Are the building missions fundamentally flawed?

All build missions have a time constraint on them, ok, no problem. This does however indicate to me that i have an element of control over the missions else why would there be a time constraint?

Normally you have 1 game month to complete these build missions be it for 2 or more structures. Generally most structures take around 11-15 days, not including the farm type complexes (i only see these type of missions on rare occasions) to complete, so there goes, in some instances, 50% of your build time. Not factored into this is the time taken to procure the materials or indeed deliver them to the desired location. Ok, so far so good, you check about, you have enough raw materials to carry out the build and can get them where they are needed in good time so accept the mission.

Then, like a house made of cards, it all falls down.

Due to the nature of the market operation, raw build materials are not yours, you may have produced them yourself and transported them to the needed location but after that they are just another number on the market.

Mission - Build 2 Blacksmith (wood 120 brick 240 total amounts).

Accept mission - Do nothing and see if the market will support without delivering materials - Mission Failed, and quite rightly so.
Accept mission - Deliver 120 wood and 240 brick. One success out of 6 attempts.
Accept mission - Flood the market. Here i tried with double and triple amounts, only failed once with the double amounts and 100% success with triple.

This building problem is only compounded the more rank you attain as the number of structures needed for the mission rises but the time alloted remains the same. In most instaces flooding the market with the needed materials is the only way to guarantee success, and personally i dont accept missions to fail them. To that end it makes required materials to build a given structure a joke. If i have to flood the market with the materials then the time constraint on the build is pointless as i know that it will start building straight away.

Is it just me, ordoes it just not make sense?

two arguments, why you could fail with deliver the exact amount of material:

- there are another buildings in process, which also needs material to start
- wood and bricks are also needed be the citizens. could happen, that the market take good for the needs and then there are not enough for the buildings...

Lebe jeden Tag, als wäre es Dein Letzter! / Live each day as it would be your last!

This is a mission set by the town administrator, buildings he deems that the town needs to progress, why would he not ensure that the materials you have provided are not used for his priority project? Other buildings and citizen needs would surely take 2nd place to his mission. If they dont take 2nd place then why is there a time limit to the build?

Actually, I appreciate the fact that those missions aren't too easy, so you have to plan ahead and actually work to make it happen in time. Whenever I'm offered such a mission, in circumstainces where I know I couldn't get the materials in time, I simply don't take the mission. Although when it's late enough in the game, I usually have a massive enough production of both wood and adobe bricks, so I simply order the stewards in cities producing them to keep massive stocks of those materials in the warehouses. This way, whenever I take on such a mission and need building materials, I send a convoy to get the materials and deliver them to where I need them, thus flooding the market and getting a high success rate, just like you described.

Hiya Grape,

It makes sense to me that the citizens demands come first, however, there appears to be another factor that's taking the building materials away from the construction ... The order of priority might be like this :

1. Citizen Demand
2. Convoy Profit
3. Building Construction

If we flood the market with wood and bricks to meet the construction demand plus citizen demand, and then along comes a profit convoy (AI or our own!), when the day changes, we're left with barely anything towards construction.

It would make more sense if the priorities temporarily swapped for the conditions of #2 and #3 above during the 30 day period. This might help meet the mission goals in time. Alternately, if they changed the mission goals on a per building basis, we could achieve the mission if we build one or all of the buildings. In this case, the mission would read ... "Build as many businesses as you can up to a maximum of six, and I will give you 5% rep for each business built".

- Rob

(22-06-2012 04:44 PM)Nageln Wrote:  If we flood the market with wood and bricks to meet the construction demand plus citizen demand, and then along comes a profit convoy (AI or our own!), when the day changes, we're left with barely anything towards construction.

I see what your saying, however, why would there be a need to an AI profit convoy? that makes no game sense as we as mere humans would never be able to compete against the AI driven multitasking. As for one of our own profit convoys, well, thats our own fault, personally i dont run profit convoys at all, all mine are "my strategy" driven convoys. Flooding the market gets you building straight away, again AI and Own convoys are not a factor.

The fact remains that you are given a time limit, you can supply the supposedly required materials to get the buildings done, but, you have no control over the start time of that building unless you flood the market. Also, as a point of history, it's the 1500's and "citizens needs" were rarely a factor.

Placing a time limit on a build must mean that you have some control over the build start time, you dont. The only way to get control of the start time is to flood the market this then negates the build time and the amount of materials needed pointless.

