The Sailors Dirge

[Alchemistor]

I've so far had not had a problem with the dirge, but it's only my first game and that on a huge archipelago map. Iv'e not voted yet, since I haven't faced the dirge early on yet.

I just wanted to add that a Civ facing the dirge should also get some kind of compensation for having to go through the troubles of defending against it and destroying it. With Orthus, once it's killed, you get his axe. I think a similar reward should be given for destroying the dirge.

 

[Ennet]

The Dirge is good as it is, It could even be more dangerous in it self, it should just be moved back a little in time. Facing 3 skeletons at your capital on turn 10-30 is just devestating, specially in slower games on epic or marathon. There is no way to defend yourself it against it that early, as you cant pump out enought warriors intime unless you have the RNG gods on your side.
Having a strong defence should be rewarded. Right now it is often pure luck if you live or die. Also when the Dirge is camped outside your capital from turn 20+ your growth will be hampered too much too early even if you surive.
I would rather see that the dirge could hold another skelleton and was even respawned when killed, because it is a ghost ship, and the Lanun in particular will have an easy time destroying it once they get sailing.

Strategic decisions > random death.

Still note that I like the ship, just not it's timing.

 

[mindlar]

I think what some people mentioned about gamespeed should be taken into consideration. The spawn chance should be higher on quick games and lower on marathon games. Alternatively space out the checks based on the game speeed.

 

[drekmonger]

In both of the games I've played under 16a, the Dirge has ended up parked in a barbarian city and eventually eaten by an AI civ.

Would it perhaps be possible to randomly warp it anywhere that's wet on the map, seeing as it's a ghostship.

^^ great idea.

 

[Dashwood]

In both of the games I've played under 16a, the Dirge has ended up parked in a barbarian city and eventually eaten by an AI civ.

In the 6 games I had over the weekend (instead of studying), I killed the Dirge twice with The Black Wind (Lanun totally pwn the thing)[Noblex2], the Dirge pwned me once (in yr 37)[Noble], and the remaining three times (one game as Clan[Prince], one game as Amurite[Prince] and one as Lanun[Prince]) it sat in Archeon's city and was useless until someone conquered the city and auto-destroyed it when capturing. So, about 50% of my experiances have had it be utterly useless, which is why I advocate respawn or improved AI.

 

[Shadowsong0]

*sigh* none of the above.

The dirge should be made more powerful BUT the AIs need some means to defend their capitals.

I really like the idea of making the dirge an arcane unit, able to summon skellies (with empower promotions later on) or even more fearsome undead critters ON TOP of its spawns. Couple this with the fear promotion, heal-on-move promotion and hero promotion (if you do not go for arcane) and you'll have an awesome barbarian seaunit worth of the dirges history.

The main problem with the dirge is it wiping out AI civs too early. Putting it back some 15 turns might help the player (what is not the problem as players are capabe of dealing with the dirge anyway) but the AIs still leave their capitals weakly guarded. Thats why i really like to see a veteran guard unit there (2 str, +25% city defense (warrior base), +40% vs. orc, +40% vs undead, immobile, national unit, one time buildable, not upgradable and most importantly CHEAP so AI builds it early).

Having secured the capitals, barbarian, barrow and temple spawns should be upped quite a notch, so early landgrabbing and exploration is dangerous again. It is just too easy as it is now (playing on noble to get the same feeling the AI does).

Concerning the problem with the dirge getting stuck in a barbarian coastal city, maybe have it warp every 20 turns (20% chance). That would make catching it with your fleets harder, too.

 

[retro V]

What if Palaces had boni for defending against barbs? Just a little +50%. Devoted citizens taking up arms, that sort of thing. Might prevent civs from getting wiped out early by barbs, if it's such a problem.

 

[Civkid1991]

I was thinking about the hoplites in ancient greece and thought a similar idea would work in this situation (diffending against skeletons in early game). If you have Agriculture or the on before it (cant remember what it was) then a farmer-military unit will spaw on the city to help defend.

 

[Kael]

First off a huge thank you to everyone for voicing your opinions nicely. This is exactly the kind of feedback I was looking for. In general the stats fall out about just where we like, most people prefer it where it is, and about an even amount want it stronger or weaker.

My assumption is that those that want it to be weaker probably play on the easier game difficulties and those that want it harder probably play on the higher ones. I think its just a personal preference for how hard you want the game.

To answer a few questions, the Dirge can hold up to 3 skeletons. If it drops them up when it has one or all three just depends on if it thinks it can harass an enemy civ or not with what it has. Of course on the easy difficulty levels it should take about 150 turns to build up 3 skeletons (assuming the RNG is actually random, sometimes I have my doubts).

The big reason for making the Dirge spawn on game start is it keeps its creation out of the turn function. If I have it appear on turn 30 I have to run a check every turn to see if its turn 30 (even on turns after turn 30) to see if it should spawn. As you can imagine the every turn check is already huge, so i try to avoid adding to it if possible. Easier to create it on game start and just push back the spawning then push back its creation.

Based on this thread I am considering the following changes, which I will pass by the team:

1. Modification of spawn percents based on game speed.
2. Basing the AI bonus vs barbarians on the game difficulty. That way the AI is more likely to stick around and fight off the barbs on higher difficulties.
3. Maybe removing the ability of the Dirge to pillage.

The fact that you could be wiped by the dirge in the first 30 turns will stay a possibility, but not a common occurance. In any case the appearance of the Dirge in your waters should be a cause for major concern for those that choose to settle on the coast.

