In D3269#149678, @Nescio wrote:

I guess D3303 might make it easier, but I don't know for sure.

Yeah, but A25 ;)

In rP19438#47619, @Freagarach wrote:

Only at their max-range, right? At any range shared between the two entities it is the same?

Well, yes, but it leads to the current Archer/Javelin situation where despite the archer having lower nominal Spread, their actual hit rate is really poor.

elephants don't collect resources, so I don't see a good reason to add food

No food is added, mercenary food cost is reduced, to 40%.
There are currently no elephant mercenaries anyway, so the point is mood. However, they're included in this patch because it's not unlikely they'll be introduced in a future patch (or mod) and having two more lines here is cheap.

In rP19438#47613, @wraitii wrote:

This means that units with the same stats (DPS & spread) but different range will have different 'real' DPS.

Only at their max-range, right? At any range shared between the two entities it is the same?

I think the Range bonus is irrelevant, and agree with removing it.

Already done in D3297/rP24539.

Ranged units are supposed to deal damage, I think increasing the resistance makes limited sense. An expert bowman is no more protected against swords than a beginner (the same isn't _quite_ true of melee units).
[...]
Reducing ranged champion resistance seems fair to me (more consistent with CS).

See D3369.

Remember that spread is "normal deviation at 100 meters".

Yes, I know, @fatherbushido once explained to me on the forums how spread works.

I don't really have comments on their actual firepower, but spread needs to be reworked IMO. [...]

I fully agree spread values need to be changed, but I'm unsure what would be appropiate values.
Moreover, if a basic javelineer has double the spread of an archer, then a champion javelineer ought to have double the spread of a champion archer, in my opinion.

So something like (D) but with spread reworked.

Do you think it's better to do spread in a separate patch (and update this one afterwards) or do you prefer to include it here, making this one more complicated?

elephants don't collect resources, so I don't see a good reason to add food

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• mercenaries cost 60% less food than their citizen counterparts
• their wood, stone, and metal costs are replaced with just metal: infantry 60, cavalry 80, elephants 120

In D3269#149687, @Nescio wrote:

As I wrote earlier, getting a combination of two or more resources is easier, so the total cost ought to be somewhat higher than if they would only cost metal.

This makes sense to me. It looks better and it's fairly meaningless in terms of CPU power.

A cost discount with a health reduction is fine. (suggested ptol structures)

That would be my preferred option I guess, mirroring gaul/brit but with cost instead of time.

As I wrote earlier, getting a combination of two or more resources is easier, so the total cost ought to be somewhat higher than if they would only cost metal.

Ranged units are supposed to deal damage, I think increasing the resistance makes limited sense. An expert bowman is no more protected against swords than a beginner (the same isn't _quite_ true of melee units).
I think the Range bonus is irrelevant, and agree with removing it.

This seemed like a good idea at the time, from what I recall, but I'm not sure it was. This means that units with the same stats (DPS & spread) but different range will have different 'real' DPS.

Britons and Gauls no longer get additional population from ordinary structures (D2950/rP24623) so the current bonus is less problematic and can stay as it is. The Gauls received a number of new things in A24 so they are not as similar as the Britons as they used to. The Britons deserve a little something as well, but that's something for a future patch.

Infantry 20 food 50 metal, cavalry 30 food 70 metal, elephant keep only metal.

I hope the resource Gatherer rate to 0 thing works?

It did last time I checked (which was at the end of last year).

I'm not sure if collecting treasures is still supposed to be possible? Depending, see inline.

Yes, they're supposed to be still able to collect treasures, hence the large number of lines.
I guess D3303 might make it easier, but I don't know for sure.

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Overall I think this looks OK.
We run, again, in the issue of using modifier to affect templates rather fundamentally. This in particular really looks like it should be a "Mercenary" filter applied to templates. This is still impossible.
I guess I'm ok with doing this in techs instead of in the templates given the number of Mercenary we have at the moment.
I hope the resource Gatherer rate to 0 thing works?

I guess my point is mostly that reducing the cost but increasing build time is essentially playing on the 'same thing', i.e. worker time, but in both directions at once.

That's another way of phrasing what I meant.

This makes it harder to understand what the bonus does. I would favour a straight small wood reduction over a complicated bonus like we have now.

Feel free to replace the time increase with a health reduction.

I think you're right, it's a little bit boring to understand now. I can't make this change in the next few hours, so can someone command this patch?

Just a note that I will merge this (soon) after the release. Template values can be tweaked thereafter, but I think the code is (quite) solid.

I guess my point is mostly that reducing the cost but increasing build time is essentially playing on the 'same thing', i.e. worker time, but in both directions at once. This makes it harder to understand what the bonus does. I would favour a straight small wood reduction over a complicated bonus like we have now.

