Rebalance Mod for MP

[Mart]

Well... there is a problem though.
Crawlers can be reverse-engineered. So it is possible to build even very expensive ones with Industrial Automation.
For now, the only solution seems to be "no reverse-engineering of crawlers before Industrial Robotics" rule.

[Mart]

For new iteration of the mod, I am thinking about giving all factions just 1 additional cp and then all factions would start with basic 350 EC.
Morgan would get not 100 additional, but 250 EC. This is to make that EC count. But that would be for testing, if this is about right amount.
This way all factions would be altered the same way.

[Mart]

Or maybe somewhat different approach. All factions get the same:
- one additional colony pod.
- 200 EC starting energy.
-- Morgans get additional 200 EC (not 100).

This 200 EC will not be sufficient to buy a cp early, but will definitely help to develop faster. Larger energy will be somewhat game experience changing, but maybe not that much as other changes.

Strategies will have to be adjusted for these changes. I wonder how much.

[Yitzi]

Expensive-for-the-early-game colony pods weaken  even further, though...since she doesn't really have anything else to build that early.

[Mart]

She might receive extra energy to compensate lost lab points for the first 10 turns.

Miriam's "flavour" is slow research. On the other hand, she has excellent support and can do a lot of exploration on land building military in the time before catching up with some techs.

Next testing scenario will be Miriam then.

[Nexii]

Also in addition to what Yitzi pointed out, SUP is also stronger the more bases you build.  With fewer bases the free maintenance becomes less valuable.

[Yitzi]

Also in addition to what Yitzi pointed out, SUP is also stronger the more bases you build.  With fewer bases the free maintenance becomes less valuable.

And +3 PROBE is also much stronger for an expansionist (as far-away-from-HQ bases are cheaper to MC).

I wonder if (despite requiring .exe modding) a better solution to the "not caring about overrun bases" problem would be to make it so that losing population to mind worms causes extra drones temporarily...

[Mart]

Also in addition to what Yitzi pointed out, SUP is also stronger the more bases you build.  With fewer bases the free maintenance becomes less valuable.

Support is balanced, since your opponents also build less bases, or maybe saying differently: there is a lag in AI factions achieving large number of bases.
From what I saw so far, Hive has no problem to reach over 10 bases after 120 turns on huge map. Believers are the same.
AI very often builds colony pods even if they are very costly. But with AI bonyses, their cost is like 75-90 minerals. Running planned and wealth with average faction (having no industry bonus) cost for human player is 120 minerals.

Now, when humans play these factions with these new rules, that may be different.
And there is also something else. Starting with 4 colony pods, as PK I was able to pop boom to size 9 when having just only 4-5 bases. I noticed, since game last longer (50% research rate) bases rather quickly pop boom compared to spread horizontally. Building a colony pod of cost 150 in a base of size 7-9 is not 5 times longer compared to building cp costing 30 minerals in a base of size 2. And such "colony pod pumps" of size 2 is a typical case in regular ruleset.

[Mart]

...
Next testing scenario will be Miriam then.

Started several games ( and abandoned after some turns) to see how Miriam is working under these new rules.
This is not the best strategy, I guess, but it worked for me:

Having 3 cp at start, 260EC, and a scout. Sometimes a unity foil was thrown in for small island bonus.
On huge map, after initial 10 turns of no lab points, the first tech could be researched after 12 mostly turns. This is without trading other techs that would bring the cost up before this.
So around 2122 Centauri Ecology is available. Formers... and all that stuff.

What to do for 22 turns?
Miriam can have 4 units free in each base. The hq can build right away, typically 2 or 3 scouts. The other 2 bases take some time to travel to their location, it can be even 8-10 turns, especially when someone plays builder style and wants to put more space between bases.
On could make 4 scouts, but this would start to drain minerals when formers come around. After 2 scouts, I started Recreation Commons. Since we do not build new cp that often now, bases grow vertically sooner, so these are very much needed.
This is strength of Miriam, she can more easily deal with such problems of population 3-4.
These 3 additional (not garrisoned) scouts bring also additional energy from planetpearls, pop unity pods. And here is the thing:
- in bases with pop 2 or more, one can pop a mineral pod and have these 150 minerals giving a new cp (fourth, ...)

