I recently downloaded MoM for my nostalgia kick. And I'll admit I am loving it, 3 am rolled around and I didn't want to go to bed. But it did get me thinking about one very big pitfall in the 4x genre while I was getting my ass handed to me last night.
And that is the must build start. I'll give you a great example from MoO2 since I haven't remembered what the order was for MoM yet.
When my brother and I play MoO2 there are 2 techs that ALWAYS get done first. Without fail or ever any variation, we go in construction for Reinforced Hull then to the must have Automated Factories. After that it is into electronics for the basic computer and then the must have Research Labs. Yes you can skip these two techs if you choose, but their basic bonuses are so important in the early game that it pretty much makes them a must have.
I find alot of 4X builders are like this. There are always those Techs or Buildings that are a must have, which is truly a shame as it detracts from the variety of the game. I think the biggest reason for items like this is that there bonuses aren't balanced right. Granted this is a hard call because don't get me wrong I love how much those previous two buildings increase my ability to build and research.
But playing MoM again I am realizing (as I am getting my ass handed to me) that there is a certain build order that you must do if you want to survive from early to mid game. Now I am not advocating for a "No Wrong Way To Build" system. There should be some deadly mistakes. But I would like to see a system that has more than one right way to start.
I also realize that EWOM has alot in it I but I am afraid that eventually if we don't do a good job at balance that their will be only one right way. I am especially afraid of this in EWOM with the way the tech trees are set up
With each following sucess costing more RP even if the tech is a basic one. And with the Housing/Food issue which we haven't seen a resolved balance on yet. Yeah I can very easily see a very linear must research X-Y-Z to get that start that will allow you to survive and win a multiplayer because it will beat anyone who doesn't do it.
So for my idea - remove it outright. Every X number of breakthroughs in any other research line also gives you a Civics upgrade. That lets you decide which way you want to go, and get the farm that you'd have to get no matter what.
Why not change each tech tree to having it's own specific set of research buildings...
Examples
[snipped to make long quote short ]
And to help at the start each town produces 1 RP for every category or you could even say 1 per level per turn
That way you still have control over what you want as your main focus by building more of those types of buildings. But you can still advance in all categories in a more even fashion. It increases the number of useful and distinct building in the game (more options never bad) and if you limit the research to the base structure plus say 2 upgrades it shouldn't become to overwhelming.
The Drawback here would be 5 different research typoes and associated bars. One could say more micromanagement though I would disagree there. and as for the K.I.S.S. aurgument, dammit this is a PC title and a TBS Wargame. We want some more complicated mechanics to gives us a deeper experience.
Wow. I love these two ideas. Getting rid of the Civics tree, but giving us a Civics breakthrough for every X breakthroughs we make in the other trees is an excellent idea! The downside is that you lose some freedom in developing your economy (you cannot choose to focus on your economy as much), but the upside is that developing your economy first and then working on the rest is no longer the be all and end all strategy on larger maps. I am a fan.
And having different buildings produce research points for different tech trees is also intriguing. Whether it allows you to research multiple trees a time or not, it would definitely introduce an interesting dynamic. It would also solve the problem that Nick-Danger pointed out - that the lines become progressively harder the farther down you get encouraging generalizing your tech instead of specializing. If your research proficiency in each line depended on your own choice (in this case of which buildings to build), then specialization would have its place again.
I think that some combination of these two ideas could make the research system as much better than the current system, as the current system is better than the original.
Is it me or are everyone supposing that all factions will use the same tech tree? We know from Brad's journal that Fallen factions don't beleive in efficacity of schools ...
Right now we can only talk about the tech tree we have, which has the problem and presumably will continue to.
Besides, if the Fallen have four "go down this line towards a way to win" trees and one "economy" tree, they'll have the same problem too. The problem is simply that economic techs are so powerful compared to everything else in the early game that it creates a right way to do things, and a wrong way to do things.
How about instead of buildings of a certain type directly producing RPs they affect your research efficiency in each field. But make the research efficiency go down as you increase in population. If you work the formulas right a large sprawling empire that hasn't put the money into highly developing their cities could be left in the dust by a small development focused empire. This is one of my big hopes and dreams for this game. Make it so that size does not correlate into a research bonus.
I honestly don't mind how the basic system currently works together. I think that adventuring and magic will be strong enough to relatively hold their own vs more economical civs ... while I see Warfare and Economy as inextricably linked.
As in, if your army is small, your gonna go Adventuring (and maybe warfare) techs ... while a large army will be economy + warfare.
Combined with completing quests or finding new magical books giving you a onetime boost to Adventuring or Magic RP points respectively, I think you would be able to have a relatively balanced play-style between lone-wolfing it and going empire.
In general, however, I don't have a problem with the idea of the Civics line in general and don't think it should be removed. After all, when you don't consider mining and farming ... the only "useful" tech in Civics is the one that unlocks schools, however schools are far enough away that its not a "MUST BUILD" strat, and actually carries a lot of risk to beeline for Schools without first getting some techs in your desired field.
