Speakeasies

[Zurai]

Thieves guilds may be rivals, but they are unlikely to become deeply involved in stopping the guild of another civ from stealing their government's secrets.

I disagree completely.

1. Why are thieves suddenly immune to the effects of nationalism (as a concept, not the civic)? Are only law-abiding citizens capable of being proud and protective of their country?
2. It's precisely BECAUSE thieves' guilds are rivals that they're going to stop any rival guild from stealing on THEIR turf. Wanna steal in Jubilee? Gotta be a member of the Jubilee Guild - and they don't like the Malakim (see #1).

 

[Hawkwood]

1. Why are thieves suddenly immune to the effects of nationalism (as a concept, not the civic)? Are only law-abiding citizens capable of being proud and protective of their country?

Technically speaking every medieval person would be immune to the effects of Nationalism, since it originated in the 19th century.

While I know that neither FF nor FfH is exactly like the real world, there is a reason why the rise of nationalism coincided with the rise of industrialism and the corresponding change in mentality.

 

[Tarquelne]

"Civic pride" might be substituted for "Nationalism" and give the same result. Or "racism", if the other civ is another race. Or several other things. Or... not. The thieves might be powerful/influential enough to often prevent activities originating outside their city/civ. Or... not.

If the government and the thieves guild have effectively co-opted each other the thieves might be deeply involved in protecting government secrets. OTOH, they might be deeply involved in selling those secrets.

Rationalizations can be supplied for most mechanics.

 

[Rystic]

The main problem here is to do with the fact that BtS espionage relies on the ratio of points you have compared to your opponent. If you neglect espionage, your opponents can perform missions against you much more easily. If only one religion allows for espionage points, then that religion is going to be able to conduct missions very cheaply.

Couple ideas regarding this:

1) Buildings provide low espionage, and espionage costs increased in XML, so it balances against teams that have very little.
2) Let everyone gain espionage, but block using it from non-Esus teams.
3) Keep espionage as it is, but only Esus can build spies.

Buildings that could provide espionage: Gambling House, Tavern, Market, Bazaar of Mammon, Nox Noctis, Eyes and Ears Network, etc.

Even Shadow mana can provide espionage points.

 

[Thunder_Gr]

Technically speaking every medieval person would be immune to the effects of Nationalism, since it originated in the 19th century.

While I know that neither FF nor FfH is exactly like the real world, there is a reason why the rise of nationalism coincided with the rise of industrialism and the corresponding change in mentality.

Well, setting the name aside, even the ancient city states of every existing civilization, were demonstrating a dislike for foreign cultures, ideas and way of life.
So, I agree with the "you have to be a member of our guild, and we do not like Malakim" argument.

 

[Sephi]

Well, setting the name aside, even the ancient city states of every existing civilization, were demonstrating a dislike for foreign cultures, ideas and way of life.
So, I agree with the "you have to be a member of our guild, and we do not like Malakim" argument.

sorry Thunder, but that's just wrong. Just look at how much foreign trade with luxuries there was. Best example is probably the love from romans for greek wine. Also, guilds didn't exist in ancient city states

You know what's mission impossible for spies in Erebus?

Stealing Perpentachs plans

 

[Gedwyn]

Maybe there's a different mechanic to explore here that would end up with something along the desired results without having to re-implement Espionage...

I really like the idea of boosting CoE a bit, adding in a spy aspect and giving them a Disciple line.

So...going along with the Night Mother unit (not bad name at all for a CoE priest) and the Speakeasy building (which probably does need to be changed. Hall of Shadows? Whatever. That's bad...but you get the idea).

Why not give the Night Mother the ability to go to another Civ's city and create a building - the Hall of Shadows - there? It would of course consume the unit - after all, the Night Mother is now in that other civ's city spying and spreading dissension...

Effects? +15% to the crime rate, maybe 1 unhappiness (might be too much), and the ability to literally spy on the enemy city. Double click on it, see what buildings have been made there etc...much like the Shadow unit does, but this is a permanent effect.

There could be a gold siphon, 1 g per turn back to you, or a research penalty (how did those documents get lost/who killed that Sage?). Nothing too severe of course...but just ideas to play along with.

I do not think this should spread CoE to the city.

Probably could write some new events around this as well...for starters, an event that let's the other civ get rid of the Hall of Shadows in thier city. You know, someone spilled the beans to the Watch Commander, and in the middle of the day (because that's when all the CoE followers are asleep) they raided the place and chopped off a bunch of heads.

