Author Topic: CRP2  (Read 24040 times)

I want to get people's inputs on what features they want to see and how they like the new features mentioned in the topic. Not all of the mod is going to be completely private, I'm working on a chunk based saving system that saves bricks as they are edited rather than as a whole which will get a public release.

Our input is it's all loving awesome and we want it.

Assuming everything listed here works as intended, with all the bugs ironed out, there's not a whole lot more for us to add. The whole City RP type thing has been around for years and years now. At this point we scientifically know everything right and wrong with it, and this addresses pretty much everything we've come to know over that long period of time. I worry slightly about the job system. If you restrict people less, they're going to be more aggressive when it comes to RDM and exploiting things. Though between you and the individual server hosts, I'm sure it won't be too bad.

I can give you a few suggestions too, that I don't think would be too difficult considering the advancements made thus far.

  • Check cards
    A mid-late game item you get which allows you to interact with buy bricks without needing to carry money. Balance? A surcharge for its use, or a spending limit, or simply a really high investment required to get it.
  • Farming
    Mining, wood gathering, and fishing have served to give people a non-violent way to earn money without waiting for ticks. Farming could be a player-made equivalent. When the player owns land, they can buy farmable bricks such as potatoes, carrots, fruit trees/bushes, etc. Then, with a gathering tool, you hit said brick and they disappear for a host-set amount of time, awarding the player with a resource in the same vein as ore, which can then be sold to the city. By extension, with a fleshed out economy system, this would promote more people to become farmers so there's plenty of food to sell in the city.
  • Special Police
    This is something I'm actually tinkering with in model form. Since criminals always end up having rockets, sniper rifles, machine guns, and sometimes even weaponized vehicles, I think it would be good to give police a bit of a booster to combat them. A riot shield would be the most obvious idea, since it's used for defending instead of killing. Other ideas would be a more balanced taser (Charge time, slow projectile) that doesn't tumble the player, or anything that would give the police more jailing power, without exactly giving them more killing power. Right now, being the badass terrorist always seems to be the endgame goal for people. However with badass police, it might be discouraged.
  • Some form of XP system
    One of the servers I play in currently has a pretty neat little experience system. Whenever you do contextually specific things within your profession, you get an amount of XP. After a certain amount, you get a level. Duh, right? Each level increases your efficiency in that job. So, more likely to get stuff when mining/fishing/etc. So a similar, more subtle and balanced system would be good to give players more incentive to, again, not RDM constantly.
However, even with all this stuff in mind... It's a waste if you make it private. Releasing a brick saving system isn't any consolation for the fact that you're not releasing the part people actually care about. Why won't CRP2 itself be released publicly? What is the reasoning? It has the potential to be one of the best mods to date, but no one will be able to take advantage because no one can have it. Then, the people you did distribute it to eventually either quit blockland, or stop hosting the mod, or SOMETHING, and then it dies, because the rest of the playerbase isn't allowed to have it.

Our input is it's all loving awesome and we want it.

Assuming everything listed here works as intended, with all the bugs ironed out, there's not a whole lot more for us to add. The whole City RP type thing has been around for years and years now. At this point we scientifically know everything right and wrong with it, and this addresses pretty much everything we've come to know over that long period of time. I worry slightly about the job system. If you restrict people less, they're going to be more aggressive when it comes to RDM and exploiting things. Though between you and the individual server hosts, I'm sure it won't be too bad.

I can give you a few suggestions too, that I don't think would be too difficult considering the advancements made thus far.

