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wieder

Administrator

Posts: 1,863

Some info about the ruleset

*** EDIT: This is not a description of the ruleset used for LT50. This was the intended ruleset but was not used because they game was 2.5 based instead of 2.6.

Look for the in-game help for more info about the ruleset. Or check the actual ruleset files form github:

https://github.com/longturn/games/tree/master/LT50

*** End of edit ***

Warciv Freeciv Ruleset
----------------------------------------------------------------------

The 'warciv' ruleset is based on the 'multiplayer' ruleset, modified
for a game pace similar to 2.0 warserver rulesets.

1. Changes compared to the multiplayer ruleset
   ---------------------------------------

The differences can be extracted by

#> diff -ur data/multiplayer data/warciv

Gameplay
--------

Trade routes are enabled, defaulting to logarithmic arrival bonuses
and simplified trade revenue formula.

Incite cost of cities is reduced.

Hill city tiles get +1 food even when mined.

City tiles always get a road.

Wonder changes
--------------

Almost all great wonders have been changed into small wonders; that
is, they are player-unique rather than world-unique. Each player may
build their own "Oracle", for example, or even move such small wonders
around by rebuilding them in other cities. For small wonders that
become obsolete, this happens only when the relevant technology is
discovered by the owning player (rather than by any player).

Unless otherwise noted, for these small wonders, all wonder effects
that affect all of a player's cities have been changed to affect only
cities on the same continent as the city with the small wonder.

The Palace is still the only Small Wonder that can be moved around
by rebuilding it to a new city. Other Small Wonders can be rebuilt
only if you have lost them with the city where they were.

Marco Polo, Statue of Liberty, Darwin, Internet, and Isaac Newton are removed.

For the Colossus, Copernicus' Observatory, Great Wall, Hoover Dam,
King Richard's Crusade, Oracle, Shakespeare's Theater, and
Sun Tzu's War Academy, these are the only changes. Other
now-small wonders have been adjusted or completely changed:

- Apollo Program: Does not reveal the map.
- A.Smith's Trading Co.: Costs 300 (was 400).
- Darwin's Voyage: Costs 400 (was 300). Gives only one advance.
- Eiffel Tower: You get one unit free of shield upkeep per city,
  instead of "AI love".
- Great Library: Reduces city corruption by 50%, instead of the
  tech-parasite effect. Costs 200 (was 300) and never obsoletes (used
  to be "Electricity").
- Hanging Gardens: Just makes two citizens happy in each city on the
  same continent. Costs 150 (was 200).
- J.S. Bach's Cathedral: Costs 300 (was 400).
- Leonardo's Workshop: Costs 300 (was 400). Upgrades two units per
  turn (was one).
- Lighthouse: No longer makes sea units veteran (justs add +1 movement).
- Magellan's Expedition: Instead of the +2 move rate, it just makes
  new sea units built on the same continent veteran.
- Michelangelo's Chapel: Costs 300 (was 400).
- Pyramids: Instead of giving the granary effect, it allows the city
  where it is built to rapture grow.
- SETI Program: Renamed to "The Internet".
- Women's Suffrage: Costs 300 (was 600). Affects 2 and 4 citizens
  under republic and democracy respectively (was 1 and 2).

As for the remaining great wonders:

- Cure For Cancer: Costs 400 (was 600), and makes two citizens happy
  in every city owned by _any_ player who knows "Genetic Engineering".
- Manhattan Project: No change.
- United Nations: Instead of unit healing, gives the senate and
  anarchy-from-disorder effects of Democracy to all nations,
  regardless of government.

Building changes
----------------

- Colosseum: Renamed to "Amphitheater", and cost decreased to 60 (was 70).
- Supermarket: Increases farmland tile food output by 100% (was 50%).
- Police Station: Affects 2 and 4 unhappy citizens under Republic and
  Democracy respectively (was 1 and 2).