I agree that adding a proportional loss of health.

Have to say this is still a pretty weird bonus. Sundiata has a point that they probably should have both faster build time, lower cost and lower HP.

The sun-dried mud bricks need time for the mud to dry in the sun, though.
More importantly, the reason Britons, Gauls, and Ptolemies are by far the most popular civs in multiplayer is fundamentally simple: they have an economic bonus at game start. Being able to develop more quickly early on is a clear advantage. Having both a cost reduction and a time discount (or population bonus) makes things a lot worse, the modifications compound and create a snowball effect. Therefore it's necessary to give civs only one such bonus (hence D2950), and ensure it has some kind of penalty.

To be honest I'm not entirely sure "dried mud" is actually specific enough that it should be a civ bonus at all. Further, Kushites seem like they should benefit too?

In the initial version of D3329 I proposed extending this civ bonus to cart, kush, and pers as well (for comparison, brit and gaul share a structure bonus, as do athen, mace, spart), but @borg- recommended against.

I would love to see this patch for a24. Three players asked me for it yesterday in the lobby. The only change I would make is to add some food to them, the rest seems good.

I might actually vote to disable this tech ATM otherwise.

The problem with vision technologies is that entities with already high vision range benefit much more than those with smaller vision ranges (the area is pi times radius square).

I might actually vote to disable this tech ATM otherwise.

That would be my preferred solution too.

• changed cost as discussed with @borg- (sorry for the haggling)

In D3320#149629, @Nescio wrote:

180 food and 120 metal?

180 food and 120 metal?

200 food 100 metal?

Previously: 1.1^3=1.331, i.e. a 33% increase.
Patch: 1.15^3=1.521, i.e. a 52% increase.
I'm fine with increasing the trade gain technologies from +10% to +15%, but please remove the +25% movement speed bonus to compensate, and keep the trade_commercial_treaty.json unchanged.

The design is like having more rooms, so I think it’s reasonable to have double pop.

Fine by me.

Was waiting for this to be finished before committing anything :)

Could you commit the icon first, though, like you did with the carnyx-trumpeter?

Here is my reasoning:

• Reducing enemy attack damage by 10% is equivalent to raising your resistances by one level.
• Champion infantry costs 80 food, 60 food, 80 metal and the swordsman has 47% more damage per second and two more resistance levels (equivalent to +23% health) than the proposed carnyx-trumpeter.
• Infantry heroes (e.g. Brennus) cost 200 food, 150 wood, 200 metal, have a lot more health, resistance, and attack damage, and much more powerful auras.

I called 250 food excessive because it's over three times the champion infantry's and even more than the hero's. I think we can agree the cost of this proposed unit ought to be somewhere in between ordinary champion infantry and infantry heroes.
So how about one of the following?

• 100 food, 200 metal
• 150 food, 150 metal
• 100 food, 100 wood, 100 metal

Or just make them cost 50% more than ordinary champion infantry, i.e.:

• 120 food, 90 wood, 120 metal.

What do you think?

Was waiting for this to be finished before committing anything :)

This commit broke --without-pch. While at it, please fix the warnings.

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Years, fix notes

Intuitively, the wood cost is 75, which is about 100 seconds at start rate to gather. The build time is 30 seconds. This would lower gathering time by around 30s, while increasing build time by around 15s. So overall a net gain. If you add the storehouse (40s build time), things might become more complex.
However it becomes a net loss if one must put two units to build vs one for other civ at the starts. I'm not entirely sure, but I have a hunch that this 'bonus' comes out about equal right now.

Formations need fixing.

I think a tech for one unit is a bit odd in the current gameplay. IMO heroes already come with better armour and HP and that should be enough, particularly since they unlock in City phase already. I don't think our gameplay is hero-centric enough that they warrant further upgrades.

In D2950#147482, @Nescio wrote:

Their structures already have lower wood costs

Where do I find that? ;P

Makes sense to me, and as a unique tech I guess a 'weird' cost structure is fine.

Or a reduction in bribe cost?

What's the reason to bump the city-phase tech even more? 20% trade increase is substantial, and we had Diffs in the past to avoid the 'snowball' effect from going to City Phase.

I think exploration is fine.

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.

My understanding here is that siege engines are more easily destroyed than captured, so pro-players prefer to destroy them.
The unfortunate problem is that we don't have a good way to define "preferred attacks" against target, so it defaults to Capture. We have patches that might change that in the future, but none right now.

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Image from Delenda Est (@wowgetoffyourcellphone).

This should compile. Will run a docker noPCH build to make sure there's no issues.

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Fix tests.

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