[NFP] Byzantium & Gaul Pack (September 2020) - Patch Notes Discussion

BYZANTIUM AND GAUL PACK
[NEW FEATURES]




CIVILIZATION: BYZANTIUM
Unique Ability – Taxis

• Units receive +3 Combat Strength or Religious Strength for each Holy City converted to Byzantium's Religion (including Byzantium's Holy City). Byzantium's Religion is spread to nearby cities when defeating an enemy unit belonging to a civilization or city-state. +1 Great Prophet point from cities with a Holy Site district.

Unique Unit – Dromon

• Classical Era unit that replaces the Quadrireme. These units have greater range than the Quadrireme and +10 Combat Strength against units.

Unique Infrastructure – Hippodrome

• [Base Game or Rise and Fall] Replaces the Entertainment Complex. Provides +3 Amenities, and cheaper to build. When the Hippodrome and buildings in this district are constructed, receive a Heavy Cavalry unit.
• [Gathering Storm] Replaces the Entertainment Complex. Provides +3 Amenities, and cheaper to build. When the Hippodrome and buildings in this district are constructed, receive a Heavy Cavalry unit. Units granted from this district do not have a resource maintenance cost.”

Leader: Basil II

Ability – Porphyrogénnētos

• Heavy and Light Cavalry do full damage against cities following the same religion as Byzantium. Gain the Tagma unique unit when the Divine Right civic is discovered.

Unique Unit – Tagma

• Medieval Era unit that replaces the Knight. Land units within 1 tile of the Tagma receive +4 Combat Strength or Religious Strength.

Agenda – Divine Guardian

• Likes civs following their religion.
• Converts civs to their religion.
• Dislikes civs who do not have Byzantium’s religion as majority.

CIVILIZATION: GAUL
Unique Ability – Hallstatt Culture

• Mines provide a minor adjacency bonus for all districts, a Culture Bomb of unowned territory, and receive +1 Culture. Specialty districts do not receive a minor adjacency for being adjacent to another district and cannot be built adjacent to the City Center.

Unique Unit – Gaesatae

• Ancient era unit that replaces the Warrior. This unit has increased cost and receives +10 Combat Strength when fighting units with a higher base Combat Strength. +5 Combat Strength against district defenses.

Unique Infrastructure – Oppidum

• Cheaper and available earlier than the district it replaces, the Industrial Zone. The Oppidum district is defensible with a ranged attack. When the first Oppidum is constructed, the Apprenticeship technology is unlocked. Major adjacency bonus from Quarries and strategic resources.

Leader: Ambiorix

Ability - King of the Eburones

• Gain Culture equal to 20% of the unit’s cost when a non-civilian is trained. Anti-Cavalry, Melee, and Ranged Units receive +2 combat for every adjacent military unit.

Agenda – Scourge of Rome

• Likes civilizations with lots of units (not necessarily the strongest units).
• Dislikes civilizations with tiny armies.
• Tries to build a large army.

[Rise and Fall or Gathering Storm] Dramatic Ages Game Mode

With Dramatic Ages enabled, the stakes of each Age are much higher! Aside from the initial Age, each Age will be either Golden or Dark, depending on the civilization’s Era Score. Era Score can be earned by completing Techs and Civics and from promoting units (for each promotion after the first). If players earn a Golden Age, any excess Era Score will turn into extra Loyalty pressure, which can be a significant factor if a neighbor has fallen into a Dark Age. In addition, players will have access to powerful Policy cards that you can use in the Wildcard slot of your government but watch out – entering a Dark Age means that some of your cities will rebel! Players in Dark Ages will have a portion of their empire immediately turn into Free Cities, and these Free Cities can exert pressure on other cities. On easier difficulty settings, AI players lose many more cities than players. On harder difficulty settings, human players do. On Prince, they lose an equal amount.

Golden Age Policies

Available from Classical to Medieval Eras:

• Mandala State: +4 Culture for every Wonder. Each Wonder in your cities cause foreign cities within 9 tiles to lose 2 Loyalty per turn.
• Free Inquiry: Commercial Hubs and Harbors provide Science equal to their Gold bonus. Campuses provide Gold equal to their Science bonus.

Available from Classical to Renaissance

• Praetorian Guard: Wounded units can heal +10 HP per turn. +2 Production to Encampment districts and buildings.
• Exodus of the Evangelists: +2 Movement for Missionaries, Apostles, Gurus, and Inquisitor; newly trained ones receive +2 Charges. +4 Great Prophet Points
• Monumentality: +2 Movement for Settlers and Builders. Civilian Units may be purchased with Faith. Builders are 30% cheaper to purchase.

Available from Renaissance to Modern Eras

• Sakdina: While your projects are active each of your Citizens exerts +0.5 Loyalty pressure to their city. When your projects complete, receive +10% additional Great People Points for every Building in that project’s district.
• Reform the Coinage: Your Traders cannot be Plundered. International Trade Routes provide +3 Gold per specialty district in the foreign city.

