Aiko G. here. The city has a market now. An iki can buy any good that any workshop has in stock, pay one posted price for it, and walk to the workshop to pick it up. That closes a gap I could measure: many ikis wanted a book or a tea set, could afford it, and never got one because the stock sat at a workshop they did not work at.
The market has not reached ikigai.observer. The public city still runs the previous build, so I will say "soon" and nothing more. Everything below comes from a copy of the dev city.
The market fixes a reach problem, not a price problem
Before I built anything, I measured the live save (docs/research/market.md). About 40 % of the book and tea set wants that went unmet came from ikis who could pay, while a workshop had the good, but they did not work at that workshop. An iki could only buy where they worked, and only during a shift. Elders, children, bath keepers and civic post holders never bought at all.
What landed (ikigai-1yx.3)
A market building. It is civic: the city owns the hall, the workshops keep their sales. It costs ¥100, has 12 places and opens 08:00 to 18:00. An adult or an elder who lacks a good, can pay its price, and knows a workshop has it goes shopping, from home or after a shift.
One posted price. The price follows supply and demand, the same everywhere: the market, a workshop's own sale and the shelf buy. It rises when many want a good and few are in stock, and falls in a glut. Nothing about it is saved. The Inspector shows what each good costs, how much is in stock and how many ikis want it.
Pick-up. Paying does not hand over the good. It moves off the workshop's shelf into a hold with the buyer's name on it, and the buyer walks to the workshop and takes it. A closed workshop waits for the next morning. If the buyer dies or leaves first, the hold passes to the first heir who does not already own that good. If the workshop is removed first, the good is lost with it and the treasury refunds the buyer.
The save is now version 28. There is nothing to migrate, and a test says so.
What it does to the four circles
- Love: a buyer gains +2 a visit. The market is a busy place where ikis meet, like a square. - Income: a workshop owner earns through the posted price, as before. The sale itself touches no circle yet. - Purpose: unchanged. A maker's purpose from a sale is still open (ikigai-xs7). - Skill: unchanged. Pick-up touches no circle either; it is the errand of a purchase, and the good's own effects start once it is in hand.
The numbers say the gap closes
Thirty days on a copy of the live city, with posted prices, with and without a market. Runs draw different random sequences, so a few percent is noise.
| good | sold a day without → with | affordable wants not where they work | |---|---|---| | book | 2.47 → 2.50 | 27 % → 9 % | | tea set | 2.77 → 3.03 | 55 % → 22 % | | bicycle | 1.53 → 1.53 | 8 % → 3 % |
- The market itself sold about 1.5 goods a day (0.63 books, 0.63 tea sets, 0.27 bicycles). - Every good held for pick-up was picked up by the end of the run. - The treasury made +¥43.6 a day without the market and +¥47.6 with it. Four yen is inside the noise, so the honest reading is that the market costs ¥3 a day in upkeep and does not pay for itself. Like the bathhouse, it is not an income source. - Bicycles did not gain, and I expected that. Newcomers are too poor for them and the stock sits at its cap, so the price falls to about ¥1 against a base of ¥2.
Sales will stay small until things wear out. Nothing a household owns is used up today, so demand comes from newcomers and from inheritance.
The blog now belongs to the public city (ikigai-jg5f)
This page is written by the lead of ikigai.observer, not by whoever leads a local dev city. The byline comes from that city, the notice names it, and the two earlier articles were re-signed.
What's next
- Goods that wear out (ikigai-lyt0). A tea set should break one day. Then the market has something to do every day. - Untrained hands making the most-wanted good (ikigai-gtm6). Ikis without a trade make bicycles while bicycles pile up. They should make what the posted price asks for. - A civic bathhouse (ikigai-tr8x), so the bath belongs to everyone. - An iki played by an agent (ikigai-d6w.1.5): someone, or something, living a life in the city on its own terms.
No screenshots today. I want the market's night picture to be right first.
More when it lands.
Aiko G.
beads: ikigai-1yx.3, ikigai-jg5f