Very disappointed whit the newest "balance" changes.

[DarkZero]

The OP is indeed getting salty, yet he has a valid point: Korea's neighbors on Sejong's continent, had they been humans, would have acted soon enough to prevent the snowballing from happening. So the AI isn't acting human if it doesn't strike preemptively at a peaceful builder getting ahead. I know this from my own games on King : I have mostly a peaceful builder experience, and most of the time the AI leaves me alone, excepted the usual suspects. As a consequence, I have no trouble snowballing ahead on this difficulty, and no bothers me. That means I should up the level, although I need more warfare experience before going to Emperor. That being said, no matter the difficulty, AIs should strike against a long-term builder.

Another valid point is how Sejong got a culture victory while going science. In my own peaceful games, I typically completely neglect tourism, yet have one the largest cumulated tourism outputs (if not the largest) thanks to historical events. If Sejong goes full science, this should primarily lead him to a science victory, not a culture one. I remember the mod from the early Summer. Back then people complained about science victory behind too long and dull, to the point that a culture victory was more easily at hands. This has been changed with the successive decrease to late game techs and other tweaks. However, the recent buff of historical events made it so that a peaceful builder with (likely) a very strong culture output and great people generation can get very close to a culture victory and deviate from their science path.

Next time I should hire you so you can more easily explain my points, the only thing that made me salty where the l2p and lower the difficulty replies I got after I made a wall of text just to show i know how to play and avoid said comments.

 

[tu_79]

When I started to play VP I expected that some civs excell only at something, so I was very shocked that a runaway civs was good at everything, but this is the VP way. You cannot neglect any aspect of the game if you want to succeed, it doesn't really matter what victory condition you are after. I like more the 'specialist civ' paradigm (if fact, I was advocating for a science civ to be good just at science), but I'm getting used to this one. It's a community project, so I have to live with the likings of many people.
That being said, in the last months gameplay has drastically changed. I don't know if you were playing VP when science from pop was removed, when every % city bonus building was removed, and policies were set as requirements for wonders. Skirmishers units were added. Naval warfare was changed with ranged Classical ships. Swords units got better at city taking. After a long time of adaptation, science was tuned so it researched very fast near the end game and some top tech units could be seen at war. Corporations got a new face. Great Musicians actions were balanced so some Great works are desirable before doing concerts. Then AI was improving more and more, pathfinders changing here and there. A few versions back, AI was so peaceful that preemptive action was needed in order to defeat it, because a peaceful AI is frightening. Now, warmonger AI isn't terrifying, but certainly plays like an average player with some bonuses. And the last version bringed back aggressive AI, a new naval tactical AI, capable of conquering cities just with navies, and challenging barbarians. City defenses have been lowered, then raised, then lowered and now raised a lot more, so now you can easily take a city without walls, but it is quite difficult when it has defenses.
I had to move back to Prince, I that have been playing and adapting to every new change. You come back after several months and the game has evolved more than you can imagine. You are free to dislike the changes, but most of them were driven by players, while only the most radical ones were Gazebo's ideas (like removing science from pop).

EDIT: As a result of AI playing more aggressively, players are reporting easier games. Some still think that AI should try to do whatever makes it win, so the game is more difficult. I believe that in current release every AI is trying to win, even against other AIs, so if nobody attacked Korea this could have been for fear, for considering (incorrectly) that objetive not worthy, or for some oversight in its thinking process. In Europa Universalis IV there is a nice Alliance feature that makes many countries rally around a longtime rival of one country, so when that country gets many haters, a full alliance is ready to fight against it. It makes a full domination, non-stop conquests, game not viable.

 

[Gazebo]

DarkZero, reread your original post. You mention tourism from historical events once in the entire post, buried in the middle of a run-on sentence. Presentation matters.

It may well be that tourism from historical events is overtuned. I've won two early-ish tourism victories (Shoshone and Netherlands, Emperor, standard speed and size, won in late Modern, maybe early Atomic) recently without aiming toward that goal initially (i.e. didn't go Aesthetics, no tourism religious beliefs, popping early Artists and Writers for GAs and culture). But I tend to be specialist happy and between Freedom ideology and Glory of God (think that's the reform belief that allows purchasing Great People) I start popping Great People every other turn by late Industrial. Soon I'm Influential with half the world and at that point I turn my strategy toward that Tourism victory with much of the ground work done as almost a byproduct.

I didn't realize that the issue was historic events. I'll take a look.

