Beyond the Game - Competitive Expansion

[P&nny]

Ah, I noticed that even though it does force the Civ4.Ini option to =1 for those lines, it only does it for the second load onward, I mean that's already super great and am delighted with this so I had another look at the CvInfo.ccp for all the civic XML tags...
And yes it was just that. Some of them had the "read" and "write" in slightly different order.
It's annoying this thing, I already had this somewhere else and it was creating OOS when a player was rejoining a game (because it didn't read the proper value for something on reload); here it never created an issue (I think because it re-applies all the civics effect as if your selecting them again when you load a game)

Big thanks still !

 

[P&nny]

A message to notify and confirm I've uploaded version 2.29 of Beyond the game !

There is renewed success and more players downloading it so deserve a refresh of the topic and a last version !
The log is as below

Spoiler 2.29 :

Beyond the Play 2.29
Fix bug - That all tech description sounds were in French, changed back to English
Fix bug - Terrain "Deep_Sea" - Can no longer be crossed by Galley, Triremes, Ironclad, and workboat before Astronomy
Fix bug - Terrain "Lagoon" (with Sailing) and "Deep_Sea" (with Astronomy) now allow trading like the terrain they replace
Fix bug - Option "Dynasty" - Correctly handles the transition from and to the trait "Builder", by resetting the 'ForcedFoodYES/NO' trigger; there is no muisscalculation of food production after the changes anymore
Fix bug - Option UUM - that reloading when shuffling resource was NOT on was not working anymore (was not restoring the Bonus properly)

New Menu - Clock Counter - On top right of the screen with CTRL-SHIFT-C : a dedicated screen which allows to track the speed at which players have played/are playing the game

Expansion Balance - Conqueror of the sea - all boats (Gun Galley, Dromont, and their UU Galleas/Drakkar) have 1 extra Collateral damage target, also are 50% immune vs Collateral
Expansion Balance - Conqueror of the sea - You cannot build Drydocks anymore. But you can build I) Shipyard, also with Steel. II) Shipyard, +4XP for boats, with Scientific Method, cost 140H.



Game Option - Old School Mapmaking - The option now allows to contact anyone at any time. So you can see/exchange with your unknown teammate (or even declare war!) on turn 1
Game Option - Large armies - The cost of unit upgrade is also scaled down now (half the cost, otherwise proportionally it's very expensive
Game Option - Cheap Building - The (15%) discount only applies to Buildings, not World Wonders

Scenario Balance - UU Madness - Camel Archer are not available anymore
Scenario Balance - UU Madness - Praetorian, Cossack, are not showing the resource they could use anymore when "Soft UU" is on. Had to implement logic to handle this case. As before, if you unselect "soft UU" they're part of the game

Civ Balance (Classi Nerf) - Carthage - Pastoralism is +1 Coin instead of +2 Coins
Civ Balance (Medi Nerf) - Portugal - Agrarian Societies is a replacement of Barbarism, not decentralization ("expires" earlier with Bureaucracy), does not provide the Caravel building Sea post ability anymore
Civ Balance (Reny Buf) - Austria-Hungary - Dual Monarchy is now available with (Constitution +) Gunpowder instead of Rifling, so that's it's a better "Reny Start" civ
Civ Balance (Classi Buf) - Poland - Nightwatch also give an extra culture (+2) and 15% City defense
Civ Balance (Futur Nerf) - China - Unique Civic providing power is HydroElectric Economy replacing Environmentalism, not Maoism replacing State Property, New button graphic (taken by Arsenal)

Map Balance - Pandemonium - Added 1 extra (bigger) size and made the default size medium instead of small

Graphism - Venice & Austria have they're own Art style, Unique Unit look for Archer/Spearman/Axeman/Swordman/Pikeman/Crossbowman/Longbowman/Knights (Georgians), Musketman, Cuirassier (HolyRoman)
Graphism - Zulu - Made Uniqe look for Civ, changed Settler/Swordsman/Cavalry (Zulu Basotho), HorseArcher/Knigths (African set)
Graphism - Nebrudchadnezzar - Replaced the leaderhead graphic, old version had a color fault on top of image

But the most novel thing is the "ClockCounter" Menu, which can gives you live indication of who is playing at what speed (it can work for MP games with or without timer, it works in SP too of course but it's just your own timer then!).
It's fully functional for 12 players tops, the order of player is randomized and anonymised if needed so that it doesn't spoil the player order.
Total playing time and indicators (how many times you did enter etc.) are working in all cases and EXCLUDE the first turn (there is a tendency to say "launch the game while I grab this or do that", so it doesn't jinx the calculations).

