News from the Services Pool update:Services Pool has 4 sources:
- PCs
- Local servants (resident NPCs)
- Guest workers (non-resident NPCs)
- Tourists (wealthy visiting NPCs).
These are by and large equal in size.
It has 6 destinations:
- Accommodation (for NPCs)
- Hotels (for tourists)
- Eating and drinking (for all)
- Shopping (for all)
- Halls (for all)
- Special (for all)
Eating and drinking is the largest by far, surpassing even
combined accommodation and hotels. The city has well responded to the need, though, and currently has 26 establishment serving the hungry and thirsty, in 5 price categories. The list below was a composition of a large work of PC's telling where they like to eat, tourists visiting places that are accessible and in the city centre, and NPC's eating cheaply near places where they live. The greatest concentrations of NPCs are near the Department Store where there are 3 highrises, the Hive area with 2 highrises and a garrison of 27 soldiers, and the Citadel with lots of soldiers and no services.
The results show that tourists could not support any restaurant totally, they are still so few. Eg. Town Hall has
/$$$$ but did not do so well. The players did support Grand Hotel, G & Q and Monero House, which were the winners. Many
/$$ taverns did very well just because there are so many NPC's. The 3 worst-performing ones were all managed by the Royal family who do not apparently understand that $$$ price point is too low for the players to get interested and simultaneously too high for NPCs. It was the winning recipe for Grail and Quail, though, due to their excellent location they were able to attract both tourists, PC's and NPC's, despite the food being
. Grand Hotel has solidified its position as
the restaurant in town (overwhelming victory in popular vote over Noble Palace, which was not mentioned even once as a diner). Good income is the result of one service bringing in 16 times the money that the $ place makes (not so much that the place was full - it never is, and it is large).
The city can easily support more taverns but the target group needs to be thought out. Luck also plays a role: H, D and Q used to be a place frequented by players. Now nobody goes there but the neighboring Hive residents (who are many). Roopatra's 2 taverns were packed full in the last calculation, then she enlarged them. Now they are doing only average, despite Mama's receiving its first
. Royal Palace basement used to have a
/$$ place, a miracle combo of royal kitchen food, cheaply, in a good location. Still it was visited neither by PCs nor NPCs. We re-branded it King's Kitchen and tripled the price. Now it is doing OK. The only target group, tourists, did not care so much, rather wanted to eat expensively since it's King's kitchen anyway.
Name................ Income Size price quality
Grand Hotel Restaurant 19 4 5 3
Grail and Quail..... 13 3 3 0
Hung, Drawn and Quartd 10 3 2 0
The Hive Tavern..... 8 2 2 0
Monero House Restaurant 8 3 4 2
Grand Hotel Drink Bar 7 3 5 n/f
Zech Guesthouse Tavern 7 1 2 0
Town Hall Restaurant 6 3 4 2
Bar in Department Store 6 1 2 n/f
House Tavern of L1 5 2 1 0
House Tavern of L5 5 2 1 0
Mama's Kitchen..... 5 3 2 1
Town Hall Tavern 4 2 4 n/f
King's Kitchen..... 4 2 4 1
The Golden Lion.... 4 2 3 1
Priory House Restaurant 4 2 3 1
Priory House Tavern 4 2 2 1
North Gate Tavern 4 2 2 0
Jacket's Tavern at C8 4 1 2 0
Outside the Wall 4 3 2 0
House Tavern of L3 4 2 2 0
Tavern in G. Hotel haw 4 2 1 0
smooth's Rooftop 3 2 4 1
Behind the Cathedral 3 2 3 n/f
King's Guesthouse Tvrn 2 1 3 0
Zechariah Palace Tavern 1 1 3 0
The midprice hotel race did not have a clear winner. All hotels get quite a good fill, and they are quite small anyway. In the luxury hotel category, the Noble Palace did not receive much income, relative to the Grand Hotel. It is catering to a segment that is not visiting our town in a regular basis, and to make up for it, the prices are so high that no occasional visitor goes there. Everyone except the Most Honorable Chairman of the Club advices his guests to go to Grand Hotel instead. The own memberbase is still so small that receptions are few. As a result, Noble Palace is mostly empty. (GH had the same problem with lacking audience in the last week, but now it's starting to hit the spot so perhaps NP will do it sooner or later.)
The King's Old Department Store did very well. It was originally intended to be a luxury goods outlet for PC's, but now it is in the middle of 80 guesthouse rooms and NPC family apartments and serves them. The commercial space in the ground floors of buildings did not do very well, except in the coveted locations.