Enhancing the flavor of certain civs

[Imuratep]

The 0 movement idea is connected to their status as guardians. They are assigned to guard one special point and thus stay there until attackers arrive. Teleporting just means you assign them another place they should guard. Gargoyles were terrifying statues on the top of cathedrals. They were said to protect them from evil so IMHO it makes sense making them into guardians that don't leave their place until an intruder is nearby.
You could create a building that mirrors citadel of light:
Ancient Tower 240
If an enemy enters a tile adjectant to the city a gargoyle with 3 duration is spawned.
Instead of creating new buildings you could say that all wall buildings gain this ability once you have researched Engineering (i.e. walls, palisades and perhaps Wall of Stone.) Another idea would be to let their fort-Castle-citadel improvement line spawn gargoyles once they have Engineering.
But as I already said you could just make them into a longbowarcher with mithril that can't be promoted. Then it would be nothing "special" but at least it would be as strong as any other golem.

 

[Ahwaric]

Yeah, I know what gargoyles were (are) in real world, so want to make the ffh ones animated versions of these.
Traps are related to the fact they appear as part of the building. They should not wander far from their building, I agree.
I think that maybe they should spawn as part of the building, ultimate defenders.
But I do not like the marksman part, I think it does not fit.

 

[Valkrionn]

While I want to make them more distinct, I ma not sure about the above.

• marksman - why? gargoyles can be sneaky, true, but I do not think they have that much finesse to be jutsified as marksman. They use stationary hiding
• hide - fits, but I am not sure if that is a good idea... invisible city defender? They should be at least visible in cities, as most units
• 0 movement - if they get movement when approached by attacker, I do not see a reason to make them immovable on their own.
• how would you justify them teleporting from city to city

Do not get me wrong, I want new ideas and definetly want to change gargoyles in 0.30.
I just think we should we need something else.
The things that come to my mind when I think of gargoyles: slow, can hide, can set traps, strong on defense.
Regarding guardian, I need to take a look to leash mechanics in rife.

On the leashes... Had a thought while reading this.

How about allowing for a UNIT to be the leash? Meaning whatever other unit is leashed, it can't move more than x tiles from the first unit? Would be interesting for summons, particularly if it's set up so that as long as it's a leash, it cannot summon any other temporary units... But so long as it's summon remains within that range, it is not killed at the end of the turn.

OK
The plan Is(as I did not yet implement elemental mechanics)

• 3 grades of elementals (first is quite weak, third is powerfull), 4-7 types (water, air, fire, earth, spirit, life, death) - the classic elements are in, not sure about the other - can use feedback (I thought of metal one, but that is too much simillar to a golem, or earth one)
• first grade is quite weak, I am not sure if current elementals should be second or third grade (I think third, they are powerfull, but I will add some dao-only special to enhance them a bit)
• the grade that elemental can reach depends on both techs & xp (always born as first grade, but might need some bonuses in late game to be able to advance)
• elementals ale spawned in cities depending on mana avaliable & buildings built
• elemental temple (will have to find a better name) replaces pagan temple and then you can build 2 elemental "nodes" that enhance certain elementals power & spawning chances, but block the opposite ones
• elementals will be able to get xp. I can limit this to Dao only, but it has little impact on other ones - they can stay for 3 turns at most (save for pyre of the seraphic ones - I think I will change them to first grade after intorducing dao - you can grow them and grown elementals at start are too powerfull)
• Also, I am not sure yet, but Dao will probably be unable to use standard mages, but will rely on druid-like casters

I have couple of code problems to solve. First, I would like add special counter to cities, simillar to ones generated by great people. But not sure I can do that (If I succed, I will probably use it for awakened & adventurers)
Second, I wanted a global variable, elemental phase. It would influence how strong are the elementals each turn. But I do not know how to do this, plus it is not vital, so it will probably not be in initially.

By the way, did you check changelog recently? I hope you like the new lunatics.
Not sure about the stygian guards, but I will post more on it in 0.30 workshop thread

This sounds interesting.