 

[P&nny]

Beyond the game 2.31 is out
with quite a few things but mostly 2 features asked by community :

Spoiler 2.31 / 2.30 Log :

Beyond the Play 2.31
Fix Bug - Great Legend - doesn't create OOS when using resource planting anymore
Great Legend - Made it that it provides 20XP if used as general, not 15
Civ Balance - Austro-Hungary - Dual monarchy second possible tech to discover is Printing press, not gunpowder
Civ Balance - Russia - is not a Reny possible civ anymore, only Industrial & Modern starts

Beyond the Play 2.30
Fix - Clock Counter screen - Fix bug when a player was dead was erroring the dashboard, and minor (length of text) layout issues
Fix - Clock Counter screen - Fix that the player hidden/anonymous name was not consistent on side panels and top of columns
Fix - Clock Counter screen - Fix a round (1 second) issue between total time played and theoretical, when no one was doing enter
Fix - Option "Large Military Armies" - Sell cost of units with 'Mercenary' is adapted (i.e. twice lower, reflecting cost of hammers appropriately)
Fix Graphic - improved sizing of Shipyard & Arsenal art, Arsenal was incorrectly layered as an Harbor (now Layer_Coast)
Fix Balance Bug - You can now gift the Battery Ram

UI Improvement - There is a clock icon on top right of the screen, it has a logic to allow you to ping, once a turn and presuming you have done enter yourself, all the players that haven't done enter. They will have a message with noise addressed to them, other players are notified but without noise

Menu Option in lobby - Also added a *** view Map Description *** option so you can have an idea of the map from the lobby if you have never played it
Menu "Advanced Option" - Improved UI in Lobby and added two new categories "1.74" & "3.19" so that Vanilla & BTS players can very quickly return the game to the exact format they use to play


New Component - Great Legend - You receive a single unit at the beginning of the game called 'Great Legend' named after illustrious Civ 4 players which can do adhoc action (only) once a game within : 1) Plant Corn/Wheat/Rice/Cow/Pig/Gems/Gold/Silver/Bronze/Iron/Ivory on any tile (any color, hill or flat) without feature (not on forest or floodplains), without bonus (or with a specific bonus required in the case of iron) and with a required technology being discovered. 2) Can start a golden age. 3) Can add 15XP points very similarly to great general (but doesn't open it's unique promotion paths). 4) Can build an Academy 5) Can advance/discover military techs but the advance is 50% of what other GP do (advances the same tech a great General would).

New Building - Component Alchemy - Philosopher's stone, National wonder that can be built by only one person by team, gives 2000 gold when built but the window to build is short : it expires with chemistry, cannot be built in Renaissance start and after
Fix Balance - Component Alchemy - Paladin now can be upgraded from Knights, like all other units

Breakdown Option extension - There are now dedicated option subdivising some effects :µ
Expansion : Advanced Scenarios / Workshop Improvement Hammer Rebalance / Workshop Coins Rebalance / Workshop Civic Rebalance (for detailed fine-tuning of balance in Industrial)
Expansion: Campus Improvement & Paved Road, on top of the colony option


Fix Balance - Mongolia - Keshik don't get consumed when they build Yurt anymore, but needs 2 tiles apart, not just 1
Fix Balance - Portugal - Carrack's don't get consumed when they build Sea Trading post anymore

Most especially :

A - Clock reminder
A little tool (a clock on top right of the screen) to send a gentle reminder to players that haven't done enter to please do so ! (but only once a turn so they can't abuse it :



B - 'Great Legend'
New Component - Great Legend - You receive a single unit at the beginning of the game called 'Great Legend' named after illustrious Civ 4 players which can do adhoc action (only) once a game within : 1) Plant Corn/Wheat/Rice/Cow/Pig/Gems/Gold/Silver/Bronze/Iron/Ivory on any tile (any color, hill or flat) without feature (not on forest or floodplains), without bonus (or with a specific bonus required in the case of iron) and with a required technology being discovered. 2) Can start a golden age. 3) Can add 15XP points very similarly to great general (but doesn't open it's unique promotion paths). 4) Can build an Academy 5) Can advance/discover military techs but the advance is 50% of what other GP do (advances the same tech a great General would).

