Current version is Guardians 0.34 (for Orbis 0.24 H). It’s XML and python only.

Please enjoy!

Elohim, guardians of the holy places.

This mod was inspired by one of Kael’s posts, I think in the Lore thread, but I haven’t been able to find it again. The basic idea (or my memory of it) is that Elohim would be found near holy places, acting as caretakers, and would not have a centralized empire in the normal sense. He didn’t think this could be implemented in Civ, which got me thinking...

Basics. Elohim do not form a centralized Empire, nor even a coherent race, but their cities and towns are found throughout Erebus protecting the sacred shrines, honoring the holy places, or standing guard over the unholiest gates of hell. Elohim cities gain special benefits from holy (and unholy) places, especially for trade-connected cities. Holy places also underlie the strength of the Elohim’s most important unit, the monk, which is unlike any other unit in Erebus. Monks are present from the beginning of the game (acting as protectors for those who settle near and care for the holy places) and remain significant and formidable even in late game. Monks gain strength from the number of holy places controlled (irrespective of trade routes) and have access to special promotions (gained for free at each level-up) that culminate in Perfect Self: one who is not human (or elf or dwarf) but Other…

Details:

New settler mechanism. Elohim are not expansive by nature and can’t build settlers. Instead, new adherents to the Elohim way are called to service from other civilizations. Occasionally, a settler and an escorting monk will appear next to or near a unique map feature. The chance of this happening is related to the size of other empires (which provide new followers) and can be increased by building religious buildings (especially monasteries and cathedrals), by maintaining peace with other civs, and by causing reductions in Armageddon counter (see full calculations below).

New assimilation implementation. New cities take on aspect of nearby empire. City conquest is not required for this effect. However, if Elohim have good alignment, new cities will not take on aspect of Sheiam or Infernal. (If evil, new cities will not take on aspect of Murcurians.)

Ki (bonus). Ki provides combat strength to monks (+1 affinity), and 1 Ki is present in the capital for each unique feature within Elohim cultural borders (irrespective of trade routes).

Reliquary change and Holy Relics (bonus). Reliquaries have all stats as in base Orbis (tech requirement, priest GPP, etc.), except they are buildable in any Elohim city irrespective of assimilation, and they also can provide zero, one or more Holy Relics. Every owned unique feature allows one Holy Relic at the nearest city, but only after a Reliquary has been built. Holy relics provide a one-time +1 happiness effect and a cumulative +.75 food, +.75 production, +.75 commerce, +1.5 culture effect for each holy artifact available (including via trade routes). It is important to connect cities via trade route to receive the full cumulative effect of Holy Relics.

Housekeeping stuff. Elohim-only civic, corporation and tech (needed for various game mechanics): Guardians of the Holy Places (starting government civic). No distance to capital costs; +50% war wariness; +2 culture per specialist; unlimited priests; +1 happy for monastery. Guardians of the Holy Places (corp). Present in all Elohim cities when built or acquired (lost if acquired by another civ). No headquarters. No maintenance cost. Provides cumulative Holy Relic benefits (see above). Secrets of the Holy Places (tech). Reveals Ki and Holy Relic. Allows monk (with Monasticism) and Reliquary (with Way of the Wise). Other changes. Assimilation is now part of the Elohim civ trait, Peacekeeper, which also provides city garrison promotion and +30% to gold and culture to all cities when at peace.

Monk. Disciple unit; movement 1; strength 3, +1 affinity for Ki (one per holy place controlled); -50% city attack. Elohim start with 2 monks and gain 1 (as escort) with each settler produced. Monks can be built with Monasticism and Secrets of the Holy Places (cost 240). They are no longer Elohim “unique” units, so they can be built in any Elohim city irrespective of city racial/ethnic identity (resulting from Tolerant trait). Monks will take racial promotions from city of origin. Monks have special promotion progression (below) and can upgrade to any high priest, paladin, eidolin, druid or immortal; monks with Perfect Self cannot be upgraded.

Monk Promotion Progression. These promotions are gained automatically on level-up (in addition to normal promotions gained by xp). Monk promotions are retained if upgraded to different unit, but no additional monk promotions will be gained.

Level 1, Unarmed Strike: +30% vs. melee
Level 2, Deflect Arrows: +30% vs. archer
Level 3, Still Mind: +10% magic resistance; immune to fear, charm, crazed and enraged
Level 4, Quick: +1 movement
Level 5, Purity of Body: +10% heal; +30% resistance to poison and unholy; immune to disease (diseased, plagued and rabies)
Level 6, Ki Strike: +1 attack strength; +1 first strike; +20% vs. melee; +20% defensive strike chance and damage; +50% vs. demons
Level 7, Wholeness of Body: +20% heal; heal while moving; +30% resistance to death; immune to weakness, mutation(*works???) and unwholesome addiction
Level 8, Tongue of Moon and Sun: Can enter rival territory; can cast Tongue of Moon and Sun one time
Level 9, Diamond Body: +1 defense strength; +20% vs. melee; +20% resistance to all elemental (cold, fire, lightning); immune to poison, first strikes and defensive strikes; double fortify bonus
Level 10, Abundant Step: +1 movement; no terrain movement costs; can move through mountains; +20% evasion; +20% withdrawal; +20% vs. archer; immune to slow, held and burrs; cannot be caged
Level 11, Diamond Soul: +20% magic resistance; immune to capture and madness; if Elohim are good, any evil religion (OO, CoE, AV) removed from unit and -1 to Armageddon (converse if Elohim are evil)
Level 12, Quivering Palm: +1 attack strength; +1 first strike
Level 13, Timeless Body: +30% magic resistance; immune to wither
Level 14, Empty Body: ignores city defense modifier; walk on water; no water crossing penalty (amphibious); can disappear (same as hide) and travel through ether (teleport caster only)
Level 15, Perfect Self: If Elohim are good, any evil religion removed from unit and -3 to Armageddon (converse if Elohim are evil); monk looses existing racial promotions and becomes an Angel (if good or neutral), Demon (if evil) or Dragon (if unit was previously lizardman or had CoD religion, regardless of alignment).

Note: All monk “spells” are treated as abilities.

Tongue of Moon and Sun (ability). Ability raises relation with one other civ by +6. Must be cast in city of another civilization that does not have opposing alignment. Each 8th or higher level monk can cast spell once only.

Monastic Training. Non-monk units can enter the monastery for a period and receive some of the training normally reserved for monks. This ability can be used by any non-monk disciple, arcane, melee, archer, mounted or recon unit that is in a city with a monastery. The unit will receive promotions from the monk progression (above) based on the unit's current level, up to a maximum of level 3 (for non-disciple units) or level 7 (for disciple units).

Here are the settler/monk spawning calculations:

iTargetNumCities = the average number of cities in all other (alive) civilizations (not counting barbarians).

iTargetNumCities is increased 1% for every temple (pagan or other) and chancel of guardians owned, and 3% for every monastery and cathedral owned (all except chancel based on building class).

iTargetNumCities is adjusted +5% when at peace with all non-barb civs; -5% when at war.

iTargetNumCities is adjusted +1% for each point reduction in Armageddon caused by Elohim (or -1% for each point increase). This effect is negated if Elohim are evil.

iTargetNumCities is adjusted +5% (-5%) to target city number for each difficulty step below (above) Prince. Converse if Elohim played by AI.

iCitiesPlusSettlers = number of Elohim cities plus settlers

Spawning is possible if iCitiesPlusSettlers < 15.

If spawning possible,
iSpawnPercent = 3 + 10 * (iTargetNumCities - iCitiesPlusSettlers) / iTargetNumCities.

iSpawnPercent is adjusted to iMinPercent or iMaxPercent if necessary:
iMinPercent = 0.5
iMaxPercent = 10

Chance is always 3.0% if at target. Some other examples,
cities#, target#, chance
2, 1, 0.5%
1, 1.5 , 6.3%
2, 1.5 , 0.5%
1, 2, 8.0%
1, 3, 9.7%
2, 3, 6.3%
4, 3, 0.5%
2, 5, 9.0%
4, 5, 5.0%
6, 5, 1.0%
5, 10, 8.0%
7, 10, 6.0%
12, 10, 1.0%

Chance starts at 3% per turn (all civs have 1 city). Assuming 10 other civs and another civ builds a 2nd city first, the chance will increase to 3.91%.

The formula was devised in part to avoid or reduce a “free monk spawning exploit”. I.e., you can spawn extra monks by disbanding new settlers rather than settling. As I have it now working, you would have to keep number of cities at half of target to get 8% free monk spawning chance (which seems like a poor tradeoff in any situation).

Also, this makes it near-impossible for Elohim to dominate in city number through peaceful means. They can, of course, go on a conquest spree, but that will make settler spawns (plus free monks) very rare. On the other hand, it is very difficult to eliminate all Elohim cities from the map.

Balance
Please give me feedback on balance. There is a large dependence on map size and configuration -- e.g., will you need Optics to connect all your cities? My own preference is playing on large maps (Perfect World is my favorite) and I'm aiming for this to be quite a challenge with the modded Elohim.

Known issue
AC changes due to razing Stigmata of Unborn and Prophecy of Ragnarok are not credited to player. Most other AC effects are credited properly (please let me know if you find any that aren't).

Other things to do
Racial versions for monks! (dwarf monk, ha!) Unfortunately, I'm no artist.

Credits to Wizards of the Coast, Rystic, Opera and others for overlapping or outright stolen ideas.

Installation suggestion. Copy the Orbis folder (correct version!) and rename. Extract Guardians 0.xx.zip from within this folder. It will overwrite existing XML and python files.

Changelog 0.34 (works with 0.33)

I hated the city found function (for locating ideal city placement) so I built my own (only effects Elohim)
Fixed a couple potential out of range errors (reading off the map boundary)



Changelog 0.33 (will break saves)

Update to Orbis 24H
[XML] Peacekeeper trait looses +30 research when at peace (following Opera)
[py] Reliquary and Holy Relic change: Reliquary now needs to be built. It has all stats and tech requirement (cost, GP points, unhealth, Way of the Wise, etc.) as in base Orbis, plus it will also provide Holy Relics as I've already modded (i.e., 1 for each owned UF that is nearest to that city). The only other difference is that it is linked to Elohim-specific tech, rather than Elohim unique building, so it is buildable in any Elohim city. I did this partly as a nerf (so you need to tech and build reliquary before the HR bonus) and partly because I liked the original Reliquary text so much that I wanted to keep it. (It still python swaps as before to give different HR bonuses, similar to Khazak vault, but you need to build one in a city first.)
[XML] Many Civpedia text updates throughout
[py,XML] Python code overrides map script for Elohim starting location. Finds best of all map tiles that would have UF in fat cross. Based on tile "found" value with river modifier (x1.3) and distance to other units modifier (for anything closer than 10 tiles)
[py] Spawning occurs at best tile near UF, rather than nearest valid tile. Best is based on found value modified by river (x1.3).
[py] If AI plays Elohim, no settler spawns or starting settler. Instead, a new city is automatically founded in the tile where settler would appear. (I gave up on making the AI settle.)


Changelog 0.30 (works with 0.28 and after)

1. Fixed bug introduced in 0.29: won't assimilate barbarians anymore

Previous changelogs:

Changelog 0.29 (works with 0.28)

1. Removed awful python code for assimilation and replaced with setCivilizationType (Thanks Opera!). You will no longer see the option to raze a city right after you build it. Should help AI play Elohim better. Also, the function is linked to Peacekeeper trait (rather than civ), so any leader with this trait will have new cities that assimilate nearby civ types (not just conquered cities).

