Civ: favorites and balance discussion

[Psychodad]

Grigori

Atm i am playing a game with gregori and realized that some mechanics can be heaviely exploited with them.

(for explanation, units with second chance alway flee to the left when defeated, so you can easiely put them left next to a babarian lair. When they retreat you can kill the attacking barb with a nother second chance unit or a fast one to get infinity kills and xp)

1. They start with two Adventurers. As long as there is no requirement to upgrade them to the strongest units other than gold, thats OP IMO. Local legend gives them another adventurer.

2. Treasure hunter (and many other grigori units) get the hero promotion as soon as they kill one living unit (witch is very easy using the above trick). Since trasure hunter is availible from the beginning u can build a few before running out of leather.

3. Upgrade all your heroes to vengence diciple -> bard. By farming barb lair you get a ton of culture. Even very erly in game u can aproximatly get about 500-1000 culture per turn.

 

[esvath]

1) maybe Grigori should start with one adventurer?


2) the chance for regular Grigori units to get Hero is only 1%.

Personally, I feel that Grigori is a little bit bland atm. What do you think?

 

[Jojo_Fr]

Grigori

Atm i am playing a game with gregori and realized that some mechanics can be heaviely exploited with them.

(for explanation, units with second chance alway flee to the left when defeated, so you can easiely put them left next to a babarian lair. When they retreat you can kill the attacking barb with a nother second chance unit or a fast one to get infinity kills and xp)

- Hum, is second chance is permanant, or can you regain it ? If yes, it should not it's a problem. If it's not permanant, the problem you explain look me acceptable.

1. They start with two Adventurers. As long as there is no requirement to upgrade them to the strongest units other than gold, thats OP IMO. Local legend gives them another adventurer.

- I don't see the problem here. Adventurers are a rare unit and you can only obtain them on a diminush return courb, right ?

2. Treasure hunter (and many other grigori units) get the hero promotion as soon as they kill one living unit (witch is very easy using the above trick). Since trasure hunter is availible from the beginning u can build a few before running out of leather.

- If they get the hero promotion, it's totally broken. It should be removed (could be replaced by battle hardened promotion, for exemple). And grigori have enough hero with their adventurers.

3. Upgrade all your heroes to vengence diciple -> bard. By farming barb lair you get a ton of culture. Even very erly in game u can aproximatly get about 500-1000 culture per turn.

- Bard promotion was totally overpowered before, I guessed it was planned to reduce it a lot. It should be replaced with a tiny culture bonus (+20 culture per victory). There is too a promotion which give gold per kill, +2 or +5 I guess. +20 culture looks me good.

 

[Psychodad]

1) maybe Grigori should start with one adventurer?

ok. Maybe even nerf the adventurer ability to upgrade to high lvl units. For example make the tier of the unit the adventurer can upgrade to dependant from adventurer level. Or make the upgrade not only cost gold, but also global yield.

2) the chance for regular Grigori units to get Hero is only 1%.

Actually every grigori special unit other than militia get the hero promotion as soon as they defeat their first living unit.

- Hum, is second chance is permanant, or can you regain it ? If yes, it should not it's a problem. If it's not permanant, the problem you explain look me acceptable.

Second chance is removed after defeat. Hero promotion lets you regain this effect with 30% chance per turn. Whitch means aproximatly every second turn.

 

[esvath]

Actually every grigori special unit other than militia get the hero promotion as soon as they defeat their first living unit.

In the xml, it is only 5% chance actually, not 1%. If you got Hero promotion after combat for all of your units, can we attribute that to your extremely good luck with the RNG?

On serious note: how about Grigori units get Second Chance after combat? 10% chance? That would be less reliable than getting Hero straight away...

Militia gets +5% chance to be Adventurer after combat.

Edit: do you really think Bard is OP? They get +100 culture now, but that prevent them from getting good combat abilities...

 

[Psychodad]

In the xml, it is only 5% chance actually, not 1%. If you got Hero promotion after combat for all of your units, can we attribute that to your extremely good luck with the RNG?

No. Every grigori unit other than milita has the special ability to get the hero promotion after killing their first living unit. Works like the Description says. Got it with treasure hunter in different games about 15 times, that would be very lucky.

On serious note: how about Grigori units get Second Chance after combat? 10% chance? That would be less reliable than getting Hero straight away...

Getting hero promotion seems ok for me, maybe 10%? Otherwise every grogori player would focus on militia for the 5% adventurer chance.

Edit: do you really think Bard is OP? They get +100 culture now, but that prevent them from getting good combat abilities...

Bard generate 200 per vitory, 100 would be better.

 

[Psychodad]

Pillage

Pillaging need ajustement or rework, just plundert a copper mine for 2500 metal. Before i plundered several trade centers. One got me abaut 500 gold, another one 70 Gold, one about 70 Food. A wild camp for 300 food and a marbel querry for 150 gold, a silver mine for about 500 gold.

That was on quick gamespeed.

Some values are much too high (500 gold, 2500 metal), other unusual (food from tradecenter?).

 

[Jojo_Fr]

- I totally agree with the idea to nerf the pillage. It should give 200 gold or ressources at maximum (double with raider trait). I often only make war just to pillage the ennemy land, to give me some ressources. War for pillage should not exist, pillage should just be a bonus.

- Something like that for the improvements with 4 stade of augmentation (as the trading post) :

Cottage : 50 gold. Village : 75 : Hamlet : 125 : Town : 200.

And all ressources including gold, should give these values, not more. So a trading post should only give 50 ressources (as 10 wood, 10 gold, 10 stone, 10 leather and 10 metal).