 

[P&nny]

Beyond the Game 2.32
Fix - Turn Clock timer - That if you did multiple enter for end turn it would be the last value to count, now it's the first
Fix - Maya Holkan - Aligned code for the +50% vs Elephant on same option (reported bug but I cannot reproduce, code is 100% aligned now so if there really was an issue it definitely is fixed)
Fix - City interface bug - that when you click a (non-holy) religion icon on top-right it would popup the powerPedia screen
Fix - Expansion Bug - That when you had some combos of option, the extra tech for Grenadier would be apply even in base game (i.e. no unit could be built with just military science) (But Grenadier still requires Nationalism extra with the expansion)
Fix - GUI - That when you toggled the option 'BTG Interface' on off, the new "Version Pane", was not appearing/disappearing
Fix - GUI - That the Beyond the Game text overlapped the Turn counter in some resolution. All Resolution with Y resolution smaller than 850 will have the text higher (squeezed up, was the best choice)
Fix - GUI - That the Game analyzer (red flag) icon is always displayed now, unless it's tournament game (doesn't require the Civ Live option to be checked). Also added noise if someone uses it (on top of written message) before the game is conceded
Fix - GUI Text - Description Widget of Clock alarm was erroneous
Improved Code - of AdvOptions menu so that list are better declared, so that 100% consistency accross menu is guaranteed

Improved Code - Rewrote code for the "MP Scenarios", so the list are consistent (declared in Python called in C++) and there is a menu, in the lobby, to check what the list of all MP Scenrios menus are. This is accessible via the "MapPreview" screen too at all times. The logic is fully integrated with all the "C4F Warlord Style" options as well.
Added some new Scenarios combinations, Pedia has been adapted for this

Improved UI - Added a dedicated tab for Player option in the option menu (CTRL-O), also, broke down the former (4 options) into 14 options so that GUI choice would be more granular and flexible. Made all the new devs consistent with "Tournament mode" and updated shortcuts. The menu also shows shortcuts available more intuitively.


Option clean - Ancient Scout Start & No settling Capital on Strategic Resources - are now 2 different options (different scenarios list etc.)
Option clean - New option - Ancient Tribes need to found Religion - Effectively overrides the above 'fair religion' option so that in Ancient start it doesn't happen and you can select both options all the time and you have the more 'normal' settings

New Option - Government-wise Societies - The civics of the first column "Government" are usable at all times, similarly to having the pyramid

New Option - Age of Bronze - Only for Ancient start (or Classical start). You get a large fraction of the following technologies already discovered:100% of 6 Base Start techs. 75% of Animal Husbandry, Bronze. 50% of Masonry, Sailing. 25% of Pottery, Archery
New Option - Age of Robotics - Only for Modern of Future start (you start with Infantry instead of Marine) You get a large fraction of several technologies already discovered

Broken down and replace "Warlord Style" by a set of option 1 for each effect :
New Option - C4F - No Start Free Building (Warlord Style)
New Option - C4F - Fixed Settler cost (Warlord Style)
New Option - C4F - No Start Free Extra Population(Warlord Style)
New Option - C4F - No Late Era Scaling (Warlord Style)
New Option - C4F - No Start Free Defense and Explore Unit (Warlord Style)
New Option - C4F - No Start Free Worker (Warlord Style)
New Option - C4F - No Start Free Settler (Warlord Style)


New Option - C4F - GForced Cheap Economic Buildings - Reproducting Cost for building's in Geforced 'Legends' MOD : https://forums.civfanatics.com/threads/civilization-iv-legends.674919/
New Option - C4F - Moai is a Medieval Wonder - Also added code for "Free tech wonder" not to give the tech if not ancient start (useful for overruling Byzantium Moai)
New Option - C4F - Ancient Unique Unit Cost tweaks - Price change for (Quick speed values) : War Chariot (20-23), Vulture (23-26), Legionnaries (26-28)
New Option - C4F - Always able to build default unit
New Option - C4F - Trait Production Modifier weakened to 50% - Instead of being (typically 100%) the trait production boost on building is only 50%

