Exotic Unit Pack - Mod Collaboration Thread

[sman1975]

A bit behind schedule - testing different behaviors on some test merc units. Main issue is how best to limit the unit's impact on the purchasing civ's economy. I wanted to keep the unit from counting against the civ's supply limit (which evidently cannot be done, unfortunately).

Currently, they are set up to cost twice as much as similar units, but with no per-turn gold maintenance, can be moved the same turn they are purchased, and unfortunately count against the supply limit.

Am thinking about actually setting the gold maintenance on merc units to "high" (about twice as much gold per turn as normal units), and not mess with the 20 turn popup window to renew. The high cost seems to mimic reality a bit better and be quite an incentive to get rid of underperforming units. I'm a bit concerned it might also be quite an incentive to not use mercs at all... This will have to be balanced somehow in testing.

Since the AI doesn't do a good job of getting rid of obsolete units, I'd probably add an LUA procedure that checks every 5 turns or so for obsolete merc units, then maybe give the AI a 50% chance of deleting them.

From early experiments, civs don't get any gold for selling merc units - something I think might be tied to the NoMaintenance item being set to "true." This is a very good thing - something I don't have to work around.

Soooo.... to make a long story longer, I've got all the icons/flags for the mercs in the game. I've got the best-possible version of the standard merc unit template build, and have added a couple of models that look pretty good right now.

Adding the models is pretty easy from here, and about 75% of them I've used before, so there won't be any issues getting them to work. New models are always a crap shoot getting them to work properly.

 

[DracoTheGreat]

That's alright. Take your time. A good mod is better than a rushed one, in my opinion.

 

[sman1975]

Well, if I'm doing it, it will be a rushed mod...

The only hope we have of success is effective testing to find all my, uh, "typos...."

3 Merc units/models done, but am working on a minor nit before I publish. As I'm out of time for now, will probably just start early tomorrow and add as many units as I can, then release a new version around lunchtime for you to test out. There should be quite a bit.

The models will be done without promotions for now. Will design a set once I have all the units built and have a better idea what makes the most sense for the land, sea, and air units we're adding.

 

[DracoTheGreat]

Cool cool. 3 PM Eastern time should be good for me to test out, but later is fine, too. Not to mention we have the whole weekend.

 

[sman1975]

Latest version uploaded. Have 9 of the merc units working, more or less satisfactorily. Takes a bit less than an hour to get a unit added, updated, and tested. It's a bit of a slog, but at least I'm fairly confident they're working they way they're supposed to.

19 to go....

Am still thinking about adding a few other units, to round out the list, e.g. Genoese Crossbowman, a fighting great general to match our fighting admiral, highlanders, and perhaps a few more. The framework is designed to easily add more units as time goes by.

 

[DracoTheGreat]

Cool cool.

Downloaded it, and about to test it!

 

[DracoTheGreat]

Tested it. Everything seemed to work fine.

 

[sman1975]

One thing I'd like to point out - I simply put the stats (combat, moves, cost, range, etc.) for each of these units to the nearest existing unit in the game. They're more of a place holder than anything. I figured as we got closer to final version, we'd have more clarity on specific promotions, and how OP the units became. Goal is to have them just a little above a contemporaneous unit, with the possibility of the random promotion making them a even more better or for a negative promotion, near the basic unit. There needs to be at least some incentive for a player to use these units.

 

[DracoTheGreat]

Yeah, ok, that makes sense.

 

[sman1975]

Latest version posted.

Added 13 units today, and all have passed testing, although I'm only about 90% happy with the Guerrilla unit's animation. It's a poorly documented unit, and it isn't clear which of the normal animations the new unit should use. Have experimented with a few alternatives, but there is still a .5-2 second delay when ordering an attack then seeing a response from the unit. Not a critical flaw, but a bit annoying.

The units are built with the stats, costs, promotions etc, closely aligned with similar units already in the game. This is temporary, and will be adjusted after all the units are built and the "Merc Function" q.v., is working.

There are 6 more units left to build (21 built so far), then I'll need work on the "Merc Function" then "rebalance unit costs/capabilities" - which should wrap up version 1.

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The "Merc Function": LUA-based routines that will process merc unit life-cycle in the game, removing units that should no longer be in play.

The basic assumption is that when a player "hires" a merc unit, it is only for X turns. For this example, let's say "20."

The merc function LUA routines will then tell the player when 75% of the merc unit contract has expired. For this example, let's assume we're using 20 turns per contract:
1. At the start of each turn, the computer will cycle through all the merc units a player has - examining how many turns have transpired for that unit's contract.
2. If the on turn 15, a message button would show up on the right side of the screen to warn the player about the upcoming contract termination.
3. If on turn 20, the computer determines if there are enough funds to renew the contract for the unit.
4. If sufficient funds are NOT available, the unit disbands automatically - with a message button on the right side of the screen to inform the player.
5. If sufficient funds are available, a pop-up window would ask the player to renew the contract.
6a. If the player declines to renew the contract, the unit disbands immediately.
6b. If the player renews, a certain amount of gold is decremented from the treasury.

