being able to build domed cities underwater was the most awesome feature in the Call to Power games and in the Rise of Mankind mod for civ4 imho ;)

so it came to my mind that FFH is the perfect setting for a sea-dwelling amphibious race that would be truly unique and lots of fun to play.

it will definitely be a challenge, design-wise , coding-wise and lore-wise. but imho the pure "drool factor" is enough to give it a try ;)

before I went around adding a whole new race to the FFH universe, I thought it would be better to just use the Aifons instead. I've read some lore about them and they are definitely interesting and deserve to be brought back from the dead :lol:

I think it's a lot more interesting to have the Aifons as a sea-dwelling civ, but if people desire them to stay extint, a whole new race can just be created out of the blue of course. everything I'm gonna post here would still apply ;)

Lore:

I'm not sure about a good backstory to justify bringing them back, I'll leave that to some great story-teller or lore expert like MC ;)

for the time being, let's just assume that they re-appeared on creation just as misteriously as they disappeared. no one knows where they have been all this time. probably some evil spell got casted upon them and disrupted the link between Danalin and them, making the God unaware of their existance and bringing him into depression and eternal sleep and dreaming. the Aifons were probably trapped into the depths of the sea and couldn't be find by anyone, hence being presumed extint. but the incoming armageddon and the machinations of Mulcarn have brought them enough power to rise again to the surface and meet the new civilizations of the Era of Rebirth.

gameplay ideas:

currently the seas and oceans of Erebus are a kinda annoying place. I think that along with the Aifons should come a more varied and interesting "sea-life" . fish resource should spawn all across the oceans , not just near coasts. underwater lairs should spawn sea-monsters. mana nodes should be found in the depths of the sea, ready to unleash their power.

Aifon cities will be built underwater of course, making them totally unique and setting them apart from all other civs on Erebus ( even the Lanun are land-based, although they'll never admit it :lol: )

most of their units will obviously be able to be invisible while in the sea ;)

first code challenge: it would be awesome to have some more types of sea terrain instead than just coast -> ocean . like sea depths, underwater volcanoes... and new sea resources like kelp, coral etc. it would be extra nice if normal civs would "see" all sea as being the same ( i.e. as it is now ) , while Aifons ( and possibly some other suitable units like OO units, but that might be tricky ) could see underwater and discern different types of sea tyles.

second code challenge: it would be awesome if Aifon cities and improvements ( if we decide to let them built improvements underwater of course ) could be invisible for most units, simulating the fact that they can't be seen since they are deep underwater.

third code challenge: they automatically have "open borders" with everyone ( there are no borders in the sea. so by default they have open borders. they can however, after researching some magic oriented technology, cancel open borders , simulating some kind of magic that doesn't let strangers wander in seas they have claimed for themselves )

fourth code challenge: very hard, probably impossible but would be totally awesome. their cultural borders are invisible until they choose to reveal themselves, come to the surface and meet other civs. then they can choose to let those they see as friends see their cultural borders, and now where the Aifons dwell :) ( of course some special units will always be able to see them, like OO units and the like.

some of them will be able to travel on land, but only for limited spans of time ( raised by having a "priest" casting a waterbased spell that keeps them comfortable on land ) , but they will have major penalties while on land and won't be able to build cities there. the same will be true for all other civs of course. in order for landbased civs to be able to attack an Aifon city, they will have to cast "Waterbreathing" on some suitable troops. but they will be on a heavy disadvantage and unable to capture the city anyway ( razing is the only option. same is true for Aifons on land, they can only raze cities ) . this will make the Aifons a reclusive civ, more than even the Sidar and rightly so. ;)

they will obviously have a strong synergy with the Octopus Overlords. their hero will be Trenton Majosi, "trained as a master of water magic by Kylorin himself" . their worldspell could be waking Danalin from sleep, giving them some huge boost, and after this has been done, they could create a Ritual ( if Trenton is still around ) to bring him to creation http://fallfromheaven.wikia.com/wiki/Danalin


their choice of technologies will be somewhat limited, since a lot of the techs available to other civs make no sense underwater :D they will however keep the religious, recon and magic line, and one could even create a Aifon specific branch of techs that make sense underwater, this would be awesome. ;)

some cool units that they could use include Krakens, giant crabs and leviathans.

that's it for now, I'll be adding more ideas to this thread as they come. I'm really looking forward to people's feedback and suggestions about this, I think it's an ambitious project but it can definitely be done if the community drops good ideas, and I'm sure it would be awesome and lots of fun if added to the game :)

Meh... i'm against putting them in... (as i'm sure Kael has something fun planned for them in one of the scenarios)

post updated with "fourth code challenge" :D

btw, thomas, it's okay that you dislike the Aifons being in the game. but what if instead of being the Aifons they were some other new aquatic civ, would you have a problem with that ? ;)

I've thought it would be a neat idea to bring them back, but a few issues arose in my head.


The ocean would suddenly get real crowded if there is a civ colonizing all of it, might get kind of annoying.
Especially if they are invisible, how can anyone possible hope to take them out? They have to either load up a bunch of vulnerable ships with troops and amphibiously assault the cities (at the bottom of the sea), or spam water walking mages to the extreme. Both strategies can easily be countered (sink the ship, everything on it dies, whilst mages are weak in direct combat).

1 would get solved pretty easily by giving them big maintanance costs for cities in order to keep them from spreading like rabbit, eheh.
2 would be solved by not needing ships, just a waterbreathing spell that could be made easy to get ( same with the ability to see underwater creatures if needed for balance ). btw, keep in mind that them being hard to exterminate is intended. OTOH, they would have a really hard time waging war on the land so it balances out I guess ;)

btw, updated first post again with some additional info on new sea terrain types.

ive always thought it would be kick arse to have an ocean dwelling civ, and the aifons always have fascinated me.

but a waterbreathing spell *cough*waterwalking*cough* would be nigh impossible for the AI to understand how and when they needed to use it...

it would be more AI friendly to say that the Aifon build their cities in coral reef/volcanic islands that emerge slightly from the waves, this means that AI would be able to attack them (albeit very badly cause AI sucks at naval warfare).

i also agree that a lot more unique ocean features like coral reefs (should be more common near the coasts and have TINY chance to spawn in aifon cities fat cross's) and resources like kelp, should appear on the oceans... perhaps even mana so the aifons can harnes it (limit to water mana?)

I like the idea and have been toying around with it a bit. I just dont know how to implement this into the game. But here is some ideas I had to kinda make this work.

1 The Aifons have only 1 large city in the bottom of the ocean and are seeking to dominate the lands from which they were banished.
2 They can't spread cities underneith the ocean and can only build cities with settlers on the land.
3 Any city NOT next to an ocean tile brings a huge ammount of unhappiness.
4 If their ocean city is destroyed their civ dies. (not sure how to do this - maybe have to take a special item and use it to cast something to banish them to the ocean again? all thier land cities become barbarian?)
5 They will need many unique units and buildings that will set them appart from other civs.

I think this can be done, but it seems like a big project.

I think this can be done, but it seems like a big project.

Given a big project, how about nomadic "cities" that automatically migrate around the world's coastal areas? Cities are built in coastal tiles but then move 1 tile every X turns, always in the same direction. Use something like the Influence Driven War code to allow seizure of resources (temporarily) within the fat cross. To the deep ocean add not resources (well, maybe a few) but lairs, monsters and magic. Enough magic to eventually seize control of Erebus, perhaps.

Hey so I got an event where some fishermen were telling tales about an Isle of Aifon. Any idea what this thing does?

Don't resurrect aifons please. Naval combat is not very sophisticated in FfH/FF. Don't make more reasons to build more ships.

Unless you actually make navies interesting but then we don't need aifons to fill the seas.

I'm sorry to say it, but I'd have to agree. With the Aifons, you'd want to build cities throughout the ocean, and limit their capabilities on the land... However, that would make it nearly impossible to wipe them out, and set them up for a relatively easy cultural/altar victory, and would be next to impossible to teach the AI to play correctly. On the other hand, you could limit it and keep them on the shores, or small islands, but that's what the Lanun are for, and eliminates the flavour. I love unique civs, but I really don't think this would work.

@deadliver: I asked Kael in the FAQ thread and he says that the Aifon Isle is a unique improvement that's basically an epic lair ( i.e. only spawns very good or very bad results )

@psychic llamas: you're right that the AI is terrible at waging sea-based war, but hopefully by the end of Ice phase it will get much better as a lot of effort is put into it ;) in case it is still dumb as a rock even then, one could always use your idea ;)
oh, and I had forgot about mana nodes in the sea. well said, post updated :goodjob:

@Valkrionn: yeah I thought about that ( easy cultural/altar victory ) , but I'm not really concerned about it, those are easy things to find a solution for. you can just give them a cultural penalty to avoid cheesy cultural victory, or just keep their cities from getting to legendary culture ( after all, they ARE sunken so their culture shoudln't have a lot of effect on land people :D ) , and some kind of penalty for priest production as well to keep it from being too easy ;)

Yes, but that doesn't change the fact that they'd either be impossible to get rid of, or be too much like the Lanun. The only way to wage war on them would be a massive navy, which would be incredibly easy for them to get rid of as all they have to destroy is the ships, not the units in them, or adopting OO. That could be changed by adding new units and mechanisms to the game, but that would be very difficult to teach the AI to use correctly. Since many people play single player, there shouldn't be a civ where the AI would be *completely* helpless to either use or combat.

It would be a challenge for someone to make the AI work. Not a bad challenge IMO since seabases are needed for other mods as well.

they are definitely not like the Lanun. the Lanun may be good seamen, but they still live on land and need ships to venture into the seas. Aifons OTOH would have no need at all for ships since they can just swim ;)

and attacking them would have no need for ships either. just cast Waterbreathing and walk into the sea as if it were land. then all the AI needs to know is that it NEEDS to cast that spell in order to attack underwater cities, but that shouldn't be extremely hard I guess.

them being difficult to exterminate is intended. a solution can always be found if this turns out to be an issue but I think that it SHOULD be pretty hard to get rid of people that live under the sea. OTOH, they are not going to give much headache on the land either, so it all balances out imho :)

I'm sure Vehem could add a "No Aifons" option for those who don't want them in FF, but perhaps adding Aifons is a good idea. If Kael intends to add them this could be like "beta testing" for them for when he does. All the do's and don'ts will be already known and his team can focus on making them fun to play with/play against.

If it's inevitable that they ARE going to be in game then I'd sooner have the first steps being made now rather than later... :p

Possibilities for a merman race:

* Aifon Cities are called Island Fishes. The "Island Fish" is a Str 6 Unit. It is visible and can attack / be attacked. Every time it loses a combat, restore it Strength back to 6 and reduce its Population by 1. If the Aifon lose all their Island Fish they are eliminated.
* Aifon Capital starts with 3 Pop to begin with.
* Aifon do not have Settlers. Instead every 75 turns the Island Fish lays a New Egg to create a new Island Fish with Population 1.
* Aifon cannot capture cities, only raze them.
* Aifon generate Cultural Borders to 8 squares only. Their culture only affects sea and ocean squares, but automatically overrides all other Cultural Borders.
* Aifon Units automatically receive the Amphibious and Water Walking Promotions.
* Aifon get special victory Conditions. Either:
1. "Rising of the Waves" - Some kind of flooding mechanic to drown the entire world. Maybe a first step would be to melt all the ice caps.
2. "Blessing of Mammon" - Some kind of economic condition. Requires lot of gold (ergo some capacity for trading)
* World Spell - Submerge. All Island Fish automatically submerge beneath the sea, heal to max, gain +1 Pop and cannot be attack or be attacked for five turns. Upon their re-emergence, you can choose where in the world the Island Fish emerge.
* New resouces: Kelp, Coral, Pearls (no longer the preserve of the Lanun), Seahorses.

Seahorse riders for mounted units. :D

seahorses would be awesome, those are lovely :D

uhoh quick get rid of the word 'lovely' from your last post, it could be interpreted as breaking hte princess rule! :p

theyre not lovely, theyre flesh eating seahorses gone slighly mental from having their Aifon friends being removed from existance for so long then comming back alive........ yeh flesh eating...

of course, I meant lovely... UNTIL THEY COME TO EAT YOU ALIVE IN YOUR SLEEP! RUN! RUN! RUN FOR YOUR LIFE! :lol:

Why not make it so they can freely swim on only coasts, and that their cities must be built on coasts with some point of land bordering it. No Ocean cities then, and it takes out the "OMG IMPOSSIBLE TO KILL" clause. Also, it'd give a whole new meaning to amphibious combat.

Because then they'd be too much like the Lanun, except that the Aifons would build their cities on the coast. As opposed to the Lanun who build their cities on....... the coast. :crazyeye: Ya dig?

Flesh Golem> :(
Seahorseys> :devil:

Oh... Well Lanun could use some competition, right now they rule the seas and there's no one to stop em. 'bout time someone took the fight to them!

I was thinking Aifons should get the Isolationist trait which basically means they don't get a research bonus for contacting other civs and they also have a harder time getting treaties not because other civs distrust them but because they themselves distrust other civs.
As for their cultural borders, I don't think they should expand beyond the second level. Lets say it can be allowed that they can have more culture but it won't result in border expansion... Is that possible? That way it won't impede ships too much (the ocean is HUGE).

OR they could require TWICE as much or their culture takes a -100% hit (I know these aren't the same but meh!), to reach the same level of culture as other civs. That could work.

Why not make it so they can freely swim on only coasts, and that their cities must be built on coasts with some point of land bordering it. No Ocean cities then, and it takes out the "OMG IMPOSSIBLE TO KILL" clause. Also, it'd give a whole new meaning to amphibious combat.

i actually thought of the exact same thing at about 1am this morning :p

on the note of AI absolutely sucking at naval warfare, why dont the Fall Further crew work on improving this? they've improved all the other things that sucked terribly (IMHO) and if Naval war was better then maybe, just maybe, it would be feasable to have the Aifons as an ocean dwelling civ...

on the note of Aifon being able to decimate invaders due to just being able to sink ships, why not make the strength of a ship carrying units scale according to the type of cargo you carry... naval warfare has nothing to do with the ships (well maybe a little :p), its the CREW, and if you have 4 immortals stacked in a ship, they would be BLOODY HARD to kill (and thus sink).

on another train of thought, if we made aifons, you could make it so that ships can actually capture aifon cities (so you dont *really* need cargo, just a LOT of ships...)

other random ideas:

limit the number of cities the Aifon can build (similar to kuriotates) so they cannot simply colonise the entire ocean.

add in stronger barbarian sea monsters (or maybe not stronger, but MORE different kinds) as well as oceanic barbarian lairs... to slow the aifons down a bit (i suspect they will be a powerhouse)

Make the Aifons like Mercurian and infernals, and make them spawn only when the Aifon Isle is explored, maybe make the Aifons the same alignment as whoever ressurectud them and as friends (not permanent allies, just really high diplomatic modifyers). Their capital pops where the isle once was and they start with a few settlers and units. The aifons wouldnt suffer the same useless-AI-effect that the mercurians and infernals have from starting later because there is no one else around to compete with their ocean territory.

Perhaps they should only get one city... They really never lived anywhere but one island...
And lets say they do come back into creation, what happens to Danalin... I'm sure they'd tried to wake him up, what would this do to the OO religion? It'd be all... not insane... OH NO! O_O

that could actually be cool, if the Aifon had some way of slowly changing the OO religion, maybe repeatable rituals to awaken danalin could shift the OO alignment closer to neutral (and maybe good) and after certain ammounts of repetitions the OO uus are replaced with DIFFERNT UUs, and the UBs change, so OO is almost like 2 religions in 1, the initial INSANE EVIL one and the second STEADY CALM one.

Gekko;7344831']@deadliver: I asked Kael in the FAQ thread and he says that the Aifon Isle is a unique improvement that's basically an epic lair ( i.e. only spawns very good or very bad results )

Thanks Gekko, now get back to work or at least look busy, Jesus is coming.

I like this idea so much that I'd want in on any group of people doing it, except I hardly have time to finish up the Jotnar.

There are many ways to handle this. And I kind of like the 'living island-city' idea. My take would of course be that the ocean is amazingly huge and can support more life then the land. Limit the race in number of cities, and allow for a hefty health bonus and +4 food per ocean square.

Insanely huge cities with low hammer production, almost forcing them to use the 'warfare' civic when at war.

Thanks Gekko, now get back to work or at least look busy, Jesus is coming.

:lol:

great ideas Psychic_Llamas. I don't like "stealing" mechanics from other civs, but I think the limited number of cities will be needed in order to avoid them colonizing all the water on the map. the idea of having them spawn after the Aifon Isle is explored is really cool as well :goodjob:

i have a feeling that if the Aifons are codable they will be one of my favourite civs, ill hunt for the aifon isle in every game so i can play as them :D

There are many ways to handle this. And I kind of like the 'living island-city' idea. My take would of course be that the ocean is amazingly huge and can support more life then the land. Limit the race in number of cities, and allow for a hefty health bonus and +4 food per ocean square.

im personally not a fan of the living cities, there is no fluff to support that they lived on giant fish, and any mechanic we come up with to do that will play havock with the AI :(

im personally not a fan of the living cities, there is no fluff to support that they lived on giant fish, and any mechanic we come up with to do that will play havock with the AI :(

You're right about the AI and the entire project would definitely need a recode of quite a bit of the code, but it does tie in with one of the central philosophies of FfH - that every race should be different to play. The strategy needed to win as, say, the Amurites, is vastly different from that of the Doviello. A race with mobile cities that need to keep an eye out for watchful eye for large fleets would definitely need a completely different strategy to win. (Say can I hear Battlestar Galactica in the background...)

The inability to produce cities inland limits any capacity to capture cities wheras the Egg Production mechanism would limit the number of Cities they can have based on time, as opposed to the hard coded limit of the Kuriotates.

Well. Even if we ignore the 'giant-fish' idea and play with other solutions, I think it is a worthy project.

A lot could be done with Python I think, since there are triggers on everything.

