This thread is primarily about a small but (to me) rather substantial piece of information from Tiy's most recent post: "Perhaps you prefer to be a builder, charging npcs rent based on the quality of the homes they inhabit." About what Tiy stated: Ok, to a lot of people, that maybe doesn't sound too exciting, but to me that sounds incredible. As for each of the things that were brought up in the recent post (i.e, Farming, Pillaging, Tomb-raiding & Adventuring), I hope they're all as equally elaborate as one another. Tiy has stated that there will be more ways to gain pixels than killing monsters, and each of these options will be fleshed out enough to allow for that to be a player's main way of gaining currency. Yes. Yes. Yes. Anyway...Back to what this thread should be about. As mentioned, it was the thought of being a builder that caught my attention, ergo, I figured it'd be worth passing on my thoughts about this subject. If anyone has any ideas they think should be considered, obviously it's a free thread to say what you want. A discussion would be great. First off: "Based on the quality of homes they inhabit", now, I'm not sure about what's intended, but how about to add more depth to building rooms and the like, you have to meet certain parameters to accommodate different species, i.e, humans like warmth, while glitches appear to have an appreciation for oppulence, regality and a sense of hierarchy (judging by their natural civilizations). - Going with this idea, it means that the more comfortable for each species a room is, the more they'll pay. Though who's to say these features shouldn't be interchangeable, perhaps a human would love a golden chalice as much as a glitch. On top of this, how about adding other factors into the mix. These should probably be interchangeable and not racially specific. This could include things such as: Size of the room. Big or small - Small may imply that the individual in the room prefers cosy spaces, big may imply that they prefer freedom and an expansive environment (though these features may be too specific and unnecessary). Perhaps the larger rooms should be more expensive, as is the case in pretty much every hotel ever. Special items or item requests - Someone staying in your hotel/tavern/inn for a long time? Perhaps you should make things more comfortable for them. What if, amongst other things, interacting with them revealed their desires for the place they're staying in. Maybe an Apex would like a fish-tank to make their stay more comfortable. Finding a fish-tank and placing it in their room, for example, would increase the payment you receive from them. Not only does this expand upon the hotel-aspect of the game, but it means that it gives you a temporary objective. I personally spend most of my time in Starbound looking for furniture...Yeah...I like my interiors, so what? Heat of the room - Presumably, more expansive heat-detection is coming. I'm also hoping for better ways to heat up large areas myself (radiators, vents and piping, please?). Different guests may like different levels of heating. This may be hard to implement due to the fact that most people creating hotels will have each room connected, therefore, rooms will be connected and no room could get severely cold if the rest are hot. Maybe have heat as a general, minor requirement...Perhaps I'm over-thinking the heat aspect...In fact... Heat of the room - The warmer the room = the more comfortable the guest is = the more they pay = the longer they stay = the richer you are. Race-specific "Likes" and "Dislikes" - This would be a cool thing to elaborate on. Although you would be hunting for furniture for each guest, perhaps separate from that could be things that a race in particular doesn't like. Maybe Florans dislike an abundance of fire-sources, whilst Avians would much prefer larger spaces. Different factors like this could influence where you build your hotel. If larger rooms cost more, perhaps Avians will pay the difference, meaning you could hunt out an Avian planet to increase the chance of having that race being your majority guest. Which brings me to... Race probability depending on the planet - Not sure how this would work, maybe you know? I'll try and wing it, I'll also be wording this in a very natural way: So, say there's a cold planet and you want to set up a hotel, well, if some races prefer the cold to others, maybe there'll be more of a chance to see that race IN that hotel ON that planet (this could extend to the natural world generation as is). A cold planet could mean less humans, apex and avians, but more hylotli (Hylotls, Hylotlies?) and glitches. Maybe a planet that's more susceptible to rain could have more Floran. Or a planet closer to the sun could have more Floran...An ocean planet may have more Hylotl. Do you see where I'm going with this? You do? Great. Basically, I think when the quality of the house is in question, there absolutely shouldn't be a top and final quality shared amongst all guests and races. That's much too simple. I feel you should have to work at making each individual guest happy; developing a beautiful and varied hotel without each room being exactly the same. Besides, we're all different, we all like different things. If the differences between us as humans are so vast, imagine how expansive it would be between species? Who's to say that everyone would like the exact same thing, they wouldn't! I've had this thread open for the entire day thinking of what to add here. I think as it stands, this is enough content to think about...I'll probably be editing it if I think about more things.
