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[gameplay] tweak mace, ptol, sele specific structures
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Authored by Nescio on Jan 13 2021, 2:21 PM.

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Summary

The library of Alexandria was the first true library (a place for the preservation and study of literary and scientific texts), as opposed to an archive (a place for storing administrative records). Ptolemy probably got the idea from hearing of Aristotle's large book collection. The Ptolemies spent enormous sums on their library and it quickly got fame throughout the ancient world, and made Alexandria to the centre of scholarship and literary activity in the Hellenistic period.
Many other cities founded libraries modelled after it. The one founded in Pergamon by the Attalids became quite considerable as well, which prompted the Ptolemies to issue an export ban on papyrus (paper); the Pergamites simply adopted vellum (parchment; the word is derived from Pergamon) as a writing material.
Much smaller libraries gradually become quite common in Roman times, but none came close to the size and prestige of the library of Alexandria, which stood out with head and shoulders above the rest.

This patch makes the following changes:

  1. It disables the mace and sele libraries, keeping it exclusively for ptol, per the above, further differentiating the civ.
  2. The “Hellenistic Metropolis” is moved from the library to the civic centre, which is appropiate, because what the technology does is doubling the health, capture points, and default arrow count of the civic centre. (For comparison, technologies affecting towers are researched at towers.)
  3. The crannog and military colonies no longer benefit from the “Hellenistic Metropolis” technology. This may have been simply an oversight: the technology was introduced in rP12753, the military colony in rP14411. With the technology military colonies have 40% the costs but 133% the health of civic centres of other civs.
  4. While theatre emerged in classical Athens, it quickly became a hallmark of Hellenistic culture, and every self-respecting city had one (as well as an agora, gymnasion, and hippodrome, but that's a different discussion). It thus makes little sense spart and mace have them in 0 A.D., but ptol and sele do not. Therefore, ptol and sele get theatres too, using the mace actor as a placeholder.
  5. Now that the gaul theatre has been renamed to assembly and all (now five) civs that have theatres can build them, it's added to the generic template_unit_* build lists, to save unnecessary duplicate lines in the specific units/ files.
  6. The theatre's resource costs are changed to more appropiate values (the total remains the same).
  7. Because of their large size and high costs, theatres have their health increased.
  8. The lighthouse revealing all shores everywhere on the map is more something for a cheat or a fantasy game (see also this forum thread), and is thus removed. To compensate, its vision range is increased by c. 11% (i.e. a 23% larger area).
  9. The lighthouse is postponed to the city phase, to make the city phase even more interesting; its very high vision can especially make a difference on small maps.
  10. The cart super dock is postponed to the city phase as well, due to its very large territory influence radius.
  11. [EDIT]: The library aura now gives a 15% discount on technologies, instead of 10%, but it is no longer stackable.
Test Plan

Check for mistakes and omissions. Consider the consequence of each change.

Event Timeline

Nescio created this revision.Jan 13 2021, 2:21 PM
Owners added subscribers: Restricted Owners Package, Restricted Owners Package.Jan 13 2021, 2:21 PM

(And yes, I'm fully aware including unrelated changes in a single differential is bad practice.)

Nescio edited the summary of this revision. (Show Details)Jan 13 2021, 2:28 PM
Nescio removed subscribers: Restricted Owners Package, Restricted Owners Package.
Nescio requested review of this revision.Jan 13 2021, 2:32 PM
borg- added a comment.Jan 13 2021, 2:41 PM

I agree with everything, but I don't think it's logical that "Hellenistic Metropolis" doubles health. Hellenic constructions have +10% health, so why does tech double the value? I don't know if this change should be made in this patch.
Maybe increase the range of the lighthouse a little more, like 210?

I agree with everything

Great!

but I don't think it's logical that "Hellenistic Metropolis" doubles health. Hellenic constructions have +10% health, so why does tech double the value? I don't know if this change should be made in this patch.

Yes, I fully agree with you, the technology seems far to strong. However, I would prefer to see it changed in a separate patch, partially because I'm unsure what would be appropiate values.

Maybe increase the range of the lighthouse a little more, like 210?

That would mean a 36% larger area than it currently has.

