Planet MULE RTS hybrid

[mountainwampus]

I love the RTS version of MULE but most people agree, its not nearly as fun as good ol Planet MULE. But why not merge the two concepts? Have everyone playing simultaneously, grabbing land grant flags, outfitting MULEs, placing bids on realtime land auctions, assays can be private. Then, when the time runs out it goes to auction and everything else could be identical to classic MULE. The only thing that would be lost is seeing other peoples assays, but I think this is annoying anyway.

[mikman]

I agree with you MW, the game would probably be more fun if the auction portion was the same or similar to the original. keep the RTS for the planting flags and assays and stuff...

[piete]

I agree with MW except that land auction should be like _original_ meaning also slower increase in price.

To give the needed advantage to lower ranked players in land grant and development, the starts could be staggered by one second or so to guarantee at least one mule for them, and in case of few mules (<8 ) the development start interval could be the time it takes to develop one plot (to give the last player at least a chance to grab 2+ mules).

This would still change the original game but not that much, in my opinion. And the increase and game speed would compensate the slight deviation from the original.

Last edit: Removed the sunglasses

[mountainwampus]

Piete,
land auctions, I feel like it's not so much the price increases too fast, but the timer goes way to slow!!! Sometimes it takes 5 minutes to jack the price on three land auctions in a row, and it's such an obvious tactic, it has to be done, and it's a giant waste of time. I think ALL the timers for all auctions need to go twice as fast. Jacking the price of land to $5000, then backing out should not be possible. If there was only enough time to race as high as $1500-$3000, more land would sell and "land auction sabotage" would not occur.
Also, i like the staggered start idea, that would work perfect.
AND why not make ranks adjust in real-time?
There is nothing worse than being in 1st, losing a plot of land, pirates, pest, etc, then staying in 1st throughout that month, thus getting denied food and energy at auctions.
Realtime adjustments of rank would really liven things up and make the month less predictable and more exciting.

[piete]

MW,
I liked the idea of real-time adjustment in ranking but maybe that would deviate too much from the original. But I still would like to test it.

Now the game is still a bit unbalanced since the majority of really bad events go only to 1st player (like pest and radiation) whereas in the original also the 2nd player got them and quite frequently actually. Now a single turn can take all chances of victory from one player, especially when experimented players are playing (last time I played with Rhodan this happened to him, well, considering the number of games he is playing it mustn't have bothered him for too long... )

When we get the random events to the original's (_perfect_ ) balance I think this problem becomes less serious.

[Rhodan]

If a land auction would end after the first plot is not sold it would be a big help to the game.
I am not sure we should adjust the land auction so someone cant drive the price so high.
Land is still getting sold. All the plots are being taken by round 8 or 9.
It was a legit strategy in the original game you just couldnt go as high.
IF you adjust the land auction are you going to adjust the speed of food and energy also?
You couldnt get 500 or 1000 for a food or energy in the orginal but I see no one complaining about that.