- Thread starter Rob (R8XFT)
- Start date
turingmachine
Emperor
- Joined
- May 4, 2008
- Messages
- 1,438
You don't need to register for the download site.
Otherwise, the file is probably just too big. Most personal or instant download sites have a file size limit and download queues are standard fare on any free site willing to host such big files.
The upload is a test version. I'm happy with Atomic Gamer - you don't need to register to download and it's your choice as to whether or not you want to wait for the download.
This is my favorite mod, congrats on such an awesome work.
Thank-you!!
There's a new player in town, coming to you in version 12 (which should be available around Easter): Pheidon of Argos. Thanks to Firebug for the map and civ icon.
Pheidon of Argos
Natan35
Mayor of St. Natansburg
The mod is amazing!
I think I found some bugs though:
while fighting vs. Barbarians, the approximate damage calculation seems to be way off. Its always wrong by about 6-8 points. Can you check that please?
I think I found some bugs though:
while fighting vs. Barbarians, the approximate damage calculation seems to be way off. Its always wrong by about 6-8 points. Can you check that please?
I've no idea how to check that Natan. It's not been changed from the normal game though.
Natan35
Mayor of St. Natansburg
Well, it might be the honor bonus not working, or something specific to my current game.
great mod anyways.
great mod anyways.
Unedjis
Warlord
- Joined
- Dec 9, 2014
- Messages
- 148
Sooo I handed in my thesis, so now I got time for Anno Domini again. I started a game as Nubia (with my modified UA, which is now working - thanks FA! Apparently starting a new game is a requirement for trait changes to be applied), and so far it's working great. The difference to last playthrough is that this time, I'll try to fix bugs/oversights on the fly if that's possible through simple XML modifications that do not require starting a new game (such as adjusting unit strengths and building yields).
So here are my findings so far:
The potential Great Granary bug made me aware once again that the Health system is not at all transparent. Sometimes changed values seem to show up only after loading a saved game, and the actual effect that Health has on the probability of a city getting the plague is not really clear either. Yes, there are rough risk estimates (from Extreme to None), but still it seems very random which cities generate plagues. And if one near your empire gets hit, even your healthiest cities are extremely likely to catch it. SO what I'm saying is, it would be awesome if there was some sort of breakdown of the numbers could be included either in the Civilopedia or on the website. How do tile improvements influence Health (I seem to be noticing that building farms on flood plains eliminates their negative health, but I'm not sure)? Does health from features (flood plains, marsh, forest) only apply when these tiles are worked, or is it universal as soon as they are within the city radius (seems like the latter because a size 1 city built on flood plains still gets the -health from all flood plain tiles in its radius)? How does population figure into this (starts at -5 on size 1 and now it's -8 on size 15), what are the exact effects of (lack of) fresh water? Stuff like that ...
The same goes for the Events and Decisions mod, that either wasn't included in earlier versions or I just noticed for the first time this playthrough. I absolutely love it, but I do not really understand how Magistrates are generated and figure into this. There is one building that generates them, but I can't build that yet, so where did the initial magistrates necessary for the first two decisions (Taxes and Panem et Circenses) come from? Magistrates don't seem to show up in the Strategic Resource summary although they are listed by the IGE as one (and you can theoretically even put them on water tiles; not sure if you could harvest them with a work boat xD). So, if I have the option to make a decision, am I good to go or should I maybe reconsider because there is only a limited number of magistrates that can be generated through the game, so I don't want to waste them on sort-of-but-not-really-great decisions?
Lastly, I have a suggestion to make that I tried to change myself but failed (so far). The Health policy tree still seems pretty weak in comparison to others (apart from the Ceremony tree, which has an equally underwhelming final policy), so I wanted to spice it up a little by changing the final policy before the finisher (Medics, which halves production cost for Hospitals and Medics) by adding a +1 Culture modifier for all medicine-related buildings (i.e. Apothecaries, Barbers, Herbalists, Hospitals, and Medics but not the Grove and the Aqueduct). [My reasoning is that this now very powerful policy has all other policies of the tree as prerequisites, and functions sort of like a finisher that makes the weaker earlier policies worthwhile. Also, since you don't get to build all these buildings from the start, the culture gain is spread out enough across the game that it doesn't throw everything off balance; by the time you can build Hospitals, +1 Culture isn't all that much anymore, even if it's potentially +1 per city for each building, adding up to +5 each.]
