PvK Balance Mod Version 1.1 posted (for SE4 Gold Version 1.91 - Patch 4)
 

On this thread, I said I'd make a racial point balance mod for the basic (otherwise unmodded) game.

Post here if you have any strong opinions about what things should cost. I have a pretty good idea of what to do, but you probably have good ideas too, so if so, post away.

PvK

[ February 26, 2004, 06:08: Message edited by: PvK ]

Re: PvK Balance Mod Version 1.1 posted (for SE4 Gold Version 1.91 - Patch 4)
 

You should definetly add SJ's maintenance modification.

Geoschmo

Re: PvK Balance Mod Version 1.1 posted (for SE4 Gold Version 1.91 - Patch 4)
 

Aggressiveness and Defensiveness need to be very expensive. Make the minimums of them be 90%. Religious races dont need to be able to lower Aggressiveness to 75% to get half the points back for taking Talismans. Remove Environmental Resistance by making min 100 and max 100. It is a pointless trait that only serves as a loophole to get free points.

Re: PvK Balance Mod Version 1.1 posted (for SE4 Gold Version 1.91 - Patch 4)
 

<font size="2" face="Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif">I would, but this would require modding the vehicles.txt file, so that would be sort of beyond the scope of the mod, and it would lose compatibility with other mods that otherwise would be able to work with it.

PvK

Re: PvK Balance Mod Version 1.1 posted (for SE4 Gold Version 1.91 - Patch 4)
 

<font size="2" face="Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif">I would, but this would require modding the vehicles.txt file, so that would be sort of beyond the scope of the mod, and it would lose compatibility with other mods that otherwise would be able to work with it.

PvK</font><hr /></blockquote><font size="2" face="Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif">Ok then, well make it real expensive then, and top it out at 10% period.

Geoschmo

Re: PvK Balance Mod Version 1.1 posted (for SE4 Gold Version 1.91 - Patch 4)
 

<font size="2" face="Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif">There are two brackets for both reduction and improvement, and I'd rather not remove those options entirely, as again that would make the scope of the mod more than just a balance correction. What I will do though is make nearly-pointless sacrifices earn extremely few points.

Aggressiveness 75% is still a disadvantage for a Religious race, because not all their units will have talismans. Very low aggressiveness is a signifigant disadvantage even to races that plan to avoid using it, because cementing yourself into a strategy that avoids hitting with non-talisman direct-fire weapons, is limiting your flexibility.

Environmental resistance is greatly overvalued, but also is not without consequence - it cuts down planet reproduction significantly, which does have an effect even in the unmodded game. Also, it's more interesting if players have to pay at least a bit of attention to planet Conditions, so it should be worth at least a few points.

PvK

Re: PvK Balance Mod Version 1.1 posted (for SE4 Gold Version 1.91 - Patch 4)
 

<font size="2" face="Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif">Fyron said tolerance is pointless, when he should have said it's redundant. The conditions of the planet have no effect. I thought they did too, but I was wrong. Tolerance is just another linear modification to reproduction rate. You lose one point of repro and about for every five points of tolerance. It may also affect happiness, but that appears to be linear as well. Conditions have no effect on this beyond the effect conditions already have on reproduction.

Geoschmo

[ December 22, 2002, 23:16: Message edited by: geoschmo ]

Re: PvK Balance Mod Version 1.1 posted (for SE4 Gold Version 1.91 - Patch 4)
 

I ran a test on Environmental Resistance. I set up 1 system with 16 planets, ranging from a conditions value of 0.0 to 1.5. I colonized all planets on the same turn. Here are the results:

Totally standard, average race:

All planets are Happy

0.0 is Deadly and gets 0% reproduction
0.3 is Harsh, and gets 7%
0.5 is unpleasant and gets 10%
1.0 is mild and gets 12%
1.3 is good and gets 14%
1.5 is optimal and gets 17%

The planets stayed Happy after a number of turns.

The second test had a race with 120 Environmental Resistance trait:

0.0 is Deadly and gets 0% reproduction
0.3 is Harsh, and gets 11%
0.5 is unpleasant and gets 14%
1.0 is mild and gets 16%
1.3 is good and gets 18%
1.5 is optimal and gets 21%

All planets became Jubilant after 1 extra turn.

Conclusion:
ER is linear in effect in regards to Reproduction Rate on all planets, regardless of conditions. Harsh planets are affected the same that Optimal and Mild planets are.

