C2C: My Ideas, Suggestions and Concepts

Praetyre · Apr 2, 2011

On suggestion, I've decided to post all my current and future non-technical/critical ideas in this thread, both to help keep discussion focused on more pressing matters in these threads and to provide a place where these ideas can be discussed, debated and preserved for easier reading, should anyone find them of value.

I have seperated out the various ideas I have had over time for incorporation into the Caveman to Cosmos mod into spoilered sections, so as to avoid the "wall of text" syndrome so prevalent with suggestion posts and threads. I will not be simply reposting these earlier ideas of mine, but refining them for easier reading and greater context. My first contribution to C2C was the tweaking of leaderheads to incorporate the new religions and optimize for historically accurate civics preferences, as well as adding a huge amount of new Great People for those longer and/or more modern games.

New/Revised Game Speeds:

Spoiler :

Culture Specific Religions Module/Game Option:

Spoiler :

I wish to emphasise that I would never advocate making any of what I'm proposing here mandatory. It will likely be the most controversial of all of my suggestions, and I understand that many people would not want to use it in their games. It woudl solely be an option for people who want it, much like Revolutions or Barbarian Civs.

My idea is to create:
A: Unresearchable starting techs, based on the ethnic citystyle of a civilization (So, for example, the Mongols would start with Mongol culture, the Romans with European culture, the Americans with Anglo-American culture, the Malinese, Zulu, Ethiopians with African culture, etc.). These technologies would be as follows:

Spoiler :

B: Special projects with a cost of 1 :hammers:

which serve no purpose except founding a new religion. These projects would require, as prerequities, both the technology that originally founded that religion AND a specific "cultural" tech from above. These projects would be as follows:

Spoiler :

Addendum Regarding Religions:

Spoiler :

Great Person Only Techs:

Spoiler :

Okay, this time I will quote a post, since it's fairly recent and fairly summative:

Praetyre said:
I like the idea of the GP-only techs and wonders.. for the techs, you could do something like what Hydromancerx was suggesting for RoM's Civ V edition, with these "special" techs representing lost or alternate paths for history. For instance:

Prehistoric: Megafauna Domestication (Both potent and alternate history)
Ancient: Ancient Computing (The Antikythera mechanism writ large: Big boosts to science output and the speed and power of all naval vessels right up to the atomic age. Also greatly speeds up calculation and computer-based technologies like Mathematics, Architecture, Computers, Radar etc.)
Classical: Greek Fire (Enables a new Fire Galley unit, ala Age of Empires, and a new Fire Tower building for the ultimate in pre-gunpowder defense.)
Medieval: Lost Relics (Enables the "discovery" of special items like the Ark of the Covenant, Shroud of Turin, etc. that act as world wonders with enormous benefits for particular religions. Would need at least one wonder for each religion of that time)
Renaissance: Da Vinci Tech (For lack of a better word. Early glider technology and aircraft in the Renaissance)
Industrial: Supertech (For lack of a better word, again. Think something like the early-Dreadnought that is this monstrosity.
Modern: Ultraefficient Motor (Something akin to those urban legends about suppressed 200 MPG carburetors. A benefit akin to early Fusion or SMAC's Clean Reactors, with virtually no upkeep costs for engine-based units and greatly increased speed. Downside, of course, is that it would probably reduce the value of fossil fuels...)
Transhuman: Sapient AI (The potential for a global "robot rebellion", with a new faction, ala Planetfall's way of handling the SMAX factions, popping up and seceding from mankind, taking all the robotic units with it.).
Space: Time Travel (Dunno. Always difficult to use as a device without seeming contrived. Maybe some world wonder that enables you to recover any units lost in battle 10% of the time at the base the wonder is in?)

Civic Specific/Great Person Only Buildings:

Spoiler :

Dancing Hoskuld · Apr 2, 2011

I am not a fan of historical limiting games but it should be possible to implement an option to enable your suggested religion changes. It may even be possible to choose your culture when you get the "Cultural Identity" tech for a half way option.

As to GP techs branches, it is possible to restrict a tech by making it require a building. Make that building only buildable by a GP and "bob's your uncle". I wanted to do that with the Mega Fauna tech so that the AI did not waste time researching it.

Hydromancerx · Apr 2, 2011

A couple things ...

1. Megafauna Domestication was suppose to be the "Golden Age" tech of the prehistoric era. I have no problem with it being only assessable via Great People.

2. No culture on Earth is made from just one group. Throughout history different groups a have merged into different socialites or splintered off. Also as time goes on the nations evolve and grow different from the ones they once were. I would like to somehow simulate this process beyond the revolutions elements.

One part i plan to do is the whole minor civ element where you can build "embassies" to "fake" civilizations. These add-on to your civlization's culture by adding new units, buildings and/or promotions. Note each embassy is just a wonder so it can be taken over by other civs if they take over your city.

However i would like to try to go beyond even that. One where each civilization starts out more generic and overtime it gets formed into a distinct and unique civilization. I think this can be done with a combo of the civilization wonders and the traits mod .

