19-05-2002 07:10									#1
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Finally got a game going tonight - nice. Having done a rough explanation of the rules (1-1.5 hour [random chat slowed this down]), we then did turn 0 (about 1 hour), and then a further 2 turns (about 1hr45 together). At that point we switched to Settlers, Knights and Seafarers of Catan . We were getting quicker towards the end, and all agreed that the game was good, we just had had about 4 or 5 hours of it and it was time to stop.

A few thoughts that came out to start with - mainly minor as we haven't done much play yet (we hope to carry on after exams).

1. The fate card 10 of Clubs doubles your per turn influence increase for d6 turns, at the cost of an instant 10 honour loss. Quincunx drew it - thankfully he only rolled a 1, but was quite understandably annoyed that he went to -4 influence for that turn, and lost honour. Clarification necessary?

2. The lake is seen as still a little powerful, even at only 30g bonus/province. Only 8 provinces get that bonus, and it seems quite heavily weighted in the favour of the people who, going first, chose them. Was posited that perhaps a larger number of smaller lakes might be better.

3. We haven't really got far enough to tell, but we're slightly worried about the efficacy of espionage actions. It would appear that even Mourngrym needs to get quite high up that tech branch before it becomes at all useful - is this the case?

4. Similarly, we're mildly worried about the provinces->troops->more provinces->more troops->yet more provinces->victory! thing. Is this balanced in late game?

I must say I was very pleased to draw J of Diamonds myself - a leader with the ability to get charging infantry is not to be sneezed at - 15 attack strength makes short work of neutral provinces... I'm Castillar too (I chose last, or I'd have gone Quincunx), so hello to influence collection. After turn 2, I already had 7 and was due another 5 next turn. I also have 8 of hearts (no combat for a full round of turns) which I can use if someone threatens before I have my "shield" up. OTOH - I am worst off for land, as the dice roll made me play last as well. Fury and Mourngrym will share the Western half, and the Five and the Seven have the SE with the lake, while I have a strip along the NE boundary, with a small foothold in the heavily-contested centre of the kingdom. It looks like it could get very interesting...

	19-05-2002 11:36									#2
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This is a comment on #4.

I have for years advocated this sort of thing with no luck in seeing it implemented in a game.

It is specifically designed to help with the runnaway win problem you are alluding to.

Create a chart of common, uncommon, rare and ultra rare events. This chart is consulted whenever one faction reaches the synergy that leads to an inevitable win.

Each event will have a negative effect (directly or indirectly) on the leading faction.

More than one of these events can be triggered in each game, but some will be so rare as occur one in 100 games.

Example: A great person is revealed, oriented to oppose the leading faction. Connected to either a neutral provinces or group of provinces or to an AI controlled faction, this person has such charisma that armies form at his feet and he is nearly irresistable in battle. This great person has two weaknesses 1)a limited lifespan and 2)a second weakness from a random chart [that the human player will have to discover and exploit]

This sort of thing would spice up an otherwise lackluster endgame. Also, if you are clever you can use these events to link into a sequel game.

	19-05-2002 16:54									#3
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#4 is a problem that has been discussed at some point already ... I believe the plan at the moment is to make the percentages for Fate Cards dynamic during the course of the game. This would mean that whatever faction was in last place (using some kind of formula to work out the score, which would include number of provinces and number of military units) would have an increased chance of drawing 'good' Fate Cards. I'm not sure exactly how this system will be implemented, since Fate Cards are not gonna be in v0.1 they haven't been exactly worked out yet, but this might go some way to stop the problem. We must nevertheless be careful to balance it properly, so that a player is not penalised for doing well in the game, nor rewarded for doing badly, but it would be great if the system could go some way to avoiding a necessity for land-grabbing throughout the game. Multiple paths to victory are an important part of the game, which is where the Influence and Temples to stop attacks comes in.

	19-05-2002 17:24									#4
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I'm pretty sceptical 'bout supposed remedies to the running away with the games syndrome that rely on some sort of skewed misfortune system. There are several reasons for this:

Pro primo; running away with the game is an reward for a strategy well planned and executed. If the game doesn't devolve into MM hell, hunting down the stragglers and refusing to listen to their pittiful pleas is a pleasure.

