RA: The biggest Bug never fixed!!!

ArcaneSeraph said:

You're only analyzing the first wave which is kind of missing the idea. It's to prevent outteching the AIs. Let's say under the current system each RA grants you basically 1 tech and you can get 5 or so at a time. They land, you plow through pushing up your median and maybe using key GS bulbs along with it. You push your median up and you repeat.

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No, I'm analyzing the second wave. I'll have a post on this in Strategy soon, but right now you only need two waves. One to clear mid-Renaissance into Bio/Steam (skipping Fertilizer/Metallurgy), and one to clear the three techs after Electricity and then backfill as much as possible. The first wave is unaffected by your change on Deity; the yields on the second are halved. Everything else is hard teched by aggressively pushing Education and Astronomy, then plowing through the left side of Rationalism with Culturals and Monasteries/The Oracle if available.

If you halve my yields in the second wave, I'm going to research mid-Renaissance techs before setting off what is now the first wave; I'll probably also start earlier and add some third wave RAs at the back end of Medieval to push Renaissance techs. Doing those two things will cover the differential on Deity. On lower difficulties it will force additional turns.

ArcaneSeraph said:

Yes sure it will place a premium on GSes and free techs. However where are you going to get them?

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If you require 15 more turns to get out, I move the Public School, Garden and National Epic into the new bottleneck. Maybe I need a second Public School to get out as a result of that shift. That's all that changes.

Snuffleupagus said:

Couldn't this be balanced by linking RA and GS production to hard beaker production? Rather than getting an amount of science based on development, you'd get a one time boost based on some multiplier of the hard beakers you are currently producing. (maybe about 5 turns worth on standard speed?).

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That's one way to do it, although as others have pointed out it can be gamed (get Secularism and slap specialists in all possible slots). I'm suggesting linking it to the opponent's (promotes parity, still fully rational to sign them with everyone in the lead because the alternative is worse), and capping GS production by turns elapsed. A mod that alpaca ceased maintaining capped GS outputs by number of techs researched, but I feel that's a little too easily gamed. It's a good solution given the limitations of the current modding toolset, though.

Martin:

I was going to argue but there's really no point. You are chaging your data as it suits your arguments and quoting out of context on points that I clearly agreed with just for the sake of argument. It's the same as the liberty versus tradition debate we had. You swore up and down that your way was always optimal and buying settlers or workers and going tradition was inferior. Yet I find the other day you've posted and said:

Martin Alvito said:

I found Tradition to be surprisingly acceptable when playing through Deity Challenge 3 even before the Landed Elite buff. If you aggressively use cash to get Workers and Settlers for luxury hookups (to get more cash), you'll generally recoup the investment once you finish the tree if you have quality tiles to grow into. The catch is that you're gambling that (a) there are AIs and (b) they have dirt that yields cash.

That's a good bet on a Deity Pangaea since the AIs start with two cities to your one as well as turbocharged Workers, but it's not a safe bet on lower difficulties or if you hit a ruin on a map type that could isolate you.

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So just like this I guess ideas are only worth considering if you come up with them?

stealth_nsk said:

In this case players will boost their science output for the turn they get the research and revert it back afterwards. This could be done by several methods:

1. Putting science specialists inside their slots. Wouldn't help too much if they are already there.

2. Putting other specialists in, if you have Secularism.

3. Putting workers on Trading Posts if you have Free Thought.

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How about +33% beakers from Cities for 12 turns then? Like a Scientific Golden Age (or Scientific Revolution, if they just rename that SP). Micro-ing for more beakers might be worth it, but would actually require sacrificing other priorities for a few turns. The length could decrease by 1 turn each use too (down to 5 or so), like regular Great Person burns.

Speaking of which, sorta off-topic, but burning GPs should really be buffed (other than GE and GS)... the larger point being that the game should somehow encourage a relatively balanced production of each type of GP.

ArcaneSeraph said:

I was going to argue but there's really no point. You are chaging your data as it suits your arguments and quoting out of context on points that I clearly agreed with just for the sake of argument. It's the same as the liberty versus tradition debate we had. You swore up and down that your way was always optimal and buying settlers or workers and going tradition was inferior. Yet I find the other day you've posted and said:

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I'm not changing the data. Go look at what I did in G-Minor X. I'm telling you precisely what I worked out through a sizable amount of experimentation, and how your proposals would alter the results. I realize that it's tough from your perspective to assess the validity of the claims when you don't already know everything I've worked out, but if you pull up the turn 142 save you can see exactly what I did and why.

This is IMO why vexing seems to get so frustrated with you; when you don't fully understand the argument, you resort to attacking the poster.

