Is less more?

[Iceciro]

I may be biased because I've been playtesting a module that is boosting what the Cualli have on the other side of the equation in the way of unique stuff. I'm also working on a new leader for the Cualli and a new leader for the Mazatl that change up their current dynamics a little.

Personally, I don't mind the agnostic leaders, but I commonly play with 15-16 civs so even if I get every agnostic leader in the game, it doesn't slow the AIs down founding religions. (And for some weird reason I never seem to draw the Grigori) I also don't like mixing them because both civs tend to play rather well for AI civs, unlike say, the Amurites, who seem to get stepped on every game.

 

[Valkrionn]

Exactly what argument are you assuming by the phrase "same argument"? Because it certainly doesn't match mine. My reasoning for the Cualli and Mazatl being combined is predicated on them also ceasing to be agnostic and gaining unique variations of currently existing religions. If that happened, the remaining differences would be:

• World spell (their world spells need work anyway)
• Hero (the Scions already have a different hero for each leader)
• Palace mana

Palace mana is the only actual obstacle, and frankly we could use a few more civ's that do something unusual with their palace.

That's why they could be combined. As to why I think they should, it's because they are both agnostic and have a unique terrain type. Both of these things detract from the game and so I like to see them trimmed whenever possible. Agnostic civs mean that religion won't play a diplomatic factor that game (and religions other than my own are less likely to ever even be founded), and terrain specialties mean that there will be a large chunk of land that no other AI will ever use. When those things happen occasionally, it adds flavor to the game. When they happen at least once a game it spoils it. For me as well, the motivating factor is wanting to use random civs.
The Ljosalfar and Svartalfar do fall mostly into the same argument (although I would exempt them because I wouldn't want all of that art to go to waste and the AI knows how to handle forests), but your other two examples do not in the slightest.

It was not meant to match yours, because I didn't know what yours was. Was going from the Orbis argument... They're the same race, possess quite a few of the same mechanics, so why not? I used the 'They're the same race' part to argue for the elves, dwarves, and Bannor/Clan.

Personally, I have no REAL issue with Agnostic leaders... Especially if, like the Scions, their 'internal' religion is well fleshed out. I'd rather not have many more agnostic civs, but the ones we have I'm perfectly fine with. I'm already planning on introducing 'Cults', or religious guilds, so I suppose I"m working on the issue in a different direction. Can merge Opera's bUniqueCult tag too, so leaders who follow their own cult will have diplomalus's with civs following religions. That's enough to make me happy.

I personally never have an issue with other religions being founded. In most of my games every religion is founded... And yes, this is in the current version. Finally got a copy of the game again.

I also have no real issues with a unique terrain type for a civ... Although I'd prefer it if other civs knew how to terraform back. Going to attempt merging Sephi's arcaneAI's, so they'll actually do it.

 

[far_wanderer]

Out of curiosity, how many AIs do you have in a game? I've never had an issue with the AIs founding religions, though... I got beat to Order in my last game (admittedly I pushed it back a little, but still.)

I tend to get at least the Grigori/Cualli/Mazatl each game, though. (I've disabled the Illians because their worldspell irritates me to no end.)

I play mostly on Small and Standard maps, so anywhere from 3 to 7. So...

Personally, I don't mind the agnostic leaders, but I commonly play with 15-16 civs so even if I get every agnostic leader in the game, it doesn't slow the AIs down founding religions. (And for some weird reason I never seem to draw the Grigori) I also don't like mixing them because both civs tend to play rather well for AI civs, unlike say, the Amurites, who seem to get stepped on every game.

...that would be why we have such differing opinions. For you, they're less than a tenth of the world. For me, they're usually as much as a quarter. And because the AI plays them well, they're usually a big quarter.

It was not meant to match yours, because I didn't know what yours was. Was going from the Orbis argument... They're the same race, possess quite a few of the same mechanics, so why not? I used the 'They're the same race' part to argue for the elves, dwarves, and Bannor/Clan.

That's fair, I just wanted to be clear that I was not making the same argument you were opposing.

