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SD, For the love of god re-address the food/city spam issues

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SD, For the love of god re-address the food/city spam issues

from Elemental Forums

Post after post now i read tons and tons of differing ideas to fix this issue. Alot of them sound like a maked improvement to the current food issues.

https://forums.elementalgame.com/397376 This post here sums up one of the better and simpler ways to fix this.

I am not sure why, but its coming across that this is not as big of a concern to SD as it is to the players of the game.

Maybe i am a sky is falling alarmist here but i am not enjoying the game as much. It just feels like a race and more of an RTS now then a serious 4X TBS game.

Sorry to the readers for yet another post on this, but i am noticing that the other threads are not getting alot of SD comments now, hopefully they are not looking at the forums cause there hard at work on implementing a fix.

elemental
33,821 views 34 replies
Reply #26 from Elemental Forums Top

Quoting Nick-Danger, reply 25

Quoting Frogboy, reply 21...Why did that happen?... Socrates said "The unexamined life is not worth living".

Your asking, let alone answering, your above question bodes well for Elemental's future, and upcoming SD games.

I respect your 'the boss expects more from himself than his/her employees' philosophy.  The bosses I've most respected led from the front, didn't ask of others what they wouldn't do themselves, and generally worked their way up through the ranks so they understood each job they oversaw.  Sometimes it bites one in the keister, but what doesn't sooner or later? 

I hope the laid-off SDers get their jobs back ASAP.
End of Nick-Danger's quote

We've hired back some of them. Others won't likely be coming back regardless for various reasons (for instance, we laid off a receptionist which was not a position that made a lot of sense since there's no one to "receive".  In a small company, you often end up with positions that really have no business justification.

One of the things that I hope people realize is that we're somewhat...different than your typical company.  We're you guys except we set up a company to make stuff.  We're not a publicly traded company. We didn't have to release Elemental when we did, we just thought it was done and ready for the world. There was no quarterly public statement we had to make to "share holders" to pressure us on release.

Never underestimate the power of cognitive dissonance. 

 

Reply #27 from Elemental Forums Top

Quoting Frogboy, reply 21
Nick - non-global mana was the achille's heel of this.


Stardock policy: NO manager shall work fewer hours per week than anyone under their management including the CEO.  If my guys were working 90 hours a week, I was working 100 hours a week. It was a bedrock principle.  You do that for a few months and you'd be surprised at how "good" easier solutions start to look.

I find the Elemental launch endlessly fascinating (which I know I shouldn't bring up from a PR point of view) because experiencing first-hand some of the project development catastrophes I had previously only read about has been a real eye opener.

 

 
End of Frogboy's quote

 

While I can understand the reasoning behind such a policy, I don't think it's necessarily a particularly good policy- due to potential to having a "Japanese" mentality invade- where it becomes work longer, not smarter.  Didn't  you guys once say that outside of crunch time, that Stardock employees didn't work overtime?  I know I remember hearing that around GC2 time. 

 

It sounds like this changed for Elemental, and I do wonder if that had something to do with what happened.  That things looked good when they wouldn't have if you guys were working more humane hours.

 

 

ObjectDock - Access shortcuts and frequently used applications from an animated dock.
Reply #28 from Elemental Forums Top

Stardock policy: NO manager shall work fewer hours per week than anyone under their management including the CEO.  If my guys were working 90 hours a week, I was working 100 hours a week. It was a bedrock principle.  You do that for a few months and you'd be surprised at how "good" easier solutions start to look.
End of quote

Knowing when you productivity starts to be negative (ie you introduce more problems than you are fixing) due to too much work per week is really tricky

Reply #29 from Elemental Forums Top

Quoting Peace, reply 28

Stardock policy: NO manager shall work fewer hours per week than anyone under their management including the CEO.  If my guys were working 90 hours a week, I was working 100 hours a week. It was a bedrock principle.  You do that for a few months and you'd be surprised at how "good" easier solutions start to look.

Knowing when you productivity starts to be negative (ie you introduce more problems than you are fixing) due to too much work per week is really tricky
End of Peace's quote

It is. Not to mention judgment.

