Fall 2017 Patch - Undocumented Changes

[Piruparka]

Actually that would be kind of a cool feature. Having a unit automatically escort your trader; if it comes across a border you don't have an open borders agreement with, it will stop there and wait for the trader's return, just to guide it home automatically. Ed, pls read this.

 

[nzcamel]

Actually that would be kind of a cool feature. Having a unit automatically escort your trader; if it comes across a border you don't have an open borders agreement with, it will stop there and wait for the trader's return, just to guide it home automatically. Ed, pls read this.

I'd like that too. But given it's likelihood vs other pressing issues, I'm not holding my breath

You'd like it to stop one space short of the border, so as not to cause a diplomatic incident!

 

[nzcamel]

Sorry but this has been there already (from day 1, if I'm not mistaken).
Sometimes it didn't work properly and you had to disable the first one with a right-click - then you got the ability to cycle through the remaining instances.
I'm however not sure about the declaration of war notification - I've never paid attention to those so I don't know whether you could cycle through them or not

Yes, there were dots for different instances, but I found nigh on impossible to click and use them. It's only the arrows and the absolute ease of using them that is new and unmentioned.

I see what has changed:

The arrows are now both at the right hand side of the box. It used to be that the left pointing one was on the left side of the box. Which was kind of annoying -from memory- as you could lose the box as you moved your mouse across to click on it. Certainly a nice improvement.

 

[MrRadar]

Sorry again, but the arrows are not new.

I see what has changed:

View attachment 480036


The arrows are now both at the right hand side of the box. It used to be that the left pointing one was on the left side of the box. Which was kind of annoying -from memory- as you could loose the box as you moved your mouse across to click on it. Certainly a nice improvement.

I went thorough my screenshots and found one from 14 July 2017, just pre-Summer patch, and you're right - there were arrows, only in different places. I somehow never acknowledged them, probably dismissed as just a decorative element

Anyway, after the current rearrangement they are much more noticeable and convenient.

 

[bbbt]

I went thorough my screenshots and found one from 14 July 2017, just pre-Summer patch, and you're right - there were arrows, only in different places. I somehow never acknowledged them, probably dismissed as just a decorative element

I didn't realize the arrows next to city names were arrows I could scroll through cities with for ages. I think I also just processed them as brass-style ornamentation or something. Though why they put in the ability to click on a unit name and get a pop-up list of units to go to, but didn't do that for the cities, I do not understand.

 

[Tech Osen]

In my current game, I've discovered an unfortunate change due to the religion model - you can't link a religious unit with a regular troop. Usually I wouldn't care, but playing as Spain, I just want my missionary attached to my Conquistadors. Means that I always have to move them separately, and definitely more than once have forgotten to move the missionary onto the same tile so have missed out on my +10 bonus.

Unfortunate side effect of moving the clergy onto a seperate layer. Affects (humans playing) Spain the most but also in general apostels with medic promotion.

 

[masda_gib]

I went thorough my screenshots and found one from 14 July 2017, just pre-Summer patch, and you're right - there were arrows, only in different places. I somehow never acknowledged them, probably dismissed as just a decorative element

Anyway, after the current rearrangement they are much more noticeable and convenient.

... Yeah, I never thought of clicking those arrows. I always dismissed them as deco elements. I learned something today!

 

[nzcamel]

Unfortunate side effect of moving the clergy onto a seperate layer. Affects (humans playing) Spain the most but also in general apostels with medic promotion.

I don't really see why. Military units are on a separate layer to all the units they can link with.

 

[Jendass28]

Another tiny change I noticed which has big impact on the war gaming - but not 100% sure. Can someone confirm?

When you pillage a trade-route it eats all your movement - the same way pillaging improvements and district does. before the patch you were able to pillage the trade route and then e.g. attack or pillage other things.

 

[masda_gib]

I don't really see why. Military units are on a separate layer to all the units they can link with.

But religious units are special because they can occupy the field of another players unit.
You can stack your builders with your combat units. But you can't stack your builder with a foreign combat unit. You can do that with religious units.
I guess it is this special behavior that makes them unlinkable for now.

Edit: I think it can be easily solved by just letting them behave like other unit types when linked. I just guess that's the cause of the current state.

 

[UWHabs]

But religious units are special because they can occupy the field of another players unit.
You can stack your builders with your combat units. But you can't stack your builder with a foreign combat unit. You can do that with religious units.
I guess it is this special behavior that makes them unlinkable for now.

Edit: I think it can be easily solved by just letting them behave like other unit types when linked. I just guess that's the cause of the current state.

