It would appear that the Horse Breeders Guild is a city only guild, which might explain why one never sees one in a game. Most factions can only build stables and cavalry in their castle line of buildings...
Crazy.
One for the modders no doubt.
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It would appear that the Horse Breeders Guild is a city only guild, which might explain why one never sees one in a game. Most factions can only build stables and cavalry in their castle line of buildings...
Crazy.
One for the modders no doubt.
Just remove the word city from the requires section in the EDB file from each level of the guild and you have it for castles too.
Yay! Russia can get a guild that barely anyone one else can! :laugh4:
Actually, I think it might be intentional. By restricting it to cities, it essentially limits the Horse Breeders Guild to factions that can recruit cavalry in their cities. These happen to be factions that were historically noted for having high quality horses, essentially the Muslim and Iberian factions. That makes sense to me.
Maybe...
But then the stables line of buildings arguably gives the largest amount of points towards the guild, and they can only be built in castles and castles can't have the guild. So if it's intentional, it's pretty bizarre. Anyway, all cities still end up with Thieves Guilds.
Right you are TinCow. It's city only to give an advantage to the Eastern factions.
You can achieve it with any faction.
Example As England if you wish to get the guild asap.
- Produce 60 (to be absolutely certain of gaining HQ) Hobilars from a castle.
- Disband them as they are produced unless you want to use them.
- Convert the castle to a city
- Low taxes
- High Chivalry Governor
- Maximise growth, build farms etc.
- Rush to Huge Stone Wall for HB Guild HQ.
Note: You don't need 60 Hobilars, I do that just to be sure and anyway I have cash to throw around.
Factions who can get horse breeders without doing something very special(like building units you wont use in your armies):
- England(Demi-Lancers)
- France(Gendarmes and Mounted Archers)
- Milan(Famiglia Ducale, broken lances and milita)
- Venice(Broken lances and milita)
- Spanish(Jinetes and Gendarmes)
- Portugese(Jinites)
- Moors(Arabs, Christian Guard and Granadine Jinetes)
- Egypt(Mamelukes and arabs)
- Turks(Turkomans and Sipahi)
- Sicily(Broken Lances and milita)
- Hungary(Hussars)
- Poland(Hussars)
- Can russia build cav other than their poor milita cav in cities?
This list is from memory, I might have left out some.
All of the units listed above are units you are very likely to use in your armies. For example, the italians get their heavy cav in cities, the english demi-lancers are as good as castle knights and can be built in cities, the iberians usually use a LOT of jinetes, same goes for the horse archers of the muslim factions.
However, for a lot of factions, these units come late, usually only from a huge city. That means you probably already have a guild in place... So simply demolish the guild in place, or plan far ahead and don't accept guilds where you'll one build cav.
The method I use, is to demolish the guilds already there. I usually do it when gunpowder arrives, as I'll then switch production from castles to cities. I'll have a couple of towns produce gunpowder with the alchemy guild, and a couple others producing cavalry with the horse breeder.
Good post !
My idea is for those who wish to get the guild in early before Demi Lancers. Updated my 1st post.
Actually you can have a city, get the merchant's guild, recruit loads of merchant cav, destroy the guild and upgrade to horse breeder.
Very good idea, or perhaps get one of those Hospitallier (sp?) Templar, line of Knights building in your city could do that as well i supposeQuote:
Originally Posted by FactionHeir
Good idea but merchant cav is expensive no ? I never recruited it so would'nt know. I'd go with the cheapest cav that is available.
Agreed with Tincow. Like Sinan said in another, ancient post, "The Arabs have a love affair with the horse".
(ok, I just wanted to post that sentence once more, I'll admit. :laugh4: )
But the fact that some stuff can only be gotten by some factions, or is much easier for some factions to get than others is intentionnal IMNSHO. Just like it's way easier for Western factions to get the Sword Guild, or like the christians don't have a battle assassin unit (except for those sneaky Hungarians that is). It certainly helps giving the Muslim cavalry the edge they need against christian knights, and with that kind of bonii they can actually hope to invade Europe, not just hope the crusaders die in the desert heat like in MTW... And making it more readily available to christians would just make the muslim factions even more underpowered than they already are.
EDIT : @Sinan : it's not really that Merchant Cav is expensive, it's that it's completely useless and way, way overpriced. They're a tad cheaper than knight, but IIRC they have even worse stats than Hobilars. They're just router bullies, in essence. Or at least, they would be in cav charges weren't so overpowered (see : Khazak charges)
I've said this before w.r.t. swordsmith's guilds - if it is intentional then its a mind bogglingly stupid way of achieving it. The golden rule of game design is: dont obfuscate the rules. The player should be able to determine cause and effect in your game, either by reading the manual, or by obvious in-game feedback. If horse breeders guilds are supposed to be aimed at eastern factions only, then be blatant about it. Make it only available to muslim and orthodox factions. Dont leave the player stumbling around trying to figure out a way to beat the limitations. Dont dangle a carrot in front of us but then force the us to try to come up with exploits just to get it (cos its not like the AI factions are ever going to work it out).Quote:
Originally Posted by Sinan
Similarly with swordsmiths guilds - you have to do some pretty detailed digging around in the game files before you discover that a couple of factions can't build em. All this can possibly do is alienate the player who's been playing as a russian wondering why they never get a swordsmiths guild. Either explicitly state that russians cant build em or make it as easy as it is for everyone else. Dont make the player extract descr_guilds.txt to figure it out. :rolleyes4:
Personally I find it very hard to believe that it's by design, given how broken a lot of the guild attraction mechanism obviously is. Case in point: thieves guilds. The AI obviously has no long term goals w.r.t. trying to attract certain guilds, it just builds the first thing it gets offered in each city - i.e. thieves guilds. This indicates that guilds are supposed to be balanced in terms of how quickly they get offered. Theyre supposed to come along in a way that suits whats being built in that city - its supposed to encourage city diversification - but thieves guilds just stomp all over that because their triggers are too easy to get.
Conversely, masons guilds are pretty damn hard to get. Frankly i never bother since the rewards are pretty poor, and i've yet to see one in an AI city.
