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Old March 13, 2003, 20:39   #541
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I agree this is a big fuss over something relatively minor.

I just want everyone to agree that the zero-bombard modification is being made mostly to make things more interesting for the human player. It just seems to me that this is the realm of other mods, since this one is supposed to remain close to stock Civ3.

I'm fine with the change, I'm just pointing out that the different goals of the AU mod philosophy are sometimes contradictory. So I can see where this debate is coming from, at least. A part of me is screaming "simplify!", and the other part "accessorize!" (I'm neither crazy nor a fashion designer, in case you're wondering).


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Old March 13, 2003, 21:02   #542
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Also, Civ3 is supposed to be based on realism, and it is difficult to justify zero-bombard for Longbowmen when you don't give it to Archers.
Like it's difficult to justify having it for Archer and don't having it for other ranged units like Riflemen or Tank.

Probably the 2nd reason (1st was my conservative aproach), why I didn't used this modification.
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Old March 13, 2003, 22:55   #543
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I think the superior range and long-distance stopping power of longbows provides a sufficient rationalization for giving the ability to longbowmen but not to archers - especially when we give it to longbowmen and guerillas but not to tanks or modern armor. Player1 hit it right on the head: the decision of which units get the ability and which don't is not hinged on realism.

Alex, the AU mod was never supposed to be a catch-all for changes that people think "enhance" the game, and if you try to make it that, you depart enormously from the original spirit behind the mod. The mod was intended to incorporate only changes that either (1) benefit the AI without otherwise significantly affecting gameplay for the human or (2) add large enough extra strategy elements to be worth the changes in gameplay. I think it's up to advocates of a change to show that the change provides enough objective benefits to make it worth changing the game for. And if later playtesting shows that the claimed benefits aren't materializing, the change should be removed.

Dominae, what is it that you like about zero-range bombardment? Do you view it as making the game more challenging in some way? Or do you just like it because it takes away the problem of archers' you've built earlier being significantly devalued by the middle of the ancient era?

It seems to me that one of the major strategic choices of the early game is, "Do I try an early archer rush and get stuck with obsolete archers when it's over, or do I focus more on building early and fight later?" The more valuable archers are as the game progresses, the more the balance shifts in favor of early archer rushes (and/or building up significant archer forces as barbarian hunters). Considering how attractive the dark side tends to be even with the stock game, I don't view changes that promote early warfare as something positive. (Of course I'll grant that my own early-game builder proclivities leave me a bit biased as well.)
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Old March 13, 2003, 23:06   #544
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Quote:
Originally posted by nbarclay
Dominae, what is it that you like about zero-range bombardment? Do you view it as making the game more challenging in some way? Or do you just like it because it takes away the problem of archers' you've built earlier being significantly devalued by the middle of the ancient era?
Well, first, I like the "realism" of the change, since I originally thought it was dumb to have Archers act like melee units with strong offense and poor defense. In real life I doubt archers were ever caught without a heavy escort. So the change is fun for me from that perspective.

Of course, that has nothing to do with the AU mod. I do think the change adds something to the AI, since every time I attack a stack (in a city or not), there is a chance that an Archer or Longbowmen is in there, waiting to knock off a HP "for free". This happens quite a lot, since Archers and Longbowmen are ubiquitous in the AI's forces, and the AI likes to escort them with good defensive units. So it's nice to see this change in action, helping the AI out in every game.

I did not consider the effects of the change on human strategy until only very recently. This is because I did not usually mount Archer offensives per se, just the odd Archer here and there for disruption. Furthermore, I never consider Archers to be worth it once I begin building Horsemen or Swordsmen; the zero-range bombard in no way puts the Archer in the same category as its 30-Shield buddies in terms of cost-effectiveness. But in AU206 it was obvious that I was benefitting from the change just as much as the AI does, before those expensive units became available.

So, in short, my reason for liking the change is not that I want to make the most out of my "crappy" units. I have no problem with this, as I know that even the lowliest Elite Archer can knock off the last HP from a Musketmen.


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Old March 13, 2003, 23:08   #545
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By the way, zero-range bombard for archers also tilts the balance between swordsman attacks and horseman attacks just a little toward the direction of swordsmen, since left-over archers are more valuable as part of a swordsman stack.
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Old March 13, 2003, 23:21   #546
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Quote:
Originally posted by Dominae


Well, first, I like the "realism" of the change, since I originally thought it was dumb to have Archers act like melee units with strong offense and poor defense. In real life I doubt archers were ever caught without a heavy escort. So the change is fun for me from that perspective.
It seems to me that zero-range bombardment just piles unrealism on top of unrealism. On open terrain, archers on both sides would be in range to fire roughly simultaneously, so neither side would have the kind fo advantage that zero-range bombardment represents (unless only one side had archers). But the whole idea of archers attacking spearmen directly, rather than from a distance, makes no real sense in the first place. In a real war, archers would be behind other troops that would defend them, not leading an attack themselves.
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Old March 13, 2003, 23:42   #547
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Quote:
Originally posted by nbarclay
It seems to me that zero-range bombardment just piles unrealism on top of unrealism.
And here I was happy with the change because it added realism (in my mind). Thanks a lot Nathan!

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Old March 14, 2003, 00:15   #548
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Quote:
Originally posted by nbarclay
... On open terrain, archers on both sides would be in range to fire roughly simultaneously, .... In a real war, archers would be behind other troops that would defend them, not leading an attack themselves.
So what we really need is (belongs in General forum, Trip's "Biggest Disappointments With Game Engine?" thread) to be able to separate bombard units from bombard city/terrain capabilities.

