Balance on Deity

[Stalker0]

I consistently settle 6-8, and can go 10 if I want. I've had games where I settle 12-14 cities on my own before ~125. Happiness is just a number for most of the game, and I'd rather be at -15 with 6-10 cities than +10 with 4 most games. At least until later when the yields are a huge factor for happiness. Early on it's mostly the combat strength I care about, and that's solved by having 2x more cities than my enemy.

If you are focusing on combat I could see this.

I can say that 4 cities will generate significantly more culture and science than the 6-10 cities you mentioned with that happiness penalty, so it definitely matters

 

[SionEnglaid]

That’s fine, but it doesn’t refute my point. Negative happiness is a hole that a lot of new players have a hard time getting out of. That’s my point: he’s new the mod, may be underestimating the happiness system and spamming REX style.

Not really struggeling with happiness. Since cities cause less unhappiness compared to vanilla - pop seems to be way more important - spamming 10 cities is not a big problem. Depending on the game, I sometimes dip into low unhappiness up to -10. And even that does not feel bad if mitigated after a while. More often than not, I stay happy by keeping up with roads and after that improving luxs. If happiness is an issue, it's usually way later in the era before I get my ideology.

 

[Deadstarre]

couple problems i'm seeing on the 1/14 patch leading to deity easyness:

1) too many unimproved tiles for AI, staying unimproved for too long a time. are they not building enough workers anymore? is %70 AIworkrate bonus not enough?

2) loss of food on buildings / specialist food increase making a regular occurrence out of the city governor issue where they could be not starving yet due to low growth expectation they prefer to work a 2food tile over a superior tile with 7 non-food yields

3) loss of border growth bonus should stay gone but it's hurting them, they need to be more pro-active about buying tiles (and improving them) to keep up with their pop at times. do they need more gold to do it?

 

[Gazebo]

couple problems i'm seeing on the 1/14 patch leading to deity easyness:

1) too many unimproved tiles for AI, staying unimproved for too long a time. are they not building enough workers anymore? is %70 AIworkrate bonus not enough?

2) loss of food on buildings / specialist food increase making a regular occurrence out of the city governor issue where they could be not starving yet due to low growth expectation they prefer to work a 2food tile over a superior tile with 7 non-food yields

3) loss of border growth bonus should stay gone but it's hurting them, they need to be more pro-active about buying tiles (and improving them) to keep up with their pop at times. do they need more gold to do it?

At this point Deity VP starts off roughly where Immortal starts in vanilla. It’s the late game that really shows the AI’s potential re: Deity.

G

 

[Deadstarre]

At this point Deity VP starts off roughly where Immortal starts in vanilla. It’s the late game that really shows the AI’s potential re: Deity.

G

not sure what that has to do with them needing help on their tile infrastructure.

BTW this is what happens when i'm the only one in a game who takes rationalism (and if it was the AI, people would be posting "why is one AI gaining 10 tech lead near the end of industrial?"). this whole idea that the tech leaders have woes from supply cap and/or must fall behind on city buildings because they didn't take industry is bogus; empiricism needs to be reworked its just too much science and is ruining games.

 

[DarkZero]

At this point Deity VP starts off roughly where Immortal starts in vanilla. It’s the late game that really shows the AI’s potential re: Deity.

G

People around here must suffer from memory loss...you gave deity a single free tech at the start of the game and everyone freaked out, them everyone, @Deadstarre included, started a massive discussion on how, whit the exception of archaeological digs, the deity bonuses where to front loaded and created games where the moment you finally managed to surpass the ai you basically won the game... which them created a bonus yields formula change that made ai bonuses more spread out and lower in the early game/stronger on the late game, and while the numbers may not even been final right now, everyone seemed to agree it was a change for the best, and now here we are where suddenly 100 turns into a deity game where the human player is not dead last now made deity the new settler...tsk tsk tsk.

I am really feeling sorry for you G, so much time,sweat and blood pored to make the ai as good as possible and its looks like in every single thread someone who never looked into a single line of ai code has found massive logic flaws whit your baby.

 

[Gazebo]

People around here must suffer from memory loss...you gave deity a single free tech at the start of the game and everyone freaked out, them everyone, @Deadstarre included, started a massive discussion on how, whit the exception of archaeological digs, the deity bonuses where to front loaded and created games where the moment you finally managed to surpass the ai you basically won the game... which them created a bonus yields formula change that made ai bonuses more spread out and lower in the early game/stronger on the late game, and while the numbers may not even been final right now, everyone seemed to agree it was a change for the best, and now here we are where suddenly 100 turns into a deity game where the human player is not dead last now made deity the new settler...tsk tsk tsk.

I am really feeling sorry for you G, so much time,sweat and blood pored to make the ai as good as possible and its looks like in every single thread someone who never looked into a single line of ai code has found massive logic flaws whit your baby.

not sure what that has to do with them needing help on their tile infrastructure.

