ls612's C2C Units

[Johnny Canuck]

Not sure if this is the right place for this, but the Story Teller unit requires both Oral Tradition and Trade, but the former is redundant, since Oral Tradition is (distantly) a prereq for Trade, so the Oral Tradition requirement can be removed.

 

[Thunderbrd]

Thieves are now a non-unit. And rogues have been hobbled greatly by being made only accessible once they are outgunned.

Thieves still require the bandit's hideout to train them. They are a 2 str unit. They still have the scavenging tech prereq. However, now that the Bandit's Hideout requires the Banditry civic, which is unlocked at Archery, they will never see the light of play. By Archery, Thieves are obsoleted by Rogues which we get at Personal Adornment. Rogues, themselves are also almost obsoleted by this move as well. Not much further down the tech tree is the Assassin unlocked at Code of Laws.

I'm not against the move on the Bandit's Hideout. But this does mean that we need to base the Thief and Rogue on something else. I'd also like to propose an earlier Criminal unit, the Outcast.

The Outcast would have 1 str, be invisible, hidden nationality, bring crime with it, and would also have a special mission to join opponent cities which adds a very large, say 100pt one shot boost to crime. He would be made available on Cooperation, where social structures begin to consider how to work with the UNcooperative.

 

[Hydromancerx]

Thieves still require the bandit's hideout to train them. They are a 2 str unit. They still have the scavenging tech prereq. However, now that the Bandit's Hideout requires the Banditry civic, which is unlocked at Archery, they will never see the light of play. By Archery, Thieves are obsoleted by Rogues which we get at Personal Adornment. Rogues, themselves are also almost obsoleted by this move as well. Not much further down the tech tree is the Assassin unlocked at Code of Laws.

This is why I did not want Banditry civic moved.

 

[Koshling]

The Outcast would have 1 str, be invisible, hidden nationality, bring crime with it, and would also have a special mission to join opponent cities which adds a very large, say 100pt one shot boost to crime. He would be made available on Cooperation, where social structures begin to consider how to work with the UNcooperative.

IMO this would be fairly pointless. Crime has pretty much no impact during prehistoric (well very limited), so the 100 point crime dump would have more or less no effect in the era that the unit was current.

 

[strategyonly]

IMO this would be fairly pointless. Crime has pretty much no impact during prehistoric (well very limited), so the 100 point crime dump would have more or less no effect in the era that the unit was current.

Yeah back then they didnt even know what crime was, they just TOOK everything they wanted, WHEN they wanted it, or at least died "trying."

 

[Thunderbrd]

IMO this would be fairly pointless. Crime has pretty much no impact during prehistoric (well very limited), so the 100 point crime dump would have more or less no effect in the era that the unit was current.

I realize we don't have many crimes at that time, which is something I also don't think is good either as I believe we should have a number of minor crimes - as mentioned in another thread.

But even if everything stayed as it is there, I found that crime was able to ruin me as soon as actual crime buildings were being unlocked. This is because I was already incapable of running less than 200 crime due to being a Nomadic and due to being Aggressive as well (wasn't paying much attention to how badly these two added crime) which adds more after 200 crime, I was in a runaway crime situation by the time the big nasty crime buildings were getting unlocked and was nearly in revolution on my second city - it went through a number of anarchy periods courting full revolution.

All this before I had access to TW units. I had to beeline to the TW tech to survive, crossing about 4 columns to stretch to get it. Early crime was definitely devastating and now I'm hovering at about -1000 crime in every city, paranoid I'll let it get the better of me if I'm not looking. With every city I build, I review the amount of crime I'm pulling in and usually find I need another TW in many of them (and I'm able to get all the crime promotions and I still need to staff about 9 or 10 of them in my capital to keep crime in the negative! Of course, I don't shirk building the crime buildings either so I guess I'm a bit of a glutton for punishment there...)

My point is, early crime can create a huge bind-up to your enemies as soon as they start to discover the techs that release mean crime buildings because there's really nothing that can be done about it for a long time if it gets away from them. If you could use some Outcasts to blast your neighbors early on, you may be able to get one or more of them to experience this kind of frustration despite whatever buildings they may build. Might be a bit excessive as you could achieve it with Thieves too... but it could suit some strategies.

Besides, I like it better when our unit concept lines start off with a 1 str version.

 

[Koshling]

I realize we don't have many crimes at that time, which is something I also don't think is good either as I believe we should have a number of minor crimes - as mentioned in another thread.

But even if everything stayed as it is there, I found that crime was able to ruin me as soon as actual crime buildings were being unlocked. This is because I was already incapable of running less than 200 crime due to being a Nomadic and due to being Aggressive as well (wasn't paying much attention to how badly these two added crime) which adds more after 200 crime, I was in a runaway crime situation by the time the big nasty crime buildings were getting unlocked and was nearly in revolution on my second city - it went through a number of anarchy periods courting full revolution.

All this before I had access to TW units. I had to beeline to the TW tech to survive, crossing about 4 columns to stretch to get it. Early crime was definitely devastating and now I'm hovering at about -1000 crime in every city, paranoid I'll let it get the better of me if I'm not looking. With every city I build, I review the amount of crime I'm pulling in and usually find I need another TW in many of them (and I'm able to get all the crime promotions and I still need to staff about 9 or 10 of them in my capital to keep crime in the negative! Of course, I don't shirk building the crime buildings either so I guess I'm a bit of a glutton for punishment there...)

My point is, early crime can create a huge bind-up to your enemies as soon as they start to discover the techs that release mean crime buildings because there's really nothing that can be done about it for a long time if it gets away from them. If you could use some Outcasts to blast your neighbors early on, you may be able to get one or more of them to experience this kind of frustration despite whatever buildings they may build. Might be a bit excessive as you could achieve it with Thieves too... but it could suit some strategies.

