2.0.9.1 RtR Mod Discussion

[Krill]

In itself that proposed change is not to do with privateers, but with the current design of naval warfare: it is simply the amount of hammers you can dump into a navy that lets you win unless you are CHM and have 4XP boats, at which point you'll win anyway with even production. This point is not just a revelation from PB37, it is something that has been accepted for a long time. So long as the tech level and promotion levels are even, to defend you just spam galleons. This change is to make it harder to defend just due to production changes, and make players look to other tactical and strategic methods of defending and attacking.

As far as another transport slot for Galleons goes: sure, fine, whatever. You could even trade that off with removing their ability to gain terrain defense, if you still wanted to weaken an Astro bulb somehow.
  
As far as problems with medieval/ren era naval warfare goes: if not PB37, could you provide some examples of other games where you think it is unbalanced? Or where this has been accepted for a long time. The only game I can think of where early Astro brought a big benefit to the player was PB27, but that was because of New World islands, not because it allowed one team to predate on another that knew it was coming and yet was defenseless to stop it. OTOH, I can think of numerous games where early Astro brought very little to the player... for example, my own miserable whiff in PB29.

I think there is a misunderstanding of why I'm suggesting the changes to the privateer.

It is not because when a tech leader gets Astro that it is a win button. It is because it is a lose button for another player.

Are there examples of where it's a win button? Not really, but then I'm not claiming it is. Are there examples of where the cost of defending against Astro are so prohibitive, that it constitutes an irreparable set back? Yes. You in PB29 is one such example. PB27 would have been another under slightly different circumstances, specifically if I had carried on playing and not attacked Gav.

This is why I am not suggesting changing the Astro beeline, nor changing galleons except for the minor buff, and moving privateers forward in the tech tree (what to doesn't bother me, but it can't be Astro) and lowering the cost of caravels. It lowers the cost of defending and starts to introduce a manner to defend that does not exist purely along the lines of rushing Astro as the defender. I disagree with the point that caravels are an adequate defense, given the defender has to invest 50% more hammers in boats that have no utility except in defense to defend against galleons.

This can be considered in terms of a farmers gambit: the players that don't have to to rush Astro to defend have the advantage in being able to run alternative gambits (Lib, Nationalism to Taj, rushing OU, going for Economics GM). The players that have to go to Astro...don't. The hammer cost of having to defend an attack, that is a price a defender must pay.

The tech cost? That's too prohibitive.

So let's look at this again. If the consensus is that Astro rushes are not that effective, yet the cost to defend is accepted as being high, should the cost of Astro itself be reduced? Astro itself gives a game changing unit, ability to trade over ocean (which is of limited value except on PB27 type maps), and the Observatory. If, and I stress the if here given the previous posts, it is accepted that the defense against Astro is too high, what is the outcome of the thought experiment of Galleons being unlocked at Compass? Just bear me out on this.

In the theoretical mod that Astro isn't needed, there is still the hammer cost, and it saves two GS. Does this help a defender not get completely taken out of contention? The hammer cost is the same, the GP counter isn't horrendously bumped up, the timing to be attacked isn't altered either. So one has to ask, is this part of the problem?

This is why I think that moving privateer forward is one potential solution to the problem: If it is possible for a tech leader, or tech near-leader to defend without resorting to an expensive tech side track, then it lowers the strategic costs of the defense to an acceptable level. And it does it with the minimum of changes which was the original design constraint.

Fucking about with the costs of Astro, Galleon position in the tech tree and other crap actually makes more changes

[GermanJoey]

I guess I did misunderstand your motivation, my apologies there... I can definitely get behind trying to reduce stuff that are "lose buttons"*, even if I still feel that the Privateer/Caravel change is probably too heavy-handed. The idea of the counter-unit for a unit coming way before the actual unit feels really weird.

*note: this is the same reasoning that I've been saying about free CG w/ the Protective trait for years!!

[chumchu]

EIM played a big role in OT4E winning PB36. It was not a mod game though and there was a lot of other things going on that game that contributed.

[chumchu]

If we want to enable a counterplay to galleons that is not just your own galleons I have the following suggestion on how to make it with minimal changes.

Just change the privateer to the following.
Privateer: 3 Strength, 4 Moves, + 100% vs Galleon and Galley, 70 hammers, requires gunpowder and optics. Hidden nationality.

It has even odds with caravels but more move though it costs more hammers and requires gunpowder. That is important if we want it to be more of a factor than just requiring caravels protecting the galleons which would happen if privateers were hard countered by caravels. 100% vs. Galleons makes it useful in its role but not overpowered. At 4 moves strength 3 it can be used to attack and pillage civs with weaker navies but it will not flat out destroy galleys/triremes.