[Feature Request] Shared Income

from Sins Forums

Since I know you are reluctant to add Planet Trading (another feature I'd really like to see in Diplomacy), then perhaps you will at least add some shared income options. It should be easier to implement into the current engine at least.

Basically, the implementation of this I would envision for Sins is that all credits and resources gathered by a team would be divided equally by the team. An example of another game that uses this feature is the Cooperative Campaign from Red Alert 3, although many RTS have some variation on automatic income sharing.

This encourages teamwork by allowing teammates on the front lines to focus on combat, by reducing harmful intra-team competition, and by mitigating the common issue that arises when one team member happens to have all the ice planets and another team member happens to have all the volcanic planets.

This feature could be available as a special ingame trade pact or as something in the game settings. (or better yet, both, though if I had to choose I would definitely say put it in the game settings since it is most useful for Locked Team games).

7,584 views 11 replies
Reply #1 from Sins Forums Top

The problem with this is that sending credits to an ally is subject to a tax (the upkeep level of the ally you're sending it to).  Shared income would essentially double-tax a huge percentage of your entire team's income, whether or not you needed the redistribution.  I think this would be a bad thing.

You can very easily send money to your allies as it is, and then you can ensure that only the money that needs to be sent gets taxed in this manner.

Reply #2 from Sins Forums Top

TEC players will have options along these lines with their Envoys and Pacts.

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Reply #3 from Sins Forums Top

Quoting Darvin3, reply 1
The problem with this is that sending credits to an ally is subject to a tax (the upkeep level of the ally you're sending it to).  Shared income would essentially double-tax a huge percentage of your entire team's income, whether or not you needed the redistribution.  I think this would be a bad thing.
End of Darvin3's quote

That's the point. Shared income should not be double-taxed. It should be divided between team members at the time it is gathered before it is subjected to upkeep taxes.

Reply #4 from Sins Forums Top

Quoting Yarlen, reply 2
TEC players will have options along these lines with their Envoys and Pacts.
End of Yarlen's quote

 

Cool! But is it going to be as direct as the OP mentioned it, or is it more of a subtle, indirect, once-every-minute ability for envoys or tiny percentage (10% of what you make gets shared-esque) in pacts sort of thingy?

Reply #5 from Sins Forums Top

Yay I have always hated that feature in RA3 so I would have to say no to this feature, however if this was an option when you are starting a game then maybe...

Reply #6 from Sins Forums Top

Quoting ice27828, reply 5
Yay I have always hated that feature in RA3 so I would have to say no to this feature, however if this was an option when you are starting a game then maybe...
End of ice27828's quote

Well, yes, it would definitely have to be an optional thing. But it's definitely the feature most lacking in locked team games currently IMO.

Reply #7 from Sins Forums Top

Quoting Yarlen, reply 2
TEC players will have options along these lines with their Envoys and Pacts.
End of Yarlen's quote

I've looked at the TEC pacts and I don't see anything resembling a true Shared Income feature.
Yes, they can increase their own income and those of their allies, but that's not the same as evently dividing ALL income.

With true shared income, if one team member is harvesting 20 metal per second and the other is harvesting 10 metal per second then they should both actually receive 15 metal per second.

Besides, this should be a feature available to everyone, not just one race. The best way to implement it, as was mentioned before, would be in the pre-game options.

Reply #8 from Sins Forums Top

it should not be available to everyone. it makes sense for the tec ethos and it makes sense in the way it is designed as an envoy ability.

the fact that not everyone can share means that you must consider all of the advantages and disadvantages of which race you should choose. you want to profit-share some resources? play tec. your team needs an advent to help spur their media hubs? help your team, play as advent.

Reply #9 from Sins Forums Top

Quoting uglybutz, reply 8
it should not be available to everyone. it makes sense for the tec ethos and it makes sense in the way it is designed as an envoy ability.

the fact that not everyone can share means that you must consider all of the advantages and disadvantages of which race you should choose. you want to profit-share some resources? play tec. your team needs an advent to help spur their media hubs? help your team, play as advent.
End of uglybutz's quote

Again, I'm not talking about racial balancing here... I'm perfectly happy with TEC being the only race with the ability to *increase* the income gain of their allies... This topic has nothing to do with envoys or reputation points or any of that.

The feature I am discussing is a general gameplay dynamic, like Locked Teams and Pirates Active/Inactive.
I know that my friends and I would greatly enjoy team games more if we would not have to worry about dividing the universe's wealth evenly during our conquests or that one person would be unfairly burdened just because their homeworld happened to spawn closer to the enemy.