What is so scary about a civ whom could have a few cities (or perhaps just one) that cannot be directly invaded/destroyed/taken? If you dominate the rest of the map you'd easily win through any other mean.

And as mentioned, one can introduce new spells for arcane units with Death, Entropy or Chaos that could lower the citysize by one. Send a bunch of adepts out with a small fleet and purge those pesky fishes.

Neat idea. One thought to consider is that they'd lack any land resources that they had not traded for. To counter this, many unique deep-ocean resources could be created that they could trade with.

that could actually be cool, if the Aifon had some way of slowly changing the OO religion, maybe repeatable rituals to awaken danalin could shift the OO alignment closer to neutral (and maybe good) and after certain ammounts of repetitions the OO uus are replaced with DIFFERNT UUs, and the UBs change, so OO is almost like 2 religions in 1, the initial INSANE EVIL one and the second STEADY CALM one.

and how about some die hard hold out who can perform rituals to split the two religions, they keeping drowns and the like, while the other continues to grow more pure.

As I pointed out in the Lore thread for this, I don't think Danalin is going to be "good" when he wakes up and finds Hastur there saying dumb things to him and that someone hid his people away... I'd rather think he's going to just rage upon creation. :p

which sounds good, considering how I wanted to give them a ritual to bring Danalin to creation after they have awakened him with their worldspell. since you're bringing him to the party, he might as well be angry, he'll be more useful I guess :lol:

i love the idea of opting for tha Aifon to try to pascify Danalin or fuel his rage. after all if i had been trapped by agares for Ages id be pretty damn pissed off, i suspect the Aifon should be Nutral with 2 very different paths, which they can be followed via different ritual chains. on the one side it causes chaos, by creating areas of raging seas and by raising the sea level, chaging the worlds climate (ie more rain and thus more jungle and less desert) the other path could be an attempt to calm Danalin, which would change the OO religion with every ritual cast. and thus would give the Aifon a very interesting religious victory condition. OO could shift closer to good and slowly loose the insaity and develop a more calm, growth based theme, where followers get more benefits from coast and ocean tiles (extra food and trade routes?), UUs could be diplomats that have water walking, can be used en mass to restor peace via diplomacy/ have good defence. maybe add a synergy with rivers and jungle (very wet climates) could make any enemy unit on coast or ocean in good OO boarders either take damage or lose movement, maybe reveal all oceans to all Good OO follower (oceans not explored normally would revert to black FoW if religion is switced) (this would also reveal the location of the Aifons to all OO civs)......... ideas dwindling...............sleep calling...........

The problem with Danalin going on a rampage is that he is the god of serenity. Gods really don't have free will by human standards so danalin is completely incapable of being angry. If he could get angry he probably would have when the Aifons were destroyed.

awesome ideas Psychic Llamas! I especially love the concept of raising sea level and making Erebus wetter :D

Agreed, awesome ideas! ;)

Agares has, as far as we know, nothing to do with the dissapearnce of the Aifons and Danalin's sleep. Hastur, Mammon's archangel, is giving Danalin have nightmares, making Mammon much more suspect.

Agares is just the plotter, he could have simply came up with the idea. Same as when he tricked Bhall so Mulcarn could reign. The angels of evil are his puppets and he is the puppeteer. Mulcarn was a tool for Agares own ends, though in all honesty I still do not understand why the heck Agares would want Mulcarn to basically freeze creation into a stasis... That isn't destroying creation that's simply preserving it. Besides, Mammon is all greed he has nothing to gain by poking at Danalin's mind. Danalin goes insane and what does Mammon gain? Whenever Mammon does something the question of what gains he makes is key. Though I can understand Hastur IS the archangel of Mammon. I doubt the lore for this is even invented yet so we should have a big argument and get this plot fleshed out! :D

Agares is just the plotter, he could have simply came up with the idea. Same as when he tricked Bhall so Mulcarn could reign. The angels of evil are his puppets and he is the puppeteer. Mulcarn was a tool for Agares own ends, though in all honesty I still do not understand why the heck Agares would want Mulcarn to basically freeze creation into a stasis... That isn't destroying creation that's simply preserving it.

But... it could force other gods to intervene, shattering the compact (and maybe the godslayer) even more

random question that will make sense later...which god/ archangel is responsible for luck/ unexpected change/ altering the future/ taking control of ones destiny????

Good point. @ thomas
If you're referring to waking up Danalin. I don't think it would be either Mammon's or Agares' intention to wake him up. It could very well be Mammon I suppose, and there's stronger evidence to support him. I just want to know what the God of Greed is going to get from driving Danalin insane. :confused:
The OO religion? .
The main purpose of driving Danalin insane in my thoughts is that his religion has been twisted in such a way that it is easy for the forces of evil to influence the worshippers of OO without breaking the compact.
I suppose Mammon could gain from this by getting worshippers? Does Mammon like insane worshippers? :confused:

Mammon was the angel of foresight, thereby the angel of destiny and the future (I guess)
Tali is sort of like the angel of change, (winds of change)

EDIT: Forgot to add Mammon's foresight is blinded by his greed. So he's not really much for destiny anymore.

random question that will make sense later...which god/ archangel is responsible for luck/ unexpected change/ altering the future/ taking control of ones destiny????

Esus's archangel (the name escapes me) is the angel of luck AFAIK.

Amathaon is the god of Inspiration, making his followers prone to bursts of enthusiasm and sponteanuity.

Esus' angel is Iaegus

Agares is just the plotter, he could have simply came up with the idea. Same as when he tricked Bhall so Mulcarn could reign. The angels of evil are his puppets and he is the puppeteer. Mulcarn was a tool for Agares own ends, though in all honesty I still do not understand why the heck Agares would want Mulcarn to basically freeze creation into a stasis... That isn't destroying creation that's simply preserving it. Besides, Mammon is all greed he has nothing to gain by poking at Danalin's mind. Danalin goes insane and what does Mammon gain? Whenever Mammon does something the question of what gains he makes is key. Though I can understand Hastur IS the archangel of Mammon. I doubt the lore for this is even invented yet so we should have a big argument and get this plot fleshed out! :D

From what Kael's hinted at, it sounds like Mulcarn is much more in control than he lets on. He has the aspects of cool rationality and patient plotting after all. His priests are cold and calculating and most likely, he is the same way. I have a feeling that Agares isn't in control of his fellow Evil Angels as he'd like, what with Mammon subverting at least one vault (Danalin) and perhaps invading another (Oghma's, if that D&D info is canon). Don't forgot that the god of deception probably isn't honest about his goals either. :p Ceridwen and Bhall are the closest to Agares but who knows what agendas they have.

random question that will make sense later...which god/ archangel is responsible for luck/ unexpected change/ altering the future/ taking control of ones destiny????

Are you looking for one that does all, or is this multiple questions.

Lugus's archangel Baelious is the angel of Fourtune. That seems closest to what you are asking.

Unexpected change doesn't exactly fit in any of them, but it is probably Bhall's area, or maybe Tali's or Camulos. Bhall's would be a passion for changing things, while Tali's would be trying random stuff just for fun. Camulos has been described as completely random changes (where as Tali is predictably irresponsible) but I see it more as violent strife where you pick victims for no good reason. He was supposed to deal with Peace.

Mammon was supposed to be about making reasonable predictions of the outcomes of actions and adjusting actions to seek to improve one's destiny.

Oghma's archangel Embarr is responsible for imagination, which could be important in changing one's destiny too.

Amathaon is the angel of birth, new creation, and inspiration. Oghma's archangel really seems closer to him than Oghma to me, so he too could involed in the same way as Embarr.

When I said naval warfare sucks it is because there is only one worthwhile ship (aside from Black Wind) and that is man'o'war ... Everything else plain sucks. I dislike having an unit that is superior in every way. Rather, we should have several different types of ships, which have distinct roles in combat. And then we need some promotions to further specialize our ships. And finally, land units should become more involved in naval combat. Boarding ships and guarding them against boarding. Capturing ships should not be a special feature for Lanun.

Are you looking for one that does all, or is this multiple questions.

multiple questions ;) you answered my question with Mammon:

Mammon was supposed to be about making reasonable predictions of the outcomes of actions and adjusting actions to seek to improve one's destiny.

the only thing that has bugged me with the aifon story is that the prophets completely freaked out about what they saw when they predicted the fate of the aifons as a race... however, what if Mammon and Hastur whispered lies to the prophets and gave them false prophesies? what if the visions of destruction are just that, visions, and nothing more, insane halucinations... what if the Aifons were drawn back into Danalins vault and are being similarly twisted by hasturs dreams, but the fact that mammon diverts prophets visions of the Aifons t oa false conclusion, means that it appears that the Aifon have been 'obliviated'...

im still trying to rationalise a situation where the aifons could come back.

also, i think the reasons behind Mammons intensions is he is greedy of the faith that Danalins followers has in him. if i was a god of greed i would covert all the other gods powers and followers. By subverting the Aifon and Danalin, and twisting them with nightmares, he gains control over them and breaks their faith in Danalin (somewhat) and so he feels he has gained control over them.

anyway, thats my random thought complete :)

Yes. It makes perfect sense the angel of greed will not be happy if people serve somebody else. After all, as the personification of greed, his greed is absolute.

Ya know, the best ever aquitic civ in my opinion was way back in Civ II: Test of Time. The fantasy game on that had 4 'levels' tho: sky, earth, underwater, and underworld. But the Mermen on that game were really damn cool.

As for Aifons, it'd be cool to resurrect em. But the problem is how would get them to sort live underwater? Or make so they can live on platform like cities that sorta float above the water? It'd almost require a new underwater level to avoid causin the seaways to become crowded. Idk. The cultural borders brought about since Civ IV kinda limits this whole thing.

Make the Aifons like Mercurian and infernals, and make them spawn only when the Aifon Isle is explored, maybe make the Aifons the same alignment as whoever ressurectud them and as friends (not permanent allies, just really high diplomatic modifyers). Their capital pops where the isle once was and they start with a few settlers and units. The aifons wouldnt suffer the same useless-AI-effect that the mercurians and infernals have from starting later because there is no one else around to compete with their ocean territory.

I like that. That makes a lot of sense, man. I mean then the whole powerhouse problem is reduced. The Aifons are still important, but not so big that they pretty much rule the sea hands down.

Just face it, we will never actually get see the Furlings Aifons.

Just face it, we will never actually get see the Furlings Aifons.

Except maybe in the 200th Patch in a parody scenario named "Dark Fantasy: X-Treme"...

(nice reference :D)

@MC: don't say that! hope never dies!

well, actually it does, just slooooooooooooowly so :lol:

When I said naval warfare sucks it is because there is only one worthwhile ship (aside from Black Wind) and that is man'o'war ... Everything else plain sucks. I dislike having an unit that is superior in every way. Rather, we should have several different types of ships, which have distinct roles in combat. And then we need some promotions to further specialize our ships. And finally, land units should become more involved in naval combat. Boarding ships and guarding them against boarding. Capturing ships should not be a special feature for Lanun.

I agree. We need to rework naval warfare in FfH/FF. It'd be cool to have ships that can shoot somethin similiar to greek fire. (Not magic like fireballs, but greek fire. Ya know, science-oriented fire.) Then have really powerful ships that are the powerhouses of the ocean, like Man o' War, but w/o the huge 6 to 8 (w/ promotions) unit carrying capicity. Then ships that are catapult-like, in that they are purely seige ships and can cause collateral damage or severe damage to city walls. (Of course, we'd have to remove the bombardment of most ships or marganilize the bombardment of most ships. As it is, tho, catapults and canons still level city walls better than ships.) A few kamikaze type ships would be cool as well, sorta like fire ships or ships that explode and destroy other ships upon attack. (The key to these would be that you lose them after combat and they're useful for nothin but combat.) Maybe a primitive submarine would be cool too. It'd prolly be magically oriented to keep it from being flooded or something. Then, a ship that is similar to Ironclads. (I'd argue for this ship being a UU for the Dwarves, since they are more scientifically-based than other civs.) Idk, jus a few spitballed ideas on improvement of naval warfare.

I think that improved naval warfare needs to be key if a civ like the Aifons comes into being again. Otherwise, the idea of an aquatic civ is jus kinda stupid. (The Aifons should have UUs of all the improved ships.) And naval warfare was always kinda my biggest problem with FfH.

Of course, there should be 3 DLs. One, for jus the Aifons. (I doubt this'll be used much, but some might desire it.) Two, the Aifons and improved naval warfare. And three, jus improved naval warfare. This should keep everyone happy and reduce the amount of potential complaints.

nice ideas about new ships rlaf. definitely agreed that more variety would make things a lot more interesting. catapult ships, ballista ships, etc. ;)

Maybe also, we should borrow a ship from WHFB. The Black Arc. (We'd rename it.) Or, to be more specific, borrow the idea. These ships are basically floating castles. Kinda like small cities, they carry thousands of troops. And, I think, that such a ship above all else should be stronger or weaker depending on wat units it's carrying. Like some1 else said, if an Immortal is on it, it should be harder to sink. But I think it should only really apply to the Water Fortress (needs better name, huh?). The reason why is that such a ship was built to be a castle. It'd be like the 'dragon of ships'. I think it should work like this. The ship's overall strength should be this formula. Ship's base strength (let's say 5) + 50% of the base strength of the units carrying it (So, w/o the bonuses added by mithril, iron, or bronze weapons) = the total unit strength of the ship. So, 2 Immortals and the ship itself would give it a strength of 14. Wat do ya guys think?

Maybe also, we should borrow a ship from WHFB. The Black Arc. (We'd rename it.) Or, to be more specific, borrow the idea. These ships are basically floating castles. Kinda like small cities, they carry thousands of troops. And, I think, that such a ship above all else should be stronger or weaker depending on wat units it's carrying. Like some1 else said, if an Immortal is on it, it should be harder to sink. But I think it should only really apply to the Water Fortress (needs better name, huh?). The reason why is that such a ship was built to be a castle. It'd be like the 'dragon of ships'. I think it should work like this. The ship's overall strength should be this formula. Ship's base strength (let's say 5) + 50% of the base strength of the units carrying it (So, w/o the bonuses added by mithril, iron, or bronze weapons) = the total unit strength of the ship. So, 2 Immortals and the ship itself would give it a strength of 14. Wat do ya guys think?

I wish we had some things like this... (actually, the way i envisioned it as a unit that could produce it's own units as well as carry them...) A huge floating structure with not only a military but civilian support as well...

naturally, a civ would only be able to support a a few of these floating wonders...

Anyone read 1984 recently? One of the major weapons is a huge ship called a floating fortress, with thousands of troops and hundreds of guns...

Yeah, I think that there should be a national cap of 3 or 4 on these ships.

Lots of ideas in this thread to inspire imagination. :P

I was sort of thinking of an ocean race with a slow mobile capital- an islandhome on the back of an ancient sea creature. It could be a powerful unit or just a moving platform floating on water, but I imagine a mobile city would be a coding challenge. Still, the code for mobile cities could pave the way for airborne cities down the road.

Anyway, this oceanic race would be able to create sea-based settlers, but their city area would be limited to the 8 tiles immediately surrounding the city (maybe upgradeable by tech?). These would suffer a cultural penalty, and (if possible) culture from these ocean settlements would not be able to spread onto land (until a certain tech is discovered, perhaps).

An advantage for this race is that their capital is mobile: it can move, albeit slowly, to resources (that is, if oceanic resources tiles are created). Their units automatically having the amphibious promotion wouldn't be a stretch, either.

The great penalty for this race is that its ocean settlements can be attacked and destroyed by naval units (once the garrisons are defeated). One idea might be having settler units be very expensive until the discovery of a certain tech, which would make them cheaper than others. This would prevent this ocean race from gaining too much of an early advantage, while addressing the frailty of their settlements later in the game.

The only major problem with a 'moving capital' or 'moving cities' is how exactly can we combine a city and a unit. It doesn't really work. The basic programming of Civ, since Civ I, has been units and cities separate. Wat's more feasible, imho, is having the cities underwater, as Gekko said he was thinkin bout doin. You see, altho that will require some new codin, I doubt it'll be as much as makin a 'unit' that is both a city and moveable. Sides, which, the most logical place for the Aifon capital is the Ilse of the Aifons (or watever it's called). That city would be on a island, obviously. (However, it'd be understood in the lore that half on land and half underwater.) I think the Aifons should be able to build cities on land and underwater, with condition that any land cities must be near an ocean tile.

Lore aside. And I speculate.

Moving City. City on a single landsquare, unique 'dragger' unit that only can move maximum one grid-square from the city. Every end of turn there is a check if the 'dragger unit' is inside the city. If it isn't the entire landsquare, city, all units etc are transferred to the square where the 'dragger unit' is.

You can even give the 'dragger unit' a spell that have a wait period of three turns, so that the city can move one grid square each three turns.

A city in the ocean should be a big exception! Otherwise the ocean will lose it's current function as a natural boarder. Maybe only the capital of the Aifons should be sea-based and all other cities have to be coastal or on a river.

Naval warfare - Invasions:

But first of all we need a working AI for naval invasions. I saw a lot of games lately played automatically by the AI and the AI did never! manage to conquer another continent or island. In most cases they didn't even try. They destroy some ships, bombard a bit and that's it. Anything else than a pangea map is almost cheating for a human player. Maybe we can steal something from the new Better BtS AI version and adapt it for FfH or FF. They changed some things about naval warfare in there. For some reason I can't remember how well the AI did in BtS. It's too long ago that I played an unmodded game.

