[BTS] Ancient Astronauts Civ4 MOD

[thehiredgun]

ANCIENT ASTRONAUTS ver 1.0

This is a first attempt to create a MOD based on Ancient Astronauts theory as made popular by theorists Erich von Däniken in the book "Chariots of the Gods?" and shows such as Ancient Aliens on the History channel. This MOD explores these ideas and asks you to develop a civilization with a keen eye towards locating and identifying ancient knowledge lost on our planet.

Designed for vanilla BTS 3.19, the MOD focuses on new resources such as Ancient Ruins and improvements such as Excavations to help discover knowledge lost to the ages. Along with additional tech, buildings, wonders, and units, this MOD attempts to offer a new flavor for CIV IV without disrupting or overcomplicating the original design of vanilla BtS. For those who have played a lot of Beyond the Sword, the changes will seem subtle at first, but lead to intriguing gameplay. No additional MODs or Features needed. Simply unzip to your Beyond The Sword \ MODS folder. Enjoy!

by thehiredgun (aka dstahl)
(this is my first mod and first upload so let me know how I can improve!)

"According to ancient alien theorists, extraterrestrials with superior knowledge of science and engineering landed on Earth thousands of years ago, sharing their expertise with early civilizations and forever changing the course of human history. But how did this concept develop, and is there any evidence to support it?" - History Channel

DOWNLOAD V1.0 FROM ATOMIC GAMER (12.4MB Zip)

Here is a list of some of the features of the MOD

Spoiler :

New Buildings
Stonemasonry Hut
Warehouse 13
Museum
Tesla Towers

New National Wonders
Tower of the Winds
SETI
Skunkworks

New and updated World Wonders
The X-Files
The Great Sphinx
Pyramids of Giza
Easter Island Moai
Stonehenge

New Resources
Artifacts (Ruins)
Underwater Ruins
UFO (Crash Sites)

New Tile Improvements
Inuksuk
Geoglyphs
Dye Plantation
Excavation
Underwater ROV
Area 51
Crop Circles

New Units
Manned Kite
Trade Ship
Heavy Swordsman
Fabled Warrior
Biplane
Flying Saucer
Scorpion Gunship
Orbital Bomber
Assault Mech

New Technologies
Megaliths
Dye Making
Meteorology
Archeaology
Powered Aviation
Metaphysics
Xenoarcheaology
Fringe Science

Link to images of tech tree/resources/improvements

Credits to many great modders on this forum for units and help files including woodelf, deon, and walter hawkwood. You inspired me!

As mentioned, this is a first mod and so there are known issues.

Spoiler :

• not all civilopedia entries are in all languages
• some units need to be visually improved
• there is a WIP CONTACT victory condition that should be manually disabled before playing to prevent AI from trying to complete it.

Please submit bugs and or any feedback to this thread or directly to thehiredgun@gmail.com

Cheers and enjoy!

 

[Dancing Hoskuld]

Sorry, I have not played this yet, but I would like to use your Geoglyphs improvement in Caveman2Cosmos. We use Playtping's Nazca Lines wonder but require a terrain type barren in the city vicinity. I was thinking of the wonder placing the geoglyphs on each barren plot near the city when you built the wonder. They would not be available any other way.

Is it OK for me to use the geolyphs art?

 

[thehiredgun]

Sorry, I have not played this yet, but I would like to use your Geoglyphs improvement in Caveman2Cosmos. We use Playtping's Nazca Lines wonder but require a terrain type barren in the city vicinity. I was thinking of the wonder placing the geoglyphs on each barren plot near the city when you built the wonder. They would not be available any other way.

Is it OK for me to use the geolyphs art?

Certainly - go for it. The MOD is there for all to use and enjoy and there are many things that I borrowed from many of the MODs on this site as a starting point. The Geoglyphs will probably look best over desert of plains. Not sure how they'll look if you put them on other types of terrain.

Hope it works well for what you want to use it for in your MOD.

