With the new patch, the Jotnar have been changed extensively. Have any questions or complaints? Post them here. ;)




Civ-Wide Changes:

No city size cap.
Jotnar Staedding added by palace rather than python code.
No link to AC for spawn rate. Too limiting for evil Jotnar.
Kindred Promotions (Woodkin, Seakin, Firekin, Frostkin, Stonekin, and Stormkin)
Palace mana Mind, Creation, and Law. Spirit is pretty useless for them. Life is also a possibility to replace Mind.
Unique monument. Gives +1 gold and +1 culture. Spawns a Jot Adult when built.
Unique barracks. Gives +1 happy, 10% commerce bonus. Requires code of laws. Allows them to build Thrall Axeman (replacing orc conscripts)
Staeding gives +1 food to water tiles. Encourages coastal starts.
Changed flavourstart to weight coastal start, riverside, hills.
Changed starting techs to seafaring and crafting. Allowing them to use water techs immediately is very important, as I changed the flavourmod settings to drop them in coastal starts. They don't have any DOMAIN_WATER units, so essentially all seafaring is doing is letting them work the tiles and use pearls. Crafting lets Hephaustus or Father beeline the metal techs.
Traditions civic loses number of cities maintenance bonus entirely. Gives 25% enslave chance.
Archery techs, Poisons unblocked. Mounted line techs blocked.
Eliminated distance maintenance entirely, +50% number of cities maintenance. The Jots can wander all over the map and settle the nicest spots they find...but if they try to spam cities their economy will tank.
2.25 food per population. Not a huge nerf, but it does noticeably slow early growth.
+100% trade route income. Might dial that back some...but it seems a better solution than adding gold to buildings. Encourages playing them as intended.
Civ bonuses to improvements....gone. +1 :food: on water tiles, improved fishing boat(sea farm). That's it.


Leader Changes:

Mother Enningas:

Spiritual/Financial


Father Kasghenal:

Conqueror/Slaver


Uxol the Half-Breed:

Arcane/Treacherous/Raiders/Pretender

Pretender: Grants Estranged to all Melee and Disciple units.

Egrass becomes an Arcane unit for Uxol, is able to take Channeling 2 at KotE.


Hephaestus:

Blacksmith/Veinhunter/Emergent




Unit Changes:

Thalls:

Slaves receive an effect promo. Changes the name to thrall. Thralls can be used a couple of new ways. "Long Pork" is a heal spell that sacrifices a thrall. "Conscript Thrall" converts a thrall to a Warrior. "Recruit Thrall Guide" converts a thrall to a scout.
Unit_Warrior receives an effect promo that changes their name to Thrall Conscript. More likely to defend the stack, defense only (preventing them from having spirit guide XP land on them), free unit.
Unit_Scout and Unit_Hunter receive an effect promo "Thrall Guide". Defense only, free unit. They can't pop lairs, but they can explore.
At Deception a promo becomes available for Hunters: "Thrall Cultist". Overwrites Thrall Guide, -1 Combat, Invisible_Animal, can pillage, extra first strikes and withdraw, infects culture, can explore rival territory, some other minor stuff. Expendable terrorist units, essentially.
At Code of Laws + Bronze Working barracks can be built, which allows Axemen. Effect promo renames them "Thrall Militia". They can attack. Considering giving them some penalty. Combat % penalty outside borders? Abandon % outside borders?


Jot Citizen:

No big changes here. They can only upgrade directly to bottom-tier units (Cyklops, Wild Troll, Huscarl, Worker, Settler, Jot Adept, Reaver). When in a city they gain a promotion that adds 2 hammers to the city production, "Artisan".


Worker:

Made them eligible for the Age upgrade promotions. Also eligible for "Artisan"


Melee Line

Huscarl:

Available at Mining. 4/6, can use bronze weapons. Eligible for "Artisan". Huscarls were historically laborers when they weren't fighting.


Hill Giant:

Cartography, Bronze. Can use bronze, iron weapons. No building requirement.


Wielder:

No change other than tier from 2 to 3.


Berzerker:

13/8. Fire theme stripped. Randomly go enraged. Immune to and cause fear. Heal after combat, blitz, pillage on move. No national limit.


Jotun:

16/16. Can cast Warsong. Buffs stack w/blitz, pillage on move, march, +1 move. Horribly powerful...but an end-of-line super-expensive unit should be.


Titan:

Currently unchanged.




Archery Line: This is mostly accomplished through promotions rather than unique units...

Hurler:

Requires Archery. -2/+2 Combat/Defense. 3 Ranged Strength, 1 range, 15% limit. Bonus to city and hill defense. +1 first strike. Costs 50 gold, requires archery range, available to melee. Changes unitcombat to archer (which is needed for the subsequent promotions)


Strong Arm:

Requires Bowyers, Fletcher, 50 gold. +3 ranged combat, +15% limit, +1 first strike.


Deadeye:

Requires Bowyers, Age 100, Bowyer, 50 gold. +3 ranged combat, +15% limit, increases range to 2, +1 first strike.


Tryggvi.

Actual unique unit, upgrades from Wielder. With all the archery promos (it only comes with the first one...but buying the rest is a no-brainer) it is a 10/18, ranged strength 12 (70% limit, range 3), collateral damage, marksman, 6-9 first strikes engine of shooty death. Of course, by the time you have it you've sunk about 600 gold into the thing + the cost of all the buildings and tech. National limit 4.




Recon Line:

Wild Troll:

I added Hidden Nationality back...but will probably remove it again. Too big a nerf for Uxol. At Hunting they get an effect promo that allows defensive bonuses, +1 move, +1 defense.


Troll Hunter:

Not available until Tracking. Otherwise similar.


Troll Ranger:

9/8 (9/9 with effect promo), available at Animal Handling. 3 First strikes.


Troll Elder:

No major changes.




Disciple Line:(Need Cyklops art for all disciples, or need to drop the Cyklops entirely.)

Cyklops:

Requires Mysticism, pagan temple, Education. 4/4, starts w/channeling 1, creation 1, medic 1, divine. All jot disciples can use the spread state religion spells.


Mouth:

Requires Priesthood. 6/6. Starts w/channeling 2, medic 2, jot spellcaster, mind 1, law 1. Can only be upgraded from Cyklop.


Voice:

Equivalent of High Priest. Requires Theology. 8/8. Add channeling 3, mind 2, law 2. National limit 4.




Adept Line:

Sloegrrekkr:

Basic adept. Requires KOTE, no building. 4/4. Jot spellcaster, channeling 1, spirit guide.


Speaker:

Unchanged


High Speaker:

Boosted to 8/8.




Naval/Mounted Line: No actual unitcombat Naval units.

Reaver:

5/5, 2 move, unitcombat mounted. Requires Bronze Working and Sailing. Upgrades from Jot Adult. No bad goodies, access to Bronze and Iron weapons, can cast escape (sneak away and return to port).


Freebooter:

10/10, 3 move, air combat 8/range 1/60% cap, collateral 100/60/7, Blitz. Expensive tier 4, upgrades from Reaver.


Reaver(Promotion):

Promotion that Reavers start with. 5 gold earned per successful combat, amphibious/waterwalking/boarding, +50% pillage


Longship(Promotion):

Autoacquire promo, requires reaver. When the unit steps onto a water tile their art changes to lOngship art, +1 visibility, +2 moves, +2 power/defense, +15 withdraw, +3 cargo.


Pirate(Promotion):

Promotion available at Optics. 100 gold cost. Can gain hidden nationality, +2 Combat, +1 move, +100% pillage, pillage on move.


Longship2(Promotion) (needs new name):

Autoacquire effect promo. Requires Astronomy, Pirate. +2 move, +2 combat, +1 visibility, +15% withdraw.






Kindreds:

Woodkin (Troll only):

Available to recon only through spell, requires Hunting, 100 gold. +25 attack/defense% in forest&jungle. Forest stealth (added as prereqOr along w/Forest Stalker).
Woodfather: Requires Woodkin, Age 100. Doubles attack bonus in forest&jungle, Nature affinity 1.
Woodkin spells/prereqs

Bloom: Woodkin
Poison blade : Woodkin + age 50
Mesmerize: Woodkin + age 100
Entangle: Woodfather
Summon Treant: Woodfather




Seakin (Troll only):

Promotion requires 100 gold, Fishing. Must be adjacent to water when transformation spell cast. -25% combat and -1 move on land. +50% combat on water, + 5 move.
Triton: Requires Astronomy and age 100. Gives Water affinity 1, some other stuff.
Seakin spells

Sea farm: Build Order, rather than a spell. Creates an improvement that is essentially a slightly improved fishign boat. Considering a gold cost. Represents Seakin actually herding/farming the sealife. Might disallow workboats for Jots...as sacrificing units doesn't feel right.
Submerge: Spell gives stealth on water. Have it available with just seakin right now...open to increased prereq if needed.
Capsize: 1 turn bonus to first strikes and withdraw, + 50% vs. unitcombat naval. Requires age 50.
Summon Water Elemental: Requires Triton
Tsunami: Requires Triton. Same effect as OO spell.




