play balancing the civs

[davidlallen]

Well, that is what I get for "assuming" that code I cut and pasted from another mod was correct. I had done a manual test that the upgrade cost for the human player is right, but I did not go far enough to investigate the if-clause for the AI. The code "should be" a copy of the sdk function upgradePrice; looks like tsentom did some global replace to change the assignment "x = y" to "x = (y)/2" and then did not check for the effect of multiple sequential "/2".

I will rewrite it from the original sdk and take the -25% at the end. This was a very indirect way of finding a bug, which made the Ix AI way too powerful!

 

[hiec]

Hi folks!

This is my first post here and I registered to give some feedback for your great mod! I think Dune Wars works really well in terms of immersion into the game world. I played two games with the Fremen and really enjoyed listening to the music, building wind traps, digging for water and especially riding sand worms through the desert.

What bothered me though was game balance. I played both games with Fremen (Paul Muad'Dib) on Noble. In vanilla civ, Noble is rather easy but enough to keep me interested in the game (given that I play casually and don't reload). In Dune Wars, my points are almost triple that of the second best faction by midgame. That's when I stopped playing because I saw no point in conquering even more factions with the same handful of Fremen raiders I started to attack the first enemy faction.
In my opinion Fremen raiders are way to strong. You get them quite early, they ignore city defenses and with 11 strength even a stack of guardsmen can't stop them. Even during midgame I found no reason to build other combat units (except for guardsmen to guard the conquered cities). 11 strength for 180 build points just beats them all.

Well, I definitly look forward to future versions of this mod. It's a great total conversion and I love how it carries the Arrakis feeling in it!


EDIT: I just read in the most recent patch the raider now has strength 10 and you get it with Desert Industry. In my opinion that still makes it a very strong unit, but maybe I'm wrong. Definitly an imporvement though!

 

[Deliverator]

Hi, hiec. Welcome to Dune Wars.

EDIT: I just read in the most recent patch the raider now has strength 10 and you get it with Desert Industry. In my opinion that still makes it a very strong unit, but maybe I'm wrong. Definitly an imporvement though!

Yes, try the Fremen in 1.7.1. The raiders in 1.7 were very over powered because they were inadvertently placed in the wrong tech tier. I have play tested a little and the balance definitely seemed better.

Well, I definitly look forward to future versions of this mod. It's a great total conversion and I love how it carries the Arrakis feeling in it!

Thanks for the positive comments - capturing the atmosphere is definitely something we have been trying to do. If you have any more ideas/opinions on any aspect of the mod, then please post them.

 

[flex12]

Hi folks!

This is my first post here and I registered to give some feedback for your great mod! I think Dune Wars works really well in terms of immersion into the game world. I played two games with the Fremen and really enjoyed listening to the music, building wind traps, digging for water and especially riding sand worms through the desert.

What bothered me though was game balance. I played both games with Fremen (Paul Muad'Dib) on Noble. In vanilla civ, Noble is rather easy but enough to keep me interested in the game (given that I play casually and don't reload). In Dune Wars, my points are almost triple that of the second best faction by midgame. That's when I stopped playing because I saw no point in conquering even more factions with the same handful of Fremen raiders I started to attack the first enemy faction.
In my opinion Fremen raiders are way to strong. You get them quite early, they ignore city defenses and with 11 strength even a stack of guardsmen can't stop them. Even during midgame I found no reason to build other combat units (except for guardsmen to guard the conquered cities). 11 strength for 180 build points just beats them all.

Well, I definitly look forward to future versions of this mod. It's a great total conversion and I love how it carries the Arrakis feeling in it!


EDIT: I just read in the most recent patch the raider now has strength 10 and you get it with Desert Industry. In my opinion that still makes it a very strong unit, but maybe I'm wrong. Definitly an imporvement though!

Hi guys. Just played my first round Dune Wars also with the Fremen and to be honest i saw the same problem as Hiec. As Fremen there is no point in building other units than the Raiders (and upgrades). And since they can walk about anywhere on the map it makes them even stronger. Well i kinda conquered the whole world without any problems.

