Starbucks?  I think Juan Valdez Colombian coffee would be more appropriate.  After all, he has a MULE in his logo!

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Juan_Valdez

Also, being able to convert your energy plots makes food valuable the last few turns since there's really nothing much else to do once the map is full.

thats not good , in the original he would appear on any mountain regardless of if a plot was filled up....would be nice if we could fix that and maybe put an event where he takes money from the leader.  he has to get his money from somewhere to always have a treasure chest

I think the reason why the wampus doesn't appear if the plot is filled is due to the fact that you have to press a button to catch it (unlike the original, where you simply walked over the mountain but only while the wampus was visible).  If the wampus is on your plot, and you press the button, you might accidentally remove your MULE.

Same here.  Graphics are stuttering throughout the entire game on my machine (I'm using Windows XP).  It's not game shattering, although it is somewhat annoying.

All the units of food should get flooded to whoever owns the bottom plot.  Jackpot!

In version 1.1
it wasn't all that fun
Since smithore was king
the host with no ping
could buy out the store and be done
(and your chances of winning are none).

I agree.  In a lot of games, the host player with ping advantage (who happened to be in 1st place) was able to consistently buy out smithore from the store, even when the 2nd-4th place players appeared to reach the line at the same time.  Even if the smithore strategy is fixed, there are other cases where this poses a problem.  For example, multiple players with food or energy shortages rushing to buy the remaining units of food or energy from the store only to see the 1st place host snap everything up. 

Regarding simultaneous buying:  I agree that it reduces the host advantage when everybody buys each unit at the same time.  Also, if there are more buyers than units, then the lower ranked players get those units, i.e. if 4 players try to buy the last 2 units from another player or the store, then the 3nd and 4th place players buy 1 unit each while the 1st and 2nd place players are left in the dust.

Another suggestion would be "cutting in line."  This suggestion is not mutual with "simultaneous buying."  Lower place players could have the ability to "cut in line" while goods are being transferred.  This can happen at any time.  If there are 15 units in the store, a lower place player can decide to let the host get the first 5 units, then "cut" and get the last 10 units.

These suggestions do fundamentally alter the gameplay mechanics of the original, so they'd be good options to include in an alternate version.

Don't also forget that due to the limited size of the map, any land you possess is land that is not falling into the hands of an opposing player.  Not only should you factor in your own returns, but there's also the returns missed out by others.

Well, I don't think this would necessarily hold true. If there's a bottleneck then part of the chain might become disproportionately valuable; for instance, if there are sufficient mules for the colony, and sufficient parts for mules, but there are lots of parts plants sitting unsupplied, then the price of smithore may go up against the price of mules. And if there's a shortage of mules but a glut of smithore and parts with no plants to assemble them into usable mules, the price of smithore doesn't necessarily need to go up. But I'm not sure if this should be a factor in the store's pricing algorithm, or if that should be pegged to other parts of the production chain like you suggest, leaving it up to players to decide if one of the interim products is more valuable.

In the first example you mention (sufficient mules, sufficient parts for mules, price for smithore may go up against the price of mules), it may be worth it to amass smithore.  However, at the same time the game will be automatically converting your smithore to mule parts and/or mules.  I'm wondering if there'd be a way to not convert your smithore to mule parts or mules without having to change production.

Sorry, I wasn't quite clear here--I meant that at present the risks of cooperating exceed the benefits, where the only benefits are saving yourself food and energy plots. When you have food and energy and parts and mules to worry about, then relying on other players to fill some of those needs becomes more tempting.

My bad for misunderstanding.  Yes, I see what you mean. 

Personally I'd be more concerned about the reduction in the total value of crystite. Most of the colony's wealth comes from production in the last few turns where you can have lots of crystite plots churning out huge quantities due to production bonuses, where there's not really much change in the time-added value one way or the other; the profits you can skim off the random price on your earlier production are fairly small change in the long run. It is a valid concern, though. I'd expect to see all around lower scores with this change added.

I'd welcome lower scores.  I remember in the C64 version it felt like an accomplishment to hit the 100,000 colony score mark.  Now colonies can hit 150,000-200,000 with alarming regularity, which doesn't feel right.  I just don't want to see the lower scores come about as a result of people not making crystite. 

Someone did mention the possibility of a map expansion, and this might be a worthwhile addition; that would provide some room for extra mules, offset the overall impact of having to devote several plots to making mules, and increase the colony's total output. I wouldn't make any drastic changes, but maybe an 11x5 map would work better for this mode than 9x5? Maybe even just 10x5, if you don't mind being slightly off-center.

A larger map would mean more empty areas of land at the endgame, which isn't a bad thing necessarily. However,  I don't want more turns added to the game to compensate. 

It would also mean slightly more time to travel across the map, especially if you are building “mule parts” plots around the left and right edges to maximize BPV.  I can imagine what a pain that would be, especially if early food shortages (or radiated mules going crazy) mean you have a lot of those plots unoutfitted.  Again, this is not a bad thing.  It makes food even more valuable.  One thing I don't want is a longer timer as this is yet another thing that will increase the duration of the game.

