[MOD] Stone Ages: Alpha Revival

I am currently working on a revival of AcidSphinx' Stone Ages mod, (original discussion thread: http://forums.civfanatics.com/showthread.php?t=160483 ) I have a "proof of concept" version that works fine on my Mac. I am not able to test it on a PC and previous iterations had a number of PC-only bugs. Sam Yeager graciously fixed bugs that prevented the game from starting up (thanks a million, Sam! ) If you have a Mac this should work fine! If you have a PC download it and let me know if it works. One guy from France (Naokaukodem, thanks for your help too) can start the game but sees no text. I have not yet had any feedback from somebody with an English-language version. Link to the current file is in my sig.

What's currently there:

You start off as a single tribe with access to one of the basic food technologies (gathering, hunting, or fishing). Terrain provides almost no net resources unless improved so you want to settle near improved territory and improve resources right away. Gatherers can improve plant food resources, Hunters can improve animal resources, and Fisher can improve river and lakesides, all for +1 food. Other food path techs are available but they're well down the tech tree.

Early on you want to get Paleolithic Fibers. Once you have that, the fiber resources appear, you can research specific techs for specific fibers, and once you have those techs all basic workers can build a +1 resource improvement.

"Commerce" (which needs a namechange) is not generated by most tiles, but by particular improvements and specialists. You can get these via Fire, Awareness of the Seasons, and Cave Painting.

Exploration is very dangerous! Those animals are nasty!

Limitations:
Art is minimal (AcidSphinx did some but I'm no artist and there will be no more art unless an artist joins on the project). Basically all units use the warrior animation. Only the startup part of the game is there - you'll run out the tech tree pretty fast and there is no currently acheivable victory condition (except probably domination or conquest on a Pangaea - not tested). I'm still working on the balance between the food paths, and the pacing of development.

Future Plans
I'm planning to do this as a limited-era mod - probably equivalent to about two eras. The two phases will probably roughly correspond to 1) exploring your neighborhood and finding what's there and 2) putting together what's available into forming a civilization (like how Middle Easterners domestication wheat and goats while the Incas domesticated potatos and guinea pigs). You'll win by either being the first to civilize (this will work like the space race) or leaving the Mysteries of the Ancients (ie, a cultural win). There are a lot of additional ideas from the original thread.

Put the exactely link for download here please

Would you keep updateing the mod as well?

Direct download link: http://forums.civfanatics.com/downloads.php?do=file&id=2628&act=down

Nice to see this stable at last. nice work curtadams.

Glad to see this brought back to life. I'll dl this when I get a chance and run it through some PC tests and let ya know if I find any bugs.

Ok the french lack of text bug is a common bug it has to do with the language settings, tell him to set his language to English

Might I suggest using Esubiuis's live animals for this...it sounds like it would go well.

I managed to get it work, as suggested above I re-installed the game in english and it worked.

I don't know if this is a bug, but what seems to be wonders of the world can be built several times in different cities, like the Lascaux Caves - is this normal?

Also I noticed a lack of some technologies, particularly weaponry technologies, and Flint ressource. Do you plan to implement bronze and iron also?

By the way, here is how I would like the technology tree to work (just correct me if this is silly): stone age weapons (flint and other stones, bone, hardened wood) take a certain time to mature. This is the pre-stone age. The next stone age weaponry tech allow more worked stone age weapons. Then another tech allow very hi-worked stone age weapons, so that the next age former weapons are less efficient than them. They would be efficient however if one does not have the appropriate ressources like the flint. Same goes for the bronze age to the iron age: 3 tech levels each, and the last of the first beats the first of the last, providing one can lack the ressource and head forward the second anyhow.

Now the mod lacks of some art. In order to interest the artists in your project, why not to implement some programation in the meantime? For example, an idea could be to completely change the way scientific research is managed: it may not be based anymore on commerce, but on the contacts between the different civs and factions, like in this topic of mines: http://forums.civfanatics.com/showthread.php?t=184244

The Lascaux Caves is a "bug", in the sense that something has to be misdefined with the building definition file. I haven't looked at it yet but I will fix it (it's probably one field wrong) for the next iteration.

Stone (which will be Flint) is in the game but doesn't show up. Another bugfix.

I'm not planning to put in functional metals - civilization predates metal-working. I might put in copper as a "reward" very near the end of the game but I need to figure out what to do with it - you can't normally win this mod militarily because I am NOT going to put in transoceanic travel. I suppose I could make it an option for domestication events.

Weaponry needs a complete overhaul and yes, there should be a sequence of weapon qualities. I don't know the order of stone age weapons and can only think of a few - let's see

Slings
Atl-atl
Wooden spears
Clovis point
Handaxes

Changing the mechanic of how research works is not feasible with my modding tools.

