New Version - August 16th (8/16)

[Gazebo]

I dont think Denmark should get the yields for pillaging a road or railroad. Its very exploitable and doesn't feel right

I'm not getting faith for great works with the goddess of beauty pantheon. It appears to give 1 faith when I look at it, but my total faith never went up

I was having issues with this, but I thought I fixed it - I'll check.

G

 

[emdash]

Oo. It's always halfway depressing to read these threads if something is broken, like how AI Mongo would just consume city states; now I guess Bluetooth is overperforming, but I dunno if it matters that much as AI. I don't plan on picking him.

I just updated to this modpack from the last official one (thanks for making it, Blazer), and it seems really good. In the old one, Japan (who I had been trying to get good with) still had the great x points per general. Their new change is great. I dunno if they are weak as a Civ anymore. You get some scouts going and it adds up, plus you can get decent yields off of barbs.

Very happy to see the nerf to early boats vs land. I would just tear up units on land with Dros. Also I had been taking Jesuit and it's good to see that cost higher because it was pretty cheap before.

I am kind of wrecking the cpu in the game I started. I will probably get complacent by AD and lose haha.

 

[Aldebaran1997]

Talking about beliefs, why are those x yields per y followers beliefs even thingy? I don't get it is healthy game-design wisely, do you? They perform jaggedly in every religious patch by those tiny numbers and aren't even that fun and balanced. Why do we need those beliefs anyway? I assume that it makes AIs do well, but I think better UX is more important than better AI performance.

 

[Owlbebach]

Talking about beliefs, why are those x yields per y followers beliefs even thingy? I don't get it is healthy game-design wisely, do you? They perform jaggedly in every religious patch by those tiny numbers and aren't even that fun and balanced. Why do we need those beliefs anyway? I assume that it makes AIs do well, but I think better UX is more important than better AI performance.

Well culture-per-follower is one of my favorite beliefs, probably top5. Food is also great. Not sure about the rest, never took science or faith or production, they seem underwhelming

 

[Hitsuommy]

One thing that I noticed during my last game was that the automatic function on workers and missionaries are pretty bad late game, first I bought like 8 emissaries and they all started to walk together, when going to a new city only the first one was used and then the rest would go to the next city, now, with workers I had so many that at one city they were in a little group of 6 moving together, extremely inefficient, is there anything I can do to make this better?

Also I would like to make a suggestion, the AI always assume you are a warmonger and it's impossible to have a good relationship with any AI after you annex ou puppet a city even tho you didn't even start the war. I think that if you didn't start the war you should not be punished so hardly, even after 300+turns all AI's were still mad with me with a war that I did nothing to start, seems really unrealistic to me.

 

[Owlbebach]

Barring any major exploits, ideologies and policies are now locked, as well as all beliefs. Not making any more substantial changes to the underlying systems or models.

Hey all,

Yesterday i've been thinking about an interesting fact: while i do like (very much!) the direction of literally ALL of the recent changes that were made to the game, but i do not like the exact result of many of the changes in terms of balance.

The answer to the question that i see is that it happens due to how new changes interact with previous balance. Balance is a very fragile thing, i know this for sure (back in time i was a hardcore Starcraft II player, i know that something as small as changing damage of one of many units from 17 to 18 can turn the whole matchup upside down)

Given what is stated in the quote i was thinking about what current balancing process lacks in terms of final tuning and here is my humble opinion:

1) There should be less changes in every update. There is so much stuff going on that its literally impossible to understand how new changes affect the game.
2) Changes lack consistency. Changes should be analyzed in more details in terms of how they affect current situation (for example recent buff to markets is at the same time a nerf to Arabia, a buff to Ethiopia is at the same time a nerf to all other religious civs, changes to influence decay is a HUGE buff to Austria and Greece)
3) Tuning should be done from big to small (that we actually have), but only one aspect of the game should be changed. I mean if we tune policies - we change policies only, we do not touch religion, particular civs, buildings, etc, except those that are directly affected by the change. Preferably only in one tree.
4) After big changes are done - small issues that were caused by the big changes (like particular civs/strategies/combinations being too strong) should be addressed right away
5) Game should be balanced around the strongest combinations. If something is weak in many combinations and strong in one - it is good, while if the same thing is good in many combinations and overpowered in one - it is wrong
6) If something is very strong - (if possible, not including something ridiculous) it should NOT be nerfed directly, it should be nerfed in some other, indirect way. This is crucial to keep every civ unique.

