Ruleset

[jwrober]

Any thoughts as to the ruleset that will be used for LT44? A variant of LT43?

[wieder]

Yes. The ruleset will be based on LT43 unless there is a really good reason to do something else. Some changes will be done but probably not big ones.

[kamBLR]

May be a noob question, but: Why Wonders of the world availiable not only forthe first nation, like in classic rules of civ?

[Corbeau]

Because the classic Civ was a single-player game where you played against computer and basically had one opponent consisting of many parts (nations). The goal was to reach the end and succeed, there were only two possible outcomes, you win or you lose. World Wonders were only the steps on the path, you raced against the computer in building them and you had a fair chance of getting some built.

In an all-human multiplayer environment, unique World Wonders are an exception,if you're lucky you manage to build one, maybe two, three if you're VERY lucky (or have crappy opponents). Their role is reduced to mere candy that, if you don't manage to build (very likely), you have to manage without (most of the time). So, to give more importance to them, and also to speed up the game a bit, most of them were made available to all players.

Also, keeping all of them unique is detrimental to players who have invested huge amount of resources and then someone built them just before you. Such a blow can be crippling and could basically throw the player out of the game.

That said...

...while writing this, I see a problem. They are expensive, but also give very significant bonuses which makes not building them automatically losing strategy (at least if you're playing against people who are roughly equal to you). In other words, you are practically forced to build them. Which is always bad. Not sure how to solve this problem.

[wieder]

Currently the small wonders are quite often a must for one to build. To make building them more interesting, there are many of those and the idea is that no one can really build all of those when they become available. You need to decide what to build and when. It's also possible to succeed without any of those or with just very few small wonders. With the small wonders you also kind of get to decide what kind of nation you are. In the commercial civs different nations get different kind of special bonuses. In this game there are really no pre-defined qualities for the nation but your civilization becomes what you make of it. Built the lighthouse very early and your ships travel really fast. Build colossus and get more trade.

In one game I ended up with most land and built maybe only one small wonder.

Then again you always need to build some buildings or you lose. Quite often the walls at least on some cities. Or barracks.

[kamBLR]

Did you have an expireince in early ruleset with unique wonders? I agree with many positions of your (Corbeau, wieder) points of view, but I think uniq wonders also bring new strategys: conquer the city with wonder, risk not to be the first... Just interesting rather that ruleset wasn't interesting?

[jwrober]

I would be in favor of some unique wonders as kamBLR has mentioned. I see Corbeau's point as well. When I play against the computer I rarely do any of the wonders except a few that don't expire such as Magellon's Expedition and Hoover Dam. I can see the needs in a human based game however are different.

[wieder]

There are some unique world wonders. For example the great library gives everyone 50% boost for the libraries but unique boost for only the city it's located in.

Marco Polo gives everyone +30% boost on trade but only the player building Marco Polo can build The Trade Company that gives only the player owning it 10% boost to trade.

And there are other unique wonders but the majority of the wonders are small wonders.

I have played with all unique wonders and there the game is maybe too much about luck and rushing to get some specific wonder. If you are lucky you get it and the players failed trying to get it may be crushed because of losing the race. The small wonder system with some selected world wonders work pretty well nowdays. However if there are ideas how to improve it please let me know and we may be able to do some changes.

[jwrober]

I can see how supporting nation unique wonders would be a good strategy. For example, Lighthouse as a small wonder makes sense as any nation early in the game can improve sea units movement. However I think Magellan's Expedition should be a major wonder (unique). In this scenario it would go to a nation that is looking for "naval superiority" and would work with his team to get it first (certainly good for coastal nations). In the LT43 ruleset, this is not so.