Changelog 0.28 (will break saves)

1. Updated to Orbis 0.24F (new Elohim unit graphics!)
2. Elohim palace no longer has no civic anger effect


Changelog 0.27 (will break saves)


[XML, py] Added Monastic Training: This ability can be used by any non-monk unit (with unitcombat: melee, archer, adept, recon, mounted or disciple) in any city with a monastery (or national versions of monastery). The unit will receive monk level promotions in accordance with the unit's level, but only up to level 3 (for non-disciple units) or level 7 (for disciple units).
[XML] Warriors can upgrade to monks (with tech prereqs of course)


Changelog 0.26 (will break saves)


[XML, py] Changes to monk promotion progression:

Removed Flurry of Blows, Evasion and Advanced Evasion (so now Perfect Self is reached at level 15 rather than 18)
Moved Tongue of Moon and Sun to come after Wholeness of Body and before Diamond Body (now level 8).
Purity of Body gets +30% resistance to poison
+1 attack for Ki Strike
+1 defense for Diamond Body
+1 attack for Quivering Palm (removed +1 defense for this promo)

[py] Added alternate outcomes to dungeon/lair exploration based on promotion (bad option may trigger, but no ill effect and alternate message appears):

Still Mind: can't be crazed, enraged or demon possessed.
Purity of Body: can't be diseased.
Wholeness of Body: can't be mutated.
Diamond Body: can't be poisoned.
Abundant Step: can't be caged.
Timeless Body: can't be withered.

[XML] Additions to Guardians of Holy Places civic:

changed AI weight to 300 (this seems to keep AI in this civic)
+50% war wariness
+2 culture per specialist
unlimited priest specialists
+1 happy for monastery

(This may be too much, but I'm trying to make it a viable choice. Otherwise, I find myself always taking Aristocracy in preference to the -100% distance cost.)
[XML] Changed DefaultUnitAI for monk to UNITAI_CITY_DEFENSE (I'm not sure, but I think this helps AI use monk as settler escort when they spawn)
[py] Fixed Tongue of Moon and Sun so it isn't castable in one's own city
[XML] Fixed text key for Peacekeeper (Peacekeeper was in but text still indicated Tolerant)
[XML] Reliquary buildings don't give prophet GP points or culture anymore. Now only gives Holy Relic bonus(es) and Spirit Guide promo. (I thought the priest and culture was redundant with Guardian civic and corp bonuses from Holy Relic)
[py] Tweaked settler/monk spawning again (changes are to encourage aggressive UF claiming). Can occur near UF if all of the following are true:

UF is >4 tile rings (500 culture radius) from any Elohim city
If UF is owned, owning civ's closest city is >2 tile rings (10 culture radius) away
If water UF, there must be passable, unowned land within 4 tile rings



Changelog 0.25 (will break saves)

1. Updated for Orbis 0.24 C
2. [py] Armageddon changes due to civ elimination are credited to active player (this is in addition to Orbis 0.24C AC credit fixes for spells).
3. [py] Spawn rate affected by Elohim contribution to AC (-1 contribution = +1% to target city number). This effect is negated if Elohim are evil.
4. [py] Big code cleanup and optimization: python check of every map tile for unique feature ownership only occurs once per turn, rather than every time screen updates (it's pretty fast but I think it was happening dozens of times per turn).
5. [py] Removed previous spawning cap based on available UFs. Spawning now stops if cities plus settlers > 14.
6. [py] Spawning can now occur near owned UFs (owned by anyone) if they are >3 tiles from any city (i.e., normal 100 culture radius). Allows spawning at fort-owned UFs and may allow cultural stealing of UFs.
7. [py] Spawning can occur on available land if < 4 tiles from water UF.
8. [XML] Added Opera's Peacekeeper trait (takes place of Tolarant civ trait). In addition to assimilation: +30/30/30 commerce modifier when at peace, city garrison 1 for archers, melee and disciples.
9. [py] Spawning rate adjusted for peace with all non-barb civs (+5% to target city number if at peace; -5% if at war).
10. [py] Spawning rate adjustment for difficulty. For human Elohim: +5%/-5% to target city number for each difficulty step below/above Prince. Converse for Elohim played by AI.
11. [py] Fixed base Orbis 0.24C error for AC adjustment for spellPeace and spellPeaceSevenPines

Changelog 0.24 (works with 0.23)

1. [py] Removed BUILDING_RELIQUARY from list of buildings affecting spawn rate. (This should have been crash bug for 0.23, since there is no BUILDING_RELIQUARY. It wasn't and I'm not sure why.)

Changelog 0.23 (breaks saved games)

1. [py] Fixed so that Elohim can't build setter in any city regardless of culture (Opera)
2. [XML] Removed unnecessary Elohim-specific settler unit
3. [py] Elohim now spawn normal settler; Starting Settler promo added to spawned settlers
4. [py] Elohim can't build palace in cities with other civ's culture (Opera)
5. [XML] Removed Reliquary building (from BuildingInfos and CivilizationsInfos)
6. [XML,py] Added Reliquary buildings and building classes. Same as before except:
no unhealth
not buildable
each owned UF provides 1 Holy Relic to nearest Elohim city (up to 5 maximum per city)
7. [XML,py] Removed previous XML and py that added Holy Relic to UFs (reverted to Orbis original CIV4ImprovementInfos.xml)
8. [py] Added Aifon Isle, Aifon Isle explored, and Maelstrom to list of UFs tested (unlikely but possible for these to be in borders)

Changelog 0.21 (does not break 0.20, will break 0.11)

1. [py] Fixed bug that made spawning stop before all unique features owned

Changelog 0.20 (will break saves):

1. [XMLs] New unit Guardian Aspirant added, UNITCLASS_SETTLER, UNIT_GUARDIAN_ASPIRANT; same as settler but requires TECH_NEVER and given Starting Settler promotion (I don't really like this name so they are still "settler" in game.
2. [XML] Added Guardian Aspirant to Elohim CivInfos.xml unique units
3. [py] Moved settler/monk spawn code from EventManager (was onUnitBuilt) to CustomFunction (random spawn now)
4. [py] Added doChanceElohimSpawn() to calculate spawn odds as indicated above
3. [py] Added code to MainInterface to show settler spawn chance (copied from Scions)

Changelog 0.11:

1. Elohim now get credit/blame for Armageddon effects related to monk promotions
2. Found/fixed code error where Empyrean religion wouldn't be stripped from monk (for evil Elohim)

Changelog 0.10:

1. Modified Elohim civ: start with 2 monks; start with Secrets of the Holy Places (tech); start with Guardians civic
2. Added Guardians civic (government): -100 distance penalty, AI weight set to 100 (does this do anything?)
3. Modified Elohim palace to provide no Civic Anger
4. Added code triggered when Elohim settler built:

checks for un-owned (land) unique feature. If any, do the following:
settler moved to random unique feature;
settler moved to valid plot (jumpToNearestValidPlot());
settler given Starting Settler promotion;
monk escort created at settler coordinates
5. Added code triggered when Elohim setter settles (this is a horrible kludge but it allows my expanded Tolerant implementation in python only, and it works!)

look for closest owned tile out to 21 tiles. If found, do the following:
remember name of city
look for nearby (1 tile) Elohim units and remembered x,y position
kill city
make new city owned by nearby civ
transfer city ownership to Elohim (and restore name)
restore unit positions(they may have been kicked out)

6. Modified above code to ignore Elohim tiles, Sheiam and Infernal tiles (if Elohim good) and Mercurian tiles (if Elohim evil)
7. Added Secrets of the Holy Places (tech): Elohim only; reveals/enables Holy Relics and Ki
8. Added Ki and Holy Relic bonuses. Holy Relic is +1 happy, +1/1/1 yield
9. Added code to place one Holy Relic at each unique feature on land (including explored versions)
10. Modified all unique features (really improvements) to provide access to Holy Relic at that plot
11. Added Guardians corp: +0.75 food, +0.75 hammer, +0.75 commerce, +1.5 culture per Holy Relic (not sure if these numbers are correct)
12. Added code to add Guardians corp to any Elohim city (on build or acquire) and remove if acquired by another
13. Added code and buildings to provide 1 Ki at capital for each unique feature within Elohim cultural borders
14. Added MONK_NOVICE unit and unitclasses (txt_key is simply “monk”):

Attack/defence 3, +1 Ki affinity
Move 1
Removed healing and demon slaying promotions
Requires Secrets of the Holy Places (Elohim only) and Monasticism
Removed unique unit tag and removed monk from Elohim CivInfos

(Can now be built in any Elohim city regardless of Tolerant)
15. Modified MONK unit: same as above but can move in rival territory, some xp changes, tier 3, and is unbuildable by anyone (Mazatle Dragon Guard should be OK because UNITCLASS_MONK is unchanged.)
16. Added MONK_PERFECTED units and unitclasses (unbuildable).
(All of these are called “monk” and only MONK_NOVICE is visible in pedia)
17. Added Monk Promotions: one for each level, auto-acquire
18. Added onUnitPromoted code to cause invisible automatic unit upgrades at level 12 (monk_novice->monk) and level 18 (monk->monk_perfected)
19. Added Tongue of Moon and Sun promotion and spell (one-time use by each 12th or higher level monk)
20. Added spells: Disappear (identical to hide) and Move though Ether (uses teleport code but is caster only; and yes, a Perfect Self Dragon can use it!)
21. 3 monk spells changed to abilities
22. Various text additions

Huh. That looks quite impressive! :eek:

Ah, yes, I see it :crazyeye:

very very interesting, this should make them truly feel unique :goodjob:

i guess this isn't compatible with LeadersEnchanced, huh ? >.>

Nope. I thought about starting with LeadersEnhanced, but then I would have to call it an Elohim Modmodmodmod.

Nope. I thought about starting with LeadersEnhanced, but then I would have to call it an Elohim Modmodmodmod.You know, even though you didn't use my modmod as a base, I'm pleased to see that you considered the option :)

Merely a humble suggestion on my part, but if it were compatible with LE, I would certainly play it.

It's pretty well documented if someone wants to attempt a merge. I put "# Elohim start" "# Elohim end" markers for my code in the 3 python files (only maybe 5 or 6 parts added) and there are no alterations in existing code. The XML is easy because I mostly added whole entries (usually at the end of the file), and only altered a couple (see change log). I'm not sure if any LE features will have a bad reaction with mine. Certainly it would be easiest to start with LE and add the Elohim tricks.

Unfortunately RL starts tomorrow and I won't have much time on this over the next 2 weeks (I'll try to fix bugs if there are any :lol:).

Impressive :O

I will try to convert your mod to LE, if you want / don't mind, as an external plug-in. Not right now though as I'm fixing many bugs introduced by the Ngomele civilization and others I've overlooked... I'm even missing some files :rolleyes:

Please do. I would be honored.

You may want to wait a day or so to see if bugs crop up. There are also some balance/exploit problems I may try to fix.

I really like this idea, although it wouldn't work for the FF Elohim.... Giving me ideas on how to do something else though. :lol:

something similar to this would fit FF's Austrin very well imho.

I really like this idea, although it wouldn't work for the FF Elohim.... Giving me ideas on how to do something else though. :lol:

cannibalize this to FF Plus already :D

Speaking of cannabalizing...

I'm about to upload a radical departure from 0.11. After playing though several times, I find that I can usually steamroll everyone else. The problem is that Elohim usually have the best start, and then the best 2nd city, and so forth. So I get a couple settler factories, and then the ever-more powerful monks dominate everything. Doubling settler cost didn't fix this (if you have a good starting feature; if you have a bad starting feature, then it can be crippling). While steamrolling can be fun, it isn't my intention for the Elohim. (I don't want them to be particularly easy either.)

So in version 0.20 I've cannibalized some Scion ideas and code. Now, Elohim don't build settlers at all. Instead, the new settler and monk escort spawn at unique features (with frequency I'll explain above). This is in keeping with my conception that Elohim are not expansive at all, and that their settlement populations are derived from nearby civilizations.

Wow, I only just tried 0.10 and now you've updated to 0.21 :O
Can't wait to try the new changes out.

I gave 0.11 a whirl yesterday on a huge map with all specials present and it was a bit of a steamroll as you say.

I started with building up my first city with some defenders and two workers which built a lot of farms. I could then pump out one settler every 12 turns. Around turn 200 my monks had str 12 and could pretty much kill anything.

The changes to 0.21 sound interesting, but it could end up a bit boring if you don't get any spawns I guess. And I really hope they don't spawn in the same place all the time, in my game yesterday I had three settlers in a row start in the same location and then die from the hill giants around that spot.

Yeah, a lot of settlers get killed on their first turn and that is just part of the experience :D.

