Beta 12

[AbsintheRed]

I didn't think of the Plakaat of Verlatinghe. So 1581 is fine. If we would change it to 1576, it made it easier for me to write a Dawn of Man. But it isn't neccessary.

Considering this, I changed my mind. 1581 Is better, because it is a formal declaration of indepence.

I also don't mind it either way
It's totally up to you, whatever fits better in your eyes
You are the dutch after all

 

[merijn_v1]

As I said, I changed my mind and I think 1581 is the best date. (And I have a different Dawn of Man text now)

 

[AbsintheRed]

I'm adding a few more hints:
- You cannot trade techs you didn't discover yourself, also your newly discovered techs cannot be traded for 10 turns.
- In RFCE you cannot declare war on newly spawned civs for 5 turns.
- Don't be surprised if the AI values techs suprisingly high: One of the factors modifying your tech costs is the size of your empire.
- You won't get huge diplo boost just for sharing a religion with another civ. You have to earn faith points for that.

Anything else needed?

 

[Tigranes]

Year 1546 -- Turkey signs a defensive pact with Germany.

Year 1548 -- all hell breaks loose. Turkey declares on the former master -- Bulgaria, my ally (I am Austria).

Naturally, this means a war with Turks. Makes sense. But then Germany declares on me How so? I thought they had defensive pact with Turkey, not offensive.
But it gets even more crazy. All my allies dropped me over the issue! First Bulgaria, who got me into this mess in a first place, and then England. But in the meantime Germany never dropped Turkey! Does not make any sense! Can somebody tell me what is a bug here and what is intentional?

 

[Veshta]

Welcome to the diplomatic mess that caused World War One .. alliances and treaties criss crossing the continent.
Turkey declares on Bulgaria, you then declare on Turkey as per Bulgarian arrangement .. this represents an attack on Turkey which invokes the German defensive pact.

You were dropped like yesterdays garbage because you were suddenly at war with what was probably the two biggest military powers around (if my games are anything to go by) so your relative power plummeted ..

It is very important to keep track of the various alliances and make sure you have your back covered once the techs for them start coming into play .. in your case a pact with France prior to the Turkish attack will make the German front a lot more manageable for example.

Isn't politics fun?

 

[Opera]

They dropped you? But they're in the war as well. Defensive pacts are automatically cancelled when "used up" IIRC.

 

[Sian]

lets see

Turkey declares on Bulgaria
You honor pact with Bulgaria declaring on Turkey (game forgetting to delete the pact)
Germany honors pact with Turkey (which unless pacts been changed in RFCE, should have been deleted when Turkey declared a offensive war), Declaring on You
Bulgaria honors pact with You, declaring on Germany (forgetting to delete once again)
Sweden Honors Pact with Germany Declaring on Bulgaria
You Honor pact with Bulgaria declaring on Sweden (deleting the pacts with Bulgaria and Sweden, since they respectively is honored and broken as per wardeclaration)
England honors pact with You declaring on Germany (deleting the pact since they honors it by declaring on someone declaring on you)

 

[Opera]

I'm not sure it "forgot". It may simply be that they aren't lifted until the whole cascading DoWs are finished.

 

[Sian]

Opera, if thats the case then Sweden should have declared on England (given that they decalred on Germany, and Germany is the only logical access point for Sweden, given that they was the only one declaring on Bulgaria)

 

[Wessel V1]

In RFC 1.180 Rhye made a change to the Defensive Pact mechanics: they remain until cancelled in a formal way. That caused many World Wars that didn't exist before in RFC. In RFCE this mechanic exists too, so DP's won't get broken by a war declaration. I'm not too much into this part of European History (1500 - 1800) but I think that considering the many relations the families had among each other, it should stay this way.

 

[Tigranes]

Guys, I think I was clear in my first post...
Here are the bugs:
(1) Germany should not declare on me, as her pact with Turkey is defensive, not offensive.
(2) Germany should drop Turkey -- but they never did.

may be (3) I got dropped...

I am not sure about "used up" alliances -- is it so? It can make sense but needs to be explained somewhere. Relative powers have nothing to do with all this -- there was no formal cancel visit by any of the leaders -- it all happened during the same turn -- as you see Bulgaria DID drop me later during the SAME turn (begining of the turn in fact).

