RFC Europe playtesting feedback thread

[Myri]

Playing Venice at Emperor, as always very peaceful, did not even take Ragusa in 1026
- around 880 The Pope conquers Napoli, later it was razed, razing was turned off
- Hungary only settles Pest and becomes a Vasall, 2 settlers, 2 archers and a skirmisher stand just right to Pest, only moved once
- 1026 Genoa converts to Islam
- Byzantium still has Cyrene, Alexandria, Singidunum (Hungary)
- Burgundy, Byzantium and Arabia Merchant Republics (maybe some more, not much contact to the west)

other games:
- started as Portugal, Spain neutral, Cordoba very small and no troops, maybe Toledo won
- barbs capture or raze everything in germany and around bulgaria
- france often neutral
- started as England, 2 french cities flip, reduced to Paris, declares war, Trebuchet in Boulogne and extra Cavalry make a very short war (i did not fight because there was really no point in playing that game)

For the Norse Lübeck is Kiel.

bye Myri

 

[jessiecat]

--> Imperialism: +1 stability from cities outside the core area is a good change.
--> Ragusa: When I play Venice I actually destroy the city and settle 2 cities near it, they get more resources and more production. Also, maybe we should test some games without Ragusa some more times, since it is usually well defended, sometimes they stay independent until the Renaissance era.

Again, why should we not have Ragusa or play without it? It's one of the most important cities in the area, a major Roman port and Venice's first really important colony. Maybe it misses the stone, but so what? Its not that bad a city. If the human player razes it, that's his choice. But well defended? Are you joking? Two archers and no walls?
And no way does it stop Venice from doing anything. If the AI is too stupid to attack it that's its fault. Better to make the AI more aggressive than get rid of it. As the only indy city on the Adriatic it has to stay. It's too important.

 

[Wessel V1]

A more aggressive AI could help indeed then. I don't have so much historical knowledge, so I can't tell whether the city should be in or not. The problem is that Ragusa has archers on hills, and with a wall (cheap since Ragusa has plenty of production for an AI controlled city), these are not that easy to kill, especially when they are upgraded to Crossbowmen or Arbalests.

Also, I was just trying to suggest it since Verily said there was a difference. Since this is an alpha version, anything that could help gameplay should be tested by someone who wants to test it. I'm neutral about the city, gameplay should decide IMO.

 

[3Miro]

I am trying to teach the AI to do early rushes and other things like that. I don't know if I will be successful.

 

[micbic]

Ragusa should be challenging to capture, it ruins the Venetian UHV and was indy for a looooong time (IIRC till 1400-1500)
@3Miro: You have become a maths professor, so teaching rushes should be much easier
Besides fun, now, making the AI rush may result in interesting results, ie an expanded
Bulgaria, Frankia or Poland
BTW: A possibly good scenario would be giving Frankia more starting forces and
Burgundy a more cultural orientation
And finally, any possibilities of integrating Better AI into the mod?

 

[jessiecat]

A more aggressive AI could help indeed then. I don't have so much historical knowledge, so I can't tell whether the city should be in or not. The problem is that Ragusa has archers on hills, and with a wall (cheap since Ragusa has plenty of production for an AI controlled city), these are not that easy to kill, especially when they are upgraded to Crossbowmen or Arbalests.

Also, I was just trying to suggest it since Verily said there was a difference. Since this is an alpha version, anything that could help gameplay should be tested by someone who wants to test it. I'm neutral about the city, gameplay should decide IMO.

I'm not trying to discourage anybody from playtesting in any way they see fit and I appreciate what you're saying about gameplay but one of the key features of this mod is its historical flavour. Part of that involves having a handful of pre-built cities in 500AD left over after the collapse of the Roman Empire. Key examples include York, Toledo, Valencia, Barcino, Marseilles, Milano, Rome, Napoli, Alger, Tunis and Ragusa. This is not including the eastern half of the Roman Empire which represented by the Byzantines. I do agree that there are too many pre-built in France and probably Russia too. But Ragusa is one city that is historically essential IMO.