Besides, I like it better when our unit concept lines start off with a 1 str version.

Yeh, but the AI implications are nasty. Bear in mind that all the AI has to go on is the AI weight for the crime property, so it assesses it based only on how bad its crime level is, NOT on what EFFECT that CURRENTLY has. So if something is added that boosts crime a lot the AI will go all out to fight crime even though it (at that time) doesn't actually have much impact. It also (relatedly) means (another new concept) that the AI has to start evaluating the FUTURE value of things not the CURRENT value, since they will be very disparate (value of that unit via its mission for example, as well a value of performing the mission). I think we'd need some significant work on property evaluation for the AI to make sense of missions like that, and more generally of circumstances that lead to large amounts of a property that don't have an effect, but will do later. Especially for a property that you have very restricted means to fight (like crime before TWs).

 

[strategyonly]

Yeh, but the AI implications are nasty. Bear in mind that all the AI has to go on is the AI weight for the crime property, so it assesses it based only on how bad its crime level is, NOT on what EFFECT that CURRENTLY has. So if something is added that boosts crime a lot the AI will go all out to fight crime even though it (at that time) doesn't actually have much impact. It also (relatedly) means (another new concept) that the AI has to start evaluating the FUTURE value of things not the CURRENT value, since they will be very disparate (value of that unit via its mission for example, as well a value of performing the mission). I think we'd need some significant work on property evaluation for the AI to make sense of missions like that, and more generally of circumstances that lead to large amounts of a property that don't have an effect, but will do later. Especially for a property that you have very restricted means to fight (like crime before TWs).

If its more AI work, then i'd say not right now, lets just get more balancing done first.

 

[Hydromancerx]

Can't we just move Banditry civic back to Scavenging tech and leave the thief units the way they are? It seemed to work just fine that way.

 

[JosEPh_II]

Why not just keep Bandit Hideout an other Associated bldgs were they are. And Then just Remove the Banditry Civic altogether. Then Tribal Military Civic would make sense somewhat.

It's ridiculous that Bandits hideout goes obsolete at the next Military Civic anyway. Griped about this point forEver but No you all just Had to keep the Banditry Civic. (I made that! don't touch it! sentiment) So to keep using Assassins and such you were forced to keep Banditry Civic when other Military Civics are better suited for the timeframe and tech area you are in as the Eras pass by.

JosEPh

 

[Hydromancerx]

*grumble* What's the point of making all of the civic specific buildings if we are just going to remove them from being civic specific. We already removed the Barter Post from Barter civic and the Mercenary Camp from Survival civic.

generalstaff had some great ideas with these building in his Civics Buildings mod. I would hate to see them all undone.

 

[JosEPh_II]

You're The Modder do what you want. I shouldn't have posted at all.

Shall I delete my post to make it go away?

JosEPh

 

[Thunderbrd]

Why not just unlock thieves and rogues with something new? Just before this recent change, we had thieves nearly eliminated from potential use due to making the bandit hideout cost so much production at a time when other buildings would keep coming in and overriding it in any sense of valid priority. The AI could successfully see this too so thieves just were never seeing the light of day.

Perhaps simply a new tech: Theft
could unlock thieves and they wouldn't NEED a special building to access them? See how well that helps them to get back into the game!

Rogues, being unlocked at personal adornment, could possibly use their own new building that opens up then too: Hut of Whispers, where the darker sorts begin to band together and make plans and machinations.

 

[Nimek]

[*grumble* What's the point of making all of the civic specific buildings if we are just going to remove them from being civic specific. We already removed the Barter Post from Barter civic and the Mercenary Camp from Survival civic.

Because most of that buildings have no reason toexist as civic specific. Example e-university as eeducation building. How you can implement eeducation civic when you have no infrastructure for that?

Civic specific buildings should work another way. First you must build some of them (build infrastructure) to implement civic conected to them.

Euniversity is just one example.

 

[Hydromancerx]

Because most of that buildings have no reason toexist as civic specific. Example e-university as eeducation building. How you can implement eeducation civic when you have no infrastructure for that?

If I recall correctly the e-university has other requirements besides the civic. Such as computer networks and university.

 

[JosEPh_II]

Why not just unlock thieves and rogues with something new? Just before this recent change, we had thieves nearly eliminated from potential use due to making the bandit hideout cost so much production at a time when other buildings would keep coming in and overriding it in any sense of valid priority. The AI could successfully see this too so thieves just were never seeing the light of day.

Perhaps simply a new tech: Theft
could unlock thieves and they wouldn't NEED a special building to access them? See how well that helps them to get back into the game!

Rogues, being unlocked at personal adornment, could possibly use their own new building that opens up then too: Hut of Whispers, where the darker sorts begin to band together and make plans and machinations.

Currently the AI uses Rogue and Assassin, but a Thief or Ambusher is non existent. They were all (imo) so much better 10 versions back. And all were usable and used.

2

JosEPh

 

[strategyonly]

Currently the AI uses Rogue and Assassin, but a Thief or Ambusher is non existent. They were all (imo) so much better 10 versions back. And all were usable and used.

2

JosEPh

Agreed . . .

 

[Hydromancerx]

Could the reason they are not made any more is because all the building had their AI weights removed?

 

[Koshling]

Could the reason they are not made any more is because all the building had their AI weights removed?

AI builds rogues and they use the same building don't they? So it can't be the building that is at issue.

 

[strategyonly]

AI builds rogues and they use the same building don't they? So it can't be the building that is at issue.

Agreed, i just think the AI has a better choice NOW, and it doesn't see a crime unit when FIRST starting a civ as important enough to counter the regular units, that is MY guess.