RESOURCE SHIPMENTS
Resources arriving as discrete scheduled or triggered deliveries — monthly supply drops, ordered shipments with lead times, caravans and cargo ships materializing goods at the dock — rather than continuous local production.
- SOLO-DEV COST MEDIUM
- TIMING REAL-TIME / TURN
- COMMON IN STRATEGY · CITY-BUILDER · COLONY-SIM · SURVIVAL
XCOM's monthly council supply drop structures its entire strategic economy (the month is a heartbeat: spend, survive, resupply), Anno's trade routes turn shipment scheduling into the mid-game's real puzzle (goods exist, but they're on a boat), colony sims like RimWorld sell orbital trader visits and drop-pod deliveries as lifelines with timing you don't control, and survival co-op games ritualize the supply drop as a contested map event. Designers deliver resources in shipments because arrival events create rhythm that faucets can't: a trickle of income is wallpaper, but a shipment is a moment — anticipation before, decisions after (the post-drop spending spree is a designed dopamine beat) — and the interval between shipments becomes a survival question that forces planning horizons ('will the food last until the ship docks?'). Shipments also make logistics attackable and dramatic: cargo in transit can be raided, delayed, or lost, which converts the economy's plumbing into gameplay surface, and lead times on ordered goods (buy now, receive in three days) price foresight against desperation. Key decisions: cadence and reliability (clockwork shipments enable planning; variable ones inject survival anxiety — pick per genre), whether shipments are passive income or placed orders with lead times, and interception stakes — can shipments fail, be stolen, or arrive damaged, and can the player do the same to enemies. Pitfall: shipment intervals without interval pressure — if nothing meaningful happens between deliveries and stockpiles comfortably bridge every gap, the shipment is just income with a loading animation; the mechanic earns its structure only when the wait itself is playable — scarcity to manage, arrival timing to plan around, or cargo to defend.