City Management Feedback Thread
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The city/residential area system is completely new for this latest Alpha test, and maybe it would be easier on Prometheus if we tried to gather all the feedback in one thread instead of each individually posting a new thread. Anyway, I'm a vice governor so I'd like to make a couple points first and hopefully others like @Alexian @Shivashanti @Ostaff @Dreamcraftwd @Rife @Jahlon @Kralith @Xzait will also chime in.
My main issues with the system so far is:
- Residents are counted towards rank up, but citizens don't seem to matter at all. # of citizens should count towards prestige or something, instead of being a dead number. Cities should want to gather more citizens as well as residents.
- Residents don't risk anything at all if the city is sieged. Only the citizens who have plots within the city walls would be risking their homes. Meanwhile the residents get to enjoy all the benefits of the city's research without having to care about anything when siege comes. The extra bonus of being able to craft at city crafting stations doesn't outweigh the work of being a citizen. If a city has set permissions to both citizens and residents, then the citizens don't get any extra bonus at all and meanwhile have all the work of having to care about city upkeep and defense.
- The city squares are TOO small! xD
- Prestige is currently "broken"
- We need a little bit more control over residential areas/being able to log residents.
- Having some type of citizen & residents communication board or chat would be ideal.
- The tech tree- is it intended to only begin getting 1 research point instead of 2 at the village level? Of course this will lead to cities specializing in certain things, but then having the market locked behind research as well discourages cities from wanting to spend those precious points on it.
- Some type of symbol indicator (like the militia symbol status or the young player status) to tell resident accounts apart from random players. I say accounts because often we don't even know the outside residents at all and then can end up attacking them or their alts.
Okay I'm done for now someone else add their feedback =P
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Aye... Cities are way too small. Is it even possible to build enough buildings within the city boundaries in order to get the highest Rank????
Tech Tree is a joke. Sorry. it is. With the way it is currently implemented NO ONE will want to make a Shrine (except maybe Evil cities), a Bank (Except maybe evil cities), A Market, a herbarlist or Farming cause ALL of their tech points have to go into the must haves! Defense, Armor, Weapons and Enchanting. I personally believe the tech tree should deal with things that are not mandatory to have and instead greatly increase the value of the city. It has been to my understanding that Syndesia is all about their "tech", this is what distinguishes them from the other planets. So we need "tech" that other planets literally just can not have. It has been stated by Michele (Suit) said that armor and weapons across planets will be comparable. Therefore, these should NOT be hidden behind a tech tree unless it allows the making of :"Armor" and "weapons" that are BETTER than what is capable of being made on other planets.
Also, Residents SHOULD NEVER HAVE CRAFTING STATIONS INSIDE OF THEIR PLOTS! This totally defeats the city permissions as I have stated several times before and will keep stating until the devs wise up. Also.. processing stations are worthless within a city due to current permissions and no-logging.
A city chat would totally be helpful to contact all citizens and residents at one time (even if they are not currently in the local area)
A resident log to know who is who and the ability to kick residents out is definitely needed.
Prestige wise.. buildings that take Research Points on to make should give a lot more prestige. And the more points you have to spend on being able to make that building should largely increase that's building's prestige as well.
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For first i just link my both Suggestions here, since they are direct related to the City Management. More i will write next days.
[QoL] Better Management of Town Citizen - mainly about the need of an extended Citizen list and the visibility for Governors of Account related to the Characternames
[PVP QoL] Visible Relation of Residents+Citizen to own town - about visibility of citizen/residents for own city to see ingame who is related to your own town
More points will be:
- Size of a city: way too small for getting enough prestige for rank 13-15
- Permission System: adding a rank for new citizen, to be able to restrict new people till they showed, they are trustful (especially Reason of Smelter, Advanced Smelter, Tanning Tubs and Chests)
- Walls should give Prestige. What else than a big and strong Wall shows more the glory of a town?
- Reworking of Prestige in general, Storage Piles gives more Prestige on same space than a Town House or a personal plot with a nice big house. It would even give more prestige to build up 4 cheap stockpiles (=400) than a prison (=300) on the same townspace.
- Communication: Towns need a channel for communication, either a chat (local but private) and/or a blackboard.
- Wasted space: In town there is a need of so many streets, since all buildings need to snap at the street, it waste so much space. Also between buildings is way too much space or a rest of space left, because it doesn't fit exactly. Also we would have a need to know which size Buildings will take, means to show the blueprint, even we can't build them in reason of the Research. Nothing is more frustrating, if you figure out at a high rank, that the left over space for the building you planned isn't big enough.
- Marketplace & Bank shouldn't be locked behind a research, since it is a key element for each town. I would more change the actual Research for it to:
- "Player Market" - adds the ability for player to sell their own stuff
- "Guild Bank" - adds a bank accessible for all guild member.
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@Ostaff said in City Management Feedback Thread:
Cities are way too small. Is it even possible to build enough buildings within the city boundaries in order to get the highest Rank????
Nope, maybe if we sort a bit different, we can get the 13. rank, but i doubt it. rank 14 and 15 is technically impossible.