And as always, your mod is SO much fun. I'm curious, however, how conquest is going to play out in the late game on a landlocked map. Last playthrough was an archipelago map, and naval attacks proved fairly effective even on cities with a strength of 60-72. The attacking ship lost half it hit points, and the city's counter attack killed it off, but since you can easily bring in more ships by sea, that wasn't much of a problem. But whenever a land unit attacks such a city, it dies instantly, hardly doing any damage at all. So I am thinking of rebalancing the land units so that the top tier units have about 30 Strength instead of 18-20. But I'll see how it plays out first, and will let you know.
Oh, one last question: Any particular reason why now pretty much every former bonus resource is a strategic resource?
So here are my findings so far:
Spoiler :
The potential Great Granary bug made me aware once again that the Health system is not at all transparent. Sometimes changed values seem to show up only after loading a saved game, and the actual effect that Health has on the probability of a city getting the plague is not really clear either. Yes, there are rough risk estimates (from Extreme to None), but still it seems very random which cities generate plagues. And if one near your empire gets hit, even your healthiest cities are extremely likely to catch it. SO what I'm saying is, it would be awesome if there was some sort of breakdown of the numbers could be included either in the Civilopedia or on the website. How do tile improvements influence Health (I seem to be noticing that building farms on flood plains eliminates their negative health, but I'm not sure)? Does health from features (flood plains, marsh, forest) only apply when these tiles are worked, or is it universal as soon as they are within the city radius (seems like the latter because a size 1 city built on flood plains still gets the -health from all flood plain tiles in its radius)? How does population figure into this (starts at -5 on size 1 and now it's -8 on size 15), what are the exact effects of (lack of) fresh water? Stuff like that ...
The same goes for the Events and Decisions mod, that either wasn't included in earlier versions or I just noticed for the first time this playthrough. I absolutely love it, but I do not really understand how Magistrates are generated and figure into this. There is one building that generates them, but I can't build that yet, so where did the initial magistrates necessary for the first two decisions (Taxes and Panem et Circenses) come from? Magistrates don't seem to show up in the Strategic Resource summary although they are listed by the IGE as one (and you can theoretically even put them on water tiles; not sure if you could harvest them with a work boat xD). So, if I have the option to make a decision, am I good to go or should I maybe reconsider because there is only a limited number of magistrates that can be generated through the game, so I don't want to waste them on sort-of-but-not-really-great decisions?
Lastly, I have a suggestion to make that I tried to change myself but failed (so far). The Health policy tree still seems pretty weak in comparison to others (apart from the Ceremony tree, which has an equally underwhelming final policy), so I wanted to spice it up a little by changing the final policy before the finisher (Medics, which halves production cost for Hospitals and Medics) by adding a +1 Culture modifier for all medicine-related buildings (i.e. Apothecaries, Barbers, Herbalists, Hospitals, and Medics but not the Grove and the Aqueduct). [My reasoning is that this now very powerful policy has all other policies of the tree as prerequisites, and functions sort of like a finisher that makes the weaker earlier policies worthwhile. Also, since you don't get to build all these buildings from the start, the culture gain is spread out enough across the game that it doesn't throw everything off balance; by the time you can build Hospitals, +1 Culture isn't all that much anymore, even if it's potentially +1 per city for each building, adding up to +5 each.]
Spoiler What I tried to change this in my game :
And as always, your mod is SO much fun. I'm curious, however, how conquest is going to play out in the late game on a landlocked map. Last playthrough was an archipelago map, and naval attacks proved fairly effective even on cities with a strength of 60-72. The attacking ship lost half it hit points, and the city's counter attack killed it off, but since you can easily bring in more ships by sea, that wasn't much of a problem. But whenever a land unit attacks such a city, it dies instantly, hardly doing any damage at all. So I am thinking of rebalancing the land units so that the top tier units have about 30 Strength instead of 18-20. But I'll see how it plays out first, and will let you know.
Oh, one last question: Any particular reason why now pretty much every former bonus resource is a strategic resource?
