is to be 100% offense, and to log in every hour to either spend gold or convert it to diamonds.  This would produce the greatest take-from-my-enemy and prevent-my-own-losses combination.

The problem I'm having with Lords is that I'm trying to follow the latter strategy, and it requires me to log in every hour to protect my gold.  This is simply not feasible as I have a life apart from the game.  So, my personal life, work, etc, induces a kingmaker effect on my ability to succeed based on this setup.  The final result is a desire to quit playing because it feels as if there is an obstacle outside of my realistic control that is preventing me from winning.  Even if other players have to leave for more time than I do, I see my 1 weekend spent away from home as a kingmaker against my success.

So what does this have to do with breaks?  I guess I'm saying Lords needs a break period where I can get some rest and get my vaca on.   I've been going to bed at Midnight and getting up at 6:00 AM.  This cannot be healthy. All my favorite other games allow me to put it down for several hours without substantial fear of loss.  I need the same thing here.

Also, as I am playing lords to research for my own design on gameplay mechanics, what I'm looking to create is:
1) A system that allows players to lose resources, but significantly reduce that loss if a player logs in at least [once per 24 hours?].
2) A system that allows you to take resources from other players based on their power/strength/rank/land/etc every [1 hour]

I have some more thoughts on this, but its proving difficult to organize them : \

[Chris]

The fix is simple. Make gold banking limited to X times per day. Several games do it this way.
Or you could go even more extreme by making gold at hand and gold stealable separate things (GalacticImperator).

But the thing is... players don't like it. Hoarders openly said to me that they hate it that thay can not save all their gold (even though the net effect was the gold being saved much easier and without stress). Hunters said they don't like it that they can not steal gold from players the moment they withdraw it from bank. It turned out to be a cure worse than disease...

I see my 1 weekend spent away from home as a kingmaker against my success

Isn't it a desirable trait for BBG?

[CygnusX]

But the thing is... players don't like it. Hoarders openly said to me that they hate it that thay can not save all their gold (even though the net effect was the gold being saved much easier and without stress). Hunters said they don't like it that they can not steal gold from players the moment they withdraw it from bank. It turned out to be a cure worse than disease...

I don't think I like this solution.  Especially since you have players on both sides that say they dislike it. 

When I attack a player in Lords for 6-10k in gains... I think 'wonderful, I totally deserve this gold'.  And since its nearly 100% - 200% of my hourly income, it is a huge boost to my finances.

But when I get attacked for 6-10k in losses... I think 'game over.  I just lost every competitive edge I had.  I'm already down several spots behind the lead guy, and that was the last nail in the coffin.'

So, how do I keep my winnings high, but my losses low (which is what all active players want)?  I think this demands a system where players are rewarded based on their opponents size/land/rank/etc, and not what they have on hand.  And the defender, in this situation, needs to be able to hedge their losses simply through activity.  This does not have to be the core component of the entire combat system, but needs to be a large part of it.

I'm a little worried though that there is an exploit in all of this that I'm missing.  It seems to me that this, if anything, should reduce multi-accounts... but I just don't know.

I see my 1 weekend spent away from home as a kingmaker against my success

Isn't it a desirable trait for BBG?

Yes, it is.  Since (theoretically) a significant source of money for BBGs comes from Ads (and certainly through activity), you need players that visit your site often.  And this negative reinforcement has done a great job at keeping me playing.  But if I continue to feel that my absence is a kingmaker against me, then it will lead to behavior extinction, and I will not come back for the next round.

[Chris]

So, how do I keep my winnings high, but my losses low (which is what all active players want)?

You don't

There is an imperative for such type of game for players to be unsuccessful in defending their gold.

Nothing is more important than this, nothing
And yes, this has terribly inperfect implications. This is the inherited flaw of the "steal gold at hand unless it is banked" type of game. And if you attempt to remove the flaw you either break everything or result in a completely different game type.

Since (theoretically) a significant source of money for BBGs comes from Ads (and certainly through activity)

I don't know where you got this information from, I never heard about it (above year 2007).

[CygnusX]

So, how do I keep my winnings high, but my losses low (which is what all active players want)?

You don't

There is an imperative for such type of game for players to be unsuccessful in defending their gold.

Nothing is more important than this, nothing
And yes, this has terribly inperfect implications. This is the inherited flaw of the "steal gold at hand unless it is banked" type of game. And if you attempt to remove the flaw you either break everything or result in a completely different game type.

Then I shall make a new game.

Since (theoretically) a significant source of money for BBGs comes from Ads (and certainly through activity)

I don't know where you got this information from, I never heard about it (above year 2007).

I guess I keep seeing these and holding out hope...

[codestryke]

When it comes to breaks it is you the game designer that needs to make some decisions about how you want to control the pace of your game. There are a bunch of other turn based games out there and many games have found some cleaver ways to add breaks into there game.

Another aspect you need to consider is what type of game this is going to be.. A round based game that resets or a never ending game. This too will aid in how your game is paced. We run one game where the round is a year or longer so the intensity of it isn't near as say one of our games that was a 30 day round. With a longer round lengths you get the marathon style of game play rather then the sprint style.

If you have a game that is run for longer periods of time there is no reason you can't declare a hold on attacks for say 3 days a month. Call it whatever you want and make it fit into your story. In Lord of Ultima they had a number of interesting ways to combat the build/attack frenzy. There is also vacation mode you can add to your game where the player puts themselves in vacation mode and still accumulates turns but no resources and they cannot attack or be attacked.

Like I said the possibilities to handle the situation are endless.

[Chris]

Then I shall make a new game.

Of course you know and accept that the new game will have a flaw too? Just a different one

When designing a new game I always start by selecting 1-3 someone elses games as a base (every time I tried to make it completely unique and original I failed ) and round duration (I don't make everlasting games, so one dilemma less for me ). Then I choose my core design choices (for Lords it was no micromanagement and low time consuming, new players being important to old players and no framing, heavy intense players interaction), these are things that are priority, things that are incompatible with these are sacrifaced, no matter how cool these could be. Every time I tried to break this procudere I paid dearly...