A true resource sharing feature only works if it works for all members of the team when enabled. Otherwise it defeats the purpose.

The existing racial balancing would still be in effect. Shared Income only ensures that all members of the team receive the same raw income (as if they had the same number of planets and extractors). Modifiers to income such as research and fleet upkeep would be applied *after* the sharing takes place, meaning that team members would still benefit from raising their own economy tech and keeping a low fleet size.

Reply #10 from Sins Forums Top

why should it even be an option? how would you even incorporate resource sharing? why would you want to be worried about how your teammates would spend your resources? even if you were locked teams it makes no sense that you should recieve shared income because that means youd either A} be sharing expenses and/or B} really only needing one person watching development and economy and general admin which makes no sense, especially if there is more than one fleet and more than race. youd have to completely change how the game is played and designed.

 

also: and if your teams arent locked then, even assuming you could get profit sharing to work, it just musses the whole game theory aspect right up because the dominant strategy every single game would be to try and ally with the biggest and best team. there would be no shaky alliances (navigating shaky alliances being an important part of the game already). there would be no suspicion between players except on the level of wondering where the biggest alliances were which isnt really a big deal since Diplomacy keeps track of player relations to each other and this knowledge is available to everyone. thered be no possibility of disallying because why would anyone want to lose their access to a huge pool of resources? what would the incentive be to disally? not only might you be outmatched numbers wise but income wise youd have a huge comparison deficit to make up for and you really couldnt unless you were rommel reborn or something and even then youre basically fighting a defensive battle the whole time which is fairly reliant on attrition and youre gauranteed to lose that because theres no way you could catch up to something that is economically so much more massive than you

Reply #11 from Sins Forums Top

For purposes of clarity, I'll respond to your comments in reverse order.

Quoting uglybutz, reply 10
also: and if your teams arent locked then, even assuming you could get profit sharing to work, it just musses the whole game theory aspect right up because the dominant strategy every single game would be to try and ally with the biggest and best team. there would be no shaky alliances (navigating shaky alliances being an important part of the game already). there would be no suspicion between players except on the level of wondering where the biggest alliances were which isnt really a big deal since Diplomacy keeps track of player relations to each other and this knowledge is available to everyone. thered be no possibility of disallying because why would anyone want to lose their access to a huge pool of resources? what would the incentive be to disally? not only might you be outmatched numbers wise but income wise youd have a huge comparison deficit to make up for and you really couldnt unless you were rommel reborn or something and even then youre basically fighting a defensive battle the whole time which is fairly reliant on attrition and youre gauranteed to lose that because theres no way you could catch up to something that is economically so much more massive than you
End of uglybutz's quote

This feature was mainly suggested for locked team games, which is the only type of game my friends and I enjoy playing. I personally feel that the Diplomacy expansion has very little benefit for locked team games at the moment. Yes, the envoy abilities & pacts are nice for miscellaneous bonuses, but I'm not going to be able to convince my friends to buy Diplomacy for those alone. Shared Income is a feature we've always wanted, and would add a lot to our overall enjoyment of locked team games.

Quoting uglybutz, reply 10
why should it even be an option? how would you even incorporate resource sharing? why would you want to be worried about how your teammates would spend your resources? even if you were locked teams it makes no sense that you should recieve shared income because that means youd either A} be sharing expenses and/or B} really only needing one person watching development and economy and general admin which makes no sense, especially if there is more than one fleet and more than race. youd have to completely change how the game is played and designed.
End of uglybutz's quote

I said "Shared Income", not "Shared Resources". In this mode, you would only share *raw* income. Your actual pool of available resources would NOT be shared with your allies. The raw income from all taxes and extractors would just be divided evenly between the team. Adding a Shared Income feature would NOT require any major dynamic change or rebalancing of the game.

Modifiers from research and fleet supply would still be applied separately to each player after they receive their ration of the raw income. This means that you could NOT have only one player in the team working on economy, since only he would benefit from his economic research.

It *does* mean that if one player on the team had twice as many planets as the others, he would NOT receive more raw income than they would. That's called teamwork. Shared income ensures that each team member can support approximately the same number of ships at any given time, so that no team member ever feels like he isn't contributing to the battle. Yes, a bad player might hurt the team by not pulling his weight economically or militarily, but that's the nature of teamwork. From your comments, it seems that you simply have very different gaming preferences than my friends and I do.