Prehistoric Era analysis

Arakhor said:

Have you considered merging Earth Oven and Slash & Burn? They're both applied uses of fire at roughly the same time and they're both single-interest techs.

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Is there a unifying concept that can be named to encapsulate both? This may be a good idea actually.

Then again, less used structures like these do beg for more development and perhaps there are some additional things that can happen with these. In particular with Slash and Burn... I can see some possible interesting defensive structures that would be unlocked there once repel is more fully fleshed out, maybe a unit. At that point would it then be too powerful a tech if it were combined with Earth Oven? Perhaps... perhaps not.

I suppose to me it depends on how we'd attempt to blend the concept to cover both.

Arakhor said:

If your optimal tech is to reveal two or three buildings or units, then yes, I'd agree that you have some very over-stuffed techs. My main point about what techs reveal is that each of them (of course) costs various beakers and they provide significantly differing rewards for those beakers. For instance, Chopping, Slashing and Piercing each cost more than either Hard-Hammer or Soft-Hammer Percussion and each provide less for that increased cost.

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1) I don't think we should strive to make all techs equal in value at all. The varying texture to this adds some strategic value in evaluating your approach to exploring the tech tree. Some techs SHOULD be more rewarding while others more 'part of the process of getting to something better', others still being completely ignorable so as to punish the inattentive player who is simply selecting in a methodical manner with a distraction to real progress being peppered in now and then.

2) The very techs you mention, Chopping etc... are actually exceedingly high value techs for a clever player. I discussed that effect earlier. The fact that they give value without burdening a city to build more to get that value is actually extremely worthwhile to obtain - buys time to build other things while still growing your city's capabilities with the techs you're obtaining. Sure they could use some more details but in play they prove more valuable than most of the techs before them to the point I spam out into them and have found that extremely effective.

Arakhor said:

I queried Cactus Hill because its description mentions flint tools (not weapons), but the Wikipedia entry mentions hafted flint tools used for butchering, which admittedly does sound like a very primitive hand-axe.

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I figured some sort of research was done to find that as the reasonable place to put the access to that wonder...

Arakhor said:

My main proviso for resources is relevance - will tree bark, vines and what-have-you be relevant in later eras? If not, they should go obsolete at the very least.

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If the diplomacy screen could sort and filter better would this be much of an issue?

Thunderbrd said:

If the diplomacy screen could sort and filter better would this be much of an issue?

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It would be an improvement on spamming the Resource section, yes, but obsoleting/replacing stuff is a strong theme in Civ IV and (I think) proves deleterious towards immersion if certain resources didn't obsolete in time. Hydro mentioned nebulous 'people' more than once and, speaking as a some-time member of 'people', it certainly ruins my immersion to see my mediaeval empire still treasuring ash, bark, grass and what-have-you, let alone a modern empire!

That's another reason to shy away from universal goods as a resource, e.g. clothing. The Civ AI can be convinced to give up their only source of a particular resource and given Hydro's assertion that if you don't have clothing as a resource, your civ does indeed have access to no clothing at all, you can see where I'm going with this.

Have you considered merging Earth Oven and Slash & Burn? They're both applied uses of fire at roughly the same time and they're both single-interest techs.

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This is a bad idea. I am open to new ideas, but lets not remove and/or merge tech from the tech tree.

1) I don't think we should strive to make all techs equal in value at all. The varying texture to this adds some strategic value in evaluating your approach to exploring the tech tree. Some techs SHOULD be more rewarding while others more 'part of the process of getting to something better', others still being completely ignorable so as to punish the inattentive player who is simply selecting in a methodical manner with a distraction to real progress being peppered in now and then.

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I agree here. That's one of the best parts of C2C is that there are many different ways to wok your way though the tree. Beelining to a tech is not always the best way to get there. For instance the game might tell you to research A, B and then C to get tech D, but if you research B, C and then A you can get to tech D faster.

As in life not everything is equal or balanced. This management of chaos is one of the best parts of C2C. There is no super set rule that will always apply, which is why you need to seek out the best paths and adapt to what the game throws at you for each play though. One game you might settle your first city near a lush bountiful area, while in another you might start out some where crappy. Even the crappy spots can be turned into good spots if you research and build what you need.

For instance in one of my games I had a huge empire that split up into many smaller nations. All I had left were like 5 cities in the tundra. Thanks to terrain damage the other nations would get killed before they could get to my cities. And eventually I was able to retake over all my past empire plus more. The tundra cities are in general crappy city locations, but they are exactly what I needed to protect me from the other nations who took over the rest of my empire.