Personally, I have no REAL issue with Agnostic leaders... Especially if, like the Scions, their 'internal' religion is well fleshed out. I'd rather not have many more agnostic civs, but the ones we have I'm perfectly fine with. I'm already planning on introducing 'Cults', or religious guilds, so I suppose I"m working on the issue in a different direction. Can merge Opera's bUniqueCult tag too, so leaders who follow their own cult will have diplomalus's with civs following religions. That's enough to make me happy.

I'll be curious to see how you make cults into something other than just more religions, but even if you don't it would be a step in the right direction.

I personally never have an issue with other religions being founded. In most of my games every religion is founded... And yes, this is in the current version. Finally got a copy of the game again.

You and Iceciro both say this. Either one of us is experiencing a very odd and longstanding run of luck, or there are only a few civs that regularly found religions and you two encounter them more often on larger maps. Even with six AI civs, none of them agnostic, I'm lucky if two religions get founded.

I also have no real issues with a unique terrain type for a civ... Although I'd prefer it if other civs knew how to terraform back. Going to attempt merging Sephi's arcaneAI's, so they'll actually do it.

If you can get that to work I'll be fine with them too. I still don't like the way they end up all looking the same, but that's an irritation as opposed to a gamebreaker.

 

[Iceciro]

Admittedly, I can respect the difference in that when they can take up so much of your space in agnostics.
You could just disable the Cualli (I feel like the game is short on Good races, or seems to be) though, or both of them.

And a good option for the terraforming issue would honestly be if it would just un-terraform in a standard civ's culture.

 

[far_wanderer]

Admittedly, I can respect the difference in that when they can take up so much of your space in agnostics.
You could just disable the Cualli (I feel like the game is short on Good races, or seems to be) though, or both of them.

That's already what I do.

And a good option for the terraforming issue would honestly be if it would just un-terraform in a standard civ's culture.

That would solve a part of the problem, but the real issue is that a big chunk of land turns to jungle and then the AI doesn't want to build there to begin with.

 

[Tholal]

Here's my 2 cents for what it's worth (which is probably less than 2 cents).

FF, and particularly FF+, seem to have lots of extra stuff thrown in with little thought into how it might effect/enhance gameplay. New features are great when they make the game more fun. But the 'fun' is the most important part.

Also, it's easy to say "there's an option to turn that off", but when I'm staring at an option list of 30+ checkboxes, some of the fun is already being lost.

A very important part of making a good game is knowing when to streamline.


Here's what I would dump entirely:

Worker experience - There's only a handful of promotions, it doesn't make a whole lot of difference gameplay-wise, requires extra micro-management and doesn't add any fun factor

Master Buildings - More micromanagement; being able to spread them to every city is a bit overpowered. Not a whole lot of fun added here unless you are the Grigori and have the cash to outfit your Adventurers.



And then there are a number of things that need someone to pay lots of attention to them:

Commanders - I love the concept, but I find the actual gameplay with them to be very cumbersome... and that's without even touching the Bannor since this feature was introduced

New/Reintroduced mana types - The extra mana-types and their spells don't do much for me. And half the time I can't even tell what the spell is supposed to do. Force is a prime example.

Corporations - These are just huge bonuses for little to no cost. I think there's potential here to make them into something interesting, but again, someone needs to sit down a put a lot of thought into it. It really feels like this was simply tacked on and forgotten about

Blizzards - I know this is from base FfH, but I wanted to throw it in as another example. Blizzards have almost no effect on gameplay, and nothing really fun or interesting about them. The Illians can move them around IF they find one and IF they have a surviving priest who managed to upgrade to a High Priest, but then what? It's a lot of micromanagement to try and drag the thing around, and it doesn't really help their efforts to conquer the world.

 

[WarKirby]

this thread requires bumping

 

[Lemminkäinen]

My thoughts on Cualli are that they remind me of Dural a few patches ago when they didn't have the boatload of unique buildings giving them lots of specialist slots and making them play very different. In other words, Cualli are a diamond in the rough and someone should do something awesome with them to make them shine. Expanding the slavery theme would rock.

