Realism Invictus

[Jayman1000]

I usually wait to have skirmishers before running slavery for that exact reason. i also position units on all (possible) improved hills and forest so slave spawn elsewhere. all in all slaves are actually a good thing because they are used to gain experience in most of my games.

Yes I can see that now; I just didn't think in those lines of strategy, mostly because I didn't know (or had forgotten since last I played years ago). Then Apache declared war on me for some reason, came with a 7 unit stack that I took out because I had sligthly more powerful units. So I amazed a largish army and moved to their capital only to find out they have two insanely strong "Tribal Forts" that are nigh invincible, so I had to give up that plan and just kill their units when they dared venture out. I guess these super forts makes sense or else I would probably kill all other native americans in the americas way too soon. EDIT: or not, just lost three 90% fights in a row

 

[Jayman1000]

Diplomacy music volume for many of the Native American civilizations (tribes) is very high, especially compared to the usual background music in game. On a volume scale of 10 I'd say the background music is 2 and tribe diplo music is 10 (that's how it feels/sounds like to me). It's the music track with the native american flute. I have to turn down my volume considerably before contacting them, then turn it back up when done. Don't know if anyone else has this occurring for them? it's very high to me, my ears almost hurt.

I used the amplify effect with value -15 in Audacity to reduce the volume to a level that matches the other music in game. The attached file is a mp3 export of the modified mp3 from the assets - sounds - diplomacy folder (for some reason the file is twice the size of the original though).

 

[krasny]

I just nuked a civ who had just declared war on me. Now everybody hates me. Are nukes now redundant? Or are there some situations where you can use them without becoming universally hated?

 

[Jayman1000]

I just nuked a civ who had just declared war on me. Now everybody hates me. Are nukes now redundant? Or are there some situations where you can use them without becoming universally hated?

A nuclear attack as response to declaration of war doesn't sound like something the international community would find appropriate I think a serious rep hit is in order. Would be nice though if you didn't get a rep hit for nuclear attacks if the ones you nuke nuked you first. If that could be made into a system where you would only get larger rep hit if you dropped more nukes on more large cities than your opponent had already done to you (perhaps each city could be made to have a "nuke" value to match, perhaps based on population, number of/type of buildings, wonders etc). On the other hand I think tactical nukes dropped at sea should probably not give much rep hit unless you dropped a lot of them; while ICBMs on large cities should count as the highest offense, especially if you were the one to declare the war.

 

[Shuikkanen]

I've always seen nuking as the "end of diplomacy" -option. If you intend to nuke anyone, make sure you nuke them to the ground and annihilate them, or everyone else too for that matter, and that it's basically the last step before winning.

 

[krasny]

If a civ declares on your civ knowing that your civ has nukes, surely there should be no diplo penalty, just a collective Darwin Award for the declaring civ.

 

[Jayman1000]

If a civ declares on your civ knowing that your civ has nukes, surely there should be no diplo penalty, just a collective Darwin Award for the declaring civ.

But realistically if that happened today, that a nation declared war on another country, do you think that the rest of the world would just think it all fine and dandy if the defending civilization responded by launching it's ICBMs? Perhaps if most of your country had been conquered, and/or your capital being threatened then I would think it fair if the rep hit was much lower, but nuking your enemy just for declaring war is imo not an action that realistically would be acceptable and the world should appropriately condemn you.

 

[Jayman1000]

Is there a way to have the civilopedia list EVERYTHING in one big list? I find the current civilopedia somewhat confusing to use (but that's just because I am a newbie, but that's also the reason that I am reading the civilopedia in the first place: im a newbie that want to learn ). Say I want to read about Famous Warriors I have to know a forehand that I have to choose Military - Traditions. But I didn't know that it was a tradition, so I felt I clicked around the civilopedia too long before I found it. I really like a long list where I can simply find everything alphabetically (or use the nice filter feature on it). A search feature . Sure the initial load time of the list may be considerably longer, but it would be very convenient not having to first click around/through a lot of different categories which can be quite confusing for a newbie.

 

[Orendor]

The leaderheads are working again, Walter. Whatever you did to fix them worked.

