Turning SMAX back into strategy game

[bvanevery]

MY 2262.  I research Cyberethics, which makes the Planetary Datalinks available.  Not real exciting as there's never going to be a bunch of common tech that I haven't researched.

MY 2267.  I buy Gene Splicing from Lal for a mere 150 credits.  It makes Research Hospital available.

MY 2272.  The Pirates have sent 4 empty Transports to my northern shore.  It's been awhile since I've experienced Pirate spam, since my own mod plays differently.  I will gradually shell them.  I still don't want to go Green because Planned is useful for growth and completing my stuff.  I still haven't even filled out my island yet, this has been a vertical game with a lot of interruptions.

MY 2279.  I research Environmental Economics, which will be useful for all these trees I've got on my island.  The energy restriction was removed some time at the beginning of the game though.  I've got almost 1700 cash so I start spending it.

MY 2284.  Roze blows off our Pact.

MY 2286.  Lal asks me to support his war with the Drones.  Since the Drones are Seething towards me, I acquiesce.  Domai has got a couple of techs to steal, so I could try to get a land based probe team over there.  If I can overcome the meh.

The Spartans intervene and declare war on me.  They immediately try to make a probe team attack on a northeast base, but I garrisoned everything with armored infantry Probe Teams eons ago.  They retreat helplessly.  I move forwards with 2 units and blow it away.

I research Superstring Theory.  I have been wondering why Lal was out researching me and now I know why, it gives Cybernetic.  I switch to it, not liking the additional ECONOMY penalty.  I'm now at -1 energy per base, but at least I've got lots of money.  My RESEARCH is now at an excessive +6.

3:30 AM, got somewhere to be tomorrow morning, going to bed.

[Alpha Centauri Bear]

MY 2237.  I research Ecological Engineering, which makes the Manifold Harmonics available.  It only costs me 240 to produce, definitely far too cheap, and possibly quite overpowered this early in the game.

I don't feel it is overpowered. You need non-negative PLANET rating to activate it first. Then with +2 PLANET it gives +1 everything from monolith. Nice bonus but how many monoliths you work? And remember that the number of monoliths doesn't increase. As for fungus production you probably have 1-0-0 fungus production at this time. Maybe 1-0-1. So you get 2-1-2 with +2 PLANET. Nice but not incredible. Good addition for poor terrain bases.

[Alpha Centauri Bear]

I will decrease most of the multiplication abilities

Could work.  Not crazy talk.  I guess only downside is AI not really understanding that the abilities are worth half as much as they used to be, but still cost the same.  Human player understands just fine and can make the choice.

Nope. Unfortunately, they are hardcoded in box version. Yutzi's patch lets edit them.

[bvanevery]

As for fungus production you probably have 1-0-0 fungus production at this time. Maybe 1-0-1. So you get 2-1-2 with +2 PLANET.

In MY 2286 I've got another +1 energy from Centauri Meditation, giving me 1-0-2 in fungus.  Oddly when I go Green and get +2 PLANET, I only get 2-1-2 in fungus squares.

[Alpha Centauri Bear]

My RESEARCH is now at an excessive +6.

SE effects are capped at values given in help. So the best you can get is +5 RESEARCH. Everything over it is a waste. I tried to design the table so to limit such waste to 1 above and below, though.

[Alpha Centauri Bear]

Some changes absorbed from discussion.

[bvanevery]

SE effects are capped at values given in help. So the best you can get is +5 RESEARCH. Everything over it is a waste. I tried to design the table so to limit such waste to 1 above and below, though.

Note that some of the overkills are not actually a waste in the real world.  For instance, +4 PLANET does raise your Psi attack advantage to +40%.  I think excessive EFFIC probably continues to feed the Bureaucracy formula to your advantage.  I don't know about +5 vs. +6 RESEARCH, I haven't checked actual game behavior to find out.

[bvanevery]

Some changes absorbed from discussion.

BTW I would recommend packaging this in a more installation friendly manner.  I should be able to drag and drop all files in 1 action, rather than needing to go into a subfolder, or needing to avoid copying certain files like readme.txt for fear they'll overwrite an official one.  In my mod I have readme_mod.txt for instance.

If I have missed something about the creation of a /factions folder in the game directory, let me know, but none of my GOG installations have a /factions folder.