New 6 Options "Profession" - New Option Category, new Panel in option, new Panel in Game Analyzer
1 option each for Farmer / Shepard / Miner / Slave / Lumberjack, 1 option "High cost" to add 4H (quick speed) of cost to each
Lumberjack and Ore miner removed as UU of specific Civs. UU Madness adjusted too

New Option dedicated to Warehouses & the weaker Granary percentage (35%) - No gameplay change
New Option dedicated to Brewery - Brewery doesn't allow food produce anymore, it doesn't give +1 'flat' happy (but gives it with resources still), the negative econ cost is -2 gold not -10% science, the obsolete tech is now philosophy. Charistmatic +2/+2 still applies same way

Trait Balance - Organized - Simplified - The free unit is every 8 units not 10. The free promotion 'Brave' it's now 100% protection collateral instead of rest, Explosive promoition also been cleaned to simplify and it 'only' has the faculty of killing other units for the siege units receiving it
Trait Balance - Organized - Simplified - Doesn't give 50XP anymore with general
Trait Balance - Organized - Simplified - Doesn't cascade a barrack when producing a stable anymore, nor any other building
Trait Balance - Organized - Simplified - Doesn't give -33% Unhappy with Slaving
Trait Balance - Philosophical - -50% Unhappy with Slaving
Trait Balance - Philosophical - Melee (and Gun?) units don't have free Sentry anymore
Trait Balance - Conqueror - Simplified - Doesn't provide discount upgrade boats anymore

Civ Balance - Poland - Normal units have new Graphics : Horse Archer/Knights/Cuirassier/Maceman/Musketman
Civ Balance - Poland, Nightwatch doesn't give extra %defense anymore but cascade a free wall instead
Civ Balance - Poland, doesn't have Lumberjack as UU of Slave anymore
Civ Balance - Poland - (New) UU - Polish Pikeman : 7 Strength
Civ Balance - Australia - Mining Worker - a normal worker that can mine much quicker (1 turn mine, 3 turns mine forest, 2 turns mine forest serf)

Civ Balance - Russia - Civic (New) - Tsarism (serfdom) - + 25% Unit production
Civ Balance - Russia - is a Renaissance Civ again
Civ Balance - Korea - UU (New) - Geobukseon (Trireme) - 50% chance Withdrawal (Mighty Toad graphics)
Civ Balance - Byzantium - UU (Koursores) cannot bombard anymore, still has +15% city attack
Civ Balance - Byzantium - Civic Crusades - Also allows to produce missionaries, like Org Religion does

Great Legend Balance - Extra resources are available to plant : Deer/Fur/Wine/Dye/spices/Silk/Sugar/Incense/Banana & Expansion resource if option checked
Great Legend Balance - An extra available action is to plant 9 trees around the tile the Legend is currently located

Maps - Hemispheres - Reintegrated in BTG
Maps - TeamBattleGround - Added option to select Elephant spawn: i) Normal BTS ii) No Elephant iii) 'BTG' Balance within 3-4 tiles of starting spot iv) 'BTG' Balance within 4-6 tiles of starting spot
Maps - TeamBattleGround - Added option to spawn extra unit (typically LumberJack or advance defense unit for later eras start).
Maps - TeamBattleGround - Added a new option that get more free units, including up to 3 extra Great Legends
Maps - Eldorado - Added a new option that get more free units, including up to 3 extra Great Legends
Maps - Caribbean - Added a new option that get more free units, including up to 3 extra Great Legends (good for Machine guns)
Maps - Pandemonium - Added a new option that get more free units, including up to 3 extra Great Legends
Maps - Pandemonium - Review code to remove the normal generation of Elephant, and put it (with odds) on the outskirk of the circles, like other happy resources
Maps - BTG_ScenarioWorlds - Integrated in BTG, this is essentially a "WB Pre-made" map loader as script. It's bundled with the 3 Vadus/earth/EarthEvo maps
Maps - Shuffle - Broke down the random choice of the maps (there are 8) so that you can pick a specific one if you want

 

[Silica_Pathways]

Doesn't work. Tried both types of installations, both crash when trying to start/generate a new game.

