CulturalDecay Mod

CulturalDecay makes two significant changes to culture. First, any time a city is lost (conquered, destroyed, etc), it sends a "Culture Shock" through the region, resulting in the loss of 50-75% of the culture generated by the city. Note, this culture is NOT the culture visible in the city screen, it is the culture that determines the city boundaries, and which Empire will be able to work a square. The Culture Shock makes it much easier for an Empire to exert control over squares surrounding a city when it is conquered.

The second thing it does (which gives it its name) is cause squares outside of an Empire's borders to slowly lose culture over time. This loss (5% of the square's culture every turn, resulting in a half-life of roughly 14 turns) makes it harder for an Empire to regain lands that they lost in the past.

Installation:

CulturalDecay should NOT be installed in your main Civ IV location, as it will overwrite necessary files. Instead, it should be installed at: "My Documents\My Games\Civilization 4".

CulturalDecay makes use of the DataStorage mod to track culture generation on a square. Because it needs to store the information every turn, using this mod on games in progress will not result in optimal behaviour (although there should be no problems doing so).

History:

v0.2
- removed the cultural smoothing effect
- added the Culture Shock effect
- switched to using DataStorage to store cultural data
- borrowed some code from Mylon to determine Cultural boundaries

v0.1
- first release

Bh

i like this idea, but i'm not sure what you mean by:

Bhruic said:

Currently, once an Empire's culture has developed on a square, it is there permanently (until the Empire is destroyed).

Click to expand...

i've had culture borders shift quite a bit in my games. i've even taken over cities from rival civs because my culture borders engulfed their cities, as in civ3. can you clarify this a bit more?


Tad

That's because your culture is increasing. The civ that 'owns' a square is the one that has the highest culture rating. The square also needs to be within the cultural boundaries of a city.

However, let's say you destroy an enemy city. 200 years later, they rebuild a city in the same location. They immediately have the full cultural 'effect' that they had previously.

The easiest way to see what I'm refering to is to turn cheat mode on, and hold the shift key while mousing over a square. It will display the culture ratings for any civ that has 'affected' that square.

Bh

Huh... I didn't know that. Well, this is a very good idea, I think. You've done great work so far, Bhruic.

Nice work but I may have a problem with your premise.

Poland, Estonia, Lativa, Lithuania, Armenian, Ukrania, Macedonia, Serbia, Croatia, Bosnia, Czechslovia, PALESTINE, NORTHERN EIRELAND, Scotland, etc...

They may have be enveloped by other Civilizations, in some case have been returned to Sovenignty, but never did their culture seem to slip.

Sorry, but I don't give a flying fig about realism. I made this mod because I didn't find the current cultural model to be the best for gameplay. If there are other people who agree, they can use it. If you're looking for realism, probably best to look elsewhere.

Bh

Bhruic said:

Sorry, but I don't give a flying fig about realism. I made this mod because I didn't find the current cultural model to be the best for gameplay. If there are other people who agree, they can use it. If you're looking for realism, probably best to look elsewhere.

Bh

Click to expand...

Sorry, didn't mean to offend you. I was just engaging in constructive analysis. I thought you might return with your arguement as to the flaw in my evaluation.

Never the less, again good work.

Hmm, hope I didn't come off too offended - I really wasn't. I guess it was a bit on the blunt side.

I know some people like realism in their games (and in Civ in particular), but I'm not one of them. I'm for logical consistency, and good gameplay. In this case, I don't find it "makes sense" for a square to continue to have the cultural level associated with a civilization that no longer affects the square. For example, in one of my games, I was at war with the Egyptians. I razed/captured all of their cities on the mainland, and they were left with a single island on the other side of the world. And yet their cultural level remained in the territory I conquered. If they had sailed back and planted a new settlement, they would have overwhelmed my cities, and possibly taken them over culturally.

Now that could actually 'make sense' if they did it immediately, but 20 turns later? 50? 100? That's pushing it, imo.

Ideally what I'd like to do is come up with a better cultural 'war' system. I'm looking into things like having units spread/destroy culture, etc. Hopefully I can come up with something good.

Bh

This a great idea. I've always thought a problem with the series in general is that no civilization decays, they are only overwhelmed by another more powerful Civ. History shows numerous times that civilizations do fall apart at times, and not just because of a threat on the horizon. Rome is the obvious example.

I would like it if there was some sort of need to actively maintain your nation's culture, or risk wholesale rebellions and the creation of new splinter Civs, (e.g. The Byzantine Empire inheriting the Eastern half of the Roman Empire, or the Diadochi Empires after the death of Alexander) especially by military expansionists. Throwing off the shackles of the overlords, so to speak.

Bit of a grand concept, I suppose, but I look forward to steps in this direction, Bhruic.

This is truly a great idea, i'll give it a try and wan't to thank you now, especially since i noticed your "THE" MoO3-Bhruic i want to
THANK YOU
for what you have already done for me!
You nearly made the game live up to what i should have been from the start, and i can't imagine how much work it took to turn this piece of **** into the good game i experienced with your MOD!
BaneBlade

Bhruic said:

However, let's say you destroy an enemy city. 200 years later, they rebuild a city in the same location. They immediately have the full cultural 'effect' that they had previously.

Click to expand...

Did you pillage the city ruins?

Is it compatible with v1.09? This looks nice.

Yup, it works just fine in v1.09.

Bh

Bhruic said:

"My Documents\My Games\Civilization 4".

Click to expand...

am i correct in assuming that i need to put the file in my games/civilization 4/MODS? when i put the filein the civ 4 folder under no sub-directory, i cant seem to locate the mod in any of the game menus, but when i put the folder in MODS the mod appears under the name 'custom assets' and not 'cultural decay mod', is this correct? i just wanted to double check before i get too far into a game.


Tad

No, you aren't supposed to put it in "My Games/Civilization 4/MODS". Just unzip it in the main "My Games/Civilization 4" folder and it'll put the files into their proper location in CustomAssets.

It's designed as an "always on" mod, not one you have to select.

Bh

ah ha! that was the answer i was hoping for, an always on mod. thank you sir, i appreciate your hard work.


Tad

Hi, sorry about the rather large bump...

Unless I'm mistaken, there's a slight bug in the code for this mod - I don't think the bottom, or the far right line of squares will be effected. This is because the python range() function is not inclusive (I believe). I'm not certain, and haven't tested it, but I've just been having problems with a similar line of code.

range(x) goes from 0 to (x - 1). So if you do range(3), like I do, you'll loop through 0, 1, 2 (for a total of 3 numbers).

Or, in other words, that's not a bug.

Bh

Okies, just me being stupid then!

Sorry!

Bhuric I'm not sure I got your first post well. In my game (at least v.1.52) the borders seem to come and go according to culture, it's not like you stick with a square once you owned it once (till your city dies)

Am I wrong?