[MapScript] Erebus Continent

[Wodan]

A question, maybe a suggestion depending on the answer. Seems like Decius shows up a lot. How does it work? Does the civ get randomly picked, and then a leaderhead randomly assigned? It makes sense he should be more frequent than any given other leader, but maybe it should be tweaked so it's more of a compromise frequency.

 

[Valkrionn]

A question, maybe a suggestion depending on the answer. Seems like Decius shows up a lot. How does it work? Does the civ get randomly picked, and then a leaderhead randomly assigned? It makes sense he should be more frequent than any given other leader, but maybe it should be tweaked so it's more of a compromise frequency.

It's just a random civ, and then a random leader from those available to the civ. Since Decius can lead 3 civs, he has a higher chance of spawning.

Some rough odds:

• Decius has a 3/19 chance for one of his civs to spawn; Approximately 15.79%.
• Of those civs, he has several different chances:
  • Bannor - 1/3, 33.33%
  • Calabim - 1/3, 33.33%
  • Malakim - 1/2, 50%

This means that, assuming a Standard map of 7 players, he should actually be guaranteed one of his civs spawn (15.79% per civ, * 7, = 110.53)... And really, very few random games with that number of civs DON"T have at least one of those three.

Given that, if just ONE of his civs is in game he has at least a 33% chance to be in game. That only goes up if you manage to get another of his civs in game.

So really, it's not easy to nerf his appearance rate. It's just a matter of him being able to lead multiple civs... Only thing you can do about it is add more leaders for those civs. In RifE, he'd have the following odds:

• Bannor - 1/7, 14.29% (2 of these are multi-civ leaders (Decius, Ophelia), others run from Good to Evil... Lots of versatility in the Bannor)
• Calabim - 1/6, 16.67% (Again, 2 are multi-civ, Decius and Xivan)
• Malakim - 1/3, 33.33%

 

[Seven05]

A question, maybe a suggestion depending on the answer. Seems like Decius shows up a lot. How does it work? Does the civ get randomly picked, and then a leaderhead randomly assigned? It makes sense he should be more frequent than any given other leader, but maybe it should be tweaked so it's more of a compromise frequency.

Lobster = fix. No lobster, no fix for you! (can you tell I miss my eastcoast seafood being stranded here in the midwest?)

For a more serious answer, what Valk said, well that and I don't pick the civs in the script but I can see what civs were picked. I suppose I could kill Decius off or force him onto a lone single tile island surrounded by ice if that counts as controlling his appearance

 

[a_civilian]

This means that, assuming a Standard map of 7 players, he should actually be guaranteed one of his civs spawn (15.79% per civ, * 7, = 110.53)... And really, very few random games with that number of civs DON"T have at least one of those three.

The probability that none of those three civilizations show up is (16 choose 7)/(19 choose 7) = 22.7%, so the probability that at least one shows up is 77.3%.

 

[Valkrionn]

Eh, my probability there was just 1/19 * 3.

 

[Wodan]

Same thing is true of... Ophelia I guess.

Sounds like you're saying it's not easy to edit the % chances to do special IF cases or something.

The most logical to me would be to reduce the chance of nominally associated leaders. e.g., Calabim are chosen, fine. But to determine between possible Calabim leaders Decius should not get equal odds, say he's 1/5 while the other two are each 2/5.

 

[LulThyme]

Eh, my probability there was just 1/19 * 3.

Which is the correct calculation for the AVERAGE number of Decius-compatible civs to appear, not for the chance to have at least 1.

 

[Seven05]

2.54 is up now.

The only change in this update is some test code for multiplayer games using alternate flavor preferences for the Doviello and Illians when the map script is used for a networked, multiplayer game (so not hotseat games).

I can easily do the same for other civs as well as applying basic MP only rules for all civs when the plots are evaluated. Since I don't play MP games very often I need feedback from those of you who do so I know if it's working and what changes, if any, need to be made. If there is any demand for it I can change this so it is accessed via a map option in game rather than automatically detecting network games.

 

[Wodan]

I had All Unique Features on in my last game, and it only did about half of them.

 

[Seven05]

I don't do anything with unique features, in fact I check for them before modifying any tiles to prevent disturbing them/placing a civ on them/etc. If they're missing, something happened to them after the world was created. It's possible that FlavourMod was unable to place them after removing them or the mod you're playing allows them to be explored and removed, or perhaps even a bug that lets the barbarians pillage them.

It could be anything except an error in how I place them because I don't place them

 

[Wodan]

Strange. I guess I'll keep an eye to see if it happens again my next game, and if so report it over in RifE's bug thread.

