[BtS] DIPLOMACY: a mod for Diplogames!

[The Capo]

Still just seems kinda pointless, to have a wonder that is only really useful if you vassalize someone before their UU loses its usefulness.

I am sorry to do this, because I hate when other people do this, but I think I have said this like eight times or so now...

YOU WILL NOT HAVE TO VASSALIZE ANYONE! THIS WONDER WILL EITHER (A) BUILD ANY UU IN ALL OF BtS OR (B) ANY UU OF A CIV IN THE GAME YOU ARE PLAYING. I HAVEN'T DECIDED WHICH.

I REPEAT: THERE IS NO VASSAL REQUIREMENT!!!

...that is all.

EDIT: Also it will never replace your UU, so if you are Rome you will never build a Jaguar, always Praets.

 

[The Almighty dF]

I am sorry to do this, because I hate when other people do this, but I think I have said this like eight times or so now...

YOU WILL NOT HAVE TO VASSALIZE ANYONE! THIS WONDER WILL EITHER (A) BUILD ANY UU IN ALL OF BtS OR (B) ANY UU OF A CIV IN THE GAME YOU ARE PLAYING. I HAVEN'T DECIDED WHICH.

I REPEAT: THERE IS NO VASSAL REQUIREMENT!!!

...that is all.

I'd go for B.
A would still be weak, but... more of a "50% faster worker speed at a time where your workers aren't really doing much" weak rather than all out useless, unless you add in your idea of +1 commerce to colosseums.

Also, I think any colly's made by the wonder -would- vanish upon the wonder obsoleting. They also don't gain double culture after x amount of turns as the normally built ones would, I think.
I could be wrong, I haven't built Stonehenge since BtS came out.

 

[The Capo]

I'd go for B.
A would still be weak, but... more of a "50% faster worker speed at a time where your workers aren't really doing much" weak rather than all out useless, unless you add in your idea of +1 commerce to colosseums.

Also, I think any colly's made by the wonder -would- vanish upon the wonder obsoleting. They also don't gain double culture after x amount of turns as the normally built ones would, I think.
I could be wrong, I haven't built Stonehenge since BtS came out.

Well, if I take away the obseletion, add the +1 gold and with the vassal requirement removed do you think that it is acceptable as a wonder?

Actually, the more I consider it I think A would be a better option than B. Because B depends on how many civs are in the game, with A in place the wonder has the same value at all times.

 

[The Almighty dF]

Well, if I take away the obseletion, add the +1 gold and with the vassal requirement removed do you think that it is acceptable as a wonder?

Actually, the more I consider it I think A would be a better option than B. Because B depends on how many civs are in the game, with A in place the wonder has the same value at all times.

Personally, I'd go for B and +2 gold per coloseum, but still have obsoletion (no free colly's, but giving a bonus to all of them seems neat.)
Personally I was always baffled by the fact that they didn't bring in money in the base game. Why do you build a football stadium? To bring a buttload of money into your town via tourism.

 

[The Capo]

Another thing I was thinking of doing, and this would be to make the mod itself smaller (file-size wise) was to merge a couple of the flavored sets. In my opinion the modern Babylonian set looks kind of stupid (blue uniforms with purple berets), the Sumerian one is a reskin to look similar to an Iraqi uniform but with an ancient mesopotamian style head/beard. I'm thinking I could probably use the same set for both of those civs. I figured I could save space by also using the same workers and scouts for these civs. I have two different asian warriors and scouts which basically look the same too, so I could also merge those. The reason I'm doing this is because I am starting to try and cut the file sizes down, I am also improving the general look of the units and making way for some really cool looking modern units. Not to mention with Bakuel's new units, some coming up from SnafuSmith, and the fact that I'm about to pillage the newly released TR for Warlords I might need the space.

