Out of date :)

See HERE (http://forums.civfanatics.com/showthread.php?t=254792) ;)

good news:goodjob:
downloading right now...

Yes!!!!!!!:D

Finally, thanks for all the work!

Waterloo

Is there a chance that you could load a file that will replace the animated leaderheads with static ones?

Animated LHs download is ready!
(see post #1)

Enjoy it!
:)

Is there a chance that you could load a file that will replace the animated leaderheads with static ones?

Static LHs are the default LHs. Animated LHs are an optional download.

You can turn back (or switching between LH types) replacing the file:

Firaxis Games\Sid Meier's Civilization 4\Mods\The Ancient Mediterranean\Assets\XML\Art\CIV4ArtDefines_Leader head.xml

You may re-extract it from 7z archives as single file, or save a copy during the installation process
;)

hi bro, glad to see a bit of my work here :)

btw: what does TAM stand for ?

what does TAM stand for ?

The Ancient Mediterranean mod

http://www.jan.vandercrabben.name/tam/

:)

oh ok. and you work at planet civilization too right?

No, I don't :confused:

sorry i had seen the 'van der crabben' name somewhere else then :)

Van der Crabben is Thamis, the mod creator since Civ3.

Yes, I also do Planet Civilization, and I'm a game designer for Empire: Total War. I'm no longer very actively involved with TAM, though... For now.

oh hi

was just curious! good to see you :)

subscribed and downloading :)

I'm glad for the animated LHs, as the old ones are a little icky.


EDIT: So where to submit bug / playtest reports?


noted:

Pedia is not clear that lumbermill is for Timber resource, and not just any woods.
(why not allow lumbermills to go anywhere, if the main benefit would be +1 commerce on
a river-side forest? Sounds reasonable for an terrain improvement to me).
Woodworking pedia has a typo, a "_".
Faces for happy, angry, sick in the city view look a little primitive, especially given the
improvements in other areas.

Bug reports are welcome here. :)

1) Pedia is not clear that lumbermill is for Timber resource, and not just any woods.
2) (why not allow lumbermills to go anywhere, if the main benefit would be +1 commerce on a river-side forest? Sounds reasonable for an terrain improvement to me).
3) Woodworking pedia has a typo, a "_".
4) Faces for happy, angry, sick in the city view look a little primitive, especially given the improvements in other areas.

Hurra to the first feedback! :goodjob:

We'll fix 1) and 3) in next XML patch.
As note, Lumbermill is for timber AND amber resources

2) We'll evaluate your suggestion

4) Graphic improvement will be in TAM-BTS

I'm at 740BC as Iberia in a Standard,Normal,Noble game.

I like the trend in the changes to the tech tree and buildings so far, particularly the tavern and harbour. I always did think the tavern's artist was too powerful and the harbour too weak. I'm not sure about Republic and Empire being the only governments that allow foreign trade routes - or have I missed something?

I haven't noticed any bugs yet, except no civilopedea description for Minoans.

My biremes have just reached the far end of The Med and I am curious about AI tech research. Only Egypt is ahead of me, Greece is comparable, Dacia close and Gaul doesn't even have Tools or The Wheel yet. Is this just the effect of harbour trade routes or have you introduced some other bias?

Keep up the excellent work.

I'm at 740BC as Iberia in a Standard,Normal,Noble game.

a) I'm not sure about Republic and Empire being the only governments that allow foreign trade routes - or have I missed something?

b) Gaul doesn't even have Tools or The Wheel yet.

Useful and detailed feedback, thanks.

a) You didn't miss anything. It's a WAD to do Rep/Emp civics more appeal

b) No intentional bias here. Sometimes civs go well, sometimes wrong. Pheraps a quick German or Barbaric expansion limited Gaul's start. Look at Gauls performance in our next games! :)

Did you conquer Tartesso in the early start? Palace +25% defence bonus was introduced to avoid easy and quick initial conquer of rival neighbour civs. It may become a 50% or be removed at all, depending on feedback. (although Iberian slinger is a power unit at the beginning)

Do any AI civs choose Organized religion civic/(any)Religion or stay with a cult in your game?

