Making Miasma More Meaningful

[Fabio1701]

I've played both purity and harmony and feel that miasma makes almost no difference to the game. I tend to just ignore it now: my workers are immune, it doesn't affect tile yield, my army is either in cities or on the front lines and even transport between lines is not affected by miasma. Compared to SMAC's fungus, it's nothing. really don't feel that I am fighting the planet at all, which is especially a problem for purity. As harmony I really don't feel that it supports me much.

What it should be is, depending on the affinity, a game changing feature which takes central stage in your strategy if harmony or purity. Here's how I think it can be a more fun and engaging part of the game:

-Make it spread by itself. that means it is never really completely taken care of.
-Make the spread dependant on how much you affect the landscape. More terrascapes, manufactories and certain aggressive manufacturing buildings increase it's spread speed, some like forests, biowells etc decrease it's spread speed.
-Miasma blooms
-some aliens are stealthed in miasma, ie can only be seen when in adjacent tile
-Have worms spread miasma (let the spice flow)

Make it affect affinities differently:

Purity:
-1 food on any tiles (purity people can't eat food which is even slightly alien)
-1 movement
+1 health if no miasma in entire city radius (psychological security)

Harmony:
-1 maintenance on tile improvements which have 2 or more maintenance (miasma powered infrastructure)
+1 health if all 6 tiles surrounding a city are miasma (psychological security)
-units can be stealthed in miasma

Supremacy:
-1 production on any improvements (get's into all the delicate electronics)

The idea is that with this then players and AI will by influenced to either spread or combat miasma and it can be used as a weapon.

seeing as miasma works on a pollution mechanic and not a forest mechanic like in SMAC, we can actually take advantage of having miasma affect tile yield without destroying infrastructure. Makes infrastructure choices more interesting. what do you guys think? How else can Miasma be made more fun?

 

[m15a]

More interesting effects could be good, but I'm not sure whether the suggestions above would be fun. For purity and supremacy, miasma would be like pillaging your tiles. They'd always get rid of it, and since it might randomly spread, it's like your tiles being randomly pillaged. It's like barbarians you can't kill. For harmony, it's the opposite. Just spam miasma and get all those benefits in all your cities for the rest of the game. For there to be a real choice, the cost of clearing or creating miasma would have to be increased to the extent that you might not bother clearing/creating miasma, which would just be frustrating. Also, you'd feel like you were being penalized for passing the supremacy/purity threshold, which doesn't really work with needing affinity for win conditions.

I think for it to be interesting, there has to some tradeoff in clearing or not cleating miasma - a bonus and a penalty for either choice - no matter what the affinity. I'm not sure what, though.

 

[Fabio1701]

More interesting effects could be good, but I'm not sure whether the suggestions above would be fun. For purity and supremacy, miasma would be like pillaging your tiles. They'd always get rid of it, and since it might randomly spread, it's like your tiles being randomly pillaged. It's like barbarians you can't kill. For harmony, it's the opposite. Just spam miasma and get all those benefits in all your cities for the rest of the game. For there to be a real choice, the cost of clearing or creating miasma would have to be increased to the extent that you might not bother clearing/creating miasma, which would just be frustrating. Also, you'd feel like you were being penalized for passing the supremacy/purity threshold, which doesn't really work with needing affinity for win conditions.

I think for it to be interesting, there has to some tradeoff in clearing or not cleating miasma - a bonus and a penalty for either choice - no matter what the affinity. I'm not sure what, though.

Indeed, you don't want it to feel like you are being randomly pillaged. I think the way to combat this feeling would be the following:

-satellites purging miasma cheaper/faster active for purity (I imagine priority would have tons of anti miasma satellites)
-satellites creating miasma chaepr/faster for harmony
-the spread not to be random, but come form a specific source which can be strategized against (ie, other misama, aliens). This way a border between a harmony and purity player may be a cold war of miasma control, but the rear cities of either player has been pacified to their specifications and you won't feel that you are doing boring cleanup all the time in places which should be taking care of themselves.

Also, because miasma is not like SMAC fungus in that it destroys the improvement, it just makes the tile more expensive or less effective, but not totally wasted.

 

[Bezurn]

I like the concept, but the implementation may be too severe.

