My first impression: Rhye, you're awesome.

Removed language.

Great job Rhye, I had great fun when I played my first game as the Vikings.

Hehe, yeah it's really interesting.
I started a game with Carthage. Interesting map, I thought the hard part of the UHV would be grab 3 dyes, instead that was doable but I didn't manage to build 3 settlers in time. Settlers cost more than ancient wonders if you have the appropriate resources... maybe they cost a bit too much ?

This is awesome, and good job!

Ok, i had used China and Babylon, and i love the map - i like Solver turning the desert rivers into flood plains though. I saw NO option to build the great wall, is this removed?

When using babylon, i was told to review my civics and i did not start with Subjegation. I could either take a turn of anarcy for it - or just not use it, which is my obvious choice. I believe i was supposed to start with it.

Besides that, the great wall missing and no option to choose religions (picky arent i?) - this is great. I saw Justinian is now playable, and thanks for adding in Emperor Ming!


2 Kudos!

Hehe, yeah it's really interesting.
I started a game with Carthage. Interesting map, I thought the hard part of the UHV would be grab 3 dyes, instead that was doable but I didn't manage to build 3 settlers in time. Settlers cost more than ancient wonders if you have the appropriate resources... maybe they cost a bit too much ?

I'd like to download it. Where's the link?:confused:

in the welcome thread.

I just want to say that China, which was already hard in RFC, is pretty much impossible if you don't have a good start simply because of the rate of research. i got as far as founding Math but only at the cost of 10% research and 7 cities in 100 AD. Then somebody founded Taoism and I gave up.

I'm going to try France next (I'm so lazy I don't want to have to research currency for the extra trade route).

I think that you need more resources in some areas of the map ( like Europe and China ) to reflect more the balance of the normal RFC.

AND I LEARNED I DON'T KNOW HOW TO PLAY A NORMAL CIVILIZATION GAME T_T i don't know what to do and where to go, completely lost...

lol Edungeon, I may have the same problem...

Just started a game as Persia (huge map, high earth likeliness) and I'm looking around asking: OK, so where do I go? Where's Babylon? Where's India? I have a Chinese scout right next to me, and huge amounts of open land, not as much Indies or Barbs here.

I really don't feel the need to conquer anybody with all this great empty land around (in RFC Persia you're boxed in with India to the east, Babylon to the west and Indy Samarkand to the North so conquering is essential), however, I am Babylon's sworn enemy and he will fall...mwahhahha :scan:

I tried a few games (3) as Carthage. I always started near India, 2/3 near Egypt, once (that I rerolled immediatly) near Greece... Rome was always too far to be a rival. Maybe India should be swapped with Rome.

As AP and Edungeon said there is a problem with starting areas: in 4 starts (I count one that I didn't even try playing) I started three times in the desert and once on plains, I never had rivers and barely food resources. At least the starting location should have more resources. I noticed that when France spawned (next to my Leptis, grrr) 3 cows were created in its starting area (which didn't even need it), plus they (and Spain of course) start with techs the "elder" civs can only dream about, unless they'd trade but they are all very seclusive.
Adding resources like it happened for France might be a good idea also for ancient civs (maybe only 1 food resource). Also I would consider making any resource on Jungle improvable like the plantations, because in RFC on a drawn map you won't find pigs and rice in the jungle, but you will with the current RFC RAND script ;)

My last impression is on barbs: Camel Archers are nasty... they already were when you knew in which area and where from they'd come, but now it can be anywhere. Good luck :D

@Q-Meister: it SEEMS there is great land ready to be colonized, but then in the middle ages civs start popping like crazy, so if you expanded much you'll loose cities or go to war. Carthage is pretty doable btw, even with a mediocre start I managed to build the 3 settlers needed (chop, chop, chop) and find dyes.

Some comments (all criticism because that's what's helpful):

1. Some civs don't seem to expand. This is particularly an issue with China, which has turtled rather than building more than two cities in both games I've played (on Huge maps).

2. Barbs need to be wiped from tiles right next to start locations. The Vikings and the Khmer were both wiped out on their first turns in my first game as Rome, before the opportunity to switch to them even became available. (I looked at Worldbuilder, and there were barb stacks right next to their spawn sites.)

3. AI Egypt is a religion-founding monster. AI China has not yet managed to get both Confucianism and Taoism. Egypt always gets at least one, sometimes both, as well as Judaism, and, in my second game, Islam before the Arabs even spawned. (I got Christianity as Rome using the Oracle; this was on Viceroy, though.) If Egypt is always going to found Judaism, maybe it should be replaced by an Egyptian religion such as Atenism.

2. strange because those barbs should have flipped to the spawning civ... it happened to me (I got an extra starting warrior as Carthage).
3. in my game Egypt isn't so strong although it can found Judaism (but not always, Persia or Greece are also good candidates), but this happens in the unmodded game just the same... also, in the only game where I met China -or the only one that actually had it- it was the tech leader and founded both chinese religions... This to say, that it's RAND, and I think it's a bit too early to talk statistically.

