I don´t like the way the early game ofthe mod is right now. But since we got some controversial discussion about this topic I thought I´d set up a poll for this. Nice side effect: we get a thread to discuss this topic and collect some ideas.

Like I said before I´d like to speed up the early game. My suggestions would be the following (not all should be implemented, but at least one IMO).

The most simple thing would be to lower the costs of early techs.

Civs could start with 2 Settlers - nice efeect of this would be that the expansion phase would be shorter and Total Warfare could begin earlier in the game.

Civs might start with 3 or even 4 starting techs.

That´s it for now from me.

2 settlers and 1 worker would help. More free units.

But the worker can´t be used unless you got Stoneworks.

Roads? He has to be doing something. Plus, he can "scout" and you don't have to waste time building one later when you need one.

Maybe each civ should get at least one starting tech that would enable the worker to do something then.

If you don´t have to waste the time to build a worker you would end up just pumping out more and more archers and warriors, but maybe we just need some early buildings. I´ll just have to look at the techtree again and find out when you´re able to build things like barracks, watchstones and lighthouses (the early buildings of vanilla cIV).

Yep, good thinking. Building roads, mines, cottages, farms, something would give the game more than hitting "Enter" for 25 turns (or so it seems).

As the ancient age is very un-warhammer, I think that it should only exist until the map is filled up with cities and tensions arise inbetween civs. I am not sure that we should incourage very early war (axeman rush style), as it is unrealistic and gives the human player to strong an advantage.

As the ancient age is very un-warhammer, I think that it should only exist until the map is filled up with cities and tensions arise inbetween civs. I am not sure that we should incourage very early war (axeman rush style), as it is unrealistic and gives the human player to strong an advantage.
Well I think that's the way it is right now at least in my last playtestgame.

About starting settlers and techs:
Duke I agree with this idea. I fact I'm playing with the idea diversing civs alittle more with that. Civs with large population(Humans, Orcs could have additional starting settlers and ancient races could have additional starting techs-no problem with that. But I don't want to leave the ancient era behind totally. We put alot of work into the units and we already don't have many eras anyway. Instead we should spice the era up with additional stuff to build and more to make it interesting on its own.

Maybe we need to build cheap early buildings that become obsolete at the next age so we have to build better ones? So a training yard give +1 xp, but becomes obsolete with a barracks that gives +3 xp? That's just an example, but would allow early stuff to be built.

Something like that I was thinking.;)

:woohoo:

A decent idea early! Now be prepared for 6395 crappy posts to keep my average. ;)

Can't wait to read that:rolleyes:

Btw: we also should dip into Barbarian design. That's the main enemy in ancient era normally after all so all those warriors and archers would be needed and not put to waste.
Maybe the game should only be played with raging barbs.

I think it needs to be speed up a little, because when any of the Civs discover a new army it gains a huge advantage until the Swordsmen, Axemen and Spearmen units are owned by all.

Maybe grant a small Gold bonus for killing animals (sold pelts etc..) and set up raging animal barbs in the early game. Would give you something to do in the early stages when CIv's generally anren't at war. And since animals do attack Civ territories it actively gets you exploring as well.

I love the idea of fursells after killing animals. Any idea how to get that coded(pretty sure I can't do that in xml). They should give 5-10 Gold depending on str. imo.

We need more and more animals then. :)

I love that idea as well.

Wahoo! A good idea and it only took me 13 posts! :D

:lol: how about also doing the capture animal thing, allowing scouts ans hnters to catch animals. they could be used to build circuses (like fall from heaven) or odd food farms (lion meat anyone?) or animal pelt stalls where they sell the pelts. that would give early buildings AND animal hunting, as wel as something to do in the early game (i personally like the early game as it is, but thats just me i think;) )

A Fur Trader building then?

I started a new game last evening (noble, aggressive AI etc.) and have to admit that you´re mainly right Ploe.

I could post a nearly complete description of my game here, but I´m too lazy to type that down right now, so here are some points:

About techs:

02 (the turn number): I got Mysticism due to a goody hut
09: researched Stoneworks
18: researched Agriculture (everything fine until now IMO)
45: founded second city
47 (!!): researched Animal Husbandry (should be a little cheaper IMO, it´s a basic tech - we should make it 2/3 of the costs that it has right now - Research-Rate was still at 100%
59: researched Archery
66: the Wheel
67: 3rd city
77: Mining (would have taken Horsebackriding, because I started a war against Gilles, but that would have taken 38!! turns so I decide to research Masonry instead)
86: 4th city
91: Research Rate drops to 70%, because the money from goody huts had all been consumed
98: Masonry
101: 5th city
104: Research Rate at 40%
106: captured Brionne (6th city) - 90 Gold research bacj to 70% - Rest of Research for Chronicles
110: Research Rate 60%
113: Research Rate 50% - gained my first Copper Resource for Chariots
117: Research Rate 40%
120: 7th city
125: researched Revelation of the Old Ones (3 turns before that Gilles foundedOld Ones Worship)
captured Couronne (8th city)
127: Research rate 30%
128: captured Bordeleaux (9th city) - gain Fishing
131: captured Mousillon (10th city) - only Gold - destroyed Gilles
133: converted to Old Ones
138: captured Eppzhlsh (barbarian - 11th city)
140: I end the Game with about 3 turns to go until I would research Pottery

My conclusion:

After 143 turns I would have had 13 techs (one from a goody hut and research bonus from captured cities)

I was able to start construction on 1 Wonder (Mark of the Old Ones) and 4 Buildings (Watchstone, Barracks, Walls, Shrine) - that´s too little IMO, so yes, we need more early buildings.

