Final Fixes Reborn

black_imperator said:
The only thing i intend to fix about the current guilds is to cut them completely. The mechanic isn't very interesting and they have no lore connection so i have no intent in keeping that. The only question is either i do it well before i'm ready to unleash their replacement or not.
Click to expand...

I agree on the lack of integrated lore, but I do think the Guild mechanism is very powerful and useful in the game. Would be happy to brainstorm on how to adjust it and make it more meaningful.

Do you want the reproducible interface breaking save?
 
Don't get rid of the guilds, I find it a nice thing to boost a new city, when you need extra production or culture. At least don't remove them until you have coded a replacement.

I would like to say something about units giving production points from their sacrifice (slaves, kilmorph). For me this is a quality of life in the end game, when you want to develop rapidly a city. So I would advocate to allow the siege workshop to grant the possibility to build the supplies unit, that would have a cost and be able to be sacrificed for half its worth in production. Because not all nations can have slaves or be Kilmorph. As I say, this is a quality of life, not something unbalancing the game.
 
Mknn said:
I agree on the lack of integrated lore, but I do think the Guild mechanism is very powerful and useful in the game. Would be happy to brainstorm on how to adjust it and make it more meaningful.
Click to expand...

Just because a mechanic is powerful and useful doesn't mean you should keep it. The guilds are powerful and useful, and for exactly this reason it becomes a question if you can afford not to found them, essentially turning them into a GP tax. The only reason I'm not bothered by the guilds is because the AI doesn't undeinrstand them properly, so I won't have to deal with the AI outperforming me based solely on their difficulty advantage. Also, there's absolutely zero incentive to spread them to your rivals, even including your allies (since that would make them reluctant to trade their spare resources with you).

That said, they are a welcome boon to new-founded cities in the late game, which otherwise have a tough time catching up.

The other mechanic with this issue is the Master Craftspeople buildings, and it annoys me greatly. The AI vastly outperform me in GP points (and especially Great Engineers) and gold production, and the equipments from these buildings make units perform roughly one tier better than unequipped. I'd say the Master Craftspeople buildings are generic and the equipment promotions neither add flavour nor interesting options, yet you have to get them to not end at a military disadvantage with no proper counter.

Mknn said:
Do you want the reproducible interface breaking save?
Click to expand...

Do, don't ask. Just upload it and share it here, and Black Imperator will check it out when it works for them.
 
black_imperator said:
and Units is the winner with this shocking last minute third vote ^^

You'll get your dev diary in a day or two. I need to actually write it properly ^^
Click to expand...
seeing your desperate call for a tie-breaker... I had to this ;)

re-guilds:
- I'm dubious about that one. It takes much and gives too much.
IMO guilds in FFH should be different and give other things than mere hammers/commerce...etc
there should be incentives to share with others.
an effect for example could be (if codable):
takes 1production (or 1 food) from city, gives 1 gold (or 1science, or 1 commerce, or 1F) per type of ressource of the guild.
it could thus be a more efficient way of converting an output of the city (food/prod/commerce) into another one.
a few other effects
- or double commerce / food / production coming from trade route with a city that has same guild
- gives +1xp per yield type to units
- gives access to guild-specific free or bought promotions/gear that have increase effect depending on number of cities with the guild (in effect outputting an invisible untradable ressource and having the promotion depending on affinity with the ressource ; maybe have the guilds consume the ressource (so you need 3 iron or 1 iron 1copper 1 mithril to build a craftsman guild in 3 cities).
for example : hardened armor : +2%str per craftsman ressource
or "Productive Guard" : +1Hammer in city per craftsman ressource while idling in city (need level 6 and guardsman promotion)(either using a stackable promotion or using affinity.
or "Ethnology" : +1 science per "Sage guild ressource" when killing an enemy unit....etc

re Master craftpeople
- I like this mechanics... however I find it difficult. Getting a GE (and multiple GE as it is) is hard, and more so for some civs/some contexts.
would it be possible to have a few alternatives ?
for example : Great craftsman for mounted unit could be alternatively built with a GM ?
Greater craftsman for melee could be built using a GGeneral
Greater craftsman for archery could be built using a GCommander
Greater craftsman for Siege could be built using a GS
Greater craftsman for Recon could be built using a GA
or alternatively, you can sacrifice a level 8 or 10 unit of the series to build to Great craftsman building ? (like a veteran decides to improve the army using his crafting talent instead of only killing people)
 
On the Master buildings, the Promotions they provide can be useful, and in some cases can serve to further differentiate the civs (eg, some promotions are available only to certain civilizations, such as the Khazad-specific Siege promotions), and of course the Gold and Hammer boosts are nice, but getting rid of them won't be a huge loss, if that 's what you decide. If you do get rid of them, it might make sense to at least keep some of the civ-specific promotions for those particular civs, but not critical.