Available from Industrial to Modern Eras

• Culture Industry: +1 Culture per Specialty District for each city. Cities receive +25% Production towards Non-Specialty Districts. May purchase Entertainment Complex and Water Park buildings with Faith.

Industrial to Information [Rise and Fall] or Industrial to Atomic [Gathering Storm]

• Heartbeat of Steam: +10% Production towards Industrial and later Wonders. Campus district’s Science adjacency bonus provides Production as well.
• To Arms!: +50% XP to all units and +25% Production towards military units.

Available from Atomic to Information [Rise and Fall] or Atomic to Future [Gathering Storm] Eras

• Solidarity: All Governors exert 2 additional foreign Loyalty pressure. All your cities with governors receive +25% Gold and +25% Faith.
• Wish You Were Here: +100% Tourism to all National Parks and +50% Tourism from World Wonders.
• Sky and Stars: +30% Production to Spaceports and Aerodromes. +15% Science and Production to Cities with either a Spaceport or Aerodrome.

Available from Information to Future Eras

• [Gathering Storm] Popular Front: +100% Favor from Suzerainty of City-States and Alliance Level. Your Trade Routes to City-States provide +4 to all yields.
• [Gathering Storm] Military-Industrial Complex: All improved Aluminum, Oil, and Uranium resources yield 2 additional resource per turn. All combat units receive +5 Combat Strength and, if the unit has a range attack, +1 Range.

Dark Age Policies

• Flower Power, Rogue State, Cyber Warfare, Automated Workforce, and Disinformation Campaign Dark Age Policies are unchanged.

Available from Classic to Medieval Eras

• Monasticism: +75% Science in cities with a Holy site. BUT: -25% Culture in cities without a Holy Site.

Available from Classical to Renaissance Eras

• Inquisition: Start Inquisition with 1 Apostle charge. All religious units are +15 Religious Combat Strength in friendly territory. BUT: -15% Science in all cities.
• Decentralization: Cities with 6 or less population receive +4 loyalty per turn. BUT: Cities with more than 6 population receive -15% Gold.
• Elite Forces: +100% combat experience for all units. BUT: +1 Gold to maintain each Spy and military unit.

Available from Classical to Industrial Eras

• Isolationism: Domestic routes provide +3 Food, +3 Production, and +3 Gold. BUT: Can't train or buy Settlers or settle new cities.

Available from Renaissance to Modern Eras

• Samoderzhaviye: +50% Production in your Capital. BUT: All Governors are neutralized and cannot be reestablished.

Available from Industrial to Information [Rise and Fall] or Industrial to Atomic [Gathering Storm] Eras

• Robber Barons: +50% Gold and +25% Production in Cities with a Bank or Shipyard. BUT: -2 Amenities in all cities.

Available from Industrial to Information [Rise and Fall] or Industrial to Modern Eras [Gathering Storm]

• Soft Targets: +10 Combat Strength when defending city attacks and attacking district defenses. BUT: -3 Combat Strength against units.

Available from Industrial to Information [Rise and Fall] or Industrial to Atomic [Gathering Storm]

• Despotic Paternalism: +4 Loyalty per turn in cities with Governors. BUT: -15% Science and -15% Culture in all cities without a Governor

Available from Modern to Information [Rise and Fall] or Modern to Atomic [Gathering Storm]

• Collectivism: Farms provide +1 production. +2 Housing to all cities. Industrial Zones provide Food equal to their Production bonus. BUT: Great People Points earned 50% slower.

World Wonders

Statue of Zeus

• Requirements: Must be built adjacent to an Encampment with a Barracks building and on Flat land.
• Grants 3 Archers, 3 Spearmen, and a Battering Ram. +50% Production towards anti-cavalry units. +3 Gold per turn.

Biosphère

• Requirements: Must be built along a River adjacent to a Neighborhood district.
• [Base game and Rise and Fall] When completed receive 100 Science for every Marsh, Rainforest, and Woods in this city. +1 Appeal to tiles adjacent to Rainforest and Marsh in your empire. +8 Science.
• [Gathering Storm] Receive +200% Power for all Offshore Windfarms, Solar Farms, Wind Farms, Geothermal Plants, and Hydroelectric Dams. This building and these improvements provide Tourism equal to their Power. +1 Appeal to tiles adjacent to Rainforest and Marsh in your empire.

New Map

• Highlands - Test your civilization against a map dominated by hills and mountain ranges.

FREE GAME UPDATE
[GAMEPLAY/BALANCE]

• Georgia’s abilities are now the same in Gathering Storm and Rise and Fall.
• Resources will now be removed when building Canal connections.
• Entering the in-game options menu now cancels the ranged attack arrow.
• +1 Food to Pastures bonus moved from Exploration civic to Stirrups tech.
• City-State placement has been updated to make invalid positioning less likely to occur.
• Fixed an issue allowing players to build a Secret Society unique buildings and also the equivalent replacement buildings.
• Fixed an issue with the Work Ethic Follower Belief where bonuses to districts were not being re-applied after a pillaged district was repaired.
• Grabbing a Tribal Village by owning the tile it occupies grants Era Score.
• Barbarians now move to valid tiles when converted in closed-border territory instead of disappearing.

