Better Tomorrow V

[fuch1141]

Author: fuch1141, avatar
Last Update: 8/17, 2011, patch 5.2.0



Dear CFC fans,

I am glad to present to you my last mod, Better Tomorrow V

Each version of Better Tomorrow presents its own unique features.
Better Tomorrow (warlord) presents unique leader's trait
Better Tomorrow 3 presents HDI (human development index), promotions
Better Tomorrow: Civilization presents resources

Better Tomorrow V (BT5) would like to emphasize trade route and international relationship. BT5, like his sibling, is also a neat, conceptual, and historically accurate mod which means BT5 still hold less is more philosophy.


but don't worry, what is good in previous series will still appear in Better Tomorrow V!


Why Better Tomorrow V?:

Spoiler :

* Most prestigious mod such as Better BUG AI, Varietas Delectat with leaderhead and Amazonian Civilization are all integrated in BT5!
* Favorable features in previous series such as traits, promotions, believable technologies, HDI and humanitarianism are all included and more elaborate.
* Trade route Economy (TE) is first introduced in BT series; there are also lots of new building, civics, units working well with TE and other economic style.
* Mechanism design. BT series continuously introduce new mechanism to make the game continuously interesting.
* Planet. Planet system makes game more fun...or a disaster!
* Each civilization has 3 UU/UB/CP, (civilization powers) and most of them are quite different to their counterpart!
* 3 new yield icon; 2 from SMAC/Planetfall, 1 from self-made icon: Nutrition, Energy, and Trade(diamond shape) ; new UI, new resource icon, new graphics! More new graphic, more happiness!
* 3 Beautiful theme! You could switch them in "option"!
* 6 new civilization, 75+ more units, 16 new technologies, 56+ new buildings, 55 new promotions, brand new civics system!

* more detailed listed in following spoils!

Credits:

Spoiler :

BGM/theme
- "Adiemus" by Enya
- "Return to Innocence" by Enigma/Difang and Igay Duana
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Difang_and_Igay_Duana
- "Dr. Strangelove Theme" by Laurie Johnson
- "We'll Meet Again" by Vera Lynn
- pic: Gaomei Wetland by anonymous

Modpack
- Better Bug AI by Fuyu et. al.
- Varietas Delectat by avain et. al.
- Amazon civilization by SaibotLieh et. al
- Sevopedia by Gaurav

Graphic Component
- leaderheads by Melcher
- The Ark of the Covenant by Deon
- crystal palace by charly1977
- EF buildings by Walter Hawkwood
- cirus maxius by woodelf
- Petra by HROCHland
- Meenakshi by HROCHland
- The lost wonder by Gaius Octavius
- Alhambra by woodelf, winddelay
- Yield Symbol by Firaxis, imported by Maniac
- The Strip by Grave
- Bedouin Gathering by Valkrionn, Ahwaric
- rollercaster by Kathy, Hrochland
- Tavern by Duke van Frost
- carneval by C.Roland
- viking storehouse by woodelf
- shipyard by kodzi,asioasioasio
- airport by Geomodder, Kathy
- highway by asioasioasio
- Department Store by asioasioasio
- DNA by asioasioasio
- Las vegas by asioasioasio
- great statesman by TheLopez
- modern mine by kissa
- teepee by HROCHland
- res remake by johny smith
- sewer by Chamaedrys
- Dromon by Edgecrusher
- Reactor core by Lord Tirian
- Resources by Zuul
-Great Diplomat by tsentom1
-Python wonders by tsentom1
- "Cruise missile" by snafusmith
- "F/A-22" by The Conquests
- "SAM & Artillery" by Italicus
- "AEGIS" by snafusmith
- "WTC" by charly1977
- "satellite" by snafusmith
- "Humvee" by snafusmith
- "Futuristic troops!" by Rabbit, White
- "Futuristic tank" by sharick/C.Roland
- "Protestor" by GarretSidzaka
- "Sea Factory,SeaGardens, Future Farm" by hrochland
- "Modern Workshop" by Chamaedrys
- "new flag" by Thorn
- "BTS flag" by Thorn
- "solar plant" by C.Roland
- "B52" by snafusmith
- "Burj Al Arab" by hrochland
- "Custom Colors and Flags v3.0" by Bad Ronald
- "EU, USSR Flag" by Maxrig
- "Main Screen Mod" by NeverMind
- "jihadist" by BeastMaster
- "Attack Spy!" by GarretSidzaka
- "T-90" by The Conquests
- "Chinese T-99" by snafusmith
- "Leopard 2A5" by snafusmith(baal_isidro reskin)
- "EF2000" by The Conquests
- "Module FlAG" by Roamty
- "UAV Predato" by asioasioasio
- "Team color of KMT" by "Road to War" team
- "Decal and Flag" by Rhyes