By having dynamic traits that adjust as you plan the game it will help you form the type of civilization you want it to be. Then if you add in techs that require specific buildings then you can have even civ specific tech paths.

The down side is that you will have to give up the current pre-set civs and leaders. Each civ would not have a unique building or unit. However though proper research, wonder buildings and a little luck you could recreate the civ the way they are now, but most likely you will end up with a completely unique civilization.

This would also mean we can do away with the super huge add-on civilization packs. This would not be optional since it would basically overhaul the entire system. So if we are going to do this we better be sure we want to do it.

Hydromancerx · Apr 2, 2011

Praetyre said:
Culture Specific Religions Module/Game Option:

Spoiler :

I wish to emphasise that I would never advocate making any of what I'm proposing here mandatory. It will likely be the most controversial of all of my suggestions, and I understand that many people would not want to use it in their games. It woudl solely be an option for people who want it, much like Revolutions or Barbarian Civs.

My idea is to create:
A: Unresearchable starting techs, based on the ethnic citystyle of a civilization (So, for example, the Mongols would start with Mongol culture, the Romans with European culture, the Americans with Anglo-American culture, the Malinese, Zulu, Ethiopians with African culture, etc.). These technologies would be as follows:

Spoiler :

African Culture (Starting tech for Ethiopians, Malinese and Zulu)
Asian Culture (Starting tech for Chinese and Koreans)
Crescent Culture (Starting tech for Assyrians, Babylonians, Israelis and Sumerians)
European Culture (Starting tech for Dutch, English, French and Germans)
Mesoamerican Culture (Starting tech for Aztec, Inca, Maya, Olmec)
Self Explantory Ones:
American Culture
Arab Culture
Egyptian Culture
Greco-Roman Culture
Indian Culture
Japanese Culture
Mongolian Culture
Norse Culture

B: Special projects with a cost of 1 which serve no purpose except founding a new religion. These projects would require, as prerequities, both the technology that originally founded that religion AND a specific "cultural" tech from above. These projects would be as follows:

Spoiler :

Andeanism (requires Astronomy and Mesoamerican Culture)
Asatru (requires Norse Culture and Ship Building)
Baha'i (requires Crescent Culture and Steam Power)
Buddhism (requires Indian Culture and Meditation)
Christianity (requires Crescent Culture and Theology.)
Confucianism (requires Asian Culture and Code of Laws)
Druidism (requires Druid Culture and Naturopathy)
Hellenism (requires Athletics and Greco-Roman Culture)
Hinduism (requires Indian Culture and Polytheism)
Islam (requires Arab Culture and Education.)
Judaism (requires Crescent Culture and Monotheism)
Kemetism (requires Egyptian Culture and StarGazing)
Mesopotamism (requires Caste System and Crescent Culture)
Mormonism (requires American Culture and Representative Democracy)
Naghualism (requires Mesoamerican Culture and Sacrifice Cult)
Ngaiism (requires African Culture and Livestock Domestication)
Shinto (requires Japanese Culture and Mathematics)
Taoism (requires Asian Culture and Philosophy)
Tengriism (requires Mongolian Culture and Horseback Riding)
Voodoo (requires African Culture and Fundamentalism)
Yoruba (requires African Culture and Music)
Zoroastrianism (requires Crescent Culture and Dualism)

In addition to this, some religions, in a Manhattan Project like manner, would enable others to be built (with the proper technologies first, as usual):
Buddhism->Shinto
Christianity->Mormonism
Judaism->Christianity->Islam->Baha'i

Addendum Regarding Religions:

Spoiler :

Just a quick little note, actually: I was wondering whether some of the excellent ideas from abbamouse's Realistic Religions mod could possibly be incorporated into C2C, with his permission, of course. It was one of the first Civ IV mods I ever played, and while it no longer works with Warlords and BtS, the main ideas behind it are very interesting and very sound. One of my personal favorites was the reduction of Christianity's spread rate to increase missionary activity and the various modelings of dietary restrictions. Only real issue I can see in implementation is the way he has the food penalties (giving and for particular resources for temple and cathedral buildings to counteract these resources bonuses), since A. There are a lot of buildings i.e. the supermarket, nightclub, grocery etc. that will still outweight these penalties and B. The issue of the "fake" resources that require a combination of resources in city vicinity. Guess those would again be a programmers issue. I see some of his ideas have been incorporated already (religions now give different bonuses, missionaries are renamed) so I figured I might as well put it forward.

I would also suggest we base a system on human migration. Based upon which cultures you pick would ultimately result in what type of civilization you become. This would both be the first migrations out of Africa as well as chance for later migrations via the colonial era or even ones into space.

I have no idea how such as system would work but I guess that's why we are having this discussion.

EDIT: Here is the world religions timeline too that i posted before along with the orginal post.

Hydromancerx said:
Ok so strategyonly and I have been working on making room for additional techs by separating each column with spaces. While RoM and AND had a lot of techs there were some ares that were left out. This post is ment to brainstorm for each area. Please chime in if you have ideas or comments about this subject.