Guilds have been a problem going back to FfH2, trying to figure out what to do with the Corporation slots. The original Guilds in FfH2 didn't really work out, which is why Kael got rid of some and converted two of them into Great Wonders. The old WildMana used the slots for "Noble Houses of Erebus," whose "Support" could provide you certain units (and maybe buildings?). And of course the ones we have know we inherited from RifE and, if memory serves, originally from Fall Further. I'm with some of the others in really liking the quick production boost you can give a newly-founded city from something like the Stonefire Guild. The boosts provided by the other Guilds can be nice, too, so I think I would miss them if you got rid of them, but sadly I can't say that I have good ideas about what should replace them. Back in the day people threw out ideas like "Assasins; Guild" or "Thieves' Guild" (whether from D&D or elsewhere), but the question, as always, is what actual effects they should have in game, and I think that's what proved difficult.
 
That's because we all tend to think of guilds as something that is fully controllable. But they should not really. They should have a chance to spawn in any empire satisfying some conditions (at the very least one specific tech, but that's not too hard to imagine others, if they are sensible). Once they have spawned, they spread without the player having a say to the spread, and 'fight' others guilds for supremacy (not always, but it can happen). Events should also be tied to the presence or absence of a guild, for a fun mini-game of 'guild wars' ;)
This way they provide bonuses, you can probably favor one through the answers to events, but that's it. They are an underlying mini living system within your empire. Guilds. And Guildmasters!
 
I like that Vorpal. Perhaps Guilds represent the growth of various things done by other players: if the Bannor are doing particularly well, Bannor-ish things begin to sprout up elsewhere, spurred on by vague legends of travellers. They could open up building other civ's buildings, for example, or could impact culture distribution, or whatever. Halls of Mirrors and mimics everywhere!
 
Be careful not to take it too far down that line though. Civ is a strategy game. And having a mechanic that you have absolutely no control over running around messing up your strategy is not fun. It's arbitrary and annoying.
 
Ah, different strokes. I like those things, but I think I am in the strict minority with that.

It would have to enable things that you could choose to do, offering perhaps radically different, unexpected strategic directions.
 
Nor'easter said:
On the Master buildings, the Promotions they provide can be useful, and in some cases can serve to further differentiate the civs (eg, some promotions are available only to certain civilizations, such as the Khazad-specific Siege promotions), and of course the Gold and Hammer boosts are nice, but getting rid of them won't be a huge loss, if that 's what you decide. If you do get rid of them, it might make sense to at least keep some of the civ-specific promotions for those particular civs, but not critical.
Click to expand...

The civ-specific promotions are nice, but I would probably make them a little easier to acquire than having to spend a Great Engineer.

Nor'easter said:
Guilds have been a problem going back to FfH2, trying to figure out what to do with the Corporation slots. The original Guilds in FfH2 didn't really work out, which is why Kael got rid of some and converted two of them into Great Wonders. The old WildMana used the slots for "Noble Houses of Erebus," whose "Support" could provide you certain units (and maybe buildings?). And of course the ones we have know we inherited from RifE and, if memory serves, originally from Fall Further. I'm with some of the others in really liking the quick production boost you can give a newly-founded city from something like the Stonefire Guild. The boosts provided by the other Guilds can be nice, too, so I think I would miss them if you got rid of them, but sadly I can't say that I have good ideas about what should replace them. Back in the day people threw out ideas like "Assasins; Guild" or "Thieves' Guild" (whether from D&D or elsewhere), but the question, as always, is what actual effects they should have in game, and I think that's what proved difficult.
Click to expand...

If we look back at our own past, guilds were historically something between professional associations, trade unions, cartels, secret societies and trade schools (I stole most of those points off Wikipedia, but shush). A guild would generally strive to monopolise their business and amass political influence, but in return they would ensure and preserve the quality of their trade.

I'm with Vorpal that guilds should be somewhat out of your control. I think putting them on roughly the same level as religions is a good choice, and maybe a bit less controllable since smaller groups of people tend to act a little more erratic. I would probably make them into two general categories: craft guilds and merchant guilds, where the crafts guilds compete with one another but not the merchant guilds, and vice versa. Crafts guilds would be geared toward different kinds of production projects (buildings, projects, different unit categories), while merchant guilds would be geared toward the buying and selling of goods (exotic products, luxury resources, health resources). The guilds would generally improve the category they're geared toward, but also hurt the efficiency the way monopolisation tends to work, usually hurting construction speed in the case of crafts guilds and commerce in case of merchant guilds. For example, a shipwrights' guild would produce better ships but hurt naval unit construction speed, and a masons' guild could increase wonder production speed at the cost of regular building construction speed, while an importers' guild could offer extra luxury resources in the city at the cost of trade income.

A city's capacity for guilds would be limited by the overall commerce production of the city, meaning that you could have several guilds of the same category if the city was affluent enough. The Guilds civic would of course increase this limit, while other civics would suppress the guilds and their negative effects. Guilds spread like religions, but the player can build Journeymen to control the expansion. Ideally, guilds would tend to expand to cities which do what they do, so if you're building a lot of melee units in a city without the weaponsmiths' or armorers' guild, they'd be more likely to expand there naturally, possibly even outcompeting a guild which isn't seeing a lot of action. Likewise, a city which is very happy wouldn't find much use for the exotic goods of the importers' guild, and may instead look to the grocers' guild for fresher food, or bulk traders' guild for strategic resources they lack for their military.

