Rhye's of Europe Technology Tree Discussion Thread

[Barak]

sedna great point on #3. Stability needs tweaking.

I don't think we should return the huge penalties from RFC, in general we don't want civs collapsing unless conquered (or at least large portions of them being chopped away). It would be more realistic to increase the secession rate (it is already higher than in RFC). That way, of you conquer a large empire, simply the periphery would start to split.

It was always my understanding that the theory was of RFE was to watch as Europe develops over time and lead your civ to victory! In RFC this could be done with smaller empires, but with our map and number of civs it seems like we should be able to exist as stable empires with more cities in our core areas.

Of course stability would be hit with poor economies, over expansion to strange lands, bad civic combinations, unhealhtiness/unhappiness or too many wars.

Yes, civs should still collapse, but not if the civ is playing it "right".

 

[3Miro]

Right now, as long as you are in your core/normal are you can expand with very little difficulty. There should be a bigger hit for conquering territory outside the core. Yes we seem to agree that civs should collapse, but not as often as in RFC.

 

[jessiecat]

I agree with 3Miro's point that whole empires shouldn't collapse due to instabity but that single cities should revolt as a result. I've never been a fan of the total collapse scenario in RFC at all. As far as having more cities, why is that desirable? Surely we want the player to win by achieving defined goals like fulfilling the UHV conditions or by cultural or diplomatic means, rather than simply wiping out their neighbours militarily. I, for one, have no interest at all in winning by conquering the known world. If I was, I'd still be playing Age of Empires or Total War, not something a bit more subtle and intelligent like Civilization.

 

[Barak]

There should of course be ways for the entire civ to collapse. It has after all happened in the history of the world

But I would also feel good about civs that have cities declare independence with out the entire collapse.

 

[jessiecat]

There should of course be ways for the entire civ to collapse. It has after all happened in the history of the world

But I would also feel good about civs that have cities declare independence with out the entire collapse.

I do agree of course that a civ be likely to collapse completely when it's capitol is conquered. But not always. Historically this has happened where a new capitol is formed and they carry on the fight from there. And even to win. And having one or two cities declare independence shouldn't necessarily mean the end of the game for the player either, just a temporary setback.
I'm more concerned right now about the independents teching too fast and out-producing other players. And with them acting like a huge aggressive empire as well. They're nothing at all like that in RFC. Why are they so much more powerful in RFCE? Where did we get that from?

 

[3Miro]

Indies in RFCE are simply much more than in RFC. I don't know about the tech rate, sedna could hit them with RFCEBalance (should work just as the other civs).

One idea would be to unsure that indies fight among themselves (always war). I think we can do that fairly easily from Barbs.py (in which case we may have to decrease the WW for the indies)

 

[sedna17]

Both good suggestions for the indies. Really though, I think we have too many of them. There was a suggestion in another thread about which ones should be eliminated.

This also touches on the performance issue of course. We have a huge map with lots of incredibly productive land area and many civs. The game will play a little slow. There are improvements to be made, but we do have a LOT of units getting on the board very early. It's mostly the AI planning what to do with units between turns that is causing the slowdown I feel. Looking through some ancient threads I understood how many of the "features" of Rhye's and Fall Rhye put in mainly to improve performance on a big map with many civs (late-spawning, collapse, plagues, embassies). We can tolerate a somewhat more complex game I think.

A few things to do to reduce the AI-wait time:

• Remove some independent cities
• Make independents fight each other as suggsted (killing off units)
• Replace some independent cities with Barbs (even more fighting)
• Barbarian invasions (more units initially, but if they destroy units/cities then a net gain)
• More plagues. Everyone likes plagues. Currently the first one hits around the Black Death, but there are a number of early ones we might introduce: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_historical_plagues
• Decrease number/size of cities by increasing city separation. We can 1) forbid cities to be founded less than 2 squares apart or 2) tell the AI to build more spread-out empires or 3) decrease the quality of the land/number of growth resources in certain areas.
• Ensure some early civs fall, even if we allow them to rise again later: Arguably when played by the AI the early Franks and Burgundians should BOTH collapse and re-spawn later. Al Andalus should normally be defeated by Spain. Kiev and Moscow probably both get wiped out by the Mongols (although that's not until 1200+) and can re-spawn later.

 

[st.lucifer]

Both good suggestions for the indies. Really though, I think we have too many of them. There was a suggestion in another thread about which ones should be eliminated.

This also touches on the performance issue of course. We have a huge map with lots of incredibly productive land area and many civs. The game will play a little slow. There are improvements to be made, but we do have a LOT of units getting on the board very early. It's mostly the AI planning what to do with units between turns that is causing the slowdown I feel. Looking through some ancient threads I understood how many of the "features" of Rhye's and Fall Rhye put in mainly to improve performance on a big map with many civs (late-spawning, collapse, plagues, embassies). We can tolerate a somewhat more complex game I think.

