Large Scale Mod

[db0]

A mod to increase the scale of Civ to a more realistic and Epic level inspired in part by this post. I found that while the 1UPT is a very nice idea, by sticking to the scale of Civ4 along with the increased road and maintenance costs, things get too cramped and you end up playing skirmish battles with a couple of units on each side at the early ages and a couple dozen ones at best in the late ages. That, along with the limited maneuverability of the terrain does not allow the 1UPT combat to really shine.

The goal of this mod will be to make civ more enjoyable as a tactical experience on larger maps with fewer players, by allowing players to

Have and manage more units

• By reducing maintenance costs and thus allowing larger armies to be produced and clash in battles
• By increasing movements all over the table, so that waging warfare on larger maps is not a logistical nightmare and more maneuvering tactics can be employed

Have and manage larger empires

• By decreasing the hapiness and culture penalties on cities, so that a "small" empire on a large map is not 4 cities but rather a dozen. This will allow for greater production and thus larger armies.
• By increasing distances between cities, so that attacking an empire through military is not as simple as bringing down and razing a city every few turns. It will require maneuvering over a large front, allow a chance for reinforcements from the defender and provide many opportunities for tactics (pincer attacks, flanking etc).
• By increasing city defences, so that more units will be required to bring them down.
• By reducing maintenance costs for railroads and roads so that maneuvering over the large scale of your empire is actually feasible, but not low enough so that roads on every tile can be spammed.

Hopefully in the end we'll have a mod where in the larger maps, wars with a frontline of dozens of units per side will be possible, reinforcements over a period of time will happen, wars of attrition, guerilla wars and so on might be viable tactics. A tall order, but hopefully possible.

This mod is meant to be played on a huge map (or larger) but with 2-4 less AI opponents and city-states, so you have more space to expand - and optimally on the marathon or epic setting. This is selected by default for you in the size of the maps when this mod is active.

This is the changelog over the basic game

Spoiler:

== Version 9 ==

• Fixed description
• Reduced the tiles cities can work back to 3 to balance the closer distance cities have to each other compared to before.

== Version 8 ==

After some requests, I'm moving the cities-per-hex down to 4 (from 6)


== Version 6 & 7 ==

No change. Gamespy b0rk and I can't reupload without incrementing the version

== Version 5 - Beta ==

• Increased Golden Age threshold by 50% since the decreased hapiness allows them easier.
• Fixed the broken population unhappiness by using traits. Now all Civs should get -50% Unhappiness from Pop and Gandhi gets 75% less.

== Version 4 - Beta ==

• Scaled technology costs to be easier to get (compared to the overall increase) at the Ancient and Classical eras (so that the initial game is not very slow)
• Increased visibility for all units by 1 to make up for the faster movement
• Increased visibility of all owned plots by one as well (so your cities can see further now)
• Changed tooltip for the settlers being unable to found a city to point out that you need to be 6 tiles away.

== Version 3 - Alpha ==

• Changes that were supposed to work in Version 2, now finally active.
• City strength more dependent on population and less on tech level. This makes large cities very formidable in defence and makes /sieging/ the city for a few turns to cause starvation a more valid choice.
• Modified all worlds to have by default less civs and CS and added a larger world size over Huge, Gargantuan, which is 1.5 times the Huge.
• Modified all worlds to provide less culture penalties per city (roughly halved)
  

== Version 2 - Alpha ==

• Increased movement of all units (including embarked ones) except settler by 1.
• Reduced maintenance to 1/3 (maintenance costs are very opaque so I don't know exactly how they work - See http://forums.2kgames.com/forums/sho....php?p=1187495)
• Unhappiness penalties from Cities and Population halved
• Extra Luxuries now give a bit of happiness (So now they help a bit if you cannot trade them)
• Civilizations start further away from each other to give them room to expand
• Increased Tech costs by 50% and Decreased Unit Production Costs by 30% similar to the Economy Mod to allow some more warfare. I actually increased building costs by 10% to sustain city specialization given how the slower tech allows you to build practically everything before you get new options from higher tech. No other tweaks from that used so they should be compatible if used together but I'm not sure which one will take precedence.
• Cities more forbidable to balance out the larger amount of attackers. They've got 50% more starting health as normal and their damage increases quicker based on population and tech level. They also now attack 3 spaces away to counter the move 3 of most units.
• Hill cities now also especially more powerful.

Planned Changes (Please provide some help if you know how to implement any of these)

Spoiler:

• Reduce the maintenance of roads and railroads by 1/3
• Reduce the amount of goodie-huts
• See how AI can handle the changes and tweak as appropriate
• (Optional) Dependency on Active City Defense Mod (Can't figure out how to use this function at the moment)
  
  Also see this question on the mod buddy

At the moment, I'm trying to keep the mod modular and I'm not changing a lot of other values other than the core gameplay I'm trying to achieve. This will allow players to use other balancing mods to tweak the settings to their liking. Mods I think deserve to be used along with this one are the Active City Defense Mod, R.E.D. modpack and Thalassicus' balance mods and I also like the changed done in Balance-Playable, especially for the maritime CS and the Strategic Resources.

