Hmmm... turns out that we don't have a thread for Civics. Whatever. Civics were like the first thing I did for this mod. A couple of the early ones have since been tweaked, but a bunch of them have been as-is for a while.

So what do people think? Here are my observations:

1) The AI (almost) always chooses merchant republic.
2) Religious Law is probably never worthwhile.
3) The stability interactions are pretty complex, and some of this information should be available in the game. I wrote the civic stability section of the code, but found myself with a -12 civics stability with no idea why.
4) Too many civics do lots of things. It really is hard to chose a civic which does too many things all at once. Better to streamline.
5) A lot of civics do kinda the same thing. Lots of happiness from religion. Lots of bonuses to specialists. Lots of +xx% of gold. There are a bunch more options (things like building military troops with food) which could diversify the choices. See a pretty easy to read list of possible civic effects here. (http://modiki.civfanatics.com/index.php/Civ4CivicInfos)

3) The stability interactions are pretty complex, and some of this information should be available in the game. I wrote the civic stability section of the code, but found myself with a -12 civics stability with no idea why.
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I have noticed the same thing that the civic stability is almost always negative, only slightly though, even if running suitable pairs of them, like Feudal law, Vassalage. There might be something wrong in them.:confused:

Hmmm... turns out that we don't have a thread for Civics. Whatever. Civics were like the first thing I did for this mod. A couple of the early ones have since been tweaked, but a bunch of them have been as-is for a while.

So what do people think? Here are my observations:

1) The AI (almost) always chooses merchant republic.
2) Religious Law is probably never worthwhile.
3) The stability interactions are pretty complex, and some of this information should be available in the game. I wrote the civic stability section of the code, but found myself with a -12 civics stability with no idea why.
4) Too many civics do lots of things. It really is hard to chose a civic which does too many things all at once. Better to streamline.
5) A lot of civics do kinda the same thing. Lots of happiness from religion. Lots of bonuses to specialists. Lots of +xx% of gold. There are a bunch more options (things like building military troops with food) which could diversify the choices. See a pretty easy to read list of possible civic effects here. (http://modiki.civfanatics.com/index.php/Civ4CivicInfos)

Well merchant republic is a pretty good civic, especially if you ignore the stability cost function like the AI does.

Personally I'm not a fan of the current merchant republic civic, as it still gives bonuses for lots of cities – the positive effect should be linked to the capital only.

I agree that we should take a look at all the civs and try and differentiate them both in effects and aims, maybe choosing what they represent and pciking 1 clear bonus and 1-2 clear disadvantages:

Government
Despotism: Same as original RFC. Default setting.
Electorate: Espionage bonus (10%). Specialists give 1 extra science and culture. -1 stability for each city beyond capital. Low upkeep.
I did assume this was showing the elected and advised kingships of early northern Europe and the middle east, plus the circles of the HRE, and maybe the golden liberty of Poland. Its kinda hard to say what effects would represent that but I think these ones really don't except for the decreasing stability. I do think this is more a military early game civic than anything else, so perhaps the barracks happiness bonus, and +2 experience (since the intriguing and having to be a warleader to get the throne helps experience).
Divine Monarchy: +1 happiness per military unit in cities. Specialists give +2 extra culture. High upkeep.
Constitutional Monarchy: Can buy production with gold. Very stable for large civs. Medium Upkeep.
Representation: +3 science per specialist. +3 happy in 6 largest cities. Medium Upkeep. Same as original RFC
These other three are pretty much fine

Legal
Tribal law: Same as original RFC (just renamed). Default setting.
Feudal law: 5 free units. New units receive +2 Experience. 10% culture penalty. Low upkeep. Incompatible with merchant republic.
This is the ruler distributing power to his vassals, allowing more force to be called when necessary, but loosening control over outlying regions. Secondly feudal levees often found themselves outmatched by professional armies so I'm unsure about the experience. Perhaps we should enable drafting with Feudal law to show the calling up (also makes it good for surviving early game barbarians and threats) whilst increasing the culture penalty.
Bureaucracy: +50% hammers, +50% gold in capitol. High Upkeep. Same as original RFC.
Bureaucracy is pretty okay, but I think it should have a clear disadvantage too – perhaps unhappiness in all non-capital cities to show the centralisation of power? Additionally the first applications of bureaucracy was towards the army, can we have Bureaucracy give extra experience to siege units?
Religious law: 25% reduced cost for buildings with state religion. 25% penalty to research. +1 happiness in cities with state religion; -1 happiness for other religions present. High upkeep. Incompatible with electorate.
Rather overlaps with several of the religion civs. I think it should thus loose the reduced building cost flag, and instead give +1 gold and -5% upkeep to all of the state religion buildings. Thus assisting in the running of large religious empires whilst offering synergy with Organised Religion and Theocracy
Common Law: 10% bonus to research; +2 trade from town. -1 happiness for each military unit. +100% great person birth-rate. Low upkeep. Incompatible with feudalism, theocracy.
This fine, though the research bonus could easily be removed to simplify things

Labor
Tribalism: Same as original RFC. Default setting.
Serfdom: Workers complete tasks 50% faster. -50% Cottages, hamlets, and villages growth. +1 food from Farm. Low upkeep.
Its always struck me as a bit odd that serfdom, a mechanism for tying people to the land, boosts the size of your cities in the early game. I think we should drop the cottage growth reduction (which goes to guilds) in exchange for plus 2 unhappiness to keep cities small, and changing the CIV slave revolt event to a 'serf revolt' event
Free peasantry: +100% growth for cottages, hamlets, and villages. Medium upkeep. Incompatible with feudalism and theocracy.
This is good
Apprenticeship: Unlimited artists, scientists, merchants. Workshop gives +1 hammer. High upkeep.
fine as well
Free labor: +5% production and commerce. +1 hammer from town.
This kinda clashes thematicly with free-peasantry at the moment, since they're both giving bonus to towns. I think this should represent the influx of rural labour to the cities of the 16th century onwards, and thus have a bunch of city based bonuses. There are a number of ways you could represent this, but I think that modelling it as like 'power' in regular CIV is the best – giving a bunch of advantages to late game buildings (+10% commerce to textile mill, wharfs and warehouses, +10% production to forges, tanneries, builders yards and shipyards) whilst its disadvantage would be +1/2 unhealth in all cities.

Thus for cottage economies you stick with free peasantry, but shift to free labour if you have well developed cities.


Economy
Decentralization: Same as original RFC. Default setting.
Manorialism: +10% military unit production. -1 Trade route. +1 commerce from farm. Low upkeep.
Yeah this one is fine
Guilds: +10% gold bonus. 1 free specialist in each city. High upkeep.
Traditionally guilds were very anti-competitive minded and routine smashed up workshops in outlying towns – we could make this a very clear 'use this with specialist economy!' civic by adding the -50% Cottages, hamlets, and villages growth to it. Also replace the gold bonus with a 'reduced corporation cost' flag which we're currently missing out on using.
Mercantilism: +20% gold bonus. No foreign trade routes. Inflation +100%. +1 trade route per city. Medium upkeep.
This is the keeping of bullion within the country to improve local industries and resource production, so you should choose it if you have a highly productive hinterland. Perhaps +2 gold to workshops and mines as the advantage, and no foreign trade routes and +50% inflation as the disadvantage.
Merchant Republic: +50% unit build costs; each unit requires 1 extra gold in maintenance cost/turn. +25% research and gold production bonus. +100% penalty to war weariness (twice as powerful). -2 stability for each city beyond capital. Medium upkeep.
Merchant republic is meant to be for a small city state with far flung colonies, and shouldn't have bonuses beyond the capital. Thus I think it should be changed to: Advantages: +400% commerce from trade routes in the capital, no distance upkeep. Disadvantages: quadruple number of cities upkeep, each unit requires 1 extra gold upkeep, +100% war weariness.

Religion
Paganism: Same as original RFC. Default setting.
Organized Religion: + 1 happiness per city (with state religion); cities with state religion construct buildings 25% faster; High upkeep.
This is fine, though the bonus overlaps with religious law we should change that civic rather than this one
Theocracy: Gold production increased 25%, research decreased 25%. Stability bonus for small empires (+12 (1 city), +9 (2 cities), +6 (3 cities); stability penalty for large ones (-2 for each city above 3?) No spread of non-state religion. Medium upkeep.
Whilst I get what people were going for here, the small medieval religious states were often hives of intellectual activity, and the research cost is already covered by religious law. So why don't we make this civic work more tightly with our mods new mechanics – having theocracy adds +75% to your faith points score making theocracy have a religion dependent bonus! Loose/reduce the gold and research parts but keep the size based stability thing
State Religion: +2 experience points, +1 happiness in cities with state religion; Med. upkeep.
I'm not sure why this gives experience boosts, especially when compared to organised and theocracy at encouraging the men. How about we get it so acts of piety boost stability when you're running State religion, I.e. a weak version of the Orthodox faith bonus say +1 stability per 7-10 faith points. Keep the extra happy bonus as well.
Free Religion: +1 happiness per non-state religion, +10% research. Low upkeep. Same as RFC original.
This free religion makes very little sense in a pre-1800 context where nearly every state had some associated religion and state secularism was unheard of in Europe. Thus I think this one should be renamed to Tolerance, and instead give +5% commerce and +5% culture per religion in the city, let you keep a state religion, but have no happiness bonus itself.

Expansion
Subjugation: Same as in RFC – default setting.
Vassalage: +8 stability for each vassal. Distance maintenance costs increased 25%; stability penalty for expansion decreased 25%. Medium upkeep.
Occupation: +2 additional stability pts. per conquered city. Same as in RFC.
Imperialism: +2 stability points for cities founded outside the Core area. Same as Resettlement in RFC.
This is kinda weak considering the crowdedness of the map and how it comes quite late, perhaps a 50% bonus to culture production as well?
Colonialism: Allows construction of colonial projects; +1 trade route in each city. High upkeep.

AGREE!! I think your new civic ideas are 100 times better then the current ones, and i urge the RFC Europe team to consider replacing the old ones with these much better civic options. Also I think a lot of the wonders could use a good rework, in the sense of removing the Ka'aba and replacing it with the Great Mosque of Damascus and also reworking the wonder specialties so you don't have so many unlocking entire civic options, which I find plain stupid.

AGREE!! I think your new civic ideas are 100 times better then the current ones, and i urge the RFC Europe team to consider replacing the old ones with these much better civic options. Also I think a lot of the wonders could use a good rework, in the sense of removing the Ka'aba and replacing it with the Great Mosque of Damascus and also reworking the wonder specialties so you don't have so many unlocking entire civic options, which I find plain stupid.

Err i agree with your comment except... WHAT? How is unlocking entire civic options stupid??

Unlocking all religious civics is useful. You can use free religion straightaway and if ur Hungary u can even complete a UHV. Unlocking all expansion civics means you can use occupation for a strong military strategy. OR u can use commonwealth and increase trade route yield. The list goes on and on. How is it stupid??

If you don't want those wonders' benefit, you can always don't build them... but there many people out there who will want those wonder benefits, i'm sure :D

Well, I feel that by unlocking these all the civics in a branch, you destroy the historical aspect of the game, so instead of waiting to research a certain tech that goes with a certain civic, you instead build a wonder which pretty much cuts your way there, not to mention a lot of the time the later civics tend to be better then the earlier ones. Also there are TOO many wonders that have this affect, in the sense that in RFC there was only 2 (one for 3000BC and one for 600 AD start) while in this game, you have a lot more, which I think unbalances the game a bit too much in the favor of one civ over another.

How does it destroy the historical aspect of the game? There are many civs in real life history that used certain advanced civics much earlier than other civs. Hungary used free religion much before others even thought of it, for example. Those wonders gives these civs the opportunity to do so

How does it destroy the historical aspect of the game? There are many civs in real life history that used certain advanced civics much earlier than other civs. Hungary used free religion much before others even thought of it, for example. Those wonders gives these civs the opportunity to do so

Then maybe getting free religion can be one of Hungary's UHV goals, it doesn't have to come with the construction of a wonder which has no relevance to it, instead there should be something else which more accurately describes the wonders ability, instead of unlocking a bunch of civics, in fact the only reason we really do that is when we are to lazy to think about what would fit in better, and since RFC Europe is still in its early stages of development its ok for now, but I would like to see a change in this, and also the Ka'aba being replace with the grand mosque of Damascus

Then maybe getting free religion can be one of Hungary's UHV goals, it doesn't have to come with the construction of a wonder which has no relevance to it, instead there should be something else which more accurately describes the wonders ability, instead of unlocking a bunch of civics, in fact the only reason we really do that is when we are to lazy to think about what would fit in better, and since RFC Europe is still in its early stages of development its ok for now, but I would like to see a change in this, and also the Ka'aba being replace with the grand mosque of Damascus

Now now, that's not true :P if they are too lazy to think of effects really they wouldn't even have included the wonders heh. Yes having first to have free religion IS one of Hungary's goals. Hungary used free religion very very early, and without the wonder (Golden Bull) Hungary can only have the civic when Liberalism is discovered, which is something like 1600-1700, which is historically inaccurate. Other than that, i'm sure many people want those wonder benefits, so yeah, i will like to hear some support from the others please? :D

And i'm not in charge of wonder names or wonder art but i think its fair to change the Ka'aba into Grand Mosque of Damacus :)

P.S Since you are the turk and i'm Byzantine-biased we are ENEMIES!!! :D Nah just joking XD

I think the new application of the guilds-building isn't usefull.
+20%:hammers: was much better than the opportunity to engage another enginier or merchant.
What about +15%:hammers: and possibility for 1 more enginier?

Oh, I just recognized, that this is ths wrong thread. I'm sorry for this...

Just wonder, what are the final civ list? If it is not yet totally decided, i think it would be cool with a Mamluk civ, having Egypt as their main dwelling.

The finalized civ list consists of: Turks and Arabs in Middle East, Byzantium and Bulgaria in Balkans, Venice, Genoa and the unplayable Papal State in Italy, Portugal, Cordoba and Spain in Iberia, France and Burgundy in France, Austria, Germany (HRE), Poland and Hungary in Central Europe, Kievan Rus and Muscovy in Eastern Europe, Norse and Sweden in Scandinavia, England and Netherlands.

AFAIK the only way to get Mamluks in is as a late dynamic name for Arabs.

Just wonder, what are the final civ list? If it is not yet totally decided, i think it would be cool with a Mamluk civ, having Egypt as their main dwelling.

The Civ list is final, and has been for some time.

Burgundy, Byzantium, France, Arabia, Bulgaria, Cordoba, Spain, Norse, Pope, Venice, Kiev, Hungary, Germany, Poland, Moscow, Genoa, England, Portugal, Austria, Ottomans, Sweden, Netherlands

Then i must ask you to. Include it as a dynamic, changing with the times name for the arabs. They are my favorite among the middle eastern civs.

Based on my recent Byzantium game (played under the not-yet-out-I'm-sorry Alpha10), I wrote up a little strategy guide. I'm not sure if I generally want to start collecting strategy posts, because it's annoying to keep them up-to-date when things change, so consider this partly just playtesting feedback.

Guide to Byzantium:
Updated for Alpha 10

When you choose to play Byzantium you inherit both the most powerful and the most troubled empire in the early game. Here's a guide to accomplishing the Unique Historical Victory Conditions.

(1) Make Constantinople the largest and most cultured city in the world in 1000 AD.

This first goal is easy to accomplish if you can hold on to enough health and happiness resources and build a few wonders. The key is to keep your empire in good shape while you do it. You'll start off with a slightly over-streched economy, your stability will go down before it comes back up, you'll be hit by a plague, and at two dangerous enemies will arise right next to you and go to war. We'll go through each in turn of importance.

The Plague:
The plague is the most devastating thing if you're not ready, and you can't predict exactly when it will come (sometime around turn 40). You'll want two defenders in each city, so most cities should start building an archer or spearman. Your initial worker force is a bit small, so you might want one or two more to help out. Focus on getting health resources hooked up first. You have a lot of them (don't forget to connect sea resources as well). The plague duration and severity can be dramatically decreased by having a lot of excess health in your cities. For this reason, I suggest keeping your cities small -- even Constantinople. Don't worry, it'll grow fast after the plague. Keep all your cities small (working production or specialists) and gobble up health resources.

It may be worthwhile to go after more health resources. You start with two galley and two war galleys, and more swordsmen than you really need. If you load up four troops you should be able to take a couple weakly defended indy cities. I suggest Naples in southern Italy (easy access to barley for +2 health) and Tunis/Carthage (a good spot for crabs for +2 health with lighthouse).

