Feature Requests and Discussion

[Terkhen]

Good example! I just looked through the Player AI and couldnt find anywhere that it evaluates any bonuses that it gets from SpecialistTypeExtraCommerce (which is a new tag that Kael added for FFH) ! I'll enter a bug for that issue. Thanks for pointing this one out guys!

Cool

It may be tricky, though, given how it makes all specialists modify the capital instead of the city they are in.

Why do Khazad (for all practical purposes) ALWAYS go for Runes, and Ljosalfar ALWAYS go for Leaves? If this is hard coded, then frankly, that's fine with me, because well over 95% of the time it's the best choice for the AI anyway. If it's not a pure hard-code, then at the least there are some heavy weights pointing these civs towards those choices.

They are definitely weights. If I remember correctly, these weights are defined for each leader.

If we steer the AI towards the correct religion choices when one choice is dominant over another, why not do the same for civics?

The religion choices are enforced for flavour reasons and not for gameplay reasons. Each leader's favourite civic is also enforced for flavour reasons. Since these restrictions are not made for gameplay reasons, they are in my opinion not comparable to your enforced civics idea. The AI implementation decides about gameplay, not flavour.

Having said that, I don't think that the current religion hardcoding is a great idea either even if it is for flavour reasons. I think that the game should lessen the religion weights to not force civilizations into specific religions nearly all the time. But that's just my personal opinion and MNAI should probably not change the religion weights to keep things the same as they are in vanilla FFH2

 

[Tholal]

I currently have it working like this:

Makes sense. If you can identify the function you need, I'll try and expose it to python. Otherwise I'll dig into the code when I get a chance.

 

[MagisterCultuum]

The code that trades maps starts at line 860 of CvDeal.cpp. It does not look like something that is easy to expose to python.


As I said, I'd really rather be able to let the council members share maps as if on the same team or as if they had spies steal each other's plans. It seems like the latter would be possible if you exposed void CvTeam::changeStolenVisibilityTimer(TeamTypes eIndex, int iChange), which starts at line 4392 of CvTeam.cpp.

 

[doktarr]

The last time it happened to me, I had to wait like 10 turns, but they capitulated. Try to avoid getting EXTRA negative marks when you are at war with them.

Interesting. So if I had just waited long enough it would have become an option? I guess I should have just dragged the first war out another dozen turns instead of making peace and coming back for the last city in a second war. Still, this seems silly to me.

I did manage to get capitulation in my latest game by following this formula. It appears that you just need to be at war for a certain amount of time in order to get your opponent to accede to capitulation. If the war is new enough, than it won't be an option no matter what the relative power situation is. It takes much longer to become a possibility than other things, like techs or money or cities, though.

Here's another data point for your consideration:

• War with the Ljosalfar.
  
• First ever war with them. She declared war on me, not the other way around.
  
• Our initial relations were bad, but not horribly so. -2 for "refused to help us", -1 for close borders, and -5 for "heathen religion", against positives for embassies and years of peace. Fairly standard stuff.
  
• The war has lasted over 30 turns.
  
• I have captured 7 of her 8 cities, and have captured the city that was, or became, her capital three times. She is down to a single small coastal city. She has never captured a city in the war.
  
• I have rung up a ridiculous warscore against her (her war weariness is over 300) while she has killed roughly 8 lunatics and 1 Angel (and a couple slaves).
  
• I am far ahead on techs and game score (well more than double; more than quadruple if you count my teammate civ).
  
• She is down to a single fighting unit (an Adept, I believe) and some workers, all in her last city. I could kill her at any time (and a crazed lunatic presumably will do so at some point in the near future, although I am running my lunatics away in the hope that she will build warriors fast enough to keep up).
  
• The only thing I can demand from her in peace is a world map, 80 gold, and her conversion to Agrarianism. Capitulation is in red.

Something seems wrong here.

 

[Kiech]

Why she declared on you, I can't answer.

