Quitters aren't a problem if we're getting rewarded for winning like WarCraft 3 on Battle.Net where you unlock avatars the more victories you accumulate. So if that system was in place I would be really happy to face a quitter as my record would get better and better and I would be one victory closer to my new lobby avatar

And I can't seriously believe the people who are debating about scientists keeping notes to save some of the research and stuff like that....I've only played Age of Wonders out of the AoW/MoM/MoO trio but if you lose a city which gave you 20 research then what you are currently researching will take longer unless you devote more magic income to research....

That would work, but it takes away the "tough choice" quality of the research that I was attempting to create. I rather like the idea of making an irreversible decision that could impact your empire forever. Sort of like the morality in GC2.

I'm also not the biggest fan of strict mutual exclusivity - whether it be in research or some other aspect of the game. I don't hate it, but I think a 'soft' form of exclusiveness works better: it allows people to mold their strategies more to their own personal preferences while still preventing players from getting the best of all words.

To give an example, let's say there are two techs, "laser accuracy" and "laser power." With regular mutual exclusiveness, researching one prevents you from researching the other - you have a binary choice between accuracy and power. With a soft form of mutual exclusiveness, there are several ways of going about it. One method is to make researching the second of the two take significantly longer or cost much more than it would (or a combination of the two). Another method is cause each tech to have reduced effectiveness if you research both (or, when actually using these techs, choose whether to have a very accurate but weak laser, a very strong but wildly inaccurate laser, or an all-around mediocre laser) - how this would be be done depends on the nature of the tech and the game.

In the vast majority of circumstances I think some form of soft mutual exclusivity is more fun than straight up "if you researched this then you can't under any circumstances, no matter how situations have changed, and no matter how much you are willing to put into it, research that." Sometimes that is the way to go, though. In my example of laser research, I'd say no. If there's something that fundamentally changes some part of an aspect of your nation, maybe. Things like "free the slaves" vs. "enslave everyone!" don't seem fundamental to me if they're including as research. If position regarding slavery is determined by faction choice, on the other hand, that's an entirely different matter. But to me, if I can research it, then I can choose whether or not to actually use it, regardless of whatever other technologies or policies I have at my disposal. However, I'm all for not being able to use certain techs/policies in conjunction with others - or getting severe penalties to their effectiveness if you do. 

Well, best to keep all of our options open, for the modders if nothing else. I realize that the GC2 ethics system is screwed, but the idea of snap choices that can effect the outcome of the entire game has always been appealing to me.

I'm going to have to agree here. The only tough choices I find when playing these games are usually what race/magic school to choose. All other choices are mostly predetermined from that point since certain things work better with the strategy/playstyle I've already chosen.

A huge amount of effort would need to be put into balancing those choices. A similar dilemma was seen in the quest rewards in AOW series where you would choose between two rewards. One of them was almost always the clear winner and you didn't even need to think about choosing.

Stardock has quite the advantage here though. Since they already analyze matches with GC they can do a similar thing with choices. Let's say they program in a random event where you choose to lose X (+/- a random #) of your mana or lose (Y +/- a random #) of gold. The program then records and submits which option players pick most and what random ratios or variables were found to make the decision the most balanced. Then the game either modifies the choice in the next patch or on the fly.  Trying to balance things like "Gain X trolls or Y swordsmen" are just really tough to balance when you have to consider things like special abilities, cool factor, and other things that don't fit into an equation very well.

The AI in the GC series uses the tactics of the most successful players. It really doesn't matter if you personally aren't giving them information since tons of other people who submit to the metaverse are. Elemental's devs already revealed they'll have AI's that learn from you as you play them. Either way, this is irrelevant as there's nothing stopping them from doing so in Elemental. Even the most privacy concerened player could still excuse them for using information collection if it was only collected during alpha/beta. They could always give users an opt out button, but would you really care enough to opt out of anonymously improving the game AI and balance though? This isn't a big evil Microsoft.

You go with your gut and design a choice or rules for choices and then you use the statistics to help refine it. It doesn't take a lot of effort to do. You can get a nice picture of a player's empire and playstyle by sending a miniscule fifty vaiables to a server when they make a choice (though some of them could even be helpful without almost any related data). If that doesn't fit your network or players then you just have the game automatically submit completed games or autosaves to a server. There's a lot of ways to go about this with various levels of intrusiveness. A lot of times, the question you are trying to ask might only involve mainly involve a couple variables.

Sample sizes of 1000 are fine and not hard to come by when the collection is automated. Having that data point you to possible problems is a trivial task as even a glance looking at percentages can be quite insightful. In my experience even the most minimal data analysis has always paid off compared to how much time I spent implementing the collection.

The problem of getting a situation where the same half of players choose one option and the other half always choose the other is solved by unique id's as is done with most scientific studies. You'd realize the two populations of players and look at other variables. Of course, looking at broad and sweeping choices like exclusive technologies are harder to look at than the near immediate player rewards/punishments I suggested. However, because it is harder to balance, having a more objective way to see the results of choices is even more important. It's better to analyze info they collect from the beta testers' actual games  than having the devs try and simulate it themselves (wasting time, including their own biases, etc.).

At the very least, this type of statistical analysis will point out common trends and game imbalances. If done properly, it can also provide possible soltutions and then evaluate how effective they were.

Alright, so we've got a reasonable disagreement here on the merits of data collection & analysis  that didn't degrade into a steaming pile of junk. That's a pretty amazing feat on the internet.

"but what I hope to do is to build a cloud of multiplayer AI players that I can constantly be updating and enhancing in near-real time based on the data I get back from them on how they were beat, what exploits were used against them"

Sounds pretty indistinguishable from the bot learning from the player's perspective, which is really all I'm concerned about. All AI are just a collection of tricks anyways so the actual methods are pretty irrelevant so long as the player thinks it's effective and doesn't "fall" for the same thing every time.

Either way it looks like those multiplayer bots are getting scrapped anyways. I totally missed this line:

"2. I’m killing off the bots concept. People hate them. I thought they were cool but they’re too much work only to be hated. So there won’t be artificial players."

I am glad to see how the devs are eager to use game data to improve things though and I hope they still use it for the normal AI.

Only hatred I remember was demigod players being mad at getting stuck with them as teammates and opponents when they were looking for humans. No bots checkbox = problem solved.

We are so off topic.

Well since essence does not recharge, how to use that will be your tough choice.

Sorry, I had to hassle you after the ribbing you gave GW in the FAQ thread lulz.

I'm with you 100%. I've pretty much been arguing for what you said in your first paragraph for months now, in various threads here and there. And any patches to AI (or any other aspect of the game) are always welcome, of course.

I'm of this opinion as well. In short, a robust dynamic AI system will be key for the longevity of the franchise. That coupled with personality based activity will make the game environment very rich and challenging.

temporarely back from vacation....

Leaving again tomorrow...

Nice update thanks

Well, tech research had better not be based entirely on RNGs.... the random element will completely nerf any balance in the game. That's not saying a little randomness isn't fun, but once it becomes the main aspect of teching.....

as I said before, since the ability to research 3 things at once is an UNLOCKABLE ability (which implies a definite benifit), it's possible that when you research 3 things at once you literally add all your tech points to each tech, increasing your output threefold. (There might be a small penalty, though: triple research output sounds like a BIG boost.)