Nation balance

[Dienstag]

Balancing versus Variety

Civ III - each civ starts with 2 of 6 civ-specific traits, that endure throughout the whole game. Adds somewhat to replayability. Makes balancing somewhat of a challenge.

Master of Orion 2 - each race starts with a handful of unique factors (I forget how many possible, it's been a while). Player may customize race at beginning. Correct me if wrong, but I think the factors stay the same throughout the game for everybody. Adds a bit more replayability, I suppose, for about the same challenge in balancing.

My ideal CivIV - each civ starts as a generic tribe, and gains various bonusses and penalties based on WHAT'S HAPPENED IN THE GAME SO FAR. This includes the units it builds, so no pre-canned civ-specific units at the beginning. I expect that would be the pinnacle of replayability, but I'm not sure how difficult it would be to program (most likely very difficult... but one can hope). Since the number of possible trait combinations will be astronomically higher, balancing will have to be taken to another level (meta-balancing?) One requirement would be a really good AI. I don't realistically expect this anytime soon.

So, regardless of how well the nations in CivIII are balanced, I guess I'd be more impressed with the designers if they made an unbalanced (but thoroughly modifyable) CivIV.

[KLIN-TONN]

Dienstag

when you say "generic tribes" do you mean all the same? As in: a tribe would become a people and a people a civilization with an identity dependent on how the civ had conducted itself? IOW, my civ's identity (Japanese, French, Romans) is determined by the game itself?

Man. That would be cool - and yet, I'm sure, impossible.

[Aeson]

There were a lot of features in SMAC that would have been great if they were included in Civ3. Social Engineering and the Unit Workshop really added a lot of options. It wasn't all that balanced, but it was fun to play around and design your own units.

[Thrawn05]

IMHO, the UUs in this game are not that great. Most of them just increase an ability by one, whether it be movement, offense, defense, etc... And considering the combat system in the game (which I am generaly happy with IMO), don't really make much of a difference (except those who have an extra movement like the Jag Warrior and Impi).

[Ironikinit]

Let's face it, the Americans and English got screwed. A lame UU coupled with expansionistic. They both need good UUs!

How about a revolutionary musketman for the US? 2/4/1 but moves with explorer movement (treats all terrain as road).

For the English, a Yeoman, 5/1/1, an improvement of the longbowman. Really, the longbow should be a crossbowman, and the English should get a 5/1/1 longbow as their UU.

Both of these come early enough to trigger a good, possibly great GA.

The only way I can see a worthwhile naval UU is if it's quite early and has a movement bonus. Namely, a galley with a move of four. Exploration is what navy is best for in the game, other than transport. And an air UU? I completely fail to see the advantage.

[Windwalker]

Originally posted by Ironikinit
Let's face it, the Americans and English got screwed. A lame UU coupled with expansionistic. They both need good UUs!

How about a revolutionary musketman for the US? 2/4/1 but moves with explorer movement (treats all terrain as road).

For the English, a Yeoman, 5/1/1, an improvement of the longbowman. Really, the longbow should be a crossbowman, and the English should get a 5/1/1 longbow as their UU.

Both of these come early enough to trigger a good, possibly great GA.

The only way I can see a worthwhile naval UU is if it's quite early and has a movement bonus. Namely, a galley with a move of four. Exploration is what navy is best for in the game, other than transport. And an air UU? I completely fail to see the advantage.

Well, they can fix the American UU if they allowed fighter planes to dogfight....

- Windwalker

[Thrawn05]

Originally posted by Windwalker


Well, they can fix the American UU if they allowed fighter planes to dogfight....

- Windwalker

I'm working on the editor, I want to see how that works out. But waiting for moedern times to role around is a pain in the...

I guess I should just set their cost to zero, with no tech or resources needed, so that all the civs can build them from the start. That would be fun

[Dinner]

Originally posted by Rothy
So thats 850 years being the Worlds Pioneers, Which leaves Americans erm... 250 ...

Face it, England Has the Greatest History of Empire left standing!

God Save the Queen

Grrr, the empire was British nee English!

[korn469]

if you want fighters to dog fight do the followings

*bump up chance to intercept air mission (the higher the more of a chance a battle will happen, and the more useful air superiority is)
*make fighters have similar attack and defense values so that the outcome of the dog fight isn't predetermined
*bump up fighters bombard abilities a little

all of these things together should make dog fights much more likely, and from what soren said in the chat on friday they have added a new value that should make the AI smarter about using units with a defensive AI in offensive roles if they have good enough stats, but too bad we'll have to wait and see

[Windwalker]

Originally posted by korn469
if you want fighters to dog fight do the followings

*bump up chance to intercept air mission (the higher the more of a chance a battle will happen, and the more useful air superiority is)
*make fighters have similar attack and defense values so that the outcome of the dog fight isn't predetermined
*bump up fighters bombard abilities a little

all of these things together should make dog fights much more likely, and from what soren said in the chat on friday they have added a new value that should make the AI smarter about using units with a defensive AI in offensive roles if they have good enough stats, but too bad we'll have to wait and see

Well, I don't think the AI would use the fighters at all in that capacity if the values were changed in the editor. In general, I'm not sure if the AI is capable of handling rule changes all that well (except maybe just base attack and defense values of normal units, as long as it's clear that one's an attacking unit and one's a defensive unit).

