Testing Government and Influence

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Grummel7
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Re: Testing Government and Influence

#256 Post by Grummel7 »

Oberlus wrote: Sun Aug 08, 2021 10:43 am So Capital or planets with Reg. Admin would have the +5 influence regardless of focus, right?
In that case I think I like more to remove the Capital/RegAd requirement and keep the focus need.
That would means it's basically "for free" again. In my current game I have 34 colonies, 9 of them have influence focus (capital race Eaxaw -> only average influence). Getting -1 on all colonies and +5 per influence focus would currently increase my net influence output by 11.

Compare it to other Stability effects:
  • Martial Law gets even more than 10 points, but costs a lot of research and it does not raise stability above 15, so you still miss some of the better effects. I guess it may work well, if you can do research on planets that have 15 without it.
  • Diversity gives stability and research. It's really strong when there are lots of natives (*), but you need a lot of races to come even close to 10 points.
  • Environmentalism only gives 5 points and other bonuses, but only to planets that haven't been terraformed, have no buildings and do not have industry focus, while reducing industry an all planets by 5.
(*) Perhaps the effect of Diversity should depend on the native frequency.

I'll try Trith next, I have a feeling they may be hard to play at the moment.

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Re: Testing Government and Influence

#257 Post by Oberlus »

Right...

What about going back to a percentage bonus, probably smaller that the +100% it had before, maybe +50%, and make Translator building apply later? Was that (similar to) what you propose first?
Or a per population bonus (I guess +0.2*pop or 0.5*sqrt(pop)), and Translator building is not affected regardless of priority)?

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Grummel7
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Re: Testing Government and Influence

#258 Post by Grummel7 »

Btw. another reason why you shouldn't require influence focus in the capital.
BadInfluenceCapital.png
BadInfluenceCapital.png (26.11 KiB) Viewed 1281 times
Note that bad influence only affects palace and broadcast when the focus is influence. This also means you'd get a lot more when your capital race has good influence. Which makes some sense, but I am not sure it is good for the game.

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Grummel7
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Re: Testing Government and Influence

#259 Post by Grummel7 »

Argh, Bad Influence, bad stability, xenophibic, narrow tolerance and self sustained now only working on good planets, my first impression is that Trith now really suck. Well, xenophobes suck by definition :mrgreen:, but as a player race they should still be able to compete.

Its almost funny that they get Concentration camps immediately, but to build one they have to research Defensive Militia Training and Architectural Psychology, then adapt Border Checkpoints followed by Racial Purity.

Another problem: The Hunt. Its helps only the planet in the same system, while the unowned planet still triggers the xenophobia in all systems around. So you'd rather ignore the hunt, conquer and planet and get rid of its people.

I will keep playing, though.

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Geoff the Medio
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Re: Testing Government and Influence

#260 Post by Geoff the Medio »

Grummel7 wrote: Mon Aug 09, 2021 9:55 amIts almost funny that [Trith] get Concentration camps immediately, but to build one they have to research Defensive Militia Training and Architectural Psychology, then adapt Border Checkpoints followed by Racial Purity.
How about making Racial Purity unlocked by having Trith kn the empire and adoptable without Border Checkpoints, then?
Another problem: The Hunt. Its helps only the planet in the same system, while the unowned planet still triggers the xenophobia in all systems around. So you'd rather ignore the hunt, conquer and planet and get rid of its people.
Is this issue general or specific to Trith as the potential beneficiary? I don't think Trith would thematically want to hunt other species, but rather just exterminate them, so...

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Re: Testing Government and Influence

#261 Post by Grummel7 »

Geoff the Medio wrote: Mon Aug 09, 2021 1:11 pm How about making Racial Purity unlocked by having Trith kn the empire and adoptable without Border Checkpoints, then?
Well, Eaxaw have the same problem. Whether its given with Xenophobia at the beginning of the game or also to every empire that conquered a xenophobic race I do not mind. Racial Purity by itself give no bonuses (except being liked by some races).
Geoff the Medio wrote: Mon Aug 09, 2021 1:11 pm
Another problem: The Hunt. Its helps only the planet in the same system, while the unowned planet still triggers the xenophobia in all systems around. So you'd rather ignore the hunt, conquer and planet and get rid of its people.
Is this issue general or specific to Trith as the potential beneficiary? I don't think Trith would thematically want to hunt other species, but rather just exterminate them, so...
Maybe you are right, Trith want to get rid of everyone they can sense via telepathy. Eaxaw are only affected by other races that are part of the empire, so it should work for them and The Hunt fits them much better, too.