Hydromancerx said:

This is a bad idea. I am open to new ideas, but lets not remove and/or merge tech from the tech tree.

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Why is it a bad idea? If it's holy writ that you may only add to C2C and never remove things, just say so and it will cut out a lot of useless discussion. Otherwise, just shutting me down cold is not going to explain anything.

Thunderbrd said:

Are you saying a tech in and of itself cannot directly reduce flammability? We could give an autobuild I suppose. Makes sense that a safer way to cook would reduce flammability as well as those things you've mentioned.

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Disagree - just because a new technology has been found - does not mean everyone uses it. Due to cost, wariness of its benefit, content with the way things are now etc etc.

So please no autobuilds like this, the city should build the appliance or what ever, to get the benefit. I assume this equates to the majority of citizens now using the new technology.

"Slash and Burn" is an important tech and a very important and good method of land management in jungle areas especially for nomadic peoples as it improves the fertility of the soil and incourages food producing plants something that is lacking in most untouched jungles. The soil improvement is contarary to the percieved wisdom on this - latest research is that the charcole produced from burning the trees holde the nutrients in reducing the leaching that normally happens. It is also a good method for tropical islands, contrary to "Guns, Steel and Germs" or whatever, the people on Easter Island were living in a vertual paridise where they only needed to do a bit of farming a few days a year to provide all their needs.

Arakhor said:

Why is it a bad idea? If it's holy writ that you may only add to C2C and never remove things, just say so and it will cut out a lot of useless discussion. Otherwise, just shutting me down cold is not going to explain anything.

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We have removed things before, even techs. However its more difficult to do without messing up other techs and things that depend upon them. Its like trying to put toothpaste back in the tube. It can be done but its messy and you might loose some.

I also don't think those specifically should be removed. While you may see them as pointless techs to research I see them as speed bumps for the player not to pass though an era too fast. This allows one to catch up and actually build some buildings before they go obsolete.

Note I mean relative speed. Like the % of the game you stay in an era which should be independent of what actual game speed you decide to play on.

Arakhor said:

Conduct
* Other than Crime (Corruption) which is unlocked here, the only point of this tech is to build an Executioner's Hut. I don't think it would be unbalancing at all to move both of them to Chiefdom (and maybe adjust Chiefdom's tech cost if that's an issue).


* Why is Cactus Hill under Axe Making? Wouldn't it be better under Flint Knapping or Fine Edge Tools?

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1. Conduct is supposed to be a prehistoric legal tech based on the idea that people behave themselves instead of being savages.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Misconduct

It is currently incomplete, I was going to add Honor Codes, Banishment, and other stuff to it but never did.


2. Agree, Cactus Hill should be under Flint Knapping or Fine Edge Tools because it introduced the Clovis Point.

Hydromancerx said:

I also don't think those specifically should be removed. While you may see them as pointless techs to research I see them as speed bumps for the player not to pass though an era too fast. This allows one to catch up and actually build some buildings before they go obsolete.

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So, why not "simply" increase the beaker costs of the Prehistoric techs or cut down on the beakers available? That huge list of myths and stories adds up to a lot of beakers, after all. As a side issue, why should Language civics add beakers or affect relations with other civs? I would assume that if you can't communicate, you simply can't communicate - no relation maluses needed.

Azurian says Conduct is not complete and I agree with him entirely, but I really don't think you should be in the business of throwing in techs just to slow down the player. You're much better off making sure that the game doesn't have an excess of gold, hammers or beakers instead.

Arakhor said:

So, why not "simply" increase the beaker costs of the Prehistoric techs or cut down on the beakers available? That huge list of myths and stories adds up to a lot of beakers, after all. As a side issue, why should Language civics add beakers or affect relations with other civs? I would assume that if you can't communicate, you simply can't communicate - no relation maluses needed.

Azurian says Conduct is not complete and I agree with him entirely, but I really don't think you should be in the business of throwing in techs just to slow down the player. You're much better off making sure that the game doesn't have an excess of gold, hammers or beakers instead.

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To have more gradual chnage than big change. Think of it like steps up to the 2nd floor. You can have many sized steps but its still the same distance. Rather than a few step steps, I would much rather have many shallow steps. Where one choice will not have a big impact but many small choices add up to a big change.

The Myths are DH's area so I will leave it to him to address that.

And yeah I have a Tribal Council building I want him to add to the Conduct tech. His other buildings I was not happy with. So the Tribal Council is an adapted version of his ideas of Honor Codes and Banishment.

