Rhye
's and Fall creator
yea, UHVs may require some luck. I think it's impossible to gather a good choice of goal types without considering the ones that involve luck too.
Rhyse too based on luck
- Thread starter Pygoscelis
- Start date
I really like this mod a lot, but I think things are rigged too strongly to keep history on track. It's not alternate history if its not history at all, but neither is is alternate history if it hardly varies. History should be favored, not inevitable.
Hakim the Mad
Chieftain
- Joined
- Sep 10, 2007
- Messages
- 29
Yes exactly! Stability is a good idea so that first to a virgin land is important but not the only thing that matters. But as it is now the game is so slavish to stability that the games rarely deviate and that inherently favors certain sides probably accidently and in some cases in ways which aren't historically accurate. Britain for example is one of the weakest powers because its "historical culture" areas are restricted to SAfrica, parts of India, NAmerica and Austrailia. This might sound like a lot but in this game SAmerica is of far greater importance than perhaps it should be and Africa too little since much of West Africa(one of the more densely populated areas on Earth in 1492) is mostly a barren desert. India too which is about 2/3 the size of the US can support only a fraction of the cities that can the US. Some of the problem is the UHV and some of it is the distortion of the map but in the end this mod while fun goes stale very fast because there is little variance and the "history" doesn't allow for much contingency since everyone will have to stay confined to their culture areas anyway there isn't too much reason to compete, but in Europe
Human influence creates a unique game every time.
A lot of the things people complain about in the mod are actually what makes it great. In the first few games I played I failed miserably, coz I followed the general civ strategy of expand as much as possible as fast as possible. I've always thought this was tedious and the impulse has cost me more than a few games through overexpansion (trying to block off a far too big piece of real estate with one too many cities...also why I might be the only person who LIKES an isolated island start).
In this mod however, a small empire of a few big, well-developed cities is just as good (if not better) than a big one. I played as India and only ran into trouble in the mid-game (when I tried like hell to cross the jungles of SE Asia to build a city, only to have it flip to the Khmer) and in the end game when I tried to build a colonial empire and watched my hitherto fantastic economy sink like a stone. I love being able to build a successful country in it's historical area and not have to make the Netherlands the size of Russia just to be competitive. The balance between big empires and small ones is something sorely lacking in the vanilla game. People don't seem to realise that IRL big empires are inherently unstable and come with their own set of problems but Rhye's reflects this. Now expansion is a choice, something that has to be thought out and planned, not just a dire imperative like building military units.
It's a good thing
I also love having independent states around to add a bit of flavour to the proceedings. And of course the strongly, but not strictly historical focus. My last game, Rome survived but China collapsed. Gotta love it
The only things I don't like are the game speed (I do love the leisurely marathon speed of vanilla, but understand the limitations). And the fact that resources and tribal huts are in the same place all the time....that and the diplo spamming. But all in all it's worth it. I like the mod almost as much, if not more than the actual game. And Civ 5 would do well to incorporate some elements, esp. staggered civ spawning and stability.
In this mod however, a small empire of a few big, well-developed cities is just as good (if not better) than a big one. I played as India and only ran into trouble in the mid-game (when I tried like hell to cross the jungles of SE Asia to build a city, only to have it flip to the Khmer) and in the end game when I tried to build a colonial empire and watched my hitherto fantastic economy sink like a stone. I love being able to build a successful country in it's historical area and not have to make the Netherlands the size of Russia just to be competitive. The balance between big empires and small ones is something sorely lacking in the vanilla game. People don't seem to realise that IRL big empires are inherently unstable and come with their own set of problems but Rhye's reflects this. Now expansion is a choice, something that has to be thought out and planned, not just a dire imperative like building military units.
It's a good thing
I also love having independent states around to add a bit of flavour to the proceedings. And of course the strongly, but not strictly historical focus. My last game, Rome survived but China collapsed. Gotta love it
The only things I don't like are the game speed (I do love the leisurely marathon speed of vanilla, but understand the limitations). And the fact that resources and tribal huts are in the same place all the time....that and the diplo spamming. But all in all it's worth it. I like the mod almost as much, if not more than the actual game. And Civ 5 would do well to incorporate some elements, esp. staggered civ spawning and stability.