ArcaneSeraph said:

So just like this I guess ideas are only worth considering if you come up with them?

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No, if we define Tradition as viable "if competitive" it turned out that you were right under certain limited conditions. Tradition is not usually competitive, but if several other conditions happen to obtain you can get an acceptable result. To elaborate on what I said in the other thread, success of Tradition requires:

- Accessible AIs to sell luxuries to (proper map type; bad luck with Hostiles can isolate you even on Pangaea)
- AI cash (potluck below Deity)
- High / yield tiles like all that Silver in Deity Challenge 3
- No early attack (so that you can actually buy Settlers and Workers rather than units, and can hook up the luxuries for resale)

Since those conditions rarely all obtain simultaneously, it's no wonder that the general consensus is that Liberty is superior. When I actually had all of that obtain for once, it turned out that Tradition worked well. But Liberty is at least as good under those conditions (the GE would have been extremely helpful) and better if one does not obtain.

Now, you can take that as validation of what you were claiming and accept the partial victory with good grace, or you can insult me. Your call.

wobuffet said:

How about +33% beakers from Cities for 12 turns then? Like a Scientific Golden Age (or Scientific Revolution, if they just rename that SP). Micro-ing for more beakers might be worth it, but would actually require sacrificing other priorities for a few turns. The length could decrease by 1 turn each use too (down to 5 or so), like regular Great Person burns.

Speaking of which, sorta off-topic, but burning GPs should really be buffed (other than GE and GS)... the larger point being that the game should somehow encourage a relatively balanced production of each type of GP.

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A good idea came up in previous post.
"If you want to a way to convert good relations to beakers then you should simply have a MOO-like RA where say each side has research boosted X amount/turn. No cost, but you can only do it if you have good relations. Maybe something like +1 in ancient 2 in classical 4 in medi, 8 in ren, 16 in industrial 32 in modern and 64 in future. "

This is good, what you get depends on the era you are in. Even amplified by PT and rationalism, it can't replace the hard research. For example: You have PT&Rationalism and sign 7 RAs in ren era, what you get is 8*7*(1+50%+50%)=112. It's helpful but it can't replace hard research.

For the argument between Martin and Arcane, IMO, i'd like to say:

"Both have points, but Arcane's view is sound&clear and Martin's are hard to understand, maybe it's just because i'm too dumb."

Martin Alvito said:

I'm not changing the data.

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First:

Martin Alvito said:

- delay first wave and hard tech a couple more mid-Renaissance techs first

That's about it, really. Min of the medians is going to merely halve what you'd get with an AI that just hit Industrial, which is common in the 160 range when a first full wave would ordinarily resolve now.

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Second:

Martin Alvito said:

No, I'm analyzing the secondwave.

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Initially it was the first wave when the AIs first hit industrial and then I discuessed that a bit and then you said no it was the second wave.

First:

Martin Alvito said:

If techs in the back end of the tree were cheaper, it would add another 10-20 turns of research before the vertical empire could RA/GS bomb its way to victory.

I don't think that would be quite enough to shift equilibrium strategy, but it would be a start. Getting rid of the National College would put a much larger premium on early growth to drive , which would at least push players towards a mid-size, 5-6 city empire.

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Second:

Martin Alvito said:

- delay first wave and hard tech a couple more mid-Renaissance techs first

That's about it, really. Min of the medians is going to merely halve what you'd get with an AI that just hit Industrial, which is common in the 160 range when a first full wave would ordinarily resolve now.

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Martin Alvito said:

That said, nerfing RAs is going to do less than you think. All you'll accomplish is move back the dates when players want to RA/GS bomb their way out of the game.

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So your suggestion would delay the first wave by delaying the NC and weaken some of the waves, adding 10-20 turns and that would be a good start.

My suggestion would delay the first wave and halve what you get for a later wave and ultimately delay when players RA/GS bomb their way out of the game.

Yours is a good start but mine will merely do this.

First:

Martin Alvito said:

That's a good bet on a Deity Pangaea since the AIs start with two cities to your one as well as turbocharged Workers

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Second:

Martin Alvito said:

Since those conditions rarely all obtain simultaneously, it's no wonder that the general consensus is that Liberty is superior. When I actually had all of that obtain for once, it turned out that Tradition worked well. But Liberty is at least as good under those conditions (the GE would have been extremely helpful) and better if one does not obtain.

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So it was a good bet then but now it's rare?

You say you have to build any more buildings then you say you'll just need more public school, national epic, gardens. It won't affect anything - just a minor delay. Oh wait I'll need an extra wave in medieval but no big deal. It's just as easy. This won't affect deity but only lower levels but here's my re-rolled game on prince difficulty that I got ideal conditions with that proves you only need 2 waves of RAs.

