1.17 patch: Can pop rush. Research is too fast.

[SirPleb]

I'm combining two issues about 1.17 in this note.

The gruesome details follow. First a summary:
1) I've succeeded in pop rushing with 1.17. It is a lot more tedious to set up and to run, and takes a bit longer to get rolling.
2) The aggregate AI research rate seems to be significantly higher now. I think this is not good.

I love other things in the patch! I sure don't like to be negative about it. But the net result of the above problems is that, in my opinion, the 1.16 version of the game was probably better balanced. At least for flat-out, high difficulty, conquer the world type games.

Note that there also may be a bug, which I described in another thread, allowing the AI's to "meet" each other before they physically can. That bug is really bad when it happens (is it just me? ) It defeats the usual exploration over a long period of time. And it aggravates problem #2 above. I imagine it could be quickly fixed in a minor patch. But fixing it would not solve the other issues I'll try to describe in this note.

Details:

1) Pop rushing.

First, let me state my bias so you know where I'm coming from. I am not strongly in favor of or against pop rushing. I'm mildly in favor. It isn't critical to me to have or not have. But I am the kind of player who WILL use whatever tricks are available, to go for the highest score I can get! So if pop rushing is in I'll do it. (I do also have a bit of a bias- if pop rushing is gone my current HOF submission might have to be removed I do wish that no changes would be made which can greatly impact maximum possible scores.)

So the question I had was, is pop rushing now a dead technique? Within the 1.17 rules the best approach I could think of (maybe there is better) is along the following lines:
* Create a number of towns which have a granary, 3 citizens, 4 or 5 shields of production, and 4 extra food. Use an irrigated cattle or wheat and a bit of mining. It must be close enough to the capital to net at least 4 shields/turn after waste. In each of these towns produce workers nonstop, one every 3 turns. (One every 2 or 2.5 turns in towns which can do better with 5 shields and if lucky with more than 4 food.)
* Create a number of towns which have population 1 and a barracks. We will send the workers produced by the other towns over to these and convert (pop rush) the workers into military units. These towns might be called "training camps". ( No more whipping to death in slave camps! Now we'll just pump workers in one side and get trained Horsemen out the other!) These towns can be placed anywhere, they will never grow. They remain at population one forever and that one is an entertainer, immune to unhappiness.

Next question: is it affordable? I just replayed the start of a huge-deity-15rival map I've just finished for a HOF submission. I used 1.17 and the above approach. When I originally played the game I had 7 old style "slave camps" producing Horsemen, for 2.8 Horsemen/turn. In this new try, I got 7 "worker farms" running with 6 "training camps" supporting them. By the time I had the whole operation running at full speed it was 775BC. In my original game the slave camps were up and running in 1150BC. So it took an extra 15 turns. I think that could be reduced to 12 - I haven't done this before and think I could tune the build next time.

12 turns extra would not change the game greatly. And offsetting this a bit, the new approach was generating a bit more cash and a bit more culture than the original at equivalent dates. The new way also has 7 towns which will later on become productive parts of the empire. And in the original game at one point I lost at least a dozen Cavalry in one culture flip (second turn after a capture while quelling resistance) - with 1.17 I would not have lost those.

Note that the new approach I used requires that the pop rush towns be very close to the capital, using prime real estate. This could stop a lot of pop rushing, I don't know. It has no effect on my recent game - that's where the original slave camps were anyway.

The new way is at least twice as many mouseclicks to keep running.

So, bottom line, I think the 1.17 fix for pop rushing may turn out to be not much of an improvement. For people who want to squeeze everything they possibly can from every legitimate trick available, it will just be a lot more fiddly mindless work running the thing, for a slightly less powerful result. (10 food plus 10 shields = one 30 shield unit.) For people who already didn't like it because it was a fiddly trick, it is now a lot more fiddly. For people who just didn't like it, it is still there if someone is willing to work at it.

Personal opinion, I really wish Firaxis had either de-powered it a lot (e.g. down to 20 shields/citizen), or had de-powered it just a bit and made it more natural and easier to use. My preference would have been the latter, I don't mind it, will use it if available, and would sure like it to be less fiddly to run.

2) AI research rate.

