Pacing in the modern era

[Snuffleupagus]

Ok, so here's the deal:

I was playing last night and everything was going great untill a little after 1900 and right around when I discovered SAM infantry. the pacing got all wacky.

The techs and years felt like they were flying by, meanwhile building units and buildings would take my city forever. I was making 100-200 gold per turn and researching a new tech every 3 turns. But I was building a unit in most of my cities in 9-11 turns (well, I had about 4 or 5 cities above this rate, but I was trying to use them to build all the world and national wonders I was dicovering constantly). By the time my armies would walk from my border to an enemy town and get in position I would have developed one or two new techs and the armies would be obsolete, but I couldn't really build fast enough to reinforce.

It felt like it would be 2000 or later and I would barely have any modern amenities built but I would have practically every tech.

I was winning the game by about 600 points and chalked it up to reaching a economic tipping point. Also I thought perhaps I had gotten ahead of myself with techs and needed to develop and build factories and power plants as soon as possible.

But now I'm reading that other people are having similar problems. that late game pacing seems off but that you can fix it by simply decreasing the amount of years that go by in late era turns and increasing the amount needed for the late techs.

I as just wondering if anyone out there has tried this, if they have instructions and advice for how to do it and what they think the numbers should be changed to.

I really like a good fun modern era, and it is discouraging to start again if it is always like this.

thanks

 

[Gargoyle]

Switch to Epic.

 

[AlecTavi]

This is definitely a problem. I have had the same issues in most of my games. The major issue is the way that cottage/hamlet/village/towns work. By the end of the game, if you have been building towns the way the workers recommend, you end up with research and gold far outpacing production. Waging war throughout the modern era is one way to keep the tech race down, as civs will need to concentrate on military forces rather than technological development.

Still, something does need to be done with game balance. I'm not sure if increasing the tech points of later technologies is the right way to go about it. If you haven't built up your economy the way I've described, it could make the later ages impossible. But could that be a good thing? I'm interested in what others think.

Another solution might be to increase the late-game military aggressiveness of the AI. If the AI has a production advantage and a research disadvantage, they might be able to roll over the player with superior forces. Again, what do people think?

 

[Arathorn]

Just put me down as generally agreeing that something should be done -- that 2 and 3 turn techs aren't much fun. That general AI aggressiveness might be a good fix (but hard to do, from my perspective). For me, it's usually around Gundpowder that I blink and notice I'm building spaceship components. Muskets to rifles to infantry in 5 turns and then tanks in another 10. Just silly.

Arathorn

 

[Palantir30]

Switch to Epic.

This will do no good, as he will just have more cities cranking out more beakers. Epic slows you down a bit in the early game, and bigger maps do much the same, but the late game is still way too fast.

Its also not connected to cottages/villages et. al. I dont build them because extra food is always more valuable than extra coin out of a square, since food gives you a whole other populant, who will earn more coin and production. City specialists are hugely powerful in this game, and extra food is how you get more of those. Never build cottages unless you are WAY short on healthy icons and you cannot grow anyway.

The algorithm that sets the beaker requirements needs to be tweaked progressively upwards. The first techs are fine but once you get into the rennaisance, they're a bit underpriced, industrial are underpriced and modern are tremendously underpriced.

 

[homan1983]

Switch to Epic.

That is the worst reply I have ever seen in my entire life.

You don't understand the problem? The techs com in every 2 turns.... you cant builda signle tank before modern armor comes along.

Of course we expect standard to be faster than epic: however we expect the pace of the game to be the same throughout the entire history if in the SAME game type.

Why should ancient be at a normal rate where you can actually make armies and fight and industrial/moder fly by to a spaceship victory?

One of the problems is that in every game either all or most of the AI put 90% research (thats right, no culture no army nothing) and just wiz by the techs to endgame where they build a spaceship. Even if you fight one or 2 guys, they will usually be provided all the techs. from the other AIs.

And since each tech. comes in every 2-3 turns, one hardly has time to react and try to force a reduction in that person's tech rate.