Also: alchemists guilds - hands up anybody who has ever seen one in an AI city. Its only possible to get them late in the game once gunpowder arrives, by which point every city already has a guild, so you will have to either demolish an existing guild or have planned in advance and denied all guild requests in your chosen city. The AI doesnt do either of these as far as i can tell, so alchemists guilds might as well come with a rule which says 'only the player is allowed to build these'. If you build one of these then you're effectively using an exploit. :confused:
So the whole scheme is fundamentally broken for thieves guilds (too easy), mason's guilds (too hard) and alchemists guilds (too late). Its not beyond the realms of possibility thats swordsmiths guilds (bugged anyway if you consider that the guild HQ gives no extra effects after the master guild, so why have it?) and horse breeders guilds arent similarly broken.
I'd really like to see guilds drastically reassessed in the next patch (or even in the expansion). Make it so that once you have one thieves (or any other type of) guild, it becomes harder to get offered one of that type in your empire - i.e. push up the thresholds for that guild type - so other guilds get a chance. i.e. for the first guild the threshold is 100, for the second guild of the same type its 200, for the third its 300 etc*. Plus make swordsmiths guilds globally available, and make horse breeders guilds possible for castles - and if you want eastern factions to have a cavalry advantage then give it to them up front in some other way.
(*alternatively, every time you gain a guild, reset all of the guild scores to zero for that guild type)
The games which do that are often boring a lot sooner than those where I can always find new stuff that was hidden before, so I don't entirely agree. Some features are better revealed, but others are not. In this case, it's good as it is, IMO.Quote:
Originally Posted by Daveybaby
Actually even though egyptians don't have a sword unit (other than hashashin, which I didn't train this time around) I got a lot of swordsmith guilds simply because I kept declining other guild offers and because I build the blacksmith line of buildings which give points towards swordsmith.
This also means russians can probably get it.
Merchant cav is cheap to build, expensive to maintain. Costs, IIRC, 390 to produce but has a maintanence cost of 250. Very poor attack, very good armor, OK charge bonus.
Biggest advantage it has is free upkeep in cities. With its small troop count this isn't much of an advantage since it doesn't work well for keeping control of a city. It also is only free for a city that already has a merchants guild. :wall:
There's a big difference between hidden features and depths to a game, and stuff that you have to figure out how to get that the AI cant. Either make make the AI clever enough to figure out how to get those guilds, or make them easier to get.Quote:
Originally Posted by Husar
I agree with Daveybaby that the guild system is entirely too borked to lend any credence to the notion that Horsebreeder guild design may be intentional. The immediate tip-off is that it has guild points granted by a structure (the stable series) that cannot even be created in the same sort of settlement that it is available in. That is not only counter-intuitive, it is just plain stupid, and I refuse to demean CA developers by even suggesting that they might've designed the system to be so absurd.
It seems likely that either:
- Horse breeders guild is incorrectly limited to city only
- Stables were supposed to be available in cities
The former looks far more likely to me, and so working on the assumption that CA devs are not poor enough to intentionally design Horsebreeders the backwards way it currently is in the files, it seems the most prudent thing to do is simply grant the guild to castles as well where it seems like it should naturally be anyway.
Middle_eastern factions should have a sufficient edge with the guild still, as they continue to be able to recruit cavalry from cities, and get huge boosts to the guild total by constructing the racetrack series as well.
As to the comments on the thieves guild being everywhere, I've been trying to come up with a good way to beat that. The best I have so far is to somehow limit the guild to one instance per faction. My first idea was to make the guild points required for the guild and the m_guild be exactly the same amount (or 1 apart if identical is not allowed), and set them both for the same minimum city size requirement. This would essentially grant the m guild the first time a settlement gets offered the guild, and would ensure that only one could be in existence inside a given empire unless it captured more. It's a little sloppy, but it's way easier than trying to screw around with balancing the guild points that guild receives.
Alternately (and better if it works), I think you can attach a faction_building_exists check to the guild buildings in the EDB. I'd basically require "and not faction_building_exists >= thieves_guild" for each level, along with the faction requirements. This would actually keep all guild levels intact, but not allow a second thieves guild to be built if any already exists in the faction. Should check their proliferation nicely.
A good way to minimize thieves guilds is to edit out the "Spymission" and "Spyinsettlement" triggers. That way, thieves guilds will only appear where they are trained, and this will limit them nicely. If there are still too many, or two few for your taste, play around with the numbers on the "spytrained" trigger a little. I've set the number to 8 and upped the points for the first level to 125, and I've got the number of thieves guilds I want...Quote:
Originally Posted by Foz
To restrict the TG, I already upped the points needed and also restricted to only inns and above allowing spy upkeep (agent_limit)
Drat. Evidently the guild mechanics completely ignore the requirements of constructing the building that are listed in the EDB. I tried enforcing that only 1 thieves guild could be present, and then actually tried making it so to get a thieves guild you were already required to have one, and both cases resulted in their usual proliferation. That puts an unfortunate limit on my options.
@Foz:
You could do something similar by just messing with the guild points.
Add a trigger like this to export_descr_guild.txt:
What this does is decrease the thieves guild scores for all other settlements you own (but critically not the settlement where you built the guild, thus you can still upgrade it). If you made this -1000, then you would probably never get a thieves guild offer in those settlements for the rest of the game. The only problem for this is that AFAIK guild scores are maintained when a settlement changes hands. So even if you dont have a thieves guild and you take over a settlement from someone that does, then youre probably not going to ever get to build a thieves guild there no matter how many spies you churn out from there.Code:Trigger limit_thieves_guilds
WhenToTest BuildingCompleted
Condition SettlementBuildingFinished = thiefs_guild
Guild thiefs_guild o -100
So i would suggest making it -100 or so, which would just give theives guilds a bit of a handicap whenever you build another one. This could be expanded for every guild type to help make sure that no one guild ends up dominating the game, regardless of the balance of the trigger conditions.
What really needs getting rid of is the +2 per turn bonus for every settlement you own, for every spy in an enemy settlement at the end of a turn. If the AI has 5 spies around in various enemy settlements, thats +10 points per turn, every turn, for every settlement. No wonder there are so many thieves guilds around.
I think that by messing with the triggers for all of the guilds it should be possible to get the AI to have a variety of guilds in it's cities.
Some Possible Fixes For Other Guilds
Assassins Guilds are now way too easy to get for a human player. I trained up 4 or 5 assassins on a rebel stack, and went from no assassins guild at all to having the guild HQ in a dozen or so turns (wasnt counting, but it was certainly pretty rapid). This is because you get +20 in every settlement for each successful assassination!!!! Bit of an exploit there, so i would suggest neutering the assassins guild by nerfing the mission success points, maybe mod this down to +5 per success, or even get rid of it altogether.