Then we could make archers a bombard unit with 1 defense point.
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Old March 14, 2003, 14:10   #549
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Let's get off the Archer issue for now...there's only three or four of arguing about this anyway.

I was thinking of a new change, concerning required techs. The idea is to selectively remove the "optional" status of certain techs, especially some Medieval ones. Specifically, I believe Navigation and Printing Press should be required in the Medieval age, and Advanced Flight, Nationalism and Sanitation in the Industrial age.

Here are my reasons:

1. Improve the AI

The AI selects techs based on its tech valuation formula. I'm not sure right now if a tech being optional figures into this equation or not (it must), but this factor is clearly not as important as it should be. The result is that the AI researches all the poorer optional techs, while the human player is advancing to the next age and benefitting from Steam Power and Railroads.

I consider this a huge deficit in the AI, and one which I "exploit" almost every game. Sure, the optional techs mostly have some useful ability tied to them, but usually this is not enough reason to research the tech in the first place. Cavalry is the notable exception. Researching Democracy just to get Democracy (and then a chance to proceed on to Shakespeare's) is really not a wise move.

On the higher levels, this effect is masked by the fact that the AI researches (trades) so fast, but whenever the human player pulls into it is all-too-obvious.

2. Provide more strategic options

In the Medieval age either you're doing a Cavalry beeline, or you doing a rush to the Industrial age beeline. It is too easy to avoid the optional techs, since they're not critical, and the AI will pick them up anyway. Forcing the human player to obtain more techs can only make the tech game more interesting.

Further, note that Advanced Flight comes with some quite interesting abilities, which are still not used regardless of the modifications to these individually. What is required is an independent reason to get the tech in the first place. The same applies to Navigation.

3. Add to realism

Not that important, really, but I'm not entirely happy when I've got Galleons and Ironclads cruising around while I've yet to obtain Navigation. Similarly for Advanced Flight and Rocketry and the Space Race.

4. Not change too much from stock Civ3

Obviously any change will deviate from stock Civ3, but I do not think that these changes will affect the flow of the game all that much. The AI already thinks Nationalism is the best tech ever, and Printing Press is not so shabby to it either (go figure). The same argument applies for the other techs I've mentioned, although slightly less so. The major difference is that, what the human player would usually trade for eventually (since the AI "fills out" the tree quite well), is now required up front. Other than removing the beeline capabilities which (a good thing), I cannot see this change drastically altering the nature of the game from stock.

Comments more than welcome.


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Old March 14, 2003, 14:44   #550
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Making Navigation mandatory would remove a major strategic choice from the game: Do you go ahead and get Navigation to get the ability to travel safely and trade over ocean tiles sooner, or do you reduce your research burden by waiting until Magnetism to gain the travel and trade advantages? In AU 206, my game would have been very different if I hadn't researched Navigation so my caravels could cross to the other continent safely. The way I view it, Navigation and Magnetism provide two different approaches to traveling safely through deep water, with the approach that comes with Navigation being the more primitive of the two. If you don't bother learning the more primitive way until you have the technology for the better way, why learn the more primitive way at all? Theref'ore, I see no realism problem either.

Nationalism is fine the way it is. The AI already makes it too high a priority compared with Steam Power, and if you're so far ahead that you can get out of the modern era before you can trade to an AI for Nationalism, what's the point in making you research Nationalism?

Making Printing Press mandatory makes perfect sense. Realistically, an industrial society trying to function without printing presses should be at such a huge handicap that it would be unplayable.

I see nothing unreasonable about making Sanitation mandatory because it and hospitals are so integral to the concept of a modern society. The change does, however, have some gameplay ramifications in that it devalues strategies built around not needing to get hospitals and grow past size 12. I have to give that one a "thumbs sideways."

I have a much harder time justifying why Advanced Flight ought to be mandatory. Keep in mind that jet fighters come with rocketry, so Advanced Flight is more of a sidestep from the evolution of aviation than an integral part of it. Helicopters are nice, but does a society need helicopters or paratroop tactics in order to be considered modern? If we make Advanced Flight mandatory, we might about as well make all techs (or at least all non-governmental techs) mandatory, because our only real reason for doing it is to keep the human player from gaining an advantage through skipping them.

So to recap, I support making Printing Press mandatory, have mixed feelings about Sanitation, and oppose making the others mandatory for varying reasons.

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Old March 14, 2003, 15:12   #551
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Thanks for your comments Nathan.

Quote:
Originally posted by nbarclay
Making Navigation mandatory would remove a major strategic choice from the game: Do you go ahead and get Navigation to get the ability to travel safely and trade over ocean tiles sooner, or do you reduce your research burden by waiting until Magnetism to gain the travel and trade advantages?
I'm not sure I see this as being much of a problem. By going Navigation first, you're deciding that ocean travel/trade is very important to you. But you're avoiding the Invention-Chemistry branch. Conversely, if you beeline for Military Tradition (as many players like to do), you get your boats anyway (which has always seemed like a bad design decision to me), but you still have to go back and get Navigation.

Maybe I'm just not seeing where this "major" strategic choice is, in actualy gameplay (not in theory). Are you saying that getting Navigation first would be a no-brainer if it were required? Given that it's off the path to Military Tradition, I would beg to differ. In fact, Navigation is still a weak tech, but now its required so its contribution is at least significant.

