3UC/4UC for VP: Project Coordination Thread

[Hinin]

Cacadores are rangers and marksmen, functionally identical in role & training to a German Jaeger. Why not use the proposed Jaeger ideas for the cacadores? I think a Gatling gun replacement would be more appropriate though; the cacadores were created in the 1800s, and persisted into the mid 1900s

Concerning the GGun part, this is exactly what I suggested in the comments of the spreadsheet if we wanted to keep the Cassadore.

Here’s what I think:
Spoiler : slaganz
Warrior replacement
50 production (cheaper than warrior)
7 CS (+1 from warrior)
Furor Teutonicus promotion (+50% vs barbarians, kept on upgrade. Does not have “Brute force” promotion)
“Native tongue” promotion - 50% chance to convert barbarian on kill
Druhtiz oath - +5 influence when given as a CS gift

I reduced the amount of influence so the AI isn’t missing out as much, and ressurrected the barbarian conversion from vanilla Germany

The only problem with "barbarian conversion" is that it is the same kind of bonus that the Huns have. For the bonus against barbarians, the only concern I have (I already had it before) it that this could lead to some unwanted situations (an authority Germany would wreck barbarians as if they were nothing, which could be a bad game design), but it could also make a tradition or progress Germany a much safer option against bbs (in short, your infantry spear line would be on-par with authority ones when fighting bbs), so I'm not quite sure how to feel...

Let's imagine how Germany would work with such a unit : you build some Slaganz in the early game, and you go beat so bbs, acquiring one or two new units along the way. Then, when you first meet a CS, you give some of these units (decreasing you military upkeep at the same time) to become at least friend with it and allow it (and you) to grow and improve easily. Until you attain Steel, you can always produce some of these units to maintain your relations and so you enter the Medieval era (and the time where the Hanse and the Teutonic order really shine) with enough elements to display your true potential (if it plays well). You must only be careful against other players, since the Slaganz isn't nearly as powerful as a Jaguar or a Scout, and only pillage with your UM when you have the number advantage (and some promotions acquired when destroying some bb huts).

PS : I'm always playing with the "Enraged barbarians" option toggled on, so I don't know if CSs even need more units in games where barbarians are calm.

 

[Jarula]

Meh on the slaganz...

The bonus on Barb's and city state gifting is kind of weak.

What could be good furor teutonicus basically copy Frances ua...

 

[Hinin]

Meh on the slaganz...

The bonus on Barb's and city state gifting is kind of weak.

What could be good furor teutonicus basically copy Frances ua...

The problem with your suggestion is that we don't want copies of other factions UA as part of UM attributes. It would be cheap.
But I agree that, if we want an interesting unit, some work will need to be done, unfortunately.

 

[pineappledan]

The only problem with "barbarian conversion" is that it is the same kind of bonus that the Huns have.

Hun's UA: "Mounted melee units deal more flanking damage and can capture units, and defeated Barbarians in Encampments join you"
Huns can only convert using mounted melee units, and the first of those comes at the same tech level that replaces warriors.
The Germanic promotion would only work vs barbs whereas the hunnic promotion works on everything.
wrt. the hunnic conversion in encampments, the Germanic one only works 1/2 the time, but can convert unfortified barbarians

First, the idea for the slaganz is to amass a "barbarian horde", correct? players aren't going to build one of those themselves because warrior just suck too hard to be worth it.
Second, without the -25% maintenance from the vanilla game, Germany would be hurting from gold upkeep from this, so they would be giving away CS gifts by necessity.

I don't think you can execute on your plan of barbarian CS gifts unless you create a free unit mechanic. The only other possibility I can think of is that building a Slaganz could spawn 2, like Zerglings. Otherwise production at that ultra-early stage is just far too precious

Alternative Suggestion: 'Native Tongue' Promotion: On killing a barbarian unit, 50% chance to convert. Converted units have the 'Druhtiz Oath' Promotion, which gives +5 influence if gifted to a city state.

I don't know if that is possible to do, but then you would be gifting your converted barbs instead of gifting away the unit which allows you to farm more barbs. It would be more streamlined

For the bonus against barbarians, the only concern I have (I already had it before) it that this could lead to some unwanted situations (an authority Germany would wreck barbarians as if they were nothing, which could be a bad game design), but it could also make a tradition or progress Germany a much safer option against bbs (in short, your infantry spear line would be on-par with authority ones when fighting bbs), so I'm not quite sure how to feel...

