Author Topic: Chapmen Removal  (Read 4742 times)

Offline x4000

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Re: Chapmen Removal
« Reply #30 on: May 07, 2013, 07:40:08 pm »
Aquohn: that's already in the release notes for the next version:

LaughingThesaurus: I think that gets superfluous with the new way of doing things, as the boundaries will be SUPER obvious when not in placement mode.  That's what I'm seeing so far.  But we'll see.
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Offline Misery

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Re: Chapmen Removal
« Reply #31 on: May 07, 2013, 08:00:18 pm »
Whoa.

Ok, I sleep for like 8 hours, get up, and you guys have exploded half the game again.


Though, I'm getting used to that by now :p


Now, lemme see.   My (initial) thoughts on this are....


Chapmen, I dont think are a bad idea at all by themselves.... trying to keep everything related to them efficient was decently challenging, at least.   As UNITS though they were somewhat ignored, you'd place them.... didn't really matter which city you put them in, as they MIGHT stay in that city, or they might not.... and then you could ignore them.   The idea of having to constrain everything into the cities themselves is a decent one..... but what's to keep the player from just spamming cities?  And in some cases, they might HAVE to.  I'm thinking of my current game, where the Greek just never seem to have enough rice or wheat;  heck, I'd set up a seperate little area.... cut off from the main island.... that had a town building, 10 or so of both wheat and rice fields, and a few dedicated Chapmen just to get those moved.   Alot of the time, you need *alot* of resources.   I dont think that should be changed, actually..... but restricting them to cities ONLY suddenly alters the balance, if you need to build a town hall EVERY time you need a new group of things.


There's also the idea of building destroying/capturing to worry about.   Like, ok.  Currently, resource buildings are decent targets for the enemy to attack, particularly as you CANNOT keep all of them super close to cities (the easiest to defend areas).  This means that resource destroying/stealing will actually HAPPEN, and is something the player must watch for and think of.... I think this is a good thing, and further adds strategy to the idea of WHERE you're placing these things.    This change will alter all of that.   Building stealing/destruction will become much more rare, as these things are now going to be both super compact, never in small groups on their own, and will have the tendancy to be near places that can fart out constant units.   This is the part of the change that I DONT like about this.  Cities seem very hard for units to grab as it is, and damage to them often seems kinda vague and easily dealt with, as you pretty much HAVE to have a massive invading force to knock one down.  I think this might actually hit siege units pretty hard;  these guys wont be able to do a blasted thing MOST of the time, at least not based on what I've seen so far.   Currently, they CAN do stuff even on their own, because resources often end up placed out in seperate areas.   But they do near nothing to cities without a huge force backing them up (and are really not very good at fighting troops most of the time).  Every other unit type in the game can DO stuff on their own (which is exactly how it should be).


Not to mention, this means that as buildings go, there will literally be only one in the entire game where it actually MATTERS where you place it, in a strategic sense, which is the town hall.  No other current building.... NONE of them.... will have any strategy whatsoever, in terms of where.  You'll have strategy in terms of WHICH city you put them in..... but that's it.   I kinda liked that I often had to think about where I was putting each resource building, often seperate from the main city areas. Which was different from the various city structures like military buildings or schools or whatever;  you only choose a city with those, beyond that it dont matter where IN the city you put them.


So, all in all, I'm thinking there's some good stuff in this idea.... but there's definitely a few problems that might crop up as a result.  Particularly since various parts of the game were designed with the idea of this somewhat-core concept always being there.

Offline x4000

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Re: Chapmen Removal
« Reply #32 on: May 07, 2013, 08:08:48 pm »
In terms of the cities, the idea is that you have a variety of them, and what you put in each one matters hugely.  THAT was always the core idea of the game, and was not expressed in actual gameplay so far.  It was expected that you would have 3-5 cities per side routinely, whereas people have been doing 1.

In terms of units farting out constantly, that's also not something that was expected.  There may need to be a cooldown there or something of that nature.  I had expected resource shortages to mean that that couldn't be constant, but that isn't balanced that way so far.

In terms of the placement of individual buildings within a city, that actually does matter because stuff near the front gets attacked first.  But also, it's supposed to be about city-by-city, not mass cities.  All the AI logic is actually built around that, as are the god powers.  But thus far it's been moot with only one city at a time.

Quote
Ok, I sleep for like 8 hours, get up, and you guys have exploded half the game again.

I can see how you'd think that, but honestly it's a matter of we exploded the game you were actually playing, not the game that we were designing from the start.  People were playing this radically differently than we ever expected, just way off in left field from our design, and so we're taking steps to rein that in some.  Not that we don't want flexibility or whatever, but the god powers start meaning entirely different things when you have only one town per side, for instance, versus 3-5.
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Offline Misery

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Re: Chapmen Removal
« Reply #33 on: May 07, 2013, 08:24:55 pm »
In terms of the cities, the idea is that you have a variety of them, and what you put in each one matters hugely.  THAT was always the core idea of the game, and was not expressed in actual gameplay so far.  It was expected that you would have 3-5 cities per side routinely, whereas people have been doing 1.