The reason I am posting this though, if you noticed any units you think should be changed or improved upon, please let me know and I'll try to adress them before the next playtest is out. It will slightly delay it, but I'd rather err on the side of quality than err on the side of expedience. Now would also be a good time to draw my attention to any improper buttons or text you might notice. I'll also try to get in some of Absinthe's changes to the UUs and UBs. As far as those go here are the planned changes to some of the names:

• The Phalanx will be renamed to Hoplite.
• The Praetorian will be renamed to Legion.
• The Frankish Paladin will be renamed to Carolignian Paladin.
• The New League of Nations will be renamed to the United Nations.
• The Redcoat will probably be renamed to Regular, or Colonial Regular or something like that.
• The Camel Archer will now be the Asnar Warrior.
• I will probably rename the Babylonian Bowman to something Babylonian.

Anything I've missed?

 

[The Almighty dF]

Another thing I was thinking of doing, and this would be to make the mod itself smaller (file-size wise) was to merge a couple of the flavored sets. In my opinion the modern Babylonian set looks kind of stupid (blue uniforms with purple berets), the Sumerian one is a reskin to look similar to an Iraqi uniform but with an ancient mesopotamian style head/beard. I'm thinking I could probably use the same set for both of those civs. I figured I could save space by also using the same workers and scouts for these civs. I have two different asian warriors and scouts which basically look the same too, so I could also merge those. The reason I'm doing this is because I am starting to try and cut the file sizes down, I am also improving the general look of the units and making way for some really cool looking modern units. Not to mention with Bakuel's new units, some coming up from SnafuSmith, and the fact that I'm about to pillage the newly released TR for Warlords I might need the space.

The reason I am posting this though, if you noticed any units you think should be changed or improved upon, please let me know and I'll try to adress them before the next playtest is out. It will slightly delay it, but I'd rather err on the side of quality than err on the side of expedience. Now would also be a good time to draw my attention to any improper buttons or text you might notice. I'll also try to get in some of Absinthe's changes to the UUs and UBs. As far as those go here are the planned changes to some of the names:

• The Phalanx will be renamed to Hoplite.
• The Praetorian will be renamed to Legion.
• The Frankish Paladin will be renamed to Carolignian Paladin.
• The New League of Nations will be renamed to the United Nations.
• The Redcoat will probably be renamed to Regular, or Colonial Regular or something like that.
• The Camel Archer will now be the Asnar Warrior.
• I will probably rename the Babylonian Bowman to something Babylonian.

Anything I've missed?

I have one more unit name I'd like changed. Can we maybe change the name of the "Fast Worker" to maybe Karta (worker in hindi)? I just always found that name to be kinda... ******ed. "Fast Worker replaces Worker."
At least maybe karta asanyami (off the top of my head, Fast Worker.)
Just seems to me as silly as calling the Berserker a "Better Maceman".

 

[cybrxkhan]

On naming, some suggestions/possibilities:

- Rename the Babylonian Bowman. 'Bowman' is way too generic, although admittedly I don't know what would be a better-sounding replacement
- Fast Worker - it's really a weird name for a UU, and one which I consider actually kind of rascist and condenscending (but you said that you don't really want to change the base game or anything like that, so whatever)
- Keshik - see wikipedia here; the Keshik, like the Praetorians, were more like elite guards rather than actual units. Something like "Horde" would be so much better, even if a bit generic.

That's all I can think of presently.

 

[AbsintheRed]

While searching through the modcomps I found this.
Just simple renaming, but I like most of them, especially the last 2:

Praetorian now called Legionary - Praetorians were historically a special force of bodyguards. Seems a bit weird seeing hundreds of them swarm the land IMO.
Phalanx now called Hoplite - A Phalanx is the name of the formation not a unit!
Maceman now called Man-at-arms - Men-at-arms is a more generic term for a medieval soldier and sounds better than 'Maceman' (which, in-game, actually wields a flail! - go figure)
Colosseum now called Stadium - Stadium is just a more generic term and seems to fit better for all civilizations throughout all the ages.