The problem is that schools increase research in everything else. So the guy who goes down his chosen line in a largerish game will always lose tech wise to the guy who goes schools, then goes down his tech line.
It's very much a case where economy > all else.
Still, in most small or medium map sizes ... the specialization person can kick the school guy's ass. Its only in the most peaceful (or large) of games that the School is the obvious choice. Of course, this assumes that the specialization person invades before the School guy's schools start to pay off (or even before he builds his first school on small maps).
Its very much a Potential vs Here n Now question ... and doesn't have a definite answer. Certainly schools are preferred if your going to wait until you have a legion for your first conflict ... but more likely people may attack you with just a Champion + Party.
Tridus's point was that in larger maps, schools are the obvious choice. Starting out by specializing can give you a short term advantage, and therefore is competitive, maybe even advantageous, in small maps; but starting out by specializing in a large map would put you at a severe disadvantage to someone who built a strong economy first, then worked on the other areas.
I personally won't be content until I can play on any sized map and still have some choice into how to start. I would like to start out specializing on large maps, and also start out working on economy on small maps, and still be viable.
Quoting pigeonpigeon
"won't be content until I can play on any sized map and still have some choice into how to start. Can specialize on large maps, can Econ small maps"
See, I don't see this happening. And the reason is ... is that at that point its just "common sense." The real plague of some must builds is if its too specific, cheesy, and always wins in ANY situation. Econ strats working on large maps, and specialized starts working on small maps ... to me is an indication that the system WORKS.
One thing where I might agree with you, however, is that Large(ish) and Small(ish) empires should be equally viable on any mapsize ... of course how big a Small(ish) empire is probably has a lot to do with "relative to map size."
So on a small map, 1 might be small and 5 might be big, while on a large map 5 cities might be small and 20+ cities might be big. (and I don't mean ALL cities, but just settlements in general)
TO REITERATE: a "trend" of having to get "some" civic techs before getting other things is perfectly acceptable.
What is NOT acceptable is having to research A, and then B, and then C, and then D, and then E ... or else you are hopelessly lost, and it has to be in that exact order ... and then you have to follow a perfect build strategy, combined with the immediate switch to teching X, Y, and Z implementing expansions 1, 2, and 3 in that order ... etc etc etc.
See, HAVING to do a very specific set of things to be viable is bad, as its cheesy and non-intuitive. However, needing SOMEWHAT of an economy before doing other things is LOGICAL and therefore acceptable.
If EVERY mapsize beelining Schools was the key to victory, that would be lame ... however consider being attacked, either by players or by bandits. If you don't have any means of fighting them off, then your school beeline wasn't optimal.
I think the key here is to not make ANY ONE thing optimal ... and even if SCHOOLS end up being the single required beeline in the game, its agreeably quite silly ... however its better than having Magic completely dominate Warfare and Adventuring, thereby being the only possible specialization choice (or vice versa for Warfare or Adventuring).
I mean, knowing what works for each strategy is just part of learning to play ... but having one strategy as the only winner is lame (cough Chalid and Firebows, cough cough)
This kind of issue can be resolved by the use of Ranking mechanism. Your empire is big, if you are ranked 1st in terms of number of city. It is (almost) this simple. I've covered that in one of my 'achievement' based building/unit post.
Maybe it is time for me to start a new post to talk about that from a slightly different perspective, when I've time.
Which is why I removed the Civics tree. Problem solved, there is no "specialize in economy" option anymore. You have to pick which method of winning you want to start working towards, and all four of those should be viable on any map.
See Tridus ... I COULD see your method working ... in that all teching now has "equal" value. However, I think that would remove a lot of "fun" from the game ... building up your own economy/empire from scratch.
Your idea of everyone getting economy at the same rate sounds a lot like the ideas of everyone getting essence at the same rate. Killing diversity for the sake of possible "balance", also potentially removing a lot of the exploratory fun (even if its not fun in a competitive sense).
Communism for everyone!!! ... Sovereigns don't gain exp from battle, but instead gain exp at an equal rate, so that all Sovereigns have the chance to be the same!!!
Once you build one more city than the majority, everyone else has to build the same number of cities as you can before you can build another!! end of city spam!!!
I mean, I think at some point there has to be the ability to branch out and be better than everyone else, even if it gives the possibility for any particular strat to be overpowered. Variety is BETTER!!!
One thing to keep in mind is that currently we cannot lose what we take on the Map. With Beta 2, and the introduction of visual battles, I assume that will change so your power base can\will become way more fluid.
For example. I now can go out and hold all the Shards, even if I don't get credit for them right away. But I know my Magic research will be useable, and as such I build SP buildings to build up my SP bank.
Well, when the enemy AI or other players can take them away, and I cannot get them back easily, along with all the other Pioneer capturable resources, then many otherwise "beeline" type builds will have to be much more fluidic and even trying to lock yourself into one Track may not be really advisable.
