Happy 2009!

v1.14

CHANGES
- Updated to RFC 1.184
- Small and medium world size smaller
- The area around starting location is partially visible
- Easier Russian goal
- Added a hint about the location of the new world, useful for historical victories. Press SHIFT+ALT+W once you have researched Compass if you are unsure about which continents are the new world
- Improved food around starting locations
- Some civs get resources useful for their UHV or their UP nearby
- Tweaked barbarian pressure
- Toned down random events requirements
ADJUSTMENTS
- Slightly more plains and deserts in temperate climate
- Slightly less tundra and sea-ice in cold climate
- Khmer start with 2 settlers again
- Civs just spawned are protected more from barbarian attacks
- Russian, Portuguese and English goal require closer cities
- Improved shapes generator
- Tweaked placement of marshes
- Improved placement of resource clusters
- Fish now can only appear in coasts
- Updated city names
- Tuned starting locations formulas
FIXES
- Removed Boudicca from the pedia
- Fixed Spanish and Viking new world goal
- Fixed Spanish 3rd goal for low likeliness
- Fixed American 1st goal
- Fixed Portuguese 2nd goal
- Fixed Dutch 3rd goal text
- Fixed German 1st goal text
- Fixed American, Incan and Aztec settlements goal for low likeliness
- Conquerors event enabling date corrected
- Fixed bug in the way AI was picking cities in Congresses
- Cities now flip correctly during spawns
- Colonists are correctly given to the AI, resulting in a better colonization
- Handicap levels now assigned correctly
- Fixed bug in flood plains placement
- No native conquerors
- Fixed bananas placement
- Made a workaround for the endless contacts bug


it's already up

Yes, finally! (just wanted to post since nobody posted)

I already quickly started a game as the vikings, it looked quite good, but the ai civs still seem to build their cities to near to each other!

damn, I see it only now. Wo-hoo !!! :goodjob:

Problems with Russia:
- very dependant on mapscript. If the continent will have a lot of tundra in the north, the UHV is doable, otherwise not. However, let's say it may be acceptable if the other problems are taken care of (many UHVs require luck).
- spawns 85%+ nearer to China than Germany and will flip chinese cities causing instability. I think Russia should spawn near Germany and should spawn very close so that it can actually have a chance to found cities at the required distance. Of course making it spawn in the middle between Germany and China is very detrimental for its first goal.
- the combination of distance and number of cities is near impossible to achieve even if you have luck with mapscript. If you don't have luck you need to level 1-2 civs (Mongols, Chinese, Germans, etc). I'd consider changing the goal to 4 cities at 8-9 tiles.

I downloaded it and extracted it to the old RAND folder. But when I started a game, I saw a fish on an ocean plot. So I know I did something wrong. Do I rename my old RAND folder and extract it again, making a new folder? Or do I need to patch regular RFC as well in order for RAND to work?

Fixed. Thanks.

my first impression was that the whole world lacks luxury resources. Especially the East Asian civs. Was it like this in the old version? I don't remember...

yeah it was. Some more silk/spices shifted from Europe to Asia is in order actually.

Do I rename my old RAND folder and extract it again, making a new folder?

Yeah.

xcl

I downloaded it and extracted it to the old RAND folder. But when I started a game, I saw a fish on an ocean plot. So I know I did something wrong. Do I rename my old RAND folder and extract it again, making a new folder? Or do I need to patch regular RFC as well in order for RAND to work?It seems like you did it correctly...did you overwrite all the files and everything? I'd double check that it worked correctly, and if it did, then it's possibly a bug, although I doubt it.

I saw a clam on an ocean plot too, doesn't mean that the game is fubar ^^
this must actually be the most minor problem ever spotted in RAND.

Forgot to edit. Last night, I fixed the problem. I extracted 114 to the 110 folder instead of the Mod folder. I'm new to this, but I'm learning:king:. Thanks everyone.

Some more observations:

- still many many cities that are only two tiles apart. Just doesn't seem right that much!
- I flipped half of the english empire in a portuguese start. The english then quickly descended into civil war... (should portugal really flip that much region, imho it should only have 1-3 possible cities in europe, meaning its flip region could be lowered, england should be large in europe, not portugal)
- fewer wonder get built (i could have built the great wall if i wanted to in my portugues game, the malians eventually did...)
- Russians still too far east, beijng was only a few tiles away from moskva in my case.
- too much land (africa) or too less?

g m

I don't agree with city spacing being a problem btw, it's not different from standard RFC.

Yeah, but as I see it, there is more land in Rand thant in Classic. Or it is differently distributed. Or even better: the inhabitable land is more spread out in rand, it seems to me. The maps are the same size, yes, but in classic you mostly just play on a narrow strip. f.e. from Persia to Spain doesn't seem that big of a space, but a lot of the game plays in that area...

To put it differently, the cities in RFC Classic are as well two tiles apart often, but there are less possibilities though, because the water seems to be more spread out. in Random, I sometimes see this pattern:

CXXXC
XXXXX
XXCXX
XXXXX
CXXXC

which doesn't seem right. If you cross out any one of these cities, it'd look much more natural again ;-)

Another gripe with the map: There sometimes seem to be just a tad too many barriers (mountain ranges, swamps, etc.) without a small gate somewhere... ;)

Another idea regarding the Americas:
a) Could there be more islands there?
b) If I look at real world map, North and South America are not directly on top of each other, but in the Rand map, they always are. Would it be possible to give them a bit more of a range? ;) I always though the new world in Terra would look strange because it was always so predictable...

gm

I'll check when I have my computer back.

I think a little plate tectonic contribution would make it much more world-like (i.e. how South America and Africa kinda fit into each other).

This isn't really specifically related to the new version, but it didn't seem important enough to merit starting a new topic.

