Policies: BNW Adaptation

[Ahriman]

Looks like the Tradition Policy Finisher bug is going to be fixed in the fall patch: Link

\Skodkim

There are some great fixes in here.
[Most importantly, they added my hometown as a citystate ]

And there are a lot of things here with implications for the mod:
City conquest population loss and unrest, and the effects of tourism influence.
Social policy values.
Germany and Japan civ adjustments.
New pantheons.
I don't understand the trade route change, moving bonus gold from markets and banks away. That seems like a step backwards.
Custom AI for some civs won't work with our changes (eg Netherlands doesn't need flood plains and marsh, spain doens't need natural wonders).
Improved operational AI for targeting camps might clear the need for the camp autoclearance mechanism.

 

[stackpointer]

There are some great fixes in here.
[Most importantly, they added my hometown as a citystate ]

Looks like the Tradition Policy Finisher bug is going to be fixed in the fall patch: Link

\Skodkim

If we want to get into the details of the patch then we should probably start a new thread ("how the fall patch will effect CEP" or something like that). However, I have downloaded the SDK beta and it looks like that code for the tradition finisher hasn't changed in the way we needed to in order to solve the indus sanitation problem.

 

[mitsho]

I like the concentration of the faith-buying policies in one place as it makes it easier to balance the faith costs over them (you can't go faith heavy and have several faith-buyable buildings which we do count to the stronger beliefs generally). That's the theoretical thought behind it, to streamline the system and bring some order into Firaxis' Chaos, I gues. Whether that warrants a complete overhaul is a different question, but I personally like the direction. Also I wouldn't rely too much on the vocal community here

And yeah, let's discuss the patch somewhere else, does aren't the definite patchnotes though, right?

 

[Ahriman]

I like the concentration of the faith-buying policies in one place as it makes it easier to balance the faith costs over them (you can't go faith heavy and have several faith-buyable buildings which we do count to the stronger beliefs generally). That's the theoretical thought behind it

Then put them in the follower belief slot. Don't limit them to only civs who finish the Piety tree.

 

[mitsho]

Then put them in the follower belief slot. Don't limit them to only civs who finish the Piety tree.

Sounds reasonable, actually The thing is you still can get potentially two faith buildings since you can chose two follower beliefs. For that to work it'd need to be in the Enhancer spot (which is still doable and might make people beeline more for a second great prophet). But then where to put these "spreading" beliefs? Probably the policy-based beliefs then. In this way though, the faith-buildings would still be only available to one civ. Good for faith-cost balancing, but maybe not for the most fun. Still worth a try I guess.

 

[skodkim]

If we want to get into the details of the patch then we should probably start a new thread ("how the fall patch will effect CEP" or something like that). However, I have downloaded the SDK beta and it looks like that code for the tradition finisher hasn't changed in the way we needed to in order to solve the indus sanitation problem.

In the bugs section it specifically says: "Fixed an issue where you receive a Free Building in a city that had hard built the same building. Before the hard-built building would be sold off (deleting its effect) but due to a logic area the effects for the same (free) building would not be reapplied. Should fix Aqueducts from the Tradition finisher, Broadcast Towers from CN Tower, etc".

Is that not what we're looking for?

\Skodkim

 

[mystikx21]

It's a different bug. That sounds like it would be related to any issue where you could build both as a glitch, or accounts for upkeep issues.

But it's not the same issue that made the indus sanitation free instead of an aqueduct. It's a different set of code that they're unlikely to fix because it would only come up in a mod.

 

[skodkim]

It's a different bug. That sounds like it would be related to any issue where you could build both as a glitch, or accounts for upkeep issues.

But it's not the same issue that made the indus sanitation free instead of an aqueduct. It's a different set of code that they're unlikely to fix because it would only come up in a mod.

Could it be that we should start looking into dll modifications? whoward69 has apparently already fixed this bug in hus dll mod link along with other nice things that could probably be used to enhance the mod even further.

\skodkim

 

[mystikx21]

I had thought there was some notion to use that for the interface changes, partly to speed it up, and partly to integrate some fixes easier. It might be necessary to test what we know first in the current stages though. I'm not much of a coder (reading it, sure), so I can't speak to what strategy would be best there.

 

[stackpointer]

Could it be that we should start looking into dll modifications? whoward69 has apparently already fixed this bug in hus dll mod link along with other nice things that could probably be used to enhance the mod even further.

\skodkim

DLL modding is an xor thing. If we use a custom DLL then it permanently excludes capability with any other mods that use DLL modifications.

I had thought there was some notion to use that for the interface changes, partly to speed it up, and partly to integrate some fixes easier. It might be necessary to test what we know first in the current stages though. I'm not much of a coder (reading it, sure), so I can't speak to what strategy would be best there.

I was under the impression that a lot of the lua coding in civ5 is the interface.

Speaking of speeding the lua up, has anybody tested the mod with LuaJIT?

 

[Ahriman]

If we use a custom DLL then it permanently excludes capability with any other mods that use DLL modifications.

