My team is looking for experienced developers to help create a unique UO experience. Although the changes we plan to make are not incredibly complicated (from what I can gather from peoples input so far) when all put together they will make create a new experience playing Ultima Online. With our current plans the game will shift to become a platform of realistic economy, city building and politics.
Professions
We plan to tone down the concept of kill monster get money, sure some human mobs will still carry gold as loot the majority of gold on the shard will be earned through a unique profession system. Right now we have 10 potential professions we want to implement. Below is a quick description of what we want to do with each. For those with more than one idea the prior one is more likely/possible and more important at least at first.
Farmer - 1: (like above) Ability to plant seeds, water/tend them and then sell the crops for gold. (food will be important on the shard, if a player is "starving" a debuff will be im place)
2: Can rent specific farm housing with fields to plant crops
Harvester - Bonus to gathering resources (mining/lumber jacking)
Rancher - 1: Bonus to hide and meat collection.
2: Can rent specific ranch housing with penned in areas where cows/sheep/goats spawn
Guard - 1: Receives a damage bonus against criminally flagged players.
2: Create a system of auto-teleport option to bring the guard to the scene of the crime if the guard is in the city the crime takes place.
Shopkeeper - 1: Ability to set up vendors.
2: Manage NPC vendors in their houses adjusting prices as they wish
Caravan Master - 1: Able to purchase a pet "Caravan" like a strong pack animal.
2: Able to check city vendor prices on all items in real time
3: Bonus to buy/sell prices
Merchant Marine - 1: Able to purchase a merchant boat that has a larger hold and stronger hull
2: Able to check city vendor prices on all items in real time
3: Bonus to buy/sell prices
Adventurer - Access to a quest NPC for PvM quests
Sell sword - 1: Access to a "job board" system that Caravan masters and Merchant marines could post to looking for help protecting their goods during transport.
Outlaw - Increased selling prices at bandit/pirate cities, decreased selling prices at normal cities.
Dynamic Economy
These professions are only useful if a dynamic economy is implemented. We plan utilize basic laws of supply and demand. Each city vendors' prices will be determined on the supply of that item (for resources, ore/ingots/boards/stone) whereas a low supply will increase price and vise versa. This will create a natural trading economy where players can buy low and sell high. For example:
If a city by a mountain has large stocks of ingots, due to harvester players (miners in this case) selling to NPC vendors, the price per ingot will be low, but across the map a city on a jungle island has very few ingots in stock the price will be high. A merchant marine player checks the prices and sees that buying in the mining town and selling in the island city would make for a big profit. The merchant marine buys a large stock of ingots and sends out a contract for local sell swords saying he will need their services and offers X amount of gold, 10% on taking contract and rest of gold on completion. The sell swords take contract and come to mining town to protect the ship from both NPC and Player pirates/bandits. Upon reaching the island city the merchant marine heads to the NPC vendor and sells his ingots for much more than he bought them.
City Building and Politics
Players will rent housing in cities/towns as opposed to building their own, this will centralize people to local areas and creating a sense of community. Towns will have faction like abilities where an elected official can place taxes and war other cities.
-Taxes will pay for guards (which will not be auto-whack, but will teleport to the area like normal NPC guard.) we want different tiers of NPC guards available to towns from cheaper weaker ones to expensive nearly omnipotent guards.
- Taxes can also go to town growth (which wont be an implemented mechanic but will take place with devs)
There will be 2-3 larger cities to start the shard with most needed amenities. Beyond that there will be more than a few "trading posts" that will start with a multi-function building having a banker, provisioner and rooms for rent. A group or guild can move into this trading post and through the use of resources and gold players can grow the small out post into a larger town. Everything from adding more housing, vendor buildings and walls. For example:
A group inhabiting a small trading outpost by a mountain wants a blacksmith building so they can train a smith or attract players who want to smith as well as have a blacksmith NPC who can sell/buy weapons and armor. Their trading post already is equipped with a forge (because we will place them near mountains anyway) but they will need a smith for the anvil. The group will contact a dev (on a forum or in game) and will gather the predetermined price for the building (X amt of gold, X amt of wood, X amt of stone) and the dev will build the building for them.
- Politics and trading will come into play as cities can broker deals to compensate for poor resource locations. A mountain side city might need more wood or food while a farming town would need stone and ingots. A trade is just waiting to happen.
- We are currently brainstorming ways of creating spheres of influence for cities and ways of capturing/occupying enemy cities that will make sense.
Skill changes
First and foremost magery will become a rare and very powerful skill to have. Training it will be a pain and regs will be expensive. We want the rare GM mage to be a god among men. A spellbook will become somewhat of a rare item in of itself
Skills themselves will be made slightly more difficult than the average free shard.
Custom Map
We currently have a general idea for a map that will space out resources and potential city locations, it will start off roughly half the size of the felucca map. We plan to add islands/continents as player numbers increase and current city locations become crowded.