Civilpedia:
- Mighty Wikipedia and google

Special Thanks:
- People post and suggest in this topic

F.A.Q:

Spoiler :

Q: Why I have to try Better Tomorrow 5?
A: BT5 is concise. If you like fast-face, intensive fun experience, then BT5 is a most!
However it doesn't mean "Better Tomorrow" series are simple mod. Contrarily, BT5 is a bit complex; Better Tomorrow series are all emphasizing on mechanism design. BT5 would like to deliver concise and fast pace experience; in another aspect, BT5 also shows more strategic depth and complexity. The old thinking process don't work well in BT5.

Q: Is Better Tomorrow 5 a balanced mod?
A: Definitely not! BT5, like master of magic (MoM), is not a balanced game. However each civilization, strategy, civic and other feature is so unique that you will like what you choose; You would be willing to try all your effort to keep your strategies and civilization to stand the test of time!

Q: May I use your mod or components to develop my mod? I really like your design!
A: Sure! All 3D model and some 2D graphics are contributed by CFC members. Python things and game mechanisms were made by me. Just stay on GNU agreement and give CFC members and me a credit!

General Rules

Spoiler :

* support up to 50 civs in a game
* Introduce "Planet" concept (it is similar to pollution in CIV1)
* Road, Railroad now cost you golds!! road:4$, railraod: 10$
* Some improvements take long time to construct (eg. cottage and workshop)
* max 10 trade routes per city! (however it requires lots of work!)
* up to 3 national wonders could be supported in a city
* Forest provides you +0.75 health, and jungle provides +75% defense.
* Civics are remade to fit historical context
* cottage now generate (happiness) instead of commerce
(CE now work with high HDI civics)
* Trade route generate more commerce now especially foreign trade
(new economy style, trade economy)
* silk road economy (SE) replace CE. It is a trade-off between OPENNESS civics to make SE more efficiently.
* Most ships except trireme, galley, transport, early carrier and carrier can bombard shore (+1 air range) and could be improved even further by promotions. It is important to control the sea! (v5.2.0 or higher)
* and more!

Known Issues:

Spoiler :

* Low end computer: People with low end computer who experience some anomaly such as no main menu and slow response may delete "ASSET/Modules" for better performance. (it will disable 5 new civilization)
* Only English supported.
* Multiplayer untested. If you have any multiplayer experience of BT5, please inform me!

Download link:
http://forums.civfanatics.com/downloads.php?do=file&id=17087
https://sourceforge.net/projects/bettertomorrow5/files/Better%20Tomorrow_0817.7z/download (Alternative Download, 7z format, smaller file size):
(Current version: 5.2.0)
(5.2.0 is not compatible with 5.0.8, 5.0.2, 5.0.4 savefile)

If you have BugOption problem...
please see post #50, and solution is here (post #51)

If you have unbulidable Dardanelles Gun problem... (This will be fixed in 5.3.x)
http://forums.civfanatics.com/showpost.php?p=10868706&postcount=59

Alternative Silk road city:

Spoiler :

smaller scale for Silk Road city Inprovement(5.2.0)
Install instruction: unzip and overwrite CIV4PlotLSystem.xml and CIV4ArtDefines_Improvement.xml

Thank you! m( _ _ )m

 

[fuch1141]

Trade Route Economy (TE)

Spoiler :

Trade Route Economy is first introduced in BT series. You may ask "WHAT? We DO already have trade route system! It seems quite the same in BT5!"
Actually, I make trade route to be the most crucial income of TRADE (former name: COMMERCE) . This emergent effect will be immense and induced different strategies thought. The main income of TRADE formerly is from cottage; When talk about TRADE in BT5, trade route is much more important than cottage. In BT5, maximal number of trade route in a city is more than it is in Beyond the Sword; furthermore, revenue of a trade route in BT5 is much more than it is in BTS, especially foreign trade.