I can, roleplay-wise, understand why they would not capitulate. All of the leaders firmly believe that they will 'rise again' and this is not the end of their civilization.

Furthermore, as capitulation is so powerful in FFH2, I would recommend that vassalage maintenance be much higher than in normal BTS.

 

[doktarr]

Oh, I can understand why she declared war on me. I was in the midst of a long war with the Bannor and was stretched thin for troops. She had finished the Clan off and had no other potential enemies on the continent - it was either DoW me, or join my war against the Bannor. If I were her, I'd figure "I've gotta deal with Basium now, before he finishes off the Bannor and turns to me".

She moved across my border with a ~30 unit stack that turn. But the turn she declared war on me, I made peace with the Bannor, promoted a dozen slaves into (Iron, Blessed, 10/7) Lunatics, and planted Combat 5/Drill 4/Empty Bier Basium in a castle right next to the big stack. Things went downhill for the Ljosalfar very quickly after that.

I agree that capitulation is extremely powerful in FFH2, simply because a capitulated civ gives you three mana nodes for the cost of a single city. Counteracting that would be nice; it is strange that I have such a strong incentive to keep a tiny rump state alive. I'm not sure how vassalage maintencance works, but if it's going to be re-worked, I suggest a high base maintenance cost, but making that cost not scale up very quickly for each additional city. That way the "release all cities on the far-flung continent" event still makes sense. The goal should just be to reduce the incentive to have a tiny vassal, not to make vassals bad overall. (Obviously, I don't think making capitulation ridiculously hard to achieve is a good way to effect this.)

 

[Kiech]

Its not hard to get a capitulation, you just have to provide the leader with a way of "saving face", a little bit of time does that, apparently.

 

[Tholal]

Here's another data point for your consideration:

[*]The only thing I can demand from her in peace is a world map, 80 gold, and her conversion to Agrarianism. Capitulation is in red.

Do you have a savegame I can look at?

 

[doktarr]

Do you have a savegame I can look at?

Here's one right around then. I only played 12 turns last night, but nothing changed (other than me killing the Bannor off startlingly quickly with Chalid and a stack of blessed Lunatics who didn't feel like stopping when the Bannor had one city left). The Ljosalfar still have just the one figure and some workers, and still refuse capitulation despite teetering on the brink of elimination every turn.

At this point they hate me a lot, but that's just because the positive modifiers have disappeared and been replaced with a -8 for "this war spoils our relationship". I'm not sure how I could avoid that.

 

[MagisterCultuum]

I'd like it if (when the Advanced Tatics game option is active) units could airlift to superforts just like they can to cities.


It would also be nice if there was a way to trade superforts through diplomacy, but I'm not sure how that work work as they don't have named to identify them.

 

[doktarr]

Here's one right around then. I only played 12 turns last night, but nothing changed (other than me killing the Bannor off startlingly quickly with Chalid and a stack of blessed Lunatics who didn't feel like stopping when the Bannor had one city left). The Ljosalfar still have just the one figure and some workers, and still refuse capitulation despite teetering on the brink of elimination every turn.

At this point they hate me a lot, but that's just because the positive modifiers have disappeared and been replaced with a -8 for "this war spoils our relationship". I'm not sure how I could avoid that.

I'm wondering now if the AI is just massively miscalculating its power. Maybe there's some rounding error that causes power to accumulate incorrectly, or perhaps tigers aren't properly accounted for? I noticed on the power graph that the turn before the Ljosalfar finally got defeated (eventually some enraged Lunatics finished her) her power was something like two thirds of mine. Then it bombed to zero in one turn after defeat. Clearly, with one warrior and a couple workers, her power should have been drastically lower for quite a while before that.

 

[MagisterCultuum]

Could you allow Temporary Features and Temporary Improvements, would would work like Temporary Terrain and revert to whatever feature or improvement (including the lack thereof) was there before?