I also think you need a much snappier name for your work than "RightTime".  I get that it was probably a functional "work in progress" statement of what you were trying to accomplish in the tech tree, but it's neither memorable nor descriptive of your purposes.  My own mod name is not entirely ideal, but at least I didn't get too far off the mark early on when releasing it.  A good chunk of it really is about the AI playing better, I did what I could.  Once people actually start paying attention to your mod on a regular basis, you're going to find that you don't want to change names or threads, for fear of disrupting the limited amount of attention you worked so hard to get.  So it behooves you to get it right at this stage, as best you can, before you're fully committed.

[Alpha Centauri Bear]

If I have missed something about the creation of a /factions folder in the game directory, let me know, but none of my GOG installations have a /factions folder.

That's the thing about faction txts. I do not mod factions per se. That is I do not do custom faction neither I want to change any faction benefits. I am modding the game rules and it is so happens that some rules need to be reflected in faction txts. Unfortunately. This is what I disclaim in readme. Those factions in subfolder are examples of corrected original faction files. If you are playing with modded factions - do no copy them from there but instead apply changes outlined in readme.

Namely:
1. Decrease POLICE rating for all factions by 1. I.e. give -1 POLICE for faction without inherent POLICE modifier, give -2 POLICE for faction that had -1 POLICE, give 0 POLICE for faction that had +1 POLICE, etc.
2. Give all aquatic factions exactly -3 SUPPORT to cope with their enormous production bonus.

The #2 is experimental to see if it work against aquatic production bonus. From my experience I feel this is a little not enough. So I give them some other negative modifiers like -1 EFFICIENCY. giving -4 SUPPORT will be an overkill and would halt their production completely.

I also removed all extra bonuses from aliens but this is entirely optional.

[Alpha Centauri Bear]

I also think you need a much snappier name for your work than "RightTime".  I get that it was probably a functional "work in progress" statement of what you were trying to accomplish in the tech tree, but it's neither memorable nor descriptive of your purposes.  My own mod name is not entirely ideal, but at least I didn't get too far off the mark early on when releasing it.  A good chunk of it really is about the AI playing better, I did what I could.  Once people actually start paying attention to your mod on a regular basis, you're going to find that you don't want to change names or threads, for fear of disrupting the limited amount of attention you worked so hard to get.  So it behooves you to get it right at this stage, as best you can, before you're fully committed.

Well, I though about "Strategic Balance" mod. But this is toooo generic and overused already.


The main idea is to remove all clutter, put features at (more or less) right positions in the tech tree, and rework some over/under powered strategies to make them less so. That includes weapon and armor progression and unit cost. Unfortunately, as you see, there are many focus areas. It is difficult to name them with one word.

Ideas are welcome.

[bvanevery]

I also removed all extra bonuses from aliens but this entirely optional.

In sum though, having gone this far, you are modding factions.  You're just not modding them as much as, say, I am.  It's fairly easy for you to describe your changes to someone else, in a few sentences, if someone just wants to be inspired by what you're doing.  Whereas in my case, it's a long and complex conversation, really no point in me trying to rattle off Points 1. 2. 3.

I'd suggest you not get into the business of leaving it up to the user to fiddle these things.  It increases the number of test cases you have to consider when a user gives feedback to you.  If you know what the faction settings are, then you can address any shortcomings when you get complaints.  If the user wants to fiddle factions into custom configurations, or do "merges" with other mods, let them be responsible for it.  You don't even know if they have the editing discipline to do all these things without making typos or other trivial errors.  Actually testing work is a serious value add, and you want your work to reflect your discipline and integrity as a game developer, not someone else's dinking around.  As you know, there's a long history of a lot of garbage mods for SMAC, not because they didn't have ok basic ideas, but because they were implemented by people who did not have enough release discipline over time.  In the present day, such work is all but dead and forgotten.

A practical consequence of you currently lacking commitment to your own faction changes, is I tend to forget at times whether I need to just throw a new alphax.txt on top of your new release, or whether you might have changed something in the faction.txt files too.  So that could affect phenomena I report about your mod, if something was missed.  I brought this issue up because it's easier than cranking up WinMerge to examine 14 faction.txt files to see what you actually did, or likely didn't do.  Another way of dealing with this is a painfully detailed CHANGELOG, as I do.  But IMO the root cause is, you changed factions, you really should install all of your changes every time and not leave this in the realm of user chance.