Rhye
's and Fall creator
Diplo spamming is gone in the next patch!
You are my new favourite person Rhye. Well you and Vishaing. (Epic RFC was like a birthday and christmas present all in one
Hakim the Mad
Chieftain
- Joined
- Sep 10, 2007
- Messages
- 29
Yes but IRL despite this big empires were incredibly common prior to the last 50 years and one could in fact argue an informal Euro/American Empire still stretches across the globe so in actuality there must have been some pretty darn good incentives for doing it.
As I have consistantly said...the problem is not stability, it is a good idea but it must be tweaked so as to not limit what can be done. The game is far too much of pursuing only your historical boundaries and far too little of "what if"
And you seem to forget that even the Dutch had a large colonial empire at one time which included Indonesia, South Africa, New York, parts of the Carribean, and Northern Brazil.
Oh by the way there are numerous historical inaccuracies in Rhys including that the Portugese first settled the Cape Town settlement, Lagos Nigeria et al
I like Rhys but I have always felt that scenario building is too much for one person to do and every great designer must get an outside and objective viewpoint of their ideas.
Well that depends on how you define big empire. Up until the sixteenth century, big empires were ephemeral and didn't last. The thing is tho, the vanilla game is totally unbalanced towards larger empires. Bigger is always better. IRL (at least until maybe the 19th or 20th century) small states could be just as wealthy/dynamic/successful as big ones and it would be nice if that was reflected in the game.
Rhye
's and Fall creator
the Dutch had a large colonial empire...
isn't it possible in RFC? It definitely is.
Probably in the normal game it wouldn't, because the tiny size of Netherlands compared to the rest of the European powers would make them lag behind and lose the colonisazion race.
And where are the inaccuracies? The portuguese have their own city and settlers area, including Africa
Hakim the Mad
Chieftain
- Joined
- Sep 10, 2007
- Messages
- 29
Which IMO shows the problem here as evidenced in the designers and supporters of the flaws of this mod....THEY DO NOT UNDERSTAND EVEN THE MOST BASIC OF STRATEGY.
Yes I would agree that larger in Civ 4 has benefits, but it also has enormous drawbacks...even before Rhys. First of all large empires almost always brings one into conflict with others...especially in this modpack which makes you unpopular and more likely to have to go to war to defend said empire, and if you are large enough, or the vaguely defined "too big" that people bandy about here it will be difficult to defend said empire. But aside from that there are other disadvantages some of which Rhys expands(very wisely) as with increased tech costs. So size was never really so much of a problem in Civ 4 as it was in Civ 3.
What is actually happening is that inferior tacticians like those who defend the modpack and rhye cannot win with their subpar tactics and thus must change the rules to give themselves and advantage. I for one have never had a problem winning this modpack because I know how to win regardless of the variables presented me as in regular Civ 4. Some of the things people complain about here are examples of poor strategy and poor play such as not being able to build a wonder fast enough to beat out an opponent is an easily solved problem for a good tactican if you merely stockpile engineering great people to rush build as needed.
In an ongoing game with this Mod as the French I have managed to build every wonder available to me and I am only in the late renaissance by doing such things.
If you were to ask me I would say that in reg Civ 4 small empires have too much power, or perhaps a balance already in that they can alter how they play in order to gain other victory conditions. That is the primary assumption of Rhye is that every game must end in domination/conquest and therefore everything else is without purpose. But in fact one of the common victories I have gotten via online play...especially with a poor starting location is to 1)build as many wonders of the world as possible 2)really try to build the Parthenon so that I can 3)crank out great people with a combination of the Parthenon/Statue of Liberty, Mercantilism etc to try to get artists. If you culture bomb enough times in 3 cities you will get a win and you do not need to be huge.
The problem with this mod it is that it is still not hard.