 

[Gokudo01]

so nobody has got issues with lighthouse not providing city connection !!!

 

[Owlbebach]

so nobody has got issues with lighthouse not providing city connection !!!

worked fine in previous version, didn't have time to test this one

 

[Enrico Swagolo]

Goddess of Beauty might be slightly too good, I do nothing but be an Authority guy and a free GE/GA comes out super fast.

so nobody has got issues with lighthouse not providing city connection !!!

Runestone gave them to me before I got bored of Danish overpoweredness and stopped playing. Are you sure the lighthouses are on the same body of water?

 

[Mad Madigan]

so nobody has got issues with lighthouse not providing city connection !!!

I ran into that problem with the version before last (7/21?) but never in the 8/6 version. I haven't been able to try this version to see if it still happens. Not entirely sure what caused it, but I think it's linked to when your capital isn't "counted" by the game being on or directly connected to the ocean. I play using Communitas, so it's not uncommon for "coastal" civs to get a starting location on an in-land sea or large continent-spanning 1-tile wide channel. The last time I was able to recreate this problem, I was playing as Polynesia and Honolulu spawned on an intercontinental "channel" that was counted as "ocean" and connected to the real "ocean" several dozen tiles away. I started settling cities along the channel/canal to ensure I owned all of the territory so the game counted me as having an open sea route between all my cities. It worked just fine at first, but as soon as I started settling cities on islands in the big, proper ocean the game wasn't counting their lighthouses as being able to reach the capital or any of the other cities on the same continent as the capital, even though there was a clear traceable path through the 1-tile wide channel. Gazebo wasn't able to repro it, so I'm not sure if it was a one-off bug with Communitas or just a hard to reproduce edge case with how the game calculates whether a city is connected via water to other cities.

 

[Workerspam]

so nobody has got issues with lighthouse not providing city connection !!!

Lighthouses were working fine for me with Carthage yesterday; no problems with making a city connection. You sure all the water tiles between your cities have been revealed?

 

[Favorius]

About the Pagoda, does anybody build it? I never do. Does it generate pressure and defends from pressure like the other buildings?

When i go wide it is central to my strategy and honestly it was too good coupled with piety finisher. Now it is useless. %25 nerf would be better than %50 nerf.

BTW my current game, I am playing Celts and my religion has cathedrals and padogas. All of them nerfed

 

[Gazebo]

Hey all,

Yesterday i've been thinking about an interesting fact: while i do like (very much!) the direction of literally ALL of the recent changes that were made to the game, but i do not like the exact result of many of the changes in terms of balance.

The answer to the question that i see is that it happens due to how new changes interact with previous balance. Balance is a very fragile thing, i know this for sure (back in time i was a hardcore Starcraft II player, i know that something as small as changing damage of one of many units from 17 to 18 can turn the whole matchup upside down)

Given what is stated in the quote i was thinking about what current balancing process lacks in terms of final tuning and here is my humble opinion:

1) There should be less changes in every update. There is so much stuff going on that its literally impossible to understand how new changes affect the game.
2) Changes lack consistency. Changes should be analyzed in more details in terms of how they affect current situation (for example recent buff to markets is at the same time a nerf to Arabia, a buff to Ethiopia is at the same time a nerf to all other religious civs, changes to influence decay is a HUGE buff to Austria and Greece)
3) Tuning should be done from big to small (that we actually have), but only one aspect of the game should be changed. I mean if we tune policies - we change policies only, we do not touch religion, particular civs, buildings, etc, except those that are directly affected by the change. Preferably only in one tree.
4) After big changes are done - small issues that were caused by the big changes (like particular civs/strategies/combinations being too strong) should be addressed right away
5) Game should be balanced around the strongest combinations. If something is weak in many combinations and strong in one - it is good, while if the same thing is good in many combinations and overpowered in one - it is wrong
6) If something is very strong - (if possible, not including something ridiculous) it should NOT be nerfed directly, it should be nerfed in some other, indirect way. This is crucial to keep every civ unique.

