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Re: fixes to advance.g


>	* lib/advances.g: Comment out lots of advances, the cash material,
>	and the forum and marketplace units - they don't do anything.
>	Keep the mostly-useless ones like ships, corvees, &c.  Make advances
>	cost more at higher generations (otherwise the game degenerates
>	into massive numbers of legions on each side around turn 25 or 30).
>	Also require the navigation advance for the trireme so you don't
>	the situation where you can build a trireme without canvas &c.
>	* kernel/run.c (run_population): Comment out code which hardcodes
>	the unit name "Granary" (the hardcoding is just too gross to live,
>	but the whole concept seems odd, see comment for discussion).

Glad that you are taking an interest in this game! I left it kind of
half-finished. Always intended to go back and fix things, but didn't have
time. As for the changes you propose, I would say the following:

1. Higher advances costs in each generation. I'm all for it. Just didn't
have time to test out the numbers. Progress is definitely too fast now. If
you have playtested your numbers and think they work I'm willing to go for
them. BTW, the same applies to construction costs. All units (except
facilities) now cost 10 cps. This was also an arbitrary choice. The costs
should probably be higher, and of course differ for different units. If you
can find numbers that work here, please go ahead and change them, too.

2. Requiring navigation for the trireme. Kind of a hack (it is also
required for the bireme) but makes sense for the reasons you mention. The
real problem is that he advances beyond generation 5 are still unfinished,
as you can tell from the declining numbers, so there is no natural followup
to navigation.

3. Pruning "unnecessary" advances and units. Not such a good idea. I spent
a lot of time on the advances tree with the intention of building something
that would be both realistic (unlike Civ2) and expandable (lots of room for
new interesting units). If anything, I think we need even more advances
(see above). And more units that use them. Moreover, part of the challenge
with this game is to figure out what advances (and units) are really
important and what are dispensable. Just like in real life!

4. The hardcoded Granary code is something Stan added for the Civ2 game.
That was done after I wrote my game, hence the now duplicated effect. I
don't mind if you remove it, but you should check with Stan first. The Civ2
game probably needs to be modified in that case.

5. Commenting out the cash material. The idea was to add code for buying
units etc. like in Civ2. But that wont happen anytime soon, and a useless
material is far more confusing than a useless unit. So it makes sense to
remove it for the time being.

Hans




Hans Ronne

hronne@pp.sbbs.se



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