50 points gets 1% Repro and 1% happiness.
125 points gets 5% ER, which has the same effect as the above.
Therein lies the free points exploit associated with ER.

Proposed plan:
To eliminate the free points loop-hole, change ER to cost as much to lower by 5% as it costs to raise Repro and Happiness by 1%. Make ER cost 10 points per percent to lower. But, leave its cost to raise alone. It costs fewer points to raise ER to 105 (125 points) than it does to raise Repro from 110 to 111 (200 points), so ER can serve a good purpose when trying to get really high reproduction.

[ December 22, 2002, 23:38: Message edited by: Imperator Fyron ]

Re: PvK Balance Mod Version 1.1 posted (for SE4 Gold Version 1.91 - Patch 4)
 

Thanks Fryon!

Re: PvK Balance Mod Version 1.1 posted (for SE4 Gold Version 1.91 - Patch 4)
 

Just some ideas - not really tested...

Double point costs for research, construction, and minerals.
Increase Maint Reduction to 200 per point.
Halve point costs for ground combat.

Let repair range from 50% to 200% - cost maybe 5 points per point of repair, with no increase in cost. (so 200% repair would cost you 500 pts, dropping to 50 would save you 250 pts) (it could probably cost less than that, but 5 is such a nice even number...)

Suggest maxing Defensiveness at 110%, allow aggressiveness to go to 120%.

Eliminate Bezerker, or give it more penalties (less consruction seems good). Ditto with Merchant (suggest more ship combat penalties)

Good luck!

Re: PvK Balance Mod Version 1.1 posted (for SE4 Gold Version 1.91 - Patch 4)
 

Mentioned this in another thread, but changing racial costs will make AIs and EMP files obsolete. Are you (or someone else) going to provide AI_General.txt files with this as well, or will this just be for new empires?

Re: PvK Balance Mod Version 1.1 posted (for SE4 Gold Version 1.91 - Patch 4)
 

Thanks Spoon.

Krsqk, that's a good point. I'll just do the mod for new empires first, and then hope some brilliant and eager people mod all the AI's. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/icon12.gif Mainly because it's a lot of time-consuming work to do it.

PvK

Re: PvK Balance Mod Version 1.1 posted (for SE4 Gold Version 1.91 - Patch 4)
 

After thinking about this some more, what Fyron said about the tolerance could almost be applied to everything. The problem most people have with the characteristics isn't so much that they are too cheap or too expensive when raising them, it's that you get too many points back when reducing them and don't hurt your race enough to account for it. I think most of your changes could be made on the minus side of the charatcteristics.

And doing this would have the side effect of making your work in revising the AI easier, as few of the stock AI anyway have much in the way of reductions IIRC.

Geoschmo

Re: PvK Balance Mod Version 1.1 posted (for SE4 Gold Version 1.91 - Patch 4)
 

Both are good ideas, Geo, although the AIs often are set to pick the undervalued attributes, and the total point levels can't be changed, so I can't really change the scale without increasing the power level, which isn't the goal of the mod. (Probably not clear there. I mean, if I wanted to not break AI setups by keeping positive costs almost all the same, I think it would probably end up devaluing everything but the undervalued ones, which would probably end up making 2000-point empires as potent as pre-mod 5000-point empires, and since I can't change the starting point bracket values from 0/2000/3000/5000, that's probably not desired. Agree?)

So I think some of the popular ones are probably under-valued on the positive side:

maintenance reduction (maybe 200/point to +5, then 300/point to +20)

combat bonuses (maybe 100/point to +5, then 200/point to +25)

intelligence (maybe 75/point to +10, then 150/point to +25)

political savvy (perhaps twice as valuable as the production aptitudes)

and perhaps construction.

PvK

Re: PvK Balance Mod Version 1.1 posted (for SE4 Gold Version 1.91 - Patch 4)
 

Emotionless is obviously way too expensive.
Organics may become overprized after 1.82 OA fix.

Re: PvK Balance Mod Version 1.1 posted (for SE4 Gold Version 1.91 - Patch 4)
 

"Emotionless is obviously way too expensive"

Subtract 800 from the cost for Emotionless, since it lets you drop Happyness to 50%.

Phoenix-D

Re: PvK Balance Mod Version 1.1 posted (for SE4 Gold Version 1.91 - Patch 4)
 

<font size="2" face="Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif">If you reduce the cost of Farming, this will essentially make Organic cheaper, and also give less points back to everyone else, who can safely drop it to 50%.

