General discussion for civics

[jiallombardo]

Per @JosEPh_II 's request, I'm posting my Information-era save (for studying relevant civics). The game uses SVN version 11142, with a couple of tweaks, namely:
- Forest burn script is disabled
- Emancipation Proclamation is implemented (currently it doesn't remove slave specialists and buildings)
- Ancient Forest requirement added to cultures that require forest
- Roman culture instead of Roman Embassy required for Terra Sigilliata

The game's on Eternity, Noble difficulty, Alternate Earth Tiny Map, events are disabled.

 

[raxo2222]

Joseph has to downgrade to 11142 SVN to open this save
Space terrain was renamed - didn't affect games on regular maps.

 

[jiallombardo]

Ah, well, I asked beforehand whether my save would be helpful, and uploaded with Joseph's blessing Sorry if that's not helpful, I didn't mean to spam or anything.

 

[Thunderbrd]

Ah, well, I asked beforehand whether my save would be helpful, and uploaded with Joseph's blessing Sorry if that's not helpful, I didn't mean to spam or anything.

I don't think any of us see it as that. Thank you for the report. Rax was just explaining why in this case it might not be as useful as hoped.

 

[JosEPh_II]

Joseph has to downgrade to 11142 SVN to open this save
Space terrain was renamed - didn't affect games on regular maps.

Why? Will it crash if I load it? Guess I'll find out soon enough.

 

[raxo2222]

Why? Will it crash if I load it? Guess I'll find out soon enough.

Yes, it will crash if you load it on later SVN

 

[JosEPh_II]

Okay then since I'm using 11164 atm.

 

[Faustmouse]

Why were the specials of civics changed? I noted it mostly on City States; usually my strategy was to overexpand my empire, being on the edge with gold (with 2+ cities needed to build wealth to keep me running at 0% science) and the massive reduction in upkeep cost of City States was a very important goal to reach. Now the first few civics I looked at in every category are pretty much the same. So you pick just the latetest available, with no real strategic choice. Especially City States seems such a perfect candidate for a huge reduction in City Maintenance, while also decrease Gold, Science, Espionage and Military production. That would be more realistic and also gives you a strategic choice, if you want to landgrab earlier with less efficient cities, or if you want to stay on a civic that benefits smaller empires with less cities more.

 

[JosEPh_II]

Why were the specials of civics changed? I noted it mostly on City States; usually my strategy was to overexpand my empire, being on the edge with gold (with 2+ cities needed to build wealth to keep me running at 0% science) and the massive reduction in upkeep cost of City States was a very important goal to reach. Now the first few civics I looked at in every category are pretty much the same. So you pick just the latetest available, with no real strategic choice. Especially City States seems such a perfect candidate for a huge reduction in City Maintenance, while also decrease Gold, Science, Espionage and Military production. That would be more realistic and also gives you a strategic choice, if you want to landgrab earlier with less efficient cities, or if you want to stay on a civic that benefits smaller empires with less cities more.

AFAIK the only recent changes to Civics has been Toffer's new maint cost system for units. It did change several (actually about 1/5 of all of them ) Civics.

It is Toffer90's and T-brd's plan to combat too much gold in the game as it progresses. And limit number of units in the game overall IF I have gotten all the facts straight. More/changed costs to all Military units is also in the works by T-brd.

I am currently running a test game(s) to see how these changes are affecting play.

Also are you playing with the latest version? Kind of important to know.

 

[Faustmouse]

Yes, I started the game right after the first changes of Toffer regarding the Upkeep of units, and updated to the newest SVN when it came out. Haven't played for a long time so this change might have been a bit old.

Goldwise, nothing appears to have changed so far (early Ancient era); the limiting factor for cities is more the happyness, less the gold, but the latter also plays an important role. Which is good!

My main point of complainment was more that the civics (so far) feel less diverse than before. However, the first 2 or civics were mostly just upgrades, and only after that you got civics for certain strategies. So lets see.

 

[Thunderbrd]

My main point of complainment was more that the civics (so far) feel less diverse than before

I somewhat get that feeling from the latest ones as well, though I don't often remember enough of the old to know what the differences were that may have caused this new impression.

Perhaps its just some reasonable feedback to consider @JosEPh_II that maybe each option could be given something that might make it something you might want to try to hang onto even if it isn't economically most ideal. You do well with the econ balance and I know you want to keep them 'simple' but maybe it can still be kept FAIRLY simple and still give some sense of loss with any given change while giving an overall gain. Just something to consider maybe.

 

[Yudishtira]

The starting civics give a 75% (iirc) penalty to research. The first-change civics that alleviate it all have huge gold costs. So if one of them used to save you gold, it's not surprising that it's no longer the case. That should be fixed.

The second half of Prehistoric and first half of Ancient are the only time when you don't have too much gold. The huge gold costs from civics start too early.

 

[JosEPh_II]

Yes, I started the game right after the first changes of Toffer regarding the Upkeep of units, and updated to the newest SVN when it came out. Haven't played for a long time so this change might have been a bit old.

Goldwise, nothing appears to have changed so far (early Ancient era); the limiting factor for cities is more the happyness, less the gold, but the latter also plays an important role. Which is good!

My main point of complainment was more that the civics (so far) feel less diverse than before. However, the first 2 or civics were mostly just upgrades, and only after that you got civics for certain strategies. So lets see.