Something I saw in another note about the patch mentioned that the AI's would now be more aggressive about trading techs. In the game start I just played, at 775BC the AI's were at least 3 techs further ahead than at the same date when I played with 1.16. I couldn't tell for sure, they might have been further again. (I feel sure of at least 3 based on the wonders being built.)

This is bad news I think, at least for Deity players. The high rate of tech research was already one of the problems at Deity level. Not just in difficulty, but also in overall game balance/fun. At Deity level you can figure on techs developing very fast, and as a result if you want conquest you have to gain control of the world early. You don't get to take 540 turns (the total available to 2050.) You get perhaps 300 to take complete control. More or less depending on style of play of course. With the new aggregate rate of research I'm seeing this number may just have dropped a lot. Reducing it may or may not make Deity level harder, we'll see what strategies develop. But I think it will reduce the fun.

I should note that in the game I just tried, this problem was probably made worse by the bug I've described elsewhere. The AI's all met each other very early, giving them more opportunity to trade than they should have. Nonetheless it looks to me as if there is new "more aggressive" trading happening aside from the bug, and that it will not have a good effect on the play in maps like this one.

A closing comment: So far I have not seen other changes which I think will greatly impact the maximum possible scores. I personally haven't found drafting useful, and have used worker factories very little. I didn't use much tech trading in my recent huge monster game - it would just have sped up the overall tech advancement rate and I needed to slow it down!

 

[Piglet]

I think a better way to tackle over-powered (read over-use) pop-rushing would be for its happiness effect to not only be in the city in which you pop-rush, but also (much diluted of course) in the other cities of your empire (possibly decreasing by distance from the pop-rushing city). It seems reasonable that a population would look dimly on their fellows being mal-treated as well as themselves (though obviosuly not as much) so this is both realistic and should prove effective. Pop-rushing would remain a valid tool used judiciously, but could no longer be over-used without dire consequences...

 

[BillChin]

Maybe it would be better to have empire wide effects for pop rushing. However, the new patch does limit pop rushing in one respect. A player needs cow or wheat or flood plains near their capital. This limits pop rushing on about 66% of starting maps. I know a lot of players like to start games until they get a favorable map, but this is one additional level of cheese and this cheese is not always present.

The old rules (1.16 and prior) let a player set up pop rushing anywhere they might find food tiles, even if the tiles are 20 or 25 squares from the capital. This is where pop rushing has the most leverage because distant cities can not produce anything useful. Under the new rules these distant cities take ten turns to make a worker and a player needs a dummy city to boot, so distant pop rushing is much diluted.

If a player can set up 7 productive cities and 7 garbage cities in a short amount of time, they probably have a good shot at the game without pop rushing. I have to believe the 14 city start is on a better map. It makes little sense to me that a seven garbage city start is only 15 turns faster than 7 good cities plus 7 garbage cities. Perhaps three good cities and 7 garbage cities could be achieved about 20 or 25 turns faster (than the 14) under the old rules with some tweaking.

With 7 productive cities optimized for production a player can produce units in each city every four to six turns. Sure this is worse than two or three turns, but that faster speed is terrain dependent (wheat, cows, flood plains), while the other speed can be gotten on most any terrain.

Even with all the changes, I am sure players will find a way to win. Firaxis does not want to make the game impossible, because that is bad marketing.

The new patch seems to have some severe bugs (armies from goody huts), so another patch to patch the patch is sure to be coming relatively soon.

 

[SirPleb]

The map I was playing is definitely a better than average start position. When I started toward my goal in this play I decided (after a couple of very weak starts) to only play a map which had at least one good tile visible at the start. And since bonuses seem to get clumped, that means good odds of other ones nearby. I think your (BillChin) estimate of 1/3 is about right for maps which are good in this sense. Later note: I got curious and just ran some tests. Out of 40 random maps I generated 22 were "bad" with no cattle/wheat on grassland visible (without moving anything or settling), 18 were "good". 4 of the good ones had two bonuses. Probably some of the bads would have been good in actual play when more tiles became visible. So it seems nearer 50:50 than I had thought. I wonder if this changed with the 1.17 patch? I still have it loaded. The number of "good" maps was higher than I'd expected. Archipelago, climate, and age might have an effect too - I ran the tests with the middle settings on everything but size.