I appreciate the sentiment, but here's the problem: I'm not a full-time developer. I work when I can, thus the size and severity of patches will vary based on the amount of time I've recently had. I teach, thus the summer is quieter. That's over now. Also, this is not starcraft. While small tweaks matter, we have neither the numerical feedback nor the time to wait for large amounts of empirical data before making a change. You all are the beta testers, not me.

G

 

[tu_79]

In any game, an imbalance can shadowed by clever mechanics. Politics is one of those. Cheaper research for already discovered technologies is another. Even when one civ is clearly stronger, it would serve it for nothing if the whole world gets annoyed with it. Otherwise, balance would be as fragile as the starcraft example.

We have a nice framework here to hide some of those imbalances, so only the most flagrant, things that scale too much in the right conditions, bring our attention.

This allows Gazebo to do some daring changes and the game is still playable. Though I admit that the recent change to medieval policies got me confused. It's like change of paradigm. For example, taking artistry is not enough to achieve the cultural victory as before. World Congress matters.

Speaking of which, WC is where weaklings can fight more effectively the runaways, joining together without risking too much retaliation, but enactments need to be strong.

 

[Owlbebach]

I appreciate the sentiment, but here's the problem: I'm not a full-time developer. I work when I can, thus the size and severity of patches will vary based on the amount of time I've recently had. I teach, thus the summer is quieter. That's over now. Also, this is not starcraft. While small tweaks matter, we have neither the numerical feedback nor the time to wait for large amounts of empirical data before making a change. You all are the beta testers, not me.

G

I did not mean that you must or must not do something. Your work would be awesome even if left as is. I'd be glad to help with coding, but i'm not a programmer. And it should NOT be like starcraft, that was just an example of how small thing could turn balance upside down.

In fact while i think that frequent updates are good i was saying that there should be LESS changes in every update. And i was just suggesting the strategy of balancing (i.e. personally i think that founder beliefs should be reworked, and religious civs should not be balanced before it is done unless they suddenly became ridiculous like India)

 

[Gothic_Empire]

It's a complicated game with a lot of interconnected things. I've come to trust G's gut on changes. And these really are gentle changes compared to the earliest day of the mod.

Also, you'd have hated Thal. Every release of Communitas felt like a new version of the game.

 

[joosegoose25]

I was having issues with this, but I thought I fixed it - I'll check.

G

Yeah, definitely not giving the faith from Great Works.

Btw, love the changes this version. I can't remember the last time I had an urge to try something new like I did when I read about the new Goddess of Beauty (Egypt!!).

 

[nekokon]

To be honest I almost never drop my current game whenever there's a new patch. How you feel about your game game is much more important than playing with the newest update as soon as possible.
If you can beta test the newest patch and give feedback, it's great. If you prefer less changes, stay with the older version.

 

[Borussia]

Authority penalizes you in war

If you want to go to war and expand by force with your civ you are most likely choosing authority as your policy branch.
I think it is strange that if you choose authority you get penalized if you use your troops to fight wars and not keep them at home.
The Discipline policy forces me to keep a huge amount of my forces as garrison and not use them on the frontlines because I need them for happiness at home.
Tradition and Progress also need some garrisons to fight crime but not for happiness generation. This means all else equal a civ with Progress can afford to send way more troops to the frontline than an authority civ / warrior society. Makes no sense.

In my current game I have like 50 infantry units und 42 of them are used as garrison and not to defend the borders. 42 units are 45% of my ground forces. If I send them to war I have 42 less happiness.

 

[HungryForFood]

On the flip side, Authority has a policy that gives you free units, which I usually use for my garrisons. This is especially true when they spawn at cities without military buildings, as they will be sub-par anyway.