[MOD] More Naval AI

[[to_xp]Gekko]

would it be possible to enable the infernal worldspell in MP for the next release? it's just completely unfair and it's not like the summonable civs are OP either. if somebody hates it so much it can just be agreed to not use it beforehand, same as Stasis.

 

[Nor'easter]

I think there are two problems with the Infernal world spell:

1) It's pretty useless for the Infernals. What I've seen happen in my games is that with their homeland on a far-off continent, they use the spell to take over one of my cities. I demand that Hyborem liberate the city, he refuses, I declare war and march in to retake it. Spell wasted.

2) Unlike other world spells (e.g., Stasis, Arcane Lacuna, Raging Seas, Worldbreak, River of Blood), Hyborem's Whisper adversely affects only a single opposing player. Yes, you can usually quickly retake the city, but if it was a city with one or more National Wonders, it can be really difficult to recover from. If it's a city in which you had several levels of the Altar of the Luonnotar, you might never recover, since you might not generate enough Great Prophets at that point to rebuild it.

Again, although some of those other world spells can be unpleasant, they at least adversely affect everyone, unlike the Infernals' world spell.

Gekko's right that in MP people can just agree not to use it, but that wouldn't apply to the AI in SP.

We had some discussion on this over in the RifE forums, and if development on that mod had continued there might have been a new world spell for the Infernals. Krieger66 came up with an idea here, which Valkrionn suggested modifying here, and Krieger66 suggested a final modification here. Just putting it out there for your consideration, but it might be more than you want to change.

 

[[to_xp]Gekko]

although I agree that hybo's whisper is not very well designed, changing it is outside of the scope of this mod so I think that's a discussion for another thread

 

[Tasunke]

Hmm.

I'm not so sure about that ...

Personally, I think Hyborem's Whisper should be available immediately, and should just give a Wane/Shade and a Great Commander.

(free GP and Free GC ... personally I think its fitting).

If needing some sort of tech, possibly Military Strategy, or Writing

 

[MagisterCultuum]

In a recent game (of my modmod, actually testing an issue with a saved game someone posted in my thread) where I was playing as Statius the Redeemer of the Infernals, I captured a Clan of Embers and set up a puppet state under Hafgan the Purger. This action caused me to loose the status of being at peace with the Barbarian State.

I do not think it should do that, particularly because my new vassal had the barbarian trait and should have had peace with the barbarians himself if not forced to declare war on them by becoming a vassal of a player who was already at war with them.

 

[Broken Hawk]

Hmm.

I'm not so sure about that ...

Personally, I think Hyborem's Whisper should be available immediately, and should just give a Wane/Shade and a Great Commander.

(free GP and Free GC ... personally I think its fitting).

If needing some sort of tech, possibly Military Strategy, or Writing

Agree, at the very least it should be available immediately.

 

[[to_xp]Gekko]

1) khazad game, I've got 2 cities and found RoK. to my surprise it gets founded in the capitol! however, the thane appears in my 2nd city.

2) Lanun attacked with some 8 warriors, and got right next to a city of mine with 2 warriors. instead of attacking, they just moved back and forth giving me time to reinforce and fight them back.

 

[MagisterCultuum]

1) khazad game, I've got 2 cities and found RoK. to my surprise it gets founded in the capitol! however, the thane appears in my 2nd city.

This is normal behavior, even in basic FfH2. Whenever you acquire the technology that founds your leader's favorite religion, then that religion is automatically spread to your capital. If said religion has never spread anywhere before, this makes your capital its holy city.

The gifting of disciple units is handled by the same code that gifts angels and manes to the Mercurians and Infernals. Not only does it grant the unit to a random city, but it also grants those units to every other player who has the same civilization type as you. (I changed that in my modmod.)

Edit: I just noticed that in base FfH2, no leader actually has a favorite religion set in CIV4LeaderInfos.xml. The python is in place, but it is never actually used. This modmod however does give favorite religions to many (not all) leaders, so the code is used. Both Khazad leaders have the Runes of Kilmorph as their favorite.

 

[Tasunke]

Interesting.

