[Religion and Revolution]: Feedback and Questions

Hi everyone,

I agree. Converted natives shouldn't be able to found a new colony, and shouldn't be able to be trained in their own village
I agree!

I've added the gold amount on the Score Board.
See here:

It was quite easy to do (the most difficult part is the alignment part...)
However I've noticed something strange. When you trade with AI, the available gold is somehow rounded up.

In this game, Montezuma has 1486 gold but will only trade 1480.
William Penn and Mem de Sa have 100 gold but will only trade 90.
Simon Bolivar has 110 gold but will only trade 100
Hans Egede has 80 and will trade 80
The difference will never be over 10 gold if I'm correct, and you will never see the "true" last digit (it only goes 10 by 10) when you trade with Europeans or natives. So somehow this does look like a hidden variable...

Is that OK with you?

Robert Surcouf said:

I agree. Converted natives shouldn't be able to found a new colony, and shouldn't be able to be trained in their own village
I agree!

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Great.
I will ask these questions again in our main thread.

Robert Surcouf said:

I've added the gold amount on the Score Board.

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Fantastic!

Robert Surcouf said:

So somehow this does look like a hidden variable...

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Well, I don't know if you could call it a "hidden variable".

It is simply calculated how much the player is willing to trade.
(AI_maxGoldTrade, it depends on several factors like attitude)

I do not think that sould be displayed somewhere ...

Robert Surcouf said:

Is that OK with you?

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It is perfect.

thadian said:

i don't like converted natives being able to settle new towns, ...

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I think so too.

First let me tell that Robert's screen shot looks just terrific But perhaps Indian gold should not show, because in original game you cannot see Indian gold but one can see European gold if you talk to them. So new interface feature would not disclose more than necessary, just makes player's labor load lighter


Now please allow me to suggest another idea (I hope you guys are not sick of them by now ). I propose to implement more realistic and more player-friendly storage system. This terrific mod could have two Storage dimensions -- General Storage and Specialized Storage.

General (Base) Storage: Warehouse-Warehouse Expansion-Custom House: these work like Original Colonization I buildings with RnR addition of drying Coffee.

Specialized (Additional) Storage: Each Specialist's Building comes with its own specialized (invisible) Warehouse! Basically if you are building Textile Mill you sure would design it with corresponding storage rooms for Cotton, Wool, Cloth, etc... So building, for example Rum Distiller's house, will automatically add, say, +100 storage room to the base (general) limit, but for Rum and Sugar, ONLY! Great Arsenal this way would look like ... great Arsenal, place were you can store a lot of weapon (Guns and Muskets). You produce guns and you store them with guns, not with Sheep

In addition Markets could add +100 to storage of the goods for items used in Domestic Market system. Tavern would add extra storage for Alcohol. Government Buildings, which are in charge of Public Works, can add extra storage for Stone and Lumber. Silver does not get extra storage from any building, except base value. Stables come with barns allowing to keep more cattle, horses and sheep. You got the idea -- different goods will have different storage limits, beyond which Waste, Warehouse Expansion and Custom House would work just like we have it now..

This idea will reinforce RnR focus on specialization, will make buildings even more desirable and unique and will solve two main current problems with that frustrates me tremendously:

1. Current storage system forces human player to use Treks and Galleons as mobile warehouses, which is unrealistic and AI is not smart enough to do the same.
2. I am spending too much time and "unrealistic" effort on storage acrobatics. Like doing all kinds of tricks people would not do in real life to fix the storage issues

1. Current storage system forces human player to use Treks and Galleons as mobile warehouses, which is unrealistic and AI is not smart enough to do the same.


+1. I also use mobile warehouses to skirt the system. Not that i want to, but i have to.

Here is no Translation to german in the Text.

@team:
I've updated our version. (Gold amount in Main interface).
I might be busy in the next few days. Don't be surprised if I don't show up that often...

@Thadian:
OK then. I'll hide natives' gold amount and show it only if the "no variables hidden" option is set. Is that OK?

In the Worldbuilder the value "cocoa +2" is absent in the auxiliary text with the area kind "Prärie"

Rambozod said:

Here is no Translation to german in the Text.

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I will correct.

Rambozod said:

In the Worldbuilder the value "cocoa +2" is absent in the auxiliary text with the area kind "Prärie"

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Sorry, I don't understand.
(Cocoa is give by Terrain Feature "Jungel" and not by a Terrain itself.)

