Balance Feedback

[SevenSpirits]

It looks to me like this forum needs a thread for suggestions that are only balance-related (and not "plz add this thing!!").

I've only played a little so far but two things struck me right away. First, I feel like Spiritual is too powerful in this mod. There are a LOT of civics and so you will want to be switching around a lot (especially if they are balanced, which if they aren't now I would hope they are in time). Also, there are a lot of civics that give bonuses or penalties to research or gold. If you are spiritual, you can be in the gold-friendly, research-unfriendly civics for 5 turns to build up gold, then swap to research until you run out. Repeat. Since the civics modify a lot more than the normal BTS ones, it's a lot more open for abuse. This makes me feel like I need spiritual, when in BTS I never cared about it.

Suggested fix: Give non-spiritual civs more ways to change civics without anarchy. (Golden ages aren't nearly enough.)

Second, I am confused by walls. In the base game, I think it's fair to say that almost no human player builds them (at least in single player; I don't know about multiplayer but I would assume they aren't very good there either). Only the AIs do. This is because they don't really do anything unless that city is attacked, and that almost never happens.

In this mod, walls now give increased maintenance. Why?? Unless I am missing an obscenely important unit or building that requires walls/castles such that you want them in every city, all this is going to do is hurt the AI.

Suggested fix: remove the maintenance. Also, you may want to add another feature to walls so that they don't suck as much.

Also, I want to say that is is a fantastic mod. I LOVE the expanded tech tree. I hope you continue to put thought into it, and try to make it even better. It would be especially nice if you spread the religions out a bit more. I think judaism/christianity/islam are certainly linear, but the others are pretty unrelated. All of them can afford to have other prerequisites, hopefully from completely different parts of the tech tree.

 

[Endovior]

I'm inclined to agree, particularly with the walls bit; given the maintenance increase, it usually makes more sense to add an extra military unit to a relatively vulnerable city then to build a wall; the former is easy to do (as you can build the unit in a more central city) and has no consequences (as you can move the unit out later when the city is less threatened), while the latter is harder to do (as you most likely need defenses in a new city which is struggling to grow) and has lasting consequences (as the walls represent a drain on your income until a good deal later in the game). This strikes me as a bad mechanic.

 

[Kristaps513]

Yea some more ballance would be nice.

 

[Capellan]

One possible balance issue I encountered: getting access to all economic Civs through a relatively early wonder is just wrong. With Global Market, I had 12 cities, 100% science, and was pulling in 600+ gpt. None of my cities were building gold: that was just the excess I was getting from my busy little specialists.

 

[Kristaps513]

One possible balance issue I encountered: getting access to all economic Civs through a relatively early wonder is just wrong. With Global Market, I had 12 cities, 100% science, and was pulling in 600+ gpt. None of my cities were building gold: that was just the excess I was getting from my busy little specialists.

I had over 6000 gold at early middle ages lol.

 

[Empiremaker]

Global Market (Marco Polo's Embassy) + Capitalism (Pyramids) + SE = Tons of Money

 

[zappara]

Yup, those balance issues have been noted. I'm looking for ways to limit the civic choices that some wonders give (preferable python change).

 

[gram123]

About the wall/castle issue. Im not sure if its already build into RoM, but one way to make wall a building you would want to build were if the wall were a requiment before you could build a castle, which both ekstra defence and +1trade route, and the castle gives acces to Edinburgh castle wonder.
So if the walls were requiment for castle you would have a reason to build them

Another point i think it was build into ViSA for warloards, when ever you have a castle present in a city you have a change of getting a UU unit istead of the unit you were acually building, again would make walls/castle more usefull.

In ViSA they also gave you a chance to get a UU whenever building a unit during Golden Age, it worked pretty well...

 

[gram123]

I feel there is a problem with the AI during the late game, it seems the AI isent very good at playing the late ages....

I have RoM through a couple of times now at it seems everytime I find a fair match in the early game, as soon as i reach the Modern age the AI stop resisting. While my research keep comming in faster and faster it dosent happens for the AI.

It seems somehow also like there is another balance issue to look at, when you reached the future age, it seems impossible to use all the money you earn. In all the games i have played witch reached the future age, at some point you can easyly have 100% to reseach and still making money. Maybe some of the late civic is a bit to powerfull.