Government changes
------------------

The Fundamentalism government is similar to 2.0 'nowonder':
- No unhappy cities.
- Minimal corruption.

Technology changes
------------------

- Philosophy gives a free tech to the first player to research it.
- Discovery of Environmentalism additionally knocks 50% off cities'
  pollution from production.
- Added Fundamentalism from the civ2 ruleset.

Unit changes
------------

- Caravans and Freight both cost 50 and can make trade routes.
- Elephants, Crusaders, and Fanatics added from the civ2 ruleset.

Default settings
----------------

The ruleset suggests some server setting changes, although these can
be overridden. Notably, huts, barbarians, national borders, and
diplomacy are all disabled, more initial units are given, and "fairer"
map settings are used.

2. Use the new ruleset
   -------------------

To play a game with the multiplayer rules, start the server with:
       ./fcser -r data/warciv.serv
or a single player game with
       ./freeciv-gtk3 -r data/warciv.serv
(and any other command-line arguments you normally use; depending on
how you have Freeciv installed you may have to give the installed
data directory path instead of "data")

Start the client normally.  The client must be network-compatible
(usually meaning the same or similar version) but otherwise nothing
special is needed.

Note that the Freeciv AI might not play as well with rules other
than standard Freeciv.  The AI is supposed to understand and
utilize all sane rules variations, so please report any AI
failures so that they can be fixed.

Last edited by wieder (2020-01-02 01:14:42)

Harry

Player

Posts: 2

Re: Some info about the ruleset

Darwin appears under the removed list but it also appears under the small wonders list, has the wonder been removed or will the Darwin exploit exist in the game, albeit in a less powerful form?

wieder

Administrator

Posts: 1,863

Re: Some info about the ruleset

Darwin is completely removed.

dz

Player

Posts: 9

Re: Some info about the ruleset

What about the end conditions. I wasn't aware of the rule about ending when controlling a certain % of the tiles as what happened in LT48.

Corbeau

Administrator

Posts: 1,025

Re: Some info about the ruleset

What about the end conditions. I wasn't aware of the rule about ending when controlling a certain % of the tiles as what happened in LT48.

I'm not sure what is the question.

dz

Player

Posts: 9

Re: Some info about the ruleset

What are the end conditions for this game?

Harry

Player

Posts: 2

Re: Some info about the ruleset

he means are there any circumstances where the game would end prematurely to a in-game victory condition happening, they had an additional win condition for LT48 where after controlling a large portion of the map a winner was declared and the game did not continue after that

Corbeau

Administrator

Posts: 1,025

Re: Some info about the ruleset

Oh, LT48 had very specific endgame conditions that don't happen in most other games. Usually they are "announced alliance victory" or "announced score victory".

nutzer

Player

Posts: 15

Re: Some info about the ruleset

I find the ruleset quite a bit "abusive" with all its speed enhancements. I would appreciate some nerving of the war style, in particular reducing speed of workers to 2 and adapt terrain conversions more to the later game versions. E.g. some terrain should not be changeable like Swamp, Desert, Glacier; also it appears nonsense to allow a building target of Hills because this is very unrealistic. (I mean you can perhaps build Hills from Mountains but certainly not from the flat terrains.)

Last edited by nutzer (2020-01-01 13:03:08)

Corbeau

Administrator

Posts: 1,025

Re: Some info about the ruleset

What does worker speed have to do with "war style"?

As for terrain alterations, I definitely agree about hills (although drying up swamps is a regular action, if you ask me). In Sim ruleset the only terraforming you can do is ocean to swamp (as done in some areas throughout history). Hills remain hills, mountains remain mountains etc.

wieder

Administrator

Posts: 1,863

Re: Some info about the ruleset

The speed for the traditional rulesets has been 3x with some exceptions and in this game we are using, for the 2nd time, 2x-2.5x multiplier for some of the early units. This was done exactly to make the early game slightly less about wars and more about building the ancient empire. Wars are still a possibility and for the workers, the 3x moves remain because they were like that in the previous games. If the 2x moves work ok we may do some changes for those too. The 2x moves for the workers might have slowed down the game given that the citymindist is 4 and the workers need to have moves left to do some work. A warrior can attack a tile next to it but a worker needs to be on that tile.

