The Great Library Mod

[Watiggi]

I am interested in making a mod for the Great Library. This mod would be an addition to the current Great Library and would add another interesting dynamic, much like religion does (but smaller in effect). The idea is to allow the Great Library to be a place of learning, where people can go to learn and exchange knowledge. I’ll put it in game terms:

When civs discover Literature and someone builds the Great Library, a unit becomes available to all who have Literature except the builder of the Great Library. This unit is built by the other civs and is sent to the city with the Great Library to exchange research with them. The owner of the unit will receive an immediate, once off amount of research whereas the owner of the Great Library will receive one research beaker per turn for each unit that has ‘learned’ there (so it will accumulate, much like a Shrined Holy City).

The unit for all intensive purposes behaves much like the missionary (there can be only three of them built at any one time per civ and they go to another city to perform a function). The unit then goes to the Great Library and ‘learns’ (much the same way as a missionary spreads their religion).

When this unit learns, the civ that made the unit gets some research. The research they get is given immediately. The amount they get is not much but should be enough to entice people (and the AI) to want to do it and do it frequently, but at the same time, not give the civ a big research advantage. It should have a sense of balance about it, whereby the hassle to build it/send it away equals what you get for it, but in amounts that encourages the civ to do it (it is free beakers after all). Distance should be irrelevent. The further away the civ is (and thus have longer to travel), the more research you get for each ‘learning’. Civs closer to the Great Library don’t receive as much, but make up for it by being able to make more of these units because they travel less distance. The two extremes in distance should ultimately result in the same net amount of research. The difficulty in dealing with barbarians/enemies over long distances need to be factored in. So the research received may be more favourable towards civs with a long distance to travel (so as to entice them to deal with the hassel of escorting them, etc).

For the civ that has the Great Library, they cannot make the unit. Instead, the Great Library gets one research beaker per turn for every unit that ‘learns’ from their city (much the same way a Shrined Holy City gets one gold per turn per their religion in a city). The Great Library will still maintain it’s original function and it will obsolete as normal. However after the Great Library is obsolete, units will still be able to learn from the Great Library and the research accumulated will still be in effect. As techs gets more and more expensive, the advantage of making these units may or may not loose its appeal, depending on the civ in question on whether they need the research or not. In that way, it becoming obsolete would be of a more natural thing as opposed to a pre-defined tech.

The civ that has the Great Library doesn’t have to do anything to increase the research. They get less but it accumulates over time. It is a longterm strategy. Unlike civs who do not have the Great Library, the accumulated research can also be increased with other improvements like the Library and the University.

The other civs get more research up front, but they have to put in time, effort, energy and initiative into making and sending the units out in order to get this upfront research. The AI has to know of the scientific value of this unit and know how to use it.

It should be balanced and be like an addition to the game, much like religion is, but not be a requirement to win, nor should it give the civs (any or all) an unfair advantage; it should just make it an interesting dynamic, much like religion is.

Your thoughts?

I am not a modder myself, but I am interested in making this mod. If this interests you, let me know.

Watiggi

 

[Watiggi]

Current status: not yet started.

I am in need of some people who can do the coding.

 

[Watiggi]

Is no one interested in this idea! Wow, I'm surprised. I thought that this would be a nice addition to the current game and that people, including modders would want to have it made.

Why doesn't this idea interest you?

 

[Agent 009]

I like this idea but as it is it would be a bit unbalanced. What could be changed to balance it out would be the bonus given to the civ that built it.

For example: Instead of just the +1 beaker per turn received, the owner of the Great Library also gets some commerce and even perhaps some research done to the tech they are currently researching.

The way you have described it wouldn't be balanced for this reason:

Let's say for arguements sake that there are 3 players. 1 human 2 AI. both AI have built their max amount of this new unit and sent it the great library. Let's say the amount of RP received is based on a percent of the tech they are researching. No matter what, the owner of the great library receives the + 1 beaker per turn/use/unit and is cumulative, it still will be drastically less than what the opposing side is receiving. i.e. Tech total points is 100 on both sides. Ordering the units to learn would gain let's say 10%. That's 10 pts per unit. 30 total for each side. 60 total for both sides combined. The owner of the Great library as you say would only get +6 beakers... The following turn the owner is now getting +12 beakers and the to AI would have received a total of 120 pts. Not at all fair. See my point?

It is a good idea it just needs refining. However, there is one other problem. How would this get programmed in? I know it cannot be done with just the XML. So, that would leave at best python as well, and at worst the SDK. That's a lot of work for something like this which leads me to believe there are not likely going to be many ppl willing to take on this as a project.

Perhaps I am wrong as I do think it is a good idea but unfortunately, I couldn't do this myself as I lack the programming knowledge neccesary to complete such a task.

 

[Watiggi]

Thanks for commenting on it Agent 009 (feel like I am in a movie ). I appreciate the points you have made.