Edit: I'd also like to see CoE get the next step in Disciples as well...the rank 6 updgrade to the national unit like other religions get...so what do those units do? Probably something along the same lines, except with pretty drastic effects. Stick that unit in a city and cause instant unrest for 5 turns, or 10 unhappiness etc until the unit is moved (or killed), or perhaps bring something like the espionage event into play (you know that event, pay money for 4 improvements to be destroyed...) except that you can do this at will when you bring that unit into a city...click the button, 4 improvements get destroyed and you get the gold from them as if you had pillaged them (which is pretty much what you did). All this sounds fairly overpowered, so it needs some tempering...but just putting the ideas out there.

 

[Thunder_Gr]

sorry Thunder, but that's just wrong. Just look at how much foreign trade with luxuries there was. Best example is probably the love from romans for greek wine. Also, guilds didn't exist in ancient city states

Trade, yes. But that was that. There was no "Thieves guild cooperation through international networks".
However, I did not say that stealing anything was difficult. I just said that nationalism was evident and local organizations disliked foreigner applicants/emmisaries.
So, you could steal the secrets, but you should be expecting some counter-action from the local organizations, if they took notice of your presence. Unless a compensation was involved, of course.

And the traders were the most effective spies at all times(yes, even in modern times.)

I will disagree about guilds non being present in ancient city states. Simply, they did not have the same influence and magnitute as in the Roman Empire times and later.

You know what's mission impossible for spies in Erebus?

Stealing Perpentachs plans

And do you know why is that? He does not know them himself!!

 

[sharper_knives]

Technically speaking every medieval person would be immune to the effects of Nationalism, since it originated in the 19th century.

While I know that neither FF nor FfH is exactly like the real world, there is a reason why the rise of nationalism coincided with the rise of industrialism and the corresponding change in mentality.

Lets clarify, since it's fairly ridiculous to believe that no one in the middle ages had any sort of national pride. I don't think he means Nationalism the doctrine or social movement.

 

[Rystic]

Maybe there's a different mechanic to explore here that would end up with something along the desired results without having to re-implement Espionage...

I really like the idea of boosting CoE a bit, adding in a spy aspect and giving them a Disciple line.

Council of Esus doesn't have formal disciples or priests. Units with the Esus promotion are, for intents and purposes, the Esus disciple line.

Effects? +15% to the crime rate, maybe 1 unhappiness (might be too much), and the ability to literally spy on the enemy city. Double click on it, see what buildings have been made there etc...much like the Shadow unit does, but this is a permanent effect.

I kind of like this idea, being able to see into cities when you have an Esus unit there. I don't think a building is necessary, though.

I'd also like to see CoE get the next step in Disciples as well...the rank 6 updgrade to the national unit like other religions get...so what do those units do?

Esus has to be buffed in another way. Ideally, we want add as few units to it as possible. Instead, promotions, unit abilities, and civilization buffs (like a civic that gives some bonus off crime rates, etc).

 

[Gedwyn]

Esus has to be buffed in another way. Ideally, we want add as few units to it as possible. Instead, promotions, unit abilities, and civilization buffs (like a civic that gives some bonus off crime rates, etc).

No, I understand that and I agree...the explanation on my end wasn't that great.

I'm not expecting CoE to suddenly grow priests with spells, healing and a divine ability...but abilities or promotions that mimic a spy based disciple line would be a better explanation.

I don't see any reason why there can't be 1 or 2 new units added to mimic the other religions disciple lines though. Or maybe just have the ability to pay and upgrade a rank 4 assassin into a 'Night Mother' and then pay again to upgrade that into whatever the rank 6 would be.

I'd still like to see the ability to pay for healing and disease removing brought in at some point as well. And I do think they need a temple equivalent building...although that would be more of a...guild hall I suppose than a temple. But assuming you've built that building, you can pay for miracles and upgrades etc.

And yeah, you don't need to have a building built in other civs (which I have no idea of how that would be coded, and whether you could even do it etc)...but just to station a unit there seems to me to be...I dunno, just not fitting in as well as a creating a building, or whatever you want to call it: A meeting place, guild hall, theives den, a cave half a mile outside of the city walls...where your spies would meet and create their devious plots to thwart the other civ.

 

[zup]

Regarding Council of Esus, there are two major things that bug me.

