3rd and 4th Unique Components for VP - Official thread 87

[SuperNoobCamper]

My first time getting to the late late game as Japan with 4th UC, i cannot elaborate how much i love the Yamato, the Great admiral points on kills is extremely useful since it flawlessly synergizes with shogunate .... 3 range makes the indirect fire invaluable ..... the drawback of giving your opponent and is pretty much negligible at this point in the game.
Kabouki theater is great and the replacement guilds seem ok, not a big jump in power level in comparison with the standard guilds but no one would say no to a few more culture, tourism or .
What an amazing mod, you really hit the mark with Japan both in terms of flavor and power level.

 

[General_Drax]

The 2-18 beta had me quaking in my boots and I just saw 2-9 compatibility for this. Wish me luck on my first mod mod game as Rome boys!

Same for me. Sticking with 2-9. The 2-18 and the rework of AIs bonus seems very difficult to balance. It was already hard (for me) getting one (ONE !) early wonder and a religion on Emperor.

 

[SuperNoobCamper]

Same for me. Sticking with 2-9. The 2-18 and the rework of AIs bonus seems very difficult to balance. It was already hard (for me) getting one (ONE !) early wonder and a religion on Emperor.

I had both Hanging Gardens and Terracotta Army stolen from me on Emperor ... the spike in difficulty is actually huge this patch but i can't say that i hate it as immortal felt really easy without even trying in 2-9 beta.

 

[nmb93]

I had both Hanging Gardens and Terracotta Army stolen from me on Emperor ... the spike in difficulty is actually huge this patch but i can't say that i hate it as immortal felt really easy without even trying in 2-9 beta.

I wasn't sure if the mod had gotten easier or if I'd gotten better at it, probably a combination. I've been playing on and off for ~1.5 years now and I still remember how incredibly interesting, difficult, and balanced late game was in the first couple of games that I played. Since moving up to immortal, I'm finding that as long as I'm able to capture a few cities by the end of the classical era I can stay competitive. With the 2-18 buffs though...it sounds like early conquest is off the table. One of the things I loved about this mod was that higher level AI didn't start with a bunch of free stuff. Maybe, sadly, some degree of that is actually required to really balance it out?

Anyway, regarding my game, I decided to restart. Playing as Rome I pawned close to Persia and could've crippled him with ancient war but decided to settle a bit and do a big Legion + Ballista push on my other neighbor. That was going mediocre when Ethiopia announced it had entered the Medieval era while I was building libraries. Soo I might play with map settings and civ selection a bit to cheese my next game. I will say that the new Us for Rome make the ancient era particularly busy tech wise. I usually beeline Legions and then conquer with them while researching to courthouses. But now I need comp bows and plantations...decisions decisions I guess.

 

[General_Drax]

@nmb93 Are you playing with the modified .dll (2/3 yield) on 2-18 ?

Main thread reports are contradictory as best. Well ... gonna find myself I guess.

 

[Legen]

Well, the tophet issue only happens if I make a modpack, it is now granting the culture and xp yields if I apply the mods through the MODS menu instead. Guess I'll be playing without a modpack for a while.

the drawback of giving your opponent and is pretty much negligible at this point in the game.

About Yamato's yields on construction (600 ) and destruction (400 ), I think it would be more thematic to have them switched, both for the civ's design and the UU's theme.

Japan plays as a cultural civ that doesn't have special benefits on golden ages, the benefit of 600 isn't of much interest; meanwhile, having an opponent gaining culture delays a potential cultural victory on that civ. This part of the UU goes against what the civ tries to achieve, and I don't think it is necessary; the UU already costs more than the unit it replaces (2000 instead of 1800 ).

On the UU's theme, Yamato has a legacy on japanese culture to this day, while having little to no impact on the american culture, which tends to emphasize the Battle of Midway instead. By the time Yamato and Musashi were sunk, the americans were already winning the war and didn't know the full specifications and capabilities of the Yamato-class even late into the war. Meanwhile, in Japan, Yamato appears often as a symbol for the events and spirit during the war, and as a means to understand it. She also appears frequently in popular culture and is known worldwide even by people that have little knowledge or interest in naval warfare/history. I think the extra culture captures these aspects of the japanese side better than the extra golden age points.

 

[adan_eslavo]

I noticed that Khatun Ahaw promotion fro Maya mentions Land Units and grants promotion to Helicopters

 

[nmb93]

@nmb93 Are you playing with the modified .dll (2/3 yield) on 2-18 ?

Main thread reports are contradictory as best. Well ... gonna find myself I guess.

I stayed on 2-9 for my game with this mod because it was recently updated to specifically support up to 2-9. I'm planning on trying 2-18 later this week and will definitely be using the easier DLL.