Personally i would change the mission to something more like the way deliverys work. It would remain a build mission but would count down the raw materials as it does for a delivery. I would also cut down the amount of time you get to complete the mission say, build construction time for whatever type of building it is plus maybe a max of 5 days added on top. Those 5 days would be your window to get the stuff delivered, counting down the materials as per delivery missions as your ships come in. As soon as the quota of materials is reached then the build starts, if you manage to get the stuff there within the delivery window all well and good, if not you fail.

It would then actually become a mission and not just, yeah, i will accept that, flood the market, job done and forget about it.

Hi Grape,

I never had a feeling that I really have to flood the market by now but on the other hand I usually do not accept such missions if there are still AI- (or even player-) buildings in the town waiting for materials.
Your idea that the administrator takes care to put "these" buildings to the top of the current building-list, i.e. finish them first, sounds logically. But in the end it isn't so and maybe some people find reasons why this is realistic as it is: Administrator: "I reward you for building, how to do it in time is your problem!"

But maybe the issue is known and this point avoids the "flood-effect":

Walt Wrote:Update 1.2
• Required construction goods for new building now increases the demand in the trading window

Regards,
Cete

(22-06-2012 07:30 PM)Grape Wrote:  The fact remains that you are given a time limit, you can supply the supposedly required materials to get the buildings done, but, you have no control over the start time of that building unless you flood the market.

Well, the start time can be controlled. If you bring a boat load of material to the town before accepting the mission, you can start construction immediately.

Take a worse case scenario ... 6 buildings at 15 days construction time. I've brought enough wood/brick to cover 12 buildings, so now I accept the mission. If I add wood/brick to the market on a daily basis not to exceed one bar, I meet the conditions right away. If not, then I add a bit more the next day. It usually takes a few days using this technique, but it works for me. Since I'm not flooding the market (2 bars+), the price isn't attractive and the AI won't grab any wood or brick, if that was another case.

- Rob

Walt Wrote:Update 1.2
• Required construction goods for new building now increases the demand in the trading window

I think I might be seeing this now, in the latest english steam version. I can't check now but a few items on the update list seem to be changes that already exist.

Also, regarding my example with 6 buildings ... When I build them, I sometimes build them at a rate of 1/day ... So, by the end of 6 days, I've got 6 buildings and the last would be complete on the 21st day (assuming a 15 day build time). This requires me to sit in the town view and watch, but it has been working for me none the less. I don't like anything left to automation ... I'd rather do it myself.

- Rob

Grape Wrote:The only way to get control of the start time is to flood the market this then negates the build time and the amount of materials needed pointless.

Nageln Wrote:Well, the start time can be controlled. If you bring a boat load of material to the town before accepting the mission, you can start construction immediately.

Can you not see that both of these are the same principle just different methods? We both bring a shed load of materials, I then flood the market, you micromanage the market. Can you not also see that you are rendering the build time of the mission pointless by not accepting the mission untill you have got the materials in place already?

We do all of this because we know we cannot trust the game mechanics to get the job done as i suppose the developers intended them to be done. So we devise our own methods of ensuring that we can complete the mission, every method relies on lots of materials, double the amount seems to be most popular. We bring double the amount because we can only use the number of materials required for a certain structure as a guideline, if we bring the amount stated for a build we run the risk of failure.

As for the 1.2 update, as far as i can see this is a knee jerk reaction, and will only effect the market after the fact and have no impact at all on build missions. I can still see me flooding the market and Nageln micromanaging the market to get our missions done and not leaving it to the mechanics.

Game mechanics are there so that the user, using those mechanics can achieve the desired effects. If by using those mechanics you fail to achieve those effects are then the mechanics not flawed?

(23-06-2012 10:47 AM)Grape Wrote:  Game mechanics are there so that the user, using those mechanics can achieve the desired effects. If by using those mechanics you fail to achieve those effects are then the mechanics not flawed?

I disagree, at least somewhat.

The game mechanics aren't necessarily there to make things easy for the user. If they made the game too easy, as in making building missions 100% fail-proof, wouldn't you get bored out of your skull way too quickly?
Where's the challenge in clicking "Accept", and then clicking a few more buttons to construct 2-6 buildings? Sure, getting the money and reptutation to do that does count as a challenge, but once you've done that, if it wasn't for the building materials issue, those missions would be simple and boring, at least in my humble opinion.

By the way, I apologize if this had already been suggested before (I haven't got to read the entire thread carefully), but one method that comes to mind is stocking your warehouse with the required building materials before or right after accepting the mission, thus having your steward sell the materials to the market graduately, as required. The advantage of this method, in my opinion, over flooding the market, is from the profit angle. When you flood the market, your selling price goes down very far very quickly and you might end up losing money, especially if you're not contstructing the materials yourself. When you're selling the materials graduately, though, the demand never gets too low, so you neceessarily get better prices for your materials. This works, of course, only if nobody else (as in the AI) floods the market either, in which case, there wouldn't be a problem to begin with...

