Chapter 48: Alpha 0.3 Life, New Playstyle!

Early the next morning...

Outside the wall of the nursing home, loud shouts could be heard.

"To start the abandoned construction site stone transportation mission, we have a group of three! We need one more player and the rent for two small carts has already been paid! Anyone who wants to join can message me privately!”

"Are there any players of the strength type? Waiting for another teammate to cut trees and earn money to level up!"

"I’m an agility type player, waiting for one teammate to accept the mission to head out to the northern townhouses to start the scavenging mission. Perception type players will be under first consideration. Intelligence type players, please stand aside.”

"Damn, do intelligence type players have no human rights?"

"The outpost is recruiting part-time warehouse administrators, with a fixed daily salary of nine silver coins and one hundred contribution points. Working hours are from 6 am to 6 pm, with a three hour break in between. Your job includes checking account books and inventory, material procurement, and sales. Intelligence types will be considered. There are only two slots available. Note that the administrator will always be watching, if he finds out that you are breaking the rules, you will be punished severely... Fuck yeah! Sign me up!"

"The woodworking hut is also hiring! The daily salary is ten silver coins and two hundred contribution points, and additional commissions will be based on orders fulfilled. Uh, woodworking experience is required. You must know how to handle logs, and can make good quality furniture, bows, and spears... Damn, those requirements are so high."

After the update, every player received a novice gift pack of 5 copper coins from the generous Administrator.

What could they actually do with five copper coins?

Actually, they could do a lot!

For example, players can rent an axe for 5 hours from the logging hut, or rent a cart or other tools from the warehouse for 5 hours.

If they didn’t want to rent equipment, players could also buy a pound of shofar potatoes, green wheat, or 100 grams of jerky in the warehouse. The purchasing power was pretty high.

It had to be said that players were creatures that had great adaptability to new environments.

If the scavengers on Baker Street heard that someone would replace the chips that they had been using for nearly a century with a few pieces of metal, they would immediately raise arms and go for a desperate battle.

However, players were completely different!

They were a group of particles suspended in Brownian Motion in a bottle, and chaos and order had duality. As long as they still needed to repeat the actions of putting on and taking off the helmet, they would never be able to jump out of the bottle.

The game has rules, and updates and adjustments were the norm.

Everything seemed like common sense to the players.

In less than an hour, these little geniuses were already familiar with the rules of the new version even without anyone to teach them. They began to figure out how to adapt themselves to it.

In the open space in front of the fence...

Ample Time did not leave immediately. Instead, he found Old White, Night Ten, and Gale. They sat together for a combat meeting.

Ample Time quickly took the lead and started. "The biggest change in the update is the changes to the economic system and identity system."

"I just consulted the Administrator's assistant. If we want to get contribution points, in addition to making major contributions, they can only be obtained through employment. Take the warehouse administrator with the lowest threshold as an example. You can get one hundred contribution points every day if you work. If everyone starts with zero contribution points, they will need twenty days to buy their citizenship.”

Gale touched the bridge of his nose, raised his hand, and continued, "Let me add something. It doesn't just have to be employment. Daily tasks are guaranteed to grant contribution points. Take cutting twenty trees and dragging them to the woodworking hut as an example. In addition to the rewards for cutting the trees, we can also get eighty contribution points... Unfortunately, the upper limit of earning contribution points is one hundred and sixty, which means that we will hit the cap after two missions.”

Ample Time mumbled, "Mhm... If one uses the three hour break as a warehouse administrator to do their daily mission, the theoretical maximum contribution point one can earn a day is two hundred and sixty. It will take eight days to accumulate two thousand points. However... It’s not going to be easy for ordinary players to earn this.”

Night Ten whispered, "Damn, doesn’t that mean that my three thousand contribution points is a ridiculous number?!”

Old White touched the back of his head and said with a smile, "I have 5000."

"Holy shit!" Night Ten yelled.

When they first entered the game, contribution points when they cut trees were calculated based on the length and thickness of the wood. Trees as thick as arms would gain 1 contribution point per meter. Trees as thick as thighs would gain 2 contribution points per meter.

Perhaps, the game’s numerical planning was not well designed at the start. As a result, Old White who was of the strength type gained 800 points just by cutting trees, and even Ample Time who had the worst stamina, gained 300 points per day.

It was obviously a ridiculous number!

Sure enough, starting from Alpha 0.2, the income from cutting a tree had been greatly nerfed. In version 0.3, they would only gain two to four copper coins according to the thickness and length of the tree. If players didn’t have their own axe, they had to pay a copper coin per hour to rent one.

Even if one hacked down twenty pine trees that were as thick as one’s thigh a day, one could only earn eighty copper coins, which was only eight silver coins!

Coupled with the eighty contribution points in the past from the same number of trees, the Lumberjack class had been greatly nerfed!

However, the outpost was not short of wood. It was estimated that the trees were cut to prepare for farming in the coming year.

"Thanks to the overflow of contribution point data in the early game, the four of us have the highest contribution points in the game. I have already redeemed my citizenship, you should upgrade your status as well. In this way, the area we get in total will add up to twenty square meters. We can obtain a good spot close to the nursing home."

"What are we doing with the land?"

"Of course we’re going to build a house! Is there something wrong with building a three-story building with a small apartment of twenty square meters? As long as the height does not exceed the nursing home, we should be fine. The first floor can be the living room and the second and third floor will be partitioned so each of us will get a room. Isn't this nice?"

Ample Time rolled his eyes at Night Ten. How could this guy ask such stupid questions?

"It makes sense..." Old White's eyes lit up. "We can use the first floor as a shop to do business!"

