Getting techs free once enough players have it

[wieder]

I somehow remember that there was a setting to let everyone to get a tech once certain % of the players have already researched it. I remember seeing something like that but simply can't remember where it was. Or if I was actually reading just about some wish or plan for a future version of Freeciv.

The need for a setting like this comes from keeping even the small nations relevant and with enough recent techs. In a multiplayer game the top players usually have all the nice techs and stuff while the players less familiar with the game are sooner or later playing with obsoleted techs. We have disabled tech trading because that too often makes the game a popularity contest so that's not a solution.

For LT40 we plan to enable "tech trading" with diplomats and spies only. Effectively letting tech transfers happen with stealing. We are also turning off getting techs while conquering cities with a planned code patch. This however is also not enough since not everyone is able to steal from the big players.

Tech leakage is also used but usually not enough once the game enters into late mid game.

This is where getting techs with this setting would come handy. For example once 50% of the players would have certain tech, everyone else would also get it for free. 50% here is just an example and not necessarily the value we would like to use. But you get the idea.

Does anyone know if implementing something like this with ruleset change would be possible and if it is, how to do that?

[Corbeau]

I found this:

Code: Select all

[effect_great_library]
type    = "Tech_Parasite"
value	= 2
reqs	=
    { "type", "name", "range"
      "Building", "Great Library", "Player"
    }

"Gives all techs that at least 2 other players have"

I'd say that's what the "2" in the code does

[wieder]

Thanks!

Once again even more simple than I thought. I was obviously looking at the wrong place and not thinking about the actual effect

This should really help to keep the game interesting in the late game.

[Corbeau]

Actually, come to think about it, we are talking about a Longturn.org game. A negligible amount of idlers. With most or all players active, once half the people get a certain tech, its cost will drop to half anyway and that should be something even people lagging behind should be able to handle. When more people get it, it will become even cheaper. And with tech trading enabled, it's not a long shot. So maybe this isn't actually needed.

It's a different story in Longturn Web. In LTW8, out of 300 nations, 200 are idle. There, techleak has very little effect as the most backward active player gets a 33% discount which helps a bit, but isn't crucial. And we're talking the worst player. Others get less discount. There such a thing would make a difference. But I'm not sure LT40 really needs it.

The only thing that it may affect is some people making a strategy of it: invest nothing into tech and let it come free once enough people reach it (thinking about it, this may be your intention). Oh well. Something new to try, I guess.

[wieder]

Maybe we could try it out with some kind of cautious value like 70% maybe? Could be even higher like 80% if we really want to play it safe.

Letting the techs become cheaper could a viable strategy but also a risky one. Playing the freeloader strategy could be one more way to beat the others but probably a risky one. Then again, as you said, it's something new and another strategy someone might want to try out. This strategy and keeping the half-defeated players kind of relevant is also something that would make the game better. If the small nations are too underdeveloped it's no fun to play those and that leads to idling. Idling makes the game worse for everyone.

I would love to add more options for utilizing new strategies and while not everything is really possible, LT40 should have plenty of new ways to try something new.

I haven't yet played the web multiplayer games, but what I have heard, it might be better if that game would calculate the tech leak from active players instead of all the players. Probably not going to happen since web multiplayer and longturn.org take very different approaches to improving Freeciv. On longturn.org we are more focused on trying to create best possible ruleset while the web multiplayer tries to create as easy as possible way to actually play the game on any platform. Both views have lots of upsides but also lots of downsides.

[AndreasR]

Actually, come to think about it, we are talking about a Longturn.org game. A negligible amount of idlers. With most or all players active.

It's a different story in Longturn Web. In LTW8, out of 300 nations, 200 are idle.

LT38 currently has 20 confirmed players out of a total of 48, and many players have another player as regent, so they are not actively playing themselves. Source:
http://longturn.org/game/LT38/

Therefore I don't think Longturn.org games are less likely to have players become idle, as you suggest here.

[wieder]

Yeah, there are 20 players who started playing LT38. Because of a bug it's possible to "join" LT38 after it was started. However since the game is already running the new players are only listed on the web page and they can't confirm participation.

The 20 players who have started playing are not all active. More and more players will soon become inactive since the game is already in the endgame. The Blue team has, most likely, already won and what's left of the Red team is still trying to create a miracle / postponing the inevitable

The delegated players give some idea about how many people are really playing but since the delegation rules were made more flexible for LT38, that's more complicated now.

I just checked it and out of the confirmed 20 players who were added to the game, 6 players are no longer playing.

Out of those 6 players 2 are replaced with new players and the 4 are delegated to team members.

Currently there are no nations someone is not making moves for. In the ideal situation there wouldn't be need for making permanent delegations or replace players. However we are really trying to avoid having nations who are not played by anyone. Delegate replacement is one way to implement giving nations away since on longturn.org the actual player replacements require saving the game, editing and loading.

On SG1 there are 16 players and 3 idlers who are actually not played by anyone. This would result with balancing issues but the problem was solved by setting those nations to defensive mode. The admin /took the nations for a turn and switched them to produce best possible defensive units and other stuff with work lists. No techs will be updated for the production queue but at least the idlers won''t unbalance the game by becoming easy and fat targets for those who want to conquer them. Now they should be hard and fat targets

[XYZ]

Therefore I don't think Longturn.org games are less likely to have players become idle, as you suggest here.

Not true. I simply forgot to switch off the delegation and therefore was accounted as idling... In fact the players who play at longturn.org are mostly known and therefore very reliable. The ones who idled simply lost some battles and were demoralised and thus left.

[Corbeau]

LT38 currently has 20 confirmed players out of a total of 48

Just to make things clear, those 28 never actually started the game. LT38 has 20 nations on the map. This is the whole point of the confirmation system, to weed out potential idlers before they start playing.

Andreas, don't make this a contest because it isn't. Freeciv Web is good as it is in this regard. A free-for-all with easy entry.

And shouldn't this be in another topic?

[wieder]

Of course when there are more players the LT games will have more idlers. More players usually means more casual players who may want to give up after trying the game. I wouldn't be surprised if half of the players in a 100 player game would be idle by T120. More idlers will also happen once the players have no hope of winning.

Might be a good idea to introduce designated delegates... But there would be issues with those.