Live stream "The Tech Web: Midgame Choices" Thursday, Sept 18 at 2pm EST

[Seek]

Alternatively, "yield" is the minimum, and "provides" is the modifier? That was my thought, at least. I'm not sure the math works out, but it seemed like it might fit.

You could be right. It'd explain the huge cost on Terrascape. But wow, if true then tile yields are getting absurd.

Yeah, with buildings so weak and tiles so strong, I wonder if going wide with every city just building food and health buildings for pop and tile yields won't be the way to go. It's a little worrisome - buildings are seriously about half the yield of many tiles. Hopefully there's something I'm missing..

 

[AriochIV]

I guess the rationale there is that if an improvement costs maintenance, then it provides some benefit even if the tile isn't being worked.

"this is where you decide that video games actually are art..."
video games confirmed as art a couple hundred years from now

But only if you're a Supremacy psychopath...

 

[Gamewizard]

This is something that really should be cleared up by maddjin in the next stream. The wording is certainly confusing.

 

[defiler]

A small detail that caught my eye
On the PAU save when Pete opens Magan city view, it says that its building Ectogenesis Pod
By comparing the half built frame of the wonder at south of Magan with the unindentified wonders at Arioch's site I would say that Ectogenesis Pod is the Unknown Wonder 5

 

[AriochIV]

A small detail that caught my eye
On the PAU save when Pete opens Magan city view, it says that its building Ectogenesis Pod
By comparing the half built frame of the wonder at south of Magan with the unindentified wonders at Arioch's site I would say that Ectogenesis Pod is the Unknown Wonder 5

I would agree with that.

 

[MadDjinn]

This is something that really should be cleared up by maddjin in the next stream. The wording is certainly confusing.

yes it is confusing, and we should be able to clear it up.

 

[motku]

I would agree with that.

Oh indeed, check your PMs for all my silly thoughts about the unknown wonders. I've figured that one was the Ectogenesis Pod (something that I always hoped we do as people though most are disgusted by it) from the way the icon alone looks.

 

[OldEarthRelic]

The buildings all get a free upgrade from quests, so they're not quite as weak as they first appear.

 

[Aeson]

Why?
I have no objections to 'outsourcing' research. It's simply a more direct approach from receiving science beakers from the city states in CiV when you choose the right social policy.

Wild level of dice roll OP.

At the worst Adept Blue gives you comparable return to other stations, which are all along the lines of 3 to 4 counters per turn or a similar value in units.

It's the upper bound that's completely out of whack. Look at the (estimated from turn time) cost ratios:

N1: 1
N1L: 2.5
N2: 8
N2L: 12
N3: 22
N3L: 34

You can realistically get a N2 tech by the time you'd get the first Adept Blue free tech. That opens up N2L and N3 techs. If you get a N3 tech that's 34x as much Science as getting a N1 tech, and it's dice deciding the game.

T4 and T4L could theoretically be in play for SF or FI in the first 50 turns of trading with Adept Blue, and (not sure on the ratios) would put it around 50x as useful.

A N1 tech from a trade route is reasonably balanced. 2x is ... pushing it. 50x is a catastrophe.

At the very least it should be not random, but give one of the lowest value techs. But even then it's going to scale up pretty fast. By mid-game it will be giving N2 and maybe N2L techs. The other stations are completely outclassed by that point.

Imagine what this does to MP or competitive SP. Or even just someone picking a difficulty level because that's what level of challenge they find fun. It just is potential to wildly skew the difficulty of the game.

 

[Eagle Pursuit]

with all the possible techs and leaf techs to research in the tech tree, it's not like it's going to give you a tech that you actually want every time. Maybe 1 in 5 or 10 at the most. Otherwise, it will be giving you techs that don't work with your victory objective or your affinity.

It's not like Civ V's tech tree where every tech is forward progress towards the end game.

 

[Aeson]

with all the possible techs and leaf techs to research in the tech tree, it's not like it's going to give you a tech that you actually want every time. Maybe 1 in 5 or 10 at the most. Otherwise, it will be giving you techs that don't work with your victory objective or your affinity.