Yes this is actually quite true, but if we are going to split hairs like this then what's to say that a 30 city empire is excessively large, unfair, and imbalanced? What I have seen with Rhys is that every empire gets a chance to expand some make poor choices and expand where they cannot defend but overall just about everyone including the Dutch end up with at least 6-8 cities. So why is 30 too large? In fact historically the Dutch by being minor on the European stage but signficant abroad where a major pawn by the larger powers of France, Spain and England. What I dislike about Rhys is that unlike IRL there is no power imbalance as in between Britain, France and everybody else. Historically the power dynamic of Western Europe was driven by 2-3 major powers which doesn't really happen in Rhys because "everyone becomes equal"
Well I will agree with you on onething here in regards to city spacing. IMO the reason why the perception exists that "bigger is always better" in Civ 4 is because there is absolutely no reason to space your cities close together...That is you try to hav as little overlap as possible because there is no reason to do otherwise. Extrapolate that a bit and empires get very very large quickly. What I do like about Rhys is that he has found a very clever way around that problem by 1)building in a lot of historical players especially in Europe which makes even the Dutch a viable option 2)amping up resource effect as with wheat so as to make it possible to achieve a large population even with cities tightly spaced. Because of this as France I tend to have 5 cities in "historic France" including Brest, Cherbourg, Paris, Bordeaux, and Marseilles eventhough only 3 would be needed to use all the territory. That said with stability as it is I also will exploit the weakness of the stability concept as presently used to "cluster" in another 4 for max effect. So that while Rhys intent is to deter large 30+ city empires in some ways he amplifies it since my metropole can consist of as many as 10 cities. This still distorts the difference between France and Holland who has only 1-2 cities.
During the captivity of the Portugese monarchy by the Spanish crown the Dutch seized control from the Portugese of Northern Brazil, the East Indes(Indonesia) and especially the Cape Town settlement which was the origin of the Dutch presence in South Africa. But yes at one time the Dutch obstensively controlled a very large empire.
Well obstensively your reasoning for stability as it is now is essentially to protect countries like the Dutch as per the assumption that in the reg game they woud not built a large colonial empire yada yada. But a better analysis would be that if there was no stability would they be able to with your other innovations...I say yes. First off the Dutch start with a very large navy and this alone is a big advantage since even a galley can be upgraded into a Galleon when that tech is discovered. Secondly, the tech brokering the computer does ensures there is actually very little tech disparity between AIs. And Thirdly they also start with settlers with which there is no ground to build new cities meaning that when America is discovered and galleons made they should be one of the first to colonize. If the concern is that "tiny" little holland can't keep up then start them later in the game say after 1000AD and or increase the technology size penalty for city #. That seems to be a very effective means to deter excessive expansion. If I thought expanding would slow down my tech so that rivals could jump ahead of me and gain a tech lead I would be very afraid of overexpansion...and in fact that already happens to some degree with this mod. In my very first game as France I built a very large bulky empire in America which slowed my tech pace down and because of this Germany got a huge tech lead and took over enough of homeland for me to get the point.
Overall what I would like to stress with you is that the stability concept is a good idea but that its implementation is a bit of as it is right now. I really can't say how much it needs to be tweaked but I hope you consider doing it. I've found that sometimes even just minor changes can be enough. That said you seem uncomfortable with "large" empires, and that is in scare quotes because I don't really know what "large" or too large is, but something to consider is that a game where every side is created equally is very boring and this mod treads too far in that direction. I have found upon playing this mod several times as differing powers that some of the minor powers like the Dutch and the Portugese can be very powerful allies, but ultimately there needs to be greater powers and minor powers. Perfectly symmetrical play is extremely boring. Its seems to me that one of the major limitations on the minor powers like the Dutch and Portugese is stability because they can't due to their size expand to quickly or too far out of their safety zones so if you can preclude them from them you neuter them. For example, the Dutch really need New Amsterdam, and Cape Town because after them there isn't a lot of other places to go, so part of my strategy is to expand into some of those areas just to keep them from them. With only 1 city out of safety zone I can deprive them of 2 and without colonies the dutch or any other minor power becomes irrelevent. On the otherhand I would argue that IRL had the French deprived the Dutch of New Amsterdam because the culture of Montreal ate up the land needed the Dutch could have just gone somewhere else. That is you seem to assume that the Dutch or anybody else where married to the lands they conquered which they weren't i.e. IRL there was a lot of contingency involved which this mod doesn't take into account