My proposal for Furor Teutonicus is only 17% stronger than the brute force promotion. The bigger deal would be that it could be carried forward to spearmen imo.
My experience with playing around with bonus vs barbarians is thus: You could jack it up to 100% vs barbarians and you'd still take 25hp on heal over it.

Yes, it does overlap some with the Hunnic UA, but it differs in slight, but meaningful ways. The bonus vs. barbarians is comparatively modest. Keep in mind, however, that a warrior replacement has to have a very large an noticeable impact on gameplay in order to be noticed at all. It is unlikely you would build more than 3 or 4 of these.

 

[De_Genius]

So you need do 2 things when SetXY is triggered:
1. If goedendag moved scan all area for other units, check their range and add or delete from them promotion, or if one had promo and is still in range do nothing;
2. Check if other unit moved, look for goedendags (all) and check the closest range. If your unit went out from aura delete promo only from that unit, if went in - add or it could have an aura and stayed in range then do nothing.

Those are all possible situations when you need to modify promo. I think there's no more variants.

I think you are misunderstanding me. I have the code to work which gives and removes the promotions correctly when units move in and out of range of a Goedendag.
But if a Goedendag dies, the surrounding units will keep the promotion until they move again. Also if I build one, the adjacent units will not gain the promotion until one other unit has moved.
It is these triggers I mean, that I am not sure about how to find and execute the code when happening.

 

[Hinin]

Well said pineappledan

Why not make the Slaganz a lot cheaper than the warrior (like - 30-40 %) and also add a "can pillage without cost" effect (in "Furor teutonicus" if we want to keep it through the ages, in a lost promotion if we don't want to). This unit could be the response to those civs who forward settle very early : you stay at war with them for some time, harassing them whenever possible and attacking these early cities with groups of 4 or 5 Slaganz going in and out of their territory without losing too much production building them ; this allows you to slow down expansionist AIs and give you more room (and time) to choose the placement of your cities. The only (and big) downside to this tactic is that it will swallow your income, but you can always give some Slaganz (and bbs) to CS whenever want to focus on economy, with increased effect thanks to "Druhtiz oath".

N.B. : Maybe all the attributes would make the unit a bit too powerful on paper, but let's not forget that this unit will have no "mobility buff", no real combat buff against other civs except the +1 CP, which isn't much (plus, the German have no military cap buff like the Zulus or Assyria have).

 

[pineappledan]

There's not much point in trying to convince players and AI to make lots of the Slaganz. They won't. No point in giving them pillage-related buffs because there are virtually no improvements to pillage that early on. Making slaganz too cheap might have unintended consequences. For instance, you might just gift 5-6 slaganz to a city state that closely borders a major civ, and then start a proxy war, just funneling units into the city state from accross the map. It would sap all the production from one of your cities, but you could essentially lock-down another civ on the opposite cside of the continent with endless CS gifts

Since there's no pillaging to be had, and there's no war to be won without support from ranged and siege weapons, the Slaganz would be useless in taking actual cities.

Your original idea gives Germany a good flavour.

1. Establish yourself as the "barbarian king"
2. Kick barbarian ass and establish the pecking order; Amass an army of hill-people
3. Distribute your army as oath-sworn warriors to establish good relations with the other minor tribes (the city-states), with the promise of leading your loose coalition of tribes to a great destiny
4. ???
5. Profit

I think moving the Druhtiz Oath promotion to converted units fits this flavour better, you would be forced to farm barbarians for your influence instead of pumping out production, and it would further differentiate the German unit from the Hunnic UA. We could give the Slaganz itself 'Druhtiz oath' as well, but it might not be necessary.

 

[phantomaxl1207]

How's this for a Portuguese UU: an Ribauldequin (Organ Gun)? A replacement for the Gatling Gun that comes earlier (Steam Power to help defend while they get key infrastructure [Seaports].

Being designed as anti-personal weapon it would have a higher RCS, but a lower CS since it takes a while to reload.

 

[Hinin]

How's this for a Portuguese UU: an Ribauldequin (Organ Gun)? A replacement for the Gatling Gun that comes earlier (Steam Power to help defend while they get key infrastructure [Seaports].

Being designed as anti-personal weapon it would have a higher RCS, but a lower CS since it takes a while to reload.

I think that, if we want a Gatling gun replacement, we should stick with the Cassadore, simply because we don't have a 3D model of an Organ gun. Moreover, if the unit appears earlier, we should not give it more pure offensive power (whatever the cost), but a trick that gives it a distinct advantage, like reconnaissance promotions for example (not offensive power, just survivability and mobility).

