The Kuriotates seem like a very unique, very interesting civ to me. They may be aligned with "good", but they're basically a nation of dragon-worshippers following a powerful dragon slowly possessing a young boy. They have powerful core cities, but the other cities are little more than culture-holders.

I think it would be a very interesting mechanic if after Cardith conquers a city, they enslaved or looted the city. Every building the city has is converted into gold, and you get a number of workers or slaves proportionate to the population of the city. These could then be sent back to the core empire to improve it even more. Sort of like a Tamerlane burning the cities he conquers but sending the best artisans back to his capital to make it shine.

Kuriotates definitely need a reworking. Centaurs are awesome, and I love the concept of the super-cities... but their super-cities just aren't super enough to make up for their scarcity. I've tried playing as them and just never been successful... and the AI always sucks as them. Even on "No Settlers" maps where you'd figure their few cities wouldn't be so much of a limitation... but it still really is.

Best suggestion I've got atm is to simply double their city limit, or at least increase it by a couple cities... say, 5/7/9 instead of 3/4/5. Or, make their cities even more super, like give them a bunch of extra happiness and/or production.

Looting an Enslaving just isn't right for a Good civ.

They do need something though. Settlements probably need the ability to build somethings (albeit not much) instead of just being for grabbing territory.

I also think the Cult of the Dragin could use some serious reworking. Right now it is just a minor annoyance, and doesn't actually help anyone (until the late game dragon heroes show up, if you are lucky enough to have the cult of the dragin promotion on enough enemies). I liked it better when it was a religion. How about making it be triggered by repeatable rituals instead (which settlements would be able to perform)? It might be nice (and certainly more thematic) if the dragon were summoned through a series of rituals too, instead of being built.

What if settlements were normal cities albeit with only a one space work radius (instead of the usual two, or the Kuriotates' three)?

What if settlements were normal cities albeit with only a one space work radius (instead of the usual two, or the Kuriotates' three)?

This is what I've always wanted the Kuriotate settlements to be like, or at least give another trait that makes cities have a 1 tile radius.

While I agree with MC's point about looting & enslaving being not right for a good civ, I think there is a gem of a good idea here. Perhaps as a captured city's population drains into a settlement, it could generate specialists in a similar fashion to the Kidnap spell?

And I love the idea of summoning Eurabatres through a ritual.

I second the ritual summoning idea, that's absolutely brilliant. It should be easy to implement, too- add 3 or 4 levels of a ritual, none of which are tied to tech but are prohibitively expensive until later in the game, the end of which spawns the Gold Dragon in all his glory at your capital city.

about the AI playing the kurio's poorly: that's because the AI doesn't fully understand the sprawling trait, and still packs it's core cities relatively close together, instead of using their full 3-tile radius. I like the idea of giving settlements the ability to work their initial ring, and giving them a few basic buildings (obelisk, palisade, maibe elder council or market). There should still be a penalty for them though, else you'd just make a new settlement every 3 tiles, and practically forgo the drawback of the trait.

What if I changed the expansive trait from +2 health to +3 health, and gave the Sprawling trait +3 happiness? I'd really like to boost the super-cities, and I agree that they are weaker than they should be right now.

Adding any production to settlements will probably never happen. Its really easy for the AI and the code to simply disable production. Once we change that from disabling to "can only build certain things" it gets more complex.

Even if it is only rituals?


Boosting the traits is Ok I guess, but I don't know if it is enough. In my version I also made the Expansive trait give the Mobility 1 promotion and the Sprawling trait the Navigation 1 promotion to unitcombat_civilian units (i.e., workers, settlers, and great people). (I included xienwolf's xml changes and added the unitcombat so workers can get promotions to make them move and work faster). Actually being able to expand or sprawl by having the fastest settlers seems more appropriate. (I think I also made these traits speed the production of settlers)

Even if it is only rituals?

Yeap .

If anything I would rather they go back to no settlements at all rather than boosted settlements. The whole "only three cities" thing is what makes them unique and fun. +3 health and +3 Happiness would be nice, but I think you should give them even more.

If anything I would rather they go back to no settlements at all rather than boosted settlements. The whole "only three cities" thing is what makes them unique and fun. +3 health and +3 Happiness would be nice, but I think you should give them even more.

The real purpose of settlements is to allow the kuriotates to claim resources. Outside of that (and of course denying them to your enemies) settlements shouldnt matter.

Why not more commerce + happy boosting buildings? Those are interesting and flavorful, while providing a very unique bonus.

for example: a unique version of a brewery, (a distillery? sorry, i'm dutch not english) which doesn't require to be next to a river and adding commerce? Could work, although i'm not that fond of giving corn, rice and wheat even more bonusses (they're already one of the strongest res. with a potential 2 health and 1 happiness each).
Other option: an aquarium, granting additional happiness and tourist revenue (commerce) to sea resources (fish, clam, crab and whale, not pearls since they've already got a building for that).

Kael that is an excellent idea.

Since settlements are just to claim resources, I don't think it is right fore them to be made by settlers that cost full price. Making settlers much cheaper with either (or both) of these trait seems appropriate.

Craftsman's buildings: Horse breeder (+ happy from horses, this is VERY sweet for Kurios as they have centaurs and don't need horses)
Tailor and jeweler are in already
Bookseller - Req. library, +25% science, +10% commerce
Glassblower - + happy, money?
Forester's hut - Spreads forest around city? +1 hammer from forests?

Anyway I love the idea of slowly upgrading my core cities with dozens of various buildings, not just 2 extra.

Additional buildings are a great idea, especially given that Kurio cities should really shine. They will add culture and glory to the Kuriotate super-cities, effectively giving each one magnificent wonders the other civs can only marvel at.

I still like my slaves idea, though. I understand it may not be the best for a "good" civ, but consider this: Good in this game is largely defined as an opposition to Hell. Why shouldn't Cardith Lorda bring back his hated enemies and use them to enhance the happiness and welfare of his people? He could be a sort of Basium-figure, who stands outside of human morality but is no less firm than the human "good" factions in his opposition to Armageddon.

Besides, Cardith Lorda is a dragon. To him, all our cities are just ant farms. Who cares about these humans anyways?

Additional buildings are a great idea, especially given that Kurio cities should really shine. They will add culture and glory to the Kuriotate super-cities, effectively giving each one magnificent wonders the other civs can only marvel at.

I still like my slaves idea, though. I understand it may not be the best for a "good" civ, but consider this: Good in this game is largely defined as an opposition to Hell. Why shouldn't Cardith Lorda bring back his hated enemies and use them to enhance the happiness and welfare of his people? He could be a sort of Basium-figure, who stands outside of human morality but is no less firm than the human "good" factions in his opposition to Armageddon.