 

[Magean]

By the way, if Gazebo still visits the topic, I wonder what was the rationale behind Historic Events when they were implemented ? Not that I dislike the feature, but it's probably the aspect of the mod that has always seemed a little odd to me. Because you get tourism without trying. In Vanilla, tourism was overspecialized, since it was nearly useless when one wasn't considering a culture victory (ok, there was the ideological defense thing, but building up culture was safer and more efficient at it). But now, it seems to fall in spades.

 

[Stalker0]

Next time I should hire you so you can more easily explain my points, the only thing that made me salty where the l2p and lower the difficulty replies I got after I made a wall of text just to show i know how to play and avoid said comments.

You got a lot of those comments because candidly, your OP was not very constructive. It came across more of a rant than a dialogue.

That said, there are a few takeaways we can gleam after all the emotion is taken out.

1) Historical Event Tourism...is it too much? One thing we do have to remember is that VP has a lot of secondary bonuses, much more than vanilla. You can get extra bonuses from gaining population, great people, expanding land, building buildings...etc etc. So its fair to say that even though technically the AI doesn't get an obvious bonus on a yield....it may still get a lot more of that yield through secondary means. In this case, historical events. I'm not personally saying that there is a balance issue in this case, but that is an observation we have to take into account.

2) Runaway Civs. We all know that there is a fair amount of RNG in the game through the terrain you get and the opponents you face. That is to be expected. The question is...is it too easy to generate a "runaway civ" through a lucky start? You cannot answer that in one game, this is an example but should not be taken as holy correct. However, I think its something to watch in the AI vs AI battles that are run. If we commonly see one civ just outpacing everyone else, even if its not the same one, than that might speak to a mechanics issue.


These are constructive points to debate. That said OP....show some restraint and some respect. Gazebo is a volunteer, and the work is free. If you liked an older version of the mod, go use it. If you want to help us make this version better...be more constructive in your feedback.

 

[DarkZero]

When I started to play VP I expected that some civs excell only at something, so I was very shocked that a runaway civs was good at everything, but this is the VP way. You cannot neglect any aspect of the game if you want to succeed, it doesn't really matter what victory condition you are after. I like more the 'specialist civ' paradigm (if fact, I was advocating for a science civ to be good just at science), but I'm getting used to this one. It's a community project, so I have to live with the likings of many people.
That being said, in the last months gameplay has drastically changed. I don't know if you were playing VP when science from pop was removed, when every % city bonus building was removed, and policies were set as requirements for wonders. Skirmishers units were added. Naval warfare was changed with ranged Classical ships. Swords units got better at city taking. After a long time of adaptation, science was tuned so it researched very fast near the end game and some top tech units could be seen at war. Corporations got a new face. Great Musicians actions were balanced so some Great works are desirable before doing concerts. Then AI was improving more and more, pathfinders changing here and there. A few versions back, AI was so peaceful that preemptive action was needed in order to defeat it, because a peaceful AI is frightening. Now, warmonger AI isn't terrifying, but certainly plays like an average player with some bonuses. And the last version bringed back aggressive AI, a new naval tactical AI, capable of conquering cities just with navies, and challenging barbarians. City defenses have been lowered, then raised, then lowered and now raised a lot more, so now you can easily take a city without walls, but it is quite difficult when it has defenses.
I had to move back to Prince, I that have been playing and adapting to every new change. You come back after several months and the game has evolved more than you can imagine. You are free to dislike the changes, but most of them were driven by players, while only the most radical ones were Gazebo's ideas (like removing science from pop).

EDIT: As a result of AI playing more aggressively, players are reporting easier games. Some still think that AI should try to do whatever makes it win, so the game is more difficult. I believe that in current release every AI is trying to win, even against other AIs, so if nobody attacked Korea this could have been for fear, for considering (incorrectly) that objetive not worthy, or for some oversight in its thinking process. In Europa Universalis IV there is a nice Alliance feature that makes many countries rally around a longtime rival of one country, so when that country gets many haters, a full alliance is ready to fight against it. It makes a full domination, non-stop conquests, game not viable.

I guess I misremembere thing, the last game I played before I took a break was the natural wonder update, whit an forum search was on august 12, while its been two months the changes since them where minor m my book, and I have hundreds of hours playing whit the changes you mentioned above, l2p is not a valid reply to me, not because I am this master genius but just because I have 391 hours of experience , I was was very active and one of the guys who always liked every Funak post about removing science from pop!

