[WTP] Quick questions

[Windock]

Is it expected behavior that REF fleet, after proclamation of independence, does not bombard cities? I have played a few games with original and TAC, so I'm used to build my defenses around knowledge that coastal cities will be bombarded to oblivion. However in WTP they do not do that, and so the end game is much-much easier with REF army suiciding itself over well protected cities.

 

[raystuttgart]

To be honest, I have not played until revolution since quite a while myself.
(It has been at least 3 years or more since I played a full game until WOI myself.)

Is it expected behavior that REF fleet, after proclamation of independence, does not bombard cities?

I was expecting AI to still bombard the city defenses.
(Unless of course you did not build any city defenses which the ships could bombard.)

However in WTP they do not do that, ...

@devolution
Would you have any potential explanation for that?
I can not remember that we changed anything to AI logic considering bombarding city defenses.

@Windock
A savegame to check what you are reporting might help to understand.
If there is an issue it might also help to analyze AI logic.

 

[Mr. ZorG]

during wars with Europeans, AI constantly uses cannons to reduce the defenses of forts and cities. I think REF will also do it.

 

[raystuttgart]

during wars with Europeans, AI constantly uses cannons to reduce the defenses of forts and cities. I think REF will also do it.

@Windock was talking about the Ships of the King. (REF fleet)
They have their own Unit_AI if I remember correctly.

I will check at the weekend.

 

[Zingo99]

Is there some way to disable that units wont return to "usual" mode after passing enemy units when have set to "goto"-mode...? Annyoing when you have ~20 treasures with "goto" harbor city and they pass some wild animals etc.

 

[raystuttgart]

Is there some way to disable that units wont return to "usual" mode after passing enemy units when have set to "goto"-mode...?

That was already changed in "Plains". Automated Units that are attacked or spot an enemy stop their movement.
But there is no way you can do it yourself (unless you want to code).

 

[raystuttgart]

I will check at the weekend.

I have done a brief check fo the code and there is nothing I see that would explain if Royal Fleet would generally behave different than in TAC.
Royal Fleet should still approach the Cities of the Player, first drop Royal Land Units and then bombard city defenses. (e.g. "Stockades" and "Bastions".)

 

[Windock]

@raystuttgart Thank you for looking.
I am attaching 2 save files. First is right before the REF fleet arrives. You can see that, after it arrives, it only unloads troops, and it is perfectly capable to bombard the city (unless they have no moves left, but I cannot see if it is true).
Second save file, next turn, is after the REF unloads all troops. The fleet does not bombard the city it unloaded troops at, instead goes to the next city where it does nothing again.
It may be the case that animations do not fire, and I do not see if they bombard. However, it is my experience for the last 3 games that the fleet does not try to bombard cities, or if it does, then too little.

 

[raystuttgart]

@devolution
Could you please check and see if you find any explanation why the REF fleet does not bombard?

 

[bogwart]

Hi! I've got a question about Wild Animals.
In my current game, they continuously appear within City radius (which is rather annoying because after killing them I always have to reassign citizens who worked the concerning tile).
-can I edit an xml file so that they stop appearing in City (or maybe cultural) radius?
-wasn't there a version of this Mod where they aren't allowed to do this in the first place?

 

[raystuttgart]

-can I edit an xml file so that they stop appearing in City (or maybe cultural) radius?

No, you would have to wirte additional source code in DLL.

-wasn't there a version of this Mod where they aren't allowed to do this in the first place?

No, they could always spawn within City Radius, but they will be pushed out of it, since they can not enter it.

I might take a look and improve the code when I find some time.

 

[raystuttgart]

Ok, I changed animal spawning so it should not happen in Cultural Radius of Europeans (and Kings) anymore.
(Unclaimed territory or Native territory is still valid for animals to spawn.)

Edit:
I basically check if the "Owner" of the plot is Native or "NO_Player" (i.e. unclaimed).
Thus the only plots that do not fulfill these conditions are basically owned by Europeans and Kings.
(Kings is basically just a side effect of simpifying the check to save a tiny bit of performance.)

 

[ConjurerDragon]

Ok, I changed animal spawning so it should not happen in Cultural Radius of Europeans (and Kings) anymore.
(Unclaimed territory or Native territory is still valid for animals to spawn.)

Wait a moment - I understand that you do not want to disturb the colonists in the colonies in America by having a wild animal spawn in their colony (+1 or +2 depending on choice) - but the entire cultural radius grows far more into lands that are not used to place colonists and would be to far to much to bar from the wilderness.