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Re: Testing Government and Influence

#262 Post by Grummel7 »

Just started a game with Cray, it looks like a cake walk compared to Trith. 5 points stability for each good/bad step is simply too much. With Cray (+10), your colonies automatically fulfill almost all stability requirements. With Trith and maybe other races with Bad Stability, its hard fulfill even the most basic ones.

I suggest to reduced the step to 2 points. Exobots should then probably raised to Great Stability.

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Re: Testing Government and Influence

#263 Post by Oberlus »

Grummel7 wrote: Sun Aug 15, 2021 7:39 pm Just started a game with Cray, it looks like a cake walk compared to Trith. 5 points stability for each good/bad step is simply too much. With Cray (+10), your colonies automatically fulfill almost all stability requirements. With Trith and maybe other races with Bad Stability, its hard fulfill even the most basic ones.

I suggest to reduced the step to 2 points. Exobots should then probably raised to Great Stability.
Will the +2 from good stability be enough to allow for some stability-bound stuff on itself or will it require always some extra stability bonus?
Maybe 2 is enough, otherwise 3 may be OK.

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Re: Testing Government and Influence

#264 Post by Grummel7 »

Oberlus wrote: Sun Aug 15, 2021 8:29 pm Will the +2 from good stability be enough to allow for some stability-bound stuff on itself or will it require always some extra stability bonus?
Maybe 2 is enough, otherwise 3 may be OK.
What do you mean with "some stability-bound stuff on itself"? Every point helps, but of course +2 is not as strong as +5.

My main point is that player races with -5 are really tough to play. Adaptive Automation and Nascent AI e.g. require stability 10, which is relatively easy to achieve in colonies close to the capital with normal stability, but really hard with -5 early in the game.

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Re: Testing Government and Influence

#265 Post by Grummel7 »

I've played (or rather started) a lot of games recently and I must say the game is becoming more balanced and really allows different strategies now. The games have more variety then they had in V0.4. Some things however definitely still needs to be balanced.

Top most is Metropoles, which is totally OP. With the game as it is, the best you can do get it as soon as possible by setting your home planet to influence focus in turn 1, then adopt Planetary Infastructure, Centralization and Metropoles as soon as you can. With good influence you can have it in turn 10. The only metropole will be your capital, but it gains about +10 to Research and Production! Your other planets get -5 Stability, but who cares, they have to grow for a long time before they can match the metropole bonus of your capital. And if you a lucky enough to conquer a Volp-Uglush planet, your have a second metropole quickly. It's also great for Sly, since every Gas Giant has to potential to become a metropole.

One idea I have to make it more reasonable is to require a certain number of colonies, e.g. with 4 or 5 colonies you can have one metropole, to get a second, you need 8/10, etc. Also the bonus should be reduced and have a stability requirement.

Trith definitely need help. In 0.4 self sustained allowed them to colonies adequate planets immediately and poor after researching subterranean habitation. Now self sustained only works on good planets and they have narrow tolerance, so they cannot settle anything but radiated for quite some time, but being xenophobic they don't want to include other races into their empire neither. At the same time their telepathic xenophobia take away most of the self sustained bonus if there are a few natives around. Then they have bad stability and bad influence, the later means that they have trouble even to use concentration camps, which do cost a lot of influence.

Cray on the other hand are too strong. Just a quick look shows that they have 5 positive traits and only one negative.

Btw.: is there a good reason why broad planet tolerance is shown with a double plus, while narrow is shown with single minus? I would rather do it the other way round. Broad upgrades two types from hostile to poor, narrow downgrades 4 types.

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Re: Testing Government and Influence

#266 Post by Grummel7 »

Ophiuchus wrote: Sat Aug 07, 2021 8:53 pm
Geoff the Medio wrote: Sat Aug 07, 2021 8:14 pm
Grummel7 wrote: Sat Aug 07, 2021 7:05 pmOne thing that bothers me, is that while it takes 40 turns to get your own people fully indoctrinated, conquered people catch up immediately. Wouldn't it make sense for a conquered planet to take 40 turns to get the full bonus as well? Scripting that requires a little code amendment, but I've done that already in my environment, if you like the idea.
Sure, sounds reasonable... Bonus would depend on the lesser of the time since adoption and the time since conquering a planet, then?
+1 (note this creates an unexpected result on reinvasion - your carefully indoctrinated people lost all of their indoctrination, but it is better than what we have now. and scripting for reinvasion sounds mostly impossible with the current system)
Just found an interesting case: What happens if you conquer a planet, then empty (or it empties itself -- ancient guardians) and colonize it? With the current calculation you get the bonus from the turn when you conquered it, which sounds wrong.

