I am coming back to Civ3 after a decade or more. I got it up and running on a M2 MacBook Air. Working well. Anyhow, I have been reading through the forum, checking youtube, etc. trying to refresh my dormant knowledge. Once issue was always how some units are unbalanced and never used or some UU are too weak compared to others. Is there a thread or list of suggested minor fixes to balance units, UUs, etc. better? Nothing crazy, just some tweaks for balance. If I remember there is an editor to tweak these things. Or a mod that doesn't overhaul the game, just balances civs/units better?
Balancing/Tweaking Units & Other Minor Tweaks
- Thread starter SayHayKid
- Start date
tjs282
Stone \ Cold / Fish
Off the top of my head, there are at least a couple of Civ3 tweak-mods that might fit your bill: one by @player1 fanatic (not sure if CFC will tag him properly) and another by @SkipperXIV. You should be able to find both of those in the Civ3 downloads section.
If you have the GoG/Steam version of Civ3 installed (not clear if you're using the PC version on Mac?), you might also want to take a look at the amazing .exe-modding work done by @Flintlock .
If you have the GoG/Steam version of Civ3 installed (not clear if you're using the PC version on Mac?), you might also want to take a look at the amazing .exe-modding work done by @Flintlock .
Last edited:
Fergei
Warlord
- Joined
- Mar 31, 2020
- Messages
- 256
I list my personal preferences for unit changes at
- Scout – given defence of 1 (to increase power of Expansionist Trait)
- Jaguar Warrior - enslaves (for flavour, add feasibility as a unit in mid-Ancient Era)
- Legionary - +1HP (legendary military unit for a truly legendary Civilisation)
- Keshik – increase attack from 4 to 5 (legendary military unit for a truly legendary Civilisation)
- Explorer – available at Map Making (to increase appearance rate before maps are shared)
- Galley / Caravel / Galleon / Carrack / Transport– carry capacity increased (to increase threat posed by AI attacks on other islands / continents and reduce player admin)
- Infantry – defence reduced from 10 to 9 (to increase attack viability of cavalry and marines to prevent a period of extended defensive dominance)
- Paratrooper – attack increased to 6 from 4 (to try and increase usage)
- Modern Paratrooper – attack increased to 8 from 6 (to try and increase usage)
- Bomber rate of fire reduced from 3 to 2 and removed lethal land bombard (to reduce power)
- Flak air defence increased from 2 to 3 (to counter Bomber strength)
Some the above changes are connected to other changes though. Primarily the difficulty setting changes (AI more productive but start with less units, makes change to scout more relevant) and tech changes (to make Swordsmen appear later and make early game combat with archers, chariots and horsemen).
Whatever your preferences I cannot recommend spending time with basic settings highly enough. It's pretty straightforward and can give so much more variety to the game.
[C3C] - Civ 3 Conquests - retuned
Main objectives - overview - Provide a more consistent challenge throughout the game (rather than the early game difficulty spike and routine late game victory often offered by the default settings). - Make random maps more viable by reducing having to abandon a game as being...
forums.civfanatics.com
- Scout – given defence of 1 (to increase power of Expansionist Trait)
- Jaguar Warrior - enslaves (for flavour, add feasibility as a unit in mid-Ancient Era)
- Legionary - +1HP (legendary military unit for a truly legendary Civilisation)
- Keshik – increase attack from 4 to 5 (legendary military unit for a truly legendary Civilisation)
- Explorer – available at Map Making (to increase appearance rate before maps are shared)
- Galley / Caravel / Galleon / Carrack / Transport– carry capacity increased (to increase threat posed by AI attacks on other islands / continents and reduce player admin)
- Infantry – defence reduced from 10 to 9 (to increase attack viability of cavalry and marines to prevent a period of extended defensive dominance)
- Paratrooper – attack increased to 6 from 4 (to try and increase usage)
- Modern Paratrooper – attack increased to 8 from 6 (to try and increase usage)
- Bomber rate of fire reduced from 3 to 2 and removed lethal land bombard (to reduce power)
- Flak air defence increased from 2 to 3 (to counter Bomber strength)
Some the above changes are connected to other changes though. Primarily the difficulty setting changes (AI more productive but start with less units, makes change to scout more relevant) and tech changes (to make Swordsmen appear later and make early game combat with archers, chariots and horsemen).
