[BtS] Diversica

[mamba]

Version 0.70b (bugfix for 0.70) released, fixes some graphical bugs.

 

[Sword_Of_Geddon]

Bernie has uploaded more native units, both Sioux and Iroquois, are you going to update this mod to include them? Or wait till World of Civ? Just wondering.

 

[mamba]

More native Sioux ? Haven't seen those yet, I only saw the announcement that he will create 3 more units, both Iroquois and Sioux. As to the Iroquois, I will include them in the next release, which will probably be the WoC release, unless there is a bunch of new units to add before WoC fixes the problems I reported, which prevent me from using it in its current form (or at least which prevent taking advantage of the WoC format to me).

 

[Sword_Of_Geddon]

So Mamba what is the progress of the new version? Maybe make a miner update with the new Native American units(Sioux and Iroquois) before the WOC version comes out?

 

[mamba]

The WoC version will still need some time, most of all because WoC itself still needs time to fix bugs.

I pretty much finished converting everything to WoC format today (took a while, believe me) but haven't started testing it yet. I will probably slice and dice it to check some things with the latest beta (now that everything is its own file slicing is easy...). My checks with 0.90 brought up some issues which need to be fixed for WoC to be of any use to me.

Depending on how long it takes for WoC to stabilize I might do another release in non-WoC format. But as I said this depends on both WoC and the amount of new units I add. 6 new units never warranted a new release, that is just too few to matter

Otoh if Bernie releases the remaining natives I might create a 'fix' for those units, no point in adding 6 today and missing 3 a week from now imo.

 

[Sword_Of_Geddon]

sounds cool. I cant wait to see what you have in store with you optional expanded Next war thing you may do.

 

[mamba]

To be honest I haven't given it much thought recently, so far the WoC conversion was my main concern.

I have taken a look at the Final Frontier stuff though and whether to use some as planes / ships as you suggested. Some would work, I am not sure if they would be of much use though as these would simply introduce yet a stronger version of what is currently the strongest version for certain unit types in game, so no big advantage here imo.

Apart from that I guess most games are won by the time you would get around to them

 

[Sword_Of_Geddon]

I always play the game the whole way threw to see the units so please keep players like me in mind. Please I'm begging you mamba to add in those units. Also expanding the next war tech tree to accomadate them would be a must. Just think about it alright?

 

[mamba]

Also expanding the next war tech tree to accomadate them would be a must. Just think about it alright?

I agree, if I add them, that will require additional techs. What to add and how to add it is something I have not made my mind up on yet. That decision is still wide open, I will look into this some more and might still come to the conclusion that I won't be adding anything. Nothing has been decided yet, one way or the other.

 

[mamba]

Bugfix 0.70c released.

Nothing like completely reorganizing your mod (thanks to WoC) to find duplicates and bugs. So here are the bugs, the changes due to duplicates and new units are left for a new version

 

[lord_graywolfe]

hey mamba just to let you know. the Next War files that you include in your mod have a gamespeed file that uses the old warlord speeds not BtS. i dont know why Next War uses those speeds but that file is the only one the game uses so i had to delete it so i could run at the normal, longer, BtS speeds. of course this was a slightly older version and you may have already taken care of this.

 

[mamba]

I removed that file in 0.70

 

[njohns99]

Have you checked out the World Piece mod? It would be neat to enable that kind of terrain generation.

 

[mamba]

I am following the discussion there but haven't yet played a game with it. So far the mod seems to be undergoing major changes, so I won't be taking a look just yet

Chances are the end result will be pretty complex and no parts can easily be separated / incorporated into other mods (besides, I never did any Python programming and won't venture into dll changes either).

So the probability of me adding anything from it is slim. It definitely looks like an interesting mod though.

 

[Bospor]

Well, I finally finished one game! It took me a while, but I did it. I have to say that I am very gteatfull to Mamba for all his hard work! Thanks man, very well done indeed!
There are some small changes that still could be done to the mod, but overall it is a great mod and I recommend to anyone out there.
Some units are so impressive that I just loved it!