The flaw is that the layer they're on allows units of different nations on the same tiles. So you can have an Arabian musketman on the same tile as a Russian Guru. So if you allowed them to be linked, you'd have a bunch of extra checks to handle. Doesn't seem like it would be too challenging to at least have some simple rules - if you want to move/attack a tile where both units would be required to fight, then block that and force you to stop linking them first. Otherwise it'd be the same as the rest of the movement rules for linked units - if one of them gets stuck in a zone of control or runs out of moves, then the linked units can't move.

 

[Uberfrog]

The religious unit layer already seems to be bugged - I found it quite frustrating on the new Nirvana scenario, my units would frequently stack themselves and then be unable to move until the next turn. So it quite possibly is more complex to implement than that.

 

[Yokel]

The religious unit layer already seems to be bugged - I found it quite frustrating on the new Nirvana scenario, my units would frequently stack themselves and then be unable to move until the next turn. So it quite possibly is more complex to implement than that.

There seems to be a new stacking thing in general. I was playing as Khmer, and moving a Varu and a Musketman, they ended up crossing on the same tile, stacked. But the next turn, I couldn't fire the Varu until the Musketman moved. Is that just how siege units behave in general, tweaked because the Varu can move and shoot? Or is there a new 1.5 UPT tweak going on?

 

[UWHabs]

There seems to be a new stacking thing in general. I was playing as Khmer, and moving a Varu and a Musketman, they ended up crossing on the same tile, stacked. But the next turn, I couldn't fire the Varu until the Musketman moved. Is that just how siege units behave in general, tweaked because the Varu can move and shoot? Or is there a new 1.5 UPT tweak going on?

If you have 2 units on the same tile for some reason, then you can't attack with either until one moves. I notice this early on when I build a new unit - if I have a warrior in my city and build an archer, I need to move one before I can attack a barb next door. You shouldn't be able to cross them in the first place, so that seems like the bug.

 

[Yokel]

If you have 2 units on the same tile for some reason, then you can't attack with either until one moves. I notice this early on when I build a new unit - if I have a warrior in my city and build an archer, I need to move one before I can attack a barb next door. You shouldn't be able to cross them in the first place, so that seems like the bug.

That's what threw me off. I didn't even consider that they'd stacked themselves, so I had no idea why I couldn't fire the Varu, until I moved it and realized there was the Musketman underneath. Then I noticed later that another pair had stacked itself in the middle of a different 3-4 turn move order.

 

[Uberfrog]

Yeah the behaviour it's triggering is the (intended) behaviour that makes you move a second unit out of a city before a garrison unit can attack.

The problem is it's triggering when you try to move a unit (with two movement points) through another unit. This should be possible, but for some reason when the second unit moves onto the occupied tile, it stops, and the anti-stacking code kicks in. The problem is, it forces both units to wait until next turn before one can move, so you in fact end the turn with a useless stack.

 

[nzcamel]

When you pillage a trade-route it eats all your movement - the same way pillaging improvements and district does. before the patch you were able to pillage the trade route and then e.g. attack or pillage other things.

I'm not sure, but I think you're right. I have a feeling that it didn't previously eat up all your movement.

The religious unit layer already seems to be bugged - I found it quite frustrating on the new Nirvana scenario, my units would frequently stack themselves and then be unable to move until the next turn. So it quite possibly is more complex to implement than that.

Yeah, I've seen religious units stack and the unit that was there first then couldn't move until the next turn.

 

[Jaybe]

I'm not sure, but I think you're right. I have a feeling that it didn't previously eat up all your movement.

Yes, looting a trade route DID end a unit’s turn, at least since the summer patch, maybe before.

 

[God of Kings]

There seems to be a new stacking thing in general. I was playing as Khmer, and moving a Varu and a Musketman, they ended up crossing on the same tile, stacked. But the next turn, I couldn't fire the Varu until the Musketman moved. Is that just how siege units behave in general, tweaked because the Varu can move and shoot? Or is there a new 1.5 UPT tweak going on?

You mean the Domrey? India is the only one with Varu.

 

[TomKQT]

Another tiny change I noticed which has big impact on the war gaming - but not 100% sure. Can someone confirm?

When you pillage a trade-route it eats all your movement - the same way pillaging improvements and district does. before the patch you were able to pillage the trade route and then e.g. attack or pillage other things.

Normal pillaging (improvements or districts) doesn't eat all your movement, it takes I think 3 movement units, so if you have 6 you can even pillage two times in the same turn (I do this often with ships when I pillage enemy harbors). This was not changed in this patch.
And trade route pillaging - I'm quite sure (but not 100 %) that it has always worked the same way (different from normal pillaging) - eating ALL your remaining movement, regardless how much you had. Similar to taking a promotion.

So I would say there was no change in pillaging in this update.