Frostkin:

Requires Philosophy, 100 gold. -1 Combat, -25% on desert. +2 cold damage, +25% on tundra and snow.
Mulcarn's chosen: Requires Theology, age 100. Ice affinity 1.
Frostkin spells

Freeze: Turns tile to tundra or snow. 2 turn delay.
White Out: Snow Stealth. Requires tracking.
Frozen lands: Same as old version, does a small amount of damage.
Summon Ice Elemental: Yup. Requires Mulcarns Chosen.
Snowfall: Requires Mulcarns chosen.




Firekin:

Requires Warfare, 100 gold. Reverse terrain bonuses of frostkin. -1 Combat, +2 fire damage.
Efreet: Requires Rage, age 100. Fire Affinity 1.
Firekin spells

Scorch: Considering a delay...otherwise the same.
Fireball: Requires age 50.
Ring of flame. Like the AV spell. Requires age 100.
Summon Fire Elemental: Requires Efreet.
Pillar of Flame: Requires Efreet.




Stonekin:

Requires Construction, 100 gold. +2 defense. +25% on hills and peaks, -25% in marsh. Immune to first strikes, +25% workrate.
Juggernaut: Age 100, Blasting powder. Immune to magic, ignore building defense, Earth affinity 1.
Spelunker(Promotion): Hills invisibility. Autoacquire, requires sanitation.
Stonekin Spells

Earth's Boosom: Turns tile into a hill. 2 turn delay.
Earthquake: Requires age 50.
Stoneskin (affects whole stack): Requires age 100
Summon Earth Elemental: Requires Juggernaut
Crush: Requires Juggernaut.




Stormkin:

Requires Trade, 100 gold. Aircombat 2/range 1/15%, +1 first strike, +15% withdraw, Defensive strike 10/5, -3 Strength, +2 Lightning, Immune to Lightning. Allows Hurler, Flying.
Thunder: Requires mercantilism. +3 air combat, +2 moves, +15% withdraw, +10/5 defensive strike, Air affinity 1.
Stormkin spells

Windtalker: Create building in city that gives +1 research/+1 gold, disappears if the caster leaves.
Lightning Bolt: Summon lightning elemental. Requires age 50.
Bellow: Same as Dragon's Roar. Age 100
Summon Air Elemental: requires Tempest
Maelstorm: requires Tempest.

The spawn rate on citizens might need to be toned down some, I don't ever remember seeing something like what's in the attached image.

I don't see why they should be able to see pearls, but aside from that it looks fine :)

They do need some new documentation, thought.

Wow. I'm playing a game right now with the Jotnar under Uxol. I guess I'll see if I get swarmed by giants. I'm the Bannor, too, which is gonna bring a negative between me and him. Crap.

15 turns later and I have another 10 citizens :lol:. Also the city maintenance penalty is either not enough or not working properly, I have 7 cities running 100% research with a 14 gold surplus per turn.

Hmm... That's only 3 citizens per city, but given the turn might be a tad excessive. What speed was that on?

To clarify, the max amount of giants went from this:

iMaxGiants = 3 + (3 * pPlayer.countNumBuildings(gc.getInfoTypeForString( 'BUILDING_JOT_STAEDDING'))) - (CyGame().getGlobalCounter() / 5)

To this:

iMaxGiants = 4 + (6 * pPlayer.countNumBuildings(gc.getInfoTypeForString( 'BUILDING_JOT_STAEDDING')))

Higher base value, more per city, and no dependence on AC... I think the number per city will be first to drop down again if we decide to nerf them.



As for Pearls, in my view it's a side effect. These are Nordic inspired giants, not Greco-Roman... Meaning a push towards coastal cities and raiding is a must. Seafaring accomplishes that, and allows us to give them a flavourstart value for coastal terrain. Fishing is too strong, as it allows immediate improvement, and allowing you to work water tiles with Traditions is a bit off... Mostly because it leads to NOTHING along the Naval line. Pearls are a minor thing. :p



About documentation.... Will be working on that. Hopefully Vermicious will do it, as he made the changes and knows them better... If not, I can root through the code. Something like the pages for the Malakim and Doviello.... Need to make one for the Mechanos and D'tesh as well. And eventually the Bezeri. :p

The names of the Jotnar leaders are TXT_KEY_LEADER_enter name

Known, and already fixed in the QuickFix.

Okay, okay, so it's a brand new upload that I just put up.... :mischief:

I'm playing on normal speed.

Well... That's going to need some looking at I think. :lol:

I'm at home on dial-up so the posted picture is taking forever to load...how many citizens are we talking?


I found myself with about 2-3 per city hanging around as garrisons/production boosts for most of the game (normal speed, diety). Are we seeing far more than that on average? I know you can get some absurd turns where 5 pop....but that is a side effect of the randomness. Easy to change the formula, happily.

I'm more concerned about the economy not scaling properly. I was tweaking that down as I tested...further tweaking is not a problem. We can crank the number of cities maintenance up as high as we need to.

Documentation...I will do. I'm going to be out of town for a week (and drunk for most of it, hopefully) so it won't be immediate. :p

....and a lot of the spoiler list is out of date, I see. :lol:


If you have questions over the next couple of days feel free to bombard me. I'll answer them as quickly as I can. :D

Any chance you could post an updated list then? :lol:

As for the screenshot, 12 adults, 4 cities. Didn't strike me as an issue until I saw that it was only turn 76.

Any chance you could post an updated list then? :lol:

As for the screenshot, 12 adults, 4 cities. Didn't strike me as an issue until I saw that it was only turn 76.


Yeah, I will when it isn't 2:30 in the AM. :lol: Most of it is on the team board already.


As for 12 adults...he started with 2. 4 cities means 4 monuments, so that is 4 more. So 6 spawned over 76 turns? That strikes me as OK. Unless he has lots of upgraded giants running around, of course.

2 Hurlers is all. I forgot about the monuments... Might be okay then.

Yeah, I will when it isn't 2:30 in the AM. :lol: Most of it is on the team board already.


As for 12 adults...he started with 2. 4 cities means 4 monuments, so that is 4 more. So 6 spawned over 76 turns? That strikes me as OK. Unless he has lots of upgraded giants running around, of course.

I only had 2 huscarls but I easily had the cash to upgrade all of them to hill giants within 6 or so turns. Their economy especially with RoK seems to be a little too good.

Attached image from a quick game because I need to sleep. Oh forgot you're on dialup. I had 8 hill giants 5 cities 11 citizens 4 workers by turn 60ish with the ability to pump out a hill giant every other turn.

Why did you remove the city size cap already?

Mostly because it was an arbitrary limit. They are still limited to one ring of worked tiles, lost all bonuses on improvements, and only get +1 :food: on water tiles. In addition to that, they take more food than normal per pop point... It was 2.25 last I saw any hard numbers, but it might have gone up.

So basically, it's still there, just slightly higher. Most cities will top out at 10-12 pop. Only an exceptional city will get much higher... Yggdrasil would do it.

Ok :)

FYI, I'm adding such a system for the Ngomele, using the DLL. They will start out with a pop cap and buildings, technologies and civics will be able to modify it :)

Wild Trolls can build Roads... not bad except Seakin trolls can build roads in water. :)

Also I have 2 Citizens, 2 huscarles, 2 wild trolls, and a worker with only 1 city. I don't think I got them too fast, just seems like a lot for 1 city. Do Workers and Wild trolls not count against the max?

its 93 turns and i have 22 jotnar citizens (5 morphed to units) + egrass + bunch of warriors. huge commerce output and incredibly high production. + u get too many slaves (2-3 per turn atm from barbs)

Egrass the founder can build roads, but can not do the "Build road to" command. Have to step into each square then click the build road command. No functionality loss, but annoying.

Seakin's fishing improvement is neat. Makes a big difference even on bland coastlines square. Makes coastal cities an actual option.

I have a cyclops (1st I ever made in any version) that has channeling I and Growth I but can not cast it. I do not have creation mana and JUST researched KoE. Don't have Alteration yet.

Answering these more or less in order:

1. Right now it is at 2.5 food per population. Econ is broken, no question. I've been dialing it back as I test. I'll keep dialing it back with each successive patch until everyone except Warkirby is happy. :lol:

2. Roads on coast hexes is a known quirk. Could be blocked if needed...but Valk and I were both sort of amused by it.

3.. The limit is determined by counting units with the Giantkin promo, so wild trolls and workers do count.

4. Enslavement chance is the exact same as you would get with slavery. Easily dialed down if needed, but its utility varies greatly depending on your game settings. 22 Giants on turn 93 is a bit high...sounds like we'll dial that back down a bit.

5. I have no idea why Egrass can't "build to". I'll look at it, but I believe he has always lacked that ability.

6. Cyklops is a divine unit...KOTE shouldn't have any bearing on it. It worked in my test version... Stupid question, but are you in a city? Have you already cast this turn? Are you in the middle of spreading the word?