Quote:
Nationalism is fine the way it is. The AI already makes it too high a priority compared with Steam Power, and if you're so far ahead that you can get out of the modern era before you can trade to an AI for Nationalism, what's the point in making you research Nationalism?
I agree. For the same reasons I see no harm in making it required. It has the effect of making Communism and Espionage slightly more attractive to the human player, which is a good thing. Plus, with the new Scientific trait, I can see Nationalism getting bypassed far too often. Because the AI prioritizes it but the human player does not, the human player basically has more trading power than the AI. That's a bad thing.

Quote:
Making Printing Press mandatory makes perfect sense. Realistically, an industrial society trying to function without printing presses should be at such a huge handicap that it would be unplayable.
I'm surprised your reasons for liking some of the changes are mostly "aesthetic", but I'll go with it!

Quote:
I see nothing unreasonable about making Sanitation mandatory because it and hospitals are so integral to the concept of a modern society. The change does, however, have some gameplay ramifications in that it devalues strategies built around not needing to get hospitals and grow past size 12. I have to give that one a "thumbs sideways."
Yes and no to the size 12 argument. It is still better to do 3-spacing. Making the tech required means that those cities that you do want to make bigger (assuming you're ralphing or something similar) will not be "kept waiting" until the AI discovers the tech. And notice that the AI loves big cities, so making the player have to research Sanitation actually helps the AI.

Quote:
If we make Advanced Flight mandatory, we might about as well make all techs (or at least all non-governmental techs) mandatory, because our only real reason for doing it is to keep the human player from gaining an advantage through skipping them.
That's the very point of my proposal. Realism is secondary here (but I'm not sure I agree with you that Advanced Flight brings nothing more than Helicopters and Paratroopers...in my mind it should almost be a prerequisite for the kind of stuff you can do with Rocketry). The point is to reduce the human's advantage of being able to avoid all the bad techs. Ideally all the optional techs would have useful abilities (making them attractive to the human as much as the AI), but this is obviously not the case (consider Advanced Flight).


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Old March 14, 2003, 15:59   #552
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Quote:
Originally posted by Dominae
Thanks for your comments Nathan.

I'm not sure I see this as being much of a problem. By going Navigation first, you're deciding that ocean travel/trade is very important to you. But you're avoiding the Invention-Chemistry branch. Conversely, if you beeline for Military Tradition (as many players like to do), you get your boats anyway (which has always seemed like a bad design decision to me), but you still have to go back and get Navigation.

Maybe I'm just not seeing where this "major" strategic choice is, in actualy gameplay (not in theory). Are you saying that getting Navigation first would be a no-brainer if it were required? Given that it's off the path to Military Tradition, I would beg to differ. In fact, Navigation is still a weak tech, but now its required so its contribution is at least significant.
Usually, my first beeline is to Education. From there, it's one short step to Astronomy and the ability to trade over sea tiles, and another short step to Navigation and the ability to trade over ocean tiles. For someone who likes trading techs for luxuries as much as I do in most games, those steps can make a lot of sense. But with Navigation as an optional tech, the benefits of being able to trade for luxrues from across ocean quite possibly before I even discover Gunpowder are counterbalanced by the fact that I have to research an extra tech to get through the middle ages.

Granted, for someone who beelines to Military Tradition first, the situation is different. Once you have Chemistry, Theory of Gravity is only one tech farther away than Navigation, so the main reason to research Navigation would be if you want Magellan's Voyage. But the fact remains that for some strategies, Navigation's optional nature can present players with a major strategic choice.


Quote:
I agree. For the same reasons I see no harm in making it required. It has the effect of making Communism and Espionage slightly more attractive to the human player, which is a good thing. Plus, with the new Scientific trait, I can see Nationalism getting bypassed far too often. Because the AI prioritizes it but the human player does not, the human player basically has more trading power than the AI. That's a bad thing.
I still don't see how making Nationalism mandatory would improve anything. All being mandatory means is that you have to get it from an AI sometime before the end of the industrial tech tree, and with how much AIs prioritize Nationalism without its being mandatory, being able to trade for it is a foregone conclusion in any remotely competitive game where the human player has something to trade. The only time it would make a difference is when the human player is behind and wants to skip Nationalism to help catch up, but I see no compelling reason to undercut that option. In other words, I see it as a change with no really useful purpose, and I prefer to keep changes that do not serve a clearly useful purpose out of the AU mod.

Quote:
I'm surprised your reasons for liking some of the changes are mostly "aesthetic", but I'll go with it!
I like it when gameplay improvements and aesthetics come into alignment, and I think making Printing Press mandatory is a case where they do. It's a lot messier when something improves gameplay but doesn't seem particularly logical in terms of realism, or whe something makes perfect sense in terms of realism but undercuts gameplay.

Quote:
Yes and no to the size 12 argument. It is still better to do 3-spacing. Making the tech required means that those cities that you do want to make bigger (assuming you're ralphing or something similar) will not be "kept waiting" until the AI discovers the tech. And notice that the AI loves big cities, so making the player have to research Sanitation actually helps the AI.
Sometimes, although in a competitive game, chances aren't bad that the AI will pick up the tech eventually if the human player researches other techs and waits.

Quote:
That's the very point of my proposal. Realism is secondary here (but I'm not sure I agree with you that Advanced Flight brings nothing more than Helicopters and Paratroopers...in my mind it should almost be a prerequisite for the kind of stuff you can do with Rocketry). The point is to reduce the human's advantage of being able to avoid all the bad techs. Ideally all the optional techs would have useful abilities (making them attractive to the human as much as the AI), but this is obviously not the case (consider Advanced Flight).
What in Advanced Flight, other than the name itself, implies that it ought to be required for Rocketry? Helicopters and paratroop operations have nothing whatsoever to do with technologies needed to evolve from piston-engined aircraft to jet aircraft or rockets. And if I understand history correctly, the developments came separately at roughly the same time.

