techumseh
Deity
Insult to injury! I don't have a beard or a flannel shirt. Btw, the '80s will only be remembered for really bad fashion and even worse music. 
The Cold War: Playtest Thread
- Thread starter JPetroski
- Start date
techumseh
Deity
There's a bit of a problem. Something wasn't quite right in my SP game, so I cracked it open with Cheat Mode. It turns out that no faction is building fighters. I'm playing as China and it's now August 1965. Currently the Soviets, the US and the Europeans have Jet Fighter I and II technologies. The Soviets can build MiG 15s and 19s, but are not building any. The US can build Early Jets and Sabres, but are not building any. The Europeans are building 1 Hunter. The pro-east can build Yak 9s, not building any. And the Pro-west and Non-Aligned can build Spitfires but aren't.
The Soviets have no fighters at all, and only show one Yak-9 destroyed, which is interesting because they start with 10 and building 4. The US, Europe and the Non-aligned have fairly big fighter forces, the Non-aligned actually have 26 Hunters. And of course the East and West have the airforces given them by events. A number of US, European and Non-aligned jets have NONE as a home city, so presumably most or all were created by events.
I've noticed this before when I made TechMod. I wanted three sets of units (British, German and Russian), including airforces. I found only the Spitfire got built by the AI, and it was in the stealth fighter slot. In Cold War, the only fighter being built is the Hunter, which is in the helicopter slot. So I suspect the AI will only build fighters in particular slots, which is a big problem for scenarios with multiple aircraft types. Perhaps this can be solved for AI controlled civs with events, but that will likely be somewhat complex.
The Soviets have no fighters at all, and only show one Yak-9 destroyed, which is interesting because they start with 10 and building 4. The US, Europe and the Non-aligned have fairly big fighter forces, the Non-aligned actually have 26 Hunters. And of course the East and West have the airforces given them by events. A number of US, European and Non-aligned jets have NONE as a home city, so presumably most or all were created by events.
I've noticed this before when I made TechMod. I wanted three sets of units (British, German and Russian), including airforces. I found only the Spitfire got built by the AI, and it was in the stealth fighter slot. In Cold War, the only fighter being built is the Hunter, which is in the helicopter slot. So I suspect the AI will only build fighters in particular slots, which is a big problem for scenarios with multiple aircraft types. Perhaps this can be solved for AI controlled civs with events, but that will likely be somewhat complex.
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Well, this is a bit of a problem. Luckily, lua presents a pretty good (in my mind) solution...
It has always been possible to simply give the AI more units, but you never used to have a way of knowing if you were giving them too many, or too few. With lua, it's not difficult to count how many units a civ has and then give another civ some to match them, or to count how many a civ has, and then give that civ more to catch up, etc. All of this is possible and not all that difficult to implement (I've managed to pull off several counting events), but the question is, what is the best way to implement it?
Should the major powers have a flat # of aircraft they should at least own each turn?
Should the AI have parity with the human? Or maybe 50%?
All things to consider....
techumseh
Deity
I think a formula would be fairly easy to develop. I'm a little unsure about how production of various types of units is determined for each city. Obviously it's a combination of technology and particular improvements, eg. factory and military industry, but some cities seem to be able to build more advanced units without them. For example in my MP game, the Soviet city of Baku is building MiG 19s, without having the military industry improvement. Is there something else, perhaps in the Lua events which controls this?
tootall_2012
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Hi John,
I was finally able to begin playing the scenario this week. I choose to play in Hot Seat mode as the Americans and their Pro-West proxy’s. I’ve reached August 1952 and I have to say, so far, I’m very impressed with what you’ve done here.
The implementation of the Arms Sales, Unit Gifting Policy and Nationalist Movements really captures the essence of the Cold War era. I feel totally immersed in the period.
I really like how you’ve implemented the unit building requirements and how many Pro-West cities can only build the basic infantry unit, thereby reinforcing the whole concept for military purchases. The tech tree, choice of buildings and wonders are very apropos and the corresponding graphics simply marvelous.
I really like the concept behind the Non-aligned and Neutral nations and how they can move from one camp to another (case in point, the conversion of Tel Aviv to a pro-western city in 1949, which all of a sudden I had to begin defending initially from the Arab counterattack but since surprisingly from the Europeans)
Of course, in the first ten turn or so, I was simply trying to get my bearing on how the game mechanics and different units worked but I’m slowly starting to get a grasp on things. As such, through my proxies I was able to capture Pyongyang, San Jose, Tunis, Tirana.
I’m not sure why the European powers are at war with the Pro-West nations but as a consequence, I lost Tirana and then Athens because the former kept attacking and destroying all the military equipment I purchased and sent to Tirana thereby allowing the Soviets and Pro-East powers to easily overrun the nation thereafter.
I’m not certain if the capture of Pyongyang was a fortuitous decision, because it 1) helped save South Korea from a certain Soviet and Chinese invasion and 2) may have helped to stabilize my control over China proper for the KMT regime, as only 2 cities have fallen to the CCP to date. It was certainly a risky decision at the time I made it, as I had few troops in the Peninsula but since, I’ve been able to funnel a steady stream of tanks, artillery and fighters into the city through the military purchase program. I also gifted a cruiser and destroyer to Japan to put an end to the constant harassment from soviet vessels that kept attacking and destroying my units in Pusan.
After surviving the initial Arab onslaught, I’ve been more preoccupied trying to survive the repeated European attacks against the city and to date managed to survive only by sending a contingent of armor, artillery, US infantry, early jet fighter and a cruiser and destroyer to the area and gifting them to the pro-Western city, which has allowed me for now to fend off the attacks.