I could make a similar argument with Sun Tzu's War Academy. This one as well could be a major wonder and helpful for that nation that is looking for "land superiority" due to the effect this wonder has on land units. Anyone can build barracks (not a small wonder of course, but still gives benefit to units)

What I do like about LT43's ruleset that I have mentioned before is how the tech tree is handled making later techs more difficult to obtain. That "feels" natural to me. I would like to see the wonders handled in a more natural way as well. For example, in the real world only one nation built the pyramids so I think it should be like that in Civ. However, all nations benefit today from the invention of the Internet so I would think any one can build that as a small wonder. Just like the Atlantic Telegraph Co is a small wonder in LT43 (e.g. like Internet any one that builds it benefits). There are other examples I could make.

[wieder]

Good comments!

Maybe we could reward the first players with the world wonders and split some of them into 2 different ones.

Magellan's could be the world wonder giving 3 extra moves. It could cost maybe 30-50% less than it costs now. Magellan's would become available with Navigation just like it does today.

If the players wouldn't have Magellan's, he or she could build some other similar wonder. One that would give 2 extra moves and maybe cost the same as the Magellan's costs now. This new small wonder would become available maybe with steam. That wouldn't make one player too powerful but would still give a nice advantage. One extra move can really be handy if you calculate how far away someone can attack. I can remember many times when it has been one tile short...

The tech costs hopefully make more sense now... The question is do they become too expensive in the end or not? This is the first game with those costs and I'm more than interested to know how the mid and late techs work.

Btw, Sun Tzu can now with barracks make vv units instead of just v units

[wieder]

We also have the LT40 ruleset with more changes and with slightly more experimental nature. We could test some ideas there when the follow up to LT40 is started after the summer. The basic ruleset for LT40 is mostly the same as with LT43 but there we have bigger city working areas, more units, different kind of buildings and 3 types of missiles to make the late game more interesting For the follow up for LT40 the idea is to add even more stuff we can experiment with and ideas are more than welcome.

The highlights LT40 had:

http://forum.longturn.org/viewtopic.php?id=829

[kamBLR]

I agree with jwrober. And I think that uniq system is not perfect in LT43, and it can be better with more uniq wonders, that really strategical points in the game. What I want is: wonders that can only be build by one nation.

[Corbeau]

Still, need to make sure that the loss of the race isn't devastating for someone if he can't switch to another useful wonder. Losing 300 shields early in the game can mean a disaster.

Basically, could do it in a non-mechanical way; experienced players will know this already, but when you see someone new starting to build a wonder, it is everybody's duty to scream "don't build it directly, ALWAYS use caravans!"

[Corbeau]

If the players wouldn't have Magellan's, he or she could build some other similar wonder. One that would give 2 extra moves and maybe cost the same as the Magellan's costs now. This new small wonder would become available maybe with steam. That wouldn't make one player too powerful but would still give a nice advantage. One extra move can really be handy if you calculate how far away someone can attack. I can remember many times when it has been one tile short...

I'd go with a smaller bonus for the Small Wonder. At most 1/2 of the bonus of the Great Wonder, probably less.

Also, another change, not completely related to this. Yes, it is annoying to have Warriors and Phalanx in the modern age. Let's have one unit per turn upgrade automatically, no prerequisite (or a standard prerequisite such as Invention), and have Leonardo (unique) upgrade two per turn, forever, no cutoff tech.

[wieder]

Let's see what we can do about the great wonders. We can definitely add at least some stuff for one of the next games and then see how it works. Maybe even for traditional like LT43.

I guess we could try something like this with more experimental. Maybe having invention (no building needed) to upgrade 2 units / turn automatically and then having a great wonder to upgrade one more unit. Could be forever since it really no longer matters to the top players when the upgrades end for Leonardo's. However the traditional will most likely stay traditional. Maybe

[Corbeau]

Two upgrades for free and +1 with a wonder is a too small difference. I wouldn't be interested in building it even if it costs 100 shields.

[wieder]

I would definitely build a wonder that would upgrade one more unit / turn. Definitely if it would cost 100 shields. Leonardo's now costs 200 and it upgrades 2 units each turn.

Maybe we could use some great wonders that would apply to just one city and would become available around gunpowder or slightly before that. One that would make new ships veteran, one that would allow the city to generate production on oceanic tiles. The wonders should not be available too early but not only once one city no longer really matters.

