Scions documentation

[Iceciro]

Re: Risen Emperor

Is there a reason he's Agnostic and not Intolerant? It seems like there'd be a far lesser chance of the Emperor's subjects following someone who wasn't clearly there and giving them an eternal life, even if it's life "of a sort".

 

[Tarquelne]

Re: Risen Emperor

Is there a reason he's Agnostic and not Intolerant?

Sheer inertia. It occasionally occurs to me to look into changing it, and then I forget.

So, I ask the forum, *is* there a reason he should be Agnostic and not Intolerant? Intolerant seems better to me, too.

 

[Valkrionn]

Intolerant seems a better fit to me too. He's a God-king...... I don't think he'd be too happy with his citizens worshiping others in his place.

 

[Iceciro]

Allright, I have a reason - at least for the time being.

Agnostic's broken. I swapped the Emepror over to it, and now I have CoE along with the quasi-Scion-religion. Fun, but it'd be all kinds of broken if I was Order-Scion.

 

[[to_xp]Gekko]

I'll agree that Intolerant seems to fit the emperor better than agnostic

 

[Valkrionn]

Allright, I have a reason - at least for the time being.

Agnostic's broken. I swapped the Emepror over to it, and now I have CoE along with the quasi-Scion-religion. Fun, but it'd be all kinds of broken if I was Order-Scion.

Do you mean Intolerant?

 

[Iceciro]

Oy. Yeah. The thing that isn't in base FFH. The new one. It's broke.

*goes to get some sleep now*

 

[WarKirby]

someone mentioned that about the khadi, too. intolerant apparently doesn't do as it says.

 

[Tarquelne]

Edit - and don't get me wrong, I'd love to see this fixed somehow. I'd like to see Scions as limited as other civs are on crowded maps, and equally capable of expanding exponentially on larger sparsely populated maps

I've adjusted the spawning rate. It's a simple adjustment to the size-based modifier but a little Actual Thought (tm) was applied this time to the numbers. It still won't help with the crowded/sparse issue but it should give a better fit to map size. The numbers that changed all went up, btw, they might either all need to reduced or have some sort of crowding mod.

EDIT: This also raises the population limit (vis a vis spawning) for all sizes above Small.

 

[Anathema]

I may be completely wrong, but I seem to half-remember something about barbarian spawn rate being affected by the amount of unclaimed land? I wonder if Awakened could somehow use a mechanic like that - if there's more unclaimed land you get a bonus, to match the civs that are settler-spamming, but in a more crowded map with no unclaimed land you get a penalty, to match the civs that have nowhere to expand to and thus need to conquer instead of building settlers just like the Scions.

Edit - I mean, this is a minor issue; Scions work well as is, this would just give them more flexibility. As is I can have a well balanced Scions-vs.-Other Civs map, I just need to choose map options carefully to not imbalance things either way. Whereas if I'm playing, say Bannor, I can create a lower-than-recommended-civs map for barbarian hordes and rampant expansion while I match the AI in settlers and cities in a way the Scions have no hope of doing. As Bannor I can also make a densely packed double-the-recommended-civs pangaea map for constant warefare, without worrying about being overpowered because where other civs are crippled by lack of expansion room, the Scions don't really *need* to expand beyond one super city and have enough Awakened to keep that city at the happiness cap.

Edit 2 - Hey, I have a similar idea that fits the lore a bit better. What if Awakened spawn rate could be influenced by the total land area you control (inside your culture). So if you play like other civs do and expand by building/capturing a bunch of tiny cities (a choice which cripples the Scions at the moment, since you wind up with a ton of size 1 cities that will never grow because your capital can't put out enough Awakened), your culture covers a wider area and you get a bonus - more Awakened are attracted to an empire that has greater cultural influence, after all. Whereas if you dump everyone in your capital and don't expand, you get a penalty because your empire controls so little land. This brings the Scions more in line with other civs that can control many cities and have them all collecting food and generating population at once (hence the Awakened bonus for controlling more land), but they can't support nearly as much population if they're limited to a small land area and a few cities (hence the Awakened penalty for limiting yourself to a few cities).

 

[Iceciro]

Well, just remeber Anathema, even in a crowded map where the civs can't hold more than a few cities, those cities will continue to slowly grow and be able to work more tiles, and thus have more potential production.

While every Scion pop-point can be put on a tile and work something productive, if you lock them off at certain pop-points too early they can be steamrolled easier than you'd think. In the early game most Scion units are NOT suited for assualts on cities, but on defending your land, so you won't expand militarily - then as your enemies expand the map won't be getting clear-er, so you just fall behind until someone can mop up.

Remember, most Scion units, for a long time on the tech-tree, are more suited to Defense than offense, especially now that the Disciples get a debuff outside cultural borders.