There is also the issue with capturing the workers, if they are capturable. Maybe this could be fixed with a hybrid solution. Making the early workers with 2x moves and not capturable. Then introducing new workers the players would get with maybe some pottery level technology (could be something travelling related, but not as late as the wheel) and those workers would be capturable and having 3x moves. The same might also apply to the explorers...? but for explorers the default ones would have 2x moves and not capturable. Then the ones you would get with seafaring would obsolete those and given them 3x moves + make them capturable maybe?

The terraforming used to become available with fusion but that was boring from the playing point of view since almost no one really gets those units in a normal game.

We have lots of swamps turned into farmland in Finland. We also have some hills built here. For this game the cost of building a hill was increased. Maybe we could look into the terraforming costs more? Flat to hills is also there to make the game less dependent of your starting location. The hills give more defensive value. In the modern times, especially after inventing cars and stuff, the difference for attacking a city on hills is not that much compared to a city on flat.

Usually when people get explosives, about 50-60% of the game is already over. Maybe even more for some players. People get gunpowder by T55-T60 on average and getting to explosives happens maybe around T70-T80 if there is not that much rush. The game is often decided around T100-T120 if the planned length is about 120-150 turns. LT50 has more expensive techs so that remains to be seen.

Terraforming glacier, desert etc are more unrealistic but have been there to keep the game interesting even in the case of global warming and/or nuclear winter. I would rather adjust the costs instead of postponing to the end of the tech tree.

Workers can be used for wars because they can build roads you can use to move the early units fast. Better to scout for such activity

nutzer

Player

Posts: 15

Re: Some info about the ruleset

I walk from the assumption that a game shall be interesting and thrilling to play, regardless of what the speed. Given that, if a ruleset makes everything super easy to achieve, except slashing and hacking the neighbour, then I find it boring. This may be just a personal whim of myself, of course. But actually speed plays a great role for any strategy relevant element.

My concern was primarily with speed by which workers achieve their terraforming and modification tasks, it is not about walking speed in the first place. I compared the rule setting for transforming M on Grass and found it is 15. Actually in game the speed is not 15 but 3 (or is it 5?). So I concluded, not seeing any setting for work speed, that work speed is linked to movement speed. Hence I recommended nerving of movement speed. If work speed can be separated from movement speed, then movement speed can be discussed separately.

About transforming to Hiills it just doesn't make sense gamewise if you think. Major aspect of Hills is they are exploitable for Shield (minerals). So building Hills would mean you have to put all the minerals into them that you later exploit, otherwise it's ridiculous. You see it doesn't make sense at all.

Wahazar

Administrator

Posts: 232

Re: Some info about the ruleset

Transform cost is 15, but it is costs of movement points, thus "fresh" worker can do it in 15/3 = 5 turns, if worker has "v" status, he have more movement points (3+1/3), so it is even faster.
Not sure if work cost should be adjusted to be longer or not, it depend on game pace.

wieder

Administrator

Posts: 1,863

Re: Some info about the ruleset

The current idea has been making the game even more hard for the good players. This keeps the game interesting to them, because without that it would be mostly a race between few top players. Back in the days, and maybe in some other games, it has been too easy to predict the winners if you know the players. You sure can still make some educated guesses but the less advanced players are still important and can make a difference. A good player can still conquer and kill the neighbors in the early game. It simply takes more effort.

If the work times are too short, we can of course add to them. Currently transforming grass to hills takes 8 turns for a green engineer.

One option might be adding a new terrain type. Artificial hills that would give the similar defense values but not give the production bonus.