 

[Seven05]

Ok, I did find a small chance for them to get wiped out if you used the ancient city ruins options since there I was being lazy and only checking for any improvement when I should have been looking specifically for city ruins although for most of that process it ignores tiles that already have improvements so the chance is really small and the likelyhood of it actually removing half of the is insanely small.

Anyway, I'll post that update soon just in case, but try a game without the ancient city ruins and see if you still have trouble getting them all to show up. I tested about a dozen maps in Wild Mana with the ruins enabled and all unique features and only had one map that was missing the broken sepulcher (replaced by city ruins) before my fix.

 

[Wodan]

Ok, I did find a small chance for them to get wiped out if you used the ancient city ruins options

That must be it! I did use that option in that game. I didn't notice that some of them weren't around until I scoured the map looking for Brigit.

try a game without the ancient city ruins and see if you still have trouble getting them all to show up

I did, and a quick peek in WB showed they seem to be there.

Aside: I doubt I'll use the ancient ruins option anymore because it seems to have an unintended side effect of keeping the AC permanently low as AIs sanctify them all over the place. Which basically amounts to a nerf of some of the evil civs. Right?

 

[Valkrionn]

Trust me, you'll be wanting to use that option in RifE. As it won't be normal City Ruins.

 

[Wodan]

Trust me, you'll be wanting to use that option in RifE. As it won't be normal City Ruins.

 

[Seven05]

That must be it! I did use that option in that game. I didn't notice that some of them weren't around until I scoured the map looking for Brigit.


I did, and a quick peek in WB showed they seem to be there.

ok, well the good news is that I'll have a fix up for that today or tomorrow. I've been Testing some different world types such as inland sea, coastal, etc to see if I can do them as options or if I need a new script.

Aside: I doubt I'll use the ancient ruins option anymore because it seems to have an unintended side effect of keeping the AC permanently low as AIs sanctify them all over the place. Which basically amounts to a nerf of some of the evil civs. Right?

That was my concern too until I realized the AI wasn't sanctifying them often at all. Most often they just build improvements right over them, the barbarians also love to pillage them so it's really only human players that get to abuse them for sanctifying. This is offset somewhat by the added graveyards, if you're greedy like me you sack all of them for gold and free techs

 

[Wodan]

It annoys me no end when an AI with Open Borders comes in and desecrates my graveyards.

 

[kornuletz]

I play almost exclusively with this mapscript now, really nice!! Much appreciation! Thanks and good job!

Also, some personal feedback on the starting positions:
for single player, it creates a very good flavorful atmosphere.
for multiplayer, I still think tundra starts kinda ruins illians and doviello (with everything on default, the way it is meant to be played IMO).
In my experience, they get left behind by everybody else, easily.

I wouldn't know how to fix that in a "non-flavourful" way to be honest.. Also, meanwhile, I have another favorite nation anyway.

My suggestion is to try to improve illian and doviello starting positions by either:
-guaranteeing them food deer ressources (not always the case)
-reducing the tundra width (expanding the snow tiles even, though that would help only illian)
-making both illian and doviello start somewhere between tundra and grassland, at the limit between the two, rather than in grassland
-a mix of all of the above?

I hope you understand the main point. If some more experienced players think that this would make these nations too good, forget my tips. Maybe it is me.

All I know is that in a multiplayer environment I never seem to be able to compete with "tundra starts", and I am much better of with any other civilization. Also, I didn't include "the Clan" as they seem to me to have somewhat better starts.

tl;dr version:
Good work! Love the script! Some personal ideas about better starting positions given.

PS. I could swear that I always get a pig in my fat cross with Balseraphs, even though I don't see that condition anywhere in the script. :-D
And sorry for the long post, started writing and kinda forgot to stop.

 

[Milaga]

I started a Sidar game with the Magister Mod and version 2.54 noticed that the Sidar seems to have a flavor for lots and lots of forests. Forests everywhere, and very little resources. I regenerated several times and saw the same results. They all seemed to be on rivers but were downright miserable. In vanilla FfH you cannot chop forests without Mining, and forests eliminate the 1 commerce from being riverside.

I finally got a map that I decided to keep since even though there were no resources whatsoever visible, I had the Remnants of Patria in my starting plot. Always a good thing. Before I could beeline Education the three grassland plots I had were overgrown with forests and my research dropped to a crawl.

After some exploring it looks like there was a LOT of forests on the map. There were, therefore, a scary amount of Giant Spiders.

