Dawn of Civilization - an RFC modmod by Leoreth

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Thanks for the nice words :)

Thanks! The idea behind them was to make them best suited for war, in practice, while keeping the Barracks' happiness. The techs stayed the same, even though I've personally always wanted to run a fascist society in the 1700's. Guess the most reasonable answer's to employ more scientists.
More scientists is always a good idea ;)
Another question: does Aristocracy still have +50% GG emergence, too?
 
Would it? Some of the log entries of later versions refer to the fix or extension of previous changes, so the whole thing could end up rather confusing.

I'm looking forward to release an arbitrarily "final" version (maybe before I start trying to add new civs) with one changelog, that documents all features of the current modmod compared to standard RFC.
 
Just about the only thing I don't like about this mod is making some Wonders require a religion as a pre-requisite to be built.

This makes it practically impossible for certain Civs to build certain Wonders -- can Persia realistically beat China to Calendar? (On Emperor level?!) Yet it's a common strategy for Persia to pursue the Great Wall to be able to defend itself against Barbarians over its overstretched length.

In the balance of realism vs. gameplay, it seems a shame to lose that kind of option.

Random idea: you could have a National Wonder, Limes, that provides a temporary bonus against barbarians.
 
Just about the only thing I don't like about this mod is making some Wonders require a religion as a pre-requisite to be built.

This makes it practically impossible for certain Civs to build certain Wonders -- can Persia realistically beat China to Calendar? (On Emperor level?!) Yet it's a common strategy for Persia to pursue the Great Wall to be able to defend itself against Barbarians over its overstretched length.

In the balance of realism vs. gameplay, it seems a shame to lose that kind of option.

Random idea: you could have a National Wonder, Limes, that provides a temporary bonus against barbarians.
Realism vs. gameplay is always is difficile question. I was thinking hard about making the Great Wall explicitly Taoist (it's technically not related to Chinese culture or religion, as every civilization could come up with a great wall in theory).

It's just that ... I didn't like how Rome's and Persia's (and many other civ's) strategies made it mandatory. I admit that my first UHVs with both also utilized the GW, but even then it felt like a cheap cop-out. I think it fits history better to actually battle the invading barbarian hordes than locking them out.

If certain civs have become to difficult because of that (Persia may get in additional trouble during their race to 8%, I admit), I still can go and try to balance it otherwise.

I have a suggestion for a new Gustav Adolph leaderhead: Maurits van Nassau. With small changes like removing his collar and Hollandische cap he would be perfect for the role.
I like the Maurits van Nassau LH very much. It's a pity he's too close to Willem van Oranje to be used in the game. But why do you think our current Gustav Aldolph needs to be replaced?
 
It's just that ... I didn't like how Rome's and Persia's (and many other civ's) strategies made it mandatory. I admit that my first UHVs with both also utilized the GW, but even then it felt like a cheap cop-out. I think it fits history better to actually battle the invading barbarian hordes than locking them out.

I think that the best approach here is to change the marble resource in Southeast China to a stone. This will make it considerably easier for China to get the Great Wall, while also making it less likely that they build marble-based Western wonders.

Most importantly, this keeps things more flexible -- it doesn't strip players of options entirely, it just makes the competition a little tougher.
 
If certain civs have become to difficult because of that (Persia may get in additional trouble during their race to 8%, I admit), I still can go and try to balance it otherwise.

Some modders have set the Great Wall's prerequirement be 4 or more constructed Walls. Maybe that's an idea to consider? The Chinese have a relatively quick source of Stone and plenty settlable land.

I like the Maurits van Nassau LH very much. It's a pity he's too close to Willem van Oranje to be used in the game. But why do you think our current Gustav Aldolph needs to be replaced?

Oh, I meant that van Nassau's LH's graphics could be used to better Gustav's appearance. Don't you think his face looks rather odd?

Another question: does Aristocracy still have +50% GG emergence, too?

Of course not. I'm running +50% worker speed rate there. The negative down-effect of that is that by the time the Americans settle, Russia's vast woodlands have been stripped bare. :x
 
In FtH, farms give +1 :commerce: for the Aristocracy civic... could be an idea.
 
In FtH, farms give +1 :commerce: for the Aristocracy civic... could be an idea.

Ehrm, I suggest that you read the thread in its entirety before addressing any ideas. The Chinese Marble has already been turned into stone as well as the +1:commerce: from Farms been tested. The reason the latter was dropped was because the AI ignored cottages entirely then.
 
I apologise, I did read through it, I must have just missed it or misremembered it....

Does the AI really ignore cottages altogether? Even if the bonus is only available for one Civic?
 
As long as they're running the civic, they continue to ignore the cottages' ability to grow. Given how huge a role aristocracy has had in history as a society civic, it's unlikely that there'll be an alternative until Liberalism (1600's usually).

While it's true that urbanization has been a rather recent phenomenon in history, it really hurts Europe (namely France and Russia) to farm any flatlands they can find, enlargening the cities' sizes, maintenance costs and unhappiness to no end, just because they give the temporary +1:commerce:. Even if the effect was moved to another civic, the result would stay the same. (No foreign cottages, hamlets, towns or villages until Liberalist era. Not much reason to run Republic, either.)

It's a shame too, because Russia really needs that +1:commerce: from farms.
 