I think what really bothers me is that I can't find any consistent standard that you're going by in wanting to make some techs mandatory but not make all the optional techs mandatory. (And making all techs mandatory, or even making certain aditional ones mandatory for largely arbitrary reasons, drags out the game a few extra turns, which doesn't especially thrill me.)

Nathan
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Old March 14, 2003, 16:04   #553
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Instead of forcing ppl to have Advanced flight to jump to Modern era, y dont u put Airfields in Adv flight rather than in Flight.

The reasoning is that, in conquest games worker created Airfields is too powerful. Ppl would just attack a distant civ from the sea, take one of the workers, make an instant airfield and transfer the bulk of their army with airlift. In the old Civ 3 you have to wait till rebellion dies off then you can pay huge amount of money to rush an airport.

Airfields should be treated as advanced military base and landing strip.

Airport would still be in Flight. But at least Airfields in Adv. Flight will give Warmongers the incentive to research that tech.
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Old March 14, 2003, 16:23   #554
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Quote:
Originally posted by nbarclay
Granted, for someone who beelines to Military Tradition first, the situation is different. Once you have Chemistry, Theory of Gravity is only one tech farther away than Navigation, so the main reason to research Navigation would be if you want Magellan's Voyage. But the fact remains that for some strategies, Navigation's optional nature can present players with a major strategic choice.
I honestly fail to see how making it mandatory removes that choice. I fall into routines too, but if your games always look like "beeline to Astronomy then trade all my Luxuries", then your "strategic options" are already quite limited. The fact that you've granted that different strategies deal with Navigation in different ways proves my point, I think.

Quote:
I still don't see how making Nationalism mandatory would improve anything. All being mandatory means is that you have to get it from an AI sometime before the end of the industrial tech tree, and with how much AIs prioritize Nationalism without its being mandatory, being able to trade for it is a foregone conclusion in any remotely competitive game where the human player has something to trade.
You did not address my main point, which is that, by skipping Nationalism entirely, human players essentially have more trading power. That is quite the advantage, and one that I'm sure you've noticed (although the effect is far more pronounced in the Medieval age with Printing Press, Democracy, and such).

Quote:
I think what really bothers me is that I can't find any consistent standard that you're going by in wanting to make some techs mandatory but not make all the optional techs mandatory.
Here is the implied standard in my reasoning:

1. All techs should have some use. It would be nice if the use of all techs were enough to make the human player consider them, but that's a different story.

2. The use of optional techs should, on average, be greater than the use of required techs. This is obvious, because a useless optional tech is not going to be researched very often. You can see that the tech tree was designed this way: The Republic, Literature, Chivalry, etc.

3. The AI is hard-coded to research most of the techs, in order to make the game more fun. The human player has the advantage of skipping some of the more usless optional tecsh. This is a major advantage, one which we should definitely address in our attempts to make a more competitive AI.

So, from these points, I think it is somewhat clear which techs I think should be mandatory:

NOT:

The Republic
Monarchy
Literature
Chivalry
Military Tradition
Democracy (government )
Free Artistry (Democracy as a prerequisite)
Communism (government)
Espionage (a specialized ability, perfect for optional status)

YEA:

Printing Press
Navigation
Nationalism
Sanitation

ON THE FENCE:

Advanced Flight
Amphibious Wafare

The last two I'm not sure about. If I had my way I would make them optional because it makes the game more interesting and helps the AI (because it researches these even when it could go for Computers), but if you would rather keep things like stock these reasons may not be that convincing to you.


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Old March 14, 2003, 17:31   #555
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Amphibious Wafare should definitely not be required. It applies not at all to a landlocked AI civ.

Advanced Flight and Rocketry are indeed tied together IRL. Helicopters never had any decent weight-lifting capacity until they were powered by jet engines. (Maybe just make paratroops available with flight, helicopters with rocketry, and just delete advanced flight unless you make it required for airfields)!
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Old March 14, 2003, 17:55   #556
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Helicopters with rocketry???

Rocketry was invented in 1900's wasn't it? With Werner Von Braun and Germany's V1 - V2 Rockets?
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Old March 14, 2003, 18:00   #557
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In Civ3 terms, Rocketry refers to jet aircraft.
V1-V2's were researched/developed around 1940 (less than 5 years before the first jet aircraft), though deployed/used later.

Once jet engines were advanced enough to be compact, they could be used with helicopters, which gave them a sufficient power/weight ratio. Piston engine helicopters (Korean War vintage) were small puppies.
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Old March 14, 2003, 18:05   #558
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Quote:
Originally posted by minke19104
Helicopters with rocketry???

Rocketry was invented in 1900's wasn't it? With Werner Von Braun and Germany's V1 - V2 Rockets?
A bit OT but wuoldn't a separate "Rotary Aircraft" line of development make sense? -- From "Flight" (biplanes) to "Autogyros" to "Transport Helicopters" to "Attack Helicopters"?