This has been said so often by so many people that its almost not worth mentioning, but fix Horse Breeders Guilds so that they can be built in castles as well as cities (or even instead of).
I've been going on about Swordsmens Guilds and how annoying it is that russia and turkey dont get them, but i've now changed my mind (see woodsmens guilds below). What does need doing is a fix for the guild HQ, and in particular, removal of the cavalry bonus - if you want cavalry bonuses, build a horse breeders guild (obviously after fixing that so that you can build it in castles).
Normal Guild: +1 melee weapon
Masters Guild: +1 melee weapon, +1 valour to sword infantry trained in settlement
Guild HQ: +1 melee weapon, +1 valour to sword infantry trained faction wide
Instead of giving russia etc access to swordsmans guilds, how about beefing up Woodsman's Guilds instead? Get rid of the 'england only' rule, and add triggers so that it also gets points when you build axe wielding infantry, and get it to give weapon and valour bonuses to axe troops. Do halberds count as sort of axes? They look a bit axey... No? Thats turkey stuffed then.
Mason's Guild needs some more triggers, because at the moment its pretty hard to get, being (like the horsebreeders guild) a city based guild but with most of its triggers only buildable in castles. Solution: keep it city based, but boost the 'other settlements' triggers for the castle based buildings.
i.e, current triggers are:
Build Stone wall series: +10/15/20 settlement, +2/2/3 others
Build town watch series: +10/15/20/25/30 settlement +2/2/2/2/3 others
Build mustering halls* series: +10/15/20/25/30 settlement, +2/2/2/2/3 others
Build armourer* series: +10/15/15/20/25/30 settlement +2/2/2/2/2/3 others
Build bowyer* series: +10/15/20/30 settlement +2/2/2/3 others
change *these to something like:
Build mustering halls series: +10/15/20/25/30 settlement, +5/6/7/8/10 others
Build armourer series: +10/15/15/20/25/30 settlement +5/6/7/8/9/10 others
Build bowyer series: +10/15/20/30 settlement +5/6/8/10 others
Alternatively, add more triggers for other city based things like the catapult series, town hall series, etc.
The real problem is the Alchemists Guild. There is simply no way the AI is ever going to build this guild, because all of the triggers are gunpowder based, and by that time all the slots are inevitably taken. The only way i can see a way to make this work is to tie it to ballistas/catapults/trebuchets as well as cannons/handguns. Since the guild gives an experience (i.e. valour) bonus and not a weapon bonus this is kind of feasible, since its all about aiming big guns at things far away really innit?
Great. Now all i need to do is find enough spare time to write the mod :wall:
So the AI works towards getting certain guilds? Have you ever discovered it's pattern for guild construction?Quote:
Originally Posted by Daveybaby
Haven't seen the AI build gothic knights yet, maybe they should be available in wooden castles because currently the AI can't figure out how to build them.~;)
I don't think dumbing the game down to suit the AI is a good idea because it also dumbs the player down, if you go on like that, you could make the battles similar to chess because the AI can handle that a lot better.:sweatdrop:
I think if it's a bit of a challenge for a player to get a certain guild with certain factions, that's fine, I guess it's meant to be like that, and if it's hard for the AI as well, then it's probably meant to be hard for the AI as well, otherwise they could have made the AI cheat for example, but then you might end up with master horse breeder HQs in every AI city. ~;)
Yes, i have discovered its pattern: It builds the first guild it gets offered, in every city. This is inevitably the thieves guild, since the triggers are unbalanced. If the AI has any longer term goals, such as 'save this city for a mason's guild', there isnt any evidence of it.Quote:
Originally Posted by Husar
What we need to do is either re-write the AI so that it prioritises different guilds for different cities (impossible, unless you happen to have a copy of the M2TW source code lying about that we can have to play with) or, more realistically, mod the game to balance the triggers so that a range of different guilds are offered to the AI before it manages to put a thieves guild in every city.
The reason the AI isnt building gothic knights is financial, not trigger based. Its widely acknowledged that the AI doesnt spend its cash wisely, which is why there are several threads devoted to giving it huge cash bonuses to make it competetive.Quote:
Haven't seen the AI build gothic knights yet, maybe they should be available in wooden castles because currently the AI can't figure out how to build them.
I guess we can just wait for a much better AI. While youre at it can you sort out poverty and world peace? ;)Quote:
I don't think dumbing the game down to suit the AI is a good idea because it also dumbs the player down, if you go on like that, you could make the battles similar to chess because the AI can handle that a lot better.:sweatdrop:
Failing that, in the real world, the game rules and the AI's capability to utilise those rules to play the game competitively have to be in balance. Otherwise, the human player is effectively given massive advantages over the AI. Dont make your game too complex for the AI to play it.
Chess is an excellent case in point - chess AIs are really good because the rules are very simple and well known. Its a level playing field. If there were lots of stupid rules like 'if you have a bishop next to a queen on turn 19 and its a wednesday and none of the knights have moved yet, then you can have an extra rook' then chess AIs would have a much harder time of it. If the player could exploit that rule because the chess AI hadnt been programmed to know about it, then the human has an unfair advantage. Also no one would play chess, because it would suck.
Much better to have all the rules out in view, and an AI that knows about them, and let the gameplay depth and replayability come from strategic interactions and an AI opponent that can actually play the game as well as you can.
Its not hard for the AI, its impossible for the AI, because it isnt programmed to jump through the hoops required to get a horse breeders guild in a castle. The reason it isnt programmed to jump through those hoops is most likely because thats not how the game was designed to be played. Thus a human player has a advantage over the AI that i would consider an exploit.Quote:
I think if it's a bit of a challenge for a player to get a certain guild with certain factions, that's fine, I guess it's meant to be like that, and if it's hard for the AI as well, then it's probably meant to be hard for the AI as well
I'm sorry, but this standpoint doesn't wash with me. I have never seen a Horse Breeders Guild in my entire time of playing Med II, and that's not surprising given that the main source of points for the HBG is from the stables line of buildings and these are only buildable in cities. Like Foz stated above, this can't be design intention. It's a mistake, plain and simple. Yes it might be possible from some obsessed human player to manufacture the game's mechanics to get a HBG, but if it's that difficult for the player it'll be nigh impossible for the AI, which seemingly just builds the first guild offered in any of its cities/castles. And this is why the AI always has Thieves Guilds in its cities and the occasional Swordsmith Guild in its castles. Any good game design should be based around what the AI can achieve, and if the AI can't do it, it shouldn't be in (or should at least be modified).Quote:
Originally Posted by Husar
Having said all that, I am interested in Daveybaby's suggestion as to how to limit Thieves Guilds, and any other guild for that matter. Does anyone know if this works well? My only concern would be if the AI does manage to build more than one of the same guild type - would this trigger not hamper the progression to the later levels in the other cities?