You say your not changing data but every single post seems to be a completely different argument with a completely different strategy.

Anyway... look I apologize if my last post was offensive. I did not mean it that way. I merely wanted to say that I don't see the point in continuing to argue as it seemed to me that you weren't even bothering to really consider anything I had to say. You just state your expierences as facts and are never swayed from anything I or most anyone else has to say so I just felt it was pointless. That's all.

I said many times that I thought your posts were intelligent and your points worth thinking about. Praise IOW. You say that I'm not capable of understanding the point and apparently just get mad. I'm not really sure how I'm the one being insulting but okay. I do apologize.

I think I see the basic issue at this point. I've got a typo (the disputed post should have read "180" and not "160"), and you're not following the timeline and its effects. First wave signs around 120-130 right now and resolves around 150-160, second wave signs around 150-160 and resolves around 180-190.

Push that back ten to twenty turns, and the Deity AI is in Industrial already yielding no net change on that wave. If anything, I'm getting a better yield because I researched more late Renaissance techs before the RAs. By 190-200 the Deity AI is late Industrial/early Modern. It won't halve yields, though it will impact them. The net result would be requiring another 1-2 GS to get out at most.

That sounds bad, but you've also given me ten to twenty more turns to generate Great Scientists. I'm going to get an extra GS during that time period with certainty, and if I know the timeline in advance I can adjust my builds to produce a second one.

Once you recognize that, the rest should fall into place. What I'm saying is that your theoretical suggestion looks pretty but isn't going to delay exit by more than fifteen turns on Deity, give or take. It'll extend things further on lower levels, but I'm honestly not sure by exactly how much. It would dramatically impact strategy, but I strongly suspect that it would simply drive players back to a modern version of the old Babylonian ICS where you'd make fifteen Great Scientists in a game, literally taking the Scientists back out in each city once it popped a GS. Naturally, I don't think that you'd see players making fifteen GS with anyone but Babylon, but you're probably looking at 10-12 in a low level game. Whether or not players would actually settle all those cities or annex a few of them is also unclear (due to the persisting Courthouse bug/"feature") and would require testing.

ArcaneSeraph said:

So your suggestion would delay the first wave by delaying the NC and weaken some of the waves, adding 10-20 turns and that would be a good start.

My suggestion would delay the first wave and halve what you get for a later wave and ultimately delay when players RA/GS bomb their way out of the game.

Yours is a good start but mine will merely do this.

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It appears from your posts that your goal is to make the Renaissance and later eras meaningful rather than brief phases players zip through, but a fifteen turn early delay is no more than a "good start" on forcing the player to play level with the AI even on Deity. It does cause the player to have more time after building the Classical/Medieval buildings to work "junk" like early Renaissance buildings into the queue as the best available option given tech limitations.

A later change is meaningless because the later buildings are so bad; you're just extending the period of time where you just click "End Turn" unless you're in a war or need to stick a building/Wonder in a queue again. The only things worth building at that point are buildings, units, Broadcast Towers and Wonders. buildings get built now in Space games and in a Cultural capital, but don't make sense in Diplomatic games since you can double GE the UN. Nothing changed there. You buy Broadcast Towers with , and units only make sense if you're under attack. You haven't added a lot of depth by extending this later period of time; you have to fix the buildings or extend the time frame a lot further.

ArcaneSeraph said:

So it was a good bet then but now it's rare?

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Go reread what you quoted. It's a good bet for all of the conditions except peace to obtain if you're playing something like Deity Pangaea (ie: the map/difficulty in question); it's a lousy bet under other conditions. Further, I forgot to account for peace in the initial analysis, which was a mistake on my part. If I'd had to fight on turn 19 in that game like in Deity Challenge 4, there would have been no way of getting a Settler with 500 because I'd need to spend the initial luxury on units to live.

It's later when the Tradition finisher starts to pay off, assuming that your early game proceeds smoothly. If you can build unmolested until around turn 55-60, the benefits of the finisher are ultimately meaningful and compete with the GE (as we already knew from the LE/Meritocracy debate). But you have to get there in a comparable position first, which requires a fair number of conditions.

ArcaneSeraph said:

You say your not changing data but every single post seems to be a completely different argument with a completely different strategy.

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Look at it this way: you're seeing individual pieces of the puzzle. I'm seeing the whole puzzle and how things fit together because of all that time I threw at figuring out the optimal research strategy in the last couple of weeks. I know what I'll do if you deny me a third or even nearly half of my RA yields...because I've had to do it in games where I got repeatedly Hostiled. Not only that, I know how to respond and what the impact on finish time will be - and if you look in the thread, it's not like I'm picking 15 turns out of thin air.