Re: PvK Balance Mod Version 1.1 posted (for SE4 Gold Version 1.91 - Patch 4)
 

Not too mention making farming cheaper than mining or refining just makes sense. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/icon7.gif Of course making sense isn't always the same thing as game playability. But in this case maybe it is. Good suggestion Spoon.

Geoschmo

Re: PvK Balance Mod Version 1.1 posted (for SE4 Gold Version 1.91 - Patch 4)
 

PVK is not the only modder who is watching this thread closely. Thanx for all of your help with the AoW mod!

Re: PvK Balance Mod Version 1.1 posted (for SE4 Gold Version 1.91 - Patch 4)
 

I've done some work on this, and it's getting there. Here are my current notes, for your comments.

Traits:
=======

* Advanced Power Conservation cost lowered from 1000 to 500.

This trait was rarely used, and while helpful, was not nearly as useful as other 1000-point traits.

* Mechanoids cost lowered from 1000 to 250.

This trait was probably never used by a skilled player in a competitive game. I have played many unmodded games, and have never been attacked by a plague bomb, and the few natural and espionage plagues have been easily cured for little cost and little effect. Moreover, empires with this advantage are immediately identified as such, so only an unobservant player would ever try to use a plague attack on a Mechanoid player. 250 points seems about right for this minor advantage, and removes the "balance penalty" for roleplaying mechanoid races.

* Lucky cost lowered from 1000 to 250.

The practical value of this varies depending on the game settings for random events. In many games, it will not be worth very much. In games with catastrophic events, at 250 points it simply becomes a dare to risk not taking it. Since the effects vary, and if multiple empires take it, they counteract each other, and since frequently this has little effect, it seemed to make sense to reduce it to a minor cost, which removes the amount of "wasted points" for empires which take Lucky in games where it won't have much or any effect.

* Natural Merchants, Propulsion Experts, Ancient Race and Hardy Industrialists left at 1000 points.

These all seem of roughly equivalent value to me. Ancient Race can be abused in some gamey ways, but gives no advantage beyond knowledge, so opponents can get more permanent advantages. Hardy Industrialists may be somehwat less efficient compared to construction aptitude, but it can be combined with it to reach the highest levels of construction rate, which some players use in their grand strategies.

* Advanced Storage Techniques cost increased from 1000 to 2000 points.

This one was pretty much universally accepted as the best 1000-point unmodded advantage, for its many effects and side-effects on facilities, starting strength, population, and cargo space. 2000 points seems about right to me compared to the other adjusted values.

* All racial techs remain at 1500 points.

After the many discussions over the years, it seems to me that these are all fairly well balanced and rated at 1500 points. They can all seem too powerful or too expensive if one doesn't appreciate all of their abilities and counter-tactics.

* Emotionless cost reduced from 3000 to 1800 (net 2200 to net 1000 when minimizing Happiness).

This is a very useful ability for lazy or new players, as well as for large empires that suffer damage that would otherwise make the entire empire riot and fall. Almost no competitive players were thinking twice about paying 2200 points for it, however. At 1000 net points, I'd say it's a good deal, and a valid choice for roleplayers.

Physical Strength:
==================
* Basic cost lowered from 25 to 3.
* Threshold lowered from 20 to 10.
* Positive threshold cost lowered from 100 to 5.
* Negative Threshold cost increased from 10 to 3.

Minimizing troop strength to 50 now only provides 150 points.
Maximizing troop strength to 150 now only costs 230 points.

Intelligence:
=============
* Basic cost increased from 25 to 50.
* Threshold lowered from 20 to 10.
* Negative Threshold cost increased from 10 to 40.

This means "the cheap bonus" is +10 for 500 points, instead of +20 for 500 points.
+20 costs 1500 points, and +50 would cost 4500.
Playing a "dumb" race is now more viable - a 90% race gets 500 points, while a 50% race gets 2100.

PvK

Re: PvK Balance Mod Version 1.1 posted (for SE4 Gold Version 1.91 - Patch 4)
 

I agree with everything you posted, though wonder about these two:

<font size="2" face="Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif">I still have a hard time seeing why Natural Merchants are worth so much - their biggest benifit (not having to worry about a spaceport getting wiped out) can be more or less achieved normally by putting 2-3 more spaceports in each system. My gut says it's worth maybe 500, but since so many say otherwise, I'd say maybe give it 750.