It's not really "diversity" or "variety" when everybody is doing it that way because it also happens to be correct. As soon as you have a right choice and four wrong choices, you've eliminated diversity. Everybody who wants to win will go down the correct path, and there is no diversity at all.
Balance in this case actually INCREASES diversity.
(WoW talents are a classic example of this problem. Lots of choices, and 95% of players with any idea what they're doing are all using the same cookie cutter builds because they're the best. In effect, there's very little actual choice for most classes. The ones that have better balanced trees wind up with 5 or 10 points that can be spent on anything, and those are the ones where you see some real diversity.)
I also had this problem in my board game design.
Players had access to let say 20 different unique buildings which were each on a card. All the players had the same building list. Player could build any building they wanted.
- So the first problem is that players will find the optimal path of building to construct and will do always the same thing.
Solution so far, Buildings are acquired randomly from the deck of buildings and players have a bit of control over the luck.
- the 2nd problem is that the player could need a certain building to do something and if he does no have acces to this building it can break the game and prevent him from doing anything.
for example: Need a port building to travel on the sea, and the player start on an island.
Solution so far, make sure that the buildings does not allow a player to do something he could not do before but rather improve what he could already do.
Which lead me to the idea of situational bonus. If you make a building that increase production, sure all people are going to build it. But if you have a building that increase the production of forest tiles, now there will be situations where a player that has little forest on his territory would have little interest in this building. In fact, researching and building it would cost more than what it would bring.
I think that is the solution to the problem, in order to force the player to used various path, you must make sure that all building and technologies are not always good in all situation. So player will chose their tech according to their situation.
Situation could be determined by terrain location, special resources, spell configuration of the wizard, size of the empire, race of the empire, etc.
Sounds good. Would be interesting for some techs to be more useful for a smaller empire and almost worthless for a large empire.
preferably such techs in all categories.
Also, special techs depending on terrain, such as your forest example. Or a tech that improves Ice shards (one for each type of shard).
The goal should be not merely having no 'must build starts' but also having the 'best' tech pathing reflect one's specific situation (map/goals/etc.).
If going for a small empire, that should change what is the 'best' tech pathing. Little food in your area? -- then better emphasize food techs more than you otherwise would to get the most out of that limited resource. Few forests? -- then better find another way to get building materials (tech to allow stone to replace wood in buildings?).
Situational 'best' tech pathing increases the opportunity for player skill to shine.
"in order to force the player to used various path"
A direct NO-NO in any game design.
Provide options.
Never "FORCE" a player to have to do anything they don't want to.
I thought we were attempting to prevent "required" things from happening?
Doesn't "forcing" the players hand, run directly counter to that idea...?
Maybe the term forcing was wrongly used. It should be stated as: Strongly convince that this is a good or bad choice for him.
Note that player are not forced to take a path, it's just that some path are less useful than others. But players still have the liberty of taking the wrong or ineficient path.
I believe I understand the idea here, but, why would someone, who desires to "win" ever take the "less useful" path regardless of circumstance?
The proper premise to be used is if there is 5 choices available, and 5 different players all select a different one, each selection will be as useful to that player, as would be the selections of all the other players.
That is where true Balance shines and why it is such an elusive creature.
There can be various reasons. For example, let say the foresters guild add production from your forest.
If you have little forest around your cities, it wont be a good choice. Some other buildings could benefit you more.
But let say in your game, you want to place focus on production and that other building which is better for you increase your magic power instead. You might say, I will select this production boost builing even it it does not worth much for me because I want to focus on production and because I have a project X that requires a lot of production.
This is a big time problem in a lot of games. Particularly 3x..4x...5x... Xx...
For instance, on of my old favorites is Civ II. I might wiggle a little bit on the tech tree, but I'm always going for those techs and building the wonders. However, I feel that (not factoring in the radical ideas here), that the randomly awarded research will help somewhat. It relieves the pressure to get a specific tech. as you do not have that control.
However, if I spend all my time focusing on combat, that's my own darn fault, as I won't have the infrastructure to support my megalomaniac tendencies. Instead, while I'll be ahead in combat initially, I'll slow down as I won't have bumped my research rates, etc. And as long as those tech rates keep increasing, I'll only be hampering myself by pursuing it.
So right now, you almost have to diversify. But your particular playstyle is still accessible, so you can specialize in something, but you cannot focus on one "tree". And I think that's perfect. You have to balance, but your free to specialize SOME.
That's pretty much forcing them. If you have five choices and four are wrong, anybody who plays to win has zero choice. You get cookie cutter games and everybody doing the same thing.
This is why balance is a good thing. If the game is balanced, you have five choices, and two or more can be right. That lets people do different things for various reasons.
There is a fine line between picking a different strategy with an equivalent chance for victory, and simply making a mistake that does not maximize the benefit of your situation.
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