General A New Dawn discussion

I'm pretty new to this mod (just about a quarter of the way through my first game). What do you all think about leader trait balance? Are there any traits that are notably powerful or weak? For example, in vanilla BtS, Protective is largely considered the least useful leader trait, while Financial is almost too good. In this mod, Protective leaders get quite a few cheap buildings, most of which have additional effects besides a defensive bonus. Financial seems to be quite a bit weaker, as its effect kicks in on 5 (?) commerce tiles instead of those that produce at least 2. I am correct in assuming these two traits are pretty much on-par with the rest of them now?

Zach said:

I'm pretty new to this mod (just about a quarter of the way through my first game). What do you all think about leader trait balance? Are there any traits that are notably powerful or weak? For example, in vanilla BtS, Protective is largely considered the least useful leader trait, while Financial is almost too good. In this mod, Protective leaders get quite a few cheap buildings, most of which have additional effects besides a defensive bonus. Financial seems to be quite a bit weaker, as its effect kicks in on 5 (?) commerce tiles instead of those that produce at least 2. I am correct in assuming these two traits are pretty much on-par with the rest of them now?

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I know Financial doesn't seem nearly as spectacular as it does in regular BTS; there's a lot more gold, so it's easier to run an economy, although in my most recent game, I wound up actually using the slider (sometimes I can run 100% science in the end game without losing any money). Spiritual is a lot more powerful with the extra civics and opportunities to change coming along more often.

V705 release

Does anyone have any idea why the GG's in captured cities slowly fade away(disappear)?

Oh yeah, that's happened to me as well, but V 715, upgraded from 705.

I didn't worry too much about it as I'm playing a high to low game, and rely on Great Generals and 2 Great Commanders.

I had 5 in 1 city and 3 in anther completely dissapear. Both from Dead AI's.

Whew!, I thought I was seeing things.

Can anyone explain to me how inflation works? I play with Advanced Economy (I don't know if these are related though).

I'm trying to make a type of calculator which gets all civics you are using and add together all separated info.

So my doubt came when I saw a No inflation civic. What's the difference between positive, negative, no inflation and lack of inflation info?

OBS.: I checked my game and my inflation is 0. I'm using +5% from monarchy and -10% from slavery, so it seems negative inflation corrects the accumulation of inflation, instead of just slowing the increase.

Well, I have another question, if anyone can answer this too:

There are few civics which give +1 military support cost.

Many may not know this so I'll explain what I could gather about this mechanic:

There are 2 types of support cost, Unit Support cost and Military Unit Support cost.

The Unit Support cost follows this: There is a number of free units based on difficulty and your total population. You may get events or civics which give you free units, that add to this value. All the units pass this value start costing 1 gold every turn (if you don't play on deity there is also a handicap which reduces this cost in %, e.g. in easier difficulties you may cut in half this additional cost).

This means for every unit (any unit, including GPs, GGens, workers, settlers, land units, ships, airplanes, etc.) you have above the limit of free units is counted and 1 gold is added to the expenses of your empire.

The military unit support cost works differently. It has the same mechanic of a number of free units, in this case free military units, which don't count toward the expenses. Any military unit (which doesn't include non military units) above this minimum is counted and gives an extra 1 gold cost per unit (again with easier difficulties' handicap) to your expenses.

But this only is active (at least in vanilla BtS, and in LoR too) if you have a civic which has the +1 military unit support cost. Even when this tab in the Financial advisor says: Military Support Cost for 80 units (free support for 40) and you don't have the +1 military unit support cost civic option, this tab will be totalizing 0 expense to you. The numbers are just there because they are always calculated, but only taken in effect if you have the civic option enabled.

Which makes me think Monarchy (which has +1 support cost for military units) surely benefits a lot from Standing Army (which gives + a lot of free military units). But when you are not using any civic with this (which I think are only Monarchy, Paradise and Pacifism), the bonus from Standing Army seems useless, and you would surely opt for another military option.


Or, and here the question finally comes: There are special units which give extra support cost (e.g. Tank). As I never reached as late as the first unit of this kind in the game I'm not sure, so that's why I ask:

Those units which have the extra support cost, this cost is added to the Military Unit Support Cost or not? So if I use Standing Army, will the + a lot free military units be filled with this extra unit cost?

So if I use Standing Army and no +1 military unit support cost civics, my Tanks will only start costing when the total extra I have to pay for them exceeds the limit of free military units given by Standing Army and other factors?

I know there are three questions, but it's actually only one, I just wanted to be sure you understand my question.

Because if this extra cost is added separately, in a way you can't counter it, Standing Army and other + free military units options are useless if you don't use a civic which gives +1 Military unit support cost.