ArcaneSeraph said:

Anyway... look I apologize if my last post was offensive. I did not mean it that way. I merely wanted to say that I don't see the point in continuing to argue as it seemed to me that you weren't even bothering to really consider anything I had to say. You just state your expierences as facts and are never swayed from anything I or most anyone else has to say so I just felt it was pointless. That's all.

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If you want to sway me you need to address my claims directly. You're making a purely theoretical argument about the impact of your changes. I'm responding with an empirical one which claims that the net effect of your proposed changes is not at all what you think it is. You're insisting that your theory is correct, but the empirics just don't bear your theory out because your theory fails to account for the alternative means by which a player might respond to the changes in the environment.

Since I've got empirical data that falsifies your theory, why should I be persuaded by your theory? I understand why you're not persuaded - you don't have the data. You can take my word for it that I've personally observed the solution and can tell you how to solve the problem, or not. I can tell you how to replicate the data if you want; I'm going to be sharing that with everyone soon enough anyway. What you can see in the saves should be enough for you to back out the basic concept, though what's going on in the opening 70 turns is likely less clear.

ArcaneSeraph said:

I said many times that I thought your posts were intelligent and your points worth thinking about. Praise IOW. You say that I'm not capable of understanding the point and apparently just get mad. I'm not really sure how I'm the one being insulting but okay. I do apologize.

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I don't think you're incapable of understanding the argument. If I thought that, I wouldn't waste my time talking to you.

I said that you're not fully understanding the argument. That's different. Instead of taking a positive approach and trying to work together to figure out where the miscommunication is, you're accusing me of distorting facts and refusing to listen. You apologize, but you also persist in offensive behavior by trying to impugn me.

Try asking questions next time. Politely. If the argument doesn't make sense to you, that's not necessarily your fault or mine, and nothing to get upset about. It may be that you're dense or simply not listening; it may be that I'm bad at communicating the argument. I find that it's almost always some of both in these situations, and hopefully the fault is almost entirely mine.

Don't go into the gutter, make accusations and do your level best to paint me in a bad light. Do that and I will bring you up short real fast.

I agree with a lot of people here. RAs definitely need a change. I've been lurking around for a while but had a free day so I'm actively lurking today .

I came up with an idea that amalgamates a lot of the ideas here so if you see your idea in here or something like it, it was probably yours and I give you credit! I'd appreciate some feedback on it. Like? Dislike? Change? Let me know.

Initially, what are the goals we are collectively trying to achieve:

1) We want to force hard research (no more 200 at the end of the game as others have said)
2) We want to weaken RAs so they augment and not replace hard research
3) We want (or at least I want and I think others do too) to have a meaningful end game that isn't just rushed through with great scientists and RAs. The Industrial and Modern eras are a joke right now.

I'm going to call it the RA Bucket implementation. It's kind of hard to explain. I hope I do it justice. I'll use an example to help.

The idea is, when an RA lands you get:

0.5 * min (your median, your partners median, your bucket)

Basically ArcaneSearph + a bucket. The devil is in the details and is a bucket in this case The bucket is a counter. From the time the RA is signed to the time in lands, it keeps track of how much hard research you've done. It doesn't take away from hard research and change anything like that. It just keeps track of it. On to the example:

Assume we have a hard research rate of 100/turn. Assume our partner has a hard science rate of 20/turn. Assume we signed an RA and when it lands the min of the two medians is 1500. What will each civ get?

Our bucket has 100 added to it each turn. It has 3000 in it when the RA lands. So using the above equation we get:

0.5 * min (your median, your partners median, your bucket)
=0.5 * min (1500, 3000)
=750

Our partner has a science rate of 20 added to his bucket each turn. It has 600 in it when the RA lands. So what does he get:

0.5 * min (your median, your partners median, your bucket)
=0.5 * min (1500, 600)
=300

Because he didn't have enough actual science, he wasn't a good participant in the RA and therefore didn't get as much of a bonus. Research agreements, by definition, are agreements to research between two parties. If one participant doesn't actually pursue science himself to a large degree, he won't get much benefit from the research agreement. So logically this makes sense. At least to me. There would be absolutely no way a civ with 200/turn would ever get a tech worth 10000 with this option.