(besides, an Organ gun could not have more ranged power than a Gatling gun : even if it is a game, we always try to maintain some credibility to what we add)

 

[Hinin]

I think moving the Druhtiz Oath promotion to converted units fits this flavour better, you would be forced to farm barbarians for your influence instead of pumping out production, and it would further differentiate the German unit from the Hunnic UA. We could give the Slaganz itself 'Druhtiz oath' as well, but it might not be necessary.

More good ideas !

 

[pineappledan]

How's this for a Portuguese UU: an Ribauldequin (Organ Gun)? A replacement for the Gatling Gun that comes earlier (Steam Power to help defend while they get key infrastructure [Seaports].

Weren't organ guns... awful? like, they were impotent curiosities, not weapons of war. Moreover I'm not aware of any Portuguese connection, or notable use by Portuguese forces of organ guns.

 

[Hinin]

Your original idea gives Germany a good flavour.

1. Establish yourself as the "barbarian king"
2. Kick barbarian ass and establish the pecking order; Amass an army of hill-people
3. Distribute your army as oath-sworn warriors to establish good relations with the other minor tribes (the city-states), with the promise of leading your loose coalition of tribes to a great destiny
4. ???
5. Profit

Replace the ??? by this.

Spoiler Bismarck the barbarian king :

Weren't organ guns... awful? like, they were impotent curiosities, not weapons of war. Moreover I'm not aware of any Portuguese connection, or notable use by Portuguese forces of organ guns.

It's linked to the use of Organ guns by Portugal in Age of Empires 2 and 3 : it has made people think Portuguese really employed this kind of weapon.

 

[pineappledan]

Based on the other UC for Germany the ??? is obvious:

1. Establish yourself as the "barbarian king"
2. Kick barbarian ass and establish the pecking order; Amass an army of hill-people
3. Distribute your army as oath-sworn warriors to establish good relations with the other minor tribes (the city-states), with the promise of leading your loose coalition of tribes to a great destiny
4. RECLAIM THE HOLY LAND
5. Profit

 

[Hinin]

Let's not forget that, before being a knight order, the teutons were a Germanic tribe, with paganism and stuff.
So my list is this :

Spoiler My swamp :

1. Establish yourself as the "barbarian king"
2. Kick barbarian ass and establish the pecking order; Amass an army of swamp-people
3. Distribute your army as oath-sworn warriors to establish good relations with the other minor tribes (the city-states), with the promise of leading your loose coalition of tribes to a great destiny
4. Hang your enemies by the feet to sacred trees in honour of the gods !!!
5. Profit

More seriously : is there a way a promotion allows you to give another promotion to captured units (to make them gifts for CSs) ? Your idea is good, but it could be a horror to code.

 

[Blue Ghost]

I tend to build about two warriors on average to defend against barbarians before I unlock Military Theory. Two slaganz would be enough to convert a handful of barbarians. It's a nice callback to Germany's original UA.

The base influence from gifting to city-states is too low to be significant, and I don't think 5 additional influence is enough. I'd say at least 15 to be worth it, perhaps 20. You could go even higher if you're giving the promotion to converted units, since you won't be able to mass-produce them for gifting.

 

[pineappledan]

The AI won't know to do this though, so giving more than a nominal buff wouldn't feel fair. I agree that if the converted units can get the promotion that solves a lot of problems

 

[Blue Ghost]

@pineappledan, the XML file you uploaded is for flax as an improvement, not as a resource. Do you know what art definitions I need for a flax resource?

More seriously : is there a way a promotion allows you to give another promotion to captured units (to make them gifts for CSs) ? Your idea is good, but it could be a horror to code.

You can give promotions to units with Lua. Since you'd probably be using Lua to capture units anyway, you could just throw in the promotion while you're at it. As for making the promotion work, you could probably do something with GameEvents.PlayerGifted, provided that works properly.

 

[pineappledan]

I do not, but there is this guide on the tutorials forum which should cover that. I think.

 

[Blue Ghost]

I'm lazy and work starts up again tomorrow. I don't feel like spending hours fiddling with resource art assets when the new version is so close to completion. Looks like release will have to be delayed again.

 

[Jarula]

The problem with your suggestion is that we don't want copies of other factions UA as part of UM attributes. It would be cheap.
But I agree that, if we want an interesting unit, some work will need to be done, unfortunately.

How about we try teutonic knights or better yet basically ancient German units basically a spearman or swordsman replacement with bonus in friendly lands like a Germanic jaguar?

Or make a Germanic unit that if turn is next to Barb unit recruits it.