In terms of units farting out constantly, that's also not something that was expected.  There may need to be a cooldown there or something of that nature.  I had expected resource shortages to mean that that couldn't be constant, but that isn't balanced that way so far.

In terms of the placement of individual buildings within a city, that actually does matter because stuff near the front gets attacked first.  But also, it's supposed to be about city-by-city, not mass cities.  All the AI logic is actually built around that, as are the god powers.  But thus far it's been moot with only one city at a time.

Quote
Ok, I sleep for like 8 hours, get up, and you guys have exploded half the game again.

I can see how you'd think that, but honestly it's a matter of we exploded the game you were actually playing, not the game that we were designing from the start.  People were playing this radically differently than we ever expected, just way off in left field from our design, and so we're taking steps to rein that in some.  Not that we don't want flexibility or whatever, but the god powers start meaning entirely different things when you have only one town per side, for instance, versus 3-5.


Cooldowns (or something) on military buildings is not a bad idea here.   I like the idea of having "pure military" themed cities.... if I want to have a city that is constantly making siege units (and I will), it makes sense if I have to build a city that has like 6 of those siege-factory buildings in it (whatever they're called).   That's alot more interesting (to me) than just one or two of these military factory buildings being able to make a constant stream.   HOWEVER.... this might slow the pace of the game early on.   Wont be an issue once things get going.... not whatsoever.... but early on it might be.

Offline Oralordos

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Re: Chapmen Removal
« Reply #34 on: May 07, 2013, 08:25:58 pm »
It might reign me in a bit. When I play I usually manage to streamline everything to the point where I will have 6-8 cities on each side, each with 7-9 unit producing buildings with enough resources to build a unit on everything whenever the buildings are open. I actually get enough units on the board that when it goes into the unit turn, it actually pauses for a noticeable amount of time while it calculates what everything is doing. I also used to get multi-million points before that was removed. The sheer number on both sides maintained a stalemate even if one side was stronger altogether. The update that increased the costs of everything didn't even effect me. ;)

Offline x4000

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Re: Chapmen Removal
« Reply #35 on: May 07, 2013, 08:33:20 pm »
Oralordos: Holy crap! ;)
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Offline Oralordos

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Re: Chapmen Removal
« Reply #36 on: May 07, 2013, 09:03:22 pm »
Am I the Cinth of Skyward Collapse Alpha?  ;D

Offline x4000

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Re: Chapmen Removal
« Reply #37 on: May 07, 2013, 09:05:07 pm »
Yes, yes you are.  Send me your save and I'll give you a pull-quote for your sig if you want. ;)
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Offline Oralordos

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Re: Chapmen Removal
« Reply #38 on: May 07, 2013, 09:12:20 pm »
I'll send you my current one once I get far enough.  >D

Offline x4000

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Re: Chapmen Removal
« Reply #39 on: May 07, 2013, 09:18:30 pm »
 ;D
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Offline mrhanman

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Re: Chapmen Removal
« Reply #40 on: May 07, 2013, 10:49:20 pm »
6-8 cities on each side, each with 7-9 unit producing buildings


Offline Cinth

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Re: Chapmen Removal
« Reply #41 on: May 07, 2013, 11:23:06 pm »
Am I the Cinth of Skyward Collapse Alpha?  ;D

Awesome!  Just wait until I really get started ;)

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Opened your save. My computer wept. Switched to the ST planet and ship icons filled my screen, so I zoomed out. Game told me that it _was_ totally zoomed out. You could seriously walk from one end of the inner grav well to the other without getting your feet cold.

Offline Oralordos

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Re: Chapmen Removal
« Reply #42 on: May 08, 2013, 12:28:32 am »
My first game kinda fizzled.

My second game I managed to get my Norse economy up to my levels but not the Greek. Luckily I was able to set up a chokepoint. I stuck a level 4 guy with adamantine there as a guard for the last 10 turns, and by the end of the game, he was down to half health. This is guy with more health and damage than one of the gods, and he was taken down to half health on a chokepoint in 10 turns, when facing the comparatively weaker Norse. Did I mention that the Norse units were all at level 2 and 3 too? Not level 4s? This was back during 0.801 too so there was massive chapman congestion. That game I could actually see waves of units incoming. Everything would produce, then the next turn everything would move, then everything would produce again.

My third game was a game where I tried diplomacy. You can see my diplomacy area here. Note that there are six town centers with at least two military buildings on each on screen, there are two more to the lower right, and 4 more that are pure military off screen to the upper left. This was on 0.802 so the chapman congestion problem was solved, and I am informed that prices more than tripled on that version as well, but I had a high enough surplus that I didn't notice. There were at least 6 deaths every turn in the battle area as well.

I'll finish my current game on 0.804 tomorrow and send post the save so everyone can see what kind of crazy things are possible when you go crazy.
« Last Edit: May 08, 2013, 12:30:11 am by Oralordos »