The Crusades (Game Thread)

[Alcibaides]

I'm cool with that. Let's get going again asap

I have been running some tests on this scenario and have come to the conclusion that currently the events and set up are not balanced. The game is supposed to simulate the desperate struggle of the Crusaders and Jihadists for control of the Holy Land, a clash of civilizations if you will.

However, I have tested the game out with no human player, and even with the Turks controled by the AI, they quickly overwhelm the Holy Land in a few turns, before any of the European Powers can even get their first reinforcements out there. Furthermore, I have noted Civi's frustration at defending the Arab's isolated cities in North Africa, which are stretched very thin across the entire Mediterranean with not even a road connecting them.

I have been working on improving the scenario a little bit to make it more interesting.

Seeing as some people have dropped out of this game and others are now joining, would people be interested in starting again from scratch? We have only played out a couple of turns so far so it seems like it would be ok to begin again.

These are some of the changes I have started making:

-Adding more cities to the map

-Making major cities larger

-Creating fortresses in more strategic locations

-Connecting the North African cities with a road

-Giving each of the Crusader Civs a boatload of Crusaders that are within 1 turn of reaching the Holy Land.

-Changing the events as follows:

-Turks just get 1 NONE support unit per turn

-Arabs get 3 NONE support units every turn (1 in Arabia, 1 in Egypt and 1 in Morocco)

-Spanish get 1 NONE unit every other turn.

-Europeans (French/English/Germans) get a boat with Crusaders near the Holy Land at a random turn interval (maybe 1 in 10 chance?)

This is what I have so far, if anyone has any further suggestions then let me know.

[Civilionaut]

sehr zart
weiterhin die "friedlichen" Arabs

[Ingvar]

I agree with these measures, they mean the Arabs have a much better chance and they also mean the Turks will not be unassailable.

How does making units/boats spawn at sea work out?


Civi: was meinst du mit friedlichen Araber?

[cupcoffee]

Seems fine to me. I'll stick with the Spanish.

[McMonkey]

I'm more than happy to start again. The Turks were way too powerful in the original version!

I believe there are some problems spawning units at sea. I think Kobayashi found a solution in his Dainichi Sekai Taisen v3.0 scenario!

[Alcibaides]

Excellent, your support has motivated me to dedicate some time to this and make it as good as I can.

I have noted that there is a unit in the rules file called "Mont St. Michel" which looks like a castle, I do not think this unit was even used in the original game. I am going to rename this "Citadel" and place a few of them in some of the major cities (Jerusalem, Cairo, Constantinople, etc.).

What do people think the defence should be for this unit? I do not want it to be so high that it makes cities that have it virtually impregnable, just something that makes those cities a little more challenging to take? I was thinking a defence of 6 with a +50% against cavalry.

Would that be about the right balance?

I was also going to make the unit buildable when your Civ gets the "City defences" tech. With a build cost of 100 shields. Would that be a fair build cost for a 0 movement unit with a 6 defence? Or should the build cost be higher?

[McMonkey]

Make any Castle unit the toughest defender but not invincible. 6 defence is about double the best infantry. That sounds about right. The x2 vs Cav falg should work in this particular scenario as HP/FP and Move rates are so low. I can't remember the exact conditions, but I know they work in the original Civ2 game but not in lots of scenarios where the stats are higher.

You need to consider the effect of rush building on Castle production. I would probably double the cost to at least 200. If there is no big gap between the most expensive land unit and the Castle then players will be able to produce them very cheaply. If you make a big gap between the most expensive infantry unit the players will either have to wait for the production bar to fill up of pay a hefty sum to finish off the Castle in a hurry!

[Ingvar]

Regarding Castles: Maybe try giving them lower defense but higher hit points, so that players always need to waste a few units to take them down, but every single units is likely to do some damage.

Also: making units spawn at sea could possibly cause "spawn camping" to take place. Making them spawn in homelands could give the game a bit more of a Crusade feeling I guess.

Overall I suggest you take a McMonkeyish approach, when he gave Sengoku Jidai a facelift. Giving all factions more units at start, and more naval units, can make a much more exciting early game.

Can't think of anything else right now....

[McMonkey]

I remember now. Its the AI who can't cope with event spawned units at sea. I think it works ok for human controlled Civs though.

I agree with Ingvar, a few more ships at the start helps kick start the game!

[Alcibaides]

I am almost done, I will soon post how I have improved each civ.

However, I am running into some sort of bug that I would imagine McMonkey may have come across before in his immense experience of scenario design. When I change some of the stats for certain units, they no longer become buildable. Why would this be?

For example, if I change the movement rate of the "catapult shot" unit from 3 to 2, I can no longer build it. Similarly, if I change the build cost of the Moorish cavalry from 6 to 7, it also cannot be built anymore, why is this?

When you say "a few more ships helps kick start the game", are you referring to transport ships?

[McMonkey]

I am almost done, I will soon post how I have improved each civ.

However, I am running into some sort of bug that I would imagine McMonkey may have come across before in his immense experience of scenario design. When I change some of the stats for certain units, they no longer become buildable. Why would this be?

For example, if I change the movement rate of the "catapult shot" unit from 3 to 2, I can no longer build it. Similarly, if I change the build cost of the Moorish cavalry from 6 to 7, it also cannot be built anymore, why is this?

