FIRAXIS: A list of EASY fixes for the next C3C patch - Page 2

Kull · November 13, 2003, 00:46

On the Player Setup Screen, PLEASE add a toggle for Tech Trading Allowed/Disallowed. It's a simple historical fact that Civilizations didn't trade Technological advances one for one in the manner represented in this game. Yes, knowledge was disseminated via trade routes, conquest, and theft, but those are NOT "barter". The idea of a Civilization game without Tech Trading may seem like Heresy, but I can guarantee it will add a whole new dimension to the game.

alexman · November 13, 2003, 00:47

kwpulliam1973, I suspect your last suggestion involves some work. Workers actually get moved by doing nothing when they are on auto (it's like hitting the space bar). Undoing (or delaying) that move might not be worth the effort for a patch.

Dominae · November 13, 2003, 01:01

Quote:

Originally posted by alexman
The problem with giving out a starting ship is that it's not possible to ensure that a civ will start by the coast.

Good point. I was so happy with my solution there for a while!

Quote:

And I suspect that teaching the AI how to perform suicide runs is outside the scope of a patch, although I hope I'm wrong.

I feel the same way. I would be happy if the AI would just build and use Curraghs a lot more frequently than they currently do. I can accept the fact that suicide missions will always be a human-only strategy; I cannot accept the fact that an entire unit is only useful to the human player.

---

Uber Krux: asking to get your favorite unit improved is not the point of this thread. The Mayans are just fine as they are (if not a bit too strong versus Restless Barbs).

Catt: I'm sure the designers will filter out what's important and what's not. If I were them I would wait a little, because these boards are all about hype. I think we should all play a little more to see what's really problematic and what's not (you have no idea how happy I am to do this now that the game is stable!).

Dominae

Catt · November 13, 2003, 01:15

Quote:

Originally posted by Dominae

Catt: I'm sure the designers will filter out what's important and what's not. If I were them I would wait a little, because these boards are all about hype. I think we should all play a little more to see what's really problematic and what's not (you have no idea how happy I am to do this now that the game is stable!).

I'm sure they will, too. I just wanted (and want!) a voice added to the clamor that calls out for a quick patch, fixing the truly unintended consequences in the first release, believing that it would be a better approach than a later patch that addresses game balance issues that may or may not be terribly problematic.

Catt

dexters · November 13, 2003, 01:37

Alexman, here's another fix for your list.

This one has to do with AI ships now bombarding only cities. It ties in with your lethal bombard request.

My suggesiton is essentially to return naval bombard to its previous state, and that was to bombard tile improvements.

http://apolyton.net/forums/showthrea...hreadid=101359 <--more info in this thread.

korn469 · November 13, 2003, 01:46

alexman

there is a problem with your "make civil defense have a bombard value of 48"

buildings with a bombard value when a town changes into a city, that's why civil defense doesn't have a bombard defense value

korn469 · November 13, 2003, 01:47

oh yea my suggestion...

add a "lethal stealth attack toggle" to the editor
this way planes could knock out tanks, but not infantry

Fried-Psitalon · November 13, 2003, 02:44

I must disagree with adding any more lethal land bombardment. No offense, but some of the items on your list are awfully SP-centered at the expense of MP, and while I know all the arguments that SP is the core and we MP folk are sneezes in a gale, C3C attempted to balance the two worlds equally.

Lethal land bombardment for boats would be tremendously abused by humans in SP and MP both - give me an aircraft carrier, a battleship, a transport and a single marine and I'll own every coastal city on the map in short order.

Also, the seafaring trait may be strong enough in SP without the sinking bonus, but that's pretty darn appealing in the MP world, since a lack of contact can utterly doom one team or the other in short order if the opposition doesn't have that problem.

I said this a lot during the beta, so I'm not surprised to say it again here: Let's look for fixes that don't come at the expense of either the SP or MP community, even if that may be more challenging, rather than one that robs Peter to pay Paul. Part of the reason MP *is* a sneeze in a gale is because that has gone on for too long!

Respectfully,
Your MP-Playing-Only Friedrich Psitalon

notyoueither · November 13, 2003, 03:41

Good points, F-P.

Standard rules have to reflect SP, MP, and most playing styles. I think pointing out the killer bugs would be more appropriate; assuming that BA and Firaxis need to be held by the hand to find them...

They would be:

1. GPT trading bug. It's a game killer.

2. FPs being counter productive for corruption reduction, and additional FPs making it worse.

3. Anti-RCP solution to RCP. Let me put it this way, corruption was the enemy for too many from day 1. Solving RCP by increasing corruption is, shall I say... killing the baby to save the bath water.