  • Check cards
    A mid-late game item you get which allows you to interact with buy bricks without needing to carry money. Balance? A surcharge for its use, or a spending limit, or simply a really high investment required to get it.
  • Farming
    Mining, wood gathering, and fishing have served to give people a non-violent way to earn money without waiting for ticks. Farming could be a player-made equivalent. When the player owns land, they can buy farmable bricks such as potatoes, carrots, fruit trees/bushes, etc. Then, with a gathering tool, you hit said brick and they disappear for a host-set amount of time, awarding the player with a resource in the same vein as ore, which can then be sold to the city. By extension, with a fleshed out economy system, this would promote more people to become farmers so there's plenty of food to sell in the city.
  • Special Police
    This is something I'm actually tinkering with in model form. Since criminals always end up having rockets, sniper rifles, machine guns, and sometimes even weaponized vehicles, I think it would be good to give police a bit of a booster to combat them. A riot shield would be the most obvious idea, since it's used for defending instead of killing. Other ideas would be a more balanced taser (Charge time, slow projectile) that doesn't tumble the player, or anything that would give the police more jailing power, without exactly giving them more killing power. Right now, being the badass terrorist always seems to be the endgame goal for people. However with badass police, it might be discouraged.
  • Some form of XP system
    One of the servers I play in currently has a pretty neat little experience system. Whenever you do contextually specific things within your profession, you get an amount of XP. After a certain amount, you get a level. Duh, right? Each level increases your efficiency in that job. So, more likely to get stuff when mining/fishing/etc. So a similar, more subtle and balanced system would be good to give players more incentive to, again, not RDM constantly.
However, even with all this stuff in mind... It's a waste if you make it private. Releasing a brick saving system isn't any consolation for the fact that you're not releasing the part people actually care about. Why won't CRP2 itself be released publicly? What is the reasoning? It has the potential to be one of the best mods to date, but no one will be able to take advantage because no one can have it. Then, the people you did distribute it to eventually either quit blockland, or stop hosting the mod, or SOMETHING, and then it dies, because the rest of the playerbase isn't allowed to have it.
Because it will end up in the same boat as everything else; it'll saturate the server list with a bunch of different servers of the same thing. I rather see a mode like this hosted by a competent administration like Yorktown's rather than random other hosts who host the stuff RPG's they do now, the adminstration is a big factor to the success of these servers.

Because it will end up in the same boat as everything else; it'll saturate the server list with a bunch of different servers of the same thing. I rather see a mode like this hosted by a competent administration like Yorktown's rather than random other hosts who host the stuff RPG's they do now, the adminstration is a big factor to the success of these servers.

Until the designated people stop hosting.

Our input is it's all loving awesome and we want it.