On the city counter... Depends on how you want to do it. Do you want to add to it via xml only, or is python okay? Using something like the current Adventurer counter, just for each city, would be quite easy.

 

[Imuratep]

]
OK
The plan Is(as I did not yet implement elemental mechanics)

• 3 grades of elementals (first is quite weak, third is powerfull), 4-7 types (water, air, fire, earth, spirit, life, death) - the classic elements are in, not sure about the other - can use feedback (I thought of metal one, but that is too much simillar to a golem, or earth one)
• first grade is quite weak, I am not sure if current elementals should be second or third grade (I think third, they are powerfull, but I will add some dao-only special to enhance them a bit)
• the grade that elemental can reach depends on both techs & xp (always born as first grade, but might need some bonuses in late game to be able to advance)
• elementals ale spawned in cities depending on mana avaliable & buildings built
• elemental temple (will have to find a better name) replaces pagan temple and then you can build 2 elemental "nodes" that enhance certain elementals power & spawning chances, but block the opposite ones
• elementals will be able to get xp. I can limit this to Dao only, but it has little impact on other ones - they can stay for 3 turns at most (save for pyre of the seraphic ones - I think I will change them to first grade after intorducing dao - you can grow them and grown elementals at start are too powerfull)
• Also, I am not sure yet, but Dao will probably be unable to use standard mages, but will rely on druid-like casters

I have couple of code problems to solve. First, I would like add special counter to cities, simillar to ones generated by great people. But not sure I can do that (If I succed, I will probably use it for awakened & adventurers)
Second, I wanted a global variable, elemental phase. It would influence how strong are the elementals each turn. But I do not know how to do this, plus it is not vital, so it will probably not be in initially.

Sounds cool. Looking forward to playing them.

 

[Opera]

I have couple of code problems to solve. First, I would like add special counter to cities, simillar to ones generated by great people. But not sure I can do that (If I succed, I will probably use it for awakened & adventurers)
Second, I wanted a global variable, elemental phase. It would influence how strong are the elementals each turn. But I do not know how to do this, plus it is not vital, so it will probably not be in initially.

Hrm, I hate to say that, because I'm not sure if I will do it, but I'm sure I could do it.

What you could do is add two tags to buildings: ElementType & iElementCounterIncrease.

You'd then calculate each turn how many points the counter gets and increase said counter; of course you'd have to keep track of how many points are from which element. When it reaches the threshold, you can run a thing to choose which thing to generate according to the elements used, really like GPs.

As for a global phase, it's doable too. You'd have to add the variable into CvGame. I'd use various types though, like PHASE_NORTH, PHASE_SOUTH, PHASE_EAST, PHASE_WEST, PHASE_HEART (the center), PHASE_BODY (the whole). Either you'd use defines to have set cycles, like 15 turns between all + 10 random turns (DEFINE_PHASE_MIN_TURNS, DEFINE_PHASE_RANDOM_TURNS), either you'd make them a full XML file instead of a BasicInfos one and you'd store how many turns one particular phase last; so that HEART could be short, etc.

If you don't want to hardcode too much, a whole new file would be better; or you'd need lots of defines and semi-hardcoding for what's to come: using phases to modify things, like the points you gain.

Say, you gain 2 ELEMENT_FIRE points per turn, but you're in PHASE_NORTH, which gives -50% ELEMENT_FIRE points (and +50% ELEMENT_WATER), you'd only gain 1. PHASE_HEART could enhance the other elements, DEATH and LIFE while PHASE_BODY would be the shallow phase, -50% for every element.

If you push it further, you can even give buildings/civics/traits the ability to enhance how many points are gained for a specific element. Using a whole new file for elements could be a good idea too.

Adding a new bar isn't too difficult; I'd suggest you try to get how one works and then you should be able to make one yourself.

 

[Valkrionn]

Hrm, I hate to say that, because I'm not sure if I will do it, but I'm sure I could do it.

