Vokarya's Workshop: Buildings

[Vokarya]

I feel magistrates are a "somewhere to put specialists if you have nothing else for them to do" class, so I think it does not matter that there are not so many slots later in the game, when you are unlikely to be using them anyway.

Only producing 66% of the GPP the other specialists do, and producing less benifit than most others, is coupled with a great person who produces a fraction of the beakers when used to bulb, is rubbish when settled and whos special ability, while in some circumstances could be vital (ending a war that you are loosing) but I have never used, generally adds up to a rubbish specialist type.

We should definitely fix Magistrate so that it is equal to the other specialist types in GPP. Otherwise, it is equal to other specialists: Magistrate is +1 commerce/+3 espionage, Spy is +4 espionage, Artist is +4 culture. The points are about equal.

For Great Diplomat bulbing, there is a digit missing. There is a stat <iBaseDiscover> that covers the science provided when bulbing. In BTS, this value is 1000 for most Great Persons and 1500 for Great Scientists. In AND, those values are multiplied by 10, but Great Diplomat was not updated. It's an easy fix to make.

Settled Great Diplomats could also use an upgrade. I think having Great Diplomat should be +4 commerce/+6 espionage.

Does this sound good?

 

[45°38'N-13°47'E]

Yep, sounds good to me

 

[Noyyau]

I feel magistrates are a "somewhere to put specialists if you have nothing else for them to do" class, so I think it does not matter that there are not so many slots later in the game, when you are unlikely to be using them anyway.

Only producing 66% of the GPP the other specialists do, and producing less benifit than most others, is coupled with a great person who produces a fraction of the beakers when used to bulb, is rubbish when settled and whos special ability, while in some circumstances could be vital (ending a war that you are loosing) but I have never used, generally adds up to a rubbish specialist type.

Sums up my experience with magistrates pretty well.

 

[Rezca]

AI Surveillance IMO should also help add local stability for Revolutions; I feel it sort of makes sense, since it's intended to help maintain order/security and all that.

 

[Vokarya]

AI Surveillance IMO should also help add local stability for Revolutions; I feel it sort of makes sense, since it's intended to help maintain order/security and all that.

Probably, but that's a future issue. I want to put some stability on Village Hall and possibly other buildings, but I need to know how much is appropriate. I find that the early eras need help more than the later eras, except for captured cities. I especially want to know the meaning behind that bug that was causing a connected city to have twice the RevIndex increase from distance as an unconnected city. That has to come first.

 

[Rezca]

Probably, but that's a future issue. I want to put some stability on Village Hall and possibly other buildings, but I need to know how much is appropriate. I find that the early eras need help more than the later eras, except for captured cities. I especially want to know the meaning behind that bug that was causing a connected city to have twice the RevIndex increase from distance as an unconnected city. That has to come first.

True enough.



I'm still scratching my head over the revolution experiences I've been having personally; There's no way that my empire's revolution problems could be permanently cured in just one turn and when I was already in critically dangerous condition, by merely switching the difficulty and reloading. I was still in ancient civics (most of them bad, except for Charity) and was religionless - it literally went from Critical to Safe in a few turns after I changed the difficulty.

No one else has been experiencing this (AFAIK), but every time I switch the RevDifficulty mid-game it completely neutralizes Revolutions for me

 

[45°38'N-13°47'E]

Probably, but that's a future issue. I want to put some stability on Village Hall and possibly other buildings, but I need to know how much is appropriate. I find that the early eras need help more than the later eras, except for captured cities. I especially want to know the meaning behind that bug that was causing a connected city to have twice the RevIndex increase from distance as an unconnected city. That has to come first.

I'm having a look at that problem. Sourceforge being down doesn't help though

 

[Vokarya]

Merchants need to be cut down in just a couple of places. There aren't a lot of good mercantile buildings in the later eras, so that leaves Hypermarket shouldering a big portion of the Merchant count in the Transhuman Era. The current sources of Merchants are:

• Bazaar - Shopping District - Hypermarket: 1 Merchant, increasing to 4 at Shopping District and 6 Merchant slots + 1 free Merchant at Hypermarket
• Market: 1 Merchant, absorbed into Shopping District
• Tavern - Hotel - Vacation Resort: 1 Merchant, increasing to 1 free Merchant at Hotel
• Bakery - Food Processing Plant: 1 Merchant, increasing to 2 Merchants at FPP
• Grocer - Supermarket: 1 Merchant, increasing to 2 Merchants at Supermarket and then absorbed into Hypermarket
• Advertising Agency: 1 Merchant, obsolete with Androids

This is a very heavy curve in the Classical and Medieval Eras, and a little high for the Modern Era as well. The current curve looks like 1-4-5-4+1-8+1-9+1-8+2. I think there are a few cuts that we can make.