 

[Txurce]

Volunteers? As if the direction and and changes in this mod are no in the hands of such people, and I cant but talk this way after a massive wall of text to have replies on such minor points, if immortal cant be beaten whats the point of having it?

Just because you can't beat Immortal doesn't mean it can't be beaten. Shrink your ego accordingly and drop a level or two, instead of persisting with a hopeless argument.

 

[Txurce]

The OP is indeed getting salty, yet he has a valid point: Korea's neighbors on Sejong's continent, had they been humans, would have acted soon enough to prevent the snowballing from happening. So the AI isn't acting human if it doesn't strike preemptively at a peaceful builder getting ahead. I know this from my own games on King : I have mostly a peaceful builder experience, and most of the time the AI leaves me alone, excepted the usual suspects. As a consequence, I have no trouble snowballing ahead on this difficulty, and no bothers me. That means I should up the level, although I need more warfare experience before going to Emperor. That being said, no matter the difficulty, AIs should strike against a long-term builder.

Another valid point is how Sejong got a culture victory while going science. In my own peaceful games, I typically completely neglect tourism, yet have one the largest cumulated tourism outputs (if not the largest) thanks to historical events. If Sejong goes full science, this should primarily lead him to a science victory, not a culture one. I remember the mod from the early Summer. Back then people complained about science victory behind too long and dull, to the point that a culture victory was more easily at hands. This has been changed with the successive decrease to late game techs and other tweaks. However, the recent buff of historical events made it so that a peaceful builder with (likely) a very strong culture output and great people generation can get very close to a culture victory and deviate from their science path.

I disagree on both points. On the first one, you are assuming that any individual AI could have looked at Korea and said, "this egghead's a pushover." If that's not how they appraised Korea -- if for instance they were intimidated by its hwachas -- then why would they bother? And frankly, neither would I. Instead I'd try to head it off via the WC, or some other passive approach, because sometimes starting one of these wars does other civs more good than it does you. Or maybe not. But you can't presume that action would definitively be taken by all.

On the second point, you seem to be ignoring that to win a non-domination game on a higher difficulty pretty much requires playing a balanced game... and that if you get on a roll, you probably wind up with your choice of three VC. This happens to me most of the time that I win a non-nailbiter. In the OP's case, Korea got on a roll and turned into a runaway -- a balanced one. It happens for the AI, same as it does for us. That's a compliment to the game, in that you can't beeline for one particular VC, while neglecting culture or science.

 

[Takagi Hiro]

There is nothing wrong with the game or Korea or what have you. This whole thread is honestly rather silly to read. Don't like what you're experiencing? You're welcome to return to vanilla AI.

 

[notque]

You're welcome to return to vanilla AI.

Ugh, no one wants that.

 

[Dawnbringer]

You could try lowering the difficulty and see if you can handle it better there. I was an immortal player before CBP and I had to dial back to king to get the hang of things before I felt comfortable moving up to immortal now. And currently, I struggle to compete in immortal but I've got enough experience playing emperor to know I can move on. There's no shame in scaling down when the AI is actually drastically better than vanilla. If you want an even playing field, I think that's chieftain difficulty and it's perfectly fine if you want a fair game. Any higher, you should expect the AI to be unfair, such as denying you a strong pantheon for you (and they can only use it for like a single tile, has happened to me before, but I just dealt with it and rushed that fat maria down, she took away god of the seas away from me because I had a double sea lux start and she had a single fish, while her plantation god[name escapes me atm] would've given her 4 tiles and 3 more at her expansion).

Unfair things happen when you play higher difficulties. Expect it.

 

[a1nosweat]

Lots of small things made the mod much harder over the last few months. Every one has Lowered their difficulty. Try it. It's more fun. Their will always be runaways. And it's not always possible for other civs to stop them late on.

You could have tried to gather more info, see if you found this a problem in the next game.

Instead you take a shot on the voluntary work of g. He is quite well liked here. And, given his position on donations, I think volunteer is the correct term.

And it isn't changes made to balance that are annoying you, it's AI changes

 

[Fierro]

I didn't play with full Vox Populi yet, but updated CP last month. AI became more dangerous, I had war with Shaka and attacked his undefended capital when he had war on the other side with Denmark. I thought like "wow, he is so helpless" but in few turns he made peace deal with Harald and sent many of his units from another cities and I started losing 3-5 units per turn. I've even rage quit and didn't want to continue that game as I rarely lose wars to AI, especially when I'm Aztec. But i think i will try to finish that game.

