RtR mod 3.0.0.1 proposed change log

[Krill]

OK, with that stuff out of the way, I think it's worth talking about game options.

Map Trading; it seems that a lot of people don't like map trading being early in the game, and it does have a very large effect on how games are played out in the larger PB games because the lack of information causes an awful lot of misplays. The changes to barb animals is one attempt to solve the lack of information aspect, but there is another proposal that I've voiced before;

Default game setting; Map trading is enabled at Writing, barbs are enabled.
Game setting; No barbs; Map trading and barbarians are disabled.
Game setting; Raging barbs; map trading is enabled at writing, raging barbs are enabled.

The upshot of this is that in games where the only impediment to scouting are other players actions, you need to invest in building those scouting units to uncover the map but you don't have to invest in military to counter barbs. In games where barbs exist, you only have to invest in fighting them and not scouting.

This should open up the options for games to be played without map trading, but also doesn't lead to stupid no military farmers gambit for everyone games (unless you choose to play Always Peace but those games are vicious on another level).

This is certainly a DLL change that I couldn't implement on my own, and I wouldn't agree to implement it without community concensus (which means post now or forever hold your peace etc).


The second game setting option is to do with Espionage and the No Score mod;

In 2.0.7.6 All the active espionage missions were removed because of, frankly, how they fuck up intended game balance. At present that means espionage only enables vision on demographics, research targets, city visibility and then city view.

I want to discuss about implementing No Score tenets into the No espionage game setting and leaving the current default setting as is. I'm aiming to lower the amount of information early and to stop the intensive cloak and dagger stuff that is possible for those people that either have way too much free time or really boring jobs I'm not aiming to remove all information from the game because information is needed to make decisions.

The changes would be to remove a significant proportion of the demographics information from F9; removing the opponent average column and the ranking position for all of the demograpics screen (leaving the minimum and maximum numbers in place but you can't figure out for whom unless you have contact, and in No Espionage games once you have contact you immediately get graphics anyway). The changes to the score ranking would be to remove the visibility on everyones score except your own, but to still leave the ranking system in place for score ie you know you are third in score and you know who is below and above you, but you don't know what score they have. The F9 graphs will be unchanged.

The upshot of this is that it removes the information necessary to calculate every players actions in the early game but it still leaves enough information in the game so that it doesn't devolve into farmers gambits like happened in PBEM4. Once you have contact with a player, you have that individuals graphs, if you don't have contact you don't get anything. The lack of the average number means you can't get any information on players you haven't met excluding that max/min number which is left in place to know when the game is ''over''.

Thoughts

[flugauto]

Maybe change map trading to reveal only your land in MP games, only what is inside the borders.

No score no average sounds interesting. I am not sure about the rank.

There are wonders that give free buildings everywher, like Stonehenge and Eiffel. They should change.

[Krill]

Map trading in a manner that provides pictures of your own land isn't going to be implemented because that's the exact map information that no player wants to give out,.

I really don't understand your point about Henge etc. Since when has Henge or 3GD ever been viewed as unbalanced/

[flugauto]

Map trading in a manner that provides pictures of your own land isn't going to be implemented because that's the exact map information that no player wants to give out,.

I really don't understand your point about Henge etc. Since when has Henge or 3GD ever been viewed as unbalanced/

When you trade maps now, you give your own map and what is outside your borders. Right?

I dont say 3GD is unbalanced. Only the wonders that give free buildings.

[Krill]

You are the first person I've heard complain that Henge is broken.

No, it's not getting changed, nor are any of the wonders that provide per city bonuses. Per city bonuses are not inherently broken and I'm not going to turn RtR into a shit version of Civ 5. Which is saying something because of how shitty Civ 5 is in the first place.

PS. 3GD gives power to all cities on that continent, replacing the need to build power plants. It replicates that ability without additional hammer investment. It's no different from SoL or Henge in what it does, which is providing a per city bonus for a set base cost, so yeah, it's right on a basic level to say it provides free buildings.

[Ichabod]

Map Trading; it seems that a lot of people don't like map trading being early in the game, and it does have a very large effect on how games are played out in the larger PB games because the lack of information causes an awful lot of misplays. The changes to barb animals is one attempt to solve the lack of information aspect, but there is another proposal that I've voiced before;

Default game setting; Map trading is enabled at Writing, barbs are enabled.
Game setting; No barbs; Map trading and barbarians are disabled.
Game setting; Raging barbs; map trading is enabled at writing, raging barbs are enabled.