Mysticism and Chronicles do absolutely nothing right now! Chronicles should get something like an early Library and maybe Standing Stones should be back at Mysticism and Mysticism could allow a new civic.

Stoneworks is a tech we putted in as an extra, but now one has to research one more tech in the early age, which doesn´t give an extra bonus compared to vanilla (but we should keep it nevertheless IMO - I like it), so others shouldn´t be made too expansive.

I would make Mark of the Old Ones cheaper, around 300-350 hammers

Animal Husbandry could allow for an early Market and/or a new economic civic called Barter (Tauschhandel in german), which could give the effects that freemarket got right now (+1 Trade route per city)

Oh, and I could only build Warriors, Archers and Chariots as Military Units, but the early warfare still was fun - But the aggressive AI wasn´t really aggressive, I think this was because of playing only at noble.

Don't misunderstand me I like this feature from FFH but I think it also should stay unique to FFH. So please no circus for me and simple fur trading can be just reflected by gold for killing animals. We should have played this Mod with raging Barbs anyway so not much time for the more peaceful exploration should be given.;)

:lol: how about also doing the capture animal thing, allowing scouts ans hnters to catch animals. they could be used to build circuses (like fall from heaven) or odd food farms (lion meat anyone?) or animal pelt stalls where they sell the pelts. that would give early buildings AND animal hunting, as wel as something to do in the early game (i personally like the early game as it is, but thats just me i think;) )

I´m absolutely against copying the Circus system from FfH, we got enough from their mod, let´s do something on our own. And I also think that it is strange to have a fur resource and then sell furs from wild animals.

But to spice up the early Age I got an Idea concerning Goody huts:

What If we could implement different kinds of goody huts, not only Tribal Villages.
We could have fantasy like things like Old Ones Artifacts, Old Dragon Treasures etc.
This would have two effects at once: spicing up the early Age and giving more fantasy flavour to the mod from the beginning.

And more Barbarian states (cities)!!

:lol: ok ok, ill stop it with the FfH-ing;) it was worth a try...

I do like that idea about different goody huts. you could have a witches cottage which could only give techs, dragons hords which could only give gold, and ancient temples which could help with researching religeons, and tribal vilages could be all of them.

Barbarian cities require unoccupied space AFAIK so if you over expand you'll get less barb cities. I wish they'd come sooner. Kael explained it once that they need a certain number of player cities/player before they spring up. Maybe Olleus can fiddle with the numbers to make more appear.

edit - post 6,666. That can't be good! :evil:

just wanted to :bump: this

I started a new game last evening (noble, aggressive AI etc.) and have to admit that you´re mainly right Ploe.

I could post a nearly complete description of my game here, but I´m too lazy to type that down right now, so here are some points:

About techs:

02 (the turn number): I got Mysticism due to a goody hut
09: researched Stoneworks
18: researched Agriculture (everything fine until now IMO)
45: founded second city
47 (!!): researched Animal Husbandry (should be a little cheaper IMO, it´s a basic tech - we should make it 2/3 of the costs that it has right now - Research-Rate was still at 100%
59: researched Archery
66: the Wheel
67: 3rd city
77: Mining (would have taken Horsebackriding, because I started a war against Gilles, but that would have taken 38!! turns so I decide to research Masonry instead)
86: 4th city
91: Research Rate drops to 70%, because the money from goody huts had all been consumed
98: Masonry
101: 5th city
104: Research Rate at 40%
106: captured Brionne (6th city) - 90 Gold research bacj to 70% - Rest of Research for Chronicles
110: Research Rate 60%
113: Research Rate 50% - gained my first Copper Resource for Chariots
117: Research Rate 40%
120: 7th city
125: researched Revelation of the Old Ones (3 turns before that Gilles foundedOld Ones Worship)
captured Couronne (8th city)
127: Research rate 30%
128: captured Bordeleaux (9th city) - gain Fishing
131: captured Mousillon (10th city) - only Gold - destroyed Gilles
133: converted to Old Ones
138: captured Eppzhlsh (barbarian - 11th city)
140: I end the Game with about 3 turns to go until I would research Pottery

My conclusion:

After 143 turns I would have had 13 techs (one from a goody hut and research bonus from captured cities)

I was able to start construction on 1 Wonder (Mark of the Old Ones) and 4 Buildings (Watchstone, Barracks, Walls, Shrine) - that´s too little IMO, so yes, we need more early buildings.

Mysticism and Chronicles do absolutely nothing right now! Chronicles should get something like an early Library and maybe Standing Stones should be back at Mysticism and Mysticism could allow a new civic.

Stoneworks is a tech we putted in as an extra, but now one has to research one more tech in the early age, which doesn´t give an extra bonus compared to vanilla (but we should keep it nevertheless IMO - I like it), so others shouldn´t be made too expansive.