Stability:
You'll probably loose a city or two to instability at some point. If it's a crucial resource city, you'll want to take it back. Otherwise, you may choose to let it go for now. Your two main options for increasing your stability are to build stability boosting buildings and faith points. For the first, you want to start by researching Manorialism, and then building manors and courthouses in every city you can. Each one is worth a stability point, and once you have all of them built you'll be in good shape. Running priest specialists (Alexandria and Constantinople are good choices) and using the Great Prophet action "Become a Saint" boosts your faith points, which for Orthodox civs gives you a stability boost, so this is a good strategy. Keeping your cities with lots of excess happiness helps stability too, and you can gain faith points from building Orthodox buildings, so luxury resources and Orthodox churches/cathedrals should be priorities.

Enemies:
The Arabs will spawn first and take Jerusalem and Tyre. This sucks, but there's no reason to play fair. Don't build any buildings. Don't improve around these cities. To begin with, build cheap troops, and shuffle them off to your cities to replace the garrisons which will die in the plague. Once you research Alchemy you can just have them pump out money for their last few turns. Don't let these cities grow at all. Work production and money. Right before the Arab switch starve them down to pop 1 and move out the last defender. This strategy significantly weakens the Arabs and generally they aren't too much of a problem.

The Bulgarians often strike around the same time as the plague. Apart from this, they are not as much of a threat. You might have to deal with an attacking stack or two, but as long as your Hadrianopolis and Constantinople are well stocked you'll be okay.

Economy:
You'll want to lower your tech rate a bit right away. Once you get some of your cities grown and some more courthouses up, you won't be in too bad shape. Alexandria can be a major powerhouse for your economy, as well as your easiest source of stone for wonders and walls/castles. Don't lose it to the Arabs, and take it back if it goes indy. Your initial navy is useful to keeping this city (and any other ones you take on the coastline) defended and/or shuttling workers to these cities.

Constantinople:
As I said, keep it small pre-plague. Build anything with culture. Build any wonders you can. After the plague, grow it large, and you'll be fine for the first UHV, however...

(2) Control Anatolia and Greece in 1300.

The most significant challenge to this goal occurs starting in 1050. First the barbarian Seljuk turks attack, and then the Mongols. You can't afford to let them gain a strong foothold. It's much easier to defend then attack. Both sets of barbs will appear in land outside your cultural borders in eastern Anatolia. Once you've built your stability buildings (manor houses and courthouses) you want to start building walls and castles and additional defensive troops. The Seljuks are tough, but you're probably okay with about 5 defenders (guisarmiers/arbalestiers/cataphracts) in every city which can be attacked from outside your cultural borders in the east. Once they stop spawning, take back any cities they did capture, rebuild your improvements, and prepare for the Mongols to do it again.

It's possible you'll get a crusade sent against you by Genoa or Venice. You get a couple turns warning, which is fine as long as you have some spare mounted units not too far from Constantinople (which is where they always attack). Other than that, after the great schism the Catholics may hate you, but they are unlikely to make a significant attack even if they do declare war. You should complete this UHV the turn before the Ottomans show up to wreck your day.

(3) Be the richest civ in 1500.

The Ottomans will rise and take a significant core of your empire. Check where that will spawn, and move troops out accordingly, but generally it's going to be nasty. Your two options are to turtle up in your remaining cities and raise money, or to counter-attack the Ottomans. Generally counter-attacking isn't too hard, especially if you do it early. The Ottomans can be a ridiculously powerful military force if you give them time to get established, so if you're going to do it, go to war with them as soon as you can (do you need to wait some number of turns?). Otherwise, if you can make peace with them and live intertwined with them, it is possible to survive and not hard to accumulate plenty of cash.

Where can I find the colors for each civilization?
Is there a pallet anywhere or can somebody please throw together a quick one?

Where can I find the colors for each civilization?
Is there a pallet anywhere or can somebody please throw together a quick one?

I'm not sure exactly what you want. I don't have an image with all the colors laid all out. If you look in Assets/XML/Interface/ you will find CIV4ColorVals.xml which describes the RGB values of the colors, and CIV4PlayerColorInfos.xml which defines color combos. Those color combos are given to civs in Assets/XML/Civilizations/CIV4CivilizationInfos.xml

So, from that you can certainly put together a pallet, but it would be a bit of work.

Not sure if this is the place to post it, but after examining the reccent Settler Maps, I've noticed that that some countries are surprisingly missing part of their controlled territory...

-Austria: The Austrian Netherlands (Belgium/Luxembourg, former Spanish Netherlands, being transfered to the Austrian Habsburgs after the War of Spanish Succession) don't seem to be represented at all. Granted, they only have about an 100 year time frame for this mod (being first formed in 1713), but that's still in the correct time frame.

-Spain: A similar situation: The Spanish Netherlands look represented, but really weirdly. It looks like they only have a few inland spots, though they historically controlled the land of the Austrian Netherlands mentioned above, as well as THE Netherlands.

-Germany: Based on what I've gathered, this Germany represents the HRE and Prussia. What confuses me, though, is that a good deal of their Western boarder seems to be totally absent. http://ejmas.com/jwma/articles/2008/howe_4_large.jpg
On the Settler Map, Frankfurt, which can be found almost in the center of the above map, is on the western fringe of the boarders. If anything, the Rhine and Rhineland should be included into the map. Germany, if the HRE, should also have parts of Austria on it's map, considering some (if not all, it escapes me at the moment) of Austria was part of the HRE.

That's all that have really caught my eye- Forgive me if this has been adressed or is intentional, but I was merely curious.

Settlers map does not represent the are that the civilization controlled, but rather the are that the civilization settled. Those would be the ethnic borders of the nation (some exceptions in RFC exist as in the case of England settling India, however, we don't have to make that exception here except for the Arabs and Vikings). War maps are the territory that the civilization will try to control by force.

Ahh, my mistake. After looking at those, I've still noticed that the Netherland region is missing from Austria and Spain. Is there a reason for that, or...?

Any plans to add further civs?
I would be really happy to help, I could easily adapt any of the civs in my signature line... also, I am going to be making a "Gothic" civ, which will basically be a combination of the Ostro & Visogoths, but I could split them further up into their two individual civs.

No new civs before we have a full release. Sorry, but this would only make balancing harder at this point.

I think the only additional civ worth adding would be Scotland or possibly Sicily. All the other important ones are covered.

I think the only additional civ worth adding would be Scotland or possibly Sicily. All the other important ones are covered.
Now that we have your opinion :D

I think the only additional civ worth adding would be Scotland or possibly Sicily. All the other important ones are covered.

I have to politely remind you that apart from Western Europe, there is also the Eastern one, to the East ;) (currently mostly unsettled)

Which brings me back to Romania... Seems that Hungary, Kiev and Bulgaria have a LOT of room to expand...
And the Crusader states, which in the prime, were pretty large... though at its largest it had a short life span... and could arguably have been more of a series of independent feifdoms...

Which brings me back to Romania... Seems that Hungary, Kiev and Bulgaria have a LOT of room to expand...
And the Crusader states, which in the prime, were pretty large... though at its largest it had a short life span... and could arguably have been more of a series of independent feifdoms...

No Romania/Moldova in this time period, Wallchia. You cannot talk about Wallchia until mid-late 1300, and this will do little to Bulgaria, Kiev and Hungary. Conflict with the Ottomans might be interesting, but the Ottomans do not make it deep into Europe anyway.

There is a rather long list of potential new Civs, but those would not make it into the release until RFCE2, if that ever happens.

I have to politely remind you that apart from Western Europe, there is also the Eastern one, to the East ;) (currently mostly unsettled)

Yeah but who cares about Eastern Europe :p

No Romania/Moldova in this time period, Wallchia. You cannot talk about Wallchia until mid-late 1300, and this will do little to Bulgaria, Kiev and Hungary. Conflict with the Ottomans might be interesting, but the Ottomans do not make it deep into Europe anyway.

There is a rather long list of potential new Civs, but those would not make it into the release until RFCE2, if that ever happens.
Romania was first united within the 500-1800 timeline.
Mihai the Brave did it in 1600. Transylvania, Wallachia, and Moldavia united.

As you mention, it might not have a huge impact, but their spawn (whether united Romania later, or just a Wallachia around 1400) would certainly take some of the land from either Hungary or Bulgaria... and Hungary does seem overly powerful in the games that I have spawned... and historically speaking and at the risk of upsetting someone (no offense is intended), Bulgaria seems a bit over-represented to even included... really wasn't hugely important, no more so than Romania or a number of other civs. Totally overrun by the Ottomans...

Without Romania's huge opposition... the Turks could have conquered much, much more of Europe... history would be completely different.

Anyhow. It's your Mod... this is just one guy's opinion, not trying to get anyone upset. I think Romania would be a good addition, but I am not going to protest or anything... still my favorite mod even with this consideration.

You guys are welcome to continue to have this debate, but as 3Miro says, the current list of civs is set in stone. This is not because we believe we have exactly the perfect civ list, but because these are the civs we have, and it's a non-trivial amount of work to change.

Of course others would be welcome to take up our mod and add a new civ to it (like the RFC Celtic mod or Corossol's mod which includes Phoenician).

You guys are welcome to continue to have this debate, but as 3Miro says, the current list of civs is set in stone. This is not because we believe we have exactly the perfect civ list, but because these are the civs we have, and it's a non-trivial amount of work to change.

Of course others would be welcome to take up our mod and add a new civ to it (like the RFC Celtic mod or Corossol's mod which includes Phoenician).
How much work is it to change, exactly? I would be happy to do the XML coding for some other civs.
I could also edit the pythons IF someone told me which pythons I had to change, through simple deduction.

How much work is it to change, exactly? I would be happy to do the XML coding for some other civs.
I could also edit the pythons IF someone told me which pythons I had to change, through simple deduction.

It is a decent amount of work.

You need to edit the XML files to add a new civ with UU and UB and sync all the XML changes with Consts.py (Python).

Then you need to add the nation into the WB as a new team (and sync with Consts.py).

Add index for the nation, starting turn, core and normal areas, a bunch of religious parameters and respawn probabilities, mercenaries and so on. All of this is in Consts.py.

Then you edit RFCEBalance.py with an entire for the nation with specific parameters for growth, production, science ....

Then edit RhyesAndFall.py for starting units and techs.

Then edit Victory.py and possibly other files for the UHV depending on the conditions that you pick.

UP are usually done in C++. You can use any of the existing ones from RFCEBalance.py, but for a new one you will have to do specific coding.

I am sure I am forgetting something off the top of my head.

That is a lot.
I think I will give it a shot... I give myself a 30% chance of success. If it works, I will let you know.

I haven't been on this forum for a while, so how's the work on this mod coming along, any new patches?

I haven't been on this forum for a while, so how's the work on this mod coming along, any new patches?

We are almost done with the features and starting to really work on the balance. Of course everyone has their own opinion on how things should be balanced, how difficult the game should be, how competent the AI should or can be and so on. Basically, we are having fun.

I think the ability to buy the crusade should be removed. Quite often you work very hard to get enough faith points and allies to get yourself elected and then every single time Genoa buys control. I had a game where they were the vassals of the Byzantines, yet every time a crusade came up they bought it and attacked Constantinople.

I think the ability to buy the crusade should be removed. Quite often you work very hard to get enough faith points and allies to get yourself elected and then every single time Genoa buys control. I had a game where they were the vassals of the Byzantines, yet every time a crusade came up they bought it and attacked Constantinople.

This is a bug, I should make it so that one cannot lead a Crusade against their master.

Buying the Crusade is important, it is the best way for Venice to go after Byzantium. We can put a cap on how often you can buy a Crusade, but the dynamics should be there.

Really? Venice is almost always one of the two nominees in my games.

Really? Venice is almost always one of the two nominees in my games.

The nominated are the one with best relations with the Pope (i.e. Pope's lapdog) and the one with most faith points (largest empire + most Catholic buildings). Venice is the lapdog I guess, then the AI votes based upon their relations with voting power proportional to the faith points.

Good relations with the Pope (OB, trade, gifts), lots of Faith Points (large empire and a lot of temples and monasteries) and good relations with the other Catholic players should give you a nomination and election.

I will do some test games myself.

I can get myself elected fine, but every time I do Genoa steals my Crusade :lol:

The nominated are the one with best relations with the Pope (i.e. Pope's lapdog) and the one with most faith points (largest empire + most Catholic buildings). Venice is the lapdog I guess.
Which is funny considering in history the opposite was pretty much true. Of course, what great civilization wasn't excommunicated by the pope at some point or another :lol:

I can get myself elected fine, but every time I do Genoa steals my Crusade :lol:

The best way to get the crusade is to be the richest player, if you ask me. And if Genoa is in your way... destroy it! :D

Other than that, wouldn't it be nice to know the details of the election? Who voted for who and with how many votes, just like the Apostolic Palace and United Nations in RFC. That way it would be easier and funnier to track who are the most influential players to try to get their approbation... or destroy them. :p

The best way to get the crusade is to be the richest player, if you ask me. And if Genoa is in your way... destroy it! :D

Other than that, wouldn't it be nice to know the details of the election? Who voted for who and with how many votes, just like the Apostolic Palace and United Nations in RFC. That way it would be easier and funnier to track who are the most influential players to try to get their approbation... or destroy them. :p

The most influential player is always one of the two nominees. Buying the Crusade decreases its power, even if you go after Jerusalem. Info screen would be nice, but I will mark it as low priority on my to-do list.

Ok, good to know. Thanks.

Yes but the nominees will always vote for themselves so they're irrelevent. It would be nice to know how influential the other players are so that you can try to build close relations with them... or make them slightly less influential. How are the votes per civ decided anyway?

The buying crusade code must be buggy, because yesterday I saw something like:

"Venice wins the crusade!"
"Venice uses financial power to buy the crusade!"

Also, perhaps it's just me, but there should be a cap for how many times one civ can be elected, and how many times it can buy the crusade.

Apart from that, it's absurd to have Venice/Genoa redirect the crusade ONLY if they "steal" it from other player, and never when they win it fairly.

In my opinion Venice and Genoa should never attack Jerusalem. Same as Spain. They should redirect it to their interests.

The leader of the Crusade doesn't decide where the Crusade is going. If Venice is chosen to load the Crusade, they are chosen to go to Jerusalem. When they buys it, they redirect the Crusade to Constantinople.

Caps on number of election may be redundant, but a cap on buying a Crusade will be implemented.

In my opinion Venice and Genoa should never attack Jerusalem. Same as Spain. They should redirect it to their interests.
Why? That makes no sense. Venice played a huge role in the conquests of the Levant, there was only one case of them doing otherwise, which is of course very well published. Genova also played a large role. This is kind of a silly assertion to be honest.

Also, Spain did send many crusaders to the Levant as well (even while having the Reconquista in their lands).

I have added some code which gives some civs an extra chance to re-spawn. Under the current system, if enough Civs are currently dead, then a random civ is chosen to re-spawn. Now, in addition to this mechanism, certain civs are given a chance to re-spawn at some specific date. The dates are randomly chosen at the beginning of the game, but are most likely to occur around a specific date. The normal rules for resurrection apply (basically there must be enough indy cities or indy + unstable or unhappy player cities in the spawn zone).

As an example, let's consider Arabia. The Abbasid Caliphate effectively lost power around 1000 AD or so. In our game, Arabia often collapses with the coming of the Selujk Turks + the first crusade around 1100. After that, they were unlikely to re-spawn. Under the new system, they get an additional chance to re-spawn around 1170, coinciding with the establishment of the Ayyubid dynasty in Egypt (Saladin an Ayyubids). At the beginning of the game, random numbers are generated to pick a particular turn in the range of +/- 10 turns of 1170 (with 1170 the most likely date). Let's say the random number generator comes up with turn 195. Then, on turn 195, the game will check within the Arab "Broader Area" to see if there are enough indy or unhappy/unstable cities and if so, the Arabs will re-spawn and resume control of this area under the normal resurrection rules.

I think of this as a simple way to sneak multiple civs into the time-frame. We can tune the broader areas to be appropriate for the special re-spawn. Thus Arabia will mostly control Egypt on re-spawn and Germany will control mostly Prussia (for example). Here's what I came up with for re-spawn dates. Note that for civs that don't collapse, this code will have no effect. The goal is, as always, to have a balance between randomness and determinism.

