Echoes of Earth: A total conversion for BERT

Machiavelli24 said:

jimkirk, I have yet to put a version that is visible to the public on steam workshop. But if you want you can get access to the internal version.

I'm hoping to finish integrating the final text from the writer this evening. When that is done I can send out a version that will be the public release candidate. Once the release candidate is ready to go it will be a week long sprint (or death march) of everyone playing it as much as possible to find any remaining issues. If after that week everything is good to go than the workshop entry will be set to public.

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would love to try it .. its for rising tide of course right?
would it also be compatible with "rising tide of aliens mod"? which makes aliens harder and the game more of a challenge .. artifact helper and harkinon? map map which adds larger maps

jimkirk said:

would love to try it .. its for rising tide of course right?
would it also be compatible with "rising tide of aliens mod"? which makes aliens harder and the game more of a challenge .. artifact helper and harkinon? map map which adds larger maps

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PM sent. Echoes of Earth is for Rising Tide. For most mods it will not be compatible (because Echoes of Earth touches so many parts of the game) and I can't promise which ones will work without looking closely into it but Artifact Helper will probably work. The map script will probably work. Aliens are questionable but it may work.

so far tried it with a few other mods.. artifact helper .. harkinians map pack .. rising tide of aliens and user interface tweaks of rising tide .. so far after double enabling everything worked .. one thing i am not sure about right from the start we get a signal collector and converter and are required to build a lasercom ..for a mission but to do that takes a long time by the time one can get the oppurtunity to build one you fail the quest

In the twilight of Earth's great civilizations, we were chosen to venture to the stars in search of a new home. But we did not travel alone. As we slept, behind us streaked messages from Earth. Their dream that we would not let the light of humanity extinguish. When we awoke we listened to words spoken centuries ago. As we gazed across the vast space and time that separated us, we hoped that Earth still lived and that the words were not the echoes of ghosts.

Echoes of Earth is a total conversion mod for Rising Tide. It completely replaces the technology web, buildings, building quests, diplomatic traits, improvements, orbital units and more! The four design pillars of Echoes of Earth are:

1. Play the Map
2. Struggle to Survive
3. Dynamic Decision Making
4. Remember Earth

Resources and Links

• Steam workshop page. You can download the mod from there.
• The official guide contains a complete overview of all the new features with pictures. It should be the first place you look for more information about the mod.
• Alternative download location from CivFanatics.
• Reddit discussion thread on /r/civbeyondearth
• Development blog. Contains behind the scenes info and sneak peaks at future versions.

The Design Pillars of Echoes of Earth
1. Play the Map
Never before has the map been so critical in the choices you will face. What terrain and resources are nearby will determine what improvements you can make and what buildings are available. Specializing your cities to take advantage of the things they are uniquely suited to do will be key in growing an effective colony. Your technology and diplomatic trait choices will be shaped by what parts of your colony you want to benefit.

2. Struggle to Survive
Life is not easy on the new world. Energy will be scarce, Health will be a concern throughout the game and orbital units will require effort to sustain. Many yields are harder to come by. If your colony lacks for certain resources you will have to struggle to preserve with the constraint. The planet does not welcome you and survival will require foresight and cunning.

3. Dynamic Decision Making
No two games of Echoes of Earth will play out the same. From the moment you make planet fall you will need to form your strategy within the tools you have available. You will not be able to follow the same steps in every game. You will need to utilize your colony's strengths while mitigating its weaknesses. Even as your colony establishes itself on the new world its Affinity will shape its play style. Each Affinity has unique improvements, buildings and technologies that give it a fundamentally different play style than the alternatives.

4. Remember Earth
Earth did not forget you when they launched the great seedships. As we slept Earth sent messages -- the Signal -- in our wake. These messages contained all the information they could discover that would help us survive on this new world. Over the course of the game Earth's aid will help you survive on this new world. But as time goes on Earth will face its own trials and require our help! They did not abandon you, you should not abandon them! Can you save Earth from its fate?

What is new in Echoes of Earth

1. Completely redone tech web
2. Completely redone buildings and building quests
3. A new orbital system
4. A new Health system
5. A new Trade Route system
6. A new Energy economy

For more information on the new systems go to the official guide.

Echoes of Earth has been released! The discussion thread is here. The mod can be downloaded from its workshop page. There is an official guide that described all the new mechanics and systems.

what would the official version do to the beta version ? will the save games work? do we still need to double enable?