There's more (sorry for the long post). What about more than 1 RA? Assume you have 2 active at a particular turn. What I propose is that each bucket only gets 1/2 of your hard research added to it with 2 RAs active. You have to split your research sharing between 2 separate empires and the fairest way to do it is equally. The more RAs you sign, the more hard research you need to get maximum benefits from them. In this way it scales by number of civs. For the math people out there:

bucket @ turn X + 1 = bucket @ turn X + hard /number of active RAs at turn X

There are a few add-ons that would well with this idea, I think.

Add-on 1) The PT and Rationalism work differently. Instead of multiplying the reward, they multiply the amount of added to the bucket(s) each turn. They allow you to sign more RAs rather than just making each RA better.

Add-on 2) Diplomacy multiplies the reward. If you are friendly, it's easier to work with your partner. Therefore friendly civs get 1.5x the science. Netural get the same. Guarded get 0.5x the science.

Add-on 3) If a partner is an era or more behind when the RA lands, they get 2x the reward to help catch them up.

That's the idea. I think it's pretty good as I don't see any way to exploit it.



On a side note. Maybe I shouldn't say anything but I don't really follow most of your posts Martin. I've played the game a lot and I think I understand most elements of it but I'm not really sure what your position is except that you don't like anyone else's position. That's your perogative but I can see what ArcaneSeraph is saying. Maybe he should've said you are leaving most of the data out rather than changing it. I'm not trying to offend you so please don't take it that way. Your posts sound like "Nope. Won't work. Merely does this" with no real justification of where your numbers or ideas are coming from. Forgive me for saying so but is sounds rather arrogant and dissmisive of other's ideas. You aren't discussing; you are just telling people the way it is with no room for debate. There's nothing to debate as you haven't given an example or anything. When he said he didn't want to argue anymore you said he was being insulting and just didn't understand your arguments and he should've asked questions politely. Again that's sounding kind of arrogant. You know better and the only reason to disagree is because of lack of understanding.

Maybe it's me and I'm missing something or reading something into things that's not actually there. I know people are intimidated to talk on forums and I'd just like to see everyone be allowed to have an opinion whether people think it's valid or not.

Hrmm... the idea actually sounds pretty decent PasturedCow. I'd really have to think about it as it's kind of complicated but I think with the right balance factors it could be quite good. It definitely would force hard research. My only concern would be that if it was too strong it might accelerate things too much but... you have it at 0.5 * median... and you need your own research... so in theory it should definitely be slower than the current and make RAs good but not too powerful.

I think if this approach was adopted you'd have to change GSes a bit too. Otherwise they will be too powerful. If you capped the max they could give to say something like:

min (2000, 0.5 * current median)

Each GS would able to give you any early tech for free but only a portion of the greater techs. Making them good for beelines but not a research replacement.

On this other business... I just should've said I didn't want to discuss it anymore and left it at that. It wouldn't have blown up. I did indeed feel as you said - like my idea was just casually dismissed by a judge. Nope. Sorry. Dismissed. Next. However I shouldn't have let that get to me. The internet is full of all sorts and its hard to know what exactly is meant sometimes so I think it's just best to say 'ah well' and let it drop .

PasturedCow said:

Your posts sound like "Nope. Won't work. Merely does this" with no real justification of where your numbers or ideas are coming from. Forgive me for saying so but is sounds rather arrogant and dissmisive of other's ideas. You aren't discussing; you are just telling people the way it is with no room for debate. There's nothing to debate as you haven't given an example or anything. When he said he didn't want to argue anymore you said he was being insulting and just didn't understand your arguments and he should've asked questions politely. Again that's sounding kind of arrogant. You know better and the only reason to disagree is because of lack of understanding.

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Unfortunately, in this case a problem of fact vs. opinion is the problem. Theory is an opinion; empirical results are facts. There isn't room for debate on what happens under his hypothetical change; I've already faced the exact situation and identified the optimal solution to the problem through trial and error. His argument is theoretical, mine is empirical, and when the two collide the empirical fact stands and the theory falls. That's the whole concept we call the scientific method.

I have given an example; you can look at the saved game and the thread I cited. I can't fudge the dates on what I said about what happens to the approach when you get Hostiled by three civs, right? You can believe me or not, but since I said all that stuff before the discussion, it would be very hard for me to be dishonest in anticipation of this thread. That's a very significant point in my favor.

That may come across as arrogant; fair criticism, but I don't know a gentler way to put it. The complaint that I may not have explained this well also has a large amount of validity. Failure to understand my argument doesn't make you stupid - it means you don't understand the argument. That could be the listener's fault, or it could be the explainer's. Given that several of you are saying, "I don't get it", it looks like that's largely my fault here. Fair enough.

