[BTS] Expanded Epic Game (fixed Next War)

[LordGek]

That sounds similar to the problem identified earlier -- where if the AI creates a colony, it is supposed to automatically gets all of the mother country's techs and drafts two of the best defenders. But there's a way to get into a 'tech hole' where you can't build any draftable units (like if you get Rocketry before Assembly Line, where the SAM Infantry are not draftable, but they obsolete riflemen,) and the game crashes. (I think this also occurs when the AI tries to draft units, or if it gets the "militia take to the hills to repel the evil invaders" event when an attacker burns down a city.)

Solver's patch fixes this bug. Are his latest patches incorporated into this mod? (Do they need to be?)

Since this mod doesn't have its own "CivGameCore.DLL", I think if you have Solver's latest fix it will filter down its effects to this mod.

 

[Kalimakhus]

This is actually a modcomp. There is a modpack "Extra" built by Chiyu on this modcomp and its last release does include solver's patch. I think you would better get Extra.

 

[Chiyu]

Actually, Expanded version 1.5 which was uploaded one week ago DOES include Solver's Patch.

Anyway, since Solver's fix has been updated, this modcomp has been updated with the new fixes as well. You can download version 1.6 from the first page .

 

[LordGek]

Actually, Expanded version 1.5 which was uploaded one week ago DOES include Solver's Patch.

Anyway, since Solver's fix has been updated, this modcomp has been updated with the new fixes as well. You can download version 1.6 from the first page .

I hope it's incorporating more than just Solver's new fixes as he is still posting nearly daily updates!

 

[Alkyon]

Hey, just finished a game with this mod, and I must say you did a great job Chiyu. The Next War mod was a great idea, but there were so many small details that weren't right (the Portuguese UB, the music, the Apostolistic Palace, probably a lot more that I didn't notice). There are a couple of small details that I would like to see changed (maybe make the SS casings unavailable until shielding is researched to delay the space race a slight bit now that there are more technologies), but this is still far superior to the original Next War mod.

 

[jkp1187]

Hey, just finished a game with this mod, and I must say you did a great job Chiyu. The Next War mod was a great idea, but there were so many small details that weren't right (the Portuguese UB, the music, the Apostolistic Palace, probably a lot more that I didn't notice). There are a couple of small details that I would like to see changed (maybe make the SS casings unavailable until shielding is researched to delay the space race a slight bit now that there are more technologies), but this is still far superior to the original Next War mod.

This is a priority of mine. I have not played the mod to completion just yet, but I think all of the SS parts need to be 'moved back' to an appropriate tech so that you have to run the tech tree in this mod, just as in the regular game, to build and launch the spaceship.

How about the following:

SS Engine = Cold Fusion (formerly Fusion)
SS Cockpit = Cybernetics (formerly Fiber Optics)
SS Life Support = Hydroponics (formerly Ecology)
SS Stasis Chamber = Cloning (formerly Genetics)
SS Docking Bay = Shielding (formerly Satellites)
SS Thrusters = Superconductor (unchanged)
SS Casing = Composites (unchanged)

What do you guys think? I tried to pick techs on the far side of the chart, so to speak, but at the same time link the parts to techs that made sense. I didn't see any reason to change Thrusters or Casing -- those were 'simple' enough parts to warrant relatively early techs. The only one I was a little unsure of was moving Docking Bay to Shielding, just because I wanted to give people a reason to go up that particular branch of the tech tree. (The tech itself doesn't quite match, although I'm sure someone can retcon a good reason as to why shielding is necessary to construct the docking bay...maybe to make sure the tachyon particles don't deflect course of the ships?)

As an aside, it would also be really, really cool if someone could provide a replacement Icon for the "Center for Disease Control" so it doesn't re-use the UN icon...

 

[Alkyon]

Actually jkp1187, thats a pretty good spread. I was originally thinking Shielding for the casings because which would you prefer to be behind, advanced composites or advanced composites backed up by shield technology? However, I like your idea of the Docking Bay requiring Shielding. A good retcon would be saying that the shielding technology is required as a safeguard against failure around the door seals (remember, the trip does take several years, plenty of time for the seals to deteriorate, especially if constantly exposed to the hard vacuum and radiation of space) as well as to protect the docking bay (if not the entire ship) from space debris.

Also, if anyone plans to combine the Gods of Old and Next War mods, I think this mod would probably be a good starting point due to all the fixes included here.