 

[Feyaria]

Quick holland feedback:
I had a strange bug, i got only half the culture every turn.
With so litle culture, i couldnt even get the whole BFC of Amsterdam, never got control of the southwestern clam.

I got a -1 diplo malus from Venice for attacking an indipendent city.

Divine Monarchy has no We love the King message.

Papal razed Napoli, but that was a good thing, so Spain settled a city in southern Italy (Cosenza, 2 tiles southeast of Napoli, a lot better city) Spain also settled Sicily and in the replay i saw that they even had a city in Holland, which got autorazed at my spawn. Kiev was again one of the strongest civs, they rarely collapse due to mongols now.

The UHV are a bit more challenging then others, key was to get the +100% civic as fast as possible. Spain and France built the 3 African colonies, but noone built the Trading companies and the other colonies. If the AIs would do that, it would be realy tricky to get 3 colonies with so little production. Conquering the indipendent Stavanger helped me a lot!

Was short but fun to play, finished in 1735, one tech away from Industrial Revolution, the end techs should be a bit more expansive if the game is realy meant to be played till 1800.

 

[Wessel V1]

You don't have to apologize, I wasn't upset or something. I'm also not saying that we absolutely should remove Ragusa from the game, just that we might consider it's strength for the sake of the Venetian AI if that could help. I've played a bit with the WB and I must admit that the independents do an excellent job in defending their cities. Lübeck for example had a tripple promoted city defending archer, with a combat strength of 9.00 and a first strike, without any defensive buildings; enough to survive anything until Amored Lancers. This could be a result of the free barbarian wins; all those Horse Archers provide lots of experience. Perhaps it's a solution to lower the experience cap of independents against barbarians to 5, or 2 (if it's possible of course)? Or would that make the independents too easy to conquer?

 

[Wessel V1]

Forgot to upload the screenshot I wanted to post, so here it is. I put a Armored Lancer there, to see if it had a chance. There is also a fortified spearman in the city.

 

[3Miro]

Forgot to upload the screenshot I wanted to post, so here it is. I put a Armored Lancer there, to see if it had a chance. There is also a fortified spearman in the city.

Wessel, I looked at the screen shot and I have some observations.

1. You should not expect to be able to conquer a city with a single unit. That was doable in some of the older test version, but it is bad gameplay.

2. The Armor Lancers are not a main city attack unit. You should have brought some catapults to a siege. If you remove the 20% defense bonus, you will be at an advantage.

3. You have the Armor Lancer, but the unit has no promotions. What about combat 1, from just a Barracks you can produce a unit that would have the edge in this battle. With a stable, you will shift the odds strongly in your favor. Also, a spearman would have no change with combat 1 + shock.

4. I have been thinking about reducing the city defense bonus for Crossbowman. It will not affect this battle, but it will affect others.

 

[Wessel V1]

I know, but this was to illustrate the fact that these Archers (which became crossbowmen not long after that, with more defensive skills, but that's going to be fixed I see) are pretty strong. Maybe the AI should not capture the city soon, and of course I had to get more units (this is a WB screenshot, I'm not even at war with the independents), but it was to point out that the city is well defended.

I've continued the game a little, and Venetia conquered Athens! They were so suprised that they made peace and gave the city back.

 

[micbic]

Continuing my Venice game, issues:
1. Will something be done with the mined forests? Both normal and dense forests can be mined.
2. And also, shouldn't the player recieve negative bonuses for refusing to ''play a role of the schemes of a snake like the Pope'' ? (BTW this caption makes me laugh)

 

[jessiecat]

I know, but this was to illustrate the fact that these Archers (which became crossbowmen not long after that, with more defensive skills, but that's going to be fixed I see) are pretty strong. Maybe the AI should not capture the city soon, and of course I had to get more units (this is a WB screenshot, I'm not even at war with the independents), but it was to point out that the city is well defended.

I've continued the game a little, and Venetia conquered Athens! They were so suprised that they made peace and gave the city back.