However, failure to ask good questions and the choice to instead resort to ad hominem attacks on my character are entirely his fault. It's good policy when you don't understand something to ask questions - even in bad faith if you have an agenda to prove your own argument right. Socrates remains infamous for that. Asking questions does not weaken your own position, and frequently confers ammunition with which to strengthen it.

To accuse me of changing the data to suit the argument is to accuse me of the worst sort of intellectual dishonesty. That's a clear personal attack, and a career-threatening one in academia! I fail to see why I should stand for slander, or come down on it any less harshly than I did. To be honest, I felt I was real gentle about it. You don't level that accusation without a boatload of proof.

ArcaneSeraph said:

On this other business... I just should've said I didn't want to discuss it anymore and left it at that. It wouldn't have blown up. I did indeed feel as you said - like my idea was just casually dismissed by a judge. Nope. Sorry. Dismissed. Next. However I shouldn't have let that get to me. The internet is full of all sorts and its hard to know what exactly is meant sometimes so I think it's just best to say 'ah well' and let it drop .

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I think that's good sentiment, but the best response would have been to express that sentiment differently than you did. If you're tired of the argument, you don't have to roll over on it. Simply state that you're not following the position and feel that it's sidetracking the thread away from its original purpose, and request to end the debate. It's hard for someone to refuse that position, because you can always call a mod in at that point to enforce your request.

Well, this thread is on a role. While I won't pretend to fully understand what you're saying Martin, I think your second to last post helped make it clear.

A question for those with more experience 'abusing' RA's and GS's, would it help if GS's automatically granted you the uknown technology which cost the least number of beakers?

It seems this might prevent bulbing and filling in with techs later?

Although this might just take away from what is an interesting strategic aspect of the game: getting GS's for a specific technology you want.

Wonders and Policies which grant a technology could still give you your free choice, separating them in value from GS's.

Martin Alvito said:

Unfortunately, in this case a problem of fact vs. opinion is the problem. Theory is an opinion; empirical results are facts. There isn't room for debate on what happens under his hypothetical change; I've already faced the exact situation and identified the optimal solution to the problem through trial and error. His argument is theoretical, mine is empirical, and when the two collide the empirical fact stands and the theory falls. That's the whole concept we call the scientific method.

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Except that unless you've modified your game this is impossible. How can you have empirical data on what you call a hypothetical change? The only possible way to do so would be to analyze exactly what techs the AI opponents have over a range of games whenever an RA lands to calculate their medians and then somehow artificially alter the amount of science you got to duplicate that amount when proceeding forward. You need firetuner or something like it. Alternately you could've implemented the mod and anaylzed it that way. Applying data from the current patch and projecting onto a theoretical model is not empirical data.

Martin Alvito said:

I have given an example; you can look at the saved game and the thread I cited. I can't fudge the dates on what I said about what happens to the approach when you get Hostiled by three civs, right? You can believe me or not, but since I said all that stuff before the discussion, it would be very hard for me to be dishonest in anticipation of this thread. That's a very significant point in my favor.

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I did look at that thread. Congrats. It's impressive. To be fair though I don't understand how it's relevant to this. It's on prince difficulty. The medians of the AIs on prince difficulty will be pathetic so isn't is obvious that changing the rule as suggested would have a drastic effect on the results of that game? Also as you stated you need a lot of things to go perfectly to achieve that result, including a lot of re-rolling. A game like that will only occur on an easy difficulty with lots of re-rolling is an outlier. It does not affect the standard play at all.

I don't know the details of your game and I'm gathering they are somehow new or different or something but I do know that my experience says that standard diety play seems to have 3 to 4 waves of RA and a good (not optimal but good) game ends from 220 - 250. I feel that those RAs would be worth a lot less under the proposal. The fact that I'm usually an era ahead when the last waves land would suggest this is case.

Martin Alvito said:

To accuse me of changing the data to suit the argument is to accuse me of the worst sort of intellectual dishonesty. That's a clear personal attack, and a career-threatening one in academia!

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Maybe he shouldn't have said it in that exact way. That's fair to say. However do you really not see what he meant?

You originally said that all the proposal would do is delay the first wave and make the first wave worth half as much. You would require no more buildings or anything else. Later you said you were actually talking about the second wave and you now would have to build some extra buildings to compensate. Then there was this talk about an extra 3rd wave at the end of medieval. What exactly is that called? Changing the information? Changing the argument? Changing the data? I'm not trying to slander you by any means but that's what it seems like to me. Granted it may have been an omission or a mistake or a misunderstanding. In academia mistakes, omissions, and misunderstandings still have to be explained.

Snuffleupagus said:

Well, this thread is on a role. While I won't pretend to fully understand what you're saying Martin, I think your second to last post helped make it clear.