Similarly to Israel, I find myself having to fight off constant European attacks from Hong Kong against my Chinese held city of Guangzhou, which seems odd under the context. I would have thought, like the Americans that the European powers supported the KMT regime. To date, it hasn’t proved to be a major threat but it is pulling resources away from my main struggle against the Chinese Communists.
Overall, this is again a truly first rate scenario and I’m really enjoying the experience to date.
Some Questions:
With regards, the generation of military aircraft by the AI, it’s too early for me to give an account like Tech’s though to date I have been encountering a regular flow of European, Chinese and Soviet early designs.
For my part, I wouldn’t recommend implementing a type of aircraft parity mechanism. I feel it would be too gimmicky and prevent a player, who uses his or her resources wisely to achieve air superiority, as in this case the event file would always artificially re-establish balance.
I think producing a flat rate of aircraft for the AI powers, based on historical production figures, would be much more appropriate and realistic. Of course, it would be useful to know which aircraft the AI produced for which power during any given game to be able to establish that rate. If you are interested, I could create my usual scenario casualties excel sheet once I completed this game which could give you a base line to work with.
In case you are interested, I attached an updated describe.txt file that allows all the units to display correctly in the game Civilopedia.
That’s it for now.
I was finally able to begin playing the scenario this week. I choose to play in Hot Seat mode as the Americans and their Pro-West proxy’s. I’ve reached August 1952 and I have to say, so far, I’m very impressed with what you’ve done here.
The implementation of the Arms Sales, Unit Gifting Policy and Nationalist Movements really captures the essence of the Cold War era. I feel totally immersed in the period.
I really like how you’ve implemented the unit building requirements and how many Pro-West cities can only build the basic infantry unit, thereby reinforcing the whole concept for military purchases. The tech tree, choice of buildings and wonders are very apropos and the corresponding graphics simply marvelous.
I really like the concept behind the Non-aligned and Neutral nations and how they can move from one camp to another (case in point, the conversion of Tel Aviv to a pro-western city in 1949, which all of a sudden I had to begin defending initially from the Arab counterattack but since surprisingly from the Europeans)
Of course, in the first ten turn or so, I was simply trying to get my bearing on how the game mechanics and different units worked but I’m slowly starting to get a grasp on things. As such, through my proxies I was able to capture Pyongyang, San Jose, Tunis, Tirana.
I’m not sure why the European powers are at war with the Pro-West nations but as a consequence, I lost Tirana and then Athens because the former kept attacking and destroying all the military equipment I purchased and sent to Tirana thereby allowing the Soviets and Pro-East powers to easily overrun the nation thereafter.
I’m not certain if the capture of Pyongyang was a fortuitous decision, because it 1) helped save South Korea from a certain Soviet and Chinese invasion and 2) may have helped to stabilize my control over China proper for the KMT regime, as only 2 cities have fallen to the CCP to date. It was certainly a risky decision at the time I made it, as I had few troops in the Peninsula but since, I’ve been able to funnel a steady stream of tanks, artillery and fighters into the city through the military purchase program. I also gifted a cruiser and destroyer to Japan to put an end to the constant harassment from soviet vessels that kept attacking and destroying my units in Pusan.
After surviving the initial Arab onslaught, I’ve been more preoccupied trying to survive the repeated European attacks against the city and to date managed to survive only by sending a contingent of armor, artillery, US infantry, early jet fighter and a cruiser and destroyer to the area and gifting them to the pro-Western city, which has allowed me for now to fend off the attacks.
Similarly to Israel, I find myself having to fight off constant European attacks from Hong Kong against my Chinese held city of Guangzhou, which seems odd under the context. I would have thought, like the Americans that the European powers supported the KMT regime. To date, it hasn’t proved to be a major threat but it is pulling resources away from my main struggle against the Chinese Communists.
Overall, this is again a truly first rate scenario and I’m really enjoying the experience to date.
Some Questions:
- What was the reasoning behind allowing the European power to wage war against the Pro-West nation? It seems counterintuitive and non-historical.
- Why is it more expensive, when I make a military purchase to transport said equipment to Montreal, Toronto or Tokyo, for example, than it is to Tirana or Pyongyang? Shouldn’t it be the reverse? What was the logic behind this?
- Perhaps I’m still too early in the game, but what is the purpose of the SSK submarines? Do they turn into ballistic missile subs once I’ve discovered the SLBM tech?
- I recall asking TNO in the following post whether it was possible for the human player to control more than one nation, as was the case with Fantastic World, but based on his reply at the time, it was never clear to me if the answer was yes or no. If yes, than that would certainly make the usage of the Hot Seat mode obsolete. Does anyone know the answer?
- Consider adding a HELP tab like in OTR or Napoleon to easily access a unit’s stats
- Consider adding a DIPLOMATIC screen, like in Napoleon, that allows you to see your relations with the different powers (we used the F3 key in the situation)
With regards, the generation of military aircraft by the AI, it’s too early for me to give an account like Tech’s though to date I have been encountering a regular flow of European, Chinese and Soviet early designs.
For my part, I wouldn’t recommend implementing a type of aircraft parity mechanism. I feel it would be too gimmicky and prevent a player, who uses his or her resources wisely to achieve air superiority, as in this case the event file would always artificially re-establish balance.
I think producing a flat rate of aircraft for the AI powers, based on historical production figures, would be much more appropriate and realistic. Of course, it would be useful to know which aircraft the AI produced for which power during any given game to be able to establish that rate. If you are interested, I could create my usual scenario casualties excel sheet once I completed this game which could give you a base line to work with.
In case you are interested, I attached an updated describe.txt file that allows all the units to display correctly in the game Civilopedia.
