SMACX AI Growth mod

[Dewbacca]

So about a year ago I was playing the v1.20 of this mod and really enjoying it.

Cats killed my monitor, internet got iffy in my rural area and I fell off into a much loved series of books for a reread and discussion with my wife... so not much SMAC(X) in that period.

I buy a new monitor, internet is still approximately dial-up speeds and wife and I are reading a new series of novels, but seems to be less discussion, so I get to poke around on  my games again, and when I check in here, I see this Growth mod is up to v1.37, I've missed some interesting changes and glossed over some of the v1.2x changes to try and catch up.

I am currently on Year 2220 of a Transcend difficulty game as the University on v1.37, playing standard SMAC factions (Original 7), retarded tech progression but able to select research. Map is a very large "Glorious Map" I downloaded from this site.
My overall assessment is WOW, doesn't even seem like the same mod as v1.20. It DOES seem to assist the AI greatly, so while it seems very different (from both SMAC-SMAX and v1.20) it's still doing a fine job of promoting a more vibrant and productive AI.

Clean Reactor: I love this tech and it's a staple of my gaming style, Forest and forget, build lots of clean military units & lead the pack on research. But giving it out at the beginning of the game, AND making it so cheap to add to other units seems oddly like cheating to me.
I would recommend pairing this ability with the tech that gives you recycling tanks. That would at least make you EARN the ability, and increasing the cost of clean vs standard unit would better reflect the VALUE of that ability.
I have observed the AI using clean units, so the reason for adding them is valid and adding prototypes of them is effective in inducing the AI to utilize them. It has the side effect of killing a fun tradition of breaking the AI's production when supported units are forced onto other cities as you capture enemy bases... but while that was a fun tradition, it was cruel and I'm not sad to see it go.

Prototype Units: I hate these on general principle. They wouldn't be as loathsome if I could delete or upgrade them to get them out of my build screen, but of course you can't.
That being said, I've read your reasoning for adding them and while I can't speak to specific units, I DO see the AI using these units, so the reasoning and inclusion of them is valid, but I will try to be more observant and see if I can help identify useful prototypes and eliminate any unnecessary ones in future replies.

Early Magtubes: I am a big proponent of magtubes and am always glad to see I have that ability... but so far in both v1.20 and v1.37 I can report I got them EARLIER than was useful. I didn't have much city spread at the time and all of my formers were busy upgrading tiles for existing cities or for future city expansion, so it has consistently been researched well in advance of my ability to use it effectively or enjoy it's benefits.
I might suggest a logical point to consider placing this ability would be when you get the ability to harvest 3+ minerals from a tile. Lore-wise you would have enough minerals THEN to encase highways in pressurized metal tubes. It's a bit far fetched that you would have enough metal to do that as early as I have been getting that ability in this mod.

Faction Agenda/ Diplomacy/ Societal/ Economic, ect:
Ok, I have a lot of impression, a lot of confusion, very little specifics that I can comment on. I am still trying to get a handle on how these have changed and how to navigate those changes for desired effect. I can only give you examples of my confusion in lieu of specifics, you may glean some useful information from the sad tales.

Deidre and I usually get along, especially early in the game. This game crammed us together as competitors on a small continent and we both quickly outgrew our allotted space and tensions started to rise. We were immediate friends, but she was never that happy about it. She was belligerent on a couple of occasions over new tech I had received and DEMANDED it! Sometime before turn 80, she parked a mindworm next to one of my cities, blatantly violating the terms of our friendship. I let it slide for several turns until I need in that area for improvements. I contacted her, we exchanged some tech, and I politely asked her to move her unit, at which time she declared vendetta upon me!
At this point that has backfired on her and she has been driven from the continent, but it was touch and go there for a while, she had most of my tech and a few more cities than I did. If the AI had built mindworms instead of spore launchers the outcome would have been different I fear.

In all of my years (decade+) of playing SMAC(X) I have never had more than a brief friendship with the Spartans. My style conflicts with their parameters and sparks fly, I expect it like a sunrise or a morning backache. But in THIS game... maybe it's the mod, maybe it's the Spartan Empire being so far away, but it's different. I met an empty transport at sea and got a begrudging truce from them around turn 50... and around turn 80, here comes another transport right up to my shores, and I expect the worst... I mean, It's SPARTA!
So imagine my surprise when Santiago offers me a Pact of Brotherhood if I will agree to war on the Hive! I nearly fell outta my chair. Not only did I agree to her terms, but I am considering honoring that agreement with some clean units once I have dealt with the duplicitous Deidre.
I'm not complaining, I'm just sayin... this ain't normal Spartan behavior.