A question for those with more experience 'abusing' RA's and GS's, would it help if GS's automatically granted you the uknown technology which cost the least number of beakers?

It seems this might prevent bulbing and filling in with techs later?

Although this might just take away from what is an interesting strategic aspect of the game: getting GS's for a specific technology you want.

Wonders and Policies which grant a technology could still give you your free choice, separating them in value from GS's.

Click to expand...

What you are suggesting could work, yes, but as you also pointed out it takes a way a lot of the strategies both in early game and late game. For example who would want to save a GS to bulb rifling when you'll end up with something like currency instead? I believe that capping the GS bonus to a certain number of beakers and altering RAs as many have suggested here would pretty much eliminate the problem.

So yeah it's a good idea but personally I'd rather not solve the problem by eliminating strategic variety.

Martin Alvito said:

To accuse me of changing the data to suit the argument is to accuse me of the worst sort of intellectual dishonesty. That's a clear personal attack, and a career-threatening one in academia! I fail to see why I should stand for slander, or come down on it any less harshly than I did. To be honest, I felt I was real gentle about it. You don't level that accusation without a boatload of proof.

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This isn't the Harvard Honor's Debating Society. It's a forum for heaven sakes. I bet you there are literaly 1000s of posts suggesting that someone else is lying or incorrect or falsifying results. Proof or it didn't happen. Save or it didn't happen. Heck its even in the description of the HoF rules about cheating.

I've had several papers published in peer-reviewed journals. I've attened and presented at many conferences. Trust me. Engineers are not shy about acusing people of anything at those conferences - and those are in academia. They are competing with you to get their proposals pushed forward. They will attack every bit of your paper from the premise to suggesting the data only used positive outcomes, was an incomplete sampling, or based on fraudulent premises. That's why you have to use standard available databases and such to demonstrate validity and repeatability.

I guess it would've been fairer to say that the contents of your posts seem to be suggesting changing arguments. You said there were incomplete or erroneous. Fine that's fair. That's exactly what I was talking about. It's hard to argue against a shotgun defence. I certainly meant no personal attack to the level you have interpreted it as. Apparently however you did mean your posts as personal attacks.

As you suggested, I will now say this is clearly off topic and I wish to discuss it no further.

To honor Arcane's request, I'm going to respond to PasturedCow via PM.

ArcaneSeraph said:

I've had several papers published in peer-reviewed journals. I've attened and presented at many conferences. Trust me. Engineers are not shy about acusing people of anything at those conferences - and those are in academia. They are competing with you to get their proposals pushed forward. They will attack every bit of your paper from the premise to suggesting the data only used positive outcomes, was an incomplete sampling, or based on fraudulent premises.

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There's a world of difference between poking holes in methods and accusing someone of altering data. If you're familiar with academic norms, you should know this and you should choose your words much more carefully.

ArcaneSeraph said:

Apparently however you did mean your posts as personal attacks.

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I don't see how you can conclude that. Stating that you're demonstrably wrong empirically is not a personal attack. Stating that you don't understand my argument isn't a personal attack. That can result because you're thick or uninterested in learning, but it can also result because I explain my argument poorly, and I've already admitted that the latter appears to be the cause here.

At this point I think it's safe to say that we simply can't communicate, and I think that the best solution is ignore. Agree?

From all the information in this thread from various sources, I feel that the problem seems not to be just RAs alone. Many others have said this too. If they are fixed it would help but it leaves the GS, Oxford, and Scientific Revolution free techs to deal with.

I don't see a problem with Oxford or Scientific Revolution. That's only 3. However I do see a problem with GS. There are quite a few options out there and I think many of them would work better than they do now. A few below:

1. Apply a hard cap
2. Apply a time based cap
3. Convert them to an RA like mechanism
4. Have them boost your science for a certain duration, like a golden age
5. Have them give a base amount + extra depending on the size of the city they are bulbed in.

1 is the easiest and extremely hard to exploit. 4 would be rather interesting in my opinion. 5 is what they used to use and it was pretty good. It would make tall empires better which is kind of a nice synergy. Wide can get more GS but tall can use them better.

2 is gamey and 3 is manipulatable.

PasturedCow said:

I don't see a problem with Oxford or Scientific Revolution. That's only 3. However I do see a problem with GS. There are quite a few options out there and I think many of them would work better than they do now. A few below:

1. Apply a hard cap
2. Apply a time based cap
3. Convert them to an RA like mechanism
4. Have them boost your science for a certain duration, like a golden age
5. Have them give a base amount + extra depending on the size of the city they are bulbed in.