BTW this is what happens when i'm the only one in a game who takes rationalism (and if it was the AI, people would be posting "why is one AI gaining 10 tech lead near the end of industrial?"). this whole idea that the tech leaders have woes from supply cap and/or must fall behind on city buildings because they didn't take industry is bogus; empiricism needs to be reworked its just too much science and is ruining games.

I'm not going to load the save, but what's wrong with Empiricism, exactly?

G

 

[tu_79]

People around here must suffer from memory loss...you gave deity a single free tech at the start of the game and everyone freaked out, them everyone, @Deadstarre included, started a massive discussion on how, whit the exception of archaeological digs, the deity bonuses where to front loaded and created games where the moment you finally managed to surpass the ai you basically won the game... which them created a bonus yields formula change that made ai bonuses more spread out and lower in the early game/stronger on the late game, and while the numbers may not even been final right now, everyone seemed to agree it was a change for the best, and now here we are where suddenly 100 turns into a deity game where the human player is not dead last now made deity the new settler...tsk tsk tsk.

I am really feeling sorry for you G, so much time,sweat and blood pored to make the ai as good as possible and its looks like in every single thread someone who never looked into a single line of ai code has found massive logic flaws whit your baby.

Agree. But I think most complaints come from people expecting the game to be played as in vanilla. It is a rather different game now, and it needs to be played differently. So, when we say that you need to show the winning screen that's for something. Handicaps are not fine tuned, but it is so easy to tweak, that every player can tune up his game to make the perfect challenge for himself. I think this could be emphasized more often.
Dislike how immortal starts with so many units? Easy change. Dislike how you can keep up the pace with deity AI in early game? Easy change.
Base settings should be those whose most of us agree are challenging and fun, but not everyone has to agree, and they can modify what they like, with little trouble (most are text edits in a xml file).

 

[Deadstarre]

I'm not going to load the save, but what's wrong with Empiricism, exactly?

G

we had this discussion before. last time i did the math it was something like +%14 unconditional flat science bonus (math for 10 cities i think). then you lowered it from %3 to %2 reduction. I found it was still generating runaway science leads in my games so i reworked the policy entirely last time i was playing. but its been awhile, so for 1/14 i (mostly) gave VP out of the box another shot and in this game i have 15 cities (no puppets), its turn 269 im in atomic era and because i'm the only one who took rationalism I have a 10+tech lead on every AI, 50+ happiness, no supply cap problem, city infrastructure up to date.

to the heart of everything I said about giant % modifiers being a problem, empiricism is still the biggest one of all because of the way it works. and unlike normal city % modifiers this one takes into account and works on top of everything in the game including instants and bulbs, every % modifier, all empire modifiers the happiness modifier, everything. its just too much science, the penalty reducing mechanic needs to go the way of the dodo bird.

i'll be reworking it again for myself (and nerfing industry slightly to compensate; does imperialism look appealing yet?) but i remember last time someone made a thread about a perfectly balanced game that stayed balanced late into the game and then suddenly saw an AI skyrocket an enormous 10+ tech lead out of thin air that ruined their game, i felt bad for them cause I know it sucks and I also know this policy is the biggest reason why that happens.

re difficulty: i'm also going to try increasing their AIworkrate bonus and see if it helps, these unimproved tiles are definitely a problem considering their high pop and loss of border growth. I expect this would be a sane way to keep AI competitive early to mid without giving them bad bonuses that destroy or limit gameplay options.

 

[SionEnglaid]

After we spent quite a lot of time discussing possible issues with the setup, I started a game of Deity on Pangea playing the Netherlands on the latest beta build. The AI quickly colonized the whole continent. But they were still a step behind me. I think I just snowballed from a strong early game. I am currently in the industrial era and still rocking triple the average stats, number 1 on everything, having completely absorbed two of my neighbors. I am owning roughly a third of the map. It was more interesting than some of my earlier games on Fractal or Communitas, but still way less competitive than Vanilla or NQ. I agree with another person's assessment in here that Deity roughly plays like vanilla Immortal in the beginning. But I don't see any significant catching up so far. I'll keep you updated as I play further.

 

[Gothic_Empire]

Listening to people talk about this mod makes me think I must be just awful at this game.

 

[tu_79]

Listening to people talk about this mod makes me think I must be just awful at this game.

I accept I'm not as good as other players, but I have fun with it nonetheless. But don't let some commentaries decept you. Many players go for epic pace, so they can take advantage of their superior tactical skills.

Also, I think this whole thread is because some people are used to vanilla difficulty, where you are nothing compared to the AI and if you manage to survive to renaissance it's automatic win. Now, it's a different concept, where you can beat the other AI quite easily in the early game if you have luck and skill, but it gets harder and harder, so winning is not guaranteed. It's perhaps the biggest change from vanilla.

 

[Gothic_Empire]

I'm in a situation where i will win on King 90% of the time, unless an AI snowballs off in the fog somewhere during the early game.

