Is The Nexus too easy to build(Conversely, are Gates too expensive)?

[Onionsoilder]

Yeah, I get that Pass Through Ether is an expensive tech. I get that it has a big hammer investment. What I'm talking about is the comparison of The Nexus to normal Obsidian Gates... It costs only twice as much hammers to build The Nexus as a normal Gate. So, for essentially building a Gate twice in your highest production city, you get a gate in every one of your cities. Even if you only had two cities, the wonder would still save you hammers-turns on production.

 

[DarkxL0rd]

It's no more lengthy than some of the other uber-wonders... guild of hammers, city of a thousand slums, guild of the nine. it's really just a reward for the tech leader i imagine.

 

[MagisterCultuum]

I think it should require Dimensional Mana (which should be reintroduced and given a fully complement of spells), and maybe also provide some.

FF's approach of giving out Nexus Portals which are essentially the same as Obsidian Gates but letting real Obsidian Gates carry more than one unit per turn seems good.

I hadn't noticed the hammer cost was only twice that of an obsidian gate. Maybe they should be adjusted.

 

[UncleJJ]

I have to agree. All those wonders that give a free building in all your cities are seriously overpowered. I think it would be better if instead the wonder simply reduced the cost of the building which would still have to be built in any cities. Perhaps the wonders should give a 100% boost to production of the relevant building, like Organised gives to courthouses and Nature mana gives to the Genesis ritual. That would still be a very powerful bonus and worth building the wonder for but doesn't give an unlimited benefit. If 100% production bonus is too much or too little then adjust to your taste and different wonders could have different bonusses. Note that for an Industrious leader the Guild of Hammers would then give a 100% bonus to add to the Industious one when building a forge.

 

[Schmoe]

I tend to agree, specifically with the Nexus. The wonder is such an amazing advantage, especially when contemplating overseas invasions, that many times I'll rush Pass through the Ether just to ensure I get the Nexus before anyone else.

I think that a hefty production bonus for the associated building might be a good compromise. I guess the crucial question to me is - should the Nexus enable a portal in a city that's in revolt? If not, that eliminates a valuable strategy for overseas war. If it should, what is the appropriate resource commitment for such an ability?

 

[Avahz Darkwood]

I hate the nexus and the gates, they mess up the auto function of my workers...

 

[Onionsoilder]

I hate the nexus and the gates, they mess up the auto function of my workers...

You actually put your workers on auto?

I haven't autoed my workers in years... the BTS worker AI is crap, and the workers in FFH understand the concepts even less.

 

[DarkxL0rd]

if i ever get an engineer at any point in the game, he is on official nexus duty.

 

[Avahz Darkwood]

You actually put your workers on auto?

I haven't autoed my workers in years... the BTS worker AI is crap, and the workers in FFH understand the concepts even less.

yea I left micromanaging civ about 2 years ago. I dont have the time anymore to play a single game for more than a few hours about once a week. So some things have to be done to speed it up. Thats one reason I dont start in ancient era anymore.

 

[dyx]

I don't know if it's FF or FF+, but there the Nexus Obsidian Gates allow you to airlift 1 unit per turn, while the normal ones allow 3 lifts and give +1 trade route.

 

[kumquatelvis]

Making the buildings cheaper instead of automatic would be interesting. I usually build the Guild of Hammers well before I have the tech to actually build forges, which always struck me as a little cheap.

 

[Dumanios]

Me too

 

[Tielby]

I have to agree with the original poster. The military advantage of having gates in every city (even freshly captured ones) is just too great for that price. I think the current price is just a holdover from when it was required to have Dimensional mana as well to build the Nexus. That made it more challenging since the Dimensional spells didn't otherwise make that mana a high priority for most civilizations.

 

[Grantor]

To Uncle JJ:

I would question ever building the Nexus when it does not pay off any economic benefit until you have built your third Obsidian Gate.

As a game-play feature, late game techs are intended to help the winning player win even faster, and thus avoid late game stagnation and assisting with the slog of actually finishing a game that you have clearly won already. Birthright Renewed, Bridgit the Hero, and the Nexus are all meant to be rewards for the leading player so they game moves faster at the end, instead of moving slow.

I have no explanation as to why the Guild of Hammers is positioned where it is in the tech tree and why it is relatively cheap in hammer-cost. And I could see the Nexus costing more hammers, but why? These later rewards only need balancing in a multi-player game; for Civ, MP is not the primary means of play.

 

[Emptiness]

He did suggested that the wonder reduce the cost:

I think it would be better if instead the wonder simply reduced the cost of the building which would still have to be built in any cities. Perhaps the wonders should give a 100% boost to production of the relevant building, like Organised gives to courthouses and Nature mana gives to the Genesis ritual.

I'm not sure where you got the idea that he meant the tech should reduce the cost.

-------------

I don't play FfH2 multiplayer, but I don't think that the multiplayer aspects of the mod should be totally ignored. MP balance shouldn't be achieved at the cost of the SP game, but I don't think the changes being proposed here would harm SP at all.

 

[UncleJJ]

To Uncle JJ:

I would question ever building the Nexus when it does not pay off any economic benefit until you have built your third Obsidian Gate.

Are you aware that each Obsidian Gate gives an extra trade route? So a civ with 20 cities could easily gain 50 or more commerce from the Nexus, far more than 2 Obsidian Gates alone. It is a major economic benefit even if the strategic ability to move troops unlimited distances in one turn between cities is not used.