That’s it for now.
Last edited:
tootall_2012
King
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Eisenhower just became President of the United States... I like how you were able to implement the switching of each nations leader names (I remember this was a feature in one of Prof. Garfield's lua lessons). Well done and very nice touch!
EDIT: Another question:
Is there any reason for the U.S. not to grant free technologies to its pro-West proxy through the Gifting Policy feature every chance it can?
EDIT: It's April 1954, and I've just encountered my first set of Soviet and Chinese Mig-15's in Manchuria and near Beijing. I'd better research Jet Fighter II quick or I'm going to get a trouncing in my air battles!
EDIT: Another question:
Is there any reason for the U.S. not to grant free technologies to its pro-West proxy through the Gifting Policy feature every chance it can?
EDIT: It's April 1954, and I've just encountered my first set of Soviet and Chinese Mig-15's in Manchuria and near Beijing. I'd better research Jet Fighter II quick or I'm going to get a trouncing in my air battles!
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tootall_2012
King
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Just a quick update.
It's December 1955 and through a series of Nationalist funded movements and my Pro-Western proxy, I've managed to capture:
Central America: San Salvador, San Jose
North Africa & Lybia: Casablanca, Oran, Algiers, Tunis and Tripoli
Middle East: From Tel Aviv moved on to Damascus and Aleppo and are targeting Iraq next
China: I'm holding on to Beijing and Pyonyang and recaptured Yan'nan and are moving on Sian. The Soviets are putting a lot of pressure around Urumchi which has compelled me to divert significant infantry and air assets to fend of their repeated attacks.
I see it takes a fair amount of planning and preparation to launch a successful operation in any one area (it probably took me close 20 or so turns to finally subdue North Africa), which is very realistic I find. No quick and easy conquest here as there is a lot of resistance from local forces.
Perhaps my only caveat is that it might still be a little too inexpensive for the Pro-Western power to purchase military equipment. Case in point, even at a cost of $800/$1000/$1000 per unit respectively, I still have managed to buy approximately 26 F4U Corsairs, 28 Early Jets and 27 M-26 Perhings within 28 turns.
"The American Dream" wonder has just expired though at this stage I haven't seen a significant impact on the overall happiness of my U.S cities, though I don't have that many units that aren't stationed in my cities. We'll have to see if that changes, particularly if I ever get caught in a hot war.
Quick Note: The EuroInf.wav file appears to be missing from your sound folder, which means the "Western Inf." make no sound when attacking.
EDIT: You should update your PEDIA.txt file with regards the Aqueduct. It still says a city needs an Aqueduct (aka Urban Expansion) to go beyond size 8 when in fact the rules.txt file sets that number at 5:
@;Aqueduct
@PEDIAIMPROVE9
Allows city to increase beyond size 8.
EDIT 2: I noticed you also appear to have successfully implemented the ToTPP Attack per Turn limit feature. As we may recall, it had a bug in version 0.13. So far it seems to work perfectly, which should be great news for any future scenario that wishes to use it. Did you encounter any issues during your own testing?
Sorry, if I'm bombarding you with a whole list of feedback/questions and comments.
It's just easier to write them as they come up, otherwise I might forget some.
It's December 1955 and through a series of Nationalist funded movements and my Pro-Western proxy, I've managed to capture:
Central America: San Salvador, San Jose
North Africa & Lybia: Casablanca, Oran, Algiers, Tunis and Tripoli
Middle East: From Tel Aviv moved on to Damascus and Aleppo and are targeting Iraq next
China: I'm holding on to Beijing and Pyonyang and recaptured Yan'nan and are moving on Sian. The Soviets are putting a lot of pressure around Urumchi which has compelled me to divert significant infantry and air assets to fend of their repeated attacks.
I see it takes a fair amount of planning and preparation to launch a successful operation in any one area (it probably took me close 20 or so turns to finally subdue North Africa), which is very realistic I find. No quick and easy conquest here as there is a lot of resistance from local forces.
Perhaps my only caveat is that it might still be a little too inexpensive for the Pro-Western power to purchase military equipment. Case in point, even at a cost of $800/$1000/$1000 per unit respectively, I still have managed to buy approximately 26 F4U Corsairs, 28 Early Jets and 27 M-26 Perhings within 28 turns.
"The American Dream" wonder has just expired though at this stage I haven't seen a significant impact on the overall happiness of my U.S cities, though I don't have that many units that aren't stationed in my cities. We'll have to see if that changes, particularly if I ever get caught in a hot war.
Quick Note: The EuroInf.wav file appears to be missing from your sound folder, which means the "Western Inf." make no sound when attacking.
EDIT: You should update your PEDIA.txt file with regards the Aqueduct. It still says a city needs an Aqueduct (aka Urban Expansion) to go beyond size 8 when in fact the rules.txt file sets that number at 5:
@;Aqueduct
@PEDIAIMPROVE9
Allows city to increase beyond size 8.
EDIT 2: I noticed you also appear to have successfully implemented the ToTPP Attack per Turn limit feature. As we may recall, it had a bug in version 0.13. So far it seems to work perfectly, which should be great news for any future scenario that wishes to use it. Did you encounter any issues during your own testing?
Sorry, if I'm bombarding you with a whole list of feedback/questions and comments.
It's just easier to write them as they come up, otherwise I might forget some.