Speaking of renames, I always wanted the national wonders not to be civ-specific.
For example building Mount Rushmore, Hermitage, Scotland Yard, etc always bothered me when playing with a different civ :S
They can easily be National Monument/War Memorial, National Gallery, Secret Service, or any other name that suits them better...

@ AbsintheRed; I planned on changing the names of the Praetorian and Phalanx to Legion and Hoplite, but you've gone the extra mile here. I like the new names. Now I can call the swordsman and axeman heavy and light infantry. I was discussing this with someone for the last mod, but I called the Swordsman the Light Infantry and the Axeman the Heavy Infantry (I think we called the Maceman a Footman, but Men-at-Arms is probably better), but he suggested that the Swordsman be called Heavy and the Axeman light because it would make more sense to people (since the swordsman is stronger). But in reality the heavier infantry would be used to fight melee type units, while the lighter infantry was quicker and would be used to sack cities. So I don't know, what do you guys think I should rename the sword and axeman? They won't always be using a sword and axe, which is why I want to change it BTW.

Don't forget these (maceman, colosseum, axeman, swordsman). I like the idea of renaming fast worker too. Maybe Keshik can stay this way, we also have Tarkans so it's not that bad.
Also, we really should rename the national wonders too, as they have various art for them in Cultural Citystyles
There are a couple more NWs than I listed above, and the naming is very unfortunate on some occasions.
Abu Simbel (Egypt), Petra (Middle-Eastern), Terracotta Army (China) as Mount Rushmore for example??

 

[AbsintheRed]

I am sorry to do this, because I hate when other people do this, but I think I have said this like eight times or so now...

YOU WILL NOT HAVE TO VASSALIZE ANYONE! THIS WONDER WILL EITHER (A) BUILD ANY UU IN ALL OF BtS OR (B) ANY UU OF A CIV IN THE GAME YOU ARE PLAYING. I HAVEN'T DECIDED WHICH.

I REPEAT: THERE IS NO VASSAL REQUIREMENT!!!

...that is all.

EDIT: Also it will never replace your UU, so if you are Rome you will never build a Jaguar, always Praets.

Capo, you are exactly as stubborn as me
Also, I don't get what's TAdF's problem with this UU feature, it's not weak at all. On the contrary, UUs are really powerful. Even if it's only from your vassals, and you play a civ with late UU
like Germany or America, and can get better maceman or knights by vassalizing someone in the medival era it's a huge advantage.

So I still prefer to have this ability only for your vassal's UU, IMO it would be overpowered if you get many civs UUs.
Imagine a huge map with 18-20 civs. If you have at about 1/3 rate for building enemy UUs, that means you have 7 UUs on average in that game, so this wonder basically provides you with 6 extra UUs!!!
If you can have all Diplomacy civs UU, then much more... If something then this is really unbalanced
I really get the idea behind your suggestion and why it fits in the Colosseo's concept very well. But does this also fits your concept of Diplomacy Games?
But fine, if you really want to then we can go with B, but then please make it the civs you contacted


So the UU wonder: ~30% chance for building UUs of any civ you contacted
+1 or 2 gold per colosseums
never obsoletes

UB wonder: ~30% chance for building your vassal's UB
can capture the original owner's UBs in cities
strenghtens vassals
never obsoletes

 

[Xyth]

If you're looking to cut down on unit file size a good place to look would be the Modern units by Zerver like the Marine, SAM Infantry, Paratrooper. His units tend to use large texture files. I'm not at all an expert on modern military but to me camo is camo and slight variations aren't noticed in Civ unless very zoomed in and half the time the only other difference is the tiny flag on the uniform.

Also I've noticed you have a lot of duplicated units in the art folder. Particularly a lot of settlers and workers and such are in both their respective civ folder and in the shared folder. I don't have your last playtest on hand or I'd give some specifics.

Also Praetorian should become Legionary rather than Legion, to be consistent.

 

[mechaerik]

Also, some of the texture files that Zerver uses can be MASSIVE.

 

[The Capo]

All good stuff, thanks a lot guys!