Did you conquer Tartesso in the early start? Palace +25% defence bonus was introduced to avoid easy and quick initial conquer of rival neighbour civs. It may become a 50% or be removed at all, depending on feedback. (although Iberian slinger is a power unit at the beginning)

Do any AI civs choose Organized religion civic/(any)Religion or stay with a cult in your game?

I tend to favour economic expansion of military agression during the early part of a game. I didn't attack Tartesso. Instead I quickly spread east and west and cut Tartesso off from the rest of Iberia and they still only have two cities to my six.

Iberia is the only civ with Alphabet of the 13 I've met so far so I can't answer youe second question yet.

I dislike the new religious civics. I don't see any reason to switch out of Cult of the Sea once you get Fishing. The lack of state religions also makes the diplomacy side of the game extremely boring. Wars are rarer than normal and diplo wins are easy.

The pop-up when new religious civics are available says they give +20% but everything else says 15%.

I dislike the changes with the wonders. Although I don't know if it's because they're different or they're poor ideas. I'll think about it some more.

1) I dislike the new religious civics. I don't see any reason to switch out of Cult of the Sea once you get Fishing. The lack of state religions also makes the diplomacy side of the game extremely boring. Wars are rarer than normal and diplo wins are easy.

2) The pop-up when new religious civics are available says they give +20% but everything else says 15%.

3) I dislike the changes with the wonders. Although I don't know if it's because they're different or they're poor ideas. I'll think about it some more.

1) There are reasons to switch out of Cult of the Sea, depending on Civs and resources. Cult of War prepares a better army, cult of fire boosts wonder/building production. I frequently switch cult. Cult of Sun seems a bit lower the others.
Diplo wins aren't easy at all. I never reach them.
The lack of state religions is under investigation. Next xml patch will fix it.

2) Tips, Pedia and whatever text will be fix in the final release

3) I think because they're different. Now wonders follow their historical timeline:
BUILDING Year
BUILDING_STONEHENGE -2500
BUILDING_PYRAMID -2500
BUILDING_SPHINX -2500
BUILDING_DODONA_ORACLE -2000
BUILDING_GREAT_ZIGGURAT -1200
BUILDING_ORACLE -1000
BUILDING_HEROIC_EPIC -800
BUILDING_NATIONAL_EPIC -750
BUILDING_HANGING_GARDEN -600
BUILDING_KROISOS_RICHES -550
BUILDING_AGORA -500
BUILDING_CIRCUS_MAXIMUS -500
BUILDING_ARTEMIS_TEMPLE -450
BUILDING_PARTHENON (Zeus) -433
BUILDING_HYPOCRAT_OATH -430
BUILDING_PLATO_ACADEMY -400
BUILDING_MAUSOLOS -350
BUILDING_ARISTO_THEATRE -350
BUILDING_COLOSSUS -300
BUILDING_GREAT_LIBRARY -300
BUILDING_GREAT_LIGHTHOUSE -280
BUILDING_GENIUS_ARCHIMEDES-250
BUILDING_ILLYRIAN_CITADEL -250
BUILDING_GOLGATHA 30
BUILDING_HADRIAN_WALL 130
BUILDING_HOLY_EMPIRE beyond 550

About effects, main goal was to reduce massive culture and GP spread in mid-late game. The seven (historical) ancient wonders are more valuable now.

After completing 1 game fully (as Egypt) and playing the 2nd around 200 AC (as Rome), both huge map, at this point different points were difficult or clearly nice :
- more "round" graphics, nice
- nice new ressource (salt), nice not to have +2 hammers from hills, but it weakens productive trait
- watermill stays too powerful imo (unchanged from previous version)
- religion : clearly a problem without the ability to build temples without organized or divination, so cultural victory becomes very hard, happiness not easy to manage, strange relationships between nations. With that, cultural trait loose a lot of its interest.
The strenght of founding every religion becomes too strong, cultural victry seems very far. I'll try to manage with monarch, but seems very very difficult without +50% from religious great temples.
- the IA comes very late to seafaring, so sea domination is too easy if the humain player is not technologically backwarded
- ia still builds far too much horse archers/chariots, very weak defensively. Mounted javelineer/war chariot underestimated by IA (except hittite).
- tons of unused siege towers and rams are kiling IA economy

1) - watermill stays too powerful imo (unchanged from previous version)

2) - religion : clearly a problem without the ability to build temples without organized or divination, so cultural victory becomes very hard, happiness not easy to manage, strange relationships between nations. With that, cultural trait loose a lot of its interest.
The strenght of founding every religion becomes too strong, cultural victry seems very far. I'll try to manage with monarch, but seems very very difficult without +50% from religious great temples.