Anyway, interestingly, as soon as I allowed HBGs to be built in castles, I found an AI castle with one pumping out upgrade cavalry. Hey presto, problem solved.
Also, what exactly does an Explorers Guild do? I'm always being offered these, but can't seem to find anything in the code...
Gives you a chance of getting some ancillaries. Each level gives the same chance, not cumulative.
Not much.Quote:
Originally Posted by Jambo
There's a 5% chance each turn for a general in the settlement to get an ancillary that gives movement and line of sight bonuses.
Theres a 33% chance that an admiral created in the settlement will get an ancillary that gives 1 command point, and movement + line of sight bonuses again.
Plus there 2 or 3 really obscure ancillaries that can only turn up between certain dates, that give movement & trade bonuses - one of which is marco polo, apparently - have never seen them actually appear though :rolleyes4:
According to the in game description it also gives some kind of trade bonus. Havent seen any evidence of that in the files though, and havent really tested it in-game.
So overall, pretty useless IMO. There's an awful lot more that could be done with this guild (e.g. give 'knowledge of customs' traits to merchants, and other movement and line of sight based ancillaries to generals, translators etc to diplomats etc etc) but i really dont think theyre worth bothering with at the moment.
The Danes should be able to get horse breeder's guild as well, since they can train the Norse War Clerics from a church buildings Abbey and up. I use these a lot since they get an experience point when they only frown towards an enemy and can basically be retrained in almost every city since you need your churches anyway.Quote:
Originally Posted by HoreTore
I will try to dedicate one city to train these in my current Dane Campaign and see if I really can get the Horse lovers' Guild.
This should work perfect in Italy. I just turned Florence into a castle on VH to for a quick supply of cavalry.
I agree it is rare, but I have seen the AI build Horse Breeders Guilds twice, once in an Egyptian city and once in a Turkish city. I agree it should be a bit more common, but I think that's more because other guilds are usually offered first and the AI always takes the first thing that is offered. That's why the Thieves Guild shows up everywhere: the AI like spies, so that play style naturally encourages the offer of the TG. If the AI reduced spy production, you would see other guilds in AI cities more often.Quote:
Originally Posted by Jambo
The Alchemist's Guild, Woodsmen's Guild and Horse Breeders Guild have their bonuses written like:
gun_bonus 1
archer_bonus 1
cavalry_bonus 1
Whereas the Swordsmiths Guild and other bonus-related buildings have them written as:
heavy_cavalry_bonus bonus 1
happiness_bonus bonus 1
trade_based_income_bonus bonus 1
law_bonus bonus 1
(with an extra "bonus")
Are the first set working as intended?
And is there a way of giving valour or bonuses to melee infantry?
E.g. heavy_infantry_bonus bonus 1
The entire guild point system is buggy. I get offered guilds in cities that have never even seen the unit it’s meant to improve. The theologian’s guild seems to work fine but thieves and explorers at the very least have issues.
Yes.Quote:
Originally Posted by Jambo
Try it :tongue2:Quote:
Originally Posted by Jambo
As HoreTore suggested, I commented out the spy-in-enemy-settlement and spy-mission-success type triggers. The end result after 77 turns on autopilot (I typically start a hotseat game, control mongols, then give up control of my faction in order to make a bunch of turns pass) is no thieves guilds that I can find at all. As a result most cities have mechants or explorers guilds, but Egypt in particular seems to have developed a healthy dose of theologians guilds. Some cities also get knight chapter houses now, as thieves guilds are not turning up to push everything else out. All in all it's a huge step in the right direction, though it makes me cringe to see explorers guilds knowing how worthless they are. Perhaps they ought to be disabled until we can hammer down enough other solutions to actually get to fixing them somehow.
I don't know at what point the AI will start getting some thieves guilds again, but it seems like we should push the numbers up from here to try to achieve balance. It turns out I don't like the one-guild trigger plan as much, as it would generally guarantee the capital will house the thieves guild since it achieves guild ability first. With the trigger mods in place, the capitals are generally getting merchants guilds, which seems just fine with me considering that they usually are the economic center of the empire. I'm not sure whether the guild bonus for producing spies should go up or if either of the two removed triggers should just be reinstated, but my inclination is the former as both removed triggers are likely overpowered on their own, especially since they grant points to all settlements.
About Daveybaby's idea of reworking the guilds, I'm definitely all for it. Many guilds seem rather afterthought-like, and there is clearly a lot more benefit that can be squeezed out of the idea.
I think the combat troop guilds would actually make the most sense if they were just aligned by troop type. It makes great sense from a design perspective to have a melee guild, an archer guild, and a mounted troop guild. The horsebreeders already counts for all cavalry that exist, and doubly so after it is allowed in castles. Swordsmith gains points from only sword troops, but grants a general melee bonus, which seems inconsistent. Woodsmens seems tailor-made to be an archery guild, but is unnecessarily limited to only England. I think a lot of the complaints and balance issues with those 3 guilds would be solved if they were simply expanded into their natural broad-class roles: the given class grants guild points when recruited, and gains benefits from the guild. Castles would then have far more/better guild choices (judging realistically, not by what a player could theoretically accomplish) and each AI faction is likely to make best use of the guild that plays on its unit strengths, lending a more distinct feel to fighting different factions than is currently possible. With some tinkering it may even be possible to get some AI factions to have nearly even odds of getting each of the 3 guilds, mimicking the settlement specialization that some players will employ.
If you want to make the Explorer's Guild useful, I have an idea. Make them give temporary bonuses to movement. For instance, units that start their turn in a city with an Explorer's Guild get an extra 50% movement for that turn. A Master's level increases it to 2 turns (or an extra 100% movement maybe) and a HQ increases it to 3 turns (or an extra 150% movement). Perhaps this could be done by granting traits 100% of the time when in an EG city, then every turn the trait loses 1 rank until it is at 0. As long as there is 1 rank in it, the bonus movement works. Regular EG give rank 1, Master's gives rank 2, HQ gives rank 3.Quote:
Originally Posted by Foz
In my own working copy of the guilds file, I got a quite good balance of guilds even for AI factions. They tend to get quite a lot of horse breeder and order guilds in particular and some sword and merchants guilds. Of course also the occassional thieves guild.