4. Not really a bug, just an SP game killing design decision. The little boats that the AI doesn't build. Yep, that one. The AI has to use them or remove them.

5. Republic army support costs... I have no proof yet, but I'll find it if it is there. I can say that as a human it is extremely easy for me to kill myself by an unwise switch to Republic. I did it in my first game and had a 5gpt free and clear income for my reward. Spread that out among research and rushing! I am positive that the AI is commiting economic hari-kari with this more often than not.

alexman · November 13, 2003, 04:20

Kull: tech trading can be disallowed with the current C3C editor. Just mark all techs as non-tradable.

Dexters: I'm sure they changed the AI naval bombardment priorities for a reason (WWII conquest) so I'm not sure they would want to change it back that easily. I thought that giving lethal land bombard to ships would make it OK to have the AI bombard cities instead of tiles, because it then would have a chance to kill units, not just damage them only to have them heal again. I no longer think lethal bombard is a good idea though.

Korn: I already stated the problem you mention with giving civil defense a bombard strength, along with the solution. Of course the real fix would be to have an extra editor flag "works for level-1 cities only" for walls.

Fried-Psitalon: Good point about giving lethal land bombard to ships. I see now that the increased movement of ships make it possible to strike a defender and conquer his coastal city before he has a chance to strike back, especially if that defender is the AI.

As for the seafaring trait, of course the reduced sinking chance is appealing in MP. It's appealing in SP. Too appealing for the human, but unused by the AI. The reduced sinking chances are already inherent in the seafaring trait from the +1 movement!

NYE: The 'killer bugs' are not very many, and I'm sure Firaxis will fix them soon enough. The additional point of this thread was to point out other possible fixes that are easy to implement in a patch. By the way, the Republic unit support should not be a problem for the AI on higher levels where it gets loads of free support.

notyoueither · November 13, 2003, 04:25

How about for players of Monarch and lower? They don't count?

alexman · November 13, 2003, 04:32

Sure they count, but the point of difficulty levels is to face a stronger AI as you go to harder levels, and a weaker AI at easier levels. Even Monarch-level AI Republic gets 8gpt plus 2gpt for each city.

Let's further investigate this Republic maintenance issue for the AI though.

droid · November 13, 2003, 05:38

I would like the ability to modify the rebase multiplier in the editor.

RomanGod · November 13, 2003, 06:21

Move the shield limit for unit costs back up to 10,000 shields! Plz!!

dexters · November 13, 2003, 07:26

Quote:

Dexters: I'm sure they changed the AI naval bombardment priorities for a reason (WWII conquest) so I'm not sure they would want to change it back that easily. I thought that giving lethal land bombard to ships would make it OK to have the AI bombard cities instead of tiles, because it then would have a chance to kill units, not just damage them only to have them heal again. I no longer think lethal bombard is a good idea though.

If that's the case, it will just be a waste of time for the AI to deploy its now large navies to bombard essentialyl useless targets. I had also theorized in my thread that it was probably WW II thar changed it, but do we want to let one scenario affect all epic games?

Perhaps a happy middle is for the AI to compromise. If there are less than X amount of tiles around a city, then it would be city bombardment. This would fit well with most of the island cities in the wWII conquests. Otherwise, bombard titles.

I still think this should be fixed since most people feel that the old AI navy was far more of a nusience when it actually destroyed something of value.

Backpack · November 13, 2003, 08:58

Alex - That makes sense about the worker movement points on Auto. - While I would like to see it, it would probably require an entire review of all the code related to auto-settlers - Too Complicated for a quick patch. Thanks.

On the suggestion of airliftable bombardment units. - I forgot to mention that Settlers are not airliftable either. unless there is a dead horse relevent to not making them airliftable, I would like to see that implimented for a standard game as well.

Thanks again for collecing all these posts and putting together a comprehensive - "Please Fix These While You're At it" list.

Kevin

Inverse Icarus · November 13, 2003, 12:47

not sure how easy it is, but there should be away to defend against "stealth attacks", like when subs pick their target. i mean, if theres a destroyer in the stack, you can SEE the sub approach, so why does it get the advantage of picking off the carrier / transport?

korn469 · November 13, 2003, 13:15

alexman

are you updating the list?

alexman · November 13, 2003, 13:18

Yes, I try to add things that are easy, well-defined solutions to commonly accepted problems.

korn469 · November 13, 2003, 13:46

alexman,

URGENT KILLER-BUG FIXES (EVEN IF NOT SO EASY TO FIX):

sounds great

Gamebalance Issues
I agree with the changes you propose to walls, though I don't think it would solve the bombardment problem. Plus I don't think it is an "easy" change.