Emperor consistently kicks my ass. Unless I spawn on my own private island, the best city locations are snapped up before I can get to them (sometimes being settled the turn before my settler can do it), I'll miss almost every wonder I try for, I'll be behind in techs and policies both by turn 100 or so, and the AI ALWAYS has "territorial disputes" with me that lead to early wars that I can't really win -- archers and spears vs. legions was my last game. Rome was just slamming into my holy city while my archers hit for 1 damage a round and I had to buy new spearmen every turn.

I don't know what to change about my game to avoid this.

 

[tu_79]

Don't go for wonders if you are not certain that you have some advantage (beelined tech and high production, or a great engineer).

Also, in emperor you need to pay attention that every citizen is working on the best possible tile. If they do not, you are doing something wrong. You can no longer let your cities grow happily ignoring what those new people are going to do. This usually involves a worker unit with an escort for a while.

You cannot let barbarians or other wars stop your development.

 

[ElliotS]

I'm in a situation where i will win on King 90% of the time, unless an AI snowballs off in the fog somewhere during the early game.

Emperor consistently kicks my ass. Unless I spawn on my own private island, the best city locations are snapped up before I can get to them (sometimes being settled the turn before my settler can do it), I'll miss almost every wonder I try for, I'll be behind in techs and policies both by turn 100 or so, and the AI ALWAYS has "territorial disputes" with me that lead to early wars that I can't really win -- archers and spears vs. legions was my last game. Rome was just slamming into my holy city while my archers hit for 1 damage a round and I had to buy new spearmen every turn.

I don't know what to change about my game to avoid this.

If you look closely you'll realise you're making a ton of mistakes. You don't need to play a perfect game to play Diety, so I know you've got room to grow. Just pay atention every time you make a choice or you reflect one one.

Any time you work a worse tile. Any time you delay getting a worker and lose yields that you could have had. Any time you build a worker too early and don't have tiles for it to upgrade, wasting gold and opportunity cost. Any time settling one or two tiles away would have been better. Any time you have a big military and DON'T use it to bully a neighbor. Any time you don't have a big military and get your butt kicked. Any time you could have picked a better religious belief. Etc.

Those are all chances to grow. Look at photo journals, videos of us playing and whatnot if you need to, but an honest evaluation of your choices is all it really takes in my experience.

 

[tu_79]

If you look closely you'll realise you're making a ton of mistakes. You don't need to play a perfect game to play Diety, so I know you've got room to grow. Just pay atention every time you make a choice or you reflect one one.

Any time you work a worse tile. Any time you delay getting a worker and lose yields that you could have had. Any time you build a worker too early and don't have tiles for it to upgrade, wasting gold and opportunity cost. Any time settling one or two tiles away would have been better. Any time you have a big military and DON'T use it to bully a neighbor. Any time you don't have a big military and get your butt kicked. Any time you could have picked a better religious belief. Etc.

Those are all chances to grow. Look at photo journals, videos of us playing and whatnot if you need to, but an honest evaluation of your choices is all it really takes in my experience.

Damn! You are describing my last game.

I've learned the hard way that you can't have workers without escorts if you don't have close neighbours. Those barbarians don't let your workers do their work.

 

[MorphBer]

I'm in a situation where i will win on King 90% of the time, unless an AI snowballs off in the fog somewhere during the early game.

Emperor consistently kicks my ass. Unless I spawn on my own private island, the best city locations are snapped up before I can get to them (sometimes being settled the turn before my settler can do it), I'll miss almost every wonder I try for, I'll be behind in techs and policies both by turn 100 or so, and the AI ALWAYS has "territorial disputes" with me that lead to early wars that I can't really win -- archers and spears vs. legions was my last game. Rome was just slamming into my holy city while my archers hit for 1 damage a round and I had to buy new spearmen every turn.

I don't know what to change about my game to avoid this.

I was doing ok on Emperor but with the new patch I had to surender 2 games around turn 100 because I can't get expanding early working.

3rd game this is how it looks after 320 turn:



I was wondering why this was so dominatin contrast to the previous games. Easy neighbors? Godess of Purity with 1-2rshes or Lakes in every early city? Then I remembered I put difficulty back to king out of frustration... The gap between those two is unreal...

Fun fact Mongolia is second with 17 Techs (others have 20-26)

 

[tu_79]

I was doing ok on Emperor but with the new patch I had to surender 2 games around turn 100 because I can't get expanding early working.

3rd game this is how it looks after 320 turn:

View attachment 486086

I was wondering why this was so dominatin contrast to the previous games. Easy neighbors? Godess of Purity with 1-2rshes or Lakes in every early city? Then I remembered I put difficulty back to king out of frustration... The gap between those two is unreal...

Fun fact Mongolia is second with 17 Techs (others have 20-26)

View attachment 486085

Tweak AI handicap, specially C.

 

[MorphBer]

I am not a fan of adjusting myself, I take what is given by G

 

[tu_79]

I am not a fan of adjusting myself, I take what is given by G

It's a work in progress. Values provided in the release are for testing. Both ElliotS and I think that early values should be lower. Just test it with handicapC = 100.