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Topic: Some improvement suggestions for build 20.1

king_of_nowhere
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Posted at: 2020-02-15, 01:01

good spot. looks like a bug, and should be investigated

i'm trying to figure out the constrains, though; for example, the north-west corner is only adjacent to a single woodcutter. why can't it be used? there are plenty of instances of a field planted adjacent to a single building


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WorldSavior
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Posted at: 2020-02-15, 09:59

It's not only that fields can be blocked by buildings, but buildings can also block the path for the farmer, by the way.


Wanted to save the world, then I got widetracked

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hessenfarmer
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Posted at: 2020-02-15, 10:13

niektory wrote:

Farmers don't have a problem with sowing on locations adjacent to their own farm, but they do not sow on locations adjacent to other buildings (including other farms).

Just checked with Build 20 and Frisians, but I think it's true in master and with other tribes as well.

For example, in this screenshot the farmer does not sow anywhere:

example screenshot

I have done a quick check. this isn't related to build 20 as it is the same way in b19.

Furthermore the farmer cna harvest in these spots but not sow.

So my guess is this might be buried in the find node algorithm and the definition of walkable.


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hessenfarmer
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Posted at: 2020-02-15, 12:17

Ok I found it.

this should only happrn for empire, barbarians and frisians not for atlanteans. reason is that the atlantean farmer does not use the space attribute in his findspace command.
So we could change this either way.
1. delete the space attribute for the 3 tribes if we consider this behaviour a bug, however due to comment text in the code this was invented to prevent workers from locking them in. I don't know if this still can happen also I believe not.
2. set the attribute for atlanteans as well to be on the safe side regarding inlocking of worker.

EDIT: I have traced this back until 2010 and the programs has always been like this. Maybe the space parameter was simply forgotten when introducing atlanteans. But since nobody complained so far about atlantean farmer got locked in we could easily make it the same way for the other tribes.

As this will block routes for roads more easily We could make the fields not blocking roads anymore as for the harvested field. What do you think?

Edited: 2020-02-15, 12:47

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Nordfriese
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Posted at: 2020-02-15, 13:21

Without the space flag, a farmer can sow fields even on coasts, like reed fields. I would consider this a bug because wheat/corn/blackroot/barley fields are larger and should not be placed on the shore IMHO. So I favour this one:

set the attribute for atlanteans as well


As this will block routes for roads more easily We could make the fields not blocking roads anymore as for the harvested field. What do you think?

-1. I remember that tree saplings were once removable by building roads/flags/buildings. I don't know why it was changed, but it should be consistent for all types of tribe-planted plants.


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stonerl
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Posted at: 2020-02-15, 13:40

Nordfriese wrote:

Without the space flag, a farmer can sow fields even on coasts, like reed fields. I would consider this a bug because wheat/corn/blackroot/barley fields are larger and should not be placed on the shore IMHO. So I favour this one:

set the attribute for atlanteans as well

+1


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king_of_nowhere
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Posted at: 2020-02-15, 15:06

hessenfarmer wrote:

Ok I found it.

this should only happrn for empire, barbarians and frisians not for atlanteans. reason is that the atlantean farmer does not use the space attribute in his findspace command.
So we could change this either way.

i always noticed that the atlantean farm can work in places where others cannot - close to water, for example, other tribes have greater problems. this explains why.

i would prefer extending atlantean fields to other tribes because they allow the farms to work better on maps with little space (archipelago sea, fjords) but i'm fine either way


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Solstice_s_Return
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Posted at: 2020-02-15, 15:31

Intresting, how didn't I realize earlier that my optimization was futile exercise?

There's something else related to it too. I did a couple of simulations to see how the current maritime shipping algorithm works for the AI but before getting into any conclusion, I found that now AI does tons of useless farms. It gets five or six of them running and then does dozens of more and wastes a lot of resources in the process. It never gets farmers in them but seems to have toolsmith and all the needed resources for making more scythes. I would rather see it making castles because the current AI seems weaker than the previous, albeit being more adaptive at the same time. The weakness apparently comes from continuous dismantling of military buildings, which on big maps leads to vast areas of land without any military buildings. At the same time it seems that the current AI also favors small military buildings (possibly the main reason for a general weakness over b19 AI on the same map) and as a result it has more sparse distribution of stronger military buildings at its territory.

Finally a conclusion of the current AI seafaring capability: It is weaker than previous. Why? Because two times out of three it did not even begin constructing ships. It has a shipyard early on and harbor at around two hours into the game, but it never got any further in two out of three times.

I must admit that the AI behaves a lot differently than in b19 and may be better in many things, but at this point overall it is a lackluster compared to non genetic algorithm used in b19. Maybe this loss of capability can be catched up with the next build.

Btw. I also found out that the shipping algorithm of b19 worked a lot better in long distances, but the new algorithm is more effective in most of the other situations. There was also some strange fleet movements when almost every ship decided to sail to the most distant port and idle there while there was unfulfilled need for a single stone at that port and absolutely no other needs. EDIT: and that fleet was completely empty.

Edited: 2020-02-15, 15:52

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hessenfarmer
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Posted at: 2020-02-15, 15:32

as this might be a major change for legacy tribes we should seek a broader consensus. May be we should open at least an own thread on this or even a poll might be suitable.
Personally I am fine either way only we should be consistent among all tribes.


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Solstice_s_Return
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Posted at: 2020-02-15, 15:46

I think that the spaces around a farm should represent the actual useable spaces, because otherwise it is a bit fuzzy information piece to help making decisions. If it is this way, then the spaces that can not be actually used should be completely red or something like that. While it is clear that a field can not be sown on water, road, building or tree and the farm takes some spaces too, the rest of them should be available.


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