What you could do is add two tags to buildings: ElementType & iElementCounterIncrease.

You'd then calculate each turn how many points the counter gets and increase said counter; of course you'd have to keep track of how many points are from which element. When it reaches the threshold, you can run a thing to choose which thing to generate according to the elements used, really like GPs.

As for a global phase, it's doable too. You'd have to add the variable into CvGame. I'd use various types though, like PHASE_NORTH, PHASE_SOUTH, PHASE_EAST, PHASE_WEST, PHASE_HEART (the center), PHASE_BODY (the whole). Either you'd use defines to have set cycles, like 15 turns between all + 10 random turns (DEFINE_PHASE_MIN_TURNS, DEFINE_PHASE_RANDOM_TURNS), either you'd make them a full XML file instead of a BasicInfos one and you'd store how many turns one particular phase last; so that HEART could be short, etc.

If you don't want to hardcode too much, a whole new file would be better; or you'd need lots of defines and semi-hardcoding for what's to come: using phases to modify things, like the points you gain.

Say, you gain 2 ELEMENT_FIRE points per turn, but you're in PHASE_NORTH, which gives -50% ELEMENT_FIRE points (and +50% ELEMENT_WATER), you'd only gain 1. PHASE_HEART could enhance the other elements, DEATH and LIFE while PHASE_BODY would be the shallow phase, -50% for every element.

If you push it further, you can even give buildings/civics/traits the ability to enhance how many points are gained for a specific element. Using a whole new file for elements could be a good idea too.

Adding a new bar isn't too difficult; I'd suggest you try to get how one works and then you should be able to make one yourself.

Or, you could wait till I'm done with the system I'm about to start on (rather, hope I finish it. ), which will have many different tags allowing the system to be activated by Trait, Religion, Civic, Building... and modified by Units, Spells, or Resources.

Trait
	bSpawnUnit - Activates unitspawning
	bCapital - 1, spawns in capital only. Default, spawns everywhere.
	bRandom - 1, random. Default, counter.
	iSpawnMod - Affects spawn rate
	iSpawnInitial - Sets initial spawn rate
	iSpawnCap - Function depends on bRandom. If random, sets the random value checked against. If not, sets the initial cap.
	iSpawnCapMod - Sets the amount cap is increased by when a unit spawns.
	iAIBonus - Self explanatory
	iNumCityMod - Affects spawn based on number of cities
	
Buildings/City - Clone all relevant Trait tags
	iSpawnModGlobal - Affects spawn rate
	iSpawnModCity - Ditto, city only
	iSpawnUnitGlobal - Affects what units spawn. If player does not have a spawnunit, activate now. Similarly, if other tags are blank activate now.
	iSpawnUnitCity - Ditto, city only
	iPopulationModGlobal/City - Affects rate based on population. Doviello have tag applied to palace.
	iBonusMod - Affects spawn odds
	
Civics - Clone all relevant tags
	iSpawnMult - Multiplicative, rather than additive
	
Religion - Clone all tags

Unit/Promotion 
	iSpawnMod
	
Spell
	iSpawnMod
	
Resources
	iSpawnMod

If you see anything else you think is needed, let me know.

 

[Ahwaric]

Thanks to both of you

I think I will start with trying to copy existing great people counter, but change it to work for elementals instead. Elemental phases will have to wait.
Actually, I might try to do it this weekend (still a bit busy with real life stuff, plus trying to finish some other things first - should finish at least RL stuff till friday)

A lot of nice stuff there Valkrionn. Will have to read more about the tags

 

[readercolin]

How exactly do these Dao differentiate themselves from Fall Furthers Khadi? Aside, of course, from having more elementals.

-Colin

 

[moshi]

When the AI plays the Amurites, the refusal to trade any techs, even to friends, means they invariably end up on the bottom tier of the power chart, and almost always dead last by turn 250. Even though I'm not immersed in FFH lore, i understand there may be reasons for this unwillingness to trade techs so I propose integrating it more fully into the civilization, rather than having it punish the AI but not affect a human player.