On the other hand, great mod loved it and cant wait what the future brings

 

[Deliverator]

Hi guys. Just played my first round Dune Wars also with the Fremen and to be honest i saw the same problem as Hiec. As Fremen there is no point in building other units than the Raiders (and upgrades). And since they can walk about anywhere on the map it makes them even stronger. Well i kinda conquered the whole world without any problems.

On the other hand, great mod loved it and cant wait what the future brings

I'd be surprised if you could do this easily with the 1.7.1 patch installed.

 

[davidlallen]

Thanks for the feedback! Please update to 1.7.1 and you will find the Fremen more balanced.

 

[Riso]

Could you please update the second post for 1.7.1? It currently lists all the specials for 1.6.

Also I wanted to ask why the Bene Gesserit are a playable faction.
It isn't until the later books, after they merge with the Honored Matres, that they stop being an order entirely focused on working behind the scenes.

I would be more expecting them to be a kind of a priest/mage unit from FFH2, with the Kwisatz Haderach being simply a late game tech requiring weirding way/genetics or a very very difficult to get special person to start a golden age.

It is a bit weird to be able to take them and conquer the map.

 

[Deliverator]

It is a bit weird to be able to take them and conquer the map.

I agree that it is slightly strange. The Bene Gesserit prefer indirect manipulation and do not seek to wield overt power themselves. So yes, the concept of the Bene Gesserit have standing armies and conquering cities is odd. The reason we have them is probably more historic (since they were in Dune Wars 1.0) than from any particular design. At one point we also the Spacing Guild as a faction, but we dropped them since they are strictly non-interventionist and we wanted to use them for mechanics such as the homeworld screen.

Ahriman's suggestion was to think of the BG faction as being a minor House being manipulated by them. I'm not sure that works entirely, but since the BG are such a big part of the books we really want them to have a significant role in the mod. An option might be to make Bene Gesserit the cultural religion instead of Imperial and associate the BG units with that I suppose, but I'm sure some people would object to that and we'd have to find another well characterized civ to replace them. Nine feels like a good minimum number of civs.

There is some information on the evolution of the civs in this thread.

With regards to FFH2 style spells - we have tried to avoid those in favour of mechanics that the AI can understand. As Sephi's Wild Mana modmod has proved, it is possible to make the AI understand and use spells, but we don't have that level of coding know-how on this mod. I think more spell-style abilities would be cool if we can make the AI understand them.

 

[Riso]

Perhaps it would be better to replace the BG faction with the Honored Matres. They are expansionist, aggressive and wield even a planet destroying super weapon.

Their appearance is a bit premature, but then you have the Ordos..

With regards to FFH2 style spells - we have tried to avoid those in favour of mechanics that the AI can understand. As Sephi's Wild Mana modmod has proved, it is possible to make the AI understand and use spells, but we don't have that level of coding know-how on this mod. I think more spell-style abilities would be cool if we can make the AI understand them.

What I actually meant was not the spell abilities, as good as an idea that is, but the progression of adept->mage->archmage.
You start out with a novice BG and then you can upgrade that unit to an adept for a high price. The adept then is more likely to succeed in spying or whatever than the novice.
Perhaps you could even use the BG as a missionary style unit that does not vanish instantly.

 

[davidlallen]

What I actually meant was not the spell abilities, as good as an idea that is, but the progression of adept->mage->archmage.

I am not sure if you have used the "super spies" feature very much. Spies get promotions the same way as other units. So, rather than upgrading to a different unit type, the same unit gets more promotions. The spy promotions give benefits in terms of better success chance or a chance to escape upon a failed mission. The Reverend Mother has a number of unique spy missions, some of which are pretty powerful. Some information about the missions can be found in this thread.

 

[Riso]

That's true, but if I am not mistaken right now you go from the Sayyadina unit to Miss Superspy without any steps in between.

By using this as hierarchical base you could have several weaker "spy" units around, and even use the "Sister" as a replacement for the spy.

 

[Ahriman]

It is a bit weird to be able to take them and conquer the map.

I agree with all Deliverator's comments. Yes, it is slightly strange, but I think it works.
I certainly wouldn't be wanting to go below 9 playable civs.