If it helps with correlating possible sources, my system was win10x64 running on a dell inspiron 15 using the intel intergrated graphics chipset and a 1.7-2.3ghz i5 processor. Directx etc is up to date I believe.

 

[arizzi]

Yeah, that's not an intended AI behavior, but I've observed it several times too. Been there for quite a while, but so far we were unable to find its cause and therefore fix it.

http://www.realism-invictus.com/forum/viewtopic.php?f=4&t=825

The AIs generally field massive armies and seems to be engaged in a perpetual military arms race. This could contribute to their war mongering behavior. Once they have an enormous army, they will likely be inclined to use it. It also generally tanks their economy and research. I have never played a game in which I was not the tech leader by a large margin (on Monarch).

The fact is that remaining small is rarely feasible, and the large civs will invariably dominate the smaller ones. I see the increased research cost per city and per unit as good measures against this I would suggest boosting those. I would also suggest 2 more things.

1. Remove the requirements for certain limited buildings such as the requirements for the national university and the art eras. Small civs will not be able to build these and will be hugely disadvantaged. (more than they already are.)

2. Decrease the rate that great people are produced the more cities you have.
In my games at least, one of the reasons I dominate science wise no matter how large I am is because I take advantage of all the great scientists and money producing prophets, merchants etc. and stack them with stuff like national university and stock exchange.

 

[sazhdapec]

Decrease the rate that great people are produced the more cities you have.
In my games at least, one of the reasons I dominate science wise no matter how large I am is because I take advantage of all the great scientists and money producing prophets, merchants etc. and stack them with stuff like national university and stock exchange.

Try increasing the difficulty

 

[arizzi]

Try increasing the difficulty

I have but increasing difficulty only serves to exacerbate the problems mentioned before. They just build larger armies faster and go to war more easily. Yes they also research faster, but my argument was that the ai way overemphasizes military over research, and ends up crippling its economy, and making all other play styles obsolete. I think Monarch is the optimal difficulty for, a balance between challenging and just blatantly unfair.

Actually looking at civ 6 they seem to tackle the wide vs tall dynamic by increasing production costs per number of cities or districts.


On a completely separate note, I would just throw out there the idea of limiting the speed of boats in waters an enemy controls (same as on land). The way it is now it feels like navies are useless and can be ignored for the most part. An invading fleet transporting an army can declare war and have all their units on your soil the same turn right next to your coastal city.

 

[sazhdapec]

I have but increasing difficulty only serves to exacerbate the problems mentioned before. They just build larger armies faster and go to war more easily. Yes they also research faster, but my argument was that the ai way overemphasizes military over research, and ends up crippling its economy, and making all other play styles obsolete. I think Monarch is the optimal difficulty for, a balance between challenging and just blatantly unfair.

Well, that's the key point. Since AI builds more units you have to keep up and delay the production of your GP generators thus AI has more time to build GP generators itself. Actually there are times when AI plays a peaceful strategy. Sometimes it brings to that civ's end. But if it manages to survive it can use it technological superiority. The last time I played emperor I became the incontestable tech leader (when no tech was researched before me) only in the modern era or rather in the late industrial.

 

[arizzi]

I can see where you are coming from, however this is the point about the ai "way overemphasing" its military becomes a problem. Even on Monarch, there is no possible way that you can match the sheer number of units the ai outputs if you have fewer cities. On emperor and above you can forget it. You will always be behind them in power rating. That generally leads to them attacking you relentlessly even if they are pleased with you, effectively making diplomacy worthless.

Case in point I have never in 5-6 years of playing this mod seen a smaller civ beat a larger one either militarily or culturally (and to be honest they are generally behind larger civs technologically as well). The only exceptions I would say are England on the world maps or ai on a lonely islands. Notice that these cases are successful precisely because they lack the problem I'm describing. Nobody ever attacks them, which never happens on a normal map. The only way to stay successfully small is to be alone

The arms race that usually occurs really just obsoletes other play styles and victories (wide vs tall, builder vs military) since you basically need to focus on military all the time, there is no choice or trade off, and to be a builder and survive all you really can do is exploit the ai's stupidity in battle. The only playstyle that wins you games is going large and conquering everyone else.

