AU: A MOD for the curiculum

[Dominae]

I agree with lockstep. JWs are good enough to use right until the end of the Medieval era (and beyond). So I would very much like to have my JWs only upgrade late in the game.

Whether the AI will use them as effectively throughout this period is another matter. I suspect not. Therefore, I think JWs should upgrade to either Swordsmen or Horsemen. I think Horsemen would be more powerful, however, since JWs - Horsemen - Knights completely undermines Chariots and bypasses Swordsmen entirely.


Dominae

[player1]

Somehow I choose them to upgrade to Horsmen, since someone would actuly like to have "tank-type" Swordsmen and "bandit-type" in same time.

And it looks unnatural that when you get Iron and have NO Hrsmes, to lose only mobile unit.

Luckly, you could delay Horseback Riding for some time, if you like Jaguars a lot.

After that, you could make one huge big upgrade (as some people like to do).

P.S.
Of course if you still prefer Jaguars, you could make several "rural" 2-3pop cities unconnecet to Horses which could make Jaguars. And since Jaguars are cheap, they could do that quickly too.

[alexman]

Originally posted by Dominae
I think Horsemen would be more powerful, however, since JWs - Horsemen - Knights completely undermines Chariots and bypasses Swordsmen entirely.

Chariots would be removed from the Aztec build queue. JWs are just cheap chariots, after all.

However, when in doubt, leave it unchanged. So for 1.04 JWs will continue to upgrade to swordsmen. The Aztecs are a powerful enough civ as it is (ask Vel), no need to help them out more.

[Theseus]

KD, I'll start the new thread. I'll also put a thread in Creation just to see if the modders have any contributions.

[Dominae]

Yep, the Aztecs are plenty powerful. As for JWs and resources, I usually "unconnect" one of my big production cities just to produce a legion of the little suckers. Seems like a pretty drastic move, but they're really that good.


Dominae

[player1]

Originally posted by alexman
Chariots would be removed from the Aztec build queue. JWs are just cheap chariots, after all.

However, when in doubt, leave it unchanged. So for 1.04 JWs will continue to upgrade to swordsmen. The Aztecs are a powerful enough civ as it is (ask Vel), no need to help them out more.

Althoug personnaly Jaguar to Horsmen is probebly better option then Jaguar to Swordsmen.

If you don't have Horses, you'll need Iron in order to kill something. If you do get Iron, you'll lose your only mobile unit.


On the other hand, keeping Jaguar to later ages is interesting option too. Surely more then original "Jaguar to Swordsmen upgrade".

But I still think that Jaguar to Horsmen is more natural.

[player1]

Originally posted by Dominae
Yep, the Aztecs are plenty powerful. As for JWs and resources, I usually "unconnect" one of my big production cities just to produce a legion of the little suckers. Seems like a pretty drastic move, but they're really that good.


Dominae

On the other hand, you also want to upgrade them after some time.
Unfortunately, you can't do both things in same time.

[Dominae]

I've been looking at the Governments tab in the Editor, trying to come up with some change for Communism. I have to say, there aren't my options available. Here are a few:

1. Increase Worker production under Communism by 50% (from 2 to 3). This is the standard suggestion.

2. Increase the number of free units supportable by Towns, Cities and Metropolises (under Communism). The exact number is negotiable.

3. Increase the base number of free units supportable by the entire nation, under Communism. I can't think of a number here, but maybe something around 30?

4. Under Republic, decrease the Worker rate from 2 to 1.

5. Play with the Espionage tab to make Communism the one and only viable Espionage government.


Options 2 and 3 make Communism better for war. Since the AI already almost always switches to Communism during war-time, this could help it out considerably. Option 1 is ok, but won't make Communism that mure more appealing, I don't think. Option 5 is (IMO) quite boring, but maybe something interesting can be worked out.

Option 4 is the real eyebrow-raiser. Basically my reasoning is that by weakening of The Republic, all the other playable government get a boost, including Communism. Want to go builder but remain peaceful? Democracy. Want a nice economy but still conduct some war? Republic. Want to conduct long wars but still build your infrastructure? Monarchy. Want to be a warmonger, and rule over vast empires? Communism.

Obviously, these options aren't mutually exclusive.

Any comments?


Dominae

[Killerdaffy]

Originally posted by Dominae
I've been looking at the Governments tab in the Editor, trying to come up with some change for Communism. I have to say, there aren't my options available. Here are a few:

1. I think this is a viable option, even though the AI wont make too much out of it (take a loot at the discussion on AI workers)

2. Hm, uninspired

3. Creates problems with different map sizes (30 units on tiny is A LOT)

4. Out of the question in this mod (too far reaching consequences)

5. Sounds interesting but I don't see a way of implementing this.

[alexman]

Number 4 is a very interesting suggestion. Unrealistic, but it might improve gameplay as you suggest. The choice between Monarchy and Republic would be even tougher than it is now (Non-religious players now use Monarchy only when they will be fighting for a long time). This actually might be a bad thing though, because it would help Religious civs even more.

Originally posted by Dominae
Want to be a warmonger, and rule over vast empires? Communism.