I would make Mark of the Old Ones cheaper, around 300-350 hammers

Animal Husbandry could allow for an early Market and/or a new economic civic called Barter (Tauschhandel in german), which could give the effects that freemarket got right now (+1 Trade route per city)

Oh, and I could only build Warriors, Archers and Chariots as Military Units, but the early warfare still was fun - But the aggressive AI wasn´t really aggressive, I think this was because of playing only at noble.

Once a week I bring up the dream of an SDK or python addition of aggressive AI like CivIII. We have 2 choices now and CivIII had 5 levels of aggression. Why, oh why, can't we get more? :cry:

I started a new game last evening (noble, aggressive AI etc.) and have to admit that you´re mainly right Ploe.

I could post a nearly complete description of my game here, but I´m too lazy to type that down right now, so here are some points:

About techs:

02 (the turn number): I got Mysticism due to a goody hut
09: researched Stoneworks
18: researched Agriculture (everything fine until now IMO)
45: founded second city
47 (!!): researched Animal Husbandry (should be a little cheaper IMO, it´s a basic tech - we should make it 2/3 of the costs that it has right now - Research-Rate was still at 100%
59: researched Archery
66: the Wheel
67: 3rd city
77: Mining (would have taken Horsebackriding, because I started a war against Gilles, but that would have taken 38!! turns so I decide to research Masonry instead)
86: 4th city
91: Research Rate drops to 70%, because the money from goody huts had all been consumed
98: Masonry
101: 5th city
104: Research Rate at 40%
106: captured Brionne (6th city) - 90 Gold research bacj to 70% - Rest of Research for Chronicles
110: Research Rate 60%
113: Research Rate 50% - gained my first Copper Resource for Chariots
117: Research Rate 40%
120: 7th city
125: researched Revelation of the Old Ones (3 turns before that Gilles foundedOld Ones Worship)
captured Couronne (8th city)
127: Research rate 30%
128: captured Bordeleaux (9th city) - gain Fishing
131: captured Mousillon (10th city) - only Gold - destroyed Gilles
133: converted to Old Ones
138: captured Eppzhlsh (barbarian - 11th city)
140: I end the Game with about 3 turns to go until I would research Pottery

My conclusion:

After 143 turns I would have had 13 techs (one from a goody hut and research bonus from captured cities)

I was able to start construction on 1 Wonder (Mark of the Old Ones) and 4 Buildings (Watchstone, Barracks, Walls, Shrine) - that´s too little IMO, so yes, we need more early buildings.

Mysticism and Chronicles do absolutely nothing right now! Chronicles should get something like an early Library and maybe Standing Stones should be back at Mysticism and Mysticism could allow a new civic.

Stoneworks is a tech we putted in as an extra, but now one has to research one more tech in the early age, which doesn´t give an extra bonus compared to vanilla (but we should keep it nevertheless IMO - I like it), so others shouldn´t be made too expansive.

I would make Mark of the Old Ones cheaper, around 300-350 hammers

Animal Husbandry could allow for an early Market and/or a new economic civic called Barter (Tauschhandel in german), which could give the effects that freemarket got right now (+1 Trade route per city)

Oh, and I could only build Warriors, Archers and Chariots as Military Units, but the early warfare still was fun - But the aggressive AI wasn´t really aggressive, I think this was because of playing only at noble.

I like that idea about the bartering civic. And yes we definitly need some more buildings (but only a few-yes sort of early library for chronicles fits, hunting could make a sort of early training yard available or archery).
Instead of changing only techcosts there are a lot of files still open to mod like handicapinfo, civics etc.
Standing stones I'd say no cause they are the magical vortex keeping chaos at bay that's why it obviously needs the tech/event rawmagic as well as high magic. But yes we should have an earlier wonder as well maybe some sort of prophecy linked with mysticism.(PL we need fluff!)
Mark of the Old ones sure can be cheaper;)
Would you like to make the patch containing this or some of these changes after version 8c is up(in half an hour or so)? I think I got a little tired with xml:(
Next time maybe try Prince again and raging barbs:D
I just wanted to have noble checked because I wanted to know how far we get with mere xml changes- I now fear there won't be a way around reprogramming the AI on long term but for now we need to get as much aggressiveness out of this game as possible with xml(I think alittle bit can be tuned here still but not much).

Now I need to start bumping my posts! :p

@ Ploe: I didn´t have a look at it, but has my idea about giving every leader at least one of military or production flavor been implemented for the last version?
If not, this may be a good idea to make the Ai better via XML only.

I have alittle hope E.L.M. can tweak a little here for us.

@ Ploe: I didn´t have a look at it, but has my idea about giving every leader at least one of military or production flavor been implemented for the last version?
If not, this may be a good idea to make the Ai better via XML only.
Yes woodelf made that and I checked it. Didn't work well though. The AI was up to date with weapons but still very peaceful and not caring about religion at all.
The flavors I believe just affect what techs the AI is going for but doesn't have any effect on behavior by itself. I made the Leaders alittle more unpleasant but as you see that also had a limited effect-well maybe stronger with religions but I want the AI aggressive already without religion at all.