• Delete the Merchant slot from Tavern. Increase the maximum commerce from domestic connections to +2. This means that instead of using a Merchant that generates +3 gold (and +3 GPP) but costs you a citizen, you will get an extra raw commerce from a fully connected empire of 6 or more cities. I don't think that is that hard to do.
• Delete the Merchant slot from Bakery. This leaves only 2 Merchant slots in the Classical Era, one from Bazaar and one from Market.
• Reduce Shopping District to 3 Merchant slots. This is still an improvement over Bazaar (1 slot) + Market (1 slot).
• Add 1 Merchant slot to E-Bank. This gives the Modern Era some flexibility. (I don't want to add a Merchant slot to Bank; the Medieval Era will be at its target number of 3 Merchants already.)

This gives a curve of 1-2-3-3+1-6+1-9+1-9+2. I need to leave Hypermarket where it is in order to keep the Transhuman Era count at its current level. I don't think putting Merchant slots on Ports is a good idea; it will inflate the specialist count too much.

 

[<Nexus>]

I feel magistrates are a "somewhere to put specialists if you have nothing else for them to do" class, so I think it does not matter that there are not so many slots later in the game, when you are unlikely to be using them anyway.

Only producing 66% of the GPP the other specialists do, and producing less benifit than most others, is coupled with a great person who produces a fraction of the beakers when used to bulb, is rubbish when settled and whos special ability, while in some circumstances could be vital (ending a war that you are loosing) but I have never used, generally adds up to a rubbish specialist type.

I think they could/should be more unique, like:
Magistrate +0.5 and +1 local stability point per turn
Great Magistrate +2 and +1 national stability point per turn
...and cutting down the and values
(I am aware that we don't have an XML tag for the revolution effect now)

 

[Vokarya]

Scientists are in very good shape overall. The curve for Scientists looks like this:

• School of Scribes: 1 Scientist. Disappears once SoS upgrades to Printer.
• Library: 1 Scientist
• Alchemist's Lab - Laboratory - Research Laboratory: 1 Scientist
• University: 1 Scientist
• Observatory: 1 Scientist
• Museum: 1 Scientist
• Zoo: 1 Scientist
• Biological Warfare Lab: 1 Scientist
• Accelerator: 1 Scientist
• Cloning Laboratory: 1 Scientist
• Cloning Factory: 1 Scientist
• Mech Assembly Plant: 1 Scientist
• Android Factory: 1 Scientist

This gives a curve of 1-2-4-5-6-10-12. A little high in the Medieval Era, and low in the Industrial (this is why Zoo gives a Scientist slot), but otherwise right where it should be. The only thing that I'm not sure I like is having specialist slots on the later buildings whose only other purpose is to produce particular units (Bio War Lab, Cloning Factory, Mech Assembly Plant). I don't know if those should be consolidated into other buildings or not.

 

[youmakemefart]

I think they could/should be more unique, like:
Magistrate +0.5 and +1 local stability point per turn
Great Magistrate +2 and +1 national stability point per turn
...and cutting down the and values
(I am aware that we don't have an XML tag for the revolution effect now)

This is an excellent idea btw...

 

[Samson]

I think they could/should be more unique, like:
Magistrate +0.5 and +1 local stability point per turn
Great Magistrate +2 and +1 national stability point per turn
...and cutting down the and values
(I am aware that we don't have an XML tag for the revolution effect now)

I think this would be a really interesting way to give the player a way to influence stability directly in a city. My question about it would be what would happen if revolutions was off, and if anyone cares about that?

 

[<Nexus>]

I think this would be a really interesting way to give the player a way to influence stability directly in a city. My question about it would be what would happen if revolutions was off, and if anyone cares about that?

Nothing special happens. Some buildings also have rev values (Tax Office, Porcelain Tower) and those are still okay with rev off.
In my proposal I didn't give Magistrate and Great Magistrate any and values, but only because I don't know what the right values would be.
And a bonus is useful without revolutions too.

 

[Samson]

Nothing special happens. Some buildings also have rev values (Tax Office, Porcelain Tower) and those are still okay with rev off.
In my proposal I didn't give Magistrate and Great Magistrate any and values, but only because I don't know what the right values would be.
And a bonus is useful without revolutions too.

I think this makes sense. Having happiness from a specialist sounds a bit Civ3, I think it could be fun.