I have been pondering on the calculations to see if they are out of balance or not. I think you’ll find that they are deceptively balanced or at the very least, are close enough for the mod to be made and then tweaked. I was aiming at more of a constant amount of beakers returned instead of a percentage of tech so for an example it could return 50-100 beakers per learning. I am going to make the calculations based on 75 beakers returned for each ‘learning’. Let’s say that it takes 8 turns to make the 3 units (which is the limit at any one time) and gets them there and learns (so turn 0, you start bulding them; turn 7 they ‘learn’ in the Great Library, thus receiving the beakers). This is based on a civ that is close by, so a civ that is further away would get more, but it would be balanced out so that it wont be any more advantagous.

Now, 3 units are going to produce 75 beakers totalling 225 beakers. This amount is made within a total time frame of 8 turns (remember it’s limited to three in-game units at a time – much like the missionary). 225 / 8 = 28 beakers per turn. The Great Library would have to be making 28 beakers per turn for it to match that. If reality is any slower so that 3 units takes more than 8 turns to build and travel time, which is a strong possibility, then the owner of the Great Library wins out as it will still be producing beakers during those turns. In other words, if it took 12 turns to build and send them to learn, then it would get 225 beakers over 12 turns which would equal 225 / 12 = 19 beakers per turn. The question is, can the Great Library equal or exceed that amount of beakers?

First of all, you have to remember that if there are 3 other civs, then 3 of them may be adding to the Great Library. If this is true, then the Great Library beakers per turn will grow while some civs don’t learn from there (and thus don’t get any research from it while the Great Library grows). The net effect is that the amounts will be distributed over these 3 civs (in a ratio based on who goes to learn from the Great Library), while the Great Library grows in beaker count.

**I was wanting to include a running example where I had the figures laid out in a table showing how they progressed over a period of turns. Unfortunately the editor isn’t tab friendly (or I am not editor friendly) so it didn’t come out to well and was hard to read. So I will summarise the results instead.**

The assumptions I made:

*4 Civs, 3 of them (Civ A, B and C) build the unit, the other (GL Civ) owns the Great Library.
*75 beakers given per ‘learning’.
*The Great Library gets +1 beakers per turn from each ‘learning’.
*It takes 8 turns to build and send 3 units to the Great Library.
*Every 8 turns, 9 units are made and sent to the Great Library, 3 from each of the 3 civs.
*A max limit of 3 units at any one time can be made by a civ (just like the missionary).
*The end of the 8 turns is when all the units learn. So the GL Civ will only get an additional 9 beakers that turn, on top of the normal amount (the 9 beakers comes from the 9 new units ‘learning&#8217. It is assumed that all 9 units learn at the same time
*Civ A, B and C continually build and send units. If they do not, the Great Library still generates beakers anyway while Civ A, B and C do not – so the GL Civ will win out.


After turn 8, Civ A, B and C have 225 beakers each. GL Civ has a total of 9 beakers.
After turn 24, Civ A, B and C have a total of 675 beakers each. GL Civ has a total of 243 beakers.
After turn 48, Civ A, B and C have a total of 1350. GL Civ has a total of 1126.
After turn 80, Civ A, B and C have a total of 2250. GL Civ has a total of 3290.

After turn 80, the Great Library is producing 649 beakers every 8 turns or 81 beakers per turn, whereas the other civs will be producing 225 beakers every 8 turns or 28 beaker per turn. Off course this requires the civs to continually build 3 units, send them over and learn every 8 turns (which may actually be a reality or it may not). The longer it takes to build/send them, or the less frequently they do it, the more advantagous the Great Library is as it gets beakers per turn anyway. If Civ A, B and C keep producing units, as you can see the GL civ will come out on top. This isn’t factoring in the Library, University, Oxford University, etc, bonuses either as it could triple the amount.

I have made similar comparisions if Civ A, B and C takes 12 turns to build and send 3 units each over to the Great Library. Results favor the owner of the Great Library as after turn 84, GL Civ has a total of 2298 beakers whereas Civ A, B and C has only brought in 1575 beakers in total from the deal.

I have even altered the amount Civ A, B and C get from each learning to 150 and it is still acceptable. Unfortunately numbers are numbers and testing / experimenting with a real game model will shed more light on the gameplay side of it. If they got 150 beakers from the deal, then:

After turn 112 Civ A, B and C would have gotten 6300 beakers and GL Civ would have gotten 6606 from the deal. The Great Library will be bringing in about 117 beakers per turn at this point. That is equal to 936 beakers every 8 turns which out does what the other civs can get from the Great Library themselves even at 150 beakers per unit (which is 450 beakers over 8 turns). It just means it takes longer to get “on top”.

Again, if the unit is delayed at any time (and so Civ A, B or C doesn’t get its research within the 8 turns) then it will benefit the Great Library owner as it will still be generating research during that time.