Better BTS AI is definitely something that would be awesome to adapt to FFH/FF , it does make the game better.

nice idea about partially submerged cities Aifon Isle style being 1-tile islands, that would be a lot easier to code than totally submerged cities I guess :D

hears another idea, not very well thought out though...

what if the aifons raised the sea floor to form massive coral flats and volcanic islands? so that their cities would spread 'underwater' versions of land terrain like hell or swamp terrain conversion? each turn ocean, would have a small %chance of turning into coral (+1 food +1 hammer) or volcanic islands (+2 hammer) however make it so that tiles only continue to change to coral/ volcanic island so long as the city has more than 1 coast tile linking it to the ocean. in addition make it so that any land tiles within the Aifon cultural borders degrade to coast and ocean and potentially later to coral volcanic islands.

make Aifon settlers only able to settle on coral, volcanic island, ocean or coast squares, and never within 2 squares of a land mass greater than 10 squares.

the way i see it the aifons would then be a civ that can use 'land' units (but obviously flavoured to have distinct advantages in coral or oceans)

Give Aifons special workers to replace work boats that cannot work land squares, only coral volcanic island ocean and coast, and give aifon special improvements for each.

this way each Aifon city would be surrounded by a matrex of coral and volcanic islands whilst still being connected to the ocean. alowing for easyer AI invasion.

Sorry if this has been brought up before, but what about only having cities on islands and/or coast but also having a unit similar to the Mongol movable unit they had in the Warlord scenario. It would randomly generate a unit every so often.

I was always a big fan of the Pirate faction in SMAC:AC so I'd like to see this as well. I'm also a big advocate for upgraded naval coding. Civ III used to be evil when it came to naval combat. Civ IV, OTOH, seems to be mentally challenged.

Plus I wish we had better graphics for the different ships. I mean the Elves are going to have different ships from the Dwarves and the like.

I would think this race could have a sort of Decius as one of their leaders. I mean the Call of Cthulhu is hard to resist...I mean the "Octopus Overlords". :D So you can have one leader for the neutral to good, another for the OO.

One idea is to have some units that have water-walking, but have some sort of promotions that causes them to get weaker the longer they are on land. Sort of like being diseased. So while they'd be great attacking coastal areas, they'd be really limited inland.

Plus, what race would these people be? I always wondered about the artwork for the Svartalfar. I mean Faeyl looks like she's underwater. Maybe the Wood elves drove the 'evil' elves into the oceans.

One thing about this race though, regardless of what race they end up: I would think they would be TOTALLY against the Illians. I mean glaciation is not good if you live in the water. If anything, you want lots of warm water, shallow seas and the like.

To bad there isn't any coding that I've seen that mimics the ability formers had in SMAC where you could terraform up or down. Being able to raise oceans to seas or sink certain lands to create islands would be nice. Not to mention it would be nice on certain maps to be able to lower mountains to hills so you can make passes.

To bad there isn't any coding that I've seen that mimics the ability formers had in SMAC where you could terraform up or down. Being able to raise oceans to seas or sink certain lands to create islands would be nice. Not to mention it would be nice on certain maps to be able to lower mountains to hills so you can make passes.

thats why i propose an automated terrain conversion based off the hell terrain conversion and swamp conversion :p

If it could be coded, then it'd be cool.

Over on the Cult of Dragon thread, a lot of us have been talking about different dragons. Maybe the Aifon could have a take off of Jörmungandr and have some sort of muckin' huge Sea Serpent as their late game 'hero'.

I agree with what has been said about some of the changes in terrain like the Hell terrain or the marsh/swamp terrain from FF. If the Illians are trying to make everything cold and snowy again, I would think the Aifons would want warm weather, shallow seas and the like.

So yeah, you'd expect them to want to transform areas to coast/seas with lots of islands and the like. Plus, tropical islands are supposed to have volcanoes, right? :p Maybe the Aifons could get some sort of special resource of them. Of course I think religiously, the Aifons would really be a Dualistic type people, caught between elements: Air above, water below - fire brings technology, water brings food/wealth.

Which brings up the thought that if the Aifons don't do metals, what sort of units would they create to compensate? You'd think they'd end up with obsidian weapons and shells, kind of like Jules Verne's Nemo crew's gear. I mean that could be used as a limiting factor for them: no bronze, iron, mithril upgrades.

I do like the idea of corral as a sea resource. Plus I wonder if there would be a way to make it damage ships that enter the square with it?

Over on the Cult of Dragon thread, a lot of us have been talking about different dragons. Maybe the Aifon could have a take off of Jörmungandr and have some sort of muckin' huge Sea Serpent as their late game 'hero'.

Damn, I like that idea! We really should implement this.

I do like the idea of corral as a sea resource. Plus I wonder if there would be a way to make it damage ships that enter the square with it?

id prefer a coral terrain which large late game ships cannot enter, but early game ships can at the risk of being damaged. and perhaps a coral resource which grants aifons a bronze weapon like upgrade? (coral can be extremely painful and strong)
aifon ship uus would obviously get no penalty from coral and all would be able to cross it.

one interesting thing we should consider then is that land units and sea units will come into contact with each other and thus be able to fight each other...

Over on the Cult of Dragon thread, a lot of us have been talking about different dragons. Maybe the Aifon could have a take off of Jörmungandr and have some sort of muckin' huge Sea Serpent as their late game 'hero'.

i think id rather the Aifon be able to 'tame' the Leviathan if it spawns in the world. iirc Kael said there arent any more dragons besides the ones already in the game... id also prefer their hero to be Trenton rather than another big beasty.

I agree with what has been said about some of the changes in terrain like the Hell terrain or the marsh/swamp terrain from FF. If the Illians are trying to make everything cold and snowy again, I would think the Aifons would want warm weather, shallow seas and the like.

my thoughts exactly :)

Coral as a terrain? That wouldn't make sense. Coral Reefs as a Feature, on the other hand, makes perfect since. It is simple to make this feature impassible to some ships, and to make it damage ships that do enter these tiles.




There definitely were more dragons. Some gods made several, while others made none. Some relied on other forms of beasts that strictly speaking were not dragons. The dragons in FfH are however the strongest of the dragons created. Most of the weaker ones have been slain, and aren't coming back.


Leviathon was a Beast that served Danalin and was essentially equivalent to a dragon. He was awakened to protect the Aifons from whatever horrible fate would happen, but he failed. Leviathon was the only survivor and only witness to what happened, but the horror drove him completely insane. He was once a gentle beast, but not anymore.



I still prefer the Aifons not return, although I'd love to see them added in and Age of Magic prequel after Ice is done.

srry messed up. Ignor this post

Coral as a terrain? That wouldn't make sense. Coral Reefs as a Feature, on the other hand, makes perfect since. It is simple to make this feature impassible to some ships, and to make it damage ships that do enter these tiles.

why not as terrain? it is possible to walk (and swim) vast distances over coral atols, and there are many pacific islands made entirely of coral. the whole point of the coral asa terrain was to alow land units to invade aifon cities easyer. if thats impossible to code, then i suppose coral as a feature works fine.


There definitely were more dragons. Some gods made several, while others made none. Some relied on other forms of beasts that strictly speaking were not dragons. The dragons in FfH are however the strongest of the dragons created. Most of the weaker ones have been slain, and aren't coming back.

ah k, didnt know that. but id still rather not see the other dragons in the game, too much of a good thing ya know?

Leviathon was a Beast that served Danalin and was essentially equivalent to a dragon. He was awakened to protect the Aifons from whatever horrible fate would happen, but he failed. Leviathon was the only survivor and only witness to what happened, but the horror drove him completely insane. He was once a gentle beast, but not anymore.

i know, thats why i suggested that. but if the leviathan saw the aifons come back do you think that some of its former loyalty would return also? perhaps not... its a cool thought none the less.

I still prefer the Aifons not return, although I'd love to see them added in and Age of Magic prequel after Ice is done.

how come all the civs in FfH have to be in the same time scale? after all the Sidar wern't around when the Amurites were fighting the illians, so why cant the aifon be added in? plus vanilla civ has civs from all across history, i think its a lame excuse saying theyre not in the same time period. although, an age of magic prequel would be awsome.

Well. Just so you know, if there ever is a team set together to make the Aifons, I am interested. However unless Vehem likes the idea, I think the thread belongs with the modmodmod packages threads.

i agree with Arctic Circle. im also very interested in helping out with making Aifons (once ive finished uni that is) but unless Vehem decides to do something with Aifons then this should be moved to modsmodmods :p

Base Civ is any Civ that ever existed. Could be interesting to do the same for FfH, but then people would want Patria brought in as well eventually....

Well. Just so you know, if there ever is a team set together to make the Aifons, I am interested. However unless Vehem likes the idea, I think the thread belongs with the modmodmod packages threads.

i agree with Arctic Circle. im also very interested in helping out with making Aifons (once ive finished uni that is) but unless Vehem decides to do something with Aifons then this should be moved to modsmodmods :p

Not something I'm looking at for the moment - but I have been following the thread and like a lot of the discussion/ideas. Content-wise I'm basically looking at a Dural-Redux and the "Cold-Elves" for the foreseeable future. If people do want to see an Aifon civ however, I'd strongly encourage giving it a go. We'll be happy to help out with any problems as best we can.

Not something I'm looking at for the moment - but I have been following the thread and like a lot of the discussion/ideas. Content-wise I'm basically looking at a Dural-Redux and the "Cold-Elves" for the foreseeable future. If people do want to see an Aifon civ however, I'd strongly encourage giving it a go. We'll be happy to help out with any problems as best we can.

Well I would think the Aifons would go well with the coding you did in FF for the Lizards since a consequence of wanting warm and wet would be more swamps & marshes.

In regard to 'Cold Elves' what exactly is the break out with the elves? Are the Svartalfar simply evil wood elves? As I said before, I always thought the pic of Faeyl made her look like she was underwater. Plus the 'historic' paring of them with illusions always made me think of water since any reflected image from water is always a 'bad copy' - Then again, Hannah the Irin always looked Elvish to me...and Luann looks like a typical anime she? he? :lol:

Again, if the Aifon get done, I vote again for some way to lower/raise terrain like the SMAC formers!

the "Cold-Elves" for the foreseeable future
So, where's the thread on wat you're plannin to do with these guys?

Not something I'm looking at for the moment - but I have been following the thread and like a lot of the discussion/ideas. Content-wise I'm basically looking at a Dural-Redux and the "Cold-Elves" for the foreseeable future. If people do want to see an Aifon civ however, I'd strongly encourage giving it a go. We'll be happy to help out with any problems as best we can.

awsome an iprovement to the Dural is definately needed and ive been wondering when you plan on implementing your Cold Elves :D (I LOVE ELVES OMFG! :p )

Base Civ is any Civ that ever existed. Could be interesting to do the same for FfH, but then people would want Patria brought in as well eventually....

why not? :p

Base Civ is any Civ that ever existed. Could be interesting to do the same for FfH, but then people would want Patria brought in as well eventually....

Still hoping for steampunk gnomes! :lol: (And I don't even play Warhammer!)

Well it is good to know that the FfH team will not make a better Aifons later on, that would be a break of morale for anyone that made a Aifons mod. ;)

well, seeing as we have so many ideas here, which ones do you (everyone) think are best to implement aifons?

I think that's up to the OP. Well...OP?

well I know little about modding so I guess the choice belongs to the guys that will be willing to work on this ;)

well gekko (and everyone else), how about which ideas do you like the most, regardless of if it can be implemented or not? it is fairly easy to find compramises and work arounds for ideas that dont work.

Damn, I'd like to help but I jus got a new job. So, I'll be too busy. This makes me sad. :(

damn rlaf :( well if you get any free time... :D

Yeah, if I do and you guys haven't finished.

Well before asking people to vote on their favorate ideas for the Aifons, it'd be nice if someone compiled all (or most) of the ideas in this thread and put them into one easily readable post. My vote's for Xienwolf doing this because all of his long posts are nice and pretty :D

Cold Elves? The Beyond-wintercourt? The Svasvasvartalfar?

Or a degenerate mixture of Ljosofar and Svartalfar who were cut off from the two courts and had to survive as best they could..

I guess the cold elves would be those who didn't just switch to worshiping Esus, but switched to Mulcarn. There were a few elves frozen in Mulcarn's palace on the Mountain Mulyr along with the men and giants. This may not seem to likely because of elves weakness to the cold and their closeness to Muclarn's enemy Sucellus, but elven longevity does lend itself to the sloth and nostalgia representative of the ice sphere. It seems like these would have just joined the Ilians though, imho.

If I were adding another Elven civ though I'd probably start with the Once-Elves. I imagine that Haerlond is still looking for vengeance against Varn, Auric, and perhaps the Sidar that now have the Books of Laroth.

Good idea, let's start a poll to see who should start a poll to start a race ;) :p

I've been watching this thread casually, so wouldn't know what the majority of the ideas are without a complete re-read. And I am sure people would rather I am getting bugs sorted out so that Vehem can play with the final toys for releasing the next version right now ;)

ill compile the different ideas then :)

Good idea, let's start a poll to see who should start a poll to start a race ;) :p

I've been watching this thread casually, so wouldn't know what the majority of the ideas are without a complete re-read. And I am sure people would rather I am getting bugs sorted out so that Vehem can play with the final toys for releasing the next version right now ;)

What do you have against burocracy :D

Your right though, its better that you finish up out new FF than compile a list of stuff about things. Now back onto buisness, I purpose we vote on who should start a poll to make a thread compiling all the ideas about the Aifons so we can vote on which ones we like :mwaha:

-Edit
Or that works too.

In regard to 'Cold Elves' what exactly is the break out with the elves? Are the Svartalfar simply evil wood elves? As I said before, I always thought the pic of Faeyl made her look like she was underwater. Plus the 'historic' paring of them with illusions always made me think of water since any reflected image from water is always a 'bad copy' - Then again, Hannah the Irin always looked Elvish to me...and Luann looks like a typical anime she? he? :lol:

As I understand it there was basically an elven nation which was closely tied to Nature and so had "seasons". During Summer (and probably Spring) it was ruled by the Summer Court - under Arendel. During Winter (and probably Autumn) it was ruled by the Winter Court - under Faeryl. These were also known as the Seelie and Unseelie courts I believe.

With the Age of Ice however, winter lasted a little bit longer than it usually did. Faeryl obvious was quite happy about this and was reluctant to hand back power when Winter finally ended. This is possibly the main cause of a civil war between the Seelie and Unseelie courts.

The two courts however do not account for all elves in the world. There were musings on another thread that a majority of the elves would be best described by a Neutral alignment with the two courts (with Arendel's idealism and Faeryl's betrayl of the old ways) being the "good" and "evil" ends of elven culture. Some elves would side with each court, but there were probably others that just stay out of the way. This view also gives a good justification for the two neutral elven leaders - both serve the Ljosalfar but aren't necessarily "good" in all cases.

====

Looking at it that way, we've got Summer Elves and Winter Elves, each with many sub-sects and factions. The main civil war is between Summer and Winter, but each sect may or may not be involved to some degree. Some sects will have parted company with the courts long before the Age of Rebirth and whilst most are unimportant to the "big picture" - being too small to be of interest to the larger nations - there was one sect that saw Mulcarn's rise as a way to ensure the Winter Elves ruled the forests forever.

They chose to leave their forest and aid the Illians, becoming servants in a manner similar to the Doviello. The Doviello were obviously the muscle and had great numbers, but the Elves were more subtle and skilled. In the end however, despite the fact that the old laws granted power to the Winter Court for so long as Winter remains upon the land, the Elves began to feel that Mulcarn's stasis was deeply unnatural and wrong for the world. Their existence was tied to the seasons and they could not rest easy whilst the balance was disrupted.

Long before Kyorlin began his quest for the Godslayer, this group of elves struck desperately against the Illians, but had never seen the power of Mulcarn himself. They struck deep into the heart of the Illian lands, but were defeated utterly at Letum Frigus. They fled the field and were hounded by the Illians and the Doviello for the remainder of the Age of Ice.

===

In the Age of Rebirth, they are a people with no home. Having sided with the God of Winter, they are hated by followers of Sucellus and despite having initially sought to increase the power of the Unseelie, their association with Mulcarn means they are not fully trusted by the Svartalfar either (again it's their service to Mulcarn that makes them shunned, rather than their eventual betrayal). They are also forever changed by their experience with Mulcarn. They rushed to serve one which they believed would bring them power and were nearly destroyed for it. They are now cold and calculating, almost callous in their methods. Their true goal is unclear, but they seem uninterested in the elven civil war unless they have something to gain from temporarily siding with either of the courts.

===

Cold-Elves
Cold, calculating, implacable.
Highly specialized - members of the civ have specific skills that they hone (military, not city-specialist).
Shunned - unable to follow FoL due to their betrayal of Nature.
Winterborn - forever changed by experience with Mulcarn.
Dictatorial - they serve no court and their leader defines their laws.

I definitely support a Cold Elves race. fantasy games should ALWAYS have 3 elven races! it goes like:

1) wood elves ( ljolsalfar )
2) dark elves ( svartalfar )
3) high elves ( where are these? --> cold elves will be fine, thank you ) :D

Sounds cool.

Sounds cool.

Pun intended? :D

As I understand it there was basically an elven nation which was closely tied to Nature and so had "seasons". During Summer (and probably Spring) it was ruled by the Summer Court - under Arendel. During Winter (and probably Autumn) it was ruled by the Winter Court - under Faeryl. These were also known as the Seelie and Unseelie courts I believe.

Well not to get to theological, but the concept of the Oak King (Summertide King) and the Holly King (Wintertide King) is a very old concept in many European pagan religions as well as modern neo-pagan ones.

Perhaps that might make a really good set of Hero's or maybe a set of magical items relating to the Holly & Oak King. Maybe something on the order of the shield of the Oak King (which gets broken if one has ever heard Gwydion Pendderwen's song The Raven Is Calling) and the sword of the Holly King.

Just a thought...

Perhaps that might make a really good set of Hero's or maybe a set of magical items relating to the Holly & Oak King. Maybe something on the order of the shield of the Oak King (which gets broken if one has ever heard Gwydion Pendderwen's song The Raven Is Calling) and the sword of the Holly King.

change them to the Oak and Holly Queens and your set :D

Gekko;7436428']I definitely support a Cold Elves race. fantasy games should ALWAYS have 3 elven races! it goes like:

1) wood elves ( ljolsalfar )
2) dark elves ( svartalfar )
3) high elves ( where are these? --> cold elves will be fine, thank you ) :D

Not to set myself up to be 'flamed' :eek: But I always like the concept of the 'Pini' elves from Elfquest as wood elves because in most fantasy the only difference between Wood Elves and High Elves were their clothing.