I can see what i can dig up on early religeoud wonders. they will most likely be elven or lizardmen based, but that should be OK.

...

Actually i just found something: there is a Hotek's Column in my map of Naggaroth, and also something labled 'the Monoliths'
There are also several wonders built by the lizardmen dedicated to the old ones, most reference the starts, sun or moon. IIRC, ther is one called the Alter of stars? Isle of Stars? i cant remember exactly, but its a little island west of Lustria, and it look quite important. i will find out more tomorrow.

I think it affects research s well as what it is going to construct in its cities, but I´m really not sure.

I think it affects research s well as what it is going to construct in its cities, but I´m really not sure.
Yes can be construction as well but certainly not behavior.

See, time to bump. This would help solve aggression!

Once a week I bring up the dream of an SDK or python addition of aggressive AI like CivIII. We have 2 choices now and CivIII had 5 levels of aggression. Why, oh why, can't we get more?

See, time to bump. This would help solve aggression!
Put it in your sig!:D
No wait I'll do it...

Put it in your sig!:D
No wait I'll do it...

This is in the SDK, in function CvPlayerAI::AI_getAttitudeVal. This gets the value of the attitude towards the player (all those + and -'s in diplomacy).


if (GC.getGameINLINE().isOption(GAMEOPTION_AGGRESSIVE _AI))
{
if (GET_PLAYER(ePlayer).isHuman())
{
iAttitude -= 2;
}
}



I would think just changing the number 2 to something higher would do in making them more aggressive against humans . If you want I can make that two a define that you can set in XML and you can play with it. Also, perhaps I can take away the human restriction so that they're more aggressive all around, or add just another one, like...


if (GC.getGameINLINE().isOption(GAMEOPTION_AGGRESSIVE _AI))
{
if (GET_PLAYER(ePlayer).isHuman())
{
iAttitude -= GC.getDefineINT("AI_AGGRESSIVE_DIPLO_PENALTY_VS_HUMANS")
}
else
{
iAttitude -= GC.getDefineINT("AI_AGGRESSIVE_DIPLO_PENALTY_VS_AI");
}

}

}

Didn´t somebody say some time ago that Rhye did a wonderful job in his mod to make the AI way more intelligent (declaring wars that actually make sense etc.) maybe somebody should have a look at his code or ask what has been done to achieve better results for the AI?

Thanks for the support Ploep! :p

Sounds like we can sick Gerikes on the problem. Yippee, my prayers might be answered.

This is in the SDK, in function CvPlayerAI::AI_getAttitudeVal. This gets the value of the attitude towards the player (all those + and -'s in diplomacy).


if (GC.getGameINLINE().isOption(GAMEOPTION_AGGRESSIVE _AI))
{
if (GET_PLAYER(ePlayer).isHuman())
{
iAttitude -= 2;
}
}



I would think just changing the number 2 to something higher would do in making them more aggressive against humans . If you want I can make that two a define that you can set in XML and you can play with it. Also, perhaps I can take away the human restriction so that they're more aggressive all around, or add just another one, like...


if (GC.getGameINLINE().isOption(GAMEOPTION_AGGRESSIVE _AI))
{
if (GET_PLAYER(ePlayer).isHuman())
{
iAttitude -= GC.getDefineINT("AI_AGGRESSIVE_DIPLO_PENALTY_VS_HUMANS")
}
else
{
iAttitude -= GC.getDefineINT("AI_AGGRESSIVE_DIPLO_PENALTY_VS_AI");
}

}

}

Ah I see aggressive isn't aggressive in general. I think there already is a tag like that in Leaderinfos. That would just make the AI have a bad attidude towards the player but indeed not declare wars intelligently (-better than nothing still). But would you be interested to have a look at the AI if you can discover how we can make it declare wars more strategically-mainly not to declare war to the weakest at all but the weakest adjacted to his own territory?
I believe Rhye heavyly based his code on using his worldmap so I don't think his code can be used directly but may be an inspiration for those who can read it. We would need something more flexible since we don't use the same map at all times. What would also already help is more detail how the xml tags in the Leaderinfos really work. There is currently no reliable info available just a couple of tags were analyzed by seve05.

Ah I see aggressive isn't aggressive in general. I think there already is a tag like that in Leaderinfos. That would just make the AI have a bad attidude towards the player but indeed not declare wars intelligently (-better than nothing still). But would you be interested to have a look at the AI if you can discover how we can make it declare wars more strategically-mainly not to declare war to the weakest at all but the weakest adjacted to his own territory?
I believe Rhye heavyly based his code on using his worldmap so I don't think his code can be used directly but may be an inspiration for those who can read it. We would need something more flexible since we don't use the same map at all times. What would also already help is more detail how the xml tags in the Leaderinfos really work. There is currently no reliable info available just a couple of tags were analyzed by seve05.

Fair enough. I've downloaded Ryhe's and gonna' see what he's done with that. I'll see if I can search too what the leaderhead tags do.

In other news, I love how the early game is turning out. With archers, battles are becoming more like skirmishes, where you can send out a stack of 2 archers plus maybe a warrior and realize that

That sounds incredible Gerikes. Very cool.