Spirictum said:

But this only is active (at least in vanilla BtS, and in LoR too) if you have a civic which has the +1 military unit support cost. Even when this tab in the Financial advisor says: Military Support Cost for 80 units (free support for 40) and you don't have the +1 military unit support cost civic option, this tab will be totalizing 0 expense to you. The numbers are just there because they are always calculated, but only taken in effect if you have the civic option enabled.

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I am pretty sure this is wrong, and you always get charged support for units past your free military units support count. The +1 essentially doubles the support costs.

Afforess said:

I am pretty sure this is wrong, and you always get charged support for units past your free military units support count. The +1 essentially doubles the support costs.

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This is using Monarchy (which gives +1 military unit support cost)


This is after I changed to Republic (no anarchy as I'm on a Golden Age)

I guess it was like I said

"Close Friends" what? I gifted contact with Shaka to Churchill and then without even closing the window asked if he'd declare war or stop trading with him, and without even a single turn passing they're his friends!?

Sometimes I hate the peaceful "Love everybody" AIs

Rezca said:

"Close Friends" what? I gifted contact with Shaka to Churchill and then without even closing the window asked if he'd declare war or stop trading with him, and without even a single turn passing they're his friends!?

Sometimes I hate the peaceful "Love everybody" AIs

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It uses the same threshold as the embargo option, since stop trading with is embargo + more. Churchill is among only a few AI's that will not stop trading unless they are annoyed. Most are cautious or pleased. Feel free to argue to change it, I am uncertain whether it hurts or helps them more.

It's StopTradingThemRefuseAttitudeThreshold in LeaderHeadInfos.xml

Afforess said:

It uses the same threshold as the embargo option, since stop trading with is embargo + more. Churchill is among only a few AI's that will not stop trading unless they are annoyed. Most are cautious or pleased. Feel free to argue to change it, I am uncertain whether it hurts or helps them more.

It's StopTradingThemRefuseAttitudeThreshold in LeaderHeadInfos.xml

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Ahh I see.


The only time I truly hate the peaceful AIs is when the game is full of 'em. Makes everything so boring

What does the message For reasons of their own, [some civ] has introduced us to ambassadors from [unmet civ] mean? Not playing with Revolutions, but BarbarianCiv is turned on. Also, is there something that causes this message to appear, or is it just random?

Zach said:

What does the message For reasons of their own, [some civ] has introduced us to ambassadors from [unmet civ] mean? Not playing with Revolutions, but BarbarianCiv is turned on. Also, is there something that causes this message to appear, or is it just random?

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It's fairly normal. You know how you can trade contacts in the diplomacy screen? The AI can trade contacts too. They can even trade contact with you to another AI that has not met you.

When an AI trades contact with you to an AI that has not met you, a message like that appears.

Afforess said:

It's fairly normal. You know how you can trade contacts in the diplomacy screen? The AI can trade contacts too. They can even trade contact with you to another AI that has not met you.

When an AI trades contact with you to an AI that has not met you, a message like that appears.

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I've seen them do it out of spite before too, just to make a rival of theirs mad

Or... Would that be intentionally trading with a rival of mine? Not sure, but the message kinda seemed like they were trying to intentionally make someone mad by trading the contact to me

Honestly,
Does anyone know about what I asked? In a mod full of civics with less military unit support cost, has any modder considered if this was a good option?

I mean, if the extra cost doesn't count for the Military Unit Support Cost tab, it's useles to run any combination of civics which give a discount in military unit cost and doesn't give a +1 military unit support cost.

So some combos should be avoided like Fascism + Nationalist + Standing Army and not Paradise, but if you change it to the famous Pafacism (Fascism + Pacifism) or Parafascism (Paradise + Fascism) or even both together (Fascism + Pacifism + Paradise) then you may truly enjoy the free military unit support cost. Also any other combo without Monarchy, Pacifism or Paradise and with Standing Army, Conscription, Fascism, Intolerance and to a lesser extent (because there are lots of bonuses and few military support cost discount in these civics) Nationalist, Prophets, Communalism and Vassalage is not using the free military unit support cost.

Unless the + of special units is counted in the military unit support cost, then it'll make sense.

Spirictum said:

Honestly,
Does anyone know about what I asked? In a mod full of civics with less military unit support cost, has any modder considered if this was a good option?

I mean, if the extra cost doesn't count for the Military Unit Support Cost tab, it's useles to run any combination of civics which give a discount in military unit cost and doesn't give a +1 military unit support cost.

So some combos should be avoided like Fascism + Nationalist + Standing Army and not Paradise, but if you change it to the famous Pafacism (Fascism + Pacifism) or Parafascism (Paradise + Fascism) or even both together (Fascism + Pacifism + Paradise) then you may truly enjoy the free military unit support cost. Also any other combo without Monarchy, Pacifism or Paradise and with Standing Army, Conscription, Fascism, Intolerance and to a lesser extent (because there are lots of bonuses and few military support cost discount in these civics) Nationalist, Prophets, Communalism and Vassalage is not using the free military unit support cost.

