Choosable townies

[Baskingner]

Hey guys!

i thougt it would be fun when you start a new town, you can choose your townies! I will explain:

Everytime you start on a new map, you will get a screen popped up with a townie on it, with his name, level (that was mentioned before wasnt it?) and his stats (woodcutting, health, strength). After that you can click 2 buttons, pick townie or refuse townie.
You may choose 10 different townies, so you choose your starting "team" at the game start.
If you dont understand it yet (because of my lack of english) then try to take a look at virtual villagers 4 (tree of life). People with ipods and ipads maybe know this game? There you can also choose your starting survival team.


I think this element brings up a but more of tactics in the game! You have to create your perfect team!

I know it needs a lot of work like townie-stats and levels and the game is not far enough developped but in future this might be possible dont you think...??

What do you guys think?

[tom k.]

A bit like dwarf fortress then, where you choose your starting dwarfs and their skills

[Grapes]

Hmm... perhaps it could be an option for some control freaks. No offence. In different games I've tried to reach the best possible results and follow the most effective ways every now and again as well. But Towns should be a bit more chaotic than that. I feel. I like that players do not have the direct control over the characters. Sure it's a bit clumsy at the moment because of the AI but it will be sorted out at some point. And usually it's more fun to play with a ragtag group of misfits than if everyone's already a professional expert. That's my opinion anyway.

[Baskingner]

(....) But Towns should be a bit more chaotic than that. I feel. I like that players do not have the direct control over the characters. Sure it's a bit clumsy at the moment because of the AI but it will be sorted out at some point. And usually it's more fun to play with a ragtag group of misfits than if everyone's already a professional expert. That's my opinion anyway.

I dont think if you choose your starting townies its that much diffrence to the chaotic "part" of the game! Its just adds some more tactic to the game! Cause you still cant move your townies and the AI is still not the best! In my opinion the chaotic part is slowly but surely removed from the game! Cause if you see all of the last patches you see a lot fixes in AI! Tell me if im wrong please!

and about those "ragtags", its just a matter of balancing to see how experienced they are in certain jobs at the start! They wont be experts right away but just start with "strenght (15/100) instead of starting at 0 strenght!

[fbu]

Well, it would surely help you to identify with your townies. In about every DF game I have ever played, I could discern my initial group of dwarfs immediately (if even due to the job-specific appearance). I cannot say that to be true about townies whatsoever; they are just an anonymous blend of workforce.

[YetiChow]

I would love to see this feature added; or some way to "carry over" townies between different towns - quite commonly I start a map and play for like 2 days (game days) before realising I won't enjoy the map (not enough resources, too much work to get building space etc.) and just quit and start another town. I'd love to see an "abandon town" option which allows you to delete your map but keep the townies.

This works really well with narrative gamers, as it lets them/us (trying to be objective, but I'm definitely a narrative gamer myself) create a story not only in one map but over the course of the journey of a group of townies. Basically, what I'm suggesting is that the game move form being map-based with the townies on the periphery (basically just tools to create the map you want) to townie-based with the map on the periphery (just a playing field to set out the story of the townies). This would be a kind of second game mode - the current one could (and should) remain, but there would be an option to do things differently and refresh your experience. Basically you form a dream-team (with an option to randomise those starting townies if you wish) and focus on getting them installed in a town; if the first map you come to isn't suitable then you move on to the next one.

This would essentially mean a separate save folder for populations; basically each group of townies gets a whole file to themselves instead of being part of the meta-data of the map save (or however they do it now). That's a lot of infrastructure, so there would have to be an option to go with the "regular" setup for those who aren't so interested in the micro-story of the townies. However, if this were added then the immersion and entertainment potential for narrative gamers would be nearly limitless. Many Towns players (probably most) are already narrative gamers - you almost have to be to enjoy sandbox games where you are making up the story as you go along - so this would be a real boon to the fan base I'm sure.

Of course, this wouldn't be added anytime soon (or even in the forseeable future - it's more of a vague dream than a tangible goal), bt I would greatly appreciate it if the community and the Devs considered the idea