Also changing seafaring probably isn't an easy change either. Plus it's easy to fix both suicide ships, and the Curraghs problem in the editor.
*Make sea and ocean cost 2 movement
*Make galleys and curraghs wheeled units, and make oceans impassible to wheeled units
*Make Curraghs have a transport capacity of 1 (not tested)

Coastal Fortresses, possibly a good change
Colosseum, again possibly a good change

AI behavior Issues

GS replacing MI, I'm not sure I don't play the standard epic game enough

Removing the offense flag, I don't think it's needed

Not making MPPs with enemies, sounds good

USER INTERFACE ENHANCEMENTS

I agree with all of these

EDITOR ENHANCEMENTS

agree with all of these, though instead of immune to lethal bombard flag, you could add a "lethal stealth attack" flag could do the same thing, and it could possibly be easier to code

two others for editor options

*remove the hardcoding from army movement rates
*removing the hardcoded distinction between scientific and military Great Leaders
*would like the ability to modify the rebase multiplier in the editor (from droid)

also did you miss the civil engineer bug? I think you should add it to this list

alexman · November 13, 2003, 13:49

What is the civil engineer bug?

Also, how will a "lethal stealth attack" flag prevent air units from killing infantry? I don't follow...

Stuie · November 13, 2003, 14:00

Quote:

Originally posted by alexman
Increase the happy faces for the Colosseum by 1. This way it becomes a viable alternative to Cathedrals for non-religious civs. Colosseums are probably currently the least-built improvement along with coastal fortresses.

I don't think this is necessarily true anymore given the luxury resource scarcity found in C3C. It may still be low on my build list, but I certainly build them now since I am usually unable to obtain all 8 luxuries. Perhaps a slight cost reduction is in order to bring the [happy faces/shield expenditure] ratio more in line with Cathedrals.

Jon Miller · November 13, 2003, 14:05

Quote:

Originally posted by alexman
Increase the happy faces for the Colosseum by 1. This way it becomes a viable alternative to Cathedrals for non-religious civs. Colosseums are probably currently the least-built improvement along with coastal fortresses.

why?

this does nto seem like something that is broke

they are not meant to be the same, they are meant to be different with each having it's own advantages (not just the same buildign twice)

Jon Miller

alexman · November 13, 2003, 14:09

Quote:

Originally posted by korn469
Also changing seafaring probably isn't an easy change either. Plus it's easy to fix both suicide ships, and the Curraghs problem in the editor.
*Make sea and ocean cost 2 movement
*Make galleys and curraghs wheeled units, and make oceans impassible to wheeled units
*Make Curraghs have a transport capacity of 1 (not tested)

I would imagine that the change to the seafaring trait must be very simple: when calculating sinking odds, somewhere there is a check to see whether the unit belongs to a seafaring civ. Just remove that check!

The three changes you suggest are significant departures from the original design, and I'm not sure Firaxis will want to do this in a patch. By the way, I tested giving curraghs a transport capacity and the AI builds them too often (they sit idle in a city waiting to get loaded with units that have not yet been built). Also, Alphabet allowing a naval trasport changes the AI's research priorities big time.

alexman · November 13, 2003, 14:15

Regarding Cathedrals, perhaps you're right that the luxury scarcity in C3C has made them more useful than they were. I will remove the suggestion as not "commonly accepted".

Jon Miller · November 13, 2003, 14:30

your suggestion would make cathedrals unuseful for anything but religious civs

lets look at the number

cathedral
160 cost
2 per turn
3 culture
requires tech to the middle ages
requires temple
3 content faces

colloseum
120 cost
2 per turn
2 culture
no prerequisites
early tech
2 content faces

the only advantages the cathedral has is in culture and content faces

in every other way colloseums are better

they cost less, are avaiable earlier, and don't require a prerequisite

Jon Miller

alexman · November 13, 2003, 14:34

Non-religious civ:

Cathedrals cost 53.3 shields and 0.67 maintenance per happy face.

Colosseums cost 60 shields and 1.0 maintenance per happy face.

How on earth did you convince yourself that colosseums are better?

Jon Miller · November 13, 2003, 14:39

the tech and prerequisites issue which you have ignored

Jon Miller

korn469 · November 13, 2003, 14:41

alexman

the civil engineering bug is that the shields don't display properly

adding a lethal stealth attack flag, then selecting tanks, modern armor, etc as the only units air units can stealth attack fixing the problem of air units killing infantry

as far as the ease of the sea faring fix, one requires a coder, and one requires 5 minutes in the editor

Thoth · November 13, 2003, 14:42

Jon: The Cathedral is more cost effective in terms of gold/sheilds per happy face and per culture. Once I get Monotheism, colloseums drop to the bottom of my priority list until very late in the game.