Tribal Council works since it's macro, while the ones I suggested were too micro.

The resources Stone Tools (also Flint Tools, Obsidian Tools and Antlers) were originally supposed to increase your worker rate and go obsolete at Composite Tools. I think we had some trouble getting it to work so put the work rate increase on the techs instead. I think it would be better to try and go back to our original idea with these.

Edit There is no tag on the bonus for worker rate but there is one on buildings iWorkerSpeedModifier. This means we could replace the bonuses with a national wonder style building instead but it would need to be one for each only not many as we now have.

Not that it matters much since these are really for the Nomadic Start.

I suggest we do put the obsolete tech on the Stone Tools resource anyway.

edit2 Thinking about it they should just be equipment promotions available only to the gatherer. I think I will change it to that.

Dancing Hoskuld said:

The resources Stone Tools (also Flint Tools, Obsidian Tools and Antlers) were originally supposed to increase your worker rate and go obsolete at Composite Tools. I think we had some trouble getting it to work so put the work rate increase on the techs instead. I think it would be better to try and go back to our original idea with these.

Edit There is no tag on the bonus for worker rate but there is one on buildings iWorkerSpeedModifier. This means we could replace the bonuses with a national wonder style building instead but it would need to be one for each only not many as we now have.

Not that it matters much since these are really for the Nomadic Start.

I suggest we do put the obsolete tech on the Stone Tools resource anyway.

edit2 Thinking about it they should just be equipment promotions available only to the gatherer. I think I will change it to that.

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Interesting.

You overlooked Bone tools as well I think. And possibly Wood Tools.

I think it would depend on WHAT is being built.

If you're going to make equipment promos for workers out of these (the code isn't quite ready for a real equipment test but the way we have equipments now would be fine) then I suggest that you use the promotion tags that help you define how much better the tool sort is for specific builds or in particular terrains. Builds are so limited at this stage anyhow that you probably actually have less options on builds than terrains and it would be more suitable to adjust based on the build rather than terrain or feature (well... maybe in some cases the feature) anyhow.

Anyways, point being, think deeply on how the tools would differ and what they would be most helpful with and least helpful with. We've not begun to explore the depth to which we can use promotions to manipulate worker build rates.

Thunderbrd said:

Interesting.

You overlooked Bone tools as well I think. And possibly Wood Tools.

I think it would depend on WHAT is being built.

If you're going to make equipment promos for workers out of these (the code isn't quite ready for a real equipment test but the way we have equipments now would be fine) then I suggest that you use the promotion tags that help you define how much better the tool sort is for specific builds or in particular terrains. Builds are so limited at this stage anyhow that you probably actually have less options on builds than terrains and it would be more suitable to adjust based on the build rather than terrain or feature (well... maybe in some cases the feature) anyhow.

Anyways, point being, think deeply on how the tools would differ and what they would be most helpful with and least helpful with. We've not begun to explore the depth to which we can use promotions to manipulate worker build rates.

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I was assuming that rock, bone and wood tools were what you started with and what you used to make the others so I ignored them. The only thing that goes before them is "hands" which we come with.

Antlers from deer are natures own picks not sure if we need an Antler Tools as well as an antlers.

OK here is a rough first cut for Gatherer promotions.

New Promotions
Note: the techs Fine Edged Tools, Composite Tools, Flint Knapping and Microlith should have their work rate increase reduced by 25 over all.

I am not sure what else I need like promotion lines and levels etc. Also it should not be necessary to get all the lower ones to get a later one. The upgrades are replacements.

I expect that there would be more:-
edit There are Work Modifiers for Hills and Peaks but not Flat Lands or all terrains (in domain).

Dancing Hoskuld said:

I was assuming that rock, bone and wood tools were what you started with and what you used to make the others so I ignored them. The only thing that goes before them is "hands" which we come with.

Antlers from deer are natures own picks not sure if we need an Antler Tools as well as an antlers.

OK here is a rough first cut for Gatherer promotions.