As a game-play feature, late game techs are intended to help the winning player win even faster, and thus avoid late game stagnation and assisting with the slog of actually finishing a game that you have clearly won already. Birthright Renewed, Bridgit the Hero, and the Nexus are all meant to be rewards for the leading player so they game moves faster at the end, instead of moving slow.

There are many ways to speed up victory once a player has reached a "winning position". Are you suggesting this is the best way or even just a good way to do that? Why not simply introduce another victory condition that reflects his advantage and avoids stagnation?

I have no explanation as to why the Guild of Hammers is positioned where it is in the tech tree and why it is relatively cheap in hammer-cost. And I could see the Nexus costing more hammers, but why? These later rewards only need balancing in a multi-player game; for Civ, MP is not the primary means of play.

I only play SP so I have no interest in balancing for MP considerations but I resent being almost "forced" to follow particular tech paths and building particular wonders because they are rediculously overpowered. I know I don't have to, but it is a pity in a game with so much choice and flexibility that certain wonders are so overpowered and required either for a quick victory or simply to deny them to the opposition.

 

[Grantor]

I would suggest that the stagnation it avoids is overseas conquests. Without a free Obsidian Gate, you would still have to do the first step, send a strike team to conquer a city. But then you have to either spend several more turns shipping back-up troops to the fight, or you would have to wait for the revolt to finish, and then you would have the slow building of a new Obsidian Gate.

That's game slowdown.

However, for half of the victory conditions of the game, this Wonder is no help at all. There is no need to conquer the others for Religion, Tower and Culture wins.

And, yes, we agree: there are many ways to speed up victory once a player has reached a "winning position". I'm suggesting that this was Kael's design goal for the Nexus (and these other tools). Its "goodness" would be relative to the type of win you were aiming for. And what type of world set-up you used. It would truly be a torturous slog to try to conquer a large-sized archipelago world without the Nexus; yet it's only a convenience on Pangia.

The idea of a wonder that reduces the cost of other improvements is interesting. I believe Civ II and III had those. But I notices that none are in vanilla Civ IV. I will hazard a guess: the reward of this wonder is too delayed, thus players never build this wonder in actual play.

BTW, there is an interesting thread in the FfH2 Play Balance topic about "adjusting a value up and down until you get the desired effect." The Engineer faction suggests that this is tedious and prone to subjectivity; instead the correct value should be calculated. The Simple Answer faction suggests that there is no formula for calculation and that the only result that gives true balance is value testing.

I would suggest that anyone can disable a wonder/building/whatever that they personally dislike by deleting it from the XML. That's pretty easy.

 

[Grantor]

Are you aware that each Obsidian Gate gives an extra trade route? So a civ with 20 cities could easily gain 50 or more commerce from the Nexus, far more than 2 Obsidian Gates alone. It is a major economic benefit even if the strategic ability to move troops unlimited distances in one turn between cities is not used.

No, I was not aware of that.

20 cities is a hell of a nation. I would think that the NPC civs would be more worried about the massive armies that are about to come from your nation than the jump of your total income when you succeed at finishing a wonder.

I would also point out that you get a bigger cash bonus from the high temple buildings, and you get that wonder without researching any extra techs or doing any building (although you do need a Great Prophet).

But, at a cost of only 600 hammers, yeah... the Nexus is comparable to other wonders, but probably still too cheap.

Acuae Sucellus 600               Bone Palace 700               Catacomb Libralus 600   
Celestial Compass 500            City of a Thousand Slums 500  Crown of Akharien 900   
Form of the Titan 500            Grand Menagerie 120           Great Library 350   
Great Lighthouse 600             Guild of Hammers 550          Guild of the Nine 500   
Hall of Kings 600                Heron Throne 250              Infernal Grimoire 400   
Mercurian Gate 600               Mines of Gal'Dur 700          Mokka's Cauldron 600   
Pact of the Nilhorn 500          Pillar of Chains 500          Prophecy of Ragnarok 500   
Ride of the Nine Kings 600       Shrine of Sirona 500          Temple of Temporance 650   
The Eyes and Ears Network 1,500  The Nexus 600                 Theatre of Dreams 500   
Tower of Complacency 750         Tower of Eyes 700

Short examination here:
Tower of Complacency (No unhappiness anywhere) [750]
Theater of Dreams and Temple of Temporance (+1 happy everywhere) [500 plus three Theaters, 650]
Infernal Grimoire and Eyes and Ears Network (One free tech, or about four lower tier free techs) [400, 1,500]
Bazaar of Mammon (+100% gold, at least 50 coins, probably more) [600 and most expensive non-tower National Wonder in list]

 

[DaLingure]

For the Kuriotates, it is good as it is now, because you get the Obsidian Gate in every settlement. If the Nexus only reduced the costs of Obsidian Gates, you would never get them in your settlements.... It should be just more expensive to be balanced.

 

[Grantor]

Hmm...

That's interesting. I assume that you would get a free Mage Guild, Forge and Carnival with their associated Wonders too.

For argument's sake I'll ask: Would there be any point, ever, of building the Nexus for Kuriotates if it didn't do this?

If it costs the price of two Obsidian Gates to build, and you only have three cities that get the reward, why bother? (Perhaps as a denial tactic?) In fact, your big cities aren't going to be far enough apart to bother with Obsidian Gates at all. 300 hammers for +1 trade route isn't a very good deal. I'm of the opinion that the Nexus (that adds to all Settlements) makes it worthwhile to get Pass Through the Ether if you are Kuriotates. Otherwise this is a dead tech for you.