 

[Hawkeye Pierce]

Not exactly a balance issue, but I'm not sure where else to put it.
My biggest gripe with Civ4 in general is that although we have the wonerful feature of timescale - marathon, epic, etc... it doesn't really do that much more than make the time you spend playing longer. I'd like to see the techs take a bit longer to research, without it affecting the time it takes to train units and perhaps even wonders and buildings too.

Does no-one else feel that no matter what length/difficulty you play on, the only time your army really has more than a 1 in 10 chance of arriving at the front and being more or less up to date is in the modern era? I appreciate that this constant race to be up to date is quite realistic, and realism is always applaudable, but the eras kinda pass by without being noticed.

I'd like to start building, for example, stonehenge, in the Ancient era and perhaps have the possibility of completing it before the Classical era begins.

The ships need looking at in this repect also, I can't quite put my finger on it, but they don't seem to 'fit in' with regard to eras. Perhaps the original tech-tree was too messy for my liking.

Having said all that, I really like the mod and the additions you've outlined for the next version look really good too. Any chance of putting in lots and lots of civs as standard for those of us (me) who like to play on enourmous maps?

 

[gram123]

Not exactly a balance issue, but I'm not sure where else to put it.
My biggest gripe with Civ4 in general is that although we have the wonerful feature of timescale - marathon, epic, etc... it doesn't really do that much more than make the time you spend playing longer. I'd like to see the techs take a bit longer to research, without it affecting the time it takes to train units and perhaps even wonders and buildings too.

Does no-one else feel that no matter what length/difficulty you play on, the only time your army really has more than a 1 in 10 chance of arriving at the front and being more or less up to date is in the modern era? I appreciate that this constant race to be up to date is quite realistic, and realism is always applaudable, but the eras kinda pass by without being noticed.

You can do this your self, its just a number you need to change in the XML file..
*GUIDE*
locate /mod/rise of mankind/assets/Xml/gameinfo/CIV4GameSpeedInfo
and open with any texteditor(ie wordpat)
Find the gamespeed you are planning to play (ie epic, marathon or whatever)
find <iResearchPercent> and make the value higher 200 is standart for matathon, 150 for epic

 

[baha]

ok, whie the rounds take more than a minute, it is time to give some detailed balance issue oriented feedback.

I have now played two games of ROM starting acient until approx. 2000 AD. In both games (monarch diffculty, epic speed, starting acient) one AI was heading off with tech. The first standard size map, Zara Yacob pwned me in 2001, beeing much larger and more advanced than me. In the second, on large map, pacal was at future tech around 1965. Im using Continenets and Island mapscripts from this forum. The maps tend to be food freindly. There are a lot of buildings and techs in the game, for epic gamespeed somehow even too much, so I think, there is no need to add more but rather tweak the civics: switching from emancipation to contracs will give angry people in the city, i think this is a bug. also the health points of my cities are far from the way one would expect them: in the second, large game at 2005, berlin is 41 with 16 unhealthy but still growing by 27! i have sid sushi, so the food processing factory bonus and global market +25% are making the health count obsolete: "there is enough for everybody, lets throw all the food away". I have still 30 techs to reasearch. Although industrious, I could not build a single WW since 1600, as AI was having much more tech. My tech level matches the time of the game. back in 1980 after a conquest, me and pacal were even at around 6000points, then he attacked me but could only gain 2 small cities, however crippled my entire infrastructure (i have 48 cities and a hard time to control them, as the interface in the city screen is very slow on my athlon 3500+, single core) Now in 2008 im at 6600, pacal just captured the last non vassal state, and is at 8600. I guess he will attack me soon... :-( one round takes 1:45, so my next game on ROM will be def. on a standard map. maybe, the bounses for the advanced civics needs to be lowered. as the advanced civ's strength is growing to fast from 1700 on.... feel quite drunk now, so will continue watching the earth spin

edit: I have swtiched to my 1.80 GHz intel core 2 laptop, and the interface was much faster. however, at the end of the game around 2040, one round took 2:30. this is much to slow... i have really enjoyed the game, but at this speed and map size the future is unplayable

 

[Dewion]

i know this had been mentioned earlier, but the AI really sucks..
i know that i should play higher difficulty, but that "player gets minus that and AI gets plus that" feels stupid.. doesn't the higher difficulty make AI more clever? could that alone help enough, or does the AI still need that higher research and production?

actually, i even haven't test that in RoM, have u zap modified difficulties?