#Sedna17 Respawn: These dates are the most likely times for each civ to have its special opportunity to respawn
tRespawnTime = (
245, #Burgundy 1335 -- so they can participate in 100 years war and act as Valois Duchy of Burgundy
999, #Byzantium -- no special respawn
350, #Frankia 1600 -- France united to modern borders + start of Bourbon royal line.
190, #Arabia 1170 -- Ayyubid dynasty from Egypt to cause problems for Crusaders
195, #Bulgaria 1185 -- Second Bulgarian empire
174, #Cordoba 1122 -- Almohads, better timing than Almoravids
290, #Spain 1467 -- Union of Castile/Aragon and ready for colonies
265, #Norse 1395 -- Kalmar Union
999, #Venecia -- no special respawn
999, #Kiev -- no special respawn
999, #Hungary -- no special respawn
401, #Germany 1701 -- Prussia
999, #Poland -- no special respawn
999, #Moscow -- no special respawn
999, #Genoa -- no special respawn
380, #England 1660 -- Restoration of Monarchy (also leading up to Scottish Union)
267, #Portugal 1400 -- Make sure Portugal is around for colonies
313, #Austria 1526 -- Battle of Mohacs, Habsburgs take over Hungary
294, #Turkey 1482 -- End of Mehmed II conquest.
999, #Sweden -- no special respawn
999, #Dutch -- no special respawn
999 #Pope -- no special respawn
)

Seems very interesting and a unique historic simulation aspect not found in RFC, I'll be glad to test it out if it'll come in the next version and report those historical re-spawns and how they affected the game.
Edit: It's probably either really late or out of the mod's time frame but how about a Genoa re-spawn as Piedmont-Sardinia?

Why? That makes no sense. Venice played a huge role in the conquests of the Levant, there was only one case of them doing otherwise, which is of course very well published. Genova also played a large role. This is kind of a silly assertion to be honest.

Also, Spain did send many crusaders to the Levant as well (even while having the Reconquista in their lands).

1. That "huge role" had nothing to do with actual military operations on the Holy Land.
2. I think you are mistaken. If there was any intervention in the crusades of knights from the spanish kingdoms, it was negligible.

A question about the Cordoba respawn. If it respawns in 1122, where is the capitol? It really should be in Morocco either at Tangier or ideally Marrakesh. This holds true for the Almohads, Almoravids and esp. the later Marinids. And flip the cities on or south of the Guadalquivir River in Andalusia to be accurate.

A question about the Cordoba. If it respawns in 1122, where is the capitol? It really should be in Morocco either at Tangier or ideally Marrakesh. This holds true for the Almohads, Almoravids and esp. the later Marinids. And flip the cities on or south of the Guadalquivir River in Andalusia to be accurate.

Good point. I can define separate capitol cities for the re-spawn. Of course, that city might not exist any more, in which case it will default to the RFC code which finds a "best" new capitol.

Would make an interesting twist to the later game. Imagine a growing Moroccan Islamic kingdom with Atlantic Access competing for colonies and building a North African and Atlantic empire. Now that would be a nice bit of alt. history.:D

I have added some code which gives some civs an extra chance to re-spawn. Under the current system, if enough Civs are currently dead, then a random civ is chosen to re-spawn. Now, in addition to this mechanism, certain civs are given a chance to re-spawn at some specific date. The dates are randomly chosen at the beginning of the game, but are most likely to occur around a specific date. The normal rules for resurrection apply (basically there must be enough indy cities or indy + unstable or unhappy player cities in the spawn zone).

As an example, let's consider Arabia. The Abbasid Caliphate effectively lost power around 1000 AD or so. In our game, Arabia often collapses with the coming of the Selujk Turks + the first crusade around 1100. After that, they were unlikely to re-spawn. Under the new system, they get an additional chance to re-spawn around 1170, coinciding with the establishment of the Ayyubid dynasty in Egypt (Saladin an Ayyubids). At the beginning of the game, random numbers are generated to pick a particular turn in the range of +/- 10 turns of 1170 (with 1170 the most likely date). Let's say the random number generator comes up with turn 195. Then, on turn 195, the game will check within the Arab "Broader Area" to see if there are enough indy or unhappy/unstable cities and if so, the Arabs will re-spawn and resume control of this area under the normal resurrection rules.

I think of this as a simple way to sneak multiple civs into the time-frame. We can tune the broader areas to be appropriate for the special re-spawn. Thus Arabia will mostly control Egypt on re-spawn and Germany will control mostly Prussia (for example). Here's what I came up with for re-spawn dates. Note that for civs that don't collapse, this code will have no effect. The goal is, as always, to have a balance between randomness and determinism.

#Sedna17 Respawn: These dates are the most likely times for each civ to have its special opportunity to respawn
tRespawnTime = (
245, #Burgundy 1335 -- so they can participate in 100 years war and act as Valois Duchy of Burgundy
999, #Byzantium -- no special respawn
350, #Frankia 1600 -- France united to modern borders + start of Bourbon royal line.
190, #Arabia 1170 -- Ayyubid dynasty from Egypt to cause problems for Crusaders
195, #Bulgaria 1185 -- Second Bulgarian empire
174, #Cordoba 1122 -- Almohads, better timing than Almoravids
290, #Spain 1467 -- Union of Castile/Aragon and ready for colonies
265, #Norse 1395 -- Kalmar Union
999, #Venecia -- no special respawn
999, #Kiev -- no special respawn
999, #Hungary -- no special respawn
401, #Germany 1701 -- Prussia
999, #Poland -- no special respawn
999, #Moscow -- no special respawn
999, #Genoa -- no special respawn
380, #England 1660 -- Restoration of Monarchy (also leading up to Scottish Union)
267, #Portugal 1400 -- Make sure Portugal is around for colonies
313, #Austria 1526 -- Battle of Mohacs, Habsburgs take over Hungary
294, #Turkey 1482 -- End of Mehmed II conquest.
999, #Sweden -- no special respawn
999, #Dutch -- no special respawn
999 #Pope -- no special respawn
)


I will try to look up some dates fro the civilisations currently listed as "no special respawn" If you are interested, but Moscow should definitely have 1480 (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_standing_on_the_Ugra_river) as their respawn date.

I will try to look up some dates fro the civilisations currently listed as "no special respawn" If you are interested, but Moscow should definitely have 1480 (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_standing_on_the_Ugra_river) as their respawn date.

Thanks. I'm not sure all the civs need or want a special re-spawn. Byzantium, obviously, doesn't need one. Venice/Genoa should probably be one-shot civs too.

I like that feature :goodjob:

I'm going to playtest it right now; testing the new soundtracks too :)

Some further suggestions:
1261 - recapture of Constantinople by Empire of Nicaea and subsequent restoration of Byzantine Empire
~1356 - reign of Casimir the Great; reunification of Poland, previously fragmented into a dozen of warring duchies

Hm. When Cordoba respawns, it does to its normal area?? Doesn't that include Spain?

Good point. I can define separate capitol cities for the re-spawn. Of course, that city might not exist any more, in which case it will default to the RFC code which finds a "best" new capitol.

You can use the code for capitals linked in my signature if you like.

Thanks. I'm not sure all the civs need or want a special re-spawn. Byzantium, obviously, doesn't need one. Venice/Genoa should probably be one-shot civs too.
Venice and Byzantium were both over 1000 years long... I think that deserves a respawn if we are allowing the Cordobans to respawn!!!

As for Genova... probably not. Perhaps a Milan faction could be the version of a Genova respawn... meaning, if Genova disappears, Milan later shows up in its place.

Venice and Byzantium were both over 1000 years long... I think that deserves a respawn if we are allowing the Cordobans to respawn!!!

As for Genova... probably not. Perhaps a Milan faction could be the version of a Genova respawn... meaning, if Genova disappears, Milan later shows up in its place.

Byzantium is extremely unlikely to collapse any time before the Turks. I think giving them a special re-spawn would only ruin your 1/1000 chance of ever playing in a alternate history where Byzantium collapsed early. I have no objection to giving Venice and Genoa a special re-spawn.

Why Polish has 150% penalty at buildings?

I think it would be awesome if Venice respawned as Florence or Kingdom of Naples; Genoa would respawn as Milan; Byzantium as Greece; and Cordoba as Morocco or some other North African place. Shouldn't Burgundy fall and respawn once per game, also?

I think it would be awesome if Venice respawned as Florence or Kingdom of Naples; Genoa would respawn as Milan; Byzantium as Greece; and Cordoba as Morocco or some other North African place. Shouldn't Burgundy fall and respawn once per game, also?
The Kingdom of Naples was a part of other empires in this period.

Hi Everyone,
After playing a few games on this latest version as the Venetians, English and Bulgarians I have come up with a list of things that I have critiqued. I am not saying this mod is bad, and if it was awful I wouldn't take the time to write this up, so please take this as constructive criticism rather then a list of things that were "bad". You guys have done a great job and this mod has come a long way, the last time I did this long list was a couple versions ago, and I can definitely see a trend of awesome looking progress coming up in this mod, just compare, the Ottomans and the Cordobans compared to what they use to be like. :) And please if there are any questions please ask me and I will go further in detail, as I couldn't write too much for each one.
Also if you look at page 8, where my original list of changes is, you can definitely see how far this mod has come :)
So here is the list, I tried to be more organized this time by assembling them into groups:

Civilizations:
England
1. More settlers and maybe one or two more workers needed, England is way to big and way to bare, it needs to have more cities. Dark Ages England was a time of broken up kingdoms and fiefdoms; this should be represented more by independent cities, a few which don't flip to you
2. Resources are too spread out in England, they should be closer to potential city sites, for example compare London in RFC to London in RFC Europe, the resources are too far away from it, I would say put them closer to London to have a stronger impact (also around the Exeter, Plymouth area)
3. The English should start off with basic ships that can transport units across the water, again think of RFC, and how you start off with 3 galleys
4. Boulogne and Cherbourg are TOO weak, they are immediately captured by the French and there is no way of helping them out since you don't have any ships! I say the French and English shouldn't be at war from the start (since the English in 1066 were the Normans pretty much). And instead of having Boulogne, try to better represent the Normans by taking out Boulonge and adding Rennes (or Brest) and Cherbourg, and have them heavily defended, since these were the main fortresses of the Normans, and shouldn't collapse so easily.
5. Dublin is too well defended, the idea that they switch to crossbowmen is unbelievable, they should just have 2-3 archers no crossbowmen, or else the PC English will never invade Ireland
6. Whatever happened to the Normans?? 1066 is the year they come and invade England! Where are they represented? If anything you should start off in Rennes and have London flip to you or at least represent them by having another city in France (a total of 3) all well defended. The Normans were even more powerful then the French King! (for further info listen to: Norman Centuries, an excellent podcast)

Cordoba
1. I was very impressed by Cordoba and how great of a civilization it has become, I was especially impressed by how far it can reach in Europe, in every game it was able to take Toulouse all the way in Southern France, so the historical side of it is definitely ok, but something which bugged me to no end was the fact that they never expanded into Morocco, or North Africa for that matter. Especially since Morocco is so lush and rich now, I'm surprised the computer doesn't go for those spots, what I think needs to happen now is that there should be independent cities in North Africa which flip to them at 1040, the year the Almoravids took control of Spain, so with this change of powers, should come th rest of the independent cities in North Africa, or alternatively just have the independent cities flip when Cordoba is founded.

The Ottomans
1. Like the Cordobans, the Ottomans have been vastly improved from the last version I played them as, they have definitely taken huge strides towards becoming the real Ottoman Empire, but there should be some sort of incentive for them to change there capital from Bursa to Constantinople/Istanbul, I don't know how Rhye did it for RFC, but in Rhye's game they always switch from Sogot to Istanbul once they've taken it. Also if the AI is ever going to be able to take Europe or at least the Middle east they need more troops and a bigger area of expansion when they arrive, this will help them invade more territory, a good idea would be to have the Bulgarians at war with them so they would be able to expand into the Balkans quickly
2. The Ottomans power is sort of useless I find, either it should be changed to the normal RFC power of culture, or the percentage rate at which they get extra drafts should be lowered from 70% foreign culture to at least 40-50%, but that is up for debate.
3. A good idea for the Ottomans so for them to perhaps have some cities in the Levant flip to them, maybe that will help spur there capture of the Middle East
4. The Ottomans need to have more unique city names in the Middle East (Levant) because when they captured Al-Qods it was called Jeruslam also, when they captured Antyka it was called Antioch, more unique names should be added.
The Spanish
1. The Spanish should be given extra troops, like a LOT more troops around the 1400's, to represent the real reconquista of Spain by Ferdinand and Isebella (so around 1470), I have seen too many times the Cordobans never collapsing and holding on to Spain for too long or they just collapse by themselves, and the Spanish NEVER take back their cities, and instead become vassals of England (ironic ;)) or France. You could turn the Reconquista into an event that spawns units in North Eastern Spain. Also it would be even cooler if the army spawned with some religious persecutors like 5 of them.

The Map:
1. Much more Independent cities are needed scattered across the map, especially around North Africa which is a huge waste of space since no one ever colonizes it. And for the few that are spread around Europe, they need to be better defended, too often do I see destroyed city ruins of barbarian, or independent cities
2. England is too big in general, it should be much smaller then France
3. There should be independent cities in Corsica, Sardinia, Sicily and Southern Greece (south of Athens) preferably Sparta
4. Why is Sicily an island? It makes controlling the place so much harder for the AI and for humans, just do what Rhye did in RFC, have a small land bridge which connects the boot of Italy with Sicily
5. Since Alexandria is part of the Byzantine Empire, I understand that they would add more defenders if necessary, but it becomes hard for the Arabs to expand Westward if they can't even capture an Independent Alexandria, there should be less defenders controlling Alexandria basically. Also the city of Cairo should be added, first as a Byzantine city with Christianity in it, and later an important Arab city, since Cairo was the regional capitol
6. More dense forest is needed in Northern Europe (including England) to make sure that there progress is checked, but instead what should happen is that when the Europeans finally are able to cut them down, they should get a bigger production boom from them, bigger then the normal cities. Also once again more independents are needed in Northern Europe
7. Marrakesh should be placed closer to Tangier, or else it is never captured and stays as a barbarian city for the rest of the game, either put it closer with less defenders or else just have it flip to the Cordovans when they arrive.
8. There should be a byzantine- Arab city in between Sour and Antakya (one more city for the crusaders to take as well). Some good once could be: Beirut, Byblos, Tripoli etc

Things in General:
1. Research rate is way too fast for all civs, this really shouldn't be, the only civs that should be speeding through at the beginning are the Arabs, Cordobans and perhaps the Byzantines. Each technology should be worth more research points or else your just speeding through the game, overall the game speed should be reduced for better gameplay or else your just speeding through the eras.
2. If you can have custom leader heads for all the other civilizations I'm quite sure you can have them for the Arabs who are misrepresented by Saladin, who only came much later and never controlled such a vast area, Saladin should be replaced by another Umayyad caliph who would best represent this area. Also on the topic of custom leader heads, Leopold and the Cordoban leader head could be given custom leaders heads, and also just as you vastly improved Sweden's leader head, please do the same to the Venetian leader whose eyes make him look as if he is blind
3. Still too many wonders that give away all the civics, I'm sure you guys can be more creative then that, plus it ruins the historical aspect to the game, if you need any help coming up with some, just ask.
4. Also the wonder, "The Dome of the Rock" should just spawn in Jerusalem once the Arabs take it or when Islam is introduced, also the same for the tomb of Al-Khalid, but that wonder I'm morel lenient about
5. Why is Temple Mount a wonder? If anything it should be a normal building or at best a national wonder, cities all over Europe and especially the Middle East had Jewish quarters. And instead of giving a merchant, let them give the city extra trade routes (or have 1 merchant, one extra trade route) but it should cause something like 2 unhappiness due to the unrest it would cause, but the amount of unhappiness is up to debate.
6. There should be more Jews in Muslim Spain and the Middle East in general to show the tolerance and something which the Spanish should have with them during the reconquista event is a lot of religious persecutors added so that they can have Spain with only one faith.
Questions:
1. What happens if you invade the Papal States, I'm Venice and I control all of Italy except for Rome, is it ok if I just invade them?
2. Do you guys think there will ever be Hotseat for this game?

@The Turk: Thanks for all the comments. It will all be taken in consideration and here are some quick points:

1. England should absolutely get ships on start. This needs to be fixed.

2. Ireland not being settled as well as North Africa and some of the Mediterranean islands is due to a bug in the AI (it wasn't loading settles into the ships). This has been fixed for the next version.

3. Some nations do not have custom leaderheads simply because we have been unable to find proper leaderheads. If you have specific suggestions, please share links to the files.

4. The Dome of the Rock should require Islam as a religion in the city, but I don't think we should restrict it to a specific city.

5. Judging from your signature, you have been playing the game on Viceroy. As far as tech rates and such are concerned, we are trying to balance the gameplay for Monarch level of difficulty. It would be practically impossible for us to balance all three levels at the same time.

