"Shadow" schedule

[Apepis]

I think It's a bad idea to remove Education civic category. In fact, if you must to remove something, there's Compassion, filled with crappy options (and one totally overpowered). Education was interesting and well balanced - one of the best categories.

[onedreamer]

Compassion options are not that crappy, really. I do even adopt Fend for Themselves at times, because its No Upkeep is quite a monetary boost in big empires. I just didn't like that Public Healers was made Good only, now the Good and Evil civs have the best options in this branch but poor neutrals are left with discards. It would be ok if Public Healers was only forbidden to Evil.

Originally Posted by Kael

Clan thieves sneaking into Acherons city to try to steal his horde, or slipping over into your neighbors cities to steal the Lyre or the Staff of Souls are all possible now, and make playing the Council of Esus very interesting.

Ok, I can see that Clan would have a downside for failing with Acheron's Hoard, but what about non-barbarian civs ?

[Apepis]

Fend for themselves? Well, imagine that you have no Compassion cathegory - then you get "no upkeep" for it for free, and are not punished with +unhealth. Protect the Meek and Public Healers are way, WAY too weak for their cost. Seriously, who really likes Compassion (except Sacrifice the Weak, which could be placed in Cultural Values and fit htere better than Scholarship), huh?

[Blakmane]

I thought it more likely that compassion was gonna get the chop as well

but then again, I *did* only use apprentice in education anyway...

[TheJopa]

Compassion civics have diplomacy bonus/penalties, don't forger, and I guess we will have random events tied to compassion civics (Sacrifice the weak- The weak rebel, public healers-good medic etc.)

[onedreamer]

Originally Posted by Apepis

Fend for themselves? Well, imagine that you have no Compassion cathegory - then you get "no upkeep" for it for free, and are not punished with +unhealth. Protect the Meek and Public Healers are way, WAY too weak for their cost. Seriously, who really likes Compassion (except Sacrifice the Weak, which could be placed in Cultural Values and fit htere better than Scholarship), huh?

Protect the Meek and Public Healers were nerfed in 0.25, don't know why, but they were ok prior to this, and certainly not less useful or more costly than most Education civics. Don't forget that Expansive and Philosophical civs don't pay upkeep for Compassion and Education.

[MagisterCultuum]

(as stated in my earlier post) I too liked having the education category, but the actual civics make more sense where they are now.

I just noticed the lack of Religious discipline. I wonder if that is because unlimited priests + the Altar was too powerful. It probbaly was, but it was still nice to use. Perhaps its effect was absorbed into another civic (like theocracy). If not, then maybe granting free xp per priest specialists wouldn't be too overpowered after all

Hopefully Fend for themselves now provides a little free xp now, and protect the Meek / Public Healers will return to their earlier incarnation.


Oh yeah, I'm a little worried about having The Undercouncil as a civic option. Wouldn't that mean that everyone would know that you are on it? It seems like only other council members should know who else is in the council. Maybe it should be a "hidden civic" like Esus is a hidden religion; non-members think that Undercounsil members have no membership.

Also, if you could implement the true/apparent religion/alignment, I would love it if this would allow Undercouncil members pretending to be good or neutral and pretending to follow a good/neutral religion to also be members on the Overcouncil, acting as spies for their the Undercouncil to subvert its adversary's will. There should be a way for the Overcouncil members/Empyrean religion civs to discover this subterfuge (possibly though a random event. If I knew that any of this was possible, I would submit it to the event contest) and force them off the council (and causing a huge diplomatic penalty, possibly even making the whole Overcouncil declare war on the Over/Under council member). Hmm... this just got me thinking that a "night of the werewolves" like event to discover Undercouncil members on the Overcouncil could be in order. It would also be nice if one particularly expensive Undercouncil resolution allowed you to frame a non Undercouncil member on the Overcouncil as one of the Undercouncil's spies. It would be very fitting for the Undercouncil to try to tear the Overcouncil apart though deceit.

[xanaqui42]

I found Education to be an interesting set of choices, where I wouldn't consistently make the same choice, and other than Sacrifice the Weak, the choices in Compassion aren't interesting - barring Sacrifice the Weak, I'd virtually always take the lowest one available.

Frankly, even with keeping Education gone, I'd still consider removing Compassion - the bonuses for the higher Compassion civics can be granted in other ways, and Sacrifice the Weak could be moved elsewhere (where you might have a significant trade-off). Alternatively, I'd differentiate these more.

Membership looks interesting though.

Originally Posted by MagisterCultuum

"It can only be joined by Neutral or Evil players, and although they don’t have to worship the Council of Esus to join, they can’t be members of the Overcouncil." - what does this mean? Do you mean that it works just like the AP, where you need the state religion to be a full member but can still vote if you are neutral? Or do you man that No One can be a member unless he founds it (making founding it a lot more important). I'll assume you mean the first one if not corrected.