-Oz

PS Who wants to do an autogyro graphic

-O
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Old March 14, 2003, 20:10   #559
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Quote:
Originally posted by Dominae


I honestly fail to see how making it mandatory removes that choice. I fall into routines too, but if your games always look like "beeline to Astronomy then trade all my Luxuries", then your "strategic options" are already quite limited. The fact that you've granted that different strategies deal with Navigation in different ways proves my point, I think.
My beeline to Education is almost universal because universities help research the techs on the way to Military Tradition. Whether to go on and pick up Astronomy and maybe Navigation too, or to start down the bottom of the tech tree right after Education and maybe Banking, depends on the situation I find myself in. But if Navigation is mandatory, that significantly shifts the balance in favor of going ahead and getting Astronomy and Navigation early. The biggest part of the price of getting Navigation early - having to research an extra tech you wouldn't really need otherwise - disappears. (And if you think about how much extra luxuries can let you shift commerce from luxury spending to science, you can see how Navigation could pay for itself if it opens up enough cross-ocean trading.)

If skipping Navigation were unquestionably advantageous, there would be advantages in terms of AI competitiveness to making it mandatory for the human player. But given the fact that players may quite legitimately view a detour to Navigation as worthwhile in spite of the tech's being being optional, I think it's hard to argue that Navigation needs to be made mandatory in the interest of balance.

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You did not address my main point, which is that, by skipping Nationalism entirely, human players essentially have more trading power. That is quite the advantage, and one that I'm sure you've noticed (although the effect is far more pronounced in the Medieval age with Printing Press, Democracy, and such).
I don't see how making Nationalism mandatory would make any significant difference. Right now, I skip Nationalism and pick it up from an AI whenever I find it convenient to do so (i.e. it's available and trading for it doens't interfere with my tech lead or with deals I regard as more worthwhile). If Nationalism were mandatory, I would do exactly the same thing.

The only times making Nationalism mandatory would be relevant are if the human is so far ahead that the AIs don't have Nationalism to trade to him by the end of the industrial era, in which case making him research Nationalism is a pointless nuisance, or if he is doing poorly enough in the tech race that he can't get a branch lead to trade for Nationalism, in which case I see no reason to begrudge him the advantage the standard rules offer. Therefore, I regard the proposed change to Nationalism as not providing sufficient value to justify a rules change.

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Here is the implied standard in my reasoning:

1. All techs should have some use. It would be nice if the use of all techs were enough to make the human player consider them, but that's a different story.

2. The use of optional techs should, on average, be greater than the use of required techs. This is obvious, because a useless optional tech is not going to be researched very often. You can see that the tech tree was designed this way: The Republic, Literature, Chivalry, etc.

3. The AI is hard-coded to research most of the techs, in order to make the game more fun. The human player has the advantage of skipping some of the more usless optional tecsh. This is a major advantage, one which we should definitely address in our attempts to make a more competitive AI.

So, from these points, I think it is somewhat clear which techs I think should be mandatory:

NOT:

The Republic
Monarchy
Literature
Chivalry
Military Tradition
Democracy (government )
Free Artistry (Democracy as a prerequisite)
Communism (government)
Espionage (a specialized ability, perfect for optional status)

YEA:

Printing Press
Navigation
Nationalism
Sanitation

ON THE FENCE:

Advanced Flight
Amphibious Wafare

The last two I'm not sure about. If I had my way I would make them optional because it makes the game more interesting and helps the AI (because it researches these even when it could go for Computers), but if you would rather keep things like stock these reasons may not be that convincing to you.
I think Navigation falls squarely in the "Specialized ability, perfect for optional status" category. It's not something human players will want to use all the time, but neither is it so worthless that a good human player will always prefer to skip it.

Nationalism also does a fairly good job fitting into that category. The abilities to draft and to sign MPPs are far from useless (although I'm less sure about the embargo ability). Granted, top players can usually stay out of situations where they really need those abilities until they can trade for Nationalism, but the very fact that we do trade for it relatively early makes it easy to ignore that Nationalism is where those abilities come from. In any case, the trading window between the time AIs get Nationalism and the end of the age is long enough to make making Nationalism mandatory pretty much pointless.

Sanitation often pays for itself through the extra gold additional laborers bring in. If human players skip it, it's usually because they've planned around not needing it, not because the tech itself is without value. And AIs certainly get their beakers' worth out of it, so one can hardly argue that the AIs are doing something stupid researching that instead of focusing on mandatory techs. Still, the difficulty of conceiving of a modern society without sanitation and hospitals makes the idea of making Sanitation mandatory something that doesn't bother me.

Amphibious Warfare attempts to fall into the "specialized ability" category, but is far from entirely successful at it. Actually, if AIs were at all competent at using the ability, the increased pressure AI marines would place on players to fortify coastal towns might be well worth the cost of the tech to the AI. But as things stand, the AI doesn't get much value of the tech and its value to human players is far from clear.

And I think Advanced Flight could probably be moved at least marginally into that category. Making it a prerequisite for airstrips would be one step in that direction. And with some tweaks to the helicopter unit, the ability to build an airstrip the moment you conquer a city might actually make it a lot more useful than its traditional reputation holds. It's not my style, but for someone who likes to pound cities with artillery before capturing them even with tanks, consider the potential usefulness of being able to helidrop artillery and infantry to cover them a few tiles behind enemy lines.

By the way, you left out Music Theory and Economics. Those two techs come with relatively valuable wonders if you can reach them first, but have little (Economics) or no (Music Theory) other value. Personally, I research Navigation myself more often than I do Music Theory.
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Old March 14, 2003, 20:34   #560
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... Personally, I research Navigation myself more often than I do Music Theory.
Even if you missed Sistine's???

(BTW, who WAS Sistine IRL, anyway???)
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Old March 14, 2003, 20:58   #561
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It's "Sistine Chapel," not "Sistine's Chapel." Not that I know where the "Sistine" part comes from.