The building would face the main entrance of the nursing home, where players would spawn! It was simply the prime location amongst prime locations. They could sell anything they wanted and they would still be rich!

"Yes! I also took this into consideration!" Ample Time snapped his fingers while smiling with confidence.

"The new version obviously encourages players to be creative and organize production and trading by their own initiative! Do you remember what the developer emphasized at the start of version 0.3? The goal of Wasteland Online is to create an economic system that can truly reflect the relationship between supply and demand. This also determines that a large part of the equipment and supplies of the players in the future may have to be obtained through player transactions!"

It was the perfect time to get their hands on prime land at the moment!

Unfortunately, the identity system limited the upper limit of the land that each player could purchase. Otherwise, Ample Time would’ve given in to his desire to save money to buy all the land around the nursing home and develop real estate in the wasteland.

Wasn’t his method more cost-effective than buying a house in Beijing, Shanghai, and Guangzhou?

After all, there was no way the game wouldn’t be a massive hit the moment it was released!

"Nice!" Even Gale couldn't help but give a thumbs up at the idea.

The analysis was just too damn good!

Night Ten and Old White looked at each other, their faces filled with excitement.

"How much does it cost to buy land?"

Ample Time explained, "I checked. We only need ten silver coins for one square meter. What we have to do now is to grab two hundred silver coins before the other players and buy the nearest twenty square meters from the nursing home!"

Old White hesitated slightly. "What if someone is faster than us?"

Ample Time made a helpless expression. "If that happens, then invite him into our group."

At present, few people have been promoted to citizenship. Even if someone was faster than them, how many could there be? Having more people in the group was not a bad thing.

Nodding, they didn’t object to bringing more people in.

"I have another question," Night Ten raised his hand and asked, "What shall we do to save money? I checked. Burning cement pays the most with no experience requirement. However, the daily income is only ten mere silver coins. If we count the 20% production bonus, it's only twelve silver coins at most... Moreover, they only need two people!”

Gale pointed in the direction of the production site and continued, "There’s no vacancy now anyway. Just look at the cement kiln... smoke is already rising and there are probably a ton of people there.”

Although the cement kiln was built by Old White and the others, after version 0.3 updated the land system, the facilities inside the wall were counted as public facilities.

As the builders of the facility, both Old White and Ample Time had a 30-day right of first refusal.

Unfortunately, the location of the cement kilns was too far. They were almost next to the wall. Not to mention that some monsters might invade the nursing home one day, and the first thing they destroy would be those kilns.

Neither of them intended to waste precious land purchase quota. After all, it didn’t take much technical skill to make those kilns. It was better to wait for the disposal of assets 30 days later. Ultimately, the administrator would compensate them with a sum of money and contribution points.

In fact, they almost couldn't wait for the administrator to confiscate it that very moment so they could buy land with the compensation.

Ample Time touched his chin and said, "Even if there are still vacancies, I don't recommend applying for those fixed positions. If we want to outperform other players, we must find another way."

Night Ten looked at him and raised an eyebrow curiously, "Like what?"

"Like hunting!"

"Hunting?"

Ample Time nodded. "Mhm, I checked the warehouse earlier and found that the dead body of a mutant hyena can be exchanged for five silver coins. If the prey weighs more than thirty kilograms, we can get an extra two copper coins for every kilogram."

Night Ten's eyes widened. "5 silver coins? That’s a lot!"

Moreover, that was the minimum compensation they would obtain.

Although the weight of a mutant hyena was thirty kilograms or so, during autumn, most of the prey would be hoarding fat, and they would generally be heavier than usual.

In that regard, the game was very detailed!

"... Mhm, in addition to the mutant hyena, there are also mutant reindeer on the purchase list. The price of each prey is at least twelve silver coins! Basically, if the four of us team up, as long as we can hunt eight mutant hyenas a day, we can steadily surpass the income of four people producing cement!"

That was the fastest way to earn two hundred silver coins that Ample Time could think of.

"But... Where are we going to find so much prey?" Old White wondered hesitantly, "There seem to be only birds and small animals in the wetland park. We can only find larger prey when we head into the city, right? "

Before Ample Time answered, Night Ten raised his hand. "Don't worry about this! I have been hunting with the Administrator these days. I remember the dangerous places in this area and where there are many prey. Not only that, but yesterday, the Administrator and I also found the migrating deer herd. As long as we follow their footprints, we’ll be able to find our prey!”

Gale nodded. "Mhm, Night Ten is a perception type. His 9 point perception is currently the highest among all players. Searching for prey shouldn't be difficult. Now the question is, how should we hunt? The weapon merchant is still not available at the moment."

Ample Time smiled confidently in response. "There is no need to use guns. Spears, slingshots, bows, and crossbows... As long as they are used properly, these weapons are not inferior to guns in medium and close range."

"Have you used a bow before? It's not easy to hit a target." Gale frowned.

Back when the university organized an open demonstration with an archery club, he tried it once. He used bows with professional sights to shoot targets. Unfortunately, there was no need to even mention hitting a target twenty meters away. One would be considered a talent if they could even scratch the target after shooting ten arrows!

Everyone clearly aimed at their own targets, but their arrows might end up on other people’s target but more often than not, they would end up scattered on the ground on the protective cotton that had been put up.

If they had a bow and arrow without a sight...

Gale couldn't imagine what kind of accuracy they would be able to achieve.

Whatever it was, Ample Time didn’t seem to be worried at all. He maintained a confident smile and continued, “Don't worry about this. Leave the archery to me. I have some experience with it. You are responsible for making traps and dealing the final blow. Old White will be our tank, and Night Ten is responsible for detection and alerting us in case anything goes wrong."

"Trust me, we won’t have any problems with this lineup!”