starting tech allocation: how it works

CapTVK · February 7, 2000, 06:35

When I playtested the 'king of the castle'-map last sunday I seemed to have a tremendous amount of techs: ten. At first I thought I had a lucky fluke but afterwards I took another look at the map and decided to try again to see how much extra techs I got. The results were amazing: 7 to 10 techs (including monarchy many times) almost every time. No matter what civ I chose I always ended up with 7-10 techs except for one civ. But more on that later...

I believed that the formula for getting extra starting techs was based on the distance relative to other civs and landmass. And for the first time I had a chance to test this premise. Because the starting location for all civs on the 'king of the castle'-map are fixed and evenly spaced relative to one another. The results will always tend to be the same.
I simply restarted every game on deity ,restless tribes, 7civs, no random starting positions, revealed the map and counted the techs every civ got at the start. All the civ's (AI controlled) that started on islands got around 7-8, sometimes 5 but I've never seen a civ on an island get less than 5.
The only civ that was odd was the 7th, the purple civ exactly in the center of the map. It never received any techs. All the times it would get 0 techs even when I selected the civ to start with. I would never receive any techs.

Preliminary findings (25x) would tend me to conclude that tech allocation is based on:[*]Relative distance to other civs[*]Landmass (the 6 civs all started on small islands, the 7th had an entire continent to itself)[*]Starting location (the purple civ had a lot of good squares in the center)

You can check out the map on this thread: http://apolyton.net/forums/Forum2/HTML/001288.html

And the testgame on this thread: http://apolyton.net/forums/Forum2/HTML/001290.html

MacUser · February 7, 2000, 08:38

Is that just for the starting (first/host) player? Two of us (including myself) received no extra tech other than irrag. mining and roads. I was the middle north country, so I was closer to the land mass than the corners. Did that make a difference?

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CapTVK · February 7, 2000, 09:41

Thanks for the info MacUser. I tested this in singleplayer mode and wasn't sure if the other players who joined at the start got any techs. What I need to find out now is if AI players at the start do get the average 5-8 techs. I think they do because I was on an island with the Egyptians who had some techs to trade. So it seems that the AI does get techs at startup but human players, apart from the host, don't.

This isn't a problem on this map however, all starting location are set. I could start a MP player with 6 AI civ's. As host I would get the average 8 tech and so do the AI civ's. The human players can then hotjoin take over an AI civ and get their average 8 techs for free. Just like the host!

This means that the host tech advantage is (almost?) eliminated...

ECHO Cho ho o · February 7, 2000, 15:11

When playing a single player game I have noticed that when i get alot of tec's im usually close to another civ. The more tec's i get the closer they are. I use this to judge my starting strategy

Caesar the Great · February 7, 2000, 15:53

A better way to start your map would be if you made it into a scenario. This would ensure that people get techs!! Unlike your host advantage of 10 and 0 for all of us. I was slaughtered by an AI who had 12 techs!!! Vs my none!!! Note they started ON my island!!! To prevent this from happening again as I said MAKE this into a scenario.

Great map... just needs to be fair for the humans (not only the AI), you can't win against an AI that is 5 squares away from you, especially since they had an infinite amount more of techs than you.

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It's a wonder in this world when it takes a fascist to make democracy work ~ EvC

The only way to peace is through war. Conquer or be conquered.

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CtG

BlackJack · February 7, 2000, 16:10

I'm with ECHO, when I get a lot of techs at the start, I figure I'm in trouble - either I've got a neighbor nearby or I'm in pretty dinky territory. So I start accordingly - war techs and map making - until I figure out which situation it is.

CapTVK · February 8, 2000, 10:57

quote:

Originally posted by Caesar the Great on 02-07-2000 02:53 PM
A better way to start your map would be if you made it into a scenario. This would ensure that people get techs!!

Great map... just needs to be fair for the humans (not only the AI), you can't win against an AI that is 5 squares away from you, especially since they had an infinite amount more of techs than you.

Noted, actually I designed the map to be flat but the maps are always wrapped in normal play. That's why we had two islands on the map with 2 civ's each on them instead of four islands with one civ each. I want to edit the map first before I start experimenting with scenario's. For now I'll place all the islands along the top and bottom of the map. That should take care of that problem...

CapTVK · February 11, 2000, 18:10

Tested the map in flat mode, all players seem to get far less techs now, interesting results...