Part three of the Middle Ages is now complete, as is the game itself...
That was a surprisingly quick victory. Do you feel that this scenario would be more fun if it required a lot more victory points? It feels like barely anything happened - you accidentally got into a dangerous war, you survived, you're making your comeback, conquering nicely - and then it ends. Or do you, as the one who played through it, feel differently? Nice job, at any rate!
Well, I knew that the Sipahi in the hands of a human player is a deadly weapon, and that once I had a decent number of them, I would be able to do some damage. I was a bit unlucky that I got into two wars too early: in the first war it was still a long way to Sipahis, and in the second war I had just started producing/upgrading them and had only 4, of which I lost a few due to bad RNG luck. (Extremely bad RNG luck was also a major factor in the first war.)Nicely done coming back in the Middle Ages! I thought you might be out of luck after that second war with the Magyars.
AoD is indeed a very queer scenario, and I am very curious, how the AI will handle that. Could either be an easy one, or a quick loss due to conquest in Europe or if the AI figures out what to do with those treasure units... But before we get to that, there is another even stranger scenario: Mesoamerica. I've prepared a little writeup of all the rule changes and required strategies for that, which I'll post as a teaser shortly...Age of Discovery was always kind of fun, ferrying the sugar and tobacco and so forth back to the Old World.
Yes, that describes it very fittingly. The end came a bit surprisingly to me as well, kind of like an anticlimax. Never thought I could rack up these VPs so quickly. I think, the problem is like choxorn says, that the VP system becomes kind of "unbalanced" on the higher difficulty levels:Do you feel that this scenario would be more fun if it required a lot more victory points? It feels like barely anything happened - you accidentally got into a dangerous war, you survived, you're making your comeback, conquering nicely - and then it ends.
The "problem" seems to be twofold:I'd imagine the pace of VP scoring depends on difficulty level, on a lower level there wouldn't be nearly as many AI units to kill.
Are you saying that Comm, Ind and Exp buildings get trait-based discounts in this Scenario?!?Some of the city improvements have changed significantly:
Codex (replacement for Library) is 100s (50 for scientific nations)
Temple 20s (so only 10 for religious nations!)
Courthouse 180s (90 for religious or expansionist)
Stela 60s (30 for religious or commercial)
Sacrificial Altar 40s (20 for religious or militaristic)
Ball Court 150s (75 for industrious or commercial)
Tambo 140s (70 for commercial or expansionist)
Fishing Dock (Harbor) 250s! (but only 125 for militaristic or commercial)
Marketplace 200s (100 for commercial) and requires a Tambo. The Marketplace also increases production by 25%, even though this is nowhere documented...
Aqueduct is unchanged compared to the base game
Hospital 300s (but only 150 for militaristic)
On Deity, the AI has lots of workers, which can be captured, and lots of units, which can be enslaved, so if I manage to get like 25 slaves back home, that would already be 1000 culture points. (Of course I will have a Sacrficial Altar there asap.)
I think it is the "Other Characteristics" in the Editor. If you check a trait for a wonder, it means "GA trigger", and if you check it for an improvement, it means "half price". (Doesn't seem to have any effect for the small wonders, though?!)Because they don't in the base game, and I was under the (mistaken?) impression that was hardcoded in the .exe. But if there's some way of modding that in the .biq I'd be very happy...
I want to get it asap mainly for the extra culture: it's only 20s for a religious civ, and getting some early extra culture in my capital, before the AI does, cannot hurt!It's not really all that important to have a Sacrificial Altar in your capital ASAP, just by the time you want to be sacrificing workers- when I did it I didn't bother sacrificing them at all until I had enough to get to 2,000 culture in my capital, because until I had that they were more useful building improvements.
But Marketplaces do have the Commercial flag in the base-game: that's how Smiths makes Markets maintenance-free (along with the other "Commercial"-flagged generic buildings, e.g. Harbours, Banks, etc.) — but Commercial Civs don't get their shield-costs halved for any of those buildings.For example, the Marketplace in Mesoamerica has the "Commercial" flag set, which it doesn't in the base game.
And then there is the strange tech of Blood Cult, enabling another government of the same name. Honestly, I have no idea, why the game designers added this?! Why would we want another anarchy that late in the game? And as far as I can see, Blood Cult is not even an improvement over Monarchy, but rather a major step back: it reintroduces the Despotism penalty, and it reintroduces pop-rushing instead of cash-rushing! All the other things, corruption level, MP maximum, draft rate and worker efficiency are the same. Only the free unit support has been increased from 2/4/8 to 8/8/8. But I rather pay a little more gold than put up with another anarchy and a mediocre government?! (If anyone knows, what the game designers had in mind with this, please enlighten me. Perhaps you can now also sacrifice your own workers instead of only slaves? But that would be too easy, almost an instant win, as you can certainly have some worker pumps running the entire game and then just wait for Blood Cult?!)
The power graph doesn't look too bad for a Deity game, so it could be that the AI cannot handle all the rule changes that well? Before the game, I had really been afraid that this scenario would turn into a humiliating defeat, but now I get fresh hope.
While I wouldn't claim to be an expert modder on the level of e.g. @Civinator or @Vuldacon, AFAIKnew, only the Civ-traits Rel, Sci, Mil, Sea and Agri were/are hardcoded to give shield-discounts on buildings — so in your suggested test, yes, unticking "Religious" for the Temple would make it cost the full 60 shields for Religious Civs.Hmm, then I'm at my wit's end... We need to ask the expert modders... But perhaps in the C&C forum.
Edit: one way to test this, may be by unticking the religious box for the Temple and then checking, whether it now has the full 60s for a religious civ?!
Hmm, it's hard to find out, because: none of the 6 civs in Mesoamerica are actually commercial... Ah, wait, I found a way to test this: I started a game as the Incas, who are expansionist and agricultural. So per my theory, they should get a discount on the Courthouse:AFAIKnew, only the Civ-traits Rel, Sci, Mil, Sea and Agri were/are hardcoded to give shield-discounts on buildings
The Mayas were too boxed in for my taste, at least for a Deity game. Not much space, no nearby luxuries (second ring at best, so could easily get lost to the Olmecs or Toltecs on Deity), not much food. The Aztecs just have the best start land: food and a lux resource for the capital, more food and two luxes in first ring distance, and a fourth lux in second ring distance. For a Deity game, I didn't want to take any chances... And I think it payed of: so far I was able to keep the AI's pace, tech-wise as well as in terms of expansion&population. Only my military is weak compared to everybody. But I'll be working on that soon...although to be honest I am a bit disappointed that you are going with the Aztecs and not my beloved Maya
That may even be. As I just wrote in part 3, the Mayas (Chichén Itza) had always been a handful of points ahead of Tenochtitlan, and then at one point, when I built the Temple of the Moon and must therefore have overtaken the Mayas, I noticed in F8, that Cuzco had jumped ahead of both Tenochtitlan and Chichén Itza, by a bit more than 20 points. The only explanation I have for that, is that they sacrificed a slave in the capital?!I wonder if the Inca are going to start capturing and sacrificing slaves with their war with the Moche, and if so if that will noticeably boost their culture?