Pattern

Boosting engine

An internal investment increases the future flow of the same resource. The player trades action now for greater future capacity.

Ask

What internal investment increases the later flow?

Sources

1. Michael Sellers, Advanced Game Design: A Systems Approach, ch. 7, p. 236A boosting engine is a system that adds resources to the game in a way that enables the player to choose between using them to act within the game in the moment or to invest them to gain a greater flow of resources in the future.
2. Ernest Adams and Joris Dormans, Game Mechanics: Advanced Game Design, ch. 4, pp. 66–69If StarCraft players set aside a certain portion of their mineral income to build new SCVs, they get the same curve as money in a savings account.
3. Daniel Cook, Value chains – A method for creating and balancing faucet-and-drain game economies, “Source Type: Investment (Exponential)”Positive feedback loops result in hard to balance economies.

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