Assuming everything listed here works as intended, with all the bugs ironed out, there's not a whole lot more for us to add. The whole City RP type thing has been around for years and years now. At this point we scientifically know everything right and wrong with it, and this addresses pretty much everything we've come to know over that long period of time. I worry slightly about the job system. If you restrict people less, they're going to be more aggressive when it comes to RDM and exploiting things. Though between you and the individual server hosts, I'm sure it won't be too bad.
I'm confident that no single perk or combination of perks is too overpowered for a single job. We'll have to see what monstrosities of jobs people create when the beta comes around though.
  • Check cards
    A mid-late game item you get which allows you to interact with buy bricks without needing to carry money. Balance? A surcharge for its use, or a spending limit, or simply a really high investment required to get it.
This won't be added until I implement player-owned banks, which may be this revision or the next one. We'll see. I also feel it would take a bit too much income away from criminals.
  • Farming
    Mining, wood gathering, and fishing have served to give people a non-violent way to earn money without waiting for ticks. Farming could be a player-made equivalent. When the player owns land, they can buy farmable bricks such as potatoes, carrots, fruit trees/bushes, etc. Then, with a gathering tool, you hit said brick and they disappear for a host-set amount of time, awarding the player with a resource in the same vein as ore, which can then be sold to the city. By extension, with a fleshed out economy system, this would promote more people to become farmers so there's plenty of food to sell in the city.
Farming is pretty much going to need to be a new addition in this one as food was spawned out of nowhere on previous servers. Players will place cropland in agricultural lots and be able to plant seeds for different crops and harvest them to be processed and sold as food.
  • Special Police
    This is something I'm actually tinkering with in model form. Since criminals always end up having rockets, sniper rifles, machine guns, and sometimes even weaponized vehicles, I think it would be good to give police a bit of a booster to combat them. A riot shield would be the most obvious idea, since it's used for defending instead of killing. Other ideas would be a more balanced taser (Charge time, slow projectile) that doesn't tumble the player, or anything that would give the police more jailing power, without exactly giving them more killing power. Right now, being the badass terrorist always seems to be the endgame goal for people. However with badass police, it might be discouraged.
  • Some form of XP system
    One of the servers I play in currently has a pretty neat little experience system. Whenever you do contextually specific things within your profession, you get an amount of XP. After a certain amount, you get a level. Duh, right? Each level increases your efficiency in that job. So, more likely to get stuff when mining/fishing/etc. So a similar, more subtle and balanced system would be good to give players more incentive to, again, not RDM constantly.
Both of these suggestions are already handled by the job and perk system. Players get experience by doing their job which allows them to rank up and get more perk slots. These perk slots can be filled to give the player better tools to allow them to do their job such as a chainsaw as a lumberjack or a riot shield as a policeman.
However, even with all this stuff in mind... It's a waste if you make it private. Releasing a brick saving system isn't any consolation for the fact that you're not releasing the part people actually care about. Why won't CRP2 itself be released publicly? What is the reasoning? It has the potential to be one of the best mods to date, but no one will be able to take advantage because no one can have it. Then, the people you did distribute it to eventually either quit blockland, or stop hosting the mod, or SOMETHING, and then it dies, because the rest of the playerbase isn't allowed to have it.
Releasing this mod is not going to put an end to the hundreds of stuffyRP's I've seen come and go over the years, it will only make the problem worse. Too many people think the mod that the server is running is directly equivalent to the quality of the server; it's not. Any CityRP has the ability to have a decent mod but still be complete and utter garbage. The only reason that servers that run this mod are so well received is because of all the effort that the hosts and the administration put into it which is what those hundreds of stuffyRP's lacked. It takes good administration, a good city, good players, and lastly, a good mod to make a good CityRP. It takes dedication to host a server running this mod and not just a bunch of scripts and shapes packaged into a .zip file. If anybody thinks they're a good enough host to run this mod, go ahead, PM me, and I will tell you exactly why you aren't.

Until the designated people stop hosting.
Still better than it being spread thoughout the serverlist by stuff hosts. If anything it ruins the reputation of the mod, it doesn't make it special or fun when it is hosted by someone good, people just go "oh this mod again" just as they do with Iban's.

If anybody thinks they're a good enough host to run this mod, go ahead, PM me, and I will tell you exactly why you aren't.

This is my point though. Who IS good enough? How do you know? Have you individually taken measure of each and every of the nearly 200 thousand people in Blockland to be able to judge that? Sure if you release it, there will be a bunch of servers with it that aren't very good... But so what? Those same people are going to host stuffty servers regardless. And when everyone tells them they're stuffty, or when no one joins, they'll close back down again, because people who don't understand how to properly operate a server aren't going to even be capable of keeping alive for very long, let alone pay for dedicated server space.

Meanwhile, you're making yet another version of a mod that already has "Hundreds" of stuffty versions floating around. Why are those old stuffty versions floating around? Because people who DO have the dedication to run such a complex server, have to settle for them, because they don't happen to be buddy-buddy with the people making each of them. Because there is no standardized release, the cycle that has gone on for, what, getting close to a decade now? Is never gonna end.

Oh, you're making another CityRP? Cool! Oh, you've made a bunch of improvements? Wowzer! Oh, you're not releasing it publicly because you don't want people stealing your work to edit and call their own? Or you don't think anyone outside of your clique is worthy of it? Ok then, no reason for us peons to care anymore. Guess I'll just wait another 8 months for someone else to do this same thing all over again and see if they release it.

I mean seriously, it's your mod, your hard work, and I respect that, but, how many damn times has this happened? You're repeating history with this. Once your people stop hosting the server, you or someone else is gonna come out with another "BRAND NEW" version of the City RP, only give it to their friends, and then they will stop hosting, and it will die all the same, over and over and over again. You're fueling a vicious cycle that is never going to end.