Well, as long as roads can ONLY be build on coasts, not oceans, then, well, they ARE GIANTS.

Answering these more or less in order:

2. Roads on coast hexes is a known quirk. Could be blocked if needed...but Valk and I were both sort of amused by it.

k. Kinda funny. As long as you all know about it.

4. Enslavement chance is the exact same as you would get with slavery. Easily dialed down if needed, but its utility varies greatly depending on your game settings.

I kinda agree. Seems like about every other fight I get one. Seemed high but they are pretty useless arnt they? The race doesn't lack worker type units, I saw they can upgrade to warriors or scouts that can't attack. Do those ever upgrade or do they stay there?


5. I have no idea why Egrass can't "build to". I'll look at it, but I believe he has always lacked that ability.

not game breaking, like I said just annoying.

6. Cyklops is a divine unit...KOTE shouldn't have any bearing on it. It worked in my test version... Stupid question, but are you in a city? Have you already cast this turn? Are you in the middle of spreading the word?

I didn't think KotE would matter but I thought I would mention it. I have RoK for a religion but got it just before I made the cyclops which upgraded in my capital where my religion had not spread to yet. I don't have spread the word yet. Not sure I am missing a tech (I haven't done any of the priest tech line yet not sure if that matters) was DEFINITELY in a city, tired both in case it was an issue of religion not present. Not an issue of it being greyed out. The button to cast it just isn't there.

I noticed my Seakin troll USED to have the ability to cast capsize and soak but now neither show up anymore.

Attached save game

k. Kinda funny. As long as you all know about it.



I kinda agree. Seems like about every other fight I get one. Seemed high but they are pretty useless arnt they? The race doesn't lack worker type units, I saw they can upgrade to warriors or scouts that can't attack. Do those ever upgrade or do they stay there?



not game breaking, like I said just annoying.



I didn't think KotE would matter but I thought I would mention it. I have RoK for a religion but got it just before I made the cyclops which upgraded in my capital where my religion had not spread to yet. I don't have spread the word yet. Not sure I am missing a tech (I haven't done any of the priest tech line yet not sure if that matters) was DEFINITELY in a city, tired both in case it was an issue of religion not present. Not an issue of it being greyed out. The button to cast it just isn't there.

I noticed my Seakin troll USED to have the ability to cast capsize and soak but now neither show up anymore.

Attached save game

The slaves you convert to warriors can eventually become slightly nerfed axemen that can attack. You need code of laws to build the Jot barracks that allows that. Thrall guides (scouts/hunters) can be upgraded to Thrall cultists.

The buttons not being there...that is a bug. I'm on pathetic dial-up, but I'll try and have a look at your save game.

Happily the spell thing is NOT a bug.

The answer was in your event log. "Turn 79: A player has cast Arcane Lacuna"


:)

I totslly missed that. Thank you. Just went back and looked... yup can cast now.

Sorry about that.

Oh yes, what DOES wisdom of the Ancients do? It says it creates units in cities with Council of the Warcheif.

5. I have no idea why Egrass can't "build to". I'll look at it, but I believe he has always lacked that ability.
Nope, he's definitely had it previously. I used to use it quite often.

Also, why do Jotnar get +1 food from Ice?
Edit: So the Jotnar lost the Wall of the Covenant? That sort of this should RELLY be listed somewhere-I tried to beeline it.
Althought, the Palaces do look interesting.
Edit2: Also, the complete lost of religeos Heros is a farly large blow. There units are tought, but only getting 1 hero (who's not a monster in a fight) is rather weakaning.

1. Wisdom of the Ancients. World Spell. Doubles the current experience of all your Giantkin units. LIke all the best world spells it is most useful late in the game...but can bail you out early.

2. Egrass...I don't think I did anything that would change that. Very odd.

3. +1 food from Ice is in there for once The White Hand is a playable religion. That is meant to be a strong choice for the Jots.

3a. Yes, the wall should be documented along with all my other changes. I'll get to that, I promise. :crazyeye:

4. Religious heroes is a balance issue and a flavor issue. Religious heroes provide an interesting, powerful unit for most civs. Every single giant has the potential to be an interesting, powerful unit...so the religious heroes are both silly-looking and unneeded.

Few things I found while playing.

1. Is egrass the founder Supposed to be able to upgrade up the divine line? He became hero of foxford for me, and then later I was able to upgrade him to a speaker (not sure this is right - but the one that is available at priesthood). After the upgrade he was no longer able to improve my land anymore, but... not sure if that actually matters when he can suddenly have strength 6 base (strength 10 base by the time I upgraded him - +2 from old giant, +2 from heroic attack/defense)

2. You have stated that there is a new unit available down the archery line (an upgrade from weilder). However, in my game the archery tech tree is blocked. I am able to build hurlers and one other unit at engineering, both with ranged attacks, but am not able to build any units with ranged attack. Horse line is also blocked, as stated (and poisons unblocked). Also on the note of stating things, food required is 2.5, not 2.25. So what happens when the jotnar run sacrifice the weak?

3. City spamming still VERY viable. Courthouse gives -40% maintenence, barracks -20%, basilica -40%, and having one stormkin promoted giant in each city casting that wind spell thingy gives another -10%. And thats not counting the 5%'s from law mana. Even without going order or building law mana nodes, you will probably have a minimum of -75% maintenence reduction from the 2 buildings, the spell, and the 1 law mana source provided. Going order you can skip the unit and still get -110% from basilica, courthouse, barracks, and 2 law mana nodes (palace and holy building). The only major nerf to city spamming is the inability to upgrade citizens to settlers. This however is countered by the artisan promotion. Just stick a bunch of citizens who you haven't bothered upgrading in a city and presto, you have more production than a dwarf with a full vault and fields of mithril in every square. And on this note - just upgrade a huscarl per city, give him the air mana upgrade, have him cast the spell, and let him give -10% maintenence and +2 hammers in the city he is stationed in (and provide a nice big meatshield to stop attackers. (also, what is up with the buildings providing mana and city maintenence reductions? Considering that they now have the freedom to spread great distances and can live fairly well in most enviornments, why do they need mana providing buildings?)

4. Having thrall militia no longer able to be built once you can build thrall axmen kinda sucks - militia costs no maintenence costs, axmen do. Also on the subject of militia - when a unit captures a slave, the slave gets aptitude. Then once you upgrade him to militia, the militia now has aptitude. If it weren't for the increadiably slow rate at which aptitude gives xp (and if it weren't for the fact it was on thralls) this could be a bit dangerous. Note - the dovollio have the same ability.

5. You changed the troll effect promo from +1 defense to +1 attack, but didn't revise in your posts. You may want to consider changing it back (after all, random wild trolls are more dangerous if they are stronger attackers - a good defense should be a good offense).

6. The 100% trade route income is visible in that I get 100% bonus, but it doesn't state that there is a 100% trade route bonus income. You may want to add in that display item. Also, I didn't look to closely, but it appears that when I get a 50% bounus from buildings, etc, I remain at 2 commerce per trade route instead of going up to 3 commerce - just checking to see if this is how it is supposed to work.

7. The coastal changes are very powerful - especially since sea farms can find new resources. +4 food on coastal tiles with lighthouse and sea farm may be a touch OP. (and thats not counting the +3 commerce before financial). +5 food from a freshwater lake is also a very large bonus (needs to be next to sea and freshwater lake to get this though). By turn 150 or so, all 10 of my sea farms was either on a resource or had discovered one.

8. Seakin (and reavers). Specifically, they can go on ocean tiles. Before optics is discovered. So they can cross the globe and get a first snatch on circumnavigating the globe before anyone else. It doesn't do them any good, but it does deny it to other people.

9. Traditions + slavery = lots o slaves. When still slaves, they can be sacrificed for hammers, but once upgraded to thrall militia, can no longer sacrifice for production. Was this an intended change? (btw, capturing frostlings leads to very powerful militia - they remain frostlings and get +1 cold combat :lol:)

10. Blacksmith gives free armored promotion to units. Except it doesn't. And there is no armored promotion in the civilopedia. What is this supposed to do?

11. Last thing. The kindred promotions. Umm... I get the general idea of what they are supposed to do as far as the +2 fire etc. However for the spells that are enabled by age, there seems to be a few issues - namely, there are conflicting things here and in the civilopedia as to when certain spells are able to be cast. Example - pillar of fire. Looking that up in the civilopedia, it states that age 200 is needed (giantkin 3) to be able to summon. Here it says that it needs efreet (age 100 and unlocked at rage). As I haven't gotten to rage yet, which is it?

Hope my input helps

-Colin

Well, as long as roads can ONLY be build on coasts, not oceans, then, well, they ARE GIANTS.

My thoughts exactly. :lol:

Few things I found while playing.