3) - the IA comes very late to seafaring, so sea domination is too easy if the humain player is not technologically backwarded
- ia still builds far too much horse archers/chariots, very weak defensively. Mounted javelineer/war chariot underestimated by IA (except hittite).
- tons of unused siege towers and rams are kiling IA economy

1) Yes, I agree. It should be weakened or it should appear a bit later

2) All religious civic/building issues will be fixed in the next XML patch

3) AI military and tech management is the same from previous versions. We'll try to improve it as well, following your feedback.

Thanks ;)

I still find Babylon's UU overpowering. You should get rid of the +15 city attack bonus.

Started a fresh game as Arminius (germans).
This start on the normal med map makes me think they need to be able to do something with all that darn forest. But short of some kind of woodsman hut / camp anywhere tile improvement, i thought about chopping it, and then had to wonder why that pottery (a perfectly reasonable requirement for Copper Work) was moved to require such advanced research into farming technology? I'm thinking it'd make much more sense to put it back after The Wheel, as in the vanilla game. Pottery should just require a river bank and some skill, no? The Wheel should be enough of a requirement, not Flax and farming.


EDIT: to be continued


Continued: Well Rome is a freaking tough opponent in the med for Germany, but a nice challenge. Trying to get a foothold in the Southern Alps felt like real history! :lol: Not much to note other than it'd be appreciated if the northern border of the med normal map was two more rows tall.

Seems to be very difficult to generate culture other than through holy sites, especially if your civ gets stuck in war and tactical research.
I'll have to check out all the options, but I had little chance to both wage war against Rome and try for a culture war against the neighbors.

I like the 'Religious" civics. They have a nice customizable trait feel to them and add some "national religion" feel that I like. Much better than just a +1 happy, +1 culture religion. Also cool that Despotism isn't the worst government trait in the game.

The Hanging Gardens might be a little overpowered in this new release, especially when compared to other not quite as valuable wonders...

I still find Babylon's UU overpowering. You should get rid of the +15 city attack bonus.

Babylon was a powerful civ in the ancient era. When you reach copper working, spearmans get rid of its archer's UU

The Hanging Gardens might be a little overpowered in this new release, especially when compared to other not quite as valuable wonders...

The seven ancient wonders should be the better wonders. HG are a powerful wonder, but it's not alone :)

1) why pottery (a perfectly reasonable requirement for Copper Work) was moved to require such advanced research into farming technology?

2) it'd be appreciated if the northern border of the med normal map was two more rows tall.

3) Seems to be very difficult to generate culture other than through holy sites, especially if your civ gets stuck in war and tactical research.
I'll have to check out all the options, but I had little chance to both wage war against Rome and try for a culture war against the neighbors.


Thanks for your valuable feedback ;)

1) Pottery stays where it was in the previous TAM releases. It didn't move itself on techtree. It stays on the path toward copper-working, although it could be moved as you suggested. We'll think on it.

2) People skilled enough to modify (or to create new) scenario maps are welcome. Now we are focused on gameplay tuning.

3) Life is cruel... :)
More seriously, TAM would be a thought, fun and challenging mod. Real wars require a tremendous effort; civs at war shouldn't have many resources to go easy for culture and knowledge

Yet 2 games terminated (gave up on third one with Darius, crashing every 5mn...). 1 time and 1 diplo victory. A few more feedbacks :

Good points :
- cities need a lot of building as to develop, not allowing very specialized city. Seems more realistic to me. Nice point.
- imperial roads, needs tech + building improvement, good point.

Questions :
- why many leaders have been weakened (1 trait instead of 2) like Kroisos, Darius, Nubian, Hiram, Hittite... ? Only few leaders have 2 (cesar, hammurabi, hatshespout and agamemnon)
- why some civ are not present on huge map ? teuta, tartessos, kroisos for instance. It makes few competition for hittites and rome, making them easily strong.

