Rules Day 3

Solid day working on game mechanics today, everybody.  I'm very nearly ready to publish the new rules for the Sex Engine, and then get to work building them into the prototype.

Again I'd like to thank the community for some really good and thought-provoking posts here over the last few days.  Although I'm often shit at replying to them, I read every post and message you guys send here and on Discord.

Enrico raised a good point about overcomplexity:

Good thinking, but be careful to not go too overboard. For example you can theoretically solve that problem simply by designing a short set of choices (heroine actions) to solve the stiffness problem, and then end with an output that can be a success (at this point you'll reconnect with the standard sex scenes) or a failure (it's totally good and important to have these too) with its set of endings. What the stats can do is to highly personalize the text along the way and decide the stiffness problem output. Am I making any sense? :P

This is a good observation and is in fact it's the solution I plan to implement.  I'm now working on a definitive set of rules for the heroine actions that should be available here – what's the difference between giving him a BJ to get him hard, or letting him fuck her tits?  What about if her boobs are massive?  And when writing that scene – shouldn't it differ based on her opinion of the guy?  The new rules will give us a framework to explore all this content.

Although that might seem dangerously complex, my hope is that having a framework to work within will actually help speed up and direct the writing.

William Urquhart pointed out that arousal has both mental and physical components:

One thing I thing might be missing in this perspective: arousal vs. physical response.  For both men and women (even without performance 'issues') the same general state of arousal (sexual excitement meaning) does not equate to *physical* arousal (physical response to sexual excitement)...

The previous version of the Sex Engine reduces Arousal to one stat, which increases every time any NPC performs a sex act on the agent.  The new rules break this down into three interrelated components (mental arousal, wetness/hardness, and orgasm stage).  Mental arousal acts as a brake or accelerator to wetness/hardness and orgasm.  (Again, what seems like it could be over-complex is my attempt to creäte more structure and direction upon which to hang the writing – hopefully I'm hitting the right balance, but you guys can tell me next week.)

bsnick pointed out that being made to do something you don't like can be sexy:

You mention going down on someone you find repulsive so I'm wondering if your system factors in anything that would find a repulsive person to be a turn-on. It's something that I've seen in numerous stories which probably boils down to the heroine finding the humiliation to be arousing enough that they can orgasm from the repulsiveness of it. I suppose that would be a kink or something for a 'perks and their opposites' system.

I agree with this (if it's true that "everything is about sex except sex; sex is about power", then it's obvious that both exercising and relinquishing one's power could be arousing).  Kinks is a good idea and would work, but I'm currently sketching out something a little different based on Objectification Theory and the Friend Zone Matrix.

N P said she's not keen on a Corruption mechanic:

Also, very pleased to hear that you’re not resorting to the “corruption” mechanic which, though I quite like it in some contexts, would be a let-down in FA.

Wild Bill saw a way it could be used:

I don't think a corruption attribute would necessarily imply grind. If it was used for scene variation rather than gating, for instance, having a high corruption wouldn't be inherently better than a low corruption.

And Falloutbabe suggested interaction with another planned system:

On the one hand, I am also against firm barriers that unlock Kate's actions, on the other hand, there should be some kind of border that determines how much she is willing to do. In the course of her task and camouflage Kate must inevitably carry out actions that are against her principles. Here, the previously mentioned level of stress could play a role.

These comments all helped guide my thinking on how to reflect the agent's increasing sexualisation, without (a) just ignoring it or (b) ruining her characterisation or railroading you into a Bad End.  I'm tentatively excited about my solution.  :-D

Okay, there is more I want to respond to (especially the important conversation Vysirez started), but I have to go socialise now.  I am at a family thing tomorrow, and plan to use Sunday to catch up on project & life admin, so the next dev day will be Monday.  I'll probably update the Trello and catch up on PMs and Discord over the weekend, but the next dev report will be Monday evening.  So have a great weekend, everybody, I'll see you then!