Answers to questions:
1. You should be unable to declare war on the Pope.
2. No. Multiplayer is just too much to code and impossible to balance.

Do you know when the next version will be released?

Well I'm happy you replied, I was hoping someone would since I spent quite a while compiling and then writing these out. If anybody has any questions about any of my suggestions PLEASE tell me, as I can further explain them.

3. Some nations do not have custom leaderheads simply because we have been unable to find proper leaderheads. If you have specific suggestions, please share links to the files.
Well you could still fix up the leader for Venice, who doesn't look too good, you guys did a fantastic job fixing up Sweden's leader (Gustav I think). Also a custom leader head for the Arabs can be found in "World of Legends" the mod, which has a new leader with a new head. As for Leopold, I really hope you can find a leader head for him.

4. The Dome of the Rock should require Islam as a religion in the city, but I don't think we should restrict it to a specific city.
Yes it should, I think a few of the wonders should require a certain religion, (ex. Religious buildings such as St. Sophia). Also the Alhambra and the Cordoban Gardens should require Islam. But in the case of the Dome of the Rock, I specifically believe that they should be placed in Jerusalem and that the Ka'ba should be removed from the game (if it hasn't already)

5. Judging from your signature, you have been playing the game on Viceroy. As far as tech rates and such are concerned, we are trying to balance the gameplay for Monarch level of difficulty. It would be practically impossible for us to balance all three levels at the same time.
Overall I wasn't too sure what you meant by your answer here and I hope you can explain it more, but from what I understood, yes I did beat the Venetians on Viceroy but I played on all levels to get a feel for it, and I still feel that the research rate is too slow. I get gunpowder by around 1100 in Europe, far too early, if anything it should start in the 1500's earliest. There is definitely something skewed about the research rate. (And the production rate as well)

If i remember right, the LH they used for Venice was Ekmek's Enrico Dandolo, and he is actually remembered as the blind Doge of Venice, leading the fourth crusade against the Byzantines. Actually it was the Byzantines who blinded him during his period as ambassador in Constantinople.

If i remember right, the LH they used for Venice was Ekmek's Enrico Dandolo, and he is actually remembered as the blind Doge of Venice, leading the fourth crusade against the Byzantines. Actually it was the Byzantines who blinded him during his period as ambassador in Constantinople.
The blindness being caused by the Byzantines is nothing more than a rumor from what I understand. I will have to look into my History of Venice by JJ Norwich to verify.

How about: add some barbarian hero units (with great commander attached)? Seljuks, Mongols, Pirates.

Why is civ name Cordoba? Should be Al-Andalus. Cordoba is just a caliphate out of several. There were taifas, Almoravids, Almohads, emirate of Granada after all. And these did control large parts of northern Africa unlike the Cordoban caliphate.

And I'm still waiting when you rename the Moscow civ to Muscovy and set proper adjectives. ;)

Why is civ name Cordoba? Should be Al-Andalus. Cordoba is just a caliphate out of several. There were taifas, Almoravids, Almohads, emirate of Granada after all. And these did control large parts of northern Africa unlike the Cordoban caliphate.

And I'm still waiting when you rename the Moscow civ to Muscovy and set proper adjectives. ;)

Agreed, couldn't have said it better myself;)

Why is civ name Cordoba? Should be Al-Andalus. Cordoba is just a caliphate out of several. There were taifas, Almoravids, Almohads, emirate of Granada after all. And these did control large parts of northern Africa unlike the Cordoban caliphate.

And I'm still waiting when you rename the Moscow civ to Muscovy and set proper adjectives. ;)

The Civ names is just Cordoba, so People know what they choose. But the Dynamic names are Al-Andalus and other names.

I changed Moscow into Moscovites a while ago. Some Russian said that was a better name.

The Civ names is just Cordoba, so People know what they choose. But the Dynamic names are Al-Andalus and other names.

I changed Moscow into Moscovites a while ago. Some Russian said that was a better name.

Cordoba rather confused me, and Arabia isn't named after a single caliphate right? UHV's clearly imply the civ is supposed to represent Al-Andalus rather than Cordoba.

From what I see in Alpha 10b, civ description is "The Moscovites", short description is "Moscow", and civ adjective is "Moscowan". But Moscowan isn't even a word ;)
Would be more appropriate to have Muscovite and Muscovy everywhere. Moscovite (with an o) is French, English has an 'u' there.

Well, I was the Russian who said it (though I'm Polish ;) ) and I suggested both Muscovy and either Muscovite or Moscovite, as both are better than "Moscowan". I've seen 'o' used in English but corovanrobber is right, it's from French.

For Cordoba, Moors is a more general term, but it's not a case of correct/wrong. Al-Andalus is a geographical term, it's as wrong as Arabia IMO (that isn't even on the map), but maybe it's just me.

For Cordoba, Moors is a more general term, but it's not a case of correct/wrong. Al-Andalus is a geographical term, it's as wrong as Arabia IMO (that isn't even on the map), but maybe it's just me.

Well since Moor is a European slang word for "Black Man" or "Muslim" in general, no I don't think its a very appropriate name. Plus Al-Andalus represented all the Caliphates that were set up there, only the Caliphate of Cordoba had its capital at Cordoba, after the Almohads and Almoravids invaded, this was changed. But the name Al-Andalus remained.

Yeah Moors... would make sense to call civ Al-Andalus (as there's already Arabia which is a region), and set adjective to Moor.

Well since Moor is a European slang word for "Black Man" or "Muslim" in general, no I don't think its a very appropriate name. Plus Al-Andalus represented all the Caliphates that were set up there, only the Caliphate of Cordoba had its capital at Cordoba, after the Almohads and Almoravids invaded, this was changed. But the name Al-Andalus remained.

Slang? It's a well established term for Muslim people of Arab, Berber and Black African descent from North Africa.
Then again if civ is though to be the caliphate of Cordoba then it has quite non-Cordoban UHV's, as well as war maps, since Cordoban caliphate didn't even control Barcelona, not to mention Toulouse.

During the time of Shakespeare ''moor'' was a derogatory term for a black person.

The adjective is Moorish. And yeah, it's not really slang, though maybe some use it as such in Spain, but it's a historical term, and actual medieval designation for Arabs, Berbers and even Caucasian Muslims living in Spain and Maghreb, much like "Saracen" but more local (and "Frank" for that matter, which Muslims called all Western Europeans).

Almoravids = moors... it was just a bastardization. "Al" is an article, so moravids became moors in short/slang. It has never really been an insult, unless you consider that by any reckoning the Europeans were not happy with the moors in any sense and therefore the title wasn't especially pleasant.

I guess it's ok to use this term now, since there are terms like "Moorish architecture" and I frequently see "moor" in scientific literature.

Cordoba int he game represents the sum total of the Muslims in Iberia. WhenI first coded the nations, I had to give them a name. Since then all the dynamic names of all the civs have been changed, but Cordoba stayed for some reason (I wasn't following all of those). We need several ways to refer to them, one is for the startup screen: The Byzantines, The Bulgarians, The Franks, The Al Andulans?, how would to put it there. Then we need a short name for the score menu on the bottom left corner and several official names depending on religion, date, status as vassals. When we make suggestions, we should be specific on which one we mean.

Almoravids = moors... it was just a bastardization. "Al" is an article, so moravids became moors in short/slang. It has never really been an insult, unless you consider that by any reckoning the Europeans were not happy with the moors in any sense and therefore the title wasn't especially pleasant.

Not quite... the term moor has been known even before Islam, think where the name of Roman province Mauretania comes from? And moors are called мавры (mavry) in Russian, which makes the etymology obvious;)

We need several ways to refer to them, one is for the startup screen: The Byzantines, The Bulgarians, The Franks, The Al Andulans?, how would to put it there. Then we need a short name for the score menu on the bottom left corner and several official names depending on religion, date, status as vassals.

Where to look current ones? As for now I propose "Al-Andalus", "The Moors", "Moorish" (as embryodead corrected), some obvious changes in names that depend on religion, date etc.

Where to look current ones? As for now I propose "Al-Andalus", "The Moors", "Moorish" (as embryodead corrected), some obvious changes in names that depend on religion, date etc.

RFCEurope\Assets\XML\Text\Civ4_something_DynamicCi vNames_COR_something.xml

The file name is not hard to spot once you are in the folder.

Yes Corovanrobber is absolutely correct, that is very true. But the term Moor is very Eurocentric to say the least, and was used to insult people. But to change it on the start up screen it would be called- The Andalusian's and on the Score chart it would say Al-Andalus. This is something I got from wikipedia it says, "Al-Andalus (Arabic: الأندلس:)) was the Arabic name given to the parts of the Iberian Peninsula and Septimania governed by Arab and North African Muslims (given the generic name of Moors), at various times in the period between 711 and 1492". As you can see the name Al-Andalusia or Al-Andalus was given to ALL the caliphates from 711 (when Ibn Rushid) took over all the way to the emirate of Granada that fell in 1492 (ironically the day Columbus left to the New World)
So I propose the more historically sounding one: The Andalusians, Al Andalus, Andalusian

RFCEurope\Assets\XML\Text\Civ4_something_DynamicCi vNames_COR_something.xml

The file name is not hard to spot once you are in the folder.

I looked it, seems ok already. It would be sufficient just to replace the few instances of Cordoba with Al-Andalus, or Andalusia as the most names are;)

So I propose the more historically sounding one: The Andalusians, Al Andalus, Andalusian

Andalusian sounds strange to me, but I don't know. If everybody says Moor is derogative term, then it must be;)
But if the RFC civ is supposed to sufficiently settle North Africa, people there most certainly aren't "Andalusian", according to the definition you have posted.

Andalusian sounds strange to me, but I don't know. If everybody says Moor is derogative term, then it must be;)

Oh it's not now, but in the middle ages it was.

Oh it's not now, but in the middle ages it was.

Well I don't know about that...

But yes you do have a point, that is why I said that when the AI or human player spreads to North Africa and beyond, that the civ dynamic name switch to the Almohads or Almoravids

Hello to you all,
I've been playing civ IV and RFC for years, but only yesterday did I find out about this project. I'd like to contribute to this great work you've done. I was really impressed. But there is something that bothers me :
Why is the Spanish spawn date so late ? the first (and only ones before the 1400's) to control a kingdom in Spain were the Visigoths in the 6-7th century. Why not making them start at the beginning in 500 ? I know it's probably too late for this suggestion, but it would make more sense historically to have someone in Hispania before the Corobans arrive.
Also, on a completely different subject, what will you do after Civ V comes out ? Will the project continue ?

Hello to you all,
I've been playing civ IV and RFC for years, but only yesterday did I find out about this project. I'd like to contribute to this great work you've done. I was really impressed. But there is something that bothers me :
Why is the Spanish spawn date so late ? the first (and only ones before the 1400's) to control a kingdom in Spain were the Visigoths in the 6-7th century. Why not making them start at the beginning in 500 ? I know it's probably too late for this suggestion, but it would make more sense historically to have someone in Hispania before the Corobans arrive.
Also, on a completely different subject, what will you do after Civ V comes out ? Will the project continue ?

Visigoths are represented by independent cities in the region. After a lot of testing and deliberating, this is what we have for Spain; it is historically accurate and it leads to a good gameplay.

When is Civ V coming?

When is Civ V coming?

Fall of 2010. Which means we have 6 months left. :run:
On another note, since laptop problem is almost fixed, expect me back at around 10-15 days (and WOW Alpha 11!!!)

When is Civ V coming?

They say it comes in fall 2010. But I think that's too soon. I think it comes spring next year.

The site now says 1 September 2010...

So I guess we will not see RFCEurope 2.0, lets hope we can get 1.0 by then. We only need to work on balancing right now.

At any rate, I will finish the mod even if I have to do it myself. Even if everyone goes for Civ V, then I will probably not. I am using Linux and it usually takes some time for us to get a new game working properly. I will have to consult other LInux users on Apolyton.

3Miro, even when civ V comes along I'm sure people will still play civ IV, especially RFC which won't be available right away for civ V.

I know I will still be playing 4 because my current PC can barely handle it, much less a whole new upgrade...
I won't get 5 until I get a new computer that'll be able to handle it easily (perhaps more than one processor can handle 5?)... Civ6 might be almost ready to come out by then.

I'll also continue to play civ 4, unless the civ 4 mods I play get converted to civ 5. In the meanwhile, I'll continue to enjoy RFCE and civ 4.:)

you could fix the civs rating because after arabia it's all like 1 star then 2 stars then 3 and so on going down

I've started that list but never made the effort to finish it, also since things are / were changing rather frequently. Though I think the "already done list" is still appropriate, it may have to be revalued (dense forests, RFCEbalance stuff, resources, etc.). If you'd like to, you could finish the list.:)

ok, i think i can finish it for tomorrow

just to check if i am capable of doing this work, cordoba i put trade - 2, production - 5, culture - 2(culture i don't know how to measure it), growth - 4 and starting situation - 5

A complete list of what the 5 categories stand for can be found here:

http://forums.civfanatics.com/showthread.php?t=322753

A list on the civs I've already done can be found on page 81 and 82 of this thread. I've not completed the list back then because I didn't have enough experience with these civs to judge them, and because the balance shifted quite frequently back then. Some of those should be re-evaluated, some are fine. Also, note that all of these are from my personal point of view, it's open for debate. Now, to judge your's:

- 2 stars for trade is okay I think. Cordoba has many resources near, also diverse, so it can trade many of them. There are also some good seaports available, that increase trade. However, because of different religions, people don't always want to trade.
- 5 stars for production is fine too. Cordoba has the most potential of all civs before Turkey (with the possible exception of Arabia), and should be valued with no less than 5 stars.
- 2 stars for culture is doubtful. Catholic wonders can be constructed in Barcino, Islamic wonders in other cities. Three stars seem appropriate to me.
- 4 stars for growth is fine too. There is some space in Africa to settle, some resources to stay happy and healthy, and of course the faith points that clear the built-in penalty (see RFCEBalance). Three or four stars in this category.
- 5 stars for starting situation is a lot. Byzantium surely should get 5 stars, but should anyone else? Cordoba has a nice start with some independent cities and settlers around, but except for that, it isn't extraordinary. 4 Stars are enough, since it is a good start, but not excellent.

That gives Cordoba a total of 17 stars. That is a lot, so maybe some thing should be valued less (trade?). Overall, I think you've done a good job on judging Cordoba. It doesn't matter that I have some different opinions. Which one is right or wrong doesn't matter, we can always finetune settings when the mod is (almost) finished. Please continue what you are doing.:)

A complete list of what the 5 categories stand for can be found here:

http://forums.civfanatics.com/showthread.php?t=322753

A list on the civs I've already done can be found on page 81 and 82 of this thread. I've not completed the list back then because I didn't have enough experience with these civs to judge them, and because the balance shifted quite frequently back then. Some of those should be re-evaluated, some are fine. Also, note that all of these are from my personal point of view, it's open for debate. Now, to judge your's:

- 2 stars for trade is okay I think. Cordoba has many resources near, also diverse, so it can trade many of them. There are also some good seaports available, that increase trade. However, because of different religions, people don't always want to trade.
- 5 stars for production is fine too. Cordoba has the most potential of all civs before Turkey (with the possible exception of Arabia), and should be valued with no less than 5 stars.
- 2 stars for culture is doubtful. Catholic wonders can be constructed in Barcino, Islamic wonders in other cities. Three stars seem appropriate to me.
- 4 stars for growth is fine too. There is some space in Africa to settle, some resources to stay happy and healthy, and of course the faith points that clear the built-in penalty (see RFCEBalance). Three or four stars in this category.
- 5 stars for starting situation is a lot. Byzantium surely should get 5 stars, but should anyone else? Cordoba has a nice start with some independent cities and settlers around, but except for that, it isn't extraordinary. 4 Stars are enough, since it is a good start, but not excellent.

That gives Cordoba a total of 17 stars. That is a lot, so maybe some thing should be valued less (trade?). Overall, I think you've done a good job on judging Cordoba. It doesn't matter that I have some different opinions. Which one is right or wrong doesn't matter, we can always finetune settings when the mod is (almost) finished. Please continue what you are doing.:)

I don's see the list, on pages 81 and 82 only the first 5 - 6 civilizations are listed, where is the rest?

To be completed, I never made the effort to finish it. Since we are getting very close to the beta now, I think that it is time to finish it.