Spoiler :

* = Already in the Game

Religion Techs
- Shamanism (Req Personal Adornment AND Tribalism AND Petroglphs)*
- Tengriism (Req Horseback Riding AND Shamanism)

- Druidism (Req Naturopathy AND Mysticism)
- Yoruba (Req Folk Dance AND Mysticism)

- Hinduism (Req Sedentary Lifestyle AND Polytheism)
- Kemetism (Req Stargazing AND Polytheism)
- Mesopotamism (Req Pottery AND Polytheism)
- Asatru (Req Ship Building AND Polytheism)
- Hellenism (Req Athletics AND Polytheism)

- Naghualism (Req Sacrifice Cult AND Calendar AND Polytheism)
- Andeanism (Req Construction AND Polytheism)

- Jainism (Req Meditation AND Hinduism)
- Buddhism (Req Meditation AND Hinduism)
- Confucianism (Req Meditation AND Code of Laws)
- Taoism (Req Meditation AND Philosophy)
- Shintoism (Req Ancestor Worship AND Polytheism)

- Sikhism (Req Hinduism AND Monotheism AND Clockworks)

- Ngaiism (Req Livestock Domestication AND Dualism)
- Zoroastrianism (Req Duelism AND Monotheism)

- Judaism (Req Mesopotamism AND Monotheism)
- Islam (Req Education AND Monotheism)
- Christianity (Req Theology AND Judaism)
- Voodoo (Req Yoruba AND Christianity AND Fundamentalism)
- Mormon (Req Representative Democracy AND Christianity)
- Bahá'í (Req Steam Power AND Islam AND Christianity AND Buddhism)

- Scientology (Req Globalization)

Arg ok I have been looking over all this stuff all day. I will post the other subjects later. So here is just the religious techs. I tried to pick the most logical. Here is also a time line for the techs I found on the web.

There is also some room for other religious related techs too I think.

I don't think this would work exactly this way but the core idea is the same.

Praetyre · Apr 2, 2011

Interesting.. I'm not sure how easy it would be to give you a free tech on cultural identity, but restrict it to a narrow range of techs. Plus, citystyles still wouldn't change, so even if you had the French using Mongol culture, their cities wouldn't be full of yurts and tents.

I quite like the idea regardng "embassy" wonders, partially because it reminds me of the fantastic Europa Barbarorum mod for Rome: Total War. There was a complex system of empire establishment where your society could, based on the buildings it built and the dates, go from nomadic to sedentary, go through specific reforms for particular cultures (the various Parthian and Roman ones, for instance) and, when conquering a foreign city, gradually establish it as going from a simple provisional government, to a fiefdom, to a vassal, to an ally etc.

For these "Embassy" buildings, I'd advise taking a leaf from the "fake resources" and adding cultural units based on the surrounding terrain. A Mongol Embassy, for instance, would require tundra, horses and desert in the city vicinity, while a Spanish Embassy would require desert, plains and ocean.

I am personally a strong skeptic of the single-origin hypothesis, but nonetheless, I do like the overall idea of developing cultures, though I'd organize it along slightly different lines meself, and require some cultures to have "crosses" between others to develop (Southeast Asia would require both East Asia and India, for instance, while on the other hand, I don't see why Central America would need North America to develop). My own custom scenario relied on the future BarbCiv and Revolutions to simulate divergence and migration, but your model intrigues me. Partly, this is because I ended up picking my (19) starting factions based on more general cultural groupings, the Spanish representing Iberians, the Zulu representing southern Africans, the Malinese west Africans, the Sumer eastern Semitic peoples, the Arabs not only themselves but desert peoples like the Berbers, etc...

Of course, that was based on a start date of 12,000 BC. Since we seem to have gotten the whole errors caused by Civ4GameSpeed.xml out of the way, there's no reason we couldn't have an earlier start date if we wanted, particularily, as thunderbrd recently remarked to me, given the "discovery dates" of our technologies. Taking a few for sample:

Language: There's a lot of debate about this, and some evidence it predates modern man himself, but since this mod deals with modern man, 100,000 BC is the earliest we can affix (though the whole Toba disaster complicates things). It also depends on what we really call "language". Since this tech enables the national language wonder, it's probably a lot more advanced and distinct than the stuff tens of thousands of years ago.
Weaving: Wiki says it may have been known in the Paleolithic, but that's a term as broad as Austrolipithecus to 10,000 BC. Ah, the joy of ambiguity...
Basketry: It's linked to weaving, but earliest evidence places it at 8000 BC.
Prehistoric Art: 60,000 BC or so. The Lascaux Cave Paintings certainly predate 12,000 BC.
Spear Making: At least 400,000 BC. However, again, that's pre "wise wise man", so the 100,000 BC clause applies.
Fire Making: Ditto.
Cooking: Anywhere from 2,300,000 BC to 10,000 BC, though most researchers say from 40,000 down, which fits pretty well for us.
Hunting: Even chimpanzees have hunting troops, so like Language, it seems to come down to definition.
Canine Domestication: Around 15,000 BC. So, seems to fit.