Haven't seen an assassin guild or explorer guild with the AI yet in my set up, but thats likely due to the AI hardly ever training/using assassins or if they do, they have other guilds already.
Don't think that's currently possible, but its certainly possible to make some named ancillaries only become available if you have a higher level of the explorer guild. And in general increase the chances of getting them when spending a turn in town.Quote:
Originally Posted by TinCow
Here's some initial things I'm testing as changes for the Explorers_Guild:
I also gave trade_based_income bonuses to each level (+1, +2 and +3).Code:;------------------------------------------
Trigger intrepid_explorer_vnv_trigger1
WhenToTest CharacterTurnEnd
Condition EndedInSettlement
and SettlementBuildingExists = explorers_guild
and IsGeneral
AcquireAncillary intrepid_explorer chance 5
;------------------------------------------
Trigger intrepid_explorer_vnv_trigger2
WhenToTest CharacterTurnEnd
Condition EndedInSettlement
and SettlementBuildingExists = m_explorers_guild
and IsGeneral
AcquireAncillary intrepid_explorer chance 10
;------------------------------------------
Trigger intrepid_explorer_vnv_trigger3
WhenToTest CharacterTurnEnd
Condition EndedInSettlement
and FactionBuildingExists = gm_explorers_guild
and IsGeneral
AcquireAncillary intrepid_explorer chance 10
;------------------------------------------
Trigger intrepid_explorer_vnv_trigger4
WhenToTest AgentCreated
Condition SettlementBuildingExists = explorers_guild
AcquireAncillary intrepid_explorer chance 25
;------------------------------------------
Trigger intrepid_explorer_vnv_trigger5
WhenToTest AgentCreated
Condition SettlementBuildingExists = m_explorers_guild
AcquireAncillary intrepid_explorer chance 50
;------------------------------------------
Trigger intrepid_explorer_vnv_trigger6
WhenToTest AgentCreated
Condition FactionBuildingExists = gm_explorers_guild
AcquireAncillary intrepid_explorer chance 50
;------------------------------------------
Trigger naval_navigator_vnv_trigger1
WhenToTest AgentCreated
Condition IsAdmiral
and SettlementBuildingExists = explorers_guild
AcquireAncillary naval_navigator chance 25
;------------------------------------------
Trigger naval_navigator_vnv_trigger2
WhenToTest AgentCreated
Condition IsAdmiral
and SettlementBuildingExists = m_explorers_guild
AcquireAncillary naval_navigator chance 50
;------------------------------------------
Trigger naval_navigator_vnv_trigger3
WhenToTest AgentCreated
Condition IsAdmiral
and FactionBuildingExists = gm_explorers_guild
AcquireAncillary naval_navigator chance 50
;------------------------------------------
There can only be one grandmaster guild in the game. How many of the master guild variety can one have per faction? Unlimited like the first level?
Quote:
Originally Posted by TinCow
Why wouldn't it be possible? Here's something close, I'll finish making it to order when I can. As it is, sitting in an explorers guild builds up movement bonus levels. Shouldn't be too hard to make it work the other way, based on guild level. I start out using a 3 level trait to get the job done. Something like this:Quote:
Originally Posted by FactionHeir
That goes in the export_descr_character_traits.txt file (EDCT). IIRC MovementPoints is percentage based, so this should be 50%/100%/150% bonus. I could be mistaken though.Code:;------------------------------------------
Trait EnhancedMovement
Characters all
Level Movement_1
Description Movement_1_desc
EffectsDescription Movement_1_effects_desc
GainMessage Movement_1_gain_desc
LoseMessage Movement_1_lose_desc
Threshold 1
Effect MovementPoints 5
Level Movement_2
Description Movement_2_desc
EffectsDescription Movement_2_effects_desc
GainMessage Movement_2_gain_desc
LoseMessage Movement_2_lose_desc
Threshold 2
Effect MovementPoints 10
Level Movement_3
Description Movement_3_desc
EffectsDescription Movement_3_effects_desc
GainMessage Movement_3_gain_desc
LoseMessage Movement_3_lose_desc
Threshold 3
Effect MovementPoints 15
From there, you want triggers that fire on turn start or turn end, your choice. Try these:
And that also goes in the EDCT, just in the lower (trigger) section. Note that the removal triggers will hit everything that isn't in a explorers guild settlement at the end of the turn. This shouldn't be problematic though, as I recall demonstrating before that minuses to traits can never take them negative, it simply isn't allowed. So, no one can go below 0 in EnhancedMovement ranks, meaning there shouldn't be any quirks as a result.Code:;------------------------------------------
Trigger EG_Give_Bonus
WhenToTest CharacterTurnEnd
Condition EndedInSettlement
and SettlementBuildingExists >= explorers_guild
Affects EnhancedMovement 1 Chance 100
;------------------------------------------
Trigger EG_Remove_Bonus_A
WhenToTest CharacterTurnEnd
Condition not EndedInSettlement
Affects EnhancedMovement -1 Chance 100
;------------------------------------------
Trigger EG_Remove_Bonus_B
WhenToTest CharacterTurnEnd
Condition EndedInSettlement
and not SettlementBuildingExists >= explorers_guild
Affects EnhancedMovement -1 Chance 100
...and, we're finished. That should get the job done. I haven't tried it, but it ought to work theoretically. I may of course have mistyped things or simply missed something, in which case anyone with a mind to try it can let me know. Also you may need to add descriptions to the correct file - I have no idea what the game does if/when it can't find some that are listed for a trait. It may even be possible to skip all the lines about descriptions and whatnot - I don't make new traits enough to know what is required, or their particular quirks.
As Russia I get this guild all the time. My cavalry is great, even when their green they start with experience!
One master guild per faction. You can get more though if you capture them from other factions.Quote:
Originally Posted by Jambo
However, you havent put any upper limit on the value of EnhancedMovement - so if you leave a unit in the settlement for 10 turns they will have the bonus for 10 turns after they leave (unless that was your intention).Quote:
Originally Posted by Foz
I think you can put a limits in to stop this though (added lower bounds checks as well for the hell of it).