Like this idea a lot.  Some comments:

Mules would be their own commodity with an auction phase just like any other good. The store would no longer produce mules from smithore on its own, but you could sell mules to the store during the auction phase and other players could buy mules from the store, etc. You'd no longer be able to buy or sell mules at the mule corral; instead, that's just where you pick up mules from your personal stockpile.

Obviously, there have to be some mules present at the start or else you'd never be able to produce anything. So each player would start with 2 mules in storage, and the store would have an additional 8 mules for sale, similar to the starting food/energy supplies. That gives the colony as a whole a starting supply of mules roughly equal to what it currently gets.

If desired, this concept could be extended even further by inserting an intermediate stage of production. Instead of assembling mules directly from smithore, perhaps the smithore would have to be refined or processed into machine parts first. There would thus be a sixth type of plot that would produce its own commodity, "parts." One advantage of this, aside from extending the production chain, would be that the "2 smithore = 1 mule" production rule could be split to work on 1:1 ratios: a refinery/machining/factory plot (not sure what the best name for it would be) would consume 1 smithore per 1 unit of parts produced, the mule assembly plot would consume 1 smithore + 1 machine part per 1 mule produced.

Would there then be six commodities during the auction phase (smithore, mule parts, mules, crystite, food, and energy)?  This would slightly lengthen an already long game.  However, I consider this problem very minor.    

Here's where I think your suggestion adds a strategic layer to the game you haven't yet mentioned: because smithore is used to produce mule parts, the price of a mule part should be more than the price of a unit of smithore.  From an economic perspective, there is labor-added value for a finished or intermediate product compared to a raw material.  From a gameplay perspective, it wouldn't make sense to waste one energy converting smithore to a mule part, and then finding you have to sell that mule part for less than if you just kept the smithore.  For the same reasons, a mule should be worth more than a mule part.

Given that a mule should be worth more than a mule part, and a mule part worth more than smithore, the prices of the three goods will either rise at the same time, or they will fall at the same time.  In other words, they'd be very closely correlated.  I am also assuming that the store price for these three goods will depend on the quantity the store holds (of all three goods), the number of mules in everyone's corrals, and the number of unused plots.  However, because of the correlation, one could theoretically flood the store with smithore to reduce prices on mule parts or mules.  Similarly, one could sell mules to reduce prices on smithore.

I think this adds all sorts of defensive strategies.  Suppose during the smithore phase, you see someone buying out the store.  The prices of goods are set before auction, so the prices of parts and mules due to the smithore shortage wouldn't go up until the next turn (otherwise, a savvy player would buy out smithore, then immediately sell his mules at a higher price the same turn).  A different player might then dump enough mules into the store to cause the price of smithore next turn to plummet below what the first player bought it for, and rendering the smithore buyer's strategy useless.  The first player could, of course, try to buy out mule parts and mules (in addition to the originally bought smithore).  I'm not exactly sure how much more difficult or easier that would be.

I'm not sure how the BPV for refinery plots should be calculated, though. Perhaps it could be the inverse of the BPV for the assembly plots, going higher as you get further from the town, on the rationale that smelting smithore is a messy process and your polluting refineries get smacked with environmental regulations hampering their production if they're too close to town.

This is interesting.  Would economies of scale still apply?  Currently, two plots side-by-side get an extra unit of production.  Plots on top of one another don't.  If BPV is calculated by distance from town, what would be better:  grabbing the left and right edges of the map (the highest BPV plots but with no adjacent plots) or building a line of adjacent plots (with decreasing BPV's as one approaches town)?  

Regardless, placing your plots along edges might be a nice way to screw with other players attempting to build contiguous line of plots.  I like it.  

And while there are some benefits to cooperating--being able to ditch those 3 required plots for 3 additional crystite plots adds up to a lot of extra crystite--the risks generally outweigh the benefits. Although during the late stages there's often some excess food/energy in the economy anyway, so you may be able to hoard up and shift everything to mining for the last few turns anyhow.

If you took this concept to its more extreme version with separate production plots for both mule parts and mules themselves, you'd have the same food/energy requirements, plus you'd need your own smithore plot (and it would have to be a good one if you wanted to make sure you got 1 mule per turn, let alone 2 for land auctions), a refinery plot, and an assembly plot.

When you say the risks of cooperating exceed the benefits, you're implying that an individual player should create his own smithore, refinery, and mule plots instead of specializing and then trading during the auction phase.

