Slave Hunter Promotions / Slave Master Promotions [IMPLEMENTED]

[raystuttgart]

I will finish / port one of my small features from my prototypes branch "Crime and Law".
(The feature below is one of my top 3 favourite features of that branch and it is relatively small.)

It will become part of branch "Yields" to ensure that it will also be published eventually.
(Since I have no idea how we will procede after "Yields", I want to ensure that some of my effort is preserved / saved.)

Slave Hunter Promotions:



---------

Slave Hunter 1: 10% less running away / revolting of Slaves, Servants and Criminals in City
Slave Hunter 2: 25% less running away / revolting of Slaves, Servants and Criminals in City
Slave Hunter 3: 50% less running away / revolting of Slaves, Servants and Criminals in City

---------

• Available to Melee Units only. Prerequisite is Veteran 1.
  
• Unit Slave Hunter has Slave Hunter III by default
• Reduces the chances of Slaves revolting or running away.
• Unit needs to be stationed in City for more than 1 turn to work.
• Max value from stacking is 50%, no infinite stacking

---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Slave Master Promotions:



---------

Slave Master 1: 10% higher productivity of Slaves, Servants and Criminals in City
Slave Master 2: 25% higher productivity of Slaves, Servants and Criminals in City
Slave Master 3: 50% higher productivity of Slaves, Servants and Criminals in City

---------

• Available to Melee Units only. Prerequisite is Slave Hunter 1.
  
• Unit Slave Master (new) has Slave Master III by default
• Increases the productivity of Slaves working in City (Production Bonus)
• Unit needs to be stationed in City for more than 1 turn to work.
• Max value from stacking is 50%, no infinite stacking

---------

It is a relatively tiny feature and I should be able to finish and merge it into Plains with little effort.
(As I said, it is basically already implemented, simply not yet fully polished.)

Even though it is small, it will quite drastically change the gameplay considering Slaves.
(So there should be no more complaints that "Slave strategy" is not a valid / strong strategy anymore.)

 

[raystuttgart]

Just as a small explanation:

In this "Prototype" / "Proof of Concept" I was trying expand on this design pattern
Units outside the City (having Promotions) -----> Modifiers to the City

-------------

Another idea:

Thief standing on Enemy City -----> Negative Production Modifier + Stealing Gold
(This is actually also a prototype in "Crime and Law" but I do not know how to teach it to AI.)

Once the pockets of the Thief are full, he needs to get back to one of the Player's Cities to drop off the Gold there.
(Thief would be "invisible" and only become visible to e.g. Town Guards, Scouts, ...)

-------------

As @devolution once formulated: "Unstacking the City"
(So why not do stuff with Units, Professions, Promotions, ... outside the City to affect the City.)

-------------

There are actually more ideas related to that.
All it takes is somebody being creative and motivated to implement stuff.

 

[ConjurerDragon]

...
Another idea:

Thief standing on Enemy City -----> Negative Production Modifier + Stealing Gold
(This is actually also a prototype in "Crime and Law" but I do not know how to teach it to AI.)

If it is an enemy city, isn´t it then only possible to stand on the (central square) of the city only if no military units of that city are there and then the own unit will try to conquer the city?
Or do you simply mean the "loot" feature with which units can destroy improvements outside a city in the outlying city squares and get gold for them?

Once the pockets of the Thief are full, he needs to get back to one of the Player's Cities to drop off the Gold there.
(Thief would be "invisible" and only become visible to e.g. Town Guards, Scouts, ...)

Has the problem of camouflaged units (e.g. Ranger) been solved because of which the Ranger was made visible again?
Or what would be different in the problem of an invisible Ranger and an invisible Thief?

As @devolution once formulated: "Unstacking the City"
(So why not do stuff with Units, Improvements, ... outside the City to affect the City.)