As you can see, there are things that manage to map out pretty well, anthropologically speaking, and others that are ambigiously dated or defined. Since the Prehistoric Era is one of the first things most players will see of the mod, and one of it's biggest "draws" (haven't heard of any other big mod doing it, while Final Frontier and the like take you into the space age...) I think a second look at the Prehistoric era, might be good, if for no other reason than I find it weird how Stone Throwers are almost immediately rendered obsolete by Slingers, which kind of kills the whole prehistoric, hunter-gatherer atmosphere.

Dancing Hoskuld · Apr 2, 2011

Praetyre said:
For these "Embassy" buildings, I'd advise taking a leaf from the "fake resources" and adding cultural units based on the surrounding terrain. A Mongol Embassy, for instance, would require tundra, horses and desert in the city vicinity, while a Spanish Embassy would require desert, plains and ocean.

As we have seen recently, building a building with terrain limits works but having a unit build it in a city will ignore terrain requirements.

Praetyre · Apr 2, 2011

I wouldn't suggest having the Embassies buildable by :gp:

, if that's what you mean. I'd have them as just plain old World Wonders, that Great Engineers can hurry along if they like, but that no Great Person can build themselves.

Hydromancerx · Apr 3, 2011

Interesting.. I'm not sure how easy it would be to give you a free tech on cultural identity, but restrict it to a narrow range of techs. Plus, citystyles still wouldn't change, so even if you had the French using Mongol culture, their cities wouldn't be full of yurts and tents.

Well you could link it like this. Each civ could start out with its own unique cultural tech. Then upon getting cultural identity different techs could open up based on the first tech you had. For instance lets say the civ you picked was from Asia. They would get like an Asia based starting tech. Then upon cultural identity you could then open up specific civilizations wonders to choose from such as Chinese, Japanese, Korean, etc. Whomever own the Embassy would then get that culture for that city.

Using some dependency chains I also think you could have one as your "major" culture. For instance Chinese Embassy + Palace could open up a 3rd wonder that gives the Unique building to every city you own.

Note this would only work if you had on limited wonders since unlimited wonders would mean you could make unlimited major cultures. In addition there would also be an exploit of getting say getting a whole bunch of embassy wonders in one city. However that would use up your wonder slots and I suppose would balance out since you would not be able to make all the other cool wonders that depend upon the palace such as the treasury.

I quite like the idea regardng "embassy" wonders, partially because it reminds me of the fantastic Europa Barbarorum mod for Rome: Total War. There was a complex system of empire establishment where your society could, based on the buildings it built and the dates, go from nomadic to sedentary, go through specific reforms for particular cultures (the various Parthian and Roman ones, for instance) and, when conquering a foreign city, gradually establish it as going from a simple provisional government, to a fiefdom, to a vassal, to an ally etc.

Well remember we can link buildings (and wonders) to civics and even religions. I could see specific "embassy" wonders that only become available if you have the right civics or combination of civics as well as religion or both! Honestly it would only be limited by the amount of effort we put into it since buildings are super easy to make.

For these "Embassy" buildings, I'd advise taking a leaf from the "fake resources" and adding cultural units based on the surrounding terrain. A Mongol Embassy, for instance, would require tundra, horses and desert in the city vicinity, while a Spanish Embassy would require desert, plains and ocean.

I believe we had a topic on this before. Let see if I can find a quote. Here we go ....

Hydromancerx said:
Thanks. Happy Holidays to you too!

I also still have my gears turning on what to do with the "City State" idea for Civ4. I would use a similar combo resource method where if you have 2 of the right resources in your city vicinity then you can research a wonder to build an embassy with a "City State" civilization. In doing so you gain access to their special buildings, units and promotions.

Tech Level
Ancient = Obsidian
Classical = Copper
Medieval = Iron
Renaissance = Sulphur
Industrial = Coal
Modern = Oil
Trans-Human = Uranium

Here is an idea example on how it could work ...

Apache Embassy
Req Resources: Sulphur AND Horses
Req Terrain: Desert

Special Units
- Apache Cavalry (Replaces Calvary)

Building
- Apache Cactus (+1 Food from Desert tiles)

Promotions
- Apache Raiders (200% More Gold from Pillaging)
- Apache Endurance (Cavalry get +1 Movement)

Obviously this kind of stuff should be adjusted but it would give a new level of game play if you could pick up new cultures into yours.

It would not have to be those specifically but you get the idea. We could also link them to city vicinity buildings so for instance maybe a bonus building like "Salmon Nets" (Fish + Prime Timber) and "Blueberries" (Wine + Coffee) should allow for the Nootka Embassy.

I am personally a strong skeptic of the single-origin hypothesis, but nonetheless, I do like the overall idea of developing cultures, though I'd organize it along slightly different lines meself, and require some cultures to have "crosses" between others to develop (Southeast Asia would require both East Asia and India, for instance, while on the other hand, I don't see why Central America would need North America to develop). My own custom scenario relied on the future BarbCiv and Revolutions to simulate divergence and migration, but your model intrigues me. Partly, this is because I ended up picking my (19) starting factions based on more general cultural groupings, the Spanish representing Iberians, the Zulu representing southern Africans, the Malinese west Africans, the Sumer eastern Semitic peoples, the Arabs not only themselves but desert peoples like the Berbers, etc...