In my present game as Venice I turned up with 2 catapults and 4 promoted macemen only to find that Ragusa had been razed by the Pope. What's with that? I think they had transported troops from Italy by ship. I thought that the Papacy wasn't supposed to leave Rome. But their armies are still roaming all over Western Europe. @3Miro Can't you stop this?

 

[3Miro]

1. The Pope declaring war on Indies was a bug, noted and should be fixed.

2. Nothing prevents the Pope's army from roaming Europe, which is fine, as long as they don't declare war to anyone.

3. Forested hills are supposed to be mined. That is a feature and not a bug.

4. There will be punishment for Crusade refusal. I have not implemented it yet. I will put diplomacy penalty for refusing.

5. I increased the archers defense, since they were useless against any other unit. With 2 - 3 lancers one could capture all the Indy cities in the world without resistance. Now Crossbows seem a bit OP however.

6. About the AI conquering Athens, well, AI says it enough?

 

[micbic]

Well, I suppose that AI actually means Artificial Idiotcy

 

[3Miro]

Well, I suppose that AI actually means Artificial Idiotcy

Well we are trying for Artificial Intelligence, however, we get Actual Idiocy.

 

[fdgsgds]

Do the barbarians raze too much? I always find they take all the crappy cities belonging to former Moscow/Kievan Rus and they raze extremely useful cities. I once saw the Keshiks raze Constantinople.

Are the barbarians going to be changed at all?

P.S. Once the Pope declared war on me. Will this be fixed?

 

[3Miro]

Do the barbarians raze too much? I always find they take all the crappy cities belonging to former Moscow/Kievan Rus and they raze extremely useful cities. I once saw the Keshiks raze Constantinople.

Are the barbarians going to be changed at all?

P.S. Once the Pope declared war on me. Will this be fixed?

1. Barbs are Barbs, they conquer and they raze.

2. On which version was it that Keshiks made it to Constantinople.

PS Yes.

 

[Myri]

Alpha 3, Germany 939

barb count in germany, mostly near Lübeck:
3 archers
8 spearmen
1 axeman
18 horse archers

City placement does not look better, inland city instead of La Coruna, Venice only 1 city, Hunyadvar on the salt (but at least they founded a 2nd city), Drustar instead of Bulgarian coast, Malaqah instead of Cadiz, ...

Another game (Alpha 2) barbs conquered York, London and Southhampton, Queen fled to Caen.

Isn't it possible to script events if ai controlled, if human controlled, ...? Add crusaders (that should not cost upkeep) if a human defends Jerusalem, remove some barbs around ai controlled nations and something like that?

bye Myri

 

[jessiecat]

Just reporting my first Monarch UHV victory on the new Alpha3 version, playing as France. I knocked out Burgundy early capturing Dijon and razing Lyon (it was in a lousy spot). Founded Luxembourg to control the west bank of the Rhine. Captured Tours then Toulouse. Founded Bordeaux to block the Spanish. Founded Lyon in a better spot and captured Marseilles. Meanwhile Germany spawned and founded Basel. After a short war I captured that and they capitulated. Controlled all of France for UHV1 before 1400. Expected Burgundy to respawn but they never did.
Starting building wonders in Paris and settling GAs. Had 15,000 culture by mid 1500's. That's too easy for a UHV. Should be 25,000. By the end of the game Paris had built 7 wonders and had 32,000 culture. Meanwhile I was only 3rd. in techs behind Arabia and England. By the time I built my trading companies Engand had built 2 colonies. But I caught up fast with research at 90%, 4 vassals, 2 DAs. Got my 3 colonies and a UHV victory in 1698. Could have built 2 more within 6 turns if I hadn't won first. To sum up, the first UHV is easy if you're aggressive. The 2nd. is too easy (should be 25,000 culture, as I said) and the 3rd. is a foregone conclusion once you start teching fast. But an enjoyable game nevertheless.
BTW @3Miro. There's a typo in the opening menu which made me laugh. Instead of requiring Spain to control Sardinia it says "Sardines". I know Michael would love to have Spain controlling everything but the sardine monopoly is a step too far IMO.