Besides, Cardith Lorda is a dragon. To him, all our cities are just ant farms. Who cares about these humans anyways?

The Kuriotates are all about equality and tolerance. Slavery is anathema to them.

I do agree with the Jopa that a few more buildings could be good. But I need some really good ideas for them. Sometihng that fires in each if the following areas:

1. Design need- Kuriotates need more bonuses in their super cities, we already have this.

2. Function- Something cool that the building does, it should make Kuriotate cities more useful.

3. Flavor- Something that brings out the Kuriotate flavor and ties in well with the mechanic. Enough that players will be able to easily remember what the building does from its name, and unique enough that it seems like an interesting idea on its own.

Just curious. I know that you can easily mod settings so that cities need to be, say, 4 tiles apart instead of the default 3. Is it possible to apply this to a single civilization instead?

I still like my slaves idea, though. I understand it may not be the best for a "good" civ, but consider this: Good in this game is largely defined as an opposition to Hell. Why shouldn't Cardith Lorda bring back his hated enemies and use them to enhance the happiness and welfare of his people? He could be a sort of Basium-figure, who stands outside of human morality but is no less firm than the human "good" factions in his opposition to Armageddon.

Besides, Cardith Lorda is a dragon. To him, all our cities are just ant farms. Who cares about these humans anyways?

Well, he is both a human child and a dragon in the same body, with their minds merging more than one possessing the other. But remember whose dragon it is. Eurabatres is the greatest creation of Amaothon, who the gentlest of the gods. He is not a violent beast bent on destruction like Abashi or Acheron. That you would think otherwise shows the "taint of the enemy" that Eurabatres found in so many potential hosts before comming across Cardith. :p

Building Idea

Seeing as the Kurios are a cosmopolitan society, why not have buildings that represent the different races that belong to their empire. An example (and this is just off the top of my head) would be like a Hobbit hole that provides a new resource like pipe weed.

This way you could bring in other fantasy creatures that would otherwise never find their way into the game as units or civs. It could be a fun way to handle the unique buildings flavor wise.

art gallery / museum: a building where the greatest artists can show their work. Happiness and commerce from: dye, marble, bronze.

I still say the Kuriotates need to have their cities cap looked at. On a huge map, 5 cities does not cut it. I playes as the Kuriotates on Rhyse' Earth map and was able to place 2 cities in northern South America, 2 cities in Central America and 1 city appr. where Texas is, and then I was done, settlement time for me. I went from Top of leader board on normal speed from years 150-250 as I wiped 2 neighbors off map(Sidar & Grigori), then slowly fell down leader board and got butt handed to me by the Calabim around year 420. my 5 cities could not keep up with their 13 or 14 cities. despite my technological lead.

Well, he is both a human child and a dragon in the same body, with their minds merging more than one possessing the other. But remember whose dragon it is. Eurabatres is the greatest creation of Amaothon, who the gentlest of the gods. He is not a violent beast bent on destruction like Abashi or Acheron. That you would think otherwise shows the "taint of the enemy" that Eurabatres found in so many potential hosts before comming across Cardith. :p

:(Forgive me but I'm not too well versed in this lore.

@Nimbus: Do mana nodes spawn when you play on Rhye's Earth map?

Building Idea

Seeing as the Kurios are a cosmopolitan society, why not have buildings that represent the different races that belong to their empire. An example (and this is just off the top of my head) would be like a Hobbit hole that provides a new resource like pipe weed.

This way you could bring in other fantasy creatures that would otherwise never find their way into the game as units or civs. It could be a fun way to handle the unique buildings flavor wise.

A purely flavour-related change similar to this would be giving Kurio units random race. i.e., when you train a Longbowman, it could be human, eleven, dwarvish or orcish (or perhaps even some other races - centaur and lamia most notably), but that would require a lot of new unit art. And orcs might look a tad silly in Kuriotate uniform. They need more art, anyway.

@Nimbus: Do mana nodes spawn when you play on Rhye's Earth map?

No, i downloaded the map, converted stone to marble, spices to reagents, coal to gunpowder, silver to cotton, aluminum to mithril, sea oil to pearls, land oil and uranium to mana and then added in the unique wonders, graveyards and some barrows.

Suppose the Kuriotates could only build settlements (except the starting settler) but could use a special unique unit "governor" to upgrade a settlement to a city hub. These "governors" would increase in hammer cost each time one was built.

Eg.
first governor costs 100 hammers
second costs 150 hammers
third costs 225 hammers
fourth costs 337 hammers
fifth costs 506 hammers
... (the numbers need a lot tweaking and correlation to game speed, but that's the idea)

This lets the Kuriotates have an unbounded number of cities but makes them very interested in founding as few as possible since new cities rapidly get very expensive. Oh and they could also have the number of city maintenance cost increased dramatically by their palace.

Any newly captured city would be a settlement until a player chose to send and spend a valuable governor to upgrade it.

I like this because it allows a player to decide later, if need be, whether to upgrade a settlement or a captured city. Sometimes I really don't know when I found or capture a city whether I will want it to be one of my few, and I would really rather decide in twenty turns or so.

Three ideas:

Buildings that create resources. Since you have 3 core cities: that means first city to build such a building supplies your empire, second and third are available for sale. And it fits the thema since Kuriotates are confederation of many small races: examples for Kurio's goods would be some lamia alchemical products, new steed of horses, steel weapons that you need iron to produce and are stronger than iron but weaker than mithril (+3 str), fine pottery, sculptures (I think it would really fit the theme if you could create pottery and sculptures as Kurios and sell it to other races).
I think Kael considered something like this for all races but it was too complicated. Maybe introduce this in something simpler form for Kuriotates only?

Another level in cottage-town developement that is better than town- call it enclave or metropolis or whatever - adds +5 gold and +1 hammer. I think it would be good and flavourful way to boost the 'super cities'.

And something I recall from civ3 - it was called Longevity great wonder. Basicaly when Kuriotates cities grow, they would grow by +2 instead by +1.

I really like the Governor idea. I think that the governor cost should increase exponentially, though- say the first one is 100, then 400, 1600, 4800, etc. Maybe also a way to downgrade a city into a settlement if you decide it isn't worth the maintenance costs?

I also really like that super-town idea. I think of the Kuriotate empire as something like the Byzantine empire or the early Roman empire: A powerful inner core of extremely beautiful, powerful cities, surrounded by a vast number of what amount to barbarians who pay their service to the capital cities for protection.