Well i think we have to think in a wide range of cultures over time. For instance for the Americas they could all come from the "Clovis" culture and then radiate out into other paleo-indian groups. That's not to say we cannot have new cultural radiation based upon the random map you are on.

Of course, that was based on a start date of 12,000 BC. Since we seem to have gotten the whole errors caused by Civ4GameSpeed.xml out of the way, there's no reason we couldn't have an earlier start date if we wanted, particularily, as thunderbrd recently remarked to me, given the "discovery dates" of our technologies. Taking a few for sample:

Honestly i could care less about the actual date as long as we have enough "turns" then that's fine.

On a side note we could also have say a "Neanderthal Embassy" for early game where it could give you the "Neanderthal" units that were shown before. Perhaps even the embassy could go obsolete by sedentary lifestyle too.

Language: There's a lot of debate about this, and some evidence it predates modern man himself, but since this mod deals with modern man, 100,000 BC is the earliest we can affix (though the whole Toba disaster complicates things). It also depends on what we really call "language". Since this tech enables the national language wonder, it's probably a lot more advanced and distinct than the stuff tens of thousands of years ago.
Weaving: Wiki says it may have been known in the Paleolithic, but that's a term as broad as Austrolipithecus to 10,000 BC. Ah, the joy of ambiguity...
Basketry: It's linked to weaving, but earliest evidence places it at 8000 BC.
Prehistoric Art: 60,000 BC or so. The Lascaux Cave Paintings certainly predate 12,000 BC.
Spear Making: At least 400,000 BC. However, again, that's pre "wise wise man", so the 100,000 BC clause applies.
Fire Making: Ditto.
Cooking: Anywhere from 2,300,000 BC to 10,000 BC, though most researchers say from 40,000 down, which fits pretty well for us.
Hunting: Even chimpanzees have hunting troops, so like Language, it seems to come down to definition.
Canine Domestication: Around 15,000 BC. So, seems to fit.

The prehistoric techs were gone over and over. And while not perfect they are at a balance of game functionality and historical accuracy. Neither of which are perfect but they do at least make sense most of the time. For instance its hard to deal with techs that apes and hominids already had such as scavenging, tool making, etc. Thus those were done more as a logical progression of what tech fits with what than accuracy. Remember we also have to work with the rule s of the game and its elements. If we could have an ape Spore-like creature level that comes before the game I would but we don't really have that. I mean sure we could have say a starter unit that wanders around without a city an would have to reveal goody huts to get techs but that would not be fun since you would almost certainly die most of the time from wild animals.

As you can see, there are things that manage to map out pretty well, anthropologically speaking, and others that are ambigiously dated or defined. Since the Prehistoric Era is one of the first things most players will see of the mod, and one of it's biggest "draws" (haven't heard of any other big mod doing it, while Final Frontier and the like take you into the space age...) I think a second look at the Prehistoric era, might be good, if for no other reason than I find it weird how Stone Throwers are almost immediately rendered obsolete by Slingers, which kind of kills the whole prehistoric, hunter-gatherer atmosphere.

Where would you move the slinger too? Note if you play on "snail" speed the rock throwers are around for awhile even when bee-lining to "weaving". Note that the rock throwers were put in AFTER the slingers were already in place. So unit dynamics could still change.

Dancing Hoskuld · Apr 3, 2011

You do know that there is a tag in the Building XML which says you can't build this building in a city with any of a list of buildings, don't you? So you could say building Embassy X can't be built in a city with Embassy A, B or C.

Hydromancerx · Apr 3, 2011

Dancing Hoskuld said:
You do know that there is a tag in the Building XML which says you can't build this building in a city with any of a list of buildings, don't you? So you could say building Embassy X can't be built in a city with Embassy A, B or C.

Oh i totally forgot!! BTW is there a limit to that? Because if we are making like tons of new embassy wonders I don't want to be maxing out at a 5 building block limit.

I will have to look at the Sports mod, I know it has some examples because Afforess made those buildings/wonders.

Hydromancerx · Apr 3, 2011

If we are going to try an embassy system with the main civs we will need to know what we currently have for the Unique Units and Unique Buildings. I think thy should be updated anyways so its good we are going over them ...

Spoiler :

Overall I think we should have some overall of units especially if its regional. For instance Asian empires using similar units native to Asia or the same kind of boats that are non-European.

I also think under the new system all unique units and buildings should either be either stand alone (not replacing buildings) or if they do replace something it should make sense why.

Making such as system should hopefully allow for more customability to make your empire unique and different from any of the current standard empires.

Praetyre · Apr 5, 2011

How about turtle boats for the Koreans, ala AOE II: The Conquerors? Galleys with massively boosted defense, basically. And while Prehistoric techs being off the table doesn't bother me, one things does: Bronze is way, way too close to iron in the tech tree. It's like one tech apart at most. There was an 1500 year gap between em, and they were pivotal in ushering in the Ancient and Classical eras, respectively. I'd actually be in favour of making it one "tier" ahead of the big three of Slavery, Livestock Domestication and Megalith construction. That, or we need a new Chalcolithic era, though that would be a pain in the arse to implement...