Pro secundo; even if it's deemed important that the game isn't over when its, well, over, there have to be better ways to accomplish that then by some artificially applied misfortune dealt out from cards to punish the leader. Nothing in our experience seems to indicate misfortune is a companion of success, after all. As alternative ways of resolving these issues let me toss in a couple of other possible solutions: a growing empire of any sort experiences increasing centrifugal forces - allow for civil war or secession unless the player stations more and more troops in their provinces as their empire grows. Balanced carefully - there has to be some point in expansion, after all - this would certainly provide for plent of end-game challenge. As an alternative, make darn sure the AI plays to win. In MP games, hit-the-leader is always an overruling priority regardless of other considerations. Make the AIs understand this. Whoever comes out ahead is a threat and should be dealt with as such.

Pro tretio; it's difficult to balance misfortune. In Moo2, most events where merely irritating if you were ahead - it didn't matter squat to the outcome if the game if you lost a system to a nova if you had twenty others. In SMAC, I turned off random events forever after the game when my super-city strategy - I had like ten bases with 80+ pop each was hit with a random punishment in the form of a solar flare that eradicated my hydroponic farms. Now I had forty turns where I could produce nothing, do nothing and see nothing but countless starvation messages as my bases starved themseleves back to forty pop. And I was mad as hell, because there was nothing I could do to prevent that - it's not like there was an option to build hardened hydrofarms, after all.

	19-05-2002 19:55									#5
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In addition to moominparatrooper's second point about centrifugal tendencies of big empires there is the fat-dumb-and-happy syndrome. Since a big empire feels its got a good position the drive to innovate should be vastly reduced. FE It doesn't feel the crushing pressure where serious defeat leads to innovation, especially in the military area. In general where quantity is enough to win the drive to improve quality is ignored, be it in the military, economic, or other area.

I don't know if your timescale is long enough for such forces to play a large part, but its something we think will play a big part in balancing out bigger-is-better in Clash of Civs.

	19-05-2002 22:33									#6
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I agree with moomins second point too. You dont want (I think) to devolve the game into a one of chance.

	20-05-2002 01:26									#7
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There are two principal ways currently in my head of dealing with the runaway syndrome.

To my way of thinking, a good game is one where there is a lingering sense of uncertainty for the longest time possible, such that....while I may be ahead currently, this does not necessarily mean that I will remain so. That kind of imbalance keeps me on my toes, and ever watchful for things that would usurp my position.

The first method is one that both SMAC and Civ utilizes....and that would be to "charge" the current tech leader in a given category a higher rate relative to the other players for new techs. This assumes that the person with the highest tech level has a higher than normal portion of resources (more provinces, more discretionary income, etc), and is one method for at least partly countering the runaway game syndrome.

The second is in a method of calculating who gets what types of Fate Cards, a thing FP mentioned in his post.

The thinking goes something like this:

None of the Fate Cards are game breakers. What they amount to are unexpected minor boons, and unexpected minor burdens. The whole concept behind the Fate Cards is that there is some unseen force at work inside the Kingdom of Candle'Bre that, for reasons unknown to the players, wishes to see the Kingdom remain in turmoil for as long a time as possible.

This then, will somewhat skew the delivery of the Fate Cards themselves, such that a disadvantaged player will find himself on the recieving end of relatively more beneficial cards from this unseen force (extra troops, a free intercession from the church, perhaps a great leader who champions the current underdog's cause....stuff like that), while the big dog on the block is seen to have made his own fortune.

The Fate Cards are not powerful enough by themselves to be seen as a strategy in their own right (that is to say, we're taking care not to develop a system of delivery where Fate Cards are concerned that rewards lousy play).

The one thing we're definitely not going to do, however, is to heavy handedly punish the player who's on top (none of this...lose half your empire to civil war, or an asteroid strike nukes all your military units in your most heavily fortified province....that's silly, and harsh, IMO....there are more subtle, light handed methods of handling such things....the aforementioned notable leader championing the underdog's cause, for example).