Worker experience - There's only a handful of promotions, it doesn't make a whole lot of difference gameplay-wise, requires extra micro-management and doesn't add any fun factor

I've really enjoyed this part once I think. Once playing as Mercurians under the old system where they didn't have any units until Bronze Working I defended my capital with defense-strengthed Workers. Otherwise I usually just click the work rate promotions but they have pretty minimal effects unless you don't have the tech for the improvement you're trying to build.

Master Buildings - More micromanagement; being able to spread them to every city is a bit overpowered. Not a whole lot of fun added here unless you are the Grigori and have the cash to outfit your Adventurers.

I never have enough great people to really try out the possibilities of the Master Buildings

Commanders - I love the concept, but I find the actual gameplay with them to be very cumbersome... and that's without even touching the Bannor since this feature was introduced

Agreed. The amount of micromanagement that you can do with the Commanders is staggering.

Corporations - These are just huge bonuses for little to no cost. I think there's potential here to make them into something interesting, but again, someone needs to sit down a put a lot of thought into it. It really feels like this was simply tacked on and forgotten about

Aye, they are a bit of a no-brainer at the moment. More drawbacks would be awesome.

 

[Breez]

Also, it's easy to say "there's an option to turn that off", but when I'm staring at an option list of 30+ checkboxes, some of the fun is already being lost.

BAH you check them ONE time... they stay checked. Once you have it like YOU want it then you don't have to mess with those amazing complex check boxes anymore.

I like No settlers. Too many cities increases the micro management and draws the game out as you have to destroy 30 cities per civ you conquer. Therefore we should make No Settlers the standard and remove the check box so everyone plays MY way.

Removing options does nothing but remove various players that like those options.

Here's what I would dump entirely:

Worker experience - There's only a handful of promotions, it doesn't make a whole lot of difference gameplay-wise, requires extra micro-management and doesn't add any fun factor

Master Buildings - More micromanagement; being able to spread them to every city is a bit overpowered. Not a whole lot of fun added here unless you are the Grigori and have the cash to outfit your Adventurers.

You picked 2 of my 3 favorites. Add Ranged attacks to that and I will be the guy in front of the mob carrying the bucket of Tar.

Having Workers live hundreds of turns, longer than MANY military units, is neat to me. Protect them and they get better at what they do. I love that.

Master Buildings - They ONLY add hammers to non-units. 10% The trade off in building them everywhere is the amount of hammers gained vs the time spent building them. It is really an Opportunity cost more than anything. Should I build them early so that I get the most benefit out of them? or should I wait until after I have the basics up and going but then I lose most of the point of building them. The equipment they provide is irrelevant when considering them being built in every city. You can get that equipment by going a couple towns over if it isn't in the city you are in.

If the Master Buildings did not have the -10% on units I would agree whole heartily with you.

New/Reintroduced mana types - The extra mana-types and their spells don't do much for me. And half the time I can't even tell what the spell is supposed to do. Force is a prime example

.

The Civopedia has a description of all of them. It isn't difficult to figure out. Force is MUCH more useful than... say Nature.

Blizzards - I know this is from base FfH, but I wanted to throw it in as another example. Blizzards have almost no effect on gameplay, and nothing really fun or interesting about them. The Illians can move them around IF they find one and IF they have a surviving priest who managed to upgrade to a High Priest, but then what? It's a lot of micromanagement to try and drag the thing around, and it doesn't really help their efforts to conquer the world.

Okay this one I get. I have never figured out the blizzard mechanic or how having one in the middle of my empire is fun.

 

[Breez]

I never have enough great people to really try out the possibilities of the Master Buildings

They add a small amount of Great Engineer GP points getting one starts increasingyour chance to get another. I make it a point to get one of each ASAP in my capital (the rest of the cities may or may not get them) but that starts a slide in the Great Engineer direction.

Of course if you want/need Great People for some other reason, say Great Prophet, then they can actually hurt you.

 

[Valkrionn]

I agree with Breez wholeheartedly here.... Of course that should be rather obvious, seeing FFPlus.