Here's my understanding:
If you're Evil, and the The Undercouncil is founded (by anyone creating the Council of Esus holy shrine), you can join the The Undercouncil. If you're Neutral, and the The Undercouncil is founded, and you aren't a member of the Overcouncil, you can join the Undercouncil.

Originally Posted by [NWO]_Valis

So far it is all about politics and I do not like politics in RL as in games so I am beginning to worry if there will be anything for me :/ ...but maybe it is time to try something new.

While Kael's spending more text on the Overcouncil and Undercouncil, there's also:

2 Religions, both with new units.
World Spells (apparently 1 per civilization)
An equipment system (handling more than the present 2 items)
and (promised) Guilds.

Finally, if you look carefully, you'll notice some other things - there is a new mana type, for example. At least one of the religions has some new spells. There's the ability to take over another civilization for a few turns.

Frankly, my main concern at the moment is that the "Sneak Attack" ability may be too powerful; I can easily see taking out 1 or more major cities before the opponent has a time to respond. Kael Coalbane's special ability could easily have similar problems - sure, you may not be able to disband their units, but what if you can move most (or all) of them out of their cities, then Sneak attack a number (or all) of their cities simultaneously? That would seem to be a combination that would be difficult to overcome, even against a human player.

[Kael]

Unlimited priests got moved to theocracy, which needed the boost.

By and large the best techs were moved to other categories (apprenticeship is now a labor civic, scholarship is now a cultural value) and everything else that determines how much an empire focuses on education is done through the research slider.

[[NWO]_Valis]

I wonder how will the AI cope with a pro-active spreading of the Council.

[Aroldo]

I´m with Xanaqui as far as civics are concerned.

[MagisterCultuum]

I Imagine I'll try to use Kael to take over who ever is closest to the Maelstrom, load all his units into boats and send them into the storm. Then when I return to my old civ, I'll cast Resurrection and repeat. (Oh, wait,I just realized that Kael is a religious hero now, so resurrection won't work. Maybe I should try to find a way edit the spell so it works on religious heroes too...)

By the way, who is The new Dark Elf hero, and does the UNdercoundil have any councilliors?

[onedreamer]

ppl, they are called Counselors.
But Council of Esus really seems a bit overpowered in the hands of the human player compared to the AI, especially in regards of the sneak attack. For example a human player will realize I'm trying to do that and cut open borders if possible (although if we just signed he won't be able to ! Unless he declares war, which makes sense after a warning), but the AI will just naively let me place all my units... in few words it seems really a huge advantage vs the AI and unlikely to work vs a human player.

[Nikis-Knight]

"It can only be joined by Neutral or Evil players, and although they don’t have to worship the Council of Esus to join, they can’t be members of the Overcouncil." - what does this mean?

You can't be a member of both.

[zxcvbnm]

Will there be a new civic for the Overlords as slavery is public now?
Or is it simply left away as it wasn't exceptional at all and replacing it with a powerful one would unbalance the game?

[Ekolite]

If a player has adopted Council of Esus, it looks like they have 'no religion' yeah? I can see why this would work against the AI but I think a human player would get suspicious if a player other than the Grigori had no religion in the late to end game and put two and two togeather...

[onedreamer]

yeah the advantage is almost completely against the AI, same with the sneak attack, as I mentioned.
Btw Slavery was one of the best religion civics. I don't know how can you complain about it, when you are at war this civic becomes outstanding.

[onedreamer]

Originally Posted by xanaqui42

Frankly, even with keeping Education gone, I'd still consider removing Compassion - the bonuses for the higher Compassion civics can be granted in other ways, and Sacrifice the Weak could be moved elsewhere (where you might have a significant trade-off). Alternatively, I'd differentiate these more.

Most people (myself included) just stuck with Apprenticeship. Unless you could build command posts or built the Titan, the choice was between Apprenticeship and Conquest for having a promotion at birth (we can safely exclude Theocracy up until 0.25, I think). Now... what you have to give up for Conquest is simply much better than what you have to give up for Apprenticeship.

[kumquatelvis]

Originally Posted by Kael

in “shadow” prophets can build all the holy shrines while many shrines have a 2nd great person that can also build them

I'm quite happy about this. I hated when I ended up with a great prophet and had nothing to do with him (supposing I'm evil and cannot build the Alter).

[zxcvbnm]

Originally Posted by onedreamer

yeah the advantage is almost completely against the AI, same with the sneak attack, as I mentioned.
Btw Slavery was one of the best religion civics. I don't know how can you complain about it, when you are at war this civic becomes outstanding.

How about pacifist OO civs?

If it was so exceptional then the OO must have been overpowered earlier or underpowered now

That's what I was trying to say