Sistine is worth three happy faces, but only in cities with cathedrals (which tend to be a relatively low-priority item for me). Bach's is worth two happy faces for all cities on the same continent. Trading for eight luxuries instead of four is worth four happy faces in cities without marketplaces and fourteen with marketplaces, and you don't have to beat an AI to a wonder to get them. Even if the last luxury isn't available, going from four to seven luxuries adds ten happy faces.

In other words, give me trade routes and a big enough tech lead that I can trade tech for luxuries, and I can do perfectly fine with neither Bach's nor Sistine.
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Old March 14, 2003, 23:16   #562
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I have "no dog in the fight" of the discussions regarding zero-range-bombard archer units or mandatory / optional techs. But I am heavily biased against making any changes whatsoever unless there is a demonstrable deficiency to be corrected.

In that spirit, if changes to the tech tree are warranted, for my money the best overall change would be to eliminate the "Industrial Corridor" by rearranging some of the tech prerequisite requirements. It seems to me that a human-built Theory of Evolution basically seals the game (whether playing as a "warmonger" or a "builder"), because such a lead on one tech branch funnels all peaceful counter-tactics into the channel (Industrial Corridor) that offers no alternative approaches and therefore no opportunity to leap ahead or foolishily fall behind. I can remember only one or two games (one of them was an early AU game, MiniTourney III, my first ever Emperor game) in which I lost a tech lead after having reached parity in the early Industrial Age. This translates into "game-over" for the AI by the mid-Industrial Age for most of my games.

Perhaps a more varied branch system in the Industrial Age tech tree might be a consideration?

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Old March 15, 2003, 09:29   #563
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This whole mandatory tech discussion looks to me like change for sake of change.
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Old March 16, 2003, 19:34   #564
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Quote:
Originally posted by nbarclay
But if Navigation is mandatory, that significantly shifts the balance in favor of going ahead and getting Astronomy and Navigation early.
Why? If Navigation is so good to you (in terms of the ability to trade for Luxuries), then you would get it anyway, right?

And if not, you would just skip it entirely, right (I mean, until far into the Industrial age). So I'm still not clear as to where the strategic choice lies. I believe that making Navigation a required tech does not change strategic play that much, but it does help the AI. It therefore does not affect 3 out of 4 of the AU mod philosophies, but improves one.

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I don't see how making Nationalism mandatory would make any significant difference. Right now, I skip Nationalism and pick it up from an AI whenever I find it convenient to do so (i.e. it's available and trading for it doens't interfere with my tech lead or with deals I regard as more worthwhile). If Nationalism were mandatory, I would do exactly the same thing.
If it were mandatory, you would have to pick it up, whether you wanted to or not. It may in fact be very inconvenient for you to have to pick it up at the end of the Industrial era. This puts you closer to the AI, which kills for Nationalism, removing your priviledged status of being able to avoid it entirely.

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I think Navigation falls squarely in the "Specialized ability, perfect for optional status" category. It's not something human players will want to use all the time, but neither is it so worthless that a good human player will always prefer to skip it.
The fact is that the AI likes Navigation a lot more than Espionage. The AI seems to think that Navigation is mandatory, while Espionage is relatively optional.

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In any case, the trading window between the time AIs get Nationalism and the end of the age is long enough to make making Nationalism mandatory pretty much pointless.
The problem with Nationalism (I think) is that you can sign MPPs even if you do not know Nationalism.

And, again, I disagree with your point that Nationalism would be "too easy" to pick up if it were required for advancement to the Modern age. In close games where there actually is a tech race (remember those?), having to buy/obtain Nationalism from the AI could be very annoying. Strangely, your example was of a game where Nationalism would be rather easy to obtain from the AI (when the human player is far ahead). Trying to take the player out of all-too-frequent tech leads is the whole point of this change. It seems to me you like being in a tech lead yourself, and do not want any mod challenge you in this regard.

Quote:
Sanitation often pays for itself through the extra gold additional laborers bring in. If human players skip it, it's usually because they've planned around not needing it, not because the tech itself is without value. And AIs certainly get their beakers' worth out of it, so one can hardly argue that the AIs are doing something stupid researching that instead of focusing on mandatory techs.
Sanitation's value is a lot less valuable to the human player than to the AI (because the AI always uses sparse city-spacing). The AI was coded this way. Thus, the AI is in fact researching a "mandatory" tech (for it), which the human player can jump over, either entirely or until the AIs get it (always eventually). This helps the human player immensely, since he or she can just jump straight to Scientific Method, without ever looking back.

Quote:
Still, the difficulty of conceiving of a modern society without sanitation and hospitals makes the idea of making Sanitation mandatory something that doesn't bother me.
Again, you're arguing from aesthetics. This makes me think that you believe the two primary philosophies of the AU mod are "improve realism" and "change as little as possible". Through my experience with the AU mod (including numerous polls), I thought the two primary ones were "help the AI" and "add strategic options". Other than the Navigation issue, I want to know if you think the change I'm proposing does not further these last two aims.

Quote:
By the way, you left out Music Theory and Economics. Those two techs come with relatively valuable wonders if you can reach them first, but have little (Economics) or no (Music Theory) other value. Personally, I research Navigation myself more often than I do Music Theory.
Those two could be made mandatory too. On a side note, I now consider J.S. Bach's useful enough for me to research Music Theory myself (depending on the specific game, of course).


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Old March 16, 2003, 19:37   #565
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Originally posted by player1
This whole mandatory tech discussion looks to me like change for sake of change.
Please offer reasons to back up your comment. I believe I've outlined arguments for why I think the changes I'm proposing are in the aims of the AU mod. If you're not going to address those and simply state that this is all whimsy, well, I'm wondering why you're bothering to post here in the first place (no offense, really!).