 

[Maatissi]

Well... It isn't exactly just that simple to code an AI that can actually beat human beings in sheer wits. Though I've always dreamed of an AI that could really analyze human played games and do some "patterns" derived from the succesful ones in its respective gameplay. This AI feedback should be sent to Firaxis, actually.

From my viewpoint, Zappara should concentrate on editing the tech tree and stuff like that right now. Graphic stuff also needs some attention, there are still paved motor car roads appearing in the early industrial age, long before automobiles, for instance...

Yeah, same old nagging?

 

[zappara]

actually, i even haven't test that in RoM, have u zap modified difficulties?

Hmm, I think I've left them untouched as I didn't think those need any changes. I haven't beaten the game on high difficulty levels yet and I used to play Civ1-3 on emperor level.

From my viewpoint, Zappara should concentrate on editing the tech tree and stuff like that right now. Graphic stuff also needs some attention, there are still paved motor car roads appearing in the early industrial age, long before automobiles, for instance...

Yeah, same old nagging?

Editing tech tree is such tedious task but I agree with you - I always put gameplay / balance / complexity ahead of graphics. Frankly I don't care much of graphics, I still play such games as ADOM (Anciend Domains of Mystery) which is completely done on ASCII graphics. But since many of other players like fancy graphics, I do what I can to add some I actually wanted to have more route types like carriage paths, roads, roman roads/highways (stone), asphalt roads, motor highways, sky roads, railroads, electric railroads, Maglevs.. unfortunately you just can't add new route types since it was hardcoded into game (was mentioned in some thread long ago).

 

[Maatissi]

Once again, thanks for your speedy reply.

It seems that even Civilization IV is not yet actually very flexible and versatile as could be expected with the "open" xml-code, though a great leap forward from the Civ III editor system.

For graphics, I simply point out realism. Having highways before automobiles just spoils the atmosphere. And yes, I like ADOM and Nethack, too. There is also no substitute for blitzing through good old Civ I when feeling nostalgic and hungry for "strategy snack"...

By the way, is there any way to edit the road patterns on the map? Sometimes the roads just run in quite odd manner, especially alongside rivers.

All in all, I still hold this mod as the best, looking forward to the version 2.0 quite enthusiastically. I hope you can also integrate more Civ-specific units/graphics in the future as, like I mentioned, they have a great deal in making the gaming experience more enjoyable, or "authentic" if you may. (I guess Snafusmith's Modern Warfare mod already has all the "graphical gadgets" one can dream of...)

Keep up the superb work!

 

[arkham4269]

I am playing as the Danes and for fun I put in all the British Isle Civs as well as the Vikings and Swedes.

The problem I'm running into is that many of them are aggressive races. My issue is not that they're acting aggressively, only that that's all they do. What is the point of being a Spi/Cre if all it seems to do is create a Civ that everyone else want's to 'steal'? I mean I have to spend almost all my time building units and defensive structures. Since I'm up against a lot of Aggressive cultures, they have the advantage on me with promotions and such.

What I don't like is that they are ALWAYS demanding stuff. Sure you sort of expect that from 'scruffy barbarians' but at no time do these Civ's ever ask for stuff. I mean if my culture is way high (and I'm not weak) you'd expect that some of these Civs would at least try to suck up to me to get some goodies. I'm tired of Civ's demanding things, especially when I may have 10 cities to their 3, I have iron & copper and they don't so if I did go to war with them, I'd snuff them.

Again what is the point of trying to play the 'high road' of culture and religion if you just end up being more of a magnet for the aggressive Civs? The one thing I was thinking is that there needs to be a much bigger penalty when a 'grunt' culture takes over a city of a higher Civ. As the Chinese used to say, "Go ahead, take our cities; in a generation you'll all be Chinese" So I think if the grubby Welsh take one of my cities, it should take much longer to stop revolting and I think it should have a higher chance to revolt if peace breaks out.