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I think the point is that while Europe and America both oppose the Soviet Union, that doesn't mean their interests are aligned everywhere. Europe wants to maintain its colonies, while America prefers decolonialization and influencing the newly independent nations. Hence, the Americans would like to have the Pro West tribe take over colonies, and Europe has to be at war with the Pro West for this to happen. I guess this is a bit of a problem with having only one proxy civ, since Pro West represents two somewhat different groups of nations. The first group are the 2nd tier Western Aligned countries that don't exert a lot of 'overseas influence,' like Canada, Australia, and Nationalist China, and so don't belong in the European or American civ. In principle, Europe should support these pro west governments. On the other hand, there are independence movements which are also anti-communist, and while Europe might prefer that they be pro west instead of pro east, the European interest is first and foremost to hold onto these as colonies.
Maybe this distinction could be made by transferring ownership of certain Pro West cities and units to the Americans during the European turn. I don't have any other ideas at the moment about how to address this.
techumseh
Deity
This is also something I've been puzzling about. Canada, Australia and Japan are three countries, part of the western alliance, that wouldn't be at war with the Soviets or the Chinese, unless a general war breaks out. Two solutions I've considered are: a) make them part of the European civilization, or b) don't allow the Pro-west to attack the Europeans, but re-set the events to strengthen Non-aligned, Pro-east and Neutral attacks on European colonies and trigger Pro-west attacks against former colonies liberated by those civs.
Of these, I much prefer the second. It's true that the US did not support the colonial empires of the European powers, and wanted to displace them with their own "independent" neo-colonial regimes. But they did support them when communism was the alternative, eg. French Indochina. I'm not aware of any instances when the US supported direct intervention against European colonies battling independence movements. Once independence was achieved, it was another matter.
I agree with Tootall about a Diplomatic screen. It would be good to know the relationship between any two civs. It would also be good to know the possible consequences of attacking any particular country. A pop-up in the course of the game isn't good enough, IMHO. In order to plan long term strategy, the player should be able to access relevant information at any time. All countries maintained an intelligence service and a diplomatic corps to provide key strategic information to the top leadership. Players acting in their place should not have to guess or have numerous do-overs to learn the diplomatic realities of their world.
Of these, I much prefer the second. It's true that the US did not support the colonial empires of the European powers, and wanted to displace them with their own "independent" neo-colonial regimes. But they did support them when communism was the alternative, eg. French Indochina. I'm not aware of any instances when the US supported direct intervention against European colonies battling independence movements. Once independence was achieved, it was another matter.
I agree with Tootall about a Diplomatic screen. It would be good to know the relationship between any two civs. It would also be good to know the possible consequences of attacking any particular country. A pop-up in the course of the game isn't good enough, IMHO. In order to plan long term strategy, the player should be able to access relevant information at any time. All countries maintained an intelligence service and a diplomatic corps to provide key strategic information to the top leadership. Players acting in their place should not have to guess or have numerous do-overs to learn the diplomatic realities of their world.
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Sorry I've been a bit delayed. Time is short in the age of remote learning Kindergarten! I'm glad you two are enjoying this and you're giving me great feedback with things I need to tweak (as well as reinforcing that some things are working, so thank you)!
-I tend to agree with you on this one. I was considering raising the production cost of western units, which would also address this. Really, I'm concerned that the Pro-West SP (and eventual MP) game will be too easy.
-I was surprised myself. I thought it would only work for the first 80 units, but so far, so good. I have everything set at "2" so I don't know if that has anything to do with it (meaning, would it still work if they all had different values?) Anyway, if TNO quietly fixed it and forgot to tell anyone, that would be a good development as it is a cool feature.
I'll address these next three as a group:
So, like Garfield alluded to, the Pro-West doesn't mean "American Puppet." It does mean "nationalist / quasi-democratic / not-openly-Communist." Consider all the groups out there that tried to overthrow their European overlords during this time period, but also were inspired more by the American Revolution than the Communist one. In SP, currently, this can produce some odd effects (though I have an idea for how to fix that), but in MP, I think it will work quite well and as intended, at least once I get the Soviets balanced right (which I'm not sure is currently the case). The reason being, ideally, the European and American players will want to work together against the Soviet and Chinese players, as the two of them are quite powerful. I think that, naturally, you'll have a situation where these crazy events (like Hong Kong raiding the mainland) simply won't happen, because as much as I will say "treat the proxies like a different nation," we all know darn well that it's human nature that if the Pro-West civ starts attacking America's ally, Europe, it's going to cause bad blood.
In the SP game, what I suppose could be done is to just make the Pro-West and Europeans at peace with each other unless Europe and America are at war with each other, in which case all bets are off. I think this would solve most of the issues at a keystroke. That won't necessarily solve the dillema of "would all these Pro-West countries really take America's side in a conflict?" but, with 7 civs, we're going to need to cut a corner here and there
I would also need to tweak the pro-west rebel event in the game to ensure the city they're rebelling against isn't European, unless Europe and America are at war, but it's fixable, anyway.
-This is the international dateline at work. Prof. Garfield posted a fix here or in the development thread that I haven't gotten around to changing yet. I can't remember the specifics off hand but I think the game thinks the map is flat even though it is round. It should be an easy fix for the next release.
-It's an attack sub. The subs in general are of... shall we say... marginal use in the SP game. In the MP game, the SSBN's are quite deadly and you'll want to keep faster, SSK's on hand that can chase them down under water and destroy them.
-Sure.
-I'll have to remind myself what you two did but having some sort of diplomatic screen has been asked for often by you and Tech and I'll accommodate it somehow. I don't know why I can't get everyone to just have an embassy - I'm wondering if the diplomacy model is preventing it (does setting different diplomatic states wipe the embassy?)
-Flat rate works, historical production figures is kind of thrown out considering the human isn't producing according to history. If the Allies never built a B-17, would the Germans have built so many Fw190s?
-Awesome, thank you!
-I don't think most of them will do them much good, but this isn't an issue I've really thought about until now. There aren't many technologies that are giftable in the game to start.
