Mod ideas for industry, hurrying, retooling, upgrade

[Alpha Centauri Bear]

Opening this thread to collect ideas on what can be done with the subject. This may be converted into actual mod implementation but not guaranteed. I think we may go rather slow on that as the problem is complicated.

Desired functionality to keep

This is functionality that probably should be in the game regardless of changes, IMHO. Welcome other opinions.

1.
Number of accumulated minerals scales to INDUSTRY rating change so that completion percentage doesn't suddenly change just because user flips INDUSTRY rating mid turn. Prevents speeding up project construction exploit.
That exactly feature was already implemented for AI in vanilla! You can check it yourself. So may as well be there for human player too.

2.
Projects hurrying cost should be higher than facilities/units ones. I don't have a specific or even fixed number in mind. I only believe it should be distinctly higher.
Now, upon thinking, I am not sure this should be such a hard requirement anymore. I agree to sacrifice this distinction in favor of simplicity and transparency if needed.

3.
Hurrying cost should not vary because of mid turn INDUSTRY change to prevent mid turn "flip INDUSTRY - hurry - flip back" exploit. Even better it should not be INDUSTRY rating dependent at all but this is optional.

4.
Free retooling on a first production turn should be possible as this is when human player chooses production unless queued.

Problems, exploits

Vanilla exploit. Project construction can be accelerated by switching to higher INDUSTRY at the last turn and then back next turn. Costs 80 credits in total but may be beneficial for costlier projects.

WTP exploit. Hurrying cost may be reduced by switching to higher INDUSTRY before hurrying and then back same turn without incurring SE switching cost at all. This is currently fixed by calculating hurry cost without regard to current INDUSTRY rating.

Free retooling threshold allows to hurry cheaper item type (facility) up to threshold and then retool to more expensive one (unit).

Unit upgrade should be cheaper than disbanding them and then paying for the rest of new unit. I don't know if it is broken currently in vanilla or WTP but this is something to keep in mind.

Formulas are complex due to different hurry cost multipliers, different thresholds for units/facilities and projects. That itself present problems in transparency and may make promoting new ideas difficult.

… feel free to add more

[Alpha Centauri Bear]

Some wild preliminary ideas.

Do not penalize for retooling ever. This is pretty weird and stand-alone feature without real game influence and meaning. I don't think it makes game any interesting to force player stick to whatever they are building when situation changes. Even more, I think we need to preserve unlimited number of carry over minerals so no accumulated minerals ever lost! Frees a big part of player mind in production planning. Like if one invested 600 minerals into project that is already built by other and there are no other projects available. In vanilla player was locked to this pile of minerals hoping they can discover another project anytime soon and spend them there. Otherwise, they will be completely wasted.

One correction to the above. Penalize for retooling from non-project to project to exact proportion of their hurry cost to avoid hurry-switch exploit.

Another global solution for the switching between categories. Store amount of bought minerals somewhere in base and then recalculate them when switching between categories with different hurry cost. Like if one is building RC and produced 10 minerals then hurried another 10 minerals then switched to project - 10 produced minerals will be transferred as is but 10 bought minerals will convert to 5 (the how much one can buy project minerals with same credits spent). This is brilliant BUT (a big but): a special and complex coding, modification in formulas everywhere, not transparent to user.

Optionally, remove all retooling penalties, hurrying thresholds, make all categories hurrying cost the same. Probably solves everything.

Optionally, make hurry cost grow globally as game progress to reflect energy intake growing faster than minerals one. Say starting at 2-3 at the very beginning then +1 every 50 turns. Keeps mineral production important throughout the game and reduce project instant-hurry later on. Maybe even make it grow fractional to avoid prejump rush to spend all the money. Makes less transparent to player, though.

Upgrade cost should be an exact hurry cost between old and new unit mineral cost. Makes it cheaper: (new - old) * hurry cost than disbanding and buying the rest: (new - old/2) * hurry cost. That is already like that in WTP.

[Nevill]

Do not penalize for retooling ever. This is pretty weird and stand-alone feature without real game influence and meaning. I don't think it makes game any interesting to force player stick to whatever they are building when situation changes.

I think it has a point. There is a certain inertia to player choices. They are not producing minerals, they are producing an item. If that item is a poor fit for their current situation, they get a choice between sticking to it and fending the problem off with other bases, or switching at a cost.

Planning ahead so you don't have to change production should be rewarded. If you could switch at any time, then it wouldn't matter what you build.

This is why I dislike the "free" upgrades for items of the same cost. You build an ECM unit... wham, and it's amphibious. Next turn you need AAA - there you go. It makes it completely irrelevant what you build; you are not in command of a unit, but of a lump of minerals you can shape on any given turn.

At least you can't downgrade a unit.

I think hurrying thresholds exist for the same reason, i.e. to prevent the players from 1-turn buying anything they wanted, and making them spend some time building up to it first... but the problem is then reduced to 2-turn buying, or hurrying production to carry exactly 10 minerals over, so I am not sorry to see the thresholds go entirely.