I can understand that this is a big downside.

But on the other hand.... isn't this mod rather bigger/more popular than basically anything else that it might be compatible with?
What dll adjusting mods are there out there that we really need to worry about?

It strikes me that maybe those mods should worry about compatibility with CEP rather than the reverse. Dll modification is probably inevitable in the long run.

But I can understand that we should hold off as long as possible, concentrating on features and changes that don't require any dll modification. This is probably a more efficient use of Thal's time anyway.

 

[skodkim]

DLL modding is an xor thing. If we use a custom DLL then it permanently excludes capability with any other mods that use DLL modifications.

sure but isnt whowards dll mod THE dll mod out there?

\skodkim

 

[stackpointer]

Off the top of my head, I can think of the RED mod (and his associated derivative mods) and the Civ4 diplomacy mod.

Anyway, I was also under the impression that the free buildings (aqueducts) through tradition was going to be removed in the upcoming policy changes?

 

[Ahriman]

Anyway, I was also under the impression that the free buildings (aqueducts) through tradition was going to be removed in the upcoming policy changes?

Free growth buildings are still in Thal's current design:
http://forums.civfanatics.com/showpost.php?p=12811168&postcount=1

It's a nice effect that is quite useful.

I guess I still don't fully understand the bug; why is it that free culture or defensive buildings can work (giving you the next available version, and not having issues with UBs) but it can't work for growth buildings? Is this because the growth buildings aren't separately defined as a building class? Is it possible to add a new class and change the existing growth buildings to be within that?

Isn't RED just a graphics mod?

 

[stackpointer]

I guess I still don't fully understand the bug; why is it that free culture or defensive buildings can work (giving you the next available version, and not having issues with UBs) but it can't work for growth buildings? Is this because the growth buildings aren't separately defined as a building class? Is it possible to add a new class and change the existing growth buildings to be within that?

See my posts here: http://forums.civfanatics.com/showthread.php?p=12756765#post12756765 and http://forums.civfanatics.com/showthread.php?p=12755365#post12755365

 

[Ahriman]

Thanks, so it's just the lack of the canConstruct check, and that's defined in the dll.

 

[Thalassicus]

After reading this thread (twice) I still can't clearly see what is being broken/fixed.

It got buried on an earlier page.

The faith we get should balance the faith we can spend. What's the point of excess faith?

This should happen with or without Piety. Empires without piety can spend faith on great people, missionaries, and inquisitors. Piety gives us more faith, so it should give us new ways to spend that faith. It's not useful if it gives us more than we need. That's the problem with piety right now.

===============

What needs to happen IMHO is for piety to provide additional, interesting, ways for the gamer to spend faith before the late game.

I'd love to do this. However, I don't think it's feasible with sql and lua, the tools I use for this project. I've thought about this problem a lot over the past year, and figured out only two possible solutions:

• Swap faith purchase beliefs with reformation beliefs.
• Unlock purchase of stories with faith, in addition to gold. (I wrote all the code for stories myself, so it's completely within our control.)

All the other ideas we've seen would require changes to the c++ code. This would take a lot of extra time, and make the project incompatible with other projects that change the c++ code, like whoward's mod discussed above. I'm very reluctant to do that when we can solve the problem with less side-effects.

 

[Ahriman]

I've thought about this problem a lot over the past year, and figured out only two possible solutions:
Swap faith purchase beliefs with reformation beliefs.
Unlock purchase of stories with faith, in addition to gold. (I wrote all the code for stories myself, so it's completely within our control.)

Why can't you create new beliefs that do similar kinds of effects to existing ones?
It seems like the obvious solution.

I tried going for a religion without getting Piety policies, and I found that a bunch of the founder beliefs were near useless things that I would never pick (there is no point in founder beliefs that just make it easier to spread your religion, because the main benefits from spreading religion come from other founder beliefs. I found that a lot of the follower beliefs that I would have liked to pick were not available. Overall, I found that there was no reward to me from getting a religion early.

And again:

The faith we get should balance the faith we can spend. What's the point of excess faith?

This should happen with or without Piety. Empires without piety can spend faith on great people, missionaries, and inquisitors. Piety gives us more faith, so it should give us new ways to spend that faith. It's not useful if it gives us more than we need. That's the problem with piety right now.

Great people from the industrial era, missionaries, and inquisitors are not enough things to spend faith on for the first four eras of the game (ie the whole period where religion is supposed to matter) for factions who do not finish the Piety tree.
Removing access to faith spending policies has made the problem worse, not better.

 

[mystikx21]

Great people from the industrial era, missionaries, and inquisitors are not enough things to spend faith on for the first four eras of the game

- This.

I'd also say that moving all the pagoda/etc around weakens religions, which in turn weakens piety. If piety doesn't help get a religion faster, and if it doesn't help use it (eg, that the most useful beliefs are not tied to the religion really at all), then I'm having a hard time seeing how it is improved.

 

[Wichtel]

Can we give missionaries the ability to build a monestary with a policy?