2. strange because those barbs should have flipped to the spawning civ... it happened to me (I got an extra starting warrior as Carthage).

Barbarians flip, but not on the first turn. What normally happens is this:

Turn 0: Units appear for the new civ without movement points.
Turn 1: Barbs (and other units) flip. The AI founds the capital. If you're playing a different civ, you are given the opportunity to switch.

In this situation, though, there are barbs next to the spawn site on Turn 0. The new civ appears but can't move its units. In the interturn, the barbs attack and wipe them out before the barb units can flip.

I'm assuming that's what happened, anyway. In both cases, there was a stack of four Axemen next to the spawn location the turn the units appeared. The first time, they were wiped out rather than the option of switching appearing. I went back, opened up WB, and deleted the barb units, and the civs survived.

nope, in my carthaginian start the barbarian warrior flipped on turn 0: in fact it was defending a goody hut and I heard the money sound when the game was still loading with the advancement bar, I went WTF ? Then I understood what happened when I started, also because the hut graphics were still there (but not the hut itself ^^) Also, the warrior wasn't in the same square of my starting stack, but next to it.

Probably related to the fact that there's no stone or marble around civ spawn sites!! (E.g. pyramids built in 830 AD when Russia spawned)

Something else: a bunch of Cows appear near every European start location. I guess this is for balance, but sometimes the Cows appear on top of Mountains.

Are you able to work that mountain?

Russia is spawning too close to China--even in a huge map, I flipped 2 cities from the Chinese, and the Mongolians haven't even spawned yet. That's why we need marshes! :)

Are you able to work that mountain?

It wasn't mine, but I assume not.

Also, playing as the English, the Dutch spawned in "America".

I saw sheep on a mountain. They were out of my city radius but when I turned on "display yield" there was no yield. So I assume you still cannot work it. Although, if you were Inca, you might still get the bonus.

I'm playing one game as India (after a false start which I quit because Carthage spawned on top of me :p) and enjoying it very much. The only potently noticeable thing so far is that Egypt goes religion happy and tends to found Judaism, Confucianism and Daoism. I can just about accept Judaism (though if I knew how I'd adjust the spread modifiers), but the others are painful. They even founded Christianity in the first game.

(The first time this happened China wasn't there, so it made some small sense - though really I wish C+D could be taken out altogether if China doesn't spawn)

After getting so used to RFC's accurate religious spread, I'm finding this hard to fathom. In RFC I'd just enter the worldbuilder and re-appropriate any lost religions, but now I don't want to reveal the map!

Russia is spawning too close to China--even in a huge map, I flipped 2 cities from the Chinese, and the Mongolians haven't even spawned yet. That's why we need marshes! :)

I doubt marshes would help anything with this "issue", the spawn areas for the new Euro civs are huge, and besides this would be an issue only depending on which map type you play. If you play medium likeliness (let's call it medium random) then it's acceptable that Russia spawns near China sometimes. Maybe less acceptable that Carthage ALWAYS spawn as a neighbor of India. If you play high random then the Dutch can be born in America. If you play a large map where not all civs are present, and China is missing, you can't really complain if another 3000 BC civ founds the chinese religions... I think if you guys want almost the same game as the base RFC, should play huge map with low random (high earth likeliness) and temperate climate.
Real issues IMHO are resources spawning on mountains or on wrong terrain types; few food for starting areas of ancient civs, especially those connected with desert; rivers that cross deserts without a single flood plain, food resources that can't be improved because under a jungle, and more stuff like this.

I started as Greece, standard map(crappy computer), random earth likeliness(I think that it's low). India started north of me, Egypt and Ethiopia are far east. Rome is somewhere, maybe behind Egypt(they declared war on me for some reason). I don't know where other nations are, at least Spain, Russia and Mali have spawned somewhere. Korinthos is the greatest city in the world, has about 5 wonders and a nice stack of phalanxes. Athenai is my capital, not as good as Korinthos but still fairly good. Sparte is my third city, it's the holy city of Christianity(great prophet) and Islam(great prophet + running a deficit economy to get it in time).

Veeeery nice.

Hi all,

my first impression:

I played as Persian Empire until about 600 AD. (Screenshot below)

The map is very good, interesting landscape, impassable mountain ranges, muc space to expand.
Yet the growth of most cities is very slow especially for cities in southern hemisphere (like Egypt, Persia, Arabia etc.). By 550 I managed to have cities as big as 4 points, then the plague came, they went back to 2 points. The map is barely settled.

more impressions later on ...

