Ello there.

Now when i've gotten the Smithing and Mining scripts working, i thought i'd make a thread here in the melting pot (approprite name for this category )

For now you can only smith coins by the use of gold nuggets, obviously i intend to advance this into armor, weapons, construction tools, materials for quests and your own pleasure.

Mines will be placed out according to the locations pointed out by our glorious team leader Valisarius.

Anvils will most probably also be placed out, in order to use these (for now) you need nothing but a repair hammer. But i also intend to advance this, so that you will need to be close to a forge/furnace, and you will also need callipers/tongs due to immersion.

You will also learn how to smith new items by doing quests (if Valisarius agrees) and finding armor/weapon pieces to melt down so that you can further examine their raw components (again if Vailsarius agrees) however, melting down will not always work... If you paid attention to the chemistry classes, you should know that some raw component plus raw component equals a new component. Such as copper plus tin. melt this down and you've got bronze (i'm not saying there will be copper and tin)

To start off.. What does Valisarius think?

Feel free to comment and critisize (spelling?) this.

Cheers!

//ANGEL

You can find some Mining and Smithing screenies here ->Angel



Any ideas about improvement, ranging from... Nothing to... Everything..
Come ooon...

Cheers!

//ANGEL

haha Lol, nice message box

Great stuff Angel!

Thanks!

By the way, which times are you available on MSN?

Cheers!

//ANGEL

Interesting message, yeah ok lets go with it. I dont want to get too popular culture and modern, try to keep the ancient feel, but a little smile dont hurt.
Top job there Angel

Oh sorry, i was just messing around with the messagebox
I will change it in any way to suit your needs
Just tell me what to do.

Currently i am having a hard time connecting these damn messagebox lineups... Gaaah

Thanks!

//ANGEL

Um, should you really be allowed to smith coins? Imagine if everyone did that... coins would have no value! So I made 500 coins and grew 5 carrots. Current market price of carrots - 100 coins. Hmm.. smith another 500 coins - market price now 200 per carrot. I'm rich, but hungry...

There would be hyperinflation and maybe a currency and banking crisis like never seen before. And never to be seen again until the early 21st century

Don't forget the Roman empire largely declined because of inflation. It cost more and more to pay the garrisons, so they had to be thinned out. Barbarians noticed this and went for it...

One solution might be a commission from the local ruler to mint coins. This would be a contract to produce coins for the state, for which you'd presumably be well paid. Plus, you could always sell the state the gold that's used, assuming you owned a mine

Commodities (e.g. gold) and currency should always be different, even if the currency is tied to a gold standard. Commodity price will vary depending on supply and demand. If the state has enough reserves, then people will have confidence in the currency.

This could be part of a quest, impressing the local ruler with your honesty and steadfastness to win a commission to mint coins. Maybe safely delivering them to towns and outposts too, or recovering stolen coins from thieves who pulled a heist on the ruler's vaults.

Minting coins is not a good idea, but shipping the ore to the treasury might be worth while.

Found an interesting page about old coinage:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Curti ... of_Coinage

Might give some ideas, e.g. refining ore, assaying and minting.

In a similar vein to alchemical equipment, could have refining equipment.

Assaying the refined ore could be done by certain professionals - an excuse for a state assaying office. You leave your metal with them for a day or two, come back and find out how pure it is and how much it's worth.

And of course, the final stage, minting! Only if you get a licence or contract, and you do have to turn over the finished coins. And then get paid with some.

Sing some songs about miners in 10049 BC...

It might not be such an exciting part of anyones time in Mesogea however, minting their own coins. However, owning a minting and mining company, obtaining a license etc and then having further power within the government world might be an interesting side quest...

If it can be made to work and tied to some quests then players at least will have one more option to play with. Players are notoriously good at finding uses for things that developers never intended. Also, it might be possible to code some generic quests that respond to a player's wealth and make them a target for thieves/bandits/protection rackets/kidnappings/etc. The problem isn't so much: could it be made interesting and fun? as: where should we focus our energies?

Well that opens up the cupboard doesnt it. I like those lists. I wonder if it would even be possible to script in family members, to develop an existence in Mesogea. even adopted family, then they can become part of the target. Missing people.

I like the idea of Mesogea having a series of commercial activities in which the player can participate (mine ore, refine it, etc..) or interact in other ways (geological exploration, trading ore, manufacturing metal products).

It could be that the player can partially buy into or own outright such an activity, useful to generate money while off adventuring. It could bring into play other actions, such as wisely choosing and hiring a manager and staff - dependent on speechcraft. Top notch people running your mining/refining/smelting business will generate more income than rank amateurs doing the same.

For many of these activities it should be possible to build them from scratch. Hence buying or hiring floorspace in town should be allowable. Buy in the equipment, hire some staff, and you're in business. Of course, you may need to find a regular buyer for your produce, so traders will have to be part of the picture.

It would also bring a sense of realism if others were doing these activities throughout the continent. Some cities could be famous for e.g. ironware or glassware, others could have craftsmen producing fine jewellery from gold or cut gemstones. Hence each city could have artisan's quarters and trading zones. I'm pretty sure that early cities came about as foci of specialisation and trade.

It could also bring politics and militarism into play; think of the conflicts and diplomacy over dominating the silk route and the spice trade. There could be entrepot towns that are well positioned on trade routes.

Think of the modern world; Jo'burg for gold, Detroit for cars, Prague for glassware. Kimberley and Sierra Leone for producing diamonds, Antwerp for trading diamonds, etc.

I think it would be too difficult to try to model a whole city economy, but this could be mimicked in various ways; if the number of glassmakers in town goes up, the market price of glass goes down locally. It also allows for sensible international trade, where goods will have higher prices in cities that don't produce them.

I am sure that as a general NPC and city interaction we could run some minor commerce that on the surface could be made to look realistically complex but underneath could be simple equations.

This is quite an exciting development I think, it will give the cities real identity rather than just a few different house types.

You should check out the NPCs with Jobs mod -> http://npcwithjobs.com/.

This is pretty much the focus of their mod: developing realistic economies and communities.