A few things to do to reduce the AI-wait time:

• Remove some independent cities
• Make independents fight each other as suggsted (killing off units)
• Replace some independent cities with Barbs (even more fighting)
• Barbarian invasions (more units initially, but if they destroy units/cities then a net gain)
• More plagues. Everyone likes plagues. Currently the first one hits around the Black Death, but there are a number of early ones we might introduce: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_historical_plagues
• Decrease number/size of cities by increasing city separation. We can 1) forbid cities to be founded less than 2 squares apart or 2) tell the AI to build more spread-out empires or 3) decrease the quality of the land/number of growth resources in certain areas.
• Ensure some early civs fall, even if we allow them to rise again later: Arguably when played by the AI the early Franks and Burgundians should BOTH collapse and re-spawn later. Al Andalus should normally be defeated by Spain. Kiev and Moscow probably both get wiped out by the Mongols (although that's not until 1200+) and can re-spawn later.

One other thing which may or may not be related -

As things currently stand, the only units which become obsolete are UU's (some of them quite quickly). There are often large stacks of obsolete units moving around aimlessly from one independent city to another, often on different ends of the map. In part, this is due to the fast autopeace rate (although I think this is a good thing - a drawn-out war with the fast-teching, powerful indies is devastating; try playing as Venice for proof) - the AI starts moving troops towards a front halfway across the map, and then turns them around as the war ends two turns later.

 

[KaiserBenjamin]

Just FYI, I did a Dutch spawn using the latest version (December 9th) and they were still behind in technology relative to the other civilizations.

 

[3Miro]

One other thing which may or may not be related -

As things currently stand, the only units which become obsolete are UU's (some of them quite quickly). There are often large stacks of obsolete units moving around aimlessly from one independent city to another, often on different ends of the map. In part, this is due to the fast autopeace rate (although I think this is a good thing - a drawn-out war with the fast-teching, powerful indies is devastating; try playing as Venice for proof) - the AI starts moving troops towards a front halfway across the map, and then turns them around as the war ends two turns later.

You have a point. The purpose of the Plague was to kill a lot of obsolete units. We can increase the power of the plague. Also, for gameplay purposes we could benefit form a plague around 1000AD, but that doesn't happen. Jessiecat could not find such a plague, which means there probably wasn't one (I wonder how long people had to wait for the year to pass, back then).

-The tech and probably production rate for indies should be decreased.
-Some of the AI's should be forced to spread out (Russia, Norse, Kiev, maybe Hungary, for Bulgaria I am afraid that would contribute even further to the unhistorical eastward spread).
-We should probably slow the growth of some nations (the early ones).
-Add barbarians that would do damage and decrease the number of units and improvements.
-more balancing is required for the Dutch and probably other civs.

Those could be fixed in RFCBalance. sedna should be able to do it (tell me if you need help, it is just changing the constants, but make sure you read the comments to figure the right constants and right values).

-Theoretically I could try to "tweak" the independent AI so that it works faster. I may be able to do that by making the indy AI more "stupid". Would help the indy problem and perhaps speed the game.

 

[jessiecat]

Both good suggestions for the indies. Really though, I think we have too many of them. There was a suggestion in another thread about which ones should be eliminated.

• Remove some independent cities
• Make independents fight each other as suggsted (killing off units)
• Replace some independent cities with Barbs (even more fighting)
• Barbarian invasions (more units initially, but if they destroy units/cities then a net gain)
• More plagues. Everyone likes plagues. Currently the first one hits around the Black Death, but there are a number of early ones we might introduce: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_historical_plagues
• Decrease number/size of cities by increasing city separation. We can 1) forbid cities to be founded less than 2 squares apart or 2) tell the AI to build more spread-out empires or 3) decrease the quality of the land/number of growth resources in certain areas.
• Ensure some early civs fall, even if we allow them to rise again later: Arguably when played by the AI the early Franks and Burgundians should BOTH collapse and re-spawn later. Al Andalus should normally be defeated by Spain. Kiev and Moscow probably both get wiped out by the Mongols (although that's not until 1200+) and can re-spawn later.

My suggestions;

1. Eliminate Tours, Leipzig, Memel, Minsk, Tver and Pisa

2. Make indies fight each other (Always at war?) and slow their tech rate. Agreed.

3. Change Pamplona, Nantes, Beograd, Riga and Kharkov to barbarian. Add Astrakhan as a strong barbarian base for later invasions.

4. Barbarian invasions able to raze indy cities but not civ ones?

5, More plagues but shorter duration. (who really luvs plague anyway?)