Whatever your preferences I cannot recommend spending time with basic settings highly enough. It's pretty straightforward and can give so much more variety to the game.
Mac version won't run, so Windows in a WINE skin wrapper. It took a little tweaking. So, not sure if I can get an .exe mod to work. I'll have to experiment. Thanks for the resources.
timerover51
Deity
Check out the Cross-Platform editor in the Creation and Customization section.
That should run on a Mac.
Cross-Platform Editor for Conquests now available!
Welcome to the Cross-Platform Editor thread! This editor allows you to do nearly everything you can do with the Firaxis editor, and runs on Windows (XP+), Linux, and Intel Macs (sorry, no Apple Silicon support). Specialty builds support PowerPC Macs, Windows 95 through ME/2000, and Haiku...
forums.civfanatics.com
That should run on a Mac.
Fergei
Warlord
- Joined
- Mar 31, 2020
- Messages
- 256
I'm pretty happy with almost no tweaks to all Ancient era units, but slowing down tech development of horsemen and especially swordsmen, so that there is a bit more variation. I don't sense anyone hates unit balance in the Ancient Era?
I'm currently looking at the Middle Ages combat because although most of the units are well balanced, I think it is too heavily dependent on access to resources. An AI without iron can survive the Ancient Era easily enough but is going to be lucky to not be stomped on before it discovers Gunpowder. I also consider Cavalry to be pretty overpowered, particularly against Civs lacking either saltpeter or horses.
So for balance in the Middle Ages I'm exploring:
- making Ancient Cavalry available to all Civs at Monotheism (for a combat option for Civs lacking iron in addition to the somewhat flimsy Longbowman). I've been taken aback by how strong these ACs are even, with Feudalism to blunt their attack.
- making Crusaders available to all Civs at Printing Press, Astronomy or Chemistry (for a combat option for Civs that can't make Cavalry)
- making Cavalry wheeled units that cannot pass mountains (I'm worried the AI wont be intelligent enough to factor this in if they are based in a mountainous region)
- considering limiting Cavalry to just 2 movement points.
Its early days with some horrific misjudgements (do not make ACs available in the ancient era as they carve through spearmen!), but the aim is to reduce potential for AI snowballs built almost exclusively off access to resources, by giving those lacking a resource a fighting chance. My current game somehow has the Inca with no iron making military gains in the age of knights and musketeers.
I'm currently looking at the Middle Ages combat because although most of the units are well balanced, I think it is too heavily dependent on access to resources. An AI without iron can survive the Ancient Era easily enough but is going to be lucky to not be stomped on before it discovers Gunpowder. I also consider Cavalry to be pretty overpowered, particularly against Civs lacking either saltpeter or horses.
So for balance in the Middle Ages I'm exploring:
- making Ancient Cavalry available to all Civs at Monotheism (for a combat option for Civs lacking iron in addition to the somewhat flimsy Longbowman). I've been taken aback by how strong these ACs are even, with Feudalism to blunt their attack.
- making Crusaders available to all Civs at Printing Press, Astronomy or Chemistry (for a combat option for Civs that can't make Cavalry)
- making Cavalry wheeled units that cannot pass mountains (I'm worried the AI wont be intelligent enough to factor this in if they are based in a mountainous region)
- considering limiting Cavalry to just 2 movement points.
Its early days with some horrific misjudgements (do not make ACs available in the ancient era as they carve through spearmen!), but the aim is to reduce potential for AI snowballs built almost exclusively off access to resources, by giving those lacking a resource a fighting chance. My current game somehow has the Inca with no iron making military gains in the age of knights and musketeers.
You may want to increase their costs to 70 shields or at least 65. Else they end up being more shield-efficient than knights. For a proper balance they ought to be less shield-efficient than knights.
Knights cost 70 shields an have attack 4 instead of 3 and at veteranlevel only 4 hp instead of 5. So at 70/((4*4)/(3*5))=65.625 shields they are about as efficient at attack as knights.