Thanks for the feedback. I'm currently working on version 12, which will change a few things that's for sure. First-up, the Anno Domini era has had a few techs added (including some moved technologies), so it's now a full era...just wait until it's uploaded (hoping for Saturday/Sunday this week, but don't hold me to that).
Some of the other changes? Argos have come in as a civ and I've been doing some unit reskins...mainly shield reskins. Of the units a civ can build, 14 come with shields, so currently the Amazons, Argos, Athens, Corinth, Epirus, Ithaca, Minoa and Thebes have their own shield design, which is used for each of them in all 14 units - and the list is being added to.
Attached are some screenshots:
01. A Theban axeman attacks a barbarian camp.
02. Theban spearmen defend their home city.
03. Anno Domini era WIP.
04. Meeting Ithaca.
05. Minoan spearman at Knossos.
06. Athenean short swordsmen outside Athens.
07. Meeting Argos.
08. Epirus spearmen at Ioanna.
09. Epirus facing up to the Amazons.
Some of the other changes? Argos have come in as a civ and I've been doing some unit reskins...mainly shield reskins. Of the units a civ can build, 14 come with shields, so currently the Amazons, Argos, Athens, Corinth, Epirus, Ithaca, Minoa and Thebes have their own shield design, which is used for each of them in all 14 units - and the list is being added to.
Attached are some screenshots:
01. A Theban axeman attacks a barbarian camp.
02. Theban spearmen defend their home city.
03. Anno Domini era WIP.
04. Meeting Ithaca.
05. Minoan spearman at Knossos.
06. Athenean short swordsmen outside Athens.
07. Meeting Argos.
08. Epirus spearmen at Ioanna.
09. Epirus facing up to the Amazons.
Attachments
Natan35
Mayor of St. Natansburg
Beautiful! Looking forward to the next version of the mod.
Unedjis
Warlord
- Joined
- Dec 9, 2014
- Messages
- 148
Okay, so I dug around in the Vanilla files a little and I found out that there is no such thing as <Policy_BuildingClassYieldChanges> in connection with Faith or Culture there; it appears only in connection with Gold. Which might explain why both the +2 Faith from Medics and my +1 Culture for medicine-related buildings aren't working. Both Culture and Happiness are in their own tables, and there is none for Faith. (Possibly +Food and +Production might work in <Policy_BuildingClassYieldChanges> though.)
The good news is, I can make my idea for the Medics policy work because there is another table called <Policy_BuildingClassCultureChanges>. No idea why they are separate but well. I suppose I'll change Medics so that medical buildings yield culture, and Faith Healers ... hmm, I think I'll try to use <Policy_SpecialistExtraYields> to add +2 Faith per Doctor specialist in Hospitals, if I find those specialists.
Edit: I am an idiot. I dug around in the VANILLA files, and of course there is no reference to Faith there. In the G&K/BNW versions of Civ5Policies.xml, there is one. But still I don't understand why the Faith bonus from that policy isn't working. Also, the SpecialistExtraYiels would apply to ALL specialists, which is kinda pointless. Trying to find another solution. OH and also, I managed to confirm that the Great Granary +Health isn't working because there is no reference to it in the according table in Plague.sql. I added it in hopes it is going to show up in game even without starting a new one, but it might break everything. *fingers crossed* But first to try and find another solution for the Faith Healers so that IF everything breaks I'm sure to NOT know which of my changes exactly broke everything. Because that's how I do things, apparently. (Really the reason is that I don't want to go through the 3 minutes of mod configuration every time I change something.)
EDIT edit: The +2 Faith isn't working because it's for ORGANIZED_RELIGION, not FAITH_HEALING. Duh, could have checked that earlier. :-/ Changing it now and then checking what Organized Religion is supposed to do in game. Now to go testing.
Edit 3: Okay, so I did a step-by-step testing of the Health policy tree through IGE. Ritual Cleansing does not give +1 Health per Well/Herbalist but +1 Culture for Wells (as indicated in the XML file). The Faith bonus from Medics is now working (after I assigned it to the correct policy) but the individual Health bonus is not; the global Health bonus from Temples is working. [I think that policy is strong enough even without the additional +1 Health for the Medic.] And lastly, my custom culture bonus for medicine-related buildings is working as well. Best of all, this is all carrying over into an existing save, so YAY for a continuing game!
