Player Driven Town Development

Dargarath

Dargarath

Member
What if a placeable, similar to the one used in Willem's TownHomes, was developed that was called a Town Charter. These charters would lay a plot 51x51 large, convert the static trees within the plot to clearble using the Lumber Overhaul, and placed a small crossroad and market stand at the center. The owner of the charter could then sell plots to other players, purchase add-ons where applicable (Bank, Docks, Guard Shack [initiates guard protection] and bridges to span waterways, roads, parks, statues) The charter owner can collect taxes from players to purchase add-ons. If the charter owner becomes defunct, (deletes account, fails to refresh town in 1 week) ownership falls to the first owner of a plot within the town (and so on and so forth). If a town has NO inhabitants, the buildings turn abandoned and within a week, fade from existence. A player may only purchase plots from the charter owner to own homes, or can choose to purchase a farmstead, similar to the town charter but creates a farm of some resource, to be chosen at deed usage, to produce. This way, a world can be developed along the needs of the players and with the economy driving the settlement. This would be good with a new map and colonial style development.
 
Could also incorporate aspects of the Player Government System from RunUO (I think Tru was the last to update it).
 
I thought this idea up as I was running around a shard I'm on and I noticed the towns were fairly sparse looking while the outskirts were JAMMED with houses (typical UO). It kind of killed the whole aesthetic. I got to thinking about incorporating the housing into the towns and I realized that there wasn't enough towns, and the spaces available in them were poorly utilized. I went searching for scripts to see about it and came up with those ideas for modification. One of the biggest lost opportunities in UO I felt, was the disconnected housing system. Your neighbors have very little to do with you, and the random, competitive housing placement race always left me feeling isolated. I figured something like this could completely alter the feel of the game while still retaining the elements we love most.
I'm terrible at programming, Visual Basic is my typical medium and my level is intermediate beginner at best. I plan to take a look at the scripts and see what I can do, but I thought if someone else working on it as well, it might (if interest was there) produce quicker results. I think the best map to use this on would be complete wilderness, minus a small starting city.

I checked out the link, but because RunUO has stopped validating accounts, I can't access any of the files.
 
Ultima live and lumber thing were discarted and not available to public anymore due to the termination of the terms of agreements of Praxiiz, the author of those systems, so either someone with an unaltered system can provide you the files, or you can think differently.

I would love to assist you in such thing, but i suck about complex systems, more when it touches addons.
I will probably have to make a file read/write system in .txts so i can adjust stuffs in realtime.

Yew moongate... A popular player city. xD
 
That sucks, it sounded like a good system. I wonder if anyone is familiar enough with the code to reproduce a workable copy without violating any intellectual property. I'd love to get the files but I don't want an angry author forcing me to shut down my shard because of infringment. So if anyone is following this and can make a work around PLEASE contact me. Otherwise, I might be trying to write the code entirely by myself which can only be compared to a mouse trying to bump uglies with a giraffe. :) In theory it seems simple; an exceedingly large piece of property that can be added to and parceled by the owner, and trees that can be cut down. In reality, it is going to be bleary eyes, frustration and a spike in the stock price of Monster Beverage Corporation. If only I had re-discovered UO a year ago!
 
UltimaLive can still be downloaded from the Archive. It is now maintained by gametec. It still works and is available. The license for UltimaLive is GPL and cannot be revoked. It's open source. Feel free to download it and continue development of it.
 
Fantastic, and by the way Praxiiz, just from what I've seen of the shard emulator community, we all owe you a great debt of gratitude for your hard work and dedication. Thank you, very much. I'll get on it and see what I can do to contribute.
 
Ain't that the truth! :cool: We originally created an entire map that was to be modeled by players. Players would have to chop down trees and landscape the terrain. Then build their towns/cities. BTW, thats how the real world works for the most part too. People build near other people. Every once in a while you have people who want to be way out in the 'boondocks' ;) Sorry, one more edit....don't forget the LumberHarvest and Tunneling Systems which will help you incorporate the environment that you are planning.
 
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Yes, I have made incredible headway just here recently. I went from ZERO knowledge of shard development to having a fully custom, multi-map world, linked together seamlessly by teleporter. I am still trying to figure out how to get the lumber and tunneling to work, but a little bit at a time. I just finally mastered using dragon, which, in conjunction with Ultima Live and UO Architect has led to some very interesting development ideas on my part. World building is pretty easy on this type of shard, I mostly have only one city to build and the players will take care of the rest. I just need to make the map interesting to explore and develop. How did you tackle allowing players to sculpt terrain? Did you alter Ultima Live in some way to make terrain edits using a shovel or other tool?

Edit: Also, anyone have any ideas on player built bridges?
 