Spain - trade - 2, production - 4, culture - 2, growth - 3 and starting situation - 3
Portugal - trade - 4, production - 2, culture - 2, growth - 4 and starting situation - 2
Genoa - trade - 3, production -3, culture - 3, growth - 3 and starting situation - 3
Venice - trade - 5, production - 2, culture - 2, growth - 4 and starting situation - 3
Austria - trade - 3, production - 4, culture - 4, growth - 3 and starting situation - 2
Germany - trade - 2, production - 5, culture - 4, growth - 3 and starting situation - 3
Netherlands - trade - 3, production - 4, culture - 2, growth - 3 and starting situation - 1
England - trade - 3, production - 4, culture - 3, growth - 4 and starting situation - 3

im stil finishing Norse, Russia, Sweden, Hungary, Kiev, Poland, Turkey

Norse - trade - 4, production - 3, culture - 2, growth - 3 and starting situation - 3
Russia - trade - 2, production - 5, culture - 2, growth - 4 and starting situation - 4
Hungary - trade - 2, production - 4, culture - 3, growth - 3 and starting situation - 3
Kiev - trade - 3, production - 3, culture - 2, growth - 5 and starting situation - 3
Sweden - trade - 3, production - 3, culture - 2, growth - 3 and starting situation - 3
Poland - trade - 3, production - 3, culture - 3, growth - 4 and starting situation - 2
Turkey - trade - 3, production - 5, culture - 3, growth - 3 and starting situation - 4

Norse - trade - 4, production - 3, culture - 2, growth - 3 and starting situation - 3
Russia - trade - 2, production - 5, culture - 2, growth - 4 and starting situation - 4
Hungary - trade - 2, production - 4, culture - 3, growth - 3 and starting situation - 3
Kiev - trade - 3, production - 3, culture - 2, growth - 5 and starting situation - 3
Sweden - trade - 3, production - 3, culture - 2, growth - 3 and starting situation - 3
Poland - trade - 3, production - 3, culture - 3, growth - 4 and starting situation - 2
Turkey - trade - 3, production - 5, culture - 3, growth - 3 and starting situation - 4

No offend, but to be honest, I don't think these lists are very good. Poland has a worse starting situation that Turkey? And the Netherlands with a 3 for Trade? I think some should be changed seriously.

Spain's UHV is way too easy.
First the control Iberia UHV should be pushed down to 1500, this is a lot more historical and challanging though not that much, I managed to do it by the 1200's with ease.
Also the control several cities outside of Iberia UHV should require more cities, maybe 3 more and also include the Netherlands, or keep it as it is but also require that one of those cities be specifically in Netherlands. This also makes it sort of time-limited since you could take the easy and fast route by controlling Netherlands ASAP and then trying to control the other required cities too before the Netherlands spawn, or you could take your time, get ready with the rest of the UHV's, and then conquer the Netherlands if they have spawned already.

Spain's UHV is way too easy.
First the control Iberia UHV should be pushed down to 1500, this is a lot more historical and challanging though not that much, I managed to do it by the 1200's with ease.
Also the control several cities outside of Iberia UHV should require more cities, maybe 3 more and also include the Netherlands, or keep it as it is but also require that one of those cities be specifically in Netherlands. This also makes it sort of time-limited since you could take the easy and fast route by controlling Netherlands ASAP and then trying to control the other required cities too before the Netherlands spawn, or you could take your time, get ready with the rest of the UHV's, and then conquer the Netherlands if they have spawned already.
The thing about the Netherlands, they are not even represented in the game until they were in that act of throwing off the yoke of Spanish Oppression, which is not even touched upon in the game (they start off not at war or even in bad relations).

No offend, but to be honest, I don't think these lists are very good. Poland has a worse starting situation that Turkey? And the Netherlands with a 3 for Trade? I think some should be changed seriously.
Agreed, the Dutch start off with Atlantic Access in their backyard, AND get extra trade routes as their national power. I would say a 5 star trade ranking for the cheeseheads... I mean, that's what they do and did that made them so great. If it can go to 6 stars, give them 6!

No offend, but to be honest, I don't think these lists are very good. Poland has a worse starting situation that Turkey? And the Netherlands with a 3 for Trade? I think some should be changed seriously.

Turkey starts with one of the most powerfull armies, a lot of workers, 3 powerfull cities, a little advanced tech, is very easy to conquer contantinople and anatolia to settle when Poland just start with a very very small army and a few workers. For me Turkey is the most powerful civ in the modmod.But for Netherlands yes you are right I think a 4 or 5 for trade is decent, but I analized more for rivers and ocean access

I found a bug I don't know if you already have seen it, the I finish tokapi palace with Turkey the game crashes.Sorry it's not Tokapi palace the problem but when I played again I changed the construction order but the game crashed again

Umm... the dutch are in the land of rivers... and on the ocean as well...
Definitely a 5 for trade.

Well in the mod I don't see many rivers in netherlands and Venezia has much more ocean access then Amsterdam

Well in the mod I don't see many rivers in netherlands and Venezia has much more ocean access then Amsterdam
Umm... look again.
Every square in Amsterdam's BFC (maybe minus 1) is either a river or ocean I believe...

Well in the mod I don't see many rivers in netherlands and Venezia has much more ocean access then Amsterdam

Venezia has no ocean access in the sense of Atlantic access. Trade is about Commerce.

What would help in this situation is a little more explanation on the ratings. Right now, we are only discussing numbers, without knowing what is behind them. For example, I disagree with Germany's 5 stars for production (I'll check the others tomorrow), but if you can convince me that Germany deserves 5 stars, that's fine too.

Venezia has no ocean access in the sense of Atlantic access. Trade is about Commerce.

atlantic access no but a lot of sea access, and in the early game they alredy start with merchant replubic makes the capital an important center of trade

What would help in this situation is a little more explanation on the ratings. Right now, we are only discussing numbers, without knowing what is behind them. For example, I disagree with Germany's 5 stars for production (I'll check the others tomorrow), but if you can convince me that Germany deserves 5 stars, that's fine too.
Germany has many wood tiles and some resources

That doesn't explain 5 stars. Cordoba has 5 stars for example, because there are very many resources and hills. Cows, pigs on hills, etc. all yield some production, and cumulated, all these cities have a large production. Germany is much flatter, and doesn't have a overload of resources, and more grassland. . Also, forests can't be improved until very late.

What is important to valuate civs, is to play one or two long games with them. Some civs turn out to be much stronger than expected, some to be much weaker. For example, Kiev should be the ideal cottage economy, but the plague ruins a lot. On the other hand, Arabia seems to have a poor location, but many of us have found it to be the most powerful civ in RFCE.

I think it is much easier (and also less time-consuming) to rate all civs partially together. Quick draft below.

Starting situation:

5 stars:

Byzantium

4 stars:

Arabia, Cordoba, Moscow, Kiev, France

3 stars:

All others. From an AI perspective. Turkey could be valued anywhere between 2 and 4, same story for Spain, Hungary, Bulgary, England, Burgundy, etc. It all depends on active play.

2 stars:

Genoa, Austria, Spain (although I have no experience with Spain, could just as easy be 3)

1 star:

Netherlands, Portugal (same story as Spain, I don't know how hard it is exactly to take over Iberia in a few turns).

Production:

Important stuff: hills, resources, plains, possibility to work all productive tiles (plain hills are awesome, but there must be a nearby food resource to enable it), built-in modifiers. All ratings are based on an average playing style, like expansion within settlermaps or logical nearby territories.

NOTE: again, this draft is made from WB-analysis. Playtesting experience is worth much more. If you've anything to complain, I'll change the list.

5 Stars:

Cordoba, Turkey

4 stars:

Spain (you'll have the same land as Cordoba, but this has to be conquered. Therefore, 4 stars), Arabia, England, Venice

3 stars:

All others

2 stars:

Netherlands, France (well, cottage economy is also productive), Hungary, Kiev (as said before, with a normal expansion direction, the north east is reasonably productive), Poland, Norse

1 star: None, any civ has a productive spot nearby. Again, this list is not really reliable, without more input.

Growth: based on food resources (of course), grass tiles, room for expansion, built-in modifiers

5 stars:

Kiev

4 stars:

France, (some more?)

3 stars:

All others

2 stars:

Cordoba, Spain, Venice, Bulgary, Burgundy

1 star:

Byzantium

Moscow deserves 5 stars as well, you can literally have 20 cities without many penalties.
Germany deserves 4 stars as well, as you said they have one of the flattest lands in Europe, all green and ripe for growing big, powerful cities.
Venice shouldn't have 4 starts in production, maybe 3.
And change Netherlands to 1 star in production. They're not that bad at it but I think each category needs at least 1 civ with a 1 and 1 civ with a 5.

with replaceable parts germany can have a very high production as so as Moscow, if they have preserved the forests

I think that there should be a consensus on this point: should we take in account that forests are choppable or not? I prefer not doing so, since it happens so late. Same deal with marshes of course. It does make quite a difference for civs like Germany and Moscow.

There are still two categories left to be filled in, and all should be evaluated. If anyone can come up with a reliable list for trade and culture (an experienced playtester, since trade and culture are very much dependent on experience), we'd be grateful. These categories are the most difficult I think, since it is very based on either experience and skill. Trade is I think mostly related to overall commerce, access to sea ports (trade routes) and the number of trade partners. Culture is related to the access to multiple religions, possibility to build wonders, which is also tied to religions, and perhaps another factor.

Trade:
5 - Venice, Netherlands and Genoa, they're pretty much the "big bucks" civs of the mod, relying on trade and gold, this was also true historically and wealth was their prime motivation throughout their history.

4 - Portugal and England. These guys have pretty much only coastal cities unless you expand outside of your historical zone, and it's very easy to get colonies, especially with Portugal's UP.

3 - Spain, France, Burgundy, Norse & Sweden. All civs which have a decent amount of coast available and AA, basically colony contenders, I wasn't sure if I should include Cordoba here since they have a decent amount of coast and AA too but they aren't really meant to be a trading civ, mostly because they're Muslim & far away from their other Muslim friends.

2 - The rest.

1 - Moscow & Turkey. Civs which don't rely on trade much, but on lots of lands and production.

1 - Byzantium... don't rely on trade much, but on lots of lands and production.
I would strongly disagree with this. Control of the Bosphorus was huge, and the levant... there is a reason they were so incredibly rich. Trade.

Also, Netherlands is definitely a 5 star trader with their civilization's power of trade bonus.

Back! I am wondering what happened in my month away, so could you please list me in summary changes done till Alpha 11b? Many thanks!!!

Byzantium should be 3 in trade.

I think 3 should be only colony contenders. Byzantium being orthodox next to two Muslim civs makes them worse than most other civs in trade.
I updated according to kochman's suggestions.

Back! I am wondering what happened in my month away, so could you please list me in summary changes done till Alpha 11b? Many thanks!!!

First of all, welcome back.:D

- Some unnecessary art- and XML-files are removed.
- The newest CAR mod is included.
- The newest Reformation files are included.
- New Genoan Bank name + art.
- Hanseatic Executive is now a ship.
- Irregularities have been removed from buttons.
I think this are the most important things that have been changed.

We are currently discussing about the stars we should give to all civs and new UHVs for Venice.

The problem with a UHV for Venice being the capture of Constantinople... it basically ensures that the Byzantines will be whiped out.

*I would say, instead, successful capture of ANY crusades target, be it Const., Jerus, Cordoba, Alexandria, etc...

*Wealth and/or culture at certain levels could also be a victory condition.

I like the islands victory conditions because it basically guarantees conflict with Genova, their principle enemy.

Do the German UHV's of RFC not require wiping out 6 civs? :P

I don't know if it's particularly historical but I like ''unify Italy'' as a UHV for Venice or maybe Genoa. It would be a bit of a mixed challenge, requiring the conquest of 2 well-defended indy cities, and one other player. You could also include the two islands to the west and Marseille to cause some friction with France/Burgundy.

but how they would declare war on Rome?

I think Florence and Naples are already two logical targets for Venice, the only hard part would be the destruction of Genoa, but I think that squatting on their capital could help a lot.

but how they would declare war on Rome?

Ignoring Rome.

I don't know if it's particularly historical but I like ''unify Italy'' as a UHV for Venice or maybe Genoa. It would be a bit of a mixed challenge, requiring the conquest of 2 well-defended indy cities, and one other player. You could also include the two islands to the west and Marseille to cause some friction with France/Burgundy.
Venice was always looking East though, to the wealth of the Levant. There is no good reason for them to head West...

Re: Italy unification. Is it codable to make the Papal states "capturable" after a certain date???
A good idea, though, at least for one of the two cities.

i see this is the thread for the Venetian UHV discussion. As i was saying in the feedback thread:

I highly recommend these UHVs for Venice:

1. Control Constantinople or Jerusalem in 1210. (Not by 1210, IN 1210. This will encourage the Venetian player to control a crusade. Therefore, encouraging them to save up gold in the early game to control crusade with financial power.)

2. Control the Dalmatian coast and have at least one city each in mainland Greece, Crete, RHODES (-.-) and Cyprus in 1500. (once again not by 1500, in 1500. This will make it a bit more challenging.)

3. Have xxxxx gold in year 1xxx. (Gold to get should be a 5-digit number, and year should be quite late. Once again encourages Venice to get gold. Also encourages player to build St Marco Basilica, as it increases trade gold yield. Also forces Venice to focus more on merchants, and hopefully get a Marco Polo :D )

I believe this will make the Venetian player to be a bit more "Venice-like", instead of just building settlers, loading them up to ships and sending them to settle islands, which is what we're see-ing now. I don't understand why people wants Venice to unify Italy. It doesn't make any sense. Almost all of Venice's actions in history were money-oriented.

You should put the kingdom of sardinia-piemonte and the kingdom of the two sicilies and one of those should unite italy, and extend the timeline to 1900 and so divide germany and make prussia unite it

You should put the kingdom of sardinia-piemonte and the kingdom of the two sicilies and one of those should unite italy, and extend the timeline to 1900 and so divide germany and make prussia unite it
Why would the Kingdom of Two Sicilies, which was a vassal nation of Spain/Burgundy/etc, unite Italy?

You should put the kingdom of sardinia-piemonte and the kingdom of the two sicilies and one of those should unite italy, and extend the timeline to 1900 and so divide germany and make prussia unite it

We won't include new civs. We already have more civs than vanilla RFC (this makes the game slow, especially in the late game) and it is a lot of coding. The same for extending the timeline. It isn't worth the effort. And all UHV are before that. (they are even before 1800). So many won't play so long.

Why would the Kingdom of Two Sicilies, which was a vassal nation of Spain/Burgundy/etc, unite Italy?

after Napoleon they became independent.

I guess if you extended the timeline, that would make some amount of sense... since it wasn't until 1815.

I think it's already been decided that the map and timeline won't change, and there's a really slim chance that a new civ will be added.

I don't know if it's particularly historical but I like ''unify Italy'' as a UHV for Venice or maybe Genoa. It would be a bit of a mixed challenge, requiring the conquest of 2 well-defended indy cities, and one other player. You could also include the two islands to the west and Marseille to cause some friction with France/Burgundy.

It isn't historical. At all.

At it may be quite easy for the human player.

what about dividing germany into independent and put the nation prussia at berlin and konigsberg, than they should have the uhv to unite germany.

I guess that there will be a turn problem then. Even if it may (i havent checked) fit into the time frame, their goal would have to be compleated in like 50 turns or so, and that is a little problematic.

The Mongol's UHV of controlling a certain % of the world also has to be completed in a small number of turns in RFC. However It'd be a pain to load up the game from 500AD all the way to the end just to play ~50 turns, Germany should stay as it is for now.

what about dividing germany into independent and put the nation prussia at berlin and konigsberg, than they should have the uhv to unite germany.

Same as Italia.

I don't really know what the point to all this "unify X" proposals is. Both Italy and Germany have been unified many years after this mod's timeframe, and the states that unified them (Prussia and Sardinia-Piemont, respectively) were not important enough during this mod's timeframe to be included. This is a mod for Europe from the "dark ages" to (roughly) the French Revolution ... if you expect anything else, this is the wrong mod for you.

How about adding Crimea to Genoan goals?
Generally at least something at the Black Sea, because they were active there.
http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/5/53/Genuesische_Kolonien.png

Sounds to me like a good idea :)

It was accually in an old version. I don't know why it is deleted.

Venetias UHV are realy too easy, i just won in 1041 with 12 luxury ressources by only settling/conquering the needed cities. Conquering Neapoli and palermo is easy and would give another 4 luxury ressources (each city has wine and olives)

My suggestion for the UHVs:
- Control the dalmantian coast and have a city in greece, crete, rhodes and cypros by 1400

- have 10 different luxury ressources by 1500 (you will have to trade for other ressources, like fur from russia, winning with only wine and olives is boring )

- get 50000 gold by 1600 (in my last byzantine game, i have 65k in 1500, so this should be possible) starting with merchant republic realy suggests a money UHV. And a reason to build weavers and brewers everywhere....