In my by-gone D&D age, I had the different Pini "low" elves (the wolf riders, the wave riders, the reindeer riders) being sort of like how I see the Hippus in that they aren't really into magic, not really into cities, sort of semi-nomadic but like the Mongols are some people that you don't want mad at you.

Then I had the High Elves that to me were more of the Tolkein Elves that sort of harken back to that mythical "Golden Age" - I mean come on, in almost all fantasy, "High Elves" seem to be at the end of their age. They were more into superior units (quality versus quantity) as well as magic.

I guess as a original D&D player (I started in 1975) it's hard not to see any 'evil' elves without thinking of the Drow. Yet 'classic' mythology of things like the 'wee people' can show that elves (fairies, brownies, what have you) can be very capricious against man. Plus, let's be honest, weren't the Prince and Princess of the elves in Hellboy II, the Golden Army a great example of Elves? You expect them to be like the Bannor and Good, but they are Mad As Hell and Not Going To Take It Anymore!(tm) and thus you get more of the Decius "evil" going on.

One thing I like about the whole Elfquest story line about elves was it gives you a good reason for the 'fall' of Elves. Some stayed true to the old ways, others struck out on their own, others felt the need to delve into dark places in hopes of restoring the glory of the Elves.

But enough of this! Time to go play! =)~

Pun intended? :D

Yes ;)

But also, pun not intended, as in sounds sweet/excitin/etc.

Double meanin kinda thing, ya know.

it's hard not to see any 'evil' elves without thinking of the Drow.

I love concept of Drow myself. Totally evil elves dedicated to the goddess (or god in some fantasies) of Chaos. Totally badass, sh*t your pants evil. And they like war.

I love concept of Drow myself. Totally evil elves dedicated to the goddess (or god in some fantasies) of Chaos. Totally badass, sh*t your pants evil. And they like war.

I could not guess that from your avatar.. ;)

Check out Yet Another Fantasy Gamer Comic. http://yafgc.shipsinker.com/index.php?strip_id=1 - for some Drow power.

Then I had the High Elves that to me were more of the Tolkein Elves that sort of harken back to that mythical "Golden Age" - I mean come on, in almost all fantasy, "High Elves" seem to be at the end of their age.

If I recall correctly, the Elves are relatively young in the FfH setting - younger than mankind at least (though the original humans weren't strictly as they are now - being immortal etc).

*invokes Magister for clarification*

It depends on what you mean by the elves being young. Chances are that any individual elf would be much older than any given human, as they do age much more slowly than humans and live far longer.


The elves and humanity have a common source, but diverged long ago. As humans write most of the history, they tend to say that the Elves broke off from humanity and so could be considered the "younger race." However, I consider the view that humans broke off from the elves (as the elves probably believe) to be just about as valid. Elven health, longevity (only Nemed and Gabella were immortal, their children were just very long lived), beauty, and strength were all present in the early generations of mankind. However, Man had more human-like qualities too, like a larger stature. Like in many cases of divergent evolution, you can't really say which group split from which, since they all split from a common ancestor. Elves are fewer generations removed from Nemed (since they don't mate until an age when humans would be barren), so they could argue that they are the real Mankind. Aifons would probably claim to be the real Mankind too, if any of them were still alive.

Humans (well, human lore-masters) would say that the closeness to Sucellus changed the nature of the elves' ancestors to turn humans to elves, while humans maintained a near balance between the gods to keep them closer to their original design as a perfect balance of every element. Elves would probably say that humans were elves who did not stay close enough to the divine to retain their former glory, and thus deteriorated into lesser beings (and that some then deteriorated further into Orks). I think that the Elves viewed the Aifons, who stayed just as close to their god Danalin who was friendly with Sucellus, as less degenerate than humanity, but still not quite up to elven standards. Humanity was made of those who were not nearly as close to any god, probably serving many but less devoutly and with less perfect knowledge of whom they served. (Humans are dirty too. Elven cleanliness prevents diseases from spreading and keeps then very health and long lived, but also reduced their resistance so that they are very weak to human illnesses.)


The Elves, Aifons, and Humans were clearly distinct groups by the middle of the Age of Dragons. However, believe they continued to diverge even after that, albeit more slowly. I believe that humans still often lived a couple centuries during the Age of Magic. Humans were also a bit larger then, or at least the Bannor were. The Bannor who emerged from hell were closer to Nemed and essentially "genetically superior" to other humans, but they intermarried soon afterward and the superiority didn't last.


Various human races have also been deeply effected by their closeness to various gods, but they haven't been as close to their gods, haven't followed them as long, and may have switched gods many times throughout several generations. Closeness to Camulos (plus natural selection and shear brutality) made the Doviello larger and stronger, and probably much shorter lived, than other humans. Given time, these human races could become as distinct as humans and elves. Actually, those humans who stayed loyal go Bhall are now probably much more distinct, as Orks green skin and bone blades aren't found in any other race.



Lizardmen, Centaurs, Lamia, Griffins, Pit Beasts, etc., were created by evil Patrian mages performing experiments on existing creatures (including various animals and humans) using Life/Body magic. Basically, they are Flesh Golems that are capable of reproducing. The more human-like of these were created using humans/elves/maybe aifons, and so still are descended from Nemed and have the divine spark.


Dwarves are a different story. Assuming that the creation story involving Keldon Ki is correct, they are a clearly younger race as didn't exist until the Age of Magic. I'm not sure, but that King who imprisoned Keldon could have been Kyorlin, as he was the first to unite tribes/chiefdoms/minor kingdoms into a real kingdom/empire. I tend to prefer to think that the story isn't true though. If it were, it would strongly imply that Dwarves do not have souls/divine sparks. I don't like making them seem so inferior like that. Besides, if that were true, then the gods would not have a reason to seek their worship. They would not be able to adopt religions, or at least to have access to either divine or arcane spells. The civilopedia used to include the dwarf Arthendain negotiating with Sucellus for his soul, which would not be possible if he had none. If gods like Kilmorph could just create souls out of nothing to give the dwarves, then why would they seek to collect them from the living. I suppose that Dwarves could be reincarnated from human souls, but I prefer to think that Dwarves are just another race of the original mankind formed by those who dwalt underground and were close to Kilmorph. The tale of Kelon Ki could just be a myth or a parable. It could also be another joke that they tell to humans and then laugh at them for believing.

The elves and humanity have a common source, but diverged long ago. As humans write most of the history, they tend to say that the Elves broke off from humanity and so could be considered the "younger race." However, I consider the view that humans broke off from the elves (as the elves probably believe) to be just about as valid.

Thanks - that's the part I was remembering. Seems it's more that "mankind is old" than "elvenkind is young", but in anycase, it's not Tolkien-esque with Elves as a dying "elder race".

If gods like Kilmorph could just create souls out of nothing to give the dwarves, then why would they seek to collect them from the living.

Some Earth theologies would argue that it's within $DIVINE_POWER 's ability to create a soul, but it is without value until the soul has lived. In that way, the gods (such as Kilmorph) would be able to add as many souls to the world as they liked, but each additional one would dilute the Gestalt - adding inexperienced souls to the mix.

As the number of souls that can be in Creation at a time is somewhat limited by the number of bodies living at that time, the ideal way for the gods to gain power is to allow more "beings with the divine spark" to exist. This is pleasantly contradictory with the fact that the gods and their agents are often responsible for war between the civilizations, reducing the overall number of living beings.

To clear up the debate on high-elves, wood-elves and dark-elves; look to the leaders. In most of my time reading fantasy books I've seen high-elves as the arcane source of the light elf community (Thessa), wood-elves as the creative and more spiritual type {which can be interpretted from the disciple promotion from the Spiritual trait} (Arendel) and in some fantasy settings there were the 'wild-elves' ie Amelanchier. As stated by the mods of FFH and FF, the dark-elves are embodied by the Svartalfar (Svart-black, álf-elf; Icelandic/Nordic {was nice seeing in the game :D }). So even their name gives into their deceitful stereotype of a 'drow' or 'dark-elf'.

As for an Aquatic race or water-elf... I think it would be interesting altho the original method of having them underwater would be hard for the AI to understand. An Atlantian civ tho could be plausible. "Race that ages ago survived and explored the depths of the oceans found an evil lurking within the depths. Corruption and chaos turned the nation in on itself whos leaders had one option; an ancient spell requiring the concentration of their entire race. The spell took hold over the great civilization and in an instant they vanished. But all was not as it seemed to the great empire; for their magic was based on the water around which they lived for so many ages. Without rain an ocean cannot be formed and without an ocean no rain will fall. The spell once cast became their prison, their impending doom; cut off from the world around them they began withering; dying. And worse... the evil they sought to escape followed them in their dreams. As their race died and their civilization withered the great magic protecting them began to fail..."

2 new civ rulers- Good untainted version and evil tainted version (anyone remember that Cathulu movie with the island of fish people???)

Units recieve waterwalking promotion can see "hidden" water lairs, similar to shipwreaks only in deeper ocean squares instead of just coasts. World-spell: insert random title (just got off work okay? I don't feel to creative yet) causes the civ to 'vanish' for a number of turns equal to their capitals population, the AI and other players see a 'civ has been destroyed' message, cities stop production, units on the map can still move about (great generals can then still use their recruit ability as can militia to for a moderate defence for when the civ returns). This spell is designed to be defensive in nature hence the stopping of production (also with the legend it required all the concentration of the civ to preform).

I do like the idea of more "farmable" sea tiles like the kelp (adds ?food/?hammer as kelp can be used as material for items). This then would benifit all civs tho Lanun/these guys would gain more use like the Lanun already do from water tiles.

*shrugs* Its not much, may have already been posted and needs some work into the history to correctly function in FFH/FF. And yes... I know i'm a newly registered user but hey... I fell in love with FFH about 4 months ago so... don't flame me to bad? :P

Its a terrific game you've all created, keep up the excelent work. :)

Dw, were not really into flaming here apparently =D

Anyways, It'd be nice if you guys could move the cold elf disscussion to a new topic or something, seeing as this really isn't the place :D

I could not guess that from your avatar.. ;)

Check out Yet Another Fantasy Gamer Comic. http://yafgc.shipsinker.com/index.php?strip_id=1 - for some Drow power.
LOL! That comic is great. I even decided to sig it.

Welcom to the forums Villieldr :wavey:

i love your idea of the world spell 'vanishing' the civ only to have them reappear later.

im thinking it could be like a prolonged mega defence.

lets call it "Call of the Waves" for now.

All units are teleported to the civs cultural borders (or nearst city)
All units gain temporary invisibility
All cities and cultural borders as well as improvements etc appear to dissapear for other civs (as you say a 'Aifons has been destroyed message' would be good)
all production in cities is stopped, happyness and unhealthyness in all cities is maxed.
over the period of the spell perhaps allow cities to auto spawn random units

OR

it could teleport your entire civilization (cities and improvements) to a completely different section of ocean completely bewildering enemies attacking you. perhaps allow the player to decide where to place them.

OR

reveals all the world oceans permanently

I like the idea of a vanishing spell also. I see horrible complications, but in general I'd like to ask those better then me on how to basically make a city invisible/not attackable for other civilizations. It feels like much of Aifons hang on such notions, underwater cities etc.

[QUOTE=Psychic_Llamas;7441751]Welcom to the forums Villieldr :wavey:

lets call it "Call of the Waves" for now.

All units are teleported to the civs cultural borders (or nearst city)
All units gain temporary invisibility
All cities and cultural borders as well as improvements etc appear to dissapear for other civs (as you say a 'Aifons has been destroyed message' would be good)
all production in cities is stopped, happyness and unhealthyness in all cities is maxed.
over the period of the spell perhaps allow cities to auto spawn random units

--I like the name for it and I had thought about it extending to units within your cultural boarder too. Another idea I'd thought of was it 'repelling' other civs units but that would be more like a shield and not an invis/pocket dimension concept. The addon of it random spawning units could work too. Give the spawned units the crazed promotion (3%chance to go barbarian each turn to simulate the dreaming darkness effect that plagues their race while in the 'pocket'). The repositioning of cities would be hellish on both the player and the modders I think (20+ cities to replace around the map would be not only exploitable resource/space wise but teddious). Otherwise I like your views on it PL :).

The repositioning of cities would be hellish on both the player and the modders I think (20+ cities to replace around the map would be not only exploitable resource/space wise but teddious). Otherwise I like your views on it PL :).

Not if you limitted the capacity to build Settlers and only allow them raze cities. (Can't live on dry land!) The original concept had the idea of floating cities and eggs. Even if we abandon floating cities in favour of terrafroming coral - which is probably a better idea and a lot easier to implement - limitting cities by automatically producing an Egg (Settler) unit in your Capital every 75 turns means your looking at about nine or ten cities at the end of the game, and probably a lot fewer than that when you cast the spell.

--I like the name for it and I had thought about it extending to units within your cultural boarder too. Another idea I'd thought of was it 'repelling' other civs units but that would be more like a shield and not an invis/pocket dimension concept. The addon of it random spawning units could work too. Give the spawned units the crazed promotion (3%chance to go barbarian each turn to simulate the dreaming darkness effect that plagues their race while in the 'pocket'). The repositioning of cities would be hellish on both the player and the modders I think (20+ cities to replace around the map would be not only exploitable resource/space wise but teddious). Otherwise I like your views on it PL

id prefer auto spawned units not to have crazed, it would be worse off for the aifons if they turned barb on you. id rather give them a promo which has a 1-3% chance each turn of 'killing' the unit, ie they are sent back to the pocket and trapped. this would prevent exploitation of getting an insta army. perhaps have the promo applied only after the worldspells vanishing effects are gone (so your free troops arnt gone by the time you can use them), that way they would have a temporarily bolstered force which over time would vanish again, useful for fending off invasions.

but your right a repositioning of cities would be a modders nightmare, not to mention confusing as all hell for the player.

I was thinking, is anyone working on Aifons? *bump*

And I was kind of thinking about the 'only one city' concept. Island of the Aifons. You can do a lot that would make one single city be a very interesting concept for a civ.

It's been 7 months since the last post. I'd be inclined to call a project on hiatus after that kind of period.

I belive that this idea can be resurected.
But, I sugjest a Mazatl-Cualy aproach to it. Don't know what I meen, well than let me explain.

The 1st post sugjested:
Gekko;7343497']for the time being, let's just assume that they re-appeared on creation just as misteriously as they disappeared. no one knows where they have been all this time. probably some evil spell got casted upon them and disrupted the link between Danalin and them, making the God unaware of their existance and bringing him into depression and eternal sleep and dreaming. the Aifons were probably trapped into the depths of the sea and couldn't be find by anyone, hence being presumed extint. but the incoming armageddon and the machinations of Mulcarn have brought them enough power to rise again to the surface and meet the new civilizations of the Era of Rebirth.


But I sugjest something radicaly diferent, yet still similar.

Instead of being destroyed they were cursed with a fate worse than death.

We know from official fluf that they were destroyed by some force (I don't know what and am to lazy to look it up).
But I sugjest that a small faction had survived, at the cost of pledging aligence to the true overlords. Now, they are something like the Mazatl of the sea.
They worship a minor non adoptable religion that is based around the real mysteries behind the OO.
They have krakens and other sea monsters as mounts and they govern their empires from wast cities beneth the waves.

Their objective (and hopefuly Unique VC) would be to flood the entire world for their overlords.

The Aifons them self would newer apear as units, other than a few mages and specialists to represent their few numbers and reclusive nature. Instead, they would have monsters sumoned from the deep to serve them as workers and armies alike.

Examples of troops:
Ships: Man o' War, Frigate -> Kraken, Killer Wale
Land troops: Knight, Axeman, Champion -> Giant Crabs, drown like creatures (True Drowns), Stigian Legionaries (stronger stygian guard), ect.


Their cities would only be foundable in the ocean, but once founded they could be atacked and destroyed by any naval unit. (if they have canons on board, they sure hell can drop a gunpowder keg onto the fish-men).


On the sea and in their cities, they would fight against your normal naval units like in SMAC.
On land, their land units would be fighting your land units.


All hail and fear the Cualy of the sea. The ultimate and real power of the OO.

So, what do you people think?

I personally would love to play as a truly sea bound civ. I unfortunately couldn't make it happen code wise. This civ would also run into problems on maps without water? I know you can effect where a civ is started on a map, but can you alter a map altogether if a civ needs a particular type of tile? It seems the Aifon civ would be excluded from being available to the AI.

So, does anyone like my idea for the new race OO concept?

So, does anyone like my idea for the new race OO concept?

I think it is interesting but why would water dwelling civs bother conquering land based ones? Unless they are doing it for slaves to take back to their cities or something.

Four reasons:
1. Slaves and resources
2. To apease the overlords
3. To slowely flood the world into eternal ocean
4. To take revenge on the surface dwellers. (the ones that were spared by the apocalipse)

Four reasons:
1. Slaves and resources
2. To apease the overlords
3. To slowely flood the world into eternal ocean
4. To take revenge on the surface dwellers. (the ones that were spared by the apocalipse)

So basically this civ would be spreading ocean in game?

It is more of a lore perspective. I have no idea if such a mechanic would be any good.

The general idea is that they would just want to ravage/destroy the surface world.


Basicly, your average sea dweling Evil Alligement civ.



But I can imagine them slowely raising sea levels with time.

I donno, having trouble wrapping my head around it (and I do have a big head) I mean, even Aifon isle was an island right? At best these guys could be a monstrous version of the lanun, where they do not mind having many water tiles in the bfc (such as settling on a 1x1 island.) Maybe another form of lizardman as you mentioned. Make them coastal dwellers but I donno man.

If I was to do this personally, I'd make them have one city, or at least be limited in cities, and have a python function each turn that gives a chance for the city to move, drifting in the currents... Add LOTS of ocean resources, so they'd have massive floating cities, limited to Ocean terrain. Then, as a balance, make an Autoacquire promotion that requires Ocean and Naval units, that gives a massive bonus to city attack. Maybe limited to higher tier naval.