 

[[to_xp]Gekko]

and now I've noticed a sheaim stack of 10 sheaim units ( warriors, adepts and skellies ) that's been sitting outside of a barb city for a while going back and forth.

there's definitely a problem with the AI marches units to a city and then failing to attack. maybe they should wait a bit more before attacking and bring more units? it's a waste of unit maintenance to have them spend all that time in enemy territory without doing anything useful.

 

[Tasunke]

hmm.

Skeletons should probably have

A) No war weariness

and

B) Lemming AI

xD

 

[[to_xp]Gekko]

at the start of a game, I noticed the ljosalfar starting settler moving into my vision. as it was about the settle a good spot, I moved to its tile and settled there, which got him kicked out of my borders.

some turns later, the ljosalfar starting settler is still immobile so it seems like I've kicked them out of the game for good.

 

[[to_xp]Gekko]

it would be awesome if you could include some of denev's unofficial FFH patch like WM did. out of the top of my head, there's a fix allowing floodplins on city tiles, and another limiting defensive strik+blitz which solves an exploit, along with other great changes.

 

[[to_xp]Gekko]

at the start of a game, I noticed the ljosalfar starting settler moving into my vision. as it was about the settle a good spot, I moved to its tile and settled there, which got him kicked out of my borders.

some turns later, the ljosalfar starting settler is still immobile so it seems like I've kicked them out of the game for good.

same thing here: this is turn 10, the calabim and hippus started near, both settlers moved to the same spot. hippus settled first, calabim kicked out, calabim out of the game for good as their starting settler is now idle.



if the behaviour itself can't be fixed, I suggest just lowering how much they can move at first based on mapsize so this doesn't happen.

 

[[to_xp]Gekko]

did you make golden hammers ( luchuirp worldspell ) not settleable anymore if dropped via disbanding the carryng unit? if so I'd change it back, it's always been considered a feature rather than an exploit.

 

[MagisterCultuum]

Does the function pPlayer.isHasTech(iTech): actually exist?

The BtS python API does not list isHasTech under CyPlayer, only under CyTeam.

I recall that I fixed a problem with the Eyes and Ears Network code quite a while back by changing pPlayer to eTeam.

I just now noticed that if pPlayer.isHasTech(iTech): is still used in several other places, most of them related to AI decisions.

(I just changed these to eTeam.isHasTech(iTech) in my modmod.)

 

[[to_xp]Gekko]

Tholal, could I persuade you to make a gameplay change? I know it's not the goal of the mod but hear me out:

I was playing a game as Khazad when I realized the existence of the "create battering ram ability" : spend 3 turns on a forest tile with a melee unit, and after 3 turns you get a battering ram and an unforested tile.

this is completely and utterly useless for the Khazad and their uber trebuchets and cannons of course.

but it fits the Doviello like a glove! siege engines are invaluable but they slow down your stack and shamen come with haste so... being able to get a siege engine while in enemy territory is a godsend. and if there's a civ in need of a boost, it's the doviello.

so I propose to change the Khazad prereq of the spell to Doviello.

honestly to me it always seemed like this was actually the way it was meant to be because it makes so much more sense...

on a sidenote it might be a good occasion to change Garrym Gyr's Defensive ( completely useless due to golems ) back to Arcane as he used to be. which is a thing 100% of FFH players will agree with I'm sure.

also possibly give poor charadon Charismatic so he's no longer a weaker version of Sheelba and a weaker alternative to Mahala. ( because Sheelba does what Charadon't )

on a similar note, Flauros is the only guy who really REALLY needs a nerf. half price governor manors are just crazy. perhaps Creative/Financial like in Erebus in the Balance would be the way to go.

 

[[to_xp]Gekko]

not a very good spot for a Kurio 2nd city

 

[[to_xp]Gekko]

I've noticed the final level of the Altar of the Luonnatar and the Tower of Mastery can be rushed via gold or slaves. this allowed me victory much easier than it would have been otherwise as you can avoid being dogpiled by the AIs as it was intended to be. I'd recommend changing these to rituals instead so they must be bulit the oldfashioned way, giving opponents a chance to stop you.

 

[dot]

not a very good spot for a Kurio 2nd city

Agreed.