Just found this thread, might be useful.

http://forums.civfanatics.com/showthread.php?t=145867&highlight=dogpile

Perhaps a new thread should be made for possible AI tweaks?

Yeah the link to the wiki there is pretty. I had another wiki enty but that wasn't near as good.
I will also have a look at Rhyes(just xml) maybe he just found way to set this up nicly but I still think I read something about AI choosing to start wars based on tiles (of his map). Would still be worth looking at that imo. Thx Gerikes good find I will have a close read.

This is what I worked with mostly:
http://forums.civfanatics.com/showthread.php?t=177450

A question Gerikes:
Can you try to define Rand and probabilities a bit clearer looking at the code. Some Rands seem to work differently than others. The wonderbuilders have a high Randvalue but the warmongerers a low one. Confusing. I wouldn't need every detail but a rough idea how strong changes to those settings would affect the AI behavior. Just takes so much to find that out by playtesting.:(

oh damnit I need some sleep. See you soon.

A question Gerikes:
Can you try to define Rand and probabilities a bit clearer looking at the code. Some Rands seem to work differently than others. The wonderbuilders have a high Randvalue but the warmongerers a low one. Confusing. I wouldn't need every detail but a rough idea how strong changes to those settings would affect the AI behavior. Just takes so much to find that out by playtesting.:(

oh damnit I need some sleep. See you soon.

Sure. There's a ton of values, and each one is normally in the middle of some really long calculations, so I'll take a quick look at each one and see what it does. If there are any that sound interesting I can go further in depth after.

Ok, played my first game of WHFB :) as the empire and are still in the ancient era, i like how the game plays, perhaps cause i play with raging barbarians, i didnt see much (i mean any action) frorm the other civs, but i play on noble as requested... I have to say the following, spicing up this era could be the best way, cause i like it somehow, fighting those barbs, using archers and warriors until you can build spearman and axeman (BTW: axeman doesnt have a first strike!!!) But we definitely need a camera that zooms into the action even when you defend! and i didnt play with supportfire yet... Perhaps we can make the Spearman or axeman available earlier? and i had some problems creating hapiness in my cities (but that could be due to military researches...)

but what i can say is, that even this small look into the mod was big fun :)

Here's what I was able to dig up. Some of it is pretty general, because the code is sometimes tough to read. So, I've given what I think is the best idea of what they do. If you want any more specific detail on anything just ask. I took the ones I thought would be most useful for war and peace.

iBaseAttitude:
Base diplomacy attitude (+/- value) toward another civ at any time.

iBasePeaceWeight:
Base weight that this civ values peace. Only affects the civ's attitude towards other AI's.

iPeaceWeightRand:
A random number from 0 to this number is added to their peace weight at the beginning of the game.

iWarmongerRespect:
The smaller of two AI civ's iWarmongerRespect value is added to each of the civ's attitude. So, a civ of -1 and a civ of 5 means that each civ will have a -1 towards each other.

iRefuseToTalkWarThreshold:
If the number of turns the AI is at war is less than this value, the AI will refuse to talk to another civ.
This value is doubled if the AI team was the one who declared war.

iMaxWarRand:
The chance that a civ might try to begin planning a war this turn. Every turn, the civ has a 1 in X chance of considering planning. The lower the number, the more likely they will consider to begin planning. If it does consider it, it will find the target it hates the most and start planning war on them. There is a chance that the AI will consider to begin planning but not find a valid target they actually want to attack. In this case, they will not start planning against anyone.

Once a civ does begins planning, I think it will declare war once it's planning is done. Five turns elapse after planning begins before the civ will declare a limited war (small skirmishes, etc.). Ten turns elapse after planning begins before the civ will declare a total war (much larger force used, puts more resources into the war).


iMaxWarNearbyPowerRatio:
The percentage of their total power a civ will use when determining if it's stronger than another country that is "nearby" (which I believe means they share the same continent). This only is used when determining if the AI will start a total war. Thus, a value of 200 means the AI will consider itself twice as strong than it really is when determine it's strength vs. another civ. An AI civ only declares war with another civ if it thinks it's stronger.

iMaxWarDistantPowerRatio:
Same as iMaxWarNearbyPowerRatio, but this applies to civ's that are not nearby (are not on the same continent).

iMaxWarMinAdjacentLandPercent:
Of the three "passes" used in checking if a total war will start to be planned, this is the first (after this comes checking if it's a nearby civ using the iMaxWarNearbyPowerRatio calculations, then if it's a far civ using the iMaxWarDistantPowerRatio calculations). This is a percent value. If the percent of an AI civ's total plots that are adjacent with another civ is greater than this value, then the AI civ will consider the other civ for a total war.

iLimitedWarRand:
This is like iMaxWarRand, but is for limited wars. Limited wars, being less risky, have a better shot of being started, so this number will for Civ4 be smaller than iMaxWarRand (since a smaller number means a better chance.

iLimitedWarPowerRatio:
Like iMaxWar____PowerRatio, this will give a percentage bonus to what the AI thinks of it's power when it's trying to determine if it's stronger than another. It doesn't seem as if an AI will declare a limited war against an enemy that isn't considered "nearby", so there only is one value for this.

iDogpileWarRand:
There's limited war, total war, and dogpile war. This works just like iLimitedWarRand and iTotalWarRand, except it will make the civ consider starting to plan a dogpile war. This means that the AI will attempt to start a war with a team whose power is low compared the AI civ's power AND to the power of teams that are currently at war with the possible target.

iMakePeaceRand:
The chances a civ will consider making peace with one of it's enemies. Every turn, the civ has a 1 in X random shot of deciding to try to make peace, where X is iMakePeaceRand. It will go through each team it's at war with and decide whether they want to try to declare peace. If they decide that they do, they go through the steps of declaring peace.