7. The computer would then go to the next merc unit in the game and repeat steps 2-6

Obviously, the process described above is for the human player. For the AI, I'll develop some heuristics to determine when to remove its merc units. Will have lots to do with AI civ cash-flow and unit obsolescence.

If all this works well enough, significant work will be required to best determine what the initial unit hire cost should be for each unit, what actual promotions each unit should have, and what the contract renewal cost should be.

 

[DracoTheGreat]

Sorry, I wasn't home all day today.

Will test them out tomorrow, though, and let you know how it was!

 

[DracoTheGreat]

Oh, also, I was doing a quick game, and actually saw the AI use the Camel Bowman, and Camel Rifleman units. Didn't see them use the elephants, though, and they seem to favor the Camel Raiding Party quite a lot.

 

[sman1975]

Here's the latest "Planned Merc Chart" - with the most recent stats, etc. Units still left to complete are BOLDed in the "Available Units" column.

Will try to add a few more units in today, but am short on time unfortunately. Should have all of them added by tomorrow evening.

The "Similar Unit" is my way of tracking the in-game unit that most closely resembles the new unit - helps keep cost/capability balance in place. I expect we'll adjust at least the cost numbers when we decide how to structure the merc unit function.

For example, let's say I'm playing at a game speed where the "Longswordsman" is in the game 50 turns (between my discovering Steel and Gunpowder). The Condottieri is the closet unit to that, although it lasts until Rifling. I did most of the obsolete techs this way to demonstrate that it's easier to find/hire units that aren't exactly cutting edge.

For the Longswordsman: in terms of Production (not Gold, since the exact numbers move around based on game difficulty) it costs 120 Hammers, so for 50 turns, this comes out to 2.4 Hammers per turn.

Currently the mod prices in a 10% premium on instant purchase, so the Condottieri unit will cost 132 Hammers(2.64 Hammers per turn) - if it were a normal unit. This premium can be adjusted (higher, maybe?) as needed to bring in more realism. Since no Gold maintenance is charged for merc units, perhaps a 25% bonus is better? This moves the new cost to 150 Hammers, or 3 Hammers per turn. Feels a little more like it. Anyways...

In our example, the life cycle of the Longswordsman is 50 turns, so for ease of understanding, let's set up the contract for the Condottieri for 25 turns. This means, if we want to hire this unit, we should pay 175 Hammers' equivalent in Gold (at a 25% premium). Basically, you get to purchase merc units, roughly equivalent to units you could build, but you get them instantly and for half the price of instantly buying your own units. But... you only get half the life cycle out of them, plus a 25% bonus for doing so.

Another thing I'm looking at closely during testing is how/if the AI uses the new units. Some tinkering for the non-human player may be needed to get this to work.

This is the approach I plan to start the "merc function" design with. Probably at the 25% premium at the beginning and extended testing/play will help adjust as needed.

 

[DracoTheGreat]

Looks pretty cool. And makes sense, too.

Like I mentioned before, the AI was using the Camel Bowman and Camel Rifleman units. Haven't seen them use the mercenary units, though.

 

[sman1975]

Yeah, that seems about right. The camel and elephant units offered different capabilities (and with them different "flavors") that the AI might find useful. You'd see many more camel units, as there is obviously more desert tiles than tiles with Ivory resources.

As the merc unit stats are identical to similar in-game units, I wouldn't be surprised if the AI goes with the traditional choice most of the time. Once we get everything "working", the last and sometimes painful part is to adjust the merc unit stats to give them the alternative flavoring that might make the AI like them more.

 

[DracoTheGreat]

Oh, I see.

 

[sman1975]

OK, I think V1 (minus "merc function") is nearly complete. Will add an LUA "recon" function for then recon plane & jet, the publish a new version.

I don't plan to add any more units or content, with possibly the exception of an overarching "merc promotion." This would be a promotion that applies to all merc units, and would consist of something like XP earned at 50% level and Great General has no effect. Possibly some other effects.



Here are "class photos" of the non-merc units (there are 8 new units with 7 new promotions):

 

[sman1975]

Here are the class photos of the merc units added, by Era. There are 31 new units, with 4 new promotions, with possible an additional one to follow:



Will finish up testing the "recon" function, but it's coming from one of my mods that's worked before, so that shouldn't take too long.

Will post a new version after that.

 

[sman1975]

Latest version of the mod is posted. Now work begins on the "merc function...."

Well, after lunch, perhaps...

Appreciate any feedback you have - was a rush to finish adding all these units, and there are almost certainly quite a few text fixes needed. Also appreciate feedback on the Civilopedia as well.

 

[DracoTheGreat]

Cool cool.

I made a little entry for the Gurkhas:

The Gurkhas or Gorkhas or Gorkhali are the soldiers of Nepali nationality recruited in any war zones around the world. Historically, the term Gurkha was used as a synonym for Nepali.

They were mostly used by the British from 1857 to 1947 in British controlled India. They were kept away from any urban conflicts in the subcontinent, and mostly served the front lines. After the Indian independence, the Gurkhas were split between the two nations, although most chose to side with India.

I think that should be enough for the historical information part of the civilopedia. It's mostly for game stuff, and not really for the actual history, although it's an interesting feature. I'll try to add an entry for every unit added, though that's gonna take a while, as I'm also busy with school stuff.