It's not like Civ V's tech tree where every tech is forward progress towards the end game.

Even if you say 1 in 10, or 1 in 20, or 1 in anything ... that one time it's a broken game mechanic. (And to varying extents at other times.) There are countless other possible benefits that could be given instead that are more in-line with the other stations' benefits across the spectrum of possibility. No need for one with game-breaking potential.

So I hope they change it.

 

[gunnergoz]

I withhold judgment about Adept Blue's status as OP or a game-breaker until I've played the game a few times. I find it hard to believe that it would prove to be such in the face of what must be very intensive QA beta testing - which is surely still in progress.

 

[thedrizzle02]

First post for me as I usually just read and observe.

Just wanted to point out that in the live stream, Adept Blue allows the PAU to have 12 technologies researched, while the FI game he only has 7 techs researched with more beakers per turn..... PAU has 16 beakers while the FI has 23 . Both are at turn 93.... so the only difference could be from expeditions/virtues and stations.

This is completely OP if this change in research is almost solely due to trading with Adept Blue. Maybe I am mistaken and there are other factors but that is a huge difference. With PAU he even has two tier 2 techs done while for FI he uses his factions UA to gain his first tier 2 tech.....

I hope that if this is due to Adept Blue that this station is completely changed as it will be completely game changing.

 

[ggmoyang]

I withhold judgment about Adept Blue's status as OP or a game-breaker until I've played the game a few times. I find it hard to believe that it would prove to be such in the face of what must be very intensive QA beta testing - which is surely still in progress.

Like how most strategies were nerfed after realease of ciV.
ICS, horsemen rushing, etc.

 

[Khaim]

Adept Blue allows the PAU to have 12 technologies researched, while the FI game he only has 7 techs researched with more beakers per turn.

Techs have different breaker costs. I seem to recall that PAU had mostly tier 1 branch techs, while FI had focused on the right side and had several tier 2 and leaf techs. The PAU might still be ahead overall, but I don't think it was as bad as the raw numbers might suggest. I do think the PAU was in a better position, but it's premature to say that it was all because of Adept Blue. Maybe he just played better that game.

 

[ggmoyang]

Techs have different breaker costs. I seem to recall that PAU had mostly tier 1 branch techs, while FI had focused on the right side and had several tier 2 and leaf techs. The PAU might still be ahead overall, but I don't think it was as bad as the raw numbers might suggest. I do think the PAU was in a better position, but it's premature to say that it was all because of Adept Blue. Maybe he just played better that game.

More like he researched all the cheap techs to make RNG work in his favor, and already got some more expensive techs free. And the real OPness is going to be start.

 

[Aeson]

Not counting the free tech from FI UA*, the ratio of cost of techs known to each would be ~

N0L: 1 = 1
N1: 2 = 2
N1L: 3 = 7.5

FI total: 10.5

N0L: 2 = 2
N1: 5 = 5
N1L: 2 = 5
N2: 2 = 16 (Computing is first ring, but still N2)

AU total: 28

So AU had almost triple the total Science output in the first 93 turns. The FI game had more pop and better land. More Science output in fact.

FI: 23 Science
AU: 16 Science

There might have been some other factors involved, but it's safe to say (as was said in the livestream) that Adept Blue had a big impact on AU's tech rate.

And as ggmoyang says, statistically the real OPness is just starting as N2L and N3 techs come into play on the next free tech ...

*Even with AU's UA, FI had more pop. So we can say that AU's UA wasn't enough to even make up the difference in quality of start/other factors.

 

[Gamewizard]

Adept Blue gives the free tech at the end of the trade cycle, which lasts 20 turns. So in the example game he got 4 free techs at the most, more likely only 3.

 

[AriochIV]

I believe Pete said the trade route lasts 25 turns.

 

[Gamewizard]

I guess the rationale there is that if an improvement costs maintenance, then it provides some benefit even if the tile isn't being worked.

Certainly an interesting layer added to the bland tile improvement system from Civ V. Now I see why in earlier builds the terrascape had 9 energy maintenance. I wonder if the Ecoscaping virtue adds the bonuses to what it provides or to the tile yield...