Some modders have set the Great Wall's prerequirement be 4 or more constructed Walls. Maybe that's an idea to consider? The Chinese have a relatively quick source of Stone and plenty settlable land.
That's at least worth some test games :)

Oh, I meant that van Nassau's LH's graphics could be used to better Gustav's appearance. Don't you think his face looks rather odd?
Yes, a little. But I always figured the real Gustav's did, either :lol:

Of course not. I'm running +50% worker speed rate there. The negative down-effect of that is that by the time the Americans settle, Russia's vast woodlands have been stripped bare. :x
Thought about that, too, with similar results. Aristocracy and Theocracy are both civics that keep me up at night sometimes ...

Does the AI really ignore cottages altogether? Even if the bonus is only available for one Civic?
No, not altogether. But farms made up the vast majority of Europe's land in 1776. I think the problem with it is, that even though it's just one civic, you're running Aristocracy quite long (at least until Liberalism), so everything will be farms. Then you get the alternative of Capitalism, but you have no towns to benefit from it, so Aristocracy still looks better in the AI's eye.

It's no problem to bring up things here repeatedly, by the way. I often forget what was written here (even by me). Sometimes a good idea gets buried undeservedly.
 
In other words, the AI can't anticipate the future benefits of switching to towns/Capitalism so sticks to farms/Aristocracy with hypothetical +1 :commerce: far too long. Have I got that right?

Poo. Anybody tried to do an AI "hotfix"? Even if it's just to start replacing farms with cottages at some hard-coded point along the Education -> Liberalism branch...
 
In other words, the AI can't anticipate the future benefits of switching to towns/Capitalism so sticks to farms/Aristocracy with hypothetical +1 :commerce: far too long. Have I got that right?

Yes, quite so. It's like expecting a super computer to understand information in any other form besides 0's and 1's.

Poo. Anybody tried to do an AI "hotfix"? Even if it's just to start replacing farms with cottages at some hard-coded point along the Education -> Liberalism branch...

Maybe there's an easy solution for this. Just give cottages and hamlets a Printing Press-esque +1:commerce: bonus that Villages and Towns are currently enjoying.
(Just hope that extra commerce won't screw the tech-rates.)
 
Here's an alternative idea. You give each Civ a preferential/historic Wonder, and for that Civ, the Wonder can be built one tech earlier in the tree than other Civs.

f.e.g. China & Rome can build the Great Wall & Colleseum, respectively, at Mathematics, while the Bablyonians can build the Hanging Gardens at Writing (which, incidentally, would actually mean the possibility of seeing the Hanging Gardens in Babylon (!)).

Such preferential Wonders might make some UHV objectives too easy, but in terms of game balance, I think it's generally easier to make things too easy and then work to make them harder than the other way around.
 
Maybe there's an easy solution for this. Just give cottages and hamlets a Printing Press-esque +1:commerce: bonus that Villages and Towns are currently enjoying.

That's a cool idea!
 
Here's an alternative idea. You give each Civ a preferential/historic Wonder, and for that Civ, the Wonder can be built one tech earlier in the tree than other Civs.

Very easy to do, just make those wonders new "unique buildings" but it would be a messy procedure. I always liked Hanging Gardens allowed with Pottery and Masonry. In regular RFC, that guaranteed either Egypt or Babylon builds it.

For other wonders, just pick prerequirement techs that the corresponding civilizations are more likely to research. In Mausoleum of Maussullos' case, add Alphabet as a secondary requirement. Boom, it shifts automatically to Persia-Mediterranean area. Tested many times.
 
For the farms commerce issue: I really have no idea how to fiddle with the AI, and I better keep my hands off it. While commerce for lower cottage tiers is a good idea (I used the same solution for mercantilism to make cottages worthwhile compared to workshops), I fear it'll make too much commerce overall, even if it was tied to the Aristocracy civics.

Very easy to do, just make those wonders new "unique buildings" but it would be a messy procedure. I always liked Hanging Gardens allowed with Pottery and Masonry. In regular RFC, that guaranteed either Egypt or Babylon builds it.

For other wonders, just pick prerequirement techs that the corresponding civilizations are more likely to research. In Mausoleum of Maussullos' case, add Alphabet as a secondary requirement. Boom, it shifts automatically to Persia-Mediterranean area. Tested many times.
I like that very much. Do you have more experiences for other wonders?

Because I'd really like to save me the trouble of adding fifty new unique buildings, although the "unique wonders" idea is quite good in concept.
 
I like that very much. Do you have more experiences for other wonders?

Because I'd really like to save me the trouble of adding fifty new unique buildings, although the "unique wonders" idea is quite good in concept.

I used to have a whole list of these... I'll see how many of them I can find, some are less tested than the others.
Spoiler :
The Hanging Gardens - Masonry, Pottery
Mausoleum of Maussullos - Alphabet, Calendar
Temple of Kukulkan - Code of Laws, Calendar
Shwedagon Paya - Aesthetics, Priesthood

Notre Dame - Engineering, Aesthetics
The Sistine Chapel - Theology, Music
The Statue of Liberty - Democracy, Steel/Liberalism (coast)
The Eiffel Tower - Radio, Steel


I also lessened the Colosseum's military production modifier from +50% to +25%.
 
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