...which means...
* Player have to maintain good relationship with more players in BT5 than he does in BTS (more trade routes means you need to connect to more cities)
* You have to explore much harder to find more candidate cities to trade with.
* A civilization may fall behind very soon if she is away from other civilization for a long time.
* However, there are possible hazards to open border with too many players.
* Handling international relationship is much more complex in BT5 than it is in BTS.



BT5 contain more traderoute related buildings and technologies than BTS do.

Silk Road Economy (SE)

Spoiler :

Silk Road Cities, like towns in villa civ, provide great commerce bonus to players
What difference between 2 is the yield of silk road cities depending on OPENNESS civics; what's more, you could access these civics in very early game and that means players have to choose their path carefully.

Planet

Spoiler :

Planet system is simple to understand-- more negative value, more pollution. It works quite similar as civ1 did

The chance that a city get polluted is negative PLANET value/101

Warning! Pollution may expand like forest!



positive value provides you forest growth bonus

The chance that a city get a forest is positive PLANET value/101

AI are aware of nothing about PLANET value --just like human nowadays.

todo list: Pollution should have externality, right? How about dump you garbage to other people?

3 UU/UB/CP:

Spoiler :

It is no use to talk, let act and see some examples!!!!

United States of America

Spoiler :

Do you see that? A composite unit: Carrier Battle Group (CVBG)
An uber, uber powerful...in fact an invincible unit. In reality, a carrier battle group could outmatch 70% total army strengh of a nation in the world!

In BT5, CVBG is invincible as well except nuclear weapon; besides, CVBG could join a city as a National Defense Academy or a DARPA, and it could also hurry production! eg. A CVBG crews assist Japan in Fukushima nuclear accidence. (American Empire is quite vulnerable before modern age. I think this is a good trade-off)




American also get free project, Institute for Advanced Study, which is quite famous because Albert Einstein, Kurt Godel were the guest of the institute. When American acquire "Computers", they will get any technology known by any civilization! (still, a good trade-off )(That means other civilization also get some interesting/powerful bonus in earlier age!)

Russia

Spoiler :

The most interesting part of Russian is "Pioneer"







The Russians could use pioneers (replaces scout) to build a special type of improvement, settlement. Settlements act as cities, generating culture point and expanding border automatically. Historically, the Russian people setup lots of settlement during the past centuries, and expanded their border against other nations (e.g. Qin dynasty, I read in history textbook )

In BT5, settlement is a very powerful "instrument" for expansion and capturing important strategic point. Even it destroyed, you could rebuild another one in same location/nearby location; the border of a plot expanded by settlement still count if you have 50% more culture point than rest of civilizations do.

Ambrose Bierce : Cannon, n. An instrument employed in the rectification of national boundaries.

China and India: Power of Human Resourcew

Spoiler :

Chinese and Indian civilization are the most populous civilizations in the world.
The culture of these 2 civ are quite different. Under Confucianism influence, Chinese rulers often interfere less with his people and his people often behave in conformity and feel apathy about politics. Chinese could grow at full speed if you leave them alone (no specialist/plot allocation), and they will show enormous productivity as well.


India is an another story. Even in the modern age, caste system is still rooted in the society. Poverty gap also is a serious problem. If ordinary people want to get rid of these situation, The only way is to get higher education. Indian people get happiness if you make them to be a specialist, expert, intellectual, and so on.

Want to know more interesting UU/UB/CP? please download BT5 and find it by yourself!

If you have any interesting idea about civilization power fitting historical context, please mail to me!

Human Development and Cottage Economy (CE)

Spoiler :

civic: HDI + Health/Happiness mechanism design= to specialize cities or not, that is a question.

Human Development Index (HDI) is the normalized measure of life expectancy, literacy, education, standard of living, and GDP per capita for countries worldwide. It is a standard means of measuring well-being, especially child welfare. It is used to determine and indicate whether a country is a developed, developing, or underdeveloped country and also to measure the impact of economic policies on quality of life. -Wikipedia


To maintain a high level (and same level in every city!) Health/Happiness is cruical. Civic: HDI is a powerful lever enhancing your people's disposition.