Improvable things :
- fire catapult is too strong imo (it was yet before) with +100% attacking cities. they crush very easily spearmen even without "softening" them before. overpowered.
- with a map with so much land, 51% land possession for domination victory is very high. diplomatic victory is reachable with 60%+ of the world population, but domination seems close to impossible
- starting point + weak neighbors + 2 leader trait + military trait + nice UU makes Cesar very very strong. Not such a threat when managed by the IA, but too strong imo when managed by a human player
- most IA build too much useless units, weakening their economy. Was the same in 1.97 and before.
- barbarians stay clearly far away in tech, having nearly no evolution through the game. should be more challenging with stronger units in the mid-late game, or even mounted units

@GoodGame : for culture point, the best solution is to build wonders like stonehedge or the one that gives burial mound to each city. it helps alot.

Only a few leaders have two traits, and that is the civilized nations. All "barbarians" have only one trait. Rome has three to give it a boost.

Patch #1 uploaded successfully!

See post #1 to download ;)

I dislike the new religious civics. I don't see any reason to switch out of Cult of the Sea once you get Fishing. The lack of state religions also makes the diplomacy side of the game extremely boring. Wars are rarer than normal and diplo wins are easy.

The pop-up when new religious civics are available says they give +20% but everything else says 15%.

I dislike the changes with the wonders. Although I don't know if it's because they're different or they're poor ideas. I'll think about it some more.

I wrote the new civics, but the religious ones weren't intended to work this way. For some reason they were implemented thinking that cults of particular Gods are not part of a religion. Instead they should require a state religion and there shouldn't be any organized religion civic :crazyeye:

I don't find the Cult of the Sun or the Cult of Fire very tempting. Cult of War provides land unit experience - something that can't be got otherwise until Urbanisation or Epics. Although you can get Cult of Fire quickly, it takes a while to get cities big enough to benefit and then only locally. The income from Cult of the Sea grows faster and helps with research and maintenance, which seems more important as hammers are more common than coins on land plots.

How about having Cult of Fire increase worker productivity, or allow idle workers in cities to add hammers (but not when building units)? Perhaps the Cult of the Sun could add happiness to cities based on food available?

@Dyerbods
Useful feedback, thanks.
Is your report first or after patch #1?
Cults tuning is a complex issue because we should find a balanced setup between start-mid-late game.
Patch #1 re-tunes cult effects, also resolving all previous cult/state religion issues.

3) I think because they're different. Now wonders follow their historical timeline:
BUILDING Year
BUILDING_STONEHENGE -2500
BUILDING_PYRAMID -2500
BUILDING_SPHINX -2500
BUILDING_DODONA_ORACLE -2000
BUILDING_GREAT_ZIGGURAT -1200
BUILDING_ORACLE -1000
BUILDING_HEROIC_EPIC -800
BUILDING_NATIONAL_EPIC -750
BUILDING_HANGING_GARDEN -600
BUILDING_KROISOS_RICHES -550
BUILDING_AGORA -500
BUILDING_CIRCUS_MAXIMUS -500
BUILDING_ARTEMIS_TEMPLE -450
BUILDING_PARTHENON (Zeus) -433
BUILDING_HYPOCRAT_OATH -430
BUILDING_PLATO_ACADEMY -400
BUILDING_MAUSOLOS -350
BUILDING_ARISTO_THEATRE -350
BUILDING_COLOSSUS -300
BUILDING_GREAT_LIBRARY -300
BUILDING_GREAT_LIGHTHOUSE -280
BUILDING_GENIUS_ARCHIMEDES-250
BUILDING_ILLYRIAN_CITADEL -250
BUILDING_GOLGATHA 30
BUILDING_HADRIAN_WALL 130
BUILDING_HOLY_EMPIRE beyond 550
Ambrox, nice rundown of the years these wonders came into existance. I'm curious why you have the building tag instead of the building name with the year, though. So, did you do research for each wonder to find when it came into effect?

Questions :
- why some civ are not present on huge map ? teuta, tartessos, kroisos for instance. It makes few competition for hittites and rome, making them easily strong.

