Brad Wardell's views about technology, politics, religion, world affairs, and all sorts of politically incorrect topics.

Most of the excitement in the Elemental universe has been about Fallen Enchantress.  But War of Magic continues to move forward too, albeit in a different direction.

image

There’s a lot of changes in v1.3 to gameplay that I’ll talk about later but one change that I’m working on is the scaling of costs of things in terms of population.

As many people know, in “the real world” it’s one thing to find one specialist nearby for your company but it gets progressively more difficult to find more and more. This happens to work out as a nice game mechanic because in v1.3, the cost of a study, workshop, archivist, or anything else that has no duplicate limit will slowly get more expensive in terms of personnel cost.

Your first study will only cost 1 (instead of 5). Your second one will cost 2. Your third one a bit more and so on.  This helps get the game moving early on but also makes it hard to get the crazy, out of control, late game scaling that has been typical. It also makes bigger cities more important because higher level settlements are the ones with the best resource multiplying improvements.


Comments (Page 2)
3 Pages1 2 3 
on May 25, 2011

Frogboy
An interesting idea.  Unfortunately, probably beyond the scope of what I can do in v1.3.

How about capping the max number of workers a city can use at the max population it can house? Would that be doable?

on May 25, 2011

Gwenio1

Quoting Frogboy, reply 2An interesting idea.  Unfortunately, probably beyond the scope of what I can do in v1.3.

How about capping the max number of workers a city can use at the max population it can house? Would that be doable?

I'm not sure. I like the concept.  I am wondering, however, if we might be better off having the limited number of tiles that a city can build per level again.

on May 25, 2011

.

on May 25, 2011

Kadrium
Brad, how do you plan on tackling potential problems when you conquer another faction? Suddenly inheriting 15 extra studies may really throw a wrench in my population usage.


EDIT: I'm on board with limiting city tile space, too. I'd like to see terrain affect it as well, so building near woods or in hilly terrain might cause space issues and give me a reason to chop down woods or use magic to raise/lower land and give myself some elbow room. Limited space also forces you into making decisions about how to best utilize it, and city building can use some added depth. Right now, laying out a city is essentially a completely cosmetic affair. Maybe you could give pioneers a 'survey' ability of some sort that would show a tinted overlay for usable space and available tiles at a potential city location.

 

I've been wanting the location of a city to matter more for a while now. It would be nice if the city got a bonus for being near certain enviornments.

 

For example, being adjacent (as in the city is in the adjacent square)

Mountain: +10% unit def when defending.

Woods: +10% materials.

Water: +10% food.

 

Just some ideas. To simplify this idea, you could always make the bonus only apply if the founding square is adjacent to one of these terrain types. That way you don't get string bean cities touching all the resources.

 

on May 25, 2011

Oops, I posted in the other topic.

 

The thought occurs that a pop-per-city should be easily moddable if we create a local 2ndary resource that population buildings produce.

It might even work pretty good with the AI, because the AI only builds buildings it can produce so it will default to population buildings once it runs out of the local resource.

Edit: Nope it was pointless. the AI just goes "hurr... let's put some cheat multipliers on that shit!".

 

on May 25, 2011

I would agree with a city tile limit for each level of a city, but as long as that bug where you hit the tile limit and then the city stays stuck in "too many tiles" mode (even when the city levels up or you delete buildings) doesn't make a reappearance.

Best regards,
Steven.

on May 25, 2011

If the cost for the Nth study is the same no matter where you build it, how does that help with city spam?

You could build 10 in one city or one in ten.

on May 25, 2011

It helps in two ways,

first cities that level up get a % bonus if you choose to do so. That means you should place them in a few high-level cities rather than many low-level cities.

second, high-level cities also gain access to new buildings from the civ tech tree, which further boost production by a %.

I, for one, am more anxious how the AI will handle this. The AI already has problems managing its population.

on May 25, 2011

Here is an idea I had for the MOM mod:

The more you add, the less efficient they are. For example:

Your frst workshop gives 3 point, while your second gives 2 while your last gives 1. You can build all 3 if you want, but it consume much more space. (Space was much more limited in the mod design).