How about an "Isolationist" civilization trait that disallows any tech trades and foreign trade routes (??) but having a couple unique buildings that compensate for this loss with bonuses. I'm thinking outl oud here, but perhaps a unique building available at trade taking the place of a tavern that provides a free merchant specialist and another unique building available at arcane lore gives an additional 25%.

 

[attackdrone]

When the AI plays the Amurites, the refusal to trade any techs, even to friends, means they invariably end up on the bottom tier of the power chart, and almost always dead last by turn 250. Even though I'm not immersed in FFH lore, i understand there may be reasons for this unwillingness to trade techs so I propose integrating it more fully into the civilization, rather than having it punish the AI but not affect a human player.

I have been able to trade techs with the Amurites if they are friendly with me, but only if it is a tech that they do not particularly like. A science or magic tech? Forget it! That would get you closer to the Tower of Mastery, which they want for themselves (Whether they can succeed in making it is another story).

As for the Isolationist trait, Mercantilism and Isolation civics cover that niche fairly well - instead of pushing more traits onto civilizations to encourage AI behavior it seems better to nudge certain AI to prefer a set of civics that lend themselves to a certain playstyle. Perhaps Dain the Caswallan prefers Mercantilism/Scholarship but Valledia the Even prevers Mercantilism/Isolation civics. Then AI behavior could be tied to civic choices - with Isolation preventing tech trading but giving other significant bonuses?

 

[Apeiron]

About the Sidars, I think it can be more interesting to use a system similar to the awakened system for Scion, with a global counter (not necessary to build a counter like the great people, but if you do we can use it) with can be modified by buildings, like library, market, theater, forge, and maybe by a doctrine, like aristocracy, and make shadows which can be added to city as specialists.
This type of system may be more realistic (a strong soldier don't become a great scientist) and make the Sidars more powerfull (they don't lose an big unit to gain a specialist).

About the grigoris, we can use an idea from the Durals : a College of Theology. It can be a wonder wiwh allow special promotions for some units (the grigori doctors and the luonnatars ?), promotions depending of the religions in the empire.

About the Infernals, maybe we can use the scion beacon for them, insted of a building with make... food.

 

[arkham4269]

Not to give the Scions more help than they already have, but it does seem odd that they don't have a way to use food resources. Since their cities don't grow by food, what is the point of having farms and fisheries and the like.

Now farms at least have a chance to morph into something good later, but it seems to me you'd be better off with a cottage or workshop. So what would the Scions do with it?

Two ideas, one a bit better than the other. The first is some sort of brewery building. Sure there is the Deseptus (sic) Brewery but face it, if you have a lot of grain you aren't eating, you make it into beer or hard alcohol. This can be transported via trade and is really valuable. Not to get too historical but until modern sanitation, most everyone drank a lot of beer/alcohol because it had a much better chance of not giving you dysentery.

So it seems that the granary could be eliminated for the Scions and replaced with a brewery which would have a trade bonus to represent this trade. I would move this till Trade is developed.

The smokehouse should be replaced with the RoM tannery since again the Scions aren't eating the cows, deer and the like. Since I'm sure we don't want to make the Scions a monetary powerhouse, I would think the tannery would be a hammer producer since leather goods are vital in the medieval tech Orbis is set in.

My second idea (the not as good one) is that if you have all this potential food going to waste, well you'd attract living people willing to eat it. I mean you could be a starving peasant in some Civ or be a look-down minority (but well fed) in the Scions. So I'm thinking the Scions would have some sort of counter that would calculate all the food being produced every turn. Once this counter reached a certain number (needing multiple turns to get their) then an event similar to one already in place where the player has the choice of:
1. A settler (I will reiterate here that I believe there needs to be 'refugee' unit that acts similarly to the Awakened in that it can be used to add to population or found new cities.)
2. Gain a +1 population in a certain city.
3. Gain a unit from a list. (Personally I think this would be cool if the unit had a random racial promotion to show the refugees are coming from different Civs.
4. Be able to give gifts of food to other civ's, randomly giving one of their cities a food bonus. (Sort of like the famine event but instead of keeping them from starving, it gives the bonus) This would be a good diplomatic boost.