For purity and supremacy I think the negatives should be lumped together. It's not like supremacy affinity civs eat hammers or energy, food is still important, as well as health. Therefore making the malus between the existence of miasma in their lands should be mirrored.

I do like the idea of it spreading on its own like forests, but you would think it would spread easier where it is encouraged to grow instead of where it is actively destroyed. Tying it to heavy industry improvements would seem to me to be a form of pollution from the old days of Civ which you had to tediously clean up with your workers. Also, the tech "Nano-Robotics" which gives +1 science to manufactories, which harmony affinity tech. So Harmony players are not discouraged, but encouraged from using those improvements, more so than farms in fact (which purity buffs). While I do understand that you are trying to mimic the way fungus worked in Alpha Centauri, I think a different approach could be taken instead to make it less tedious.

Miasma Detrimental Effects

• -1 food per tile should probably be replaced with -2% food intake of city for every plot of land worked containing Miasma.
• -1 Movement is too severe I think.
  The terrain is often enough to hinder your movement in Miasma fields(forests, hills, rivers). Suddenly a rover becomes no better than a soldier on any terrain with base 2 movement. It already does 10 damage to any unit that ends their turn in miasma, and the AI often willy nilly walks around in it, this would just kill their units quicker.​
• -1 health for every 12 tiles of miasma in city radius (max of -3 health):
  Overcoming the effects of the planet and making it more suitable for normal humans should be a great achievement. Coastal cities would be less effected since water tiles don't contain miasma. This detrimental effect would be obsolete by researching Alien Adaptation. While this doesn't buff Harmony directly, it allows them to co-exist with the native environment without any negative effects.​

Positive Effects of Miasma

• Harmony already has some nice synergies for miasma. They get plus +10 healing in it from Alien Hybirdization
• Stealth for units in Miasma
  Should be an end game buff. Also any owner of a satellite over miasma should be able to see the unit moving through it as well as adjacent units. The ability could probably be tied to "Metamaterials" - an end game tech. Possilby only give this ability to solider class as wel... Stealth for Xeno Titans???
  
  For native life, it should only be certain types. If a siege worm spreads miasma, then it will be in stealth most of the time. This would make them a lot more dangerous, as you can easily avoid them now. However, it might be too powerful to give to all aliens. Perhaps only Siege Worms and Raptors should gain this effect, as the other more mundane aliens aren't as stealthy.​
• -1 Maintenance for tile improvements of -2 or more
  
  I like this, "Exotic Matter" looks like it would be a good tech to tie this into, as it only has a measly wonder (and affinity points)​

 

[Fabio1701]

I like the concept, but the implementation may be too severe.

For purity and supremacy I think the negatives should be lumped together. It's not like supremacy affinity civs eat hammers or energy, food is still important, as well as health. Therefore making the malus between the existence of miasma in their lands should be mirrored.

I do like the idea of it spreading on its own like forests, but you would think it would spread easier where it is encouraged to grow instead of where it is actively destroyed. Tying it to heavy industry improvements would seem to me to be a form of pollution from the old days of Civ which you had to tediously clean up with your workers. Also, the tech "Nano-Robotics" which gives +1 science to manufactories, which harmony affinity tech. So Harmony players are not discouraged, but encouraged from using those improvements, more so than farms in fact (which purity buffs). While I do understand that you are trying to mimic the way fungus worked in Alpha Centauri, I think a different approach could be taken instead to make it less tedious.

Your point gets me thinking about the choices of what techs go with what affinities. I think it is not all entirely balanced for flavour. Harmony should not be encouraged to build manufactures, +1 science to anything sounds more like supremacy and why does purity buff farms? I get purity is hot for retro-earth stuff, but being hot for farms really is retro to the agrerian society if you get my meaning. I would expect them to care more for terrascapes and domes (more on that here: http://forums.civfanatics.com/showthread.php?t=538156). Anyway, food for thought. I am intrigued by your suggestion of not having miasma mimmick SMAC fungus but really trying to get it to be it's own thing. CBE does indeed deserve it's own lore anyway.