Owning the Great Library wont be disadvantagous at the beginning as it will out do the amounts the other civs get. It will take time to build though. Once it builds, it will become a research powerhouse. It will encourage the owner to have open boarders with the other civs and will require preplanning to turn it into a research super city building the Oxford University, Library, University, Observatory, etc. It will get to the point where the Great Library will be producing more per turn than what the other civs can realistically get from it but still be of benefit to the other civs to want to get beakers from the Great Library.

...but no one will know until something is made and people can experiment with it. It can be tweaked by altering the cost of the unit and/or the amount the unit receives in order to get the right balance and feel of what the civ gets versus what the Great Library civ gets. Ultimately it should be a long term deal for the owner of the Great Library that should pay off a lot of dividends in the late game – far more than it would getting the immediate reward. For the owner of the Great Library, it should feel like a passive version of building a Shrined Holy City where it's beakers instead of gold and it grows because of the other civs interest in getting the extra beakers from the Great Library. In essence, the other civs will build your research super city for you while getting something for themselves in the process.


Watiggi

 

[Watiggi]

How easy/difficult would it be to make this mod? Here is what the mod would need for it to work:

*A ‘scholar’ unit that can ‘learn’ only in the city where the Great Library is. The unit would be reskinned from a missionary and would have to look like a scholar of some sort.

*An algorithm that gives x number of beakers to the owner of the unit when it 'learns' in the Great Library. At the same time give +1 beakers per turn to the Great Library (the Great Library should grow much the same way as the shrine does but with beakers instead of gold). The Great Library should increase the amount of beakers per turn it produces. This amount should be able to be multiplied by the Library, University, Oxford University, etc, just as a Shrine would. Would there be a problem with this? I know there must be code that deals with the Shrine. Could it easily be altered to suit this situation?

*Code made to deal with the problem of distance. Distance should not be a factor in this. Therefore a city that is far away from the Great Library will take longer for the unit to get there and thus will get more beakers to compensate for the distance. The difficulty in getting there should also contribute to what the unit receives in beakers (ie, needing support for the unit where barbarians may be present). Whether the other civ is on another continent is also another factor. The unit will have 2 movement. Would making something that resolves this be difficult? A lot of it would need to be figured out with testing and tweaking, eventually finding the right values. Could the basic framework be done though? It would have to be done so that it could be tested and tweaked easily.

*The AI will need to make the scholar unit frequently. The value and power of owning the Great Library comes from how valuable it is for the other civs to get beakers from it. The more they get, the bigger and faster the Great Library builds into a powerhouse. The AI needs to know/mimic the value of getting beakers from it and build the unit frequently. Can this be easily done? Will it need the SDK or can it be done without it? I have noticed with the other mods that the AI seems to 'understand' how to use a unit automatically. Would this occur?

*This function shouldn’t become obsolete unless testing suggests it would be prudent to do so. The old function of the Great Library will still exist and obsolete as normal while this function will remain. Can this be done?

*Certain variables need to be easily accessed by non-modders so that it can be tweaked in order to find the point where it balances out properly. Are there any problems with having it like this? I would imagine it would be easier than having to alter the code each time to see.

This mod is made for the civ who has the Great Library. By enticing units with some research, they in turn, build your research super city. It is meant to be a variation of the shrine/religion dynamic. I know it looks as if the Great Library looks seriously disadvantaged, but I believe that it can be built up to a respectable level - a level that out does the advantage of not owning it. And I believe it will be worth it. With this mod, I would rather own the Great Library than have someone else own it as it would pay dividends in the late game.

I expect with the SDK out now, anything is possible. I am interested in what would have to be done to accomplish this mod so I can get an idea of how easy/difficult it would be. It's really going to be hard to tell whether it will work well or not until it's made. I still think the +1 beaker per turn for the Great Library is deceptively powerful.

Watiggi

 

[Padmewan]

I think the vague title of this thread kept me from reading it. I really like the general concept as I like toying with "coopetition" ideas -- I have been mulling a similar mechanic for Great Merchants and some variant of the Great Diplomat mod. The idea is that, like real life, you often gain by giving.

I think what you've described is not impossible to code in its mechanics. I think the really hard part will be getting the AI to (1) understand it (which is one of your points), and (2) use it intelligently.

Both are beyond my depth right now, esp. as my hands are full with Roanoke. (1) I think can be tackled by a few of the modders here. I suspect a good deal of the Great Merchant code could be repurposed for this.

For (2) to be resolved would not necessarily require that much more work -- for example, whether a Civ chooses to send a Scholar can be some formula determined by that leader's innate willingness to trade research (in the XML) combined with their like/dislike of you. There probably should be some threshold amount of goodwill before they are willing to send a scholar, and conversely, falling below that level they will actually pull the scholar out.

Between human players you would imagine that the collaboration required to send a scholar to a competing civ's Great Library would imply some kind of diplomatic tie. Perhaps that could also be modelled by giving a +1 bonus to diplomacy so the AI benefits from this as well.