<font size="2" face="Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif">Seems too high. I think at 1500 I'd still always take it. At 2000, I'm not sure. Maybe that is right and just seems high because it's such a large jump...

Re: PvK Balance Mod Version 1.1 posted (for SE4 Gold Version 1.91 - Patch 4)
 

<font size="2" face="Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif">Natural Merchants allow four advantages:
*it allows you to set up resources producing colonies quicker than others
*1 more facility space (or in your case, 3 more spaces)
*Hard to blockade
*Allows other facilities to be built in the time it would normally take a space port to build.

IMHO, those advantages should cost about 1250 racial points.

Re: PvK Balance Mod Version 1.1 posted (for SE4 Gold Version 1.91 - Patch 4)
 

[quote]Originally posted by TerranC:

Quote:

Natural Merchants allow four advantages: *it allows you to set up resources producing colonies quicker than others *1 more facility space (or in your case, 3 more spaces) *Hard to blockade *Allows other facilities to be built in the time it would normally take a space port to build. IMHO, those advantages should cost about 1250 racial points.

<font size="2" face="Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif">I'm still not buying it. While your points are valid, they seem like small potatoes.

Re: PvK Balance Mod Version 1.1 posted (for SE4 Gold Version 1.91 - Patch 4)
 

*Hard to blockade

I don't think Natural merchants affects blockading at all.

Re: PvK Balance Mod Version 1.1 posted (for SE4 Gold Version 1.91 - Patch 4)
 

I think the idea is if you blockaded the only Space Port planet in a system of a non-Natural-Merchant player, it would blockade the whole system's production/research/intel. I'm not sure if that's true. It is true though that if a non-Natural-Merchant player only builds one spaceport per system, then destroying or capturing that spaceport will remove the system's production/research/intel benefit to the empire.

It's also helpful if you're capturing enemy planets with troops, and you get a good one with lots of facilities but no spaceport. If you are a Natural Merchant, you can reap the rewards right away. And so on. It seems quite helpful, but not everyone's style, and it also seems to me it should be something special, and not something people take because it's cheap and clearly worth the cost, also because having it removes an interesting element from play. So, 1000 points seems good because it is worth it to players who appreciate it and will play to take advantage of it, but not worth it for every race design.

Similar logic with Advanced Storage Techniques at 2000. The cost is high to make it purchased by people willing to make the investment in something special, and play to take advantage of it. So, it should cost a little more than you might think it'd be "worth". Because if it only costs what it's worth, you might get it all the time just because it seems like a value. Rule of thumb is if anything seems like a good deal for the price, it should probably cost a little more. I think at 1500, people would still be considering it as a standard thing to buy. At 2000, hopefully players will then see it as something that is worth it if you're going to use all the advantages involved, such as stuffing the cargo space with units, and not just "because it's like +20% to all production, and costs less". If it does more, it shouldn't cost less.

Nothing's set in stone though - I'm just trying to explain my ideas about this stuff.

PvK

Re: PvK Balance Mod Version 1.1 posted (for SE4 Gold Version 1.91 - Patch 4)
 

I am curious why you made physical strength (the ground combat bonus stat) so minor. Maybe I'm just inexperienced, but I would have thought capturing planets to be of pivotal importance, and thus the costs to increase and decrease should have been higher.

Re: PvK Balance Mod Version 1.1 posted (for SE4 Gold Version 1.91 - Patch 4)
 

No, I don't think blockading the spaceport (or any other system-wide facility) does anything to affect other planets in the system. I remember a discussion about this before, and someone tested it. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/icon7.gif

<font size="2" face="Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif">The thing is, you can get 800 points from lowering the trait to 50%, and still be able to easily conquer planets. Militia are too weak to offer siginificant resistance in almost all cases. Defensive ground troops get bombarded before you drop your troops (in strategic combat). So, there is really no penalty to lowering the trait to 50%. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/icon7.gif

[ December 28, 2002, 19:04: Message edited by: Imperator Fyron ]

Re: PvK Balance Mod Version 1.1 posted (for SE4 Gold Version 1.91 - Patch 4)
 

<font size="2" face="Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif">What Fryon said, more or less. Militia are easily overwhelmed even with a small force and minimum Physical Strength. Even in those situations where defensive troops manage to fight, it is easy to compensate for low Physical Strength with more troops, and there is so little information presented about troops and troop combat, and it happens so quickly, that the physical strength of ground troops turns out to be a very minor factor (in the few actual troop combats that ever occur, it's almost always an overwhelming odds ratio for one side or the other). So, in the unmodded game, I think Physical Strength is sometimes a minor advantage, but never more important than the Advanced Traits I rated at 250 points. So, with these settings, the maximums (which aren't really very extreme - 50 to 150%) are in the neighborhood of 250 points either way.