Code:;------------------------------------------
Trigger EG_Give_Bonus
WhenToTest CharacterTurnEnd
Condition EndedInSettlement
and SettlementBuildingExists >= explorers_guild
and Trait EnhancedMovement <= 2
Affects EnhancedMovement 1 Chance 100
;------------------------------------------
Trigger EG_Remove_Bonus_A
WhenToTest CharacterTurnEnd
Condition not EndedInSettlement
and Trait EnhancedMovement > 0
Affects EnhancedMovement -1 Chance 100
;------------------------------------------
Trigger EG_Remove_Bonus_B
WhenToTest CharacterTurnEnd
Condition EndedInSettlement
and not SettlementBuildingExists >= explorers_guild
and Trait EnhancedMovement > 0
Affects EnhancedMovement -1 Chance 100
Wow, nice to see that could actually be implemented. If you wanted to give the GM Explorer's Guild a global effect similar to the other guilds, you could make the GM give 3 turns of extra movement in its own city and 1 turn of extra movement in every city in your faction.
I noticed an interesting trigger in the export_descr_guilds file which could be used to help promote guild diversity (particularly for the AI):
As I see it this only serves to perpetuate the "Thieves Guild spread." What we need is a system whereby building/upgrading a guild in one city makes the guild less likely to appear in other cities. Something like:Code:;------------------------------------------
Trigger 0001_Guild_Upgraded
WhenToTest GuildUpgraded
Guild this s 20
Guild this o 10
;------------------------------------------
Now, the question remains as to what the "o" actually means. Is it overall in terms of your faction or is it overall in terms of all factions? If it's the former then maybe a larger -ve could be used. If it's the latter then we'd need to be careful making this too large...Code:;------------------------------------------
Trigger 0001_Guild_Upgraded
WhenToTest GuildUpgraded
Guild this s 80
Guild this o -50
;------------------------------------------
Also, another important question is whether this just triggers when one "upgrades" a guild from say basic to master for instance, or, whether this also triggers when a guild first arrives?
Any suggestions/help?
Another oddity I noticed is that many of the castle buildings (smiths, barracks, bowyers) give settlement points towards the Masons Guild and yet the Masons Guild is only buildable in a city. This is one guild that I have never seen (even after some previous modding) and one that might just suit a castle's needs more. If it wasn't for the city based troops that one can recruit from Masons Guilds I'd have sworn this should have been a castle guild. As it is, it's just another messed up guild.
My suggestion for this is to also make it castle based and remove the recruitment possibilities, since they're nothing exciting, and replace them with "recruits_exp_bonus bonus 1" such that they read:
Code:masons_guild requires factions { northern_european, middle_eastern, eastern_european, greek, southern_european, }
{
capability
{
construction_cost_bonus_stone bonus 30
recruits_exp_bonus bonus 1
}
material stone
construction 1
cost 1000
settlement_min city
upgrades
{
m_masons_guild
}
}
m_masons_guild requires factions { northern_european, middle_eastern, eastern_european, greek, southern_european, }
{
capability
{
construction_cost_bonus_stone bonus 30
recruits_exp_bonus bonus 1
}
faction_capability
{
construction_cost_bonus_stone bonus 20
recruits_exp_bonus bonus 1
}
material stone
construction 1
cost 2000
settlement_min large_city
upgrades
{
gm_masons_guild
}
}
gm_masons_guild requires factions { northern_european, middle_eastern, eastern_european, greek, southern_european, }
{
capability
{
construction_cost_bonus_stone bonus 30
recruits_exp_bonus bonus 1
}
faction_capability
{
construction_cost_bonus_stone bonus 30
recruits_exp_bonus bonus 2
}
material stone
construction 1
cost 3000
settlement_min huge_city
upgrades
{
}
I've got Masons Guild plenty of times in cities where i wasn't really recruiting anything and just building lots.
Pretty sure that "o" means other settlements that you control.Quote:
Originally Posted by Jambo
i.e.
"s" = this settlement
"o" = other settlements belonging to this faction
"a" = all settlements belonging to this faction
I'm pretty certain that guild points scored by one faction will never affect another faction's settlements, although if a settlement changes hands its guild points are carried over with it.
I think only for the first level of guild, dont penalise for upgrading. Its the quantity of thieves guilds we want to manage, not their level. Note that this scheme can (and IMO should) be applied to all guild types, not just thieves guild, as a way of forcing a balance of guild types - kind of a negative feedback loop.Quote:
Also, another important question is whether this just triggers when one "upgrades" a guild from say basic to master for instance, or, whether this also triggers when a guild first arrives?
Check this post which is basically suggesting the same thing.
I think its more reliable to nerf the points you get from spying in the first place, to balance things out, rather than deduct points once you get the guild, but i agree that adding points when you build the guild doesnt help matters at all. Looking at that trigger, its almost as if CA wanted to encourage a guild monoculture.
And yeah, the masons guild is pretty broken, in that its far too difficult to get, and ive never seen the AI build one.
"o" for others and "a" for all - that makes more sense.
The trouble with a negative feedback at the stage of the first guild is that we may well limit guilds appearing by too much? Swordsmiths for example are useful in every settlement. The theory behind putting a -ve feedback when an upgrade arrives is that often the master level has a faction-wide effect.
I also agree with the idea of making the Woodmans guild open to others. I don't really buy into the notion of it being specific for England. Given the power of the Swordsmiths guild it's probably a good idea to open it up to the factions that can't get it easily, like for example Russia, by making Dismounted Druchima and Boyars count towards it.
I'm amazed you've had a Masons guild Lusted. Like the Horse Breeders, I've never even had one offered to me....
However I do agree that getting rid of the obvious bad triggers like the spy one and probably the distance away from capital one is imperative.
I recall reading that the Masons Guild is the only way to get one of the best units when playing as Russia. I haven't ever played Russia to confirm this, but if it is true I think it would be a bad idea to make it castle only.
No, you can get Berdiche Axemen at the high level city barracks, too. It's probably easier that way anyway, seeing as how you need a huge city to even get the Guild HQ. Might as well just build the barracks and start pumping them out.Quote:
Originally Posted by TinCow
Nope. Masons guild gives russia EE Spearmilitia and Berdiche axemen, both of which are available from other buildings as well.