 

[Ennet]

I'm not sure about that Kael, I think people might have voted for different things, in it self the Dirge isnt overly powerfull once you've gotten past the first 40-50 turns(depending on gamespeed).
Also didnt you add a variable for the Dirge to start spawning skeleton already? In that case changing the value of that variable should do the trick as it is the early skeletons that are the problem and not the ship.

Cheers for AI bonus against barbs aswell :b:

 

[Kael]

I'm not sure about that Kael, I think people might have voted for different things, in it self the Dirge isnt overly powerfull once you've gotten past the first 40-50 turns(depending on gamespeed).
Also didnt you add a variable for the Dirge to start spawning skeleton already? In that case changing the value of that variable should do the trick as it is the early skeletons that are the problem and not the ship.

Cheers for AI bonus against barbs aswell :b:

Yeah, its definitly very easy to set a starting turn on the spawn chances.

 

[marioflag]

3. Maybe removing the ability of the Dirge to pillage.

Kael i find that the worst problem of the dirge is that it pillages sea improvements which for coastal cities during first turns can be really important.
Why not just continue to allow them to pillage but giving you also the possibility to defend with galley or whatever else postponing dirge just about 50-100 turns since their first appearance?
I think that removing the ability to pillage to the Dirge would really weaken it.At least like Orthus, Dirge is meant to cause pain.

edit: The big reason for making the Dirge spawn on game start is it keeps its creation out of the turn function. If I have it appear on turn 30 I have to run a check every turn to see if its turn 30 (even on turns after turn 30) to see if it should spawn. As you can imagine the every turn check is already huge, so i try to avoid adding to it if possible. Easier to create it on game start and just push back the spawning then push back its creation.


sorry i didn't read very well

 

[BCalchet]

Hmm... how's this for a mechanic?

Whenever something kills the Sailor's Dirge, it recieves the 'Haunted' promotion that adds +20% strength, blitz and -60% coast and ocean defense.

When a unit with the 'Haunted' promotion dies, it is respawned in a random sea tile under barbarian control and with a 'Sailor's Dirge' promotion of +2 strength, +2 cargo and skeleton spawning. Whatever kills this new Sailor's Dirge is again haunted, and the cycle repeats.

This way, there would always be a sailor's dirge or a ship doomed to become a similar ghost ship somewhere in the world - and it would remain dangerous in games with advanced ships appearing, always returning 2 strength ahead of what killed it last time.

 

[Sureshot]

sounds fun

 

[Bringa]

Played two two player games on 016, both on prince vs 2 ai; both times one of us was killed by the dirge before turn 50. I voted that it's too dangerous, especially this early in the game.

 

[Dashwood]

BCalchet: YES. I can't even begin to put it forward empathically enough. I would love to see that. Except the part about oceans under Barbarian control, as they don't always have those (or have them within an icefloe). I'd vote for it to be on any ocean tile, controlled or not.

I already rename the ship that destroys the ghost ship Sailor's Dirge every time. Something like that is meant to continue coming back from the depths over and over again to strike fear into the hearts of sailors. Given that it is the only sea menace we have (as opposed to Undead, Orcs, etc on the land), it deserves some heavy meat. Orthus always disappoints me for failing to live up to his title, so I'd like the Dirge to be impressive, :3.

 

[MrUnderhill]

@BCalchet: I second...err...third that motion.

As you can imagine the every turn check is already huge, so i try to avoid adding to it if possible. Easier to create it on game start and just push back the spawning then push back its creation.

*Switching to Coder Mode...done.*

Kael, have you guys tried separating the code in the Every Turn Check into separate functions?
That should make it more manageable and make it easier for other modders to add things on.
You could also overlay them with if statements to keep redundant code from running over-and-over.
That could cut some lag time off.

Just a thought.

 

[Darkkender]

Well it looks like I'm late to the Dirge party but here is my observations. Even when playing the settler modes the obvious flaws that have been mentioned are what I run into. These are;

Spawns right away.

The frequency of skeletons being produced even on settler is much more than 2% of the time. When attacking a city that had the dirge and Acheron sitting there the dirge produced a skeleton every other turn for 20 turns.(This was a chieftan game)

On Epic and Marathon games I lose my capitol before the game barely gets going due to the inability to mount an adequate defense.

I have tested at higher difficulty levels yet as I'm still becoming familiar with the different Civs of the mod and don't like to jump right to diety untill I'm more familiar with a mod.

 

[Kael]

Well it looks like I'm late to the Dirge party but here is my observations. Even when playing the settler modes the obvious flaws that have been mentioned are what I run into. These are;

Spawns right away.

The frequency of skeletons being produced even on settler is much more than 2% of the time. When attacking a city that had the dirge and Acheron sitting there the dirge produced a skeleton every other turn for 20 turns.(This was a chieftan game)

On Epic and Marathon games I lose my capitol before the game barely gets going due to the inability to mount an adequate defense.

I have tested at higher difficulty levels yet as I'm still becoming familiar with the different Civs of the mod and don't like to jump right to diety untill I'm more familiar with a mod.

What version are you playing?

 

[thomas.berubeg]

I've only had the time to play .16 twice, but both times, the sailor's Dirge spawned near me, and i came into contact with it within ten turns. it already had four skeletons in it's hold. i was playing on cheiften both times.
sincerely,
thomas