When you say "a few more ships helps kick start the game", are you referring to transport ships?

Both types of ships, but Transports in particular. A few merchants to go in them would help too, though I'm not sure how good pay offs would be in this scenario!

Some of the unit slots have built in attributes and they become obsolete when a better unit is available, but I thought this was to do with attack and defence strengths rather than cost and movement. I will try and find an online guide. I would suggest asking at Apolyton Scenario League but that's down at the moment while they migrate servers.

[McMonkey]

Here is the guide by Kobayashi I had in mind: Getting the units right from the beginning and more specifically: Using your units by Mike Daumen

Invaluable reading for anyone building a new scenario. I'm not 100% sure it solves your problem, but it may well do!

[Ingvar]

The initial pay off might be low but the increase in trade is not dependent on distance, as far as I know, and a small increase in trade will mean much in the long term.

And yea, having some trade units at start will give the game a bit more life!

Perhaps another thing worth changing is city wall cost(0 shields), and make it a rule to have them in a city, to get around the scorched earth way of playing people sometimes fall into when they are losing.

[Alcibaides]

Ok here is what I have done, broken down by civ:

Arabs

The Arabs get 6 new cities (1 in Spain, 1 in Egypt and 4 in North Africa)

Instead of connecting all the cities by road, I have made the Moorish Cavalry unit treat all squares as roads.

The Arabs get 4 Moorish Cavalry once every 2 turns (1 in Morroco, 1 in the middle of the Sahara, 1 in Egypt, and 1 in Arabia).

The Arabs have also been given control of the Masyaf Citadel in the Holy Land, at random turns (denominator = 6), they get a Jihadi unit appearing on the Citadel.

I have placed Citadels in various Arab cities (Cairo, Alexandria, Bilbays, Granada, Marrakesh, Fez, Kairuoan, etc.)

Arab citadels have also been fortified in strategic positions in Spain.

However, the Arabs lose Malta, as historically this was captured by the Normans in 1091 AD.

Spanish:

The Spanish get 1 conquistador unit once every 2 turns.

I have placed some citadels in Spanish cities (Pamplona, Saragossa, Burgos, etc.)

I created one additional Spanish City (Leon)

Spanish citadels have also been fortified in strategic positions in Spain.

The Three Crusader Nations:

Germans, Anglo-Normans, and French: they each get 1 Crusader appearing in the Holy Land at random turn intervals (denominator = 10)

Each of their capitals has a citadel (Paris, London, Mainz).

Germans:

The role of the Germans has been greatly expanded, they now get control of the County of Tripoli in the Holy Land (this includes the city of Beirut and the newly created city of Tripoli). Whilst the County of Tripoli was never part of the Holy Roman Empire, it makes sense to give it to them so that they have a stake in the Holy Land from the start and so that the 3 main independent Crusader States (Antioch, Tripoli, and Jerusalem) are each controlled by a seperate civ.

One of their cities in the Holy Land has a Citadel.

They also get a warship in Genoa at random turn intervals (denominator = 12), to signify the naval prowess of Genoa.

Genoa and Rome also are strengthened with Citadels.

French:

The French are given the the Kingdom of Jerusalem (consisting of 4 cities in the Holy Land) they also have a number of other Citadels in the Holy Land, including 1 that is supposed to represent Krak de Chevaliers.

Jerusalem and 1 other French city in the Holy Land have Citadels.

Anglo-Normans:

The Anglo-Normans now just have control of Antioch and Edessa in the Holy Land. This is historically accurate as the principality of Antioch was controlled by the Normans.

One of their cities in the Holy Land has a Citadel.

They also get Malta for historical accuracy.

The Turks:

I decided to give the Turks 2 Sipahi each turn via events, whilst this is half what they used to get, it is still a lot, seeing as they are the only civ that gets event generated units every turn.

They also get citadels in some of their cities (Damascus, Baghdad, Konya, etc.)

The Byzantines:

I strengthened the Byzantine special sea unit (Fire Galley), as it was pointlessly weak before.

I also placed Citadels in and around cities that were historically the most difficult for the Turks to capture (Constantinople, Tarsus, Trebizond, Thessalonika, etc.)

I also created 5 additional Byzantine Cities where I felt a major historical city was missing.

The Barbarians:

In order to deter the human players from picking off the independent cities and to instead concentrate on going up against human opponents, I have placed Citadels in virtually all of the barbarian cities.

For historical realism, I have also placed the 'Boat Building Excellence' wonder in the Barbarian city of Venice, which gives a nice prize to the Civ that can capture Venice first (most likely to be the Germans as they are the closest, but it will not be super easy as there is now a citadel in Venice).

I encourage anybody to take a look at the files and tell me what they think, the most important thing is that the game should be balanced between the Muslim and Christian factions.

I also tweaked a few of the unit stats and production costs, for example before there were units that treated all squares as roads and had 3 defence. This was way too powerful as they could move quickly onto mountains and with the 3 defence they would be too strong, now these units have just 2 defence.

Note that it would not let me attach a *.scn file, so I had to rename it as a text file. Once you have downloaded it, you will have to rename it as a scn file.

[McMonkey]

Great work. All the changes are well reasoned and getting the balance right should lead to a much better game. The Turks were certainly getting way too many units before. Two will still make them powerful, but a reinforced set of Crusader Kingdoms will be hard to expel!