 

[Tigranes]

Now another question, please -- why do we have such an easy 1st and 3rd UHV for Austria? With my UP I was able to make 3 defensive pacts in 1500s and control required lands by 1400s.

Historically Bohemia and Hungary were not VERY stable for Austria. Think Hussite wars and multiple Hungarian revolts. How about keeping the first UHV as it is but changing stability of those lands to unstable?

For 3rd UHV we really need something more exciting. Austria was the champion of counter-reformation (along with Spain, which already has its counterreformation UHV). How about no countries with Protestant religion? You don't have to use force only -- using Austrias UP you can convince Dutch to open borders, send missionaries and change religion...

 

[3Miro]

Now another question, please -- why do we have such an easy 1st and 3rd UHV for Austria? With my UP I was able to make 3 defensive pacts in 1500s and control required lands by 1400s.

Historically Bohemia and Hungary were not VERY stable for Austria. Think Hussite wars and multiple Hungarian revolts. How about keeping the first UHV as it is but changing stability of those lands to unstable?

For 3rd UHV we really need something more exciting. Austria was the champion of counter-reformation (along with Spain, which already has its counterreformation UHV). How about no countries with Protestant religion? You don't have to use force only -- using Austrias UP you can convince Dutch to open borders, send missionaries and change religion...

That is definitely interesting. OB + Missionaries would definitely work for the Dutch, but England and Sweden would be much harder. Do you think you can actually do this, that is, leave no Protestant nations in say 1700 or some other appropriate year.

 

[dragodon64]

Guys, I think I was clear in my first post...
Here are the bugs:
(1) Germany should not declare on me, as her pact with Turkey is defensive, not offensive.
(2) Germany should drop Turkey -- but they never did.

may be (3) I got dropped...

I am not sure about "used up" alliances -- is it so? It can make sense but needs to be explained somewhere. Relative powers have nothing to do with all this -- there was no formal cancel visit by any of the leaders -- it all happened during the same turn -- as you see Bulgaria DID drop me later during the SAME turn (begining of the turn in fact).

The order of declarations decides whether or not it's defense, not any geopolitical situation.
You, as Bulgaria's ally, declared war on Turkey, they never declared war on you.
Thus, Germany declared war on you, for DOWing Turkey.
Thus, Bulgaria declares war on Germany, for DOWing you.

You can see how this goes. Note that since Turkey didn't DOW on you, England doesn't DOW them, just Germany. And although it doesn't say that the Turko-German alliance was canceled, that might be the case anyway, since Turkey didn't DOW on England for DOWing on Germany.

 

[AbsintheRed]

The order of declarations decides whether or not it's defense, not any geopolitical situation.
You, as Bulgaria's ally, declared war on Turkey, they never declared war on you.
Thus, Germany declared war on you, for DOWing Turkey.
Thus, Bulgaria declares war on Germany, for DOWing you.

You can see how this goes. Note that since Turkey didn't DOW on you, England doesn't DOW them, just Germany. And although it doesn't say that the Turko-German alliance was canceled, that might be the case anyway, since Turkey didn't DOW on England for DOWing on Germany.

Indeed. Pretty straightforward, isn't it?
And yeah, IMO all defensive pacts should stay, and the Ottomans should have DOWed England too
Most of these war declarations are formal anyway, since the civs are far away from each other

EDIT: Sweden should have also declared war on England
We have two groups: Austria has defensive pact with Bulgaria and England, Germany is with Turkey and Sweden
The correct order should be:
Turkey on Bulgaria
Austria (DP with Bulgaria) on Turkey
Germany (DP with Turkey) on Austria
Bulgaria and England (DP with Austria) on Germany
Sweden (DP with Germany) on both Bulgaria and England, also Turkey (DP with Germany) on England
Austria (DP with Bulgaria and England) on Sweden

Basically everyone should be in war with everyone from the other group
The deals should either be cancelled on the very end of the turn, after everything happened, or should stay, and only formal cancelation is possible.
I prefer the second version
IMO it's more realistic this way, and more wars are good for the mod

 

[AbsintheRed]

Now another question, please -- why do we have such an easy 1st and 3rd UHV for Austria? With my UP I was able to make 3 defensive pacts in 1500s and control required lands by 1400s.