Well I may be wrong but I seem to recall that the last time I tried to found a city on the site of Lagos with the Portugese it called it outside of my culture area. Also I would point out that West Africa was more densely populated that much of Western Europe especially Iberia in 1400 but in this mod it is mostly scrub and desert without any real value. Lagos is under a jungle. India is about the size of France when in actuality it is the size of all of Western Europe. Most of India lies outside of Englands culture areas which behooves common sense since India was the most important colony there was. Indonesia lies within the Khmer culture zone but not the Indians or the Arabo-muslims. The site for Cape Town lies outside of the Portugese culture area eventhough it was founded by them. Germanys "historic" capital was Berlin eventhough Berlin as far as German cities are concerned was a latecommer having been founded in 800AD? and not really important until 1700AD and was on land taken by crusader knights(teutons) during the middle ages so its questionable if its ethnically "German". Vienna would be a better but equally problematic choice. Sogut as the capital of the Ottoman Empire is questionable. In fact Sogut was never really a city, Izmir would be a better name for a city near that site but problematic as the capital. The Vikings should be late comers in Civilization since the first major Viking raid is considered to be Lyndesfarne in 780AD but they start at 600AD. Thebes has the Pyramids eventhough the Pyramids are closer to Cairo and that Cairo is a major city of the "Arab" Civilization. The Arabs never seem to take Egypt for that matter, and Tunis aka Carthage in antiquity was already in existance and a major city. There should be a power in between Germany and Russia such as Poland/Lithuania which was actually quite important for a long time and lasted until the late 18th century. On the Rhys map it would be about the size of Germany.
If winning at vanilla Civ is just and easy and formulaic as RFC, how is RFC sub-par, assuming the baseline is vanilla civ? And if you think Civ is sub par in general, why are you posting on a fan site for the game?
The lack of colonization is the fault of the AI. It likes to build units before sending settlers overseas and, at a certain point, the number of units make war more platable than overseas expansion. Also, the AI in incapable of understanding the UHVs. That might be fixable, but with limited time and resources, AI tweaking is not on the list.
UHVs are designed to give a different playstyle for every civ. Some are purely militaristic, some are pure builder, most are a combination. The variety is what makes the mod enjoyable. You might say the UHVs are to formulaic, but it gives you 20 plus formulas you have to try and devise on your own. How many mods have provided over 20 new victory conditions? Outside of that, stability, plague, tech penalties and a host of other minor tweaks make playing a normal conquest/space/domination game much more difficult and inspiring.
Large empires are steamrollers. Basically, they get a lead and the gap widens as time goes on because 1) They research faster and 2) They have better units. If you dislike this restriction, play vanilla civ. We hashed this out for months and your condescending opinion will not change our minds.
None of your examples exhibit external cultural pressure. Rather, they all show the power of military might to cow smaller, weaker states or vassalize large ones. Civs are already more prone to fall if you take core cities. Politics is already in place with the world congress, where you can ask for cities. And, FYI, Italy (and Germany) was united because Napoleon reorganized the independent states into a single governance. The wane of Austria and France's power let the state stay together. Which, again, has nothing to do with culture.
It's impossible to create an accurate world mod with the limited resources - both computer and time - players have available. Compromises were made and if you disagree with them, more power to you. Your opinions will be placed in line right behind Ukraine.
Hakim the Mad
Chieftain
- Joined
- Sep 10, 2007
- Messages
- 29
Right Napoleonic reorganization did aid in the unification of Germany and Italy but it wasn't the only reason. If it was then these countries would have unified in 1820, 1830 or 1850 and not 1870. The deciding factor was the relative strength or weakness of the neighboring powers. France had historically tried to keep Germany and Northern Italy disorganized for obvious reasons. In fact as proof of my point it was the unification of Germany which destabilized the balance of power in Europe and weakened France enough to drive them into an alliance of the British. So from that point of view one could say that strong German influence posed a great threat to France, and once could argue that the wars of the 20th century in Europe were about a reallignment of power towards emerging anti-colonial powers.
On a side note the IRL example of Germany as a late developing European power shows the flaws with stability. In Rhyse even if "unification" did happen as IRL Germany would still be a minor power whereas IRL its unification tended to weaken France.
In otherwords "When we are pointed out to be in error rather than make changes we will attempt to call on pity for our human weaknesses"
Isn't that an appeal to pity I forget what its called in latin but there's some term to decribe this kind of logical fallacy. Regardless Aristotle your are not. Here's an idea rather than fighting with people on this why not enlist people to help you? In fact as a result of playing this modpack I have already modified the map somewhat to better reflect the way I think it should be. It might not be perfect but "better" is always a start.