As for boosting new cities, I don't think that's what guilds should be doing, because they were more attracted to money and political power than the opportunities of starting a new life at the frontier. That said, we definitely want some mechanic for giving late game settlements a quick boost, possibly via supply shipments, even if I'm lukewarm at best to the idea of shoving around even more units every turn...
 
I'm looking to get back into FFH. Is the current revision 300 download pretty stable? If not, what would be the most stable version for me to play?
 
revision 300 is rather stable, but you might encounter a huge slowdown in your turns, but you might not. It affects only a minority of us. If you don't have a slowdown, you are good, otherwise you need to get an older version. I'm still trying to help on which version have a slowdown and which one has not.
 
Personally I very much like the master system of buildings. They offer you a chance to not just customize but also focus your army on a single unit tree (you don't exactly have 4 engineers right off the bat).

As for the cost of founding them some of you see them as just a GP tax but I see them as a GP tradeoff. That is to say every engineer you spend on it is an engineer not spent on doing other things. And furthermore is GPP spent that you could have instead used for something else like a prophet for religions or the altar or a great merchant for great wealth. So in that respect I feel that the system works very well because GP's are a limited resources.

The only thing I'd do to it is overhaul the promotions something nasty and make them into a proper tradeoff/upgrade tree system as opposed to what we have now. Furthermore I'd add all sorts of mana specific promotions, promotions that require a minimum level etc. to allow you to really customize your units.
That way it would no longer be a case of flatly buying everything you can afford for your stack but an actual strategic decision. I'll give you some examples to show what I mean.

Say for example archers:
A1: +1 ranged attack
A2: +1 ranged range (requires A1 and unit level 3)
A3: Adds marksman (requires A2 and unit level 6)

B1: +1 defense
B2: +1 attack (requires B1 and unit level 3)
B3: Adds guardsman (requires B2 and unit level 6)
Note, the above example is not an actual implementation suggestion. It is not balanced in any way shape or form and is just a demonstrative case.

Promotion Trees A and B are exclusive. Picking A1 disables your ability to get B1. Therefore now you have to chose if that archer is going to be a combat or a bombardment unit.

Suddenly it's no longer a flat tax to make your units better but an interesting gameplay mechanic.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

As for the guilds I once again repeat that uncountability is not fun. What ever system you introduce you want to make it into something that is a strategic decision set for the player. Now, this is not to say that some degree of RNG is not acceptable. Just don't make it too RNG.

Now, there have been some good ideas floated around on how to do this and some bad ones. I won't address those and will instead simply add one of my own. Tie guild founding not to GP's but to great achievements. For example have the Mascarade guild be founded by the first city to reach legendary culture. Or a blacksmiths guild by the first city to build a full masters guild.

That way you make founding a guild a goal unto it self whilst also adding an element of competitive randomness like with founding religions and getting a shrine. And the bonus you get from spreading them feels not like a GP tax but like a well earned reward for an achievement.
 
PPQ_Purple, you are full of good ideas :)

I agree for craftsmen; they are really interesting. However, IMO using only GE-founding is a bit harsh.

For guilds, your ideas are nice. However, IMO one of the issues is that guilds favorise huge empires (access to many examples of each ressources) and shines a lot for starting new cities.... which is strange.
what about having guilds being buildable ? or, maybe, having the journeymen not open the "guild" but opening a "guildshop"... with a few benefits related to the guild, but getting the actual guild in the city needs some :hammers: investement, allowed only when the guildshop is present in city ? (so no new city gaining +15 :hammers:/turn only using a stonemason journeyman !)
or having guilds present in city increase maintenance or reduce a number of gold/hammers...etc
(stonemason : consume stone/marble ; -0.5gold per stone/marble/earth mana; -0.5commerce per iron/copper ; +1 prod per stone/marble/earth mana/iron / copper) : in essence, it makes your city earning much hammers, but losing gold/commerce due to guild cost : useful to help big production cities, or some focused new cities, but not useful to spam everywhere.)
 
Got 2 bugs to report. Both cause CTD:s. First one seems to occur whenever I play scions. The game CTD:s whenever I move a scion unit through haunted lands.
Second bug concerns the unit "Landing party". This time it CTD:s if a landing party moves between sea and land. Will look into this a bit more and see if it happens with any other scenario.
 
@PPQ_Purple , interesting ideas about the Master buildings.

I was never bothered by having to use a Great Person to build a Master building or found a Guild, ti was just a decision you had to make about how best to use the particular GP.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.

Similar threads

A
Emergent Leaders Module
Replies
14
Views
3K
azatote
A
S
  • Sticky
Tweak Mod for Xtended + Master of Mana Updates
10 11 12
Replies
234
Views
15K
Ag0range
Ag0range
A
More Leaders Module Reborn
Replies
11
Views
4K
black_imperator
B
PPQ_Purple
PPQ Flavor Module
17 18 19
Replies
364
Views
31K
PPQ_Purple
PPQ_Purple
Alsark
Chislev Module
2
Replies
30
Views
5K
Alsark
Alsark
Top Bottom