 

[Shoobs]

In the xml, it is only 5% chance actually, not 1%. If you got Hero promotion after combat for all of your units, can we attribute that to your extremely good luck with the RNG?

On serious note: how about Grigori units get Second Chance after combat? 10% chance? That would be less reliable than getting Hero straight away...

Militia gets +5% chance to be Adventurer after combat.

Edit: do you really think Bard is OP? They get +100 culture now, but that prevent them from getting good combat abilities...

I find bards are indispensable in the early game and make most of my units with that promotion. Their importance for traits and guilds cannot be emphasized more imo, and if you get things set up right, you can get them to hero rather quickly.
I also feel that certain civilizations who do not get access to bards with the exception of a few units ( Luchiurp and Aristrakh, minimum ) to be at a severe and costly disadvantage.

 

[Jojo_Fr]

- Luchuirp I don't see why, they are alives and their hearth is vaillant. But Aristarkh or Infernals yes I agree they should have not bard. ^^

- Bards are clearly overpowered, because the others choices are pretty weak compared to having access faster to new guilds ! Giving so much culture by killing a unit, incluiding any animals, it's like giving +200 beakeror +200 gold, it's absurd and illogical. I am not sure that bard should exist.

- Why not giving to bards a permanent culture created by turn ? +5 culture per turn for exemple, would be acceptable, compared to a decidated theatre in a city, which produce not more than that ! What do you think ?

 

[Shoobs]

I am not denying Luchiurp the ability to have bards, I am saying GETTING to have bards is less likely due to the nature of exp. Aristrakh do have experience granting units, and you can just select Bard.


In any case, neither here or there. THe amount bards give IS rather high and I've exploited it a significant amount in all civilizations to blow past the AI.

 

[esvath]

Bards will get 100 culture per combat in the next version. Is it still too much?

Keep in mind that the class itself does not give combat benefits at all? It still need to be competitive compared with other classes, such as Warlord (25% Second Chance) etc.

 

[Jojo_Fr]

- It's much better. But bard will still be the best class in the wilderness situation.

- Wilderness should be a danger to fight, not something to farm (and bards are farmers). But, if people really like bards (me I don't), you should keep them.

- If not, we can imagine that bard promotion give to a unit a passive cultural bonus when stationned to a city. It does with the unit as if she were a super specialist when she is on a city. Would it not be more logical ? I don't see why killing barbarians or animals could lead to a cultural developpement for a civilization. ^^

 

[Calavente]

I like bards.
and I don't think them as too much OP.
the poison master / aeron's chosen is much more OP in the early game.
having your early recon go bard does not allow them to get better str than units in the wild... or a way to gain xp quickly... so while you have an easy time against wolves, once you meet giant spiders or werewolves you lost a unit.

however, maybe reducing the culture to 100 would be good.
or maybe : 50+5*Level... ? so it would rise with the unit... and be less over-strong early game?

 

[Psychodad]

or maybe : 50+5*Level... ? so it would rise with the unit... and be less over-strong early game?

Good idea, why not 50 + level². Would be rewarding to have a ledendary Bard.

 

[esvath]

Ok, 50 + 5*level, then. A level 10 Bard will get 100 culture per combat.

 

[Shoobs]

Ok, 50 + 5*level, then. A level 10 Bard will get 100 culture per combat.

I am ok with this. Still abuseable, but not overly so as before.

 

[Calavente]

well, bard is abusable.
but +5str at level 6 is also abusable... (aeron chosen + poison master).

I'm not even sure that 50+5*level + spell is enough to balance with other paths.

Maybe Bards could get a further bonus ? (str aura ? can be sacrificed in city for a +1 culture per bard specialist building / or +1happy +10 culture/turn ? like sage-arcane unit can be sacrificed? or they get free xp/turn when in a Bard district ? or something else.)

/regards

 

[User0918]

ok. Maybe even nerf the adventurer ability to upgrade to high lvl units. For example make the tier of the unit the adventurer can upgrade to dependant from adventurer level. Or make the upgrade not only cost gold, but also global yield.

I second that, the upgrade from Adventurer right into the most powerful units IG is just way out of line with the general power progression in early/mid game. If you explore a lot in the beginning and get lucky with the goody huts you can get to 1200 gold pretty fast.
That gives you for example access to a Chevalier, he's double the strength of the warrior and even brings along equipment you probably won't have unlocked yet. If you manage to get one of these you can waltz right into any city, there is nothing the enemy can throw at you to stop it that early.

Where does the adventurer get the knowledge from to upgrade into that unit? No civ has researched it yet, is he some sort of time traveler ? There should be an explanation for this behaviour, otherwise it's totally immersion-breaking. But even with a backstory, it'd still be op and should not work that way imo.

 

[CarnivalBizarre]

I second that, the upgrade from Adventurer right into the most powerful units IG is just way out of line with the general power progression in early/mid game. If you explore a lot in the beginning and get lucky with the goody huts you can get to 1200 gold pretty fast.
That gives you for example access to a Chevalier, he's double the strength of the warrior and even brings along equipment you probably won't have unlocked yet. If you manage to get one of these you can waltz right into any city, there is nothing the enemy can throw at you to stop it that early.

Where does the adventurer get the knowledge from to upgrade into that unit? No civ has researched it yet, is he some sort of time traveler ? There should be an explanation for this behaviour, otherwise it's totally immersion-breaking. But even with a backstory, it'd still be op and should not work that way imo.

I think it is important that the adventurers can upgrade to the awesome stuff, the gold cost is huge in the early game. But I am not sure, it seems that the requirements for resources are not part of the cost when upgrading?