I played for the Russians and here some things that I would recommend changing a little:
The Cossak is a unique unit for the Russians, but seems to be almost useless. I went from a knight to APC almost in no time. Kind of sucks for the Russians if their unique unit gets such a short on-stage life.
This one I am not sure about. I don't even know if it is possible, but can we add new wonders to the game? I believe that Firaxis forgot one of the most significan event in the human history: Sputnik! That was the first man-made unit in space and our first human "steps" in the outter space, how come it is not a wonder??? It is by far more wonerous than a Mount Rushmore If it is possible, can we see it in the next update (sorry if I am asking for too much here, I just don't know enough about this game modding capabilities).
With this wonder a civilization can get some extra exploration bonuses or communication bonus or spying bonus or something.
Global warming was a . .. .. .. .. .! I don't know about you guys, but I thought it was a little too much. Is it possible to have some sort of anti-warming action by a worker or something? It would be nice if a worker can reclaim the lost field eventually, let it take a long time, but let it be possible.
The last wish is to have some sort of technology late in game that would allow mining cold regions of the map and irrigating or mining desert lots.

Well, again, congratulations to Mamba on such successful mod and many many thanks to all the guys who made those awesome looking units!

 

[mamba]

Well, I finally finished one game! It took me a while, but I did it. I have to say that I am very gteatfull to Mamba for all his hard work! Thanks man, very well done indeed!

thanks, glad that you like it.

The Cossak is a unique unit for the Russians, but seems to be almost useless. I went from a knight to APC almost in no time. Kind of sucks for the Russians if their unique unit gets such a short on-stage life.

for me cavalry usually has a relatively long lifespan, it is all a matter of what techs you research in which order. Besides, the Halftrack is only slightly superior to the cavalry (I pick that one as it has two movement points too).

This one I am not sure about. I don't even know if it is possible, but can we add new wonders to the game?

It should be possible (there are some wonders at this site and some mods which use them), but I never tried

I believe that Firaxis forgot one of the most significan event in the human history: Sputnik! That was the first man-made unit in space and our first human "steps" in the outter space, how come it is not a wonder???

ask Firaxis there is no Sputnik wonder available at CFC either, I guess the problem is that Sputnik is not a building in a city

Global warming was a . .. .. .. .. .! I don't know about you guys, but I thought it was a little too much. Is it possible to have some sort of anti-warming action by a worker or something? It would be nice if a worker can reclaim the lost field eventually, let it take a long time, but let it be possible.

I have yet to see the effects of global warming (believe it or not, but I haven't managed to finish a game yet).

I assume it would be possible to allow for this (we probaby cannot restore it to its original type unless we have some way of knowing what it was, but to a specific type). At the same time I am not sure that this is needed / I actually want it.

I might look into it once I managed to finish a few games

The last wish is to have some sort of technology late in game that would allow mining cold regions of the map and irrigating or mining desert lots.

Again, it should be possible, but to me this is not important, I mostly change graphics and do not intend to change the gameplay / game mechanics.

 

[Wolfshanze]

Global warming was a . .. .. .. .. .! I don't know about you guys, but I thought it was a little too much. Is it possible to have some sort of anti-warming action by a worker or something? It would be nice if a worker can reclaim the lost field eventually, let it take a long time, but let it be possible.

I have yet to see the effects of global warming.

I assume it would be possible to allow for this (we probaby cannot restore it to its original type unless we have some way of knowing what it was, but to a specific type). At the same time I am not sure that this is needed / I actually want it.

I might look into it once I managed to finish a few games

DEFINITION:
Global Warming by-default begins to occur when a nuclear plant melts-down or the first nuclear warhead is used in anger. It's a cumulative effect... the more nukes used, the greater the chance of global warming. If global warming does occur, somewhere on the planet (random) any terrain is instantly turned into useless desert. End of Line... nothing can be done to stop it, nothing can be done to reverse the process.

SOLUTION?
It has been addressed by others... Lt.Bob's gamecore DLL does at least two things (that I implemented in the Wolfshanze Mod)... besides the well-known 40-civ change, Lt.Bob's little-known other option is changing Global Warming from the above description into something a little more manageable... instead of global warming raining-down desert tiles all over the planet, Lt.Bob's DLL changes that to raining-down nuclear fallout all over the planet... both have the effect of making the tile worthless, but unlike a desert tile, nuclear fallout can be "scrubbed-clean" with workers.

