Re: New Pitboss Game Discussion (Jan 17/09)

**Ebenezer** · 01-28-2009, 09:07 PM

Set the starter techs at 1pt each? Leave everything else at 0. Everyone would start with 2pts, but would never go past 10. It would provide a couple informational guesses very early in the game, but thats it.

**Niklas** · 01-29-2009, 08:04 AM

Unfortunately there's no way to discriminate between different techs, not without changing a lot more than the XML. The score algorithm makes all techs worth their era in (base) score, and if I start messing with the eras I'm sure we'll run into other unforseen problems. But keep the suggestions coming, and I'll keep digging as well.

**oyzar** · 01-29-2009, 08:15 AM

Make palace worth 1 score, everything else worth nothing.

**Bernout** · 01-29-2009, 11:14 AM

Originally Posted by Niklas

Weird, I can't seem to register without a password, it says incorrect registration password.

I made the registration password just "tg".

I like Oyzar's suggestion of just making the palace worth 1 point if that is doable.

Bernout

**Niklas** · 01-29-2009, 09:30 PM

Ok, I took a slightly harder look at the scoring algorithm. It's really quite hard-coded, so there is no way to get away from the fact that all one-time buildings (player/team/world) give score. There is no way to distinguish between different one-time buildings, so giving score only for palace is not possible. Same thing goes for techs, there is no way to give points only for certain techs and not for others.

I can see only three solutions:

Go with 0 score for everything, and hope the Civstats behaves. I have yet to test that, just registered my leader successfully this time with the password.
Give some score to some component - pop, land, wonders or techs. I think the worst choice would be techs, the other three have benefits and drawbacks. Wonders might be best, since they are already globally announced, and visible once you meet the person that has them.
Go in and change the score algorithm in the C++ code. I'd really not want to go there...

My preference would be to go with the first, assuming we can get Civstats to send out notifications anyway. I guess I will know in the morning.

**Bernout** · 01-29-2009, 10:58 PM

Originally Posted by Niklas

Give some score to some component - pop, land, wonders or techs. I think the worst choice would be techs, the other three have benefits and drawbacks. Wonders might be best, since they are already globally announced, and visible once you meet the person that has them.

This might end up being the best solution and I agree that Wonders would be the way to go.

I just did another test on CivStats. Even if it does the end of turn notification, we're still not seeing log in and log outs.

If we need to turn another rev of the mod, do we want to consider lowering the chance of popping techs from huts? I think when we chatted in IM you said it was a 1 in 6 chance right?

BTW, I know everyone is patiently waiting. I promise I'll have a game format proposal out for everyone to give feedback on by the end of the week.

Bernout

**emperor** · 01-30-2009, 02:03 AM

Originally Posted by Bernout

This might end up being the best solution and I agree that Wonders would be the way to go.

Yeah, points for wonders seems the most sensible solution.

Originally Posted by Bernout

If we need to turn another rev of the mod, do we want to consider lowering the chance of popping techs from huts? I think when we chatted in IM you said it was a 1 in 6 chance right?

That's incorrect, and the chance depends on the difficulty level anyway. From C:\Program Files\Firaxis Games\Sid Meier's Civilization 4\Beyond the Sword\Assets\XML\GameInfo\CIV4HandicapInfo.xml:

Settler - 20% chance of tech from hut
Chieftain and Warlord - 15% chance of tech from hut
Noble through to Deity - 10% chance of tech from hut

By the way, lowering the chance of popping techs from huts won't help anything. It'll just increase the dichotomy, because fewer people will get bonus techs and thus each "chanced" tech will be a more significant bonus for them.

Originally Posted by Bernout

BTW, I know everyone is patiently waiting. I promise I'll have a game format proposal out for everyone to give feedback on by the end of the week.

OK, looking forward to it.

**Niklas** · 01-30-2009, 07:10 AM

I did get a notification. But you're right that the problems with Civstats seem to be prohibitive anyway. The Optimal Solution (tm) would of course be to patch Civstats, but the chances of that seem rather low. So I guess we'll go with giving score for wonders and wonders alone. Anyone against?

emperor, sure it depends on difficulty level, but we're already doing this on (our own version of) Deity (so you should really look in Mods\NoScoreMod\Assets\XML\GameInfo\CIV4HandicapIn fo.xml instead). The chance on Deity for popping a tech is 1/6 if you do it with a scout, 1/10 with a non-scout unit. (Actually, it's 1/5.5 if you do it with a fully healed scout, since Healing is also impossible then.)

I agree with emperor that changing the odds just increases disparity though. If we wanted to nerf the tech popping, I think a better way would be to remove more techs from those possible to pop, such as Horseback Riding. Popping Mining early isn't really the same caliber as popping Iron Working or Horseback Riding on turn 25. We could include some other techs instead that are excluded now, though most of the early techs are already possible. I'm not sure it's really worth all the hassle though.