How they determine if they want peace.

1.) They have to be able to contact the enemy civ.
2.) AI_isChosenWar is true. This is true only if the AI's war plan against the team is not WARPLAN_ATTACKED or WARPLAN_RECENTLY_ATTACK. These are what a war plan against an enemy civ start as if the enemy civ was the one who declared war. After awhile, a war that a civ is in that is of the war plan WARPLAN_ATTACKED will eventually (after some turns) become one of the other war plans, which will allow this criterion to be met.
3.) The war counter is past 20. One point is added to the war counter every turn. I'm assuming that other factors add to the war counter as well.

If any one of the following is true, than they will try to make peace:
4a.) The war counter is over 50.
4b.) The war counter is over 30 (40 for a total war) and
The end war value for this team is between half of the end war value for the other team and double the end war value for the other team.
4c.) The war is a dogpile war and this civ is the only civ left at war with the enemy (the enemy is no longer being "dogpiled."

The end war value is a value that takes multiple factors in to come up with a number that represents how good of an idea it is to end a war against a specific team. The higher the number, the better the proposal of peace is. So, for 4b, if a team's end war value is too low, it doesn't gain as much as the other team from peace. However, I'm not sure why they would want to declare peace if their value is more than twice the others. My only thought is that if the other civ's end war value is really low, then in the process of making peace they can ask for some good stuff.


iDeclareWarTradeRand:
This seems to only have an affect on how an AI negotiates with other AI civs. It is the chance that an AI will try to make a trade with another AI to declare war on one of it's enemies. Every turn, for each AI player that the AI civ can talk with, it has a one in X chance of trying to make a trade for war with that player against one of the teams the ai civ is at war with.

iDemandRebukedSneakProb:
Every time an AI civ has one of it's demands rejected, there is a percentage chance that the AI will start planning a limited war against the rejecter. This is a percentage chance, so 100 means that the civ will always start planning after not reciving a demand.

iDemandRebukedWarProb:
This is the probability that a Civ will immediately declare war immediately after one of their demands are rejected. That would be unlike the last tag, but instead of being sneaky and start planning, then launch a war later, the civ instead declares war immediately.

iRazeCityProb:
The probability (percent) that the AI civ will raze a city upon conquering it, if they don't deam it keepable by many other factors.

iBuildUnitProb:
The probability (percent) that the AI will build a unit at a city.

The actual total probability is this number plus twice the amount of production experience a unit recieves at that city.

This total is then halfed if the Civ is considered to be having financial troubles.

This whole process is one in a few for determining if a city will make a unit. Here is the full list of criteria (if one of these is true, then the city will be set to build a unit):

1.) The civ is in a land war.
2.) The civ has less than 4 cities and the game has not progressed 60 turns yet.
3.) The unit probability test above passes.
3.) The civ is human and it is the first turn (I'm not sure why that code is there).


iBaseAttackOddsChange:
iAttackOddsChangeRand:

Every turn, the AI will set a variable that is their "attack odds change". This varaible is used to add or subtract from attack odds of a battle. I don't think this changes the actual odds of the battle per se, but instead will change what the AI THINK that the battle odds are, so that they are more or less willing to do attacks every turn.

The attack odds changed is calculated by adding the iBaesAttackOddsChange to the sum of TWO random numbers from 0 to the iAttackOddsChangeRand. I doubt you can make iAttackOddsChangeRand negative.

Thx Gerikes that certainly added some clarity.:)
I will collect all the info about this subject and put it in a new thread where I will also ask further questions about it later. Now only one question. Is it possible to set a negative ipeaceweight?-vanilla has 0 at the lowest.

Btw I now understand why the AI is that stupid in declaring war if nearby is just the same continent, think it would be possible to tweak the code so that nearby actually means there aren't any civs between attacker and defender that don't have open borders to the attacking civ?

Right now Mysticism and Chronicles do absolutely nothing except for making the early game longer.We need to find some things for those techs.

I would suggest to move the Standing Stones back to Mysticism and Stoneworks. Right now they become available by Raw- and HighMagic. The main benefit of the Standing Stones is that they give free Watchstones in every city. Watchstones become available with Stoneworks and if I don´t play with a civ that gets +2 culture in every city via traits they are mostly the first things that I build in new towns. By the time ýou are able to build the Standing Stones you already got Watchstones in all of your cities.

Conclusion: Standing Stones need to be available a lot earlier and Mysticism needs to do something - So I say let´s move the Standing Stones back to Mysticism.

Chronicles are perfect for an early Science building, like an elder-council for example (+25% Science - that´s standard). Chronicles also would perfectls fit for any kind of early civic IMO, but we should have a rough idea about civics first.