Good ideas TheJopa! I love the resources that are only available from Kuriotate buildings (ala broadway). This will relieve their happy cap some and establish them as a civilization to go to when exotic goods are required, which is what metropolises are after all.

Also like the "enclaves" one-ups on the towns. This will help them a lot. Don't think the double growth is needed though.

Im liking the town increase for them as well. Thats a really cool idea.

Since Kurioate cities are supposed to be grandiose and magnificent things, why not give them a few unique buildings to represent precisely this? Treat them kind of like national wonders, perhaps. Bigger and better versions of more mundane structures that allow you specialize your city, but only allow one or two to be built in each.

Grand Bazaar
Few markets can compare to those of a Kurioate metropolis. There are very few goods that cannot be found there, if one knows where to look for them...
Gold revenue +50%, +2 Great Merchant PP, extra happiness from certain luxury goods, +10 crime rate.
Requires Market, Tailor, Money Changer, Forge, Smithy

Grand Harbour
Hundreds of ships each day. Thousands of merchants. Tens of thousands of sailors.A hundred thousand beaurocrats to keep track of it all. And of course; a million thieves and nobles to profit from it...
+50% trade revenue. +1 commerce from water tiles. +2 Great Merchant PP. +10 Crime rate.
Requires Harbour, Drydocks, Lighthouse, Inn

Grand University
Universities are, by definition, great centres of learning. But some clearly stand above the norm - true capitols of knowledge and meeting places of brilliance...
+15 Science, Research +50%, +6 culture, +2 Great Sage PP.
Requires library, university.

Just a few quick ideas. Should help make the cities feel more properly metropolitan, if nothing else.

I also quite like the super-cottage idea. Vast urbanized countrysides would suit the Kurioates - though they'd make less sense around settlements.

I don't think they need any special wonders (although UBs of current wonders could be nice). I do think that the requirements for wonders like the Great Library and Theater of Dreams aren't really fair to them. Could you make it so these requirements are ignored for Sprawling Trait leaders, as if the game were a OCC? If not, you could just give them a UB for each which differs only in this requirement.

While on the subject of OCCs, you should really add
<Define>
<DefineName>MAX_NATIONAL_WONDERS_PER_CITY_FOR_OCC</DefineName>
<iDefineIntVal>-1</iDefineIntVal>
</Define> to the global defines. BtS added a limit of 5 national wonders in one city in a one city challenge game, which, unlike <DefineName>MAX_NATIONAL_WONDERS_PER_CITY</DefineName>, FfH does not override. It makes no sense tat you can build every wonder in one city when you have multiple cities but not when you are limited to one.


The Town idea could be good. Kael could just borrow the improvement from the Golden Girls Coalition Civ that he couldn't convince Firais to add to the Epic Game. :p ;) It could use a better name though.


The Governor idea sounds very similar to how I've often proposed upgrading settlements, except I didn't include a unit in the mechanism. The prices would have to increase way faster than you proposed, but it could be good. They should probably also be national units (limit 1)

First, I think that the Kuriotates should have one more "type" of super city, called a super harbor. They will have one, two, or maybe even three super harbors depending on the map size. This will basically be a super city on a coastal tile. Super harbors MUST neighbor a water tile, and do not count towards your super city limit. Why? I always felt like I didn't want to settle near water as a Kuriotate, because having a three tile cross would be silly when so much of what you'd be working would be ocean. So the Kuriotates never have a navy, and can therefore not effectively fight other navies (much less explore the world). A super harbor may have some building that increases the productivity (to keep up with other nation's many harbors) and/or food of coasts, but decreases food of land.

As for general unique buildings for the Kuriotates... I think that they should be somewhat culture, dragon-themed, or minority-themed.

Dragon Temple (100 hammers; Mysticism) - Replaces Pagan Temple:
Can turn 1 citizen into priest
+1 happiness for each dragon you control
+1 happiness from incense
+20% chance that units created here will be in the Cult of Dragon (when founded)
+10% culture
+2 culture

Centaur Training Yard (100 hammers; Bronzeworking) - Replaces Training Yard:
+1 happiness with Nationhood
+1 experience for centaurs created in this city
Required to train swordsmen
Required to build Heroic Epic

Dragon Totem (300 hammers; Rage) - Replaces Bear Totem:
+1 happiness
+1 production
Required to train Berzerker [or maybe a new unique unit] (will always be Cult of Dragon)

Just throwing some stuff out there... not good with the whole designing thing.

P.S. There is a typo in the Kuriotate Empire description in the fifth paragraph, first sentence. "For the Kuriotates don't care much for who you as long as..." Obviously, "are" is missing here.

What about having the number of Kuriotate 3-ring cities scale with the size of their empire? Maybe for every city, they have to build 3 or 4 settlements before building another city.

I've only lately gotten back into this since playing vanilla near the end of its dev cycle.

I've been playing a lot of random to try to get used to the changes in Shadow, and I wince when I get Cardith: the sprawling cities really don't work out too well in practice. Bonus happiness from Sprawling would definitely be a start towards making the trait more attractive, and the super-towns ("suburbs"?) are an excellent idea, too.

The best solution, though, given a shortage of production centers, is not to give Cardith more things to build but a means of getting more bang for his buck. What if Cardith had a unique Government civic ("Harmony?") which allowed drafting or provided some sort of production boost?

Rather than give the Kurios a set of quasi-National wonders, it would be better to just give them normal UBs. I especially like your sugestion for a commerce-boosting harbor UB: at present, building a coastal city as Kurios feels like a waste given that land is so much more productive than water (and this is exacerbated by the limited number of cities you can have).

Some suggestions:


Great Harbor: +100% :traderoute: yield, +1 :traderoute:, +1 :commerce: from water tiles, +1 :health: from fish, crab, and clam. Replaces Harbor.
Scriptorium: +25% :science:, allows 2 sages, 1 free sage. Requires Library and Writing. (The name means "place for writing" and refers to manuscript producing medieval monasteries, e.g. the Scriptorium of Citeaux, or the Scriptorium of St. Denis).
Tannery: +1 :) with Cow, Pig and Sheep, +5% :commerce: with Cow, Sheep and Pig. Requires Animal Husbandry. (This makes animal resources equal to grain resources for the Kurios)
Athenaeum: +25% :gp:, +25% :culture:, +1 :), Allows 1 sage, 1 merchant and 1 bard. Requires Festivals, replaces Carnival. (normally an institution for artistic and literary study).
Chancellery Office: +1 :) per religion on the city, -50% city upkeep, -10 crime rating, +1 :) with Social Order, +3 :) with God King. Requires Code of Laws, replaces Courthouse. (concept: Cardith's hyper-efficient, tolerant bureaucrats).