Unless the + of special units is counted in the military unit support cost, then it'll make sense.

Click to expand...

The code seems to verify your claims, incredible as they seem. I never knew about that, it is never explained. The free military support civic text should not displayed if it is not relevant IMO.

Zach said:

I'm pretty new to this mod (just about a quarter of the way through my first game). What do you all think about leader trait balance? Are there any traits that are notably powerful or weak? For example, in vanilla BtS, Protective is largely considered the least useful leader trait, while Financial is almost too good. In this mod, Protective leaders get quite a few cheap buildings, most of which have additional effects besides a defensive bonus. Financial seems to be quite a bit weaker, as its effect kicks in on 5 (?) commerce tiles instead of those that produce at least 2. I am correct in assuming these two traits are pretty much on-par with the rest of them now?

Click to expand...

I customize the traits to balance them. Industrious is overpowered imo, +50% wonder production is far too much, particularly since it includes national wonders. +35% is plenty (still very stong imo). Deceiver and Humanitarian are probably the weakest, +2 is ok if your playing on a huge map otherwise its very weak. Nomad is deceptively strong, at least it used to be, now that horses are changed and with them so to has the withdrawal promotion(s) im unsure. Seafaring is a bit weak, religious got changed to max 1 turn of anarchy (from 0 in orginal) and its still very strong imo. Organized is pretty weak but 50% faster factories kinda makes up for it. Agricultural is one of my favourites and is quite strong. Scientific is strong too.

All in all it depends heavily on your settings, certain traits are stronger on slower game speeds, some on bigger maps. For example - religious is much better on very slow game speeds and espionage very bad on tiny maps. Philosophical is better on slower game speeds, so too is imperialistic. Hope this helps.

Interrupting for a brief moment my part in that discussion about Military Maintenance cost, take a look at this:



This one is a small problem I have seen before but finally I could get a conclusion. Indeed it decreases science, it doesn't increase. I thought the display was wrong, but as soon as I built it I lost 1 in my city. I'm pretty sure it was right in previous versions, because I saw once it giving +x.xx and now it gives -x.xx.


Now, are you prepared?



Now this is totally gamebreaking. What surprises me is me and my friend tried a previous blitz duel and this didn't happen with the AI. On this game OTOH, the AI got not only 1, but 3 units like this (both others are axemen).

I know it's a lot bizarre, and many may get suspicious as if I WBuilt it. Well, as far as I'm concerned, MP games can't use worldbuilder, so if you want I may post the savefile here for you to see it is a MP game (I only play MP games, even if it's just me).

It's a shame we removed Take over AI option, so we can't see if it has enough XP for these ups.

This is a Blitz, Duel, Mongoose, Low Sea Level, start anywhere, 2 starting players, all default options including Revolution, Require Complete Kills, Permanent Alliances, Start as Minors, Early Buildings, No Tech Brokering, Barb World.

This should go to a "OMG Look What Happened in RoM-AND"

Spirictum said:

Interrupting for a brief moment my part in that discussion about Military Maintenance cost, take a look at this:

Spoiler :

This one is a small problem I have seen before but finally I could get a conclusion. Indeed it decreases science, it doesn't increase. I thought the display was wrong, but as soon as I built it I lost 1 in my city. I'm pretty sure it was right in previous versions, because I saw once it giving +x.xx and now it gives -x.xx.


Now, are you prepared?

Spoiler :

Now this is totally gamebreaking. What surprises me is me and my friend tried a previous blitz duel and this didn't happen with the AI. On this game OTOH, the AI got not only 1, but 3 units like this (both others are axemen).

I know it's a lot bizarre, and many may get suspicious as if I WBuilt it. Well, as far as I'm concerned, MP games can't use worldbuilder, so if you want I may post the savefile here for you to see it is a MP game (I only play MP games, even if it's just me).

It's a shame we removed Take over AI option, so we can't see if it has enough XP for these ups.

This is a Blitz, Duel, Mongoose, Low Sea Level, start anywhere, 2 starting players, all default options including Revolution, Require Complete Kills, Permanent Alliances, Start as Minors, Early Buildings, No Tech Brokering, Barb World.

This should go to a "OMG Look What Happened in RoM-AND"

Click to expand...

Pretty sure these are not bugs.
I need to check but I suppose the negative science is due to a building replacing some other building that will eventually go obsolete. As for promotions, that depends on you not clearing your ini file between different revisions so accidentally you've activated Unlimited XP which is a hidden and off by default option imported from C2C.