Gold Gulch Playtest!

[Cyrion]

Originally posted by Harry Tuttle
Yeah, I think you guys are right. I think the laborers might need to come earlier so as to not give any one player an advantage too early in the game, even if it is MP.

@ Arthedain: As for the thunderstorms, you say they are occupying your cities? Hmmm, I better turn them back to air units. At least I knwo they're attacking now!

I played yesterday (and my night was too short thereafter, thank you! ), and I noticed the same things:
1) The AI doesn't build new saloons (having bribed the 3 other whores might play a role in that... ); anyway, I'm nearly sure the AI wouldn't bribe the pioneers as they are VERY expensive!
2) Needing to bribe the pioneers to expand is IMHO really excellent! And as they are expensive, it makes your prospectors even more valuable! But I agree something should be done to help the poor AI... I'll suggest something at the end of the post!
3) The Storms and Animals are MUCH more agressive than in the earlier version, which is excellent! Now I have to be cautious with my prospectors...
4) Playing at "Deity" instead of "Prince", and not having the "riverside" saloon proves much more difficult than my last game! Now all the others have ganged up against me, and prove a worthy challenge!
5) The US Cavalry, which was before dirt cheap to bribe, is now awfully expensive: I like it!

Conclusion: the last version was really good, the current one is just brilliant!

Now, I would like to keep the necessity to bribe pioneers for the human player (i.e. not hurrying the apparition of Laborers), so here is an idea:
- you said you now have some spare space in the events file, so let's use that
- there are "Human" and "Computer" triggers that could be used for that purpose, I'll have to check tonight if it can be used in the way I intend! Not sure though...
- the idea is to create a "no, no" tech that would be the prerequisite for the pioneer and that would be given to each civ at a definite time, but only if the civ is "Computer"! Now, I'm not sure this trigger can be used for that! This is what I'll check tonight, and if not try to find a way around the problem!

[Cyrion]

Thinking a little bit more about it, I believe that the HumanOrComputer trigger is only valid for talking!

I'll try to find a way around that, but if I can^t, maybe the easiest way to fix the "no settler unit if not bribing" problem would be to re-introduce Wagontrains, but make them really (and I mean REALLY! ) expensive. That would allow the AI, or the "whoreless" players, to expand, but somewhat till they have laborers, but at a terrible cost!

What do you think??

[Harry Tuttle]

Originally posted by AGRICOLA
I was wondering about storms occupying cities. My RULES shows them to be domain=1, air.

I don't particularly like the idea of removing bribing from the game, it is such a unique feature. Perhaps the cost of Laborers could be increased to better balance the 70 shield building cost and the $2000+ cost of bribing a Pioneer.

Oh no! Extrapolating a bit into the future, the Pioneer problem will be repeated with the US Cavalry and any other units that need to be bribed in order to acquire them.

Should this perhaps be strictly a MP scen? That may solve most of the problems.

For the bribes, I wil try to balance the cost a bit and so they don't break the bank. The laborers might be moved down a bit on the tech tree and some settlers given to the Saloons from the start.

As for the Cavalry, yes, you should be able to bribe them as they had low morale during the Sioux wars. This can be a big advantage in SP games of course, but not so big in MP games. The scenario is best played as MP, but I hope to make it worthwhile wo play it SP.

@Cyrion: Cool thanks! I think a trigger that will give the tech to all saloon players at a specific time or tech researched might be a good idea. The only choice now is how and when to implement it.

I'll make some changes tonight.

[Cyrion]

Problem

I'm afraid I have to report a problem! The Global Warming problem isn't solved yet!

I had much pollution happening, and many rats everywhere (which is how it should be!), but when the "icecap" melt, the terrain change and you get "saloon types" terrain everywhere on the map!

So I think we should, if possible, keep the rats (pollution) but remove the Global Warming.

The only question now is: how to do that???

[Harry Tuttle]

Re: Problem

Originally posted by Cyrion
I'm afraid I have to report a problem! The Global Warming problem isn't solved yet!

I had much pollution happening, and many rats everywhere (which is how it should be!), but when the "icecap" melt, the terrain change and you get "saloon types" terrain everywhere on the map!

So I think we should, if possible, keep the rats (pollution) but remove the Global Warming.

The only question now is: how to do that???

I know, it's still there. Global warming can be fixed with hex editing and should be done as one of the last changes to the save file. Don't worry, I haven't forgotten.

[AGRICOLA]

Originally posted by Harry Tuttle
As for the Cavalry, yes, you should be able to bribe them as they had low morale during the Sioux wars. This can be a big advantage in SP games of course, but not so big in MP games. The scenario is best played as MP, but I hope to make it worthwhile wo play it SP.

I didn't say it very well, but I was also thinking of the other two types of US units as well as the legendary but historical western characters in your list of units in RULES. It will be difficult for AI saloons to acquire them but they do add much 'flavor' to the scenario.



@Cyrion
Check Kobra's 'The Norwegian Campaign' thread. It has explicit info on how to change a couple of bytes in a saved game so that there is no terrain change when global warming occurs. I hope that you will only have to backtrack to one or two saves before your warming occurred. Many thanks for the heads up, I'm going to fix my game immediately.

EDIT: Sorry, couldn't get table to work. Please see my next post.

[Cyrion]

Oh, OK, sorry, I thought it had been fixed!

[AGRICOLA]

The following changes prevented terrain change when global warming took place. The turn 24 game save was changed. Warming occurred around turn 35 but there were no terrain changes.

43 49 56 49 4c 49 5a 45 00 1a 2c 00 3f 80 60 50
00 00 07 00 80 00 00 07 02 00 00 00 18 00 18 00
ff ff ff ff 82 05 00 01 01 01 ff 00 05 00 ff 02
ff 06 80 80 00 00 00 00 00 00 9b 05 0e 00 52 00

[Cyrion]

Agricola, I didn't get it: did you manage it or not??

And if you can do it, here is the save on the turn before the warming occurs: can you do something about it??

[AGRICOLA]

Yes, the changes work. The bytes in red were changed to 80 in your save. It took a bit of time to test it. Global warming occurred 12AM Day10 but there were no terrain changes.

Here's the altered file

[N35t0r]

Originally posted by Harry Tuttle


For the bribes, I wil try to balance the cost a bit and so they don't break the bank. The laborers might be moved down a bit on the tech tree and some settlers given to the Saloons from the start.

An important part of the bribe cost of the pioneers is the amount of money the owner (sioux?) civ has... I cheated their money to 0 to test it and they cost around 500

giving them $5000, it costs 3800 to bribe them, and giving them $26884 (the amount i have), it costs $18420.

[Harry Tuttle]

Originally posted by N35t0r

An important part of the bribe cost of the pioneers is the amount of money the owner (sioux?) civ has... I cheated their money to 0 to test it and they cost around 500

giving them $5000, it costs 3800 to bribe them, and giving them $26884 (the amount i have), it costs $18420.

Hmmmm, I think I'll test this out and do a nice statistical graph...

[Harry Tuttle]

Hey guys, I just realized that with the Sioux as a democracy you can't bribe their units. Duh. I'll make the change in the next upload. Please feel free to change the govt to whatever you like if you are playtesting.

[:) Smiley]

Hmm, maybe thunderstroms should be under Nature, so they aren't bribeable.

Domain 1 air units can still occupy if they have unlimited fuel, like helicopters.

[Cyrion]

Originally posted by AGRICOLA
Yes, the changes work. The bytes in red were changed to 80 in your save. It took a bit of time to test it. Global warming occurred 12AM Day10 but there were no terrain changes.

Here's the altered file

Thanks a lot Agricola, I'll keep on playing tonight!