Build has FAILED

builderr-debug-macos.txt
/Applications/Xcode.app/Contents/Developer/Toolchains/XcodeDefault.xctoolchain/usr/bin/ranlib: file: ../../../binaries/system/libsimulation2_dbg.a(precompiled.o) has no symbols
/Applications/Xcode.app/Contents/Developer/Toolchains/XcodeDefault.xctoolchain/usr/bin/ranlib: file: ../../../binaries/system/libengine_dbg.a(precompiled.o) has no symbols
/Applications/Xcode.app/Contents/Developer/Toolchains/XcodeDefault.xctoolchain/usr/bin/ranlib: file: ../../../binaries/system/libgraphics_dbg.a(precompiled.o) has no symbols
/Applications/Xcode.app/Contents/Developer/Toolchains/XcodeDefault.xctoolchain/usr/bin/ranlib: file: ../../../binaries/system/libatlas_dbg.a(precompiled.o) has no symbols
/Applications/Xcode.app/Contents/Developer/Toolchains/XcodeDefault.xctoolchain/usr/bin/ranlib: file: ../../../binaries/system/libgui_dbg.a(precompiled.o) has no symbols
ld: warning: text-based stub file /System/Library/Frameworks//CoreAudio.framework/CoreAudio.tbd and library file

Link to build: https://jenkins.wildfiregames.com/job/macos-differential/2838/display/redirect
See console output for more information: https://jenkins.wildfiregames.com/job/macos-differential/2838/display/redirectconsole

borg- added a comment.EditedJan 13 2021, 2:47 PM

Since Hellenistic Metropolis is removed of library, what do you think about improving the aura a litle, or move to p2?

Maybe increase the range of the lighthouse a little more, like 210?

So I tested how much of a tiny map a lighthouse could reveal.


With a vision range of 200:

With a vision range of 210:

I guess the tiny map has a radius of 256. So what do you think is best?

Since Hellenistic Metropolis is removed of library, what do you think about improving the aura a litle, or move to p2?

No, let's keep it in the city phase. As for the aura, I'm open to suggestions.

borg- added a comment.EditedJan 13 2021, 3:04 PM

Just increase the percentage a little bit, no need to change how it works.

200 best number.

Silier removed a reviewer: Silier.Jan 13 2021, 3:08 PM
Nescio updated this revision to Diff 15252.Jan 13 2021, 3:14 PM
Nescio edited the summary of this revision. (Show Details)
  • improve library aura a bit, per @borg-
Owners added subscribers: Restricted Owners Package, Restricted Owners Package.Jan 13 2021, 3:14 PM

Build has FAILED

builderr-debug-macos.txt
fatal error: file '/Users/wfg/Jenkins/workspace/macos-differential/build/workspaces/gcc/../../../libraries/osx/wxwidgets/lib/wx/include/osx_cocoa-unicode-static-3.0/wx/setup.h' has been modified since the precompiled header 'obj/AtlasUI_Debug/precompiled.h.gch' was built
note: please rebuild precompiled header 'obj/AtlasUI_Debug/precompiled.h.gch'
fatal error: file '/Users/wfg/Jenkins/workspace/macos-differential/build/workspaces/gcc/../../../libraries/osx/wxwidgets/lib/wx/include/osx_cocoa-unicode-static-3.0/wx/setup.h' has been modified since the precompiled header 'obj/AtlasUI_Debug/precompiled.h.gch' was built
note: please rebuild precompiled header 'obj/AtlasUI_Debug/precompiled.h.gch'
1 error generated.
make[1]: *** [obj/AtlasUI_Debug/Canvas.o] Error 1
make[1]: *** Waiting for unfinished jobs....
1 error generated.
make[1]: *** [obj/AtlasUI_Debug/ScenarioEditor.o] Error 1
make: *** [AtlasUI] Error 2

Link to build: https://jenkins.wildfiregames.com/job/macos-differential/2839/display/redirect
See console output for more information: https://jenkins.wildfiregames.com/job/macos-differential/2839/display/redirectconsole

Nescio updated this revision to Diff 15253.Jan 13 2021, 3:16 PM
  • and lighthouse a vision range of 200