Whoever made the huge map needs to change this. A large map should have every faction available on it. These guys should even be on standard if possible. I understand the desire to take some of them out on smaller maps, but the large should definitely have every single civ!

did you do research for each wonder to find when it came into effect?

Yes, of course, although it isn't possible to know construction's date of some wonders exactly (mainly the oldest ones). Some results were really surprising.

I used TAGs instead of descriptions for convenience (search/copy/paste in XML files)

These guys should even be on standard if possible

Yes, they already are on standard (16 civs)

Huge map has 18 civs in. Does Civ Vanilla allow scenario maps with more then 18 civs?

@Dyerbods
Useful feedback, thanks.
Is your report first or after patch #1?
Cults tuning is a complex issue because we should find a balanced setup between start-mid-late game.
Patch #1 re-tunes cult effects, also resolving all previous cult/state religion issues.
Pre-patch. I have a Huge/Prince/Briton game that I want to progress some more before starting again.

I now think the new harbour may be too much too soon. How practical would it be to do some of the following (not fully thought out).

1) Have a probability of ships being damaged at sea, even in coastal waters, as the sea was a dangerous place. A new promotion set could be used to reduce this. Harbours and Lighthouses would reduce it in local waters. Cartography, Astronomy and Seafaring could reduce it anywhere.
2) Move Harbour to Masonry to reflect the building of sea walls. Cap the number of trade routes that can be added because a basic harbour can only handle so much trade. Buildings/Techs/Civics could increase this cap. Harbours would make ships significantly safer in local waters (though for realism, the benefit would only be for ships in the harbour - implying that ships in a city lacking a harbour should be at risk of storm damage). The trade routes added in other cities should also respect the cap - cities without harbours should not get these trade routes for free.
3) Have the Lighthouse increase ship safety in local coastal waters. Remove the food bonus from ocean plots as the bonus arises from not losing so many ships. The ocean plot food bonus could come with Seafaring. Since safer harbours are more attractive to traders, add a water trade route. Possibly remove all exploitation of ocean plots until Seafaring.
4) Add a Grand Harbour as a national wonder or 1 of N building, say with Commerce, that could remove the trade route cap, add water trade routes, make ships safer etc.
5) Add a Wharf building at Wood Working that adds a water trade route, a food bonus, etc. On the coast adds a little safety. If on the coast and adjacent to a river mouth then makes ships (almost) immune to storm damage loss. If on a river, add a hammer increase to represent the benefit of being able to move heavy loads safely on the river.
6) Major rivers were the safest and fastest transport routes in the ancient world. Vanilla Civ doesn't do justice to this. Allow Wharfs, and possibly Harbours, to be built in inland cities that are adjacent to a river. If the river connects to the coast then these cities qualify as source/target for water trade routes as if they were on the coast. Allows ships to move between connected river cities using the 'airlift' mechanism, provided 'in range' and not passing 'enemy' cities (though a promotion might allow this). Land units can be moved by transports or by the Wharf/Harbour acting like an airport. Attacks might be allowed using the 'paradrop' mechanism.
7) Add a Reed boat as a small transport buildable only in cities on rivers, perhaps from as early as Tools. Relatively long ranged on rivers and rather unsafe at sea. Builds faster with Papyrus of course.

I hope the above is of interest even if nobody has time to do anything with them.

Yes, of course, although it isn't possible to know construction's date of some wonders exactly (mainly the oldest ones). Some results were really surprising.

I used TAGs instead of descriptions for convenience (search/copy/paste in XML files)

The Illyrian wonders (Oracle of Dodona and the Citadel) were pretty accurate. The Citadel date itself I'm not too sure on, but it sounds about right.

Golgatha should be 33 AD, though. It became significant once Jesus was crucified, and He died at 33 years of age.

Huge map has 18 civs in. Does Civ Vanilla allow scenario maps with more then 18 civs?
No, it doesn't. I'll change that for BtS. But in my understanding the Huge Map should have all civs present in standard, plus 2 more.

Anyway, for BtS I'll make the DLL allow for more civs to fix that problem.

When you say, "I'll change that for BTS." does that mean sometime soon? Just wondered how far along you guys were in the conversion process.

