Dwarven Mines

[Shatner]

I don't like the idea of allowing mines anywhere. They should still be limited to hills and metal resources. Flat land is still for farms, workshops and other improvements. This might result in some flat land being undeveloped in Khazad lands, but that seems fine to me. The basic idea that I had in mind was that mines are the center of dwarven life and that should be reflected by giving them increased commerce.

Shatner's idea is interesting, though I still think it should be limited to hills / metal resources (and mountains if/when that feature is implemented).

Having mines produce food as well is also interesting, but seems a bit overpowered. You would definitely need to introduce a penalty on regular farms for the Khazad but I do like the flavor of having mines be the focal point for all dwarven activity.

I guess I should make one thing clear which I just sort of snuck into my "Dwarven Settlement" idea. Farms are the meta-improvement; working farms serves no direct purpose other than to allow you to work OTHER improvements that you actually care about (mines, windmills, towns, workshops, etc.). If you make it so the Khazad get -1 food per farm then they will have a much harder time capitalizing on flat lands. Only when they research sanitation or run agrarianism can they actually get a benefit from a farm. What this SHOULD result in is the dwarves having smaller cities overall.

HOWEVER, a Dwarf Fortress is the equivalent to a really good mine (+3 hammers), a town (+4 commerce), an AG farm (+2 food) AND a castle (big defense bonus). As such, a single population point can be spent working the equivalent to three productive tiles (mine, farm, town) with the added benefit that the super-tile gives your units a defense bonus while trying to prevent it from being pillaged. So, if a single Khazad city has three of these super-improvements in it's fat cross than it is getting the equivalent benefit of working 9 tiles (and therefore, having 9 extra population points) while only needing 3. So, the dwarves can have smaller populations (which is good and thematic and cool) AND have super-duper awesome mine tiles (also good and thematic and cool) without being meaningfully stronger than the other civs, who can work tiles the old fashion way (building farms, growing their pop and sending their excess workers into the rest of their fat cross).

Now, for this idea to work (a few super improvements around a smaller than normal city) you need to allow each city to be able build three or four of those super improvements. So, you either allow them to be built anywhere or... you make the dwarves cry into their ale when they can't find a location with hills spaced exactly two tiles apart.

I agree that normal mines shouldn't give food. In fact, I think Khazad should have a hard time getting as much food as the Bannor or the Clan or whoever. So, yeah, allow the dwarves to build normal mines on hills and metal improvements like normal but also allow them to build super-mines wherever they want; they won't have the food to work most of those normal mines (unless that location has an abundance of food resources) and they won't need to.

Got the improvements in, thought I'd post a screenshot. Keep in mind, the yields shown are on a hill... A mine would have the same yield as the first improvement, minus the one commerce. The way it's set up, you have to choose... Production on a hill, or food on a flatland? You have a limited number of these, so you have to choose wisely.

That is a screenshot covered in awesome sauce. That looks really wicked AND would allow the dwarven settlements to look very different from normal mines. Also, it conveys the fact that those settlements also serve as fortifications. Bravo.

 

[Valkrionn]

Wasn't going to allow normal mines as well, but that does seem more balanced than allowing them to build a dwarven mine on resources, regardless of the tile limits... So I'll leave it in. Testing out the build limit right now... Doing it in canbuild, so I can put a limit without needing a spell. I might also give them -1 food from farms in the civilization info... that part doesn't require a unique improvement anymore thankfully.

 

[Vermicious Knid]

This went from cool idea to finished cool mechanic amazingly quickly.

 

[Valkrionn]

Works perfectly.

I made the Dwarven Worker work *slightly* faster, with a speed of 110 rather than 100... Dwarves are supposed to be industrious.

Because of that, Dwarven Mines take 20 turns with no cost-reducing techs, and lose around 6 turns for Mining, Education, and Construction, until it takes 4 turns to build.

Mine -> Settlement -> Hall -> Fortress is 15, 30, 60 turns respectively... Nice and slow, but worth it.

Atm, they require one tile separation. So if you use your entire fat cross, you can squeeze in 6.. If I up it to 2 tiles, it becomes 3, I believe... would have to map it out.

EDIT: 4, but only if you sit them at the far end of the outer ring. Check the spoiler to see what I mean... the first 'city', the 1's are where you can build the mines, with a 1 tile separation. In the second, the 2's are where you can build with a 2 tile separation.

Spoiler :

x000x     x002x
10101     20000
00000     00000
10101     00002
x000x     x200x

Just got to add the hammer bonus from Arete and it's done. Aside from txtkeys, but those are always last.

This went from cool idea to finished cool mechanic amazingly quickly.

haha That it did.... I work fast when I'm interested in something. Pretty easy change though.

 

[MagisterCultuum]

You know, the Dwarven racial promotion already makes workers with the dwarven promotion +25% faster than those without it.

 

[deadliver]

Awesomeness!

 

[Valkrionn]

You know, the Dwarven racial promotion already makes workers with the dwarven promotion 1=25% faster than those without it.

Really? I did not know that... I'll remove the workrate boost then.

 

[Shatner]

Because of that, Dwarven Mines take 20 turns with no cost-reducing techs, and lose around 6 turns for Mining, Education, and Construction, until it takes 4 turns to build.

Mine -> Settlement -> Hall -> Fortress is 15, 30, 60 turns respectively... Nice and slow, but worth it.