Trade would also be the perfect place to put in an early Economics civic like "barter" (maybe a plus to trade route yield or an extra trade route per city, or for the 3 biggest cities, or cities with some resources in the city radius).

Those suggestions sound good to me Duke. Anything to make the earlier techs meaningful. :thumbsup:

Right now Mysticism and Chronicles do absolutely nothing except for making the early game longer.We need to find some things for those techs.

I would suggest to move the Standing Stones back to Mysticism and Stoneworks. Right now they become available by Raw- and HighMagic. The main benefit of the Standing Stones is that they give free Watchstones in every city. Watchstones become available with Stoneworks and if I don´t play with a civ that gets +2 culture in every city via traits they are mostly the first things that I build in new towns. By the time ýou are able to build the Standing Stones you already got Watchstones in all of your cities.

Conclusion: Standing Stones need to be available a lot earlier and Mysticism needs to do something - So I say let´s move the Standing Stones back to Mysticism.

Chronicles are perfect for an early Science building, like an elder-council for example (+25% Science - that´s standard). Chronicles also would perfectls fit for any kind of early civic IMO, but we should have a rough idea about civics first.

Trade would also be the perfect place to put in an early Economics civic like "barter" (maybe a plus to trade route yield or an extra trade route per city, or for the 3 biggest cities, or cities with some resources in the city radius).
Duke please leave the Standing stones where they are! Rest is ok with me.
I already wrote my reasoning about that a couple of times-they are the magical vortex build as a barrier for raw magic after the collapse of the warpgate! Let's just have another wonder for earlier building.

It´s ok with me if we leave the standing stones where they are, but they should have another effect then. As I said, it´s stupid to have a wonder that gives Watchstones in every city that late.

We then would need another wonder that will give the Watchstones and that should have Mysticism and Stoneworks as prereq IMO.

I just wanted to put a wonder with the Watchstones to Mysticism, if we will have to come up with a new name and give the Standing Stones another effect, that would be fine for me.

Do we need WH buildings for the ancient era or simple generic ones? Right now we something to build...

Instead of spamming buildings, why don't we create another excess buildable option (like the research/culture/wealth options) that gives minimal boni but is avaliable early on. Maybe create 1 Happy, 1 Sci, 1 Gold and 1 Culture, but regardless of size, this never increases. Making it useless in the late game. This also could fight against cities the maintance.

That's fine E_L_M, but we really need a market or town hall or something to add some income (for the armies) and to reduce maintenance/corruption. The number of cities penalty is a killer way too soon, but I do like starting with 3 cities so I think we need another option than simply not giving 3 starting settlers. Somewhere in the GlobalDefines is a value for maintenance fees we could change I think. That would help the player from hemorraging cash after settling 3 cities.

Sorry that rambled a bit...

That's fine E_L_M, but we really need a market or town hall or something to add some income (for the armies) and to reduce maintenance/corruption. The number of cities penalty is a killer way too soon, but I do like starting with 3 cities so I think we need another option than simply not giving 3 starting settlers. Somewhere in the GlobalDefines is a value for maintenance fees we could change I think. That would help the player from hemorraging cash after settling 3 cities.

Sorry that rambled a bit...

If corruption costs are the major problem, why not kill two birds with one stone (no pun intended) and make Watchstones decrease maintenance in the same way a Courthouse does?

If corruption costs are the major problem, why not kill two birds with one stone (no pun intended) and make Watchstones decrease maintenance in the same way a Courthouse does?

That would be a good start. I'm still a bit bored simply building warriors to be honest while watching my cashflow drop like a stone.

That would be a good start. I'm still a bit bored simply building warriors to be honest while watching my cashflow drop like a stone.

True. I haven't play-tested quite as much as I should because I keep getting bored of the early game. More units would definitely be a good start.

anybody tested with the new patch already?

The market should be available a little bit earlier with it.

And I also think that we need atleast one more early building and another early wonder would also be good IMO - as woodelf said it´s quite boring that the player is simply pumping out units.

:blush:

My bad, I haven't played the patch yet Duke.

played it yesterday, with raging barbarians its quiete ok, but what about making the early techs cheaper, until the step where you can build axemen and spearman, and from that on make the techs more expansive, by that we can speed up the early game until a point where you can fight real battles and build interesting cities, cause you have a variety of units and improvements, but wont get into next age that soon. thats the best option in my eyes! and well, we do need either more barbs or more aggressive AIs...

To go back to the original question.

I played a couple of early trial games and have this to say:

1) I recon we should get rid of level 1 technologies apart from fishing (stone working, hunting, ect...) as they make the game very slow

2) Shouldn't you get as many warriors as settlers?

3) warriors shouldn't get a bonus when defending cities. I lost 4 of my warriors attacking a single warrior in a hill city.

To go back to the original question.

I played a couple of early trial games and have this to say:

1) I recon we should get rid of level 1 technologies apart from fishing (stone working, hunting, ect...) as they make the game very slow

2) Shouldn't you get as many warriors as settlers?