Of course, as none of this stuff has been coded yet, there is plenty of time to discuss options here....

-=Vel=-

Last edited by Velociryx on 20-05-2002 at 02:10

	20-05-2002 01:36									#8
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The weighting of Fate Cards in favour of the 'losing' factions should be an option that could be toggled on or off. Personally I like the idea, and think I would want to use it in my games, but other people may well not feel so kindly towards the notion. Therefore an toggle in the game preferences to switch off the skewing of Fate Card percentages would give the player the greatest control over the gaming experience.

A similar option exists in the two-player mode of many racing games ... whereby one player gets an increase in speed or some other kind of bonus if they fall too far behind. While the system in Candle'Bre neededn't be as dramatic as this (the system in driving games is intended to give our useless friends a chance to compete with us ) it would nevertheless be a useful feature to include as an option.

	20-05-2002 01:39									#9
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Sounds like a plan, FP....and from the look of the way things are shaping up, there's gonna be one heckuva lot of options availble....that's a good thing!

Oh! And Chowlett! Good, interesting news re: your test game thus far. As to the question of the fate card that doubles influence....in my mind, the best way to "fix" that card is to make it holdable, such that the player can play it to his advantage. In this case, I'd say the best bet would be to restore that player's honor, influence, and card, and let him play it when it'll work out in his favor....


Lake bonus: Yeah, that's something we've been talking about as well. The current thinking is to not give the lake provinces any bonus, but have it such that the players owning the lake provs can build a harbor (cost yet to be determined) that would boost the income in each province having a harbor by 10-20.....hasn't been ironed out yet, but an excellent point!

Espionage: Right....the general idea is that Espionage is not something you can do from the get-go, but around mid-game, if you've been slowly and steadily ratcheting up your Espi tech level, you can use your current troop position in conjunction with it to really hammer somebody.

Ahhh, and one other thought comes to mind re: the prov--->troops--->more provs--->more troops---->game problem....

Remember that you are Castillar. Intercessions in the board game can be made to stop ANY attack in the game....including some other players expansionistic attack on a neutral territory.

So...if you find yourself in a bit of a pickle, land-wise, I'd hole up, build troops and temples, and sell your services to the highest bidder... Especially since you're holding a card that will block all attacks....you can burn your Influence to nothing, make a rival think you have no way of stopping his uber stack, and then watch him squirm as the attack falters.

Actually, the game is chock full of spoilers like that. Anybody can use the Intercession rule to choke off expansion, but Castillar is a natural at it with the bonuses to Influence he gets. The Wizards can do something similar by setting up a wide swath of Pestilence territory that's a nightmare to move through (especially if the territories chosen happen to be all the ones containing the biggest and most threatening player's Barracks)

With most war games, it's all too common to see the bulk of play centering around Uber-Stacks mowing down all the opposition, but in Candle'Bre, if you do that, you will almost certainly lose.

All it'd take would be one Intercession to shut your entire army down cold. One Pestilence cast in the province containing the Uber-stack, and g'bye to a healthy chunk of your army.

To counter that, players will quickly spread their forces out into numerous smaller contingents, and that, more than anything, is what makes the game really, truly strategic...cos then it's not all about who's got the biggest Uber-Stack....it's about placement and force coordination, and informal alliances ('k...I'll neutralize that attack here, if you agree to toss out a pestilence on this province here and maintain it for three turns....") Stuffages like that....

-=Vel=-

Last edited by Velociryx on 20-05-2002 at 01:53

	20-05-2002 01:50									#10
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quote: Originally posted by Velociryx Sounds like a plan, FP....and from the look of the way things are shaping up, there's gonna be one heckuva lot of options availble....that's a good thing!

If CB was multiplayer only, it would be. As is, you are slowly accumlating quite a burden for the poor guys who are to implement the AI.