(BTW, I feel it is possible to _mod_ troops so strength becomes more important (e.g. Proportions), but this is just a balance mod for the otherwise-unmodded game.)

PvK

Re: PvK Balance Mod Version 1.1 posted (for SE4 Gold Version 1.91 - Patch 4)
 

Been distracted lately. Adjusted Intelligence value, and added Cunning.

Intelligence:
=============
* Basic cost increased from 25 to 50.
* Threshold lowered from 20 to 10.
* Positive threshold cost lowered from 100 to 75.
* Negative Threshold cost increased from 10 to 40.

This means "the cheap bonus" is +10 for 500 points, instead of +20 for 500 points.
+20 costs 1250 points, and +50 would cost 3500.
Playing a "dumb" race is now more viable - a 90% race gets 500 points, while a 50% race gets 2100.

Cunning:
========
* Threshold lowered from 20 to 10.
* Positive threshold cost lowered from 100 to 40.
* Negative Threshold cost increased from 10

This means less can be gained by lowering cunning, and raising it is more expensive between 110% and 122%, but less expensive for a heavy spymaster race over 122%. Maximum 150% Cunning costs 1850 points. Minimum 50% gains 650 points.
Part of the reason for the overall reduction is that defensive intelligence projects have multipliers to their effectiveness, so even a 50% Cunning empire can build up fairly effective defenses against a single antagonist without a lot of effort. The other reason is that concentrating in intelligence seemed very expensive for the amount of advantage gained. 150% Cunning in the unmodded game costs 3500 points, which is way more than it was worth compared to other advantages.

Re: PvK Balance Mod Version 1.1 posted (for SE4 Gold Version 1.91 - Patch 4)
 

<font size="2" face="Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif">Good point. I don't mean to increase prices based only on rarity of use. However some advantages can't be valued completely objectively, because there aren't completely equal alternatives to measure against, so I think historical usage can offer at least a little input. I'm trying to be as objective as possible, and also to give some cost for unique abilities.

AST is almost like 20% in Intelligence, Minerals/Orgs/Rads, and Cunning, but it's a bit better because of the 20% extra cargo, and like all traits, it can be combined with aptitudes, and it also allows adding more facilities which don't have equivalent effects in the attribute modifiers. OTOH, you also have to build more facilities and units in order to take advantage of the bonus potential from AST, and there may be some rounding effects. Skillful players will be able to take more advantage than others of complex trait effects. It gets complex. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/icon12.gif

PvK

Re: PvK Balance Mod Version 1.1 posted (for SE4 Gold Version 1.91 - Patch 4)
 

<font size="2" face="Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif">Not exactly true. The troops don't get bobarded unless you also have waepons platforms on the planet. It's just that for some wierd reason the troops take damage form orbital bombarment before the weapons platforms do. But if you only have troops and no WP's, then you will have a troop to troop combat and could have problems conquering those planets if you take your 50% to physical strength. That being said, people very rarely keep that many troops garrisoned, or they can't on most small or domed worlds, or they do go ahead and build weapons platforms, or they have taken a reduction to physical strength themselves, so it rarely becomes an issue. Not never, but rarely. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/icon7.gif

Regarding the merchant trait, I can confirm 100% that Fyron is correct here. Blockading the space port has no effect on the other planets in the system. It only shuts off the resources coming from the planet being blockaded. Destroying or capturing the planet however does knock out the production from the entire system. This greatly increases the value of that particular planet to your empire. In the middle of a war is not when you want to be spending time and resources rebuilding your space port, and losing whole systems worth of resources at a time can hurt even a large empire.

Regarding the Advanced Storage. Maybe I misunderstood PvK, but it seems as if you are giving the ADV Storage some subjective value. I thought the point of the balance mod was to eliminate this kind of stuff and make the different costs all be on the same scale? I am not saying that 2000 points is too much or too little for the trait cause I haven't tried to figure it out, but it ought to be easily enough to calculate the comparative worth of adv storage versus a 20% boost in all the production facilities plus the average loss of production per planet for enough cargo faciliites to store 20% more units.

It may turn out it's still cheap at 2000 points, or that may be too expensive for what you get in return. But trying to factor in some subjective "rareness" value seems counter to what you said the mod was for.