An alternatively this food counter could be used (if it could be modded) that so many food units would equal so much gold and this 'food gold' could be used to help pay for mercenaries. So perhaps instead of paying for a unit with 6 gold a turn, the 'food gold' reduces the price to only 2 gold (mercs still need their beer money even if they are getting fed!)

 

[Opera]

Isn't the Spirit Mill their replacement of the Granary, using grains to gain happiness?

 

[Imuratep]

Also IIRC they get unhappy when their cities get unhealthy.

 

[Apeiron]

In FF the necropolis give a hammer bonus depending on the quantity of sanity ressource.

And for the Shadows, the College of Theology and the beacon ?

 

[arkham4269]

Isn't the Spirit Mill their replacement of the Granary, using grains to gain happiness?

Actually it is the replacement for brewery. I had forgotten that Orbis had it since I rarely build it since I have found other uses for the time spent building one.

While I can see the spirit mill being a happiness bonus to help drive new Awakened being created, I do believe that it should be the replacement for the granary. Then the Scion brewery would give a trade bonus and the tannery would give a hammer bonus.

 

[Ahwaric]

How exactly do these Dao differentiate themselves from Fall Furthers Khadi? Aside, of course, from having more elementals.

You can ask what are the differences between Sheaim & Khadi - they use the same spawning mechanics, just spawn different units and Khadi do not get more with higher AC
But...

• First, Dao will be in Orbis, Khadi won't
• Second, chinese/tibetan/mongolian flavour of units & buildings
• Third, many elementals, that will be able to grow, with different spawning mechanics
• Fourth, elmental ancestries gained by some standard units on unit creation - they will be half-elementals, having access to some elemental abilities, but not alive (not sure yet, as I am working of on it)
• Special druid-like casters (no standard mages & no priests as they are agnostic)

That is what is decided to come with 0.30, but I might add more. Enough to make them different?

When the AI plays the Amurites, the refusal to trade any techs, even to friends, means they invariably end up on the bottom tier of the power chart, and almost always dead last by turn 250.

It might change a bit, as I have included recent FfH tweaks to AI diplomacy. Also, I need to tweak leader personalities some day...

As for the Isolationist trait, Mercantilism and Isolation civics cover that niche fairly well

Agreed

About the Sidars, I think it can be more interesting to use a system similar to the awakened system for Scion, with a global counter (not necessary to build a counter like the great people, but if you do we can use it)

I think the system is already in - it is called the great people counter No need to add special one, but we might add some bonuses to great people spawning. It is Grigori thing, so it would have to be a bit different, but that should be doable.

Actually it is the replacement for brewery. I had forgotten that Orbis had it since I rarely build it since I have found other uses for the time spent building one.
While I can see the spirit mill being a happiness bonus to help drive new Awakened being created, I do believe that it should be the replacement for the granary. Then the Scion brewery would give a trade bonus and the tannery would give a hammer bonus.

I will take a look at scion buildings. The exchange is gone and forum is in as market replacement, so I might just re-add exchange as granary replacement. Makes sense flavourwise, plus needs only minor adjustments.
Regarding scions, I think the current spawning system should be changed. It is too much python and causes certain troubles. I would prefer to move it into dll, but that is hard, and I need to code dao elemental spawning first before attempting this change.

 

[Kalina]

[*]Third, many elementals, that will be able to grow, with different spawning mechanics

Problem here might be with first tier elementals in mid-late game - unit balanced for early game won't have chance to win a fight later. Maybe weak elementals of same kind should be able to merge to form a better one ? With 3:1 ratio, it should be more effective to advance them through combat yet gives you some options if it's not an option.