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Old March 16, 2003, 23:41   #566
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On zero range bombard: It should stay in. It satisfies helping the AI and increasing strategy.

Arguing that it also helps the human doesn't carry much water for me, as that means the human has a perfectly viable strategic option, and also because humans could use archers better BEFORE zero range got added in anyhow.

I'm for flagging Navigation as required, if for not other reason than it's silly to imagine ironclads and battleships existing in a world that doesn't understand navigation. Thus, adding realism.
Nationalism should be required, and actually I didn't realize it wasn't. The player can reap the rewards of MPPs and Embargos without researching it, which isn't really fair. Also, because the AI LOVES this tech and will ALWAYS go for it, it can only help the AI to make sure the human has to research it before advancing to the next age.

I'll have to consider my stance on the other optional techs.
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Old March 17, 2003, 02:15   #567
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Quote:
Originally posted by Dominae
Please offer reasons to back up your comment. I believe I've outlined arguments for why I think the changes I'm proposing are in the aims of the AU mod. If you're not going to address those and simply state that this is all whimsy, well, I'm wondering why you're bothering to post here in the first place (no offense, really!).


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If you make 90% of techs manadatory you lose a flavor of optional techs.

I'm means this is all just for "it will kill flavor, but maybe AI would research them more?"
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Old March 17, 2003, 04:18   #568
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Originally posted by Dominae


Why? If Navigation is so good to you (in terms of the ability to trade for Luxuries), then you would get it anyway, right?

And if not, you would just skip it entirely, right (I mean, until far into the Industrial age). So I'm still not clear as to where the strategic choice lies. I believe that making Navigation a required tech does not change strategic play that much, but it does help the AI. It therefore does not affect 3 out of 4 of the AU mod philosophies, but improves one.
I'm not saying that Navigation is so wonderful that going for it as early as possible is a no-brainer. Just that the benefits it provides can be worth researching an extra tech for depending on the situation. That's why I think there's a real, meaningful strategic choice involved in the decision of whether or not to research Navigation, and why I don't want to disrupt or change the nature of that choice by making the tech mandatory. It's the borderline situations, the ones that leave the player thinking, "Do I want to go ahead and get Navigation, or do I want to wait until Magnetism to do my sea travel and trading?" that would be affected.

Quote:
The fact is that the AI likes Navigation a lot more than Espionage. The AI seems to think that Navigation is mandatory, while Espionage is relatively optional.
It would be nice if the AI had more sophistication in analyzing how a given tech will fit into the overall game puzzle, but in the absence of significantly greater sophistication, I don't think having the AI research Navigation less would help it. On the contrary, it would help human players preserve contact monopolies longer (making Arrian Deceptions a lot easier). It would also undercut luxury trading, and keep in mind that an AI can't just ratchet up the luxury slider to compensate in such situations. So I don't view this as a case where the AI is playing particularly stupidly, except maybe if it makes Navigation a priority on true Pangea maps.

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The problem with Nationalism (I think) is that you can sign MPPs even if you do not know Nationalism.
Check the Civilopedia, or try signing a MPP sometime when you don't have Nationalism.

Quote:
And, again, I disagree with your point that Nationalism would be "too easy" to pick up if it were required for advancement to the Modern age. In close games where there actually is a tech race (remember those?), having to buy/obtain Nationalism from the AI could be very annoying. Strangely, your example was of a game where Nationalism would be rather easy to obtain from the AI (when the human player is far ahead). Trying to take the player out of all-too-frequent tech leads is the whole point of this change. It seems to me you like being in a tech lead yourself, and do not want any mod challenge you in this regard.
You're missing the fact that the human player wouldn't have to obtain Nationalism from an AI he's neck and neck with. All he needs is for an AI farther back in the pack to get Nationalism by the end of the era and he can trade for it. The only exceptions I can think of would be (1) if the human player is behind in tech to a point where handicapping him farther would be counterproductive or (2) if the only AIs that can't essentially 100% keep up with the human player are a full era behind in tech.

As for your accusation that I'm just trying to protect something I use to help me maintain a tech advantage, you couldn't be more mistaken. I don't recall a single game where I exited the industrial era without having Nationalism, and if there was one, it certainly wasn't one where I was motivated by trying to protect a tech lead. If you can come up with significant anecdotal evidence that people do refuse to trade for Nationalism throughout the industrial era to help them in games where they and the AIs are fairly even in tech, I'll reconsider my position. But in the absence of such evidence, I think your proposed change would be pointless for the types of situations you're trying to address and counterproductive in other types of situations.

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Sanitation's value is a lot less valuable to the human player than to the AI (because the AI always uses sparse city-spacing). The AI was coded this way. Thus, the AI is in fact researching a "mandatory" tech (for it), which the human player can jump over, either entirely or until the AIs get it (always eventually). This helps the human player immensely, since he or she can just jump straight to Scientific Method, without ever looking back.
I'll certainly agree that the AI has a vastly greater need for Sanitation than most human players do. But the fact is that Sanitation, city size, city development strategy (e.g. whether or not to build temporary cities), and research rates fit together in a fairly intricate balance. Make Sanitation mandatory and you tilt that balance in favor of looser city spacings and/or temporary camp cities. We've already tilted the balance in favor of encouraging research into Sanitation by tying the Longevity wonder to it. I'm not in favor of tilting that balance still farther.