Geoschmo

[ January 06, 2003, 12:21: Message edited by: geoschmo ]

Re: PvK Balance Mod Version 1.1 posted (for SE4 Gold Version 1.91 - Patch 4)
 

hello all, this is a thread i will be visiting a lot as i have many complaints and ideas about SE4G's balance.

lets start with this - scattering and stealth armor. for one, they shouldnt be stackable (maybe set them to 1-per-ship with same family).
Another thing, scattering shouldnt have the block LRS's because it makes jammer obsolete.

i'll be back with more later.

Re: PvK Balance Mod Version 1.1 posted (for SE4 Gold Version 1.91 - Patch 4)
 

I think this mod was just for racial traits, actually. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/icon7.gif

Re: PvK Balance Mod Version 1.1 posted (for SE4 Gold Version 1.91 - Patch 4)
 

Yeah, I'm only changing the point values for race setup, not the way things work, in this mod. To see how I think things should work, see Proportions mod. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/icon12.gif But, thanks for the input. Proportions 2.5.1 does some interesting things with armor. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/icon12.gif

PvK

Re: PvK Balance Mod Version 1.1 posted (for SE4 Gold Version 1.91 - Patch 4)
 

Ok... weird problem here. So far I've only modded the intended files:

Cultures, Racial Traits, Settings

When I run the mod and try to create a new game, I get complaints about QuadrantTypes, which I haven't modded.

Anyone run into this before?

PvK

Re: PvK Balance Mod Version 1.1 posted (for SE4 Gold Version 1.91 - Patch 4)
 

Hmm, seems like QuadrantTypes is being REQUIRED to be modded. Then I go to create a new race, and it complains about not finding modded Versions of RepairPriorities and Demeanors...

Has this been discussed before? Seems like either I'm confused and doing something wrong, or this is a bit lame - I shouldn't need to mod those files - it should use the ones in /Data if I don't provided modded Versions.

PvK

Re: PvK Balance Mod Version 1.1 posted (for SE4 Gold Version 1.91 - Patch 4)
 

Even if you have only edited a single file, in order to have a new mod, you must have the ALL the files from /data in the mod/data folder as well!

Re: PvK Balance Mod Version 1.1 posted (for SE4 Gold Version 1.91 - Patch 4)
 

Ditto for StellarAbilityTypes, SystemNames, and something else during quadrant creation... sigh.

Re: PvK Balance Mod Version 1.1 posted (for SE4 Gold Version 1.91 - Patch 4)
 

Argh, that's dumb. Ok, thanks Captain Kwok!

PvK

Re: PvK Balance Mod Version 1.1 posted (for SE4 Gold Version 1.91 - Patch 4)
 

Well... all but Abilities.txt, which is just a reference file. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/icon12.gif

Re: PvK Balance Mod Version 1.1 posted (for SE4 Gold Version 1.91 - Patch 4)
 

Ok, here's the latest. Please comment. Notice I got to the combat bonuses, and because of what I did there, I increased the price of Religious to 2000 - see explanation below.

Traits:
=======

* Advanced Power Conservation cost lowered from 1000 to 500.

This trait was rarely used, and while helpful, was not nearly as useful as other 1000-point traits.

* Mechanoids cost lowered from 1000 to 250.

This trait was probably never used by a skilled player in a competitive game. I have played many unmodded games, and have never been attacked by a plague bomb, and the few natural and espionage plagues have been easily cured for little cost and little effect. Moreover, empires with this advantage are immediately identified as such, so only an unobservant player would ever try to use a plague attack on a Mechanoid player. 250 points seems about right for this minor advantage, and removes the "balance penalty" for roleplaying mechanoid races.

* Lucky cost lowered from 1000 to 250.

The practical value of this varies depending on the game settings for random events. In many games, it will not be worth very much. In games with catastrophic events, at 250 points it simply becomes a dare to risk not taking it. Since the effects vary, and if multiple empires take it, they counteract each other, and since frequently this has little effect, it seemed to make sense to reduce it to a minor cost, which removes the amount of "wasted points" for empires which take Lucky in games where it won't have much or any effect.

* Natural Merchants, Propulsion Experts, Ancient Race and Hardy Industrialists left at 1000 points.

These all seem of roughly equivalent value to me. Ancient Race can be abused in some gamey ways, but gives no advantage beyond knowledge, so opponents can get more permanent advantages. Hardy Industrialists may be somehwat less efficient compared to construction aptitude, but it can be combined with it to reach the highest levels of construction rate, which some players use in their grand strategies.