 

[SuperNoobCamper]

Anyway, regarding my game, I decided to restart. Playing as Rome I pawned close to Persia and could've crippled him with ancient war but decided to settle a bit and do a big Legion + Ballista push on my other neighbor. That was going mediocre when Ethiopia announced it had entered the Medieval era while I was building libraries. Soo I might play with map settings and civ selection a bit to cheese my next game. I will say that the new Us for Rome make the ancient era particularly busy tech wise. I usually beeline Legions and then conquer with them while researching to courthouses. But now I need comp bows and plantations...decisions decisions I guess.

I started an Emperor game as Rome and i really felt this,Typically i want to enter the classical era from the lower end of the tech tree but my luxuries were coffee and whales so i had to get the middle part of the tree first then i had god of commerce as my pantheon Thanks, Montezuma for taking god of war, Jerk so i had to get markets to get a religion then i actually got a DOW from Montezuma forcing me to go construction then walls in all of border cities and by the time i had a chance to get legions and ballistas i was starting to fall behind in tech That i had to switch to building libraries while Haile Selassie was already in medieval era Freaking tradition Ethiopia is always 10 techs ahead,

 

[nmb93]

I started an Emperor game as Rome and i really felt this,Typically i want to enter the classical era from the lower end of the tech tree but my luxuries were coffee and whales so i had to get the middle part of the tree first then i had god of commerce as my pantheon Thanks, Montezuma for taking god of war, Jerk so i had to get markets to get a religion then i actually got a DOW from Montezuma forcing me to go construction then walls in all of border cities and by the time i had a chance to get legions and ballistas i was starting to fall behind in tech That i had to switch to building libraries while Haile Selassie was already in medieval era Freaking tradition Ethiopia is always 10 techs ahead,

Same deal In the game I abandoned. Ethiopia had taken tradition, blobbed out hard, and started snowballing. If I thought I had a chance at gobbling Arabia I would've stuck around but without any early conquests to justify having taken Authority I bailed.

Next game ended up being a good time. I had Songhai to the north but totally blocked off by mountains and Venice to the east. Conquered Venice and then vassalized ASAP. Then turtled for quite a while to raise a navy before basically conquering the world. The Maya and India both kept up pretty well (they had wiped Siam together) until cruisers, then by battleships it was GG. One funny note, the Mayans had beaten me to the Manhattan project and had a nuke in their last city when I took it. Is the AI hesitant to nuke their former cities that I've captured even if it means killing a bunch of my good units?

 

[SuperNoobCamper]

Same deal In the game I abandoned. Ethiopia had taken tradition, blobbed out hard, and started snowballing. If I thought I had a chance at gobbling Arabia I would've stuck around but without any early conquests to justify having taken Authority I bailed.

Next game ended up being a good time. I had Songhai to the north but totally blocked off by mountains and Venice to the east. Conquered Venice and then vassalized ASAP. Then turtled for quite a while to raise a navy before basically conquering the world. The Maya and India both kept up pretty well (they had wiped Siam together) until cruisers, then by battleships it was GG. One funny note, the Mayans had beaten me to the Manhattan project and had a nuke in their last city when I took it. Is the AI hesitant to nuke their former cities that I've captured even if it means killing a bunch of my good units?

Interestingly enough in my previous game as Spain i was the closest neighbor to a 10 techs ahead Ethiopia, i managed to eliminate him form the match by bee lining the military techs to be on equal foot in terms of unit quality ... i barely got him before he could snag my newly produced Heavy skirmishers with his renaissance era Tercios.
It's not always feasible to do so as map topography and the distance is a major factor in conquests like these but it really feels amazing when yo get to capture that city with 10 wonders.

 

[nmb93]

Interestingly enough in my previous game as Spain i was the closest neighbor to a 10 techs ahead Ethiopia, i managed to eliminate him form the match by bee lining the military techs to be on equal foot in terms of unit quality ... i barely got him before he could snag my newly produced Heavy skirmishers with his renaissance era Tercios.
It's not always feasible to do so as map topography and the distance is a major factor in conquests like these but it really feels amazing when yo get to capture that city with 10 wonders.

Could not agree more. The satisfaction of conquering a runaway is what makes the slog of a domination game worth it.

Actually this sparked a thought/question. So if the goal is to keep domination games interesting, would it make sense (after having conquered a neighbor or two) to target the tech leader next? Or leave them for last in hopes that they snowball and create more of a challenge? I know strategically, you'd want to just continually target the next easiest civ. But in practice that means that by the last civ or two, you're so powerful that there's no question about you winning.

 

[phantomaxl1207]

Great Bombards feel overtuned, to say the least. They are doing ~300 Damage to Cites per hit, meanwhile Canons are doing ~50 Damage; the City I'm attacking only has 555 HP.

