[1.0.2 BALANCE] I finally generated enough influence to cast Broken Loyalties

from Elemental Forums

I had to create a custom faction with Heroic (50 influence for quests) and Betrayers (broken loyalties spell) to do it.  Here's what I learned:

1.  It automatically put me at war with that faction.  Since I didn't have any troops nearby, they simply took it back over the next turn.  Ooops.  Reload.

2.  It was pretty cool when I did it the second time with troops nearby... I got a great big Resoln capital with 8 grain, 3 materials, and 3 essence.  All mine.  Now I only have 14 influence so it will be a long time (if ever) before I can do that again in this game.  I still think the cost is too high since I had to create a custom faction to actually achieve it.

I'm fine with it being a once per game spell, but Kraxis cannot currently generate 500 influence to ever cast it.  So either lower the cost or give Kraxis a way to generate more influence to make influence easier to trade for (right now it trades for 100 to 1).

9,922 views 13 replies
Reply #1 from Elemental Forums Top

Influence is relatively easy to come by.  Capture Prestigious Locations and build Monuments on them.  Or, take the Legacy of Serrane trait and earn Influence every time your caravans complete a trade route.

Reply #2 from Elemental Forums Top

Quoting MarvinKosh, reply 1
Influence is relatively easy to come by.  Capture Prestigious Locations and build Monuments on them.  Or, take the Legacy of Serrane trait and earn Influence every time your caravans complete a trade route.
End of MarvinKosh's quote

You just proved my point.  Legacy of Serrane is a custom faction trait.  And the few prestigious locations out there only generate 1 influence per turn unless you have the Guile trait (another custom faction trait).  When we talk about game balance, we need to talk about standard game settings and using standard factions.  Let's pretend I'm playing Kraxis and own 2 prestigious locations for the entire game.  My games are over in less than 200 turns.  2 influence/turn x 200 turns = 400 influence.  It costs 500 influence to cast.  Summary?  The spell costs too much.

Galactic Civilizations III
Reply #3 from Elemental Forums Top

For a spell that allows you to take possession of any opponent's city with zero effort, I think it's priced pretty fairly.  Less than once per game sounds about right.

Reply #4 from Elemental Forums Top

Quoting sweatyboatman, reply 3
For a spell that allows you to take possession of any opponent's city with zero effort, I think it's priced pretty fairly.  Less than once per game sounds about right.
End of sweatyboatman's quote

You've always been pretty wise for a sweatyboatman so riddle me this... if Kraxis can never cast this spell in a standard game, why is it in the game?  If it was only meant to be achievable by custom factions, then why not just let it be from some mod instead of the standard game?

 

Reply #5 from Elemental Forums Top

If the city you cast it on has troops stationed in it, what happens to them? 

Reply #6 from Elemental Forums Top

I tried Betrayers + Legacy of the Seranne + Guile with a 12 player map. I had trade routes with... 10 of them? It still felt like it took forever to cast and when I finally cast it, it didn't have a noticeable impact. At around 200 influence, it *might* be worth it.

Reply #7 from Elemental Forums Top

You also have to factor in the that influence affects diplomacy and other game mechanics in all sorts of ways.  To blow through 500 influence in one shot has all sorts of consequences.

I'd say 100-200 influence might be about right, and I'm leaning toward the low end on that.

Reply #8 from Elemental Forums Top


umm... i tottally disagree. The more towns you get the easier it is to get the influence points you need to spam the spell...

Reply #9 from Elemental Forums Top

Quoting Trojasmic, reply 5

You've always been pretty wise for a sweatyboatman so riddle me this... if Kraxis can never cast this spell in a standard game, why is it in the game?  If it was only meant to be achievable by custom factions, then why not just let it be from some mod instead of the standard game?
 
End of Trojasmic's quote

I don't know about wise :blush: ...

Just to clarify, by "less than once per game" I meant on average.  If 500 puts it completely out of the range of possibility, as you say, then it is too high.  I've never really tried to generate influence, so I am not sure of the mechanics involved.  Like I said, I would put the cost of that spell so that it requires good resources and gets you one and if you're really lucky two shots per game.

If you drop it down to a more manageable 100-200 range, a good random map might end up giving you 4-5 opportunities to use that spell.

Can you imagine the outcry on the forums if the AI started using that spell?  Oy!

IMHO, influence in the game suffers from not having enough use in the game.  What else do you need it for?  You often can't even trade it with the AI.  If there were other productive uses then I would feel more comfortable dropping the cost.  Because there'd be a tradeoff to using it.  If you use Influence Spell A you're giving up the opportunity to do X, Y, and Z.  Right now there is Spell A.

Reply #10 from Elemental Forums Top

You can get it with Kraxis, just build a bunch of towns and pick embassies at lv4. Or buy the influence from your allies and steal your enemies' cities. If you're going for that strategy, you need to dedicate some work to it.

If you lower the cost, it would become way too easy. Kraxis could just turtle all day to build up the influence and then use it to take a city, rinse, repeat.

Reply #11 from Elemental Forums Top

Quoting sweatyboatman, reply 10

Quoting Trojasmic, reply 5
You've always been pretty wise for a sweatyboatman so riddle me this... if Kraxis can never cast this spell in a standard game, why is it in the game?  If it was only meant to be achievable by custom factions, then why not just let it be from some mod instead of the standard game?
 

I don't know about wise ...

Just to clarify, by "less than once per game" I meant on average.  If 500 puts it completely out of the range of possibility, as you say, then it is too high.  I've never really tried to generate influence, so I am not sure of the mechanics involved.  Like I said, I would put the cost of that spell so that it requires good resources and gets you one and if you're really lucky two shots per game.

If you drop it down to a more manageable 100-200 range, a good random map might end up giving you 4-5 opportunities to use that spell.

Can you imagine the outcry on the forums if the AI started using that spell?  Oy!

IMHO, influence in the game suffers from not having enough use in the game.  What else do you need it for?  You often can't even trade it with the AI.  If there were other productive uses then I would feel more comfortable dropping the cost.  Because there'd be a tradeoff to using it.  If you use Influence Spell A you're giving up the opportunity to do X, Y, and Z.  Right now there is Spell A.
End of sweatyboatman's quote

See ... brilliant!  You are wise.  The right answer is 300 influence.

Reply #12 from Elemental Forums Top

Please note that not everyone plays the game the same way.  I remember reading one person that completed the full 10000 turns or whatever that the game allows.  I've not gone that far, but I have played far beyond 200 turns.

Reply #13 from Elemental Forums Top

Quoting dihir, reply 13
Please note that not everyone plays the game the same way.  I remember reading one person that completed the full 10000 turns or whatever that the game allows.  I've not gone that far, but I have played far beyond 200 turns.
End of dihir's quote

To add to the above point - not everyone plays the game on standard settings. My own favorite setting for instance is a game on huge map, epic pacing, insane world difficulty, dense monsters, 3 opponents. It takes ages to research/build things compared to a normal pacing game - but influence is earned at the usual rate, so relatively speaking it is more abundant than in normal pacing games.