To be specialized cities or not to be, is also a question. However, high HDI civics encourage players to keep all cities balanced, and well developed.

Grab as many Happiness/Health as you can. Happiness/Health represent your human development Index, and you use them to exchange better quality of your people. Player also can "reduce" their populations to get higher HDI civics.

in BT5, Cottage Economy (CE) is quite different. Hamlet/Village/Town yield less Trade but yield HAPPINESS, which works quite well with High HDI civics.

Besides, Demography shows correct approval rate and life expectancy eve you choose high HDI civic

TO have better view of civic Option: HDI, you could see this post.

 

[fuch1141]

* continue to refine 3 UU/UB/CP. Moreover, if anyone have good, interesting ideas about new civs, I would like to add new civilizations and leaders.
* Some good elements in ciV such as...

Spoiler :

Use culture points to buy something
However I have no intention to mimic the idea of social policy. What I want to do is transforming culture point to..... CULTURE. I would like to see a civilization with different culture influencing their living, aesthetic, architecture, literature..... rather than "bonus", "benefit",....and so on. It might be no any benefit at all, just visual and emotional satisfaction.

 

[fuch1141]

Current version: 5.2.0

*V 5.3.x (coming soon!)
- add "Better Tomorrow Concept" in Sevopedia
- add Externality of pollution for Planet system.
- Trade route Economy (TE) is refined. # of trade routes depends on world attraction/ trading center such as Spice Bazaar(+3 tr), World's Fair(+3), and WTC(+3). All these great infrastructures require great peoples.
- Trade route related building, such as international airport, transshipment port, superhighway, are cheaper and no maintenance.
- several building such as trading post (+1 tr) will be obsoleted very soon.
- Cities have less trade route. Players have to decide which city should be invested and spend great peoples to increase trade route. Spaming cities is useless for Trade route Economy.
- support up to 12 trade routes per city!
- More refined civics
- More corporations. Most corporation could be founded much earlier.

* V 5.2.0
What have been done
- Introduce PLANET
- New UI!
- Changing general rules makes BT5 more intensive
- Increase fun factor of 3 UU/UB/CP (England, German, France, India, Taiwan, American....etc)
- Remake Civics including graphics and contents (eg. kick out old graphics borrowed from old Better Tomorrow series)
- add more health resources and buildings to improve high HDI experience
- fix Russian settlement bug
- add/fix more graphics
- add more models contributed by CFC fans!
- add new resources graphics
- add 6 promotions, 10 units, 8 buildings, 6 resources, and 2 techs
- lower modern building cost
- tweak buildings' abilit
- balance every dimension of BT5 including civilization, tech, civics, customized rule, and so on.
- 6 new civilization, 75+ more units, 16 new technologies, 55 new promotions, 56+ new buildings, brand new civics system!
- .....and more!


* V 5.0.8
- fix Could not open domestic advisor screen (F1) problem
- fix BUG GPP display bug
- Rebalance Trade route: 1% foreign trade in per peace turn; maximal 400 turn
- Rework Transshipment Port, International Airport, Superhighway to fit Trade Route Economy
- Rework corporation: Macrosoft, RedFruit, and bonus_computers mechanism
- Add a new national wonder: Library of Alexandria, Pre-Historic Relic
- Rebalance England, German, France's unique national wonder (replace Great National Wonder)
- Add new unit/building to Korean, Zulu, Holy Roman,
- Add new pic: Arab, Dutch, Carthage, Egypt, Greek
- Add a AI playable civilization: Oceania. For political correctness, I put all historic dictators in this civilization!
( some kind of barbaric state; not playable for human player)

* V 5.0.4
- fix "BUGOptions - Cannot Locate Settings Folder"
- Enhance 3 UU/UB/CP of several civilizations (Khmer +1 new unit; Mongol, Taiwan, Aztec rebalancing
- pic and text fix

 

[kaltruhe]

I'll try this now!! excited!

 

[CoffeeShopFrank]

Looks like you put a lot of effort into making this. I'm going to download it right now!

 

[Red Boxer]

I'm getting "BUGOptions - Cannot Locate Settings Folder" spammed in my alerts.

Can I easily fix this or does this need fixing by more skilled hands?

 

[fuch1141]

I'm getting "BUGOptions - Cannot Locate Settings Folder" spammed in my alerts.