i had posted something like this but i didnt make it specific and have a rent like charges what i posted on was give an area a more village like feel when you make a bunch of "spawn (npc type)" be it a villager, cook, guard, merchant, etc give them specific rooms. etc but wnough about what i posted. what you posted is a great idea especially the race specific decor. like give an apex some big ape decorations. and maybe have rent based on the value of the decorations in the room like how in a future update merchants inventories would be based on the value of the objects around it. overall good post. its a shame that these suggestions get very little attention from developers or any of the staff.
I guess town-management and hotel-management are two different things. You'd desire to have a village in which you can designate and create specific homes for specific types of people? As you said, villagers, cooks, etc.. So a cook's house would require a fridge or oven, for example. Maybe have a weapon rack or two as a requirement for a guard's building? Good idea, but that may be outside the realms of tavern-keeping (rather, village-keeping), assuming that's what you meant. Also, yeah, race-specific décor would be good. I guess generally depending on the race, they'll like different things. But to add variation, I think it's best if it isn't too restrictive or specific. Crossovers would be good. Hmm...That is a shame, perhaps I'll just keep responding to every comment that someone posts in the hope to get this thread noticed!
I'm a big fan of this idea. I agree with the idea of making rooms and houses both rent based as well. To me, one of the most fun aspects of Terraria and Dwarf Fortress is setting up customized, themed rooms and I'd love to see that and be rewarded for it in Starbound. I shall become a Kobold Slumlord.
I love this idea! To add to this idea: the ability to hire (or spawn) an innkeeper to look after the inn for you. That way, you could be on your way to your own CHAIN of themed hotels and resorts! You could even charge for included amentities, like its own shopping district (kinda like West Edmonton Mall IRL), pools, theme parks, restaurants, etc. Regarding the race-specific decor, I like the idea (though it's probably not a good idea to include stuff like MiniKnog posters or sacrifice tables, as that is the type of environment that friendly NPC's have tried to escape). I think that certain types of decor could be preferred by a specific race, but other races may not mind (or may not care); each piece of furniture and decor is assigned a 'race preference factor' that affects the price/willingness to stay. The factors could work something like this: 2 for 'I like this!', 1 for 'Kinda cool', 0 for 'Meh', -1 for 'Do not want!' (or any arbitrary scale that works) For example, maybe you have one of those avian-style bookcases. For Avians, the factor could be 2, for most other races, the factor could be 1, and for Glitch, maybe it's a 0. Or let's say you have one of those head-on-a-spike decorations you see in Floran villages. For Floran, it would be 2, but I'm guessing other races would have a factor of -1.
BIG NEWS!!!!!! i was reading a blog from the developers and npc rent is going to be created!!!!! along with farming and livestock while being able to sell produce. chucklefish your awesome!
Sounds like an interesting rating system, I think even more simple than this would be items races generally like, and only like. Nothing they dislike or hate, but simply just like. The other items would be neutral to them. Also, although charging for amenities would add a further interesting dynamic to the game, I think it would also complicate things quite a bit. How would the game's engine figure out if you have, for example, a shop? It'd have to locate that shop and constantly check to see that it still exists. As to hiring an NPC to take care of your hotel, that'd be excellent.
I figure some sort of 'shop exists' variable might be tied to the stall object that already exists in-game, or it might be tied to the shopkeeper NPC. This is under the assumption that the game was coded in some object-oriented language, so I'm not sure if it actually works like that, but if such a mechanism already exists, that might make a 'mall' easier to implement. And even if you can't take a cut of the profits, it might at least attract visitors to the inn. (edited for clarity)