For one thing we can't see their entire technology line if we don't have the preq. techs.
Secondly by the time we build units (at least 10 turns for a few and 20+ for decent army fighting, then add another 25 turns at 1movement per turn per for all units [lets face it 99% have 1 move and 1% have 2 moves]) and by then its been 35 turns minimum. at 1tech every 3 turns, and your reduced rate of lets say 1 per 12 [since you also build units/maintain/want to use the culture slider instead of 90-100% science from ancient to modern] then they will have gotten 11 techs and you would have gotten 3.

Considering in industrial and modern new units come every 2 or 3 techs. then its pretty ridiculous. Add in the instant upgrade of anything simply by being inside your national border and by the time you march to enemy they will have units 1 tier ahead.



In essence all that is being asked is for the late-game to be the SAME pace as the start-game.

Epic probably suffers from this as well. Its all relative you see --> this means that answeing with a simple "Epic" isn't really all that helpful.

 

[Adam7Eight]

There are several possible solutions to this problem if you guys consider checking the Creation & Customization forums. I realize that this gameplay problem should be "fixed" in a patch, but until then the C&C forum is your only option.

I've edited all my techs by increasing costs a certain percentage relative to the era they are in. Not to mention increasing research rates and other Epic mode settings. It's nice having a slower paced game, especially during industrial and modern eras.

Here's a good thread to get you going:
http://forums.civfanatics.com/showthread.php?t=134109

 

[al_thor]

This 'out-of-control' tech pace is EXACTLY why I turn off the Space Race victory. If I don't EVERY SINGLE GAME becomes a Space Race. Talk about boring. The modern era simply FLIES by, techs every 2 or 3 turns, spaceship parts being built like crazy. Insane.

2K/FIRAXIS: Please do something!

 

[xguild]

Ok, so here's the deal:

I was playing last night and everything was going great untill a little after 1900 and right around when I discovered SAM infantry. the pacing got all wacky.

The techs and years felt like they were flying by, meanwhile building units and buildings would take my city forever. I was making 100-200 gold per turn and researching a new tech every 3 turns. But I was building a unit in most of my cities in 9-11 turns (well, I had about 4 or 5 cities above this rate, but I was trying to use them to build all the world and national wonders I was dicovering constantly). By the time my armies would walk from my border to an enemy town and get in position I would have developed one or two new techs and the armies would be obsolete, but I couldn't really build fast enough to reinforce.

It felt like it would be 2000 or later and I would barely have any modern amenities built but I would have practically every tech.

I was winning the game by about 600 points and chalked it up to reaching a economic tipping point. Also I thought perhaps I had gotten ahead of myself with techs and needed to develop and build factories and power plants as soon as possible.

But now I'm reading that other people are having similar problems. that late game pacing seems off but that you can fix it by simply decreasing the amount of years that go by in late era turns and increasing the amount needed for the late techs.

I as just wondering if anyone out there has tried this, if they have instructions and advice for how to do it and what they think the numbers should be changed to.

I really like a good fun modern era, and it is discouraging to start again if it is always like this.

thanks

I have to agree with the person who said switch to Epic. Quite frankly I find the game playable only on Epic speed, at least in single player mode. The Epic speed has pretty much the same speed in the early eras as quick and standard, but slows dramatically in the late game (1 turn 1 year after 1960 or something to that effect). You take about 100 turns or so after you hit modern age and it really allows for the full effect of the late game.

I do agree with you that on Quick speed especially that once you hit a tech and start building a unit, by the time you built it it's already obsolete. That may actually be true to life, but makes for a bad game mechanic.

 

[shackleton]

I increased the tech costs and the years to match.

Prehistoric 1x
Ancient 1x
Medieval 2x
Rennaisance 3x
Industrial 4x
Modern 5x

Works pretty well. By modern, you're doing techs at roughly the same pace that you were at the start.

 

[sturmtrupp]

Actually techs cost more in epic, and no you don't have more cities cranking out more techs in epic. Cities and epic are mutually exclusive. I only play epic, and I don't think I have ever had techs being cranked out every 2-3 turns. That is a symption of the shorter games.

As a matter a fact with techs coming out every 6 to 8 turns on epic and this is with a lot of emphasis on technology, I way ahead of schedule discovering almost everything by 1900! So if you are at 1900 there is not way techs will be coming out every 2-3 turns and only have SAM infantry.

Quite the opposite, I think the early periods needs more balancing, in epic. Those turns still go way too fast.