* Advanced Storage Techniques cost increased from 1000 to 2000 points.

This one was pretty much universally accepted as the best 1000-point unmodded advantage, for its many effects and side-effects on facilities, starting strength, population, and cargo space. 2000 points seems about right to me compared to the other adjusted values.

* Most racial techs remain at 1500 points.

After the many discussions over the years, it seems to me that these are all fairly well balanced and rated at 1500 points. They can all seem too powerful or too expensive if one doesn't appreciate all of their abilities and counter-tactics.

* Deeply Religious increased to 2000 points.
This is because the compensation for reducing Aggressiveness by a small amount has been greatly increased. Essentially, an average Religious player is expected to take a -5 in Aggressiveness, for a net cost of 1500 points.

* Emotionless cost reduced from 3000 to 1750 (net 2200 to net 1000 when minimizing Happiness).

This is a very useful ability for lazy or new players, as well as for large empires that suffer damage that would otherwise make the entire empire riot and fall. Almost no competitive players were thinking twice about paying 2200 points for it, however. At 1000 net points, I'd say it's a good deal, and a valid choice for roleplayers.

Physical Strength:
==================
* Basic cost lowered from 25 to 3.
* Threshold lowered from 20 to 10.
* Positive Threshold cost lowered from 100 to 5.
* Negative Threshold cost lowered from 10 to 3.

Minimizing troop strength to 50 now only provides 150 points.
Maximizing troop strength to 150 now only costs 230 points.

Intelligence:
=============
* Basic cost increased from 25 to 50.
* Threshold lowered from 20 to 10.
* Positive threshold cost lowered from 100 to 75.
* Negative Threshold cost increased from 10 to 40.

This means "the cheap bonus" is +10 for 500 points, instead of +20 for 500 points.
+20 costs 1250 points, and +50 would cost 3500.
Playing a "dumb" race is now more viable - a 90% race gets 500 points, while a 50% race gets 2100.

Cunning:
========
* Threshold lowered from 20 to 10.
* Positive threshold cost lowered from 100 to 40.
* Negative Threshold cost increased from 10

This means less can be gained by lowering cunning, and raising it is more expensive between 110% and 122%, but less expensive for a heavy spymaster race over 122%. Maximum 150% Cunning costs 1850 points. Minimum 50% gains 650 points.
Part of the reason for the overall reduction is that defensive intelligence projects have multipliers to their effectiveness, so even a 50% Cunning empire can build up fairly effective defenses against a single antagonist without a lot of effort. The other reason is that concentrating in intelligence seemed very expensive for the amount of advantage gained. 150% Cunning in the unmodded game costs 3500 points, which is way more than it was worth compared to other advantages.

Environmental Resistance:
=========================
* Threshold lowered from 20 to 0.
* Positive Threshold cost lowered from 100 to 12.
* Negative Threshold cost increased from 10 to 18.

This follows Imperator Fyron's information that 5% in this is like 1% in Happiness and 1% in Reproduction. Threshold reduced to zero since this effect is divided by 5 so the actual range is -10 to +10, and zero threshold allows different rates for low-level increases versus decreases, which need to be balanced differently to avoid "free points" schemes with offsetting choices for Reproduction or Happiness. Since it requires raising both at once and thus offers less flexibility, I devalued it 2 per point (almost insignifigant).

Reproduction:
=============
* Basic cost raised from 25 to 50.

Basic cost is raised because although population isn't a huge factor in unmodded games, a 1% change is about a 10% change relative to the base rate, and low rates can cut reproduction to 0% or a few % under bad circumstances, which becomes a relevant effect. The minimum setting will only earn 450 points, and is a meaningful disadvantage.

Happiness:
==========
* Threshold lowered from 20 to 0.
* Positive Threshold cost lowered from 100 to 40.
* Negative Threshold cost increased from 10 to 15.

Threshold lowered to zero in order to reduce reward for lowering happiness a small amount, since in the unmodded game a little unhappiness is easy to counter with troops. A lot of unhappiness can be a problem however, so the Negative Threshold cost was increased. Positive Threshold can be low, because for the most part, a high value gives diminishing benefits which can be accomplished by others using troops. Minimum setting of -50 gives 750 points (and would be hard to survive long enough to develop troops before riots took over). Maximum setting of +50 costs 2000 points.