What? Did you read what I said or do you just want to post whatever you think of? The mod has to be playable above all else. It already slows down considerably after 1300 AD, and quickly gets worse. By adding to the mod you make it more unplayable because the players lack the computational resources to run it at a decent sped and the spare time to wait 3+ minutes between each turn.
jessiecat
Divine Monarch
Prob. is, but have won 2 good games. A historical victory as the Turks in 1960
on Viceroy was easy. A time victory at 2050 as the English on Monarch was harder but the key was controlling all of North and Central America, with the Aztecs, Incas, Malinese, and Americans as vassals, which certainly helped.
Having the Yanks as vassals was cool as I'm a Canadian expat living in the
UK. Very satisfying.Agree with you about the plague though. Tired of hearing that bloody bell!
on Viceroy was easy. A time victory at 2050 as the English on Monarch was harder but the key was controlling all of North and Central America, with the Aztecs, Incas, Malinese, and Americans as vassals, which certainly helped.
Having the Yanks as vassals was cool as I'm a Canadian expat living in the
UK. Very satisfying.Agree with you about the plague though. Tired of hearing that bloody bell!
Hakim the Mad
Chieftain
- Joined
- Sep 10, 2007
- Messages
- 29
well my problem with plague isn't that it hurts the human players too much but that it all but cripples the AI. As Im sure you found out through experience once you get to 1900 and beyond the AI ceases to be any real threat largely because they have to that point neglected their internal development. I just don't find this mod to be that hard. Its true you can purposely make it harder as someone suggested by doing things not intended to happen like getting a domination victory with Japan, but I always say the best gauge for any mod is the easiest/simplist means to win anything else is superflous
Rhye
's and Fall creator
Very unlinkely. How can you prove that? I've seen often France and Rome collapsing as a result of German unification and hegemony.
OK as I've got a bit of time this morning, let's answer one by one:
- Lagos is coded under Portuguese AI maps. Same with Cape Town and most of Africa. The fact that many of these spots are not settleable is another matter and has its own reasons.
- Europe is surely bigger than RL. Good point. It's made that way, on purpose, to make it playable. So, got ahead and revert it to its original size, so that you can play with a 2-tiles big Italy. HINT: you can directly play my original Earth map shipping with the game.
- What would you propose then for German capital? Aachen? Bonn? Vienna?
- For Turkish capital? Istanbul can't be because it was Byzantine already and later conquered. Same with Bursa and Edirne. Oh wait Izmir wasn't even a capital ever. Sogut at least is the place of origin of the Ottomans. The alternative is stretching the timeline to include the Seljuks and use an eastern city for that purpose.
- Viking late comers?? The first raid doens't correspond to the enstablishment. In fact they were known by Romans (mentioned by Tacitus around 100AD)
- Memphis is too close to the coast to allow one more good city (Alexandria)
- Carthage isn't Tunis. If I add Carthage in the late start, then the late start would make no sense.
- The Arabs don't always take Egypt for the AI's fault, not for mine. I tried by all means to make them more aggressive
- Poland?? Yeah, a 1 city civ, very useful to cripple Germany and weaken Russia.
You can go on moaning as long as you want, I doubt you'll find something I don't have an answer.
Hakim the Mad
Chieftain
- Joined
- Sep 10, 2007
- Messages
- 29
You understand the problem with this right? There is difference between Ottoman and Turk. Sogut as a capital isn't a sure things some consider it merely a myth along the lines of Osman. Yes there was a Sogut but was Sogut ever a capital of anything of import is another matter. And what you suggest is a problem but I would be far more comfortable with Izmir or Konya being a capital and then it being automatically transfered to Istanbul than I am with some minor Anatolian village dominating the area until the 20th century.
Yes this is a dilemma but I think I would be more comfortable with that than wth it being in Berlin.
