Ninakoru
A deity on Emperor
Hi there,
I've made an update to my balance patch (http://forums.civfanatics.com/downloads.php?do=file&id=21997), I wanted to reason and discuss the changes, this time they are less subtle, as they will change many things indirectly. Let's go to the meat:
Less powered cities: Decreased cities strength about 40%, about 30% if we add to the math contemporary walls. City HP up from 200 to 250, heal per turn from 20 to 25 also. All walls give now +50 HP.
Cities are usually like towers of doom, are the first tactical consideration on the field, and there's usually a city at range in battles, the reason is simple: they deal huge amounts of damage and are near unbeatable with melee. You will rarely use siegue up to artillery, as they are heavily damaged on city range and need to setup prior to fire. Melee units usually don't attack a city, they receive so much damage is not easy to keep up. Also the easily forgettable walls acquire more relevance. The strength loss is compensated with extra HP, so cities are still durable targets, but a single city without troop support is an easy prey. Also garrisoned units will be more relevant adding city strength.
Soften ranged units: All ranged units have a 20% damage penalty when attacking a damaged unit. Non-siegue ranged units have 25% damage penalty attacking cities.
Lets face it, ranged is overpowered for the first half of the game. Their ability to do damage without taking it plus the range itself makes them the main unit for any (human) army, big damage and mobility, easy deal. With this change, ranged units still are powerfull but will have a little harder time focus-killing other units. On the logical side makes sense, as units represent a squadron, if there are less units on the target, the volley will also make less casualties.
On the pure tactical side, this along with the city changes will give much more relevance to the melee and mobile units. Because of range domination, melee were only used to soak damage or even worse, mere sacrifices. Now melee can regain the original place in any army as the backbone, and still ranged units will play an important role as support units and good damage-dealers. Siegue units are still good options to take cities much faster.
Air minor changes: Air units rebase distance increased from 2x to 2.5x bombard range. Air units heal 20 HP instead of 25 HP when Air Repair promotion is taken.
Rebase can be a problem, specially for WW units. When airports are online, air units are much harder to re-alocate. A few extra tiles should make air a bit more mobile. On the air repair, I consider it overpowered. Rarely you will heal the planes with it. This should marginally tone down that fantastic upgrade.
AI Policy balance: Tweaked some flavors to help the AI be more varied in the policy selection. AI will prioritize more non-ancient policies when available.
This change will give more variety to the games. AI will use more powerful and suited policies more often on the mid game, giving a bit more spice to the game. Until now, the AI was a Tradition/Piety/Aesthetics spam with some exceptions here and there. Those policies will still have a strong presence anyways. The less focus on religion and culture will make the games more open, for example you will have an easier time imposing your religion because you will not face the usual 4 to 5 other AIs going piety, still as they get other benefits, you will face more suited warmongers and more expansionists among the AI leaders.
Any feedback is much appreciated. I hope you like the changes and I still have to test them extensively but should bring the game more closed the the balance side, and more varied and fun to the tactical/strategy lovers.
I've made an update to my balance patch (http://forums.civfanatics.com/downloads.php?do=file&id=21997), I wanted to reason and discuss the changes, this time they are less subtle, as they will change many things indirectly. Let's go to the meat:
Less powered cities: Decreased cities strength about 40%, about 30% if we add to the math contemporary walls. City HP up from 200 to 250, heal per turn from 20 to 25 also. All walls give now +50 HP.
Cities are usually like towers of doom, are the first tactical consideration on the field, and there's usually a city at range in battles, the reason is simple: they deal huge amounts of damage and are near unbeatable with melee. You will rarely use siegue up to artillery, as they are heavily damaged on city range and need to setup prior to fire. Melee units usually don't attack a city, they receive so much damage is not easy to keep up. Also the easily forgettable walls acquire more relevance. The strength loss is compensated with extra HP, so cities are still durable targets, but a single city without troop support is an easy prey. Also garrisoned units will be more relevant adding city strength.
Soften ranged units: All ranged units have a 20% damage penalty when attacking a damaged unit. Non-siegue ranged units have 25% damage penalty attacking cities.
Lets face it, ranged is overpowered for the first half of the game. Their ability to do damage without taking it plus the range itself makes them the main unit for any (human) army, big damage and mobility, easy deal. With this change, ranged units still are powerfull but will have a little harder time focus-killing other units. On the logical side makes sense, as units represent a squadron, if there are less units on the target, the volley will also make less casualties.
On the pure tactical side, this along with the city changes will give much more relevance to the melee and mobile units. Because of range domination, melee were only used to soak damage or even worse, mere sacrifices. Now melee can regain the original place in any army as the backbone, and still ranged units will play an important role as support units and good damage-dealers. Siegue units are still good options to take cities much faster.
Air minor changes: Air units rebase distance increased from 2x to 2.5x bombard range. Air units heal 20 HP instead of 25 HP when Air Repair promotion is taken.
Rebase can be a problem, specially for WW units. When airports are online, air units are much harder to re-alocate. A few extra tiles should make air a bit more mobile. On the air repair, I consider it overpowered. Rarely you will heal the planes with it. This should marginally tone down that fantastic upgrade.
AI Policy balance: Tweaked some flavors to help the AI be more varied in the policy selection. AI will prioritize more non-ancient policies when available.
This change will give more variety to the games. AI will use more powerful and suited policies more often on the mid game, giving a bit more spice to the game. Until now, the AI was a Tradition/Piety/Aesthetics spam with some exceptions here and there. Those policies will still have a strong presence anyways. The less focus on religion and culture will make the games more open, for example you will have an easier time imposing your religion because you will not face the usual 4 to 5 other AIs going piety, still as they get other benefits, you will face more suited warmongers and more expansionists among the AI leaders.
Any feedback is much appreciated. I hope you like the changes and I still have to test them extensively but should bring the game more closed the the balance side, and more varied and fun to the tactical/strategy lovers.
In fact I am the tech leader and I haven't even entered the Renaissance! I feel like once I do tech Education then things are going to get a lot easier than they already are.