 

[GEFORCED]

Very nice Penny

This mod has come along way since I last played it many years ago.

Nice touch on the CCC great people

I' like to play this mod - make sure to add me on Steam

 

[Bemep42]

Doesn't work. Tried both types of installations, both crash when trying to start/generate a new game.

right mouse button on BeyongTheGame_232.exe - settings - compatibility. "on" compatibility mode with (your windows), "on" run as admin. it worked for me. some times still can crash (1%)


Penny! Thanks for good mod.
ps. BtgEarthEvolution map. some times indian start hase river, some times not. some times "north persia" hase river, some times not. need both! but can't...
pss. and please, back cossacs, cataphracts and pretorians !!! so that they are available (for those who wish) together with BeyondThePlay full civilizations rebalance.

 

[P&nny]

2.33 Uploaded for everyone, please enjoy !

right mouse button on BeyongTheGame_232.exe - settings - compatibility. "on" compatibility mode with (your windows), "on" run as admin. it worked for me. some times still can crash (1%)

Good thinking on that one, I had seen but forgot to answer because I simply had no suggestion without more details !

ps. BtgEarthEvolution map. some times indian start hase river, some times not. some times "north persia" hase river, some times not. need both! but can't...

Hadn't realized as I don't play EarthEvo myself much. Not sure if it's like that in base map or I brought an issue (bizarre, the tiles are all hardcoded, should not be possible).

pss. and please, back cossacs, cataphracts and pretorians !!! so that they are available (for those who wish) together with BeyondThePlay full civilizations rebalance.

Ah great news for you : "Softened" UU (the 3 you described) have a dedicated option for them to be turned on/off. So if you turn the below option off; you've got your perfect combo !

 

[P&nny]

I often update the link in the first page but not mention it when there is a new version (I share mostly on discord), but happy with this new 2.40 version so I do here !


Beyond the Game 2.40 - Log of changes

Clean Option - On lobby, the options don't appear anymore: they're divided / sorted into either subgroups or menus to click. This keeps it extremely clearer and much quicker to set up games. A lot of the in game Option menu has been rewritten to adapt to this. Each option will have a 'smart' default, (depending if in a group or a submenu), but can be forcibly selected on lobby anyway. All menus have coloring for each type of selection, making it even clearer
Clean Option - Some options (the 3 options for workshop in expansion), are "forced off". Don't appear on Lobby, appears on option menu and is greyed out/singled out. Easy to isolate/less cumbersome

Fix Bug - That Sphinx obsolescence with Liberalism was not applied to the faculty of worker to produce a wonder
Fix Bug - display Pedia - Wasn't showing Incubator in BTG Improvement list
Fix Bud - Tex Resource Boost - wasn't showing the right color when you had the Bonus for Production increase via resources in some locations
Fix Simplified - Ottomans Dardanelles Guns (Cannon), simplified the bonus, it's now (just) 11 units suffer collateral (versus 7 for normal Cannon)
Fix Game analyzer - that it could show more than 10 for the counts of cities with religion, buildings etc properly

Simplified - Option Balance Wonder - Great Library back to normal cost (350, was 400 in option)

Improved Logics - Unique Resources - They now pop on city 2 (Nerf balance), also they have their own dedicated popup and sound so that it's more obvious to the player when and where they appear

Improved UI Game Analyzer - Golden age (on overview page) have more details and a dedicated widget
Improved UI Game Analyzer - New widgets for 1) Wonder tabs, 2) Civic Tab, 3) Non-military Units

Multiplayer Option - New - Tier 8 - Ban Unique Resource Civ - one more category of Civ excluded, mostly for mirror and duel maps. Adjusted & improved Civ Tiers panel

Trait Balance - Aggressive - The +2H +1C is not on courthouses anymore, but on Collosseums
Trait Balance - Industrious - Worker can build improvement workshop, watermill, lumbermill at 200% speed
Trait Balance - Industrious - No more free Hammer on tiles with 4. Bonus completely removed
Trait Balance - Agricultural - No more free Food on tiles with 4. Only on tiles with exactly 5 Food.
Trait Balance - Agricultural - When you settle a city on any desert, it gets (or keeps) a floodplain, effectively giving the city a 3 Food start.