A different spin on Alsark's "super harbor": a building that allows a landlocked city to gain trade routes like a coastal city.

I've only lately gotten back into this since playing vanilla near the end of its dev cycle.

I've been playing a lot of random to try to get used to the changes in Shadow, and I wince when I get Cardith: the sprawling cities really don't work out too well in practice. Bonus happiness from Sprawling would definitely be a start towards making the trait more attractive, and the super-towns ("suburbs"?) are an excellent idea, too.

The best solution, though, given a shortage of production centers, is not to give Cardith more things to build but a means of getting more bang for his buck. What if Cardith had a unique Government civic ("Harmony?") which allowed drafting or provided some sort of production boost?

While I definitely agree with the sentiment, I do think there is space for 1-2 extra buildings to help Cardith specialize his cities. And besides the UBs could simply be replacements for existing ones.

As for the Civic, I would suggest making it a compassion civic rather than a government one. Make it something like this:

Toleration
Req. Kuriotates, Philosophy
+1 :hammers: per Town/Metropolis.
Can draft 2 units per turn.
+1 :) per religion in a city.
No state religion.

It seems thematically apt since the Kurios are all about tolerance, which I presume would include religious tolerance. This would also help with some of the problems described above (a Kurio city could get up to +36 raw :hammers: just from this civic). But more importantly, it would also present the player with an interesting strategic choice: do I want the extra :hammers: and :)... or do I want to adopt a religion?

I really like the idea of allowing the Kuriotates to have unique buildings which provide them resources. Ideally they should be able to access almost every resource in the game via a building. Then we can even get rid of their Settlements completely.

No need to make them Wonders either. Your limit on total number of Cities limits you quite well enough. So if every Kuriotates Building either provided a resource, or provided a bonus to the city for multiple resources, it flavors the entire civ and makes them play VASTLY different than anybody else.


An example would be the Stable. This does NOTHING for the Kuriotates right now. But if it provided them with a Horse Resource, and the Carnival provided +1 Happiness per Horse, and the Colliseum provided +10% Culture per Horse....


This could be done without adding too many new building classes to the Kuriotates, but making almost every building they get a Unique Building. Each one either providing a free resource, or providing stacking benefits from 3 or more resources (ie - Butcher's Shop provides +10% :food: per Cow, +2 :hammers: per Iron, and +10% to Trade Routes per Gold)

What if I changed the expansive trait from +2 health to +3 health, and gave the Sprawling trait +3 happiness? I'd really like to boost the super-cities, and I agree that they are weaker than they should be right now.

Adding any production to settlements will probably never happen. Its really easy for the AI and the code to simply disable production. Once we change that from disabling to "can only build certain things" it gets more complex.

To curve things a bit better, I think Sprawling should give +1 Happiness from Smokehouses, Granaries, Markets, and Money Changers. These are pretty standard buildings, especially for a growing civ. The Kurio's don't really need the up front boost, given they are already fast growing until their city limit, it's really just letting them juice out those cities by getting past the happiness cap.

I've talked at length about the Kurio happiness cap being such a huge boundary, since they can't build larger numbers of small cities, the only way to work more than (HappyCap*cities + cities) tiles, is to increase the Happy Cap.

Last Suggestion: Unique worker for the Kuriotates, that builds Kuriotate Cottages. These are the same as normal cottages, and grow the same way, but there's another level at the end that yields an additional +2 Trade (+3 after the trade tech has been researched).

So consider the net effect would be that their Town improvements would turn into, say, Metropolis' after X turns (50?). Give 'em a bit more long term growth.

Three ideas:


Another level in cottage-town developement that is better than town- call it enclave or metropolis or whatever - adds +5 gold and +1 hammer. I think it would be good and flavourful way to boost the 'super cities'.




Holy cow,I shoulda read the full thread first. Amazing that someone else thought of this as I did. Needless to say, I agree.

As for new building ideas:

Militia Outpost:
Requires Taxation
240 production

Gives units in this city the "Recruit Defenders" Ability. The ability summons an archer unit with XP = to the city size that lasts for 5 turns, at the cost of 2 population.
Actual archer unit created depends on technology owned ('archer' by default, longbowmen if they have the tech).



Embassy
Requires Cartography
160 production
+1 Diplomacy Modifier with all same alignment civs.
+5% science points for each civ you have Open Borders with.



Dragon Shrine
Requires PriestHood
400 Production

This city doesn't count towards your 'city' count.
(In order to get more cities, you'll have to grow the old ones enough to build this structure there. Could cost more for each you've built).


Residential District
Requires Mercantilism
280 production

Melee units of level 4 or greater can 'join' this city as 1 size of population.
Great people that join this city also give it +1 population.

I don't think that a unique worker is needed in order to add an extra level of cottages.

I do think still think that the Kuriotates could use cheaper workers/settlers and/or ones with more movement.

I like the super-town idea, and tying it to a compassion civic is perfect - Tolerance, Multiculturalism, whatever. Having a happiness boost per religion with that civic works too. That combines very very well with Sprawling, if we went with the +1 commerce +1 hammer per town, its a very substantial city boost. It would also make a very good pillage target!

A unique building allowing another trade route works for me, makes sense for supercities to have more than normal cities.

One other idea relating to settlements is to give them some capacity for culture growth. Apart from using a tonne of disciple units on them, they very quickly get swamped for culture. I propose (if easy enough to implement) giving the settlements 1 culture per turn per culture level of best city. So if your highest culture city has gone through 3 culture expansions, all of your settlements get +3 culture per turn. This would let the Kuriorates push harder against enemy borders without conquest, and would let them grab more resources.

I really like the idea of allowing the Kuriotates to have unique buildings which provide them resources. Ideally they should be able to access almost every resource in the game via a building. Then we can even get rid of their Settlements completely.

No need to make them Wonders either. Your limit on total number of Cities limits you quite well enough. So if every Kuriotates Building either provided a resource, or provided a bonus to the city for multiple resources, it flavors the entire civ and makes them play VASTLY different than anybody else.


An example would be the Stable. This does NOTHING for the Kuriotates right now. But if it provided them with a Horse Resource, and the Carnival provided +1 Happiness per Horse, and the Colliseum provided +10% Culture per Horse....


