Kongo is OP!

[TurboJ]

I feel the same way about relics the whole ... I don't like having to rely on a wonky AI to come and beat some of my Apostles. I get what a relic is, but that mechanic seems entirely unreliable / silly.

I just finished cultural victory on deity with Kongo; I simply sent my apostles into rival religions' cities and put them to sleep there until the rival civ spawned apostles of their own. I would have gained a total of ~15-18 relics this way but didn't have room for more than 10 or so in the end.

 

[shostrock]

After watching MadDjinn's LP I was wondering how they could make such a ridiculous calculation error.

It looks like for each relics it adds the base amount of faith to the total amount so far calculated then it applies the reliquaries multiplier.

// probably implemented with something like this
$faithFromRelics = 0;

foreach ($relics as $relic) {

    $faithFromRelics += $relic->baseFaith;

    if (true == $hasReliquariesBonus) {
        $faithFromRelics *= 3;
    }
}
// which result in this horribly wrong math
// ((((((((4 * 3) + 4) * 3) + 4) * 3) + 4) * 3) + 4) * 3 = 1452


// should be like this instead
$faithFromRelics = 0;
$multiplier = 1;

if (true == $hasReliquariesBonus) {
    $multiplier = 3;
}

foreach ($relics as $relic) {
    $faithFromRelics += ($relic->baseFaith * $multiplier);
}
// which result in the correct math
// (4 * 3) + (4 * 3) + (4 * 3) + (4 * 3) + (4 * 3) = 60

There's a point near the end of part 6 of MadDjinn's playthrough where he has 78 faith from 5 relics. He is Suzerain of Kandy at that point - replacing the 3's with 1.5's in the formula gives 79.125 faith (I assume there's a rounding error at some point). So that definitely seems like what's happening.

Now imagine you have both Kandy and reliquaries - if you replace the 3's with 4.5's you get...9484.875 faith per turn!!

 

[Jabulani]

In one of my games Kongo out of the blue spawned an AT Crew when he himself was fiddling with catapults until few turns before. Few turns later Kongo built a spaceport and flooded the world with mech infantries.

It must be a bug

 

[Browd]

Kongo probably had no access to niter, so he couldn't upgrade his Catapults to Bombards or his Ngao Mbebas to Musketmen, but kept teching on.

 

[KrikkitTwo]

There's a point near the end of part 6 of MadDjinn's playthrough where he has 78 faith from 5 relics. He is Suzerain of Kandy at that point - replacing the 3's with 1.5's in the formula gives 79.125 faith (I assume there's a rounding error at some point). So that definitely seems like what's happening.

Now imagine you have both Kandy and reliquaries - if you replace the 3's with 4.5's you get...9484.875 faith per turn!!

Its probably 3.5 not 4.5 (+200%+50%).....but with the way they handle math itcould be anything

 

[Jabulani]

Kongo probably had no access to niter, so he couldn't upgrade his Catapults to Bombards or his Ngao Mbebas to Musketmen, but kept teching on.

Technically speaking you might be right but from a gameplay perspective it seems too unbalanced acting that way.

 

[stormtrooper412]

that kind of thing shows just how lazy they were, I mean a simple test game would have at least revealed that

 

[God of Kings]

Someone on Reddit pulled a MadDjinn: https://www.reddit.com/r/civ/comments/5birzs/1600_faith_per_turn_vanilla_no_mods_kongo/

 

[stormtrooper412]

I figured mass artifacts are the key to good tourism

 

[Promethian]

I figured mass artifacts are the key to good tourism

Not the key but they definitely do good work. You get the same culture and tourism from themed Great Works of Art but its much harder to theme them. Also religious relics in your holy cities can contribute quite a bit however its iffy if pursuing them is worthwhile unless you have discounted holy sites like Japan or Russia.

 

[WiseGreen]

Kongo probably had no access to niter, so he couldn't upgrade his Catapults to Bombards or his Ngao Mbebas to Musketmen, but kept teching on.

According to Madjinn in one of his videos, it's actually the way the tech tree is organized. The AI usually beelines towards science/money/production-giving techs, and military ones are sorta out of the way. He did make a mod reorganizing the tech tree, and apparently forcing the AI to research the appropriate techs makes them upgrade their units just fine.

 

[spfun]

Not the key but they definitely do good work. You get the same culture and tourism from themed Great Works of Art but its much harder to theme them. Also religious relics in your holy cities can contribute quite a bit however its iffy if pursuing them is worthwhile unless you have discounted holy sites like Japan or Russia.

I've been using Archaeological museums over Art museums since the first game. It also helps that I can delay building those districts until I have the tech. There's definitely a trick to getting themed bonuses, I'll regularly have only one non themed per game ( 5 out of 6 themed or sometimes 4 out of 4 etc... )

Edit. My last game I had 5 and got them all themed.

 

[steveg700]

Seeing that Kongo receives double great person points for four different GP's really made me do a double take. And that's just one of their bonuses? Tots Ridicks.

 

[KrikkitTwo]

Seeing that Kongo receives double great person points for four different GP's really made me do a double take. And that's just one of their bonuses? Tots Ridicks.

Although 3 of those GPs are useless unless you have slots.

 

[steveg700]

Although 3 of those GPs are useless unless you have slots.

Well, sure, you'll need theater districts. And I believe the palace also has extra slots.

 

[God of Kings]

Well, sure, you'll need theater districts. And I believe the palace also has extra slots.

Yes, the palace has extra slots. In Kongo's case, the palace is the only building (excluding world wonders) that can hold relics.

 

[God of Kings]

The recent patch did nothing to fix this bug, as confirmed by MadDjinn.

Kongo reliquaries is still OP.

 

[Victoria]

Agreed, any game that can be a cultural victory on turn 107 makes it a bit broken.

Looking at the screenshot the religious items in the palace are giving 120 which is quite OTT if they can be got quick.

If not the 120 doubled to 240 for computers is around what I would expect from seaside resorts but an extra bonus for cultural that must not be sniffed at.

Double archaeology slots for England can build a similar amount so for cultural long game at least they compete. Its just the earl game "lucky rush" thats a bit yuk.

For religion though it is powerful and the science off those citizens makes the date 1820 seem like they disabled victory to get there.

 

[Morningcalm]

To be fair, Kongo is now a decent AI opponent on culture and science post-fall patch. Via cheating, but still.

 

[Victoria]

Kongo has always been a main competitor for me but is now smarter yes but not smart enough to stop the same old tactic.

Find a nice defensible position right on their border and settle there with some ranged units and a builder to quickly get walls and start acting in a slightly displeasing way. i mean how dare they attack my right to settle in unclaimed lands, the world is horrified with their blatant attack on my rights. Down go the borders to Kongo and suddenly they have lost the most important tourism modifier.

Sometimes some of my citizens will understandably get a bit angry also and perhaps cause issues with their production or great works, I must state for the record this is none of my doing. The will be suitably punished on their return to ones shores.