Guilds Spreading

[Sarisin]

My apologies if this has been mentioned in another thread I missed.

I am almost finished my 6th epic speed game of FFH2 .33.

I have yet to see a Guild spread to another city.

OK, I have only built/seen the Guild of Hammers, Guild of the Nine, and Aeron's Bounty.

I seem to recall in prior versions the Guilds spreading, sometimes even to my own cities - for a little Gold.

Anyone else notice this?

Also, when you raze the city with a Guild in it, that appears to be it as far as the Guild goes. For example, I had no choice but to raze the city with the Guild of Nine in it (just too far from my civ), and that was that for the fun of getting offered those interesting mercenaries.

It's a shame because I think the Guilds, and I haven't even seen all of them, really are fun and add some flavor to the game.

So, how about this?

Why not improve the method by which they spread? Maybe even let more than one civ build/acquire the Guild? And, how about when it is destroyed along with the city it is in, other civs have a chance to build/acquire the Guild? I know there are different mechanisms for acquiring Guilds, so it might need some work, but it just seems to me in my games anyway with no spreading, a fun element of the game is missing.

Actually, I was thinking wouldn't it be fun too if you could build Wonders again if they were destroyed along with the city they are in? I know it sounds like total heresy to some, but I just think it would be a real hoot to find Wonders like Form of the Titan and The Great Library pop up in your build list for your city. What an interesting dash that would create for the civs to rebuild it!

 

[[to_xp]Gekko]

nice thread, I support the idea of rebuilding lost wonders if that can be done and I definitely agree that guilds are underused now... not that they should be overwhelming, but right now you rarely even see them. and given how cool they are... it's a waste of kewl mechanics imho

I don't have any particular suggestion about this tbh, but I think that something as simple as just raising their "appearance/spread chance" should do the trick. it could easily be introduced as a new game option just like "living world" btw: something like "power of the guilds" ( lame name I know ) - doubles the likeliness of guilds appearing/spreading. that's probably the best approach imho. customization is the way to go, so that everyone can easily finetune the game to their own liking by just ticking/unticking options: as I see it, the more custom options, the better the game gets

 

[Polobo]

Guild of the Nine can be spread by the mercenaries that you buy. Just take one to a different city and buy a new guild with them (you lose the mercenary). Ratcatcher's guild cannot spread (it can move, however) but I assume, if destroyed, it will reappear in the city with the highest crime rate. I'll leave the other guilds to those that know more.

 

[QES]

I was curious - was there not a time in which units would randomly get promotions based on the religions that were in a city in which the unit was built?

Why could this not be done with the guilds only more so?

Perhaps the presence of a guild gives a 5% chance per turn of giving a promotion (of that guild) to a unit in the city tile . (Members of the unit are members of the guild). When/if the unit is placed in a city without the guild in it. There is a 5% chance per turn that the guild will spread to that city. (Without loss of the unit - unlike mercenaries, their mechanic should remain as is.)

This would add a nice passive way to spread guilds (for example, building defenders before building a settler for a new city, might mean that one ore more of those defenders would become gilded - and when moved to the new location - would likely spread that guild to the new city.

Also - if a unit has a guild, perhaps it should not be allowed to gain another one. For simplicities sake.

Guilds and units then would become very intertwined.

Just a thought,
-Qes

 

[Skitters]

Aerons Bounty is spread by unit, similar to the Council of Esus (ie; costs a bit of gold to spread). New units built in the city with the Guild in will be guild members too.

I've only seen it once, but I think Cult of the Dragon does spread between cities - though believe this is event driven.

I've started seeing the Ratcatchers guild a little more recently, which led to a very nice smugglers port in my Bannor city....

 

[orangelex44]

IIRC, the Ratcatcher's Guild HQ can move something like every 30 turns or so, and there's some complicated equation for it. I believe that the old city still has it, but I'm not positive about that. Whether it does or not, the RC Guild isn't very useful, I think I've seen exactly one event that is affected by it.

I've never got Aeron's Bounty.

Cult of the Dragon is spread by events, which means it spreads very slowly...

As for any other guilds, Gaelan's Circle (or whatever it's called) is spread to all Mage-Guild-containing cities of the host civ, i.e. whichever one is lucky enough to get the event chain.

The Brotherhood of Wardens is started by getting pwned, basically. I've never got it, and never seen an AI civ get it, so it's not very common.



There might be some other ones that I forgot. In any case, guilds really aren't that big of a deal overall. None of them are very useful, or spread very quickly, so they can be ignored pretty much.

Of course, there is an exception to every rule, and the Guild of Nine IS useful. To spread it, though, you have to sacrifice a Mercenary, which sucks. It's founded by one of the "economy" techs, I forget which one at the moment.