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On Cities and Residences:
Yes, Cities themselves need to be bigger. In fact, you can limit the number of City Buildings by City Rank if you like, as long as a reasonable number of starting buildings are available. Citizens should count towards the City's Rank
Residences should still pay their money for upkeep where 1/2 goes into the related city's coffers, and Residences should count at least partially towards Ranking up the related City as well. Want your City to Rank up faster, do your best to draw in happy Residents who will help support its growth.
Residents should still be divorced from City control. The City should not be able to evict Residents (they game will if they don't make their upkeep). Residents should be able to make Processing Stations, and Storage, but should be limited to no more than 1 Crafting/Finishing Station per plot. This way, Residents can compete as crafters without being dependent on cities, but they must pick which craft they will specialize in, and of course, there is still the matter of having room for the crafting station set aside on their plot to do so.
Cities can lock out non-citizens from using their Processing and Storage facilities (except the Bank) but must make crafting stations available to everyone. As only in Cities can you have multiple Crafting/finishing stations, this is one of their main appeals.
Cities should be No-PvP areas, except for someone flagged a Criminal in that city. Resident areas should also be considered safe except for those flagged as Criminals. Borders should be clearly marked as to where the 'Wilderness' begins.
As I'm not a Governor, I can't comment directly on the Tech Tree angle of things, but I will say, basic services like the Inn, the Bank, and the Jail should not require any research points at all. It also takes little to no research to create Storage or a Marketplace, so those should either be free or minimally priced/attached to other upgrades. The global Gold Wallet should either be gotten rid of, or again, made a more expensive research. Other possible researches include Guild Halls, a Postal Service for intra-game messaging and things of that nature.
The Starter towns should only allow Tier 1 construction. Higher tier gathered materials can still be used, but they result in Tier 1 final products because of the lower quality of the construction.
Also, construction quality should have a tangible difference in Abilities on items. An Excellent Quality Weapon should get a bonus to Durability and Accuracy, possibly Damage, that shows on the tooltip for the weapon. A Poor quality weapon or armor should have less than full durability to start with.
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We also need the ability to "REMOVE BUILDINGS" !!!!!
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@Ostaff said in City Management Feedback Thread:
We also need the ability to "REMOVE BUILDINGS" !!!!!
We governors can remove each building and unclaimed personal plots.
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So the Governor can remove a building that has already been built? I know we can remove blueprints before they are finished, but not the completed structure. Of course I am just a Vice-Governor, but as long as Governors can remove completed buildings, then we are good
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@Ostaff @Kralith
Limited choices builds diversification and reliance on others to fill gaps which builds cooperation or at least quality interaction.
If this game had all the cities claimed then each city would try to compete for citizens/residents and tout their different tech choices. "we have a market, live here and you can trade your farmed mats for gold" sort of thing.
A single city was never meant to be self sustaining and should not be. build trade alliances, encourage diverse city neighbors. I focus on metal tech, you focus on leather and wood, or what not.
Only allowing governors to place farm plots within the city greatly effects the usable city area. I would like to see us able to place them outside the city at the cost of having to trek the harvest further to bag.
I agree that the city size should allow for enough space where if you only build prestige buildings and roads you can reach max rank. As a sacrifice you have to rely on other neighbors for resource storage and farming which otherwise would take up city space and not give prestige required to rank up.
I do not know if this is possible or not as I do not have those permissions.**For the alpha at least I would like to see cities able to re-spec their tech tree to allow for experimentation. To avoid abuse make buildings that are no longer unlocked simply not accessible (same with their crafting stations) and make a long cooling off period between re-specs.
If you give governors the ability to kick out residents then it needs to carry a heavy cost (like 10k gold -spit balling-) as that house takes a lot of time and effort to build, stock, supply.
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@OlivePit said in City Management Feedback Thread:
Limited choices builds diversification
Yes that is clear.
We surely wasn't meant to be self sustained.
Also, there are so many other techs that aren't implemented, so a basic town market (not player market) from start would not screw the system. You simply can't unlock all stuff, even if you would get highest rank and you want to have "all nice stuff".We also wasn't thinking about dropping the market, but other needs of our townies came first.
You literally don't need the first days a market, because you simply can't sell anything, either you need the stuff still for yourself or you simply can't use it the first days. And player don't have spared money the first days.Now we are locked by prestige, market was supposed to be the next, but well, we can't reach the next at the moment. So no market for us.
My suggestion would also not screw the market, just change their tech.
Town market means, just heavy materials selled by (vice-)governors as it was in previous tests. The Player stands you unlock with the market tech then. Would make much sense and would not work against the idea of Research.
Simply like other stations, basic stations aren't locked behind research, but you can upgrade them with a research.
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@OlivePit said in City Management Feedback Thread:
If you give governors the ability to kick out residents then it needs to carry a heavy cost (like 10k gold -spit balling-) as that house takes a lot of time and effort to build, stock, supply.
Thats a very bad idea.
For first, a player in residental area don't lose its house, just because he got kicked out from Citizen list.