Another thing with venice: you start out with buerocracy and apprenticeship, but loose this 2 civics on the second turn. Bug of feature? I solved it with adding the 2 civics to the UP.

I like the idea of adding in an extra 50 or so years to the timeline(just for the sake of Napoleon), and changing Germany to be Prussia(what I've done myself, after my story was started[of course]).

Just out-of-timeline. RFCE was designed to be a Medieval mod, starting at the fall of Byzantium and closing at the French and Industrial revolution. The 1800-1900 era belongs to the Industrial/Imperialistic era, so a new modmod could cover it (Rhyes of Imperialism was attempted once ago)

love the mod Ive got a suggestion and seen a few problems that Ill post here

Problem 1 Some times when my civilization spawns I find im already at war with 1 of my neighbours (for example when I start as the English I find that on my FIRST turn Im all ready at war with the French before Ive spoken to them or even built a city. I have experienced this problem with Rhyes and fall of civilization as well since he last updated the mod

Problem 2: There seems to be Crash to desk top that occassionally happans if I scroll into an unexplored area of the map

Have you considered making the English an early start as the Saxons?
Im thinking set up all the cities in England as Indepedents to represent the Britons. Then spawn the Saxons/English in eastern England but dont give them any settlers they have to conqueror an indepedent city to get their first city. When 1066 comes around do an event similar to the choice you get when Protestantism is founded. Basicly the message says William demands the English crown do you embrace the Normans or fight them?

If you choose to embrace them then Caen joins the English civilization and English player gets a small army made up of crossbowmen and Norman Knights (some sort of heavy cavalry) and a Great General (William the Conqueror) on the downside all English cities get unhappiness for a number of turns as the Saxons get used to their new Norman Masters.

If the player rejects the Normans then its war. How this can work would I guess depend on Caens staus is it Independent or is in French? If its French then rejecting Norman conquest results in war with France and the French recieve a small army in Caen and few galleys and a Great General (William the Conqueror) that they can use to transfer there army across the English Channel or simply spawn the army southern england. If Caen is Indepedent then England is automaticly at war with them and a smaller army spawns in southern England In either case the English player recieves a Great General (Harold) and must use what ever units he has avaliable to defend his civilization from the Norman/French Invasion.

Thoughts?

I like your ideas, Dargoth. It would be great to replicate the development of the English state through the various changes you describe. As it would for Spain and Germany as well. It was seriously considered in the early development of the mod to start the English in the time of Alfred but it was considered too complicated to code if you took into account the Danelaw and the Norman Conquest as well.
Starting the English as the Normans in London then flipping Normandy and Brittainy is pretty much the reverse of history but it seemed the easiest solution at the time. But I agree that we really should look at the English start again, at least before we go to Beta.

For your first point this is a part of the game, some civs start at war with other civs like England and France as you mentioned, and Arabs start at war with the Byzantines and sometimes the Bulgarians start at war with the Byzantines too.

Yes, in normal RFC the Mongols start at war with China. I RFC Europe, the Bulgarians (at least when I played the Byzantine empire) is at war with the Byzantine empire (The Arabs just ask you for Jerusalem and Tyre, so if you refuse they declare war, if you accept you've won a few turns of peace)

Yeah I know that you ussually get a war on the turn when cities flip to you but Im talking about being at war on your first turn before the game even starts which deprives the player of the unit reinforcements they get if theres a war when the cities flip. The weird thing is that this "pre war" seems to be random and doesnt always happan.

Ive thought of another event similar to the one for the English and the Normans

In 721 the Cordobans get the option of claiming Southern France (cities of Tolouse, Bordeaux and Tours) if they press the claim they have to wait for a response from the French player. The French player gets an event saying the Cordobans are claiming southern France do the French wish to contest the claim? If Yes the cities of Toulouse, Bordeaux and Tours join the French empire and the French get a Great General Charles Martel and are now at war with the Cordobans on the Cordobans next turn an army of theres Spawns on the North side of the Pyrennes. If the French decide not to contest the cities of Toulouse, Bordeaux and Tours join the Cordobans and Islam spreads to the 3 cities.

Yeah this is a feature of RFC, sometimes civ start at war with neighboring civs if this was the case historically, even city flips and what-not.

I really like Dargoth's idea, it would be really nice to see that, and possibly for a lot of different scenarios as well, such as the German conquest of Italy

Ive thought of another event similar to the one for the English and the Normans

In 721 the Cordobans get the option of claiming Southern France (cities of Toulouse, Bordeaux and Tours) if they press the claim they have to wait for a response from the French player. The French player gets an event saying the Cordobans are claiming southern France do the French wish to contest the claim? If Yes the cities of Toulouse, Bordeaux and Tours join the French empire and the French get a Great General Charles Martel and are now at war with the Cordobans on the Cordobans next turn an army of theres Spawns on the North side of the Pyrenees. If the French decide not to contest the cities of Toulouse, Bordeaux and Tours join the Cordobans and Islam spreads to the 3 cities.

I'm not sure about that one... for england it would make sense, but there it helps France out too much : their UHV states that they should control those cities (along with the rest of France). It's already fairly easy, so if you actually give them the cities, it gets worthless (unless you propose another French UHV, then I wouldn't mind).

I'm not sure about that one... for england it would make sense, but there it helps France out too much : their UHV states that they should control those cities (along with the rest of France). It's already fairly easy, so if you actually give them the cities, it gets worthless (unless you propose another French UHV, then I wouldn't mind).


Id think of it as being more of a optional delayed city flip for the French

The English get Calais and Caen when the cities flip on there 3rd turn (and they ussually pick up York if it hasnt been razed) and Caen and Calais are part of Englands UHV.

France on the other hand doesnt pick up any free cities on its third turn and only has one Settler (to build Paris) the English can get 3 cities (Caen Calais and York) and 2 settlers and as a down side for the French claiming those 3 cities that get a war with the Corobans and they have to fight the free Corobans army that spawns in southern France also there would probably be some stability issues the French player would have deal with as Bordeaux and Tolouse arent close to Paris

721 may be historicaly correct, but is way too early for such an event. France has usualy 2 cities at that time, maybe just settling its third. Cordoba has just spawned in 712 and need to build some infrastructure first before getting more cities. If you play Cordoba, you can easily replay history and march your starting troops northwards and conquer Barcelona and Toulouse, you can manage that aproximatley between 750 and 770.

And in civ-terms, the historical battle of Toulouse from 721 is 1 or 2 Berber Cavalry being killed while trying to capture Toulouse.

An idea involving stability.

Perhaps instead of a civ splitting up into a bunch of independants there could be a whole new civilization formed. Say for each civilization you create a second one, which would be historcally accurate (to act as the seperatist state).

For example, say Germany was to collapse. Instead of Independants emerging, the east half forms East Germany (Historical name German Democratic Republic) and the west half forms Western Germany (Federal Republic of Germany). Although it wasn't a civil war that split Germany historically, it still provides two historical seperate states for Germany to split into into.

Other examples: UK into England and Ireland or England and Scotland (or all three), Poland-Lithuania into Poland and Lituania, France into the Kingdom of France and the French Republic, etc.

This allows actual interaction to occur between the two sides of the civil war with other civilizations around it, like it would have historically, and even get help from other civs.

Another thing, not quite as major but could be a fun addition could be the ability to choose which side of the war you would like to control. A pop up would appear informing you of the division of the state, and whether you would like to support (using the Germany example again) West Germany or East Germany.

East and West Germany are way outside of the scope of this mod.

East and West Germany are way outside of the scope of this mod.

I didn't mean historical East and West Germany which arent in the time frame of this mod, I meant that if Germany decended into a civil war, those could be the two opposing sides, not the two countries from the Soviet era. In this game so far, when a country collapses, it forms many little independants, as you know, never to be seen or heard from again. The emerging factions that I was talking about would take the place of the many city states formed, instead forming two new civs that are fighting for control, civs that other players can contact and conduct diplomacy with. This retains some difficulty, instead of letting other civilizations scramble to capture all the City States left over with ease.

Well, within the scope of the mod, Germany (in the form of the HRE) did basically collapse (ok, it didn't really collapse, BUT, Austria started running the show which is how that would translate in Civ4) and the independent city states were not really heard again after the scope of this mod... realistically anyhow.

The idea is nice (although Germany definitely shouldn't split into entities named FRG and GDR ... there are better options, Bavaria, Hannover and Brandenburg for example) and I would imagine civil wars to play out this way, but from an implementation perspective that means that you would have to have a civ slot for each civ's "civil war enemy". Which is a lot of extra work.

Work AND strain on the CPU... not worth it.

I hope you don't mind if I change the subject.

I just finished a course on late Antiquity / the Early Middle Ages (roughly the class started at around 300 AD and ended at around 1000 AD.) One thing I don't think is simulated very well in the current RFC:E is the effect the viking incursions had on the Carolingian Empire (more commonly known as the Franks.) According to Professor Daileader, one of the biggest factors in the collapse of a unified kingdom in West Francia was the increasing viking attacks.

Here are some excerpts from his notes posted online.


A. Starting in 789, Vikings began to attack Anglo-Saxon monasteries, then Carolingian monasteries.
B. The raids quickly intensified in Anglo-Saxon England, which was geographically more vulnerable to the Vikings than was the Continent. During the 830s, Viking raids in Carolingian Europe grew equally frequent and intense.
C. During the 840s, Viking raiders began to penetrate farther and farther inland, and their raids grew more extended as they began to winter in the areas that they intended to pillage during the spring.
D. Carolingian rulers, unable to stop Viking attacks, resorted to paying protection money, or danegeld, to the Vikings, which was a great embarrassment to the Carolingian dynasty.
E. The Vikings were successful in attacking the Carolingian Empire largely because of their superior nautical skills and their use of the Viking longboat, which was easily navigated on the ocean and up rivers. Vikings thwarted Carolingian attempts to fortify rivers by carrying their longboats overland and around fortified points.
F. During the first half of the 10th century, Viking attacks on the Carolingian Europe slowed down and finally stopped entirely.
...
The Carolingian Empire disintegrated during the course of the 9th century. Discredited by its inability to deal with the Viking attacks, the Carolingian dynasty fell prey to civil wars fought among the sons of Louis the Pious, who failed to achieve an acceptable division of his empire among his heirs. As a result, the empire split into various independent kingdoms, most notably West Francia and East Francia.


My observation is that the Norse civilization tends to hunker down. Often times I don't even encounter them when I'm playing as Francia until after the time period described above. Given the significance of these raids/invasions on European history, I think it's unfortunate that they're not simulated by the mod.

I have a proposed "solution" to this historical inaccuracy which should be easier than trying to edit the viking AI (although I imagine that would help.) What if the Norse spawn included some military units and boats in the English Channel? That way no cities would flip, but if the civ spawns at war with the Franks (as I think it should), there will be an actual chance of "viking attacks?"

I played a French game some days ago, assuming that there was nothing to worry about. However, there were some barbarian galleys with Berserkers inside, and they were pretty nasty! Just barely kept Rouen (which I prefered above Paris that game) and Bordeaux. I think this simulates the situation well enough, any ignorant human or AI has a tough job resisting them.

I played a French game some days ago, assuming that there was nothing to worry about. However, there were some barbarian galleys with Berserkers inside, and they were pretty nasty! Just barely kept Rouen (which I prefered above Paris that game) and Bordeaux. I think this simulates the situation well enough, any ignorant human or AI has a tough job resisting them.

Just to fill in the details here --
If the human is not playing as the Norse then barb galleys with two beserkers on them will spawn in the channel + slightly further north. This goes on from roughly 800 AD to 880 AD. These barbarians will normally take York and attack the French. Because they come only two beserkers at a time, a human player can normally fend them off (if prepared). Often the AI loses a city to them.

These barbs don't spawn when the Norse are controlled by the human because they interfere with the human's chance to go viking.

Yes, the barbarians in the north-west of France (they go to Brittany if their is no city in Normandy) can be quite a pain if unprepared, even though a fortified crossbowman can easily suffice to repel them.
What is true is that they don't plunder much, usually trying to attack the nearest city. It would be more historically accurate to make them plunder all around before they attack well defended areas.

Yes, the barbarians in the north-west of France (they go to Brittany if their is no city in Normandy) can be quite a pain if unprepared, even though a fortified crossbowman can easily suffice to repel them.
What is true is that they don't plunder much, usually trying to attack the nearest city. It would be more historically accurate to make them plunder all around before they attack well defended areas.
This is easily coded too... AI pillage vs AI attack...
Of course, if they take a city, which they did (they took the entire region of Normandy, not to mention Sicily and S. Italy), they make more money.

On the Vikings issue, I have seen in a game the bersekers razing Paris ;). So it kinda works sometimes, at the moment.
On Eastern Europe, I have done a list of changes, which are ready for uploading to the SVN. Just listing them, to see if they have your approval :)

-Austria starts on negative diplo terms with Hungary, so as to encourage war between the sides
-Austria unit production rate increased, the Hungarian one decreased, so as to increase the possibility Austria wins the above war
-More barbs in North Balkans, to make life difficult for Hungary (and possibly Bulgaria)
-Ragusa flips to Venice, to ensure that Hungary does not control it
-To compensate for this, Byzantine spawn zone extended to the west, so that the founded there cities do not turn indy, and so Venice needs to be more aggressive v Byzantium
-Finally, increased the Ottoman army production rate, in an attempt to see them capturing Istanbul.

If Venice controls Ragusa from the very beginning, wouldn't that make them a little overpowered? Even if you take the second settler away, I think that Venice ends up much more powerful than it used to be.

On a side note: shouldn't the Hungarians adopt the normal European building style? I know they are based on Carthage but if we get to the beta stage, at least these minor glitches have to be solved. I really like the ancient buildings, so I hope that Byzantium, Venice and Genoa keeps these but Hungary seems a bit strange with these.

I like these ideas. Although, I want to make sure that if they are added, the new barbarians added to the Balkans are not skirmishers! I hate those things!! Also, Austria has to have a very bad relationship with Hungary, since their UHV improves diplomatic relations while they are not even aggressive as is.

On the Vikings issue, I have seen in a game the bersekers razing Paris ;). So it kinda works sometimes, at the moment.
On Eastern Europe, I have done a list of changes, which are ready for uploading to the SVN. Just listing them, to see if they have your approval :)

-Austria starts on negative diplo terms with Hungary, so as to encourage war between the sides
-Austria unit production rate increased, the Hungarian one decreased, so as to increase the possibility Austria wins the above war
-More barbs in North Balkans, to make life difficult for Hungary (and possibly Bulgaria)
-Ragusa flips to Venice, to ensure that Hungary does not control it
-To compensate for this, Byzantine spawn zone extended to the west, so that the founded there cities do not turn indy, and so Venice needs to be more aggressive v Byzantium
-Finally, increased the Ottoman army production rate, in an attempt to see them capturing Istanbul.

These are good ideas (not sure about Ragusa, it should always start independent). I think you could also shrink the size of Hungary's stable zone to help.

Okay, after some compromises, the new changelist is:

-Austria starts on heavily negative diplo terms with Hungary, so as to encourage war between the sides
-Austria unit production rate increased, the Hungarian one decreased, so as to increase the possibility Austria wins the above war
-More barbs in North Balkans (horse archers), to make life difficult for Hungary (and possibly Bulgaria)
-Ragusa flips to Venice, to ensure that Hungary does not control it Changed Hungarian settler map, so as to give more stability throughout Hungary/Transylvania, and less through the Balkans
-An indy city, Apulum (Alba Iulia) added in Transylvania, so it does nor get easily controlled by the Hungarians.
-Byzantine spawn zone extended to the west, so that the founded there cities do not turn indy, and so Venice needs to be more aggressive v Byzantium
-Finally, increased the Ottoman army production rate, in an attempt to see them capturing Istanbul.

Agreed lads?

Spam Double post :(

Okay, after some compromises, the new changelist is:

-Austria starts on heavily negative diplo terms with Hungary, so as to encourage war between the sides
-Austria unit production rate increased, the Hungarian one decreased, so as to increase the possibility Austria wins the above war
-More barbs in North Balkans (horse archers), to make life difficult for Hungary (and possibly Bulgaria)
-Ragusa flips to Venice, to ensure that Hungary does not control it Changed Hungarian settler map, so as to give more stability throughout Hungary/Transylvania, and less through the Balkans
-An indy city, Apulum (Alba Iulia) added in Transylvania, so it does nor get easily controlled by the Hungarians.
-Byzantine spawn zone extended to the west, so that the founded there cities do not turn indy, and so Venice needs to be more aggressive v Byzantium
-Finally, increased the Ottoman army production rate, in an attempt to see them capturing Istanbul.