Edit 4: As the next step, I buffed the Ceremony branch a little by giving the Monuments policy +1 Culture for every Monument, while Tribal Council now also improves the Chief's Hut (only one per civ), giving it +2 Happiness/Culture/Science/Gold as a representation of what a tribal council might actually achieve through debate and resolutions. I am posting this in case you like the idea. Maybe I've played too much Civ without BNW, but I like finishing my policy branches, and thus far, Monuments prevented me from taking Dance, which in turn prevented me from taking Tribal Council and finishing the tree. Btw, in testing I noticed that the Chief's Hut only improves the Monument if you have actually built one. It does NOT improve the one you get from the Prometheus policy (and by extention, from any other source of free monuments).
Edit 5 (sorry for spamming): The Dam of Ma'rib isn't working properly (as reported before) because the BuildingType says BUILDING_MARIB instead of BUILDING_MARIB_DAM in the Desert Food yields. Fixed it in my game, although that particular fix seems to require going back to a save before the wonder was constructed. Good thing I had one from the turn immediately before.
The good news is, I can make my idea for the Medics policy work because there is another table called <Policy_BuildingClassCultureChanges>. No idea why they are separate but well. I suppose I'll change Medics so that medical buildings yield culture, and Faith Healers ... hmm, I think I'll try to use <Policy_SpecialistExtraYields> to add +2 Faith per Doctor specialist in Hospitals, if I find those specialists.
Edit: I am an idiot. I dug around in the VANILLA files, and of course there is no reference to Faith there. In the G&K/BNW versions of Civ5Policies.xml, there is one. But still I don't understand why the Faith bonus from that policy isn't working. Also, the SpecialistExtraYiels would apply to ALL specialists, which is kinda pointless. Trying to find another solution. OH and also, I managed to confirm that the Great Granary +Health isn't working because there is no reference to it in the according table in Plague.sql. I added it in hopes it is going to show up in game even without starting a new one, but it might break everything. *fingers crossed* But first to try and find another solution for the Faith Healers so that IF everything breaks I'm sure to NOT know which of my changes exactly broke everything. Because that's how I do things, apparently. (Really the reason is that I don't want to go through the 3 minutes of mod configuration every time I change something.)
EDIT edit: The +2 Faith isn't working because it's for ORGANIZED_RELIGION, not FAITH_HEALING. Duh, could have checked that earlier. :-/ Changing it now and then checking what Organized Religion is supposed to do in game. Now to go testing.
Edit 3: Okay, so I did a step-by-step testing of the Health policy tree through IGE. Ritual Cleansing does not give +1 Health per Well/Herbalist but +1 Culture for Wells (as indicated in the XML file). The Faith bonus from Medics is now working (after I assigned it to the correct policy) but the individual Health bonus is not; the global Health bonus from Temples is working. [I think that policy is strong enough even without the additional +1 Health for the Medic.] And lastly, my custom culture bonus for medicine-related buildings is working as well. Best of all, this is all carrying over into an existing save, so YAY for a continuing game!
Edit 4: As the next step, I buffed the Ceremony branch a little by giving the Monuments policy +1 Culture for every Monument, while Tribal Council now also improves the Chief's Hut (only one per civ), giving it +2 Happiness/Culture/Science/Gold as a representation of what a tribal council might actually achieve through debate and resolutions. I am posting this in case you like the idea. Maybe I've played too much Civ without BNW, but I like finishing my policy branches, and thus far, Monuments prevented me from taking Dance, which in turn prevented me from taking Tribal Council and finishing the tree. Btw, in testing I noticed that the Chief's Hut only improves the Monument if you have actually built one. It does NOT improve the one you get from the Prometheus policy (and by extention, from any other source of free monuments).
Edit 5 (sorry for spamming): The Dam of Ma'rib isn't working properly (as reported before) because the BuildingType says BUILDING_MARIB instead of BUILDING_MARIB_DAM in the Desert Food yields. Fixed it in my game, although that particular fix seems to require going back to a save before the wonder was constructed. Good thing I had one from the turn immediately before.