I tested a bit yesterday and determined that on a huge map cities up to 9 tiles from the capital would net 4 shields out of 6, under Despotism with a huge number of cities. A quick test today on a standard size map suggests the same result, it might even be 10 tiles. I used 4 shields as my minimum required production so I went with that, a 9 tile limit. The cattle/wheat can therefore be up to 11 tiles away. The way distance calculations work in the game we need to turn the grid sideways to work out the result, which I think is a 529 tile area which can be worked. Some ocean in there is likely but there would commonly be say 300 land tiles I think. With the 1.17 patch it seems that tiles with a "game" bonus can be worked as effectively as cattle/wheat. So to get the level of production in my test we need 7 tiles out of 300 to be cattle, wheat, or game. Not uncommon. If there are flood plains that's a bonus.

On smaller/easier maps the size of the factory can also be smaller. This huge map was the first time I tried to set up such a large factory. On a medium map at monarch level just two slave camps at the start can give an overwhelming boost. (And is of course much quicker to set up and run.)

It looks to me like the GOTM#2 map could have been effectively rushed from the start with 1.17. The GOTM#3 map doesn't look like it could be rushed much from the start. (But that was already true with 1.16.)

Even if we discount pop rushing as a startup technique, I think it remains powerful in the mid-game. After beginning conquest it is not hard to end up with 100 or more captured enemy workers. With a "conversion factory" corruption and bonus tiles don't matter. Now that I've been thinking about it, this seems to me to be stronger than the original pop rush approach for the mid game. One could set up conversion towns anywhere near the battlefield, not even bothering with a granary or a bonus tile.

About getting the factory going in 15 less turns (or 12 if my guess is right): The difference between my original start and new start is going from 7 good towns which I subsequently turned into garbage towns, to the new way of 7 good towns plus 6 garbage ones. It is not a very big difference in effort. In the original approach the 7 towns each needed a barracks and a granary. Connecting roads, connecting irrigation, and irrigation of the 7 bonus tiles was required. In the new approach 7 towns need granaries, 6 need barracks. Connecting roads/irrigation work out about the same - some extra roads are needed but some connecting roads and irrigation are replaced by the garbage towns. Some extra mining is required. A couple of extra turns were needed at the end to get the first workers processed before I could consider the end result to be equivalent. (I had a save from my original game which had its factory finished and had 11 Horsemen. I ran the new setup until I also had 11 Horsemen.) 6 more settlers were required for the new way which was the biggest additional effort.

 

[BillChin]

One way to eliminate pop rushing is to prevent joining workers to negative happiness cities. This is a simple fix that closes the visible loopholes. If Firaxis really wants pop rushing gone, then I hope someone is reading and takes note.

As for the 14 town start vs. the 7 town start, you might try a game under 1.16 and see how you do with a slightly different start. Instead of 7 worker factories feeding camps, have 7 traditional cities bulding units, plus 7 pop rush towns. This effectively doubles your military production, gold and culture with what you estimate as only 15 more turns of build up. Whoopa!

I start a lot of games on random maps, standard size maps, 8 players. I play out every start. I estimate that maybe 10% of the maps could support the 7 worker farm cities you describe. Rarely are there that many food tiles plus irrigation near my capital. About 40% of maps have no rivers or lakes near the capital so even if there are many food tiles on grass, pop rushing is a slow go. About 15% are in terrible terrain like jungle or mountains, so there is no chance there. That leaves the rest and it is unlikely to find that much grassland. Plains do not produce enough food. Maybe on a huge world the odds are better, because there is a much wider band of latitude for grassland.

 

[SirPleb]

Originally posted by BillChin
This effectively doubles your military production, gold and culture with what you estimate as only 15 more turns of build up.

I don't think that the situation you describe can be done as easily. It is not the same amount of work as what I built in 15 more turns. (Not an estimate by the way, I did it in 15, my estimate is 12 turns. I don't have an estimate for the kind of build up you describe. It would definitely take somewhat longer. Might be interesting to try though.) What you describe would require more good real estate (requires 14 "good" towns), more development of the land, and barracks in 8 more towns than what I did.