The University: I expect some drone issues, and generally deal with them by getting The Virtual World. This of course was challenging enough in v1.20 with you sliding the wonders back several techs... but in v1.37 I am struggling economic/ research wise under the new rules. I still cant find whatever comes after lasers on the tech tree... I'm having to beat Deidre with her own money via probe warfare and a navy of clean laser foils. She beat me to probes, so even THAT was a close call, was lucky to get probes myself via alien artifact.

I'm enjoying this game, enjoying the "new" to discovering the new rules and how to exercise them to benefit me... but it's quite the learning curve from stock SMAC(X).

For extra credit I was going to submit the .SAV from the game, but I can't seem to find where the games are saving!! They're not in the save folder!

[bvanevery]

Thanks for the extended feedback!

Clean Reactors may feel like cheating, but they aren't.  No matter how beneficial you may personally feel they are to you, they are of tremendous early game benefit to the AI.  This is an area of the game where I'm quite clear that my insights of banging around on this thing trying to make it perform better, seriously outweigh anyone's perceptions about the game that they've acquired from "stock" play.  You're simply going to have to play my mod long enough until you finally see it my way.  It takes a long time to cogitate on all of these changes, and you have noticed that the AI is playing a bit better.  This is one of the contributing factors.

The math on this is actually simple.  You don't need Clean anything when you've got lots of production in the mid to late game, with Hybrid Forests, Factories, Thermal Boreholes, Mines with abundant food, and whatnot.  You may think you're getting a big bonus from Clean stuff at that point, because it seems "efficient" for things to not pay SUPPORT, but it simply doesn't matter by then.

Yes, collapsing the AI with SUPPORT problems is traditional to "stock" play... and that's exactly the sort of thing that needed to be fixed to get the AI to play better.  I wish I could say I totally fixed it, but I probably haven't.  I've definitely mitigated it.

As for prototype units, policy has become it's not about your convenience as a player.  It's about whatever it takes to make the AI play better.  I've devised many more units than are currently in the game.  Always, I've been eventually made to realize the bottom line is, does this help or hinder AI play?  When it hinders, it goes.  Lots of things would be great, if only the AI would use them properly.  Like I can design a flying colony pod for instance... but the AI is too stupid to actually found new cities with those.

Magtubes: there are 3 things you need to build a Magtube network.  The tech, the Formers, and the desire.  If those things aren't all lining up yet, that's not a problem.  I don't need to delay the tech just because you personally weren't building more Formers, or didn't want to build a Magtube network yet.  I find in my own games, sometimes at the current tech availability it comes earlier than I need it, sometimes later than I need it.  You suggested a particular place in the tree for it to appear, but it does come at Tier 3, same as the place you suggested.  It's just on a different part of the tree than apparently you're researching.  I'm fine with where it is in the tree, from a logic / continuity / availability standpoint.  It doesn't need moving.  It's weighted 4 Explore, 3 Build, 3 Conquer, which means it's highly discoverable by many routes of focus.

The tech tree is quite broad in the earlier part of the tree, compared to how I remember it used to be.  It can actually take quite a long time to get any given tech on Tier 3.  Which ones take longer, can be somewhat random.  It definitely puts some incentive to research the paths you're actually most interested in.  Also, many key techs on Tier 3 are deliberately blocked by Secret Projects, so that you won't be able to trade for them for awhile.  This is all totally 100% intentional.

I can't explain your experience with the Spartans.  In the "stock" game they have an Erratic personality.  In my mod they have an Aggressive personality.  They should either be more violent in my mod, or less violent than other factions in the stock game.  I think people have often assumed that the Spartans were Aggressive in the stock game, but they weren't.

I have observed that any faction can decide they want an immediate Pact with you, to go wallop someone else, if their circumstances have driven them to that point.  Even factions that ordinarily would hate your guts for your social choices.  This makes for strange bedfellows but hey, whatever!  Your alliance with an ideologically opposed faction doesn't have to last over the long haul.  Hey, we fought with the Soviets against Hitler in WW II.