Aggressiveness:
===============
* Basic cost raised from 25 to 100.
* Threshold lowered from 20 to 5.
* Positive Threshold cost increased from 100 to 200.
* Negative Threshold cost increased from 10 to 50.

The pre-threshold increase to +5% costs 500 points. Maxing to +25% costs 4500 points. Dropping to -5% gains 500 points, and minimizing to -25% gains 1500 points. Because of the way to-hit modifiers stack in SE4, this seems to me a fairly accurate valuation.

Defensiveness:
===============
* Basic cost raised from 25 to 100.
* Threshold lowered from 20 to 5.
* Positive Threshold cost increased from 100 to 200.
* Negative Threshold cost increased from 10 to 50.

The same value as Aggressiveness.

PvK

Edit: Corrected Emotionless cost for new Happiness price, and fixed the stupid line breaks inserted by either IE or the forum software when I pasted that in the first time.

[ January 09, 2003, 03:23: Message edited by: PvK ]

Re: PvK Balance Mod Version 1.1 posted (for SE4 Gold Version 1.91 - Patch 4)
 

Overall, I like the changes and might even steal some. I'd be more specific but I'm really quite tired and can't focus on anything... http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/icon7.gif

Re: PvK Balance Mod Version 1.1 posted (for SE4 Gold Version 1.91 - Patch 4)
 

Very nice, PvK. I doubt seriously that I could improve on it. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/icon7.gif

Quikngruvn

Re: PvK Balance Mod Version 1.1 posted (for SE4 Gold Version 1.91 - Patch 4)
 

Well Pvk, for all the discussion, I think the end result was very well done. Good job.

EDIT: BTW, how did you get through working on the proportions mod all this time and never notice that you have to have the complete /data folder when you mdo any data files? http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/icon10.gif

Geoschmo

[ January 09, 2003, 14:09: Message edited by: geoschmo ]

Re: PvK Balance Mod Version 1.1 posted (for SE4 Gold Version 1.91 - Patch 4)
 

The numbers seem good to me. Only thing I would consider doing differently is maybe making aggressiveness cheaper than defensiveness (by giving it a higher threshold, perhaps), and/or lower the maximum possible for Defensiveness to 120% (lowered from 125%).

My thinking is that survivability seems to be(slightly) more important than lethality...

Re: PvK Balance Mod Version 1.1 posted (for SE4 Gold Version 1.91 - Patch 4)
 

<font size="2" face="Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif">Thanks.

I remember now running into the /data thing before, and even sending suggestions to MM, but I'd forgotten about it.

PvK

Re: PvK Balance Mod Version 1.1 posted (for SE4 Gold Version 1.91 - Patch 4)
 

<font size="2" face="Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif">Thanks.

Yes, as a player, I tend to think of defensiveness as slightly more valuable than aggressiveness, for the same reason you mention. If you dodge for a turn, you get a chance to try to hit again. However, on the other hand, if you nail your opponent first, you might not have to worry about him hitting you the next turn. Also, if defensiveness cost more, you could counter your [i]opponent's[\i] defensiveness more cheaply by with your own aggressiveness. Similarly, aggressiveness might seem worth less to reduce since it could be made up for eventually by a talisman or seekers/ramming/boarding/intel, but from the opponent's perspective, all of those things ignore defensiveness as well.

All told, I think they're more or less the same value - different depending on the specific situation and enemy choices. But I'd be interested to hear more ideas about it.

PvK

Re: PvK Balance Mod Version 1.1 posted (for SE4 Gold Version 1.91 - Patch 4)
 

The main reason I buy Aggressiveness at all is to counter the (kind of cheesy) tactic of maxing out Defensiveness + Bezerker. Against most players, I don't think it comes in as being critically important. You might want to view it as a "counter" to defensiveness, and should therefore cost less (the only other viable counter being the Talisman - but I don't like to consider racial traits as counters, since you can't adopt them after-the-fact).

On the other hand, I've maxed out defense and have been untouchable. Maxing out offensiveness doesn't help you as much. I think.

-spoon

Re: PvK Balance Mod Version 1.1 posted (for SE4 Gold Version 1.91 - Patch 4)
 

That's an interesting argument, which makes some sense. Perhaps defensiveness is inherently slightly better than aggressiveness - any other thoughts?

PvK

Re: PvK Balance Mod Version 1.1 posted (for SE4 Gold Version 1.91 - Patch 4)
 

Any recent work on this?