1. Is egrass the founder Supposed to be able to upgrade up the divine line? He became hero of foxford for me, and then later I was able to upgrade him to a speaker (not sure this is right - but the one that is available at priesthood). After the upgrade he was no longer able to improve my land anymore, but... not sure if that actually matters when he can suddenly have strength 6 base (strength 10 base by the time I upgraded him - +2 from old giant, +2 from heroic attack/defense)

2. You have stated that there is a new unit available down the archery line (an upgrade from weilder). However, in my game the archery tech tree is blocked. I am able to build hurlers and one other unit at engineering, both with ranged attacks, but am not able to build any units with ranged attack. Horse line is also blocked, as stated (and poisons unblocked). Also on the note of stating things, food required is 2.5, not 2.25. So what happens when the jotnar run sacrifice the weak?

3. City spamming still VERY viable. Courthouse gives -40% maintenence, barracks -20%, basilica -40%, and having one stormkin promoted giant in each city casting that wind spell thingy gives another -10%. And thats not counting the 5%'s from law mana. Even without going order or building law mana nodes, you will probably have a minimum of -75% maintenence reduction from the 2 buildings, the spell, and the 1 law mana source provided. Going order you can skip the unit and still get -110% from basilica, courthouse, barracks, and 2 law mana nodes (palace and holy building). The only major nerf to city spamming is the inability to upgrade citizens to settlers. This however is countered by the artisan promotion. Just stick a bunch of citizens who you haven't bothered upgrading in a city and presto, you have more production than a dwarf with a full vault and fields of mithril in every square. And on this note - just upgrade a huscarl per city, give him the air mana upgrade, have him cast the spell, and let him give -10% maintenence and +2 hammers in the city he is stationed in (and provide a nice big meatshield to stop attackers. (also, what is up with the buildings providing mana and city maintenence reductions? Considering that they now have the freedom to spread great distances and can live fairly well in most enviornments, why do they need mana providing buildings?)

4. Having thrall militia no longer able to be built once you can build thrall axmen kinda sucks - militia costs no maintenence costs, axmen do. Also on the subject of militia - when a unit captures a slave, the slave gets aptitude. Then once you upgrade him to militia, the militia now has aptitude. If it weren't for the increadiably slow rate at which aptitude gives xp (and if it weren't for the fact it was on thralls) this could be a bit dangerous. Note - the dovollio have the same ability.

5. You changed the troll effect promo from +1 defense to +1 attack, but didn't revise in your posts. You may want to consider changing it back (after all, random wild trolls are more dangerous if they are stronger attackers - a good defense should be a good offense).

6. The 100% trade route income is visible in that I get 100% bonus, but it doesn't state that there is a 100% trade route bonus income. You may want to add in that display item. Also, I didn't look to closely, but it appears that when I get a 50% bounus from buildings, etc, I remain at 2 commerce per trade route instead of going up to 3 commerce - just checking to see if this is how it is supposed to work.

7. The coastal changes are very powerful - especially since sea farms can find new resources. +4 food on coastal tiles with lighthouse and sea farm may be a touch OP. (and thats not counting the +3 commerce before financial). +5 food from a freshwater lake is also a very large bonus (needs to be next to sea and freshwater lake to get this though). By turn 150 or so, all 10 of my sea farms was either on a resource or had discovered one.

8. Seakin (and reavers). Specifically, they can go on ocean tiles. Before optics is discovered. So they can cross the globe and get a first snatch on circumnavigating the globe before anyone else. It doesn't do them any good, but it does deny it to other people.

9. Traditions + slavery = lots o slaves. When still slaves, they can be sacrificed for hammers, but once upgraded to thrall militia, can no longer sacrifice for production. Was this an intended change? (btw, capturing frostlings leads to very powerful militia - they remain frostlings and get +1 cold combat :lol:)

10. Blacksmith gives free armored promotion to units. Except it doesn't. And there is no armored promotion in the civilopedia. What is this supposed to do?

11. Last thing. The kindred promotions. Umm... I get the general idea of what they are supposed to do as far as the +2 fire etc. However for the spells that are enabled by age, there seems to be a few issues - namely, there are conflicting things here and in the civilopedia as to when certain spells are able to be cast. Example - pillar of fire. Looking that up in the civilopedia, it states that age 200 is needed (giantkin 3) to be able to summon. Here it says that it needs efreet (age 100 and unlocked at rage). As I haven't gotten to rage yet, which is it?

Hope my input helps

-Colin

I'll answer the ones I can here...



2. Are those techs still blocked? I was under the impression that Vermicious unblocked them... I may have goofed during the merge there.

3. Most of those bonuses are there for other civs as well. ;) The Jotnar used to get a rather large reduction from their civic... That's been moved to Distance, rather than Number of Cities. As for the buildings.... They were one method of dealing with the complaint of not having a worldspell. The other is the worldspell they've been given, of course, although it can be a rather weak one (With the potential to be devastating of course).

4. Maybe Thrall Militia should be NeverObsolete?

8. Hmm. This should probably be changed, but I'm not sure there's a way to have a promotion allow access to a terrain, at least not atm. I know Cyther did it for his mod however, so it might be something to look into.

10. :p This promotion is actually invisible atm, should probably change that... It does nothing in and of itself. Instead, it grants permission for the unit to gain the Bronze/Iron/Mithril Weapon promotions. Doesn't affect Melee, but Recon/Arcane/Divine/etc? You bet. :goodjob:

11. If the Pedia has it in the requirements, it's probably correct. The list isn't up to date yet.

yeah, saying that armored allows a unit to gain weapon promotions would have made things make alot more sense. You don't need to make it a visible promotion - but if it remains invisible, you need to make a civilopedia link from the trait that states that that is what it does.

Thrall militia - yes, it should be never obsolete. Actually, on that note, what strength levels are they supposed to be? Thrall militia strength 3, thrall axmen strength 3+metal? (not that the metal affects hephesteus, as even thrall hunters can get mithril weapons...)

as for why I bring up number 3. You stated that you were trying to prevent city spam. With the jotnar, it doesn't matter what you do to change the distance maintenence or number of city maintenence bonus, if you don't change the fact that they can drop off 70% of the maintenence following any religion and without the use of law mana, or 110% of the maintenence following order. This is compared to any other civ's able to drop off 40% without order, or 80% with order. That last 20% makes a bigger difference than the first 80. So without changing that, the only major nerf to the jotnar city spamming tactic is the inability to upgrade citizens to settlers. On the other hand, the sheer number of giants now available with fewer cities also means that you don't have to spam till the end of time to be able to have a competitive military.

As for giant numbers - you probably need to cut the spawn rate down by about 1/4-1/3. As it is, about 5-10 turns after founding a new city, I have reached the next level of giant cap. During peacetime, this means more workers and more hammer. During wartime, this means that the only thing limiting my warpower is my money chest - aka, there aint much limiting me.

And one other little thing. Why aren't workers allowed to take water affinity? It would make much more sense to give a worker water affinity than have to upgrade to a troll (who might go rogue), just to have someone to plant sea farms.

-Colin

Hmm... my seakin troll an NOT enter ocean squares. But then I don't even have sailing, just fishing, as I am playing a small water percentage map.

I LOVE the Sea-farm. I think it builds too fast. Same with roads. I am building a road in the water in 1 turn and a Sea-farm in 2 turns. Makes it very easy and fast to put a sea-farm in every water square in my culture. 1 seakin is all I need. Maybe increasing the build times or giving Seakin a reduction in Work rate might be appropriate.

You need Atronamy to enter Ocean tiles with Seakin. As such, the Jotnar don't get any particular advantage.
Also, I think they should get seaserpants back: their use as buildable raiders is powerful.

Hmm... after further testing, the seakin aren't able to enter ocean squares, even ones in your own borders. However, reavers are (in their longships). And I didn't have astronomy yet (and no intention to get it as I was playing a flat pangea map). I guess I was just mixing up the giants for the first one. As the longships aren't able to carry other things though, I don't find it too OP.

-Colin

Few things I found while playing.

1. Is egrass the founder Supposed to be able to upgrade up the divine line? He became hero of foxford for me, and then later I was able to upgrade him to a speaker (not sure this is right - but the one that is available at priesthood). After the upgrade he was no longer able to improve my land anymore, but... not sure if that actually matters when he can suddenly have strength 6 base (strength 10 base by the time I upgraded him - +2 from old giant, +2 from heroic attack/defense)

2. You have stated that there is a new unit available down the archery line (an upgrade from weilder). However, in my game the archery tech tree is blocked. I am able to build hurlers and one other unit at engineering, both with ranged attacks, but am not able to build any units with ranged attack. Horse line is also blocked, as stated (and poisons unblocked). Also on the note of stating things, food required is 2.5, not 2.25. So what happens when the jotnar run sacrifice the weak?