 

[Asterix Rage]

V57

The French UM - SPAD S.VII consumes 1 supply. It shouldn't since a recent VP change. Air Units do not consume supply anymore.

The fix:
(over) More Unique Components for VP (v57)\France\SPAD\SPAD.sql
Line 75

Replace:

INSERT INTO Units   
            (Type,                Class,     PrereqTech,    Range,    BaseSightRange, RangedCombat,    Combat, Cost,    FaithCost,    RequiresFaithPurchaseEnabled,    Moves, Immobile, CombatClass, Domain, DefaultUnitAI,    ObsoleteTech,        GoodyHutUpgradeUnitClass,    XPValueAttack,    AirInterceptRange,        Description,                 Civilopedia,                         Strategy,                                 Help,                                 Pillage, MilitarySupport, MilitaryProduction, IgnoreBuildingDefense, Mechanized, AirUnitCap, AdvancedStartCost, RangedCombatLimit, CombatLimit, XPValueDefense, IsMounted,    UnitArtInfo,                     UnitFlagIconOffset, UnitFlagAtlas,                PortraitIndex,     IconAtlas,                MoveRate,    Special,     PurchaseCooldown)
SELECT        'UNIT_FRANCE_SPAD',    Class,    PrereqTech,    Range,    BaseSightRange, RangedCombat-3,    Combat, Cost,    FaithCost,    RequiresFaithPurchaseEnabled,    Moves, Immobile, CombatClass, Domain, DefaultUnitAI,    'TECH_LASERS',        GoodyHutUpgradeUnitClass,    XPValueAttack,    AirInterceptRange+1,    'TXT_KEY_UNIT_FRANCE_SPAD',    'TXT_KEY_UNIT_FRANCE_SPAD_TEXT',    'TXT_KEY_UNIT_FRANCE_SPAD_STRATEGY',    'TXT_KEY_UNIT_FRANCE_SPAD_HELP',    Pillage, MilitarySupport, MilitaryProduction, IgnoreBuildingDefense, Mechanized, AirUnitCap, AdvancedStartCost, RangedCombatLimit, CombatLimit, XPValueDefense, IsMounted,    'ART_DEF_UNIT_FRANCE_SPAD',     0,                    'UNIT_FRANCE_FLAG_ATLAS',    0,                 'UNIT_FRANCE_ATLAS',    MoveRate,    Special,     PurchaseCooldown
FROM Units WHERE Type = 'UNIT_TRIPLANE';

with:

INSERT INTO Units   
            (Type,                Class,     PrereqTech,    Range,    BaseSightRange, RangedCombat,    Combat, Cost,    FaithCost,    RequiresFaithPurchaseEnabled,    Moves, Immobile, CombatClass, Domain, DefaultUnitAI,    ObsoleteTech,        GoodyHutUpgradeUnitClass,    XPValueAttack,    AirInterceptRange,        Description,                 Civilopedia,                         Strategy,                                 Help,                                 Pillage, MilitarySupport, MilitaryProduction, IgnoreBuildingDefense, Mechanized, AirUnitCap, AdvancedStartCost, RangedCombatLimit, CombatLimit, XPValueDefense, IsMounted,    UnitArtInfo,                     UnitFlagIconOffset, UnitFlagAtlas,                PortraitIndex,     IconAtlas,                MoveRate,    Special,     PurchaseCooldown, NoSupply)
SELECT        'UNIT_FRANCE_SPAD',    Class,    PrereqTech,    Range,    BaseSightRange, RangedCombat-3,    Combat, Cost,    FaithCost,    RequiresFaithPurchaseEnabled,    Moves, Immobile, CombatClass, Domain, DefaultUnitAI,    'TECH_LASERS',        GoodyHutUpgradeUnitClass,    XPValueAttack,    AirInterceptRange+1,    'TXT_KEY_UNIT_FRANCE_SPAD',    'TXT_KEY_UNIT_FRANCE_SPAD_TEXT',    'TXT_KEY_UNIT_FRANCE_SPAD_STRATEGY',    'TXT_KEY_UNIT_FRANCE_SPAD_HELP',    Pillage, MilitarySupport, MilitaryProduction, IgnoreBuildingDefense, Mechanized, AirUnitCap, AdvancedStartCost, RangedCombatLimit, CombatLimit, XPValueDefense, IsMounted,    'ART_DEF_UNIT_FRANCE_SPAD',     0,                    'UNIT_FRANCE_FLAG_ATLAS',    0,                 'UNIT_FRANCE_ATLAS',    MoveRate,    Special,     PurchaseCooldown, NoSupply
FROM Units WHERE Type = 'UNIT_TRIPLANE';

 

[adan_eslavo]

Coca should have happiness=2 and ResourceUsage=2 in sql file. All other luxuries have such value.