Agreed lads?
Agreed, except I don't think Hungary should be extra stable in Transylvania, as that region was often a trouble spot for them, even when autonomous.

Sounds fine to me.

The Vikings should be represented by barbs. It's not as if the early-period raids were being coordinated by the home country's monarchy. Later on by all means but in the 790s-860s certainly not.

I wanted to know: why is Germany just called the Kingdom of Germany and not the Holy Roman Empire?

Considering that Germany was a collection of generally quite independent city states, wouldn't several independent cities represent it better? They could be replaced by Scotland :).

Considering that Germany was a collection of generally quite independent city states, wouldn't several independent cities represent it better? They could be replaced by Scotland :).

The HRE was a complex thing, but they certainly weren't 'quite independent' for the most part but bound in a legal web and obligations, and Germany moved in sync on several time periods. Plus if you do split them up you give several states that were rather more relevant on the European stage than Scotland (Saxony, Brandenburg and Bohemia to name but a few).

Sure, but I think Scotland would be better for gameplay then Germany/HRE.

Considering that Germany was a collection of generally quite independent city states, wouldn't several independent cities represent it better? They could be replaced by Scotland :).

:lol:

With dynamic names on the scoreboard turned on, I have seen them being the Holy Roman Empire sometimes.

The HRE was a complex thing, but they certainly weren't 'quite independent' for the most part but bound in a legal web and obligations, and Germany moved in sync on several time periods.

The HRE wasn't Germany. It included areas outside of Germany as well as quite independent regions. Of course we can safely approximate it with Germany though.

Why is Poland's capital Poznan? Shouldn't it be Gniezno?

Great mod, runs incredibly slow though late game due to the massive amounts of units. You guys know any way to speed up?

Kill some units? :p

Great mod, runs incredibly slow though late game due to the massive amounts of units. You guys know any way to speed up?

That is not the main reason. The map is bigger than vanilla-RFC. And we have more civs than the vanilla-RFC. These things are the main reasons which slow down the mod.

Now that Muscovy starts after the Mongol invasion ends, why is the Kremlin their unique building? It gives extra defense, but it is not at all needed because nobody really threatens them. They did, of course, come in handy when the spawned before the Mongols in the older versions, but now the Kremlin is not really needed. I still build them for the extra trade route and espionage, however. So, perhaps we can change the unique building or change the Kremlin's bonuses.

I thought it also helped with city maintenance? Which is very useful to Muscovy with all their cities.

I really like this mod and was playing as Rome on Monarch. However, I found it impossible to achieve the historical goals in the alotted time. you need to control 3 cities in N Africa 3 in Iberia, 3 in France, 3 in Italy, 2 in Germany and 1 in Britain and anything over 5 pop needs barracks, aqueduct and amphitheatre and be connected to palace.

I played like 4 times, and saved as I went to go back and correct mistakes. I had very good luck one time, had a baby boom, and was able to walk in and conquer the cities for Gaul without creating settlers. BUT IT IS STILL IMPOSSIBLE TO ACHIEVE THE GOAL!! Only Rome really needs the buildings for the 2nd part of the goal but I even rushed production to get it under 5 pop. I just can't get all that territory in 143 turns (in effec 56 turns since 87 are done before you start).

I got italy easy, conquered Gaul 3 there easy, sent a settler to britain, settled spain and had a few settlers coming for Germany, and conquered 2 carthaginian cities but the 3rd was auto-razed. So I could not get the 3rd city in N Africa in time and my settlers would not come out in time to settler both spain and germany and britain in time. And seriously, I played flawlessly and had amazing luck.

So, Rhye, some advice here. Is there a mod that will let me play s Rome and even have a chance? even if I went to Prince level I don't see it happening as I won all the battles really.
Or is this game just made to be impossible to get the historical victory goals as Rome. Has anyone been able to do it?

I'm using the mod that came with Beyond the Sword/ Gold Edition.... Am I supposed to download one that has updates? If so where?
Thanks.

This modmod is about Europe in the Medieval times up to the 18th century (The name is indeed Rhye's and Fall Europe, not Rhye's and Fall as the whole world mod did). You should check Rhye's website for guides on how to accomplish the goals: Rhye's strategy Guides Wiki (http://rhye.civfanatics.net/wiki/index.php?title=Strategy_guides#Rhye.27s_and_Fall_ of_Civilization)

I really like this mod and was playing as Rome on Monarch. However, I found it impossible to achieve the historical goals in the alotted time. you need to control 3 cities in N Africa 3 in Iberia, 3 in France, 3 in Italy, 2 in Germany and 1 in Britain and anything over 5 pop needs barracks, aqueduct and amphitheatre and be connected to palace.

I played like 4 times, and saved as I went to go back and correct mistakes. I had very good luck one time, had a baby boom, and was able to walk in and conquer the cities for Gaul without creating settlers. BUT IT IS STILL IMPOSSIBLE TO ACHIEVE THE GOAL!! Only Rome really needs the buildings for the 2nd part of the goal but I even rushed production to get it under 5 pop. I just can't get all that territory in 143 turns (in effec 56 turns since 87 are done before you start).

I got italy easy, conquered Gaul 3 there easy, sent a settler to britain, settled spain and had a few settlers coming for Germany, and conquered 2 carthaginian cities but the 3rd was auto-razed. So I could not get the 3rd city in N Africa in time and my settlers would not come out in time to settler both spain and germany and britain in time. And seriously, I played flawlessly and had amazing luck.

So, Rhye, some advice here. Is there a mod that will let me play s Rome and even have a chance? even if I went to Prince level I don't see it happening as I won all the battles really.
Or is this game just made to be impossible to get the historical victory goals as Rome. Has anyone been able to do it?

I'm using the mod that came with Beyond the Sword/ Gold Edition.... Am I supposed to download one that has updates? If so where?
Thanks.
Nice rant. I will admit it is challenging, but not impossible. If I did it, you can do it. It all begins with an amphibious Praet attack on Carthage right away, followed by taking Athens and Byzantium next. They can build your praets for further conquest, while your other cities build the stuff you need.

You do have the wrong section of the forum however.

And also wrong information. You obviously have to update to the latest version first (install 3.19 and then 1.186), and then make sure you have 3 cities in France, 2 in Spain, 1 in England and 2 in North Africa. It is advised to take Greece too, because their cities are productive and these won't flip to the Europeans.

Hey thanks guys. Ya I realized it was the wrong thread/forum but I just joined this site and there are so many I didn't know where to go.

Why take Greece when that is not part of the objectives and you are pressed for time?
Just for production? Or do they count as part of Germania (guessing no).

Carthage attack makes sense right away. Historically too, I just wanted it to build the cities themselves and I conquered them to save building settlers. And I did build a wonder or two (great wall seemed very useful for 3rd objective).

But you're saying the mod has the city objectives a little easier? That would help. Where do I download the mod? Do you have a link

I'm going to try again.

Hey thanks guys. Ya I realized it was the wrong thread/forum but I just joined this site and there are so many I didn't know where to go.

Why take Greece when that is not part of the objectives and you are pressed for time?
Just for production? Or do they count as part of Germania (guessing no).

Carthage attack makes sense right away. Historically too, I just wanted it to build the cities themselves and I conquered them to save building settlers. And I did build a wonder or two (great wall seemed very useful for 3rd objective).

But you're saying the mod has the city objectives a little easier? That would help. Where do I download the mod? Do you have a link

I'm going to try again.
Greece for production, yes. As I said, build your Praets and wonders in Greece. It doesn't take long, and you then control them for the rest of the game.

Definitely Carthage immediately. 4 Praets in amphibious assault, I usually love 1 of them, but the other 3 are then experienced when you go to Greece, so take City Raider promotions to help against the Phalanx. Make sure to build walls and Spearman in Africa, as Horse Archers, Camel Archers, Elephants abound.

If you can build Great Wall in Athens, do it, but not in your core cities...
Also, you only have to have a total of 5 barracks/amphi/aqueducts, they can be in different cities too, not all the same.
Don't build a city in S. Italy, even though it is tempting and easy.

What do you mean by: "you only have to have a total of 5 barracks/amphi/aqueducts, they can be in different cities too, not all the same"

I thought you only needed all 3 of them in cities that are 5+ population. If you need 5 of each total can you have barracks/amphiteatre/aquedect all in 5 different cities?

is there an updated patch I am not aware of?
Thanks for all help guys.

It may be a patch update... I can't remember. Yes, they can be in different cities.

What do you mean by: "you only have to have a total of 5 barracks/amphi/aqueducts, they can be in different cities too, not all the same"

I thought you only needed all 3 of them in cities that are 5+ population. If you need 5 of each total can you have barracks/amphiteatre/aquedect all in 5 different cities?

is there an updated patch I am not aware of?
Thanks for all help guys.

This is the wrong threat to post these question. Post them in the normal RFC Questions and answers threat, please. (Here) (http://forums.civfanatics.com/showthread.php?t=176755) These threat are for a DIFFERENT MOD that only deals with Europe.

To answer you question, you need 5 of them. It doesn't matter in what city you build it. I think you have an older version, because in the previous version you only needed those buildings in cities that are bigger than 5. You can download the newest version in the "download the latest version" threat in the main RFC page, not RFC ModMods. (Here) (http://forums.civfanatics.com/showthread.php?t=176754)

This is a great mod. I´ve spent hours with it. Fun gameplay and no major bugs. Some text missing.

The only irritating thing about the game concept is when you over expand and get a third of your empire ripped off by a new spawn. First playthrough is often a waste until you understand where not to settle. Can I check in advance where the "pop" areas are?

And the AI is not very aggressive.

This is a great mod. I´ve spent hours with it. Fun gameplay and no major bugs. Some text missing.

The only irritating thing about the game concept is when you over expand and get a third of your empire ripped off by a new spawn. First playthrough is often a waste until you understand where not to settle. Can I check in advance where the "pop" areas are?

And the AI is not very aggressive.

In the RFCE folder their is a folder called "refference". Their you will find all maps. Including spawn maps and UHVmaps.

And the AI is not very aggressive.
Depends on who the AI is... for example, I have had some nations DW on me, and never saw one unit, or maybe a catapult came or something, no stacks...
However, I have seen other nations come with some major force in their attacks!

I think some nations may need a higher build unit ratio though...

Why is Poland's capital Poznan? Shouldn't it be Gniezno?

The previous capital was Warsaw, I suggested "Poznan/Gniezno" (same city in Civ4 terms), with a preference for the first name. There's an ongoing debate among historians on this issue... Gniezno is considered the first official capital, but in more recent publications you'll find Giecz, Poznan, Ostrow Lednicki and a few others mentioned as Polish capitals (seats of dukes/kings) before, alongside and right after Gniezno. Poznan was an older city, the royal seat, the first bishopric and the burial site of kings, it was also the largest regional center and remained as such throughout the ages (briefly becoming the capital once again in 13th c.), unlike Gniezno, whose importance ceased after less than a century.

The previous capital was Warsaw, I suggested "Poznan/Gniezno" (same city in Civ4 terms), with a preference for the first name. There's an ongoing debate among historians on this issue... Gniezno is considered the first official capital, but in more recent publications you'll find Giecz, Poznan, Ostrow Lednicki and a few others mentioned as Polish capitals (seats of dukes/kings) before, alongside and right after Gniezno. Poznan was an older city, the royal seat, the first bishopric and the burial site of kings, it was also the largest regional center and remained as such throughout the ages (briefly becoming the capital once again in 13th c.), unlike Gniezno, whose importance ceased after less than a century.

Moving the capital to Poznan works for me, my only question is why are there no resources at Poznan? Seems strange that a people would settle their oldest city near no great resource. Perhaps a food or two?

Moving the capital to Poznan works for me, my only question is why are there no resources at Poznan? Seems strange that a people would settle their oldest city near no great resource. Perhaps a food or two?

There were too many previously, making health and happiness trivial, so sedna removed a lot of them - it's true that Poland got hit a bit too hard though. Greater Poland / Poznan could use some pigs/wheat/horses.

Yeah, after playing a few games as Western civs (Portugal, Genoa, France and England) where food and resources where balanced, Poland's lack of resources and good city spots is troubling. Especially since one of the HVC is based on population.

I know you're not adding any more civs to the game now, but it would be really cool if you added 5-10 more but kept a max limit on how many civs could be in the game at any one time. Might be something to consider once the more important things have been sorted out and the game is in beta/final version. Something like what Baldyr wants to do for vanilla RFC. That way we could have a much more fluid game with a much higher level of replayability.

If you guys don't want to do it it would make a killer modmod.

I know you're not adding any more civs to the game now, but it would be really cool if you added 5-10 more but kept a max limit on how many civs could be in the game at any one time. Might be something to consider once the more important things have been sorted out and the game is in beta/final version. Something like what Baldyr wants to do for vanilla RFC. That way we could have a much more fluid game with a much higher level of replayability.

If you guys don't want to do it it would make a killer modmod.

I agree this would make a great modmod. We might be able to help someone who wanted to take up this challenge. We are not going to do it ourselves.

I dunno if you'll change this but Kiev should later rename to Ukrain. Kiev is the capital of modern day Ukrain

I would eventually guess it already does whit Dynamic City Names with the right civics and size. I would guess it is the same as with the Germans, who only if they have a certain civic (I guess) and have enough cities will be the Holy Roman Empire.

I dunno if you'll change this but Kiev should later rename to Ukrain. Kiev is the capital of modern day Ukrain

The mod does not go as far, but it could rename to Tartar Khanate, Zaporozhia Khanate or something like that.

Hey, I was just wondering if you refuse to turn over cities to new civs when they start up and you go to war with them how many times do you have destroy them before they are completely destroyed? For instance I wipe out all their units but the next turn some of mine join their liberation. Does this continue forever? a set amount of turns? Is it just better to give them the cities? (one had a few wonders I didn't want to lose which is why I was reluctant).

Also @ ondreamer " Lastly, 500-900 is what is commonly referred to as the Dark Ages, meaning we know very little about this period." Just an FYI, the term Dark Ages is now obsolete. True there are less recordswritings (but the romans were excellent in preserving these, hard standard to maintain) but most historians no longer use this term as it has been discovered there were significant technological advancements (invention of the stirrup among other things) during this period. Hence, they claim they were not so dark since there was still advancement.

Hi,
Just wondering when we can expect to see Alpha 12, or at least how close you guys are to finishing the next version.
Really excited for the new changes:)

Hi,
Just wondering when we can expect to see Alpha 12, or at least how close you guys are to finishing the next version.
Really excited for the new changes:)

I expect the next version this week. Their aren't many changes, but the changes are very big. (like dynamic leaderheads)

oh nice, dynamic leader heads are always cool, could you explain a bit more about how your going to implement them, and for who?

Almost everyone. Most civs will have 2 guys, some one, and Frankia 3.

Also @ ondreamer " Lastly, 500-900 is what is commonly referred to as the Dark Ages, meaning we know very little about this period." Just an FYI, the term Dark Ages is now obsolete. True there are less recordswritings (but the romans were excellent in preserving these, hard standard to maintain) but most historians no longer use this term as it has been discovered there were significant technological advancements (invention of the stirrup among other things) during this period. Hence, they claim they were not so dark since there was still advancement.

Funny, because this puts the term 'Middle Ages' under consideration as well.

oh nice, dynamic leader heads are always cool, could you explain a bit more about how your going to implement them, and for who?

Sedna included this. But if I'm right, it works the same as vanilla RFC. (leaderheads swaps in a specific year. Almost all civs have 2 or 3 leaderheads.

Where I can find updated list of civs? Because I think that the one in the first post isn't the best :)

Where I can find updated list of civs? Because I think that the one in the first post isn't the best :)

In the civilopedia of the Mod.;)

I've been playing this mod for few months, and i must say two things. First of all, You've done massive work already, and it's really great. Thank You :goodjob: .

But there are some points that are really spoiling the gameplay.

1. I miss the Frankish Empire from before 843. I think that franks should be much more expansive at the beginning of the game, and after that split into three states, that are now spawning in western europe out from nowhere. Similar to Rome and european civs in original RFC. Or Germany and Burgundy separating from western France in 843..? But things as they are now, when Germany comes out from nowhere in the middle of the forest is just.. weird and drastically unhistroical.

2. This leads to another problem - dynamics. The game is loong and slow, and there isn't much going on. Im building cities, some units, builidings.. boom! black death! and i repeat everything from the beginning. Little time for invading neighbours. Moreover, usually they don't even attack me, even if they declare war, probably beacause of stabillity maps. What i get is pacifistic verson of medieval history.. pretty silly :P . I think that some of the stab maps should cover each other, e.g. Engliand-France, Germany-Poland (where is famous Drang nach Osten?), etc., and a.i. should be far more aggressive. Mb also some profits from conquest? E.g. happiness from decreasing overpopulation (this problem was one of the main causes of crusades).