 

[LtChambers]

I am playing as the Danes and for fun I put in all the British Isle Civs as well as the Vikings and Swedes.

The problem I'm running into is that many of them are aggressive races. My issue is not that they're acting aggressively, only that that's all they do. What is the point of being a Spi/Cre if all it seems to do is create a Civ that everyone else want's to 'steal'? I mean I have to spend almost all my time building units and defensive structures. Since I'm up against a lot of Aggressive cultures, they have the advantage on me with promotions and such.

What I don't like is that they are ALWAYS demanding stuff. Sure you sort of expect that from 'scruffy barbarians' but at no time do these Civ's ever ask for stuff. I mean if my culture is way high (and I'm not weak) you'd expect that some of these Civs would at least try to suck up to me to get some goodies. I'm tired of Civ's demanding things, especially when I may have 10 cities to their 3, I have iron & copper and they don't so if I did go to war with them, I'd snuff them.

Again what is the point of trying to play the 'high road' of culture and religion if you just end up being more of a magnet for the aggressive Civs? The one thing I was thinking is that there needs to be a much bigger penalty when a 'grunt' culture takes over a city of a higher Civ. As the Chinese used to say, "Go ahead, take our cities; in a generation you'll all be Chinese" So I think if the grubby Welsh take one of my cities, it should take much longer to stop revolting and I think it should have a higher chance to revolt if peace breaks out.

I agree about AI demanding things. In my last game I dominated so much I just went around to various AIs and gave happy little gifts. It gave me a warm fuzzy feeling.

 

[arkham4269]

I agree about AI demanding things. In my last game I dominated so much I just went around to various AIs and gave happy little gifts. It gave me a warm fuzzy feeling.

I tell you, I almost want to go to war anytime I get "slapped" when I refuse someone something. Was this Firaxis idea of a joke? But I tell you, I ended up nuking Russia once because I refused this outrageous demand that Catherine asked of me and she slapped me. Use your diplomatic voice or you get the nukes!

I guess I'm sort of spoiled by the Europa Universalis game where going to war usually has more penalties. I think in ancient & medieval times, that if a war starts to go badly (like a stack of 8 units gets wiped out) then the warring nation would start having REALLY bad war weariness. Historically, when things started going bad, it meant the Gods hated you, your leader was inept and everyone sort of went home. So I don't understand it that a Aggressive Civ can be allowed to stay at war with me for years and years when most of the war consists of him coming in, getting destroyed, but I don't have enough combat power to retaliate. This bogs the game down for me, since I can't go on the attack, but I can't go back to building up my Civ because I'm still at war.

Plus, while the 'horde' strategy is very historical, I think that there should more of a penalty for having lots of units early in the game. If you have a horde, you damn well better being going the down the Mongol road because in real life you couldn't feed all those troops just to sit around and do nothing. So I feel that if a Aggressive Civ builds up his Army and goes to war, that's great, but if he gets whacked pretty quickly, peace should break out pretty quickly. History shows that Victory feeds Victory. Maybe there could even be a penalty (like in the old Mongol scenario) where if a Civ has been successful sacking cities, they start to accrue bonus promotions or maybe the defending Civ starts to have more war weariness to show they have lost faith in their own leaders.

 

[Galacticat42]

So I don't understand it that a Aggressive Civ can be allowed to stay at war with me for years and years when most of the war consists of him coming in, getting destroyed, but I don't have enough combat power to retaliate. This bogs the game down for me, since I can't go on the attack, but I can't go back to building up my Civ because I'm still at war.

Well, when that happens, I usually scavenge the planet looking for some1 that hates him enough to distract him while i build up an army to destroy him, or if i cant find anyone, i'll bribe the biggest civ i can find.

So I feel that if a Aggressive Civ builds up his Army and goes to war, that's great, but if he gets whacked pretty quickly, peace should break out pretty quickly. History shows that Victory feeds Victory. Maybe there could even be a penalty (like in the old Mongol scenario) where if a Civ has been successful sacking cities, they start to accrue bonus promotions or maybe the defending Civ starts to have more war weariness to show they have lost faith in their own leaders.