So it was an opposition between having a more specialised but less optimised city VERSUS having a more generalised but optimised city.

on May 25, 2011

Frogboy

Quoting Gwenio1, reply 16
Quoting Frogboy, reply 2An interesting idea.  Unfortunately, probably beyond the scope of what I can do in v1.3.

How about capping the max number of workers a city can use at the max population it can house? Would that be doable?

I'm not sure. I like the concept.  I am wondering, however, if we might be better off having the limited number of tiles that a city can build per level again.

 

I think that could work.

 

Right now I'm thinking the best model would be 1 supercity, then satellite cities for resources/troop production.  Because of this, and to give an incentive for levelling up multiple cities, I'm thinking certain types of equipment should require a certain level of city.

 

Maybe dumping the archery ranges/weaponsmiths/armorers isn't a good idea- but I'd reduce the time it took to build them by a large amount.  Maybe, in addition, super bowyers/weaponsmiths/armorers should be hero types, which can give the ability to lower level cities, and maybe boost the buildings if they are produced.

 

Now I'm really racing with wild ideas, so I'll stop.

 

 

 

 

on May 25, 2011

I like this idea. If anyone has ever played Cossacks: European Wars, you'll notice that it uses the same progressive cost system for buildings.

on May 25, 2011

Alstein


Right now I'm thinking the best model would be 1 supercity, then satellite cities for resources/troop production.  Because of this, and to give an incentive for levelling up multiple cities, I'm thinking certain types of equipment should require a certain level of city.

 

 

This has always bothered me as well.  Picture this: I have 2 cities.  One is a thriving metropolis, possibly full of martial academies and top-tier soldiery, while the other is a podunk backwater with 5 guys living in mud huts.  And you know what?  That podunk backwater can produce an army both exactly as quickly and with every bit as much quality as the thriving metropolis.  Now I'm all for unrealistic game mechanics if they make a game more fun, but I feel that this particular overly level playing field takes away from both how special the metropolis is, and from how unspecial the backwater is.

 

So, while it's Waaaay outside of the scope of anything that will ever get into the game, my ideal city troop training progression would be something like:

1. lvl 1-2, queue allows 1 military unit, raw recruits only, no mounts

2. lvl 3: allows 2 units to be trained simultaneously, can have 1 lvl of training, cavalry can be trained (requires cavalry training ground)

3. lvl 4: allows 3 units simultaneously, can have 2 levels of training

4. lvl 5: allows 5 units simultaneously, can have 3 levels of training

 

All training levels and extra capabilities must have been unlocked in-game already (research, top level hero or unit reaches a certain level, hero or unit of a certain level in the city training, whatever).

 

You could possibly have additional capability limitations; for example, need a blacksmith for each unit being trained with metal equipment, etc.  Could learn special weapon moves starting at lvl 4 city (if you use the weapon but don't know the move, go to a lvl 4 city for additional training).

 

Thus, focusing on that big city becomes more and more rewarding...  and cool.

on May 26, 2011

I like the idea that back water cities can produce full capacity unit for game purpose. It's always a trouble to be force to build you units in the same high tech cities. I like when upgrades would affect your whole empire. Still it might not be very logical.

A solution could be to assume that there is supply lines between cities and maybe increase the cost of the units represent that they must be able to ship the required material from the high tech cities.

on May 26, 2011

Other ideas:

 

Building units in higher level cities is cheaper in terms of materials used (more efficiency)  If you need that knight in the border hovel, you can get it, but it will be more expensive to get the stuff there.  Experience levels could be capped by buildings that require city levels such as training grounds.

 

Another idea, higher level cities get more value out of the resources in their domain.  Shards produce more mana,lost libraries more research,  gold more gold, metal more metal, etc.

 

 

on May 27, 2011

Alstein
Other ideas:

 

Building units in higher level cities is cheaper in terms of materials used (more efficiency)  If you need that knight in the border hovel, you can get it, but it will be more expensive to get the stuff there.  Experience levels could be capped by buildings that require city levels such as training grounds.

 

Another idea, higher level cities get more value out of the resources in their domain.  Shards produce more mana,lost libraries more research,  gold more gold, metal more metal, etc.

 

 

 

Both really good ideas!

3 Pages1 2 3