@Tigranes:

About your idea here:

Sorry, it is much too difficult to implement and very risky considering bugs for very little benefit.
It absolutely conflicts with the Custom House feature for example.

But I will ask the team, if we should increase Storage for the Warehouse buildings.

There are 3 categories of Specialists in this game: those you can hire in Europe only (Lumberjacks), those you can find both in Europe and Americas (Expert Miner) and those you can get trained with Indians only (Tobacco Planter).

1. I have loaded different maps and never found a single village with Expert Cocoa Planter. One cannot hire her in Europe (which is historically correct). So this unit is never in game. I think this is just a simple oversight/bug.

2. Pre-Colombian Americans did use Pearls so even though one can hire Pearl Hunter in Europe Natives could have a (single) village with Experts in Pearls, like we have in case of Miners. Same goes for Grapes -- Native Americans ate them, but did not make Wine, so Grape Picker village can be around sometimes. On the other side, Hemp and Cotton were cultivated both in Eurasia and in Americas (to the lesser degree, but still..), however one cannot hire Hemp Planter or Cotton Planter, which is unhistorical.

3. Now the most important part: Sugar, Indigo and Coffee were introduced by Europeans. No Indian village should tell European scout that their village "is known for Expert Sugar Planters" . I understand that player should look at Sugar on terrain and imagine -- oh, this is not a sugar, no, this is just a tile suitable for growing sugar. Okey, I buy that argument at face value. But when I see that Indians are harvesting and willing to trade Sugar and, adding insult to injury, they are somehow EXPERTS in Sugar/Indigo/Coffee growing I start to get emotional

3a. Sugar/Indigo/Coffee Berries trade. I know that this is the basic yield of the certain base tiles with Indian Villages. I know that they have to harvest something if they live on Marsh Tile. And yet there has to be some more realistic solution. I think Natives in my games started to sell me Sheep after I sold them the first herd, and I was very happy with this Perhaps the same can be done with Sugar/Indigo/Coffee Berries?

3b. Sugar/Indigo/Coffee Berries Planters. Making things historical is much more simple here. Just hire them in Europe only. Great Sid made an oversimplification with Sugar, but we don't have to follow him in this case.

In August 1492, Christopher Columbus stopped at La Gomera in the Canary Islands, for wine and water, intending to stay only four days. He became romantically involved with the Governor of the island, Beatriz de Bobadilla y Ossorio, and stayed a month. When he finally sailed she gave him cuttings of sugarcane, which became the first to reach the New World

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Tigranes said:

I think this is just a simple oversight/bug.

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It is a bug and I will fix it.
(But you could still get Coco Planters with learning by doing.)

Tigranes said:

2. Pre-Colombian Americans did use Pearls so even though one can hire Pearl Hunter in Europe Natives could have a (single) village with Experts in Pearls, like we have in case of Miners. Same goes for Grapes -- Native Americans ate them, but did not make Wine, so Grape Picker village can be around sometimes. On the other side, Hemp and Cotton were cultivated both in Eurasia and in Americas (to the lesser degree, but still..), however one cannot hire Hemp Planter or Cotton Planter, which is unhistorical.

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The reasons why "Pearl Hunter" and "Grape Picker" are not used as TeachUnitClasses is simply gameplay.
Since these profession are easily availabe in Europe, we wanted to have some more "space" for other teach professions, that you can only acquire from Natives or "Learning by Doing".
But well, one could think about it again.

It is not, that we did not know that wine and pearl existed in the new world.
After all, that was one of the reasons why I suggested these yields first.

It was also on purpose that "Hemp Planter" and "Cotton Planter" are not buyable in Europe.

Before the 16th century cotton was almost not known in Europe. (The game starts end of 15th century.)
It was an absolute luxury good and not really produced in Europe itself.

Cotton Planters were not available on the European job market.
Thus it does not make sense to have cotton planters buyable in Europe.

Hemp Planters were also relatively rare, but one could think about that.
(It would simply take out a little bit of fun and challenge from that productionline.)

Tigranes said:

3. Now the most important part: Sugar, Indigo and Coffee were introduced by Europeans.

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Yes I know.
(Cotton also was introduced to Northern America by Europeans as well. It was only known in Central America.)

But do you really think it does make sense to have these Specialists available in Europe then ?
Sugarcane, Indigo and Coffee were never produced in Europe.

Where should these European Specialists for Sugar, Indigo and Coffee come from ?
If you are going strictly by historical correctness, you could not have them in America and you could not have them in Europe.
(Only "Learning By Doing" would be valid.)