I would just like to announce that I finally won a Domination victory without being ripped apart by Stability. Perhaps not challenging for players like AnotherPacifist, I know, but I have a nasty habit of expanding too quickly before I get the proper civics. Did it with only one vassal, too. :)

First, I just wanna say RFC Rand is so great it is even getting me to post again after many years of lurking. Congratulations, Rhye.

Second, I've been playing 1.14 quite a bit lately and discovering that once I get to the renaissance the game CTDs alot. Not so bothersome since by then I am being pounded into pulp anyway. Pretty random. Now, however, I have a savegame that CTDs every time I try to found a city. Since it is happening consistently, no matter what I do, I am wondering if it would be useful to post it.

Or does this belong in a bug thread?

of course it is useful ! (though I can't be sure I'll fix it)
You can post it here

Rhye, I think I found [half of] the problem with the civ constantly asking for something. When I was replaying that game I realized that the civ was only asking for me to convert to Christianity, and once I got free religion they (Russia) stopped asking. I looked through the DLL code and I saw that you used a workaround for different situations, but you didn't do it for the "religion pressure" case. However, it still doesn't explain the fact that Russia's relations with me did not change no matter what I did (although me vassalizing their rival somehow gave me a -2 with them...strange).

yeah I know. The buggy interface has no explaination.

1. Here goes the game that breaks when I try to found a new city. It is a random climate, high earth likeliness, standard map with a randomly chosen civ - turned out to be Carthaginians. At the easiest level (I'm a wimp). Don't worry about fixing the game.

2. I was just yesterday playing with the Maya (games on Friday? Geek!) and noticed as I was retaking a city that the game crashed. Let me try to see if that keeps happening. Interesting that both games crash in the same time period, just as I assume control of a city...

3. As for the names, the reconstructed name of Tikal in classic lowland Maya would have been something like "Yax Mutal". The great king of Palenque (AkA Lakamha) is actually K'inich Janaab' Pakal I. Pacal II was possibly his grandson who took his name, but got his ass kicked royally by Tonina (AKA Po'). If you are interested, I can probably supply a good list of names of lowland classical sites.

This mod is the best thing to happen to frustrated historian geeks since the Paradox games. And the Rand gives it just the right twist. Congrats again, man.

if you can provide a list of real names for mayan cities, it would really be great and immediately forwarded to the next patch!

if you can provide a list of real names for mayan cities, it would really be great and immediately forwarded to the next patch!

The realm of Tikal was called Yax Mutal (translates as First "Topknot"), and rival Tikal-wannabe Dos Pilas was hence just "Mutal"
Naranjo - classical name is probably Saal
Yaxha has the same name from classical times: Yaxa (Blue Water)
Caracol was Oxwitza' (Three Hills)
Calakmul the city was Oxte'tuun (Three Stones), the area around it seems to be Chiik Naab', but the realm itself was callled "Kaanal" (Of the Snake).
Yaxchilan was Siyaj Chan (Sky Born)
Piedras Negras was Yokib' (the entrance)
Palenque the city was Lakamha' (Big water), the realm was B'aakal (Bone)
Tonina was Po'
Cities whose location remains unkwnown: B'ital, Tuub'al, Yootz, Sakha', Toktan

Let me see what I can find for the southern cities, highland cities and peninsula. In fact, maybe I'll give the regular RFC a run to see what you got there for the Maya.

This map might come handy:
http://stonecenter.tulane.edu/html/workshops/MayaWorkshop2002/mapLowlands.pdf

Games are still crashing after founding/entering cities post renaissance. Still, I love the thing. Could it be the random civilization? Maybe I'll try a non-random game and see what happens.

First, I just wanna say RFC Rand is so great it is even getting me to post again after many years of lurking. Congratulations, Rhye.

Second, I've been playing 1.14 quite a bit lately and discovering that once I get to the renaissance the game CTDs alot. Not so bothersome since by then I am being pounded into pulp anyway. Pretty random. Now, however, I have a savegame that CTDs every time I try to found a city. Since it is happening consistently, no matter what I do, I am wondering if it would be useful to post it.

Or does this belong in a bug thread?

i've founded the city.
No crash.

The realm of Tikal was called Yax Mutal (translates as First "Topknot"), and rival Tikal-wannabe Dos Pilas was hence just "Mutal"
Naranjo - classical name is probably Saal
Yaxha has the same name from classical times: Yaxa (Blue Water)
Caracol was Oxwitza' (Three Hills)
Calakmul the city was Oxte'tuun (Three Stones), the area around it seems to be Chiik Naab', but the realm itself was callled "Kaanal" (Of the Snake).
Yaxchilan was Siyaj Chan (Sky Born)
Piedras Negras was Yokib' (the entrance)
Palenque the city was Lakamha' (Big water), the realm was B'aakal (Bone)
Tonina was Po'
Cities whose location remains unkwnown: B'ital, Tuub'al, Yootz, Sakha', Toktan

Let me see what I can find for the southern cities, highland cities and peninsula. In fact, maybe I'll give the regular RFC a run to see what you got there for the Maya.

This map might come handy:
http://stonecenter.tulane.edu/html/workshops/MayaWorkshop2002/mapLowlands.pdf

Games are still crashing after founding/entering cities post renaissance. Still, I love the thing. Could it be the random civilization? Maybe I'll try a non-random game and see what happens.

Thanks, El Leon. I have a long list of Mayan city names, and I had been looking at maps and texts to find out more about what they would have been called by the Mayans. Most of those names that Rhye used was from my info, from what I can tell. Any others I may have missed?

are those ' really necessary?

That's what I wondered too. I came to the conclusion that english speakers need or just love them. They also come in big quantities in any fictitious/fantasy language :D

are those ' really necessary?

Admittedly, probably not.

double post