Atm, they require one tile separation. So if you use your entire fat cross, you can squeeze in 6.. If I up it to 2 tiles, it becomes 3, I believe... would have to map it out.

EDIT: 4, but only if you sit them at the far end of the outer ring.

Good work; you're a wiz! Since each settlement matures to the equivalent of three improvements, I'm in favor of having them be two tiles apart. If you can pack 6 into a fat cross then you are getting the equivalent of 18 worked tiles for the cost of 6 (so, the same as 12 free population); I think that's too much. With 4 per fat cross, you are getting the equivalent to 12 worked tiles (so, 8 free population) which I think is more acceptable. I can see your run-of-the-mill dwarven city having a hard time cresting a population of 8 or so (provided you aren't rockin' AG; a civic I feel is overpowered at the moment), but having the production and wealth equivalent of a city much, much larger.

That sound good to you all?

Valkrionn, are you planning on adding the farm and/or plantation penalty to the Khazad? On second thought, the plantation penalty isn't really necessary but I feel the food penalty is crucial for balance purposes.

This went from cool idea to finished cool mechanic amazingly quickly.

Indeed it did. Way to go, FFH community!

 

[Valkrionn]

Good work; you're a wiz! Since each settlement matures to the equivalent of three improvements, I'm in favor of having them be two tiles apart. If you can pack 6 into a fat cross then you are getting the equivalent of 18 worked tiles for the cost of 6 (so, the same as 12 free population); I think that's too much. With 4 per fat cross, you are getting the equivalent to 12 worked tiles (so, 8 free population) which I think is more acceptable. I can see your run-of-the-mill dwarven city having a hard time cresting a population of 8 or so (provided you aren't rockin' AG; a civic I feel is overpowered at the moment), but having the production and wealth equivalent of a city much, much larger.

That sound good to you all?

Valkrionn, are you planning on adding the farm and/or plantation penalty to the Khazad? On second thought, the plantation penalty isn't really necessary but I feel the food penalty is crucial for balance purposes.

Indeed it did. Way to go, FFH community!

2 tile spacing it is... I agree with the reasoning there. I hadn't though about a plantation penalty, but the food penalty is already in.

 

[Vermicious Knid]

So...we'll have dwarves building farms only to collect food resources, but lots of dwarven mines, normal mines, and towns.


Sounds good to me.

 

[deadliver]

So...we'll have dwarves building farms only to collect food resources, but lots of dwarven mines, normal mines, and towns.


Sounds good to me.

Yeah and woe betide those who go after the big mines...

 

[Valkrionn]

One more thing about mines... I enabled the <bActAsCity> tag, so units will be able to gain weapon promotions from them. Planning on doing so for citadels anyway, so it fits.

 

[deadliver]

One more thing about mines... I enabled the <bActAsCity> tag, so units will be able to gain weapon promotions from them. Planning on doing so for citadels anyway, so it fits.

Also helps with city based defence promotions right? Will archer units get the Behind Walls promo?

 

[Valkrionn]

I believe so, and no. I think it gives city defense, at least for the promotion, but does not give the wall defender promotion because that requires a palisade or wall.

 

[deadliver]

I believe so, and no. I think it gives city defense, at least for the promotion, but does not give the wall defender promotion because that requires a palisade or wall.

No biggy, not that they'll need it, being fortified on a hill in a fortress.

 

[Valkrionn]

One more little thing.... Check out the screenshot. Yes, that is a resource now, at least it will be in FFPlus... Can spawn on any hill. The event now adds the resource as well. +1 by itself, +2 for a Mine or Dwarven Mine/upgrade. Requires Mining for city trade rather than Agriculture. Adding a flavour preference for the dwarves now... Should come up easy, as they already look for hills.

 

[Vermicious Knid]

One more little thing.... Check out the screenshot. Yes, that is a resource now, at least it will be in FFPlus... Can spawn on any hill. The event now adds the resource as well. +1 by itself, +2 for a Mine or Dwarven Mine/upgrade. Requires Mining for city trade rather than Agriculture. Adding a flavour preference for the dwarves now... Should come up easy, as they already look for hills.

Badass.


So...since xienwolf told us how to make it happen...any chance of Khazad working mountains?

 

[Valkrionn]

haha, I thought so too... The Dwarves should be living off mushrooms, not corn. All the valid improvements are also able to discover mushrooms, just like metals.

 

[xienwolf]

I'm fairly certain that's just shadows not updating properly, as it looks normal after you reload.

You can directly change a water tile to a hill - it becomes grassland by default.

I'm fairly certain you're right about ocean and coast being terrain types. My question was if being underwater was the only thing that made them different, so it would be possible to edit a list of terrain types somewhere and make grassland and company legal terrains for the underwater height. Basically, is there anything hardcoded that prevents underwater terrains from being the same as flatland/hill/peak tiles, or can the lists be made to overlap?

Not sure I completely follow what you are asking. Just checked and Coast and Ocean are both defined in TerrainInfos, but so are Hill and Peak, so that isn't exactly reliable. I would imagine however that the <bWater>1</bWater> tag is quite important if these are utilized, and you could make variants of Ocean and Coast to account for different types of ocean and coast to create sub-terrains if you wanted.

 

[Valkrionn]

Honestly, I'd be much more interested in a terrain type with the same height as water, that doesn't count as water. Basically, ravines. I know they did it in Planetfall, but I have no idea how much work was involved.