Tried several Russian starts. Very interesting that the large space between Russia and the eastern civs are gone. Contacted Japan almost immediately because they are not on an island and have chariots running wild (Tokugawa is very accomodating in trading for civs/opening borders, especially for ones that haven't had wonders built yet like code of laws). In all games Moscow had 3-4 cows and lots of trees. One game I flipped some Chinese cities and warred with a dominant China for 2 centuries, and I gave up because the Mongols showed up and wanted 2 of them back.:lol: The other game I was doing well but suddenly 3 stacks of barb horsemen/axemen showed up (one in the middle of my empire which still had a hole in it due to numerous mountains) and captured 2 of my outposts despite my UP. Third time flipped a Persian (!) city (in low earthlikehood) and collapsed them, but then my science rate was at a standstill (in normal civ I would have gone on and won).
No seaports in all 3 games which is sad. And since Asia was so small, getting any inland city >20 tiles away is almost impossible without founding on future Mongolian turf.

My China game has the same experience; Russia was right next to me and I was a small China with only 4 cities...There is no equivalent to the vast streches of Siberia that I can see.

I started as Greece, standard map(crappy computer), random earth likeliness(I think that it's low). India started north of me, Egypt and Ethiopia are far east. Rome is somewhere, maybe behind Egypt(they declared war on me for some reason). I don't know where other nations are, at least Spain, Russia and Mali have spawned somewhere. Korinthos is the greatest city in the world, has about 5 wonders and a nice stack of phalanxes. Athenai is my capital, not as good as Korinthos but still fairly good. Sparte is my third city, it's the holy city of Christianity(great prophet) and Islam(great prophet + running a deficit economy to get it in time).

Veeeery nice.

Plague + Korinthos declares independence + Ottomans spawn next to me = I switch to Ottomans + Sparte flips to me + Greece collapses + I conquer those independent cities

:D

Rome is the biggest nations in the world, India is big also. Ethiopia and Mali have both about 7 cities but a small landmass. I have 6 cities, I think, but still much more landmass than Ethiopia or Mali. Egypt has collapsed, Netherlands, Portugal, Spain and Russia try to cope against Rome, Japan spawned on an archipelago, China and Inca are on a small continent(Inca has only two cities, but at least they're not fighting against Europeans).

continued:

After spawning, I almost immediately conquered the Egyptians which had only two tiny cities and no military. Fought China afterwards to get some workers. The game went well except VERY slow growth and VERY low settler building (only managed to build one more settler till 450 AD). The problem is there are almost no food resources!! With tiny cities and crappy production my military as well was tiny (except for the one I got at the start).

the most interesting aspect is of course replayability. You can roll a start with a civ and win a UHV or other victory fairly easy, and then retry and be screwed, or anyways, it will still be a strategically very different game. So far, except the food resource placement, I love it !

Probably related to the fact that there's no stone or marble around civ spawn sites!! (E.g. pyramids built in 830 AD when Russia spawned)

Yup, much easier to beat the AI to wonders now. Even with just 2 very mediocre Persian cities (no iron/copper/horse) in the vicinity and only stone I was able to build Pyramids, Stonehenge, Oracle, Hanging Gardens.

In my India game I took control of England, and now I'm terrorising the American civs. Religion took a long time to reach Europe (except France who were too far to send it to us anyway) and so far I'm the only one in the new world. Very good altogether.

Probably related to the fact that there's no stone or marble around civ spawn sites!!
Well, as I've seen (20-30 starts), Babelonia has about 30% chances to have a stone and about 5% chance to have a marble. Meanwhile, it has 95% chances for each of gold and ivory.

I suppose this is what everyone is talking about with regards to resource placement; stone, dye and ivory all in the middle of the desert and out of reach from Babylon itself. Only 1 food plain in Babylon's radius, the rest mostly desert and hills. If the stone had been closer and more food plains it would have been a decent start.

well, I see at least 2 flood plains (one is on the hill).

Plague + Korinthos declares independence + Ottomans spawn next to me = I switch to Ottomans + Sparte flips to me + Greece collapses + I conquer those independent cities

:D

Rome is the biggest nations in the world, India is big also. Ethiopia and Mali have both about 7 cities but a small landmass. I have 6 cities, I think, but still much more landmass than Ethiopia or Mali. Egypt has collapsed, Netherlands, Portugal, Spain and Russia try to cope against Rome, Japan spawned on an archipelago, China and Inca are on a small continent(Inca has only two cities, but at least they're not fighting against Europeans).

Things got boring, so I decided to start a world war:

Ottomans(me)
Spain
Portugal
Mali
Rome*
Ethiopia*

vs

India
Netherlands
Inca
Russia

* = joined because of an Apostolic Palace resolution

I razed two cities, Calcutta and Varanasi, and continued my conquest. Then, game decided to crash(or at least Vista closed BTS and informed me about an error). D'oh. Hopefully I don't lose many turns thanks to autosave.

Continued that Babylon game from above and things going OK, about to discover Civil Service at 1290AD but the big news is that none of the usual suspects (Persia, Arabia, Turkey) have flipped any of my cities!! Big surprise and relief as anyone who's played Babylon in regular RAF will know.