 

[Rezca]

Nothing special happens. Some buildings also have rev values (Tax Office, Porcelain Tower) and those are still okay with rev off.
In my proposal I didn't give Magistrate and Great Magistrate any and values, but only because I don't know what the right values would be.
And a bonus is useful without revolutions too.

Actually the Tax Office was a bit strong if you had Revolutions off. Later in the game it can give a HUGE discount on maintenance, and if Rev is disabled (or if you're like me and changing the difficulty shuts the whole thing off) then you've got a free pass on that instability hit which in any other case make it a building you *wouldn't* want in every city.

 

[Vokarya]

I was looking at applying the Aqueduct changes that I suggested before. I'm okay with having the Baray get the same changes, but I don't think it's appropriate for the Ottoman Hammam. Since the Hammam is literally a bath house, I think it would be better if we changed it to a Bath House replacement. It would keep the Bath House stats with three bonuses over the Bath House:

• +2 happiness; this was Hammam's primary bonus over the Aqueduct it was replacing
• No Marble requirement (I'm not sure if Bath House needs to REQUIRE Marble, but that's incidental for this)
• No expiry tech (Bath House obsoletes at Public Health)

 

[Vokarya]

Here's the last of the specialists; the Spy. I don't particularly like Spy specialists, and it's difficult sometimes to tell them apart from Magistrates, but we have them so I need to work with them. The sources of Spies are:

• Town Watch-Police Station: 1 Spy
• Courthouse: 1 Spy
• Jail-Cryogenic Prison: 2 Spy
• Security Bureau-Security Center: 2 Spy, increasing to 3 at Security Center
• Intelligence Agency: 2 Spy
• Bioenhancement Center: 1 Spy specialist plus 1 free Spy

So the curve is 0-2-2-4-8-8-10+1. Low in the Ancient, Medieval, and Modern Eras, but right where it should be for the others. I don't think we can really adjust anything without a new building. While I do want to implement the Surveillance Network, I think it is more appropriate to have it give Magistrates.

 

[<Nexus>]

I was looking at applying the Aqueduct changes that I suggested before. I'm okay with having the Baray get the same changes, but I don't think it's appropriate for the Ottoman Hammam. Since the Hammam is literally a bath house, I think it would be better if we changed it to a Bath House replacement. It would keep the Bath House stats with three bonuses over the Bath House:

• +2 happiness; this was Hammam's primary bonus over the Aqueduct it was replacing
• No Marble requirement (I'm not sure if Bath House needs to REQUIRE Marble, but that's incidental for this)
• No expiry tech (Bath House obsoletes at Public Health)

Simply good.

I'd like to mention as a similar issue that the Sacrificial Altar UB is currently a Courthouse replacement, but in RAND we have the Ceremonial Altar. I'd suggest the SA replacing CA, without upgrading to any temples, so it is available longer.

 

[Vokarya]

Simply good.

I'd like to mention as a similar issue that the Sacrificial Altar UB is currently a Courthouse replacement, but in RAND we have the Ceremonial Altar. I'd suggest the SA replacing CA, without upgrading to any temples, so it is available longer.

That could work. Sacrificial Altar's current benefits over Courthouse are it comes earlier in the tech tree (Sacrifice vs. Code of Laws), is cheaper (90 base vs. 120), and provides -15% to the food count to grow (which is a replacement for the -50% anger duration from whipping; whipping from slavery doesn't exist anymore, but I think drafting anger and unhappiness from events also use the same timer).

Do we need to keep any of these abilities? Or is it enough to get +1 happiness (additional +1 with Hemp) and +1 culture for the rest of the game? Ceremonial Altar goes obsolete at Humanism. Should SA be able to stay alive longer?

 

[<Nexus>]

That could work. Sacrificial Altar's current benefits over Courthouse are it comes earlier in the tech tree (Sacrifice vs. Code of Laws), is cheaper (90 base vs. 120), and provides -15% to the food count to grow (which is a replacement for the -50% anger duration from whipping; whipping from slavery doesn't exist anymore, but I think drafting anger and unhappiness from events also use the same timer).

Do we need to keep any of these abilities? Or is it enough to get +1 happiness (additional +1 with Hemp) and +1 culture for the rest of the game? Ceremonial Altar goes obsolete at Humanism. Should SA be able to stay alive longer?

Some replacement for the -50% anger duration from whipping could stay IMO (-?% War , maybe?)
If it doesn't upgrade to temples than going obsolete at Humanism is still a pretty long lifespan, IMO.