[Douglas]

Prototype Units: I hate these on general principle. They wouldn't be as loathsome if I could delete or upgrade them to get them out of my build screen, but of course you can't.

You can get them out of your build screen by opening the design workshop, selecting the design, and clicking the "Obsolete" button.

[bvanevery]

You may not be able to Obsolete some fundamental unit types until you've got a Fusion Reactor available to you.  After that, you definitely can.

[Dewbacca]

Tried a different game, Spartans this time, again, 120 turns into the game everyone is running around in plasma armor with lasers and can't touch each other.

Also noticing some of the "Clean" laser prototypes didn't have a clean reactor.

Having some install issues, going to do a clean install and proof it before going any farther forward.

[bvanevery]

I don't think 120 turns in and no bigger weapon is a problem.  It does indicate that the game is playing with a bit of tech stagnation, as in no strong research factions.  Let me guess: no Gaians, Cyborgs, or University?  Or they're in, but they got crippled starts and are all but dead.  Also, are you playing on a Huge map as I recommend?  Tech goes slower on Huge maps than Standard maps.

Or were you playing with Tech Stagnation yourself?

Are you sure the AI's units really didn't have Clean Reactors?  I have noticed a problem when you try to use the Unit Design Workshop, that clicking on a unit that said "Clean", doesn't necessarily pull up the Clean design.  But if you look closely, it doesn't actually say it's the Clean design anymore either.  It's sort of a bait-and-switch problem.  The way to know for sure, would be to activate the Scenario Editor and get a good stare at the AI units.  I'll keep my eye peeled for this issue, but it's not something I have observed myself.

[Douglas]

Are you sure the AI's units really didn't have Clean Reactors?  I have noticed a problem when you try to use the Unit Design Workshop, that clicking on a unit that said "Clean", doesn't necessarily pull up the Clean design.  But if you look closely, it doesn't actually say it's the Clean design anymore either.  It's sort of a bait-and-switch problem.  The way to know for sure, would be to activate the Scenario Editor and get a good stare at the AI units.  I'll keep my eye peeled for this issue, but it's not something I have observed myself.

That's a quirk of how the design workshop handles designs with multiple abilities and how that interacts with the dummy ability flag recently added.

In the main window where you can edit things to make a new design, it only shows the number of abilities you have the tech for - 2 if you have Neural Grafting, 1 if not - and it picks them in order from left to right in the ability flags from alphax.txt and caps the number before checking what they are.

If you copy and edit the Clean Police design, for example, its ability flags are, in order: 1) Fake dummy ability, 2) Non-Lethal Methods, 3) Clean Reactor. Without Neural Grafting, you get just the dummy ability, which then gets dropped because it's not a real ability. With Neural Grafting, you get the dummy ability and Non-Lethal Methods, and the dummy ability is dropped so you only see Non-Lethal Methods. You will never see Clean Reactor in the initial details of copying this design.

The smaller summary view in the bottom left has the actual full details, but note that if you're not hovering the mouse over a design then it's showing the summary for what's in the main window. Mouse over Clean Police in the list of designs at the bottom, and as long as you keep the mouse there you will see the actual stats for it - "(1-1-1, Clean, Police)"

The unit stats shown in the bottom left when viewing an actual unit on the map also show the full stats. The only place that has any issue with this is copying/viewing a design in the workshop.

[bvanevery]

Yeah, I've added piles of flags to the Battle Ogres in the past, and lived to tell the tale, so I'm not too worried about weird effects like this.  You can add any flags you want and they'll all get listed in the small lower left unit window.

[bvanevery]

CHANGELOG
Changed from version 1.37 to 1.38:

- Added "Recommended" to Huge map button, on suggestion of playtester kaminiwa.  Note that parentheses, curly brackets, and square brackets do not print, so I had to be creative about the delineators.  Also there's no lower case, the text prints in ALL CAPS.  I finally chose "HUGE  >>RECOMMENDED<<" as sufficiently aesthetically pleasing and helpful for selection.

- Copter chassis: set Range=5.  When it was set to Range=2, I thought it would get one "free" landing outside of a base or airstrip, then start taking damage on subsequent turns.  However, it just outright died on the 2nd landing.  Range=1 must have hardcoded a certain style of damage in the original game.  To compensate, I'm giving it a large but not infinite range of movement.  Enough fuel for 60 squares, then it dies.

