New Beta Version - January 21st (1-21)

[tu_79]

Unbelievable how strong VP changed a lot in the last 2 month. Its so hard trying to finish previos games with this changelogs.

And this is the reason why the early game is so polished and the late game still a bit rough.

The idea of my unit facing a 75% penalty on my territory, but no penalty of off it is hilarious.

Oh, well, already answered.

I should note that this patch, barring small tweaks to numbers, marks a freeze on Civ UA/UU/UB/UI functionality in addition to all other frozen systems. I'm also happy with Trade Routes, so I'm freezing that as well. Pretty much all that's left is micro-level balance.

I'm feeling too that this is near completion. Unlike my last game, that was just in classical age and now it's gone. Must see 'Aesthetics' back in action. (Old habits die hard?)

 

[infidel88]

• Warmonger value is affected by things like relationships, WC resolutions, cities taken, etc. - higher warmonger with a civ = civ fights harder against you!
• Scales against handicap value - higher warmonger translates into more CS defense at higher difficulties

I wouldn't be myself if I hadn't compain. Without testing!
While this might make sense gameplay wise, it is totally inaccurate historically. It should actually be the opposite. The more you fight and push opponent, the weaker he is. Examples - Germans in WWII, even Napoleon, not to mention ancient times, when Alexander was basically gaining whole countries with couple of battles and actual problems were sieges. Here - the more opponent cities you gain and more soldiers slaughter, the stronger opponent gets

warmonger value - is it global or individual with each country (looks like first). If I am with 3 other civs on my continent and wipe them out before someone else meets me, am I going to be a major warmonger?

 

[tu_79]

• Warmonger value is affected by things like relationships, WC resolutions, cities taken, etc. - higher warmonger with a civ = civ fights harder against you!
• Scales against handicap value - higher warmonger translates into more CS defense at higher difficulties

I wouldn't be myself if I hadn't compain. Without testing!
While this might make sense gameplay wise, it is totally inaccurate historically. It should actually be the opposite. The more you fight and push opponent, the weaker he is. Examples - Germans in WWII, even Napoleon, not to mention ancient times, when Alexander was basically gaining whole countries with couple of battles and actual problems were sieges. Here - the more opponent cities you gain and more soldiers slaughter, the stronger opponent gets

warmonger value - is it global or individual with each country (looks like first). If I am with 3 other civs on my continent and wipe them out before someone else meets me, am I going to be a major warmonger?

War weariness still applies. If you crush their armies they won't resist too much.

 

[infidel88]

War weariness still applies. If you crush their armies they won't resist too much.

Yeah, but war weariness isn't that significant for AI as for human. And if you can produce units, who fight with +50% or higher CS, it's really easy to push off opponent.

 

[tu_79]

Yeah, but war weariness isn't that significant for AI as for human. And if you can produce units, who fight with +50% or higher CS, it's really easy to push off opponent.

Resistance penalty was something like 20%. I don't believe that suddenly with this change resistance is truly 75% penalty. That would make Domination victory almost impossible.
Maybe this penalty applies when you are last standing tall civ against the big bad civ with a huge army that wants your capital and has 4x your army size.
Ways to increase or decrease warmonger penalty?

 

[LukaSlovenia29]

I like the (new) resistance mechanics! I hope it will turn out to be a great mechanism for slowing down warmonger snowballing, especially early in the game.

 

[Moi Magnus]

Resistance penalty was something like 20%. I don't believe that suddenly with this change resistance is truly 75% penalty. That would make Domination victory almost impossible.
Maybe this penalty applies when you are last standing tall civ against the big bad civ with a huge army that wants your capital and has 4x your army size.
Ways to increase or decrease warmonger penalty?

I'm curious to see if the 75% max is reached in a standard domination game, or if the resistance penalty is still around 20% for most of the game.
If I remember correctly, atomic weapons gives you warmonger penalties, so it is also direct nerf to them.

 

[Gazebo]

I also thought it was a threshold reduction. Hmm, that could be a big nerf if it only reduced pure unhappiness and not the thresholds.

It is a threshold reduction. It works like all other buildings and policies that affect the happiness system. And it is additive with other reductions from fealty or industry.

 

[LukaSlovenia29]

Thanks for the clarification, that makes it a great addition to progress!

 

[Mad Madigan]

Quick question for G:

I like that the "Spotter" and "Pillager" scout-line promotions have been removed from leveling up and given to Zeps and Paratroopers, but does this mean that Paratroopers come with Spotter as well (and Special Ops/XCOM come with both) or will only Zeps that get upgraded into Paratroopers have both promotions? I figured it was the former, but I just wanted to clarify.