Mamba... if it's something you want to look into, I've seen other options involved in the process... a lot of folks have hated the Global Warming effects, which is why I went with Lt.Bob's Nuclear Fallout option over Global Warming in my own mod... but I've seen other ways of messing with it too... from what I know though, any changes to Global Warming must be done in either the gamecore DLL or via Python commands. I'm too lazy to do either, so I just borrowed Lt.Bob's DLL and activated it with an XML command (by default, the option is turned-off, but it's easy to activate in XML).

Just sayin'

 

[mamba]

It has been addressed by others... Lt.Bob's gamecore DLL does at least two things (that I implemented in the Wolfshanze Mod)... besides the well-known 40-civ change, Lt.Bob's little-known other option is changing Global Warming from the above description into something a little more manageable... instead of global warming raining-down desert tiles all over the planet, Lt.Bob's DLL changes that to raining-down nuclear fallout all over the planet... both have the effect of making the tile worthless, but unlike a desert tile, nuclear fallout can be "scrubbed-clean" with workers.

As I am not dependent on a dll anyone could place that dll in the Diversica mod and use it. That would fix that issue.

Once I move to WoC I will be dependent on the WoC dll however, not sure if that includes this feature (it does include the Bhruic changes and more civs).

 

[Wolfshanze]

As I am not dependent on a dll anyone could place that dll in the Diversica mod and use it. That would fix that issue.

Yes... certainly so... but you also have to remember a LOT of the folks who use the mods the mod-community provides...
A) Aren't aware of every mod out there
B) Usually pick one or two-mods at best and stick to them
C) Don't want to mess with DLLs or XML changes in any way shape or form (scared/inexperienced/stand-off-ish)
D) Aren't aware/informed about what is and isn't combineable in mods (some might think Lt.Bob's is a mod on it's own and not mixable with others)

I've been doing game mods for a LOOOOOONG time... it's been my experience (and it's just as applicable now as it was 10 years ago) that for every person very knowledgeable about how to change/mix/combine mods, there's 3 or 4 people that just want to plug-in one mod and be done with it... they don't want to alter anything on their own... just unzip and go.

While I don't have any scientific research to back me up, I'll bet you this Mamba... for every 10 people who play your mod, 2 or 3 of them are experienced users who try differant mods and mix them up or alter them for their own liking... 7 or 8 of them probably just unzip your mod, use it as-is, and it might be the only mod they ever use.

That's why I included it in my mod... I figure all 10 out of 10 that use my mod will benefit... if you're one of the 2 or 3 "mod-power-users" (out of 10), you can either delete, modify or replace the DLL in my mod with something else if so desired... if you're the 7 or 8 "average-joe-users" (out of 10) that just want to unzip and play, then they get all the benefits without having to look around.

If on the other hand, you just assume "ah, they can plug-in their own DLL", I would bet only those 2 or 3 power users (out of 10) will ever know that, and most folks who might enjoy such a feature would never know how on their own, or even that they could.

That's my take on it... I have nothing to back up my thoughts other then my experience modding for many games over the years... for every power-user who will modify/alter a mod, there's a LOT of people that just take the mod straight-up and don't change a thing... usually because they lack experience in changing game code on their own.

I included the DLL and the Nuclear Fallout changes in my mod by default, because it's both something I wanted, and I also believe that more people then not would appreciate and like the change.

That's my 2-cents on the matter, but I could be totally wrong... maybe everybody who downloads a mod is a power-user and changes everything around to their own liking... who knows.

Once I move to WoC I will be dependent on the WoC dll however, not sure if that includes this feature (it does include the Bhruic changes and more civs).

If it doesn't include the Nuclear Fallout change/option, it should... folks should ask the DLL author about it and see if it too could be included... I think if more people knew about it, it would be almost as popular as Bhruic's patch!

 

[mamba]

Chances are you are right, so for everyone interested, simply put Lt. Bob's dll in the Assets directory to use it.

I will not include it in the next version however, eventually I will include the WoC dll, that will be the only dll I ship with