- Clean Transport: removed.  The Pirate AI obsessed about producing it, making hundreds of units.
- Clean Synth Garrison: removed.  It was meant to distract the AI from producing so many Clean Synth Speeder units, but the AI isn't interested in building this.
- Clean 3-Pulse Police: removed.  It's expensive and the AI shows no interest in building it.
- Clean 3-Res Police: removed.  It's expensive and the AI shows no interest in building it.
- Trance 3-Res Police: removed.  It's expensive and the AI shows no interest in building it.

The attachment limit per post is 5, and I eventually ran out of room at the top of the thread.  Consequently, this becomes the new home of version 1.38.  It was downloaded 87 times before I moved it here.

[bvanevery]

I found a documentation bug.  The Faction description for the Cult of Planet claims they get +1 SUPPORT, but they don't.  They haven't since version 1.12.  This is an old bug!

So, there will be a version 1.39.  I will wait for something other than a documentation bug before releasing it though.

Oh snap, that same description says they get +1 PLANET when they actually get +2.  Another old bug!

[bvanevery]

So I was playing a game against a populous but backwards enemy, the Cult of Planet.  I was the Gaians.  Although it was long into the Fusion era, I had a pile of old Fission units that the Peacekeeper gave me, that were perfectly good for smacking around the Cult.  I took a city near their capitol that contained the Human Genome Project, that was rather far from mine.  Nevertheless with a Democratic Green Knowledge Eudaimonic government, I had +4 JUSTICE, so shouldn't automatically be hateful to live under my thumb.

I end my turn and WOW the Cult takes over my city with a probe team.  I had a pile of units in it, as I hadn't moved forward yet, plus lots of Spore Launchers forming a front line within my city radius.  Size 13 city which should not be cheap to take over.  I look at their money and figure, the AI did this for only about 800 credits.  Neither one of us had any PROBE advantage.

Details AI cheating at probe team mission

AI cheating at probe team mission

I disgust quit my game and fired up the Scenario Editor.  This is what it would cost if I was in charge of the Cult of Planet.  Factor of 3 more expensive.  The AI is one hell of a cheater!

And this is with all my modding making probe team costs far more expensive than the regular game.  It is so broken.  Looks like nothing short of binary patching would ever fix this. 

If the AI had to pay 2700 to get their prize city back, I would consider that a fair exchange.  But the AI just ignores any sanity of rules.

[Douglas]

You could protect against this by bringing some of your own probe teams along. They have to kill all of your probe teams present before doing an operation is even an option.

[bvanevery]

Of course this late in the game, at this great a distance, it is super boring to think you need to do that to a badly beaten enemy, who shouldn't be able to buy you for so ridiculously cheap.  Like I said, if they had saved up a lot of money to "earn" this turn of events, I would think it's ok.  But it isn't, they buy that city and those units for a song.  Try looking at the cost of buying just one unit by comparison.  Taking over an entire city doesn't even remotely add up to the individual unit costs.

My entire homeland was garrisoned with probe teams, to prevent such problems.

[Douglas]

I remember experimenting with it and finding that, while units actually in a base increase the cost, units around the base do not, even though they will also be taken by the operation. There's also a modifier for drone riots, probably some other things, and definitely for distance from HQ. None of that would be affected by changing sides in the scenario editor, though.

The AI gets a number of other special rules treatments, too. For example, it does not need to actually have an available path to use a planet buster. I once tried to block a planet buster from reaching a particularly valuable base by putting a solid line of units in the way - needlejets for the ones adjacent to it, so the PB wouldn't be able to catch the base in the splash radius by hitting them. It made no difference, the base got nuked anyway. I reloaded and switched sides to check, and there was literally no way to actually fly the PB to the target in one turn.

[bvanevery]

So you had a full square around the base of air units, at a radius larger than the AI's blast radius?  Far out.

If you only used a line, you'd need to take higher movement rate for a Fusion reactor into account.  Or whatever the reactor was.

I suppose for sake of form, I should check on the relative level of ease of fixing these various binary problems that really bug me.  But if it isn't easy, I'm not bothering.  Hard stuff should go into a new game.