The problem is that Communism is terrible for vast empires because each new city increases the corruption of each and every one of your existing cities.

What about this: Make a new city improvement that decreases corruption and works only for communism. This is the next best thing since we can't change the hardcoded level of communal corruption.

[Killerdaffy]

Originally posted by Killerdaffy
5. Sounds interesting but I don't see a way of implementing this.

duh!!! sure, just setting all spies to elite but this doesn't change the cost, does it?

[lockstep]

Originally posted by alexman
Number 4 is a very interesting suggestion. Unrealistic, but it might improve gameplay as you suggest. The choice between Monarchy and Republic would be even tougher than it is now (Non-religious players now use Monarchy only when they will be fighting for a long time). This actually might be a bad thing though, because it would help Religious civs even more.

I'll support any tweak that makes the choice between Civ3's rather uninspired governments (compared to SMAC's Social Engineering system) more interesting, even if this means boosting an already good civ trait. But this is a big change, so we should look out for unwanted side-effects.

BTW, I've playtested a worker rate of 1 (for despotism) in korn's blitz mod. This feature definitely makes a difference, but could be annoying for novice players, as it takes forever to build tile improvements on forests, hills etc. A solution would be to increase the worker rate of every government but Republic by 1.

[Dominae]

Killerdaffy, I admit my suggestions are mostly uninspired (other than number 4), it's just that the Government tab doesn't give you much to work with. I didn't think outside the box like alexman at the option of new building (probably since it's "adding", not "changing", so out of flavor for this mod). But that could very well be the answer to the Communism problem.

lockstep, your suggestion of increasing the Worker rate under every non-Republic seems too powerful. It would certainly change the flow of the game considerably. Then again, I can't really justify reducing the effectiveness of Workers under Republic to below the Despotism rate.

But I do really like making The Republic a bit weaker, even if it means Religious civs will be stronger. As is, The Republic is strong enough that a lot of switching is unecessary. This doesn't seem to me the right way to balance the Religious trait (if it needs balancing in the first place).


Dominae

[Dominae]

As for changes to Espionage, maybe some Spy actions (steal tech?) could only be available under Communism and have reduced costs to boot. Again, this seems unsatisfactory to me, because it's too big of a change (and it has no real-world justification).


Dominae

[lockstep]

Originally posted by Dominae
lockstep, your suggestion of increasing the Worker rate under every non-Republic seems too powerful. It would certainly change the flow of the game considerably.

You're right about that one. But there's the possibility of fine-tuning the worker rate by also changing the base costs of worker jobs. E.g. you want every government but Republic to enhance it's workers' capabilities by 10%? Multiply all base costs by 10, multiply the Republic's worker rate by 10, multiply all other governments' worker rates by 11.

Then again, I can't really justify reducing the effectiveness of Workers under Republic to below the Despotism rate.

Yes. No government should have a worse worker rate than Despotism.

But I do really like making The Republic a bit weaker, even if it means Religious civs will be stronger. As is, The Republic is strong enough that a lot of switching is unecessary.

A suggestion to make Republic a bit weaker (adopted from korn's blitz mod and, IMO, in the spirit of the AU mod): Change the Republic's corruption from 'nuisance' to 'problematic'.

As for changes to Espionage, maybe some Spy actions (steal tech?) could only be available under Communism and have reduced costs to boot.

Making spy actions only available for certain governments is not possible with the current editor.

[alexman]

Originally posted by lockstep
Change the Republic's corruption from 'nuisance' to 'problematic'.

This would work fine if these two levels of corruption weren't virtually identical!

On a side-note: Theseus started a new thread to get people's suggestions of what to do with the AI food/production/trade emphasis.

[lockstep]

Originally posted by alexman
This would work fine if these two levels of corruption weren't virtually identical!

I know. The 'nuisance' level is actually pointless because it's only slightly better than 'problematic'. Still, changing the Republic's corruption level to 'problematic' is a small step in the right direction, isn't it?

[Dominae]

Originally posted by lockstep
Making spy actions only available for certain governments is not possible with the current editor.

Correct. I was confusing the "Immune to:" tab with the "Available missions:" tab (which is a product of my imagination) in the Governments section.

Question: Will increasing corruption under Republic make it economically similar to Monarchy? In other words, which is more powerful: corruption or trade bonus?

If the change in corruption is slight (as some have mentioned), then it does seem like a possible "fix" for Republic.


Dominae

[player1]

Ugh...

Do you know that all those changes to Govenments would a pain to balance?

P.S.
I won't change anything more in my own MOD (or maybe at least unit changes here are playbalanced).

I included +100worker speed in Communism for flavor reasons anyway.



P.P.S.
Anyway, if I would try to change something else, it would be free upkeep in Despotism.

I always felt that Despotism is the militray HEAVIEST govement at expense of all others (economy & co.)

So having despotism with 4/8/12 free units (instead of 4/4/4) could make it good choice for empires which have so heavy militray that it's even too much for Communism or Monarchy.

That's way there is theoretical possbily of having Despotism better then Monarchy or Communism is some rare cases.

