Fantastic except for hypocrisy

[onedreamer]

While I agree with the AI and predictability i am a bit puzzled by your other assertion.

Specifically - when people understand that civics limit or influence what religions one can take in a game - would then that still not be a part of strategy?

I'll explain better: Sacrifice the Weak is a definitely better civic than Fend for themselves or Protect the Meek. It's the best civic in its tree. Since I think that a set of the most powerful civics is much stronger than adopting this other than that religion, this would lead me to too much freedom of choice in civics and too much limited freedom of choice in religion, and in the end there wouldn't even be a choice because I'll always choose the best option which normally doesn't change from one game to the other.
Hmm ok I understand I can't seem to explain it clearly So I hope you get it by intuition.

 

[Bringa]

QES, I like your ideas, and I'd like to propose a few additions:

I don't like how quickly a civ can become evil according to your system. Change like that doesn't happen overnight.

What I propose would be an accumulating alignment counter. For each round, certain things are taken into consideration--your civics, for instance. So each round that you operate under an evil civic would push you slightly more toward the evil end of the spectrum. Evidently this number would need to be smaller the closer you are to absolute evil and larger the further you are from it (so that you cannot accumulate so much evil points that you will be unable to return to good).

Next, every civilization can adopt every religion (as it is right now), but adopting an evil religion while your people are of GOOD alignment (that is, forcing the religion on them) will create unhappiness. Conversely, the happiness bonuses for good/evil religions might be even higher if your civ is particularly close to absolute evil/good.

The religions themselves would have strong good/evil modifiers as well; meaning that even if your civics are set to mostly good, forcing ashen veil on your people for a long time will eventually make your civ evil.

The biggest drawback for this is that the AI needs to be taught about those changes, urgently. However I don't think that this would make the AI much weaker in regard to religions than it is now; they don't really understand the pros and cons and instead just adopt the first thing that comes their way.

Ultimately, if we flavor religion and civic preferences right, the AI will play a STRONGER game because a civ with a bias toward good civics AND a good religion will end up with big happiness bonuses for being close to absolute good.

 

[Bringa]

onedreamer: if you remember that we balance the BIG picture, not civic vs civic, I think you can agree that while Sacrifice the weak is the strongest civic in its tree (maybe even in the game), it is tied into the whole being evil thing and can be offset not just by other civics, but by any kind of advantage that comes with being good. In the system QES proposes, this link would remain in place, it would just change in quality.

 

[QES]

onedreamer: if you remember that we balance the BIG picture, not civic vs civic, I think you can agree that while Sacrifice the weak is the strongest civic in its tree (maybe even in the game), it is tied into the whole being evil thing and can be offset not just by other civics, but by any kind of advantage that comes with being good. In the system QES proposes, this link would remain in place, it would just change in quality.

Thank you for saying more eloquently what I could not.

My ideas were simply to create possible mechanics that would solve the first issue - where an early religion dominates so very quickly.

I believe that mechanically - there should be some reward for a religion being older than others. However, in the current system, the first religion quickly becomes the only religion and a "world order" is fundamentally founded. Everyone quickly adopts the same philosophies throughout the game. It reduces tensions - leading (as i remember it) the player to be the one instigating military tensions.

If there was a higher amount of competition between religions, for various people, in various parts of the world - then these tensions might become more global, and add a dynamic to the game overall.

It occurs to me, that if one must have an alignment first - and this allows (or perhaps justifies) a religion, then both flavor and the mechanical issue of "Mono-religion worlds" might be solved.

I understand that players like freedom of choice. I know that players "want to have absolute choice." But - there is more strategy, and essentially more of a challenge if limits are introduced.

I like bringa's ideas of a slow evolution to and from alignments modifiers. I also think the "unhappiness" modifiers for choosing religions might be a good compromise - however, the fact that the AI still attempts to have a religion, any religion, that best suits its mechanics, it would still adopt one even if it got negatives. This not so much being out of preference, but simply code.

The essential problem we're dealing with here - is goals. How does one program "goals" for a computer? It is easy to suggest that conquering the world, or going for a specific victory might be plausible, but when there are multiple styles and paths for doing so, the computer will usually (as stated) make the same ones over and over. In this - there isnt, essentially, multiple choices except for human players.

If religions require alignments, suddenly getting an independent religion (or a religion at all) for the computer becomes a part of the math and process to achieve the "victory" conditions already established. The computer seems to understand "prerequisites" at least in margin, so if FoL has a world wide spread, and the computer cannot have that religion, in order to get one, it MUST seek another choice. The mere pursuit of another choice will increase the over all commitment to different religions throughout the world.

The reason that the "civics" would be so easily transferable - or really, why it's so easy to flip alignments, is to create a system of dynamics in the AI that dont normally exist. Also - it would give weight to civics that are normally not chosen for certain strategies.