-I tend to agree with you on this one. I was considering raising the production cost of western units, which would also address this. Really, I'm concerned that the Pro-West SP (and eventual MP) game will be too easy.
-I was surprised myself. I thought it would only work for the first 80 units, but so far, so good. I have everything set at "2" so I don't know if that has anything to do with it (meaning, would it still work if they all had different values?) Anyway, if TNO quietly fixed it and forgot to tell anyone, that would be a good development as it is a cool feature.
I'll address these next three as a group:
So, like Garfield alluded to, the Pro-West doesn't mean "American Puppet." It does mean "nationalist / quasi-democratic / not-openly-Communist." Consider all the groups out there that tried to overthrow their European overlords during this time period, but also were inspired more by the American Revolution than the Communist one. In SP, currently, this can produce some odd effects (though I have an idea for how to fix that), but in MP, I think it will work quite well and as intended, at least once I get the Soviets balanced right (which I'm not sure is currently the case). The reason being, ideally, the European and American players will want to work together against the Soviet and Chinese players, as the two of them are quite powerful. I think that, naturally, you'll have a situation where these crazy events (like Hong Kong raiding the mainland) simply won't happen, because as much as I will say "treat the proxies like a different nation," we all know darn well that it's human nature that if the Pro-West civ starts attacking America's ally, Europe, it's going to cause bad blood.
In the SP game, what I suppose could be done is to just make the Pro-West and Europeans at peace with each other unless Europe and America are at war with each other, in which case all bets are off. I think this would solve most of the issues at a keystroke. That won't necessarily solve the dillema of "would all these Pro-West countries really take America's side in a conflict?" but, with 7 civs, we're going to need to cut a corner here and there
I would also need to tweak the pro-west rebel event in the game to ensure the city they're rebelling against isn't European, unless Europe and America are at war, but it's fixable, anyway.
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One thing that the two of you (and anyone else playing) could do that would really help me out would be to, at some point, start up a MP game (with the MP events) with yourself playing the Soviets, US, and Europe at least, and then try and see if, as one of the two sides, you can completely conquer Europe, or reach the Urals, with ridiculous ease, or not. I don't need you to play full games, but I just want to make sure that I haven't built a scenario here where all one side has to do is immediately attack the other and "win" within 5 turns.
@techumseh I'm also quite interested to see how your Soviet game is coming along as I'm curious how you feel the unit pricing is, in particular. See Tootall's comment about the western units above. I doubt you've been able to purchase quite as many because the east is poorer, but I'm interested to see how that balances. The Soviets do get cheaper rebellions but perhaps it needs to be cheaper still to counter the west's economic advantages?
@techumseh I'm also quite interested to see how your Soviet game is coming along as I'm curious how you feel the unit pricing is, in particular. See Tootall's comment about the western units above. I doubt you've been able to purchase quite as many because the east is poorer, but I'm interested to see how that balances. The Soviets do get cheaper rebellions but perhaps it needs to be cheaper still to counter the west's economic advantages?
techumseh
Deity
As Soviet player, I got into a war with Europe and the US on the second or third turn. It was not pre-planned, but I did manage to take all the German cities, as I mentioned. There I stalled, and after a couple more turns, the western powers had seriously eroded my strength. While able to produce plenty of good units, I was unable to get them to the front in time to be effective, so I decided to terminate the game at that point. If it's that tough fighting the west in Europe when they are represented by the AI, it would be very difficult against a human player. It might be different if the Soviets built up their forces for a number of turns and then launched a carefully planned attack.
I was also suddenly attacked by China, with units I had just gifted them. I'm not clear at all how the relationship between the Soviets and the Chinese changes. The chance to break that alliance did not present itself in either my Soviet MP or my Chinese SP game, though perhaps it was to early in both games. Still, it might be something for the Diplomatic screen if you go that way.
I found the costs for the Pro-east to purchase Soviet equipment to be fairly high. I did buy some, but found it much easier and cheaper to have the Soviets move one or more stacks of units to the desired location and just gift them. This will be a key strategy in my next game. Can't attack neutrals? Jut move a couple of stacks of T-34s and Katyushas next to the target city and transfer them to the Pro-east. This will be increasingly effective and far ranging as I build up my freighter fleet. And f you want to take a city from the Pro-East or the Non-aligned for yourself, just move a stack of good units next to the target city and gift it to the Pro-west. Once they take the city, the Soviets can counterattack and capture it for themselves.
Even though I was at war with the US in both games, there was no nuclear involvement. I see that researching "Hydrogen Bomb" allows a nuke to be generated by a key stroke with a strategic bomber unit. How is this handled for AI civs?
I've started another Soviet game, just SP this time. I think having direct control over your proxy is pretty unrealistic. As you've mentioned, Pro-west does not mean American puppet. I think the same was true of the various national liberation movements of the Pro-east. It's more challenging to try to manage a proxy that has it's own mind.
I have made the movement changes I suggested earlier, and can say that I think it works great. Ground units now have realistic strategic mobility. I don't know how much this will alter the game balance, but I suspect that the "balance" is pretty much unknown at this stage of development anyway. I've also given attack subs the 'sub' flag to prevent attacks on land units, until you come up with a permanent solution. I'm attaching the modified Rules file for your information.
I was also suddenly attacked by China, with units I had just gifted them. I'm not clear at all how the relationship between the Soviets and the Chinese changes. The chance to break that alliance did not present itself in either my Soviet MP or my Chinese SP game, though perhaps it was to early in both games. Still, it might be something for the Diplomatic screen if you go that way.