 

[Kalimakhus]

I didn't know that Solver's patch is included here simply because I use Extra not Expanded.

Anyway it is a general rule. Modcomps are there so that they can be combined into mod packs. They should be kept small and independent so they don't have to be updated simply because another modcomp got updated.

I am not interfering in how Chiyu manages his modcomp. I just think that he should keep Expanded independent so he doesn't need to update it too often. Once Expanded fulfills its basic purpose (i.e. Fixing Next War) it can be frozen so that he can have more time to work on Extra or any other projects.

 

[jkp1187]

Actually jkp1187, thats a pretty good spread. I was originally thinking Shielding for the casings because which would you prefer to be behind, advanced composites or advanced composites backed up by shield technology? However, I like your idea of the Docking Bay requiring Shielding. A good retcon would be saying that the shielding technology is required as a safeguard against failure around the door seals (remember, the trip does take several years, plenty of time for the seals to deteriorate, especially if constantly exposed to the hard vacuum and radiation of space) as well as to protect the docking bay (if not the entire ship) from space debris.

Also, if anyone plans to combine the Gods of Old and Next War mods, I think this mod would probably be a good starting point due to all the fixes included here.

Re: the Composites for SS Casing, I figured it would be nice to begin to build the spaceship soon after Apollo Program was completed. Kind of a psychological thing for the players -- if they build Apollo then have to wait to get a lot of techs before they can even BEGIN building the spaceship, well, it may be a little discouraging, and people might end up heading for other routes to victory, you know?

You have convinced me that shielding for SS Docking Bay is a good idea though!

Technical question: if the enabling technologies for certain SS parts are moved up, is this fact automatically updated in the Civilopedia, or do you have to manually update that in the XML files?

 

[Kalimakhus]

In Civilopedia relations are updated automatically. i.e. I you moved a part from tech A to tech B it will no longer appear in the Allows section of Tech A and will show up in the corresponding section of tech B. However if the descriptive text of tech A refers to the part this has to be changed manually.

Pushing SS parts up the tech tree is a must for this mod. But allowing some parts to be built early is also possible. The SS project as a whole symbolizes man conquest of the space which has actually began in the 20th century about 45 years ago. We still far away from building a space ship that can carry men to another solar system. So the SS project can span a very long time. Some parts of the SS can be allowed by the Apollo program project then other parts can spread up to the end of the tech tree. Some side effect is that there will be a better chance for players to deal with a rival who started building the SS. This can add more excitement to the last part of the game with many options are available and viable. One can launch a preemptive attack on this rival or hamper his economy with excessive espionage activity or whatever.

 

[jkp1187]

In Civilopedia relations are updated automatically. i.e. I you moved a part from tech A to tech B it will no longer appear in the Allows section of Tech A and will show up in the corresponding section of tech B. However if the descriptive text of tech A refers to the part this has to be changed manually.

Pushing SS parts up the tech tree is a must for this mod. But allowing some parts to be built early is also possible. The SS project as a whole symbolizes man conquest of the space which has actually began in the 20th century about 45 years ago. We still far away from building a space ship that can carry men to another solar system. So the SS project can span a very long time. Some parts of the SS can be allowed by the Apollo program project then other parts can spread up to the end of the tech tree. Some side effect is that there will be a better chance for players to deal with a rival who started building the SS. This can add more excitement to the last part of the game with many options are available and viable. One can launch a preemptive attack on this rival or hamper his economy with excessive espionage activity or whatever.

Yes, and it probably increases the importance of the Space Elevator. Perhaps that should be moved up the tech tree a little, too?

 

[Alkyon]

In Civilopedia relations are updated automatically. i.e. I you moved a part from tech A to tech B it will no longer appear in the Allows section of Tech A and will show up in the corresponding section of tech B. However if the descriptive text of tech A refers to the part this has to be changed manually.

Pushing SS parts up the tech tree is a must for this mod. But allowing some parts to be built early is also possible. The SS project as a whole symbolizes man conquest of the space which has actually began in the 20th century about 45 years ago. We still far away from building a space ship that can carry men to another solar system. So the SS project can span a very long time. Some parts of the SS can be allowed by the Apollo program project then other parts can spread up to the end of the tech tree. Some side effect is that there will be a better chance for players to deal with a rival who started building the SS. This can add more excitement to the last part of the game with many options are available and viable. One can launch a preemptive attack on this rival or hamper his economy with excessive espionage activity or whatever.

