[MUD-Dev2] [DESIGN] Crafting Systems: Supply-Driven vs.Demand-Driven

[Dave Scheffer]

----- Original Message -----
From: "Shannon Sullivan" <sdshannons at gmail.com>
To: <mud-dev2 at lists.mud-dev.com>
Sent: Tuesday, April 17, 2007 8:11 AM
Subject: [MUD-Dev2] [DESIGN] Crafting Systems: Supply-Driven 
vs.Demand-Driven

> I would like to get feedback on some recent thoughts I've had
> aboutcrafting systems.
>
> So this is what I've been thinking.  But I'm just a dreamer whereasyou
> all are experienced MMO creators so I am hoping to gets somefeedback on
> the benefits and pitfalls of such a system.  Do you seeany ways it could
> be twisted out of proportion?  Do you see anyinherent flaws in it?

If the gameworld is something like WoW the great majority of players will 
hate it. :-)

I ran several shops throughout my time in UO and my biggest "enemy" if you 
will were the very vocal majority of players who just wanted to buy their 
stuff and get into battle.  I definitely didn't fault them of course (well, 
a little!) but it is the prime consideration when designing such an 
approach.  The non-crafters considered us as parasites imposed on them by 
the devs who found themselves caught between conflicting design goals and 
customer demographics.  The OSI devs tried a great number of things to 
balance the demands and I think they succeeded in the end.

Still though the UO market was not liquid enough (no centralized points of 
commerce).  In SWG Online there are centralized points of commerce and a 
more fluid economy among crafters.  When I played (the first year) I don't 
think the demand side was actually a game mechanic but rather simply 
informal player/crafter/guild relationships.

What you outline was very recently implemented in EvE Online.  They have a 
contract system by which I can specify exactly what I want, in what 
quantity/price, and I think even where the item should be delivered.  The 
EvE gameworld makes this mechanism very appropriate: it's setting is highly 
futuristic galactic space where travel time and warfare pace the economy. 
The actual implementation is still being hardened but it's very cool and 
workable.  In this gameworld items are drained out of the economy at an 
amazing rate - I point this out because drainage is something not done well 
in most gameworlds (as you observe in your backdrop).

I think the gameworld is your determining factor, though if this approach is 
designed into a tiered supply chain among the crafters it would be very 
workable for almost any setting where basically the newbie crafter is making 
components that feed the next tier of crafter who in turn feeds the next 
tier up etc until we get finished goods.  If done correctly it might even 
minimize the advantage large guilds have over the solo crafter.  But not as 
a primary mechanism by which non-crafters get their essential daily items.

SWG started off with a similar supply chain philosophy but I believe they 
ran into "fun issues" and instead focused more on vertical skill sets (which 
also had "fun issues").  I'll leave it to Raph to clarify and correct. ;-)

Shannon if you enjoy crafting you may want to try out EvE Online.  They do 
some interesting things where resource gathering and crafting are very 
integral to both the strategic and logistical aspects of this very deep and 
feature-rich game.  They also have one of the most mature player bases in 
which I've ever gamed.

Dave Scheffer