Let me try and explain:

1. Their cities can only be founded in Ocean tiles
2. Their cities are delicate under water domes
3. They can capture surface cities, but not found them
4. Their sea cities can only be raised, not captured
5. Their sea cities can only be atacked by ships and units that can water walk
6. They have two types of troops, sea monsters and amphibius sea monsters
7. No city defense bonuses for any of their troops


No moving cities or floating cities. But cities that are hard to find, but easy to break.
Posibly due to things like:
a) Special Terain, deap ocean - creates storms and malestorms
b) Spawned sea creatures

If I was to do this personally, I'd make them have one city, or at least be limited in cities, and have a python function each turn that gives a chance for the city to move, drifting in the currents... Add LOTS of ocean resources, so they'd have massive floating cities, limited to Ocean terrain. Then, as a balance, make an Autoacquire promotion that requires Ocean and Naval units, that gives a massive bonus to city attack. Maybe limited to higher tier naval.


Did you ever read The Scar by China Mieville? It featured a floating city called Armada that was occupied by a small civilization of pirates. The city was hundreds of ships and boats of all kinds permanently lashed together. Some of the ships were used for housing, others had been filled with soil and were used as gardens, etc... Armada drifted around very slowly, until... the rulers of the city chained a beast similar to the Leviathan to it. It would be fairly easy to make the city very vulnerable to naval units if left unescorted...representing the danger of your "city" being sunk(!).

That could be a heck of a lot of fun. Perhaps even done simply as a reimagining of the Lanun...I'm not sure the game needs two ocean-oriented civs.

As for hidden cities that are very difficult to attack...interesting in concept, probably a bad idea using the civ 4 engine. The amount of labor it would require to make this work, with the end result that we have another civ the AI can't effectively use...meh. The ocean-dwelling civ in Alpha Centauri was ridiculously easy to win with...I'm guessing we'd see more of the same in Civ 4.

Did you ever read The Scar by China Mieville? It featured a floating city called Armada that was occupied by a small civilization of pirates. The city was hundreds of ships and boats of all kinds permanently lashed together. Some of the ships were used for housing, others had been filled with soil and were used as gardens, etc... Armada drifted around very slowly, until... the rulers of the city chained a beast similar to the Leviathan to it. It would be fairly easy to make the city very vulnerable to naval units if left unescorted...representing the danger of your "city" being sunk(!).

That could be a heck of a lot of fun. Perhaps even done simply as a reimagining of the Lanun...I'm not sure the game needs two ocean-oriented civs.

As for hidden cities that are very difficult to attack...interesting in concept, probably a bad idea using the civ 4 engine. The amount of labor it would require to make this work, with the end result that we have another civ the AI can't effectively use...meh. The ocean-dwelling civ in Alpha Centauri was ridiculously easy to win with...I'm guessing we'd see more of the same in Civ 4.

Yeah now that I could see. I love the concept of floating cities.

Yeah, interesting. Reminds me of the fleet in Suikoden V. Sort of floating "city" too. However, I don't see the Aifons as a civ living in a floating flowing city. And they're gone, dammit, let them be! :p

By the way, how hard would it be to code a floating city?

I had not read that book, but I *have* read Snowcrash, by Neal Stephenson. Basically the same idea in it, although the flotilla is of modern ships so no Leviathan. :lol:


I really like that idea... Possibly as a new leader for the Lanun, so as not to mess with them too much.

Yeah, interesting. Reminds me of the fleet in Suikoden V. Sort of floating "city" too. However, I don't see the Aifons as a civ living in a floating flowing city. And they're gone, dammit, let them be! :p

By the way, how hard would it be to code a floating city?

Haha that's why I've never tried. The Aifons are gone, and should remain that way.... I said so way back when this thread first started. :lol:

As for a floating city, I do not know. I know that when you capture a city, it's actually destroyed and a new city is created. Would have to do the same basic thing..... Make a new city, with the same stats, one tile away, and destroy the original.

Haha that's why I've never tried. The Aifons are gone, and should remain that way.... I said so way back when this thread first started. :lol:

As for a floating city, I do not know. I know that when you capture a city, it's actually destroyed and a new city is created. Would have to do the same basic thing..... Make a new city, with the same stats, one tile away, and destroy the original.


Guh. Would you at least be able to move the units without recreating them? That would be a nightmare figuring out all the age, special triggers on creation, etc....


Might be easier to create a civilization that doesn't actually have cities. Just make the floating "city" a ship. I know the barbs don't lose when they are sans-city...seems like you could tweak it so a civ stays alive until it loses the last unit.

Guh. Would you at least be able to move the units without recreating them? That would be a nightmare figuring out all the age, special triggers on creation, etc....


Might be easier to create a civilization that doesn't actually have cities. Just make the floating "city" a ship. I know the barbs don't lose when they are sans-city...seems like you could tweak it so a civ stays alive until it loses the last unit.

Or a civ that has only one actual city (as was mentioned earlier in the thread) and a bunch of Nomad Camp style floating "city units" to use your idea. The real city could be based on Aifon, a small atoll (like in Waterworld) and rely on slaverushing and the heron throne for production?

Or you could do a coastal civ, a bit like Lanun but different: every non-coast or non-ocean tile would give +1:mad:. The capital would automatically spread a special water terrain on which all "aifon" units could walk and be invisible. Of course, this terrain wouldn't spread outside cultural borders (which should be enabled to spread far in the ocean). They wouldn't have a chance to keep a non-coastal city... +20:mad: citizens? :lol:

I'm sorta thinking this up as I go along, so forgive the poor structuring of the following... and I'm assuming that everything I describe is somehow doable.

Instead of the Aifons, I propose:

The Civilization: The Vodyanoi, humanoid fish people from the sea.
Leaders: Unknown.
City names: Compound words (I think that's the right term :o) i.e.: Serpentblade, Sealtusk, Wallrust, etc

Hero: Unknown.

Palace Mana: No idea. :(
Water for sure, though!

Cities: Cities should be encouraged to be built by coasts (with bonus health/food there), as land-locked areas have large penalties and river-side areas having less.


The Units: Many units can be 'thralls', land-dwellers enslaved by the Vodyanoi which are the same as normal units. Units that are Vodyanoi receive the promotion: Vodyanoi, which gives Water Walking, Amphibious, and gives double movement in ocean and coasts (and lakes, too, I guess), reduced defense in desert terrain and, say, +25% attack/defense in ocean/coast/Flooding (detailed below).

Their UUs ought to be recon-sorts of units, I guess, and they'd have classic fish-monster: Sahaugin, Naga, etc. Why recon units? Well, something has to explain how they enslave the land-dwellers.

The Naval unit line should become a sea monster line, through use of UUs. Similar, but maybe they can go on land (like a turtle) or something.


Buildings: No idea. Maybe the Granary should be removed, and a building that works like it but for fish resources (fish, clams) should take its place in a seafaring tech somewhere. After all, the Vodyanoi aren't vegetarians!


Unique Features: Flooding. Works similarly to spreading Hell Terrain, except it only reduces the usefulness of the tile, effecting food and health negatively, for the most part, as well as making the tile harder to move through. It should not happen in desert tiles. I guess it should only occur in Vodyanoi land, slowly leaving after the Vodyanoi are driven out of the area. If it can spread past their land, maybe it should destroy improvements, or lower the defensive value of the land (for non-Vodyanoi) Edit: It would also reduce the penalties incurred for being a landlocked tile for the Vodyanoi.


The Vodyanoi will excel in Island-y areas, as the Vodyanoi can quickly assault the land, and retreat back to the safety of their islands. A strong naval assault will be needed to break to the land of a Vodyanoi-controlled fortress.

Or you could do a coastal civ, a bit like Lanun but different: every non-coast or non-ocean tile would give +1:mad:. The capital would automatically spread a special water terrain on which all "aifon" units could walk and be invisible. Of course, this terrain wouldn't spread outside cultural borders (which should be enabled to spread far in the ocean). They wouldn't have a chance to keep a non-coastal city... +20:mad: citizens? :lol:

Heh so these guys would really love their coastal resorts. For the terrain you could probably get away with using marches or swamps instead of a new type. Those are both reasonable watery terrain types.

@deadliver: No I couldn't as I'm talking of a new terrain (maybe a feature?) spreading on ocean.

@Unit_666: I like your idea. Maybe because some of its aspects looks like some of mine :lol:

@deadliver: No I couldn't as I'm talking of a new terrain (maybe a feature?) spreading on ocean.

@Unit_666: I like your idea. Maybe because some of its aspects looks like some of mine :lol:

Oh I see now. How about using the kelp from Orbi? ever heard of Orbi?

@Unit_666: I like your idea. Maybe because some of its aspects looks like some of mine :lol:

There was about six posts while I was typing it up... :\

:p

Yeah, why not? Not quite what I was thinking though. I was thinking that this terrain/feature would be like underwater lands, caverns deep inside, below the city, big shells used as shelters, etc.

@Unit_666: Believe me, I'm not saying you used my idea (and even if you'd have done so, whatever?). I'm sure the idea was mentioned way before in the thread (coastal cities). Your idea is far more elaborate than mine, which is cool. And seems way more doable than a floating city.

So a civ with one city (probably on a one-hex island) and some floating mega-ships that gather booty (produce supplies/slaves/something post-combat). Probably doable as a Lanun minor leader...heck probably something I can manage. :D


The vodyanoi idea is also cool. The shallows terrain isn't being used for anything right now...giving them big bonuses in shallows and the ability to spread it would be easy as heck. Shallows are just about useless for other civs...Could probably give them a stealth ability while waterwalking...

The sea monsters as naval units is the Jotnar schtick right now...but honestly I think huge viking longships would make more sense and look cooler for the Jots. So the vodyanoi could have the sea serpents and turtles, along with Kraken as a higher-tier unit. Maybe crabs if someone can find art for it?

The mechanic of invisible waterwalking freaks suddenly raiding your coastal town is perfect and distinctive. Probably should add a unit that can hang around offshore a rival coastal city and cause problems (unhealth, unhappiness)...can simulate encouraging cthulhu-esque cults, getting busy and spreading the "Innsmouth look", etc...

Oooh, I never thought of invisiblity.

Great ideas, Vermicious.

:p

Yeah, why not? Not quite what I was thinking though. I was thinking that this terrain/feature would be like underwater lands, caverns deep inside, below the city, big shells used as shelters, etc.

I get ya. I guess it all depends on whether or not this will be a lanun reboot or a whole new monstrous race of undersea dwellers intent on pillaging the dirt dwellers. *shakes a ragged claw*

So a civ with one city (probably on a one-hex island) and some floating mega-ships that gather booty (produce supplies/slaves/something post-combat). Probably doable as a Lanun minor leader...heck probably something I can manage. :D


The vodyanoi idea is also cool. The shallows terrain isn't being used for anything right now...giving them big bonuses in shallows and the ability to spread it would be easy as heck. Shallows are just about useless for other civs...Could probably give them a stealth ability while waterwalking...

The sea monsters as naval units is the Jotnar schtick right now...but honestly I think huge viking longships would make more sense and look cooler for the Jots. So the vodyanoi could have the sea serpents and turtles, along with Kraken as a higher-tier unit. Maybe crabs if someone can find art for it?

The mechanic of invisible waterwalking freaks suddenly raiding your coastal town is perfect and distinctive. Probably should add a unit that can hang around offshore a rival coastal city and cause problems (unhealth, unhappiness)...can simulate encouraging cthulhu-esque cults, getting busy and spreading the "Innsmouth look", etc...

giant vikings does sound cool...make it happen and i'll double your wages!

Hemah looked at the sea. It was calm, the waves gently washing the shore down the cliff. He heard footsteps behind him. The man slowly approached him and stopped by his side. Hemah realized that he was expecting that man, that it was why he came here in the first place.
‘What are you thinking about?’ The man asked.
Hemah hesitated for a moment.
‘Aifons?’ A question rather than a statement. Was he really thinking about them? ‘But they’re gone.’
‘They have never been truly gone.’
Hemah wanted to turn his head to see the man’s face but something stopped him. The sea . It was no longer calm. The waves were now reaching up to his feet, the wind was growing stronger the sound of thunder echoed under the dark sky. He felt the presence of something evil in the water.
‘You have to find us.’
Hemah opened his eyes. The sea was calm again and the man was gone, but the feeling of evil presence remained.

Two water dwelling civilizations: Aifnos and Strange Creatures Without a Name at the Moment

The Aifons were not destroyed (at least not all of them) but rather captured and used as SCs’ slaves until recently they rebelled against their masters and now they seek retribution. Both civs are at war with each other.

Aifons are more Kuriotatesque, with small number of cites while SCs prefer plenty of smaller cities (probably only able to work first circle like the Jotnar).
Their ocean cities are invisible for anyone but the other aquamen. Most of their units are also inwisible on water. To be able to see their ocean cities you have to research Message from the Depth or Optics. Their ocean cities can be attacked by water walking units and most ships and are automatically razed. They can settle on land and their land cities act completely normal, but they get -1 :food: and :hammers: from land tiles.

There should be a number of ocean-based resources that would only be visible to Aifons and SCs (and Lanun in case of pearls). I suggest that ocean and coast tiles yield should be changed for them (ocean 1 :food: 1 :hammers:, sea (new) 2 :food:, coast 2:food: 1 :commerce: all + 1 :commerce: from sailing, coral unique feature gives -1 :food: + 1 :hammers: with no effect on yield for land dwellers) with a bunch of special improvements (like kelp farm) and special worker unit.

Ocean cities do not gain culture at all; instead Aifons have a special building that gives a one-time boost of 10 :culture: so they can work the second ring.
Most units would be unique and they would all start with water walking and a promotion that would give double movement in ocean/sea, -% strength on land and would make it impossible to enter desert.

They would not be able to adopt any religion, and they would not spread to they lands. Aifons would have a ritual Awake Danalin, which would give them some bonuses and allow OO leaders to choose their alignment giving new units based on their choice (it would also affect heroes somehow).

Oh, and how about a submarine hero available for everyone (or rather the first civ to complete it to be exact)?

Hemah looked out into the sea. It was calm, the waves gently washing the shore down the cliff. He heard footsteps behind him. The man slowly approached him and stopped by his side. Hemah realized that he was expecting that man, that it was why he came here in the first place.
‘What are you thinking about?’ The man asked.
Hemah hesitated for a moment.
‘Aifons?’ A question rather than a statement. Was he really thinking about them? ‘But they’re gone.’
‘They have never been truly gone.’
Hemah wanted to turn his head to see the man’s face but something stopped him. The sea . It was no longer calm. The waves were now reaching up to his feet, the wind was growing stronger the sound of thunder echoed under the dark sky. He felt the presence of something evil in the water.
‘You have to find us.’
Hemah opened his eyes. The sea was calm again and the man was gone, but the feeling of evil presence remained.

Two water dwelling civilizations: Aifnos and Strange Creatures Without a Name at the Moment

The Aifons were not destroyed (at least not all of them) but rather captured and used as SCs’ slaves until recently they rebelled against their masters and now they seek retribution. Both civs are at war with each other.

Aifons are more Kuriotatesque, with small number of cites while SCs prefer plenty of smaller cities (probably only able to work first circle like the Jotnar).
Their ocean cities are invisible for anyone but the other aquamen. Most of their units are also inwisible on water. To be able to see their ocean cities you have to research Message from the Depth or Optics. Their ocean cities can be attacked by water walking units and most ships and are automatically razed. They can settle on land and their land cities act completely normal, but they get -1 :food: and :hammers: from land tiles.

There should be a number of ocean-based resources that would only be visible to Aifons and SCs (and Lanun in case of pearls). I suggest that ocean and coast tiles yield should be changed for them (ocean 1 :food: 1 :hammers:, sea (new) 2 :food:, coast 2:food: 1 :commerce: all + 1 :commerce: from sailing, coral unique feature gives -1 :food: + 1 :hammers: with no effect on yield for land dwellers) with a bunch of special improvements (like kelp farm) and special worker unit.

Ocean cities do not gain culture at all; instead Aifons have a special building that gives a one-time boost of 10 :culture: so they can work the second ring.
Most units would be unique and they would all start with water walking and a promotion that would give double movement in ocean/sea, -% strength on land and would make it impossible to enter desert.

They would not be able to adopt any religion, and they would not spread to they lands. Aifons would have a ritual Awake Danalin, which would give them some bonuses and allow OO leaders to choose their alignment giving new units based on their choice (it would also affect heroes somehow).

Oh, and how about a submarine hero available for everyone (or rather the first civ to complete it to be exact)?

Now this sounds a lot more like what I sugjested. And I full hartedly support it.
The concept of evil fish men is so much better than the concept of coast loving viking-pirates.

I think the worker techs now can just add water-based improvements for the water resources ... therefore instead of adding in new techs (other than the neccessary one unique tech to give their special traits) ... and the functionality ends up overlapping, allowing for similar start strategies.

Also, I like the Idea of finding ways to make the Sidar more invisible, and the Esus more sneaky, before making hidden underwater ppl with floating or underwater cities :D

Ok.

I too am new to the forums, and I'd just like to say that I love FFH and FF.

I was having an idea that I'd like to share with people here. First I'd just like to confirm that during the age of ice, were most of the oceans frozen?

If so, then my idea is to have a civ similar to doviello or illian, where the civ was big during the age of ice, but fell on hard times during the big melt. However, rather than having a land dwelling people, this tribe/group/nation lived primarily on the frozen seas and fished for food, much like the inuit people in real-world northern Canada. Unlike the inuit, these people carved massive cities from the ice and built it into major fortresses.

While the ice was melting, these people had to adapt fast. Their response: perform a major ritual to keep a part of the sea permanently frozen. This resulted in giving up a significant part of their humanity and binding the entire nation to the water in a way that they cannot leave either without significant penalties (not being able to enter dessert at all seems very restrictive). As the rest of the seas melted around them, they were able to keep a small glacier cold enough to remain frozen. Unfortunately they could not allow themselves to be swept into the warm southern waters and so attached the iceberg to the sea floor.