[bvanevery]

It is difficult to name them with one word.

When naming with one word won't suffice, think about most important words.

I picked "AI Growth" and that wasn't wrong.  The mod is about improving AI performance by giving factions more ability to grow.  Both by providing them more land, more distance (Huge map recommendation), and better research focus settings that for some reason trigger better growth AI.  "Explore" is the magic, that's the key.  This was noticed by someone else in the archives a long time ago, I just went to school on it.

Growth was also supposed to be about simulating population growth more realistically, but that fell by the wayside as development continued.  It didn't hold up in the face of gameplay requirements.

In your mod, the main thing I've noticed so far is the consequence of armor.  Not sure what I'd call it, but "Armor Something" or "Something Armor" is the 1st thing I'd be thinking about in your case.

The main idea is to remove all clutter,

I'm realizing some other major ideas in your mod, that I have not fully experienced yet, because I haven't finished a game.  You only do Fission engines.  It's a valid approach.  I came close to going that way myself, before I finally backed off and implemented something more like the original game.  I feel bound by keeping content of the original game lest people get too mad at me, and you don't. That's another important distinction, something that sets your mod apart.

"Fission Armor mod", as one possible name.

[bvanevery]

MY 2289.  Finally starting to build the Planetary Datalinks, for lack of pressing priorities.  With +2 INDUSTRY, cost is 640.  That's exorbitant for what it does.  You get low grade techs from this thing.  If you're advanced enough to stomach that kind of Secret Project expense, you don't need this.  It's also coming way too late to be of value.  In my mod I have it on Tier 3.  Actually I put it in the vacant Optical Computers slot.

MY 2290.  Domai just punked Lal with a mind control probe.  Size 8 base, 7 squares from capitol.  377 energy reserves after the action.  He is the Governor now, he could have been rich, but I smell a rat.  Lal is Democratic Planned Power Thought Control.  That should put Lal at +1 PROBE, not any kind of disadvantage.  Domai is Fundamentalist Planned Survival None, making him +2 PROBE, but I don't think that changes mind control cost, only success rate.  Saving game and cranking up autosave to see what Domai used to be worth.  Ok, he had 1109 credits.  Spending 700 credits might or might not be sane, it's debatable.  Lal has 453 credits in reserve, meaning that substantial reserves do not matter.

Looking at the previous turn, Domai sent 2 mindworms after that base as well.  1 boil, 1 pre-boil.  The city was empty last turn, I wonder why Domai didn't just attack conventionally or walk in?

MY 2291.  I buy 3 advanced techs from Lal for 300.  I know we're "good" allies but this seems cheap.  I wonder if the number of prereqs has something to do with the computed expense of tech?  I know the weights on the techs have something to do with it.

MY 2301.  Lal is 3 techs ahead of me again.  I don't feel like I'm the RESEARCH faction.  Domai is 2 techs ahead, and I haven't forgotten that he beat me to Secrets of the Human Brain, despite being -2 RESEARCH.  Something is not working, and I'm doubting that it's just my small number of cities.

Should I rock out and go for a population boom?  To do that in this mod, people have to be very, very happy.  I've got infrastructural prereqs for that.  Almost everyone has got a Tree Farm, a Fusion Lab, and a Research Hospital.  I think if I can't do that now, then basically, it can't be done in any reasonable way, at any appropriate needed time.  So I will try to do it, even though I'm unsure if success will buy me anything in the scheme of things.

I just remembered that due to interruptions today, I have not actually installed the newest alphax.txt.

[Alpha Centauri Bear]

But IMO the root cause is, you changed factions, you really should install all of your changes every time and not leave this in the realm of user chance.

Good advice. I'll do it.

[Alpha Centauri Bear]

Planetary Datalinks, for lack of pressing priorities.  With +2 INDUSTRY, cost is 640.  That's exorbitant for what it does.

Things like that is pretty difficult to estimate good. I'll take your suggestion on it. My take on this is that this SP gives you about 10-15% technologies for free (on top of base research). So being 10% ahead of others in research is a big advantage.