We have made these decisions on purpose.
We were mostly thinking about gameplay, but we tried to consider historical facts.

Tigranes said:

I think Natives in my games started to sell me Sheep after I sold them the first herd, and I was very happy with this Perhaps the same can be done with Sugar/Indigo/Coffee Berries?

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Sheep, Cattle and Horses are Livestock.
(A new feature of this mod which Androrc has originally implemented.)
Nations need to have them, before they can breed them.

But we will not unnecessarily make this game complicated and destroy gameplay or AI.

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Trust me, myself (and almost all team mebers as well) know about all of these facts.

It is simply a matter of taste:
I personally tend more towards gameplay than 100% historical correctness.

We have considered very well, when to go for historical correctness and when to go for gameplay, balancing and AI.
But I will check the TeachUnitClasses again.

I found cocoa planter in every game I played, this might not be a bug.

Regarding the other points: I agree with ray, but...

Regarding the pearlhunter we could think about teaching them in Indian villages.

Grape Picker: I would prefer them to be buyable in Europe.

The others: We should make no changes (as Ray said).

Schmiddie said:

I found cocoa planter in every game I played, this might not be a bug.

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You are right, it is configured correctly and maps also generate villages that teach "Expert Cocoa Planter".
(When searching the file this morning, I probably had a spelling mistake.)

It simply depends on size and type of map (terrain distribution) how many you get in average.

Edit:
Balancing has been improved in newest revision.

Schmiddie said:

Regarding the pearlhunter we could think about teaching them in Indian villages.

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Well I guess we can have it in there, since it is historically correct.

I will also control the other TeachUnitClasses again.

I strongly feel that certain very high order buildings must be immune to Indian raid destructions. It makes one to rage quit after Government Palace you were building last 20 turns was burned by Natives in a routine raid and you are not even at war with them! Pueblo revolt that led to the capture of Santa Fe was a full scale revolt, for example, not a simple raid...

Tigranes said:

I strongly feel that certain very high order buildings must be immune to Indian raid destructions. ...

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I will think about it.
(No change for Release 1 however. I simply do not have the time.)

I agree, we might think about the extent of native raid destructions for Release 2.

There is one more thing that can be easily done before the Release 1:

I find it very disturbing how easily Human player and Indians can overrun AI controled colonies, even on higher difficulty levels, even with free defenders AI gets now. So I propose 2 easy fixes:

1. Elevate Cannon Garrison to strength 3 and keep everything else the same. One simple change in XML will improve overall balance and gameplay drastically. Garrisons cannot get city defender promotion, while Cannon Regiments can get city attacker promotions. Human players mostly attack, so this will help AI mostly. With Indian raids even killing Indians does not protect you from damage, so this will not help Humans vs Indians too much. Vs King -- Artillery still has a big lead and you still have little chance of winning if you passively defend.

2. Just like King can order you to start war with another European he can order you to stop the war. Colonies would have some conflicts outside of big European wars, but large scale war in colony needs a sanction from your King. You cannot simply go around and destroy another King's colonies when your mother countries are not in war!

Robbing other colonies became very popular among players-- why focus on immigration? Just focus on military and capture Colonists of other Nationalities -- they will happily work for you while you are using riches of their colony One still should be able to do it but it must be much harder and your King must have a say in all this!

Tigranes said:

There is one more thing that can be easily done before the Release 1:

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No sorry, this will not be possible for Release 1.
(We are in the last week before our release now.)

At the moment we need to finish up the open todos and that is it.
Bugs would be fixed too, of course.

After Release 1 is out, we will continue working on new ideas.

Tigranes said:

So I propose 2 easy fixes:

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You are not talking about fixes here.
One is a balancing change, the other a feature.

Some people might agree, others won't.

Tigranes said:

1. Elevate Cannon Garrison to strength 3 and keep everything else the same.

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I don't think changing balancing of land troops is a good idea at the moment.
We will eventually have a big feature about Inventions, which will change a lot of things anyways.

Tigranes said:

Just like King can order you to start war with another European he can order you to stop the war.

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This feature is already implemented.
(DLL Diplo Event "European Peace", which might be triggered when you are leading longer war with other Europeans)

Before the first release can I suggest two little things to enhance user-friendliness of this mod:

1. Please make Domestic market pop-ups optional. If one has 13 colonies it is quite tedious to hear that money sound and pop-ups for every single market every single turn for 200 turns

2. For the time being please deactivate prices in other European countries. Only essencial op ups must distract the hardworking player