The upshot of this is that in games where the only impediment to scouting are other players actions, you need to invest in building those scouting units to uncover the map but you don't have to invest in military to counter barbs. In games where barbs exist, you only have to invest in fighting them and not scouting.

This should open up the options for games to be played without map trading, but also doesn't lead to stupid no military farmers gambit for everyone games (unless you choose to play Always Peace but those games are vicious on another level).

This is certainly a DLL change that I couldn't implement on my own, and I wouldn't agree to implement it without community concensus (which means post now or forever hold your peace etc).

Why limit the player's options by forcing a bunch of settings together? Just make all these settings separated and let people play the game they want, not the game you think they should play. It's probably way easier to code them separately too.

I actually agree with how you think a game should be played (the barbs vs. map stuff), but I don't agree to force this into the mod.

The second game setting option is to do with Espionage and the No Score mod;

In 2.0.7.6 All the active espionage missions were removed because of, frankly, how they fuck up intended game balance. At present that means espionage only enables vision on demographics, research targets, city visibility and then city view.

I want to discuss about implementing No Score tenets into the No espionage game setting and leaving the current default setting as is. I'm aiming to lower the amount of information early and to stop the intensive cloak and dagger stuff that is possible for those people that either have way too much free time or really boring jobs I'm not aiming to remove all information from the game because information is needed to make decisions.

The changes would be to remove a significant proportion of the demographics information from F9; removing the opponent average column and the ranking position for all of the demograpics screen (leaving the minimum and maximum numbers in place but you can't figure out for whom unless you have contact, and in No Espionage games once you have contact you immediately get graphics anyway). The changes to the score ranking would be to remove the visibility on everyones score except your own, but to still leave the ranking system in place for score ie you know you are third in score and you know who is below and above you, but you don't know what score they have. The F9 graphs will be unchanged.

The upshot of this is that it removes the information necessary to calculate every players actions in the early game but it still leaves enough information in the game so that it doesn't devolve into farmers gambits like happened in PBEM4. Once you have contact with a player, you have that individuals graphs, if you don't have contact you don't get anything. The lack of the average number means you can't get any information on players you haven't met excluding that max/min number which is left in place to know when the game is ''over''.

Thoughts

Seems nice. I think you should take a look at how the passive espionage bonus things are calculated, though. They were made with active missions taken into account, so perhaps there should be some cost increase before you have city visibility and stuff like that (or make the cost more dynamic in some way). I think espionage could be a pretty interesting subsystem, if it is reviewed to be solely about the passive benefits and a battle between civs for these benefits. How to do it, though, I have no idea.

Finally, make jungle not spread.

[Krill]

Why limit the player's options by forcing a bunch of settings together? Just make all these settings separated and let people play the game they want, not the game you think they should play. It's probably way easier to code them separately too.

I actually agree with how you think a game should be played (the barbs vs. map stuff), but I don't agree to force this into the mod.

You know how people complain about the effects barbs have when you lose a few unlucky combats? This is there to help smooth that out a bit. Playing a no map trading game with barbs shafts players because they both potentially lose units at random AND lose the map information, so I'm not about to enable a barbs+no map trading option; I'd simply leave the game as is.

Seems nice. I think you should take a look at how the passive espionage bonus things are calculated, though. They were made with active missions taken into account, so perhaps there should be some cost increase before you have city visibility and stuff like that (or make the cost more dynamic in some way). I think espionage could be a pretty interesting subsystem, if it is reviewed to be solely about the passive benefits and a battle between civs for these benefits. How to do it, though, I have no idea.

Espionage is a pre-Industrial age mechanic inasmuch that air recon ability lowers the need to it. I'm not sure where to start with making it a more dynamic system though.

Finally, make jungle not spread.

This I can look at doing.

[Ichabod]

You know how people complain about the effects barbs have when you lose a few unlucky combats? This is there to help smooth that out a bit. Playing a no map trading game with barbs shafts players because they both potentially lose units at random AND lose the map information, so I'm not about to enable a barbs+no map trading option; I'd simply leave the game as is.

So, why not take out the option for Cylindrical maps to be played too? I see your point, but I don't see why a limited MP community like ours should be babysitted this way. I perhaps could agree if you were making such a decision while designing Civ 6, but not on a mod that you can personally chastise players for their stupid game settings (or, let's say, voice your opinion on the subject ) in the tech/lurker thread.

All that being said, isn't a no map trading setting already coded into the game? At least I remember it in SP. And it can also be banned through the tech thread. So, I guess there's no need to make it an ingame option.