6. Minimum distance between cities to be increased from 1 to 2.

7. More incentive for AI civs to expand as required for their UHV conditions.

8. Code in respawning for all civs in core area cities where historically appropriate.

EDIT

9. Indys not allowed to build wonders (In my last game they built 6)

 

[Whitefire]

Please remember that this is the tech tree thread.


So I'm going to work on some shifting of the early game and add in several new technologies, with the hopes of causing some more strategic choices. This should be ready by tomorrow.

 

[jessiecat]

Please remember that this is the tech tree thread.


So I'm going to work on some shifting of the early game and add in several new technologies, with the hopes of causing some more strategic choices. This should be ready by tomorrow.

I am aware of that. Just replying to sedna's suggestions. I'd be interested to see how you propose "shifting" the early game though adding in several new technologies is desirable as long as they have some function other than just being arbitrary fillers to stretch the tech tree.

 

[micbic]

My suggestions;

1. Eliminate Tours, Leipzig, Memel, Minsk, Tver and Pisa

6. Minimum distance between cities to be increased from 1 to 2.

1. Yes. That means that Genoa should start with 3 Settlers instead of two.
6. That means new city name maps!!!

 

[jessiecat]

1. Yes. That means that Genoa should start with 3 Settlers instead of two.
6. That means new city name maps!!!

1. Why? Isn't two enough to start with already? Nobody should get 3 IMO.

2. Why? Not much change required. Maybe rename the odd tile in a few places.

 

[Barak]

I disagree on Pisa. I like having it in and flipping to Genoa. If Pisa is removed there will never be a city there as Firenze's culture will overtake the spot.

And I agree with Whitefire that this discussion shouldn't be in the Tech tree thread

If we do have an extra plague, I would like to see a way for Warriors to upgrade to SOMETHING. Many of our units kind of stop upgrading. Why would there be guys with clubs walking around in the high Renaissance? I can believe Lancers, Heavy Macemen and Pike units in the early stages of Gunpowder, but by line infantry any military worth its salt would have taken away the swords and maces and replaced them with rifled muskets.

Perhaps we need another late foot unit so everyone doesn't become a line infantry?

 

[jessiecat]

I disagree on Pisa. I like having it in and flipping to Genoa. If Pisa is removed there will never be a city there as Firenze's culture will overtake the spot.

And I agree with Whitefire that this discussion shouldn't be in the Tech tree thread

If we do have an extra plague, I would like to see a way for Warriors to upgrade to SOMETHING. Many of our units kind of stop upgrading. Why would there be guys with clubs walking around in the high Renaissance? I can believe Lancers, Heavy Macemen and Pike units in the early stages of Gunpowder, but by line infantry any military worth its salt would have taken away the swords and maces and replaced them with rifled muskets.

Perhaps we need another late foot unit so everyone doesn't become a line infantry?

And I agree with you about sticking to the topic.

Lets see what Whitefire comes up with in his proposed new techs.

 

[st.lucifer]

I disagree on Pisa. I like having it in and flipping to Genoa. If Pisa is removed there will never be a city there as Firenze's culture will overtake the spot.

And I agree with Whitefire that this discussion shouldn't be in the Tech tree thread

If we do have an extra plague, I would like to see a way for Warriors to upgrade to SOMETHING. Many of our units kind of stop upgrading. Why would there be guys with clubs walking around in the high Renaissance? I can believe Lancers, Heavy Macemen and Pike units in the early stages of Gunpowder, but by line infantry any military worth its salt would have taken away the swords and maces and replaced them with rifled muskets.

Perhaps we need another late foot unit so everyone doesn't become a line infantry?

Arguably, most of the armies of the Medieval period (and some later in Poland and Ukraine) consisted mostly of guys walking around with clubs and/or pointed sticks.

Maybe not so much in the High Renaissance, but there's just something reassuring about walking around with a big thumpin' stick in one's hand...

 

[Barak]

Arguably, most of the armies of the Medieval period (and some later in Poland and Ukraine) consisted mostly of guys walking around with clubs and/or pointed sticks.

Maybe not so much in the High Renaissance, but there's just something reassuring about walking around with a big thumpin' stick in one's hand...

Agreed, but once line infantry is available most nations would throw away those clubs and pointy sticks. In the age of musketmen, mounted units still used lances and swords, but eventually used guns.

 

[jessiecat]

Just to clear up one small misconception. Line infantry in our mod does not mean rifled muskets in the post-Napoleonic sense. I see them as regular infantry equiped with smoothbore muskets circa 1760s (Seven Years War) with a lot less range and accuracy than rifles. So overlapping them with pikes and even earlier weapons isn't unreasonable. As st. lucifer says, lots of armies in the 17th. to 18th.Cs relied on masses of peasants armed with pikes, pole axes, billhooks, scythes or even clubs.