An Idea for Rise of Mankind 2.x

[Teemu Ruskeepää]

Zappara, please code into some future version 10 % tax on each single unit out of the empire's current gold income (5 units = 50 %, settlers/workers are free). Use a check box option in the menu. Add with it -1 population (applies to settlers/workers) per each unit built in a city and 1-5 turns unit production time depending on the size (warrior is always 1, ICBM is 5). These 3 points will reduce the number of units, makes modern units available quickly and makes magically stronger all tactical aspects of the maps and the gameplay. It will render CivIV to the best ultimate form, quite like the Civ 1 from 1991, the only way I like it too. Especially on giant maps, where you only have to worry about 20 units per empire. The population point will create the right illusion of "men at the battle front". Since nobody has done the three points yet, and they are not worse than other ideas, please find time to add them. Thank you very much for your great contribution to Civ4, we love you for it.

 

[zappara]

I've seen you request this few times and yes, I've thought about it but I don't see any easy way to add a such feature. Something like this would require changes to the game (SDK) or it might be possible via python (not sure). If anything like this gets made, it must be optional as most probably don't want to use it (I don't). The idea has to be improved from what you've suggested as I see some problem points with it - player would always keep tax rate at 10% or 0% in order to keep unit maintenance at 0 (and have 10 free units). So limiting unit cost to 10% of tax rate is not a good way to implemented it and there should be some other kind of rule. Then there's also the problem of maintenance costs which are adjusted by several different things (units itself, civics, traits etc.)

I can't devote my time for making this kind optional feature (I got my hands full with other RoM stuff) so you'd need to get someone with good programming skills as this feature at least will require python modifications. Or you can learn python yourself...

 

[Teemu Ruskeepää]

If you circumvent the unit maintenance with a 10 % tax, then you can't afford the buildings. Trade is included in the gold income too. And you won't be able to have but a couple of extra units more than others anyway. And a simple rule of minimum maintenance of 50 gold per unit can be applied if necessary. Or a system where the historical eras have particular tolls, that increase gradually (20-40-60-80...). Government civics could have an impact on this too, but I'd love just a simple optional check box regardless of the other content. That would get us out of the fact that the global unit count increases exponentially through time, until the max. number of about 20 per city + 20 outside per empire, 500 on a standard map. There are too many units now and I don't care how, but it is critical to fix it. In Civ3 the Editor let us tweak the maintenance too. And I'm sure that this option makes the gameplay closer to what it is supposed to be, according to everybody's taste. I hope you change your mind at least before you finish working of the Rise of Mankind. Other mods are not as great as yours, but I hope I get to see this option somewhere. How about text-based files and script/string editing?

 

[zappara]

The maintenance is bit problematic in Civ 4 as it's calculated from many things (did you know that units outside your borders cause supply maintenance? ) - in Civ 3 it was much easier to edit it. I don't even know yet what all things are factored in to maintenance costs even after I've modded the game for over 2 years

Anyway units xml does have modifier Extra cost which is used in RoM for additional unit maintenance costs. You could tweak them by yourself for your own purposes. You can edit the xml file in Notepad.

 

[vincentz]

If you circumvent the unit maintenance with a 10 % tax, then you can't afford the buildings. Trade is included in the gold income too. And you won't be able to have but a couple of extra units more than others anyway. And a simple rule of minimum maintenance of 50 gold per unit can be applied if necessary. Or a system where the historical eras have particular tolls, that increase gradually (20-40-60-80...). Government civics could have an impact on this too, but I'd love just a simple optional check box regardless of the other content. That would get us out of the fact that the global unit count increases exponentially through time, until the max. number of about 20 per city + 20 outside per empire, 500 on a standard map. There are too many units now and I don't care how, but it is critical to fix it. In Civ3 the Editor let us tweak the maintenance too. And I'm sure that this option makes the gameplay closer to what it is supposed to be, according to everybody's taste. I hope you change your mind at least before you finish working of the Rise of Mankind. Other mods are not as great as yours, but I hope I get to see this option somewhere. How about text-based files and script/string editing?

Maybe you should take a look at this. It adds extra goldcost (tax) for each unit plus some other stuff. Might be what you are looking for

 

[Sarkyn]

Zappara, please code into some future version Use a check box option in the menu. Add with it -1 population (applies to settlers/workers) per each unit built in a city and 1-5 turns unit production time depending on the size (warrior is always 1, ICBM is 5). These 3 points will reduce the number of units, makes modern units available quickly and makes magically stronger all tactical aspects of the maps and the gameplay. It will render CivIV to the best ultimate form, quite like the Civ 1 from 1991, the only way I like it too. Especially on giant maps, where you only have to worry about 20 units per empire. The population point will create the right illusion of "men at the battle front". Since nobody has done the three points yet, and they are not worse than other ideas, please find time to add them. Thank you very much for your great contribution to Civ4, we love you for it.

Teemu,

Breaking down what you've asked for into pieces, so that we can hopefully put it to rest. Let's start with the fundamental question of "Can we even do this?"

10 % tax on each single unit out of the empire's current gold income (5 units = 50 %, settlers/workers are free).

This is not possible. Tax and unit maintenance are not related elements. The unit maintenance is determined by one set of numbers in one file, and the civilisation's tax and income are entirely unrelated to it.

Flat out - there is no way to create a logical link between these two elements. It cannot be done in Civ4.

Add with it -1 population (applies to settlers/workers) per each unit built in a city

I think this could be done, but it would mean modifying every single unit to do so. That's a massive, massive undertaking as there are hundreds of them in ROM. It would also mean having to RE-DO this work every time a patch was released. That means a lot of extra work every patch.

So we CAN do this, but it's MASSIVE amounts of work every patch if we do.

1-5 turns unit production time depending on the size (warrior is always 1, ICBM is 5).

How long something takes to build is determined by . All we can do is tell the game how many hammers and it will always work out how long that takes.

This request is also, sadly not possible.



So, Teemu, 2 of the 3 things you request are simply not possible in the Civ4 game engine. Your request is asking modders to turn Civ4 into a different game.

Without even touching on the minefield of "Would anyone actually want to play this?", there is no further point looking into your request when two of the three elements cannot be coded.

Instead, what you have been offered is the EXCELLENT higher unit maintenance mod. Which could be tweaked by yourself to make it cost an absolute fortune to have units, and thus give you ROUGHLY what you are asking for.

I suggest you at least try it!

Hopefully this gives you some closure to why your request isn't being picked up.

Cheers,



Sarkyn

 

[Teemu Ruskeepää]

Hi, so has Zappara et al merged the Higher Unit Maintenance Minimod for RoM 2.7 into the new Rise of Mankind 2.9 from june 2010? I wouldn't use any minimod unless it was part of Rise of Mankind, since it is the only mod that is as far developed and merged with smaller mods. I'm sorry I spammed about it a year ago, but the question of lesser units is the threshold question for any Civ game. It is not about your taste, the game needs it and those who tell me that nobody's interested, would be happy if they found that in Civ. I'm going to reinstall Civ 4 and RoM 2.9 to my new Asus 1215N and hope my wish was fulfilled. If not, the game will remain mediocre and in my closet.

10 % empire tax on each single unit
-1 population
1-5 turns unit production time