 

[BillChin]

Originally posted by SirPleb

I don't think that the situation you describe can be done as easily. It is not the same amount of work as what I built in 15 more turns. (Not an estimate by the way, I did it in 15, my estimate is 12 turns. I don't have an estimate for the kind of build up you describe. It would definitely take somewhat longer. Might be interesting to try though.) What you describe would require more good real estate (requires 14 "good" towns), more development of the land, and barracks in 8 more towns than what I did.

I do not understand why, though I have never optimized the early game for lucky maps. Maybe you need a few more food tiles. However, a pure production town does not require a food tile, plains are fine if there is water, and hills are good too.

Maybe build three good towns near food tiles to help crank settlers, then use the rest of the food tiles for pop rushing towns. Then put traditional towns where there is no extra food. Maybe you have to settle for five good towns and five pop rushing towns, but seems like that is a far better start than seven pop rush towns and the capital in about the same amount of time (1.16 of course).

If you take the same locations as your 14 town start on 1.17 and transpose them to 1.16 can't some of the garbage towns be used for actual production (near the capital, just need mines) and some of the worker farm towns be used for pop rushing (only need to work the one food tile). Seems to me, that a similar start on 1.16 with the virtually the same 14 town positions gives you a tremendous leg up for a very short additional build time. Sounds more like a mental block, not a game play block to me. You say on another thread you went back to 1.16, maybe you can try this on that lucky map.

Another thought for 1.17 is that you may not need seven garbage towns, three are probably enough to process the workers from the seven feeder towns. That probably cuts the time differential down another turn or two.

 

[SirPleb]

Originally posted by BillChin
Seems to me, that a similar start on 1.16 with the virtually the same 14 town positions gives you a tremendous leg up for a very short additional build time.

Perhaps. It isn't a direct comparison, is apples to oranges. I have been trying to compare pop rushing in 1.16 to 1.17 so that isn't something I've explored in this test. My guess however is that it gives a small boost, not a huge one at all. With the military factory approach, of course one starts filling in "real" towns after launching the factory, and eventually they grow into productive towns. I favor building those while launching the first war, I doubt that hurrying to build them fast at the very start would make as much long term difference as starting the war sooner.

It is a 13 town factory BTW, not 14, just to be precise. 7 of the towns are worker farms and they directly replace what were 7 pop rush towns in my 1.16 play. These 7 are "good" towns which use good real estate and use bonus tiles. In 1.16 they were also "good" towns until the point where I turned them into garbage by pop rushing them. The added 6 in the new way are garbage towns using any single tile (tundra or desert would be fine), not using any additional good real estate.

No, three garbage towns would not be enough. My original 1.16 factory produced 2.8 Horsemen/turn. Each new style "training camp" (garbage town) can process at most one worker into one Horseman every second turn. So 6 are required for the same level of production.

Trying to compare apples to apples in theory (cause I have not spent the time to actually build this): To get the same level of military production without rushing you'd need a setup which produces an aggregate of 84 shields/turn by some date tolerably near the same time. Losses from over-runs probably brings that up to 90/turn. And that's after corruption production. My 13 city setup which is ready and rolling to produce 2.8 Horsemen/turn would have to reach average net production of 7 shields/city before it would be at that level. It seems to me that reaching that level require a lot of additional turns. And probably requires better real estate than I had, certainly much more improved real estate.

The map I played wasn't all that lucky. E.g., I believe that GOTM#2 could have been very effectively pop rushed in 1.17 with the technique I've tested.

 

[BillChin]

Thanks for all the thoughts. I guess my main point is that your 1.16 start can probably be improved with some of the techniques you are using for 1.17. With all the work you are putting in, it is going to be tough for the other competitors for top spot in GOTM. Thanks again.

 

[SirPleb]

I do like to analyze stuff I've finally started GOTM#4 and have spent a record (for me) amount of time analyzing choices during the first few moves. The wines tile at the start combined with Emperor level (only one content citizen), with the English (Pottery at the start), and the nature of the immediately surrounding terrain, creates interesting choices. I spent some time (and graph paper ) at the start deciding whether to do Granary first, which I normally don't. This is one of the things I like most about this game - every start position calls for a different approach! And then of course the approach needs to be modifed as more is discovered.

 

[SirPleb]

(Deleted message, was a duplicate posting)