I had to spread out further than I guess I should have being historically tiny Babylon, for a while I was the largest civ in the game with just 4 moderately spacef out cities. I didn't see the point in building a coastal city next to Babil and taking the clams or on a desert coastal tile so I build them further away. This made me Shaky and even Unstable for awhile so I halted expansion and just build infrastructure. No one really close to me until Arabia came and build 2 desert cities to the east of me. Saladin is actually more agreeable to Open Borders and sends missionaries...things I wish he would do more of in the regular RAF game

After calendar and connecting my plantation resources I was back to Shaky and with Currency it's Stable/Shaky. About to expand for the first time in maybe 2000 years to get a good city with 2 gold and horse. Still a very challenging game as Babylon even without the civs flipping your cities but it's also a definite change not having that being the main focus of the game.

Cities in general are much smaller than in regular RAF, they grow more slowly, not as much obvious powerhouse uber-cities a la Rome, Shush, Frankfurt, Chicago... With being able to confirm that Turkey was not next to me I suppose I'm free to expand at will now, as much as my expansion will allow.

Things got boring, so I decided to start a world war:

Ottomans(me)
Spain
Portugal
Mali
Rome*
Ethiopia*

vs

India
Netherlands
Inca
Russia



My money's on Team A.

Team B consists of

1. Jungle Civ
2. Tiny Civ
3. Backwards Civ
4. Shadow of its former self (much smaller territory than regular RAF) civ

good luck! :goodjob:

Spain and Mali shouldn't be much help but you could probably do it by yourself. the AI is very peaceful.

I got frustrated when my second city, built 3 spaces from my capital of bibilu flipped to MONGOL so i declared war with everyone and started an ICS (infinite city sprawl for those who didnt play civ3). Meanwhile, i have 0 military of any kind, building only a city, literally every closest space i can - and the AI doesn't stop me until AP forces peace. Now, i have 42 cities, upkeep of -400 a turn, 0 gold, 0 units, still settling cities - and im conquering Mongol by settling cities on top of them. i am also setting culture to 100% before the end of turn.

FINALLY when their empire all down to the capital flipped to me they dared exile me to netherlands. random, fun but... a city should NOT FLIP UNLESS it is 4+ squares from the capital. especially since it was my ONLY city capable of growing bigger than 3. (almost no resources, a lot of desert and hills, and few grasslands but on border of desert and under a huge jungle.)



Oh and uh, they should be more aggro when you have 0 units and 50 cities, really when i TRY to build a military they war me and bring it, but i ICS and they just figure i will suicide?

I would like to say that while many of us are finding issues or faults in the scripting of the map, I would like to applaud Rhye for the wonderful new adventures we will all be endeavoring upon.

Playing on a high likelihood map, while the world looks similar to our own, the randomness makes for a VASTLY different game. Also a very fun game!

Bravo!

I am very pleased with my Babylon game. I'm on 1500AD with a 11 turn Golden Age, thanks to the Mausoleum and I'm now solid and just about on par with the Euro civs tech wise. I've also had no issues with spawning civs trying to flip my cities...In regular RAF this would be all but impossible. My stability is solid, I have 5 decent cities, although no uber-city standing among them, and I think I'll be able to compete with the Euro civs for colonies which would be awesome because again, this would be all but unthinkable in regular RAF.

Just shows you how civs that are doomed to fall in RAF have a (possible) new life in RAND.

My first impression, after a year away from videogames, let alone Civ4, let alone RFC:

Damn, this s***'s hard. :crazyeye:

But still hella fun. Fantastic job Rhye :D

You really do have to adopt different strategies in RAND than the typical chop-whip-chop tactics used in RAF. There just aren't enough trees in the games I've been in and more importantly, not enough food resources so cities do not grow nearly as quickly. I never realized how spoiled I was with all those great spawn sites in RAFs until you get placed in some jungle or desert with little or no food resources.

Even judicious whipping creates problems as cities grow sooo slowly, at least compared to what we're used to.

On about 30th-40th try as Babilonia, I got a start with India absent. So I founded Buddism and Judaism and made second and third UHVs easily. Though, I failed with first one the turn when Persia spawn, do they start with Code of Laws now? (I got Monachy from Colossus.) Well, I just wanted my Golden Age, so it was ok.
Now, I am at very large territory, about 1/4 of world map (down-right quadrant), with Egypt to west and Arabia to east, and just buit my fourth city. Egypt is Induist and Arabia founded both Christianity and Islam when spawn. Both stay in deserts, and I spread mostly to hills-plains landsape, so there are no conflicts and I have space for 3-4 good (well, decent) cities more.
The continent has another half in northern hemisphere, but it is unavailable to me because of jungles (I just built my first scout). Still, I know all the rest are there, to north from Egypt, because of switching to Ethiopian for a turn.

Tell me how to change map size? I can't see a button for this, and it's always large.