Honestly, I have no real problem with game options. A few I dislike, as they remove alot of the game in my opinion... Unrestricted Leaders, for one. Also the various 'No Religion' options, and the 'No Duin/Acheron/Orthus' options. Those, I made invisible... Can easily be revealed again with a quick XML edit for thsoe who want them, however.

As for Blizzards.... This should make them more interesting. -> http://forums.civfanatics.com/showthread.php?t=336856

 

[far_wanderer]

Master Buildings - They ONLY add hammers to non-units. 10% The trade off in building them everywhere is the amount of hammers gained vs the time spent building them. It is really an Opportunity cost more than anything. Should I build them early so that I get the most benefit out of them? or should I wait until after I have the basics up and going but then I lose most of the point of building them. The equipment they provide is irrelevant when considering them being built in every city. You can get that equipment by going a couple towns over if it isn't in the city you are in.

If the Master Buildings did not have the -10% on units I would agree whole heartily with you.

You're entirely right about the hammer bonus, but my experience has been that it's actually the gold bonus that's overpowered. A city with all four can easily support itself even at full science and still provide a few extra gold on top of that.

 

[Breez]

That may be true. I almost never drop below 80% science and that is rare normally I run at 90% or 100% science, but in my opinion that would be an argument for lowering the Gold provided not for removing them entirely.

 

[UNIT 666]

Extensive documentation and explanation of features would help newer players a lot when it comes to fully utilizing all of the stuff in Fall Further.

As far as FF's content goes, I'm still confused about the Scions, I don't think I've ever founded a Guild or created a Master building, and I've rarely used hawks, ranged attacks, or naval units. Also, spells in general are usually ignored or forgotten about.

Yeah, basically, I play FF like it's BTS. I can hardly wait for the time when I expand beyond those basic strategies.

 

[Valkrionn]

I think someone in the community REALLY needs to write up a concept section for each race, detailing any unique units, buildings, civics, spells, etc, and giving a few strategies...

Kind of like what I did for the Malakim+ pedia entry, but more in depth as that was only the new features, rather than the old ones as well.

Edit: No, I am not volunteering for this job.

 

[Vehem]

Edit: No, I am not volunteering for this job.

Are you sure? Thought you just did...

 

[Valkrionn]

Bah. I AM planning on writing one up for the FFPlus civs soon... Most likely when I'm so frustrated with C++ and the Bezeri that I can't take modding any more.

Maybe once I'm done with them I can start on a few others. Very, very large maybe, with no definite time frame.

 

[Iceciro]

Right. Valks gonna do it. /sits and waits.

 

[Valkrionn]

Lies. All lies!

 

[Dean_the_Young]

On 'Less is More', could we re-look at stacks of Doom? It doesn't make sense for everything in the world to be able to exist on one tile.

Maybe a limit could be useful: 15 units per tile, max, except for city tiles and forts/castles/citadels. Those would allow more: forts might increase the limit more per iteration (fort increases less than a castle less than a citadel), while cities could be a function of population (three units per population, minimum of ten?).

The idea is that you can't push (or be pushed against) a nigh-unbeatable stack of doom. Stacks would have to be considered more carefully: is a stack full of zombie-fodder worth sacrificing a catipult or two or three? Do you value your mage enough to ensure a marksman guardian, even at the cost of an attacking player?

Stacks that are limited to a similar maximum won't be such a steamroller on their own, but you can still overwhelm a foe: most any tile can still be attacked from multiple directions at once, and the terrain features that would usually restrain it (oceans, mountains, other impassable terrain) also tend to be the types that limit the defender production of units regardless. Those also tend to be the types of terrain that people EXPECT to limit the forces available to be sent in.

A number of things could play well with such a setup: ranged attack (especially +1 range modifiers like city walls and forts) would work well with forced distance: keep a tile or melee in front, and the archers out back. Mages with spells could stay back and still hit foes as well, versus rushing in for more magical damage.

The biggest concern I can think of is the civs like the Clan who function on cheap cannon fodder packed in together; Gremlins and orcs should be all but falling over eachother to fight, in my mind. Either a civ-specific pass could be considered, or units could get an exception to the counting code that determines when a tile is reaching its limit.


So the less we want more of might be over-huge stacks.