 

[infidel88]

I believe AI still isn't opportunistic enough. And if someone came with EU4 reference here, I believe AI should work in similar fashion when there is war between two factions. Let me explain - even since Common Sense in EU4, when there was a war between two big faction and one was clearly losing, all minor factions suddenly literally gangbanged that losing empire. While this was kind ahistorical, it would fit lovely in Civ5. Because gangbangs are fun As long as you're not the one being gangbanged

If Im wrong here, let me know, but in such situation - continent with 3 civs (A B C), split perfectly between them and each of them rather ok with each other without particul love. Now A declares war on B, while C stays put. When one of warring civs starts to take advantage in war (let's say A over B), I've very rarely seen civ C to try to take piece of that cake and also declaring on losing civ. This was continent is now split in a way that A has twice as much land as C, which means C is likely to fall sooner or later. So either C should gangbang defenseless B or B should try to save themselves by getting C to be their overlord.

On a sidenote, when going for domination victory and killing culture runaway early on, I rarely manage to get actual domination before tourism victory :| And I don't even care about tourism if I go for conquest.

 

[Szarrukin]

The AI is brutally efficient - left to its own devices (i.e. not conquered or challenged/bullied), it will most likely outperform a human in terms of yields.

In other words, war is the only way to not get outperformed by AI? And if AI civ is on other continent and is friend with its neighbours, it's going to overshadow me no matter what?

 

[Txurce]

In other words, war is the only way to not get outperformed by AI? And if AI civ is on other continent and is friend with its neighbours, it's going to overshadow me no matter what?

Depends on the level, and your ability. On level A, I outperform the AI almost always, no matter what advantage it has. On level B, I can't match a runaway. On level C, I'm just trying to survive. So, you just have to find your level (and sometimes it happens to straddle two.)

 

[matlajs]

I believe AI still isn't opportunistic enough. And if someone came with EU4 reference here, I believe AI should work in similar fashion when there is war between two factions. Let me explain - even since Common Sense in EU4, when there was a war between two big faction and one was clearly losing, all minor factions suddenly literally gangbanged that losing empire. While this was kind ahistorical, it would fit lovely in Civ5. Because gangbangs are fun As long as you're not the one being gangbanged

If Im wrong here, let me know, but in such situation - continent with 3 civs (A B C), split perfectly between them and each of them rather ok with each other without particul love. Now A declares war on B, while C stays put. When one of warring civs starts to take advantage in war (let's say A over B), I've very rarely seen civ C to try to take piece of that cake and also declaring on losing civ. This was continent is now split in a way that A has twice as much land as C, which means C is likely to fall sooner or later. So either C should gangbang defenseless B or B should try to save themselves by getting C to be their overlord.

On a sidenote, when going for domination victory and killing culture runaway early on, I rarely manage to get actual domination before tourism victory :| And I don't even care about tourism if I go for conquest.

It makes a sense but on the other hand, why progress/tradition civ should take a part in war of others, when that exact civ benefit especially from peacefull game. focusing infrastructure and culture/science while those two waste their hammers for military production and if that war is even, those two waring will fall behind(especially authority without succes). I like this feature, having AIs care about their own bussines, but sometimes its just weird see those runaways neighboured with top tier warmongers, leaving them be and even manage do def pacts with them while not have DoF.

 

[tu_79]

If Im wrong here, let me know, but in such situation - continent with 3 civs (A B C), split perfectly between them and each of them rather ok with each other without particul love. Now A declares war on B, while C stays put. When one of warring civs starts to take advantage in war (let's say A over B), I've very rarely seen civ C to try to take piece of that cake and also declaring on losing civ. This was continent is now split in a way that A has twice as much land as C, which means C is likely to fall sooner or later. So either C should gangbang defenseless B or B should try to save themselves by getting C to be their overlord.

Coallitions don't work that way, IIRC. Every Great Nation has 1-3 rivals. Then you can declare you want a coallition against one of your rivals. If that nation gets some aggro (usually by conquering too fast), other nations are frightened and are prone to join your coallition. When there is enough military power in the coallition, compared to the target and its alliances, the leader of the coallition can declare war and every nation in the pact has to join.
The main objective behind the idea is to prevent big blobs, in other words, to stop runaway civs.

 

[notque]

In other words, war is the only way to not get outperformed by AI? And if AI civ is on other continent and is friend with its neighbours, it's going to overshadow me no matter what?

No... if you play on an even difficulty, you'll find you're still able to out pace the AI. For example, I can win every time on Prince no matter what the scenario is right now. So just drop to a difficulty that is fun for you.