I could change it to base the bonus on whatever happened last, conquering or colonization. But then of course someone may speed up the indoctrination by evacuating the planet and re-settling it. It only works you have another planet of the same race with enough stability and you end up with a small new colony. I guess it only makes sense if the conquered colony is rather small and you do have live cycle manipulation. Doesn't sound too abusive. What do other think about it?

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Re: Testing Government and Influence

#267 Post by Geoff the Medio »

Grummel7 wrote: Sun Aug 29, 2021 5:53 pmMetropoles ... is totally OP. [...]
One idea I have to make it more reasonable is to require a certain number of colonies, e.g. with 4 or 5 colonies you can have one metropole, to get a second, you need 8/10, etc. Also the bonus should be reduced and have a stability requirement.
Can you make a pull request that balances things?
is there a good reason why broad planet tolerance is shown with a double plus, while narrow is shown with single minus? I would rather do it the other way round. Broad upgrades two types from hostile to poor, narrow downgrades 4 types.
Sounds reasonable...
Grummel7 wrote: Sat Sep 04, 2021 3:18 pmI could change it to base the bonus on whatever happened last, conquering or colonization.
... or adoption, presumably?

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Re: Testing Government and Influence

#268 Post by Grummel7 »

I've played a few games and now prepared a pull request for Metropoles with the following settings:
  • Bonus to research and production has been halved: 0.2 per pop.
  • Not more than 1/4 of your populated planets can be Metros. I.e. it is useless, unless you have settled or conquered at least 3 planets.
  • Only planets with a stability of 12 can become Metros. Note that once the policy is adapted, a planets must reach 12 while having a penalty of 5.
  • Adaption cost has been increased by 10.
Some more observations:

The formula of Balance is weird. You actually get a decent bonus when all your planets have the same focus since the difference becomes 0. This seems totally against the idea of Balance, I think it should use number of focuses - 1 as a factor. And the influence bonus is a lot bigger when you also have Propaganda Broadcast since it is implemented as a kind of multiplier that is applied after the broadcasts.

Abadoni may also be a bit too strong now. With Great Influence, Good Stability and Broad Tolerance they can spread like no other race.

Fulver are a pain in the neck until you build Lighthouses, I think they could also need a little push.

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Re: Testing Government and Influence

#269 Post by Geoff the Medio »

Grummel7 wrote: Sat Sep 11, 2021 9:39 pmThe formula of Balance is weird. You actually get a decent bonus when all your planets have the same focus since the difference becomes 0. This seems totally against the idea of Balance, I think it should use number of focuses - 1 as a factor.
Assuming you mean (the number of unique focuses in use - 1), that could work.

Alternatively, maybe it could use the ratio of # planets / HistogramMax instead of HistogramSpread? The idea was that you should get more bonus for using more different foci and for having the same number of planets using each of the foci that are used use. If all planets used the same focus, that ratio should be 1. If distributing planets to many different foci so that no one focus is used a lot more than others, then the HistogramMax would be lower, so the ratio would be higher. Missing edge cases for this types of formula seems to be easy, though...
And the influence bonus is a lot bigger when you also have Propaganda Broadcast since it is implemented as a kind of multiplier that is applied after the broadcasts.
That's a balance issue with Propaganda, isn't it?

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Re: Testing Government and Influence

#270 Post by Grummel7 »

Geoff the Medio wrote: Sun Sep 12, 2021 9:18 pm Alternatively, maybe it could use the ratio of # planets / HistogramMax instead of HistogramSpread?
Actually I like that idea a lot. It is easier to understand and easier to manage. All you have to check is which focus you use most, you no longer have to consider putting i.e. a second planet to protection focus to reduce the spread and generate more influence.

That way all planets using the same focus still gives a bonus, but it is the lowest possible one. Or we could use # planets / HistogramMax - 1 to give no bonus for all the same.
Geoff the Medio wrote: Sun Sep 12, 2021 9:18 pm
And the influence bonus is a lot bigger when you also have Propaganda Broadcast since it is implemented as a kind of multiplier that is applied after the broadcasts.
That's a balance issue with Propaganda, isn't it?
It is not only propaganda. The question is: why does Balance have to multiply the current value instead of giving a bonus that only depends on the planets and there focuses? I just loaded an old Abadoni save file to construct an extreme example:
unbalanced.png
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