So like someone earlier said, switch to epic.

 

[Good Omens]

I think an important long-term strategy is to shift from commerce to production in the late game. IN other words, bulldoze some of those towns and build watermills, as an example. The early research boost from cottages is critical, but in the late game pumping out units might be more important.

Understand that I've never tried this strategy myself, so it might be worthless, but it's something to consider.

 

[Kolyana]

The pacing is well off, I have to agree ... it makes the whole 'end game' somewhat BORING. Techs come and go so fast that you have no sense of accomplishment, progress or enjoying what you have before the next big thing comes along. Yes, one could argue that the real modern world is much that way, but we're talking about a game here ... tanks by the 1st world war, progressing to the second world war, prpgressing to the modern equivalent all goes by in such a blur that I often don't build an early tank, because I'm already into the modern era.

Aside from technology, the game for the last 150 years is moving too quickly ... it needs to slow down a little ... there's no sense of being a modern empire at any stage.

By the time you have nukes, the game is pretty much over. You have only a few dozen turns to make modern armor or bombers count for something ... the game is already over any time now.

It's almost like the last 150 years needs to slow down to 2 turns a year or something ... how else could you possibly fit in two world wars and get a sense of the grand scale of things when everything is whipping by so quickly?

And maybe it would not have hurt to take things out to 2100 and actually add a few futuristic techs, but pace is certainly a big, big problem.

 

[GamesMan]

BOY do I agree with this thread; the pacing is perfect till Industrial, then ZOOM, your building SS parts, or watching the AI build them. No time to use any high tech units either. Nothing like building a small army of Infantry, only to see the AI upgrade all his defenders to Mariens the moument you get near him.

 

[Snuffleupagus]

There are several possible solutions to this problem if you guys consider checking the Creation & Customization forums. I realize that this gameply problem should be "fixed" in a patch, but until then the C&C forum is your only option.

I've edited all my techs by increasing costs a certain percentage relative to the era they are in. Not to mention increasing research rates and other Epic mode settings. It's nice having a slower paced game, especially during industrial and modern eras.

Here's a good thread to get you going:
http://forums.civfanatics.com/showthread.php?t=134109

thank you. that is exactly the sort of thing I was looking for.

and for those suggesting Epic... it is my understanding that epic increases everything. It would not solve the pacing if in the end game I get techs every 6-8 turns but it now takes 12-15 turns to build a unit. might as well be techs every 3-4 turns and units every 6-9. same deal.

 

[lifeaquatic]

And what about this whole epic vs quick game thing? I mean cmon i thought the point was to please both sides, the people that like fast games and the people that like the epic...

Instead they are pleasing people that like fast games and people that like insanely fast games.

Epic is not very epic if you ask me. Is there an easy way to change the values without changing each value on all the techs etc?

 

[minger]

I completely agree with the complaints on this thread. Including the space race problem. I manage to build tanks within 4-5 turns, but it is still too slow.

Obviously they did this b/c people felt that the late game was too slow in previous civs...

 

[al_thor]

Wow. I just checked out the thread linked above. Are you kidding me???

From what I could see, it's 14 or so pages long, full of "I tried this" and "How about this?" and "Well, that didn't work, maybe we should try this?"

I'm not a "modder", but I feel that I could copy/paste or even hand-modify the files mentioned in the thread. But, while I appreciate the time and effort that the posters obviously have put into it, I just don't want to: fire up a game, play for several hours (or more) and THEN find out that my mods weren't correct, too high, too low, etc, etc.

I sure hope that either:
A) They come up with a fix
B) Someone finally posts a true solution without referencing a string of earlier mods (you know, so you have to follow the mods from ten posts until you get to the "latest & greatest".

Until then, I guess I'll just mess around in the early ages and quit when this "insane acceleration" kicks in. What a bummer.

 

[Kolyana]

Waging a war with the spoils of all fo your labors over the previous 4000 years is what it's all about! Why work hard towards tanks, nukes and those glorious bombers if the game is already coming to and end by the time you have them?

UGH.

 

[Kolyana]

I'm sure - in time - that modders will work wonders and someone, somewhere, will create a "realism mod" where everything is paced a lot nicer.