I'm having crashes when my Praetorians attack Libyan Mercenarys. On Huge TAM map. Its weird though because everything was fine for along time. Then I got a crash and lost a bunch of turns. Loaded an autosave and suddenly I'm having crashes there too. Any ideas?

PS The save is too large to upload.

I now think the new harbour may be too much too soon.

Yes, we'll lower harbour effects a bit.

Thanks for your further suggestions.

When you say, "I'll change that for BTS." does that mean sometime soon?

No, it doesn't.
Team leaders are busy actually.

I'm having crashes when my Praetorians attack Libyan Mercenarys. On Huge TAM map. Its weird though because everything was fine for along time. Then I got a crash and lost a bunch of turns. Loaded an autosave and suddenly I'm having crashes there too. Any ideas?

PS The save is too large to upload.

Probably it's an animation's problem.
Did you attack Libyans in a fortified city or in a open space?

I suggest you to turn off combat animations for some turns, or switch from multi to single unit display (or the opposite)
Tell me your progress about CTD.

Golgatha should be 33 AD, though.

Although it isn't important at all, I mentioned year 30 not at random absolutely. ;)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chronology_of_Jesus

Removing animations fixed it...

Which animations did you remove?

No, it doesn't.
Team leaders are busy actually.

Yes, it does. :)

In the relatively early development of TAM for Civ4 I helped Thamis out and was the lead programmer for a period of time. I am resuming those duties and Thamis has given me permission to resume my role as lead programmer and to head up the BTS conversion of TAM.

I'm waiting for Ambrox and Graywarden to release their final version of TAM for Vanilla. At that point I'll have a base to work from and can begin the conversion process. Hopefully they complete it ASAP, and with whatever volunteers I can muster to help in the tedious conversion process, we may just have a nice Christmas gift ready for us by the end of the month. ;)

...and with whatever volunteers I can muster to help in the tedious conversion process...

Psst... click here (http://forums.civfanatics.com/showthread.php?t=245177) :)

That should save you some time.

I removed all animations via the options screen. Movement, combat, workers, etc. I haven't had any problems since then.

Also, when this moves to BTS,and there isn't a 16 civ cap. There should probably be civs added east and north east of the Persians. They can expand into what I assume is currently Afgahnistan and possibly Pakistan without any resistance other then barbs, and it is chock full of valuable and rare (for that side of the map) resources like silk and game.

two questions.
First is crash to desktop consistently after moving my last unit
in a huge map pangaea game 373 AD (pre patch). Happened every time.
Restart computer, reload file, turn off all animatioins etc., still happens.

second question.
quit often on screen after classical age or so I will see the message
"you gained 20 gp from plundering" Where does this come from?

GREAT MOD by the way. THanks you guys.
This is my 3rd game and the first one to crash.
My main goal in the games now is to somehow, someway
MAKE A FRIEND. I have only had one civ in one game
consistently pleased with me with open borders.

Looks like file is too big to upload

There may be a problem with the Republic and Empire civics. These are higher upkeep than the other government civics and also increase city maintenance costs. The carrot for this stick is the prospect of greater income from being allowed foreign trade routes, but will there ever be anyone to trade with? The other government civics all ban foreign trade routes, therefore Republics and Empire can only have foreign trade routes with other Republics and Empires. If the AI code does any cost benefit analysis, I would not expect any AI civ to ever choose to be the first Republic or Empire as the other government civics have lower costs.

Good appoint.
Did you observe that in your late-game? Did you get any AI-civic-choice statistic report to submit?

Good appoint.
Did you observe that in your late-game? Did you get any AI-civic-choice statistic report to submit?

I stopped playing the Huge/Epic/Prince/Briton game in 365AD to switch to patch #1. At that point I had the Sphinx and had switched to Republic for a while but switched back to City States because the maintenance under Republic was significantly higher. I noticed that I had no foreign trade routes to the one civ I had open borders with. At first I though that was due to trade being blocked by intervening civs and only thought of the "No foreign trade routes" effect later. No other civ has Republic yet so no possibility to disprove my hypothesis.

I currently have a Standard/Epic/Prince/Carthage game and I'll watch what happens once several other civs get to Republic. BTW in this game I spotted a Mycenaean ram displayed as a pink catapult!

Patch #2 is out! See post #1 ;)