Well I went to try out your mod today and I got some texture loading issues which I am begining to realize are because I do not have
Polynesia and the Wonders of the Ancient World DLC's
I am a bit bummed debating if I spend the money or uninstall.... But from what I saw it looked quite impressive....
Polynesia and the Wonders of the Ancient World DLC's
I am a bit bummed debating if I spend the money or uninstall.... But from what I saw it looked quite impressive....
I broke down and got the missing DLC's to make the Mod work and WOW....
This mod is brilliant, I just love how its put together, the only issue I can see is that the AI needs some flavor changes as it seems to have issues keeping up well except for Persia it would seem that his lust for science brings him decent money. But most of the AI are suffering from a lack of cash...
Other then that the mod is amazing!!!! I give it 10 thumbs up....
This mod is brilliant, I just love how its put together, the only issue I can see is that the AI needs some flavor changes as it seems to have issues keeping up well except for Persia it would seem that his lust for science brings him decent money. But most of the AI are suffering from a lack of cash...
Other then that the mod is amazing!!!! I give it 10 thumbs up....
Unedjis
Warlord
- Joined
- Dec 9, 2014
- Messages
- 148
Ha, familiar story. I waited half a year for Civ5 to go on sale on Steam, and then I bought the full version with all DLCs again instead of having to figure out which DLCs I am missing apart from BNW (was just 2€ or so more anyway). And to be able to play Anno Domini was my principal motivation. (So they should give Rob part of each AD-induced sale.
)As for civs being broke, give them some time. Those who make it through the first three eras on top are going to come back in fulll swing. Of course there will be stragglers but not everybody can win; the world needs a few butt monkeys. I'm currently in a new game as well, at the end of the second era, and only Minoa and Nabatea (of 21 AI civs) are significantly in the plus, 3-5 others slightly above +0/turn, the rest in the negative. But it's been like that last playthrough as well, and the AI managed to recover by the mid to late game (apart from 2 civs that had been conquered but not completely destroyed). Like it says in the pedia entry of the Spice Trader, gold is hard to come by in the early eras. As soon as they can build markets and merchant's houses, the money problems usually evaporate.
Thanks guys for the feedback! I've included some of Unedjis' thoughts into the design of version 12 - which is being uploaded as we speak.
Version 12 is a major update. A full list of changes is in post two of the thread and you'll be able to download it shortly via post one of the thread. I've not had a chance to update the website with everything yet - preferring to get the version completed so that some of you will have chance to play it over what's left of the Easter holidays. I'm actually working tomorrow (Easter Sunday) and on Monday as well - but I have just had a week off to update the mod, so fair's fair!
The website will be updated over the next few days. Apart from the new techs, buildings, units and wonders, the thing I personally like the most is the shields. It doesn't sound like much, but it really makes a difference (to me). Try playing with a bunch of ancient Greek civs (the list of those with personalised shields is in post two of the thread) and you'll see what I mean.
Enjoy the mod - and don't forget to feed back.
Version 12 is a major update. A full list of changes is in post two of the thread and you'll be able to download it shortly via post one of the thread. I've not had a chance to update the website with everything yet - preferring to get the version completed so that some of you will have chance to play it over what's left of the Easter holidays. I'm actually working tomorrow (Easter Sunday) and on Monday as well - but I have just had a week off to update the mod, so fair's fair!
The website will be updated over the next few days. Apart from the new techs, buildings, units and wonders, the thing I personally like the most is the shields. It doesn't sound like much, but it really makes a difference (to me
). Try playing with a bunch of ancient Greek civs (the list of those with personalised shields is in post two of the thread) and you'll see what I mean.Enjoy the mod - and don't forget to feed back
.
Some people have downloaded the new version so I hope they're enjoying it! The work to add all the new stuff to the website begins today . In the meantime, I've removed the old previews and placed some new ones in posts three and four of this thread, which includes the new tech tree. I'll also place it here, in this post, as I want to talk a little about my plans for it.
