Esus+ Brainstorming

[[to_xp]Gekko]

so, pretty much everyone seems to agree that Esus lacks some abilities that compel you to choose it as your state religion. please post here any suggestions and ideas you have to address this

I have no grand ideas right now. one is definitely to import the Esus-only promotions from FF and Orbis

then there's this nice little modmod ( http://forums.civfanatics.com/showthread.php?t=328929 ) made a while ago by onionsoilder that adds Esus-only abilities you gotta pay for. and paying for getting something is soooo Esus!

 

[Sephi]

If you want to brainstorm Gekko, I suggest you think of some missions for a Esus-only Spy. There is some cool AI for spys in Better BTS AI now .

One thing I am going to do is to make Esus truly invisible (right now it's so easy to predict who follows Esus).

 

[[to_xp]Gekko]

seriously? I always thought xienwolf would be the one doing that at some point. that's pretty awesome

are you planning to do that for 7.30 or for a later version? I have no idea how hard that would be to code honestly.

I don't think I'd really need to think of some missions btw. I'm amazed I didn't think of it before actually: spies are already there in BTS. make espionage Esus-only and we don't have to reinvent the wheel

Orbis added Super Spies ( excellent BTS modcomp ) a while ago, so it's fully fleshed out there. might be worth stealing from there

 

[arstal]

Tweakmod gave promotions based on crime rate, which I think was an excellent idea.

 

[Sephi]

are you planning to do that for 7.30 or for a later version? I have no idea how hard that would be to code honestly.

the problem isn't coding, but ideas to make Esus truly unique Since Esus lacks healing, it should get something powerful in return that the AI understands.

 

[[to_xp]Gekko]

well espionage seems pretty unique to me, as long as the only civs that can use it are those with Esus as a state religion

 

[Breez]

I liked the promotions that FF added to Esus personally

 

[seizer]

Move shadowriders earlier in the tech tree, and reduce their strength but remove national limit. I've put them at deception but requiring a stable to build.

A mechanic similar to dwarven vaults, but for crime rate in the city instead of total gold, giving a % bonus to commerce from crime rate (to represent the state getting a cut).

Unhappiness from crime rate. Not really related to Esus, but it makes sense and is a way of balancing the benefits. Right now imo crime is more benificial than not, with the chance of free smuggler's ports and possible positive effects from most events. I also want to add a chance for a city with high crime to revolt to the barbarians, to represent it being taken over by crime lords.

As for Esus spy missions, I think most of the BTS ones make good sense in FFH too. Empyrian units and buildings should have a big chance of detecting spies though.

 

[Pazyryk]

Two ideas above that I like:

Implement espionage for Esus followers only (or perhaps only some very limited Espionage for non-Esus)
Do something with crime. It certainly seems to be a useless city statistic now (it affects maybe 2 positive events?). Maybe make high crime cities more vulnerable to Esus espionage attacks, or make crime pay for Esus followers.

 

[Brokenbone]

Above, there's a mention that "Tweakmod" gives promos based on crime rate... I'm not familiar with it, but if it's anything like the deal where units sometimes get promotions based on what's near their home city (sometimes Guerrilla, Woodsman, whatever), that would be an interesting benefit. Assumption being though that you'd use something like the FF promotions that were "Esus specials" (Racketeering, Fade Away, other names I forget). I always found the FF promotions interesting, but not interesting enough to purchase with XP better spent on less situationally limited promotions.

Something simple which could be considered for Esus aside from that might be the ability to build a limited line of "guaranteed" HN units (i.e., not hoping they get Esus religion so that they can hide their identity). I've played ROM a bit, forget which civic let you build mercenary camps that gave you access to Bandit Footpads and some other kind of Bandit unit, net though was they were somewhat expensive HN troops, fairly competitive with the melee units running around at that tech level, although quickly outpaced as everyone climbed the tiers. Anyhow, kind of like the "old style" of Guild of the Nine mercenaries, I'm pretty sure all AI understands how to use HN troops to bother all neighbours well enough.

 

[jacktannery]

Something simple which could be considered for Esus aside from that might be the ability to build a limited line of "guaranteed" HN units (i.e., not hoping they get Esus religion so that they can hide their identity).

Why not make it so that all recon units made in an Esus-following civ have the hidden nationality promotion automatically. I believe that Rife does this well (with the Mask promotion). This mechanic would mean that those civs with a unique recon hero (sidar & svaeltafar) will be far more likely to convert to CoE. Even better would be a way for any existing recon unit to acquire Hidden Nationality if the owner (rather than the unit) follows the CoE religion. Perhaps this could cost some gold?

 

[[to_xp]Gekko]

I think recon units should automatically, always get CoE when built by a civ with CoE as state religion. this will allow them all to cast mask

also, if we do add FF Esus-only promotions, I think they should be buyable with gold instead of XP like regular promotions. much more Esus-ish

 

[Pazyryk]

I agree with buying promotions for Esus followers.

I also thing Esus should be able to buy counsel votes. (On another topic, I wish there were more and more interesting council resolutions.)

 

[Ekolite]

I like the idea of implementing espionage for Esus civs only.

I think it would be good if a HN recon units could get generic artwork of a vaguely humanoid person wearing a cloak and hood to disguise their features. They would have to be a little shorter then the average human, but a little taller then the average dwarf to make it racially ambiguous.

That would make the Svartalfar world spell useful as opposed to totally pointless in multiplayer.

 

[Pazyryk]

Great idea Ekolite! Why not just have the HN promotion act as a "racial" promotion, so all HN units get a common ambiguous artwork and their nationality really is hidden. (Of course, someone would have to do that artwork.)

 

[Ekolite]

Exactly yeah, racial promotions can affect the appearance of a unit so I would have thought you could mod the HN promotion to act in a similar way.

 

[[to_xp]Gekko]

I think it would be good if a HN recon units could get generic artwork of a vaguely humanoid person wearing a cloak and hood to disguise their features. They would have to be a little shorter then the average human, but a little taller then the average dwarf to make it racially ambiguous.

THIS. SO THIS. if it can be done, HN will finally be useful against humans!!

 

[Pazyryk]

Of course it can be done. It's just artwork additions for a new racial group, no new mechanism needed at all. It's brilliant. It's so obvious I can't see why no one thought of it before. (Plus it will be fun to watch your recon unit really change to disguise herself when she goes HN.)

 

[Valkrionn]

It doesn't need to be a racial, either; You can have it applied by HN itself.

The issue (and the reason it hasn't been done) is WHAT art should be used?

 

[MagisterCultuum]

People have thought of it before.