Can I easily fix this or does this need fixing by more skilled hands?

Do you install BT5 in Admin account?
In that case, you could try this way (Rafff's article)
http://forums.civfanatics.com/showthread.php?t=336978

or this
http://forums.civfanatics.com/showthread.php?p=9945968

(modified)
All you need to do is the following:

1. Find your existing directory My Documents/My Games/Beyond The Sword.
2. Underneath that, create a directory "Better Tomorrow". Underneath that create a directory UserSettings (no space between "User" and "Settings")

So the directory My Documents/My Games/Beyond The Sword/Better Tomorrow/UserSettings needs to exist.

There are also one way to deal with it
http://forums.civfanatics.com/showthread.php?t=325670

If you still have problem, please turn on logging in CivilizationIV.ini (LoggingEnabled = 1) and dump the message to me. Thank you!

 

[Dancing Hoskuld]

Every time I have tried to down load this over the last couple of days I get a page not found error.

 

[fuch1141]

I'll try this now!! excited!

Dear kaltruhe,

I put Kim in korean civilization temporarily. If you have better idea, please tell me!

 

[fuch1141]

Every time I have tried to down load this over the last couple of days I get a page not found error.

Terribly sorry! I have corrected the link problem; you could try it again!

 

[Dancing Hoskuld]

Thank you, downloading now.

 

[bhinso]

Regarding "BUGOptions - Cannot Locate Settings Folder" I was getting the same message.
I followed the instructions to create a new folder under My Documents/My Games/Beyond The Sword/Better Tomorrow/UserSettings
But it didn't work

However, I then tried creating the same folder under My Documents/My Games/Beyond The Sword/MODS/Better Tomorrow/UserSettings
(note the addition of the MODS path)
after that it worked OK!

 

[bhinso]

OK I've discovered that for some reason adding the folder i've just added (My Documents/My Games/Beyond The Sword/MODS/Better Tomorrow/UserSettings)
actually wipes the whole mod! For some reason it then tells you you're playing the better tomorrow mod, but runs a regular game of BTS.

But on the plus side, you don't get that stupid message anymore...

 

[fuch1141]

OK I've discovered that for some reason adding the folder i've just added (My Documents/My Games/Beyond The Sword/MODS/Better Tomorrow/UserSettings)
actually wipes the whole mod! For some reason it then tells you you're playing the better tomorrow mod, but runs a regular game of BTS.

But on the plus side, you don't get that stupid message anymore...

ok, I got the problem

please download BUG Mod.zip below and unzip, put the folder "Bug Mod" under "My Documents/My Games/Beyond The Sword/". The problem will be solved!

I would release next version as soon as possible to fix this problem

Thank you bhinso and Red Boxer!

 

[fuch1141]

version 5.0.4 is released

* V 5.0.4
- fix "BUGOptions - Cannot Locate Settings Folder"
- Enhance 3 UU/UB/CP of several civilizations (Khmer +1 new unit; Mongol, Taiwan, Aztec rebalancing
- fix several pics and texts

 

[bhinso]

That works great now thanks

Just one other thing i've found from playing, the domestic advisor screen (F1) doesn't work. maybe is just my version?

 

[fuch1141]

That works great now thanks

Just one other thing i've found from playing, the domestic advisor screen (F1) doesn't work. maybe is just my version?

please download "CIV4BuildingClassInfos.zip", unzip, put it under "[where the civ4 be installed]\Beyond the Sword\Mods\Better Tomorrow\Assets\XML\Buildings", and override it

This will be rectify in v 5.1.0

Thank you bhinso!

 

[bhinso]

that works good now thanks

Next question/problem: I've noticed that when a great person is born (often great engineer) it messes up my game interface, ie get stuck in city mode, or can't select units in a city.

I had a good game though! (well until the AI all ganged up on me)

 

[fuch1141]

that works good now thanks

Next question/problem: I've noticed that when a great person is born (often great engineer) it messes up my game interface, ie get stuck in city mode, or can't select units in a city.

I had a good game though! (well until the AI all ganged up on me)

Thank you bhinso!

I fix the 2 problems you have mentioned. I also add units/buildings/graphics and rebalance some factors (esp. trade route). 5.0.8 uploading is underway!