AI is really doing excellent. Their ability to keep collected minerals pays off. E.g. they loose an SP, no problem. All minerals can go to get a cp quickly.
Often AI has more bases than me. But I get all SPs I can, so maybe this is why. While AI pushes for colony pods, I get SPs. But if I did not build SPs, probably AI would be around equal in number of bases. Growth bonuses count more, this is due to higher cp cost. Just all these differences of +Industry count 5 times more. (150 cost versus 30).

[Mart]

Crawlers trick is a good one. AI instabuilds SPs. Morgan having 3 supply droids (pre-defined 120 mineral base cost crawler at Industrial automation) added them in one turn to Cyborg Factory!
One turn he is  around 100/180 (7 turns remaining) and another turn he is 490/200.
I probed him (as Miriam) a turn before, but got Fusion Power and not MMI. So he will have that SP for now.

Interesting is, that AI somehow builds these expensive crawlers more than I suspected.
Morgan after cashing these 3 is making another one. Lal is having one.

=====
And adding this for record:
- Apparently helping SP builds is the main reason of getting crawlers by AI. Morgan resigned from the next one, once not building an SP. And I noticed here, the same as in other games for years so far, AI crawlers rather do not get resources. They just wonder around or simply stay idle.

[Yitzi]

...
Next testing scenario will be Miriam then.

Started several games ( and abandoned after some turns) to see how Miriam is working under these new rules.
This is not the best strategy, I guess, but it worked for me:

Having 3 cp at start, 260EC, and a scout. Sometimes a unity foil was thrown in for small island bonus.
On huge map, after initial 10 turns of no lab points, the first tech could be researched after 12 mostly turns. This is without trading other techs that would bring the cost up before this.
So around 2122 Centauri Ecology is available. Formers... and all that stuff.

What to do for 22 turns?
Miriam can have 4 units free in each base. The hq can build right away, typically 2 or 3 scouts. The other 2 bases take some time to travel to their location, it can be even 8-10 turns, especially when someone plays builder style and wants to put more space between bases.
On could make 4 scouts, but this would start to drain minerals when formers come around. After 2 scouts, I started Recreation Commons. Since we do not build new cp that often now, bases grow vertically sooner, so these are very much needed.
This is strength of Miriam, she can more easily deal with such problems of population 3-4.
These 3 additional (not garrisoned) scouts bring also additional energy from planetpearls, pop unity pods. And here is the thing:
- in bases with pop 2 or more, one can pop a mineral pod and have these 150 minerals giving a new cp (fourth, ...)

Good points.

[Nexii]

Also in addition to what Yitzi pointed out, SUP is also stronger the more bases you build.  With fewer bases the free maintenance becomes less valuable.

And +3 PROBE is also much stronger for an expansionist (as far-away-from-HQ bases are cheaper to MC).

I wonder if (despite requiring .exe modding) a better solution to the "not caring about overrun bases" problem would be to make it so that losing population to mind worms causes extra drones temporarily...

Maybe a simpler mod would be to allow native life to kill more than 1 pop per attack, or destroy more improvements?  Just some thoughts

[Mart]

I think it is a question of players taking risks. And players will take risks, though I agree, that if a chance of loosing a base completely when you leave it empty would be 70% or 90%, probably everyone would avoid it. With standard rules, in the first 20 turns, people often leave a base empty of size 1. There is a chance, especially when you are next to a fungus tile, that mw gets it, but the chance is small.

I have a game of these rules with over 200 turns now. Later this large cost of colony pods is not noticeable almost, when your bases have 50 or 70 minerals per turn production.
However in general, this allows to get to this stage of the game at all, I think. I need to test it on standard size map though.