Quote:
Again, you're arguing from aesthetics. This makes me think that you believe the two primary philosophies of the AU mod are "improve realism" and "change as little as possible". Through my experience with the AU mod (including numerous polls), I thought the two primary ones were "help the AI" and "add strategic options".
When have you ever seen me propose or promote a change for purely or primarily aesthetic reasons? On the other hand, when a change is a close call otherwise, the small weight I do give aesthetic/realism issues can have an influence.

Quote:
Other than the Navigation issue, I want to know if you think the change I'm proposing does not further these last two aims.
I think making Printing Press mandatory does. I'm skeptical as to whether the value is great enough to justify changing the rules over, but I do think it has merit with respect to both goals. Specifically, it makes researching Democracy oneself (which seems to be something top players almost never do) less unattractive, and it can cut into a runaway human tech lead just a little.

I find it almost impossible to imagine the change to Nationalism making a difference in a game that's at all close unless a human player lets it get to him psychologically. All the human player needs is an AI that's behind him but not a full era behind to trade with. The time it seems most likely to make a difference in game play is if a player is trying to fight back from a major tech deficit, and undercutting a human player under those consitions is not something I view as beneficial.

Sanitation is too intricately involved in existing strategic balances for me to like the idea of doing something that would significantly reshape those balances. With the default rules, and even more so with Longevity tied to Sanitation in the AU mod, the question of whether and when to research Sanitation can be a strategically interesting and challenging one. This is not a case of trying to make a strategic choice interesting where it would be a no-brainer under the default rules.

Regarding Advanced Flight, I don't know about you, but until we started discussing this, I hadn't given any real thought at all to how the PtW changes and AU Mod changes might fit together to make the tech a lot more worthwhile when pursuing a modern-era military victory. Airfields provide a quick-to-build, inexpensive place where helicopters and paratroops can operate from, a place potentially right on the front lines at the time it's built. Radar towers toughen up AI defenses and provide a target behind enemy lines that is very much worth taking out before the main attack. At the very least, someone needs to do some serious testing of how useful the tech can be in an AU Mod PTW game before we write the tech off as useless. (Do I smell an idea for a possible AU game?) I can't see Advanced Flight as being worthwhile if you can get MAs while the AI is still stuck using old-fashioned infantry, but in a closer game, it might just possibly be worth something.

Quote:
Those two could be made mandatory too. On a side note, I now consider J.S. Bach's useful enough for me to research Music Theory myself (depending on the specific game, of course).
Exactly. When I write of skipping Music Theory and Economics, I get a "You did what???" reaction too often for me to view the game as clearly heavily favoring skipping those techs. I think Navigation and Sanitation belong in the same category: you can skip them, but you lose out on something if you do. Which means those techs are doing their job.
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Old March 17, 2003, 04:55   #569
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Quote:
Originally posted by Fosse
On zero range bombard: It should stay in. It satisfies helping the AI and increasing strategy.

Arguing that it also helps the human doesn't carry much water for me, as that means the human has a perfectly viable strategic option, and also because humans could use archers better BEFORE zero range got added in anyhow.
What concerns me is that the balance of benefits is likely as follows:

1) Humans who use early archer rushes probably benefit most.

2) Then the AIs, and

3) Humans who do all their fighting after the archer era are undermined by the change.

So the rules change rewards players who do early archer rushes but works against those who don't. I don't view that as a good thing. Civ 3 already has too much of a reputation for turning builders into warmongers.

Note that I have no objection to keeping the zero-range bombard ability with longbowmen and (aside from the realism angle) guerillas, since there it doesn't give an added advantage to a strategy that's already pretty powerful.

[/quote]I'm for flagging Navigation as required, if for not other reason than it's silly to imagine ironclads and battleships existing in a world that doesn't understand navigation. Thus, adding realism.[/quote]

When is the last time you've heard of a battleship navigator pulling out his sextant to take a sighting by the stars (except maybe as part of a hobby)? The tech "Magnetism" reflects a fundamental change in the tools used to navigate, a change which rendered the tools previously used no longer necessary. Had the earlier tools not been invented prior to the discovery of the later ones, there would have been no point to their ever being invented at all. I think that's the historical basis underlying Navigation's optional nature.

Quote:
Nationalism should be required, and actually I didn't realize it wasn't. The player can reap the rewards of MPPs and Embargos without researching it, which isn't really fair. Also, because the AI LOVES this tech and will ALWAYS go for it, it can only help the AI to make sure the human has to research it before advancing to the next age.
I hadn't thought about it, but I suppose the player probably can reap the rewards if his prospective partner in the deal has Nationalism. Still, that leaves riflemen, mobilization, and the draft unavailable, as well as MPPs and embargos with pre-industrial AIs.

And have you ever left the industrial era without having Nationalism? Do you know anyone who has? If so, under what circumstances? Dominae's premise in proposing the change was that in a close game, human players will skip Nationalism all the way to the modern era. It's hard for me to imagine that happening in a competitive game because it will almost inevitably be too easy to trade for it to an AI farther back in the pack.
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Old March 17, 2003, 09:11   #570
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Check the Civilopedia, or try signing a MPP sometime when you don't have Nationalism.


Although this does not help my credibility as a prospective modder (!!!), I believe it proves my point concerning how irrelevant I find Nationalism (in my games), while the AI depends critically on it. I feel that this advantages me.

But you've definitely got me thinking, Nathan (and player1). I'll mull over it today. For now, I'm willing to say that maybe the solution is not the best, yet I would like players to admit that there is a problem (am I just crazy?): the human players is very much advantaged by having the option to skip the optional techs. Optional/mandatory is not a distinction that the AI gives much weight to, and I believe this to be a mistake.


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