Just a real quick update on the progress:

Yorktown95 is on board for hosting the next CityRP server. I'll buy a VPS sometime in the next couple months so the admin team can begin construction on a city.

I found a modeler willing to model a custom weapons pack for the server. I'll be doing all of the coding of the weapons as to not put too much work on the modeler.

The company system is fully implemented and manufacturing is partially finished. I won't be working on interfaces for the client until all of the server-sided coding is completed though.

With the economy system it was originally going to be fully player controlled but I realized there needs to be some sort of government body. When the server opens there will be an election taking place for mayor. The mayor will have the ability to set taxes on certain types of incomes and purchases, set welfare and benefits, and set the maximum and minimum values for companies. All of this is to benefit the players and prevent one company from having a monopoly across the city and prevent abusive companies from surfacing.

One question I would like to ask you guys is what other abilities do you think the mayor should have?

This is my point though. Who IS good enough? How do you know? Have you individually taken measure of each and every of the nearly 200 thousand people in Blockland to be able to judge that? Sure if you release it, there will be a bunch of servers with it that aren't very good... But so what? Those same people are going to host stuffty servers regardless. And when everyone tells them they're stuffty, or when no one joins, they'll close back down again, because people who don't understand how to properly operate a server aren't going to even be capable of keeping alive for very long, let alone pay for dedicated server space.

Meanwhile, you're making yet another version of a mod that already has "Hundreds" of stuffty versions floating around. Why are those old stuffty versions floating around? Because people who DO have the dedication to run such a complex server, have to settle for them, because they don't happen to be buddy-buddy with the people making each of them. Because there is no standardized release, the cycle that has gone on for, what, getting close to a decade now? Is never gonna end.

Oh, you're making another CityRP? Cool! Oh, you've made a bunch of improvements? Wowzer! Oh, you're not releasing it publicly because you don't want people stealing your work to edit and call their own? Or you don't think anyone outside of your clique is worthy of it? Ok then, no reason for us peons to care anymore. Guess I'll just wait another 8 months for someone else to do this same thing all over again and see if they release it.

I mean seriously, it's your mod, your hard work, and I respect that, but, how many damn times has this happened? You're repeating history with this. Once your people stop hosting the server, you or someone else is gonna come out with another "BRAND NEW" version of the City RP, only give it to their friends, and then they will stop hosting, and it will die all the same, over and over and over again. You're fueling a vicious cycle that is never going to end.
If it ever gets to the point where I can't work on the mod anymore whether it be me getting a job, going to college, or being on my death bed I will have no problem releasing it.
A majority of the community already hates this gamemode and I think the community would get more use out of a chunk-based autosaver than an unfinished mod 99% of them have no use for or are incompetent of running.

See, now that you've said you won't release it, people have kinda lost interest. Not to continue my ranting, but, people aren't concerned with it if only a couple set servers are going to have it. And I urge you to consider that, even if you don't change your mind.

As for the Mayor thing, I honestly think it's a bad idea. /Ty's edit has a mayor system and it frankly sucks. Someone is made mayor, because SOMEONE has to be, and then they don't do the job well. Then, when they leave the server, the server simply goes without, unless enough people pay enough money to impeach them. In that, it's kind of a vicious cycle. I think it would be better to have the taxes either dynamic to the economy, or supply and demand of city resources, or just simply host controlled. Having a player elected as mayor just means you'll never consistently have a competent mayor available when you play.



Now, I would like to impose another idea on you. A criminal idea. As you likely know, in /Ty's economy system, certain actions can increase or decrease the overall "health" of the economy, which then influences the paychecks people get. The point of the mayor, is they get paid a whole lot, but they are expected to donate that back into the economy to keep it strong, and if they don't, they are subject to impeachment. Though ignoring the mayor factor... An economy system like that could bring us a few more possibilities for criminal players.