Build has FAILED

builderr-debug-macos.txt
fatal error: file '/Users/wfg/Jenkins/workspace/macos-differential/build/workspaces/gcc/../../../libraries/osx/wxwidgets/lib/wx/include/osx_cocoa-unicode-static-3.0/wx/setup.h' has been modified since the precompiled header 'obj/AtlasUI_Debug/precompiled.h.gch' was built
note: please rebuild precompiled header 'obj/AtlasUI_Debug/precompiled.h.gch'
fatal error: file '/Users/wfg/Jenkins/workspace/macos-differential/build/workspaces/gcc/../../../libraries/osx/wxwidgets/lib/wx/include/osx_cocoa-unicode-static-3.0/wx/setup.h' has been modified since the precompiled header 'obj/AtlasUI_Debug/precompiled.h.gch' was built
note: please rebuild precompiled header 'obj/AtlasUI_Debug/precompiled.h.gch'
1 error generated.
make[1]: *** [obj/AtlasUI_Debug/Canvas.o] Error 1
make[1]: *** Waiting for unfinished jobs....
1 error generated.
make[1]: *** [obj/AtlasUI_Debug/ScenarioEditor.o] Error 1
make: *** [AtlasUI] Error 2

Link to build: https://jenkins.wildfiregames.com/job/macos-differential/2840/display/redirect
See console output for more information: https://jenkins.wildfiregames.com/job/macos-differential/2840/display/redirectconsole

Nescio updated this revision to Diff 15254.Jan 13 2021, 3:19 PM
  • forgot to save edits to library aura
borg- accepted this revision.Jan 13 2021, 3:21 PM

I'm accepting it as part of the balance / gameplay, not the code.

The changes make sense and remove serious inconsistencies like the lighthouse’s aura.
There are no drastic changes in the balance.

This revision is now accepted and ready to land.Jan 13 2021, 3:21 PM

@Freagarach, hopefully I didn't make mistakes this time.

Build has FAILED

builderr-debug-macos.txt
fatal error: file '/Users/wfg/Jenkins/workspace/macos-differential/build/workspaces/gcc/../../../libraries/osx/wxwidgets/lib/wx/include/osx_cocoa-unicode-static-3.0/wx/setup.h' has been modified since the precompiled header 'obj/AtlasUI_Debug/precompiled.h.gch' was built
note: please rebuild precompiled header 'obj/AtlasUI_Debug/precompiled.h.gch'
fatal error: file '/Users/wfg/Jenkins/workspace/macos-differential/build/workspaces/gcc/../../../libraries/osx/wxwidgets/lib/wx/include/osx_cocoa-unicode-static-3.0/wx/setup.h' has been modified since the precompiled header 'obj/AtlasUI_Debug/precompiled.h.gch' was built
note: please rebuild precompiled header 'obj/AtlasUI_Debug/precompiled.h.gch'
1 error generated.
make[1]: *** [obj/AtlasUI_Debug/Canvas.o] Error 1
make[1]: *** Waiting for unfinished jobs....
1 error generated.
make[1]: *** [obj/AtlasUI_Debug/ScenarioEditor.o] Error 1
make: *** [AtlasUI] Error 2

Link to build: https://jenkins.wildfiregames.com/job/macos-differential/2841/display/redirect
See console output for more information: https://jenkins.wildfiregames.com/job/macos-differential/2841/display/redirectconsole

@Freagarach, anything that needs changing?

I'm not sure I like the removal of the reveal shore, to me it seems a fun addition. <- Maybe another team member disagrees with me here.
I dislike the removal of the colony from the metropolis tech also, because that just seems to be a good part of what its supposed to do.

I dislike the removal of the colony from the metropolis tech also, because that just seems to be a good part of what its supposed to do.

Is it? To me it seemed an oversight. The technology was introduced in rP12753, the military colony in rP14411.

Nescio edited the summary of this revision. (Show Details)Jan 14 2021, 3:58 PM
Nescio removed a subscriber: Restricted Owners Package.

I'm not sure I like the removal of the reveal shore, to me it seems a fun addition. <- Maybe another team member disagrees with me here.
I dislike the removal of the colony from the metropolis tech also, because that just seems to be a good part of what its supposed to do.

Those two things could be split off.

wraitii accepted this revision.Jan 15 2021, 10:23 AM
wraitii added a subscriber: wraitii.

I agree with these overall. The Pool lighthouse bonus always seemed rather weird to me, and the code is annoying as hell and rather slow. I would like to remove it.

The Hellenistic Metropolis bonus seems to me intended for actual cities, not military colonies, so I agree with removing these from that tech.

Is it still possible for this to be included in A24?

This revision was landed with ongoing or failed builds.Jan 18 2021, 7:19 PM
This revision was automatically updated to reflect the committed changes.
Owners added a subscriber: Restricted Owners Package.Jan 18 2021, 7:19 PM