If you like what I'm trying to accomplish, please do suggest improvements as I'm very new to modding Civ

UPDATE: Gamespy is b0rked and won't approve my new version which fixed the pop-unhappiness problem. You can get it from here until it then

[Abremms]

I like the concept, I will load this up for my next game. Although I have my doubts about how good it will actually be until you get some of your planned changes in, specifically teaching the AI to handle the changes and the 6tile minimum distance between cities. AI in my games REALLY likes to crowd cities. especially Suleiman.

definitely a mod to watch though, keep up the good work!

[braydog92]

Very cool.
Like it a lot, I do.

[Cheshiremythos]

If you look at the goody hut under the improvements xml you should see goodypertiles or something like that. Its set at 40 in the base game, increase the number of tiles per a hut and you should see a decrease in huts. You could also make them have a higher minimum distance but Ive seen them at this minimum distance maybe once or twice in a dozen games.

As for road maintenance I would love to know how you fix that when you do, the xml only takes integers so I am thinking some lua or even C++ will be required to fix...change that. Same with culture.

[Quetz]

The problem I have with all these "expansion" mods that decrease the happiness penalties is that your research is directly tied to your population. Allowing huge empires is going to have everyone running right through the tech tree even worse than it happens already.

[db0]

Originally Posted by Quetz

The problem I have with all these "expansion" mods that decrease the happiness penalties is that your research is directly tied to your population. Allowing huge empires is going to have everyone running right through the tech tree even worse than it happens already.

I've already increased tech costs by 50% but I'm already thinking of making it a gradual scale (100% on ancient, then 130%, 150%, 170% and so on). I just need to find the correct balance so that a scientific victory is still possible.

As for road maintenance I would love to know how you fix that when you do, the xml only takes integers so I am thinking some lua or even C++ will be required to fix...change that. Same with culture.

Even if I can't reduce the maintenance directly, I could possibly monkey around this by adding a hidden pseudo-policy somewhere like the commerce one (I hope)

[fendrake]

I didn't see any mention of unit sight radius, so I would suggest upping that as well to match the scale.

Speaking of sight, I don't recall Civ ever having land military units that utilized invisibility (only subs and spies). It would make sense to have a skirmisher type unit that can hide from view (say unless an enemy steps adjacent to them, and only if not artillery or civilian).

[db0]

Originally Posted by fendrake

I didn't see any mention of unit sight radius, so I would suggest upping that as well to match the scale.

You're right. I was actually thinking of this today but I forgot to mentio it. This will be in the next update (barring unforeseen difficulties)

Speaking of sight, I don't recall Civ ever having land military units that utilized invisibility (only subs and spies). It would make sense to have a skirmisher type unit that can hide from view (say unless an enemy steps adjacent to them, and only if not artillery or civilian).

That's a nice idea for a guerilla tactics option but for now I'm going to leave this for the future, once the core mechanics are in.

[jaldaen]

Db0,

Awesome idea for a mod... once I update my graphics card I'll have to give it a spin.

I'm working on a similar mod, but to be played on smaller maps (since anything larger that small/standard goes extremely slowly on my computer) and I'm having a hard time changing the moves. I tried to do it through XML, but I'm missing something (I've tried many combos of XML coding, but to no avail). I noticed that it your mod you gave +1 movement to all units (except settler) and I was wondering how you did it... from your mod files it seems like you did it through SQL and not XML... is this my problem (I'm trying to change it in the wrong area)?

Anyways, I also wanted to make the suggestion that perhaps wheeled, boat, and sub units might get +2 movement vs. bipeds, quads, and wooden boats. The main reason for this is because of the Companion Cavalry and... the other quad UUs that get 5 moves.

Keep up the great work!
Joseph

PS: If you have any other tips or advice for doing something similar to this mod on a smaller scale, then let me know

[db0]

Originally Posted by jaldaen

I noticed that it your mod you gave +1 movement to all units (except settler) and I was wondering how you did it... from your mod files it seems like you did it through SQL and not XML... is this my problem (I'm trying to change it in the wrong area)?

Yes, this is done via SQL, not because it can't be done via XML but because it's easier that way. If you want to see how I did it, just go to the mod directory/SQL and see the moves.sql file thre

PS: If you have any other tips or advice for doing something similar to this mod on a smaller scale, then let me know

I'm not sure what kind of tips you're looking for, do you have have an idea on what effect you want to achieve? I can't see the same thing working on a smaller scale since the whole point of this mod is the "Larger Scale"

[jaldaen]

db0,

Thanks, I'll take a look at the SQL for your mod and see how you changed the movement.

The main purpose of the mod is to address some of the logisitical problems that can happen due to the moves 2 that many units have.