 

[Tarquelne]

Edit 2 - Hey, I have a similar idea that fits the lore a bit better. What if Awakened spawn rate could be influenced by the total land area you control

That's pretty interesting... I agree that the whole crowded map issue is not a "BIG" deal, but it'd be nice to account for it.

Also: Reading Iceciro's post made me think of something else: Luxuries. They're pretty important to the spawning rate, and on a crowded map they can be harder to grab. That's true for everyone, but they're more important to the Scions.

I might try some games at the extremes and see what they're like.

I probably won't try changing anything much for at least several patches.

 

[TimSLS]

Hmm, I actually think plopping several size 1 or 2 cities around is very adventaeous for the scions already, so I don't think the 'Edit 2' suggesiton of granting an additional awakening bonus is a good idea. If you plop a city on a hills plains for the extra 1 production in the city square(better if its a marble hills plains for three production), which has a good spot in its fat cross (say, copper in a hills, patrian artifacts, gold, something like that) you've instantly got a city with decent enough production to eventually crank out the awakening spawning buildings (which all told will cause that city to contribute an additional base 3.5% to your awakening chance) while raking in substantial comerce (if gold, artifiacts, etc). Also, once you've got trade, currency, etc (especially if coastal) its going to be pulling in alot of trade....well outweighs the maintenence and the value of an additional pop in your capital. I usually don't get around to creating a super capital until I've expanded to my defensible limits...

I agree the crowding mechanic is not urgent - seems like a very difficult balancing problem that will lead to a complex forumla that might have unintended effects...Besides, tons of game options already power up or down civs anyway, without too much of a cry for balancing. In the scions case, heres a few examples. Blessings of Amathon helps other civs more than the scions, as for awhile you'll lack the pop to work most of your recources anyway and many of the recources are tied to health and give food plusses. Raging Barbarians helps the scions significantly (period incursions of 5 stacked goblins or orcs is a christmas present for your legates). End of Winter helps the scions significantly (hampering the early phase for everyone, scions are less hampered because of food, and stretches out an early period of spawning). Other civs it is easy to dream up examples too (I'll go for the lazy example of the lanun and the amount of water...). I think a nice understandable formula based on map size, and then you know where things are going when you choose game options, map size, difficulty, etc...

Edit - on the size 1 cities comment, to explain in more detail what I am talking about - tailor your research to get code of laws early, switch to aristocracy, and then pick up drama pretty early (though after bronze working so koriana can protect you), while having every city but your capital build shrine to kyorlin, temple of the gift, then hall of the covenent, and let your capital handle building anything else. Its an effective way to play the scions in a builder, expansive, awakening focusesed manner. Not that it works any better or worse than a god king military expansive manner, but its a legitmate strategy and probably not in need to an awakening bonus from territory controled.

 

[Tarquelne]

... in need to an awakening bonus from territory controled.

I was thinking it'd play out as more of a penalty for not controlling much territory.

But I also need to try playing in the style you described.

 

[TimSLS]

I actually really like what playing as the scions does to city placement - instead of trying to cover as much good territory with a minimum number of cities and less conflict in city radius, which I've been doing in some form since civ 1, its fun to instead have a somewhat new city choice though process - how productive the city square itself will be plus needing 1 or 2 good working squares, with a strong preference for coast for extra trade routes and strategic placement...

 

[Iceciro]

The Scions are nice mainly because they tell convention to go jump off a cliff, much like how the Lanun desperately want a coastal space surrounded by hills rather than farmland tiles.

I honestly wish that every other civ were as unique in city placement, but alas, I digress.

I think the idea of having it tied to luxuries is allright, but sometimes you just get a really bad scion start with plenty of farmland (yuck!) and no luxuries, which is already pretty bad for spawning rate and very bad for building your units... but then again, back to the lanun, sometimes you spawn in the middle of the continent.

 

[[to_xp]Gekko]

how are AI scions doing in your games so far? in my games they tend to be top scorers early on, and decay after a while. I'm guessing this is because the AI tends to use all his awakened in his capital, so they end up with a size 10+ capital while all other cities are size 1-2 , which seems to do them no good.

 

[JayThomas]

The OP says you need Sorcery and Priesthood to gain reborn when razing a city. I have these techs and have razed barb cities of pop 1, 2 and 3 and no reborns. What am I missing?

 

[Valkrionn]

The OP says you need Sorcery and Priesthood to gain reborn when razing a city. I have these techs and have razed barb cities of pop 1, 2 and 3 and no reborns. What am I missing?

The population of a city is reduced whenever the Scions take control of it, and the reborn you get are equal to this reduced population minus 1.

 

[JayThomas]

Thanks Valkrionn, that explains it. My previous game I was in God King which reduces the pop loss. Think I'll be switching during war.