Tentative suggestions (from the other thread):
- Standartize hurrying costs of units and facilities. Solves the exploit of hurrying the wrong category within the retool limit.
- Make the projects cost double that.
- Do not remove retool penalties.
- Move away from the "per mineral" model to the "per row" model. This is to make retooling consistent on different industry settings. Retooling at -2 IND shouldn't lose you minerals.

[Alpha Centauri Bear]

- Standartize hurrying costs of units and facilities. Solves the exploit of hurrying the wrong category within the retool limit.
- Make the projects cost double that.
- Do not remove retool penalties.
- Move away from the "per mineral" model to the "per row" model. This is to make retooling consistent on different industry settings. Retooling at -2 IND shouldn't lose you minerals.

With these settings how do you plan to avoid hurry facility under retool penalty then switching to project exploit? It's a micro benefit but exploit anyway people in MP will be bound to use since opponents can use it too. The one you are so eagerly asked to solve.

upgrade vs. disband. Current upgrade is just barely cheaper than disbanding for minerals. Double it and nobody will care to upgrade. We sure can adjust it slightly to make all upgrades not zero but still cheaper than disbanding avoiding zero upgrade cost.

[Nevill]

With these settings how do you plan to avoid hurry facility under retool penalty then switching to project exploit? It's a micro benefit but exploit anyway people in MP will be bound to use since opponents can use it too. The one you are so eagerly asked to solve.

Ignore it, mostly.

The one I am eager to fix is annoying because the reduced cost for the first 10 minerals constitutes a significant part of the unit costs. It's an entire scout, or half the former. It loses relevance with bigger units.

It is also widespread, as every base can benefit from it.

Projects cost 20+ rows. 1 row is a drop in a sea. I count my every credit, and I wouldn't bother with this exploit because in 20 years when the project will be completed those 20 credits will become spare change. And you can only use it on a single base, because there is never enough projects to make it worthwhile.

Obviously I'd prefer the game to treat the first "retool threshold" as some undefined lump of minerals that could be anything, and would be hurried universally, but if the exploit is limited to 1/30th of a Secret Project that is built once in 30 years? There is a point where it becomes "good enough".

Current upgrade is just barely cheaper than disbanding for minerals. Double it and nobody will care to upgrade.

I was thinking it's too expensive, actually. Units are too expensive in WtP, what with the 4 credits per mineral cost.
Upgrade keeps the morale of the unit, and is available in the field.

I find the old upgrade formula... surprisingly sensible. Yes, there are rough edges and minor inconsistencies, but overall it serves its purposes. I have reverted to it in the meantime.

[Alpha Centauri Bear]

With these settings how do you plan to avoid hurry facility under retool penalty then switching to project exploit? It's a micro benefit but exploit anyway people in MP will be bound to use since opponents can use it too. The one you are so eagerly asked to solve.

Ignore it, mostly.

🤣
Universal solution for everything. We should try it more often instead of changing mechanics here and there.
Just kidding. I understood your point about this one being minor.

Current upgrade is just barely cheaper than disbanding for minerals. Double it and nobody will care to upgrade.

I was thinking it's too expensive, actually. Units are too expensive in WtP, what with the 4 credits per mineral cost.
Upgrade keeps the morale of the unit, and is available in the field.

I find the old upgrade formula... surprisingly sensible. Yes, there are rough edges and minor inconsistencies, but overall it serves its purposes. I have reverted to it in the meantime.

Err. You are saying vanilla upgrade is cheaper? I have to review them side by side then.

[Alpha Centauri Bear]

Here is what I think about future changes.

Retooling and related

Retool exemption, free minerals for new base, carryover limit.
Un-very-fortunately, this value is used directly in many places. Would be hard to override dynamically. I don't want to touch it.

Hurrying

• Hurrying cost thresholds affects only the cost of hurrying under that threshold but not total item one. That eliminates a two step hurrying exploit to minimize hurrying cost. Also streamlines partial hurrying even if this crosses the threshold.
• Hurrying cost is flat for all categories. Meaning, each brick in the wall essentially has its price
• Hurrying cost for bricks under retool exemption is the same for all categories and equal to highest cost across category to avoid hurry-switch exploit
• Project 4 rows threshold will be removed. It serves no purpose besides doubling new project cost and is easily circumvented by two step hurrying.
• I will expose hurry cost per brick for all categories. However, units and facilities cost will be same by default.
• After hurry cost is calculated it is scaled to INDUSTRY=0. This is to avoid mid-turn switch-hurry-switch exploit as well as decoupling hurry cost from INDUSTRY rating. This is already implemented.

Damn. Forgot about partial hurrying which is calculated as a simple proportion. This invalidates non equal brick costs. So, I guess, I just make hurry cost absolutely flat without any thresholds. I'll just penalize under retool exemption proportionally when switching to higher cost category to avoid exploit.


Essentially ended up just exposing category hurry cost multipliers. Nothing else changed.
Currently they are set to 3,3,6. Subject for discussion.