This could be done without adding too many new building classes to the Kuriotates, but making almost every building they get a Unique Building. Each one either providing a free resource, or providing stacking benefits from 3 or more resources (ie - Butcher's Shop provides +10% :food: per Cow, +2 :hammers: per Iron, and +10% to Trade Routes per Gold)

Remove settlements entirely, implement the +1 level of cottages, and implement Xienwolf's idea. Problem solved.

I like, but am wary of which victory conditions this leaves them.. Tower Victory becomes very unlikely unless they get lucky with a lot of raw mana or get fortunate trades.

Militia Outpost:
Requires Taxation
240 production

Gives units in this city the "Recruit Defenders" Ability. The ability summons an archer unit with XP = to the city size that lasts for 5 turns, at the cost of 2 population.
Actual archer unit created depends on technology owned ('archer' by default, longbowmen if they have the tech).


I like the concept with following addition - to make it require even less micromanagement and more AI friendly make the militia be mobilized as soon as enemy enter the city range (like Malakim fireballs or Balseraph Hall of Mirrors) instead of mobilized by spell, and add few more levels of that building (town watch, town guard, city guard). Higher levels of the building would mean more units gained (or better population-to-units conversion ratio, more promotions to militia units (like city garrison 1 or 2 or shock or combat) and eventually better units fielded (so lvl. 1 of the building would mean you get warriors, lvl. 2 would field archers and require archery tech...)

All in the all it would make Kuriotates supercities far more tougher to conquer, which is what I think we aim for.

If you remove settlements from Kurios, they can no longer stop other civs from taking ground, making them worse, as other civilizations will culturally fight for at least the third ring space. Do you also say the Kuriotates, when capturing enemy city, must raze it? Sounds a bit odd for a good civilization.

I think it should possibly be even cheaper to make settlements (though not a lot). Possibly a unique settler upgrade: pioneer, cheaper to make, can not found cities.

I don't think adding more buildings (which take more time to build) is the right answer to help the Kuriotates in their problems: they stem more from having too few cities to build stuff, and would actually be a disadvantage of sorts.

Maybe Kuriotates should have some sort of system similar to sheiam planar gates, one that gives them units for free, at least in the mid-late game.

I do like the civic idea and the additional cottage step.

Remove settlements entirely, implement the +1 level of cottages, and implement Xienwolf's idea. Problem solved.

I like the settlements, though. I like the idea of having an inner circle of cities you NEED and having a vast empire of petty little settlements.

Adding any production to settlements will probably never happen. Its really easy for the AI and the code to simply disable production. Once we change that from disabling to "can only build certain things" it gets more complex.

What about removing the "-100% commerce, -100% science" modifiers from the settlements? Without the ability to construct buildings to boost commerce and science, they would never be producing huge amounts of either, but they'd still produce some. That would reinforce the "empire" flavor of the Kuriotates, in my eye - conquering lots of foreign nations and taking the profits from their "colonies" back home. At the moment, wars of conquest seem a bit pointless for them - and I'd imagine that the settlements being practically useless for anything else than land-grabbing would actually encourage the Kuriotate player to raze many of the cities they conquer (so they don't need to waste resources defending them). This doesn't seem to fit their flavor very well.

implement the +1 level of cottages, and implement Xienwolf's idea. Problem solved.
Seconded

But IMHo the problem isn't with insufficent commerce or production of towns/hamlets, the problem is minimum of food wou get compared with farms. I suggest "rooftop gardes" building that represents not only intensive usage of space, but also multipurpouse city parks, gardens...etc and adds +1 food per metropolis in Citycross area, health and require aquaducts.

For god's sake don't remove the settlements. Can you even imagine what would playing Kuriotates look like then? Having 3 cities and watching being enveloped and eaten... Unable to gain any luxury or mana... And what about conquered cities? It would wreck the Kuriotates completely.

Unable to gain any luxuries? The only proposal so far to remove the settlements was tied to implementing buildings which allow the Kuriotates to gain Resources. Thus they can't settle new cities to CLAIM luxuries, but each city can build a building to CREATE luxuries. And they can have another building to make their current luxuries more worthwhile.


Example:

I am on a standard map, and have all 3 of my cities. I am approaching my happy cap, so I build a Gem Cutter in my Capital. I now have access to gems and thus I get +1 :). I decide to build another Gem Cutter in each of my other cities, and now I have 3 Gems, but still just +1 :), since it is a non-stacking effect. So I then set each city to build a Jeweler. The Jeweler provides +1 :) per Gems resource, and thus I now have 4 :) in each city due to the 3 Gems, none of which are on the map, and thus cannot even be pillaged.


I am now well covered for Happy points, but sadly I am stuck in the desert, or on the coast, and thus cannot grow my population anymore. No problem, I build a Corral in each City, thus gaining access to 3 Cows resources (and +1 :health: in each city for having access to any Cows at all). I then build a Butcher's Shop in each of my cities and gain +10% :food: per Cows Resource, meaning I am now at +30% Food in each of my cities. I also build a Grocer so that I can gain +2 :health: per Cows. Suddenly I am gaining a surplus of 12 :food: in each city from the freed up :disease: points and the % bonus to my food gains. Just for kicks I also build a Trademaster's Guild, which provides +4 :hammers: per Cows Resource, bringing me up to a bonus of +12 :hammers: in each of my cities.


Now I am set on my cities continuing to grow, and I am pushing nicely toward my culture victory. But I realize that when I get close to that point, people will begin to attack me.

Fortunately, the Sheaim are my neighbors. Unfortunately for them, they haven't found any Reagents on the map this time (poor AV following Sheaim. I weep for thee). So I build myself an Alchemy Lab in each of my cities and I now have 3 Reagents. I trade him one for some Fire Mana, and he is eternally in my debt. By the by, since I just gained Fire Mana, I am able to build the Tower of Elements, since I have 2 Nodes and was smart enough to make one of them Metamagic earlier, so with Water from my Palace, Fire from Trade, and Earth from Tablets of Bambur, I can just set one of my 2 Nodes to Air and get that Tower out of the way.

Of course, building the other Towers will be just as easy, since I am able to control trade relations pretty simple. Afterall, I have 3 of every resource readily available, I just have to decide to take the time and build them.

really nice idea, it would just be a bit overpowered if you continue this for the higher metals (iron, mithril), since you'd basically be the only one assured of +4 strenght on your military units.

Yes, you are assured a +4 from Mithril, but everyone else will probably have 10-20 cities by that point and can swarm you if you do not have a leg up on them for strength, or the good diplomacy to keep on their friendly side. IMO the latter is the more thematically appropriate for the Kuriotates, and completely achievable with this model.