[player1]

Originally posted by Dominae
Question: Will increasing corruption under Republic make it economically similar to Monarchy? In other words, which is more powerful: corruption or trade bonus?

Dominae

Trust me.

If you had govement with Rampant corruption and TRADE bonus, it would still be better from govenment with Minimal corruption WITHOUT trade bonus.

(at lest from gold and science point, production will be more probelematic becasue of higher waste)

[Dominae]

Ok, thanks player1. So it would seem that increasing Corruption under Republic is a viable option.


Dominae

[nbarclay]

Increasing corruption under Republic would also provide a little extra incentive for non-religious civs to switch to Democracy, and maybe even go to the trouble to research it. Under the standard rules, it's too hard for Democracy to pay back the cost of researching it (or so the consensus seems to be among those who have considered the best path to win the space race early). I hate the thought of doing something that would increase the best-case corruption for a big chunk of the game, but I have to admit that taking away Republic's corruption advantage compared with Monarchy is probably a good thing in terms of balance.

The one question I have is whether it might adversely affect the AI. But since current corruption levels are toned down compared with when the AI was originally designed, and given Alexman's claim that the difference is minimal, I wouldn't expect major problems. (Then again, with the upkeep cost per unit the same regardless of the corruption rate, higher corruption might take away a noticeably higher percentage of an AI republic's after-expenses gold than it would a human republic's.)

Nathan

[lockstep]

Originally posted by player1
If you had govement with Rampant corruption and TRADE bonus, it would still be better from govenment with Minimal corruption WITHOUT trade bonus.

(at lest from gold and science point, production will be more probelematic becasue of higher waste)

I don't have exact figures right now, but can confirm (from playtesting korn's blitz mod, which experimented a lot with corruption) that player1 is absolutely right.

[Dominae]

Playing with the editor yesterday I saw some areas that coud potentially be improved (IMO):

Civilizations:

Zulus: Add 'Defensive Units' to the Build Always tab.
Iroquois: Add 'Offensive Units' to the Build Always tab.

The change is simply to make these civs build their UU more often. Although it shouldn't be a problem, this gives five checks to both these civs under Build Always.


Dominae

[alexman]

Originally posted by Dominae
Zulus: Add 'Defensive Units' to the Build Always tab.
Iroquois: Add 'Offensive Units' to the Build Always tab.

Why are they different than other civs without the defense or offense flags checked? Do you find that these civs don't build enough of their UUs?

In my experience, the AI already builds too many units at the expense of city improvements. I would even go so far as to remove all offensive and defensive unit build preferences from all civs. The AI civs that generally do well in the game (Egypt, France, Greece, for example) don't have any units in their build preferences.

[Harovan]

In the Creation forum is a thread about upgrading Swordsmen to Knights, where they raised another interesting idea: Upgrading Swordsmen to Longbowmen.

What about increasing the defense value of Longbowmen by 1, making them 4.2.1 and simulating medieval infantry. We then could let Longbowmen, which aren't built in vast numbers by the AI anyway, upgrade to Marines, that also have the Offense flag, so the AI upgrade path won't be hurt. This way we could get rid of that annoying upgrade gap and the availability of 2 obsolete unit in modern city build orders.

[alexman]

Good idea for preparing for PtW, SR.
But would the new Longbowmen require iron like Med. Infantry? If yes, then be prepared to see the ironless AI attacking pikemen and knights with - gasp - archers!
If they don't require iron, is their cost still balanced after the increase in defense?

[Dominae]

Originally posted by alexman

Why are they different than other civs without the defense or offense flags checked? Do you find that these civs don't build enough of their UUs?

These civs are different in that they will best be played by the AI in the early-game (in fact, by anyone, since they're early-game civs). Since the success of the Iroquois and Zulus depend heavily on their production of MWs and Impis, respectively, early on, I think it can only help if the appropriate flags are checked. Yes, this will affect their performance in the late-game, but the other flags should balance that (maybe remove the 'Explore' flag, which doesn't seem to do very much).

I don't think these civs build quite enough of of their UUs, especially the Iroquois. Again, to make the AI play these civs better, they need to build their UUs early on.

I don't see much of a problem with the UUs of the other civs. For instance, the AI really likes to build Knights anyway, so all the Knight variants (Rider, etc.) don't need to be explicitly flagged (well, implicitly, but you know what I mean).


Dominae

[nbarclay]

Originally posted by alexman
Good idea for preparing for PtW, SR.
But would the new Longbowmen require iron like Med. Infantry? If yes, then be prepared to see the ironless AI attacking pikemen and knights with - gasp - archers!
If they don't require iron, is their cost still balanced after the increase in defense?

Considering how rarely people seem to build Longbowmen now, the change in balance would seem to be more in the direction of making a unit that's not normally worth building now a little more worth building rather than in the direction of making a unit that's already worth building excessively powerful.

Nathan

[Theseus]

I'm not good enough with Impis and JWs to make a valuable observation as to how many should be built, but I do agree (very much so) that the Iroqouis should build a LOT more MWs.