Changing the mechanic of how research works is not feasible with my modding tools.

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Oww too bad. Well, would it be possible to implement some kind of drying up ressources? First off, most of the squares should be covered by a ressource. (It is only logic as any food-providing square is supposed to have something else than simple grass in it!) Second, the more a square is occupied by a city worker, the more the ressources collapses. If the automatic city workers reallocate them as soon as a ressource has dryed up a little (going from 2 to 1 food for example), then the ressource should be able to grow again. There would be two kind of ressources: the cultivable one and the savage ones (not cultivable)

As for stone age weapons I'll need to work it a little as even in my own language most a them are unknown for me.

EDIT: According to Wikipedia Stone Age entry http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stone_Age

Lower paleaolithic:

Handaxe: (homo erectus) function:

As most handaxes have a sharp border all around, there is no agreement about their use. Interpretations range from cutting and chopping tools to digging implements, flake cores, the use in traps and a purely ritual significance, maybe in courting behaviour. An interpretation from William H. Calvin maintains that some of the rounder examples could have served as "killer frisbees" meant to be thrown at a herd of animals at a water hole so as to stun one of them. There are no indications of hafting, and indeed some artifacts are far too large for that. Thus a thrown hand axe would not usually have penetrated deeply enough to cause very serious injuries. Nevertheless it could have been an effective weapon for defence against predators.

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Middle paleolithic:

Racloirs : (Neanderthals) function:

It is created from a flint flake and looks like a large scraper. As well as being used for scraping hides and bark, it may also have been used as a knife

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Upper paleolithic:

Baton de commandement (Cro-Magnon) function:

Interpretations include that it was a type of spear thrower or arrow straightener although less violent ideas for its function have also been suggested such as a regal 'baton of command' which was the original understanding.

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(Solutrean industry):

produced relatively finely worked, bifacial points using pressure flaking rather than cruder flint knapping. This method permitted working of delicate slivers of flint to make light projectiles and even elaborate barbed and tanged arrowheads.

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Etc...

EDIT: about spears (from the Spears entry of Wikipedia)

Archeological evidence suggest that wooden spears were used for hunting 400,000 years ago. [end of lower paleolithic] By 250,000 years ago [middle paleolithic] wooden spears were made with fire-hardened points. From 280,000 humans make complex stone blades, which eventually will provide blades for spearpoints later on. By 50,000 [end of middle paleolithic] years ago there was a revolution in human culture, leading to more complex hunting techniques.

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Bows (weapon):

The bow seems to have been invented in the late Palaeolithic or early Mesolithic.

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About clubs:

« Armer la main de l'homme primitif d'une massue nous semble parfaitement naturel, mais il serait vain d'en chercher les traces dans les vitrines des musées ou dans les archives archéologiques. La massue ne s'y trouve pas. En revanche, elle mène une existence fort riche dans le domaine de l'imaginaire. On la retrouve invariablement entre les mains des créatures qui, de même que l'homme préhistorique, manifestent un mélange de traits animaux et humains. Dans la mythologie grecque, les Centaures et Silènes étaient porteurs de massues, dont ils se servaient pour lutter contre les bêtes féroces. »

(Wiktor Stoczkowski dans Anthropologie naïve, Anthropologie savante: De l'origine de l'Homme, de l'imagination et des idées reçues, CNRS Éditions, coll. Empreintes de l'Homme, (2000), ISBN 2271051592)

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In other words clubs does not seem to be a primitive weapon except in the imagination!

Don't know (almost)anything about this period of time, if you need some research about something? perhaps make a map? ill be glad to help, always interesting to learn about history

Naokaukodem said:

Oww too bad. Well, would it be possible to implement some kind of drying up ressources? First off, most of the squares should be covered by a ressource. (It is only logic as any food-providing square is supposed to have something else than simple grass in it!) Second, the more a square is occupied by a city worker, the more the ressources collapses. If the automatic city workers reallocate them as soon as a ressource has dryed up a little (going from 2 to 1 food for example), then the ressource should be able to grow again. There would be two kind of ressources: the cultivable one and the savage ones (not cultivable)

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That could be done although there might be performance trouble. But what's the advantage of having all tiles with resources going in and out, averaging, say, off half the time, and having half the tiles with permanent resources? (I agree on having denser resources and I'm trying to figure out a way to do it. The "standard" XML tweaks don't do the job.)

Thanks for the weaponry refs! Very useful.

Naokaukodem said:

In other words clubs does not seem to be a primitive weapon except in the imagination!

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No evidence - but chimps have been observed using clubs http://www.bostonphoenix.com/boston/news_features/top/features/documents/02537776.htm So I'm inclined to leave them in.

curtadams said:

But what's the advantage of having all tiles with resources going in and out, averaging, say, off half the time, and having half the tiles with permanent resources?