AFAIK all of the mason's guild units are trainable by the relevant faction elsewhere (havent checked all of them though)... which just increases its already considerable uselessness.
According to the docudemons, it triggers when a guild building completes, basic, master, or hq.Quote:
Originally Posted by Jambo
The trigger in question, by the way, is BAD. As you said it actually gives other settlements a better chance of getting the exact same guild that was just gotten. We want to promote diversity, so some sort of penalty to other settlements for this guild type is indeed in order. In fact if you wanted it to actually promote other guild types, you could have that trigger grant all guilds a number of points, then remove a fat pile of points from this guild. The result would be not only this guild being less likely, but others also getting a boost. I'm not sure that's needed though - simply penalizing this guild everywhere else may well be enough.
Hmm. On the one hand, doing only the first level will keep the effect from having staying power. On the other, if you recruit a second thieves guild, their effects will hurt each other. On a third hand, I am lazy, and coding something besides the guild upgraded trigger will require a lot of specific tests for named levels of each guild. Using the provided mechanics we can have just 1 trigger that does it all, so I'm leaning that way right now.Quote:
Originally Posted by DaveyBaby
I agree, and disapprove. It will still be imperative to nerf spying triggers. Even doing drastic things, I was unable to keep thieves guilds from springing up everywhere. I tried giving a hefty penalty to every other settlement every single turn a thieves guild was found, and it didn't stop the plague of them everywhere. Either they get queued to be offered as soon as they get to 100 points and ignore the fact that they have lost points, or they gain points at an astronomically high rate. Either way that guild's triggers have to be changed to change the behavior effectively.Quote:
I think its more reliable to nerf the points you get from spying in the first place, to balance things out, rather than deduct points once you get the guild, but i agree that adding points when you build the guild doesnt help matters at all. Looking at that trigger, its almost as if CA wanted to encourage a guild monoculture.
That's the beauty of my guild revisions: Swordsmith is no longer the only useful castle guild. All factions have a shot to get Horsebreeders and Woodsmens as well, so the diversity feedback would actually promote factions toward having all 3, which should in turn help their recruited troops come out better.Quote:
Originally Posted by Jambo
Actually, I have it working pretty neatly right now. I'm still playing with numbers, but it's breaking down like this:Quote:
I also agree with the idea of making the Woodmans guild open to others. I don't really buy into the notion of it being specific for England. Given the power of the Swordsmiths guild it's probably a good idea to open it up to the factions that can't get it easily, like for example Russia, by making Dismounted Druchima and Boyars count towards it.
Swordsmith: now reworked into a heavy infantry guild, not simply swords. I removed all sword-specific triggers, and replaced them with 1 trigger that grants points for any heavy infantry unit that is recruited. This generally includes dismounted knights of all sorts, pike troops, lots of things really. One of them is a class and one is a category, so you can pick out applicable troops from the EDU if you like. It is now a guild with much broader application, and generally possible for any faction to get (though some of the middle_eastern factions have very low amounts of heavy infantry, so it's unlikely there still). Some factions should really love it now, though - can anyone say Dismounted Huscarls??? It only seemed fair that the most melee-intensive factions should get at and effectively use the melee-boosting guild, regardless of whether or not they are using swords.
Horsebreeders: I simply allowed it in castles, and am figuring out how to mess with the pts given to make it appear often enough. The AI uses cav pretty sparingly, so higher points than I initially thought are probably required. Rather than make HAs count for Woodsmens guild, I let them fall here, as it feels more natural to me. I also like the notion that the East and West will put the guild to drastically different uses.
Woodsmens: I allowed it to all factions, and replaced the england-specific archer triggers with a general one that grants pts for any infantry archer recruited. Also considering granting it points from the archery range series, either in addition to or instead of from the brothel line. Byzantium loves me for giving them this guild.
I also disabled the guild point normalization, as I see no point at all to arbitrarily subtracting a point from every single guild everywhere just because it is past turn 25. If anything I will award them all a point each turn to make sure settlements are actually getting guilds and getting them upgraded!
Isn't there a trigger that gives a penalty to all settlements for a guild type when you destroy one of those guild types in a province?Quote:
Originally Posted by Foz
With that in mind, couldn't you change this trigger to decrease the chance of them appearing elsewhere when building one in a province to make it more like the GuildDestroyed trigger?Code:;------------------------------------------
Trigger 0002_Guild_Destroyed
WhenToTest GuildDestroyed
Guild this s -100
Guild this o -20
I think it would be easy to keep the "s" value, but make the "o" value a negative so that the chances of getting the guild elsewhere decrease every time one is built in another province. Make it as large as you like.Code:;------------------------------------------
Trigger 0001_Guild_Upgraded
WhenToTest GuildUpgraded
Guild this s 20
Guild this o 10
I'm not sure if that is what you guys are getting at, but it seems that might easily fix the problem.
@Foz,
Could you layout the actual text you used for the swordsmiths guild? I tried using bonuses to heavy infantry in the descr_buildings file and according to the error log file the game didn't recognise them..
I'm also not sure the "TrainedUnitCategory cavalry" works for horse breeders. I have a Moor city where I built a Racing Track (supposedly 50 pts) and then I built upward of 5 cavalry units (which I made give 20 pts instead of 10) and I still haven't been offered the HBG.
Condition TrainedUnitCategory infantry
and TrainedUnitClass heavy
I think. Didn't actually test it.
[edit]
As for guild not offering, you can only get 1 offer a turn. Also its not guaranteed I think that you get the offer right away when you met the points.
Does the bonus from horse breeders' guild and chapter house stack? If they do, that might shed some light on why horse breeders' guild is city only.
Considering how many points you get from building the racetrack series, I really think this is meant for the Iberian and Middle Eastern factions.