I have idas for bridges:
place 4 wooden poles, static 2143, then double click a stack of rope (obtained in krakens), click the first post, then the second, then walkable ropes (fire dungeon) appears linked to those 2, and then you place the wooden tiles on the ropes or something like that.
For long bridges, there could be some boats in the water placing stone pillars, then placing rope to wooden post on a pillar, and same process, then adding borders manually.

this is how i see it :p
 
Po0ka said:
I have idas for bridges:
place 4 wooden poles, static 2143, then double click a stack of rope (obtained in krakens), click the first post, then the second, then walkable ropes (fire dungeon) appears linked to those 2, and then you place the wooden tiles on the ropes or something like that.
For long bridges, there could be some boats in the water placing stone pillars, then placing rope to wooden post on a pillar, and same process, then adding borders manually.

this is how i see it :p
Click to expand...

I like that idea, it makes it more difficult than just clicking a button and placing, plus it sets up the framework for variably sized bridges. I want this shard to be about players working together to build an economy and carve out a civilization together from the wilderness, against the framework of hardships, material shortages and the ever present murderers that are in any society. I want players to feel ownership; "You see that bridge? "I" helped build it." or "This used to be all forest, now its one of the largest and richest neighborhoods in the city, and I cut a large chunk of the timber down to do it." I feel that if the path to property ownership is less focused on the accumulation of gold, and more on the logistics of getting one built, people will feel more pride in their neighborhood. Initially, the city will have plots with yards and some premade homes that can be purchased, I need to develop a core city that can support expansion, but a player coming in a year after launch, can rent a house, store up his resources and set out to either start his own town, or become a "hill person" :) What ever they desire, and the ability will remain there regardless of how many people have accumulated more gold than they can do anything with. Plus, city taxes will be a way to drain gold from the banks, and I'm toying with the idea of a realistic hunger and thirst model, (ties in with wilderness survival and controlling expansion) but I don't want this to be a needlessly challenging ordeal, I think people should be rewarded for hard work.

EDIT: Anybody know a good place to find a working download link for Knive's Townhouses? I think that system would work better.
 
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What about carpentry to create a "lockable" door, that when you craft it you get a key? This way it is more like: get guards in the city to protect ownership of the houses, etc, so if someone get in your house without permission, he can be attacked, stuffs like that.

The "i ban thee" and "remove thyself" are not really realist in the first place, so a custom house system would be better than knive's townhouse system in my opinion.
 
Po0ka said:
What about carpentry to create a "lockable" door, that when you craft it you get a key? This way it is more like: get guards in the city to protect ownership of the houses, etc, so if someone get in your house without permission, he can be attacked, stuffs like that.

The "i ban thee" and "remove thyself" are not really realist in the first place, so a custom house system would be better than knive's townhouse system in my opinion.
Click to expand...

I agree, but the component I wanted from Knives Townhouses was the ability to parcel out land. I'm mediocre as a scripter, if anyone knows of another script that allows you to parcel out land for sale let me know, I can see about adapting it.
 
You could create a house sign itemid item, which would store the big boss of the house (the one that rents the house to someone else), then the actual owner if it was sold, the price of the house, an identification (ex: all houses that are in X town will start with X####, and Y town Y####) to be able to access houses with a sort of "town governement", a boolean if for sale.

The payment time, so when you need to pay you know how much time until ejection, ex: "you have 14 days to pay your house rent (600$), press this button to pay with a bank check or later to pay another time."
Then a list of boundaries for the house in a List<Type> so you can make L shaped house terrains and such.
The max number of lockdowns and storages.
The friends of the house, co-owners (can pay the house rent), and foes (those will turn gray instantly when in your house)

Then comes the lockdown/secure/release/move/raise/etc, you could create a new sort of interior decorator with all those features, so it comes with the house (or just by using the sign's gump)

It may look very big, but i think it worths it to be unique.
If you need help i could help a little.
 
Alright, I'll see about giving it a go. I'll make a cursory build, work through the errors and then let you take a look at it to see if I can make improvements. It might be a little while though, :) Like a blind man running down an alley.....
 
Just had a quick idea for a system, animal breeding would be quite cool :p
Get goats, use herding to get them all, then make them reproduce.
The natural way would be much more like:
New types of spawner that look for it's own type of animal in it's action radius.
Must be 2 individutes in the area, if so, spawn one, then wait 1 hour, spawn another if space allows, just to avoid overpopulation.
(Ex: remote island spammed of eagles or something xD)

If players choose to kill them all, i suggest to not make it extinct (minecraft failed on that if i remember correctly), waiting 24 hours before reintroduction of 1 animal of the extinct kind, then another 24 hour for second, then it starts back at 1 hour speed.

Such ystem would lead to stables, and bull farming for leather, food for hunger, etc...
 
Po0ka said:
Just had a quick idea for a system, animal breeding would be quite cool :p
Get goats, use herding to get them all, then make them reproduce.
The natural way would be much more like:
New types of spawner that look for it's own type of animal in it's action radius.
Must be 2 individutes in the area, if so, spawn one, then wait 1 hour, spawn another if space allows, just to avoid overpopulation.
(Ex: remote island spammed of eagles or something xD)

If players choose to kill them all, i suggest to not make it extinct (minecraft failed on that if i remember correctly), waiting 24 hours before reintroduction of 1 animal of the extinct kind, then another 24 hour for second, then it starts back at 1 hour speed.