There are now 88 techs in the mod, which of course is quite a few, over five eras. I'm thinking about adding a new era - the Dark Ages - but moving along some of the techs in the tree - so rather than adding three new columns, we'd have two columns from tweaking the existing tree (i.e. in Anno Aeris, the three columns have 23 techs between them; this in itself could become four columns with about 6 techs in each column, creating an extra column). Potentially, some Dark Ages civs could be added, though I don't want to go overboard - England, for example, is well represented already, so I won't add Mercia and the Anglo-Saxons, but I could include the Franks.
How I plan to do it is to set all the units, buildings, resources, etc to line into a dummy tech so I'm just looking at the techs themselves in my version. Then, once I'm happy with the design of the tree, I'll re-add the items, though not necessarily in the same places as before. I think I've done the project as one that's had a core mod with bits added each release, so it would be good to refresh the tree and ensure everything's where it should be - emphasising the right historical context, but with tweaks to that to ensure gameplay remains intact.
Units-wise, I aim to have some different lines, much like they are in version 12, but with some tweaks. Here's some thoughts:
Spearman line: Doryphoros - Spearman - Heavy Spearman - Garrison - Hirthman
Swordsman line: Psioli/Bronze age swordsman - Short swordsman - Swordsman - Longswordsman - Fyrdsman
The idea is that the spearmen will require copper and the swordsmen require iron (except for the Bronze age guy, who will require copper) and that the spearman units will be slightly stronger, but the swordsmen each have a different promotion, that isn't lost on upgrade.
Slinger line: Slinger - Heavy Slinger - Skirmisher - Javelineer - Veiletes
Archer line: Archer - Composite Bowman - Longbowman - Flanbogaman - Crossbowman
I'm thinking of introducing the axeman a little later, with an upgrade to a heavy axeman, followed by Huscarls. Naturally, there'll be other units, such as the one-off Epibatai (a naval spearman) and the mercenary with his spear throw prior to an attack and they'll be kept. There will be mounted and naval units as well, but I think I've fairly much covered those, but perhaps an extra unit or two that does something different would be good.
So, before I next "take the lid off," has anyone any thoughts about these potential plans?
. In the meantime, I've removed the old previews and placed some new ones in posts three and four of this thread, which includes the new tech tree. I'll also place it here, in this post, as I want to talk a little about my plans for it.Spoiler :
There are now 88 techs in the mod, which of course is quite a few, over five eras. I'm thinking about adding a new era - the Dark Ages - but moving along some of the techs in the tree - so rather than adding three new columns, we'd have two columns from tweaking the existing tree (i.e. in Anno Aeris, the three columns have 23 techs between them; this in itself could become four columns with about 6 techs in each column, creating an extra column). Potentially, some Dark Ages civs could be added, though I don't want to go overboard - England, for example, is well represented already, so I won't add Mercia and the Anglo-Saxons, but I could include the Franks.
How I plan to do it is to set all the units, buildings, resources, etc to line into a dummy tech so I'm just looking at the techs themselves in my version. Then, once I'm happy with the design of the tree, I'll re-add the items, though not necessarily in the same places as before. I think I've done the project as one that's had a core mod with bits added each release, so it would be good to refresh the tree and ensure everything's where it should be - emphasising the right historical context, but with tweaks to that to ensure gameplay remains intact.
Units-wise, I aim to have some different lines, much like they are in version 12, but with some tweaks. Here's some thoughts:
Spearman line: Doryphoros - Spearman - Heavy Spearman - Garrison - Hirthman
Swordsman line: Psioli/Bronze age swordsman - Short swordsman - Swordsman - Longswordsman - Fyrdsman
The idea is that the spearmen will require copper and the swordsmen require iron (except for the Bronze age guy, who will require copper) and that the spearman units will be slightly stronger, but the swordsmen each have a different promotion, that isn't lost on upgrade.
Slinger line: Slinger - Heavy Slinger - Skirmisher - Javelineer - Veiletes
Archer line: Archer - Composite Bowman - Longbowman - Flanbogaman - Crossbowman
I'm thinking of introducing the axeman a little later, with an upgrade to a heavy axeman, followed by Huscarls. Naturally, there'll be other units, such as the one-off Epibatai (a naval spearman) and the mercenary with his spear throw prior to an attack and they'll be kept. There will be mounted and naval units as well, but I think I've fairly much covered those, but perhaps an extra unit or two that does something different would be good.