Meanwhile, I got other observations and intend to test these:
- Breaking second pop limit earlier. Maybe Silksteel Alloys. It is right after Ind Auto in the tree.
These limits of pop are actually pro-micromanagement. They force you to spread/spam new bases instead of developing existing ones. So this would most likely help.
They are strongly in the original ruleset, we are so much used to it, Morgans and PK have even parameters with it. The game would not be the same without it. So they need to be there. But I think the second limit must be broken right after the first one. And even more drastic change would be giving Habitation domes with Ind Auto too. Maybe this is a better way. After all, you need to make this expensive facility, so this is effort, that only in case of significant nutrients increase will be started.
- Giving something to optical computers. Hologram theaters.
I thought about it, and really there is no other thing influencing the game little. Presently, Holo theaters are rarely build right with Planetary Networks. They are expensive (compared to other facilities costing 1/turn), so often players get it later anyway, I think.
- More drones. This one is BIG one.
Each faction gets as standard: DRONE, 4
Univ gets DRONE, 3 because they have with parameter 4 from the start, so they are getting only somewhat more.
Why such thing? To force a player to devote more energy to psych. But AI needs to be tested on this one.

[Dio]

I think it is a question of players taking risks. And players will take risks, though I agree, that if a chance of loosing a base completely when you leave it empty would be 70% or 90%, probably everyone would avoid it. With standard rules, in the first 20 turns, people often leave a base empty of size 1. There is a chance, especially when you are next to a fungus tile, that mw gets it, but the chance is small.

I have a game of these rules with over 200 turns now. Later this large cost of colony pods is not noticeable almost, when your bases have 50 or 70 minerals per turn production.
However in general, this allows to get to this stage of the game at all, I think. I need to test it on standard size map though.

Meanwhile, I got other observations and intend to test these:
- Breaking second pop limit earlier. Maybe Silksteel Alloys. It is right after Ind Auto in the tree.
These limits of pop are actually pro-micromanagement. They force you to spread/spam new bases instead of developing existing ones. So this would most likely help.
They are strongly in the original ruleset, we are so much used to it, Morgans and PK have even parameters with it. The game would not be the same without it. So they need to be there. But I think the second limit must be broken right after the first one. And even more drastic change would be giving Habitation domes with Ind Auto too. Maybe this is a better way. After all, you need to make this expensive facility, so this is effort, that only in case of significant nutrients increase will be started.
- Giving something to optical computers. Hologram theaters.
I thought about it, and really there is no other thing influencing the game little. Presently, Holo theaters are rarely build right with Planetary Networks. They are expensive (compared to other facilities costing 1/turn), so often players get it later anyway, I think.
- More drones. This one is BIG one.
Each faction gets as standard: DRONE, 4
Univ gets DRONE, 3 because they have with parameter 4 from the start, so they are getting only somewhat more.
Why such thing? To force a player to devote more energy to psych. But AI needs to be tested on this one.

How about the inclusion of negative TALENT in the place of negative POLICE for certain social models? I currently have Cybernetic at -3 TALENT instead of -3 POLICE because it allows the factions time to develop countermeasures without severe complications. I also made Optical Computers the prerequisite technology for the Virtual World. I also made the following changes for Technology:
1. Advanced Military Algorithms require Polymorphic Software instead of Optical Computers.
2. Optical Computers requires Planetary Networks instead of Polymorphic Software.
3. Cyberethics requires Optical Computers instead of Planetary Networks.
4. Synthetic Fossil Fuels require Advanced Subatomic Theory instead of High Energy Chemistry.
5. Superconductors require High Energy Chemistry instead of Industrial Base.
6. Doctrine: Air Power requires Doctrine: Initiative instead of Doctrine: Flexibilty.
7. Doctrine: Flexibility provides sea formers and the Naval Yard facility. I also set the technology prerequisites of basic land terraforming operations (road, farm, mine, solar array, sensor, remove fungus, and forest) onto Centauri Ecology while Doctrine: Flexibility allows the construction of Kelp Farms, Mining Platforms and Tidal Harnesses. The above technology prerequisites allows the establishment of sea terraformers as a predesigned unit for Doctrine: Flexibility without the potential abuse of reverse engineering land terraformers beyond the construction of the units before Centauri Ecology.

[Mart]

I have to think about these changes.
Lack of police is in later game easily counter-measured with increased psych allocation.

Virtual World, yes, I thought about it. Good solution, though more "game changing" as players often start this SP with Planetary Networks. So game strategy would be influenced more.

Tech tree changes.
Some of them are very tempting to do. So far, I thought about leaving the tech tree as it is. Less influencing the standard game. But some techs are just asking to be made the way you write. E.g. Air Power after Initiative.

Let me think about it all.