New features for LT46

[wieder]

This has been copied from the new games forum since it's about the upcoming LT46.

Few ideas we had for the next LT40 type game. This stuff will not be in the traditional games. No worries. The traditional games will have just minor tweaks.

- based on LT40
- SDI defense only kills the attacking nuclear missile with 75% probability
- there is still one small wonder that will give 100% defense against nuclear missiles but you can have it only on one city
- something could be done with civil wars. maybe using the LT44 approach and make 1-3 govs with super low civil war probability
- some new world wonders that are not too powerful but would still give a nice bonus to the player building them
- the players would get 2 free upgrades / turn after researching invention. no need to build Leonardo's
- Leonardo's would be a world wonder giving one additional upgrade to the player who builds it
- using the more expensive tech tree
- unit based tech trading that would be more easy compared to what we had in LT40 (no worries, the next *traditional* LT game will be tech trading free)
- smaller empire sizes in the start but compensated for bigger empires when techs advance. maybe implemented by splitting govs into two like: ancient monarchy and monarchy where the main difference would be smaller/bigger empire size. or maybe even having Monarchy I, Monarchy II and Monarchy III like with barracks. The revolution time will remain as one turn so it's not big issue to switch multiple times
- making the trade based governments less powerful by making markets, banks, stocks and super highways to give 40% bonus instead of 50%
- city working areas may grow in 3-4 steps instead of just 2. traditional games have no steps but LT40 had those
- new production based improvements for most of those govs without trade bonus (communism, federation, monarchy...)
- pollution will also affect ocean tiles
- SDI will give 25% defense against non-nuclear missile units
- new city improvement giving 25% defense against non-nuclear missile units
- missiles and cruise missiles are no longer city busters but will have FP3 by default and shorter range
- less range for all fighter units and the first fighters will be less expesive

two alternative ways to handle (early and early mid-game) wonders and small wonders:

- caravans costing 30 instead of 50
- removing caravans (but leaving freights) and making the early wonders cheaper so that they could be built in one city without the help from the other cities

Changing the siege unit to make bombardment attacks and restoring the days of glory for howitzers. The howitzers would ignore terrain and move like alpines. However they would have just 3 moves allowing a v howitzer to move 7 tiles and still attack with full strength.

[Wahazar]

What about enemy_unhappiness effect, as is in an experimental ruleset, it increase unhappy percent depending on amount of non-native nationality in the city and type of government?

[wieder]

Was that available or possible with 2.5? I somehow remember it was a feature added in later versions?

[Wahazar]

Was that available or possible with 2.5? I somehow remember it was a feature added in later versions?

Definitely yes, it is working with 2.5 well, checked on 2.5.3.
Very interesting feature, make citizens angry due to their nationality.
Of course enemy nationality would dissolve when city will grow up. Republic, Communism and Democracy have some bonuses (less percentage of angry nationalists).

[Wahazar]

What is a current state of art of LT46 project?

BTW, I had idea about above-mentioned SDI defense: an unique unit, like Patriot launcher, which gives 25% to nuclear protection, add 50% to missile defense and 100% to air defense.
Thus it can be used for 100% nuke protection of city (if there is 75% from SDI already) or 25% of nuke protection for standalone stacks (not sure if it is ever possible, didn't tested such effect yet).

[wieder]

LT46 is currently on hold because of the 2.6 transition. I guess it would be easy to do it as a 2.5 game but then again 2.6 would be also nice. Maybe we should decide something sooner than later.

That would be interesting unit. Definitely interesting. I'll ask you for more details about how to do it. Maybe that would need 2.6 anyway since I have a feeling that 2.5 has a bug regarding to that kind of features. Not sure since some people, who really should know, say there is no bug.

[Wahazar]

That would be interesting unit.

Sounds good, doesn't work.
Not possible to have unit bond to nuke_proof effect, no matter if in city or on the field.
I tried to add condition
"UnitType", "Tactical ABM", "Local"
but seems it refer to position of attacker, not defender,
while Adjacent or City are not allowed for unittype.
Maybe 3.0 with action enablers would work?

[wieder]

Maybe with 3.0 but then again they say it's not that different from 2.6 what it comes to the basic ideas.

I also wanted to add some bonus trade to ruins but that was impossible with 2.5 and now I can't remember if it would have been possible with 2.6. Maybe 1 or 2 extra trade. Nothing too fancy or too powerful but a nice bonus for those who decide to move a city or maybe conquer and rebuild when the old city is destroyed in the process. It would be probably hard to exploit because it takes time to build a city and citymindist 4-5 limits what you can do.

[Wahazar]

I also wanted to add some bonus trade to ruins but that was impossible with 2.5 and now I can't remember if it would have been possible with 2.6.

It is doable, for example I defined small 25% defense bonus for small units.
However trade bonus for ruins is, in my opinion, not a good idea - anybody with help of 'fake' enemy can produce sea of ruins, regardless of citymindist - just make city on empty area, allow to conquer, make another one, etc, and make final one surrounded by ruins. Settlers cost recovered after 30 turns (or earlier in case of Democracy bonuses).

[Wahazar]

Well, since most of proposed features are already contained in augmented2 ruleset, which longturn version is ready,
what about just launching LT46 with augmented2?

[wieder]

I suppose it could be an augmented2 game too once we get 2.6 running. Oh... I forgot to ask this. How are the sprites required by augmented distributed to the players?

[Wahazar]

The simplest method is to automatically install tileset/spec/png files using Modpack Installer. This utility is included in official freeciv releases.