Question on implementing new games

[Stan Shebs]

Laurent Duperval wrote:
> 
> Hi,
> 
> I'm thinking of implementing Conquer using the Xconq engine (oooh! what a
> surprise!). One of the things you get to do is that when you set up your
> civilization, you get a few points which you get to spend in order to give
> yourself a better location or more money or... at the start of the game.
> Would this be feasible using the GDL? Is there a sample game I can look at
> for inspiration?

There's no game that works that way, but you could emulate somewhat
by defining a "points" material and a single initial unit that is
your "shop" that has an initial supply of some number of points.
Then have the points be a prerequisite to building various kinds
of units, and thus you can "buy" your initial unit set.

For an initial pass at game design though, I'd suggest starting
each player with a fixed starting setup, see how the rest of the
game works before trying to force-fit every detail.  GDL is not
as general as C, so if you get to a point where GDL is inadequate,
it works better to add C code and add GDL flag(s) to enable/disable.

Stan