Also, WOW this latest patch really clears up a ton of balance concerns! Can't wait to try this out later this week!

 

[Noob Fanboy]

You're nerfing progress too much. Early production is very important, now we have to take the left side of the tree first (or just the worker policy and then the left side), and that side is suppossed to be the one scaling more in late-game, while the right side was more about the early game. Progress was nerfed in a previous patch too, what is the reason of the change?

Or this is a buff?, it's just so hard to get used to it

 

[Gazebo]

You're nerfing progress too much. Early production is very important, now we have to take the left side of the tree first (or just the worker policy and then the left side), and that side is suppossed to be the one scaling more in late-game, while the right side was more about the early game. Progress was nerfed in a previous patch too, what is the reason of the change?

Or this is a buff?, it's just so hard to get used to it

The fact that you aren’t sure tells me that this is a premature evaluation.

 

[Noob Fanboy]

Maybe, but i really want to know the reason of the change, i have yet to finish a game with a previous version so i'm not testing it still until the end of the week.

I feel it's like a situational tradeoff

 

[Stalker0]

Progress overall I think is stronger...but it may be weaker going through it.

Before I would finish the right side then go left, because the second left policy was pretty bad and I’m still in my settler building phase.

I still feel like you want to go the worker policy early because other wise the free worker doesn’t get you much. That said left 1 can get you through the tree quicker if you can slip more building into the order...but that’s less expansion early.

So a lot of theorycraft. We will see what it looks like in play.

 

[Noob Fanboy]

It's like a choice between delaying production or delaying science from city connections... i can't play still, it's a really weird change, i will wait for some player feedback. But progress is going to feel different every game for sure (i can see iroquois and shonghai going directly in the right side)

 

[tu_79]

It's like a choice between delaying production or delaying science from city connections... i can't play still, it's a really weird change, i will wait for some player feedback. But progress is going to feel different every game for sure (i can see iroquois and shonghai going directly in the right side)

Such things we love!

Not knowing which path is best. Having to study each situation to decide which path is worth more in this circumstances. And on top of it, those changes every couple of weeks that make all your cumulated knowledge obsolete.

 

[Workerspam]

Regarding the Progress changes: switching the 2/2 to Expertise seems like a straight up buff (at least for my play style). While the early worker from Liberty is nice the main reason I take that policy is to get to the policy hidden behind it. Now most games I'll build/buy my initial worker and go down the left side of the tree, getting that sweet 10 culture per building while my cities are building Shrines and Monuments.

Fraternity, as good as it is, is normally the next to last policy I unlock anyway and this rearrangement won't change that. The free worker and civilian benefits will be unlocked later but I'll still get a ton of use out of it.

I'll miss the 5% reduction in policy costs but that was likely too much scaling long term benefit combined with the reduction in building costs for one early tree. The reduced happiness threshold is a nice consolation for losing that perk.

 

[BiteInTheMark]

Its a bit sad, progress gets hit so hard. I can understand, if you want to decrease its scaling power. Policy cost reduction halfed and then removed, production bonus to buildings halfed, science and gold reduced at birth of citizen, trade route bonus removed. But it didnt get anything in exchange for that, like flat yields.
Asking me, has anyone noticed AI which picked progress were overperforming, making plenenty of nerfs necessary. The treshhold reduction is nice, but the reduced culture cost too. This solution feels more as a compromise for AI overperforming with infrastructure and stomping human player into ground with unhappiness.

 

[Noob Fanboy]

Regarding the Progress changes: switching the 2/2 to Expertise seems like a straight up buff (at least for my play style). While the early worker from Liberty is nice the main reason I take that policy is to get to the policy hidden behind it. Now most games I'll build/buy my initial worker and go down the left side of the tree, getting that sweet 10 culture per building while my cities are building Shrines and Monuments.

Fraternity, as good as it is, is normally the next to last policy I unlock anyway and this rearrangement won't change that. The free worker and civilian benefits will be unlocked later but I'll still get a ton of use out of it.

I'll miss the 5% reduction in policy costs but that was likely too much scaling long term benefit combined with the reduction in building costs for one early tree. The reduced happiness threshold is a nice consolation for losing that perk.

But you know, early game is about settling and developing tiles in capital with progress, i think the way to go now is early worker -> settler spamming -> second policy for culture (while building shrines and monuments) -> third policy for production. the downside is that you get the science from city connections later

 

[Gothic_Empire]

ooo. Can't wait to try it out. Have to finish off my current multiplayer game first tho.