As somebody has already mentioned before, in High Earth Likeness (on a huge map), Russia spawns too close to China, so that there is no space for Mongolians between them.
In fact, in my first (and so far, only) game, Russia spawned right next to China, but there was a big gap to the west between Russia and Germany. This kind of makes Russia into an Asian power, rather than a European one, so the UHV condition can only be met by colonizing to the west, which is problematic because "Europe" is jam-packed with civs.

Also because there was no space left on Asian mainland for Mongolia, it spawned on an island (or maybe it was a big long peninsula) next to Japan!

So I would really prefer for Russia to be moved further west, at least for High likeness.

Does anyone know where to view civ's traits? For example, Emperor Ming's traits?

Leader traits has been removed in Rhye's in favor of Unique powers that each civ has, the Chinese UP is the Power of the Myraid where Melee units can be built faster than normal.

Things got boring, so I decided to start a world war:

Ottomans(me)
Spain
Portugal
Mali
Rome*
Ethiopia*

vs

India
Netherlands
Inca
Russia

* = joined because of an Apostolic Palace resolution

I razed two cities, Calcutta and Varanasi, and continued my conquest. Then, game decided to crash(or at least Vista closed BTS and informed me about an error). D'oh. Hopefully I don't lose many turns thanks to autosave.

I didn't have an autosave. Grr.

Well, anyway, I saved before starting the war, so I loaded that save and declared war again. Now I razed Calcutta and captured Varanasi, and also prevented my Greek cities from rebelling by building theatres and placing troops in them. Then, I sent my stack of doom(just a couple of cavalries, riflemen and cannons, India still has longbowmen and musketmen) to destroy Dilli, the holy city of Hinduism and Buddhism. I razed it. Hehehee. India won't still capitulate though, they say "We're afraid of your enemies!" :D I made peace with Netherlands and Inca, not sure about Russia. So now it's basically India vs everyone. :D

I really messed my game up.

chose random civilsaton, got incas. so, ok, I go for my target. saw, wow, lots of barbs switch to me, but that also ruined my income rate, which of course is crucial for the uhv. then I got the conqueror's event, but managed to repulse them, with those "free" troops.

so, I continued to expand nicely, endured the colonial plague wave, but I wouldnt have enough income for the 3000 gold. thus, I decided that feudalism is enough to defend myself against angry europeans and dropped science rate to 0. got lucky that even by the mid 17 hundreds only spain had founded a city on my southern american continent. 1 down, two more to go. well, to make it short, I messed up the gold condition badly, had only half the amount, but a decent rate at least of ~70 gpt. continued for a few turns just for the sake of it, bought a few techs, then came america.

geez, why not. the uhv is gone anyways why not try my luck in north amercia (whose coast I had sailed and that apparently was not colonised). I switch, what happens: I start directly south of my former incas as america two places from where I had previousl planned a city. I was so shocked I quit without saving, when in retrospection it would have been a great start. lots of good land, a civ whose strongest unit was a longbowman, who was isolated without any friends and a bunch of europeans apparently to busy to bother with the new world. bah, should have just annihilated my former self and be done with it.

ps. is it normal in rfc that the english keep demanding large sums of money from me every single turn I see them, even if I said no for a dozen times? it might be nice to have an option "no, and dont ask me again you stupid ".

ps, great job rhye, looking forward to more time for playing.

Now, I am at very large territory, about 1/4 of world map (down-right quadrant), with Egypt to west and Arabia to east, and just buit my fourth city. Egypt is Induist and Arabia founded both Christianity and Islam when spawn. Both stay in deserts, and I spread mostly to hills-plains landsape, so there are no conflicts and I have space for 3-4 good (well, decent) cities more.
large.Well, them both announced war with me eventually. Egypt did nothing, as usual, and we write peace 10 turns later. But Arabia actually sent three camel archers and a swordsman to my Babilы. Luckily, a spearman, a babilonian archer and two warriors was enough to stop them.
It seems AI is really more agressive in RAND.

The game is very well done, and I'm close to winning my first victory as Portugal. The diplomacy is a little strange though:
1.) Germany and France act like Japan. I am pleased with Germany and cautious with France, I share the same religion as both of them, yet they refused to open their borders with them (very annoying when I needed to get 12 open borders by 1650). In fact, they didn't even have, "We care about our brothers and sisters of faith" in the diplomacy screen.
2.) China is a religious psycho. I had -12 for "heathen religion", right when I came in contact with China. Spain on the other hand, only had -2 for "heathen religion". Strange.
3.) I'm pretty sure this is a bug, but every single turn England asks to convert to Christianity. I say no every turn, but I don't get any negative diplomacy points.
Has any one else encountered unusual diplomacy?

I have a wacky england talking to me and making the same request every turn. Thankfully when I say no it doesn't seem to affect our relationship. But yeah, I have that bug as well.

I didn't have an autosave. Grr.