	20-05-2002 01:57									#11
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True, and a good point. We've got an AI discussion going between the guys doing the research on it right now, and I posited there that, IMO, the simplest way of handling AI proper use and utilization of some of the features eventually to find their way in the game, is simply to avoid the issue by having the AI operating from a different, more simplified, rules set. This could be made totally transparent....the player wouldn't see any outward signs of it, and yet, the AI's performance would be improved, cos it wouldn't have to balance so many factors out.

So...essentially my thought is that the player gets the rich tapestry of options and choices, and the AI plays by the "CB Lite" rules.

-=Vel=-

	20-05-2002 02:06									#12
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That's an excellent idea. As long as it's made perfectly clear from scratch what the AIs modus operandi actually is.

Remeber all the outraged threads 'bout how the AI cheated this or that way in spite of Firaxis having said it wouldn't back when Civ3 came out?

Last edited by moomin on 20-05-2002 at 02:30

	20-05-2002 02:19									#13
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::nodding:: How could I forget? LOL

And you're right....we spell out up front what rules the AI DOES play by (easy to do, since we'll have to decide that specifically for the game), and just make mention of that in the player's guide section regarding the AI.

A couple of specifics I'm thinking of are these:

With regards to the "Citizen Archetypes" mentioned earlier and on another thread, that's something I don't feel the AI should even have to cope with. Humans can balance that out, but the AI should just have "generic" citizens, Civ-style...and perhaps allow any builds made by the AI provide a happiness effect. Thus, when they build a barracks for troops, they get happy citizens, when they build a market for money, they get happy citizens. In this way, there IS no balancing act for the AI, and from the player's perspective, they get a stronger AI opponent, which, IMO is a good thing!

The budget system in CB is broken out into a military and non-military pool for the players...that's another thing I don't think the AI should have to worry over. They just have funds, and can shuffle them into whatever they feel they need.

Likewise with production limits. We wanna make it so that the AI provides a challenging game for the human players, but we wanna do it without providing blatant cheats (free units, combat advantages, etc)....I would rather see the AI have a simplified rules set, and teach it to make smart attacks (calculate the total attack/defense value of its own force, compare it to those of the enemy before committing troops to battle), than to use combat bonuses or "free" production.

-=Vel=-

	20-05-2002 10:43									#14
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Wrt "runaway" games involving an ever-increasing number of provinces captured, how about some form of EU-style tech tree effect? Tech costs rise by 50% or so for every five provinces you control, after the initial allotment.
Same thing for your armed forces. Increase upgrade costs - scaled by x% for every y units above a certain number.
Maybe implement a "bureaucratic bloating" effect on gold production for newly captured provinces as well - For every few provinces you have beyond 10 - reduce their income by 10% or so - diminishing returns sort of thing ...

	20-05-2002 17:00									#15
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quote: Originally posted by Velociryx The budget system in CB is broken out into a military and non-military pool for the players...

What's the rationale behind this? Gold is, well, gold, innit?

	20-05-2002 17:54									#16
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quote: Originally posted by ravagon Maybe implement a "bureaucratic bloating" effect on gold production for newly captured provinces as well - For every few provinces you have beyond 10 - reduce their income by 10% or so - diminishing returns sort of thing ...

Sounds like "corruption" to me.

	20-05-2002 19:47									#17
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Some sort of nod may need to be given to the notion of "corruption" in order to balance empire sizes out. In fact, that could be one way a "builder" might be able to compete with a larger empire....build in some sort of beaurocratic threshold that can be undone/expanded with tech and provincial builds...allowing you to grow your empire as big and as fast as you wanna, but also putting the breaks on rush-style expansion.

As to the breaking up of the budget into military/non-military pools, that was part of a two-step program to help tame the rush-game beast (the other was to double troop support costs from 1g each to 2g each). Essentially, the rationale is that the people who are paying the taxes that provide the income expect more than military security for their money. In later releases, this will be one thing that can be adjusted from time to time (EU style sliders), and in the meantime, opens up the possibility of doing all sorts of groovy things with income via fate cards and positional adjustments (ie - maybe say that the person currently in last place can put himself on a survival diet, whereby the peers of his realm make 100% of the treasury available for military purposes).

-=Vel=-