Because in the colonial era most cities start as Forts where everything is within the palisades or later the expanded stone walls and only some huts or hay stacks are outside for plundering. Most cities in Europe did not build outside expanded updated military walls -or razed those walls and built larges alleys- until the early 20th century when those walls had been made obsolete by the invention of high explosive shells.

Having a player forced to build in the open outside the walls reduces the value of those walls.

 

[raystuttgart]

If it is an enemy city, isn´t it then only possible to stand on the (central square) of the city only if no military units ...

Actually the implementation for "Thiefs" is tinkering with the "Invisibility Feature" I had ported from Civ4BTS.
(It was already used for the "Ranger" but caused issues because a Ranger could also enter Cities without capturing them.)

Invisible Units (normally non-Combat Units) are allowed to enter Enemy-Cities even if Enemy Units stand on them.
Once discovered they get ejected and once attacked they are directly distroyed.

Did you play Civ4BTS and use the Spies Feature?
It is pretty much a very similar idea.

It is a different feature though, just a prototype and AI does not undertand how to use it
So it might never be finished / published.

------------------

Has the problem of camouflaged units (e.g. Ranger) been solved because of which the Ranger was made visible again?
Or what would be different in the problem of an invisible Ranger and an invisible Thief?

The problem was that the Ranger was a Combat Unit, the Thief would be "defensive only".
Thus the Problem we had with the Ranger would not occur with the Thief.

------------------

Having a player forced to build in the open outside the walls reduces the value of those walls.

This concept is not about "Building outside Walls". Quite the contrary.
I do not want to use Buildings here but e.g. Units, Professions or Promotions.

More generally about techically generating effects / modifiers for a City without using a Building.
Basically figuring out which options we have for new and interesting design patterns.

------------------


I was just trying to explain what I am experimenting with considering these specific prototypes.
(I am often implementing stuff as "proof of concept" to expand the possibilities for further modding.)

 

[raystuttgart]

Here you can already see the graphics of Slave Hunter and Slave Master.

• DLL adjustments for Promotions and AI are not yet fully finished.
• XML for Promotions also not yet fully implemented.
• Python adjustments to visualize the effects in CityScreen not yet implemented.

The Slave Master:
(Completely new in "Yields". Merged from "Crime and Law".)

Spoiler :

Slave Hunter:
(Was already contained in "Plains".)

Spoiler :

 

[raystuttgart]

This beast of a feature is finally finished.
(Took me almost the complete day yesterday and 2 hours this morning to finish it, although base functionality was already there.)

Issue was that I had some very ugly bugs in there that were hard to track and solve because they were triggered in Python.
(That is why it had still stayed a "unfinished prototyp" in my prototyping branch "Crime and Law".)

But now everything works perfeclty fine as it should.

The actually really cool thing conceptually is this:
Units (with certain Promotions) can now give bonuses to other Units (in a City).
(This has not yet existed before but may also serve as blue-print for the new Military Overhaul.)

Here are images:

A slave working harder because there is a "Slave Master" in the City:
(Unit "Slave Master" has Promotion "Slave Master II" by default.)

Spoiler :

Mouse Over the City Name also shows info on current modifers from this feature:
(They exist, because there is a Slave Master and a Slave Hunter in the City.)

Spoiler :

The Units and Promotions:
(Hint: Promotions may also be gained e.g. by Town Guards.)

Spoiler :

 

[raystuttgart]

Comment on Gameplay of this feature:

This feature totally changes Gameplay with Slaves.

You can now:
1) buy huge amounts of Slaves
2) ensure that they do not run away by Slave Hunters
3) even additionally boost their production by Slave Masters

With enough Slave Hunters, no single Slave will revolt or run away anymore.
With enough Slave Masters, you can boost production of Slaves up to 100%.

-------

Slaves may now be one of the strongest strategies in MidGame.
Seriously, you will not want to miss out this feature.

-------

By the way:
It only works for Professions in which these Slaves already have a bonus.
(So you cannot e.g. put a Slave in a Building and boost production there.)