Yes, I've been looking at XML files lately to figure out how to start combining this mod and the Gods of Old, and changing tech prerequisites does seem fairly easy and simple, at least it will be once I can find where the data for SS parts is held (probably somewhere in the main game files). I originally was thinking of just tossing the casings back as a quick fix, but jkp1187 put a lot of thought into this problem and he came up with a very good spread that not only puts the SS launch back, but all the new prerequisite techs make sense.

I really like the idea of a longer, more drawn out space race. It would really raise the stakes of the victory, now the AI has more time to stop you by force, or the other way around.

 

[jkp1187]

Re: Space Elevator -- Right now, you need to have both Satellites and Robotics. What about adding Fusion as another required tech to build the Elevator? That way, construction of the Elevator will be delayed a little bit, keeping with the rest of the delayed spaceship parts. At the same time, it won't be delayed too long, and will be useful to build the big-ticket items (and, no doubt, will be the casus belli for not a few desperation wars....)

Fusion is on a different tech path from Satellites and Robotics, so you can't just grab it on the way if you're trying to beeline.

You can make up your own reason why Fusion is needed for the Elevator (need a nuclear charge to generate the 1.21 gigawatts of electricity to power the flux capacitor--whatever.)

I was originally thinking of delaying Space Elevator until Bionics, but that seems like it might be too late. I also thought of Fission, but that, by itself, might make it available too early.

Thoughts?

 

[Alkyon]

You can make up your own reason why Fusion is needed for the Elevator (need a nuclear charge to generate the 1.21 gigawatts of electricity to power the flux capacitor--whatever.)

Thoughts?

I think the correct amount of power that a flux capacitor needs is measured in Jiggawats, because a Gigawatt is an actual unit of measurement.

Anyways, that sounds good, it would take a large amount of power to lift the elevator "car" up to the orbital station. It would also take a long playlist for the elevator music, unless you're just shipping materials such as bulkheads and casings that can survive a 20 G launch.

 

[Ansible]

Chiyu: It looks like the Woods III promotion is missing its first strike chances... (it gets +2 chances in stock BTS)

 

[Ansible]

This is a priority of mine. I have not played the mod to completion just yet, but I think all of the SS parts need to be 'moved back' to an appropriate tech so that you have to run the tech tree in this mod, just as in the regular game, to build and launch the spaceship.

How about the following:

SS Engine = Cold Fusion (formerly Fusion)
SS Cockpit = Cybernetics (formerly Fiber Optics)
SS Life Support = Hydroponics (formerly Ecology)
SS Stasis Chamber = Cloning (formerly Genetics)
SS Docking Bay = Shielding (formerly Satellites)
SS Thrusters = Superconductor (unchanged)
SS Casing = Composites (unchanged)

I made a mod with your proposed tech changes, posted here: http://forums.civfanatics.com/showthread.php?t=238442

 

[jkp1187]

I made a mod with your proposed tech changes, posted here: http://forums.civfanatics.com/showthread.php?t=238442

Awesome!

By the way, I took the work Ansible did and made the change I proposed above, where the Space Elevator requires Robotics + Satellites + Fusion as prerequisites (as opposed to merely Robotics + Satellites in the "vanilla" BtS.)

I have not playtested this at all, so would appreciate hearing about any issues with how the game flows. Download is linked here:

http://forums.civfanatics.com/showpost.php?p=5826247&postcount=2

Cheers!

 

[Alkyon]

testing it now jkp, so far everything seems good (though I'm only to the medieval age so far ). All the changes you did so far show up right in the Civilopedia, so I'm not that worried.

All that I think it needs to be perfect would be the Gods of Old religions and such added, but that's just me .

 

[LordGek]

testing it now jkp, so far everything seems good (though I'm only to the medieval age so far ). All the changes you did so far show up right in the Civilopedia, so I'm not that worried.

All that I think it needs to be perfect would be the Gods of Old religions and such added, but that's just me .

Not at all, there is a lot of us who'd love to see that ALTHOUGH it might mean having to lose normal random events since GoO requires its own specialized event system (Gods granting little bonuses via the random star alignments).

 

[jkp1187]

testing it now jkp, so far everything seems good (though I'm only to the medieval age so far ). All the changes you did so far show up right in the Civilopedia, so I'm not that worried.

All that I think it needs to be perfect would be the Gods of Old religions and such added, but that's just me .

Heh. I'm testing it right now as the Japanese...unfortunately, I'm losing right now, and it's the middle ages. I should've just gone for an advanced start, I fear....