Some of the early Civics that gave Free Mil units based on Population have lost that ability. It was removed and replaced with with new tags based on unit maint. costs. Starting Free Units in the Global defines were also adjusted by Toffer's new unit cost system. You can query him on details.

I somewhat get that feeling from the latest ones as well, though I don't often remember enough of the old to know what the differences were that may have caused this new impression.

Perhaps its just some reasonable feedback to consider @JosEPh_II that maybe each option could be given something that might make it something you might want to try to hang onto even if it isn't economically most ideal. You do well with the econ balance and I know you want to keep them 'simple' but maybe it can still be kept FAIRLY simple and still give some sense of loss with any given change while giving an overall gain. Just something to consider maybe.

This has always been under my consideration and under the design I have implemented.

As to others complaints about the starting research penalties, that are overcome as you progress thru the civics, they are basically chafing over not getting a jump early in the research race over the AI. Especially on the higher difficulty levels. The Gold costs from early civics are also a major part in this very design so is a further chafe on not getting an early jump on the AI. The argument used against the early gold costs are/is actually a contradiction.
Prime example:

The second half of Prehistoric and first half of Ancient are the only time when you don't have too much gold. The huge gold costs from civics start too early.

Can't have it both ways.

EDIT: What I have implemented is a building block approach to the Civics with leeway to later go back to an earlier Civic if you particular playstyle needs to. The Civics do have interconnections. And if you study them you can see it. But this does not mean you are stifled but rather that your old way of using Civics as a means to propel you past the AI is a bit more thought provoking now. This is also why the revision of the Civics past Classical era are taking longer to rework.

 

[Toffer90]

Some of the early Civics that gave Free Mil units based on Population have lost that ability.

They still have that ability, but rather than give free military units based on population they now give free amount of military upkeep cost based on population.
e.g. When they earlier perhaps gave 1 free military unit per 3 population, they would now rather give something like 0.4 gold discount to the military unit upkeep cost per population.

 

[tantoniou]

One thing I'd like from future updates for the civics part of C2C would be an easier way to compare civics. Right now if you select a different civic you can see below your current civic, and that's already helpful, but it would help comparing even more I think if it were done side by side.
Another thing is, many civics have for instance +##% value in food, hammers etc. There is one line for all cities, then one line for capital, then another line in some for all cities (again) only it has different affected properties, and that makes comparing civics a bit frustrating.

I understand these suggestions are not of the most importance for the whole civics update, but maybe they will help even the modders organize and update the civics easier.

 

[Thunderbrd]

There is one line for all cities, then one line for capital, then another line in some for all cities (again) only it has different affected properties

These lines are translating the way the civics are designed by tag use. One tag handles all the yields, for example, in all cities, then another handles all the yields in the capital only. Another may handle all the adjusted commerces in all cities, while another then handles all the adjusted yields in all cities. Then another handles Happiness in all cities. Then another handles Health in all cities. There's really no good way to set this up so that one line for 'all cities' gives 'all possible modifiers' or so that one line specifies all yields but shows the difference if its the capital.

We aren't building these displayed information lines by typing each one out specifically so the formatting is not all that easily adjusted. The formatting has to work for all situations where that tag is displayed. Sure, we could make a giant project out of trying to improve how things are displayed in numerous various scenarios, but I strongly feel there are far better places to be placing our coding efforts. As it stands, it's really the best you can get without lots of hours of effort to setup a very very different type of system. For one thing, the yield display has been generically designed so that numerous tags for numerous purposes can send their information through that yield display and with minor variations all throughout the game, not just civics, get a very similar output that expresses things with the proper symbols in place. That would have to be largely abandoned for a more specific purpose display such as you're suggesting.

Yeah, sounds like an easy thing to improve but... ugh... *shudder*.

 

[tantoniou]

We aren't building these displayed information lines by typing each one out specifically so the formatting is not all that easily adjusted. The formatting has to work for all situations where that tag is displayed. Sure, we could make a giant project out of trying to improve how things are displayed in numerous various scenarios, but I strongly feel there are far better places to be placing our coding efforts.

I'm sure there are ways to combine/group the tags and extract just the necessary information from them, but I also understand what you say about coding hours and better placing of modding effort, especially if it is regarding the unit and AI redesign process. So I'll take your word for it
PS: If I knew more about coding I'd definitely ask to join the team and try to help!

 

[JosEPh_II]

@Toffer90 , @Thunderbrd , @MattCA , @raxo2222
Pushed to Git New Government Civics adjustments thru all of them. This includes all the pepper2000 Late Era Gov't Civics.

Will need someone to push them to the SVN please.

 

[Thunderbrd]

Nice Joseph! Feels good to get that sort of large scale project finished doesn't it?

Maybe that's cause for a version release?

 

[JosEPh_II]

Nice Joseph! Feels good to get that sort of large scale project finished doesn't it?

Maybe that's cause for a version release?

Actually it's only phase 1 of the Gov't Civic category. We have several tags in the Gov Civics that are not used or only selectively used that need to be made use of. This will also eventually help in decision making for a player on When to switch to a new Gov Civic when it becomes available. In some circumstances switching right away maybe the thing to do. But in others circumstances it maybe better to wait. We have some of that now of course but these tags are added variables for the player to consider.

As for a version release...I think it's been long overdue personally. We've got to get the non Git or SVN players up to snuff and playing with these latest version. They will see such a Huge difference in play now from current state of C2C vs v40.1 play. Yes a New Release should happen asap imo.