exhaustion of crystite deposits

[Karawane]

Due to the fact that Crystite is usually the key element for winning M.U.L.E. I have been thinking about an idea to make it harder to maintain a high crystite production throughout the game: the exhaustion of deposits. The idea is that for any two (or three?) rounds of Crystite production a plot loses a point of its expected Crystite output.

In my opinion, this would carefully shift the game balance in a direction favoring those palyers not following a make-or-break Crystite strategy. Players still going for Crystite would have to plan their mining, and focus more on the capitalisation on the economy of scale and learning curve effects.

Probably nothing for beginners but an easily implementable advanced feature. What do you think?

[Intergalactic Mole]

I think it's an interesting idea but it may not necessarily make any difference in balance of the game.  In fact, it may hurt it.  I mean, Crystite isn't always the end all.  Some people can somehow make their way to the top with other commodities.  And so to be fair I think it would have to apply to all commodities, but then what would be the point.

[Karawane]

Hm, is it really so balanced? My perception is that very few games are won by somebody not betting on Crystite. If you are right, the idea would of course be bad for the game. But am I the only one to perceive this subliminal imbalance

[Intergalactic Mole]

Crystite is a gamble and doesn't always win the game.  Pirates could wipe you out or the price could wind up being very low in the last round in comparison to other commodities (depending on supply & demand at the time).  But I don't personally agree that the original game is unbalanced.

[Karawane]

Am I really that mistaken about Crystite being the preferred bet for winning the game? I would like another opinion on that.

[piete]

I have participated ONE game where a player who didn't touch smithore (and produced crystite from the beginning) won. So crystite ONLY does not guarantee a victory. But a clever crystite player may buy or produce just enough smithore to keep the price from going up selling strategically to the store when smithore-hoarders are short of cash. On the other hand, smithore-only strategy seems to be even more difficult with the new version and possible in practice only with well-timed fires in store (=luck).

Summa summarum, a balanced strategy wins in a balanced game

[Intergalactic Mole]

Am I really that mistaken about Crystite being the preferred bet for winning the game? I would like another opinion on that.

I didn't say that it wasn't the preferred bet. I said it doesn't always win the game, and it doesn't make the game unbalanced.

[Big Head Zach]

Summa summarum, a balanced strategy wins in a balanced game

Doing some quick math here:

Food:
Over the course of the game, players need 192 Food. As a group, they start with 16.
If all players claim a river valley plot at the beginning and equip a Food MULE on it, they will produce an average of 192 Food, so if everyone plays it safe and develops their own Food, there will be plenty.

But how often do you see this happen? Inevitably, there's at least one Pest Attack, Fire in Store, Energy shortage which leaves a Food plot unpowered, a random variation which causes a player to underproduce, or most commonly, someone chooses to buy from the market rather than make their own so they can more vigorously pursue another good (Smithore, usually).

Energy:
If we assume players as a group get 4 Plots per round, and we also assume (wrongly) that they're all non-Energy plots, then the total Energy demand over the course of the game would be:

4 + 8 + 12 + 16 + 20 + 24 + 32 + 36 + 40 + 44 + 44 = 280.

However, this value could be overestimated because players usually try to equip their own Energy MULEs at some point, even temporarily. They also may run into situations where plots are left undeveloped due to MULE/Smithore costs.

However, this value could be underestimated because there's lots of opportunities for players to acquire land more rapidly than one per round.

Energy Sunspots and Fire in Store can directly affect the supply of Energy, as well as players' choices to pursue the two consistently high-value resources (Crystite and Smithore).

Point being made here is...there's lots of uncertainty in the Food / Energy markets, which players can easily exploit if they're smart about it and can keep an eye on supply/demand levels. Both of those resources are free to spike and plummet (they don't have the D/S ratio caps that Smithore does) in extreme cases.

The best players are the ones who can project a turn or two ahead, keep a neuron or two on knowing what the remaining global events are and how many times they are "in the deck", and so they are able to quickly convert their MULEs to whatever will be needed on any given turn.

Smithore gets you to the top of the rankings (it is more valuable than Food/Energy on the whole, global events notwithstanding), Crystite keeps you there (riskier than Smithore but twice as valuable on average), and Food/Energy can make the difference if you can read the signs the game is giving you.

[Karawane]

Thank you, Big Head Zach. That has helped. I have come to realize that I have played MULE for too long in an endogenous community of not-so-gifted-MULE-players. As we all get our butts kicked in Planet MULE, yours was the input I needed Please, disregard my idea from above.