Such ystem would lead to stables, and bull farming for leather, food for hunger, etc...
Click to expand...

I know when Richard Garriott was planning UO, the development team came up with a completely interdependent ecosystem, predators hunted prey, prey required forage, and what happened was the players decimated the ecosystem. :) So they changed it to the current format. I think they could have revamped it to where the player activity was included into the ecosystem from the ground up. Population levels can be controlled by the amount of players logged in and the popularity of kills and introduced to the player through a semi-random encounter system. It would give the impression of a realistic system without actually representing reality, where overhunting leads to extinction.
 
The idea I was talking about was just a concept. I was working with the creator of UL but certain situations arose which made it impossible to continue with that line of development.

You were talking about renting housing. Here is an idea. Have player built houses that can be bought/sold. You can have myriad offshoots of a construction industry. Crafters who will supply stone, timber, ceramics, slate, bricks,marble,etc., for the construction process. You can even have Lawyers(LOL) to draw up contracts for rental or purchase agreements. You could also have miners who could dig foundations or basements for the properties. The degree of detail in your environment is virtually limitless; yet very time consuming. Anyway, good luck with whatever path you choose to take! :)
 
Sorthious said:
The idea I was talking about was just a concept. I was working with the creator of UL but certain situations arose which made it impossible to continue with that line of development.

You were talking about renting housing. Here is an idea. Have player built houses that can be bought/sold. You can have myriad offshoots of a construction industry. Crafters who will supply stone, timber, ceramics, slate, bricks,marble,etc., for the construction process. You can even have Lawyers(LOL) to draw up contracts for rental or purchase agreements. You could also have miners who could dig foundations or basements for the properties. The degree of detail in your environment is virtually limitless; yet very time consuming. Anyway, good luck with whatever path you choose to take! :)
Click to expand...

Thank you for the well wishes. I did have a series of prebuilt homes in the main city that would be for sale. Bigger and better than you could place with the HP Tool and kind of a reward for early settlers. :) They would be available as well as player placed houses. My goal was to really give the feel of settling a wild land, I'm trying to balance the organics of player driven development with the aesthetics of a frontier land. I have my work cut out for me. I love the idea of the world being built with gathered resources, it creates a NEED for a logging industry, stone and metal mining. Combined with a realistic item decay system, the continual need for resources can help to eliminate stagnant industries (e.g. Tailoring, Carpentry and Cooking) I'm also not a big fan of teleportation in the form of scrolls, runes and moongates. My maps are going to be zonal maps, tied together with an edge-of-map teleporter to the corresponding location on a different map. This means seamless and LARGE landscape to travel through, without magical movement. This will drive the need to expand to different towns. It will also mean that a large chunk of the UO community will probably turn up their nose at the shard. :) But whomsoever is left will probably be the players I'm looking for. Another side effect of this is that the Camping skill suddenly becomes important, and the first person to setup a town on a fairly lucrative trading route could become wealthy beyond imagining. It will be the land of opportunity.
 
Me personally, I wouldnt eliminate the ability to use Recall, Sacred Journey etc. What you could do, however, is make the system more resource intensive and time comsuming. If you have it set up so that it takes like 2-5mins to teleport to the desired location and is an expensive means of transport then it would get used less often. I agree with the elimination of static Moongates/Teleporters. Also, you could make it so runes can only be used by the person who created it. Another neat thing would be to make the recall accuracy dependent upon the players skill in magery. So, if the lower their Magery or INT the more likely they will be thrown off course. You would need to find a way to make sure they aren't dropped onto tiles where they can't move or become stuck.

With the Camping skill you could make it so a player needs to camp a certain spot for a specific amout of time before they can settle the area. You could also allot parcels of land based on Camping skill. The better the skill the more likely a player will get a bigger plot.
 
Sorthious said:
Me personally, I wouldnt eliminate the ability to use Recall, Sacred Journey etc. What you could do, however, is make the system more resource intensive and time comsuming. If you have it set up so that it takes like 2-5mins to teleport to the desired location and is an expensive means of transport then it would get used less often. I agree with the elimination of static Moongates/Teleporters. Also, you could make it so runes can only be used by the person who created it. Another neat thing would be to make the recall accuracy dependent upon the players skill in magery. So, if the lower their Magery or INT the more likely they will be thrown off course. You would need to find a way to make sure they aren't dropped onto tiles where they can't move or become stuck.

With the Camping skill you could make it so a player needs to camp a certain spot for a specific amout of time before they can settle the area. You could also allot parcels of land based on Camping skill. The better the skill the more likely a player will get a bigger plot.
Click to expand...

Thats a good idea. Maybe instead of camping, you could have a timer on the town placeable that expires if nothing is built within a certain time.
 
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