 

[Legen]

I've been experimenting with 34UC Babylon lately, motivated by the changes to Goddess of Wisdom.

About Babylon's E-temenanki, I'm having the issue of not being able to build it when I unlock Mathematics due to the population requirement. This civ just reaches the tech so early and the cities tend to consume food on the scientist slot from the Walls of Babylon, instead of growing. As such, the E-temenanki's bonus of being available at Mathematics ends being irrelevant; by the time it is finally built, Babylon likely already researched the original Poetry and Drama tech (and often more).

On the rest of the UB, I'm loving how the investment reward works, very fitting for the civ's uniques. The food on all shrines is also very potent, given how much this civ wants to be working scientist slots. Also, the extra culture on citizen birth has been a surprisingly pleasant benefit, as the civ is very likely to be one era ahead of a generic civ quite often; I quite underestimated it when I first tried.

 

[SeaPanther]

@pineappledan
@SuperNoobCamper

I just got to play Japan, and the Yamato has been bugging out with its animations. Have either of you noticed this? It's been a slog to Atomic, and I was looking forward to wielding these.
I notice that the turret animation seems to bug out with choppy rotating, and no firing animation nor audio play. It also takes a while for the stutter to play out, ~10s or so before the damage is logged. It slows things down quite a bit.

Ideas?

 

[Drakle]

UB - Andelsbevægelse (replaces Agribusiness):
Unlocked at Fertilizer
1250 Production cost
does not require Horses
+5 Food, +3 Production and 3 Gold
+2 Food +2 Production and +2 Gold to Farms and Pastures
+1 Food to Grassland and Plains tiles
+10% Production when constructing buildings
10% of Food in city is converted to Gold

I haven't played Denmark yet, but this part of the kit seems out of place. Firstly there doesn't really seem to be any real-life reason for Denmark to have very productive farms. Denmark isn't really particularly highly populated or much of a major food exporter.

Then for in game purposes, it is firstly a later game building, particularly for a Domination angled civilisation. One who gets its Unique Units well before this. So by the time you get any use of this building, you should have already used your power spike, and either be on track to win, or you've wasted it.

As for the building itself, it is useful but at such a late stage it is nowhere near good enough to counteract the snowballing potential of earlier buildings.

I would say than France's Public School replacement is in a fairly similar position, except I see more of a synergy with it, as its UA Culture and Production boosts work towards creating decent cities, which this than boosts.

UB - Grande École (replaces Public School - Academy in EE):
available at Scientific Theory
1000 Production Cost
7 Gold Maintenance
+5 Production, +5 Science and +1 Culture
1 Scientist Specialist
+1 Science for every 2 Citizens in the City
+2 Production to Scientist and +2 Science to Engineers
-1 unhappiness from Illiteracy
allows training Archaeologists

However, this isn't just a complaint. As an alternative, perhaps Denmark should get a Unique Writers Guild. This would represent the Nordic/Skaldic Poetry. Sure this is a bit more Norweigan/Icelandic, but with the base civilisations, neither of them exist and are represented by Denmark. In the base game, one of Denmark's UU is literally 'Norwegian' Ski infantry. And most of the stuff that got actually written down, ended up in Denmark sent from Iceland where they were highly overrepresented in terms of writing.

As an idea for bonuses, perhaps it could give Great Writer Points for exploring, pillaging and fighting. Does not have to be for all three, but primarily exploring, and either pillaging (which synergies with the rest of its kit) or just fighting. The building would have two Great Writing slots, start with one filled (ideas for these great works could be the Prose Edda, Poetic Edda/ Codex Regius and maybe a Saga or the Passion Hymns). Once both slots are filled, it could provide a further boost. Maybe another military-style boost, like Exp, but maybe something else to help boost other play styles if the player just wants to raid, not go for full-on domination.

 

[pineappledan]

The Andelsbevægelse was a contribution by De_Genius, a Dane, who came up with the idea, coded it, and made the icon himself. Outside of numbers tweaks, I won't entertain the notion of replacing a contributor's work without their explicit consent.

Danish Co-operatives were a big movement in the 1800s, and they continue to have a large impact on modern Danish life. The food bonuses mirror similar terrain bonuses that the runestone gives, so Denmark does have a growth-oriented kit already. I also appreciate how an industrial bonus spreads out the power curve on this civ; I find the state of civs like Assyria and Rome to be quite regrettable. I also don't like the idea of unique guilds. It's been batted around before, and it's very difficult to balance them.

 

[phantomaxl1207]

I am genuinely pleased with the unique Japanese Guilds.