Trait Balance - Imperialistic (small tweak) only 33% of Golden with city conquest, not 50%

Balance Resources Boost - Tweak - Pearl also give +1 Happy with Custom House
Balance Resources Boost - New - Amber also gives promotion 'Pious' to Triremes
Promotion New - Pious - +10% attack on coast & lagoo

New Feature - Kilimanjaro - Like a mountain/Volcano, cannot be improved. -1H +5Gold (plain Kili is 1F 5G). Has to be implemented by map (Africa map does it). 25% defense 3 moves.
New Feature - Savanna - New type of similar (half) forest. Provided 0.25 health, 25% defense. +1Coin, +1F next to river. All improvement can be built (it doesn't clear the Savanna) and forest preserve works too. You can chop it (with Iron working) like a Jungle, but it provides very little hammer.
It grows very quickly (100 vs 8 for normal forest). Need to be implemented by Map (Africa has it), can only appear on plains and not hills.
New Feature - Grain (seed) and Deposit - add +1F & +1H to a tile respectively, not implemented yet, will have to be called by map script

UUMadness - Map Logic - There is now a callback to MapScripts so that each mapscript can I have a list of UUM & WWM resources different from each there. Implemented for 'Africa' map
UUMadness - Pedia Improvement - You can now see in game the amount of resources that are/should have been allocated and total counts (easier to track, especially for development, specific map list)
UUMadness - Balance of Resources - Review and changed slightly to improve for latest versions resources changes and using abov logics/developments

New Map 'Option' Logic - BTG Distance Modifier - Some map (implemented for Three Iron) now have an option to change the distance maintenance cost

Civ Balance - Australia - Only pops 1 Gold max with civic Commonwealth
Civ Balance - America - Carnegie Library is now +2GP points (neutral type) instead of Cascading a free barrack (full alignment to Realm Beyond mod)

New Map - Africa - Based on Polar circle, with very specific arid land, very balanced for teamers. Make most use of new Feature type of Savannas

Map Fix - ThreeIron - Removed bug that '3 columns' mirror didn't work. Added some tweaks of resources balances for smaller size maps
Map Updated- Inland Mirror - Rewrote "normalization" logic as a custom python. Minium hill count, and the (no food) balancing is done via Deers
Map Updated - Hemisphere - Incorporated the improved Normalization logic & adapted for mirror (no more mirroring discrepancies on capitals), added option for Marble & Stone removal or selection, added wonder restriction choices




Pictures
Option much clear - All in groupings on lobby

Can adjust Distance of city cost in the map options (key for the map ThreeIron)

"Game Analyzer" Menu gets a log of new infos in new Widgets

UUMadness Menu in the Civelopedia - You can now track which resources have been randomly assigned, also, it can be different by map

Civs with Unique Resources now get it in city 2 not on capital, and it's also announcd nicely

 

[phillip1882]

I just downloaded the mod and was quite fun, though there are some aspects i don't understand.
according to the great prophet it looks like there should be about 12 religions, but in the tech tree i can only see the standard 7. do you need to be a pacific civ for some religions?
I'm unclear what I'm supposed to do with the treasure unit.
in a custom game, i can only seem to set a maximum of 12 civs even on huge maps.

 

[P&nny]

1 - If you play with the option "Pagan belief", you can build a building called the pagan shine.
It gives your "belief" points, which count as faith point in your religion if you have one; but if you don't have one they'll accumulate and when you get to the threshould (125pnt in quick), you can found a new religion.

Also, if you start a game in a later era (like Classical start) in BTS some civ get a religion, other don't. In BTG thanks to the many religion everybody does then.

2 - If you lose the unit, you will die. This makes more sense if you play mutilplayer arguably

3 - Correct, limited 'normal' games to 12 Civs to speed up game process time, but you can go to load mod as usual for an .exe which allows 41 Civs