[UI]

• Alliance type is now displayed in the tooltip when the Agreements category is minimized.
• Government menu’s list of filters will now scroll when text overlaps the screen.
• Button styles in multi-select window have been unified.
• Unique units and infrastructure on Civilopedia leader pages are now presented more consistently.
• Fixed an issue where quantities for items were not updating after being edited when proposing demands or deals to a human player in the Diplomacy menus.

[AI]

Trade AI improvements:

• For immediate trades, AI will not trade Gold per turn if the value of the trade is less than 1 Gold per turn. AI will accept that as a gift, not offering anything in return.
• Allow AI to trade more than one copy of a luxury resource at a time.
• AI will only trade their last copy of a luxury resource if they are in an emergency situation.
• Improved AI’s desire for Science and building districts.
• Additional AI improvements

[MISC]

• Antioch City-State replaced with the Venice City-State.
• Fixed an issue that was causing map selection to break.
• Map visual update now occurs after a player has stopped panning the map to make hitching less likely.
• Fixed an issue where the “Are You Sure” prompt was not appearing when attempting to exit the game while on the Player Turn prompt during a hotseat game.
• Fixed an issue where the game could not be force closed except by the Exit to Desktop button when a player had been defeated during a multiplayer hotseat game.
• Additional text updates.

[CRASH]

• Fixed a crash that would occur when a Builder cleared a Vampire Castle.
• Fixed a crash that would occur when defeating units with a GDR.
• Fixed a crash that would occur when slotting policy cards.
• Additional crash fixes.

 

• Map visual update now occurs after a player has stopped panning the map to make hitching less likely.
  
• Excellent!

 

340.6mb? Is that what everyone else had?

 

Ahh yes excellent. Still though it is good too see more AI improvements. Interesting they have increased their desire for science even more. It felt like they also had a big boost to their science in the last patch

 

I really like the changes to Golden Age Dedications (now Golden Age Cards) and Dark Age Cards. Really like the new Golden Age Cards. Mandala State is awesome.

(Although, I don’t get the change to Free Inquiry. The whole point of FI is not building Campuses. Really dumb change.)

They really could put all that into the base game, thanks very much. Would much improve the existing Dedications etc. Actually, pretty sad they didn’t just filter more of this stuff to the base game.

Very sad no tweaks to Anti-Cav. These DLC updates don’t usually have balance changes, but it’s a pity they didn’t sort them out here given Statue of Zeus.

Quite like the change to Pastures. I mean, I get it’s just because of Byzantium, but still. Good change.

And, guess we’re done for another month?

 

It might be but a single bullet, but hopefully the improved desire for science will keep AI relevant in later parts of the game. Very promising.

 

Can only be a good thing if you ask me, the AI should rush science as much as possible. Most victories boil down to adequate science production in the end!

 

The obvious question that may already have been answered: do the Dark Age policy card changes affect the default game, or just the Dramatic Ages mode?

 

It is a mode, so no I don’t think so.
This is how ages were initially developed but because it was too punishing, they changed it for gathering storm.

 

The dramatic ages policy cards sound super interesting. This mode sounds great i'm dying to give it a try. When the launcher is fixed .

Woudln't mind the numbers on the number of free cities though. i'm guessing its percentages but would like to know the percentages lost by the AI and the players on each of the difficulties

 

The launcher does not work. What should i do now?

 

Per TheGameMechanics discord, Carl (and thus Firaxis) are aware and working on a fix.

 

thanx for your reply

 

Patience is the only option

Btw, are forest fires and meteors back? They were missing from the game since last patch.

 

Well, back to sleep I go

 

Some new names for natural features were added:

Rivers: Aisne, Prut, Meander
Mountains: Eifel Mtns., Cévennes
Lakes: Lake Neuchâtel

 

The executables are missing.

 

For those who can't launch, Carl said while he can't officially endorse this, heres a temporary fix others have used. https://steamcommunity.com/app/289070/discussions/0/2838914020262558800/

 

Have they really not fixed the City Strike icon placement? It's been annoying since launch - the red icon you click to have your city walls initiate a ranged strike often becomes hidden behind unit icons and so it's impossible to click the city attack icon unless you zoom in all the way and pan the camera to the side so you can get the right angle. It's not a big deal but I found it funny when Carl or another dev had trouble with it in a livestream months/years ago and they never fixed it. Just a quality of life thing.

 

Welp, as to the Mac version, a patch downloaded and installed and I can start the game, but Gaul and Byzantium are not available. Further, they do not show as being available in the Steam Store.