K.

I don't view the mechanics as being flawed, but it's definately not in the players favor. If we supply a flow of goods to the town that meets the demand and we achieve the mission, then how could the mechanics be flawed? Perhaps our methods are not exactly in tune with the mechanics? Everything is prone to failure. Without the possibility of failure, I have complacency ... When I'm complacent, I fail. Supplying an over abundance of goods tells me that I'm aware of failure, but it doesn't guarentee me that I won't fail.

I view the Build Missions as a lesson in supply and demand. I don't use these missions on the sole basis of gaining reputation. If the mission is of my best interest, I take it. If I fail, I still view it as a success because I wanted to build in that town anyway. If I view the mission by it's criteria alone (build X amount by this time), then indeed, the extra red-tape (supply/demand) get's in the way and it might appear as a pointless mission.

If you ask me whether the mission is pointless, I would say maybe. If you ask me whether the mission is in my best interest, I would say maybe. If you ask me whether the build mission should include supply and demand, I would say yes. It's not a milk run (delivery mission) ... If it was, then it's flawed. We've already seen milk run's fail because of bad mechanics (i.e.,not getting credit for the goods supplied).

Now, here's a funny cause/effect from the build mission. Sometimes, when I build rapidly and the town's current state of wood/brick is at the zero bar level, the administrator will suddenly have a delivery mission available that needs wood and bricks! I can now kill two birds with one stone. I don't rely on getting that second mission, it just falls in my lap, like most of the missions I encounter.

- Rob

(23-06-2012 10:47 AM)Grape Wrote:  As for the 1.2 update, as far as i can see this is a knee jerk reaction, and will only effect the market after the fact and have no impact at all on build missions. I can still see me flooding the market and Nageln micromanaging the market to get our missions done and not leaving it to the mechanics.

If I read it correctly ... The change should effect the new demand indicating more goods needed to supply the town, thus if you maintain about 1.99 bars (.99 is one or two goods below level 2) the mechanics will handle the rest. If we continue to flood the market (2+ bars), the goods will be at an attractive price. When the day changes, if the priority goes to "sales first", then we're screwing ourselves.

I am hoping that what you say will be the case but i just cant brimg myselt to believe it. What i will do though is once we finally get the update is start a new game and run a few tests again. I know the amount of tests i did earlier were nothing compared to the thousands that should have been done to get a realistic figure, but then again no one is perfect

@ Kelesis666

I generally have all of my warehouse stocked with at least 200 wood and 300 brick at all times, i also have wood and brick delivered on a regular basis to keep the market fresh, i am pretty sure we are not alone when we do that

What i am wondering is though is how the "stewards buying off of the market" and the "increase in demand" update are going to work? surely we are going to be able to keep a town in a constant state of high demand? and if thats the case there go my build missions again!!

Anyway, i still think that the build missions are flawed, nobody has raised a good case of them working, only offering our various work arounds to achieve the missions. The update to the market (increased demand) may well alleviate the problem in that delivering the amount of materials required for the build (no flooding and no micromanaging) may well get the job done.

(24-06-2012 07:20 PM)Grape Wrote:  Anyway, i still think that the build missions are flawed, nobody has raised a good case of them working, only offering our various work arounds to achieve the missions. The update to the market (increased demand) may well alleviate the problem in that delivering the amount of materials required for the build (no flooding and no micromanaging) may well get the job done.

I still have a problem with the term "flawed" in this context.

I agree that you can't just tell the architect that you want those buildings built and leave the rest to the game mechanics. That would obviously not work most of the time, due to lack of building materials. I don't see, however, why you see that as a flaw.

It actually makes a lot of sense to me, that things are more complicated than just clicking a few buttons to achieve a mission. I see the building materials issue as an integral part of a complex economy, which has already been severely simplified in this game, so we can play it without needing a degree in economics or business administration. Simplifying it even further by taking the building materials issue out of the picture for building missions seems to me like depriving us of the little challenge we do have with them.

I do agree there's a lot to improve, but I don't think the direction should be "let the game machanics take care of everything for us", since then we would have nothing to do and the game would lose its attraction.