Firstly, Alazkan. I have to research bothdeception and poisons before I build him or have just one shot hidden nationality? He needs to have CoE religion by default, at least in my opinion. It fits thematically too. And iirc, I still have to research deception to spread CoE, so I cannot shortcut found it. I can change it myself, but I'd rather not have to do it every patch.

Secondly, nightwatch and shadowriders. Again, one shot hidden nationality. Yes the ordinary scout who happened to get CoE religion by accident can hide his affiliation at will (my will, of course) but not the guys dressed in black, who look the same for everyone, and most importantly, cannot even be built without the appropriate state religion, Council of Esus. Note that after the Empyrean priest casts his spell, the nightwatch are worthless waste (and I know that from personal experience) and shadowriders are just extra knight slots, who sadly cannot be upgraded from a champion to get march and city raider. Perhaps even if they had to go back to a city (to get disguise supplies) to restore hidden nationality (only recon can do it on the field). As a side note, same applies to hidden nationality ships.

 

[Tasunke]

well. I must say that my idea of a "Esus pries" came from the fact that casting Malakim spell under Esus gave assasins, and they are relatively the same strength. Of course, I dont think they should get divine powers, which is why I was suggesting normal arcane spells. however, I think they need to have a Esus state religion only unit Assassin-like unit, maybe to even replace the nightwatchmen all-together, that can spread the religion. It wouldnt get healing abilities or the divine tag, just representing powerful Esus spies/ ect that the other members could rally behind/ idolize.

That being said, I really like the Idea that Night Mothers, or what-da-heck "Nightwatchmen" could be expended in order to get semi-permanent city visibility/spying. *to be removed when the event comes up ... hopefully chances of event based on the city's crimerate

 

[Tasunke]

Also, I agree that units starting with hidden nationality promo should be able to reaquire said promo when returning to city, maybe at expense of gold.

maybe this would nerf Svartalphar world spell? maybe not.

IMO hidden nationality units should be able to fit into stacks and move together, because honestly in single player I doubt the AI will notice if its lacking your civtag anyways ... and really my experience in MP has taught me that hidden nationality is mostly worthless against humans, and the only thing that comes to mind with HN units not joining stacks would be to trick human players (which wont be happening anyways). As I see it, this HN restriction only hurts those that want to use it alot, and it makes the Svart worldspell usefull for maybe one stack attack before I get bored and remove it.

I must go ahead and say that I LOVE shadows. I dont normally use them ... but on diety the calabim on Vampire Island had built 100+ ritualists, and I was softening their army with my high level shadows before invasion. Of course, I ended up winning Tower of Mastery due to very good timing* of vassals in my little slice of Erebus. (*they all revolted eventually due to me asking for all their mana every time it came up)

 

[Tasunke]

My intent is to actually have a reason to use Esus because right now their coolest tricks are open to everyone .... and I really want the cool Esus music to be my ambiance from time to time. Lately its primarily been Veil or Kilmorph. (I'd like to find a game where it was feasable to use the black dragon ... but its just too far away and too isolated)

 

[ushram]

I agree that it should go to Esus, but I think that at the very least Svartalfar and Cualli should have an affinity for it.

Just made me think of Thompson's "Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas"

"I was right in the middle of a $%#@ing reptile zoo, and somebody was giving booze to these goddamn things. Won't be long now before they tear us to shreds. "

 

[Iceciro]

I still think letting Recon units "buy into" esus with a token of devotion (say, 25 gold?) is the easiest, simplest, and of course, code laziest solution to the not-CoE Alakazan.
<brokenrecord>It's the way Fall Flat does it and seems to work well.</brokenrecord>

 

[Tarquelne]

Seems like there's a sense of entitlement with regard to Heroes. At least. For all units a buy-in is a nice idea. Heroes could be made automatic, or maybe barred from it. (I can imagine a hero needing that for play-balance reasons.)

 

[Iceciro]

Well, it's only a recon-unit thing.

That means it'd be Alazkan, Harmatt, (Potentially Korinna, but only the Emperor gets her and he can't have a religion), and Rathus Denmora that could do it.

I really don't see anyone getting overpowered by being able to buy into CoE.

 

[Rystic]

or maybe barred from it. (I can imagine a hero needing that for play-balance reasons.)

Barring heroes from it defeats the reason it was originally suggested. Non-CoE heroes = reloading until they are. That's what we're trying to eliminate.