Once again, thanks for your detailed critique! This is very helpful for me to improve things.
On the explorers:
- After doing some extensive testing I take back what I said about the scouts not having enough movement through the Explorer I, II and III promotions (even without the respective FF which I missed out, dam AI
). The reasoning behind this change of opinion is because it forces me to carefully consider each move rather than opt for the Explore option, which is rather tedious.
- What I would say, however, is rather than considering adding defence to one of the Explorer promotions, reflect whether upgrading the flat 5% defence bonus the seasoned scout unit gets would be a more balanced choice. After all, 5% seems rather insignificant when most promotions start at 10% and higher. Perhaps a flat 10% would be advisable?
Well, this is something, which is really very difficult.
In short: due to how combat and promotions internally work, even a 1% increase in strength results in a ~11% increase in victory chances, if you're comparing to units with equal strengths. Furthermore, promotions generally work in two different ways, of which one results depending on which of the two units involved will have more promotions (in terms of percentage) in two different calculations.
Sounds complicated? Believe me, it is.
Under the current rules it is next to impossible to find proper settings. (This is the reason for the excessive changes in combat modifiers by terrain, too).
I am currently working on changing this, but since there are so many options involved and to be taken into consideration, this again may need some more time. It is not just the programming, but the estimation of the programming's results, too.
On the initial free army units:
It really breaks the game (easily wipe out natives and fight "easy-stupid" AI) if you play on easier settings, like I did, so I would suggest updating the modmod description recommending large maps and higher difficulty settings.
Good hint.
Currently I am thinking of adding two options in the start screen:
a) "standard" additional army (if checked)
b) "reduced" additional army (if checked)
c) no additional army at all (if not checked)
This way, each player should be enabled to pick the options fitting best to his parameters and playstyle.
Once again, this will take some time.
On the yield changes:
I am still trying to understand and take in the yield changes you carried out. Perhaps a more detailed log would benefit players? I was holding out founding a settlement on a marsh tile because I did not have any Expert Farmer units and then found out it yielded 5! food
Don't get me wrong: the changes are positive but for regular players with a set strategy they may not be well acquainted with different yield expectations.
Yield changes are not finalized yet.
The problem here is a wrong conceptional approach of Firaxis (as I think) making the food available in a city's own tile too important.
I think I have already found a theoretical solution for this, but this solution unfortunately not only requires heavy code changes, but Python knowledge as well (one thing which I am missing even more than C++ knowledge). So, this change for sure will take much more time and not happen very soon.
I have just downloaded your new update (17) and will try it now. I love R&R but your army strength, movement point alteration and sales-for-immigration(points) really bring a breath of fresh air and much needed balance and realism onto R&R! I love how I have to consider whether it's worth sailing to Europe because those dreaded ocean squares are so "big", and correcting that awful mistake of letting my Firebrand Preacher unit teach a Polar Bear unit a lesson xD
Please keep up the excellent work - you got a fan =)
Glad to hear this.
I found a bug regarding the tobacco resource and I am unsure whether it is related to your XML change on tobacco appearing on savannah plots.
The bug is that I have a tobacco resource on a farmland plot, which does not have a base tobacco yield, hence it is redundant.
Can we have a look at this? Just wasted some turns training up an Expert Tobacco before realising he couldn't do his thing
I think I already know what has happened here and this is just my fault. I misinterpreted one setting in the XML files
I will release a patch to avoid this happening in new games. Unfortunately, this may be savegame compatible (not tested yet) but won't change it for current games.
Sorry about this.
Edit:
Since RayStuttgart has announced a new (the final) version of RaR for the coming week, chances are good that I will postpone any new development (except error correction) until this new version hits the planet.