3. City spamming still VERY viable. Courthouse gives -40% maintenence, barracks -20%, basilica -40%, and having one stormkin promoted giant in each city casting that wind spell thingy gives another -10%. And thats not counting the 5%'s from law mana. Even without going order or building law mana nodes, you will probably have a minimum of -75% maintenence reduction from the 2 buildings, the spell, and the 1 law mana source provided. Going order you can skip the unit and still get -110% from basilica, courthouse, barracks, and 2 law mana nodes (palace and holy building). The only major nerf to city spamming is the inability to upgrade citizens to settlers. This however is countered by the artisan promotion. Just stick a bunch of citizens who you haven't bothered upgrading in a city and presto, you have more production than a dwarf with a full vault and fields of mithril in every square. And on this note - just upgrade a huscarl per city, give him the air mana upgrade, have him cast the spell, and let him give -10% maintenence and +2 hammers in the city he is stationed in (and provide a nice big meatshield to stop attackers. (also, what is up with the buildings providing mana and city maintenence reductions? Considering that they now have the freedom to spread great distances and can live fairly well in most enviornments, why do they need mana providing buildings?)

4. Having thrall militia no longer able to be built once you can build thrall axmen kinda sucks - militia costs no maintenence costs, axmen do. Also on the subject of militia - when a unit captures a slave, the slave gets aptitude. Then once you upgrade him to militia, the militia now has aptitude. If it weren't for the increadiably slow rate at which aptitude gives xp (and if it weren't for the fact it was on thralls) this could be a bit dangerous. Note - the dovollio have the same ability.

5. You changed the troll effect promo from +1 defense to +1 attack, but didn't revise in your posts. You may want to consider changing it back (after all, random wild trolls are more dangerous if they are stronger attackers - a good defense should be a good offense).

6. The 100% trade route income is visible in that I get 100% bonus, but it doesn't state that there is a 100% trade route bonus income. You may want to add in that display item. Also, I didn't look to closely, but it appears that when I get a 50% bounus from buildings, etc, I remain at 2 commerce per trade route instead of going up to 3 commerce - just checking to see if this is how it is supposed to work.

7. The coastal changes are very powerful - especially since sea farms can find new resources. +4 food on coastal tiles with lighthouse and sea farm may be a touch OP. (and thats not counting the +3 commerce before financial). +5 food from a freshwater lake is also a very large bonus (needs to be next to sea and freshwater lake to get this though). By turn 150 or so, all 10 of my sea farms was either on a resource or had discovered one.

8. Seakin (and reavers). Specifically, they can go on ocean tiles. Before optics is discovered. So they can cross the globe and get a first snatch on circumnavigating the globe before anyone else. It doesn't do them any good, but it does deny it to other people.

9. Traditions + slavery = lots o slaves. When still slaves, they can be sacrificed for hammers, but once upgraded to thrall militia, can no longer sacrifice for production. Was this an intended change? (btw, capturing frostlings leads to very powerful militia - they remain frostlings and get +1 cold combat :lol:)

10. Blacksmith gives free armored promotion to units. Except it doesn't. And there is no armored promotion in the civilopedia. What is this supposed to do?

11. Last thing. The kindred promotions. Umm... I get the general idea of what they are supposed to do as far as the +2 fire etc. However for the spells that are enabled by age, there seems to be a few issues - namely, there are conflicting things here and in the civilopedia as to when certain spells are able to be cast. Example - pillar of fire. Looking that up in the civilopedia, it states that age 200 is needed (giantkin 3) to be able to summon. Here it says that it needs efreet (age 100 and unlocked at rage). As I haven't gotten to rage yet, which is it?

Hope my input helps

-Colin

1. Yes, Egrass can upgrade along the arcane and divine lines. He was always able to upgrade to immortal...I just added some earlier options. Essentially he is just a super-Citizen, so shouldn't be a major problem.

2. Sorry for the confusion. Ranged units went through SEVERAL builds. I eventually decided the best solution was to block the archery techs (fletchers don't make sense for huge brute throwing rocks) and link them to the construction line. They have access to the ammo promos as well. :)

3. Agreed. I've continued to tinker with that. I'll probably block courthouse and reduce unique Jot buildings' effect on maintenance. Will also swap Law mana for something else...Norse giants were an unruly bunch. As for Order...if you go Order you'll have a spam advantage. No real way to fix that except blocking Order...and I don't want to do that.

4. Hmmm. I could create an unique warrior unit for Jots again, I suppose. The art was the main reason I didn't...I liked the look of orc thralls. No big deal though.

5. Stacks of 5 Trolls that hit age 50 were ending AI civs is why I changed that. I'll look at it again.

6. No...that doesn't appear to be working as intended. Perhaps there is a cap on trade route increase %? I'll look.

7. Sea farms were part of a broader series of improvement changes. Sea farm is the only way that has made it in so far. Right now it is +2 food/+1 commerce...will reduce to +2 food. They are meant to be as good as farms for the Jotnar.

8. Seakin can't travel oceans until they upgrade to Troll Ranger. Reavers can...but that was intended. If it is OP I can change, but I rather like the idea of enormous Longships exploring the globe ahead of everybody else. :D

9. The sacrifice for production promotion tag wasn't working in FF50. I'll check and see if it works now. :)

10. Valk answered

11. The answer is both. You have to be an age 200 unit with the advanced Firekin promo to cast Pillar of Fire.

Thanks for the feedback. :goodjob:

Hmm... my seakin troll an NOT enter ocean squares. But then I don't even have sailing, just fishing, as I am playing a small water percentage map.

I LOVE the Sea-farm. I think it builds too fast. Same with roads. I am building a road in the water in 1 turn and a Sea-farm in 2 turns. Makes it very easy and fast to put a sea-farm in every water square in my culture. 1 seakin is all I need. Maybe increasing the build times or giving Seakin a reduction in Work rate might be appropriate.


Right now I have the work rate on trolls pretty high...because I want them to be able to build forts fairly quickly. Apparently nobody has discovered Jot Fort Commanders can expand a fort into a city at level 5. :D

What I'll do is pump up the time it takes to build a sea farm. That was just a first swipe at assigning a value. :)

"Route To" command is specifically linked to UNITAI_WORKER, so the only way any unit can use it is if they are Worker AI type. You could have python in onUnitCreate which sets the AI type for Egrass to WORKER when controlled by a human just to enable that button, but I think that would disable Recon mission (automated exploration), can't remember for certain though if the last has specific UnitAI types, or just a unit capability check.

"Route To" command is specifically linked to UNITAI_WORKER, so the only way any unit can use it is if they are Worker AI type. You could have python in onUnitCreate which sets the AI type for Egrass to WORKER when controlled by a human just to enable that button, but I think that would disable Recon mission (automated exploration), can't remember for certain though if the last has specific UnitAI types, or just a unit capability check.


Giving him worker AI should be fine...I'll change.

Change Fort to a city huh? Hmmm I have some level 4 or 5 fort commanders I will look into it when I get home. What happens to the commander when that happens?

Change Fort to a city huh? Hmmm I have some level 4 or 5 fort commanders I will look into it when I get home. What happens to the commander when that happens?


He turns into a Hurler. :)

One thing-Blocking archer and Mounted weakens Conciroir (sp) considerably. Can Father be allowed to reasearch them? (perhaps only the as a Player?)

Conqueror?

Yeah, that one.

I would like them unlocked just because I like building the master equipment buildings, but I understand why that wouldn't make sense.

my balancesuggestion would be:

take the working abilities from jotnar citizens. u get loads of them and u got hardly any space to improve so even before turn 50 u can have finished upgrading your capital with whatever improvement u think fits the purpose.

u get free slaves. let them upgrade to lowlevel workers if needed but strip the citizens of their working capabilities. they lead to this skyrocketing before turn 100

One thing-Blocking archer and Mounted weakens Conciroir (sp) considerably. Can Father be allowed to reasearch them? (perhaps only the as a Player?)

Honestly, I think the best thing to do would be to just unblock all their techs, and put the block into their AI. Not too hard to do.

my balancesuggestion would be:

take the working abilities from jotnar citizens. u get loads of them and u got hardly any space to improve so even before turn 50 u can have finished upgrading your capital with whatever improvement u think fits the purpose.

u get free slaves. let them upgrade to lowlevel workers if needed but strip the citizens of their working capabilities. they lead to this skyrocketing before turn 100

Hmm... I like that about the citizens, though. :p Maybe gimp their speed? If you have very slow free workers, you'll still want a few normal workers.

The "Artisan" abilities of Jot Citizens, I wonder if they could be finessed in some way to only affect buildings as opposed to units. I can picture why they'd build stuff faster, three twenty foot tall guys could build Stonehenge before lunch *shrugs*

A little harder to understand how twenty citizens could "encourage" a Soldier of Kilmorph to clear out of basic training faster.

Guess those are RP considerations though. Still, sitting 10-20 citizens with nothing better to do in your production centre already means you'll beat lots of other civs to good Wonders, being able to switch focus to equally strong military output might make them a little too dangerously flexible.