So, you didn't like my earlier check card idea because it would take away from the criminal jobs, but... Picture this. Banks, require a custom modeled and fairly large vault brick. It could be a big square, with a vault door modeled on the side, allowing that lot to store the money. Players could make these vaults for their own backs like you already want to have, but... could also serve to function for the criminals. So, you have the vault. It serves to give an aesthetically pleasing aspect to your banks, and makes players who build their own vaults need to be more considerate of their designs. And if need be, you could have different vault sizes, with respective levels of use. Perhaps capacity, or tax/interest rates, or whatever else.

Now, you have your criminals who want dat money. So, you give them an item. A drill, specifically. Then, the criminals could walk into the bank, and using similar code to mining, and fishing, the drill would collect a resource "Stolen money" from the vault brick. After enough stolen money units are collected, they turn into a money bag item, which would then be worn on your bank. Each player could only have 1 money bag at a time. Now, the stolen money units collected could be directly stolen from the economy percentage, meaning someone robbing a bank successfully is BAD for the law abiding people, and the economy itself.

Now, with the money bag item, you also have 2 more function bricks, like the ATM and similar bricks which you stand on to activate. 1 of them is a Safehouse brick, and the other is an Evidence brick. Each being very restricted in their placement. If you have a money bag, and you make it to your safehouse brick, that stolen money is then added to the players money or bank account or whatever, and they have successfully robbed the place and gotten away with it. Now, if a policeman kills or jails a criminal and takes his money bag, he can take it to an evidence brick, they return that money in full to the economy, and are rewarded a smaller amount themselves. The amounts given to the player from these 2 bricks would be up to the host, to balance things for the effort required.

So already you have incentive on all sides. Criminals target banks, cops protect them, and players who build banks have to take security into heavy consideration. If criminals are allowed to rob banks, the economy goes down and law abiding citizens suffer. If criminals succeed, obviously they become rich. Players who build their own banks have a larger responsibility to make their banks less vulnerable, and maybe even have players guard their vaults for them. After all, there IS incentive for it.

Now, to add to the idea, how do the cops know a bank is being robbed? You could make a simply system for that. Vault bricks would need a name added to them, and they could be named based on the bank's title, or the location. For example, "Main Street Bank". Now, when a criminal drills the vault, that could then send a client message out to all of the cops on the server saying that Main Street Bank is being robbed. Then the cops would respond accordingly.

Now, all of that in place, just picture it. A small group of people get together, organize, buy a vehicle with lots of seats, and rush in. Some people drill while some stand guard watching for police. When the people drilling get their bags, they trade places. Now you've got 4 people who have taken a large chunk from the economy, and all of the police show up from all sides of the map to try and stop them. The criminals then have to get to their getaway vehicle, killing any police in the way, and drive back to their base to count their loot. Or, alternate outcome, the cops are organized enough that they meet the criminals quickly enough, with enough force, to take the criminals down, and return the money to the economy, making them the heroes of the day. I think, that would be pretty badass.
« Last Edit: February 04, 2015, 09:33:22 AM by TheShadowCross »

Please make this have a fancy GUI. GUI's make everything so much easier.



Hows the arrest system so far? Is it more than "tap a guy with a baton and teleport him to prison"?

Hows the arrest system so far? Is it more than "tap a guy with a baton and teleport him to prison"?
This has been expanded upon in previous posts if I'm not mistaken. In order to arrest a criminal you will have to stun them using a blunt weapon (like say a baton or riot shield), disarm them, and handcuffing them.
Progress?
Unfortunately development has been slow as of late. I recently got a job which is putting a damper on my free time to work on the mod and currently only have time to develop on the weekends, which is already pretty minimal. It's really unfortunate because I really want to be able to start hosting next month but that chances of that happening are pretty slim.

Do you have a date when you think you'll be done? I cant wait, I remember awesome memories in your city rpgs :D

Do you have a date when you think you'll be done? I cant wait, I remember awesome memories in your city rpgs :D
My goal was for this spring but now I'm aiming for later spring or early to mid summer. Right now there just aren't enough hours in the week to get much done.