So that is essentially what we have right now planned. We have more ideas we are still working on but right now these are the things we want to implement immediately. If youre interested in getting involved we would be happy to have you along for the ride. You can message me directly or reply here with any questions. Thanks for reading.
Professions
We plan to tone down the concept of kill monster get money, sure some human mobs will still carry gold as loot the majority of gold on the shard will be earned through a unique profession system. Right now we have 10 potential professions we want to implement. Below is a quick description of what we want to do with each. For those with more than one idea the prior one is more likely/possible and more important at least at first.
Farmer - 1: (like above) Ability to plant seeds, water/tend them and then sell the crops for gold. (food will be important on the shard, if a player is "starving" a debuff will be im place)
2: Can rent specific farm housing with fields to plant crops
Harvester - Bonus to gathering resources (mining/lumber jacking)
Rancher - 1: Bonus to hide and meat collection.
2: Can rent specific ranch housing with penned in areas where cows/sheep/goats spawn
Guard - 1: Receives a damage bonus against criminally flagged players.
2: Create a system of auto-teleport option to bring the guard to the scene of the crime if the guard is in the city the crime takes place.
Shopkeeper - 1: Ability to set up vendors.
2: Manage NPC vendors in their houses adjusting prices as they wish
Caravan Master - 1: Able to purchase a pet "Caravan" like a strong pack animal.
2: Able to check city vendor prices on all items in real time
3: Bonus to buy/sell prices
Merchant Marine - 1: Able to purchase a merchant boat that has a larger hold and stronger hull
2: Able to check city vendor prices on all items in real time
3: Bonus to buy/sell prices
Adventurer - Access to a quest NPC for PvM quests
Sell sword - 1: Access to a "job board" system that Caravan masters and Merchant marines could post to looking for help protecting their goods during transport.
Outlaw - Increased selling prices at bandit/pirate cities, decreased selling prices at normal cities.
Dynamic Economy
These professions are only useful if a dynamic economy is implemented. We plan utilize basic laws of supply and demand. Each city vendors' prices will be determined on the supply of that item (for resources, ore/ingots/boards/stone) whereas a low supply will increase price and vise versa. This will create a natural trading economy where players can buy low and sell high. For example:
If a city by a mountain has large stocks of ingots, due to harvester players (miners in this case) selling to NPC vendors, the price per ingot will be low, but across the map a city on a jungle island has very few ingots in stock the price will be high. A merchant marine player checks the prices and sees that buying in the mining town and selling in the island city would make for a big profit. The merchant marine buys a large stock of ingots and sends out a contract for local sell swords saying he will need their services and offers X amount of gold, 10% on taking contract and rest of gold on completion. The sell swords take contract and come to mining town to protect the ship from both NPC and Player pirates/bandits. Upon reaching the island city the merchant marine heads to the NPC vendor and sells his ingots for much more than he bought them.
City Building and Politics
Players will rent housing in cities/towns as opposed to building their own, this will centralize people to local areas and creating a sense of community. Towns will have faction like abilities where an elected official can place taxes and war other cities.
-Taxes will pay for guards (which will not be auto-whack, but will teleport to the area like normal NPC guard.) we want different tiers of NPC guards available to towns from cheaper weaker ones to expensive nearly omnipotent guards.
- Taxes can also go to town growth (which wont be an implemented mechanic but will take place with devs)
There will be 2-3 larger cities to start the shard with most needed amenities. Beyond that there will be more than a few "trading posts" that will start with a multi-function building having a banker, provisioner and rooms for rent. A group or guild can move into this trading post and through the use of resources and gold players can grow the small out post into a larger town. Everything from adding more housing, vendor buildings and walls. For example:
A group inhabiting a small trading outpost by a mountain wants a blacksmith building so they can train a smith or attract players who want to smith as well as have a blacksmith NPC who can sell/buy weapons and armor. Their trading post already is equipped with a forge (because we will place them near mountains anyway) but they will need a smith for the anvil. The group will contact a dev (on a forum or in game) and will gather the predetermined price for the building (X amt of gold, X amt of wood, X amt of stone) and the dev will build the building for them.
- Politics and trading will come into play as cities can broker deals to compensate for poor resource locations. A mountain side city might need more wood or food while a farming town would need stone and ingots. A trade is just waiting to happen.
- We are currently brainstorming ways of creating spheres of influence for cities and ways of capturing/occupying enemy cities that will make sense.
Skill changes
First and foremost magery will become a rare and very powerful skill to have. Training it will be a pain and regs will be expensive. We want the rare GM mage to be a god among men. A spellbook will become somewhat of a rare item in of itself
Skills themselves will be made slightly more difficult than the average free shard.
Custom Map
We currently have a general idea for a map that will space out resources and potential city locations, it will start off roughly half the size of the felucca map. We plan to add islands/continents as player numbers increase and current city locations become crowded.
So that is essentially what we have right now planned. We have more ideas we are still working on but right now these are the things we want to implement immediately. If youre interested in getting involved we would be happy to have you along for the ride. You can message me directly or reply here with any questions. Thanks for reading.