Historically Bohemia and Hungary were not VERY stable for Austria. Think Hussite wars and multiple Hungarian revolts. How about keeping the first UHV as it is but changing stability of those lands to unstable?

For 3rd UHV we really need something more exciting. Austria was the champion of counter-reformation (along with Spain, which already has its counterreformation UHV). How about no countries with Protestant religion? You don't have to use force only -- using Austrias UP you can convince Dutch to open borders, send missionaries and change religion...

You are probably right on this
Austria keeps Hungary and Bohemia way too easily.
Also, the UHV's are not that interesting
I like your 3rd UHV suggestion, but we have to be sure it's possible under most circumstances

 

[amrod]

I'm adding a few more hints:
- You cannot trade techs you didn't discover yourself, also your newly discovered techs cannot be traded for 10 turns.
- In RFCE you cannot declare war on newly spawned civs for 5 turns.
- Don't be surprised if the AI values techs suprisingly high: One of the factors modifying your tech costs is the size of your empire.
- You won't get huge diplo boost just for sharing a religion with another civ. You have to earn faith points for that.

Anything else needed?

Very good, I see some of my questions' answers here I'd suggest these put into
the pedia as well (concepts page).
Also, first hint could say any civ, not just you.

I don't quite understand the tech value hint, can you explain please? (And does it have a connection with the AI liking to offer tech deals greatly overprized in their favour, even when friendly?)

 

[Wessel V1]

Tech values are based on 3 different variables:

1. The base value of the tech.
2. The research modifiers both traders have, these can be found in the Consts.py file. This variable explains why you should trade techs with Byzantium in the early game. I think the AI compares it's own research cost (let's say 1000 base x 500% modifier = 5000) with the amount of beakers it receives in return. This however seems to be the base value only, so it will trade 5 techs of 1000 base value to one of 1000, but it thinks it trades 5000 to 5000.
This also applies the other way round. Civs like France have heavy research penalties so it is harder to trade techs with them. Genoa on the other hand has an easy time as a tech trader.
3. The number of cities both traders have. I think the penalty is handled the same way as in 2. The more cities you have, the harder it becomes to trade techs because in the tech valuation the AI doesn't consider this penalty. Civs that heavily rely on tech trading should avoid overexpansion at all costs.

 

[3Miro]

Tech values are based on 3 different variables:

1. The base value of the tech.
2. The research modifiers both traders have, these can be found in the Consts.py file. This variable explains why you should trade techs with Byzantium in the early game. I think the AI compares it's own research cost (let's say 1000 base x 500% modifier = 5000) with the amount of beakers it receives in return. This however seems to be the base value only, so it will trade 5 techs of 1000 base value to one of 1000, but it thinks it trades 5000 to 5000.
This also applies the other way round. Civs like France have heavy research penalties so it is harder to trade techs with them. Genoa on the other hand has an easy time as a tech trader.
3. The number of cities both traders have. I think the penalty is handled the same way as in 2. The more cities you have, the harder it becomes to trade techs because in the tech valuation the AI doesn't consider this penalty. Civs that heavily rely on tech trading should avoid overexpansion at all costs.

This is about tech trading.

In RFCE, there is a base tech cost, however, when you research the tech, the cost changes based upon the turn on which you discover the tech. The earlier you discover a tech, the more beakers you will have to pay. If you discover the tech later, then you will have to spend less research.

RFC and BtS already have similar mechanics in the sense that if many other players have already discovered a tech, then it would be cheaper for you to research it too. In RFCE you have additional (and somewhat heavy modifier) based upon the historically accurate time for a tech to be discovered.

 

[AbsintheRed]

Very good, I see some of my questions' answers here I'd suggest these put into
the pedia as well (concepts page).
Also, first hint could say any civ, not just you.

Yep, I eventually plan to update the civilopedia too
The first hint is meant to cover all civs. Isn't it clear the way it is now, should I change it?