In 0.21, I have the spawning set up so that you won't be punished (much) for this. The % will creep up to 10% and stay there. When you get a new settler, it will drop down. But if that settler gets killed (or the new city gets killed a few turns later), then the % will pop right back up to where it was. At 10%, there isn't much room for bad luck -- you will get a settler soon.

An interesting concept, Pazyryk. I may give this a try someday.

A couple of ideas for Opera on how to partially adapt this concept for LE or whatever it ends up being called after becoming so much more than just leaders:

1) Instead of spawning settlers at unique features, perhaps forts (and Elohim fort commanders) could spawn instead? This could simulate the Elohim taking care of the old places without greatly changing the "empire" mechanic.

2) Alternatively, give Elohim recon units (and maybe some other units such as monks) the ability to build a fort so they could protect the features upon finding them. Perhaps there's a way to require that the unit be adjacent to a unique feature before that ability could be activated, to prevent AI Elohim from having forts randomly scattered everywhere?

3) In either of the scenarios above, Elohim fort commanders near special features could have special abilities related to Pazyryk's original idea, such as ki/affinity for features, or occasionally spawning monks (held) to defend the fort and the feature.

It's probably bad form to post a mod and then disappear, but that is what I'm going to do. I'll be away from a computer for the next week, and not able to mod until the 28th. Please do post bugs, balance issues, suggestions, or observations (like "I promoted my monk to Perfect Self without the WBer!" -- I couldn't). I'll try to fix bugs and update to current Orbis by the 31st. I'm happy with anyone canabalizaing anything.

Why not place a fort commander directly ON the feature for the Elohim? Let them start with a commander on each UF who has some special capabilities, and then give them an expensive method of regaining them if lost at some point in the future?

An interesting concept, Pazyryk. I may give this a try someday.

A couple of ideas for Opera on how to partially adapt this concept for LE or whatever it ends up being called after becoming so much more than just leaders:

1) Instead of spawning settlers at unique features, perhaps forts (and Elohim fort commanders) could spawn instead? This could simulate the Elohim taking care of the old places without greatly changing the "empire" mechanic.

2) Alternatively, give Elohim recon units (and maybe some other units such as monks) the ability to build a fort so they could protect the features upon finding them. Perhaps there's a way to require that the unit be adjacent to a unique feature before that ability could be activated, to prevent AI Elohim from having forts randomly scattered everywhere?

3) In either of the scenarios above, Elohim fort commanders near special features could have special abilities related to Pazyryk's original idea, such as ki/affinity for features, or occasionally spawning monks (held) to defend the fort and the feature.

I did something like number 1 for the Kurios in FFPlus... They have a 'Colonist' UU which generates a fort and a Fort Commander with Expanded Influence... Also allowed the Kurios and Khazad access to a 'Legendary Influence' promotion that adds a second ring of culture. Not really hard to do, and a unit like that would probably be rather easier to balance... If you REALLY wanted to, add a python check when the fort upgrades, destroying the fort, and creating a city on the tile. Maybe Fort-Castle? Believe that's the highest in Orbis.

Why not place a fort commander directly ON the feature for the Elohim? Let them start with a commander on each UF who has some special capabilities, and then give them an expensive method of regaining them if lost at some point in the future?

Hmm.... I like that. Might even do that for the Elohim in FFPlus, and tie the trait gains to the Commanders... If they die, the trait is lost.

I tried a short game now with the same settings as before. I had less luck with my settlers this time and all four I'd gotten had died, so by turn 80 I still only had one city.

The counter started at 3%, then slowly climbed upwards, so it seems to be working. I'll give it another go and see if I have some more luck. :)

A monk with just one Ki can't survive an attack from even a bear, so the first settlers are more vulnerable than the latter ones. Another "possibility" I see is sacrificing the settlers to build up a monk population, 10% odds of a monk every turn. ;)

One more thing: Your changelog says you added a widget to show the settler spawn chance? I did the same for Adventurers, but the first attempt ended up killing the Awakened display... I'd start a Scions game to make sure the display still works.

Just one more post before I disappear for a while...

Valkrionn, I didn't test this yet (and won't for the next week). Hopefully someone will try it and report back. There was a sort of mystery text field where I put different text than Scions and Grigori (I have no idea what this did or if that addresses the issue).

Speaking of which, I did play other civs extensively using a much earlier version. The Elohim were never a powerhouse, but it was always fun to discover their cities in the strange places.

Xanrag, 0.11 easy - bad. 0.21 hard - good. For balancing considerations, you also have to consider that the Elohim don't have to waist time/resources building settlers, which is a huge boost for a builder strategy. That and the power of the unique features themselves. These are supposed to balance the killed settlers, failed new cities, and having such a dispersed empire (all of these map-dependent -- I never tried huge so maybe it really is too difficult). It kind of reminds me of playing OOC, only you have several and then many OOC's going at the same time as the game progresses.

Xanrag,

I also worked really hard at removing or reducing exploits. Yes, you can keep the monk/settler spawn rate high (as high as 10%) by disbanding new settlers. Of course, these monks will be all over the map (that's good and bad, depending). However, you would have to keep your city number about half of everyone else's to keep it at 10%. In addition to lost opportunity by not settling, you also are gimping the monks by not grabbing every unique feature you can. So in the end, you would have a tiny empire just to get a lot of weak units spread out randomly. Please do try it but I think I closed that off as an effective exploit.

I gave it another go, trying some different settings. There is no difference in spawn rates depening on the game speed setting, ie quick and marathon have the same spawns making it better (how much is debateable) in a marathon game.

Otherwise it seems to work fine, but it does have a bit of the problem the kuriotate used to have in that it is hard to grap specific resources. There isn't much point to exploration besides levelling your monks, since you can't settle anything close to another city anyway.

In one game I got a free settler from an event, I don't know if it counted toward the spawn rate since I was already at the minimum I think (0.5%).

I played a game and it was great :D

By turn 100 or so, I already had 3 cities and 4 unique features (2 in the capital!). My monks were very powerful, enough to repel any attack. I managed to have a very powerful research and all... Very good.

Two things: I was able to build settlers in my cities that weren't Elohim. I simply added some lines in CvGameUtils to prevent Elohim to be able to build settlers.

And I was able to build the palace of the non-elohim cultures. I guess some lines in CvGameUtils.py are needed too.

I really liked this game. The flavour is great :)

I made a LE 0.36beta friendly version, too :)

Interesting idea. I mean making a unit gain abilities in leveling up like in Neverwinter Nights. Now that we are in it, we could make national adventurer units sharing a similar mechanic:
-Blackguard for any evil civ.
-Paladin for good civs.
-Warlocks for arcane civs.
-Shadowdancers for Svartalfar.
-Dragon disciples for Kuriotates and Sheaim.
-Stormriders for Barb flavoured civs.
-Clerics for Bannor.
-Divine champions for Malakim.
-Eldritch Knights for Amurites.
-Arcane Archers for Ljosafar.
-Battlemasters as a late game adventurer unit.

They would act as unnamed heroes and there would be a limit of 2. They would start with Adventurer promotion and have a set of promotions that they would gain as leveling up.

Something I forgot: do UFs still reward mana for non-elohim civs? Now that they reward the elohim specific resource, you don't get mana with them... but I wonder if it does so for non-elohim too.

Edit: Just checked, non-elohim are screwed, UFs-wise, with this. Yggdrasil doesn't reward its fruits anymore, for example. Actually, it works great with other features that can be explored because their mana is only given when explored. However, I guess Elohim will lose their resource if they explore.

To fix the resource issue, make two spells, one Elohim and one non-Elohim. The first will replace the standard resource with the Elohim-specific one, and must be cast in Elohim borders. The other can be cast as long as NOT in Elohim borders, and resets the resource... Easiest way to do that one would be a rather large if-statement, or a separate spell for each UF.

I'd say have them start with the 'traditional' resource, btw.

Yeah, good idea, Valk, thank you :)

Why not place a fort commander directly ON the feature for the Elohim? Let them start with a commander on each UF who has some special capabilities, and then give them an expensive method of regaining them if lost at some point in the future?

I much prefer this idea to Elohim waiting on the vagaries of the RNG to create Settlers. Leave the Elohim create Settlers in the usual way and leave random Settlers firmly in the province of the Scions.

Here's my take. Use the RNG to generate Guardians on any unowned Unique Features. The Guardian is automatically Elohim, works like a Fort Commander, is held and gets +1 Affinity for the mana they are guarding and at higher levels (one stripe and two stripes) can cast the spells appropriate to their sphere.

Here's the twist... Exposure to raw magical power is corruptive. Any Guardian who can't draw a trade to route to the Elohim Capital has a chance each turn to go rogue. The chance ought to rise with the AC, the level of the Guardian (power corrupts) and the malevolence of the mana type (Chaos Mana is more corrosive than Nature mana). Any guardian who goes rogue, loses his "Held" status, becomes an Orc / Infernal unit and increase the AC by +1. This gives the Elohim a solid reason to seek out access to UFs and a solid reward when they do so.

I much prefer this idea to Elohim waiting on the vagaries of the RNG to create Settlers. Leave the Elohim create Settlers in the usual way and leave random Settlers firmly in the province of the Scions.

Here's my take. Use the RNG to generate Guardians on any unowned Unique Features. The Guardian is automatically Elohim, works like a Fort Commander, is held and gets +1 Affinity for the mana they are guarding and at higher levels (one stripe and two stripes) can cast the spells appropriate to their sphere.

Here's the twist... Exposure to raw magical power is corruptive. Any Guardian who can't draw a trade to route to the Elohim Capital has a chance each turn to go rogue. The chance ought to rise with the AC, the level of the Guardian (power corrupts) and the malevolence of the mana type (Chaos Mana is more corrosive than Nature mana). Any guardian who goes rogue, loses his "Held" status, becomes an Orc / Infernal unit and increase the AC by +1. This gives the Elohim a solid reason to seek out access to UFs and a solid reward when they do so.But... It's really hard, maybe impossible, to make traderoutes to some UFs early in the game.

Anyway, I really like the flavor it gives to the Elohim. It seems to fit that they would gather around UFs and found their cities where they gather :)

I took this mod out for a spin, so to speak, and while I think it's a very neat basic concept I fear I have to agree with Kael on this one. It just doesn't work with the basic concept of Civilization 4. :(

It's great stuff for a scenario, or even if the Elohim was somehow a "barbarian" faction. One that you had to either negotiate with or defeat in order to gain access to the unique features on the map (could work well with the improved UFs suggested in the "Civics reworking thread").

My suggestion would be to give the Elohim a specific win condition - "Control all Unique Features". Add a bonus for every UF controlled, drop the current Pilgrimage event, but in all other respects keep them as a normal civilization. It's not very fluffy but let's be honest here. Almost nothing about the FFH mechanics or gameplay is very faithful to the lore created about the setting. Civ4 is all about changing history after all. Heck, in most my games as Elohim I'm running Ashen Veil as their religion!

In a way it's unfortunate that Kael & Co aren't modding Neverwinter Nights. All the lore would make an awesome RPG campaign. Thank the powers they preferred RTS games though. :D

Awesome idea :goodjob: glad to see that Orbis is attracting more and more modders

Since when is Civ4 RTS?

Anyway, I really like the flavor it gives to the Elohim. It seems to fit that they would gather around UFs and found their cities where they gather :)

Fair enough. What about leaving the Elohim with the capacity to create Settlers (which is my main objection to the proposal as it stands) but giving them a sequence of rituals instead.

Ritual 1: Reveals the location of all UF.
Ritual 2: Grants permanent visibility over all UF regardless of who controls them.
Ritual 3: Cedes control of the Maelstrom to the Elohim.
Ritual 4: Requires 2 UF - Puts a Settler and a defensive unit adjacent to an uncontrolled UF.
Ritual 5: Requires 4 UF - As Ritual 4, but 3 defensive units.
Ritual 6: Requires 6 UF - As Ritual 5 but automatically builds a City with City Walls and a Courthouse instead of Settler.
etc...