Well, anyway, I saved before starting the war, so I loaded that save and declared war again. Now I razed Calcutta and captured Varanasi, and also prevented my Greek cities from rebelling by building theatres and placing troops in them. Then, I sent my stack of doom(just a couple of cavalries, riflemen and cannons, India still has longbowmen and musketmen) to destroy Dilli, the holy city of Hinduism and Buddhism. I razed it. Hehehee. India won't still capitulate though, they say "We're afraid of your enemies!" :D I made peace with Netherlands and Inca, not sure about Russia. So now it's basically India vs everyone. :D

Razed also Mumbai, the holy city of Taoism, and India capitulated. After that, an era of peace.

Then, things started rolling.

First, I decided to take control of my auto-exploring caravel, and send it to see what's happening in the New World. Found out that America is in war with Spain, Portugal and a couple of other nations. Well, I set my caravel sail further. Few turns later America asked to be my vassal. Well, I accepted.

Then I realized what I had done

World War II.

Well, I continued, made peace with Mali(I had a defensive pact but they declared :huh:), sent couple of galleons to destroy India, and made a defensive pact with Japan to give me more allies. Next turn, Netherlands declared war on me. Netherlands was allied with Rome and Egypt(luckily Egypt is a piece of crap in my game). The result was this:

http://img111.imageshack.us/img111/9105/warki7.jpg (http://img111.imageshack.us/my.php?image=warki7.jpg)

Now this is EPIC.

Most likely I'll be safe, haven't seen any Dutch or Roman stack of deaths walking around. I just need to re-capitulate India, maybe send a couple of cavalries and infantries to Rome, and wait until I can make peace treaties.

:D That is amazing Hitti-Litti.

I’ve finally managed to play a few hours at RFC random. Here are my first impressions:

Two first quick attempts were quite bad : starting as Carthage just next to Egyptian, where very few resources, and no city flipping to me (although Egyptian one was very close) ; then starting as Babylonian in a middle of desert, with two ore resources, but… no food at all except one food plain.
Third attempt as Greece: interesting location this time. I’m playing for the UHV first and cultural victory if I fail it (I think in RFC rand we should NOT think like “I must win the UHV”, but think as “I may try the UHV if conditions are good; else I’ll try xxx victory). By chance I’ve found a marble resource quite close, so Sparte was found next to it. With the marbles and an engineer, I manage to build all the required wonder in time (I think without marble it’s impossible, UHV has to be forgotten).
At the moment I do not have any neighbour very close to me. I’m about to research music now, so I should be able to win by UHV.

Very interesting game. Not knowing by advance where all resources and rivals are changes completely the feeling… A good compromise between quite historical but determinist RFC and unhistorical/unrealist standard game. Of course, there are many things which have to be improved: it comes to mind bug in civ request (India keeps asking me to stop relations with Egypt), the few food resources in starting locations, the IA which seems to me quite strange sometimes… although it’s very playable and interesting as it is, it should be regarded as a ejoyable beta-test version. Anyway, I think I’ll past many and many hours with this mod. Thanks Rhye again!

I semi-accidentally got a Domination win as Portugal last night.

Between auto-founding Islam on spawn, wiping out Spain in an early brutal slugfest (my Great General was actually El Cid!!!), and a beautiful location for Lisboa (two fish, a pigs, two wheat, and a copper!), the game went til 1942 and was awesome. I don't care if I only got Warren G. Harding, it was still glorious.

I had actually never achieved a Domination win in Civ ever, so this was quite the experience, especially sine I had a +40 or more economy for most of the game :crazyeye:

Weird things that happened (other than spending most of the game as the Islamic Kingdom of Portugal):
1. There weren't 12 civs in the game in 1650 for me to get the UHV. Of the 10 that were still around (I was playing a standard-sized map), I had Open Borders with 7. Apparently that wasn't enough :(
2. In the 1920s, I had defensive pacts with both Germany (the Greater German Reich) and England (the British Empire), and Turkey was a vassal of Germany. Then there was this Congress. I refused to give up a city to Germany, and England refused to give up a city to me, and Turkey refused to give up a city to England. All four of us wind up at war with each other and everyone else and their vassals, except Turkey... which was at war with everyone. Including Germany. I had the curious experience of watching Germany devour alive its very own vassal. Very strange indeed, but still amusing. Germany's army vastly outnumbered mine, but mine out-teched his (Infantry vs. Rifles and Cavalry), and we both just squatted on a few (formerly) Turkish cities until we made peace and liberated them all to Rome :lol:

ps. is it normal in rfc that the english keep demanding large sums of money from me every single turn I see them, even if I said no for a dozen times? it might be nice to have an option "no, and dont ask me again you stupid ".

I vassalized India in my Portugal game, along with the Incas, Ethopia and Egypt, but that's besides the point, but India and only India kept asking me to gift them a technology every single turn. I eventually just gave them all of my techs just to get them to shut up.

I don't know if it's normal, but you're not alone :)

I was thinking about the same thing here...domination is going to be much easier on standard or large maps than the original huge earth map. I'm going to try a German large map first.