If "sacrifice the weak" is always the strongest of it's choice, the mere exclusion of some stratagems for such a choice would mitigate the "power" of any one specific strategy - and holistic approaches would again be king.

-Qes

 

[icantcmyeye]

The game is based alot on chance. You might chance to start near many villages that promote your society above the others, or you may have acheron, orthus, and the sailors dirge spawn outside your borders (this just happened to me the other day).

I have also noticed that the first religion founded is usually the most popular one, as it spreads quickly through the undecideds

But alas, it is all how you roll the die my friend... now get back to the city and fortify yourself, the clan is coming... with weapons...

 

[MagisterCultuum]

I don't have a problem with civics altering alignment, but it shouldn't be the only, or even main, factor. Doing things like sacrificing population (for production or in vampiric feasts), using a demons altar, raising cities, building the Tower of Necromancy/Mokka's Cauldron/Infernal Grimorie, researching Malevolent designs/corruption of spirit/Infernal pact/Necromancy, and using entropy/death magic should also incline a civ towards evil. Unless these things could have a fractional effect, a 9 point scale would probably be too small (not saying 100 are needed)

I think a repentant demon is a bit much, but I was thinking a good-only hero that cannot be built but must be upgraded from a priest of the Veil would be awesome (obviously, he would lose some evil-oriented promotions in the process) (we should have a few Heroes to which other units can upgrade, and a few that can be upgraded to high tier units later on) (when I first wrote my last post, the good Calormene from Chronicles of Narnia: The Last Battle who was welcomed into Aslan's Country because by piously seeking to serve Tash, his people's evil diety, he was really serving Aslan)

 

[onedreamer]

onedreamer: if you remember that we balance the BIG picture, not civic vs civic, I think you can agree that while Sacrifice the weak is the strongest civic in its tree (maybe even in the game), it is tied into the whole being evil thing and can be offset not just by other civics, but by any kind of advantage that comes with being good. In the system QES proposes, this link would remain in place, it would just change in quality.

I don't know, I guess I'm just of a different opinion. In my opinion, the best set of civics is more powerful than any other advantage in the game, being good or evil, having this or that religion, etc.

I don't have a problem with civics altering alignment, but it shouldn't be the only, or even main, factor. Doing things like sacrificing population (for production or in vampiric feasts), using a demons altar, raising cities, building the Tower of Necromancy/Mokka's Cauldron/Infernal Grimorie, researching Malevolent designs/corruption of spirit/Infernal pact/Necromancy, and using entropy/death magic should also incline a civ towards evil. Unless these things could have a fractional effect, a 9 point scale would probably be too small (not saying 100 are needed)

I definitely agree with this kind of approach though

 

[iamjooish]

Can we change race objectives, religion diplomacy importance weightings by race and possibly even make the total research path for each religion closer in terms of total research required? I would LOVE to have a game in which the first religions to pop up were always a surprise. Tired of seeing the leaves always adopted by all. Hypocritical if you ask me! Also, in general, the benefits of each religion should be expanded just a bit more. I think a religion should give tech research bonuses for certain techs, for example.

Fellowship is a somewhat universal and "plastic" sect. It doesn't care about your alignment, and greenery is everywhere to some degree. At that, everyone, regardless of virtue or character, has some sort of "niche" to fill in for the natural world. Literally.



I have changed almost every 'goal' tech for civs in... customfunctions I believe. Maybe it was another *.py.

For example, Lurch' now aims for Golem Mastery, Khazad towards machinery, elves towards Commune, and Lanun towards astronomy. Unfortunately I tend to found most religions first, on my own, now. But that's mostly because I generate random maps with starting positions that are impossibly stacked in my favor -flood plains, 'clumps' of commerce bonuses. Such as the much coveted 3 gold bonuses that oh so rarely pop up on randon map seeds.

The only other thing I would humbly suggest is that magic play a slightly stronger role up front. All towers should have a much stronger effect. All the 4 magic type techs should flow into both the summoning and sorcery techs. As it stands, researching macemen is a lot more important than getting mages.

I don't believe magic should be made stronger with the few options already available, HOWEVER, I do think there's plenty room for more options to specialize spellcasting globally, as well as individually.

Additional potential bonuses to xp, a few more national wonders, more wonders that grant additional mana bonuses or amplify their affinity, a wonder to stunt your opponent's spellcasters inside your own territory (cowled enforcers, anybody?)
et cetera.

Last, skeletons should be able to wield bronze and iron weapons. A similar summons for good and neutral that is perm till killed should be created. All of the towers should have more immediate and bigger benefits.

Hmm, hrrmm. I agree with the skeles and additional summons parts. There are few 'throw-away' kamikaze strategies as it is now...


About Sacrifice... I convert and use it in every game. There's too much of an edge not to. You use it with unyielding order and you've pretty much got an unstoppable city machine going. The other religious civics can't even come half-way to that. The order doesn't have a prayer vs a human player with Sacrifice and an axe to grind!

Evil always wins because Good is stupid.