@Kelesis666

I think the flaw here is, that you have to sell the material to the town first. That's doesn't make sense! You've got a license to build and commen sense dictates that you start building if you've got the materials for it. Even if you hire a constructor, you gonna tell him to take the materials out of you Warehouse. That's actually the way it was in PR2, why change it to this? That's ridiculous. Annoy's me.
They should change it back to what it was in PR2 period.

Ahoy.

Building is like any other mission that needs completing you have a task you know the variables.
Is there any Wood or Brick currently in the town dock?
What is the demand - Under the "Commodity List" Tab?
How much Brick & Wood do my buildings need?

I need to deliver / sell that much to complete the task.

It's a challange - it wouldn't be fun, or an achievement otherwise.

How Infuriating were some of the clues in PR2
"A bay holds two islands, one large and one small. The town on the larger, under X it must fall."
"Oh what a wondrous place. Nestled in a bay. Protected by towering cliffs, this is X, I say!"
But a buzz when you arrived at the answer.

(24-06-2012 07:20 PM)Grape Wrote:  What i am wondering is though is how the "stewards buying off of the market" and the "increase in demand" update are going to work? surely we are going to be able to keep a town in a constant state of high demand? and if thats the case there go my build missions again!!

I'm thinking the patch is purely cosmetic to show the increase in demand when you view the "Commodities List". Currently, if you build in a town, the bars will reflect the demand, but the list will still show the original town demand. Adding the ability of the steward to buy will indeed disrupt the mission since we're taking more goods out the world market (that is, if we are auto-buying wood/brick) ... A big problem if our steward is buying and selling the same goods (we'll be fighting ourselves). Players wanted the ability to auto-buy goods back in the game ... so basically, players would rather screw themselves automatically than screw themselves manually ... We're humans so we're naturally lazy and would prefer to have things done automatically, I suppose. Of course, I know there are other reasons to buy automatically (good reasons).

(24-06-2012 07:20 PM)Grape Wrote:  Anyway, i still think that the build missions are flawed, nobody has raised a good case of them working, only offering our various work arounds to achieve the missions. The update to the market (increased demand) may well alleviate the problem in that delivering the amount of materials required for the build (no flooding and no micromanaging) may well get the job done.

What part is flawed? ... Is it the supply/demand or the time limit? I would now agree with the time limit being flawed. In PR2, we horded wood/brick for the delivery and build missions. Both of these missions are indentical (milk runs). If the time limit in PR2 was 30 days, then it worked in PR2. Now that supply/demand is factored in, the time limit in PR3 hasn't changed, thus it's natural causing the mission to fail.

Here's something I observed in my mini-pirate campaign about supply/demand. I needed to increase my small town by 1000 citizens. I rapidly built 9 residences and about 5 businesses. This town didn't have wood being produced, only brick. I checked the World Map and the commodity symbol appeared over the town demanding wood. I was running a prosperity convoy between the town's since my home town produced both wood/brick. While this was going on, I went about hunting trade convoys. Most of the convoys I plundered carried lots of wood/brick. One even had 111 wood, and 86 brick. At this point, I realized that the world mechanics were working as convoys came out of no where to supply my town. By plundering those convoys, I naturally disrupted the mechanics, but after a week, I checked back in my town and at least half of those buildings were under construction.

I view the mechanics working, but only if the big picture (world demand) isn't under too much strain to support the extra demand I created when I built those 14 structures. We naturally horde wood/brick, yes. But those wood/brick could have potentially been used for the world market, thus by hording the wood/brick I created more demand than supply. Even if we horde 200, if we load our convoy with it, the first task our business is going to do is replace that 200 immediatly before it begins to provide the market.

Before I blame the mechanics, I check the big picture. If towns are on fire, then that consumes twice as much wood/brick. The fire was started at businesses that need wood anyway (blacksmith, rum distilery), so that compounds the problem even more. The player is always disrupting the mechanics. War disrupts the mechanics (a town under attack can't move goods and if the town produced wood/brick, it puts an even greater strain on the building mechanics).

I noticed that if we let the mechanics "gel and adjust" (balance out), then we will always see those missions in towns that ask for the same good to be delivered. That's to our advantage if we want to get reputation quickly. My mini-pirate campaign has put a huge imbalance to the mechanics ... One town is even down to 120 citizens!

One more comment about supply/demand ... If our build project doesn't trigger the towns demand for wood/brick (symbol next to town), then it's because some other good in the town is badly needed that's above the priority of the wood/brick. I would think you might see this if you had to build 2 structures ... the demand isn't enough, whereas 6 structures would. As you said already, 6 structures (at higher levels) would put a strain on the world demand already ... so, were basically screwed by both ends of the stick if the time limit remains at 30 days.

- Rob