The final ritual (which might require control of X UFs) could half the AC or inflict Karma-harm to each Civ based on the proportion of points they have contributed to the AC.

Back from vacation now so I'll try to have an update by the 31st. My first priority is to fix the 2 bugs above (still able to build settlers in non-Elohim cities and UF bonus problem for other civs) borrowing Opera's fixes.

I'm still not entirely happy with the current spawning settler mechanic. There are some great suggestions above. However, just to clarify my objectives: #1 Elohim should be found near unique features, and #2 Elohim should NOT have a big centralized empire. I think a lot of folks are with me on #1 but don't like #2. #2 is really the bigger departure from normal civ and some folks just won't like it. But I like it (both to play and play against) so I'm going to keep that way. It's still quite possible to win all of the victory conditions (even conquest or dominance) but the challenges are different.

I really like Jabie's idea of linking settlers to rituals. It would be tough to balance for the same reason that 0.11 was unbalanced: Elohim cities can become production powerhouses very quickly depending on the UF. But I think I'll try something like this.

How will you fix the UF resources issue? Using Valkrionn's spells idea? If so, I think it is a good take. Elohim should need to visit the UF to gather the Holy Relics. I guess you should link these spells to the monk units, as it would make a lot of sense.

Also, I really like your modmod. I'll keep it updated to mine, if you don't mind. Very cool tweak to the Elohim. By the way, can I get you to take a look to the Peacekeepers trait I did for them for the new version of my mod?
Basically, it gives Melee, Archer and Disciple units City Garrison 1 for free and gives them +30%:gold:, :science: and :culture: while at peace. It's very very powerful, especially combined with the UF but you must avoid war at all costs to keep it running well.

Thanks for the support Opera! I like Valkrionn's spell idea except that I don't know how to make the AI visit the UFs. Also, I'm trying to avoid feature additions when possible (except when I don't).

I don't really understand the current problem. I just added Holy Relic to all UFs and made it only visible to Elohim (through Elohim-specific tech). Why does this make Fruit of Yggdrasil unavailable to non-Elohim?

There can only be 1 resource on any tile. If you place a new one, old one goes away. Doesn't matter if you cannot see one of them, only one (visible or not) can ever exist per tile.

You could do it with a building: if you have a UF near one of your cities, you would be able to build a Holy Shrine/something in the city, granting it 1 HR. I don't know if it would grant it to the whole empire though or only to the city. You would have to create one building for each UF though, so that if you have 2 UFs near you, you would be able to build the two buildings. So they would need each a different buildingclass. It would be easier for the AI to build a building than to make a monk go to an UF and cast a spell on it.

Ha! I guess it would be fitting to link it to an existing building:

rel·i·quar·y
n. pl. rel·i·quar·ies
A receptacle, such as a coffer or shrine, for keeping or displaying sacred relics.

Yeah, but remember that if you have multiple UFs near your city, you'll need to be able to build at least two reliquaries.

Yeah, but remember that if you have multiple UFs near your city, you'll need to be able to build at least two reliquaries.

You might need to make an Elohim-specific national wonder or something for each UF, requiring that particular UF to be in the fat cross or whatever to be built, unless the game can be made to allow two or more of the same building per city without exploit or error...

It's easy to add multiple different buildings that are all called "reliquary" that auto replace each other and give different bonus numbers (this is how Ki works, with up to 18 Ki from one building). Or, similar to Cylnar suggestion, I could have a different building for each UF, all called "reliquary" and each giving 1 holy relic. Whatever the mechanism, it has to allow for UFs owned via forts. I also wanted this to depend on trade network (unlike Ki) so that an isolated city or group of cities would only benefit from local relics. (The flavor here is that pilgrimages to holy relics is a kind of trade.) I could perhaps program it so each owned UF counts toward the nearest city, but this is tough and may be computationally expensive (would have to trigger search for nearest city for each Elohim owned UF each turn).

A simple solution that occurs to me is that I could drop the Holy Relic next to the UF at start (in any passable plot that doesn't already have a bonus). Could be accessed by mine with road? This works but may be a little annoying as it removes a tile from other uses.

Another possibility is to only add Holy Relic to UFs that don't otherwise have a bonus.

Getting back to the spell idea, there could be an Elohim spell that is castable on an owned UF that puts a Holy Relic producing building in the nearest city. This would allow Elohim to get the relic and other UF bonuses. Same problem as above: I won't do this unless I can think of a way to make the AI visit the UFs. Another way might involve a spell castable in Elohim cities (conditional on a nearby UF) but I think the spell checks would be computationally expensive.

I'll have to think about this some more. I want it to be as simple as possible.

Opera, I do like the peacekeeper trait. I'll incorporate that for sure. (Are there any un-obvious files I need to look in to add this?)

Also, a long long time ago (perhaps Ffh 0.23? -- it was when world spells were first implemented) there was a modmod that made the Elohim world spell create a cool blue glowing wall, instead of the generic Great Wall. There was also a discussion about making the wall update each turn. I'd also like it to surround all borders and not just the capital. Has anyone seen any of these things in a recent modmod? If I can do it outside the dll I'll try.

No, it's just done in the TraitInfos file (and in the CivilizationInfos, obviously).

As for their worldspell, it's in the dll. At least for doing it for each city.

Updated to 0.23 (breaks saved games)

This fixes reported bugs. It also changes the Holy Relic mechanism. These bonuses are now given to individual cities (through reliquary building) based on number of nearest UFs. Reliquaries are auto-generated in Elohim cities with nearby, owned UF(s) (no longer buildable). Holy Relics are no longer placed on map.

Opera, I wanted to include Peaceful trait but I noticed that you didn't add this trait for Ethne and Einion (only for the minor leaders). Is this intentional? I'll add to next version if you think this trait should be included for the non-minor leaders.

Regarding settler spawning: I haven't decided yet whether to move away from settler spawning mechanism (alternative would probably be some kind of ritual series). Someone mentioned above that spawning doesn't scale with map size or game speed. It actually does in an indirect way, because it is linked to average city number for other civs (which are influenced by map size and speed). So, assuming I keep spawning mechanism, I don't think any additional map size or speed adjustment is needed.

1. [py] Fixed so that Elohim can't build setter in any city regardless of culture (Opera)
2. [XML] Removed unnecessary Elohim-specific settler unit
3. [py] Elohim now spawn normal settler; Starting Settler promo added to spawned settlers
4. [py] Elohim can't build palace in cities with other civ's culture (Opera)
5. [XML] Removed Reliquary building (from BuildingInfos and CivilizationsInfos)
6. [XML,py] Added Reliquary buildings and building classes. Same as before except:
no unhealth
not buildable
each owned UF provides 1 Holy Relic to nearest Elohim city (up to 5 maximum per city)
7. [XML,py] Removed previous XML and py that added Holy Relic to UFs (reverted to Orbis original CIV4ImprovementInfos.xml)
8. [py] Added Aifon Isle, Aifon Isle explored, and Maelstrom to list of UFs tested (unlikely but possible for these to be in borders)

I added a Peaceful trait that some leaders use (Ji, Futiro, for example) and a Peacekeepers trait that is the Elohim CivTrait. I also gave Ethne the Peaceful trait in spite of the Defender trait... So Ethne will gain +45%:culture:, :science: and :gold: during peace.

Did this answer your questions?

Nice update. I will most likely update it for .4 :)

Ah... I see. I was looking for peacekeeper and found peaceful...then I got confused. I was sure that I saw only Tolerant as the Elohim CivTrait in your modmod, but I may be mistaken (I don't have file to look at now). I'll probably add Peacekeeper CivTrait but not Peaceful (seems redundant to me). Elohim may be over-cultured with my changes and your changes combined, but maybe not...

Peacekeepers isn't in a released version yet.
The main difference between Peacekeepers and Peaceful is that the former isn't made to be used with anyone else but the Elohim. It gives them City Garrison I for Melee, Archer and Disciple units and boost their commerces during peace. Peaceful only boosts commerces (and less) and is available for any other leader.

Minor bug fix 0.24 (works with 0.23, not earlier versions)

1. [py] Removed BUILDING_RELIQUARY from list of buildings affecting spawn rate.


For any programers out there, it seems like:

pPlayer.countNumBuildings(gc.getInfoTypeForString( 'BUILDING_RELIQUARY'))

was recognizing BUILDING_RELIQUARY_1, BUILDING_RELIQUARY_2, etc. (there is no exact match BUILDING_RELIQUARY in my current modmod). Is this normal behavior? Rather annoying if so.

Good to see this mod shaping up. Gonna try it out again today, I think :)

All, could you please give me feedback on settler/monk spawning vs. creation by ritual? I can change this for the next version, but I've been enjoying the current system and I'm seriously undecided at this point. If I change it to ritual, it will have to be very expensive. One idea is to have one ritual that starts cheap (maybe 200) and scales up depending on how many Elohim cities are present (so maybe 400 for city number 4 or 5). (I can implement this though several different rituals that appear in game and civolopedia as one.)

Here are some of my thoughts:

Current spawning mechanism:
Not too original (mechanism stolen from Scions).
It's fun, and a big change from other civs, to be able to focus on city development and ignore expansion (feels like OCC).
Conversely, it removes expansion from player control (except for some minor influence through buildings), which is a bad thing.
It's easy for me to balance, since it is tied to other civs average city number.
Very strong "rubber band" mechanism, which is good for keeping AI in game (percent goes up to 10% if city number low compared to others).
This system is forgiving for the settlers or new cities that inevitably get hammered by barbs and animals (spawning percent goes right back up if settler or new city killed).

Alternative ritual mechanism
Original unique civ mechanism.
Tough to balance: first city might be powerhouse or not, which pretty much determines the course of the game (but this problem exists for all civs).
It will be brutal to loose settler and monk on 1st turn after spending 360 production (new players will throw things and post nasty messages at me).

in late game, a monk can be killed easily if spawned at the wrong place. can be really annoying when you finally spawn a settler.

Dragon,

Do you think this is a bigger problem early or late game? Monk power scaling is supposed to balance this to some extent.

One partial solution would be to make the monk and settler invisible (for a turn or two or until the settler makes a city). You can still get the conga line of barbs coming for the new isolated city, so some new cities are gonna die.

certainly late game, situation was that there where around a dozen strength 5-7 animals surrounding my monk and settler, it could handle a few.. but because there where so many it was killed.

I would say keep the spawning. I know it's not very original now with the Scions and the Grigori but it's efficient and really cool to play.

(But others may have a more argumented opinion... :lol:)

what about doing spawning of new UU for every civilization ?? :D ... than spawning wouldn't be copied from scions since it would be game-wide feature ... (( but then scions would need something after pop-limit is reached ((actually - it's easily exploitable, you just keep your pop under pop-limit and wait until 10 more awakeneds spawns and made them pop after that .. it's worth of turns of stagnation :D )) ))

New update 0.25 (will break saves)

Updates to Orbis 0.24C. I did some large code cleanup and optimization, incorporated Opera's Peacekeeper trait, and added new spawn adjustments (updated in first post).

1. Updated for Orbis 0.24 C
2. [py] Armageddon changes due to civ elimination are credited to active player (this is in addition to Orbis 0.24C AC credit fixes for spells).
3. [py] Spawn rate affected by Elohim contribution to AC (-1 contribution = +1% to target city number). This effect is negated if Elohim are evil.
4. [py] Big code cleanup and optimization: python check of every map tile for unique feature ownership only occurs once per turn, rather than every time screen updates (it's pretty fast but I think it was happening dozens of times per turn).
5. [py] Removed previous spawning cap based on available UFs. Spawning now stops if cities plus settlers > 14.
6. [py] Spawning can now occur near owned UFs (owned by anyone) if they are >3 tiles from any city (i.e., normal 100 culture radius). Allows spawning at fort-owned UFs and may allow cultural stealing of UFs.
7. [py] Spawning can occur on available land if < 4 tiles from water UF.
8. [XML] Added Opera's Peacekeeper trait (takes place of Tolarant civ trait). In addition to assimilation: +30/30/30 commerce modifier when at peace, city garrison 1 for archers, melee and disciples.
9. [py] Spawning rate adjusted for peace with all non-barb civs (+5% to target city number if at peace; -5% if at war).
10. [py] Spawning rate adjustment for difficulty. For human Elohim: +5%/-5% to target city number for each difficulty step below/above Prince. Converse for Elohim played by AI.
11. [py] Fixed base Orbis 0.24C error for AC adjustment for spellPeace and spellPeaceSevenPines

Hmm, I didn't test it out yest :(
But I'll certainly (sooner better) to then add it to LE's next version.

