We put aside a couple days last week to come up with some ideas for Fun event sequences then implement them using the event arc structure managed by the Event Director feature (as discussed in the blog post on just that subject). So let’s have a look at an example of one such event – and how event arcs can lock buildings for Special Purposes.

So the colony’s carpenter has a problem. These things happen! There are various ways to solve it (and others problems like it). Determined Inaction is always an option, as is Making A Highly Inadvisable Decision. Sometimes you can call upon the services of one of the specialist offices to resolve the issue by doing a little work. Just so here with the Vicar.

Mechanically, this nicely gives value to advanced colony buildings besides just like “make people happy” and ties them – and their overseers particularly – into the narrative drama of dynamic goings-on.

Above we see the Vicar, Kate Rivertton, beginning research on an appropriate exorcism to perform. This immediately dumps out everyone waiting for confession and sermons – prayer can wait, there’s important work to do! This changes the look of the chapel interface like so:

The UI is locked and a special message appears letting you know why. Clever players can unassign the overseer of course, but that will cause the project to fail – and come what consequences will from that. (I do BTW have a ticket TODO to add a bit of information here about the progression toward the goal of the project.)

So this event is pretty simple: the Vicar spends some time and researches a proper exorcism. This system however can take different forms: here we meet a simple threshhold to continue to the next stage in the event (or we fail to meet that threshold). Events can also have the office locked by the event arc generate as many “points” as possible in a given time to unlock different results, the higher the better.

Having met the research threshold, we get a success message. Splendid! Now the Vicar needs to do her thing:

Off she goes, Good Book in hand, to deal with The Problem. While lazy labourers sleep on the ground, dreams completely unhaunted by eldritch influences.

Of course, this might not be how it happens in your game. And maybe something completely different comes up which requires the efforts of your Laboratory or Foreign Office. Only one way to find out! (– In the next experimental patch. Soon!)