3. I would probably get exiled from my country if i didn't touch that point, so here it is :king: . I'm glad You've moved Poland's capital to Poznan, but there are still some issues. The state has adopted christianity in 966 and it's symbolical date of beginning of our history. But in game i'm starting few turns after, and without missionary. As i understand it, You're trying to randomize religions on the continent. Very well, but then Poland should begin game few turns earlier, or religions should spread much quicker, because i usually get myself bapitised around year 1050 when playing that civ. Another thing is stability map. Poland NEVER colonised eastern prussia (Konigsberg etc) before 1945 (sic!). At best case, that region was our vassal (Teuteonic Knights, later Prussia).We rather expanded to south-east than north-east ( http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Polska_1333_-_1370.png ). Next problem is unique power. It reads it gives civ bunus to science... which is weird, neither it seems to work, nor is historically correct. I think e.g. stability bonus during revolutions would be more adequate ( http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Confederatio see before 17th century). Speaking of science, it's terrily backward, way too backward IMO, even with human player it's hard to remain relatively near the others in tech race. The result is that Poland led by a.i. is almost always last, even in it's historical "golden age", XV century. Last but not least, polish UHV. All of them are, sorry to say that, nonsence. Population of Poland has never been big, even when the country was very big, so i think that idea of connection to both baltic and black seas in certain year UHV suits it better. Important thing for polish economy was massive wheat export in XVI and XVII century (it enabled growth of cities in western europe, while led Poland do wealth and... backwardness), so i think that controlling much food res (or most) in that period would be fine idea (far better than never-loose-a-city thing, irrelevant to anything i ever learned). Concerning religius tolerance in XV-XVII century period, IMO building x number of y different religions buildings could also be more historically correct than faith points thing.

I hope You'd take this as constructive criticism, not crazy nacionalist attack ;) I really apprieciate your work :) . Unforunately, i won't have much time to play the new beta during next two weeks, so i won't get new ideas... probably :scan: .

The UHV's are designed with two for each civ being actual historical accomplishments, and one being a "what-if". So getting a UHV means running the civ "better" than history. In Polands case the "never lose a city" refers to holding off the Swedes and Russians (better than history) during the 17th century.

I must agree, however, that Poland seems to be way backward techwise.

I've been playing this mod for few months, and i must say two things. First of all, You've done massive work already, and it's really great. Thank You :goodjob: .
But there are some points that are really spoiling the gameplay.

1. I miss the Frankish Empire from before 843. I think that franks should be much more expansive at the beginning of the game, and after that split into three states, that are now spawning in western europe out from nowhere. Similar to Rome and european civs in original RFC. Or Germany and Burgundy separating from western France in 843..? But things as they are now, when Germany comes out from nowhere in the middle of the forest is just.. weird and drastically unhistroical.

2. This leads to another problem - dynamics. The game is loong and slow, and there isn't much going on. Im building cities, some units, builidings.. boom! black death! and i repeat everything from the beginning. Little time for invading neighbours. Moreover, usually they don't even attack me, even if they declare war, probably beacause of stabillity maps. What i get is pacifistic verson of medieval history.. pretty silly :P . I think that some of the stab maps should cover each other, e.g. Engliand-France, Germany-Poland (where is famous Drang nach Osten?), etc., and a.i. should be far more aggressive. Mb also some profits from conquest? E.g. happiness from decreasing overpopulation (this problem was one of the main causes of crusades).

3. I would probably get exiled from my country if i didn't touch that point, so here it is :king: . I'm glad You've moved Poland's capital to Poznan, but there are still some issues. The state has adopted christianity in 966 and it's symbolical date of beginning of our history. But in game i'm starting few turns after, and without missionary. As i understand it, You're trying to randomize religions on the continent. Very well, but then Poland should begin game few turns earlier, or religions should spread much quicker, because i usually get myself bapitised around year 1050 when playing that civ. Another thing is stability map. Poland NEVER colonised eastern prussia (Konigsberg etc) before 1945 (sic!). At best case, that region was our vassal (Teuteonic Knights, later Prussia).We rather expanded to south-east than north-east ( http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Polska_1333_-_1370.png ). Next problem is unique power. It reads it gives civ bunus to science... which is weird, neither it seems to work, nor is historically correct. I think e.g. stability bonus during revolutions would be more adequate ( http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Confederatio see before 17th century). Speaking of science, it's terrily backward, way too backward IMO, even with human player it's hard to remain relatively near the others in tech race. The result is that Poland led by a.i. is almost always last, even in it's historical "golden age", XV century. Last but not least, polish UHV. All of them are, sorry to say that, nonsence. Population of Poland has never been big, even when the country was very big, so i think that idea of connection to both baltic and black seas in certain year UHV suits it better. Important thing for polish economy was massive wheat export in XVI and XVII century (it enabled growth of cities in western europe, while led Poland do wealth and... backwardness), so i think that controlling much food res (or most) in that period would be fine idea (far better than never-loose-a-city thing, irrelevant to anything i ever learned). Concerning religius tolerance in XV-XVII century period, IMO building x number of y different religions buildings could also be more historically correct than faith points thing.

I hope You'd take this as constructive criticism, not crazy nacionalist attack ;) I really apprieciate your work :) . Unforunately, i won't have much time to play the new beta during next two weeks, so i won't get new ideas... probably :scan: .

First of all, I would like you to ask to put more room between your points. That makes in more clarifying. No offend, just an advice.

1. We can't split the empire into other civs, just because we don't have any civs their. (Only Burgundy, but that one already spawns in 840 AD) We also won't include more civs, because we already have more than vanilla RFC and that makes the game too slow.
BTW, it would totally ruin the gameplay if you know that your empire will collapse in 840, no matter how stable you are.

2. I agree, the game is too pacifistic. We are working on that.

3. If it was a vassal state, I don't think that controlling it isn't so unhistorical. Their is no civ that could be your vassal.
If Poland IRL "spawn" in 966, we should make them spawn them in 966. It is just 1 turn earlier.
As for the UHV, we had some of those UHV you're proposing. But to make more variation in the game, we changed that. The game would be boring if almost all civs had the UHV: have 8 monasteries and 2 Cathedrals in X AD.

It would be fine to just have France start several turns earlier and for the AI to settle Burgundy and Germany (one city in each would be sufficient representation). Eventually Burgundy would spawn and flip one of those towns, and Germany would spawn and flip the other. Basically what happens in RFC with the Romans.

It would be fine to just have France start several turns earlier and for the AI to settle Burgundy and Germany (one city in each would be sufficient representation). Eventually Burgundy would spawn and flip one of those towns, and Germany would spawn and flip the other. Basically what happens in RFC with the Romans.

Only 1 tiny problem. France can't start in turn -10.

Well there's probably enough time as it is now that Burgundy's spawn date is later.

If pedia is correct I also have some remarks:
1. UP- Poland wasn't very technologically advanced. I think that some power related to religious tolerance is more appropriate (we had great minorities due to immigration from countries "less tolerant") so maybe no penalties for having non-state religions in cities and higher spread rate in Poland?
2. Stability map- if there is no Lithuania I think that Poland should get whole area of Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth (http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/d/df/Polish-Lithuanian_Commonwealth_1635.png) as core (not spawning though).
2a. Stability maps should include all held by the civilization (western Poland should be in German stability map, whole Poland in Russian, and Moscow in Polish :) )
3. UHV- a) largest by population? If so it's a nonsense. It could be something like largest by territory or controlling Moscow
b) not losing city to Germany or Russia. I think that 1st condition should refer to Russia so 2nd should refer to Germany and Swedes.
c) I don't know why Poland should build religious buildings (I think it's too easy too [after the first condition]). Maybe controlling most wheat/food resources? Having the biggest army (soldiers in demographics not units) [Poland never had a big army because of nobles resistance]?
4. UB- why not Sejmik from Polish mod?
5. If first post is correct and Poland starts as Lechia then it should start earlier. If it starts in 970 as Poland it should start with a missionary to immediately convert to Christianity.

If pedia is correct I also have some remarks:
1. UP- Poland wasn't very technologically advanced. I think that some power related to religious tolerance is more appropriate (we had great minorities due to immigration from countries "less tolerant") so maybe no penalties for having non-state religions in cities and higher spread rate in Poland?
3. UHV- a) largest by population? If so it's a nonsense. It could be something like largest by territory or controlling Moscow
b) not losing city to Germany or Russia. I think that 1st condition should refer to Russia so 2nd should refer to Germany and Swedes.
c) I don't know why Poland should build religious buildings (I think it's too easy too [after the first condition]). Maybe controlling most wheat/food resources? Having the biggest army (soldiers in demographics not units) [Poland never had a big army because of nobles resistance]?
4. UB- why not Sejmik from Polish mod?
5. If first post is correct and Poland starts as Lechia then it should start earlier. If it starts in 970 as Poland it should start with a missionary to immediately convert to Christianity.

1. Hungary has that UP. So we can't use that anymore.
3. I think you are playing an older version. The current UHVs are:
1. Largest in population in 1540.
2. Do not lose a city. (to anyone, not only those 2 civs)
3. Be the catholic civ with the most faith points. (So no religious buildings.
Although, that is the easiest way to get them)
4. IMO the Folwark fits well.
5. It starts at Poznan. (which needs more resources) And I hope you mean a catholicism instead of christany.

The UHV's are designed with two for each civ being actual historical accomplishments, and one being a "what-if". So getting a UHV means running the civ "better" than history. In Polands case the "never lose a city" refers to holding off the Swedes and Russians (better than history) during the 17th century.

Then we have three "what-if" UHV's.

a) Population, especially when in this game it's based on cities population is fictional. Commonwealth has always been country with economy based on countryside, not cities and towns. The only relatively big city was Gdansk-Danzig in that period.

b) Never lose a city.. i get your point, but i think is too easy in that game, and WAY to unrealistic for any civ in middle ages.

c) Faith points... it's hard to claim that country where not even half of society was catholic was even close to, let's say, Spain in that period. Era of strong catholicism in polish culture begun under russian occupation in XIX century.

If it was a vassal state, I don't think that controlling it isn't so unhistorical. Their is no civ that could be your vassal.
If Poland IRL "spawn" in 966, we should make them spawn them in 966. It is just 1 turn earlier.
As for the UHV, we had some of those UHV you're proposing. But to make more variation in the game, we changed that. The game would be boring if almost all civs had the UHV: have 8 monasteries and 2 Cathedrals in X AD.

That "vassal state" has been vassalized in XVI c, after really long wars. After that, it was very unfaithful "vassal", and huge problem for us;). But the real issue is stability map. Also, I don't agree with LuKo, who says that whole area of Commonwealth should be within it (the state was, in fact, too big and ustable:rolleyes:). But i think that map should be moved more south-east (towards Lvov ), not north-east (towards Vilnus or Smolensk) - see the map i posted. Or check map of Poland itself just before union with Lithuania.

The year of spawn (1 turn, oh well) is not a problem, the problem is date of adopting christianity (in any form - about 100 years);).

I've written something about UHV's in this post. What i mean about buildings was not just cathedras, but also e.g. jewish quarters and orthodox churches... it would create necessity of spreading non-state religions within your country, i don't think any other civ has such UHV (mb i skipped sth though).

3. UHV- a) largest by population? If so it's a nonsense. It could be something like largest by territory or controlling Moscow
b) not losing city to Germany or Russia. I think that 1st condition should refer to Russia so 2nd should refer to Germany and Swedes.
c) I don't know why Poland should build religious buildings (I think it's too easy too [after the first condition]). Maybe controlling most wheat/food resources? Having the biggest army (soldiers in demographics not units) [Poland never had a big army because of nobles resistance]?

3. I think you are playing an older version. The current UHVs are:
1. Largest in population in 1540.
2. Do not lose a city. (to anyone, not only those 2 civs)
3. Be the catholic civ with the most faith points. (So no religious buildings.
Although, that is the easiest way to get them)

I think i'm missing something. :scan:

About my former 1. point.. i agree with Ekolite, Rome was able to survive spawning of Spain, France and Germany, and even beat/vassalize them after few turns. In fact, France had some problems with stability before XII-XIII century ;) . Mb. some expansion boost for France in early game and larger spawn area.. i understand that that changing french UHV's to something like "control spawn area of Burgundy and Germany just before they spawn" is not an option? All in all, missing "little" issue with Charlemagne's empire is huge mistake IMO :confused: .

1. Hungary has that UP. So we can't use that anymore.
3. I think you are playing an older version. The current UHVs are:
1. Largest in population in 1540.
2. Do not lose a city. (to anyone, not only those 2 civs)
3. Be the catholic civ with the most faith points. (So no religious buildings.
Although, that is the easiest way to get them)
4. IMO the Folwark fits well.
5. It starts at Poznan. (which needs more resources) And I hope you mean a catholicism instead of christany.

I'm still not playing because when I have some time I play RFC MP :) My post was based on: http://rhye.civfanatics.net/wiki/index.php?title=Rhye%27s_and_Fall_of_Civilization: _Europe_civilizations which is outdated.
1. I didn't know that Hungarian UP is about religions. IMHO it fits better with Poland (Hungarian should be more "special"- it's quite unique to be very powerful civ surrounded completely by other ethnic group.
3. b) My bad
a and c) It's rather "generic" mission than real Polish "ambition"
4. Folwark is specific to every civ east of Elbe river and Sejmik is Polish.
5. I didn't mean capital but if Poland starts as a tribe (Lechia) or state (Poland). If the first option is correct Poland should start earlier and if second one it should start with a missionary (to convert to Catholicism) on the turn 1 and monarchy (whatever it's called) at 2nd.

Okay, we have several people talking about Poland. Let's see if we can put some of it together.

The current Unique Power (+science %/+1 happy) is not good, we can all agree on that. I have heard two main suggestions:

(1) Give Poland the "Religious Tolerance" UP and find something else for Hungary.
(2) Give Poland a UP like no stability hit from revolution/anarchy. I like this idea because it really have unique gameplay implications -- in RFC more than other versions of Civ you have to be really careful not to switch civics too much. With this UP you could more easily go through several civic changes.

As for the current Unique Historical Victories, I think they rank like this:
1) Have the most population -- A bit inaccurate but sort of captures the feel of having a large agricultural land anyway, so not terrible.
2) Don't lose a city -- Never an inspired UHV, a good human player rarely loses a city.
3) Have most Faith Points -- Not terrible, but perhaps not the most appropriate for Poland. Also, this goal is hard to know how you are doing. Nowhere can you see how many faith points other civs have. This is true for some other UHVs too, but I consider it less than ideal.

Suggested replacements have been:

1) A goal relating to grain/wheat/food production. We already have plenty of UHVs about having XX number of resources, so I would favor something like "Have the highest food production" or "Have at least XX food production". This is a nice goal because you can see relative food production in the score graph/demographics screen so you can actually see how you're doing. Achieving the highest food production could be hard though -- Byzantium/Ottomans/Moscow tend to dominate this due to sheer land area -- which is why I suggest a specific numerical goal. On the demographics screen you can see how many million bushels of food you produce. This is just the number of :food: in all your cities. A few test games could see what a challenging target for a given date would be.

2) A control the Baltic to Black Sea goal. A fine goal, and one which brings a bit more conflict to the Polish game. We have a lot of territory based goals, but that's because they're fun for people who like to fight.

3) Another religion-based goal, perhaps one emphasizing religious diversity -- i.e. requiring buildings from multiple different religions. This would work nicely in connection with a religious tolerance UHV.

Thoughts?

Your proposed 1 would be interesting for replacing current 1. For UHV 2, I would go for something territorially challenging: Recreating the Jagiellon Realm (http://www.biocrawler.com/w/images/e/e9/Jagiellon_Realm.png), which is the area Poland controlled by royal marriage means circa 1500 AD. Finally, 3 could be more stability-oriented, which will be challenging, given the territory required to control form 2, and a good ahistorical could-be, given the internal problems the naughty Pole aristocracy always caused to central rule.
I agree on the religious tolerance UP.

I think the religious tolerance UP should be moved to Poland. I don't know much about Hungary, but from what I've heard Poland was one of the most tolerant places in Christian Europe, and its Jewish community was relatively big and influential.
The 3rd UHV should definitely be changed, to me it sounds a-historical that in order to pursue this UHV I must eradicate Judaism from my lands, which fits Spain much more (and with them I really enjoy purging Iberia of all heathen religions).