 

[Nor'easter]

@orangelex44:

Guild of the Nine is founded by the first player to research Currency. Very useful guild, undoubtedly.

I also think the Guild of Hammers -- free Forge in every city -- is useful.

But you're right that other than that, the other guilds have very little impact on the game.

 

[orangelex44]

I knew I forgot one... But I never really consider the Guild of Hammers to be a guild. I know it is, obviously, but the Forge effect is from the WONDER (which founds it), the GUILD part is only useful for some events that I've never gotten.

 

[Nor'easter]

True, despite being called a guild, it's really a wonder, and I don't think I've ever gotten any Guild of Hammers events either. Might make sense to move it out of guilds (just leave it as a wonder), and thus free up a guild slot for something new. There were a lot of suggestions about guilds in the main FfH2 thread not too long ago.

 

[Blackmantle]

You are aware, that the guild of hammers offers half price upgrades for units in a cities territory were it is present? (or quater the overall price for leaders with the ingenuity trait. Making upgrading units really very cheap. Below a hundred gold for even things like archmages and the likes.)

And i have had it spread to others of my cities as well as other civs and to me if i didn't build the wonder. Also its easy to get it (along with Aneron's bounty) which means you'll see it often (for me nearly every single game.).

I think completely different in that the guild of hammers is one of the most worthwhile guilds with one of the most important effects (in regards to both the wonder and the guild itself.) compared to other guilds (now the guild of the nine might! have a bigger effect. But i don't use it so often beyond the events myselves in spite of that... But thats down to my playstyle. Its far from weak if used as a strategy a game is played around for sure...)

So for me the GoH whould be the biggest loss of all guilds if axed or even changed (shortly followed by GoN and AB.) and i whould be strongly against it...

Please for the sake of the uninformed reader, if possible, take the short time check the pedia first (sure its misinformative quite often, but sometimes it holds the nessesary info. And guilds has a whole topic there in its own right.), start complaining about the uselessness of features later.


I for one think that the Gaelan events should get way more common (either by relocating the first event, the whole chain or makeing the events way more common.).
That guild needs most work imo (since by its effect, it seems rather nice on paper. So it could add some things to fun. Especially as more events come by.). Still not seen it once! (at least for me, and im first civ to sorcery regularly. Had it twice or so for other civs reaching the tech a good 100 turns later. Oh and i play with living world on most of the time.) in my many games... So also no real large scale experience / testing with that guild and its features by the community can happen. Which is sad. Which it whould be moved back to KotE (not really that early either imo... Save for advanced start which shouldn't be measure of FFH2 balancing in a big way imo.). Never really understood why it was relocated to Sorcery. (Or at least Gaelan should be improved quite a bit in upgrade capabilities or power. Him Starting with Channeling 1+2+3 might be fair if he stays rather seldom and techwise at sorcery for how seldom he gets around...)

Another Guild needing a real overhaul imo whould be the Brotherhood of Wardens. I also haven't seen it yet (might also be related to AI seldomly razing cities... And due to my playstle me doing so seldomly as well.).
Thats also the one guild i feel might be axed for something else / more interesting if any major overhaul of guilds is needed at all (which i can't really jugde since i hadn't got the opportunity to witness them all even remotely enough. For reasons stated extensively in this post. So i will wait with a final verdict from my part until they all work as designed and i tested them all thoroughly.).
Because the effect is rather negligable and it seems to get spread way to seldom even if cities do get razed (also never seen it even once in my games. Unlike the Circle of Gaelan its also way weaker on paper to add to that.)
Thats the one guild which whould be the smallest loss the way it is implemented now, as well as on paper / for flavor (now if cities were razed way more often and some serious partisan action whould be tied to the guild i might think different. Both still a possibility.).


The Ratcatchers guild is seen often enough and while rather small in effect overall is still nice and flavorfull enough to be worth its place in the game (especially as more related events come by, which is to be expected even in Ice phase when more sophisticated event-chains are to be expected if im not totally mistaken...)

On a somewhat related note, perhaps Mary (Morbus or Typhoid M. as she has known some time ago) should be made an 100% event for the first Alchemists Lab built or at least be made way much more common? She is virtually nonexist as well. Which is a sad thing imo (now given i don't build alchemists labs that often/still far from never. But i whould if the chance to get her whould be significantly higher. Provided i whould knowledgable of that.). Because she is flavorful and should even be some sort of usable now that she can spread the plague without attacking / withdrawl.
Another idea: Perhaps she could be incorporated into the Circle of Gaelan events somehow? Provided those events get more frequent of course. Those experiments sound very much like something a rouge chaos-mages followers whould do...