Btw, I discussed with xienwolf about the possibility to create unique improvements, àla unique buildings and such. So Elohim could have unique UFs (ahah) not changing much except that they would give Holy Relics instead of mana or similar.

What's going on with this? Last post was in July and since then 24D has come out. Will it work with 24D? Did it ever get incorporated into LeadersEnhanced? I really want to play this!

Well, last post was in August and it's compatible with the last Orbis version, 0.24c :p

As for LeadersEnhanced, it's hasn't been updated. However, I got report that the version you can find on my thread works well with 0.37 ;)

It's nice to be loved...

Orbis is still 0.24C, or am I missing something??? (at least it appears to be so in the Orbis bug post)

Opera, I fixed the problem with the UFs and Holy Relics a few versions back. For each owned UF, 1 Holy Relic will appear in the nearest city (it works even if the UF is fort-owned and very far from the nearest city). The current version seems to be very stable with Orbis 24C after playing through a few times.

I've made a couple minor changes without updating (while waiting for Orbis 24D). But I'd like to include these before it gets sucked up into LeadersEnhanced. Can't do it now but maybe I can update to new version tomorrow night. New changes affect how AI plays Elohim (they keep Guardian civic and do better at settling) and I've changed the monk promotion progression so it tops out at level 15 now. I did want this to be rare but level 18 is just too hard to achieve in most games. Monks now make awesome dungeon explorers because they get Still Mind at lvl 3 and Purity of Body at lvl 5.

Sure, go ahead. I'm waiting FFH patch e to release Orbis patch D (I won't wait for Ahwaric because of some critical fixes), so you have some room left to patch before the mod is out.

I knew you had fixed this but I thought I'd notify you nonetheless ;)

About sucking it into LE, I'm not sure I'll make it default. Personally, I think it's the perfect fit for the Elohim but it's so much a radical change than most people would throw things out of their window because of it :lol:

Looking forward to the next version then :goodjob:

Opera,

If you want to help me with one of my biggest headaches, could you make a city's original owner accessible to Python with something like pCity.setOriginalOwner(iNewOriginalOwner). Even better if you could talk Ahwaric into including that in base Orbis.

Currently, I use a total python kludge to do this (with a sort of ownership switcharoo). It work surprisingly well for the player, with the only weirdness being an option to raze a city right after it is built. However, I'm pretty sure that I've caught the AI using this option. So it will build a city at that distant UF, but then disband it (thinking it just got a too distant city through conquest or cultural switch, I guess).

It would be a real walk in the park to add ;)

If you want, I can do that in base Orbis for the next patch. Would that be okay?

Yes, please do!

With all of the new Elohim unit art in FFH 0.41e, I feel a little bad that my mod becomes so monk-centric, at least after Monasticism. In my last game, I had 4 paladins (promoted from high level monks), a couple priests, and then a gazillion monks and no other units. Maybe I was playing in a sub-optimal way, so I'm not really sure there is a problem (but why build anything else when you have a few levels of the Altar?).

One idea I had was to let monk novices (below a certain level) upgrade to non-disciple units. The idea is that some cultures sent young folks (even nobility I think) off to the monastery for a year or so before they started their real life (I'm not sure if this is real or I'm remembering from some fantasy book). It also fits with the old AD&D class switch (2nd ed. I think) where monks could train in new class but never again gain additional monk abilities. Perhaps a city with a monastery could make monk units that could then be promoted to archers, hunters, axemen, mages, or whatever (any T2, 3 or 4), taking one to several early monk promotions with them but gaining no more monk abilities. Higher level monks would be excluded from this (these can still upgrade to T4 disciple units). There are some problems with this idea but I'm just trying to think of a way to diversify out the Elohim army without taking away from the monk... (don't worry, there won't be anything like this in the next patch)

New version 0.26! (will break saves)

This is pretty close to feature complete now, but I'll try to keep up with Orbis updates. I'll try to make a version for the next Leaders Enhanced, if Opera doesn't do it for me ;).


[XML, py] Changes to monk promotion progression:

Removed Flurry of Blows, Evasion and Advanced Evasion (so now Perfect Self is reached at level 15 rather than 18)
Moved Tongue of Moon and Sun to come after Wholeness of Body and before Diamond Body (now level 8).
Purity of Body gets +30% resistance to poison
+1 attack for Ki Strike
+1 defense for Diamond Body
+1 attack for Quivering Palm (removed +1 defense for this promo)

[py] Added alternate outcomes to dungeon/lair exploration based on promotion (bad option may trigger, but no ill effect and alternate message appears):

Still Mind: can't be crazed, enraged or demon possessed.
Purity of Body: can't be diseased.
Wholeness of Body: can't be mutated.
Diamond Body: can't be poisoned.
Abundant Step: can't be caged.
Timeless Body: can't be withered.

[XML] Additions to Guardians of Holy Places civic:

changed AI weight to 300 (this seems to keep AI in this civic)
+50% war wariness
+2 culture per specialist
unlimited priest specialists
+1 happy for monastery

(This may be too much, but I'm trying to make it a viable choice. Otherwise, I find myself always taking Aristocracy in preference to the -100% distance cost.)
[XML] Changed DefaultUnitAI for monk to UNITAI_CITY_DEFENSE (I'm not sure, but I think this helps AI use monk as settler escort when they spawn)
[py] Fixed Tongue of Moon and Sun so it isn't castable in one's own city
[XML] Fixed text key for Peacekeeper (Peacekeeper was in but text still indicated Tolerant)
[XML] Reliquary buildings don't give prophet GP points or culture anymore. Now only gives Holy Relic bonus(es) and Spirit Guide promo. (I thought the priest and culture were redundant with Guardian civic and corp bonuses from Holy Relic)
[py] Tweaked settler/monk spawning again -- changes are to encourage aggressive UF claiming. Can occur near UF if all of the following are true:

UF is >4 tile rings (500 culture radius) from any Elohim city
If UF is owned, owning civ's closest city is >2 tile rings (10 culture radius) away
If water UF, there must be passable, unowned land within 4 tile rings

I released the new patch of Orbis today and it has ::setOriginalOwner() exposed. I'll bring your mod in LENA when you'll have updated it again ;)

hmm ... so since Orbis is now unusable (( no offense Opy )) i decided to try this mod and it's amazing, only thing i'm missing is possibility to upgrade from warrior to monk ... /:

arctincnightwolf,

See Monastic Training in changelog 0.27. Might be sort of what you're looking for. (I was trying to provide some interest to Elohim non-monk units and also to boost monastery.)

Edit: I guess I could also make warriors upgrade to monk. Seems logical since monk has become their primary fighting unit.

Updated to 0.27 (will break saves)

Sorry for the small update that is still Orbis 0.24C. I had two new things that were working well, so I thought I'd get them out before converting to Orbis E (or is it F now?).
I'll probably wait a day or two until some of the kinks are worked out of the new FFHf/Orbis? update.


[XML, py] Added Monastic Training: This ability can be used by any non-monk unit (with unitcombat: melee, archer, adept, recon, mounted or disciple) in any city with a monastery (or national versions of monastery). The unit will receive monk level promotions in accordance with the unit's level, but only up to level 3 (for non-disciple units) or level 7 (for disciple units).
[XML] Warriors can upgrade to monks (with tech prereqs of course)

It's E. But it will soon become F when I'll find how I can make graphics show up. But other than graphics (which affects the civ you're modding unfortunately), patch E is good enough to play.

Edit: Yay, 1600th post!

Great! Should be a fast update when F comes out. I'll just need to incorporate your setOriginalOwner() into my code (thanks for doing that!) and get ride of my python kludge that allows razing newly built cities (so the AI won't do that anymore).

Looking forward to it so I could make it LENA compatible for the next version ;)

Opera, here is my current code that implements my Elohim "super-assimilation". It's ugly but it works quite well. Basically, when a new city is built (after the 1st city), it looks for the nearest other empire within 21 tiles. When it finds one (after excluding some civs for alignment restrictions), it does a kill-city-build-new-city-swap-owner to make the city "originally owned" by that near civ.

def onCityBuilt(self, argsList):
'City Built'
city = argsList[0]
pPlot = city.plot()
pPlayer = gc.getPlayer(city.getOwner())

(snip)

# Elohim start
if pPlayer.getCivilizationType() == gc.getInfoTypeForString('CIVILIZATION_ELOHIM'):
# set Guardians corp (do again if pNewCity initiatied below)
city.setHasCorporation(gc.getInfoTypeForString('CO RPORATION_GUARDIANS'), True, False, False)
if pPlayer.getNumCities() > 1:
# Find nearest other civ up to 21 tiles away (yes, this is weird but works)
# if no near civ found, loop runs out and new city stays as is
xcity = city.getX()
ycity = city.getY()
xs = [0,-3,3,0,-3,3,-3,3,0,-6,6,0,-3,3,-6,6,-6,6,-3,3,-6,6,-6,6,0,-9,9,0,-3,3,-9,9,-9,9,-3,3,-6,6,-9,9,-9,9,-6,6,0,-12,12,0,-3,3,-12,12,-12,12,-3,3,-9,9,-9,9,-6,6,-12,12,-12,12,-6,6,0,-9,9,-12,12,-15,15,-12,12,-9,9,0,-3,3,-15,15,-15,15,-3,3,-6,6,-15,15,-15,15,-6,6,-12,12,-12,12,-9,9,-15,15,-15,15,-9,9,0,-18,18,0,-3,3,-18,18,-18,18,-3,3,-6,6,-18,18,-18,18,-6,6,-12,12,-15,15,-15,15,-12,12,-9,9,-18,18,-18,18,-9,9,0,-21,21,0]
ys = [-3,0,0,3,-3,-3,3,3,-6,0,0,6,-6,-6,-3,-3,3,3,6,6,-6,-6,6,6,-9,0,0,9,-9,-9,-3,-3,3,3,9,9,-9,-9,-6,-6,6,6,9,9,-12,0,0,12,-12,-12,-3,-3,3,3,12,12,-9,-9,9,9,-12,-12,-6,-6,6,6,12,12,-15,-12,-12,-9,-9,0,0,9,9,12,12,15,-15,-15,-3,-3,3,3,15,15,-15,-15,-6,-6,6,6,15,15,-12,-12,12,12,-15,-15,-9,-9,9,9,15,15,-18,0,0,18,-18,-18,-3,-3,3,3,18,18,-18,-18,-6,-6,6,6,18,18,-15,-15,-12,-12,12,12,15,15,-18,-18,-9,-9,9,9,18,18,-21,0,0,21]
for i in range(147):
x = xcity + xs[i]
y = ycity + ys[i]
pTestPlot = CyMap().plot(x, y)
if pTestPlot.isOwned() == True:
pNearCiv = gc.getPlayer(pTestPlot.getOwner())
if pNearCiv.getCivilizationType() == gc.getInfoTypeForString('CIVILIZATION_ELOHIM'):
continue
if pPlayer.getAlignment() == gc.getInfoTypeForString('ALIGNMENT_GOOD'):
if pNearCiv.getCivilizationType() == gc.getInfoTypeForString('CIVILIZATION_SHEAIM'):
continue
if pNearCiv.getCivilizationType() == gc.getInfoTypeForString('CIVILIZATION_INFERNAL'):
continue
elif pPlayer.getAlignment() == gc.getInfoTypeForString('ALIGNMENT_EVIL'):
if pNearCiv.getCivilizationType() == gc.getInfoTypeForString('CIVILIZATION_MERCURIANS') :
continue