You can't have a horse breeders guild and chapter hourse in the same settlement, and anyway by the time you get a masters version of the horse breeders it will be much later on in the game.Quote:
Originally Posted by andrewt
Maybe. Firstly, why give guild points for castle stable buildings? Secondly, if CA intended it to be "certain faction only" surely they'd have just restricted the factions that could build it in the file, much like they did with the Woodsmen guild...Quote:
Originally Posted by andrewt
Yes Agent Smith, that's exactly what we're talking about doing - keeping a bonus for the city the recruits the guild, but making it a penalty to every other city instead of a bonus. Basically, this:
...or something similar. Obviously the exact amount of the o penalty is subjective.Code:;------------------------------------------
Trigger 0001_Guild_Upgraded
WhenToTest GuildUpgraded
Guild this s 20
Guild this o -100
I found the same thing after trying many different ways I could think of that they might have put infantry or heavy infantry bonuses in. I was using it with new guild file triggers but the vanilla EDB entry, but I did ultimately want to make it bonus only infantry. Barring some way to do that, I'm trying other things. Before bed last night I changed the file to try using melee_blade numbers higher than 1, but I haven't got to try it yet. I doubt it will work, since the custom battle screens only allow 1 level of melee upgrade, though one never knows. Barring that, I may have to make it into a heavy guild (heavy infantry and heavy cav), and include the heavy cav bonus that it comes with in vanilla (though I'd want +2 on the hq since the hq level isn't an improvement at all in vanilla). At least that would still remedy the issue I have with it being related to just swords.Quote:
Originally Posted by Jambo
Hmm, I wonder if one of the non-text game files has the named bonuses in it (prolly the .exe). It would be really handy to have a comprehensive list, and that's the only way I could think of that we might get such a thing. Actually I guess it must be in some file for the game to recognize it, so the question becomes "can anyone find the entries for the archer_bonus type things in the game files and list them for us?"
Yup, that's it. Depending on how I can make the guild function, the infantry part may have to go - if it must retain heavy cav bonuses for lack of any better infantry ones to use than it already has.Quote:
Originally Posted by FactionHeir
It's still a valid question since horsebreeders grants faction bonuses to cav, which means chapter houses will possibly become affected by it. The way the EDB reads, it looks like the higher chapter house levels simply recruit different knights - ones that have 1 or 2 exp built in. They do not use anything resembling the archer_bonus form to get the job done, it's just part of the recruitment pool line for the higher guild level that the unit has inherently 1 or 2 exp. That makes it very likely IMO that the effects stack.Quote:
Originally Posted by Jambo
I suppose that means there is a workaround for the possible lack of a melee experience bonus, though it would be some work. The basic idea would be to have the 3 guild levels each trigger a separate set of recruitment codes for the barracks series, while no swordsmith guild would trigger the vanilla recruitment pools. We'd basically have to make 3 copies of the existing recruitment lines for each barracks level. The first stays the same, and gets "requires not SettlementBuildingExists >= swordsmiths_guild" Similarly, the second third and fourth set would have the last number (for unit chevrons) set to 1, 2, or 3 accordingly, and they'd be tied to the correct guild building with another requires line. For instance, "requires SettlementBuildingExists = swordsmiths_guild".
It should even be possible to emulate a faction-wide bonus for the second and third levels by adding similar conditions, but it would make the file even more crazy to look at. The game would need the following states:
- vanilla recruitment: no swordsmiths guild exists here, and no m-level+ in the faction.
- bonus 1: basic swordsmiths exists here, or m-level exists in faction (but not here).
- bonus 2: m-level exists here, or gm-level exists elsewhere.
- bonus 3: gm-level exists here.
So it's the same 4 sets of recruitment lines required, but the logic requirements are now much nastier to code. Checking if a guild level exists elsewhere but not here is where the trick happens. You'd have to check "FactionBuildingExists = desiredLevel and not SettlementBuildingExists = desiredLevel" to get the right effect. It's easily do-able, just requires a minute of thought to make sure you get it straight :smile:
Some necro psoting here but for a reason, i was wondering if anyone has actually rleeased a mod including the proposed changes to Guild and guild triggers.
To my knowledge, that's a negative, Sir.
Yeah I don't think anyone has, either. I guess it would primarily fall on me to do it since I was a catalyst of some sort, but I haven't been really motivated to do it lately. I'd have to go mess with guild descriptions to make them have text for all the new factions that would get them, setup guild pictures to be displayed with factions that don't currently have them, and that's on top of tweaking the triggers to make the guilds come out at somewhat even levels. I didn't even unpack some of that stuff yet because I had no interest in changing it. So I guess I've been avoiding it more because of all the cosmetic changes than anything. If someone wants to work with me to do a release, though, I'd be more than happy to supply the updated EDG to complement their cosmetic fixes. Call it laziness if you like, but I just don't feel like unpacking all that crap and figuring out where the game keeps all that stuff to copy it around and make everything look perdy and polished, it's just not my thing...Quote:
Originally Posted by Lusted
Well i'd be willing to set up all the guild pictures as it's fairly easy if you do the work on the triggers and EDG, as well as providing me with a list of what faction gets what guild now.
Well, my own personal mod has the Guilds appearing in relatively equal proportions. I've enabled HBs and Masons in castles and lowered the chances of receiving Thieves and Explorers since these dominated vanilla. There's also many other smaller tweaks to help prevent one type becoming too prevalent in AI settlements. I've also levelled the playing field so that Eastern factions can get their hands on the powerful Swordsmiths, Western factions the HBs and so the Woodsmans is available to factions other than just England.
If you want to have a look at my EDB and EDG and EDA (ancillaries) files I'll happily upload them to your LTC forum at twcenter. Otherwise I'm sure someone else will eventually develop a Guild mod at some point. There's also some tweaks to their effects, but you're best actually looking at the EDB and EDA for those.
Good deal. I'll list the faction changes when I can check later - I need to review the EDB changes to see what faction requirements have changed, since that will indicate which factions are allowed to have particular guilds now that weren't before, and thus would need updated pictures and descriptions.Quote:
Originally Posted by Lusted
That raises an interesting question though. England is the only faction allowed to have woodsmens guild in vanilla. What happens if another faction captures a settlement with one? Does it just vanish?
No, it stays and gives its bonus (but not recruitment). That's like an eastern faction captuing a teutons guild.
As for having guilds allowed in castles/cities and then changing that midgame, capturing a castle/city forces a recheck on whether its allowed to exist in said settlement and if not, autodestroys it.
@Jambo - have you done anything for alchemists guilds? Currently theyre very unlikely to get built because by the time gunpowder rolls around every city will already have a guild of some sort.
Okay - as far as I can tell, the only faction requirement change is that woodsmens guild is now available to all factions. All the others, it seems, were already available to all factions, they just never turned up at all for some of them. Horsebreeders is available in castles now, and likely Masons will be as well, but I don't think that has any impact at all on pictures or descriptions. So it turns out the cosmetic changes will be pretty light.
That'll definitely make things easier, i'll likely use the middle eastern Swordsmith guild image for the woodsmen guild for that culture.