 

[Kiech]

I'm wondering now if the AI is just massively miscalculating its power.

It could be that too. I feel like it does that all of the time.

 

[doktarr]

Has anyone seen the Kuriotate AI build an airship in an inland city? Perhaps the AI just can't consider that possibility.

For context - I am playing a game as the Mercurians where the Kuriotates (the summoning civ) and I are the only civs on our continent. His 5 cities (Huge map) are all internal. Despite being at war with a nearby, overseas opponent, having the necessary techs, and having hordes of Centaurs to work with, the Kurios are building useless stuff like Training Yards and Archery Ranges and haven't built a single airship.

 

[Tholal]

I'm wondering now if the AI is just massively miscalculating its power.

Turns out that there was a bug in the power calculations! Hope to have it fixed for 2.5

Could you allow Temporary Features and Temporary Improvements, would would work like Temporary Terrain and revert to whatever feature or improvement (including the lack thereof) was there before?

Cool idea. Added to the Feature Requests, though at low priority. I imagine it would be a complicated addition.

I'd like it if (when the Advanced Tatics game option is active) units could airlift to superforts just like they can to cities.

We can do that.

It would also be nice if there was a way to trade superforts through diplomacy, but I'm not sure how that work work as they don't have named to identify them.

Yeah. That's pretty much the problem with trying to make them tradeable.

Has anyone seen the Kuriotate AI build an airship in an inland city? Perhaps the AI just can't consider that possibility.

You're probably right. Flying ships with UNITCOMBAT_NAVAL are a bit beyond the AI's comprehension. Added this as a new bug issue.

 

[hzf]

The AI seems far too aggressive.

i have just installed this modmod, having not played ffh in a couple of years. On Immortal difficulty, even the more peace loving leaders of similar alignment to my own are declaring on me before turn 40. Some game I get 3 declarations before turn 50. I know to be aware of it from some leaders, but Kardith and Sandalphon declaring on turns 40 and 45 is a bit much.

Edit: this has happened in 6 out of 7 starts, so it is not just a one off. Sorry if this comes across as whiny, but there is challenging and down right impossible and no one is winning a game where 3 neighbours declare on them at turn 50.

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I am also encountering AI's named "@Random (By Alignment)".

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There was an old bug with FFH that sometimes prevented you from getting a food source and three hills in your starting location, and this bug persists. I have noticed the AI is also building there capitals in some really questionable locations.

 

[doktarr]

Has anyone seen the Kuriotate AI build an airship in an inland city? Perhaps the AI just can't consider that possibility.

You're probably right. Flying ships with UNITCOMBAT_NAVAL are a bit beyond the AI's comprehension. Added this as a new bug issue.

They also don't appear to be able to trade them. When I WB'ed an airship into on of his inland cities, he left it there on defense. When I WB'ed one into one of his coastal settlements, he ran it back into one of his cities. Both times, the airship never appeared on the trade window (not even in red).

 

[doktarr]

Basium seems a bit overaggressive about casting Divine Retribution. He cast it immediately upon summoning - before I had a chance to switch to playing him - in my latest game. This actually killed a surprising number of Pyre Zombies (20, according to the stats) but given that the Sheaim were literally on the opposite side of the world at the time, this was not a very good tactical use of the spell.

FWIW I've seen him cast it first turn at least a couple other times, as well. At the very least, it would be nice if he didn't pop his worldspell before you had a chance to switch to playing him.

 

[MagisterCultuum]

Would it be possible to make it so that you can leave the civics which are forced by Overcouncil membership at the same time as you leave the Overcouncil, rather than having to wait 1 turns until you are allowed to change civics again?

 

[MagisterCultuum]

Could you give terrain improvements a PythonPerTurn callback?

There are some things I'd like certain improvements to do each turn under certain conditions, but I really don't want to waste resources using python to cycle through the whole map and check each tile for such improvements.