Honestly, aside from thrall militia, the only unit I would ever build in my cities is the jotnar settler. Yeah, soldiers of kilmorph can be built, etc. However, if I'm getting into a fight, generally my best bet to to just buy a few more giants. Additional soldiers of kilmorph or whatever else that i might be able to build generally just get in the way. Of course, I don't particularly like the conquerer trait, so that might be part of the problem... Settlers on the other hand take long enough that it is worth it to me to dedicate 1 city to spamming them and any other cities that I have get no citizens in them but spam thralls.

On a different note, why do the national palace equivalent buildings provide additional sources of mana?

-Colin

On a different note, why do the national palace equivalent buildings provide additional sources of mana?

-Colin

Because the break on distance maintenance is meaningless for the Jotnar. :D Also, was giving them something cool to replace the OP Great Wall.

Honestly, I think the best thing to do would be to just unblock all their techs, and put the block into their AI. Not too hard to do.



Hmm... I like that about the citizens, though. :p Maybe gimp their speed? If you have very slow free workers, you'll still want a few normal workers.


If we want the techs unblocked I could do that. We'd have some silly equipment-based promotion options available...but that is already the case with many units in the game. If our minds can stretch to allow a reaching creeper with a nice pair of shoes then a strange version of a compund bow for a giant slinger shouldn't be too jarring.

Will unblock next version, swap some tech prereqs.

Oh yeah...Jot citizens. Not sure it is possible to block them from boosting unit production. We could reduce the bonus they provide in general.

Workrate reduction feels like a cop-out. What we could do is limit the projects they can work on. Exclude the various mills, workshops, mines, and wineries. Perhaps exclude cottages as well?

Another option if we want to REALLY slow them down is prohibit building settlers. Only way for them to found more cities would be through upgraded fort commanders and conquest.

I think when I first heard about the Jotnar (outside of the FF+ changes), I read about decent synergy with RoK. So many of the goodies of this civ are unlocked by gold, you better think hard about getting the most $$$$s out of your religion, and RoK fits the bill.

This means Soldier of Kilmorph access. This means the chance to ignore all that thrall fighters type business. After I realized that I almost completely abandoned the whole warriors and axemen thing, knowing the Soldier are more expensive is one thing, but if all kinds of Citizens are ready to contribute hammers to construction, all good, Soldiers will end up the backbone of your armies. Have a few giants, almost like heroes, but a wild horde of Soldiers with them, leave a few behind as a garrison in each of your new cities. Again, fundamentally the giant component of your armies can be a small, high XP and costly-in-gold core, with all kinds of fodder to come along with 'em.

At least with the old Jotnar, I seem to recall one of the only ways to get around the lack of human-sized fighting troops was racing to Currency and building Guild of the Nine, so you could have some decent non-giant fighters. Now I find Iron using Soldiers fit the bill nearly as well, available early if you rush RoK and snag the Mines.

Oh yeah...Jot citizens. Not sure it is possible to block them from boosting unit production. We could reduce the bonus they provide in general.

Workrate reduction feels like a cop-out. What we could do is limit the projects they can work on. Exclude the various mills, workshops, mines, and wineries. Perhaps exclude cottages as well?

Another option if we want to REALLY slow them down is prohibit building settlers. Only way for them to found more cities would be through upgraded fort commanders and conquest.

I would have no problem with that EXCEPT for it takes 100ish turns with no combat to get a fort commander high enough level to do that. That PLUS the 20-30 turns to build the fort is WAY to long. If the Fort commanders got +1 xp per turn until 50 xp or something THAT THEY LOST when the fort was upgraded to a city that would be fine.

then you could chose to wait a bit longer for a stronger defender or turn to a city asap.

Oh yeah...Jot citizens. Not sure it is possible to block them from boosting unit production. We could reduce the bonus they provide in general.

Workrate reduction feels like a cop-out. What we could do is limit the projects they can work on. Exclude the various mills, workshops, mines, and wineries. Perhaps exclude cottages as well?

Another option if we want to REALLY slow them down is prohibit building settlers. Only way for them to found more cities would be through upgraded fort commanders and conquest.

Limiting build projects could work. I'd say exclude the 'fancy' ones... No cottages/Wineries/Plantations/Mines. Let them build Farms, Quarries, Pastures. Basic things. Actually, with your improvement changes we may want to block mines completely, and limit Jotnar to Quarries, since those are open air. Unless they're using slaves, mines would be rather difficult for them. :lol:

I don't really want to limit settler production. If necessary, increase the COST of their settlers... I'd rather not have to rely on Forts for my cities. :p

I would have no problem with that EXCEPT for it takes 100ish turns with no combat to get a fort commander high enough level to do that. That PLUS the 20-30 turns to build the fort is WAY to long. If the Fort commanders got +1 xp per turn until 50 xp or something THAT THEY LOST when the fort was upgraded to a city that would be fine.

then you could chose to wait a bit longer for a stronger defender or turn to a city asap.

.......Damn. Meant to do that for this patch... :mischief: They'll be getting an xp/turn promotion, like Hero. Actually, several. One to take them up to the first tier of culture, then a slower one to advance them to the next.

Few things about only upgrading available by forts. It would make a very interesting idea, except that as already posted, it takes FOREVER to level a fort commander up without combat - and even with combat, the barbs aren't all that great at leveling them up. I decided to try this and build a set of forts around my borders to later upgrade into cities... 200 turns later I still don't have one at level 6 (I have 1 at level 5, but I am assuming that turn into city is a promotion that they can take at level 6 as there is no way to change it into a city atm. The other option would be to make it available at level 4 (so the upgrade at 17xp would allow them to upgrade to a city), as it takes only around 50 turns or so of passive xp to level up to that.

Also, as for blocking mines and such. The only race that I see actually mining themselves would be the dwarves. Everyone else probably uses slaves in their mines, as mines generally have high casualty rates, and are unsafe work environments (recent technology has changed that to an extent, but mines before the steam engine were essentially deathtraps - and even after that they were very unsafe up till about the early/mid 1900's). For my own sake, I imagine the jotnar cities as a collection of giants, each overseeing a horde of smaller beings. They may be orcs, goblins, humans, whatever. But when the city grows in size there is another family who is in charge of that plot of land. The land itself isn't actually worked by the giants. Instead the land is that giant families fief, and they make sure that it produces. Each "City" is then a clan of giants - essentially the whole empire is a looseish collection of city states and the jotnar citizens are younglings looking for glory and whatnot outside of the clan, and therefore rise up to serve the empire.

-Colin

I have 1 at level 5, but I am assuming that turn into city is a promotion that they can take at level 6 as there is no way to change it into a city atm. The other option would be to make it available at level 4 (so the upgrade at 17xp would allow them to upgrade to a city), as it takes only around 50 turns or so of passive xp to level up to that.

It's a spell costing 100 gold available at level 5. It doesn't show up unless you can cast it.

I will confirm it is working I converted 2 last night to cities.

I will also say both were ones placed by the map script not forts I built, which while cool, gave me a couple cities surrounded by mountains. With their limited city radius, losing 2-3 spaces to mountains hurts. However I did NOT have to convert those, just because you can doesn't mean you should.

Limiting build projects could work. I'd say exclude the 'fancy' ones... No cottages/Wineries/Plantations/Mines. Let them build Farms, Quarries, Pastures. Basic things. Actually, with your improvement changes we may want to block mines completely, and limit Jotnar to Quarries, since those are open air. Unless they're using slaves, mines would be rather difficult for them. :lol:



Nah, they could still do open pit mines. Heck, with Eartkin they can hide underground...blocking mines would hardly seem fair.

Also, as for blocking mines and such. The only race that I see actually mining themselves would be the dwarves. Everyone else probably uses slaves in their mines, as mines generally have high casualty rates, and are unsafe work environments (recent technology has changed that to an extent, but mines before the steam engine were essentially deathtraps - and even after that they were very unsafe up till about the early/mid 1900's). For my own sake, I imagine the jotnar cities as a collection of giants, each overseeing a horde of smaller beings. They may be orcs, goblins, humans, whatever. But when the city grows in size there is another family who is in charge of that plot of land. The land itself isn't actually worked by the giants. Instead the land is that giant families fief, and they make sure that it produces. Each "City" is then a clan of giants - essentially the whole empire is a looseish collection of city states and the jotnar citizens are younglings looking for glory and whatnot outside of the clan, and therefore rise up to serve the empire.

-Colin

That is EXACTLY the way I see it. :goodjob:

The jotnar water units, reaver and sea troll, get extra movement in water. While I understand why they get it, unfortunately it plays havoc with the pathfinding, which is awful at the best of times.

The Reaver is easy fix. Just make a spell to board and disbark from their longship, with the longship form not being able to go on land.

If you feel very adventurous make the Board Longship spell/ability require the Beached Longship unit in the tile. Also give Reavers a Build Longship spell/ability that requires a forest in the tile and creates a Beached Longship unit, possibly consuming the forest and taking time to cast.

The sea trolls could probably just lose the movement bonus. Give them 2 or 3 movement and water roads give them enough mobility.

The jotnar water units, reaver and sea troll, get extra movement in water. While I understand why they get it, unfortunately it plays havoc with the pathfinding, which is awful at the best of times.