Kael- please adopt Xienwolf's idea. You cannot see me right now, but I am on my knees begging you to make this happen. It would make my favorite good civ so much more fun to play.

I don't thinking giving them any resource-granting UBs (especially ones granting things like Mithril) is a good idea. Making the bonuses from their UBs have an additional effect for each source of the resource would be very good though.


I just starting thinking that it would be really cool for the "Suburb" (or Metropolis, or whatever) to have <bActsAsCity>1</bActsAsCity> and to let landlocked supercities with coastal suburbs build everything a true coastal city could. These are basically part of a multi-tile city, after all.

Possibly, the settlements could be made useful by implementing unique buildings that give bonuses to your main cities based on the number of settlements you have. Thematically, the function of the settlements isn't to actually produce things themselves, but to ship raw materials to the main cities, right? Say...

Engineering District: +1 hammers per settlement (+2 with Engineering);
Grain Processor: +2 food per settlement (+3 with Sanitation);
Government Recruitment Exams: +2 GPP (Sage) per settlement.

Something like that, anyhow. Plus, this would give the Kuriotates an incentive to conquer things, which I've always felt was a bit lacking in the race, and would also help them keep up on larger maps. You get these great Centaurs, but nowhere to put them...

On a vaguely-related note, it would also be useful to give the settlements +1 culture per turn, just so that they aren't immediately converted when an enemy moves nearby, and also for a bit more area coverage. (It's always annoyed me how my "friends" are constantly stealing my settlements.)

Possibly, the settlements could be made useful by implementing unique buildings that give bonuses to your main cities based on the number of settlements you have. Thematically, the function of the settlements isn't to actually produce things themselves, but to ship raw materials to the main cities, right? Say...

Engineering District: +1 hammers per settlement (+2 with Engineering);
Grain Processor: +2 food per settlement (+3 with Sanitation);
Government Recruitment Exams: +2 GPP (Sage) per settlement.

On a vaguely-related note, it would also be useful to give the settlements +1 culture per turn, just so that they aren't immediately converted when an enemy moves nearby, and also for a bit more area coverage. (It's always annoyed me how my "friends" are constantly stealing my settlements.)
This is so...elegant. I fully support this idea. This and the metropolis, of course.

Taking settlements away is a very bad idea, with or without resource buildings. They need a way to deny land from their enemies. Otherwise you'll have to constantly raze cities because as soon as you destroy one civ some other one will fill the empty space (unless No Settlers).

Hello , I'm totaly new on this forum and english isn't my first langage so sorry if it's stupid/ill conceived

In oriental mythologie , Ley lines (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ley_line) are also called dragon lines and like the kuriotate are based on dragon and mega cities (who can be interpreted as "nexus " of dragon line, they may be something here , like may settlements strenghten the nearby city or upgrade the land near the main city. Or may be accelerate the coming of the dragon

randoms thoughts sorry if it was already proposed !

Possibly, the settlements could be made useful by implementing unique buildings that give bonuses to your main cities based on the number of settlements you have. Thematically, the function of the settlements isn't to actually produce things themselves, but to ship raw materials to the main cities, right? Say...

Engineering District: +1 hammers per settlement (+2 with Engineering);
Grain Processor: +2 food per settlement (+3 with Sanitation);
Government Recruitment Exams: +2 GPP (Sage) per settlement.

Something like that, anyhow. Plus, this would give the Kuriotates an incentive to conquer things, which I've always felt was a bit lacking in the race, and would also help them keep up on larger maps. You get these great Centaurs, but nowhere to put them...

On a vaguely-related note, it would also be useful to give the settlements +1 culture per turn, just so that they aren't immediately converted when an enemy moves nearby, and also for a bit more area coverage. (It's always annoyed me how my "friends" are constantly stealing my settlements.)



I like the building ideas (well, not the names or specific buildings, but the general idea), although I disagree that the Kuriotates should be encouraged to conquer.


I still think it might be good for conquered cities to remain just normal cities, not being reduced to settlements or given an extra ring.



I'm thinking that if settlements won't ever be able to build anything, then the Kuriotates should have some unit(s) that can be sacrificed to construct buildings there. A Settler UU with builds for many such basic buildings (and maybe also the add to city spell?) could be good. Or, you could make civ-specific spells to make temporary buildings there. These could help culture, defense, gold, commerce, research, health, etc.

My reasoning on the draft civic's being in government was that Cardith is pretty much obliged to adopt the high-end Compassion civics, under the current scheme of things, for the sake of more happiness in his cities. I took a look over at the "relative alignments" thread in the Lore section and he's also the one who weights compassion by others the most. That's a pretty potent argument for putting it there, I admit, but it still deprives him of the benefit of 'em.

Settlements could really use some sort of culture generation or other bar from flipping; from a lore-explains-mechanics perspective, if the Kuriotates are so great, why are their people in a hurry to switch sides? Also, on some map types, they would be a lot more useful for staking out terrain chokepoints if they didn't defect so readily.

I do like the idea of settlements "feeding back" more than just resources to the cities. Perhaps a UB akin to the Dwarven Vault that gets generated in your larger cities?

Possibly, the settlements could be made useful by implementing unique buildings that give bonuses to your main cities based on the number of settlements you have. Thematically, the function of the settlements isn't to actually produce things themselves, but to ship raw materials to the main cities, right? Say...

Engineering District: +1 hammers per settlement (+2 with Engineering);
Grain Processor: +2 food per settlement (+3 with Sanitation);
Government Recruitment Exams: +2 GPP (Sage) per settlement.

Ooooh, I like this idea as well.

Kuriotate worldspell would be useless without settlements...

(I personally think it is useless now)

Useful mid-game for an easy territory grab with a number of settlements.

am i the only one who likes an instant 3 tile big cross?
by the way, the boosted cottages are being implemented in 0.32!

Settlements could really use some sort of culture generation or other bar from flipping; from a lore-explains-mechanics perspective, if the Kuriotates are so great, why are their people in a hurry to switch sides? Also, on some map types, they would be a lot more useful for staking out terrain chokepoints if they didn't defect so readily.


Give them a national UU which can generate culture like Roayal guard but isn't tied to specific civic. (Higher administrator, or something like that) Kuriotates ca'nt use aristocary from lore percpective also as from game perspective (the last thing you want is less food)

With only 4 of them you'll have to switch them between cities in imidate danger, or with gypsy wagons.