# Awful kludge to assimilate neighboring civ (city switcharoo, then restore unit positions, yuck):
name = city.getName()
# need to get all Elohim units in area and their position
pUnitGrab = []
xGrab = []
yGrab = []
iUnitCounter = 0
iPlayer = city.getOwner()
pyPlayer = PyPlayer(iPlayer)
for pUnitLoop in pyPlayer.getUnitList():
if pUnitLoop.getX() >= xcity - 1 and pUnitLoop.getX() <= xcity + 1:
if pUnitLoop.getY() >= ycity - 1 and pUnitLoop.getY() <= ycity + 1:
pUnitGrab.append(pUnitLoop)
xGrab.append(pUnitLoop.getX())
yGrab.append(pUnitLoop.getY())
iUnitCounter = iUnitCounter + 1
# now kill city, reinit and switch
city.kill()
pNewCity = pNearCiv.initCity(xcity, ycity)
pPlayer.acquireCity(pNewCity,False, False)
# now put back units possibly kicked out
if iUnitCounter > 0:
for j in range(iUnitCounter):
pUnitGrab[j].setXY(xGrab[j], yGrab[j],true,true,true)
pNewCity.setName(name, False)
pNewCity.setHasCorporation(gc.getInfoTypeForString ('CORPORATION_GUARDIANS'), True, False, False)
break
# Elohim end

I want to change this to get rid of everything after "# Awful kludge to...". I thought that setOriginalOwner() would do the trick, so I changed to:

# Elohim start
if pPlayer.getCivilizationType() == gc.getInfoTypeForString('CIVILIZATION_ELOHIM'):
# set Guardians corp (do again if pNewCity initiatied below)
city.setHasCorporation(gc.getInfoTypeForString('CO RPORATION_GUARDIANS'), True, False, False)
if pPlayer.getNumCities() > 1:
# Find nearest other civ up to 21 tiles away (yes, this is weird but works)
# if no near civ found, loop runs out and new city stays as is
xcity = city.getX()
ycity = city.getY()
xs = (0,-3,3,0,-3,3,-3,3,0,-6,6,0,-3,3,-6,6,-6,6,-3,3,-6,6,-6,6,0,-9,9,0,-3,3,-9,9,-9,9,-3,3,-6,6,-9,9,-9,9,-6,6,0,-12,12,0,-3,3,-12,12,-12,12,-3,3,-9,9,-9,9,-6,6,-12,12,-12,12,-6,6,0,-9,9,-12,12,-15,15,-12,12,-9,9,0,-3,3,-15,15,-15,15,-3,3,-6,6,-15,15,-15,15,-6,6,-12,12,-12,12,-9,9,-15,15,-15,15,-9,9,0,-18,18,0,-3,3,-18,18,-18,18,-3,3,-6,6,-18,18,-18,18,-6,6,-12,12,-15,15,-15,15,-12,12,-9,9,-18,18,-18,18,-9,9,0,-21,21,0)
ys = (-3,0,0,3,-3,-3,3,3,-6,0,0,6,-6,-6,-3,-3,3,3,6,6,-6,-6,6,6,-9,0,0,9,-9,-9,-3,-3,3,3,9,9,-9,-9,-6,-6,6,6,9,9,-12,0,0,12,-12,-12,-3,-3,3,3,12,12,-9,-9,9,9,-12,-12,-6,-6,6,6,12,12,-15,-12,-12,-9,-9,0,0,9,9,12,12,15,-15,-15,-3,-3,3,3,15,15,-15,-15,-6,-6,6,6,15,15,-12,-12,12,12,-15,-15,-9,-9,9,9,15,15,-18,0,0,18,-18,-18,-3,-3,3,3,18,18,-18,-18,-6,-6,6,6,18,18,-15,-15,-12,-12,12,12,15,15,-18,-18,-9,-9,9,9,18,18,-21,0,0,21)
for i in range(147):
x = xcity + xs[i]
y = ycity + ys[i]
pTestPlot = CyMap().plot(x, y)
if pTestPlot.isOwned() == True:
iNearCiv = pTestPlot.getOwner()
pNearCiv = gc.getPlayer(iNearCiv)
if pNearCiv.getCivilizationType() == gc.getInfoTypeForString('CIVILIZATION_ELOHIM'):
continue
if pPlayer.getAlignment() == gc.getInfoTypeForString('ALIGNMENT_GOOD'):
if pNearCiv.getCivilizationType() == gc.getInfoTypeForString('CIVILIZATION_SHEAIM'):
continue
if pNearCiv.getCivilizationType() == gc.getInfoTypeForString('CIVILIZATION_INFERNAL'):
continue
elif pPlayer.getAlignment() == gc.getInfoTypeForString('ALIGNMENT_EVIL'):
if pNearCiv.getCivilizationType() == gc.getInfoTypeForString('CIVILIZATION_MERCURIANS') :
continue

# New OriginalOwner swap
city.setOriginalOwner(pNearCiv.getCivilizationType ())
break

I've tried a few variation on that last line to get it to work, e.g., city.setOriginalOwner(iNearCiv), but that hasn't worked either. Basically, if I put any integer in the function, it does not give an error but it also does not change original owner or do anything else as far as I can tell.

Did you just tried:city.setOriginalOwner(iNearCiv)?

Yes, that is exactly the first thing I tried, but it does not change city nationality. I'm sure that "city" and "iNearCiv" are correct because I use these in the current code which is working. I have a test mod that spawns most turns so I can see if assimilation is working. I settled >10 cities with new code... but never saw ownership change. Settled some cities with old code, almost always finds near civ and swaps owners.

And pNearCiv cause an error, right?

Tried that. Gives error. It seems to want an integer there.

Hmmm. I don't get it. It should work :|

Let me pull some strings!

OK. Let me know if you don't think you can solve this today. Otherwise, I'll release an F update with my existing python assimilation and fix this in next version.

Yes, I suppose you should do that. I'm puzzled by the issue and I'm waiting for an answer from xienwolf (at best), so that's not for right now.

New version 0.28 (will break saves)

1. Updated to Orbis 0.24F (new Elohim unit graphics!)
2. Elohim palace no longer has no civic anger effect

hmmm ... monks also should have some defense bonus when standing on unique improvement ... at least in early game ...

Shameful update: setOriginalOwner() isn't the good function for what you want :blush:
I had to expose setCivilizationType()... I'll expose it in patch G. Not sure when I'll get it out though.

Wait. It seems it's already exposed. Did you try pCity.setCivilizationType(iNearCiv.getCivilization Type()) before?

I'll try that tonight. It sounds promising.

It works Orbis! Finally, assimilation the way it should be. It's beautiful!

Perfect then :)

New update 0.29 (works just fine with 0.28)

1. Removed awful python code for assimilation and replaced with setCivilizationType (Thanks Opera!). You will no longer see the option to raze a city right after you build it. Should help AI play Elohim better. Also, the function is linked to Peacekeeper trait (rather than civ), so any leader with this trait will have new cities that assimilate nearby civ types (not just conquered cities).

Unless a bug comes up, this is pretty much done.

arcticnightwolf, I do feel your pain -- my last game I got 5 new settlers killed and only had 2 cities on turn 200. Game before that I got 3 cities pretty quickly. (It's harder on larger map.) I thought about making some defensive promo for the escort monks that would be active when near a UF or until settlers settle. But then I thought, it's a tough world out there. I think it's pretty tightly balanced right now -- some super advantages balanced by some difficult challenges.

New update 0.30 (works with 0.28 and after)

1. Fixed bug introduced in 0.29: won't assimilate barbarians anymore

Nice :D

I'll get it merged with LENA in the next version. However, I still don't know if I should merge it entirely or suggest it as a module, since it's a pretty radical gameplay change... Hmmm...

Nice :D

I'll get it merged with LENA in the next version. However, I still don't know if I should merge it entirely or suggest it as a module, since it's a pretty radical gameplay change... Hmmm...

gameoption!

i personally think that all newly added things should be also added as gameoptions (( defaultly allowed ))

/me wants gameoptions !! :D

Yes, but it won't be easy for the ElohimGuardians, as they add many promotions to already existing units, a guild, etc...

Yes, but it won't be easy for the ElohimGuardians, as they add many promotions to already existing units, a guild, etc...

i know it's dangerous and it will want to eat you, but i trust in your skills ... :)

No, really, it'd be a PITA to do :(

I say add it in by default. But I'm clearly biased.

People will yell at you though. Even if they don't play Elohim, they'll be mad when the AI Elohim suddenly show up at that sweet UF that they were planning to settle.

Yeah, that's why I'm hesitating.

just started a game with this modmod and i like it very much.
just one problem though, my two starting monks don't automatically level up in the monk promotions. could this be because they are both mutated? before they got mutated it worked fine. i also have one other monk who isn't mutated and it works for him

Opera, I'd say the biggest problem with the mod now is that the AI just doesn't play the part very well. If it spawns at a very far UF, it won't settle (it does a fine job if it spawns at a close UF). I think that the settler/monk try to start the long journey back to the capital and get killed on the way. It used to work in a much earlier version, but I think some of Keal's new AI improvements specifically stop the AI from settling based on distance. I wish there was some leader modifier like BuildDistantCityThreshold. I might even go into the sdk if I thought I could modify this. If the AI won't do it, I was thinking about a python function to force the AI to settle.

I'm not sure Kael added AI improvements as of now. But maybe it depends on the distance maintenance modifier from civics? Like, if the Elohim are using City States, they will most likely settle down even if far away, but if they don't run it, maybe they would not?

I wish it worked that way, but I don't think it does. The Guardians civic gives -100% distance cost (and the Elohim AI does stay with this civic), but AI still not settling at a distance, or at least not most of the time. It either sits there, or starts the long walk back home, or (rarely but sometimes) does settle. I don't know if there is randomness built in or if some other condition is important. I'm tempted to add an auto-settle function just for the AI so that the Elohim will play there proper role even when played by AI. (I have the same complaint for all other civs -- AI Sheiam won't raise the counter, etc.) The irritating thing is that AI used to settle just fine at any distance, but this was a much earlier (never released) version of this mod (I think for FFH 0.23 or thereabouts).

In CvPlayerAI.cpp, in AI_foundValue(), you have this: pNearestCity = GC.getMapINLINE().findCity(iX, iY, ((isBarbarian()) ? NO_PLAYER : getID()));

if (pNearestCity != NULL)
{
if (isBarbarian())
{
iValue -= (std::max(0, (8 - plotDistance(iX, iY, pNearestCity->getX_INLINE(), pNearestCity->getY_INLINE()))) * 200);
}
else
{
int iDistance = plotDistance(iX, iY, pNearestCity->getX_INLINE(), pNearestCity->getY_INLINE());
int iNumCities = getNumCities();
if (iDistance > 5)
{
iValue -= (iDistance - 5) * 500;
}
else if (iDistance < 4)
{
iValue -= (4 - iDistance) * 2000;
}
iValue *= (8 + iNumCities * 4);
iValue /= (2 + (iNumCities * 4) + iDistance);
if (pNearestCity->isCapital())
{
iValue *= 150;
iValue /= 100;
}
else if (getCapitalCity() != NULL)
{
//Provide up to a 50% boost to value (80% for adv.start)
//for city sites which are relatively close to the core
//compared with the most distance city from the core
//(having a boost rather than distance penalty avoids some distortion)

//This is not primarly about maitenance but more about empire
//shape as such forbidden palace/state property are not big deal.
CvCity* pLoopCity;
int iLoop;
int iMaxDistanceFromCapital = 0;

int iCapitalX = getCapitalCity()->getX();
int iCapitalY = getCapitalCity()->getY();

for (pLoopCity = firstCity(&iLoop); pLoopCity != NULL; pLoopCity = nextCity(&iLoop))
{
iMaxDistanceFromCapital = std::max(iMaxDistanceFromCapital, plotDistance(iCapitalX, iCapitalY, pLoopCity->getX_INLINE(), pLoopCity->getY_INLINE()));
}

int iDistanceToCapital = plotDistance(iCapitalX, iCapitalY, iX, iY);

FAssert(iMaxDistanceFromCapital > 0);
iValue *= 100 + (((bAdvancedStart ? 80 : 50) * std::max(0, (iMaxDistanceFromCapital - iDistance))) / iMaxDistanceFromCapital);
iValue /= 100;
}
}
}
else
{
pNearestCity = GC.getMapINLINE().findCity(iX, iY, ((isBarbarian()) ? NO_PLAYER : getID()), ((isBarbarian()) ? NO_TEAM : getTeam()), false);
if (pNearestCity != NULL)
{
int iDistance = plotDistance(iX, iY, pNearestCity->getX_INLINE(), pNearestCity->getY_INLINE());
iValue -= std::min(500 * iDistance, (8000 * iDistance) / GC.getMapINLINE().maxPlotDistance());
}
}Maybe there would something to tweak here. Like, checking the "distance from palace modifier" and ignore this if the modifier is at -90% or lower.

