Current (SVN) development discussion thread

[Barbuesque]

I honestly never experienced this so called american happiness problem. There's gold, tobacco, cotton, and fur easily available, that's +6 happiness with the starting building + what you can get in trades + silver on the west coast. The issue entirely disappears after about 10 turns.

 

[Leoreth]

I disabled the North American natives for testing purposes and look what I found at America's spawn:

Spoiler :

I assume the roaming barbarians that fill most of the continent have always discouraged the AI from sending settlers there because it appeared too dangerous. I think this is worth expanding upon. Aside of the barbs that are intended to attack the Aztecs, I think it's better to disable the periodic spawns altogether before the Europeans have settled NA. A better way would be to periodically select a city and create some barbarians close to it, which would represent the local natives gathering armies and attacking Europeans specifically. It's certainly a more historical approach anyway.

 

[Leoreth]

New commit is up:
- fixed some problems with the slave trade feature
- AI will now suggest slave trades on its own
- disabled North American barbarians for now
- Independents can't trigger conquerors anymore
- defeating Impis and Pombos on your own territory while running Forced Labor has a chance to give you a slave unit
- invasion events are now only displayed if you have contact to the target
- redesigned the "no settlers on other continents before Astronomy" rule to be more intuitive

 

[borhap88]

New commit is up:
- fixed some problems with the slave trade feature
- AI will now suggest slave trades on its own
- disabled North American barbarians for now
- Independents can't trigger conquerors anymore
- defeating Impis and Pombos on your own territory while running Forced Labor has a chance to give you a slave unit
- invasion events are now only displayed if you have contact to the target
- redesigned the "no settlers on other continents before Astronomy" rule to be more intuitive

Very well

Waitin' for North American barbarians'redesign

 

[ImNotHere]

- invasion events are now only displayed if you have contact to the target

Does this include trading company events? As in, Britain must contact India/Mughals before they can spawn their army?

 

[Leoreth]

No, this is only about the display message. It doesn't make sense to be notified of the Seljuk invasion when you're the Maya or somesuch.

 

[ImNotHere]

Ahh, okay. I always wondered whether that was supposed to happen.

 

[Aharon]

The value the AI assigns to slaves needs some adjustments. I started up a new game as Congo, and of course wanted to achieve the 1000 gold through slave trade without major unhappiness. Astonishing discovery: You can trade a slave to the AI for, say, 25 gold, and it trades the slave back to you for nothing at all. I doubt that this is intended

 

[Leoreth]

Um, no, it isn't

 

[Lone Wolf]

I disabled the North American natives for testing purposes and look what I found at America's spawn:

Doesn't seem that unusual for me, but I give more colonists to Europeans and have the AI unit train rate at 90 instead of 110.

 

[BenZL43]

1) Parthian Horse Archer already attacked me (Babylon) while Rome was being built (around 753 BC).

2) Why Assyrian Chariot? (iirc) attacked from both Nineveh (historical) and from around Nabatean too?

 

[Tomorrow's Dawn]

The value the AI assigns to slaves needs some adjustments. I started up a new game as Congo, and of course wanted to achieve the 1000 gold through slave trade without major unhappiness. Astonishing discovery: You can trade a slave to the AI for, say, 25 gold, and it trades the slave back to you for nothing at all. I doubt that this is intended

You sir, have found the most god-like exploit in DoC yet

 

[strijder20]

Leoreth, in my America game the natives were all sitting on the forest hill two north of Denver. There were about thirty of them!

Spoiler :

Also had a nice little side effect: I was at war with Prussia, who had a rifleman running around. I was chasing him with two rifles of my own, but couldn't catch up because of no roads. Then he walked next to the hill and got slaughtered

Maybe you want to fix that too when you're redesigning the NA barbs.

 

[Tomorrow's Dawn]

Leoreth, in my America game the natives were all sitting on the forest hill two north of Denver. There were about thirty of them!

Spoiler :

Also had a nice little side effect: I was at war with Prussia, who had a rifleman running around. I was chasing him with two rifles of my own, but couldn't catch up because of no roads. Then he walked next to the hill and got slaughtered

Maybe you want to fix that too when you're redesigning the NA barbs.

Actually, yeah. I've encountered this too. Post-fall of Rome, practically a million barbs will start to gather from all across Europe to hole up in Lyons or Valencia. France and Spain end up inheriting these, although oddly enough, I never see them dominate despite the huge masses of units they inherit.

 

[Leoreth]

Fixed the "buy back slaves for free" exploit, and now the Forced Labor requirement for the enslave action is properly displayed.

I've also finished a Congolese game right now, and I think their second goal works well with the new mechanics - the unhappiness cost of creating slaves must be balanced against continuing research towards the industrial era. Neither can be neglected; I had to dial up the culture slider shortly before 1800 AD to meet the goal, because Mbanza Kongo had 18 unhappiness from drafting alone at that point. The AI was on the route to Radio when I discovered Physics in 1844 AD.

But I'm interested in what you think about them now.

 

[iOnlySignIn]

I notice a general slow-down in European tech rate in recent versions after the change in Dutch spawn date.

Example: I loaded 4~5 Prussia starts (1700 AD), in all of them only England out of all the Europeans has Rifling OR Military Tradition. It makes the Prussian early game rather trivial - just routinely slaughter some French/Austrian/Italian Knights, Longbows, and Maces with your Rifles and Cannons. In one of these starts even the Leaning Tower wasn't built yet. In reality the construction of the Leaning Tower began in 1173 and was finished in 1379.

Perhaps this is the nothing new or special, and that my past experience of fast European tech rate was mainly due to me playing England and OBing/trading with everyone. But I do remember that most American spawns I played before (before the Dutch spawn date move) where all Europeans have Rifles and Cavalry.

 

[mykeedee]

I notice a general slow-down in European tech rate in recent versions after the change in Dutch spawn date.

Example: I loaded 4~5 Prussia starts (1700 AD), in all of them only England out of all the Europeans has Rifling OR Military Tradition. It makes the Prussian early game rather trivial - just routinely slaughter some French/Austrian/Italian Knights, Longbows, and Maces with your Rifles and Cannons. In one of these starts even the Leaning Tower wasn't built yet. In reality the construction of the Leaning Tower began in 1173 and was finished in 1379.

Perhaps this is the nothing new or special, and that my past experience of fast European tech rate was mainly due to me playing England and OBing/trading with everyone. But I do remember that most American spawns I played before (before the Dutch spawn date move) where all Europeans have Rifles and Cavalry.

It seems to me that the HRE tech rate particularly has slowed, I remember loading up America starts on versions that didn't include Prussia and having their destroyers on my shores. I also think it is to do with Poland contributing nothing and Byzantium collapsing before the Turks even spawn, thereby denying the Euros quick classical techs.

 

[Wondering Kid]

Hey Leo, I was just wondering. Just downloaded it and started a game as the Spaniards. While I totally dig the idea of the Moorish (and am expecting to be in war with them soon enough) I was wondering: Why Barcelona? It totally kills Marseille and rigs me into war with the French, unless the opposite happens and they kill Barcelona (being that why I never settled it in RFC 1.9)

 

[Tigranes]

But I'm interested in what you think about them now.

I am just curious, what is your average wait time between the turns with Congo. And what kind of PC delivered you that performance, please?

 

[Leoreth]

During the lategame, 1-2 seconds on my rather mediocre laptop.