05 · Resources & Economy

Status: Skeleton · Owner: TBD · Updated: 2026-09-23

Purpose

Define every currency and resource, where it comes from, where it goes, and how the whole system stays balanced over a player's lifetime.

To define

• Resource list (recommend 3–4 basic + 1–2 advanced)
• Soft currency, hard currency, and event currencies
• Faucets: production, gathering, events, alliance, purchase
• Sinks: building, training, research, healing, teleports, speed-ups
• Storage caps, protected storage, and raid loss rules
• Speed-up items: sources, denominations, whether they are tradeable
• Inflation control across a 12-month server life
• Economy spreadsheet (link it here — the doc describes, the sheet decides)

Think about

• Every resource must have a distinct decision attached. If wood and stone are always spent together in the same ratio, they are one resource with two icons. Four resources that all gate the same upgrade is just a longer wait.
• Count your sinks before your faucets. The genre's classic failure is a mature server where veterans sit on capped resources with nothing to spend on — at which point they stop playing, because earning stopped meaning anything. Healing wounded troops and rebuilding armies are the healthiest late sinks; they convert war into demand.
• Raidable resources are a design philosophy, not a number. Fully protected storage makes a peaceful game; unprotected makes a brutal one that bleeds new players. Most ship a protected threshold that scales with progression — decide the shape early because it defines how PvP feels.
• Speed-ups are the real currency. Once players can buy time, every cost/time curve is denominated in speed-ups whether you intended it or not. Track the effective exchange rate and design it deliberately.
• Alliance-gathering vs solo production. If the map is the main faucet, the game is social and territorial. If the city is, it is solitary and idle-safe. The mix sets how much the world map matters.
• Beware the second-week cliff. Onboarding generosity followed by a hard wall is the biggest churn event in this genre. Model the curve and smooth it.
• Plan for server age. A 6-month-old server has veterans who cannot be caught and newcomers who cannot compete. Catch-up mechanics, migration and seasonal resets all belong in this page and in Seasons.

Open questions

#	Question	Blocks	Owner
1	How many resource types?	Buildings, UI, map
2	Are resources lost on defeat? How much?	PvP feel, retention
3	Is troop healing a major sink?	War pacing, monetisation