Map should show recommended starting gold

[Observer1]

Another random idea (I'm sorry if I've been annoying people with my posts. It's truly not my intention, and I apologize ahead of time.)

Maybe maps should show a "Recommended starting gold" figure for each map. It would just be nice to know that I should go back and replay a previous scenario before even starting a map where my gold level was simply too low. I think giving people a heads up on how they're progressing relative to a "norm" would be important.

I think this design element -- persistent gold -- can create a snowball effect in campaigns. If you do well early, the rest of the campaign is actually easier. If you do so-so, the game gets even harder over time. In effect, the game is like a regressive tax system. Big wins make future maps easier, which makes future payoffs even higher. Marginal wins make future maps more difficult, resulting in less money in future rounds.

Is this making any sense? This effect also happens in commercial games like Homeworld 1 & 2 (which was extremely easy if you got off to a good start, very hard if you didn't), and even arguably games like Counter-strike (teams that win initial rounds, get better equipment than the team that lost).

I'm not sure what the best way to counter that (or if other people feel like it's a problem). My gut feeling is that one way, the map could automatically donate you an automatic minimum starting gold figure -- just enough gold to win (under very tough circumstances). Otherwise, the scenario designer should at least give a guideline for what they think is a rough recommendation for gold.

Thanks

[turin]

Well, it kind of does this already. It gives you 100 gold if you start the scenario with less than that.

However, it would be nice if that number could be set by the scenario designer. Right now, it seems that if the amount of gold is set, it always goes to that, not only if the amount the player has is lower than it.

[scott]

This is a good point. The mechanism currently exists (possibly) and there is a good reason to use it, but campaign designers just need to start using it. Hmm...

There is an issue: The min gold is meaningful in relation to number of leveled up units. Should the min gold be relative to no recalls? Probably not, and I'm not keen on giving out free L2/L3 units if you don't have any. Therefore you would have to undercut the amount and assume the player has sufficient high level units. Another option is to determine a min # of units needed to win the scenario and multiply by 20. It's not perfect but at least you can fix one of the two variables.

You know what would be really useful? If someone wanted to playtest a campaign and make recommendations for min gold.

[HaJo]

Maybe maps should show a "Recommended starting gold" figure for each map.
persistent gold can create a snowball effect in campaigns.
If you do well early, the rest of the campaign is actually easier.

I know ASC (http://www.asc-hq.org), where all the maps/scenarios
are stand-alone (e.g. no carry-over of units or money), just to avoid
that kind of problems.

[HaJo]

You know what would be really useful?
If someone wanted to playtest a campaign and make recommendations for min gold.

Would it be possible to extract relevant statistics (gold at start+end, recruits, recalls)
about each scenario from the *replay-files ?

Than the players could post their experience/performance...

[ott]

Well, it kind of does this already. It gives you 100 gold if you start the scenario with less than that.

However, it would be nice if that number could be set by the scenario designer. Right now, it seems that if the amount of gold is set, it always goes to that, not only if the amount the player has is lower than it.

The way I read the code, the value of gold= in the [side] tag is used as a minimum. If there is no gold= attribute, then gold=100 is assumed. Do you have another interpretation?

[turin]

Well, it kind of does this already. It gives you 100 gold if you start the scenario with less than that.

However, it would be nice if that number could be set by the scenario designer. Right now, it seems that if the amount of gold is set, it always goes to that, not only if the amount the player has is lower than it.

The way I read the code, the value of gold= in the [side] tag is used as a minimum. If there is no gold= attribute, then gold=100 is assumed. Do you have another interpretation?

If you notice, that post was from May. What you describe is indeed the current behavior, but IIRC when I wrote what you quoted there was a bug that made it so if gold= was set, you would always start with that amount, not with that amount or higher.