The Reaver is easy fix. Just make a spell to board and disbark from their longship, with the longship form not being able to go on land.

If you feel very adventurous make the Board Longship spell/ability require the Beached Longship unit in the tile. Also give Reavers a Build Longship spell/ability that requires a forest in the tile and creates a Beached Longship unit, possibly consuming the forest and taking time to cast.

The sea trolls could probably just lose the movement bonus. Give them 2 or 3 movement and water roads give them enough mobility.


I agree with the pathfinding...but making a change so that something is slightly less awful isn't really my cuppa. :p I'll see what I can do though, I agree it is annoying.

how about half movement on water (much like the dwarves get half movement on hills or the elves half movement through forests). Means that watery roads are useless until you get engineering, but as that was more a style thing than anything else it shouldn't make a big difference. Also it should mean that they have an easier time moving through kelp, which would be understandable (FFP did implement kelp, right? well, even if it didn't, I believe it was planned for the future).

You could make it a giantkin promotion - it might look a bit funny for a hill giant to have half movement cost on water, but it would make no difference as it can't actually enter water, it would only affect reavers and trolls. Lastly, the system already works fairly well with this, as long as all units in the group have the same movement rate. It will tell me that the dwarf will move faster going over the hill, or the elf faster through the trees. When grouped with multiple people with different movement rates it breaks down a little bit (2 warriors + settler it tells me I can only move 1 over a hill instead of two). Would be a decent place to start from though.

-Colin

I haven't implemented kelp... Yet... :mischief:

how about half movement on water (much like the dwarves get half movement on hills or the elves half movement through forests).

Actually, double movement in forest is another of those misleading documentations. It's all kinds of screwy. Near as I can tell, all it does is guarantee that you'll never use more than half your movement to enter that feature. So it'd be quite useless for water units with movement > 1 .

nope, 1 move wariors can move 2 through forest (with elven) or hills (with dwarven). It is kinda weird how 1 movement units get more out of double movement modifieries, than muti move units...

Yes, but I don't think that 2 move units are actually effected.

Discussion / Idea - if there's Lairs on the map, some are Giant Steddings.

Do you think the Jots having some special option available other than "Explore Lair", or alternately, something like a guaranteed good result or a unique good result might be available? Part of the theme of Jotnar seems to be pulling together scattered families of a race in decline (it used to be that a high AC meant a few different effects on gameplay, though in FF+ that's changed), at least they'll all get to experience the Apocalypse together. I guess all I'm saying is if you find what are essentially some "unowned" Giant Steddings out there in the field, maybe there's more of a homecoming vibe available than "Orcs burst forth" or whatever. Even something as basic as finding a Jot Citizen there, or being able to "Claim Fort" thereby spawning a commander (or eventually Hurler if you hit 5th and want to spend the gold on a settlement). Just a thought or two is all.

Discussion / Idea - if there's Lairs on the map, some are Giant Steddings.

Do you think the Jots having some special option available other than "Explore Lair", or alternately, something like a guaranteed good result or a unique good result might be available? Part of the theme of Jotnar seems to be pulling together scattered families of a race in decline (it used to be that a high AC meant a few different effects on gameplay, though in FF+ that's changed), at least they'll all get to experience the Apocalypse together. I guess all I'm saying is if you find what are essentially some "unowned" Giant Steddings out there in the field, maybe there's more of a homecoming vibe available than "Orcs burst forth" or whatever. Even something as basic as finding a Jot Citizen there, or being able to "Claim Fort" thereby spawning a commander (or eventually Hurler if you hit 5th and want to spend the gold on a settlement). Just a thought or two is all.


I absolutely agree. I meant to do this, but haven't gotten around to it yet. :)

double post

So it'd be quite useless for water units with movement > 1 .
Ah, I miss read (saw a < 1 instead of a > 1). You're right, prehaps a promo with water prereq with +1 movement would work...

Discussion / Idea - if there's Lairs on the map, some are Giant Steddings.

Do you think the Jots having some special option available other than "Explore Lair", or alternately, something like a guaranteed good result or a unique good result might be available? Part of the theme of Jotnar seems to be pulling together scattered families of a race in decline (it used to be that a high AC meant a few different effects on gameplay, though in FF+ that's changed), at least they'll all get to experience the Apocalypse together. I guess all I'm saying is if you find what are essentially some "unowned" Giant Steddings out there in the field, maybe there's more of a homecoming vibe available than "Orcs burst forth" or whatever. Even something as basic as finding a Jot Citizen there, or being able to "Claim Fort" thereby spawning a commander (or eventually Hurler if you hit 5th and want to spend the gold on a settlement). Just a thought or two is all.

Hmm... Maybe allow them to convert the Staedding to a fort?

......And I see you actually said that, if I would just read through the whole thing. :p

I like that. If they can claim it, then 5 levels later they can make it a city, thereby allowing the former barbarians access to their civilized life. :lol:

Ah, I miss read (saw a < 1 instead of a > 1). You're right, prehaps a promo with water prereq with +1 movement would work...

That's actually what they have now, the complaint was that it messes with pathfinding.

... well, I fell a little slow right now...

Another thought. How about doubling their movement, but making all land terrain cost double movement for them? So if they walk on water or on roads, they get the full speed. On the other hand, exploring new terrain or terrain you haven't roaded yet, they only get half movement.

Not sure if you'd be able to get it to work, but might be worth a try...

-Colin

Out of curiosity, is there anywhere I could find the Jotnar-specific happenings? Whether it be random events or AC-linked popups.

I usually can't play far in my Jotnar games since I just start slowing down around game 160 and get memory allocation failures fairly often for some reason. Only yesterday was I able to find that interesting AC-linked (I'm fairly sure) event with the Jotnar leaving to find their children. It was really interesting!

I like the changes to the Jotnar! A few balance issues I have encountered though:

1. Sea Farms are highly unbalancing. The extra commerce is the primary culprit. I'm also using the Kelp mod, which makes the food production a bit too high as well. I would either eliminate the food bonus provided by the lighthouse or decrease the frequency of kelp.

2. I have not yet found a way to create fishing boats (sea farm) in an ocean tile. This means that whales and many pearl resources are unavailable.

3. Old giantkin units with a "kindred" promotion are a bit too powerful, especially at high difficulty levels where there are large numbers of barbarians to fight (and gain experience from). Wisdom of the Ancients then makes this even worse. These Tier-2 units are now level 22 and are nearly unstoppable. I shudder to think how powerful they will be when upgraded to the endgame units!

4. The ability to create forts using trolls is far too powerful. I had two trolls run around the map creating forts in strategic locations, then had a Stonekin giant follow later to be certain they are all on top of hills, and eventually give them all Stormkin. Barbarians are no longer a threat, invading armies never reach my borders, and I can even sometimes box in a civilization by placing forts narrow passages (peninsula entrances or between mountains). On top of all that, I also have new ranged units (Hurler) available any time I want be creating a city from a fort, then simply abandoning it to the barbarians (or guarding it if I want the city).

A lot of great ideas (some really cool ideas, I might add!), they just need to be toned down a bit in places.

Also, just one random thought on cities which occurred to me:

The decreased plot radius doesn't seem logical to me. Giants should be able to travel further to work the fields. Wouldn't it make more sense to allow cities of radius 3, but then make each point of population cost twice the food (4 instead of 2)? Perhaps also add +200% maintenance for number of cities? Just a thought, not certain how it would play out.

2. Yu can't make fishing boats, build sea farms on the resource. If their out to sea, you need to wait 'till Astronamy.
3. A bit overpowed, but other wise working properly. After all, imagine what would happen if you got unluky, and one of those units died..
5. The plot radius is reduced because it's supposed to repesent the small polulation of a Steading. And now, balance.

2. Yu can't make fishing boats, build sea farms on the resource. If their out to sea, you need to wait 'till Astronamy.
3. A bit overpowed, but other wise working properly. After all, imagine what would happen if you got unluky, and one of those units died..
5. The plot radius is reduced because it's supposed to repesent the small polulation of a Steading. And now, balance.


On sea farms....I did wait until astronomy, and cannot build them on ocean tiles using a Troll Hunter with Seakin.

I like the changes to the Jotnar! A few balance issues I have encountered though:

1. Sea Farms are highly unbalancing. The extra commerce is the primary culprit. I'm also using the Kelp mod, which makes the food production a bit too high as well. I would either eliminate the food bonus provided by the lighthouse or decrease the frequency of kelp.

2. I have not yet found a way to create fishing boats (sea farm) in an ocean tile. This means that whales and many pearl resources are unavailable.

3. Old giantkin units with a "kindred" promotion are a bit too powerful, especially at high difficulty levels where there are large numbers of barbarians to fight (and gain experience from). Wisdom of the Ancients then makes this even worse. These Tier-2 units are now level 22 and are nearly unstoppable. I shudder to think how powerful they will be when upgraded to the endgame units!