**emperor** · 01-30-2009, 08:38 AM

Originally Posted by Niklas

emperor, sure it depends on difficulty level, but we're already doing this on (our own version of) Deity (so you should really look in Mods\NoScoreMod\Assets\XML\GameInfo\CIV4HandicapIn fo.xml instead). The chance on Deity for popping a tech is 1/6 if you do it with a scout, 1/10 with a non-scout unit. (Actually, it's 1/5.5 if you do it with a fully healed scout, since Healing is also impossible then.)

True, I'd forgotten that Scouts will change the odds. A greater number of civs start with Warriors though, so I believe my calculations still hold for the majority of civs (at least before they build Scouts).

**Bernout** · 01-30-2009, 11:45 AM

Originally Posted by Niklas

I agree with emperor that changing the odds just increases disparity though. If we wanted to nerf the tech popping, I think a better way would be to remove more techs from those possible to pop, such as Horseback Riding. Popping Mining early isn't really the same caliber as popping Iron Working or Horseback Riding on turn 25. We could include some other techs instead that are excluded now, though most of the early techs are already possible. I'm not sure it's really worth all the hassle though.

So there is actually an explicit list of techs which can be popped from a hut? I really like the idea of restricting it to the early ancient era techs. This would also prevent people from leaving a hut alone in the hopes of getting a higher tech later in the game.

Bernout

**Niklas** · 01-30-2009, 12:57 PM

Originally Posted by Bernout

So there is actually an explicit list of techs which can be popped from a hut? I really like the idea of restricting it to the early ancient era techs. This would also prevent people from leaving a hut alone in the hopes of getting a higher tech later in the game.

Each tech in CIV4TechInfos.xml has an attribute bGoodyTech set to either 0 or 1. Only those with 1 can be popped from huts. I could easily include a custom CIV4TechInfos.xml that changes the allocations.

For the record, here's the list of techs that are poppable from huts by default, in the order they appear in the tech tree (left-to-right, top-to-bottom):

Fishing
The Wheel
Agriculture
Hunting
Mysticism
Mining
Sailing
Pottery
Animal Husbandry
Archery
Masonry
Horseback Riding
Priesthood
Bronze Working
Writing
Metal Casting
Iron Working
Aesthetics
Mathematics
Monarchy
Compass
Literature
Calendar
Construction
Currency
Drama
Music
Astronomy

Most early techs are in, notable exceptions are all the religions and Alphabet. Astronomy is the only really late tech to make the list. Metal Casting is also quite the catch though, as is Monarchy. If we were to change anything, I would probably remove Horseback Riding, Metal Casting, Iron Working, Construction, Monarchy and Astronomy. If we want to be even more restrictive, and just allow the early ancient techs as you say, the next set to go would be Compass, Currency, Calendar, Music, Drama and Literature. Not sure about Aesthetics and Mathematics.

So should we have a vote on this?

**Bernout** · 01-30-2009, 01:15 PM

Originally Posted by Niklas

Most early techs are in, notable exceptions are all the religions and Alphabet. Astronomy is the only really late tech to make the list. Metal Casting is also quite the catch though, as is Monarchy. If we were to change anything, I would probably remove Horseback Riding, Metal Casting, Iron Working, Construction, Monarchy and Astronomy. If we want to be even more restrictive, and just allow the early ancient techs as you say, the next set to go would be Compass, Currency, Calendar, Music, Drama and Literature. Not sure about Aesthetics and Mathematics.

So should we have a vote on this?

Given the excellent feedback from so many people, I'm thinking of forgetting about setting up some votes this time around and just going by what people have posted in this topic. So if anyone has thoughts on what you have posted above then they can sound off.

My take would be to leave the tech % unchanged and modify the list so that anything above and including the research points of Horseback Riding is excluded.

Bernout

**emperor** · 01-30-2009, 08:36 PM

Originally Posted by Niklas

If we were to change anything, I would probably remove Horseback Riding, Metal Casting, Iron Working, Construction, Monarchy and Astronomy.

I would add Currency and perhaps Music to that list (because the idea of popping the free Great Artist is a bit alarming, even if it's unlikely).

Originally Posted by Niklas

If we want to be even more restrictive, and just allow the early ancient techs as you say, the next set to go would be Compass, Currency, Calendar, Music, Drama and Literature. Not sure about Aesthetics and Mathematics.

Personally, as a next step I would restrict Calendar and Mathematics. To me, Compass, Drama, and Aesthetics are not particularly valuable techs to pop, and Literature is very cheap anyway so it doesn't matter if it's popped.

**Bernout** · 01-31-2009, 12:36 PM

Originally Posted by Bernout

My take would be to leave the tech % unchanged and modify the list so that anything above and including the research points of Horseback Riding is excluded.

Actually upon looking at the tech tree in game I would say let's just cut it off at the first 2 columns in the tree minus the 2 religion techs. This would make our list:

Fishing
The Wheel
Agriculture
Hunting
Mysticism
Mining
Sailing
Pottery
Animal Husbandry
Archery
Masonry

I think this works out fine since the tech tree progression has been slowed so we have plenty of time to find those huts and use them.

Bernout

**emperor** · 01-31-2009, 10:31 PM

Yeah, that sounds reasonable.

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