I found the costs for the Pro-east to purchase Soviet equipment to be fairly high. I did buy some, but found it much easier and cheaper to have the Soviets move one or more stacks of units to the desired location and just gift them. This will be a key strategy in my next game. Can't attack neutrals? Jut move a couple of stacks of T-34s and Katyushas next to the target city and transfer them to the Pro-east. This will be increasingly effective and far ranging as I build up my freighter fleet. And f you want to take a city from the Pro-East or the Non-aligned for yourself, just move a stack of good units next to the target city and gift it to the Pro-west. Once they take the city, the Soviets can counterattack and capture it for themselves.
Even though I was at war with the US in both games, there was no nuclear involvement. I see that researching "Hydrogen Bomb" allows a nuke to be generated by a key stroke with a strategic bomber unit. How is this handled for AI civs?
I've started another Soviet game, just SP this time. I think having direct control over your proxy is pretty unrealistic. As you've mentioned, Pro-west does not mean American puppet. I think the same was true of the various national liberation movements of the Pro-east. It's more challenging to try to manage a proxy that has it's own mind.
I have made the movement changes I suggested earlier, and can say that I think it works great. Ground units now have realistic strategic mobility. I don't know how much this will alter the game balance, but I suspect that the "balance" is pretty much unknown at this stage of development anyway. I've also given attack subs the 'sub' flag to prevent attacks on land units, until you come up with a permanent solution. I'm attaching the modified Rules file for your information.
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Some of your feedback is concerning to me because it shouldn't be possible and in fact when I test on my own games, it isn't possible. I know there was a flurry of updates earlier and I'm not sure you have all of them?
Unless this is fairly late game this shouldn't happen - how soon did this occur?
You shouldn't be able to do this. You should only be able to gift units that are in cities with certain improvements. Are you telling me that you can gift a unit that is anywhere on the map, and it works?
It isn't, at this point anyway. Right now, the AI simply uses the strat bombers as a heavy attack aircraft.
An option to fix this is if the AI has the bomber activated and they have the hydrogen bomb tech, then then attack rating changes to 99. I'm not 100% certain if the AI will use their regular nuclear behavior (I believe they typically don't use nukes unless one is used against them, but this is just something I've "heard" and I don't know if it is true) but no idea what changing the rating "on the fly" will do to this.
This is certainly an option but I am interested to see if you find it a fun one - I think it could be, but probably not in a MP game where everyone else has "something to do" and the US and Soviets have to rely on the AI for most everything.
Unless this is fairly late game this shouldn't happen - how soon did this occur?
You shouldn't be able to do this. You should only be able to gift units that are in cities with certain improvements. Are you telling me that you can gift a unit that is anywhere on the map, and it works?
It isn't, at this point anyway. Right now, the AI simply uses the strat bombers as a heavy attack aircraft.
An option to fix this is if the AI has the bomber activated and they have the hydrogen bomb tech, then then attack rating changes to 99. I'm not 100% certain if the AI will use their regular nuclear behavior (I believe they typically don't use nukes unless one is used against them, but this is just something I've "heard" and I don't know if it is true) but no idea what changing the rating "on the fly" will do to this.
This is certainly an option but I am interested to see if you find it a fun one - I think it could be, but probably not in a MP game where everyone else has "something to do" and the US and Soviets have to rely on the AI for most everything.
techumseh
Deity
Is there a place where they're all compiled, so I don't miss any?
August, 1950.
Yes it does. You mean I'm not allowed? Damn, back to the drawing board!
Btw. how do you gift a unit that's in your own city? How do you get it to the receiving civ's territory?I can see that. If I can't gift units freely, playing the Soviets SP will be less fun. As it was, I'd already gobbled up Turkey and Syria, and planning the proxy conquest of Iran and Egypt.
tootall_2012
King
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Here is the latest update.
It's December 1957 and through my continued support of Nationalist movements and Pro-Western proxy actions, I've managed to capture:
Central America: continue to hold on to San Salvador, San Jose
Caribbean: After landing an American Infantry and Artillery unit on Haiti, which I gifted to the Pro-West, I was finally able to capture Port-au-Prince. Cuba, on the other hand, is fully garrisoned from east to west and therefore any invasion there will require much more preparation.
North Africa & Libya: Casablanca, Oran, Algiers, Tunis, Tripoli remain under my control and I find myself at the Egyptian doorstep after conquering Benghazi.
Middle East: After controlling Tel Aviv, Damascus and Aleppo I was able to make much quicker progress in Iraq, than I did in North Africa, and have managed to capture Mosul, Baghdad, Basra and Kuwait in roughly three years. I’m not saying it was without opposition but given the shorter distances and stronger deployment of American gifted units it made the conquest simpler.
After some consideration, I decided I will strike south into the Arabian Peninsula and its rich oil fields, as I fear going into Iran will bring me into more direct contact with Soviet forces and I’m not certain I can quite handle them yet.
China: After recapturing Yan'nan (and the People’s Liberation Army wonder), I was able to launch operations and capture both Sian and Shenyang, which leaves the Chinese Communists with just 3 cities in northern Mandchuria.
The Soviets have continued their operations against Urumchi and are bleeding my forces as a consequence (I’m losing on average 3-4 ‘N. Asian Nat’ units per turn to these attacks, but since I still control the majority of Chinese cities I can still relatively easily replace them). They even managed to capture it for a turn with the help of pro-eastern Mujahedeen but fortunately I was able to immediately launch a counter-attack with ground and air assets that had just deployed in Hami and retake it the very next turn. It continues to be touch and go in that sector.