3) warriors shouldn't get a bonus when defending cities. I lost 4 of my warriors attacking a single warrior in a hill city.
1)no, it's my intention to have an ancient era worth playing(that means a long era), but we certainly need to spice that one up further
2)I fixed that for the next upload
3)that's still vanilla. problem is if we take out that bonus civs will easily get destroyed by barbs. But I'm all ears for alternatives.(loosing that many warriors seems just bad luck though)

how about an early ancient attack unit? Something that would kill warriors easily but struggle against archers. I'm thinking strenght 4, move 1, no bonuses.

how about an early ancient attack unit? Something that would kill warriors easily but struggle against archers. I'm thinking strenght 4, move 1, no bonuses.
Same thing. Civs shouldn't be extinguished that easy imo. I must say it's already hard enough to defend your cities in early game. Play raging barbs a couple of times and tell me afterwards if you still think cities fall to slowly.;)

Considering we're in the beta stage, maybe the early game is more bland than slow. Once we get unique attributes to each civ, giving unique early challanges, we can make it more of a game at the start. At the moment there is not much to differ civ's apart from stats and traits.

how about an early ancient attack unit? Something that would kill warriors easily but struggle against archers. I'm thinking strenght 4, move 1, no bonuses.

If your after Warrior killers, it might be better to go for an early axeman-like unit, same strength as a warrior but a +str vs melee. Still keeps archers as decent defensive until swordsman.

I see your point about cities being hard to capture, buts its really annoying having 3 cities all building warriors who have nothing better to do that sit on their ass all day. At least remove the preresquite for workers then or add some very early building (move granary to agriculture?)

I see your point about cities being hard to capture, buts its really annoying having 3 cities all building warriors who have nothing better to do that sit on their ass all day. At least remove the preresquite for workers then or add some very early building (move granary to agriculture?)
I usually only need 7 turns or less for stoneworks(workers) I really see no need accelerating this. But we definitly need some earl buildings as well. 1 for chronicles at least.

But that means that stoneworks is the most important early tech by far! it would be better for the player to have a real choice, instead of being 'forced' to research stoneworks first.

I agree with Olleus, every civ needs Stoneworks, so it really only delays workers by up to 7 turns. Plus workers usually take longer than 7 turns to build so this doesn't give the first civ to get this tech, much of a bonus. Also with there being only a few bottom level tech's, it is researched quite soon by any civ. So the effect is minimal.

If you want a flavour limit on workers, place a limit on workers: population size of city, and institute captured slaves from barbarian attacks - so you have to actively go out and get slaves (apart from maybe certain civs with certain traits allow the worker:city size limit to be less - but not slave capture)

Or maybe a life span for workers, so after x turns (or x amount of actions performed) they *die* and disband, forcing more to be built (certain civs could have longer life spans)

I've played another game (all normal settings, pangea, normal speed, playing as Brettonia) and went up to 100 IY. I attacked Vlad with warriors and then soon sent in chariots (beelined for mining and then beelined for animal husbandry). I managed to take quite a few cities, even though archers are tough when defending cities. Then the darkelves declared war on me so I sued for peace andturned my army around. I was unable to take more than 1 darkelf city but I pillaged him until he sued for peace. At the same time Archeon declared war on me and sent in beastmen through the northen forest.
However, by that time I had 7 cities but my economy was in complete ruin. I was loosing 16 gold per turn on 30% science. All of my cities had built all possible buildings so I had them build units which I had to disband immediately to stay above 0% science. I think that AI is suffering from the same problem as me as no religions have been founded yet.
In short, the military section is balanced, but we need some early financial buildings. I would have researched barter to get a marketplace, but it would have taken 62 turns.

I agree with Olleus, every civ needs Stoneworks, so it really only delays workers by up to 7 turns. Plus workers usually take longer than 7 turns to build so this doesn't give the first civ to get this tech, much of a bonus. Also with there being only a few bottom level tech's, it is researched quite soon by any civ. So the effect is minimal.

If you want a flavour limit on workers, place a limit on workers: population size of city, and institute captured slaves from barbarian attacks - so you have to actively go out and get slaves (apart from maybe certain civs with certain traits allow the worker:city size limit to be less - but not slave capture)

Or maybe a life span for workers, so after x turns (or x amount of actions performed) they *die* and disband, forcing more to be built (certain civs could have longer life spans)
Great ideas!
The slavery civic should enable a chance capturing slaves regardless of the unit attacked(except animals). I like the idea of Lifespans for slaves(maybe die after 10 buildactions).
I will consider removing the prerqs for workers.

@Olleus
yes the financial problem is known I wait for Duke about building design. Also we should consider this for the civics and maybe we can reduce costs of troops in the handicaps as well.

Here are a couple of ideas for very erly buildings:

idea for building for chronicals: the 'Communual hall', or 'City Square', where bards and gypsies and story tellers from all around gather to entertain the populace once a week. could give a small boost to culture and religeon spread, but become obsoleae with literature.

another idea could be a 'Trading Post' which could give +x gold for every couple of populations or something.(need better numbers;)) this could become obsoleate with currency or some earlyer economic tech. but dont give it a % increase in gold, because most cities have no gold income in the first place, and 15% of 0 gold is still 0. we need to make a building which give a solid number, even if it is only 1 gold. i think this building could solve a few economic disasters.