For example, an ally sitting on a hill (even a worker!) without a road can really ruin your day, but if you had one extra move, then as long as the ally doesn't have two units causing a traffic jam (much rarer), then you'll be fine... so it's mainly a logistics-based mod to help improve 1UPT at all scales. I'm familiar with XML coding, but SQL and Lua are new to me so I was focusing on doing as much as possible through XML before seeking help with the SQL.

As for tips, well I'm mainly looking at logistical and game-balance tips for what happens when you increase movement. For example, your global defines changes are very good at helping to mitigate the effects of increased movement by making civs farther apart and cities fire 3 hexes away, etc. Those are really good ideas... even at smaller scales.

Thanks,
Joseph

[db0]

I see, well in that case I would think that playing with this mod would be enough but simply on smaller maps and with less AIs per map so that you play with the amount of AI players of the previous levels. Still with the 3 moves per unit, the smaller maps will just seem very small and might create other logistical issues but this needs to be shown in practice.

[jaldaen]

db0,

Thanks for your thoughts, I might just use your mod and then modify it if I run into any problems with smaller maps. Do you mind if I borrow your code and take it for a spin? I promise I won't wreck it... though I might modify it slightly here and there.

Best Wishes,
Joseph

PS: I'll definitely include you in the credits as the main contributor as long as the mod doesn't require much changing from what you've already provided. If your mod works perfectly on small maps as is... then I might just drop my logisitics mod and use yours instead and find another project to work on.

[db0]

of course, feel free to play around naturally and if you find a combination of changes that you think make the game better on smaller maps, naturally let me know and I'll implement them into the mod proper No need to have two mods where one will do imho (unless you're dead set on having your own thing of course)

[jaldaen]

db0,

Thanks and I'll be sure to let you know what works on smaller maps.

As for combining mods... sure, I was really just doing the mod to learn how to mod games for Civ5 and address one of the problems that 1UPT creates (although I like 1UPT it does have a few drawbacks), so I don't mind letting you implement any changes that I find helpful into your mod instead of making my own. Actually, it'll free me up to explore other mod ideas I have running aroun in my head

Best Wishes,
Joseph

[Ino]

Since you increased the movement of all units, you might also want to increase the range of artillery. Which leads me to the next thing...

I've been sort of unhappy with scouts as they are. I know other people are too. I was thinking about making a combination of some of these things:
- Scouts for later eras with higher movement and combat (strong enough to take out a heavily wounded enemy on the retreat)
- Embarked scouts move faster and can see further than other embarked units
- Scouts get experience for discovering goody huts, natural wonders, city states, barbarian camps etc.


This would fit nicely with long-range artillery. If the vision is kept as it is, you will need scouts of some kind to point out targets. Combined with semi-invisibility as mentioned above, this could allow some interesting tactics.

[jaldaen]

Well I played through your mod on a duel-sized map and so far this mod feels pretty good for movement. I played as Songhai and the extra movement for the UU-horses was really nice.

Anyways, I was extremely happy with how the 3 move for bipeds worked for avoiding situations where an ally unit was blocking a path through the hills.

One thing I noticed was that the AI wasn't really using the 3 range city attack... this might have been because it couldn't "see" me just outside its borders. I'll have to play some more to let you know if this is a real problem or just me placing my troops in such a way as to keep his city from attacking. So far so good

Best Wishes,
Joseph

[db0]

Hmm, it seems that the mod is not applying any of my global defines xml changes for some reason. This is why city building is still 2 tiles and cities can only fire 2 tiles away.

EDIT: Fixed now. All Global changes should work. Cities now finally require 6 hexes of distance between each other All other changes active as well.

[db0]

Btw, can anyone tell me how many moves their units are having after the latest update? There seems to be something funky going on on my end which makes my moves be 4 and even sometimes 5, even though I haven't touched the code for this. I get the impression it has somehow cached the moves of the mod and on subsequent loads, it increases it further. Weird.

OK found the issue. It seems that when mod buddy compiles a new version, it will leave the old one in the MODS directory but it will not be visible in the installed mods. However if it was active before you created a new version it will stay active but hidden. This means that all your SQL queries will be run again (the ones you had in the previous iterations) and in case of sql queries which increment varianbles, those variables will be incremented again and again. I was at v3, and therefore my moves were 5 for most units, because v1 and v2 where increasing them as well.

I don't know if this happens when you update/redownload the mod from the mod browser. Can someone check this? Check how many versions of the mod you have in your C:\Users\<username>Documents\My Games\Sid Meier's Civilization 5\MODS directory

[jaldaen]

dbo,

So I downloaded the new mod and now the moves are 4 instead of 3 and I have two copies of the mod in the folder. I also downloaded the new version while I still had v.2 enabled (which may or may not be the problem).

So then, I deleted the mod... and guess what... version 2 gets deleted, but version 3 takes its place in the in-game MOD list (but is disabled). So I enabled it and voila! The moves are at 3 and v.2 is gone from my MODS folder.

So it seems like you have to "delete" older versions and once you do, the newer version takes its place. Definately buggy... you might want to post this in the bugs section so that other modders and Faraxis know about it... or can at least tell you what's going on.

Best Wishes,
Joseph