And simply a big NO for paying these people for being kicked out, because kicking them out has a good reason. I per example kicked out 3 thieves. Why i should pay them for stealing Ingots and stuff from chest?Also, if i remember right, it is planned to give towns politics, like election and votings.
So i think it maybe will give some possibility not to leave the decision for a kick out alone at the Governor.
But for now, we are in an authoritarian system. As an Dictator ( small insider
) i will kick out whenever and whoever i want. 
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He said "resident" not "citizien".
Kicking a citizien is obviously fine. He doesn't lose anything.
If you kick a resident, he loses the house so you should be paying him quite the money.
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@spoletta said in City Management Feedback Thread:
He said "resident" not "citizien".
Yeah, okay, but we can't kick out residents.
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As far as I understood, they were talking about the possibility to do that.
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@spoletta wouldn't make any sense, since this one just can take next residental plot, since residental plots are free for all.
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Yeah, but now he has 10k gold!
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Just a bit of feedback from someone who was jumping in to get a feel of things, but not overly participate:
1)
I jumped in a few days after alpha release and decided to run around the player cities and find a city where I could make a home and work the local market providing resources for cheap amounts of gold (I like to engage in economy). To my surprise, at the time, I couldn't find ANY cities that had even bothered to make a market. Likely due to it being far less imperative to a starting city than other buildings. However the problem with this, was that as someone who was intending to play the alpha casually (hardcore PVP server at release, for the active economy), I found myself somewhat lacking in ways to engage with the economy, because for whatever reason.......nobody prioritised making a market.I suppose this problem will be less apparent as time progresses on the server, but I do think cities should be encouraged to build a market earlier in the tech tree.
2)
Another observation while running around player housing: Many houses seem to stack building loads and loads of processing facilities. While I get the practicality of this, it looks stupid to see a line of houses and then say....12 smelting stations all in the same area. I honestly believe that such crafting and produce stations should be within the city grounds only - it also makes people gather and interact, which is good for the game.Hope this feedback helps!
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@Kazzier The reason why nobody has placed a marketplace yet is because it requires research points which are precious and take some effort to get. For example when it's a choice between unlocking crafting at higher tier mats or advance smelting or a marketplace, most would not choose the marketplace.
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Again, solid feedback all around. Cities are the crown jewel of Fractured, so it's imperative we get this right.
Cities are much too small. This was my fear before the Alpha began. I appreciate the sentiment behind transforming the cities into regional capitals, but whether or not that aspect is preserved, the city's walled maximum area needs to be greatly expanded. It was reduced from 256x256m2 to 160x160m2. That's... a significant reduction.
To me, current cities too closely resemble Albion Online cities in that they're just glorified crafting stations that the local residents use when necessary and then immediately dip. In previous tests, cities were intended to be crafting hubs, processing hubs, trading hubs, political hubs, and even residential and social hubs. But now, cities feel entirely too cramped and too useless.
I also think player houses carry entirely too much utility; as others have noted, players can just cram a smelter into every empty square inch on their property; it's preposterous that mere player houses can rival or exceed the crafting utility of cities, which is impractical and unrealistic.
Additionally, Governors are too disempowered when it comes to residents outside the city. The notion that rival guilds/enemy guilds/hostiles can just set up shop right outside the city in the residential plots and that city's Governor is helpless to do anything about it is absurd. Even the proffered compromise, that Governors can have those residents killed in between their houses and the city, is insufficient. Theoretically, zerg guilds could leverage their vast numbers to camp around a potential siegeable target and that Governor would be extremely hard-pressed to do anything meaningful about it.
QOL improvements I support include a city wide chat, city-wide noticeboard for "permanent" announcements, and a city registrar that lists city residents to the Governor.
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Feels like the way the whole citizens/residents thing is set up is backwards, especially for a city governor that would like to have more control.
A certain number of residents is required to rank up, but citizen numbers mean nothing. However, city personal plots tax rate can be controlled and set to 0, while residential plots cost 2k and 1k gold for weekly upkeep. If the resident number is the one that is important to ranking up, a guild governor would want to set up free city plots for non-guild residents so that we don't have to worry about them keeping up with the tax, not logging on anymore, etc, and assigning outside residential plot areas to guild members who we know WILL pay the taxes... just to keep the resident # for rank up. It seems backwards.
On top of that, if the city gets sieged and loses then only the plots within the city can be lost, while residential area plots won't be affected... so why wouldn't a guild governor just do that, set their active guildies up as residents outside, and then give free plots inside the city to non guild "residents" who are unreliable for taxes/defense, since those inside plots are actually less worth due to the risks? I mean if you think about it possibly the city being a "safe spot" is also a bonus, but that doesn't really count for enough of an incentive.
Possibly we might even want to switch it around and have a setting for "Residents only" for crafting permissions inside the city, meaning people who actually have claimed land plots within the city and the city territory have more "permissions" than only those who signed up as citizen and aren't "putting in their part". I do understand that the system is meant for being able to help out solo players have some viability but now it seems like weighing the importance of citizens vs residents needs a ton of tweaking.
