Awesome sauce.
http://stonehearth.net/2014/10/07/desktop-tuesday-job-changes-and-shops/
le squee!
kicks back ā¦ presses play
edit: certainly curious to hear some of TRās ideas on balancing profession changing ā¦ lots of options there!
and an excellent introduction for the stores! 
iām curious though, (once ādiscoveredā) will they always remain and be accessible via the notifications tab, or will there perhaps be another means of accessing shops?
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Well, if they are eventually rolling up with their (Probably adorable) caravans pulled by llamas, Iād assume they might stay a few days before moving on to other cities. (Assuming a goblin raid doesnāt slaughter them).
That makes sense to me at least, forcing the players to really decide in a somewhat short amount of time what is important to buy or sellā¦ or if they should wait for the next caravan to spend their hard earned gold.
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indeed, makes sense to me! i am really excited about all the opportunities this opens up though, possibly for permanant additions to your settlement, etc.
Hey there [Town Name]! It seems you have a thriving community. Perhaps I should setup shop here?
[accept] you get a new unit of type āshopkeeperā who has, perhaps, said wagon of goodsā¦ he then can replenish supplies at various points in timeā¦
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Looks good to me 
.
Definitely agree with the principle of getting the shop interaction working before the wagons appear in-game as well.
Couple of things Iāll add that I think will improve this:
- Specifying where the traders should set up shop.
- Asking traders to bring ____ next time they visit.
- Bargaining, rather than just having fixed prices.
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Do i hear a possible āTraderā class for this? 
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A few things Iām hoping to see eventually with the gold chests:
1. The ability to see the numerical value of gold present in each āchestā of goldāsince this is a specific, recorded number used to buy things (and not just a log of wood), Iād like to be able to see how this is divided in my stockpiles via either a game option or a specific view mode, such as the zone/stockpile view.
2. Consolidation of gold chestsāsince this is something that will constantly be collected and exchanged, itās likely the player will end up with incomplete or partially-filled āchestsā, taking up stockpile space for other possible items. A command to consolidate all loose gold/minerals/etc. would help minimize this. It could have varying levels of intensity, from affecting a single stockpile (so a possible trait for zone creation/editing) to multiple sources throughout the city or world, with maybe a distance limit.
3. The ability to split chests into specific valuesāthis wouldnāt be immediately as important, but it would work well for possible requests in the future for certain amounts of gold or tribute to other groups, which may involve zones to specify it or actually have a physical unit come and collect it. Either that, or you can split your chests into really small amounts and spread them everywhere, so you look really rich to your friends.
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Loving the little sparklies that the gold gives off.
Profession changing looks good too, although Scarlett was not sure what to do with the appearing trapper knife lol. 
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yeah, i would think it would be relatively āsimpleā to show your settlementās gold totals on the town view, and then an individual total on a single chestās information bar (left-hand corner)ā¦
ha! yeah, it took her a while, but she eventually dropped it into that stockpileā¦ she was probably just thinking deeply aboutsuch a life-changing event, going from a trapper to a farmerā¦ likely wondering if the unit was having a mid-lifegame crisisā¦
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lovely just lovely
Regarding profession changes:
I unfortunately do not know who the speaker is, letās just refer to him as āhimā. He said that they do not want us to change everybody to a fighter before a fight begins, but I really do not see a downside of that.
- In reality, a real king would do that if he is in need of more
soldiers. - The ānewā soldiers who usually work as farmers or carpenters or whatever will be worse than real soldiers.
- You need to have the equipment to make them a soldier.
So why would you actually disallow doing that especially if all these people will be less experienced than ārealā soldiers or whatever?
that would be @Tomā¦
El Capitan, Ol Blue Eyes ā¦ very rarely referred to as āJeffāā¦
iāll have to rewatch, but i think the idea is that they want to balance the professions swapping in order to avoid hitting the āeasy buttonā whenever your settlement runs into troubleā¦ the idea being that the player should have to make some difficult choices when assigning those various rolesā¦
and something like this seems like a perfectly acceptable test caseā¦ if the player is allowed to immediately change units to soldiers, given them a significant disadvantage in the roleā¦
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Thatās what the Defend Button is for. They donāt become soldiers, they just pick up their hoes and saws and start hacking away. You still can use them as āMilitaryā units, just not as proper soldiers.
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Added neatness of Mobile shop-keep. When Tom made mention of this shop-keep feature the first thing I saw on the screen in my imagination was 2 horses pulling an almost gypsy-like caravan with trinkets hanging off the side. I wonder if you guys would even look at it as depending what type of mobile shop keep the caravan might have a different look and feel. Either way I like what I see keep up the good work
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I do have to ask a question though. Why shops? Why wouldnāt I make all the things I need. Doesnāt this cheapen the tech tree? I buy it instead of make it? Iām just not sure how this improves gameplay.
Youāve got a point there, but i feel like thatās just a short term handling. If you know that there will be a fight in letās say 3 days, you will try to get your citizens some real weapons if needed.
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whoās to say the shop might not offer something unique? 
and the scenario @Tom went through was for those players who, for example, decide to focus on farmingā¦ they can leverage all that excess and purchase weapons and armor (instead of having to invest in that tech tree)ā¦
Edit: This was supposed to be a reply to @Ramcat.
There are a number of advantages.
Letās say I abhor mining and just want to build a town. Well, I need iron or whatever to build some stuff but thereās none to be had. Since Iām not mining Iām probably excelling at farming or whateverā¦so I just sell my extra food and buy the iron.
It also offers a means of creating renewable resources. There might not be many rare gems to be found but a trader can offer me a way to obtain infinite gems (at some cost and based on quantity available).
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[quote=āRamcat, post:15, topic:8013, full:trueā]I do have to ask a question though. Why shops? Why wouldnāt I make all the things I need. Doesnāt this cheapen the tech tree? I buy it instead of make it? Iām just not sure how this improves gameplay.
[/quote]
If nothing else, it makes those games where you embark in some awful iron-ore-free zone less problematic.
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@SteveAdamo, @Teleros, @jonzoid
Ok, I get that - unique items, alternate play styles, and world generation issues all get handled by a market place. It does seem to me that it could make the player a bit lazy. A hundred pumpkins for a breastplate? DEAL!!! And Iāve missed out on the work it took to make a breastplate.
I would think things should be quite expensive to balance laziness, but I can see that this could improve gameplay for unique items and alternate play styles. As Team Radiant will have all the bugs out of the world generation algorithm ;). Yes, that was a joke - engineer to engineer.