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In fact there would be 1 phenomenon and 1 graphic improvment.

1. The phenomenon would be drying up ressources. For example, a standard grass square with (let's assume it is) 3 foods would become 2 foods with time if haversted. Further, with the invention of the fallows, it may become permanent 2 foods. This would of course limit the amount of workable squares though the population, representing more the small primitive tribes.

2. The graphic improvment is to make those food ressources used by the city workers (obviously not grass itself) to appear on the map, simply. They would not be like traditional ressources, it is to say they would not need to be improved or roaded. They would work as Civ4 unworked squares. (except if 1. is implemented of course)

No evidence - but chimps have been observed using clubs http://www.bostonphoenix.com/boston/news_features/top/features/documents/02537776.htm So I'm inclined to leave them in.

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Well, I would say that chimps aren't human! Plus it is not about lethal weapon. Chimps would not kill purposely anyway. Who could use a wooden stick in order to fight a panther? It can for sure dissuade a week congeneric but would not be used to kill or defend against such an animal. You may knock out a human or chimp though, even kill him, but anything you can't do with bare hands? I believe that wooden sticks are not in the natural weaponry way of thinking. Except if you speak in term of spear of course. As for clubs, there have been NO trace of any fossil of them, apparently. Maybe because they could not be found at a natural state or shaped. (wood is simply not dense enough IMO btw, or if it is, it would have to be shaped, but why to shape a club when for the same amount of time you can shape a quick lethal lightening spear?)

Based on archaeological evidence development goes something like this

stone knapping ie hand held stone (flint) tools
fire
stone circles
wooden spears ie all wood with fire hardened tips

blades includes obsidian blades

glue
hearths
complex blades includes stone headed spears and arrows
abstract immages and musical instruments

oval structures eg house sort of
sea going craft

pottery lamps
grinding stones
cloth
cave painting
figurines
necklace

eyed needle
skin clothing

snares, spearthrower

dog, rye, goat,sheep, cat, wheat, barley

copper (decorative)
town walls
rice, squash
paddles
logboat
rectangular dwellings
stone fortigication
baskets

That takes you from 2 million years ago to 7,000 BC

please make this mod like a prolongation of normal game !

I would like 10000 BC - 2050 AD

The settlers should be very expensive

I thought of an idea that I'm surprised hasn't been discussed here before now. Why not use the moble camp from the Mongel senario in warlords as base until you gain enough tech to found an early perment village. (late in the game)

maxbjr said:

I thought of an idea that I'm surprised hasn't been discussed here before now. Why not use the moble camp from the Mongel senario in warlords as base until you gain enough tech to found an early perment village. (late in the game)

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Cause no one here have Warlords?

However this seems interesting, can you describe it more deeply?

i have warlords

WGW said:

i have warlords

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So... why did not you think about this?

Seriously, it would be interesting to have a deeper description of this.

This was actually one of Acidsphinx's ideas; and i think a concept of nomadic people is essential to the feel of a stone age mod

So, a brief list of what I plan to include in the Paleolithic Era.

A central unit - kind of like a settler, this unit is called a Band, it can grow to a Small Tribe and then to a Large Tribe, but only if you have the Tribalism Civic. This in turn can grow to a Small Chiefdom which in turn can grow into a Large Chiefdom, but only if you have the Chiefdom Civic, Chiefdoms have the unique ability to produce Bands. Loose all your Bands/Tribes/Chiefdoms - and that is game over! I will note here that I intend to make the Chiefdom Civic so expensive that you would only use it to quickly pump out a Band, then revert back to Tribalism Civic, and that it would not be really that wise to remain in this mode for long. Perhaps even to the extent that while in Chiefdom Civic mode you can only build Bands, while all other unit building is put on hold.

Every Band, Small Tribe, Large Tribe, Small Chiefdom, and Large Chiefdom can produce other military units, at the price of mobility, while working on a unit, the Band/Tribe/Chiefdom must sit still for the duration of the build.
I was also thinking of making an inventory of sorts, kind of like how gold operates, but with hammers and food as well.
Then when you have enough food and hammers, your bands/tribes/chiefdoms can go find a safe spot to sit and build a unit. consuming the collected resources in the process, perhaps, and I am not sure really on actuall data and numbers yet, I was thinking of it taking roughly about 5 turns depending on game speed to build the most basic unit, the warrior(which might yet have a different name - not 100% yet.

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In fact I have had this idea myself before and it was on my proposal list, but not in the way of Warlords as, as I said, I don't have it.

The Acidsphinx's ideas are cool but I don't see the point of having moving cities in his idea. However I see the point to move if you have drying up ressources.

How is the Warlords concept?