Yes thats true but the same could be said about the Franks, Visogoths, etc so shouldn't the French start in 300 or something? There is a big difference between historical existance which goes back even before the Romans were recording things, afterall its not as if the people of Scandanavia didn't exist before 300BCE, and a peoples ascendency as a "national" body. For France, Spain the time is roughly correct as it is with Germany, but Scandanavia really coelesce as a polity until the well into the age of the Vikings. Additionally, I find it personally offensive that they are called "Vikings" and not Scandanavians for the same reason. There is a big difference between a cultural group and a segment of that group like the Vikings. Plus the term Viking has a rather negative connotation along the lings of ". .. .. .. .. .. ." to me.
This is not entirely true. If you knew your Arab history you'd know that Tunis is very close to Carthage for the same reason that Cairo is close to Fustat and Baghdad is close to Csetisphon. It is true that Tunis is not exactly Tunis but for all intents purposes it is. When the muslims arrived in new areas they used established population centers since they were trying to preserve existing economic/social arrangments. However they wanted to keep the muslims seperate from the native populations and thus founded camp towns outside of town which for Carthage was Tunis. Over time Tunis became the seat of government power and asscended in importance at the expense of Carthage. So in the case of all these places mentioned Bagdhad, Tunis and Cairo they are all about 20-40 miles from the historic center. The reason why Carthage is a bit farther from Tunis than Fustat was from Cairo is because by the 7th century the center of Carthage life had drifted away from where the phonecian city was more towards where Tunis is today. So while there is a some difference between Carthage and Tunis this is most arbitrary and emblematic of the Islamophobia Europeans have towards muslims and their need to cling to the idea that muslims destroyed the mediterranean world rather than resurrecting it.
Okay but Memphis wasn't even around anymore by Roman times the Roman city in the area was called Fustat and it would probably be 1 space north of Thebes. IMO Thebes should be 1 space south and Fustat should be 1 space to the North so that Egypt could have 3 cities, and then change all the terrain around the Nile to flood plains, and around Fustat/Cairo or slightly to the North Egypt is all green in the Delta valley and should probably be grassland floodplains since Egypt was the a major producer of food for much of history. Also the Nile above Aswan needs to be straightened it does not bend that much.
I would suggest city flipping from Barbarian/Byzantine to the Arabs like is done with France and Gemrany once they capture Jerusalem since that is pretty much true to history to what happened. The myth of the Arab conquest is that they conquered! They were peacemakers as much as they were warriors
Actually, historically Poland Lithuania consisted up to Smolensk and included that city for a little while. I think Kiev was also part of that Kingdom for a while too. So in fact it would be about as large as Germany and France.
Right because you are anti-Expansion to the point that you completely overreact about it. You don't really think people should expand outside of Europe unless you are either France or Spain and therefore doesn't reflect reality. There was nothing inevitable that the Spanish Empire would inevitably ecclipse the Portugese Empire. In fact early on people would have thought the opposite but given that Portugal can't really do in Africa what they did in real life they are locked into an inferior position in South America.
Right well what I would suggest is that you distort India and the East Indies a bit to compensate. Make Australia a little more barren(all of Australia is only about as agriculturally productive as New Zealand!), make the jungles of Guiana stretch almost all the way to the coast, seriously around there and the Amazon mouth there should only be 1-2 squares which are not jungle. As for West Africa I would suggest turning some of the areas around Dakar to Plains just along the coast with desert stretching all the way to the coast just south of Casablanca.
Yeah but all your answers come from Wikipedia...thats the problem
jessiecat
Divine Monarch
Get real, both of you.! What do you want? Total historical accuracy? So
what's your source, Hakim? Not Wikpediedia. Then what? Have you ever
heard 2 historians agree? Would you prefer "our usually reliable sources?
As far as the esteemed Rhyse is concerned (Blessed be his name), you've
created a decent playable mod with lots of flaws, esp. the bloody plague.
What else matters? I'm just a poor player, like thousands out there, who
don't need to wade through your endless bickering about angels dancing
on a bloody pin, no matter how precious you both think you are!!!!
what's your source, Hakim? Not Wikpediedia. Then what? Have you ever
heard 2 historians agree? Would you prefer "our usually reliable sources?
As far as the esteemed Rhyse is concerned (Blessed be his name), you've
created a decent playable mod with lots of flaws, esp. the bloody plague.
What else matters? I'm just a poor player, like thousands out there, who
don't need to wade through your endless bickering about angels dancing
on a bloody pin, no matter how precious you both think you are!!!!
Similar threads