And I must apologize, again, for misjudging the playtest release date, although I guess I'm being very civ-like in that respect; if Civ always gets delayed and patched, the least my mod could do is get delayed.

Anyway, in all seriousness I have a fantastic unit replacement/upgrade thing going on right now, in fact A LOT of the units are getting changed and I will try my best to streamline all of them (which means getting rid of duplicates, btw if you guys notice any it would always help to let me know, even if I already realized and took care of it there might be something I am missing) and I'll try to remove as many frivilous ones as possible (there's not a good reason Babylon and Sumeria couldn't share some graphics as an example). Tonight I won't really be able to get anything done because I'm going out for my birthday in around an hour, but this unit upgrade is going to be very amazing and in my opinion this mod will be among the, if not the, best of flavored mods available (graphics-wise). I am including all flavored mods.

As far as the Flavian Amphitheatre and UB wonder, I'm not sure what to make it, but since I think the UB wonder is BETTER in a lot of ways I'll probably make it a somewhat later tech, which will dictate the era, and that in turn will dictate the wonder. So if anyone has any good ideas for this, that'd be great. I'm thinking maybe something from the Middle-Ages or Renaissance here. So anywhere between 1200 and 1600 should work. I have already explained why I don't want to go with Topkapi Palace.

 

[cybrxkhan]

Happy birthday.

For a UB wonder, the only thing I can think of is the Silk Road (i.e. spread of ideas and cultures and stuff), but a wonder like that would definitely have to focus on trade too, so I dunno.

 

[The Almighty dF]

All good stuff, thanks a lot guys!

And I must apologize, again, for misjudging the playtest release date, although I guess I'm being very civ-like in that respect; if Civ always gets delayed and patched, the least my mod could do is get delayed.

Anyway, in all seriousness I have a fantastic unit replacement/upgrade thing going on right now, in fact A LOT of the units are getting changed and I will try my best to streamline all of them (which means getting rid of duplicates, btw if you guys notice any it would always help to let me know, even if I already realized and took care of it there might be something I am missing) and I'll try to remove as many frivilous ones as possible (there's not a good reason Babylon and Sumeria couldn't share some graphics as an example). Tonight I won't really be able to get anything done because I'm going out for my birthday in around an hour, but this unit upgrade is going to be very amazing and in my opinion this mod will be among the, if not the, best of flavored mods available (graphics-wise). I am including all flavored mods.

As far as the Flavian Amphitheatre and UB wonder, I'm not sure what to make it, but since I think the UB wonder is BETTER in a lot of ways I'll probably make it a somewhat later tech, which will dictate the era, and that in turn will dictate the wonder. So if anyone has any good ideas for this, that'd be great. I'm thinking maybe something from the Middle-Ages or Renaissance here. So anywhere between 1200 and 1600 should work. I have already explained why I don't want to go with Topkapi Palace.

Happy birthday.

Also, for the UB wonder... hmm.
I can't really think of a wonder that'd fit that benefit, sadly. I guess maybe some wonder relating towards broader acception/exposure to foreign culture. Or something involving The Prince style imperialism... I just can't think of a real life wonder that relates to either of those.


I do still like the idea of a wonder that gives colly's +2 gold, though. So no matter what perk you give the Flavian, I hope that goes with it.

 

[mamba]

Anyway, in all seriousness I have a fantastic unit replacement/upgrade thing going on right now, in fact A LOT of the units are getting changed and I will try my best to streamline all of them

did you get sent or created a stash of new units ? Or are you plundering Total Realism ?

 

[AbsintheRed]

I just noticed the update on kocmann's TO civ. What do you think of new LH?
Adding a second leader (Conrad?) to Teutonic Order would be awesome
It's mostly IgorS's Barbarossa reskinned, but I think it came out pretty well.
Honestly it's even better than the "original", and you don't use the Barbarossa LH otherwise...