Not to mention monarchy. It's been around since, what 2000 BC? (assuming you discount legendary Chinese/Japanese/Sumerian genealogies...) and yet it's placed around the founding of Christianity. Seems a bit off, somehow. Classical and Ancient both need reworks, imo, as to balance their lengths with the rather lengthy Prehistoric era.

Praetyre · Apr 14, 2011

Sorry to double post, but there's been quite a few updates over the last week and it's been made a bit more prominent with whatsallthisnow's idea to split the Renaissance into the Colonial Era. After extensive testing and tweaking on my other project (a GEM with what came down to be 4 starting civs with preset starting positions, plus my personally preferred game options), I've decided to merge my game speed and, currently, tech cost edits with this project as a sore of modmod/scenario hybrid. No reason to give a damn about historical progress if you're playing on a random map, after all, and dates are just cosmetic niceties. Also, there's the whole complex interplay of map sizes and difficulty settings, one which I'd rather not tackle till I've got a fair degree of modding experience under my belt.

Still, my overall goal to equalize era times has continued, albeit along the looser, more Empire Earth esque lines I mentioned as a possibility earlier. Following my successful experimentation with switching in and out of months in the AD years and having one "increment" have fewer turns per month than the other, I've come up with a much more cogent, though also much more lengthy, set of turns. The Prehistoric era required truncation, but otherwise, my predictions regarding each era lasting 500 turns seem to have panned out reasonably well. I've now, due to the basic fact it's far easier to divide 600 turns into 12 month years, increased the average era time to 600. However, this is by no means uniform, as you will see under my new dating plan:

Spoiler :

Now onto the scenario: It currently consists of just an edited version of the GEM- 28 civs no presets map we have, which is marked as being for ROM 2.7. Not encountered any problems with it thus far, other than some long turn times around the 900 mark (which I understand is chiefly determined by the number of players and cities, and isn't as bad once you pass Medieval, plus there's one less player to calculate since the slow times came for me while turning my civ over to AI control for testing) and it seems to work well enough. It'll only really get into swing when BarbCiv gets back (Barbarian cities seem to be popping up in the right places, like in the Americas, Europe and Southeast Asia), and I sometimes think Revolutions isn't tough enough, since in my tests as Sumer Egypt's expanding all the way down into the Congo.

The current gameplan starts with 4 civs:
China (Qin Shi Huang)
Egypt (Hatshepsut)
India (Asoka)
Sumer (Gilgamesh)

These civs were, of course, the first to develop, and the only ones really around by 2000 BC. I'm letting the other ones branch off as new barbarian civs and split off via revolutions, which brings me to my next, more complex point:

Is there some way to set it so that within a particular range of tiles, BarbCivs that emerge there will always be Civ X? So, for instance, any BarbCiv in the British Isles will become England (or the Celts, if you set it to have multiple possibilities). And in a similar vein, for certain revolutions to be, for lack of a better word, culturally linked? Like, England spawns America first, then Celts, then Zulu, then Ethiopia, then Mali, then it goes random again, China spawns Khmer, Siam, Mongolia, Japan Korea, Sumer spawns Assyria, Babylon, Israel, Arabia, and so on? Not a top priority for developers, of course, but I can see it working on a similar basis that Rise from Erebus does with faction starting in particular climates.

Of course, it's all a moot point till BarbCiv gets fixed, but might as well put it out there as a possible addition.

Hydromancerx · Apr 14, 2011

Great job Praetyre! This is looking really nice. Especially the spoiler section.

As for the bottom scenario part, what about the Americas and Oceania? There were people there by 2000 BC, just not at the height of civilization yet. Are you just going to represent them as barbarians?

Praetyre · Apr 14, 2011

Interesting you should bring that up. I actually have 3 different versions of the scenario, Ultralite being the one I use for playtesting, and based on the 2000 BC criteria.

It's not based on human habitation per se, but an organized civilization. Info at this time is fairly scant, but Sumer's been a united kingdom since, what, 2900 BC, if you discount their myths about rulers who reigned for thousands of years? Egypt's Old Kingdom starts around 2686 BC. India has the Indus Valley civilization at 3300 BC and it comes to fruition at 2600 BC. China's Xia dynasty begins around 2070 BC. Other than that, the only other civilizations I can find are ones that aren't represented in C2C, and I'm not holding my breath expecting them to be, like the Minoans, Elamites, Kassites or the Nubians, or civilizations that originate from Central Asia and hadn't migrated into the area by either start date, such as the Hittites.

