I've been playing a contrived Cradle 1.35 Impossible game for some time now; I started with equivalent techs and 3 settlers- to see how well the AI could 'race'. I placed a couple of civs in a somewhat isolated situation, some in close proximity and some on closely neighbored islands (on a 200x100 map.)
These are my findings during this game...
A while after 3000BC the AI effectively faltered and fell behind.
Many of their cities were rioting. A couple of the civs were having a number of their cities fall under barbarian control.
I took a look, and happiness issues were pretty profound in their cities.
The big issue?
* empire size penalties (due to conquest and/or expansion without thought regarding this)
compounded by
* pollution via population (the AI does about enough to deal with this... just... it can't cope with much more than this unhappiness though)
The AI's were tremendously capable in terms of growth, production (at 600BC, the AI that i'm fighting has 500 units vs. my 400,) and pw expediture (for the most part)
The AI is at a disadvantage, because it cannot deal with the concepts of 'too much'. It grows both in number and size of cities without thought. This *should* be a good thing... but unfortunately... it hits a brick wall.
Solutions?
* Help the AI out with empire size unhappiness
It doesn't know any better, so its not immoral to give the AI a helping hand, neh?
What I was thinking was keeping track of what government the AI was using, and how many cities it had, and use slic (as per disasters code?) to add happiness in each of their cities to make up for the difference between their government limit, and how many cities they found/capture.
* Have a few more 'pollution solutions'
I like the fact that pollution is an issue early on. I think that its a little too difficult to overcome. I think the solution is to increase the effectiveness of the first few pop pollution buildings (perhaps this might need to be balanced by decreasing the later buildings.) At first glance the production pollution buildings in late game also look a little lightweight (I know that this part of the mod hasn't been concentrated on however)
Last, but certainly not least...
* Wonders
Wonders are a classic... 'the rich get richer' problem.
Should they be removed for the sake of playbalance?
It wouldn't be popular, but it probably would be helpful in terms of competitive gaming.
The idea for a solution, I came up with in Ctp1 days, was limited wonders.
Essentially each civ gets (gifted) their own unique techs, once per age, which allow them to build a wonder. That wonder is built, independant of other civs. I was thinking, for varieties sake, of making the wonder that is built generic; that it gets replaced by a random, age appropriate wonder, when built. Since you can define how the wonders are gifted, you can use this method to make the civs more unique.
It seems more than possible to do given the state of SLIC in CtP2.
The wonders get obsolete after 2 ages, so only 2 are in effect (less conquest) at any one time.
Having scarer wonders makes them more personal and special. It makes them more wonderful, just like they should be.
Wonder races never made sense anyway- did they really compete to build the Pyramids?
Thoughts?
MrBaggins
These are my findings during this game...
A while after 3000BC the AI effectively faltered and fell behind.
Many of their cities were rioting. A couple of the civs were having a number of their cities fall under barbarian control.
I took a look, and happiness issues were pretty profound in their cities.
The big issue?
* empire size penalties (due to conquest and/or expansion without thought regarding this)
compounded by
* pollution via population (the AI does about enough to deal with this... just... it can't cope with much more than this unhappiness though)
The AI's were tremendously capable in terms of growth, production (at 600BC, the AI that i'm fighting has 500 units vs. my 400,) and pw expediture (for the most part)
The AI is at a disadvantage, because it cannot deal with the concepts of 'too much'. It grows both in number and size of cities without thought. This *should* be a good thing... but unfortunately... it hits a brick wall.
Solutions?
* Help the AI out with empire size unhappiness
It doesn't know any better, so its not immoral to give the AI a helping hand, neh?
What I was thinking was keeping track of what government the AI was using, and how many cities it had, and use slic (as per disasters code?) to add happiness in each of their cities to make up for the difference between their government limit, and how many cities they found/capture.
* Have a few more 'pollution solutions'
I like the fact that pollution is an issue early on. I think that its a little too difficult to overcome. I think the solution is to increase the effectiveness of the first few pop pollution buildings (perhaps this might need to be balanced by decreasing the later buildings.) At first glance the production pollution buildings in late game also look a little lightweight (I know that this part of the mod hasn't been concentrated on however)
Last, but certainly not least...
* Wonders
Wonders are a classic... 'the rich get richer' problem.
Should they be removed for the sake of playbalance?
It wouldn't be popular, but it probably would be helpful in terms of competitive gaming.
The idea for a solution, I came up with in Ctp1 days, was limited wonders.
Essentially each civ gets (gifted) their own unique techs, once per age, which allow them to build a wonder. That wonder is built, independant of other civs. I was thinking, for varieties sake, of making the wonder that is built generic; that it gets replaced by a random, age appropriate wonder, when built. Since you can define how the wonders are gifted, you can use this method to make the civs more unique.
It seems more than possible to do given the state of SLIC in CtP2.
The wonders get obsolete after 2 ages, so only 2 are in effect (less conquest) at any one time.
Having scarer wonders makes them more personal and special. It makes them more wonderful, just like they should be.
Wonder races never made sense anyway- did they really compete to build the Pyramids?
Thoughts?
MrBaggins
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