Opera,

I would say to ignore only if distance modifier is <= -100%, so that no other AI is affected even if someone tweaks the civics to -90% modifier. (Guardians civic plus other civics add up to < -100 -- which fortunately doesn't give a distance profit.)

I really don't know how to change this. I assume I'm looking at C++ code that gets compiled into the .dll? I'd probably go crazy tweaking the AI (not just for my mod but base Orbis) if I learned how to work in these files. But I just won't have time in the next few weeks. Is it too big a favor for me to ask you to make this change? If you posted a modified .dll, I'd test it out to see if it gave the desired effect...

Just looking at the code, I'm guessing that the "else" part is for the first city (before there is a NearestCity). The Elohim AI should basically think every settler is settling the first city, so maybe distance modifier <= -100 could always be divert into this part of the code.

Actually, the else part is looking for the nearest city pertaining to the team as opposed to only to the player.

Hmm, the change could be trivial. I may just have to add a check to the whole section I showed above, checking if the player has a distance modifier of -100 or even less.

So the whole point is to generate iValue as a weighting factor? What happens if there is no nearest city (i.e., before you settle the first city)?

In fact, it doesn't generate iValue, it modifies it because it's already defined above the excerpt I give you which is but a tiny one in all the function. But the modifiers it applies to iValue are huge, so scrapping it for a -100% distance modifier may do the trick.

Great! I hope you'll do it. If you post a modified dll for me, I'll test and update.

Here it is.

Bear in mind that any modification to the distance modifier that increase it will invalidate the code. IIRC, there's few civic doing that (God King), but I prefer to let you know.

I hope it will work :)

Awesome. It works wonderfully with Orbis Continent ...the AI will settle near UFs no matter the distance. With multiple land masses, results are a little mixed. On an archipelago map, they are settling on different islands just fine. On a two continent map, they won't seem to settle the second continent (at least in my limited testing). I wonder if there is a separate test for other continent? Anyway, I'm not sure if that is very important. I'm very happy with this, and it should work for all of the Orbis friendly maps (who made those anyway?).

had a great game today with this modmodmod, though I was dissapointed to find I couldn't build Auric ascended, despite having completed all the rituals: ascension wasn't an option... though I did end up with Drifa.

Thanks thomas.berubeg! It's always fun to see what you can and can't build, or shouldn't build even if you can (like Temple of the Gift). I had a Clan city with warrens and several levels of the Alter that was double producing monks, a couple of which I upgraded to the cool looking orc paladins. (I just wish SeZ would get interested in making orc, elf, dwarf and lizardman monks.)

Oh, of course. it was very fun, though not very flavorful: though I ended up with one angelic monk and one Dragon Monk. (both with very high levels) just wandering the map, eating barbs. Well done with this mod.

Awesome. It works wonderfully with Orbis Continent ...the AI will settle near UFs no matter the distance. With multiple land masses, results are a little mixed. On an archipelago map, they are settling on different islands just fine. On a two continent map, they won't seem to settle the second continent (at least in my limited testing). I wonder if there is a separate test for other continent? Anyway, I'm not sure if that is very important. I'm very happy with this, and it should work for all of the Orbis friendly maps (who made those anyway?).I think it has to do with the areas rather than the distance itself. I'll take a look.

I didn't create the mapscripts but I did tweak them to make Kelp, Haunted Lands and Crystal Plains appear on map generation. IIRC, Seven07 made ErebusContinent (but I'm not sure at all).

Edit: BTW, I think I'll include this modification in base Orbis (patch G). Except if it leads to bad things with other civilizations.
Edit2: Now that I think of it, it shouldn't be an issue, at least in the current state of Orbis, since, without being Elohim and having access to their civic, it's basically impossible to get -100% distance modifier.

That would make updating this mod much easier. Thanks.

I'll post your current dll change in the first post for those who want to play against my Elohim.

New update in first post!

I included Opera's modified dll that allows the AI to play the new Elohim properly. The only change is that the AI will settle at great distance from the rest of their empire if they have a -100% distance modifier (which means Elohim only). It has no effect at all if human is playing Elohim.

I'm currently playing a game as Clan to see how hard it is to kill these Guardians.

Nice :)

By the way, I played a game with my new version of LENA and I noticed the Elohim are pretty powerful, thanks to the Peacekeeper trait I guess. "Pretty" as in "OP". I think I'll scratch the :science: bonus.

Probably a good idea. Can you be a little more specific though? Do you think the monks OP? The cities? Are they more OP than Calabim with Governor's mansion, than Clan with warrens? Also, is it OP only in human hands but balanced for the AI?

The Holy Relics are a little much. I was thinking about lessening their effect. Or, I could make the Reliquary still buildable with Philosophy (so you don't get the Holy Relics at a city until you build a Reliquary in that city). I'm hesitant to nerf the monks... I think they are high T3 but not competitive with existing T4 units in late game (you would have to control 14 UFs for them to be more powerful than a paladin with iron).

Hm, sorry, bad phrasing.

I wasn't playing with ElohimGuardians but I thought you might want to know since you imported the Peacekeeper trait. The 30%:science: while at peace they get is very powerful at the beginning even for the AI. In one game, I had the Elohim at 1100 score and the second at ~500.

That may also be an issue for you ;)

Thanks for the clarification. Removing the 30% research sounds fine -- I'll do that in the next version.

Have you started converting this for Leaders yet? If not, I'll try to release a new version tonight. If you have already started, I'll probably wait to do more extensive changes.

No, please do it. I'm waiting Orbis patch G to do anything that is merging :)

OK. I'll probably wait for G also...

This sounds cool! I've been too busy to play much Orbis for the last month and a half but I'm getting back into it and had just started a new game as Elohim. but now I think I will play someone else and do Elohim once patch g comes out!

edit: huh, it looks like patch g just came out yesterday or so. I didn't check. Downloading.

Pazyryk, just a warning: patch H is going to be out soon (like tomorrow or such), so don't update yet. Patch I should be much longer to come though ;)

And do you have any more plans you would like to share here?

Will update on Wed or with patch h, whichever comes later...

Opera, I think I remember that Ahwaric added some kind of counter system for each unit. Is that correct? If so, can you tell me how to access it with python? I'm not doing anything fancy. Just want to help the AI a little by disbanding a settler that doesn't settle after a few turns. (If you play the mod a little, you figure out that sometimes the spawn location is so bad that it is better to disband the settler, which boosts the spawn rate back up again. The AI has part of this right: it will sometimes not settle if the location is very bad. But it doesn't know that the best way to get a new spawn is to disband.)

I've only added a few minor changes, which I'll try to update in the changelog.

Two idea I've though of, but may or may not try to implement:
1. Some sort of defensive promotion (haven't thought of a good name), maybe just +1 defense, that is given to newly spawned monks. Goes away when the settler settles or dies. (just a little help before the city is built)
2. Some sort of pilgrimage promotions, maybe for monks or maybe for all Elohim units. One for each Unique Feature visited (promo graphic and name would make it clear what has been visited, so you don't have to remember). --I thought of this a long time ago, then discarded, then thought about it again, then discarded, then thought about it again...

For the unit counter, just use age. If a settler is more than X turns old, delete him... Could use a pyperturn function. I'd go with 20 turns, normal speed... If the AI hasn't settled him by then it's not going to.

Edit: Actually, make it an autoacquire promo requiring the age, carrying eithe a 'changeunitduration' tag or a pyperturn tag that uses python to kill it. Setting the settlers Duration to 1 would be an easy way to kill it next turn, but it's not a tag I've used before so I'm not sure how well it works.

Valkrionn, what is the python function to access a units age?

The only promotion that currently has any "duration" tags is PROMOTION_TEST at the end of the file. Do this really work? And how do I give a unit a duration in the first place?

I'm not sure the "age" thing is imported in Orbis.

Hmm... If age isn't imported into Orbis, then I'm not sure what you'd be able to do.

Nice :)

By the way, I played a game with my new version of LENA and I noticed the Elohim are pretty powerful, thanks to the Peacekeeper trait I guess. "Pretty" as in "OP". I think I'll scratch the :science: bonus.

... ... what about to make "Pretty" trait ?? :D All units starts with perma Loyality and Courage ... :D

Yeah, I like that. But rename it to Shiny. xD

I actually like that, though x

How about Fluffy?

(apparently I'm a warlord now...)

It'll be another day or so for patch h update. Troubleshooting new features. But I think I have the AI playing this well now, which was one of my big objectives.

New features! Ha! Teaser? Write-up? Something?

And how exactly is the AI? Did the small DLL tweak I did enhance it a lot?

Opera, everything is in changelog in second post, although not all working yet. I haven't added any new toys. Just small adjustments.

My biggest effort is toward AI. This is all only possible after your DLL change. I think now I can entice the AI to settle with UFs in fat cross. I want these guys to be flavorful to play against, ...so your elfish scouts or Dovello beastmen will find them in the empty waists, guarding those holy and unholy places...

Ha, dumb me, I should have checked! Seems good :)

Did you think about adding "Seal" spells to purge evil UFs from their evilness?

I never thought of that, no, but it sounds very fitting. I guess it would be a spell, castable on UF, that removes any bad mana, makes it explored, and has minus effect on AC. Anything else? Maybe it should not be permanent: Elohim have to maintain cultural control of tile, or else the good effects are undone.

And evil Elohim could seal good UFs and unseal bad ones. Mwahahaha...

Did you think about adding "Seal" spells to purge evil UFs from their evilness?

It should be noted that Brandeline's Well (and the other Wells of Creation) are only really evil unique features when they are sealed. The wells of creation are essentially Erebus's natural drainage system for removing the souls of the dead from the realm of the living. When a well is closed, the spirits are still drawn there but they cannot find peace, and so can easily be enslaved by necromancers or seduced by demons. Unless and until Laroth ascends to be God of the Dead, the Elohim would probably try their best to keep the wells open, and reopen those that have been closed.

On the other hand, they might also find it important to guard against what few souls might try to leave the well too though. The laws of the Once Elves demand that anyone or anything that has been to the Otherworld never be allowed to return to Erebus, although as they have been to the Otherworld it seems they have no problem with such people remaining in the liminal world of the well. The Elohim might have similar rules.

Laroth and the mercenary army of Arak the Erkling fled to the Isle of Nemora just before Kylorin rebelled against the corrupt system he had created. (Laroth had read his heart and felt his guilty conscious becoming mroe powerful than his desire for power, so he predicted the rebellion before the emperor had made his decision.) When Kylorin tracked him down he discovered a great Well there, but could not find the archmage or the elves. (They had descended through the Well into the Netherworld, while still alive). Overcome by the beauty of the place, he declared it sacred. It remained unspoiled through all the age of magic and age of ice, until Ceridwen led Tabryn Arbandi here when she resurrected him in the Age of Rebirth. She showed him the runes he needed to seal the well, and he used all his strength to perform the task. (The Archangel Gyra tried to stop him, but failed. It is unclear whether his runes just blocked her from entering Erebus to stop him, or if they closed both ends and left her trapped within the passage. If the latter, then until the well is unsealed there is no one left to lead the forces of Arawn against Laroth, or to fight the undead he abhors.) This destroyed the paradise, causing it to become overrun by restless spirits and making no one nearby able to heal. The Sacred Isle of Nemora became The Deadlands. The fact that Ceridwen ordered it implies that closing the wells of creation may be an important step in destroying the world.

so then it should be unsealing the well instead of sealing it, right?