So, before I next "take the lid off," has anyone any thoughts about these potential plans?
Rob,
I am loving the new update! Really like how its a bit slowed down than before ... I don't feel rushed through units and eras. Like the decisions too, but that requires some more of them (and I am sure you agree with that). Tech tree is great too. My thinking on the future of AD is that there are a few things you could dabble in:
1. Warfare: At this time, warfare became more raiding and sieging than earlier times. Therefore, I think a Siege tech could cover this, where it could unlock a battering ram. Also, heavy cavalry is already covered by units such as cataphracts but could probably use an upgrade (knights? elite heavy cavalry?) Infantry is pretty much nothing new except perhaps a halberdier/early pikeman unit or (possibly) a hand culverin unit ... to hint at gunpowder ... Naval warfare is much of the same as well - perhaps some galley gunships?
2. Civ wise, I would love for you to include a few new ones from this era. Perhaps 5-6 would be good ... this could give you 100 civs! (By the way, I absolutely love how many civs there are in this mod). Ideas are: Kievan Rus, Arabs, Franks, Slavs, Bulgarians, Khazar, and perhaps the Danelaw.
There are my extremely scattered ideas for AD's development. Let me know what you think! Now back to my Sassanid vs Qin duel game...
I am loving the new update! Really like how its a bit slowed down than before ... I don't feel rushed through units and eras. Like the decisions too, but that requires some more of them (and I am sure you agree with that). Tech tree is great too. My thinking on the future of AD is that there are a few things you could dabble in:
1. Warfare: At this time, warfare became more raiding and sieging than earlier times. Therefore, I think a Siege tech could cover this, where it could unlock a battering ram. Also, heavy cavalry is already covered by units such as cataphracts but could probably use an upgrade (knights? elite heavy cavalry?) Infantry is pretty much nothing new except perhaps a halberdier/early pikeman unit or (possibly) a hand culverin unit ... to hint at gunpowder ... Naval warfare is much of the same as well - perhaps some galley gunships?
2. Civ wise, I would love for you to include a few new ones from this era. Perhaps 5-6 would be good ... this could give you 100 civs! (By the way, I absolutely love how many civs there are in this mod). Ideas are: Kievan Rus, Arabs, Franks, Slavs, Bulgarians, Khazar, and perhaps the Danelaw.
There are my extremely scattered ideas for AD's development. Let me know what you think! Now back to my Sassanid vs Qin duel game...
Thanks for the response! I agree with you about the increase in decisions (and believe more events need to be added too), but they can easily be added in future update. I don't want to call the later units pikemen or knights - or go as far as gunpowder, but we could have units that do much the same thing, just named differently.
For me, Novogrod is slightly late in terms of the mod, but a possible shoe-in, maybe using the same artwork and uniques as Rurik of the Kievan Rus. There's the Nri, who were around the 8th century, the Avars, Lombards and a few others that you mentioned. I think that I really don't want to take the civ count above 100! At 94, it does leave six slots, which is a case of me choosing a good mix. Let's not forget Tibet, who would also fit the timescales.
Danelaw's an interesting thought; it could be a tech or a wonder (though I'm thinking in terms of a tech).
Incidentally, I'm adding a couple more previews to posts four and five (of this thread) of the new items.
For me, Novogrod is slightly late in terms of the mod, but a possible shoe-in, maybe using the same artwork and uniques as Rurik of the Kievan Rus. There's the Nri, who were around the 8th century, the Avars, Lombards and a few others that you mentioned. I think that I really don't want to take the civ count above 100! At 94, it does leave six slots, which is a case of me choosing a good mix. Let's not forget Tibet, who would also fit the timescales.
Danelaw's an interesting thought; it could be a tech or a wonder (though I'm thinking in terms of a tech).
Incidentally, I'm adding a couple more previews to posts four and five (of this thread) of the new items
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Unedjis
Warlord
- Joined
- Dec 9, 2014
- Messages
- 148
Wow, your changes and thoughts sound great, I'm thinking of starting a new game halfway through. Especially since you included pretty much every piece of feedback I gave you.