The main weakness of the Kuriotates is their inability to conquer other civs, because of the current settlement mechanism: this fatal flaw has to be adressed rather than tweaked around. A few possibilities:
[1] dump settlements altogether, but give them only one super city (the capital: the third ring would become a palace property so you can move it around). Flavorwise it can make sense: the supercity is the one in which Cardith resides, he's the only wonder boy after all. Minor variants to offset the super capital: extra empire expenses as a function of city count; the capital's third ring becomes available only with a certain tech (eg construction); or the capital has hapiness bonusses only upon certain techs, events, buildings, heroes etc
[2] conquered cities do not downgrade to settlements. Variant: downgrade if less than X population or some other condition...

I like the addition of +3 happiness to the sprawling. I think that would help out.

What limits city population is in my experience happiness and not the amount of food available. But is it maybe possible to give a happiness bonuses which improves with time? For example one could make many of the 'improve health' buildings also give a happy face for the sprawling threat? (or this civilization)

For special unit, how about the D&D: dragon deciple?
*National unit, max 4?
*Fearly mobile: Move 2,
*Flying: rebasing (?) probably not possible on a land unit
*Can cast 'breath weapon'
*some imunities to some elements.

A repeatable ritual - 'Prosperity', that increases gold and happiness?
Repeatable building - 'Housing', that increases happiness and health?

Hello , I'm totaly new on this forum and english isn't my first langage so sorry if it's stupid/ill conceived

In oriental mythologie , Ley lines (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ley_line) are also called dragon lines and like the kuriotate are based on dragon and mega cities (who can be interpreted as "nexus " of dragon line, they may be something here , like may settlements strenghten the nearby city or upgrade the land near the main city. Or may be accelerate the coming of the dragon

randoms thoughts sorry if it was already proposed !

Welcome to the forums Stedinger :)

Ive heard of ley lines but didn't know they had a connection to dragons! :)

@theJopa: I like those ideas. They'd be fairly expensive (the ritual and building) I guess, but cheap enough to build them on an occaisional basis!

Al

The main weakness of the Kuriotates is their inability to conquer other civs, because of the current settlement mechanism: this fatal flaw has to be adressed rather than tweaked around. A few possibilities:
[1] dump settlements altogether, but give them only one super city (the capital: the third ring would become a palace property so you can move it around). Flavorwise it can make sense: the supercity is the one in which Cardith resides, he's the only wonder boy after all. Minor variants to offset the super capital: extra empire expenses as a function of city count; the capital's third ring becomes available only with a certain tech (eg construction); or the capital has hapiness bonusses only upon certain techs, events, buildings, heroes etc
[2] conquered cities do not downgrade to settlements. Variant: downgrade if less than X population or some other condition...

I agree that the Kuriotates should be able to keep what they conquer, but not be able to expand them with the third ring.

But if you limit them to one supercity, you'd have to give them something else since anyone can get a supercity via the slums wonder.

I don't think the Kuroites are all that broken. Definitely don't get rid of Settlements. The new change boosting towns is a good move. That should be plenty to balance out the civ.

What would people's thoughts be if Settlements were just normal cities, but restricted to a radius of 1 tile? Then normal Kuriotates Cities would still be 3 tiles, and the Kuriotates could build the City of a Thousand Slums to make them 4, or to make a settlement 2.

if you limit them to one supercity, you'd have to give them something else since anyone can get a supercity via the slums wonder.
If all their cities other than the capital are normal (2-ring cities where stuff can be buit) nothing would prevent them from building the slums wonder in one of them to get another 3-ring supercity. Getting a supercity "for free" would be a major boon IMHO which would need to be offset by a disadvantage, but which does not cripple the Kuriotates as much as existing settlements (at least on the higher levels).

It's not a very elegant way to give the Kuriotates a +3 happiness bonus from the sprawling trait.

This gives them just a very very unfair starting bonus.

If there was any building to get +3 happiness cheap it would be ok.

I'd really like to see settlements be able to build ships. Sometimes you start inland and eventually need to use ships. Being landlocked for the whole game is pretty harsh. Even when you start on the coast, building a good super-city on the coast can be tough.

It's not a very elegant way to give the Kuriotates a +3 happiness bonus from the sprawling trait.

This gives them just a very very unfair starting bonus.

If there was any building to get +3 happiness cheap it would be ok.

No, but what it is is a workaround we can have added for .32 to see if it helps matters, as well as a solution that's elegant in its simplicity. It's worth a shot.

I'd really like to see settlements be able to build ships. Sometimes you start inland and eventually need to use ships. Being landlocked for the whole game is pretty harsh. Even when you start on the coast, building a good super-city on the coast can be tough.

From a game point view the point of this civilization is to focus on the megacities. The entire point is that they should not need more than 4 realy big cities. So I'm against all forms of improvements which improves settlements.

However the ship-building issue have to be addressed at some point of time.
How about its better to use an Ship-Engineer unit which can cast a spell (sacrifice caster) to create a ship?

It's not a very elegant way to give the Kuriotates a +3 happiness bonus from the sprawling trait.

This gives them just a very very unfair starting bonus.

If there was any building to get +3 happiness cheap it would be ok.

I Agree that an gradual increase in happiness would be better. Maybe the sprawling-trait instead could give a bonus to happiness depending on the health conditions? For example:

-Each building will give 1 happy face for every 2 healt the building provides? Such that the aquaduct provides +2 health AND +1 happy face.

-And/Or that curtain civics tied to healt also gives some happiness bonuses?

Possibly, the settlements could be made useful by implementing unique buildings that give bonuses to your main cities based on the number of settlements you have. Thematically, the function of the settlements isn't to actually produce things themselves, but to ship raw materials to the main cities, right? Say...

Engineering District: +1 hammers per settlement (+2 with Engineering);
Grain Processor: +2 food per settlement (+3 with Sanitation);
Government Recruitment Exams: +2 GPP (Sage) per settlement.


That could get out of hand pretty quickly. How about having settlements have a refining building that takes resources within the radius and transforms them into a new set of resources (Cotton -> Cloth) like the old game Imperialism based on resources and surrounding land. The metropolises could have building that take advantage of the refined goods.

I know it is not that likely to be implemented (requires some big changes without some kludgy work arounds), but it could be a fun idea.

It's not a very elegant way to give the Kuriotates a +3 happiness bonus from the sprawling trait. This gives them just a very very unfair starting bonus.
I agree that they get an excessive starting bonus but they're still a doomed mid-game civ.

I agree that they get an excessive starting bonus but they're still a doomed mid-game civ.

I also agree, but still happiness bonus is definitivly the way to go.