I also tried with the Persians but it's impossible--first because you have no close neighbors to conquer with wonders, and second their land's crappy anyway, and third, India is usually so small that you have a big risk of razing Delhi at size 1, so it's tough to get 2 shrines in time.

I was thinking about the same thing here...domination is going to be much easier on standard or large maps than the original huge earth map. I'm going to try a German large map first.

I also tried with the Persians but it's impossible--first because you have no close neighbors to conquer with wonders, and second their land's crappy anyway, and third, India is usually so small that you have a big risk of razing Delhi at size 1, so it's tough to get 2 shrines in time.

I tried a Persia game and was lucky enough to spawn pratically right on top of China, so I wiped them out and got the Confucian/Taoist holy city in one go. Unfortunately I only got one Great Prophet in time to build a shrine, but it didn't matter since I was way off the land-area UHV goal, and the Arabs spawned right next door and decided to invade just after the Russians spawned and flipped all of my Chinese cities to them. :lol:

Anyway, good luck with Germany!

but India and only India kept asking me to gift them a technology every single turn. I eventually just gave them all of my techs just to get them to shut up.
Did it help? Persia keep asking me for different things each turn. I wonder, if I'd give them all my technologies, all my money, drop connections and announced war to all their enemies, would they fail to find a reason to keep talking?

Did it help? Persia keep asking me for different things each turn. I wonder, if I'd give them all my technologies, all my money, drop connections and announced war to all their enemies, would they fail to find a reason to keep talking?

It worked until I got a new technology. They only seemed interested in the techs.

Then again, I played an American game (which lasted all of 15min because Spain won their UHV!!!) in which the Inca wanted me to go to war with someone every single turn, so maybe it's just different in different games?

As somebody has already mentioned before, in High Earth Likeness (on a huge map), Russia spawns too close to China, so that there is no space for Mongolians between them.
In fact, in my first (and so far, only) game, Russia spawned right next to China, but there was a big gap to the west between Russia and Germany. This kind of makes Russia into an Asian power, rather than a European one, so the UHV condition can only be met by colonizing to the west, which is problematic because "Europe" is jam-packed with civs.

Also because there was no space left on Asian mainland for Mongolia, it spawned on an island (or maybe it was a big long peninsula) next to Japan!

So I would really prefer for Russia to be moved further west, at least for High likeness.

I have seen this many times as well, and think that Russia should be more of a European than Asian civ.

I have seen this many times as well, and think that Russia should be more of a European than Asian civ.You dare to pretend to solve hardest philosophic question ever asked about Russia? :)
Personally, I think there should be a random. Russia should have a possibility of deciding itself, if it is Eurasia or Asiope.

Does anyone seriously argue that Russia is more Asian than European??! It's Slavic, and the Slavs are undeniably rooted in Eastern Europe.

On the other hand, over a quarter of the Asian continent is Russia.

Russia's origins and cultural, historical, religious and poltical heritage are all thoroughly European. It's just that while the Western European nations expanded overseas and eventually lost their empires, Russia expanded overland and retained its empire. Having the Russians start next to China is like having the English start in Australia.

Does anyone seriously argue that Russia is more Asian than European??!
Yes, of course. Most well-known artistic manifestation of this opinion is "Revenge" poem by Alexander Block, best Russian poet of early XX century. It starts: "Yeah, we are Scythians, we are Asians, with slanting and greedy eyes..."

since I am relatively new to rfc in common, could someone explain why so many civs just have no desire to expand. I saw it in normal and in rand, and of course it may have to do with stability, but still, they wouldn't be so horribly weak and out-teched if they just founded a few more cities. I am thinking of khmer, or ethiopia or atztecs and the like. maybe its just a difficulty setting, but its still strange to see them found a city or two and then do nothing even though there would be land available.

Does anyone seriously argue that Russia is more Asian than European??! It's Slavic, and the Slavs are undeniably rooted in Eastern Europe.

have you tried asking the Russians ? Most Russians wouldn't think they are european, but that's mostly because they think that euros don't want them ;)

Well Russians are generally happy to identify themselves as Slavs, and Slavs are definitely Eastern European.

Beyond the fact that Russia colonized Northern Asia, is there any argument for starting Russia in Asia rather than Eastern Europe?

Well Russians are generally happy to identify themselves as Slavs, and Slavs are definitely Eastern European.

Beyond the fact that Russia colonized Northern Asia, is there any argument for starting Russia in Asia rather than Eastern Europe?Well, IRL nobody cares about pure geographical aspect when discussing this question. Cultural, religious, psychological aspects are much more important.
If we concider European civilisation as a whole, Russia isn't integral part of this (whilst US is, though geographically it's America). Many people think it shouldn't ever became, so they treat this country as part of Asia.

In other words, grouping countries by geogarphical location onl shouldn't be default approach.

Zdarg is right, besides Russians consider themselves Russians, not Slavs (unless for political reasons in order to have an excuse to have a say in the balkan matters...). The influence of asian civilizations is very strong in Russia and its culture. So I reiterate the question: have you tried asking Russians (not politicians...) how much they think to be european ?