You still have to double enable. That is caused by a technical limitation in parts of the code mod makers can't change. The changelog between the pre-release version you played and the first public release is:

• Fixed bug where Feedsite Hubs and Neoplanetariums where boosting Arrays and Domes (instead of Domes and Arrays).
• Added missing quest text for Thorium Reactors

Apologies if this is a repeat...

It doesn't seem that the bonus culture per initiated agreement, INTEGR's unique trait, is working.

There are a couple of problems that can result in the behavior of the Culture-per-Agreement not working.

1) What version of the mod are you using? 12 or 13?
2) Can you take a screenshot of INTEGR's diplomacy screen?

If that ends up not being enough info:
3) Logs/save file

It seems I have v13 of the mod.

I didn't take a snapshot, but I've attached the last autosave from that game.

Echos should be the only mod that was active.

Thanks for the save. I've figured out and resolved the issue. I'll push an update later this evening. Once the update is available you'll be able to load up your pre-existing game and everything will work correctly from that point forward.

Rad!

Is anyone else having a hard time getting the lasercomm up before the signal disconnects?

It seems for me that initial timing is a bit off. At standard speed basic buildings have construction speed about 15-20 turns. So it is possible to construct recievers/decoders only if you forgo explorers, workers and early expansion. There is just not enough construction time.
To recieve a something from these buildings you essentially need to beeline Lasercom satellites as at turn 50 they degrade into +1 bonus and therefore would be barely worth building.

The same is true for cargo bonus for population. It is unfeasible to put a second or third city before turn 30 if you do not choose pioneering as free tech and start with building settlers. No time for build workers and explorers.

Amazing ... thank you for making this! This is like a completely new game.

Just a small thing I've noticed, and given the care taken I thought you might care about this: Tech tooltips mention unlocking Buildings, Wonders and even Units which they are not. I think this might have to do with the fact that these tooltips need to be updated manually by editing the text files.

Gaia, the tech pop up text being unchanged is something on my to-do list but I currently have it as low priority compared to working on the Wonders. However, I could see increasing its priority if it is something that you or others consider important. I expect it would help folks wrap their head around the tech web faster.

CruelDwarf, have your experiences lead you to shun buildings receivers and decoders all the time? Or do you just do something like "build them in the capital, never in other cities"? Is there a loadout combination you find yourself using game after game?

Machiavelli24 said:

CruelDwarf, have your experiences lead you to shun buildings receivers and decoders all the time? Or do you just do something like "build them in the capital, never in other cities"? Is there a loadout combination you find yourself using game after game?

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I played three games in the early stages so far. And built receiver/decoder only in the last one when I had hill capital and some good production tiles around, so the build time for them was around 10 turns/standard. I chose to ignore early expansion for that.
So with a good start they could be reasonable choice if you build them right away.

Lasercom satellite is also problematic as even if you beeline it you research it around 60-70 turn and you still ned petroleum and production time to build it. But you do not know where petroleum is as you ignored the tech because of beelining.

So lasercom satellite as the way to prolong the usefulness of receiver/decoder is not good too.

Of course the tedious text editing should be left for last ... I just was under the impression this was the release version already.

I suppose you are still working on Virtues also? I only see changes with Health Virtues and Synergy Bonuses ... are you not going to incorporate the New Horizons Virtues?

Thanks is612 for merging the threads together. It should help reduce confusion about the mod.

Gaia, while this version has been "released" there is more I want to do. I'm still working on finishing up the quest text for the late game buildings. I'm targeting having those complete along with all the new Wonder effects in the next content update.

Virtues are next on the to-do priority list after Wonders. They aren't as far along as Wonders so will likely come out later.. I'm experimenting with doing something different with the Virtues in Echoes of Earth that will be different than what was done with Virtues in New Horizons. I'm looking at ways to tie them to the Affinity economy as there were some ideas I couldn't work into New Horizons that I want to try in Echoes of Earth.
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CruelDwarf, you mentioned openings with good production, in games where you take Engineers as your colonist does it impact your calculus? Or are other colonists too worthwhile to pass up?

I've been looking at a few ways to make LaserComm a more worthwhile path. A simple option is to give players a one-time free LaserComm Sat after they build their first Observatory. A few other indirect buffs coming down the pipe is a redone Wonder (Stellar Codex) that gives a Free LaserComm Sat on construction. For Virtues I'm looking at some effects that will provide extra bonuses from Signal related stuff. The details for that are still being worked on so things will likely change over time.