In this way, you can have an entirely seagoing race that can still be attacked and you don't have to move cities around. I figure that once they started to adapt to the changing climate, they were able to expand their main city, but can't support a huge number of cities without access to more ice mana. I also think that since they are sea-based civ, they won't reasonably be able to gain metal weapons as was mentioned previously in this thread. a one-time coral based weapon upgrade might be plausible.

I don't know how feasible this is, but you could make the number of cities available to them equal to the amount of ice and water mana that they have, with the 'settler' unit being some kind of iceberg that's similar to a land based settler: controllable, easily lost, and player chooses where to build.

What do you guys think?

It would be interesting. I guess that another ice/water civ might be pretty cool if they were seperate from the Illians and the Lanun enough.

Hemah looked at the sea. It was calm, the waves gently washing the shore down the cliff. He heard footsteps behind him. The man slowly approached him and stopped by his side. Hemah realized that he was expecting that man, that it was why he came here in the first place.
‘What are you thinking about?’ The man asked.
Hemah hesitated for a moment.
‘Aifons?’ A question rather than a statement. Was he really thinking about them? ‘But they’re gone.’
‘They have never been truly gone.’
Hemah wanted to turn his head to see the man’s face but something stopped him. The sea . It was no longer calm. The waves were now reaching up to his feet, the wind was growing stronger the sound of thunder echoed under the dark sky. He felt the presence of something evil in the water.
‘You have to find us.’
Hemah opened his eyes. The sea was calm again and the man was gone, but the feeling of evil presence remained.

Two water dwelling civilizations: Aifnos and Strange Creatures Without a Name at the Moment

The Aifons were not destroyed (at least not all of them) but rather captured and used as SCs’ slaves until recently they rebelled against their masters and now they seek retribution. Both civs are at war with each other.

Aifons are more Kuriotatesque, with small number of cites while SCs prefer plenty of smaller cities (probably only able to work first circle like the Jotnar).
Their ocean cities are invisible for anyone but the other aquamen. Most of their units are also inwisible on water. To be able to see their ocean cities you have to research Message from the Depth or Optics. Their ocean cities can be attacked by water walking units and most ships and are automatically razed. They can settle on land and their land cities act completely normal, but they get -1 :food: and :hammers: from land tiles.

There should be a number of ocean-based resources that would only be visible to Aifons and SCs (and Lanun in case of pearls). I suggest that ocean and coast tiles yield should be changed for them (ocean 1 :food: 1 :hammers:, sea (new) 2 :food:, coast 2:food: 1 :commerce: all + 1 :commerce: from sailing, coral unique feature gives -1 :food: + 1 :hammers: with no effect on yield for land dwellers) with a bunch of special improvements (like kelp farm) and special worker unit.

Ocean cities do not gain culture at all; instead Aifons have a special building that gives a one-time boost of 10 :culture: so they can work the second ring.
Most units would be unique and they would all start with water walking and a promotion that would give double movement in ocean/sea, -% strength on land and would make it impossible to enter desert.

They would not be able to adopt any religion, and they would not spread to they lands. Aifons would have a ritual Awake Danalin, which would give them some bonuses and allow OO leaders to choose their alignment giving new units based on their choice (it would also affect heroes somehow).

Oh, and how about a submarine hero available for everyone (or rather the first civ to complete it to be exact)?
no, read up on the Aifons... ask Magister...

Instead of the Aifons, I propose:

The Civilization: [SIZE="4"]The Vodyanoi, humanoid fish people from the sea.


Everything is fun except for the fact that I hate transliterations.

There's already a word for "vodyanoi" in english, and quite good: nix.

For those who don't know, vodyanoi means nix/merman in russian.

Heh ... so are the Ljosalphar and Svartalphar with Norse :P .... are you implying that two is too many?

Nix
Nix is a german word, perhaps you are thinking of the Triton? No wait, that's greek.
Hmm... Merman's so blasé.

Besides, Vodyanoi are uglier and more monsterlike than the other myths I have named :lol:

Nix is a german word, perhaps you are thinking of the Triton? No wait, that's greek.
Hmm... Merman's so blasé.

Besides, Vodyanoi are uglier and more monsterlike than the other myths I have named :lol:

I see a "nix" word in my english dictionary. Maybe it was taken from german Nixe (and probably Neck are the same kind of creature).


The main problem I believe is because I'm russian :).

You know, it's always weird to see a transliterated word from your language to be used as an appellative in english. Probably it's a personal taste.

Call them Vodyaniyeh (plural) then :) or Ljosalfar should be Ljosalfr. And it's not ugly or monster-like >:E. It just means "related to water" (like water plant). So it's just "water" as an adjective.

I just used "the Vodyanoi" because I had the word stuck in my head for, like, a few weeks, while I was playing The Witcher and it was exactly what they are -- fish men. Plus, it seemed better than just calling them TempCivName1.

Edit: Also, sorta what Redeyes said: it is a much more original term than Merfolk, Triton, Fish People, Naga, etc. and its foreignness seems much more insidious. Insidious Russian Tritons.

That would be a good naming theme for the cities, though: Russian words! YEAH!

I just used "the Vodyanoi" because I had the word stuck in my head for, like, a few weeks, while I was playing The Witcher and it was exactly what they are -- fish men. Plus, it seemed better than just calling them TempCivName1.

Edit: Also, sorta what Redeyes said: it is a much more original term than Merfolk, Triton, Fish People, Naga, etc. and its foreignness seems much more insidious. Insidious Russian Tritons.

That would be a good naming theme for the cities, though: Russian words! YEAH!
"Mommy I saw a Soviet under my bed with an AK-47"
seriously man, grow up the cold war is over...

Actually I see no cold-war relation here. (??)

Actually "vodyanoi" is not a fish-man. He's a "turnskin", his normal form is a pale man with a long green beard with water weed stuck in it, but he can transform in different forms, like fish or a man with a toad head or whatever. As for many creatures in folkloire, he has different depictions.

The only problem I see that this character was always a single one (like a lord of waters). But who thinks about origins these days :).

Actually I see no cold-war relation here. (??)

The "Insidious Russians" Triton. At least, that's my guess as to what he's referring to.

But who thinks about origins these days :).

You? At the very least, not me. :crazyeye:

I want a civilization of zeuses then :). "Zeusi", people hurling lightnings and riding eagles. Oh, now I will run to that viking-esque thread and propose the civ name: odins. :D Joke.

The "Insidious Russians" Triton. At least, that's my guess as to what he's referring to.

I'd prefer russian cities for Illians then. Rough winters and bearded men are good enough for a pun :).
Or Doviello with bear cavalry :D.

no, read up on the Aifons... ask Magister...

All I found about them is that one day they disappeard and noone knows what happened to them. So it is left open. Might have been destroyed by an invisible pink unicorn, might have been captured by some mysterious creatures, that use their souls in their dark rituals. If I am wrong and there is an explanation of what happened to them then that's OK. It's not like anyone is going to put them in game anyway.

I feel that all viking/norse thematics can be best done in a Illian/Jotnar/the other existing civ plus module. There are one norse themes civ, one ice themed civ and one giant civ with giant monsters and norse theme.

Its kind like of making yet another undead civ after the two that exists.

I'd love to have the time to do the Aifons, and do them right. It'd take some serious code-effort. And I'd have only one city.

I just want Alpha Centaurii style Kelp farms.

A feature, not an improvement, that gives +1 :food:

I just want Alpha Centaurii style Kelp farms.

A feature, not an improvement, that gives +1 :food:

Sounds good to me. Loved how you could play a well run ocean mostly civ in Alpha Centauri.

You can do it with Lanun and their ports + Throne of Heron now :).

http://joeyandchristy.com/images/artextras/logos/awebreadylogos/resurrect.jpg

Because I can.

Sounds cool. I definitely approuve

It might be interesting if the aifons were turned into monsters enhanced because of Danalin's and Hemah's nightmares. They lost their ability to breathe air (I assume aifons had gills or something) and only recently researched magic that lets them leave their watery home. Or they just weren't interested in the surface until recently. AoI probably cut down their food supply (fish mainly at the time) and once the oceans thawed, they looked into alternative sources of food. They worship the overlords and cannot adopt another religion (much like Hyborem and AV). Over the centuries their worship of Danalin has become twisted, and unknowingly they actually do Mammon's bidding. They cannot do the 'redemption flip' Kahd though. Perhaps they don't exist at game start, but are spawned like infernals by whoever founds OO, who can then choose whether to switch over. Should have a game option to prevent them from spawning. And disabling OO disables them by default. Their leaders are evil of course.

Of course, they are all about the sea, thriwing in places few people want. And yes, I like underwater cities. I love the idea of enslaving 'land-dwellers', let them put slaves into cities as specialists that make food (+1:food: sounds about right), they love to eat people. No cannibalism promotion though. However, as they consume their fallen foes, they should temporarily be exempt from costs for being away from domestic soil (supply or support or whatever it is called) after killing a living unit. I'd like to see them go to a city, smash in the walls, beat down the defenders, loot and burn it and take whoever survives beneath the waves (maybe 1 slave per 3 city pop). No special slaver units but they can use slavery civic as usual. They have special sections in their cities with air, where the 'livestock' can live and breed, makes it is impossible to escape. Could either allow them to add unlimited slaves to the city, or require a special building which allow a limited number. The building can be built as many times as the player wants to, but it increases city maintenance every time. They can use slave trade, undercouncil does not care if the slaves work the fields or mines or make the main course of a fish monster's meal. In this case, using a limiting building is probably necessary.

As for their buildings, no smokehouses. It's beyond me how they'd do that in the bottom of the ocean. Besides, they like their meat fresh. They get granaries to store fodder for their livestock. They can only get 20% food stored after growth (instead of the typical 40%) but it should balance their 'free food' nicely. Need to check which :) resources they get benefits from. Fruit don't really fit at least. They can just ignore/trade away those. Some buildings may require unique names even if their effects are normal, including wonders. No forges because they don't do metals. They need unique building for master smith which supplies higher quality coral equipment...for a price. See the next paragraph why their first 'master coralcrafter' (needs a better name) does not take a great engineer. Costs are still completely open but might be high because coral does not sound particularly easy to shape. Walls should be some kind of dome because enemies can swim into the city from above as well, maybe arcology from Next War, at least for a placeholder.

Their armor is lightweight but strong coral rather than metal. I'd hate to swim in steel plate. They do not get metal promotions because getting metal resources without trade is kinda difficult for them. Instead, they get their increased base strength from their 'master coralcrafter' (again, name not final) but have to pay for every unit. In general, their units are not quite as strong as metal armed melee with best possible weapons, a penalty against metal promotions should accomplish this. But they are also immune to rust. No archers because shooting a bow is impossible underwater, maybe nets or javelins. I am not sure what to do with drowns and stygian guards (no metal). Considering how 'evil' they are, those two seem very appropriate. Maybe they take weapons from their dead enemies? Their warriors cannot be drowned though. They use drowns and stygian guards for cannon fodder and so do not expose themselves (and their expensive weapons) to danger. Their racial promotion might lower the chance of defending the stack?

They have mixed navies and cavalry. As in their cavalry cannot enter land and they don't build ships. As for what they ride, I am not sure. But definitely not something one has to capture from animals/barbarians.

As for their looks if somebody is interested in making art. I am thinking of hulking fishmen, with some fins. Not (much) taller than an average human but far more muscled. Their skin is maybe some shade of cyan. I don't know how coral armor should look but I have a special fondness of weapons with jagged edges. Art is low priority though, coding them in is far more important.

Name ideas for this faction/civilization/empire? Leader name ideas? How about leader traits? Something warmongering though.

I guess I need to make them myself to see results. But any feedback?

Personally, I prefer my coastal raiders, the Vodyanoi (http://forums.civfanatics.com/showpost.php?p=8155661&postcount=145) -- mainly because it's my idea. But, here I go...

I'm not really super knowledgeable about OO, but with how your Coralfish are described, there is little reason for them to be OO-only; they don't seem to personify Octopus Overlords like the Infernals personify the Ashen Veil, or the Angel people lead by Basium (forgot their name, somehow) personify the Order.

I think that they need to use metal resources, magic, and priests (the unit line, not the specialists) normally, like every other civ, and, because of this, their cities ought to be land-based, so they can survive in landlocked map scripts and take advantage of the same things as land-dwelling civs. Plus, every tech ought to have some purpose for them. Ideally, they should take advantage of everything FFH offers. The reason for this is simplicity -- it is key when making something as complex as a civilization for FFH, and it helps to ensure balance is visibly attainable. Edit: For this reason, I don't think civ-specific specialists are viable.

Because of this, I'd say you should re-think the coral weapons and non-land cities.

----

Perhaps Animal Husbandry could become a staple economic tech for the fish people. The Smokehouse could become a UU named Slave Pens that provides some :food:, and slaves can be sacrificed in a city with Slave Pens to increase :food: the UU produces by 1, up to a max of, say, 5. Granaries should work as normal, but with no health bonus. (via UU)

Coastal cities ought to receive a +:health: building of some sort, or have one buildable. Maybe both. This would be to promote coastal cities, as...

Tile yields ought to be largely unchanged, because either the civ or its slaves will benefit from the tiles. i.e. food bonus from farms because it helps keep more slaves fed, which in turn leads to more food for the fish people; mines are worked by slaves; horses can be eaten, and slaves can use them to help with production. Villages raise an interesting problem, though.

There definitely ought to be slave-warriors being used for the mounted line of troops.


---

For naming, I'd just say go with the classical sorts of names for fish people. i.e. Naga, Vodyanoi, Merfolk, etc. For the leader's name... Who knows. How about Zup? ;) For the traits, clearly Aggressive/Raider.

...

Oh, right! That idea about them spawning with OO is cool. If I knew more about OO's lore, I'd suggest something to make them OO-y, but I can't. :(




Please note that I edited this heavily, so please forgive the terrible structuring. One day I'll get better at this sort of thing... One day.

Any civ linked to OO like Agres is to AV should be neutral and not evil.
OO is neutral.

OO is neutral? Where does that notion come from?

They make human sacrifices on a regular basis, forcibly mutate their followers, and drown them. They employ an army of undead and demons, and one of their heroes was taken straight from an asylum. Oh, and they have a wonder which suppresses free will and independant thought.

Please explain why OO is not evil ?

Because it's cool.

Personally, I prefer my coastal raiders, the Vodyanoi (http://forums.civfanatics.com/showpost.php?p=8155661&postcount=145) -- mainly because it's my idea. But, here I go...[/SIZE]

I liked it too. However there are some concepts I want to do differently. I want them to be more...direct. Brute melee force rather than running around the wilderness. Also the Vodyanoi seem rather...neutral.

Of course, there's room enough for both fishmen.

I'm not really super knowledgeable about OO, but with how your Coralfish are described, there is little reason for them to be OO-only; they don't seem to personify Octopus Overlords like the Infernals personify the Ashen Veil, or the Angel people lead by Basium (forgot their name, somehow) personify the Order.[/SIZE]

I might allow them other religions, but all of their cities have OO permanently. I'll also give their leader(s) a strong weighting for OO. I guess I would not have to prevent them from going good because slavery and undercouncil have such nice benefits for them.

I think that they need to use metal resources, magic, and priests (the unit line, not the specialists) normally, like every other civ, and, because of this, their cities ought to be land-based, so they can survive in landlocked map scripts and take advantage of the same things as land-dwelling civs. Plus, every tech ought to have some purpose for them. Ideally, they should take advantage of everything FFH offers. The reason for this is simplicity -- it is key when making something as complex as a civilization for FFH, and it helps to ensure balance is visibly attainable. Edit: For this reason, I don't think civ-specific specialists are viable.

Because of this, I'd say you should re-think the coral weapons and non-land cities.[/SIZE]

If I moved them to the land, they'd have to go for conquest far more than I originally planned. But maybe one of their goals should be the good old world domination. It's always fashionable. Rather than play the entire civ you take control of a invasion army. Could also make them want to prevent Armageddon. Letting them have metal and master smiths makes things easier for me.

I'll definitely let them use both disciple units and priest specialists. Could make them highly religious. They think they are god's (Danalin's) chosen people and the overlords are divine messengers who relay the will of god to creation. Well the Aifons were but it has lead them to see other men inferior. Their physical form became monstrous because they were exposed to lots and lots of chaos mana. According to their clergy, it is a divine blessing and not some random mutation. In the end, their reasons and actions are purely human ones, though.

----

Perhaps Animal Husbandry could become a staple economic tech for the fish people. The Smokehouse could become a UU named Slave Pens that provides some :food:, and slaves can be sacrificed in a city with Slave Pens to increase :food: the UU produces by 1, up to a max of, say, 5. Granaries should work as normal, but with no health bonus. (via UU)

Coastal cities ought to receive a +:health: building of some sort, or have one buildable. Maybe both. This would be to promote coastal cities, as...[/SIZE]

Your slave pens seem simpler to implement than my suggestion but the end result is the same. I'll give them an increase in maintenance (gotta keep an eye them slaves) and a small penalty to city defence. Though I'd push the limit higher, if I limited it in the first place. Infinite food cries imba though. I could make them eat more food. 3 per pop? Typically large predators have lower populations than their prey. In this case you have to kill an average of 12 units or spend 90 gold to get one extra specialist. Too low? Maybe give them a penalty to farms? Could cripple them early though. Animal husbandry indeed. Another important tech is way of the wicked of course.

I can do harbor and lighthouse ub's to enhance coastal cities. And nothing stops me from adding new buildings to the game. They absolutely have to start with the ability to work water tiles.

Perhaps I should increase trade yields in coastal cities, sort of to simulate they trade not only on surface but with their underwater empire (invisible, unreachable, not even on the map) as well.

Tile yields ought to be largely unchanged, because either the civ or its slaves will benefit from the tiles. i.e. food bonus from farms because it helps keep more slaves fed, which in turn leads to more food for the fish people; mines are worked by slaves; horses can be eaten, and slaves can use them to help with production. Villages raise an interesting problem, though.[/SIZE]

Cottages I am not interested in, as I personally don't use them, ever. I could block them completely or just leave them alone. I'll probably give them a health penalty in hell oceans. Makes them want to keep hell at bay.