 

[Nebula213]

I Iike this changes for the slaves with the hunter and master. It could simulated a big slaves industry like the south amerca has with a colony with big value of slave. It has to be in a colonize game. Good work

It is my opinion but should it have also some negativ effect.:

First one the hunter and master have to be in the colony working in a building like a watch tower or similar and so they also consume food. When it is possible with the promotion in this way.

maybe the usages of slaves, hunter and master generate a minus for crosses to reduce the imigrants from europe because the bad slave politics.

And the slaves got overtime a promotion for better run away or Revolting. 3 level with inpact to the other slaves. So the promotions stack togehter when the player got to many old slaves so he got a higher risk for revoltes.

So we got a race for promitioln between hunter and slaves.

Slaves also consume not two food maybe only one but hunter and master are very bad people and consome more food in his building for his job compare to normal settlers.

Some ideas around slave topic to make a different to normal aconomy.

 

[raystuttgart]

@Nebula213
Sorry, you are way too late to now (about 7 months too late) come with change requests now.
The feature is now implemented as it is for good reasons (gameplay, performance, UI, AI ...).

I will not waste weeks of effort now anymore to rebuild a feature that is working perfectly fine and even cause massive issues while doing so.
A lot of stuff does not work as you imagine it anyways. (But again, there is no point to discuss it anymore because it is done and player feedback is very positive.)

----------

Also in next release I will implement e.g. Upkeep.
So having Units on the map will come with some cost.

 

[twodback]

Slaves may now be one of the strongest strategies in MidGame.
Seriously, you will not want to miss out this feature.

I feel like it should be toned down a lot.
TLDR: right now slaves with overseers are stronger than experts, it feels wrong.

Right now overseers are so powerful, that they make some options totally inferior.
My main concern that overseer+slave is more productive than field experts (fisherman, lumberjack, etc.).
Overseer + 2 slaves cost almost the same amount of gold as two basic experts (like fishermen), but are more productive. And you need only one overseer for a city with any number of slaves. And overseers also fulfill the role of town guards.
Gameplaywise it's so imbalanced, that it's more profitable to unlearn field experts that you get from crosses to basic colonists, and stack them as prostitutes/judges/doctors to be able to put more slaves than use them in their relative field of expertise. And there is definitely no reason to buy any field expert from overseas.
And storywise I really doubt that fresh-from-the-ship slaves (even "overseered") are more efficient than motivated workers with experience in the field.
Also from minmaxing point of view it makes "freeing of the slave" event negative (because freed slave have almost the same +X bonuses as unfree slave, but don't get percentage bonus) and there is some dissonance with green font.

So my pre-4.0 release suggestion would be to tone down a percentage bonus A LOT. For 10% per level or maybe even 5% (but with more than 3 levels of promotion).
My 5.0 suggestion (but yeah, I won't be able to code this one by myself, so feel free to ignore it) would be stacking current slave hunter anti-rebellion bonuses to reduced overseer bonuses, and make slave hunter to be able to catch new slaves when attacking native units (something like slave masters in Civilization Call to Power). It probably can utilize code from spawning of "Brave lieutenants".
Another idea for 5.0 would be making other percentage bonuses (health, liberty, maybe even bonuses from FFs) not working for slaves. This way overseer bonus could be somewhat balanced out by these bonuses at least in the late game.

Oh, and another thing: maybe slave barges should be able to transport slave hunters and overseers? But I can see that it can be hard to code, beause they are also troops, and you don't want to create another class just for this minor thing.

 

[raystuttgart]

Right now overseers are so powerful, that they make some options totally inferior.

It can easily be balanced weaker in XML.
Just check Civ4PromotionInfos.xml.

Until now nobody internally in the team was complaining though.
And as long as that does not happen I see no need to rebalance before a release.

Currently we also have other pirorities - i.e. actually publishing WTP 4.0.
But of course before we publish WTP 4.1 we will consider the feedback of WTP 4.0 again.