 

[sazhdapec]

I can see where you are coming from, however this is the point about the ai "way overemphasing" its military becomes a problem. Even on Monarch, there is no possible way that you can match the sheer number of units the ai outputs if you have fewer cities. On emperor and above you can forget it. You will always be behind them in power rating. That generally leads to them attacking you relentlessly even if they are pleased with you, effectively making diplomacy worthless.

Wrong. You can build more units than AI does in any era on Monarch. On higher difficulties you can gain enough advantage using AI's inefficiency in battle to compensate the bonus hammers AI gets. So it's only your choice to lag behind in power rating. Afaik only certain leaders attack when pleased.

Case in point I have never in 5-6 years of playing this mod seen a smaller civ beat a larger one either militarily or culturally (and to be honest they are generally behind larger civs technologically as well). The only exceptions I would say are England on the world maps or ai on a lonely islands. Notice that these cases are successful precisely because they lack the problem I'm describing. Nobody ever attacks them, which never happens on a normal map. The only way to stay successfully small is to be alone

The arms race that usually occurs really just obsoletes other play styles and victories (wide vs tall, builder vs military) since you basically need to focus on military all the time, there is no choice or trade off, and to be a builder and survive all you really can do is exploit the ai's stupidity in battle. The only playstyle that wins you games is going large and conquering everyone else.

Just like IRL)

 

[Shuikkanen]

I am going to go with Sazhdapec on this. I'm occasionally behind in power ratings on Monarch, but I have never failed to cripple another military power even if they were initially stronger than me on that difficulty as long as I spent the effort. If I go the peaceful route, then obviously it's realistic my military is weaker than other's -- but not by much if I keep the tech lead. Also, clear your continent, if applicable, if you're on the same landmass as the AI, they will almost always attack you eventually, even if they're Gandhi, when there's no other targets. But isolated and in the tech lead, just keep a strong navy and anticipate attacks.

 

[[Y]]

Okay, debaters, answer this: How many players do you put in a game?

In my experience, the difficulty scaling is flawed. The intention is for increased difficulty to make the game harder for the player, but the actual effect is that the stronger AIs get even stronger while the weak/middle AIs stay as they are. This eventually leads to the (even stronger) stronger AIs consuming the smaller ones and further consolidating/increasing power, leading to a power growth cycle. It's not as bad in smaller games, but in large games, where each strong AI has a bounty of weaker AIs to prey on, the player has little potential for impact.

 

[arizzi]

Wrong. You can build more units than AI does in any era on Monarch. On higher difficulties you can gain enough advantage using AI's inefficiency in battle to compensate the bonus hammers AI gets. So it's only your choice to lag behind in power rating. Afaik only certain leaders attack when pleased.


Just like IRL)

If you have a similar amount of cities you can keep up with the ai's power rating, but not if you have substantially less, which is what this is about. I would agree with [y] that it does probably depend alot on the map size. I usually play large or gigantic maps. Perhaps on smaller maps things are different. As for whats true to life or not, I guess it comes down to intention. If it was the intention of the developers not to accommodate other playstyles for the sake of realism, then thats fine everything is as designed. However from what I've read from the developers on these forums, as well as the recent per city unit cost and research malus, making smaller civs more competitive with larger ones is indeed a priority.

In the vast majority of my games I usually end up facing one massive superpower (something like 20-30 cities, sometimes more.) Really once the ai reaches a certain level, they will just continue to steamroll everyone around them. Snowballing is still very much in effect. I know the developers are trying to curtail this phenomenon. Thats why I keep talking about boosting smaller civs. If the smaller civs were indeed more technologically advanced, which does not happen hat often currently, belligerant civs would have a harder time. In addition to what I suggested before, I think that a harsher diplomatic penalty for declaring war on friends would also help substantially. Ideally an aggressive power would be diplomatically isolated, and perhaps deprived of a few essential open borders aggreements.