Click to expand...

Yeah this is a good point. Most if not all methods of fixing RAs will result in further overpowering GS.

1. This is okay and should be extremely trivial to mod.

2. I don't really like this as it seems to discourage good play. I got to the Industrial era fast? Too bad now you are punished for being quick as your GSes aren't very good yet.

3. I know I actually suggested this earlier but thinking about it and your post I do agree. RAs are a bag of worms already so tying GSes to them is asking for trouble.

4. I feel this takes away strategy. You can't grab that key tech early on like this. It's not bad but really changes the nature of the beast known as a GS.

5. I always liked this option. Seems to fit perfectly in the tall versus wide paradigm.

If you need help testing out any of these ideas let me know BTW . I have a nice template mod I've written around here that I can send you to help you get started, if you are interested in modding.

chazzycat said:

I'm surprised no one else has touched on this important point. Simply reducing the late tech cost escalation a bit could have the desired effect.

Personally I like having a mechanism that allows for a small empire to keep pace techwise. But it does seem a bit OP at the moment.

Click to expand...

I think the problem is that they are escalating the tech cost for other reasons.

I think the problem is that
1. RA yield depends on Tech cost
2. The best way to increase tech costs is to get research (in any way possible)
3. RAs are the best way to do that

I think the idea is right in terms of RA value=/= Tech cost *factor (use Raw output instead)

However, it should not be RA value = Your output*factor (because that removes the way for small empires to get out)

It should be RA= (Your output + your partners output)* factor

So if I have 30 beakers per turn, and my partner has 50, then the # used is 80
(so I get the exact same amount of beakers as my partner 80*Factor... Unless one of us has PT/Rationalism).

So...unless I have PT/Rationalism, I'll be helping the AI as much as myself.
RAs will work best with a big partner, but they will still help with a small AI


... you can game your output, but you can't game the AIs, and the "output" could be your total output over the course of the RA (ie the last 30 turns).. so not gamey at all.

As for Great Scientists.... there I think a different solution is needed.

1. make them harder to get
take 1 slot from the university move it to the Research lab... a reason to get the research lab
and
Great Person costs increase by 10-20% per non-puppet city (similar to social policy costs)

2. make other options with them better (drastically improve Academy)

3. make other GPs better (drastically better "Improvements" and instant uses, wonder rushing only needs a slight tweak)

...finally if necessary, either a hard cap or a cap based on city size (perhaps based on city science output?)

Let me sum it up. We need:

1. Decrease GS effect to make raw tech more important.

2. Decrease RA effect to make raw tech more important.

3. Decrease GS effect to have better balance with other GP. Additionally the thing requires making GA stronger, but that's outside this discussion.

4. Keep GS in the same concept as other GP. This conflicts with, for example, "science golden age" idea.

5. Make RA effect scale with number of opponents.

6. Keep RA diplomatic effect, so RA partners have to think twice before breaking it. This conflicts with ideas of gaining RA benefits each turn while it lasts. Note, what hard limits slightly conflict with the goal - it would be easier to break current treaty and sign another one.

7. Make formulas easy enough to be put in Civilopedia in form understandable for non-math players. The problem here, is what "Median" term is already at the border, and many suggestions here are outside of it.

8. Make PT and Rationalism comparable to other Wonders/SP.

9. Minor goal is making RA and GS effect similar. Not necessary, but would be elegant.

10. Keep strategic value of GS, so they bulb in right tech. This conflicts with "slow effects".


So from the suggestions, the following fit the goal:

1. Making GS to give 1/2 of median tech cost. Fitting goals 1, 3, 4, 7, 9 and 10. Other variants of calculating base tech reward (i.e. share of total beakers generated so far) are also good, but need more balancing work.

2. Making PT and Rationalism give only 25% increase. Fitting goals 2 and 8.

3. Making RA cost much more after each signed RA. Fitting goals 5 and 6.

4. Increasing the amount of techs and making tech cost increase smoother will just work.

These changes are not big and probably not fix the whole problem, but I don't believe this sort of problem could be fixed in 1 iteration.

I've tried to make a graphic of the total beakers accumulated for the spaceship victory, because I'm a sucker for graphs




I'm aware the graphic is awfully inaccurate - Martin Alvito could probably draw a much more realistic image, but the main problem is the last wave of RA .

~200 turns to go trough ancient+classical+medieval+ renaissance+industrial .
1 frigging turn to burn trough more then 50% of the total beaker count necessary for the space ship. {buffed RAs (PT+rationalism), GS, oxford, scientific revolution}.. Granted it takes a lot of preparation to set up just right, but still...