I’m not certain this was your intent but since I captured Yan’nan and the People’s Liberation Army wonder ALL my Pro-West ground units built now receive the Veteran status along with ANY unit which wins a battle. I feel this tends to tip the balance too much in the West’s favor and as such I would recommend you make the wonder obsolete whenever the KMT capture the city (and perhaps re-activate it the CCP recaptures it).
In essence, to date America’s role has been primarily limited to funding the Nationalist Movements and serving to bolster local Pro-Western nations by gifting them ground, air and naval units (probably around two dozen such units overall), though I have been operating a carrier group in the Mediterranean that has helped to dispatch many pro-Eastern units in North Africa and Libya.
The Western proxy’s forces have been, as you intended, the spearhead for bringing into the western ‘fold’ all these ‘wayward’ nations who previously had failed to see the glory of our way of life.
But as I indicated previously, my main concern here resides in the military purchasing program. Not the concept itself, which I find brilliant, but the ease with which it is to buy them. Case in point, despite all my expenditures to date on these weapons, the Pro-West is currently swimming in capital with a reserve of over $43,000 (twice as much as the US by the way). The Pro-West can basically buy anything they want now (and I’ve been purposely limiting their purchases not to break the balance of power too much).
I think this is probably due to a number of factors: 1) in part to the fact that this power is operating under the Fundamentalist government and therefore, gets extra tithes for all happiness improvements and since it never has to deal with unhappiness can convert all its extra citizens to taxmen, 2) given the large distance between cities that the Freight payoffs are often quite substantial (many times between $1200 to $1800) and 3) I also received some pretty large payoffs for capturing Chinese (over $3000 for Yan’nan) and even European cities.
This in my view causes a great imbalance. As we know, after WWII, the United States was by far the wealthiest nation and the world’s creditor. Most other nations were too a large extent impoverished and heavily dependent on American aid. I can understand why you chose the Fundamentalist government for the Pro-West, not to have to support each unit like under the Republic, but I feel the financial burden for the West should lay primarily with the U.S., i.e. that it should not only be responsible for funding the Nationalist movements but gifting the financial aid to its proxy for it to be able to purchase the weapons. I’m not certain exactly how but I think it’s worth thinking about adding a mechanism to curtail the Pro-West power’s ability to generate revenue (for example, instead of giving the Freight unit capability to them, give it to the U.S. instead).
With regards the European powers ability to wage war on the Pro-Western nation, I understand the argument you put forward. Too be honest, since I’ve been going deeper into the game, I’ve come to realize that from the human U.S./Pro-West player’s perspective at least, that though perhaps somewhat unhistorical, that it does provide an extra level of challenge that might not have existed otherwise. I'm sure there can be some further refinement done but I think overall it was the correct decision.
Besides China, and Greece as I indicated previously, I haven't detected much Soviet activity elsewhere. It's hard to say for sure as it's a large map. I'll be interested to have a go at the Soviet side to see what kind of mischief you can create with them.
That's it for now.
EDIT: Just as final note for today, my earlier comments about the consequences of losing the effects of "The American Dream", turned out to be somewhat mistaken as I see that more of my cities had begun to display a greater number of unhappy citizens. Nowhere near having any of them go into unrest but sufficient enough that I've felt the need to rebuild, at least, the Police Stations (aka Temples) and Government Offices (Colosseum) in many of them.
It's December 1957 and through my continued support of Nationalist movements and Pro-Western proxy actions, I've managed to capture:
Central America: continue to hold on to San Salvador, San Jose
Caribbean: After landing an American Infantry and Artillery unit on Haiti, which I gifted to the Pro-West, I was finally able to capture Port-au-Prince. Cuba, on the other hand, is fully garrisoned from east to west and therefore any invasion there will require much more preparation.
North Africa & Libya: Casablanca, Oran, Algiers, Tunis, Tripoli remain under my control and I find myself at the Egyptian doorstep after conquering Benghazi.
Middle East: After controlling Tel Aviv, Damascus and Aleppo I was able to make much quicker progress in Iraq, than I did in North Africa, and have managed to capture Mosul, Baghdad, Basra and Kuwait in roughly three years. I’m not saying it was without opposition but given the shorter distances and stronger deployment of American gifted units it made the conquest simpler.
After some consideration, I decided I will strike south into the Arabian Peninsula and its rich oil fields, as I fear going into Iran will bring me into more direct contact with Soviet forces and I’m not certain I can quite handle them yet.
China: After recapturing Yan'nan (and the People’s Liberation Army wonder), I was able to launch operations and capture both Sian and Shenyang, which leaves the Chinese Communists with just 3 cities in northern Mandchuria.
The Soviets have continued their operations against Urumchi and are bleeding my forces as a consequence (I’m losing on average 3-4 ‘N. Asian Nat’ units per turn to these attacks, but since I still control the majority of Chinese cities I can still relatively easily replace them). They even managed to capture it for a turn with the help of pro-eastern Mujahedeen but fortunately I was able to immediately launch a counter-attack with ground and air assets that had just deployed in Hami and retake it the very next turn. It continues to be touch and go in that sector.
I’m not certain this was your intent but since I captured Yan’nan and the People’s Liberation Army wonder ALL my Pro-West ground units built now receive the Veteran status along with ANY unit which wins a battle. I feel this tends to tip the balance too much in the West’s favor and as such I would recommend you make the wonder obsolete whenever the KMT capture the city (and perhaps re-activate it the CCP recaptures it).
In essence, to date America’s role has been primarily limited to funding the Nationalist Movements and serving to bolster local Pro-Western nations by gifting them ground, air and naval units (probably around two dozen such units overall), though I have been operating a carrier group in the Mediterranean that has helped to dispatch many pro-Eastern units in North Africa and Libya.