 

[Nor'easter]

@Blackmantle:

I was basing my comment on my experience of playing the game, since, as you correctly note, the civilopedia isn't always accurate. I don't recall ever seeing the Guild of Hammers spread to any other city, or any events involving that Guild. You have seen it, though, so obviously it happens. Maybe it happened in one or two of my games and I missed it.

You're right about the half-price upgrades, but my experience has been that you can only do that in the city where the Guild of Hammers is founded/headquartered. Maybe you're right that you get the half-price upgrade in any city where the GoH spreads, but I've never seen it spread anywhere.

My suggestion for the GoH, therefore, was not to ax it, but simply to make it a wonder -- that's essentially what it is, providing a free building in every city -- and to use the newly opened guild slot for something new.

Good points about the Circle of Gaelan and the Brotherhood of Wardens.

 

[Sarisin]

Some very interesting discussion posts here...

I was aware you could spread Guild of the Nine and Aeoran's Bounty, but the key is getting it in the first place in your civ.

I find the AI often beelines Currency and they get the Guild of Nine. I have never seen them spread it with their mercenaries.

I think to get Aeoran's Bounty you need to have a high level Assassin. I am not usually one that builds too many Assassins and levels them up - I do, however, work my HN Nightwatch until he gets a lot of XP and then upgrade him to an Assassin. That is how I got Aeoran's Bounty before, and then I did spread it to a few other cities (only cost Gold, I think) to get the extra Recon XP for new units.

The Guild of Hammers is a beeline for me. I like to get Engineering not only for this buildable Guild, but also the City of Slums. As Blackmantle mentioned, it is a must if you want to upgrade your units and save Gold, and who doesn't want to do that? Playing a civ like the dwarves with Ingenuity makes those upgrades dirt cheap as Blackmantle mentioned.

I have to say I get the Ratcatcher's Guild in almost every game I play (forgot about that one as I DON'T want it!). I tend to have small civs with a number of mega-cities. If you do build the City of Slums, you can rest assured you will almost certainly get the Ratcatcher's Guild. I would like to see this Guild do more, especially a positive thing, as I get it all the time.

 

[xienwolf]

IMO, Ratcatcher should make all crime events have a good/neutral option. Normally, all crime events should be bad, with rare ones that are neutral.

Crime is unavoidable, so you have to fight it and make the events rare, or embrace it and hope to catch the guild.


Also, since there are 7 "event Flavors," we should have each on a seperate weighting system. And don't worry for now about limiting it to 1 event per turn.



Actually, make it 9 Flavors. One for basic (non-flavor) events, and another for series events (anything with another event as a prereq)

 

[fuzzy_bunnies]

I'd just like to chime in that the Gaelan, Mary Morbius events need their frequency upped a lot more. I've been doing sequential saves so I know I've got about 35 games since 0.32 and I have yet to see any guild except the guild of the nine and guild of hammers once and I've never seen Gaelan or Mary Morbius.

Is is really that unbalancing to have them all spawn, every game?

 

[Sarisin]

I'd just like to chime in that the Gaelan, Mary Morbius events need their frequency upped a lot more. I've been doing sequential saves so I know I've got about 35 games since 0.32 and I have yet to see any guild except the guild of the nine and guild of hammers once and I've never seen Gaelan or Mary Morbius.

Is is really that unbalancing to have them all spawn, every game?

Wow, I'm amazed you have not seen the Ratcatcher's Guild. It is in every one of my games and I always end up with it!

To get Aeron's Bounty just get an Assassin up to Level 6 I think it is and then if I remember correctly you can found it in your civ. I might be wrong on that as it has been awhile though.

I have received the Mary Morbius event several times (I think you need an Alchemy Lab and, of course, some luck), but turned her down as the consequences of taking her were pretty severe and I don't think she was that powerful anyway.

Never saw Gaelan either.

Your post is a good one to reinforce my original thought on improving the spread of Guilds. Thanks.

 

[fuzzy_bunnies]

Wow, I'm amazed you have not seen the Ratcatcher's Guild. It is in every one of my games and I always end up with it!

To get Aeron's Bounty just get an Assassin up to Level 6 I think it is and then if I remember correctly you can found it in your civ. I might be wrong on that as it has been awhile though.

I have received the Mary Morbius event several times (I think you need an Alchemy Lab and, of course, some luck), but turned her down as the consequences of taking her were pretty severe and I don't think she was that powerful anyway.

Never saw Gaelan either.

Your post is a good one to reinforce my original thought on improving the spread of Guilds. Thanks.

Oh my bad, I forgot about ratcatchers... that one always spawns though... I've had it once or twice.