We could try this stuff one the next more experimental game.

[Corbeau]

Leonardo as it is now is valuable. Leonardo that increases this particular effect for 50, not so much. It only gets thing working somewhat faster, but you don't *need* it. Yes, if your goal is to become a military superpower, it may come in handy, but it's not crucial.

On the other hand, maybe that's it. Not crucial, but handy, giving you a choice to not build it and not cripple yourself because of it.

As for production on ocean tiles, I'd go with buoys and somewhere after electricity. Not a wonder, wonders are nation-wide projects, and if you tie a wonder to sea production, it's too binary, either "yes" or "no". With buoys, it's "you get what you pay for".

Additional idea: is it possible to build an improvement that upgrades X (or all) units in that city? So you have to drag them there and then back? Not a wonder so that there can be more of them, but make it fairly expensive, as "training centres".

Maybe make a series of them, like Barracks, and do what I did with Manufaktur + Factory: if there is an old version present, build the new version with a discount.

[jwrober]

One that would make new ships veteran, one that would allow the city to generate production on oceanic tiles. The wonders should not be available too early but not only once one city no longer really matters.

We could try this stuff one the next more experimental game.

Yes. I like this. I also like the comments about major wonders becoming unique and giving a nice advantage to the player/team that get's it first and then allowing for some small wonders that kinda compliment the major wonder (gives some benefit, but does not do the same as the big dog).

If Leonardo's workshop becomes a major wonder then you should get at least 2 or maybe 3 upgrades per turn. Makes it worth the effort of construction IMO.

I am open to playing an experimental game to test out some of these theories. So we maybe move some of this to a new forum area and discuss? I am also fine with throwing it into LT44 and see what happens, but not all might agree with me on that front.

On the tech tree piece of the puzzle - how long are these games going to run? If we are going to stop around 150 turns or so, LT43 is NOT going to be very far along on the tree based on where folks are now at T53 (as of today 5/16/18).

[Lord_P]

Major wonders favour players who are already winning.. The player with the largest production will be able to build them first and then get even more of a boost. This widens the gap between 'winning' and 'losing' players and makes it even harder to keep up and have a chance.

Personally I like things that level the playing field and allow smaller players to have a chance if they strategically work together. Rather than getting hopelessly left behind by a couple of advanced players and not being able to do anything when they roll over them with bombers and tanks..

[Corbeau]

Hm, yes, I'm afraid this argument cancels everything. We want the game to be playable and competitive and the players who are ahead to be catchable.

I'm still trying to figure out to make larger empires a bit more unstable, but manageable if you do the right thing and spend resources.

[Lord_P]

A hard thing to balance.. but there should be some kind of diminishing return on investment the more powerful a player gets. So yes you have an advantage.. but at an increasing relative cost.
There is already that effect from things like unhappiness and corruption from empire size, but theres rarely a point where it would be better not to capture another city or increase your population.

I think it might be interesting to have higher building upkeep costs (Maybe compensate with more free unit upkeep, so its better to create units and do stuff with them than just develop cities) and even buildings that you have to have before a city can build certain things. Currently it never seems to be a problem for upkeep costs to just build all the buildings available, theres no need to choose between affording building A or B. Having to specialise and keep cities lean, or afford huge costs, would add to the strategy and be an increasing drain on players with loads of cities.

[Corbeau]

I think it might be interesting to have higher building upkeep costs (Maybe compensate with more free unit upkeep, so its better to create units and do stuff with them than just develop cities) and even buildings that you have to have before a city can build certain things. Currently it never seems to be a problem for upkeep costs to just build all the buildings available, theres no need to choose between affording building A or B. Having to specialise and keep cities lean, or afford huge costs, would add to the strategy and be an increasing drain on players with loads of cities.

Actually, I think quite the opposite: keep building costs as they are, but drastically increase unit upkeep costs. After all, it makes absolutely no sense that upkeep for an Armour unit costs exactly the same as upkeep for the Warriors unit.

...which is why I did exactly that in my ruleset...