As for stuff you might add/change on a larger scale, I have two main thoughts around which I would design the military units in this mod:
1) Unit strength should be somewhat balanced to city defense strength. I'm a big fan of strong cities so you need more than 3 units to capture them, so units should not be too strong. What I'd do is balance them so that they are around half the maximum default defense strength of a city (excluding wonders and hills). You've added the Castle now, so I assume defense should be around 70 now even without Ishtar Gate or other wonders, or hill defense bonus. Which would mean units in the Dark Ages should end up having around 35 strength. Now reduce that strength by 5 per era and you have a good progression. It doesn't have to be balanced each era; maybe some eras are better on the offense (currently the early eras) and others on the defense (currently lategame, which has city strengths of at least 40 with unit strengths of 18-20). But by the end of the tech tree, it'd be great if that balance could be re-established.
2) In my Civ3 attempt at making a similar scenario (which I called Empires and which ended right before gunpowder), I always had 2 parallel infantry lines, one that required resources (swordsmen) and one that didn't (spearmen). Now, I really like your split into iron-for-promotions and copper-for-higher-base-strength. But what if a civ doesn't have access to either? (Unlikely because Copper can be obtained through Copper Mines but still a possibility.) Since you're thinking of making the Axemen an independent line, maybe that would be a candidate for a line that doesn't require any resources and is cheaper, but also slightly weaker than the other two. So if we take the strongest line (measured by brute strength without taking promotions into account), which is spearmen with copper, as the reference point for the above balance, my suggestion would be Str35 for the final evolution of spearmen, Str33/34+Promotion for the ultimate swordsman/cavalry unit, and (ranged) Str32 for any units that do not require any resources (i.e. axemen, archers). That way, even sort-of-defeated civs that have lost access to all resources have a way of building a military capable of conquest (because an army of archers without a single melee unit can never capture a city). Not that it will make much of a difference for the AI (never seen one make a comeback) but maybe if the player loses everything except 2 cities and then manages some good diplomacy, a comeback would be much more possible.
Alright. So these are my thoughts on what COULD be done. Maybe there's something you like in there. Either way, I'm still amazed at your dedication and how responsive you are to feedback. Keep it up!
As for stuff you might add/change on a larger scale, I have two main thoughts around which I would design the military units in this mod:
1) Unit strength should be somewhat balanced to city defense strength. I'm a big fan of strong cities so you need more than 3 units to capture them, so units should not be too strong. What I'd do is balance them so that they are around half the maximum default defense strength of a city (excluding wonders and hills). You've added the Castle now, so I assume defense should be around 70 now even without Ishtar Gate or other wonders, or hill defense bonus. Which would mean units in the Dark Ages should end up having around 35 strength. Now reduce that strength by 5 per era and you have a good progression. It doesn't have to be balanced each era; maybe some eras are better on the offense (currently the early eras) and others on the defense (currently lategame, which has city strengths of at least 40 with unit strengths of 18-20). But by the end of the tech tree, it'd be great if that balance could be re-established.
2) In my Civ3 attempt at making a similar scenario (which I called Empires and which ended right before gunpowder), I always had 2 parallel infantry lines, one that required resources (swordsmen) and one that didn't (spearmen). Now, I really like your split into iron-for-promotions and copper-for-higher-base-strength. But what if a civ doesn't have access to either? (Unlikely because Copper can be obtained through Copper Mines but still a possibility.) Since you're thinking of making the Axemen an independent line, maybe that would be a candidate for a line that doesn't require any resources and is cheaper, but also slightly weaker than the other two. So if we take the strongest line (measured by brute strength without taking promotions into account), which is spearmen with copper, as the reference point for the above balance, my suggestion would be Str35 for the final evolution of spearmen, Str33/34+Promotion for the ultimate swordsman/cavalry unit, and (ranged) Str32 for any units that do not require any resources (i.e. axemen, archers). That way, even sort-of-defeated civs that have lost access to all resources have a way of building a military capable of conquest (because an army of archers without a single melee unit can never capture a city). Not that it will make much of a difference for the AI (never seen one make a comeback) but maybe if the player loses everything except 2 cities and then manages some good diplomacy, a comeback would be much more possible.
Alright. So these are my thoughts on what COULD be done. Maybe there's something you like in there. Either way, I'm still amazed at your dedication and how responsive you are to feedback. Keep it up!
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