Wow! I'd really like to hear your ideas, Magister, for spells that could be cast by Elohim on specific UFs. The effects could be big world changing ones (or not). Probably should be only castable where an Elohim city guards over the UF, so the particular ones you can do would vary from game to game.

For killing off settlers after a few turns you can use the duration promotion effects to slap a duration on all settlers belonging to AI Elohim (use onUnitCreated python, not autoacquire). Give them a duration of 20 or so and that is how many turns they auto-delete after. DurationChange can apply a duration to permanent units, DurationAlter can only adjust the duration of a unit which already has one. There might be a small glitch though, I am pretty sure the solution for keeping Black Mirror settlers from making cities was a check for hasCast, but it might be fore getDuration instead (reasonably certain it is based on cast though)

New update 0.33 (will break saves)

This one should have full text now for all of the mod-specific Elohim changes. Please comment or tell me if I missed something.

After a lot of frustration, I've given up (for the moment at least) trying to make the AI settle at distant sites near UFs. So now, AI playing Elohim will insta-settle near UF with monk unit. (Human player still spawns a settler with monk.) Anyway, it is very flavorful to play against, as you will might find them anywhere on the map but always near a UF.


Update to Orbis 24H
[XML] Peacekeeper trait looses +30 research when at peace (following Opera)
[py] Reliquary and Holy Relic change: Reliquary now needs to be built. It has all stats and tech requirement (cost, GP points, unhealth, Way of the Wise, etc.) as in base Orbis, plus it will also provide Holy Relics as I've already modded (i.e., 1 for each owned UF that is nearest to that city). The only other difference is that it is linked to Elohim-specific tech, rather than Elohim unique building, so it is buildable in any Elohim city. I did this partly as a nerf (so you need to tech and build reliquary before the HR bonus) and partly because I liked the original Reliquary text so much that I wanted to keep it. (It still python swaps as before to give different HR bonuses, similar to Khazak vault, but you need to build one in a city first.)
[XML] Many Civpedia text updates throughout
[py,XML] Python code overrides map script for Elohim starting location. Finds best of all map tiles that would have UF in fat cross. Based on tile "found" value with river modifier (x1.3) and distance to other units modifier (for anything closer than 10 tiles)
[py] Spawning occurs at best tile near UF, rather than nearest valid tile. Best is based on found value modified by river (x1.3).
[py] If AI plays Elohim, no settler spawns or starting settler. Instead, a new city is automatically founded in the tile where settler would appear. (I gave up on making the AI settle.)

0.33a, b, c, etc are small tweaks to Elohim starting location. I may update these frequently while I play with this. These won't break saves and won't change anything but starting location.

Nice, Pazyryk :goodjob:

I'll definitely try to play a game against an Elohim AI!
(and I'll definitely convert it to LENA, even if I still don't know if it will be in the main mod or as a module :))

Thanks Pazyryk for this nice Mod, never played the elohim before, thinking they were a little bit boring, but now i cant get enough of them. :goodjob:

Updated to 0.34 (works with 0.33)

The built in getFoundValue function makes no sense to me. It almost seems to prefer non-river, or having lots of sea tiles in a non-coastal city. So I built my own city locator function just for Elohim. Your settler will spawn there (or for AI, will automatically settle there). It works pretty well, if I do say so myself. You will almost always be on a river, if a river tile exists near UF. You will either be on the coast or have few or no sea tiles. It also tries to balance short term needs (a few tiles with very good food) with long terms needs (many tiles with much potential). Keep in mind that the UF is determined randomly, then best tile found, so the location might still suck if all sites with UF in fat cross suck. Let me know what you think.


I hated the city found function (for locating ideal city placement) so I built my own (only effects Elohim)
Fixed a couple potential out of range errors (reading off the map boundary)


Edit: Opera, this only changes CustomFunctions from 0.33 (in case you started merging)

copmatible with LENA, yet? or not?

Not yet ;)

Not yet ;)

The sooner the better imo!

Just a quick post to say thanks for this mod. I've played a couple of Elohim games now, and really, really enjoyed them. It's definitely a unique way to manage gameplay along with lore... the Elohim end up strongly disincented to keep conquered "useless cities" (read as: nowhere near a UF), unless those cities are needed as a cultural or other strategic buffer.

The monks and their progression are a lot of fun as well. Especially in the early game, they are a precious commodity, you only get the ones who were escorting settlers, and you won't be able to replace them until far off Monasticism. When you do get Monasticism, everyone and their brother should get their couple of levels of Monk training, again, it's a very fun thing once you get it, kind of like how Amurites need to survive until Sorcery or how Calabim await their key tech of Feudalism. For just a tiny bit of flavour, I find myself in the habit of naming Monks to remember why I got them, where they came from etc., stuff like "Order of the Mirror", "Order of the Tree", "Order of the Gate" if I had cities guarding the Mirror of Heave, Yggdrasil and Gate to the Underdark, respectively. It also helps remind me when I see combat messages between turns like "Your Order of the Pyre has killed a Barbarian Goblin!", I sure know where to look on the map to determine if any planning etc. is required.

Again, thanks, this is a lot of fun and flavour, good job!

Thanks Brokenbone! I'm quite proud of it.

I always name my higher level monks from a page of Myanmar monk names http://web.ukonline.co.uk/buddhism/namedata.htm. I even thought it might be cool to code this in, so at some level (maybe 7 or so), if you have not named your monk already, it automatically gets a name: Brother Abhayalankara, Brother Adiccavamsa, etc. Perhaps too Eastern sounding for Elohim, but I like them. (There are girl names too but that might seem a little odd with the shirtless monk models.)

Your names (Order of the Tree, Order of the Gate, etc.) gives me another idea though. These could be different initial promotions given to monks (or maybe any Elohim unit) based on the UF where they spawn or are built. These could each give some minor boost that is appropriate to the Order.

Yeah, I don't think those names sounds really Elohim :)

Yeah, but it isn't any more fitting to give them European monk names. I always thought of them as sort of transcending ethnicity. Maybe best to avoid the naming thing entirely.

Create their names ;)

I would need some help from a qualified anthroponomastician.

<SNIP>

Your names (Order of the Tree, Order of the Gate, etc.) gives me another idea though. These could be different initial promotions given to monks (or maybe any Elohim unit) based on the UF where they spawn or are built. These could each give some minor boost that is appropriate to the Order.

That sounds interesting too, but free promotions might be a little much... unless it was in exchange for something else, or gained through some other unique mechanic, like a monk visiting the site and casting a spell on that tile (maybe with a gold cost, like when you get a battering ram or whatever). Stand on Yggdrasil, pay 10 gold, and get Woodsman I. Stand on Bradeline's Well, pay 10 gold, and get Stigmata. Stand on Tower of Eyes, pay 10 gold and get... Crazed? Well, maybe that one would be a bad deal.

I'm sure I saw some modmod recently for FFH about "militia" systems where units in cities near hills and forests get a chance of a free woodsman or guerilla promotion, maybe if there was only a chance of that type of thing, that would be flavour aplenty as well (build a unit near the Mirror of Heaven, surprise, this one had a free Sentry I, though most other units built there didn't).

Again though, good and flavourful work, cheers!

Ran two games as the revamped Elohim and the civ is super awesome. My only problem is that monks are unstoppable killing machines.

Once you get your second city down for +2 affinity and hit level 7 or so, there really isn't much of anything in lairs that can hurt you, so you can just keep ruins/lair diving. You get the adventurer promotion after a few and from there, it's just raking in the money/items and particularly the XP to easily get yourself to level 15. It's hard to not just conquer everybody when your monk has a 9-15 first strikes and 11 strength to roll over cities without ever losing a health point. I actually killed Archeron the first shot -- had a 40% success chance and 60% withdraw...why not? I really like the promotions, but the potency and the rate you can get them is pretty extreme. I never managed to actually get monasticism researched in either game before I won.

Also, Thessalonica is probably the most badass leader ever. The second game got me Organized, Defender, Tolerant, Spiritual, Ingenuity, Raiders. ;)

Please add into LENA, Opera.

Please add into LENA, Opera.I will. Not now though. Will take some more time.

I definitely did the Thessalonica thing as well, and while my techs tend to get me offered the Spiritual trait (for founding a religion), I usually wait, since Spiritual comes for free after some certain number of UFs are either checked out or controlled, I'm not sure which.

However, I haven't used Monks for lair-diving much. Until Monasticism, they're kind of a precious commodity, and since your cities have a chance of being in the middle of nowhere with no way for reinforcements from your other cities to come help in the event of emergency, playing it safe by keeping a super-unit fairly near home has been my style. I thought the -50% city attack business was "enough" as well in terms of specializing monks in their roles, having them running around the bush fighting barbarians and whatnot, again, didn't feel like the best use of the asset... although it's still probably better than being fortified for twenty turns at a time! :)

Ran two games as the revamped Elohim and the civ is super awesome. My only problem is that monks are unstoppable killing machines.

Once you get your second city down for +2 affinity and hit level 7 or so, there really isn't much of anything in lairs that can hurt you, so you can just keep ruins/lair diving. You get the adventurer promotion after a few and from there, it's just raking in the money/items and particularly the XP to easily get yourself to level 15. It's hard to not just conquer everybody when your monk has a 9-15 first strikes and 11 strength to roll over cities without ever losing a health point. I actually killed Archeron the first shot -- had a 40% success chance and 60% withdraw...why not? I really like the promotions, but the potency and the rate you can get them is pretty extreme. I never managed to actually get monasticism researched in either game before I won.

Also, Thessalonica is probably the most badass leader ever. The second game got me Organized, Defender, Tolerant, Spiritual, Ingenuity, Raiders. ;)

I thought the -50% city attack business was "enough" as well in terms of specializing monks in their roles, having them running around the bush fighting barbarians and whatnot, again, didn't feel like the best use of the asset... although it's still probably better than being fortified for twenty turns at a time! :)
I'm really into the sidar at the moment, so I have a tendency to level units out of habit. The palisade+palace defender+drill warrior is far more than enough to hold your first city through anything the first 130 turns or so can throw at you.

I got fairly lucky with early settler pops on the two games with one at turn 50ish and one at turn 5, so once I see 5 :strength:, it's on. Drill em up and kill everything. The diving thing was sort of an accident. I just noticed that one of my monks were immune to most things that ruin my lair busters, so I figured why not?

I will. Not now though. Will take some more time.

Thank you.

greyrest,

I haven't been successful with one of the early monks yet. I either play cautiously until monasticism, or I loose the three or four early monks to bears or failed 98% odds combats. I can see how you might have a "runaway" high level unit (with a little luck early on) but this is possible with other civs/units/heroes too. You can certainly steamroll once you get monasticism, although at that point an Altar victory might be less bother. I tried to counter the OP of high level monks with the high cost (240), along with the high cost of getting monasticism. I'm sure they are less powerful than most T4 units, unless you control maybe > 10 UFs. Yes the 15th level ones are as good as a T4 but these should be rare (I've never had one in a real game). I personally think they are less OP than, say, Calabim with Feudalism (which is much earlier than monasticism), Clan with warrens, etc, but perhaps stronger now than any other good civ. Any balancing suggestions are welcome.

Pazyryk, could I pretty please merge this into Fallen Ages?

Its a mod for RiFE that lets you play through the ages of erebus. Even if it isn't released yet (hopefully soon), I think that your mod will make the Elohim much better. =]

Sorry lemonjelly, I'm not going to merge into any other mods. I really want to update this to Orbis 24M, but even that is daunting for me now (just too much real world work at the moment).

Actually, lemonjelly was asking if HE could merge it into HIS mod. ;)

Basically, a modder actually asking permission BEFORE he merges your work, instead of informing you after the fact like is usually the case. :lol: (Yeah yeah, I do it too, I know... At least I tend to ask about major things [Mechanos] :mischief:)

Ah! Thanks! I should have actually read the question. You have my permission. (Retroactively if necessary.)

Ahh, thanks =]

I just wanted to check before I added stuff in, after all, it is your creation. =]
Glad to see that you're letting me put this in, I'm sure it will make the Elohim very enjoyable. =]

Cool concept.