Edit: I just had another idea, could potentially kill two birds with one stone. Why not alter civics slightly so that very large civs would have to gravitate towards something like planned economy, forced labor, collectivism, etc which might reduce city maintainence and generally help mitigate the costs incurred from being so large, and have the smaller countries gravitate more towards free market/labor unions/social justice which provide more research and wealth.
This would probably necessitate making penalties for expansion a little more severe, or conversely the bonuses for remaining small greater.

As it is now nobody has real reason to use the "communist/fascist" civics since they are almost always inferior, except in times of war.

It would also conveniently fall in line historically where the largest countries such as the soviet union and china would addopt communism, while the smaller, more developed european countries adopted liberalism and free markets.

I might also make republic a bit better, and despotism a bit worse.

 

[sazhdapec]

Okay, debaters, answer this: How many players do you put in a game?

In my experience, the difficulty scaling is flawed. The intention is for increased difficulty to make the game harder for the player, but the actual effect is that the stronger AIs get even stronger while the weak/middle AIs stay as they are. This eventually leads to the (even stronger) stronger AIs consuming the smaller ones and further consolidating/increasing power, leading to a power growth cycle. It's not as bad in smaller games, but in large games, where each strong AI has a bounty of weaker AIs to prey on, the player has little potential for impact.

If you have a similar amount of cities you can keep up with the ai's power rating, but not if you have substantially less, which is what this is about. I would agree with [y] that it does probably depend alot on the map size. I usually play large or gigantic maps. Perhaps on smaller maps things are different. As for whats true to life or not, I guess it comes down to intention. If it was the intention of the developers not to accommodate other playstyles for the sake of realism, then thats fine everything is as designed. However from what I've read from the developers on these forums, as well as the recent per city unit cost and research malus, making smaller civs more competitive with larger ones is indeed a priority.

In the vast majority of my games I usually end up facing one massive superpower (something like 20-30 cities, sometimes more.) Really once the ai reaches a certain level, they will just continue to steamroll everyone around them. Snowballing is still very much in effect. I know the developers are trying to curtail this phenomenon. Thats why I keep talking about boosting smaller civs. If the smaller civs were indeed more technologically advanced, which does not happen hat often currently, belligerant civs would have a harder time. In addition to what I suggested before, I think that a harsher diplomatic penalty for declaring war on friends would also help substantially. Ideally an aggressive power would be diplomatically isolated, and perhaps deprived of a few essential open borders aggreements.

There are three problems that make this happen:
1) With the technological advancement the economy of a civ is growing much faster that the cost of a growing army. In the early game a huge army can indeed cripple research. But since renaissance the cost of military units becomes less and less significant.
2) In the civ game big empires (especially the ones that were created by conquest) never fall into pieces unlike real life. Revolution mod - I believe!
3) Armies in the civ game do not suffer from being far away from homes, supply routes etc. Gigantic armies can move through devastated enemy lands for centuries and suffer no consequences.

Edit: I just had another idea, could potentially kill two birds with one stone. Why not alter civics slightly so that very large civs would have to gravitate towards something like planned economy, forced labor, collectivism, etc which might reduce city maintainence and generally help mitigate the costs incurred from being so large, and have the smaller countries gravitate more towards free market/labor unions/social justice which provide more research and wealth.
This would probably necessitate making penalties for expansion a little more severe, or conversely the bonuses for remaining small greater.

As it is now nobody has real reason to use the "communist/fascist" civics since they are almost always inferior, except in times of war.

It would also conveniently fall in line historically where the largest countries such as the soviet union and china would addopt communism, while the smaller, more developed european countries adopted liberalism and free markets.

I might also make republic a bit better, and despotism a bit worse.

I want to say one word to you. Just one word. USA. And I'm not even saying that in Russia and China communists came to power when these countries were going through severe crises. In other words a large territory doesn't necessarily translate to a communist/fascist regime.

 

[arizzi]

I agree with your first response. Point two about revolutions is not feasible at this point, however 1 and 3 should be relatively easy to address.

About your second response, per city research cost and a whole slew of other game mechanics are not incredibly realistic either but facilitate better gameplay. I believe that making communist civics attractive for larger civs would result in better gameplay, addressing some of the issues we've been talking about and also making some traditionally ignored civics more relevant.