There definitely ought to be slave-warriors being used for the mounted line of troops.[/SIZE]

Perhaps. But how do they keep their armed slaves from rebelling? Slaves + weapons == a huge risk.

---

For naming, I'd just say go with the classical sorts of names for fish people. i.e. Naga, Vodyanoi, Merfolk, etc. For the leader's name... Who knows. How about Zup? ;) For the traits, clearly Aggressive/Raider.[/SIZE]

My forum name is not appropriate for a leader of a mighty, fictional empire of fish people. But if all else fails I'll just choose some name at random. I considered these traits myself, but I was not sure about raiders. Good to know somebody thinks it fits. Organized is an alternative as it allows larger empires. I might make more than one leader.

I might go with naga. But it might lead into issues of: "wtf your naga have legs? naga don't have legs!" They still need a tail as well because it helps swimming. Merfolk sounds too benign.

...

Oh, right! That idea about them spawning with OO is cool. If I knew more about OO's lore, I'd suggest something to make them OO-y, but I can't. :([/SIZE]

I'll think of something.

Please note that I edited this heavily, so please forgive the terrible structuring. One day I'll get better at this sort of thing... One day.

Don't worry. You could not possibly be as bad as me.

Perhaps. But how do they keep their armed slaves from rebelling? Slaves + weapons == a huge risk.

You only allow slaves with families to fight, and keep their families hostage in a few secret locations - moving them about randomly. To be grisly mutilated and tortured if the slaves rebell.

Anyone even looking grumpy would be killed by his peers.

pssk.. amateurs. ;)

I like your idea there, zup... And PPQ, OO makes good neutral, and neutral evil. It's not as evil as AV, but it IS evil.

Personally, I'd go with the Infernal method and have it summoned with OO.

Note: I should have just replied to everything in order -- it would make it easier to ensure that I haven't skipped something I wanted to reply to. :(

If I moved them to the land, they'd have to go for conquest far more than I originally planned.

The one major problem with having sea cities is that they would have zero competition for settleable land. That's one one the main reason I think they should be coast-based.

But how do they keep their armed slaves from rebelling? Slaves + weapons == a huge risk.

Well, the Overlords seem to be quite a bit about control (e.g. the Tower of Complacency), so maybe they put something in the slaves' water, or somesuch. Or perhaps, the slave class of this race originated in the depths of their origin -- the slave class are the unmutated members of the race. Or perhaps, the drugging makes them think this, easing new slaves into their place.

Could also make them want to prevent Armageddon.

Do you mean sorta like the Mazatl and Elohim, as opposed to indifference/lack of knowledge like (I would assume) most civilizations? Or, were you thinking of them being similar to the Infernals and Sheaim, originally? :eek:

Cottages I am not interested in, as I personally don't use them, ever. I could block them completely or just leave them alone. I'll probably give them a health penalty in hell oceans. Makes them want to keep hell at bay.

Well, I'm under the impression that they're a staple function for civilizations, so I figure that civs should either have them, have an alternate to them, or have a reason why they wouldn't need them.

As far as Hell terrain goes, I figured that it would reduce the food value and health of water tiles, making them much less useful to the civ, much like all other terrain.

Maybe there ought to be a few specific sea-based (maybe even lake-based, if its possible) that only this civ can access, to further promote coastal, watery areas, similar to the Lanun and pearls.

wtf your naga have legs? naga don't have legs!
Elves can be miniature sprites, and Orcs can be pig-men, so I don't think re-inventing a mythical race is that much of a sin against them. WarCraft makes me think of Naga as hulking brutes seeking to enslave annihilate the land-walkers (http://www.wowwiki.com/Naga), though, so that name is sorta fitting, even if it's their race, not the Civilization's name.

Because of this, I guess I picture the Vodyanoi more like WarCraft's Murlocs (http://www.wowwiki.com/Murlocs), albeit less comical (or perhaps cute) looking.

Your slave pens seem simpler to implement than my suggestion but the end result is the same. I'll give them an increase in maintenance (gotta keep an eye them slaves) and a small penalty to city defence. Though I'd push the limit higher, if I limited it in the first place. Infinite food cries imba though. I could make them eat more food. 3 per pop? Typically large predators have lower populations than their prey. In this case you have to kill an average of 12 units or spend 90 gold to get one extra specialist. Too low? Maybe give them a penalty to farms? Could cripple them early though. Animal husbandry indeed. Another important tech is way of the wicked of course.

If they are coast-based like the Lanun, maintinance would be killer, as they could easily control many, spread out islands. City states would be good for them, because they would have very little cultural competition on their lonely islands. Alternately, if their cities are simply in the Deep (the ocean or whatnot) that could interesting. The penalties -- maintenance and defense -- are interesting, as well!

3 food per pop, if its even doable without civics, would be more fitting for a civ on the scale of the Jotnar, rather than (what I would assume) are more Human in proportions.

I've never manually controlled my cities' specialists and plot selection, so I really don't know much about specialists or how to use them well. :( A penalty to farms would be prudent though, as the most important part of the Civ would not be eating what a farm can produce. Perhaps land terrain in general should have less :food:, and the ocean should be the primary source of growth-giving :food:, with land used primarily for :hammers:.

Perhaps water-based tiles (lake, ocean, coast, river-bordered) could give high :food: but low :hammers:, and land tiles could give slightly below average :hammers: and low :food:. This would result in high populations that would have a large amount of citizen specialists, representing the slaves. Sorta similar to normal civilizations, but more extreme. I'm not really sure on what the yields ought to be, or if this would be at all feasible or balanced, though.

Although, I just realized that any civic that allows for unlimited specialists would completely annihilate how this is intended to be done...

And yes, I agree, Animal Husbandry and Way of the Wicked should be important techs for them.

I can do harbor and lighthouse ub's to enhance coastal cities. And nothing stops me from adding new buildings to the game. They absolutely have to start with the ability to work water tiles.

Just keep in mind, there's no need to go overboard on UUs or NBs (new buildings)!

I agree, though, they should start with, what, Seafaring or whatever. That's a starting tech, isn't it? :confused:

Perhaps I should increase trade yields in coastal cities, sort of to simulate they trade not only on surface but with their underwater empire (invisible, unreachable, not even on the map) as well.

That's a really neat, clever idea! Maybe that could be a theme with them -- friends in the Deep? Perhaps there could be a building autobuilt on their cities that are directly connected to the ocean (coastal or sea-based) that represents this somehow.

Don't worry. You could not possibly be as bad as me.
You're too kind! :)

As far as Hell terrain goes, I figured that it would reduce the food value and health of water tiles, making them much less useful to the civ, much like all other terrain.


I have always wanted to introduce a 'blood sea' hell terrain type, but I'm no coder or artist and I would have no idea how. All you'd need to do is have a blood-red coast type, and have a deep maroon or even black for the ocean squares. As far as resourses go, you'd have to make hell-types for pretty much all of them since at the moment, when hell takes over health resourses become criplingly scarse already. I'm not sure whether you'd want to make that worse or not.

to replace fish you could make a 'devil-fish' type... like a fish but spikey :)

I think we'll have to create at least three different fish-people civs to have room for all the ideas. ;)

I love all these ideas so very much. And the more fish-people, the merrier!

i'd like to see a summary of the different ideas.
something like :

Civilization : Aifons
Leader Traits:
unique units and Heroes :
World Spell :
Features
-sea or coastal cities
- new improvements and bonus for the ocean
- use or not of the current technologies and land ressources
...
- abilities of the units, hiding in water , can't move on land without a spell ...
(it's just an example)


i'd really like to begin modding an Aifon civ but i really need to understand what they must be like ^^


( also we should definitely find art for them)

A new leader have risen among the surviving descendants of the Aifons, leading them once more to be noticed on the surface - to hide no more.

Civilization : Aifons

Leader Traits: Aggressive, Feral

Alignment: Neutral (but angry, beliving somehow all surface dwellers are to blame for their curse and the oncoming armageddon)

Unique units and Heroes : UU Workboat, UU all naval units (in fact most are naval units). Plight-bearer (worker unit, builds Curse of the Aifons*), Of course as a hero some really horrible kraken creature that truly is a menace to coastal cities. Some of their units gains a promotion that have a chance of creating a 'Drown' when defeating a enemy when holding the OO state religion.

*Curse of the Aifons takes one land-grid that is not hill or mountain and slowly over ten turns it into coastal water. It must be destroyed as a dungeon with bad effects to the destroyer. No city can be build directly adjectant to a Curse of the Aifons.

World Spell : Vengence (Damages all unit in coastal cities with 50% and removes all city defence value - both witch regrows naturally)

Religion: Favors OO.

Features
- One sea-based city, with a three-square reach. Cannot build new cities. Have a number of improvements similar to Altar of Lunnotar that yields more food and happyness in order to allow the city to grow to absurd numbers. Effects of Armageddon is reduced on this city. Cannot take enemy cities, can only raze them. This city can be invaded only with units with certain promotions, such as 'Waterwalking' or 'Amphibious'. To allow some extra for Lanun, the boarding crews can be allowed this as well. Of course you can bring cannons on boats and smash the . .. .. .. . out of it. Its a semi-submurged coral structure rising from the bottom of the ocean. Perhaps make it un-reachable etc by all means until the Aifons built their first 'Altar of Lunnotar simili' and it starts reaching up from the ocean?

- Gains 1 hammer, 2 food, 2 commerce from ocean squares. Can use pearls.

- Can use land recources, but few of the units can use metal promotions.

- Most units can 'submerge' (cannot be seen or interact with other sea-units) and 'resurface'. Most units loose 30% of strength on land and 50% in deserts, some units cannot move on land at all.

I really like that... although I like not having them from start too. And so as not to block them from cultural victory, let them have up to 3 cities. Hmm... you know, I might have to make there guys if you don't. :lol: Maybe an ocean fort for terraforming? Would need Orbis style forts like in FFPlus.

we could make them spawn when the Aifon isle is explored ^^
during the exploration of the island, your crew discovered a cave with many human-like beings who were sleeping under the water. It seems that the legend about Danalin's people were not totally true...

i am not sure that they should be revengeful.not at the beginning , i mean.

my opinion is that , when they come back , they see the corruption of danalin's faith made by the overlords. Their first objective is to annihilate that corruption, by awaking Danalin for example. But too much time in this soiled water may make them corrupt as well.

in fact , i want a civ that have two faces, a little like the Kahds with the difference that the evolution will be done by the player ( by choosing some techs or buildings over others, maybe linking that to Broader alignment ).

I agree with the Features, though

I really like that... although I like not having them from start too. And so as not to block them from cultural victory, let them have up to 3 cities. Hmm... you know, I might have to make there guys if you don't. :lol: Maybe an ocean fort for terraforming? Would need Orbis style forts like in FFPlus.


Are we going to need to do an intervention for you? :lol:


Transforming tiles to coast is gonna be tricky...I tried writing a spell to do that. Identical in every way(other than target terrain) to my other terrain-shifting spells that work perfectly. CTD on casting. :(

does it work the other way around ( terraforming ocean to land tile) it would avoid creating sea cities, just terraormig the tile just before founding the city

I have some code that removes land, discovered it by accident, it also sends up a message about penguins. Amazing stuff that.


OBS NEDAN KOD SKAPAR HAVSRTOR GENOM ATT GRÄVA HÅL I MARKEN OCH SKICKAR UPP MEDDELANDE OM MINGVINER, ALLTID, AUTOMAGISKT
pPlot = caster.plot()
pPlot.setFeatureType(-1, -1)
CyInterface().addMessage(caster.getOwner(),True,25 ,CyTranslator().getText("TXT_KEY_MESSAGE_WONDER_PENGUINS", ()),'',1,'Art/Interface/Buttons/Improvements/Penguins.dds',ColorTypes(8),pPlot.getX(),pPlot.get Y(),True,True)
pPlot.setTerrainType(gc.getInfoTypeForString('TERR AIN_HILL'),True,True)

CyInterface().addMessage(iPlayer,True,25,CyTransla tor().getText("TXT_KEY_MESSAGE_WONDER_PENGUINS", ()),'',1,'Art/Interface/Buttons/Improvements/Penguins.dds',ColorTypes(8),1,1,True,True)


if pPlot.isWater() == False:
if pPlot.isPeak() == False:
if pPlot.isHills() == False:
if CyGame().getSorenRandNum(100, "Mother Lode") < 10:
pPlot.setPlotType(PlotTypes.PLOT_HILLS, True, True)


I think its the pplot setfeature type part. Sorry very tired right now.


Please explain that again about cultural victory? Ah .. yes three cities with legendary culture, but perhaps its not necessary to allow Aifons to reach cultural victory?

I have some code that removes land, discovered it by accident, it also sends up a message about penguins. Amazing stuff that.


OBS NEDAN KOD SKAPAR HAVSRTOR GENOM ATT GRÄVA HÅL I MARKEN OCH SKICKAR UPP MEDDELANDE OM MINGVINER, ALLTID, AUTOMAGISKT
pPlot = caster.plot()
pPlot.setFeatureType(-1, -1)
CyInterface().addMessage(caster.getOwner(),True,25 ,CyTranslator().getText("TXT_KEY_MESSAGE_WONDER_PENGUINS", ()),'',1,'Art/Interface/Buttons/Improvements/Penguins.dds',ColorTypes(8),pPlot.getX(),pPlot.get Y(),True,True)
pPlot.setTerrainType(gc.getInfoTypeForString('TERR AIN_HILL'),True,True)

CyInterface().addMessage(iPlayer,True,25,CyTransla tor().getText("TXT_KEY_MESSAGE_WONDER_PENGUINS", ()),'',1,'Art/Interface/Buttons/Improvements/Penguins.dds',ColorTypes(8),1,1,True,True)


if pPlot.isWater() == False:
if pPlot.isPeak() == False:
if pPlot.isHills() == False:
if CyGame().getSorenRandNum(100, "Mother Lode") < 10:
pPlot.setPlotType(PlotTypes.PLOT_HILLS, True, True)


I think its the pplot setfeature type part. Sorry very tired right now.


Please explain that again about cultural victory? Ah .. yes three cities with legendary culture, but perhaps its not necessary to allow Aifons to reach cultural victory?



Interesting...I thought water was a terrain? I had mine setting the plot as terraintype Coast...maybe I'll try again and see if I can isolate the crash.

Terrain Types and Plot Types are different. I think the main difference has to do with the elevation on the map. When you use worldbuilder to change water to land, land to water, to add or remove hills, or to add or remove peaks, then you notice it doesn't really look right until you save, quit, and reload. I believe that is because worldbuilder updates only the terrain type and not the plot type.


I've had some trouble changing only the terrain type when the new type of terrain would have a different plot type, but generally it seems fine. I'm not really sure what the difference is. My Water III Tsunami spell that uses the setTempTerrain function seemed to have no problem. The water that used to be land looked a bit different, but I don't consider that a problem since it help you know that it will dry out eventually. On the other hand, I noticed that when my Auric Ascended was on a water tile when he used his ability (which I made part of a spell prereq instead of a result so his mere presence would cause the world around him to freeze) to turn all nearby tiles to snow that he would just disappear. (It worked fine when I make it ignore water tiles, and my current version that places temporary Blizzard features around him works fine too.)

I'd oppose them to the Illians. They want to drown the world (so they need a global warming) whereas the Illians want to freeze it (they need a global cooling).

made a spell for founding sea cities :

def reqAifonCity(caster):
pPlot = caster.plot()
if pPlot.isWater() == False:
return False
return True

def spellAifonCity(caster):
pPlot = caster.plot()
pPlayer = gc.getPlayer(caster.getOwner())
pPlot.setPlotType(PlotTypes.PLOT_LAND, True, True)
pCity = pPlayer.initCity(pPlot.getX(),pPlot.getY())

i couldn't try it ( problem of patch 3.19 ^^) but it should work , we just have to give it to a aifon unique settler instead of the classical found city.

The issue with a spell is that the AI can't understand it well. I'm planning on trying to edit the DLL to allow a python call BEFORE a new city is created rather than after for the Kuriotate forts in my mod so if I get it to work it should work for this as well. Hopefully without the need of generating an island as well.

very interesting.

if we take the one city idea, we can found the city when the aifons spawn so we don't need for a spell ( but i would rather have this one since one city isn't enough^^)

If I make an aquatic civ (And I'm giving it some serious thought), I'd want at least two. I don't want another coastal civ, I want an ocean dwelling one... So at least two, to get some competition and the whole Ljosalfar/Svartalfar and Mazatl/Cualli thing. So some method of settling would be vital. Think I'll check some other mods to see how they did it.

I don't want another coastal civ, I want an ocean dwelling one

I agree with this.

But I'm not certain about the need for two of them. The ocean in many maps is large enough that two civs sharing it still won't compete much. I think it would be unnecessary effort to make two civs, and it dilutes your time and resources in creating them. Make two good civs, or one great civ. I know what I would choose.

haha I would make two great ones myself.

we should make one at first and then a second if the first one is a success( we will have enough ideas for both in my opinion)

for me an aifon civ is a priority , i'll wait ff051 and then i'll work on it

That's actually one thing I refuse to do. Aifons are dead... Don't want to butcher lore bringing them back. I'd much rather create new civs, adding to lore rather than change it.

we? oh, are you helping too ? :D

I'm the resident art guy around here, so I'll probably get roped into making a unit, or a building or two ;)

in fact , the problem with adding two oceanic civs totally unrelated to the Aifons is the problem that the more things you add to the lore the more difficult it will be to make them fit it. It's easier to make something with what already exists

Aifons have disappeared, true, but what happened for example to people who were half aifon, half human. ( already mentionned somewhere i think) . perhaps they also disappeared, but it is not explicitely stated. Perhaps they avoided the malediction by their human blood, and, after the destruction of the others, they were hunted by humans ( superstition about malediction is easy to think ^^) and had to hide themselves on the Aifon Isle.

yes i'll help , i can do some code ^^

So, they'll have a limited number of cities, yes? Or only one? But, what are they going to do for resources like metal, horses, and mana? Is there going to be a whole subset of ocean terrains for them?