I would strongly oppose adding Honored Matres. That would be not a little early, it would be thousands of years too early!

Also, those books kinda sucked....

I think the Mod is semi-set at the period from the House prequels up to Children of Dune, which is a roughly 70 year period IIRC.

By using this as hierarchical base you could have several weaker "spy" units around, and even use the "Sister" as a replacement for the spy.

I sympathize with the intent behind this.
Water of life is too late a tech for a unit concept that is so central to the play of the faction.

What would a weaker spy do? How would it be different from a Reverend Mother? Maybe access to one of the RM missions, but not the others?

Perhaps we could have the Sayyadina (unit trainer), a Sister (replaces infiltrator) as a standard infiltrator that also gets the Political Marriage mission, and then the Reverend Mother at Water of Life tech.

That would let you start getting some political manipulation going in the midgame, and but still make Reverend Mothers feel important and accessible only in the late-midgame, with their powerful/expensive missions.

 

[Ahriman]

Ahriman is not available right now due to travel, but I am surprised to learn that his design for the AI makes Atreides resist OB. He has suggested many times that part of the Atreides theme should be diplomacy bonuses, which would seem to contradict resistance to OB.

Is the fix as simple as bumping up some of the AI values in the leaderhead file?

I will look at this.

For OB, relevant value is OpenBordersRefuseAttitudeThreshold
They will refused OB with anyone unless they have better relations than the threshold.

For atreides, this value is:
Leto II = ANNOYED
Duke Leto = Cautious
Alia = Annoyed.

These are standard values. Basically every leader is cautious or annoyed in this field, except for the Ecazi, who are supposed to be omni-free-traders.

I didn't quite intend Atreides to be free traders, who trade with anyone (thats Ecaz). I intended to them to be reliable and trustworthy allies (well, except Alia). They're good friends, but determined enemies.
Kindof "trust, but verify." Or "good, not stupid".

So I don't think an unwillingness to make OB is likely to leave Atreides behind.
The most important thing determining Atreides power is probably their preference for the terraforming civic Arrakis Paradise. Adopting this is what can reduce their ability to trade.

Another possibility; the pilot school is very expensive for such an early game building? If every city is trying to build one, that will leave the AI well behind. Perhaps it should be cheaper?

I would make it a -25% upgrade cost.

I have no problem with reducing this bonus. But maybe 30 or 35%? 25% doesnt' feel like enough for the human player.
We were trying to make Innovation (and technological savvy) a key Ixian faction characteristic, and this is the only mechanic that achieves that.
Perhaps we could have -20% upgrade on the skunkworks, and then a further -20% bonus on some late-game building?

The Spider should be a little less powerful (may just strength 13) since it has an advantage against melee.

I haven't tested these lately, but I worry about them getting seriously over-classed by later-game units. IIRC the spider is a tier 2.5 unit. (Tier2 = shield trooper, heavy trooper, falcon thopter, etc. tier3 = kindjal soldier, etc.), it needs to be tough.
Perhaps the tier3 units in general just need to be tweaked downwards, particularly if we add an eventual tier4 in top from a better late-game tech tree.

Harks cities are already smaller since they are typically backstabbers and tend to whip a lot

I'm not convinced that whipping is actually helping them longterm. I can't help but wonder if they'd do better with whipping deactivated and larger cities.

I would give them an economic advantage rather than more production (e.g. more gold with spice, less disappearance of spice within their territory, etc).

This is an interesting idea. How about we make their UB (the slave pits) give ~+0.1 gold per spice resource?

How does the Skunkworks' upgrade cost reduction stack with this?

Very interesting question.
As usual, I nominate God-Emperor for the highest "useful comments/total comments" ratio anywhere on the forums.

 

[Ahriman]

doublepost

 

[Riso]

What would a weaker spy do? How would it be different from a Reverend Mother? Maybe access to one of the RM missions, but not the others?

Perhaps we could have the Sayyadina (unit trainer), a Sister (replaces infiltrator) as a standard infiltrator that also gets the Political Marriage mission, and then the Reverend Mother at Water of Life tech.

The weaker spies could simply lack abilities of higher units and less chances to succeed.
But yes that looks like a good start.