- Windwalker

[Pius Popprasch]

I think that Industrious is the second worst of the abilities. I can actually afford to have a second worker and sometimes I even employ foreign workers. And there isn't much beyond that. 2 Shields for a metropolis. Commercial will give you more production boost than Industrious.
And why is Industrious and Commercial a good combination?? Scientific and Commercial add really to each other. Commercial gives more trade and the Scientist makes better use of the additional trade.
Religious is #1. And it combines decently with Militaristic.

[Arrian]

Industrious has two other advantages you didn't mention:

1) Start the game with Masonry. That's a valueable tech, and allows you to start on the Pyramids whenever you want.

2) The 2x worker speed doesn't matter much in the mid to late game, when you have lots of workers, but in the very beginning, it really jumpstarts expansion.

Commerical is ok and all, and I imagine it matters more on large/huge maps (I play normal) because you have lots more cities on those size maps. A small corruption decrease due to the commercial attribute can be powerful if multiplied over hundreds of cities. I rate it as a middle-of-the-pack trait.

I agree that Religious is #1. For me, scientific and industrious are also strong traits (hence my affection for the Babs and Egyptians). Expansionist may well be stronger post-1.17, so it may climb out of the #6 spot (again, normal maps... it wasn't #6 on large or huge even pre-1.17). I still think militaristic is garbage... either #5 or 6.

-Arrian

[Windwalker]

Industrious isn't that great for the production bonus (it is only 1 shield per 7+ city right?). However, the 2x worker bonus is VERY useful at the beginning of the game, where you can't afford to build too many workers (in fact, I rarely build another one until I have at least 4-5 cities up). This makes your initial worker very important, and if he works twice as fast, it is a great advantage. Therefore, I think the order of traits goes something like this:

1) Religious. You save on at least 10 turns of anarchy a game (who knows how much shield and commerce this is!), you get cheap temples and cathedrals (which I build in almost every city), and you can switch back and forth between a communism and democracy at will, which basically makes this an unrivaled civ trait.

2) Industrious. Production bonus is marginal, but worker bonus is awesome, esp. if you expand really quickly. In most of my games, my workers never run out of things to do until the modern ages, so 2x speed workers is twice the efficiency for 75% of the game.

3) Scientific. 3 free techs + cheaper science buildings. Not a game breaker, but useful, and it really does help you get a tech lead over non-scientific civs.

4) Expansionist. Chance of free settlers is now greater with the patch, so this makes for an improved (if still highly variable) trait. If you get extremely lucky (i've heard of people popping 5 settlers in a game), this can even be the #1 trait for a particular game.

5) Commercial. A little decreased corruption + 1 commerce per 7+ city make this a marginally beneficial trait. I hardly notice the corruption bonus or the commerce bonus, but I guess it's there...

6) Militaristic. Barracks are already cheap, walls are almost useless. Chance of promotion is only slightly better than that of non-militaristic. However, I often do play militaristic civs when I'm playing conquest just to get in the spirit

- Windwalker

[Ironikinit]

Let's not forget that militaristic civs get cheap airports and harbors, too. Harbors help city growth, obviously, and cheap ones increase the value of coastal cities. Airports come in real handy when attacking other continents.

I may just be defending militaristic since I'm familiar with it. I really didn't notice the early speed bonus of the worker when I tried industrial civs. I didn't notice the bonus from commercial at all, but I've only played the French to completion once.

The extra heroes are nice, but after a certain point you really don't need them. And they can't be counted on. Anyway, here's how I rank the attributes:

1. Religious
2. Militaristic
3. Scientific
4, 5, 6. Don't matter, I only play Babylon, Germany, Japan and the Aztecs. I really do think that Expansionist is junk but there may have been changes to how that works in the patch. How the huts work, I mean.

Add playing the other civs to the I'll get around to it someday list.

[Arrian]

The reason I don't think militaristic is really all that special is that getting leaders is really hit-or-miss anyway. I played the Germans once, and I got a grand total of 1 leader while destroying 3 AI empires (yeah, I used him right away, so it wasn't like he was sitting around preventing another leader from showing up).

Yet, in my first 1.17 game, I've gotten four leaders as the non-militaristic Egyptians, and that's w/o the heroic epic (the leaders became the Pyramids, Sun Tzu, and Hoover, and I've just gotten the fourth. I'm not yet sure what I will do with him).

Go figure.

-Arrian