[Freeciv-Dev] (PR#12968) Barbarians rethought

["Per I. Mathisen" <per@xxxxxxxxxxx>]

<URL: http://bugs.freeciv.org/Ticket/Display.html?id=12968 >

On Tue, 3 May 2005, Vasco Alexandre Da Silva Costa wrote:
> > As for its effects: I propose: raze -> 50% chance of going into anarchy
> > in republic, 100% chance in Democracy, and regardless, immediate
> > barbarian in that area.
> >
> > Also, I think Brian's right with the idea that "raze" means kill one
> > population (so my idea would be that razing that size 12 city would
> > produce 12 barbarian units, and a republic would have a 1/4096 chance of
> > not having fallen).
>
> I think it should be like in Age of Wonders. 'Building raze' makes the
> citizens angry enough to revolt and seceed your empire. Military units
> give martial law. After a city is razed, aggressive partisans attack
> you, more partisans for larger cities.

The suggested penalties could also be natural to see from several other
circumstances, such as nuclear testing on live cities, aggressive warfare,
running an appalling government type, and so on. So instead of hard-wiring
them to razing cities only, I would rather generalize it and combine this
with reputation somehow.

I suggest we adapt "barbarians" to this purpose. Currently barbarians
attack players semi-randomly (prefer large empires slightly). Instead we
could have each player accumulate 'hostility points' for a variety of
activities or factors. When you have above a certain threshold of such
points, you get some opposition.

Barbarians raid your cities, steal gold and destroy production, but do not
take cities, as in Civ3. If the raid succeeds, more 'hostility points' are
generated (encouraged by success). The point of barbarians is to act as a
limiter on expansion and all-out conquest, forcing you to defend your
interior.

You get barbarians spawning in fogged/unknown areas of the map (near a
city without EFT_REPEL_BARBARIANS effect), or near cities that have a
different original owner (and no EFT_ASSIMILATE_CITY effect).

Suggested points:
 - any tile within your border that is fogged and more than 5 tiles away
   from a fortress: 1 point/turn
 - each non-original city (without EFT_ASSIMILATE_CITY): 2 points/turn
 - each unhappy city: 3 points/turn
 - raze a city: 15 points for each citizen
 - nuclear detonation: 30 points
 - pluss EFT_INCREASE_HOSTILITY each turn
 - minus EFT_REDUCE_HOSTILITY each turn
 - successful raid: 10 points multiplied by city size

Barbarians would be generated when you have more than (100+game.turn)
accumulated points. The points are then all 'spent' on creating barbarian
units.

If you get ridiculously many excess points, perhaps barbs should also gain
enough confidence to launch an all-out attack, taking over cities and
becoming a new, real player.

  - Per