Miasma Detrimental Effects

• -1 food per tile should probably be replaced with -2% food intake of city for every plot of land worked containing Miasma.
• -1 Movement is too severe I think.
  The terrain is often enough to hinder your movement in Miasma fields(forests, hills, rivers). Suddenly a rover becomes no better than a soldier on any terrain with base 2 movement. It already does 10 damage to any unit that ends their turn in miasma, and the AI often willy nilly walks around in it, this would just kill their units quicker.​
• -1 health for every 12 tiles of miasma in city radius (max of -3 health):
  Overcoming the effects of the planet and making it more suitable for normal humans should be a great achievement. Coastal cities would be less effected since water tiles don't contain miasma. This detrimental effect would be obsolete by researching Alien Adaptation. While this doesn't buff Harmony directly, it allows them to co-exist with the native environment without any negative effects.​

I definitely think -% city food/growth per tile makes more sence than my suggestion of -1 food per tile, good idea. I think that Harmony should overcome this feature at about the second tech level, alein adaption or alien science or perhaps biology on the other side to mix thing up, or do you think at a certain level of harmony points, like 3 or 4?

Movement penalty may be too harsh, I was thinking of SMAC fungus obviously. But I think that the -10 damage to units in miasma is too inconsequential to make my units want to avoid miasma. For this reason I don't even bother to clean it up in any affinity as long as I have immune workers. I think making more damage would also be too harsh, but I cant think of any way other than movement to influence a player to think, wait dont wanna go there or gotta combat that stuff.

I also like your idea of -1 health for 12 tiles. makes coastal cities more interesting.

Positive Effects of Miasma

• Harmony already has some nice synergies for miasma. They get plus +10 healing in it from Alien Hybirdization
• Stealth for units in Miasma
  Should be an end game buff. Also any owner of a satellite over miasma should be able to see the unit moving through it as well as adjacent units. The ability could probably be tied to "Metamaterials" - an end game tech. Possilby only give this ability to solider class as wel... Stealth for Xeno Titans???
  
  For native life, it should only be certain types. If a siege worm spreads miasma, then it will be in stealth most of the time. This would make them a lot more dangerous, as you can easily avoid them now. However, it might be too powerful to give to all aliens. Perhaps only Siege Worms and Raptors should gain this effect, as the other more mundane aliens aren't as stealthy.​
• -1 Maintenance for tile improvements of -2 or more
  
  I like this, "Exotic Matter" looks like it would be a good tech to tie this into, as it only has a measly wonder (and affinity points)​

perhaps only stealth for biological units (soldiers, alien cavalry, xenotitans) but not rovers, artilery and other machines. the xenotitan moves so ridiculously slow (compared to an army of cavalry and tanks) that I don't thin it will be a problem. And indeed the stealth should only work for factions, perhaps not aliens because as you mentioned, the worm is ridiculously big and I figure the stealth is not just a natural adaptaion, but a gimmick we humans have been able to engineer into our biosoldiers.

 

[Bezurn]

Your point gets me thinking about the choices of what techs go with what affinities. I think it is not all entirely balanced for flavour. Harmony should not be encouraged to build manufactures, +1 science to anything sounds more like supremacy and why does purity buff farms? I get purity is hot for retro-earth stuff, but being hot for farms really is retro to the agrerian society if you get my meaning. I would expect them to care more for terrascapes and domes (more on that here: http://forums.civfanatics.com/showthread.php?t=538156). Anyway, food for thought. I am intrigued by your suggestion of not having miasma mimmick SMAC fungus but really trying to get it to be it's own thing. CBE does indeed deserve it's own lore anyway.

I think Harmony building Manufactures is all right, but a forest alternative might be more suitable. If it is possible to mod the game to allow planting of forests then I agree it should probably be moved. A neat idea I had would be to make a Manufacture for a harmony player give a bonus for every 2 adjacent forest to it, so like +1 science per two. That would be pretty complex and I'm pretty sure the auto workers wouldn't have a clue how to utilize it though, so best to leave it out.

The Purity techs for improvements are quite overpowered. In addition to the massive culture bonus yields they can acquire from Domes and Terrascapes, the Farms in particular are just terribly imbalanced once all of the techs to buff them up, as they are not spread out well. Nabbing the Ectogenesis Pod just puts more salt in the wound. Vertical Farming adding +1 food and energy is silly, it should only only add +1 food, and the +1 energy could come later.