I was playing with Smart Climate: Modify Selection, which might have had something to do with it. The Civs in play are Bannor, Elohim, Ljosolfar, Calabim, Balseraphs, Sheiam, Sidar, Amurites, Grigori.

 

[Seven05]

I play almost exclusively with this mapscript now, really nice!! Much appreciation! Thanks and good job!

Also, some personal feedback on the starting positions:
for single player, it creates a very good flavorful atmosphere.
for multiplayer, I still think tundra starts kinda ruins illians and doviello (with everything on default, the way it is meant to be played IMO).
In my experience, they get left behind by everybody else, easily.

I wouldn't know how to fix that in a "non-flavourful" way to be honest.. Also, meanwhile, I have another favorite nation anyway.

My suggestion is to try to improve illian and doviello starting positions by either:
-guaranteeing them food deer ressources (not always the case)
-reducing the tundra width (expanding the snow tiles even, though that would help only illian)
-making both illian and doviello start somewhere between tundra and grassland, at the limit between the two, rather than in grassland
-a mix of all of the above?

I have the ability to define different rules for multiplayer games and I put some test values in for the Illians and Doviello in 2.54, unfortunately I don't play MP games like I used to so I haven't had a chance to realluy test that out. Apparently, the test values aren't any better Unless you're using an old version?

What I was trying to do was keep them in the north without forcing them onto tundra/snow. I gave the Doviello a preference for grassland and the Illians a preference for plains to keep them seperated a bit. I'll play around with that some more, and it is possible to write up my own version of normilization passes to do things like changing a few tundra tiles around player starts into grassland but only in MP games.

I hope you understand the main point. If some more experienced players think that this would make these nations too good, forget my tips. Maybe it is me.

All I know is that in a multiplayer environment I never seem to be able to compete with "tundra starts", and I am much better of with any other civilization. Also, I didn't include "the Clan" as they seem to me to have somewhat better starts.

tl;dr version:
Good work! Love the script! Some personal ideas about better starting positions given.

PS. I could swear that I always get a pig in my fat cross with Balseraphs, even though I don't see that condition anywhere in the script. :-D
And sorry for the long post, started writing and kinda forgot to stop.

I'm glad you like it, and I don't think your post was too long. I definately need more feedback regarding MP games so anything there is always appreciated. The pigs... that may be caused by flavormod or flavor starts in RiFE/Wild Mana if you're using any of those mods, otherwise it's just dumb luck

I value resources in a very simply way, water resources are worth 1 point, land resources are worth 2 points and any resource that can be accessed with starting era or earlier (default is ancient) tech is worth an extra 2 points. I count resources in the normal BFC when figuring the bonus value for any given plot. This was done to make it work even better with Flavor Mod's post-placement shuffle since each start should have at least one bonus.

And yes, I can tweak this differently for MP games if that would help there, I'm just trying to avoid any complex evaluations of the bonuses themselves since the starting plot code loops through thousands of plots multiple times calls through the DLL to read xml data slow it down a lot.

So, feel free to post all sorts of unusual ideas for MP balancing. Antyhing that won't require breaking the original code (so no 'balanced starts' or 'mirrored resources' options) is probably very doable. I can even do fun things like putting all the 'Good' civs in the east and all the 'Evil' civs in the west (or north, south, etc)

I started a Sidar game with the Magister Mod and version 2.54 noticed that the Sidar seems to have a flavor for lots and lots of forests. Forests everywhere, and very little resources. I regenerated several times and saw the same results. They all seemed to be on rivers but were downright miserable. In vanilla FfH you cannot chop forests without Mining, and forests eliminate the 1 commerce from being riverside.

I finally got a map that I decided to keep since even though there were no resources whatsoever visible, I had the Remnants of Patria in my starting plot. Always a good thing. Before I could beeline Education the three grassland plots I had were overgrown with forests and my research dropped to a crawl.

After some exploring it looks like there was a LOT of forests on the map. There were, therefore, a scary amount of Giant Spiders.

I was playing with Smart Climate: Modify Selection, which might have had something to do with it. The Civs in play are Bannor, Elohim, Ljosolfar, Calabim, Balseraphs, Sheiam, Sidar, Amurites, Grigori.

You know... I was playing around with some changes to the normilization code so I may have broken something. It should be clearing out roughly half of the forest and/or jungles in a 7x7 area centered on your starting plot. I will also need to make some adjustments to forest placement when the smart climate kicks in, I keep forgetting to do that.

I look into that as soon as I have a chance, today and tomorrow are busy days for me at work so I probably won't get anything done before this weekend.