One problem I see is the potential for a production bottleneck.  You can't create a mule without a mule part, and you can't create a mule part without smithore.  Smithore is the limiting factor.  Therefore, if four players each create their own smithore, refinery, and mule plots, then the person who has the best smithore plot(s) will produce the most mules in the long run.  Example:  Player A has a 4 BPV smithore plot, a 2 BPV parts refinery, and a 2 BPV mule plot.  Player B has a 2 BPV smithore, a 4 BPV parts refinery, and a 4 BPV mule plot.  You could say that both players are in equal shape because they can each only create 2 mules.  However, player A will still have 2 smithore left over in raw materials.  Player B has nothing left over.  Over many turns, player A's smithore will build up.  A few turns later, he could easily convert his smithore plots to parts refineries and mule plants in order to process his stored smithore and then have many more mules.  Player B can't convert his parts refineries and mule plots to smithore and do the same.           

Also, at least one player will be producing food/energy early, but by the time they decide to create their own mules in later turns, the mountains will all be snatched up.  Thus, I think trading in mules during the auction phase will still prove very valuable.

Paradoxically, even though this scheme does not add any intrinsic value to food or energy, the net result is that food and energy do become more valuable, because other players are less able to afford to produce their own. The end product of the economy is still trying to produce crystite as a cash good, but since there are more steps in the production of crystite, the importance of each individual step to the whole process (and the colony's success as a whole) is increased.

One thing I'm worried about is that, by adding more steps to the process, people will be assaying and producing crystite later in the game.  Because crystite prices are randomly variable, it possesses a “time value.”  The earlier you hold crystite, the longer you can sit through the rounds where crystite prices are low.  Your crystite will grow each round, and then you can sell it all when the price is high (assuming you are not afraid of pirates).  Furthermore, it can often take several turns to convert all your plots from a certain good to crystite.  Performing this step earlier can result in a lot of added production.  Ultimately, I'm not so sure it's good to reduce the “time value” of crystite.

Long story short, I think you have a great idea.  Not sure if any of my points are valid, but let me know!

How about an alternate version of the game where the last place player gets kicked out every 4th round (and not replaced by an AI)?  Thus, at the start of the 5th round 3 players will remain, and then at the start of the 9th round 2 players remain. 

Any plots belonging to eliminated players will disappear or be auctioned off.  Any goods owned by these players will either disappear or be returned to the store. 

The booted players can remain as observers to the game if they wish.  Could lead to some interesting gameplay dynamics, especially if one of the booted players was a primary supplier of the colony's food or energy.

The definition of insurance is the payment of a small premium to guard against rare but potentially devastating losses.  And what could be more devastating than, say, the loss of a plot?

What if the town had an insurance store where, for a fee, you could be protected against a negative random event before your following turn?  This could possibly be expanded to include protection against post-production events such as pirates, pests, or mules going crazy (maybe have pre-development protection be "basic insurance" and pre-development/post-production protection be "comprehensive insurance"). 

There are plenty of other ways the game hurts the lead players (lose out on auctions, plot grabs, etc.).  Furthermore, there is a chance that the player will pay out more in insurance premiums than he will ever receive in benefits over the course of the game, which is fine because you are essentially buying peace of mind.

For the record, I don't want this idea added to the original game.  However, I am wondering if this could be incorporated for an alternative version, perhaps in a modified form.

What if there was a "sabotage store" in the city?  You could walk into that store, and for a fee, sabotage any plot on the map so it would not produce units the next turn (poison the water, damage solar collectors, etc.)?  You can do this to already developed plots or undeveloped plots (so that they will not produce once a mule is placed).  There are a couple of drawbacks, but I do have suggestions to get around them:

Drawback #1:  The other players can see you sabotaged their plot, and the sabotaged player can either leave that plot undeveloped or move his mule out.

Suggestion:  Once a player enters the "sabotage store", he becomes invisible to all other players.  Once he sabotages the chosen plot, he is given a short amount of time (~3 to 5 seconds) before he becomes visible again.  This way, you can "guess" what was sabotaged (what plots the saboteur is close to once you see him again) but not be completely sure until production occurs.

Drawback #2:  Hurts the overall colony score.

Suggestion:  Instead of killing off all production in that plot, what if the production in that plot was funneled to the saboteur?

Drawback #3:  For a small cost, you can cause a lot of damage via sabotage.

Suggestion:  What if there decent chance (say, 25-30%) that you'd be caught red handed?  This could be announced during the production phase.  The penalty would be a 20% "criminal tax" on every unit transaction (buying or selling) during the auction phase.  Furthermore, the recipient of the intendend sabotage could receive a "criminal catching compensation/reward" (either a fixed amount or the "criminal tax") from the colony.  This reward would compensate a player if the other 3 players all gang up to sabotage his plots.  An alternative to the full "criminal tax" (which could be a lot of money) all going to one person might be 10% going to the intended sabotagee and 5% going to the other 2 players.

Thoughts?

I was playing a 9-turn game and I noticed that the AI assayed undeveloped land for crystite on its 9th turn.  This is pointless as there would be no 10th-12th turns to lay down more plots.

Either the AI thinks that it is a 12-turn game regardless of how many turns the game was originally set for, or it assays undeveloped land no matter what turn it is.  Regardless, this should probably be changed.