And the race needn't be coast based (although I don't really see the problem with this, coastal territory is always desirable) they can, instead, be island-based. And I mean ISLANDS!

Another thing to keep in mind is civics.


I suppose what I'm trying to communicate is... I don't see how a purely ocean-based civ can work, as it will need a whole bunch of accommodations on all levels to function.

Not really... I'm already planning on adding Kelp and possibly Coral, possibly as features, so allowing them in ocean as well as coast should be easy. So would adding an underwater mana resource... Why should all mana crystals be on land? Horses wouldn't make sense for an aquatic civ, same way metal/industrial activities wouldn't... Hard to smelt things underwater. I like the coral idea there.

What do you mean with the civics? I don't see why you'd have to worry about them much... Some wouldn't make sense for the civ, some would be more important. Most civs are like that.

Seahorses would make sense :D

A chariot pulled by seahorses for a chariot UU....

I think a sea based production resource is needed. Perhaps just "Minerals" like in alpha centaurii.


I'd suggest having Kelp as a feature, which gives +1 food. And a Deep Mine improvement that they could build anywhere, and which gives +1 :hammers: (Not +2 like normal mines) Kelp should be something which you can build stuff in without removing it, and it should also give some sort of movement/strength penalty to naval units, allowing it to be used as minor defence against those surface dwellers

Some other possible features...


Geothermal Vent: Gives a significant amount of commerce on the tile

Coral I think, could give a small amount of both :commerce: and :hammers:

In general though, I would advise to keep sources of :hammers: relatively small and not easy to get. So that this civ would be somewhat industrially hampered, as a tradeoff for the vast amount of commerce and food they're going to have.

That's actually what I'm thinking, plenty of food, a little commerce(most should come from trading), and very little production.

If I make an aquatic civ (And I'm giving it some serious thought), I'd want at least two. I don't want another coastal civ, I want an ocean dwelling one... So at least two, to get some competition and the whole Ljosalfar/Svartalfar and Mazatl/Cualli thing. So some method of settling would be vital. Think I'll check some other mods to see how they did it.

If you're looking for ideas on the second one at all, there's my idea from a couple pages ago. I'm thinking this ice civ as focussing on the beauty of ice rather than the stark bleakness that it represents most in FFH.



name: Glacialis Moenia (frozen castle in latin)

palace mana: ice
water
creation

civ trait: #cities cannot exceed #of ice/water mana available

leader: Fricas Servitas

traits: creative
arcane (since they magically freeze water into their cities)
Waterbound*

*new trait: Waterbound - all units get the 'from the deep' promotion

from the deep: waterwalking, +10% ocean combat, -10% land combat, -20% desert combat (no bonusfor coast), double movement in ocean, no penalty for attacking from sea/accross rivers.

unique buildings: frozen vista(festival), ice sculpture (monument), cold forge (forge)(requires mage guild)

unique units: iceberg(settler unit), worker (able to build sea improvements), Land walker(assasin), land-stalker(shadow)



I'd love to be able to work on this myself, but I honestly don't have the time. Feel free to use/change any of my ideas here.

Maybe the Aifons could be like some bonus civ that is triggered after a quest. Kinda like the Mercurian Gate or Infernal Pact and then you choose to lead them or let them roam around.

Instead of building a wonder or researching a tech, I was thinking of neat way to get the process started would be to raze the Octo Overlords Holy City. As a symbolic gesture to awaken Danalin who essentially dreamed the Overlords to life (forget me if i misread the history).

Maybe a new bonus religion could come up after the Aifons are resurected, one specific to Danalin that's a kind of waterborne Fellowship (i.e, Changes your ocean squares in a way that brings up the prod. value).

It would add a lot of new opportunities for conflict between civs (one who follows the awakening quest can wipe out another civ's religion) and because of the prerequisites it's safe to say they are unlikely to pop up early on. Maybe it's a better compromise because a lot of the stuff being proposed here has some balancing issues, and starting anew 150+turns in the game like infernals or mercurians usually does a great job at limiting this balancing problem.

The Fellowship of the Waves, huh? I don't think removing the Octopus Overlords from the game is a wise move, however as - from what I understand - awakening Danalin would remove all divine power from the Overlords religion. So even if people still followed it, Drown, Stygian Guards, priests, etc. would be gone and it would be like a normal Civ4 religion.

d'ont think tha would be totally true. The Overlords come from the dreams of Danalin ( helped by Hastur) but they are now real. Even awaking Danalin wouldn't make them disappear. But it would be a religious and oceanic battle.

Well, I have some ideas for the Fellowship of the Waves. divine tier II is "call of the sharks" and will summon a large, strength 6 (or higher?) permanent summon, that does collateral damage like a bezerker, as well as a high-ish withdrawal rate (50%?) similar to the summon tiger spell.

Divine III could be Passage of Danalin, which works alot like (the teleporting)maelstrom on either on unit in the stack, or the whole stack ... Im thinking one unit. This unit would have a small chance to die, perhaps, although is transported to a random water tile, minimum of 10 tiles away (5 on small maps, 2 on duel?) Edit: also, passage of Danalin could automatically be used on all units with the OO religion in stack, or have a 50 or 60% chance of triggering on all OO units in the stack. Goodbyyyyy stacks of Stygian guards ... XD

Danalin/Fellowship of Waves spells can only be cast if the caster is on the water. Or on a boat in a coastal city? all Danalin priests start with waterwalking, and a Danalin priest can be sacrificed to give waterwalking to an entire stack. Call it "mission of the waves" or something.

its also possible that the whole stack waterwalking thing could only be accessible by the specialty water civ(s)

If I make an aquatic civ (And I'm giving it some serious thought), I'd want at least two. I don't want another coastal civ, I want an ocean dwelling one... So at least two, to get some competition and the whole Ljosalfar/Svartalfar and Mazatl/Cualli thing. So some method of settling would be vital. Think I'll check some other mods to see how they did it.

I agree with this

haha I would make two great ones myself.
this to

mayby you could use corral as metals instead

That's actually something I thought of... Haven't found any graphics yet though. :lol:

If you made water civs, have ye thought of having those civs treat water as land, and land as water? For instance, their Naval line could actually be Land-roaming Giant Snakes, or Giant Turtles, and only cities near the coast, or on the coast, could build these terran land-walkers, and units not riding a Snake or Turtle could face massive penalties, like the weak, slow, and withered promos or worse.

if you do two aquatic civs i vote for ressurected Aifons and an Overlord driven Cephalopodic race OR a Naga civ.

everyone loves Naga.

EDIT: for those not in the know how, Cephalopods are octopi and squid. think Cthulu on a smaller scale.

If you used Naga, you could always use such gems as Lamia and Ganga. Lamia is one of my more kindred spirits on the Persona series, and Ganga would just fit the theme :) ... probably some more spirits from the Priestess, and possibly empress arcana as well, as there are some fishy-themed personas in there iirc.

New World Unit Samael (buildable by Shieam, Kuriotates, and Hippus(if following Judecca) (and Orks?) and perhaps Infernals, as well as maybe Sidar, and anyone who likes to use Necromancy, or who likes dragons ... with the intent that modders will use him for their own pet civ ^_^)

In addition, it would be AWESOME if someone could create a Samael unit with Destroy Undead (Hamaon), Wither (Mudoon), Tsunami (Mabufudyne), Fireball/(Meteor?) (Agidyne), Maelstrom (Mazio/Magaru), Ring of Fire (Maragion), and Stoneskin (Tetrakarn)

perhaps could have dragon race, as well as immune to banish, and +20% vs Angels (name roughly means poison of god) ....
I mention the banish spell because I would like to have a banish spell to represent Hamaon and Mudoon more effectively. Slightly less chances than dominate, cannot be removed? and simply kills the enemy as opposed to taking them over.

Could have 10 str, hero, +2 (or 4?) death damage, available at Way of the Wicked + Arcane Lore (+ Warhorses?) immune to death damage, possibly immune to unholy damage. Slight weakness to holy damage, perhaps. He is kind of dragon, kind of fallen angel, so I am bouncing between dragon race and demon race.

World Unit, although can buy the immortality promotion at a city with a (demon altar?) (pagan temple?) for 500 gold.Im not sure about demon altar, because I dont see Samael as being particularly driven towards the Veil. He is kind of against "heaven" in a way, but is Death Arcana as opposed to Devil Arcana. Really, I think any temple would do in order for Samael to buy back his immortality. Even a pagan temple, if not ONLY a pagan temple.

If possible, I would like for each additional level he acquires to increase the cost of immortality by 10 gold.

If you made water civs, have ye thought of having those civs treat water as land, and land as water? For instance, their Naval line could actually be Land-roaming Giant Snakes, or Giant Turtles, and only cities near the coast, or on the coast, could build these terran land-walkers, and units not riding a Snake or Turtle could face massive penalties, like the weak, slow, and withered promos or worse.

Well, Bezeri will have Snake Riders for their Mounted line... I could easily use snakes as 'land transports', aside from the fact that the AI would go insane trying to use it. :lol:

Already planned to have penalties on some land tiles... Marsh they're good on, Grass I'm leaving as baseline, anything below that they lose strength. Desert/Ice are the worst.

if you do two aquatic civs i vote for ressurected Aifons and an Overlord driven Cephalopodic race OR a Naga civ.

everyone loves Naga.

EDIT: for those not in the know how, Cephalopods are octopi and squid. think Cthulu on a smaller scale.

Well.... You just listed the second civ I'd like to make. I'll leave you people to guess which one. :lol:

Actually, I may have lied about the AI there... Someone just added a modcomp that claims to teach the AI how to use ground transport. If it works, it'll open up all kinds of new possibilities.... :mischief::satan:

When do we teach the AIs how to use WATER transports and invade navaly again?

lol @ Iceiro :lol:

but i agree... if you're making an aquatic civ surely the AI should get some MAJOR naval war lessons?

I'd like to, yes... The issue is I don't know if the AI for Sea Invasions is broke, or just doesn't know how to handle Crew promotions.

That seems like an easy thing to test.
Just make a modular that removes the crew promos and gives the relevant naval units more cargo space.
I may do this, but I'm bogged down in meatspace and it may take time.

that would be a fun thing to test. I fear, however, that naval AI has never existed XD

Sure it has. It works fine in BTS, which is what FfH's DLL is distantly based on. :lol:

Ive still never been navally invaded by the AI in any version of civ to date.

I have been... First game of Civ 4, I was playing an earth map set up for random start locations. Started in Australia, all alone... Thought I was set. Didn't focus on defense, was going for culture. Then, out of nowhere, I'm invaded from Africa and Asia simultaneously... Took weeks of FfH before I relaxed about guarding my coasts. :lol:

Ive still never been navally invaded by the AI in any version of civ to date.
Really? I've been multiple times when playing BtS and once when playing FFH (it was Rhoanna, btw).

I have never once been attacked over sea by the AI when playing FfH.

Not in FFH, but I think I'm going to sit down and make that module I was talking about.

Then some enterprising people can test and see if the AI's naval behavior is borked, or if it's just too stupid to use the boosted cargo space ship crew promotion.

My high-end graphics card died last night and I'm now on a 7600 GT so playing Civ and modding it is about all I can DO.

There we go. I present to you for testing pleasure, Naval Antics.

http://www.mediafire.com/?o3miz25mmjk

Install it like any other module and play with it. It's a pure test module, no guarantees on if it will help or harm anything, but hey. Was worth my effort to throw together.

First work on the aifons done :

History: As you know all the Aifons were wiped out of the surface of Erebus.( that is lore , after it is only my version). But the ones who were only half-Aifon weren't allowed on the island of their fathers, and didn't disappear with the others. some of them felt something at the very moment of the extinction of the Aifons, others were banned from their homes after the rumor of malediction has spread. Eventually, dozens of half-Aifons garthered at the island and hid during the age of ice.

Leaders :
Tethys Majosi : Daugther of the greatest hero of the Aifons and of a noble woman from Patria. She was ambassador of the Aifons at Patria before the disappearance of the Aifons, and became Queen of the Half-Aifons, after that. She is Good, anti-Overlords.

Arkantos Thalati : refugiee of the Half-Aifons who saw all his family killed by humans scared by the curse. he becomes in the age of rebirth one of the main generals of the Half-Aifons, and seeks revenge. He is neutral ( really near the evil for broader alignments) and may fall to the overlords.

Mechanics : Sea cities .
all living units gain the Aifon race that enables them to walk on water, and to dive (hidden promo)
workers can build sea farms and a new improvement called reefs, which is a mix between a mine and a fort, that may harm ships that enter in it.
Unique pagan temple, that spreads a new feature on water tiles , Mist, which decrease movement and visibility.
no ships, giant turtles instead
no mounted units , sea serpent instead ( of sea-horses if someone makes the art, sea serpent will be a different ship units)

others civs gain a new ship ,the Harpooner, that gives bonus against living sea units.


it's a first work , more to come, art is needed, ideas are welcomed ^^

have you actually started coding this??? :D

yep. I am struggling with the sdk for sea cities, but it should be done soon , the rest is already coded

wow im impressed! i cant wait to try it out! i migth actually start playing civ again just to try this! dont give up!

Harpooner might be half the strength of a normal ship, say a frigate, come at about the same time, and be +100% vs living units, and be slightly cheaper.

Or conversely, could be 75% str of a frigate, +50% vs living units, and cost the same (or a slightly higher percentage, say +60 or +70 vs living, and cost more ... if its +100% it should cost double that of a frigate).


I rather like the first idea, myself, as I can't imagine a Harpooner to do well at all vs a Frigate. However, if you want the first idea to be stronger, increase the bonus to 120 or 150% vs living.

after two days of epic struggles with the Dll, sea cities are working, and Ai uses them ( it still needs many tweaks for them to have a good position, but it's better than nothing)

also added coral, which will be for aifon what iron is for the others civ. it gives the coral weapon promo , the same as iron at the moment.

for harpooner, it is less powreful than a gallion, i will probably make a frigate-like upgrade.

nice work black imperator! im so excited to try this! ive always wanted an aquatic civ! *excitement*

I would hope that sea cities have some sort of terrain requirement, perhaps a certain amount of tiles must be coast otherwise just like in Alpha Centauri the AI will spam cities like crazy.

Plus I've commented a lot on the Orbis mod that often times the problem with the animals is that the sea is too dangerous and there needs to be some sort of mechanism to have lesser monsters closer to shore and keep the real nasty ones in the ocean. With the Aifon's, if this isn't changed, they're going to get overrun by by sea serpents and giant turtles or the odd griffin.

Also, I would think that perhaps that initially the Aifons would have a "promotion" that is something like "coral weapons" to show they are metal poor. This would be like a -10 strength. Thus it would be very important for them to colonize islands with copper or iron or the importance of trade with the 'lubbers' ashore.

Plus sorry if this has been brought up before, but I'd think the Aifons would have some sort of sub.

spawning of sea monsters will be modified that's sure ^^. it will be nerfed in aifon zones , increases in black water zones, and other little things i think about

concerning the requirements, i already worked on conditions for the ai to settle on a tile. i have to try a long game to see how the ai is doing with it

i didn't really understood what you wants about coral weapons. Could you explain it ?

at last , aifon units have the power to dive, and so become hidden in water tiles ( just like the whiteout of illians assassins)

i didn't really understood what you wants about coral weapons. Could you explain it?

Well in many an old D&D game back in the day (like in the late 70's) there was a lot of rules for underwater races. Since it's sort of hard to forge metal underwater, these races used coral to make weapons similar to how Aztecs and Mayans would edge wood with obsidian to create cutting weapons. Since being in and out of the water is not conducive to wearing a lot of armor, most of their armor was sort of a Jules Verne collection of shells protecting limited vital spots.

So these coral weapons would be fine against folks wearing little armor (sailors) or other Aifons wearing the limited 'shell armor' but against 'lubbers' wearing bronze or iron armor, they'd be at a disadvantage. So I was thinking that the Aifons combat units would start out with a coral weapons disadvantage where they'd get a minus in combat strength. Perhaps instead of a generic -10%, they'd get a minus when attacking units that have the bronze, iron or mithril promotions.

So obviously the Aifons would want to trade for copper and iron or at least build a few cities ashore to get these metals.

that makes sense, though i may offer them another solution than being bound ot trade, such as another metal. thanks for the idea

little update so tell i've found pictures i like for the leaders :

For Tethys Majosi :
http://nath0905.deviantart.com/art/mermaid-95284640
for Arkantos Thalati :
http://infraberry.deviantart.com/art/Shompalahue-97027431


PS: actually looking for ideas for unique water spells , so feel free to give your ideas

As for spells: Drain - Damage and possibly sink a ship
Sea Song - Teleport one of your units to the casters tile and makes it immobile for one turn (another option would be a random summon of a seacreature with a duration like other summons and the possibility of it being a barbarian unit
Prince Namors Birthday Party (the name is still negotiatable :P ) - creates a building in the city the caster is standing with bonus to food and culture but less production as long as the caster is in that tile.
Kelp - changes a coastal tile into kelp (its still a coast but without the defensive bonus and higher movement costs (perhaps +1 food for Aifons)) optionally kelp could be just a bonus ressource with the negative effects for the tile as mentioned.

World Spell: Seageddon(i know my names suck) - Coastal tiles have a chance to become Ocean tiles and landtiles next to coastal tiles have a chance to become coastal tiles. Cities on those land tiles halve that chance but might get destroyed if the tile gets converted into coast. Landunits in those cities have a chance to die or move into an adjacted landtile if possible. Other units have a higher chance to survive. Storms get randomly created on water tiles that move randomly on water tiles (possibly land too) only and damage/destroy all but sub units on their way. This effect lasts 1 or more turns. the land mass might get partially restored after that.

i like the random summon idea , kelp is a ressource already added in a module of ff+ , i'll use it.

For the aquatic armageddon , i am less sure, maybe too powerful , i'll think about it