How hard would it be to allow non-coastal cities to build ships (maybe requiring a "Dry-Dock" building)? Then the enclave improvement could act as a city, making a canal to the sea. Also, in my version, you could use water elementals to carry the ships to the sea.

What would people's thoughts be if Settlements were just normal cities, but restricted to a radius of 1 tile? Then normal Kuriotates Cities would still be 3 tiles, and the Kuriotates could build the City of a Thousand Slums to make them 4, or to make a settlement 2.

For a 4 tile radius, you'll need to put scroll bars on the city display. (It's already a pain in the ass to have to use the ESC key since the clickable text is on top of a square in the third ring.)

Well to achieve a 4th workable tile you would have to modify the DLL a fair amount, and in doing so you can alter how the city zoom works as well :)

I like the idea, that the settlements boost the great citys. Perhaps if every settlement could support additional 1-2 Military units, and with cheaper upgradecosts, would make the midgame more easy for the Kuriotates.
Another good Idea could be to improve water tile. (Underwaterfarms, Underwater settlements)

OK I just read the first page, and so i edited my post (but accidentialy deleted my orginal postings.

My first Idea was additional national wonders like
The market of thousend shops, with bring a bonus for every settlement to the city,
or a monument of the dragon wich could attract more People to the City ( more happiness per city with the dragoncult?)

How hard would it be to allow non-coastal cities to build ships (maybe requiring a "Dry-Dock" building)? Then the enclave improvement could act as a city, making a canal to the sea. Also, in my version, you could use water elementals to carry the ships to the sea.

I have a much simpler idee which would have the same effect: let none-coastal cities build ship-engineers, which can cast spells to create a ship in any of your coastal settlement or cities. The spell should 'kill' the caster. Maybe you could add a twist and give the ship created by a ship engineer a free promotion or something. But this version is atleast completly doable.

Smusebaer, I realy like the market of thousand shops. It realy sound realy great, becuase it may realy boost the effect of settlements without turning the focus away from the megacity concept. Maybe +1 happyness & health per settlement would be enough of a bonus.

what ever happened to the suggestion of allowing settlements a 1 plot radius? or even just the north/south/east/west tiles.

I have a much simpler idee which would have the same effect: let none-coastal cities build ship-engineers, which can cast spells to create a ship in any of your coastal settlement or cities. The spell should 'kill' the caster. Maybe you could add a twist and give the ship created by a ship engineer a free promotion or something. But this version is atleast completly doable.

This is not a bad idea, but it sounds like it might be more suited to the Lanun. And I'd call them Shipwrights if I were going to do it.

It seems like people are concerned about removing settlements from the game, because it would keep the Kuriotates from expanding territory.

Why not just use the "claim flags" mechanism that I made for my in-development mod mod Dungeon Adventure?

These are essentially new units that operate like a starbase in the FF mod. They do nothing except exist and create a zone of permanent cultural dominance around them. It persists from turn to turn, and earlier claims have precedence over later ones.

Right now in DA, I have these units created by a special action/spell. You could also build the units in a city, have another unit transport them through conversion to a promotion, and then drop them in place.

Here is an in-game clip that shows a claim-stake near the end:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0OI1BAPtwDA

@ Grand Seeker:
I think less than +1/+1 would be enough.

Looking at the 0.32 changelog, an idea struck me. Why can't we combine the new ideas, and Lutefisk's 'stake claim' ability? IMO, currently, sprawling isn't working as it should. The current system is more controlled. I think that the Enclave should have a cultural boundry of one. That would increase how far their boundries push, and maybe Kuriotate towns should be slower to upgrade (symbolising everyone moving to the large cities), but automatically upgrade, so their boundries push? And Enclaves could randomly spawn villages on unimproved, non-forested, non-hill-land grasslands/plains. This would be more thematic, I think, and would be more 'uncontrolled sprawling'. Of course, you would have to protect these new boundries... And this also allows you to remove the Settlement mechanic. The above system would ideally work only for leaders with Sprawling (i.e. Cardith), so it can't be abused with unrestricted leaders.

Thats a pretty good idea, using the enclaves to spread culture. One problem might be being overwhelmed by other civ's culture. Since they can't gain cultural value, or would progress beyond a ZOC fo 1, they probably would not be able to push back culture and would easily be pushed back themselves. Perhaps enclaves could make Kuri culture 100% in their tiles? This would represent the openess of the Kuriotes - even though residents may be from other civs, they are integrated into kuriotes culture and no longer consider themselves part of their previous civ.

If we were able to remove settlements, they would need a new world spell. Along the same line as their previous spell, perhaps all enclaves receive an increase of ZOC to 2, and all other cottages/towns/ etc grow one level? Or all enclaves have a 5-10% chance to spawn a great person of random type?

Something just occurred to me as a rather elegant fix for a couple current problems with the Kuriotates. Right now, the inability to choose between city and settlement in multiplayer is pretty crippling for a human player, and the AI's inability to place cities far enough apart generally kills them.

Is there any particular reason why Spawling cities shouldn't ~always~ be placed as Settlements, and require the Convert to City spell to be made into cities? Then you can still choose in multiplayer, AND you can add in an AI block to Convert to City to keep the AI from using it if the settlement is too close to a city.

And while I'm at it throwing out ideas, here's one to make the Kuriotates more viable in general: It seems to me that while the Cult of the Dragon is great at destabilizing other civs (unless they just take the 3 anarchy each time), it doesn't really do much to help the Kuriotates. So I was thinking that (only for the Kuriotates, as the Sheim don't need it as much and don't seem like the type to emphasize the Cult to the extent Cardith would), cities with the Cult of the Dragon in them have a Crusade/Planar Gate like effect where each turn they have a chance on spawning a unit for Cardith, one combat-useful mid game (something like Demagog strength, maybe?), but more importantly one able to spread Cult of the Dragon like a religion. This greatly boosts the usefulness of Settlements: Just spread the Cult to them and they start producing units for you! For maximum chaos-causing, Cult of the Dragon-ness, this effect should be able to spawn a unit owned by Cardith Lorda even in cities he doesn't own. ^_^

Anyway, just a random idea I had.

I'd be curious to know whether experienced MP players would ever choose the Kuriotates, even with the added happy bonus.

personally id rather settlements were gone and their super cities just got even larger culture size.. right now kuriotates always have the most cities and packed in everywhere, with enclaves that act as cities with those "claim flags" they should do alright, and make it so captured cities turn into immigrants with whom you can automake enclaves or add to the city for +1 pop

It seems to me the best way to truly effect a sprawling city is to have all of the settlements convey extra resources (food, hammers and gold) to the nearest hub.