Anyway, I still stand by the point that limiting the players decisions in such a way is not a good path to take. Let them decide what kind of game they want to play, even if it's a "bad" one.

Espionage is a pre-Industrial age mechanic inasmuch that air recon ability lowers the need to it. I'm not sure where to start with making it a more dynamic system though.

Yeah, achieving a balance that makes espionage not impossible to get early and not trivial to get late is difficult. And to rethink the whole system is probably too much work... It is a big mess right now, but at least we are used to it already (for example, espionage = courthouses for most of the game is very bad design, IMO).

The problem is that the average gamer doesn't see the importance of information (the fun factor of it too), so there's always need for a bonus to be tied to a system like espionage (hence, stealing techs is the only active mission that 90% of the civ players use, I'd guess; the other 10% use city revolt too, perhaps). In a pure MP strategy game desired from scratch, though, espionage and information gathering could be one of the best systems in the game.

[Krill]

You know how people complain about the effects barbs have when you lose a few unlucky combats? This is there to help smooth that out a bit. Playing a no map trading game with barbs shafts players because they both potentially lose units at random AND lose the map information, so I'm not about to enable a barbs+no map trading option; I'd simply leave the game as is.

So, why not take out the option for Cylindrical maps to be played too? I see your point, but I don't see why a limited MP community like ours should be babysitted this way. I perhaps could agree if you were making such a decision while designing Civ 6, but not on a mod that you can personally chastise players for their stupid game settings (or, let's say, voice your opinion on the subject ) in the tech/lurker thread.

All that being said, isn't a no map trading setting already coded into the game? At least I remember it in SP. And it can also be banned through the tech thread. So, I guess there's no need to make it an ingame option.

Anyway, I still stand by the point that limiting the players decisions in such a way is not a good path to take. Let them decide what kind of game they want to play, even if it's a "bad" one.

Long story short? Because I'm essentially a dictator who chooses what RB philosophy is growing into by controlling the main mod used. That's what it boils down to. I think adding multiple game options is detrimental to game balance so I'm not going to do it ergo I'm a dictator. It's that simple.

I don't have a problem adding more game options, but not ones that affect balance drastically. It's like with tech trading, there are three options but there's only 1 viable option and it took years of pain to accept it.

Espionage is a pre-Industrial age mechanic inasmuch that air recon ability lowers the need to it. I'm not sure where to start with making it a more dynamic system though.

Yeah, achieving a balance that makes espionage not impossible to get early and not trivial to get late is difficult. And to rethink the whole system is probably too much work... It is a big mess right now, but at least we are used to it already (for example, espionage = courthouses for most of the game is very bad design, IMO).

The problem is that the average gamer doesn't see the importance of information (the fun factor of it too), so there's always need for a bonus to be tied to a system like espionage (hence, stealing techs is the only active mission that 90% of the civ players use, I'd guess; the other 10% use city revolt too, perhaps). In a pure MP strategy game desired from scratch, though, espionage and information gathering could be one of the best systems in the game.

I'd like it if someone redeveloped espionage as a purely passive system based on information. I'm just not sure where to start.

[Ichabod]

Long story short? Because I'm essentially a dictator who chooses what RB philosophy is growing into by controlling the main mod used. That's what it boils down to. I think adding multiple game options is detrimental to game balance so I'm not going to do it ergo I'm a dictator. It's that simple.

I don't have a problem adding more game options, but not ones that affect balance drastically. It's like with tech trading, there are three options but there's only 1 viable option and it took years of pain to accept it.

Fair enough.

I'd like it if someone redeveloped espionage as a purely passive system based on information. I'm just not sure where to start.

The limiting of free information avaiable is a pretty good way to start, I think. I'd also look at ways of making it an investment on its own, not one tied to a different investment (that basically means changing the courthouses giving espionage mechanic - perhaps make courthouses allow a spy specialist, but not give free espionage). Perhaps get rid of the Espionage points from the Palace too and make the palace enable a spy specialist instead (or something like that). So, if you want EP, you'll have to work for it (and it kind of limits the problem of the player that is considered the strongest always being the one that gets EP dumped on -> if your EPs aren't free, you'll use them for useful things, not just dump them somewhere).

And maybe get rid of the GSpy, make spy specialists not generate GPPoints, like citizens specialists. Then, you could tie Espionage to specialists from the get go, without being afraid of balance getting owned by some crazy fast GPs.

Just some ideas, probably no merit to them, but whatever.