 

[Gnosishunter]

Awesome mod!
I am definitely feeling the tech tree mods. Can we look forward to another edition? Do you have further development in mind?

 

[thehiredgun]

Awesome mod!
I am definitely feeling the tech tree mods. Can we look forward to another edition? Do you have further development in mind?

Glad you noticed! Most of the work up to this point has been on adjusting the tech tree in the first half of the vanilla game. What I was shooting for was to provide an early game option to seek out "ancient knowledge" sites around the world that would then pay off if you focused research on them in late eras.

While my MODing speed is slow and technically challenged, my short term goals are to focus on improving the mid-game as I feel it starts to get a little wonky around the industrial age as some of the late bonuses start to kick in.

If anyone has feedback or suggestions (that don't involve adding other MODs as I'm trying to keep this simple for my own sake) I'm all ears.

Here are some of the suggestions I already have on the list
- Get the "Build the Contact Machine" victory condition in a more function state and potentially add stages so that it isn't an all or nothing option.
- Find a way to have "ancient ruins" or "Ufo Sites" spawn either unique people, higher tech units, or 'alien' barbarians. One option has been to consider converting "barbarians" to "aliens" completely, but that is currently out of my knowledge range.
- Add Events to represent famous historic "ancient alien" contacts
- Find a way to have Oceanic Exploration that opens up a new search for "ancient submerged goodie huts" once ROV is discovered.
- Find a way to include Ancient Astronaut theory into civics
- Add Aricebo Array Wonder
- Add Devil's Tower Wonder (Close Encounters)
- Update Hanging Gardens or Pyramids with Baghdad Battery bonus

If there is anything above that seems a higher priority than others, I'm open to suggestion.

 

[Deathdoor]

interesting and unusual project

but there is some bugs

1. can build Warehause and Teslatower in every city, not only 3

2. the electricity index was gone

3. can launch spaceship with unfinished details


4. can`t build geoglif on globalwarming desert


5. mech doesn`t get battlepoints from bulding/general


6. there is no Area51 in the mod


7. more wonders of the world are necessary

 

[thehiredgun]

interesting and unusual project

but there is some bugs

Thank you for the feedback!

Some notes: AREA 51 can only be built by post industrial military units (not workers)
Several of the bugs you mentioned were new to my list, so I'll work on fixes for these.

Any suggestions for world wonders?

 

[Deathdoor]

Any suggestions for world wonders?

Shambhala - can build after discovering hinduism or buddhism (?). give 1 free technology + % culture + prophet in city

Ahnenerbe - can build after discovering fashizm. give 1 free technology + culture + % spionage + % sience + prophet/spy/scienist in city

Wardenclyffe Tower - give free Tesla tower in every city (Tesla tower not national wonder) - happines + % sience + engineer/scienist in city

Viking Sunstones - can build in seacoast city after discovering sailing - obsolete with discovering optics. give free navigation promotion for all ships build in seacoast citys

Pole of Indra (Iron pillar of Delhi) - can build after discovering iron working. give culture + % culture + 2-5 happines in nearby citys + prophet in city

Ivan the Terrible’s library - can build after discovering writing and monarchy. give 1 free technology + % culture + % sience + scienist/artist in city

Project Montauk - can build after discovering mass media. give happines in all city - %hammers in all city + scienist in city

Great White Pyramid - ?

 

[mourndraken]

would like to see air ship or glider units available in ancient times; avalable with a wonder ?

 

[thehiredgun]

would like to see air ship or glider units available in ancient times; avalable with a wonder ?

Ancient air units is something I've been toying with on a local copy, something beefier than the scout air balloon.

Thematically, I'd like to tie it into the glider relics and have it represent man's early attempts at flight pre-BC.

 

[eman950]

Love this mod. The Trade Ship does not seem to work, perhaps I'm using it wrong, but an option to use it in a foreign harbor does not show.

 

[Graceheart the Leopard]

Sorry, but I couldn't resist.

I will be downloading later.

 

[Crion87]

Adds a cool bit of flavour without changing the essential game. Good job man