The Western proxy’s forces have been, as you intended, the spearhead for bringing into the western ‘fold’ all these ‘wayward’ nations who previously had failed to see the glory of our way of life.
But as I indicated previously, my main concern here resides in the military purchasing program. Not the concept itself, which I find brilliant, but the ease with which it is to buy them. Case in point, despite all my expenditures to date on these weapons, the Pro-West is currently swimming in capital with a reserve of over $43,000 (twice as much as the US by the way). The Pro-West can basically buy anything they want now (and I’ve been purposely limiting their purchases not to break the balance of power too much).
I think this is probably due to a number of factors: 1) in part to the fact that this power is operating under the Fundamentalist government and therefore, gets extra tithes for all happiness improvements and since it never has to deal with unhappiness can convert all its extra citizens to taxmen, 2) given the large distance between cities that the Freight payoffs are often quite substantial (many times between $1200 to $1800) and 3) I also received some pretty large payoffs for capturing Chinese (over $3000 for Yan’nan) and even European cities.
This in my view causes a great imbalance. As we know, after WWII, the United States was by far the wealthiest nation and the world’s creditor. Most other nations were too a large extent impoverished and heavily dependent on American aid. I can understand why you chose the Fundamentalist government for the Pro-West, not to have to support each unit like under the Republic, but I feel the financial burden for the West should lay primarily with the U.S., i.e. that it should not only be responsible for funding the Nationalist movements but gifting the financial aid to its proxy for it to be able to purchase the weapons. I’m not certain exactly how but I think it’s worth thinking about adding a mechanism to curtail the Pro-West power’s ability to generate revenue (for example, instead of giving the Freight unit capability to them, give it to the U.S. instead).
With regards the European powers ability to wage war on the Pro-Western nation, I understand the argument you put forward. Too be honest, since I’ve been going deeper into the game, I’ve come to realize that from the human U.S./Pro-West player’s perspective at least, that though perhaps somewhat unhistorical, that it does provide an extra level of challenge that might not have existed otherwise. I'm sure there can be some further refinement done but I think overall it was the correct decision.
Besides China, and Greece as I indicated previously, I haven't detected much Soviet activity elsewhere. It's hard to say for sure as it's a large map. I'll be interested to have a go at the Soviet side to see what kind of mischief you can create with them.
That's it for now.
EDIT: Just as final note for today, my earlier comments about the consequences of losing the effects of "The American Dream", turned out to be somewhat mistaken as I see that more of my cities had begun to display a greater number of unhappy citizens. Nowhere near having any of them go into unrest but sufficient enough that I've felt the need to rebuild, at least, the Police Stations (aka Temples) and Government Offices (Colosseum) in many of them.
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The Soviets get some of that money, and there is a menu for the soviets to adjust prices. When Pro East (or anyone else) buys a unit, some of the money goes to pay the "cost" of the unit, and the rest goes to the Soviet treasury. When I wrote the code, I just used 4 gold per shield and 3% of selling price as cost, but JPetroski should be able to change that rather easily (@JPetroski if you need help with that, ask).
Yes it does. You mean I'm not allowed? Damn, back to the drawing board!
There are two 'gifting' mechanisms for units, here. One is to gift a single unit on a tile. This must be done in a city with certain improvements, and immediately transports the unit to a destination city for a cost. This can also be used to deploy units within your own empire.
@JPetroski can limit what units can be given by changing the function
Code:
canGiveUnitFnThe other is to 'surrender' all units (and the city, if there) on a tile. This is 'free', but the units stay where they are.
@JPetroski can limit what units (or cities) can be given away in this way by changing the function
Code:
canGiveTileFn
Code:
canReceiveTileFnI don't think the international date line applies to this question. Tootall_2012 is asking about purchasing units, not gifting/transporting them. For purchasing units, the sample cost I provided was free transportation if the city has a certain improvement (international port), and 500 if the city has the can build coastal flag (the idea being that you can unload tanks onto a beach if you really have to, but it will be more expensive than unloading them in a proper port). This can be changed in the
Code:
cityCanReceivePurchasedUniThe sample costs that I've provided with the code I wrote, I chose for testing purposes, and the only other consideration was that they were not completely insane for the situation. If you need help changing them, let me know.
techumseh
Deity
Thanks PG. I will await John's decision on gifting units in place. I have to say, it's a very powerful tool.
Re: selling units. The dialog box allows you to increase the cost of a unit, but not lower it.
Re: selling units. The dialog box allows you to increase the cost of a unit, but not lower it.
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It's absolutely out I just checked and I see you must be using "give all units on this tile." I never double checked that and thought I had corrected it via the "give a unit on this tile" one. So at least that solves the mystery. Thanks @Prof. Garfield
I just checked and I see you must be using "give all units on this tile." I never double checked that and thought I had corrected it via the "give a unit on this tile" one. So at least that solves the mystery. Thanks @Prof. GarfieldThat means the selling price is already pretty close to the default 'cost' of 4 gold per shield. (The default lowest price was 5 gold per shield, IIRC, the proceeds going to the seller's treasury.) I suppose the units are expensive compared to using spare production or incremental rush buying if you can rush a single row at a time. On the other hand, purchased units don't use up a turn of production in a city with special buildings, so being a bit more expensive is probably justified. You will still be able to give away units to the pro east through unit gifting.
tootall_2012
King
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Ah, thanks for the tip. I wan't aware that you could gift units located in tiles with International Ports. I'd always used the 'surrender' method to date, i.e. transport my ground or move my naval units to a tile near a friendly pro-west city and gift it to them there.
Yes, Prof. Garfield is correct. I was referring to purchasing units through the International Arms Market program (key '5').
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