[*]Special druid-like casters (no standard mages & no priests as they are agnostic)

Now, that's enigmatic By druid-like you mean flavorwise (in DnD arcane caster with some divine and nature spells is called Shugenja), not that they get their only caster at Commune with Nature ? With no adepts/priests they will certainly need access to Sanctify. At which tech they will get casters ? Will they be upgradable ?
BTW, have you already thought about Dao heroes ? I would really like to see Air-based caster, named Sanari Shu Lien ;>

I think the system is already in - it is called the great people counter No need to add special one, but we might add some bonuses to great people spawning. It is Grigori thing, so it would have to be a bit different, but that should be doable.

Speaking of this, in case Shades are gone, you can increase bonuses Sidar get from settled great people a bit IMHO.

 

[Ahwaric]

Now, that's enigmatic By druid-like you mean flavorwise (in DnD arcane caster with some divine and nature spells is called Shugenja)

I do not want to disclose all the details just yet - especially as the casters have not yet been coded, so might change.
By druid-like i mean both flavour (the selection of spells), but mostly mechanics. Adepts can learn all the spells but start with none, priests have set number of spells avaliable from start. Druids are in between - start with some spells but can learn more, but only from limited schools. And Dao will have that kind of casters, replacing adepts, mages, archmages & druids (yes, probably 2 separate tier 4 upgrades). Not sure what changes to tech requirements I will add.

BTW, have you already thought about Dao heroes ? I would really like to see Air-based caster, named Sanari Shu Lien ;>

I not yet have heroes for the new civs (not even ideas), so please post some more on Sanari

Speaking of this, in case Shades are gone, you can increase bonuses Sidar get from settled great people a bit IMHO.

That would be a simple way to preserve some of the old mechanics without giving them more great people (which can be used for other things, like guild founding). I think that is the best idea. If they get great person, it is going to be there a long time. And as all great people stay forever, Sidar will get more effective ones to make it even. Done then

 

[readercolin]

Speaking for myself, when I play the sheim, I don't bother with planar gates. They are overpriced, inefficient, and with the recent AI updates, don't give you nearly enough of an army. Instead, I use archers for defense (pyre zombies don't count as defenders), pyre zombies for early game offense, and pyre zombies/mages/ritualists, with an occasional diseased corpse, for mid game offense. Note, it never makes it to the lategame. Playing as the Khadi, it seemed that they were trying to base their army off the planar gate mechanic... but they didn't give them the other advantages that the sheim have. Which means that pyre zombies can't bring them into the lategame, and they don't have the easy benefits of the specter like the sheim do.

The reason why the planar gate mechanic doesn't work is because you can't control how large an army you get. With regular units, I can start spamming them now, and know that I'll be able to get an army capable of taking down my opponent. With planar gates, a city is tied up for innumerable turns (and I have to build it in every city, as opposed to having one city that can spam out a unit a turn) building the gate, and then I don't get any guarantees that a unit will arrive anytime soon. To top it all, I don't get nearly enough units to compete with the AI armies, compared to the number of hammers put into it, and by the time I might get reasonably sized armies, most are so outdated as to be little more than bait, as they have no way to upgrade.

Combining these issues is why the khadi were such a catastrophic failure (hence why there has been some talk of removing them altogether). So if the only difference between the Dao and the Khadi is an asian flavor, they will fail. If, however, you have other mechanics to get these elementals then just a chance of them spawning, and an easy way for them to upgrade in the lategame without making them OP when they first arrive, they might be successful. Now, it could be that I've missed some of what you've said, but the only thing that you have said that appears to be different from a modified planar game mechanic is the elemental ancestries part.

So my questions are then:

Did you nerf other lines of theirs to boost this elemental mechanic?
Are there other ways to get elementals without a planar gate mechanic?
Do they have flavor other than just asian? (aka, are there ways that a normal unit can upgrade somehow into an elemental, or gain elemental abilities somehow other than just an occasional random chance)

I'm sure that I can come up with more, but class is almost out, so I'll return sometime later.

-Colin