Lite being based on a 1500 BC criteria, and thus including:
Chinese- Qin Shi Huang
Egypt- Hatshepsut
Greece- Leonidas
India- Asoka
Korea- Wang Kon
Olmec- Po Ngbe
Persia- Cyrus
Sumer-Gilgamesh

The last of my current scenarios is one that I don't give any special designation beyond PraetyrEarth, but has some more unusual criteria. In an effort to give equal representation to the various people and cultures of the world (good Freud, this sounds like some UNESCO pamphlet...), and to avoid scenarios like my aforementioned Egypt-conquers-the-Congo, "civilizations" represent ethnic groups and cultures rather than specific nations, which flows a bit better with the Prehistoric starting date. Thus, we have:

The Celts, led by Brennus, representing... the Celts!
The Chinese, led by Qin Shi Huang, representing... the Chinese!
The Egyptians, led by Hatshepsut, representing... the Egyptians!
The Ethiopians, led by Zara Yaqob, representing... the first of our broader groups, the East Africans! Might as well give them credit for being the cradle of the human race...
The Greeks, led by Leonidas, representi- representing? THIS IS THE MEDITERRANEAN!
The Indians, led by Asoka, representing South Asians (don't blame me. There's no "Punjab" civilization and Nepal and Sri Lanka have all the odds of Tannu Tuva.)
The Japanese, led by the incredibly evil looking Jingu (seriously, she looks like's she's about to give an impromptu disembowlment and serving your innards up ginsu style), representing... the Japanese! In one scenario, they established a massive empire with indirect vassals as far as the Vikings, but I guess the "Co-Prosperity Sphere" just started off a little early.
The Koreans, led by Wang Kon, representing... the Koreans! Ah, the joys of hyper-monoethnicity...
The Malinese, led by Sundiata Keita (who looks like the son, not the great great etc. grandpappy of Mansa Musa), representing West Africans. And some of the Congo, assuming the Zulus don't snatch it first.
The Olmecs, led by Po Ngbe, representing Mesoamerican peoples. There are some strange fringe theories about Olmec origins, but I'm picking them here because they were more or less the precursor civilization for all other Mesoamerican peoples.
The Russians, led by Ivan IV, representing Slavic peoples. If these were the Paradox Interactive forums, I'd be dead before I finished typing this, but hopefully the Polish lobby won't blame me for their absence, though I may become an honorary tovarisch for those who swing more towards a Pax Россия approach.
The Sumerians, led by Gilgamesh, representing Eastern Semitic peoples. Be you Akkadian, Assyrian, Elamite, Hebrew, Phoenician or plain old Sumerian, there's something for everyone here.
The Vikings, led by Ragnar, representing Nordic peoples. Rather funny to see a Swedish king among their leaders, but whatchagonadoo.

Only omissions, chiefly for balance and speed reasons, were the Aborigines (never really had a civilization in the way we'd think of it), Arabs (who didn't really develop until the 6th century), Persians (they'd have too much time to expand beyond their means, and consequently cramp the style of the Sumerians and Egyptians) and the Polynesians (never really unified). I also originally had the Chinook as the earliest (Pacific Northwest, after all) Native American tribe, but cut them for speed reasons. I've seen barbarian cities pop up in the right places in the Americas anyway, so they'll be a BarbCiv holdover.

Lastly, the only other issue that came up for me is that Korea kept conquering China, but that's why I've switched to the 4 civ model. Easier on balance (ho ho ho) and my turn times. Never had a a crash with any of them though, which is good.

Another, totally unrelated idea that came to me recently, regarding :gp:

- in the same vein as the Great Farmer unit being able to plant various agricultural resources, how about beefing up Great Artists by giving them them the self-consuming ability to add either a single Hit Movie, Hit Single or Hit Musical resource to the city they're in? Always seemed a bit odd these resources remained fairly static and that only recently you can really get a proper movie distribution dynamic in via the Red Curtains corporation. While Hollywood certainly produces the lions share of modern Western cinema, it's not like France, Hong Kong, India, Japan or even Nigeria haven't made their fair share of contributions to international cinema. That, and the Great Artist unit feels a bit useless at times, since his "culture bomb" ability is just a supersized version of the one you get with easily producable (wait a minute...) Celebrities.

Dancing Hoskuld · Apr 15, 2011

Praetyre said:
Addendum Regarding Religions:

Spoiler :

Just a quick little note, actually: I was wondering whether some of the excellent ideas from abbamouse's Realistic Religions mod could possibly be incorporated into C2C, with his permission, of course. It was one of the first Civ IV mods I ever played, and while it no longer works with Warlords and BtS, the main ideas behind it are very interesting and very sound. One of my personal favorites was the reduction of Christianity's spread rate to increase missionary activity and the various modelings of dietary restrictions. Only real issue I can see in implementation is the way he has the food penalties (giving and for particular resources for temple and cathedral buildings to counteract these resources bonuses), since A. There are a lot of buildings i.e. the supermarket, nightclub, grocery etc. that will still outweight these penalties and B. The issue of the "fake" resources that require a combination of resources in city vicinity. Guess those would again be a programmers issue. I see some of his ideas have been incorporated already (religions now give different bonuses, missionaries are renamed) so I figured I might as well put it forward.

Spoiler :

Praetyre · Apr 17, 2011

Good point.. is there any way to make it so having a particular state :religion:

outright disables the usage of a particular resource? Maybe not an XML thing, but it would pretty much circumvent the whole issue of supermarket bonuses and so on, and makes sense with what you're saying about tiny minorities (there's Hindus here in Auckland, yet most Aucklanders don't mind McDonalds) exerting undue influence with buildings. Reminds me of the new religion system (specifically, the fact religions are assigned to citizens in a cities population) in the upcoming D.U.C.K.S. mod for Civ V.