Reply #30 from Elemental Forums Top

Quoting Frogboy, reply 29

Quoting Peace Phoenix, reply 28
Stardock policy: NO manager shall work fewer hours per week than anyone under their management including the CEO.  If my guys were working 90 hours a week, I was working 100 hours a week. It was a bedrock principle.  You do that for a few months and you'd be surprised at how "good" easier solutions start to look.

Knowing when you productivity starts to be negative (ie you introduce more problems than you are fixing) due to too much work per week is really tricky

It is. Not to mention judgment.
End of Frogboy's quote

Can you please stop... Being one of the most likable game developer i have had the privilege to know (even if its just in a forums aspect).

I mean seriously, we are constantly inundated with snide, holier then though Devs who have these god complexes, yet here you are a normal and contrite Developer who has.... humility and common sense.

Your totally ruining the John Romero/Peter Molyneux/Richard Garriot, Douchebag image so many in the video gaming industry have earned.

Your like a neighbor i could go and have a beer with and just talk with, instead of these asshats who make it seem like they are rockstars because they lead a team of programmers in making a game. You and Chris Taylor need to collaborate on some project i think.

So yeah just stop it already.   o_O

Reply #31 from Elemental Forums Top

If you're really into something it's hard to know when you need to do the social thing or the family thing.  

 

I don't feel that Brad tried to keep hours down  just to be humane, but that it's  better for business to have your employees not tired and worn out.   I'm not some idealist who thinks Brad does these things just because he's a nice person- it truly is a business strategy, and an effective one to have your workers well taken-care of.  Many of Stardock's grand plans seem to have a long-term strategy in mind, one that not many other companies have.  

 

I just hope this new approach results in sales down the road.

 

Reply #32 from Elemental Forums Top

Quoting Frogboy, reply 26
... Never underestimate the power of cognitive dissonance. 
End of Frogboy's quote

And how. More lit-ra-chur-oriented types would cite irony, but they probably haven't read enough about neurological theories of sentience.

I've had a fuzzy list of unsolicited 'post-mortem' advice percolating in my head since mid-summer, but I'd probably put "don't spend so much time actively working" at the top regardless of all my quibbles about what I'd hoped to see built into the vanilla game. Cognitive dissonance is definitely easier to recognize and handle if you're not a candle burnt at both ends.

Reply #33 from Elemental Forums Top

Quoting Frogboy, reply 18

Quoting cpl_rk, reply 17
Quoting KillzEmAllGod, reply 16how has city spam been delt with in real life?


 

It hasn't, there's like 6 billion people on the earth.
Yea but a lot of them are getting negative productivity penalties because of a lack of food resources.
End of Frogboy's quote

 

Thats actually really funny.

 

And true.

Quoting Frogboy, reply 21
Nick - non-global mana was the achille's heel of this.

...

People nitpick this or that about Elemental but IMO, that one issue ruined for me the whole game design.  If there is a mistake of mistakes, it is that particular compromise.

 
End of Frogboy's quote

 

Well, I think really there was a more general loss of perspective on the project, which you have mentioned. I think Elemental would be in about the same boat it is now, even with the GMP. I don't think the other problems and issues people have mentioned are nitpicks, I think they represent serious design flaws. But thats ok - I know you guys are on top of it, and I'm thrilled to see where you are going with 1.1 and beyond. Between Stardock's continued work on the community, I think Elemental will be really amazing in the end.

Reply #34 from Elemental Forums Top

Quoting Frogboy, reply 15
There is nothing wrong with "city spam" per se. The problem with it is that right now, in 1.09, city spam is the most effective tactic for the game.

City spam is caused by:

1. It costs basically nothing to found a city.

2. It is the most effective way to gain access to resources quickly.

3. It allows you to out train your oppponent.

These are the 3 issues IMO that have to be addressed in v1.1.
End of Frogboy's quote

 

This is one of the many reasons I love you.  You are dead on.  

4. Each city can basically add +1 arcane and tech research per turn in addtion to materials and up till recently gold/gildar.