And the cultural radius of Kings...? Where does the Kings excert cultural radius? And shouldn´t they, as not being as "american" as the colonies suffer from the attacks of wild animals? I mean the REF certainly has no expertise in avoiding natural american wildlife...

 

[raystuttgart]

Where does the Kings excert cultural radius?

When they conquer Colonial Cities in WOI.
Why should the Kings have no cultural radius then?

but the entire cultural radius

For "Owner" I just have to check the Plot itself - it was a technical decision. I did not chose CityRadius of a European - because it can not be done performantly.
(Please understand that there are sometimes technical decisions that we modders make that are not always obvious to players but still reasonable.)

-----

It is the same technical conflict I originally had when I originally implemented this feature and thus had decided to still allow spawning in City Radius / Cultural Radius.
But since players complain about this all the time I had to chose the next best solution that was possible without wasting too much performance.

-----

The result will simply be this:

1. No animals spawned in Cultural Radius (of Kings / European) but since they are still spawned once a valid plot is found: More will be spawned in the Wilderness outside of them.
2. Only once you control a complete continent with your cultural borders, no Animals are spawned on that continent anymore but they would only be an annoyance then anyways.

Summary:

Simply check the result once we publish. Trust me, there is no problem
(There will not really spawn less, they will just spawn somewhere else.)

 

[nci]

Animals being unable to spawn inside colonies cultural radius makes no sense to me, it's not like they all suddenly become extinct due to territory expansion. Also, animals help unexperienced units get their first promotion.

It would be much nicer if colonists automagically return to their previous occupation after the threat is gone - otherwise they still need manual intervention during wars, which current solution does nothing to help with.

 

[raystuttgart]

So should I revert it again to the previous state?
Never had a problem myself with animals spawning in City Radius.

But actually I prefer the current solution since it makes "Wilderness" more dangerous and cultural radius less annoying in endgame.
(The total amount of animals does not really change - they are just spawned more in Wilderness instead of European Territory.)

------

Just make a decision finally:

• Alternative A) Spawning within City Radius / Cultural Radius of Europeans allowed (as before this change)
  
• Alternative B) Spawning within City Radius / Cultural Radius of Europeans not allowed (as with this change)

Because those are the 2 I can give you within wasting too much performance for animal spawning.
(I do not want to unnecessarily increase turn time because of this.)

Everything else somebody else needs to program.
(And it was never part of this discussion and should most likely be a new thread.)

------

Also maybe people confuse "spawning" with "walking into".
(2 totally different logics that are not connected to each other.)

Animals can still walk into Cultural Radius but not walk into City Radius.
(But with this change they will not be spawned in any of them, just in Wild Territory.)

So there will still be Wild Animals in your Cultural Radius if they walk into it - they just do not spawn there.
(There will never be any Wild Animal in City Radius though, they can neither spawn there nor walk into it.)

------

Summary:

It sounds like a good solution that will reduce some annoyance.
It is also performant and was very little effort to implement.
Thus I am not really sure what the hastle is about.

 

[jooe]

I am voting strongly for Alternative B)
Reason: The animals spawning in city radius disrupt the manual job allocation within the city and reset it to sub-optimal auto allocation. There is no noticable notification for this, so I often only realise many turns later when something else is done in this city.

 

[bogwart]

Animals being unable to spawn inside colonies cultural radius makes no sense to me, it's not like they all suddenly become extinct due to territory expansion

ok, but a Lynx appearing near your colony out of nowhere makes no sense to me either. It's not they are becoming extinct but in reality they usually avoid human communities.

Also, animals help unexperienced units get their first promotion

Um, that's right. But you can use other strategies, maybe like stationing your unexpirienced unit outside your cultural borders and hunt the bugger there.

The animals spawning in city radius disrupt the manual job allocation within the city and reset it to sub-optimal auto allocation. There is no noticable notification for this, so I often only realise many turns later when something else is done in this city

Exactly! You can see it in the Event Blog though, but sometimes you have to scroll quite a bit to see the notification.
Also, if you're too late you have problems with your trade routes (tile not worked by citizen>no yields>trade route broken).

So, thanks Ray for looking after this. I also vote for B).

 

[nci]

@raystuttgart I gave this problem more thought, and since most folks play gigantic map, I guess the situation won't be much of a problem even in late game. So I withdraw my arguments and vote B.

 

[Cacaso]

I vote B, too.