My ideas on farms yield improvements would be:

• +1 Food from "Vertical Farming" (removed +1 Energy)
• +1 Production from "Industrial Ecology"
• +1 Energy from "Civil Support" (NEW)
  
  This change helps offset the cost for mag rails in a purity civilization as a side effect.​
• +1 Science from "Artificial Evolution"

This nicely spreads all of the farm buffs up around the tech web, and the +1 Science is one that has leaf techs for supremacy and harmony, so not high priority for one trying to boost purity rating, which the rest of the above leaf techs do.

I think farms should be something that purity should have a good number of though, as they wish to retain the way humans are now, with some slight enhancements to the genome. I live in the Midwest, and while I don't have corn growing outside my window, farms are very much a focus of the daily life of people further out of the city, and I don't see that changing to help feed a surging population on a new planet.

I definitely think -% city food/growth per tile makes more sence than my suggestion of -1 food per tile, good idea. I think that Harmony should overcome this feature at about the second tech level, alein adaption or alien science or perhaps biology on the other side to mix thing up, or do you think at a certain level of harmony points, like 3 or 4?

Movement penalty may be too harsh, I was thinking of SMAC fungus obviously. But I think that the -10 damage to units in miasma is too inconsequential to make my units want to avoid miasma. For this reason I don't even bother to clean it up in any affinity as long as I have immune workers. I think making more damage would also be too harsh, but I cant think of any way other than movement to influence a player to think, wait dont wanna go there or gotta combat that stuff.

I also like your idea of -1 health for 12 tiles. makes coastal cities more interesting.

Back to the topic at hand though - which is Miasma. The -% food intake and -health for X amount of miasma tiles in the radius could be negated by a single tech really, as they both relate to having a population exposed directly by working in that area, and also in a regional sense in having a higher concentration around the city. So negating it at "Alien Adaptation", "Alien Ecology" or perhaps as simple as "Alien Sciences" all seem like techs that would address that issue of adapting to this new environment.

Also I think that worker immunity should be moved to something not related to Harmony. Often the AI does not take the tech which grants them this bonus, so many times I see their worker count quite low, and I do not know if they are losing them to the Miasma, or if they just aren't building enough. Moving worker immunity to say Planetary Expedition might suffice. Also putting the worker ability to remove Miasma, in a Harmony Affinity tech makes little sense, and should be moved to "Alien Lifeforms", which is agnostic.

perhaps only stealth for biological units (soldiers, alien cavalry, xenotitans) but not rovers, artilery and other machines. the xenotitan moves so ridiculously slow (compared to an army of cavalry and tanks) that I don't thin it will be a problem. And indeed the stealth should only work for factions, perhaps not aliens because as you mentioned, the worm is ridiculously big and I figure the stealth is not just a natural adaptaion, but a gimmick we humans have been able to engineer into our biosoldiers.

I like your ideas for which types of units should be able to utilize the stealth ability of harmony. It also pairs well with harmony units often getting a bonus for not having any friends around, as they tend to lie in wait for units that pass by their miasma nests.

I had a change of mind and think some alien units being able to stealth in the miasma would put that sense of dread you are missing right now when walking into a field of miasma. In particular I think the Siege Worm and the Raptor should be given these abilities.

My vision of a Siege Worm and its ability to "stealth" - Since we might be giving it the ability to spread Miasma, it might make sense for the creature to use this substance in some way. While it is a huge creature, it also burrows into the ground, and has evolved to sneak up on its prey, as larger organisms contain more dense biomatter for it to feed its capricious appetite. Using some sort of olfactory or even telepathic signals which it creates the miasma as a conduit for, this signal produces a calming and numbing sensation in the victim. By the time the prey shakes free of this sensation and notices the Seige Worm's approach it is often too late and snatches up the prey into a death grip.

Raptors are another alien creature that should be a more aggressive predatory alien, that uses the miasma as camouflage as cover in much the same way as large cats of prey use the tall grasses to stalk their meals upon the Savanna.

Having two dangerous types of creatures masked by the miasma would create the sense of discomfort a player experienced when walking along the fungus blooms of the planet in Alpha Centauri.

 

[Lglenhaber]

I really like having miasma being a weapon

You could also have the "miasma bomb", an orbital unit that spreads concentrated miasma, damaging units and spreads miasma.
In order to fix the miasma randomly spreading, you could have the miasma only spread to adjacent tiles