I guess the question though is where did Russia originate? Since the issue is spawning, not cultural relocation.

Kievan Rus was founded in the European area of modern Russia, not near China http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/f/fb/Kievan_Rus_en.jpg/607px-Kievan_Rus_en.jpg

Later of course Peter founded his great city as a mirror to the west, NOT to the east. I feel that modern Russian cultural identity is not as much of an issue as historic Russian cultural identity.

just my 2 cents

Zdarg is right, besides Russians consider themselves Russians, not Slavs (unless for political reasons in order to have an excuse to have a say in the balkan matters...).
It's slightly more complicate. Pro-Western ideologists often say that Russians aren't Slavs because we have too much of Mongolian blood. Anti-Western ideologists sincerely believe we are Slavs, but they also believe Slavs are Arians, direct descendents of India civilization, so not Europeans. Simple people just don't care, they hate them both, because they suffered from any sort of ideologists grandly.
Personally, I feel myself to be Russian, Siberian and cosmopolitan, in that order.

I guess the question though is where did Russia originate? Since the issue is spawning, not cultural relocation.

Kievan Rus was founded in the European area of modern Russia, not near China
I am not sure about your chart, it's too different from what I've seen in my schoolbooks. Kievan Rus' hadn't any access to Baltic sea, but had much more access to Black sea. Generally, it was closer to south. I'd say you chart is very early Moscow Tzardom, not Kievan Rus'.

I am not sure about your chart, it's too different from what I've seen in my schoolbooks. Kievan Rus' hadn't any access to Baltic sea, but had much more access to Black sea. Generally, it was closer to south. I'd say you chart is very early Moscow Tzardom, not Kievan Rus'.

Could be. Honestly, I took the map from wikipedia's History of Russia. Honestly, early Tzarist Russia still goes to my point of Russia as more west than east on founding. Understanding of course that they expanded east to absorbed many Asian people's into the motherland.

Its like asking the question of whether Eastern Rome (which became Byzantine empire) was eastern or western.

Could be.
Honestly, early Tzarist Russia still goes to my point of Russia as more west than east on founding.
Though it started as Mongolian vassal.
In fact, after Mongolian invasion, two cities fighted for leadership in future Russia, Moscow and Tver'... and Moscow won mostly because of eagerness to kiss Mongolian's ass.
Its like asking the question of whether Eastern Rome (which became Byzantine empire) was eastern or western.Agreed. :)

I guess the question though is where did Russia originate? Since the issue is spawning, not cultural relocation.

Kievan Rus was founded in the European area of modern Russia, not near China

Why the question is geographical and not cultural ? That's your own conclusion, which I consider pretty wrong. In fact, in this case Russians would be scandinavian... or what ?


Later of course Peter founded his great city as a mirror to the west, NOT to the east. I feel that modern Russian cultural identity is not as much of an issue as historic Russian cultural identity.

He was fascinated by his experiences in Europe, so what ? If anything, this proves once more, that he felt Russia wasn't part of it.


It's slightly more complicate. Pro-Western ideologists often say that Russians aren't Slavs because we have too much of Mongolian blood. Anti-Western ideologists sincerely believe we are Slavs, but they also believe Slavs are Arians, direct descendents of India civilization, so not Europeans. Simple people just don't care, they hate them both, because they suffered from any sort of ideologists grandly.
Personally, I feel myself to be Russian, Siberian and cosmopolitan, in that order.

At the end of your reasoning though, you said what I anticipated: "Russians consider themselves Russians" ;)
Ideologies (and even "religions") aren't the expression of the thought of people or of a majority, they are the thought of one person.

At the end of your reasoning though, you said what I anticipated:
Did I, really? Well, never mind. :)

Another thing worth mentioning is that in fact Europe and Asia aren't geographical terms at all. These are just halves of one continent, without any natural border between them. Geographically, such division is absolutely arbitrary and needless, and based on misunderstanding (Greeks didn't realize there was overland way from known Europe to known Asia). So we should classify by cultural aspect only, not by geofraphical one.

So we should classify by cultural aspect only, not by geofraphical one.

Especially in RAND. So I'd say its European, too.

I'd say you chart is very early Moscow Tzardom, not Kievan Rus'.

Kievan Rus initially had access to Baltics. It had access to Black Sea, but it was lost to the Turk tribes in the Steppe.

Why the question is geographical and not cultural ?

Because we are discussing the location of Russian starting point on the map, which is a geographical aspect.

as you know, cultures of people are extremely influenced by the geographical position where they originate from.

as you know, cultures of people are extremely influenced by the geographical position where they originate from.

Weren't you saying in that thread that despite geographically being closer to European countries, Russia has culturally more common with Asian ones?

I said that there is strong influence from the asian cultures (meaning more so than in the rest of Europe). That was in answer to someone who said that the russian culture is thorougly european.