Chief reason for these penalties isn't to make religion annoying, as much as it is to make it a bit easier to model some of the historical trends and reasons behind it (Islam and Judaism aren't that popular in Europe, where pig farms are a big part of the economy, while it's not so much a concern in the Middle East) as well as to grant, much as Abbamouse's original mod did, religions more uniqueness, personality and flavour, rather than just being a series of generic culture bonuses (though I noted some are getting more distinct positives, like Scientology principally being a :gold:

maker).

Also, on another minor, off topic note (no pun intended), but one that will no doubt be far easier to implement, how about music for the Prehistoric era? Bizarre a source as it seems, there's a couple of tracks from the greatly underrated Gex: Enter the Gecko PS1 platformer game that would seem to fit the era quite nicely:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xQPVCBvH818
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oi0ZhxGdAUM

Though, the soundtrack of Populous fits so well I'm at a loss for words.

Dancing Hoskuld · Apr 17, 2011

I prefer Sirocco's Civilisation Part I myself.

Edit Druid and Shaman are about food. Asartu (or whatever Norse) is about fighting. While Egypt-Myth is about knowledge, the wonders at least.

Dietary restrictions for the religions eg pork are often more to do with health and climate. Pork goes off faster in warm climates, and the parasites in pork transfer to humans if it is not cooked properly.

VineFynn · Apr 21, 2011

Post moved from main C2C thread, see here for some previous debates/trivia on suggestion matter
Anything that is already included just ignore. These are simply suggestions that you could include in the game, that probably won't be implemented anyway.

Fixes/Minor/Infrastructural Changes:

Spoiler :

Suggestions:

Spoiler :

I will now present you with a system of prerequisties you could use for several of the wonders that would organise and clean up the national wonders section of the city build menu. It would probably be incredibly tiresome to do this, and might restrict the players freedom. It's completely up to you.

Spoiler :

You get the picture.

EDIT: i've also attached some revised civilopedia xmls. place the xmls in Assets/XML/Text. I have no problems with it. Here is the link You could also consider adding the AND LH Pack at this link

If you do look at this, just have a think about it. It's all in good will.

Dancing Hoskuld · Apr 21, 2011

VineFynn said:
I will now present you with a system of prerequisties you could use for several of the wonders that would organise and clean up the national wonders section of the city build menu. It would probably be incredibly tiresome to do this, and might restrict the players freedom. It's completely up to you.

Spoiler :

Banks
Bank -> "[Federal] Reserve Bank" -> "Central Bank" + 3 banks -> Wall Street + International Monetary Fund + 5 Banks -> World Bank
Factories | = separated
Cement Mill/Brewery| Chemical -> Biofuel/Fertilizer/Rubber Plants| Aluminium Factory -> Filling Factory
Laboratories
2 Laboratories/Observatories/Reseach Institutes -> Space Laboratory + Radio Telescope -> Deep Space Research Institute
Epics
Heroic Epic -> National Epic

You get the picture.

If you do look at this, just have a think about it. It's all in good will.

You could do these yourself. They are just XML changes and so are the easiest to release as a mod to a mod.

Step 1. Create a folder in the Assets/Modules folder with your name. Define that folder to the MLF file in the Modules folder as described in the thread Tutorial - Adding Entries to MLF file.

Step 2. Copy the building schema file from the XML/Buildings folder.

Step 3. Create your mod building infos file. I usually copy the whole thing from the XML/Buildings folder and delete the buildings I am not interested in.

Step 4. Just make your changes for each building. Since C2C uses the WoC standard for XML you only need to include those bits you are changing from the original file. So that the only tags you will need for these changes are the

BuildingClass
Type
PrereqBuildingClasses
BuildingClassNeededs

The first identify the building. BuildingClassNeededs indicates if the building required must be in the city or not. PrereqBuildingClasses is used to say how many of each prerequisite building must be present in your nation.

Code:

			<PrereqBuildingClasses>
				<PrereqBuildingClass>
					<BuildingClassType>BUILDINGCLASS_XXXX</BuildingClassType>
					<iNumBuildingNeeded>2</iNumBuildingNeeded>
				</PrereqBuildingClass>
			</PrereqBuildingClasses>
			<BuildingClassNeededs>
				<BuildingClassNeeded>
					<BuildingClassType>BUILDINGCLASS_XXXX</BuildingClassType>
					<bNeededInCity>1</bNeededInCity>
				</BuildingClassNeeded>
			</BuildingClassNeededs>

There is usually a limit of 5 different buildings mentioned in the lists.

Note. Still have to add the bit about not allowing a building to be in the same city as another but have to go now.

C2C: My Ideas, Suggestions and Concepts

King

Deity

C2C Modder

C2C Modder

Attachments

King

Deity

King

C2C Modder

Deity

C2C Modder

C2C Modder

King

King

C2C Modder

King

Deity

King

Deity

High King of the Britons

Deity

Similar threads