Last edited by wieder (2020-01-02 14:45:31)

nutzer

Player

Posts: 15

Re: Some info about the ruleset

You are making the game more hard for good players by making it easier for bad players, is that what you are saying? I don't see what other effect speeding up moves and works might have. I don't find this compelling, why shouldn't good players differ from bad players? That's what a game is about. Imagine you would modify the rules of chess in order to make it easier for the bad players, you would be a Robin Hood but probably have spoilt the game. For instance a Dragoon in your ruleset has speed 6; together with roads (x3) it can travel 18 fields in a day, that is as fast as a Stealth Fighter plane! No harmless small village can defend against such a surprise.

As for Workers I still find speed to 2 is adequate. Accomplishing with that rate is more realistic in comparison to military units and makes growth tasks a strategy element, whereas growth now does not appear to be one.

wieder

Administrator

Posts: 1,863

Re: Some info about the ruleset

Chess only has 2 players. Then again a game like golf has a system making the game more diffucult for the experienced players. I see no point in making the victory too easy. There are some other games with golden paths and stuff like that. They kind of make the game more about a race to goal.

The good players differ from the less advanced ones. Just not as much as they may on some other rulesets.

A dragoon can travel that much with the roads and even more with rails. This game is using restrictinfra to slow down the attacking units. They can't use the roads on enemy territory and can't move as freely as the air units. The small villages can use creative city placement and maybe forests, hills etc around the citiies, to slow down the incoming attack. A forest tile takes 4 moves and sicne the roads can't be used, a 6 move unit may face hard time moving there without a warning. It can happen but it's also possibe to defend against such stuff.

Maybe the change for start worksers with 2 moves (not capturable) and 3 for more advanced ones (capturable) would work.

Corbeau

Administrator

Posts: 1,025

Re: Some info about the ruleset

Can we get another rundown how exactly the game is more difficult for experienced players, please? It seems I missed that part of the argument.

wieder

Administrator

Posts: 1,863

Re: Some info about the ruleset

In short, we don't have rapture, and we do have tech leakage. There are also more ways to go instead of getting gunpowder as fast as possible. There is restrictinfra slowing down those who know when to attack... etc... One thing is that some of the techs are not as powerful as they used to be. In comparison to some other techs. Like the fighters don't have 3x moves and the nukes are more limited in this game. They can't be moved with subs but instead they need nuclear submarines that appear at a later time. This means that ending the game in few turns is not that easy as it used to be.

nutzer

Player

Posts: 15

Re: Some info about the ruleset

If restrictinfra is set then this case is a different house number. Still I see an advantage in recognising that enhancing everything is not necessarily improving everything. I had a close look at the rules for workers. Is it true that only move enhancements will add to their work capability? Then in the trad. ruleset there is no work-enhancement at all as their move-bonus is zero (which surprises me).

Seeing improvement to the game by nerving down workers, I worked out the following ruleset modifications to your inspiration.
There is a return to individual settings for enhancements and a shortage of levels:

Settings for Worker
move_rate = 2;
veteran_names = _("green"), _("veteran"), _("hardened"), _("elite")
veteran_raise_chance = 75, 50, 33, 0
veteran_work_raise_chance = 6, 4, 2, 0
veteran_power_fact = 100, 125, 150, 175
veteran_move_bonus = 0, 2, 3, 4

Settings for Engineer:
move_rate = 3;
veteran_names = _("green"), _("veteran"), _("hardened"), _("elite")
veteran_raise_chance = 60, 40, 20, 0
veteran_work_raise_chance = 5, 3, 1, 0
veteran_power_fact = 100, 150, 175, 200
veteran_move_bonus = 0, 3, 4, 6

I am aware that move-bonus is "fractional" (3 fragments for a point). What I don't know (but assume) is that work-to-be-done is also enlarged into fractional points and work performed is subtracted from there. Is that the case?

Last edited by nutzer (2020-01-05 15:20:01)