Illians World Spell

vivictius

Prince
Joined
Jan 16, 2004
Messages
425
Can we get a new one? I usually play epic speed on large maps or bigger. Thats 30 turns at about 1-3 min a turn. The AI really cant take advantage of those turns (their score does not change relitive to everyone else) it is just really annoying and boring.

Currently the only options are to never play with them in a game at all or disable world spells for everyone. I really dont like either of those options.

Looking in the files it seems to be all done in python not xml so beyond what I can change at this time.
 
Can we get a new one? I usually play epic speed on large maps or bigger. Thats 30 turns at about 1-3 min a turn. The AI really cant take advantage of those turns (their score does not change relitive to everyone else) it is just really annoying and boring.

Currently the only options are to never play with them in a game at all or disable world spells for everyone. I really dont like either of those options.

Looking in the files it seems to be all done in python not xml so beyond what I can change at this time.

Honestly, it's not a spell I'm inclined to change. It fits flavorwise and the mechanic is good (Powerful, useful, and extremely aggravating to be used against you; As a worldspell should be).
 
I don't see what your problem is. Whenever I get hit with stasis, I find it a rather straightforward and brief problem. Yeah, your cities have been disabled, so either...
1: You don't have scouts. Turtle and wait the timer out quickly. Maybe build an improvement or two. Whatever.
2: You have scouts. There's not much else for you to be doing right now, so explore some of that wilderness while you wait.
In either event, there's clearly a lot less for you to be doing per-turn, so what's the problem?
 
The problem is that the computer still takes upwards of 3 min per turn. I am never harmed by it in any way, usualy I come out ahead, since the AI doesnt handle it well at all. It is just boring. It adds nothing to the game with the current AI.
 
Use the option at the bottom of the list to disable the Illians. It's what I do, and it saves loads of grief.
 
That option does not exist in base FfH2. I know it exists in FF, and it could exist in modmods I haven't tried, but otherwise you have to either pick all your civs by hand or put up with the possibility of Stasis.

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As for 1-3 minute turns, I'd say a smaller map with fewer AIs is in order - as well as normal or quick game speed. Or, if you really prefer to use your current settings even at the cost of long waits, then I'd suggest trying to position yourself to use Stasis to your advantage as a strategy. Stasis is much more bearable if you are waging a war during those turns. The click-wait-click factor goes away and although you aren't getting new units or technologies you are still playing the game. If you see the Illians are present then start a big military build-up, and when Stasis does come, take advantage of the fact that you're not paying unit supply costs to wage a free war against your weakest neighbor.
 
The thing is, other then that I think the Illians are rather well designed right now. Their only other fault is they keep getting their leader killed now that he is a unit. They still seem to hold their own after losing their civ traits however.

I did find a solution, in the xml you can set the spell to not be useable by the AI. That is probably the best solution since now if I ever get the chance to play another person it wont cause them problems.
 
i kind of feel the spell needs a technological requirement as every time ive gone with an advanced start the computer players havent built any units in their cities trusting on their large cities to be able to get a couple out before the barbarians come. but then the Illians stop production and it either yourve got to go into the world builder and give your opponents some defences or in a couple turns half the civilisations are killed off.
Its a good spell and a good challenge against you but it comes too soon for the AI to cope.
 
i kind of feel the spell needs a technological requirement as every time ive gone with an advanced start the computer players havent built any units in their cities trusting on their large cities to be able to get a couple out before the barbarians come. but then the Illians stop production and it either yourve got to go into the world builder and give your opponents some defences or in a couple turns half the civilisations are killed off.
Its a good spell and a good challenge against you but it comes too soon for the AI to cope.

It should require the AI to have 5 cities before they can cast it; Though I'm not sure if that's in the current version or just the team version.
 
I never play against the Illians due to their world spell, it is just so annoying. Spending ten minutes doing nothing but pressing enter once in a while is not exactly fun. A few times I've edited out the spell from the game to be able to have AI Illians.
 
If you ask me the Illian world spell is possibly the best WS out there.
Thats why everyone hates it.
 
It should require the AI to have 5 cities before they can cast it; Though I'm not sure if that's in the current version or just the team version.

It's not a requirement in the current version. I used it a few days ago on turn 5 or 6, I think. Though I see you said AI, so I could be wrong.
 
If you ask me the Illian world spell is possibly the best WS out there.
Thats why everyone hates it.
It's awesome in the hands of a human: flavorful, powerful, interesting. The AI just sorta casts it whenever, so you can't exploit it or play around it.
 
Actually, I hate it because it takes away from playing the game. But this is a trend in gaming that's annoying, somehow developers (profesisonal and mod alike) think that removing the players ability to play the game is a fun mechanic, if you've ever played an MMO you know exacly what I'm talking about :)
 
Actually, I hate it because it takes away from playing the game. But this is a trend in gaming that's annoying, somehow developers (profesisonal and mod alike) think that removing the players ability to play the game is a fun mechanic, if you've ever played an MMO you know exacly what I'm talking about :)

I never said it was a fun mechanic for non-Illians. :p

Remember: The spell does not prevent Illians from producing things. Which makes it quite fun for them, and bad for others; Which is what a worldspell should be.

A better example of a bad worldspell is the Mazatl spell; It's not fun for you OR bad for others.
 
I myself tend to remove the Illians from my games too. I play on huge maps, epic speed, 20-25 civs, so you might be able to imagine that even on a good computer loading times aren't half a second. I dislike this, cause I really like terraform wars, but well, it's the only bandaid solution I know.

Well. Except for disabling their worldspell in the XML. I wouldnt know where to look though, so if anyone could give me some pointers, thatd be great. I've windows searched for 'worldspell' 'Illians' 'stasis', but cant find it.
 
I never said it was a fun mechanic for non-Illians. :p

Remember: The spell does not prevent Illians from producing things. Which makes it quite fun for them, and bad for others; Which is what a worldspell should be.
And that alone should make you wonder if it really is a possitive addition to the game. It's not a simple case here, normally you'll look at a feature and see it it adds something to the game when considering it, in this case you have to consider what it's taking away from the game. Moving your units around is but a small part of playing a game of Civ and that is all that every player except one can do when this is active.

If somebody was to suggest a new feature for the game that would remove roughly 2/3rds of what everybody else could do, what would your first reaction be?

A better example of a bad worldspell is the Mazatl spell; It's not fun for you OR bad for others.
That's irrelevant really. There are plenty that are bad for different reasons and many that are decidedly worse than others but none that are as bad for general gameplay as Stasis.

The problem with Stasis has nothing to do with it's 'power' be it real or perceived, it has everything to do with taking away the ability for the player(s) to play the game. A world spell that you have to react to by doing something extra is a good addition to gameplay, a world spell that you reaction to is simply doing less is not. It is still a game after all, it's supposed to be something you enjoy, not something you endure ;)

You can certainly leave it as is, I'll do what I have been ever since FfH added Stasis, I'll go into the xml and set the Illians as a non-playable civ. Since I'm obviously not alone in my dislike of the mechanics of Stasis you should keep in mind that any work you do in RiFE that is directly or indirectly dependant on the Illians is wasted on a number of players.
 
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