 

[The Almighty dF]

I just noticed the update on kocmann's TO civ. What do you think of new LH?
Adding a second leader (Conrad?) to Teutonic Order would be awesome
It's mostly IgorS's Barbarossa reskinned, but I think it came out pretty well.
Honestly it's even better than the "original", and you don't use the Barbarossa LH otherwise...

I'd vote for adding Conrad. If you ask me, all civs deserve at least two leaders.

Also, it's neat to see at least one leader Diplomacy normally has will be in Civ5, according to the guys the front page sourced. Harun al-Rashid.
Oda... surprises me. Completely out of left field. However? I guess he kinda makes sense as a leader... kinda. I can almost support him over Tokugawa, really.

 

[The Capo]

I'm basically still drunk right now, so take this post with a grain of salt.

First of all, GO TERPS!!!!

​

@ TAdF; obviously I'm as unsure as you are about the UB wonder, but I think the concept is good. So anything could work, to me the first requirement for a wonder should be a remarkable building or construction effort. After that the use of the building has to be considered. So for this it should be something from a country/Empire that had a high level of imperialism or national diversity, so Persian or Roman would be a good example of this, thinking outside of the box we could go with an under/un-represented culture that is in the game. So perhaps I could use something from one of the new civs.

@ mamba; the TR update is certainly part of it, but it is a general update, some of the units will be completely original. Basically the way I operate is that I'll see a new set of units and think of all potential reskinning possibilities, so when I see a mod with some new units my first reaction is "how can I reskin this?"

@ AbsintheRed; There is a possibility I'll add Conrad, but to be honest that is doubtful, sometimes I leave leaders out of the picture because I think they can be reskinned as other leaders for other civs. In my estimation that Conrad LH is generic enough that I could reskin it for something else. Keep in mind I do intend on making a medieval/crusades modpack, and that modpack will have three Christian and three Muslim civs, so all things considered I'd rather keep that gun in my holster for later use. I originally made that TO civ because a German/French (lives in France but is from Germany) friend of mine requested it, so I'll probably leave it the way it is. And on top of that, and I'm trying to be polite as possible by saying this, I don't think the LH is good/original/unique enough to make the cut. At least not for the TO.

EDIT: Quick birthday report, I woke up around 12 in the afternoon today with a massive hangover, apparently I left my coat and phone at the bar I was at, and I had a tampon in my pocket. In my circle of friends if a guy passes out we put a tampon in his pocket, if a chick passes out we put an unwrapped condom in her pocket/purse, so I guess I passed out, I have no memory of what happened after the second bar we went to, so it seems like it was a good night.

EDIT 2: Is there any confirmation, either way, that civs in CivIV will have multiple leaders?

EDIT 3: Should I release the Hermann von Salza LH?

 

[The Almighty dF]

Just had an idea.

Petra.
Even the Romans saw it as a potential source of tourism revenue -and- as a site of cultural importance, and built road systems around it to make it even easier to travel to see it.
Maybe -that- could be the UB wonder. It'd blend in with the idea of not extinguishing cultural odds & ends in return for a bonus of some sort (in-game it's the bonus the UBs give, in real life it's the tourism and the happiness it gives to those in the region. Makes your empire look better.)

On top of that, it's a -beautiful- wonder which I've... somehow never seen in a mod, to mind.
Sadly that probably means nobody's ever made a Petra model.

 

[The Capo]

Just had an idea.

Petra.
Even the Romans saw it as a potential source of tourism revenue -and- as a site of cultural importance, and built road systems around it to make it even easier to travel to see it.
Maybe -that- could be the UB wonder. It'd blend in with the idea of not extinguishing cultural odds & ends in return for a bonus of some sort (in-game it's the bonus the UBs give, in real life it's the tourism and the happiness it gives to those in the region. Makes your empire look better.)

On top of that, it's a -beautiful- wonder which I've... somehow never seen in a mod, to mind.
Sadly that probably means nobody's ever made a Petra model.

There is a Petra model, however it is used in CC as the Middle-eastern Mt. Rushmore. So I can't use that.