4. The ability to create forts using trolls is far too powerful. I had two trolls run around the map creating forts in strategic locations, then had a Stonekin giant follow later to be certain they are all on top of hills, and eventually give them all Stormkin. Barbarians are no longer a threat, invading armies never reach my borders, and I can even sometimes box in a civilization by placing forts narrow passages (peninsula entrances or between mountains). On top of all that, I also have new ranged units (Hurler) available any time I want be creating a city from a fort, then simply abandoning it to the barbarians (or guarding it if I want the city).

A lot of great ideas (some really cool ideas, I might add!), they just need to be toned down a bit in places.

Also, just one random thought on cities which occurred to me:

The decreased plot radius doesn't seem logical to me. Giants should be able to travel further to work the fields. Wouldn't it make more sense to allow cities of radius 3, but then make each point of population cost twice the food (4 instead of 2)? Perhaps also add +200% maintenance for number of cities? Just a thought, not certain how it would play out.

1. Consensus seems to be that sea farms are a bit OP. They will be rebalanced in the next patch.
2. I will check on that
3. Old giants are going to be brutal. That is why religious heroes are blocked, for example. Spawn rate is going to be reduced slightly, so that should help.
4. This was intended. I can reduce work-rate on trolls if I hear a consensus that this is OP.
Plot radius: Yeah...I hear you. This is a game balance thing. Various mechanics of the Jotnar encourage you to spam cities...other mechanics punish you for it. My goal is to make this tricky to balance as you play. If Revolutions was incorporated I would punish spam with an increased likelihood of cities becoming independent...but that will have to wait.

The plot radius is one of the off sets to some of the other power issues. Lack of religious heros is another.

Personally I think the 1st citizen per city should come at the current rate. The 2nd should be 1/2 as likely, the 3rd 1/4th the current rate and the 4th 1/8th the current rate. (or what ever)

I think it is important to have some citizens, but I am maxing out the number of citizens I can have VERY fast it seems. Loosing a Giant isn't that big of deal to me as every city has 1 or 2 citizens "cooking" in them. Getting older and gaining exp but just sitting there idol adding hammers to the city. I lose a combat unit? No problem let me go upgrade the 150 year old citizen that had 60xp (or whatever) but is still level 1. No problem at all customizing it to fit the role I just lost. Another citizen will be along to replace him soon enough.

1: I think reducing the frequency of kelp is fine, but removing the guaranteed food from lighthouse is a terrible idea.

4: Yeah Trolls building forts or even roads seems wrong.

I think I will put forward another balance suggestion... IF possible change the :hammers: provided by a giant in the city to be based on its age. Like:
0 :hammers: at 0-50
+1 :hammers: at 50-100
+2 :hammers: at 100-200
+3 :hammers: at 201-300
+4 :hammers: 301 ->

(or what ever the age breaks are currently)

Would provide incentive to keep some experienced citizens at home to counter the incentive to send them off to fight. I find my older units going off to war and my younger ones working at home till it is their turn for combat duty.

Well, currantly you get at least 2 hammers, so your numbers would need to be rebalanced, but I like the idea.

right, I was thinking along the lines of The older ones providing more hammers would off set the younger ones giving none. I would say 1-100 giving 1 :hammers: would have the same rough effect though. Either would be fine to me.

I will be honest, I like the race but seems too OP to me in general. Just needs slight toning down. Hence the suggestion of lowing giant spawn rate, but not strength of Giants. I wonder if the way to do that would be...


0.00 to 1.00 Giants per city = spawn rate of 1.0(X)
1.01 to 2.01 Giants per city = spawn rate of .75(X)
2.00 to 3.01 Giants per city = spawn rate of .5(X)
3.00 to 4.00 Giants per city = spawn rate of .25(X)

Yeah, it is very possible to tone down the spawn rate. Easy, even.

The equation right now is:

iGiantSpawnChance = 10 * (iMaxGiants - iCurrentNumberOfGiants)

The max giants is 4 + (6*number of cities). So a Jotnar civ with 6 cities could have up to 40 units with Jot Giantkin. Your spawn rate is obviously going to taper off drastically as you approach that max.

I'm happy with the maximum number...so the thing to change is the constant. I might adjust it all the way down to 5 and see how it plays.

As for the artisan bonus...I was already considering dialing it back to 1 hammer. Having that number increase with age would be easy...just copy and paste work really.

The sea farm issue...it will be rebalanced. I will probably roll the things I want from seafaring (work sea tiles immediately, see pearls) into Traditions and slightly reduce the food they get from sea tiles. Should end up being about as valuable food-wise as a normal farm. Ah, and to answer an earlier question...Oceans are currently excluded as an eligible tile for sea farms. I will fix that.

The troll building thing I like. It is necessary for a number of reasons. Sounds like work rate needs to be dialed back though. I'll probably gimp their workrates in general and have them increase with age.

1. Consensus seems to be that sea farms are a bit OP. They will be rebalanced in the next patch.
2. I will check on that
3. Old giants are going to be brutal. That is why religious heroes are blocked, for example. Spawn rate is going to be reduced slightly, so that should help.
4. This was intended. I can reduce work-rate on trolls if I hear a consensus that this is OP.
Plot radius: Yeah...I hear you. This is a game balance thing. Various mechanics of the Jotnar encourage you to spam cities...other mechanics punish you for it. My goal is to make this tricky to balance as you play. If Revolutions was incorporated I would punish spam with an increased likelihood of cities becoming independent...but that will have to wait.

The plot radius being for balance makes sense. Thanks for the design information.

I like the idea of decreasing the work rate for trolls. That should balance out the ability very nicely.

Yeah, it is very possible to tone down the spawn rate. Easy, even.

The equation right now is:

iGiantSpawnChance = 10 * (iMaxGiants - iCurrentNumberOfGiants)

The max giants is 4 + (6*number of cities). So a Jotnar civ with 6 cities could have up to 40 units with Jot Giantkin. Your spawn rate is obviously going to taper off drastically as you approach that max.

I'm happy with the maximum number...so the thing to change is the constant. I might adjust it all the way down to 5 and see how it plays.
Wow that is more than I realized. I thought it was 4 per city. Period. 4+(6/city) means 10 for the 1st city. that explains my confusion earlier in this tread.


As for the artisan bonus...I was already considering dialing it back to 1 hammer. Having that number increase with age would be easy...just copy and paste work really.

I think balancing it is the important part, I agree with the reduction overall personally. That is why I suggest zero hammers to start with to balance out the increase late.


The troll building thing I like. It is necessary for a number of reasons. Sounds like work rate needs to be dialed back though. I'll probably gimp their workrates in general and have them increase with age.

That should work fine.

A curious thought: would it be possible -in respect to the Jotnar specifically- to increase the minimal distance between cities to 5 or 8 -perhaps based on map size?- and make their culture stronger against enemy culture(2*, 3*)?

I think that might be an interesting/awesome flavor tweak; though, I am not sure how hard that would be to implement.

2* When enemy culture would attack preexisting Jotnar culture that is. That might be the hardest part, knowing which culture came first.
3* After some thought, perhaps their culture could auto-win against enemy culture (or something close to auto win anyway), and have the Jotnar culture expand slowly -expanding out every other culture tier starting after the first expansion, or something along those lines-.

I've played several games as the Jotnar now (Great race!) and changed my opinion on a few items:

I no longer believe giants are over powered when highly promoted, but they get to that point a little bit too quickly compared to the units of other races. No clue what to do about this and the timing isn't *too* bad, so I'd be tempted to leave things as they are.

Great Commanders: They are too common for the Jotnar. After my first war I have enough great commanders to assign one to every single unit, including my large stacks of thralls sitting on cities. I typically could assign 3 great commanders for every giantkin combat unit. This is ridiculous and greatly diminishes the meaning of great commanders compared to their importance to other races. I'd also be tempted to make great commanders for the Jotnar giants so they can pass through mountains. Might create a new variation on Giantkin that doesn't give offensive bonuses with age.

Sea units: It seems a bit odd that a unit which boards a Wild Troll or Reaver can stay on when the Troll/Reaver passes over land, but cannot board that unit if on land. Any chance of either allowing boarding in any location, or forcing carried units to get off on land?

Finally, a random thought which might or might not be reasonable, balanced, and/or possible: What about allowing all giants to carry a single unit of a smaller race (e.g. humans, elves, dwarves, etc.), but not giants (unless a Reaver, etc.)?

Hmm... Maybe decrease GC rate on Traditions?

Personally I think al Great Commanders come too fast. It is like they don't ramp up. The 9th comes just as easy as the 1st.

It is glaring for the giants as they tend to have less troops.

Yeah, noting unique to the Jotnar with GC. They do tend to be in situations that lend themselves to GC spawn due to the way they fight. They have small armies with very high defense ratings, so they tend to sit and let wave after wave of warriors/hunters/whatever the AI is spamming crash into them and die. Once the AI runs out of gas you advance and crush cities.

...at least that's the way I do it. :D