New Promotions

Natural Tools

- rock, wood, bone - stuff that needs no working to make
- every city provides ie what ever auto build building is in every city from the start
- upgrades to Antlers or Stone Tools
- improve worker speed 2%​

Antlers

- nature's picks no work needed to make them
- available at Scavenging
- from Deer Herd and new building Antler Gatherer (requires deer in vicinity)
- good for all builds and routes better than trails
- upgrades to Antler Tools
- improve worker speed 2%​

Antler Tools

- shaped antler
- available Tool Making
- from Deer Herd and new building Antler Gatherer (requires deer in vicinity)
- upgrades to Neolithic Tools
- improve worker speed 5%​

Obsidian Tools

- a bit of shaped obsidian held in the hand
- available Hard Hammer Percussion
- from new buildings Obsidian Gatherer (requires obsidian in vicinity and upgrades to Obsidian Quarry) and Obsidian Quarry
- upgrades to Neolithic Tools
- improve worker speed 5%​

Stone Tools

- a bit of shaped stone held in the hand
- available Tool Making
- from building Stone Gatherer
- upgrades to Neolithic Tools
- improve worker speed 5%​

Flint Tools

- a bit of shaped flint held in the hand
- available Flint Knapping
- from Flint Quarry
- upgrades to Neolithic Tools
- improve worker speed 5%​

Neolithic Tools

- tools made from many components for specific tasks requires techs Composite Tools, Flint Knapping, Microlith and Bone Working
- available at Microlith?
- from new building Neolithic Tool Maker which requires Stone Tool Maker
- upgrades to Neolithic Tools
- improve worker speed 25%​

Note: the techs Fine Edged Tools, Composite Tools, Flint Knapping and Microlith should have their work rate increase reduced by 25 over all.

I am not sure what else I need like promotion lines and levels etc. Also it should not be necessary to get all the lower ones to get a later one. The upgrades are replacements.

I expect that there would be more:-

(above) -> Neolithic Tools -> Copper Tools -> Bronze Tools -> Iron Tools -> Steel Tools -> Machines

Hand Carts -> Animal Carts -> Machines

Explosives -> Disintegrators​

edit There are Work Modifiers for Hills and Peaks but not Flat Lands or all terrains (in domain).

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If they are to be replacements of each other then you can give them all the same promotionline and make each upgrade one iLinePriority one more than the one below it.

If you want them to be alternatives to each other, set them on the same promotionline and give them the same iLinePriority.

Promotions themselves have tags for work modifiers on terrains, features, hills, peaks, and individual builds as well as an overall work speed modifier. I'd really rather see some variation between the differing tools to make them alternatives wherever possible rather than just improvements on the previous layers.

The tags are:
TerrainWorkRateModifierChangeTypes
FeatureWorkRateModifierChangeTypes
BuildWorkRateModifierChangeTypes
iHillsWorkModifierChange
iPeaksWorkModifierChange

Thunderbrd said:

If they are to be replacements of each other then you can give them all the same promotionline and make each upgrade one iLinePriority one more than the one below it.

If you want them to be alternatives to each other, set them on the same promotionline and give them the same iLinePriority.

Promotions themselves have tags for work modifiers on terrains, features, hills, peaks, and individual builds as well as an overall work speed modifier. I'd really rather see some variation between the differing tools to make them alternatives wherever possible rather than just improvements on the previous layers.

The tags are:
TerrainWorkRateModifierChangeTypes
FeatureWorkRateModifierChangeTypes
BuildWorkRateModifierChangeTypes
iHillsWorkModifierChange
iPeaksWorkModifierChange

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Natural Tools are replaced by Antlers or Stone Tools.

Antlers are replaced by Antler Tools (or more correctly Antler Pickaxe)

Stone Tools, Antler Pickaxe, Flint Tools and Obsidian Tools can be had at the same time and therefor combine their effects. They are all replaced by Neolithic Tools.

At the moment with the exception of the Antler Pickaxe I am not looking as specific tools like the Awl or Adze. This means that these do just improve the overall work rate.

I'm already overwhelmed by the sheer number of promotions as it is. Adding even more might well be overkill, in my opinion.

These are only for the worker units and are free as equipment so your gatherers (and nomad units) will get them by going through you town if they don't have them.

I agree that there are a lot of promotions and some of them need to be changed somewhat. I am fed up with getting useless combat promotions from combat on my recon and hunter units. IMO a recon unit should never get the "Fight to the Death" promotion from combat. They are scouts it is more important that they run away to report stuff! If they win the combat they should be getting something to help them avoid it in future.

Scouts have their own anti-capture promotionline anyhow... Apparently Recon should be set under NotOnUnitCombat on the To the Death promotionline.

Overall, I feel we have about 10% the # of promotions we should have. But not all promos are skill promos. We're probably at about half the skill promos we'll have after all plans are said and done. (Many will be reworked into equipments as well.)

Aren`t Antlers "natural tools"?
And why do you need Rock Gatherer for Stone Tools, not the Stone Tool Maker?

We have Tools and I think Electical Tools as well FYI.

I like the idea of them as equipment/promotion btw!