Capital actually matters [ACCEPTED]

[raystuttgart]

Hi guys,

I always felt that Civ4Col lacked the concept of an actual "Capital City".
There was no real meaningful center of the Colonies ... no City that felt special.

Internally (in the logic) the first City you found(ed) is kind of special because it is e.g. the main City to spawn Units.
Also it may be the most likely City to trigger e.g. Python Events, Python Quests or DLL Diplo-Quests.

But that is it already. Otherwise the "Capital City" feels in no way special - just like any other City in the game.
I would like to change that and actually give the "Captial" some importance and additionally also introduce strategic player choices.

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Game Concept:

1) The player will be given an option in City Screen (or Domestic Advisor) to declare a City to be the Capital (removing that Status from the previous Capital)
2) However switching the Capital City to a new City will cause 1 turn of unrest in the old Capital City but also festivities in the new Capital City
3) Switching a Capital City is only possible every 20 turns (on Normal) and not possible at all during war (which includes War of Independence)
4) Losing your Capital City will cause 2 turns of unrest in all other cities of the player and also upset the King of the player (-1 Attitude) - which is not too hard in my opinion.
5) When the Capital City is lost the next oldest City will become the new Capital (which is the current internal logic anyways and thus requires no effort) --> again 50 turns to switch
6) The Capital City will have some special modifiers and thus also have actual gameplay effects: +10% Liberty Bells, +10% Culture, +10% Law
7) Visualization of the Capital City will be done by a "Star Symbol" in City Billboard - I think @devolution had even already implemented it in one of his branches
8) AI will get some "special rules" and will be able to move the Capital for free during peace times (i.e. it will always chose the biggest and best defended City)
9) If the player currently has no City, there is of course also no Capital which is also no problem. The first City that will then be founded will automatically become the Capital.
10) Switching the Capital City to a City that is in unrest is not allowed. Switching the Capital City while the current Captiol is in unrest is also not allowed.
11) Switching the Capital of course also implies that it becomes the main City for spawning Units or triggering Python Events or DLL Diplo Events.

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So why implement it?

1) It will make the placement of the Capital a strategic decision. (You want to protect it but also give it to the biggest City.)
2) It will feel immersive and also impactful to lose the Captial. (As your Colonies will actual react accordingly with unrest.)
3) Hunting the Capitals of other Players and throw their empire into chaos for 2 turns might actually be fun. (I would play that way.)
4) It is actually really little effort to implement this. (I estimate the complete concept can be implemented easily in one weekend)
5) Risk of implementation for this concept is actually pretty low. (There is hardly anything that could go wrong once properly tested.)
6) Since switching the Capital is only possible every 20 turns and comes at some cost there should also be no exploits.
7) Once we implement concepts like "Distance to the Capital" being able to "Switch Capital" might infact matter even more.
8) Last but not least I want to see a shiny star in the City Billboard of my Captial as it would increase my immersion.

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Feedback?

 

[Mr. ZorG]

I think I saw something like this when I was translating some file. Rei is already prepared for this
I like this idea only I have a suggestion - the riot lasts 2 turns. 1 turn is too little when losing the Capital of the Colonies. what do you think?

By the way, this will allow you to establish the first city even in shallow water, since the Capital can then be transferred to a city on a simple coast.

 

[raystuttgart]

I think I saw something like this

It is a pretty old concept of mine - probably about 10 years or so.
(It is one of my old "Path to the Throne" concepts.)

the riot lasts 2 turns.

Ok, that is fine for me as well.
It will be an XML setting in GlobalDefineAlt.xml anyways.

By the way, this will allow you to establish the first city even in shallow water, since the Capital can then be transferred to a city on a simple coast.

Also correct, but we should now have fixed all issues with spawning related to Shallow Coast anyways.
(So I also did not mention it anymore as a reason to now bring up this concept again.)

 

[ArchdukeLiet]

I only see advantages.

 

[Morlark]

Only if you spell "capital" correctly, please.

I kid, I kid

 

[raystuttgart]

Ok, I think this feature is clearly accepted.

Since it also is relatively little effort to implement it also has good chances to become part of Release 4.1.
(I am not going to implement any new feartures into Release 4.0 since we should first finish / stabilize what we already have.)

 

[Schmiddie]

Generally a nice feature in order to assign the status of the "most important" colony (please have in mind: We do not have cities in the game, we only have colonies...) between colonies.

However, for reasons of immersion, one should not attach too much importance to the status, because the colonies did not have an administratively superior capital - the status of a significant colony developed through trade or a strategically important location in the New World.

In the game, however, this is a good feature, because it allows you to assign important developments or events to a colony that develops particularly well during the game.

 

[raystuttgart]

We do not have cities in the game, we only have colonies...

Technically we have Cities although that is of course a simplification.

Of course some players rather consider them colonies like e.g. "Virginia" instead of cities like e.g. "Jamestown".
Everybody has a different immersion for this game and many may prefer to imagine e.g. the first 13 English Colonies.

However this feature should not hurt immersion in my opinion - because you can always find something that fits.
For me having a "most important City" / "most important Colony" will even increase immersion.

It is simply a small gameplay addition which should allow some interesting strategic decisions.
Also it is a new mechanic to further build on when implementing other new features.

 

[Nightinggale]

please have in mind: We do not have cities in the game, we only have colonies...

Since Colonization inherited the source code from BTS, they are called cities in the code. The same is true for native settlements. This means if we are going to be pedantic about this, a colony is owned by a European while a city can be a colony or a native settlement.

You are not wrong by stating they are colonies, but if we want to say add an icon to indicate colony having some yield stored without opening the colony screen (as in visible next to the name on the map), then the code we want to change is the city billboard. This changing between colonies and cities makes it hard to use the technically correct term every single time.

 

[modmod]

Basically: yes.

Jet in present concept: does not makes too much difference.

Ideas:
1. Configurable prerequistes:
Like probably needs a governmental palace (+ drydock, etc...) in a city to became the new capital. -> CIV4BuildingInfos.xml

2. Configurabe bonuses:
Like near the mentioned (liberty bells, etc...) also can offer like: extra storage space (capital city status as flat number) and others -> globaldefinies alt.

 

[modmod]

Question:

Would it change (moving capital) existing bonuses?
I mean like: first settlement event, which can offer food bonus/ others?

Because originaly the first settlement was the capital, so not sure events sticked to that status, or the very settlement itself.

 

[raystuttgart]

@modmod

I can just repeat my answer from the other thread about "Native Capital":

I want to keep my effort reasonable - thus not implement endless additions or special rules
My time for modding is simply not unlimited ... thus concepts may sometimes simplify a bit.

Also it is often better for gameplay to have "straight forward rules" with no 100 special settings.
It makes everything a lot easier for players to understand and will prevent unnecessary bug reports.

I described my concept and it was accepted like that. So that is what I still plan to implement.
If somebody else wants to have it more complex that person will neeed to invest the effort to implement it.

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Like probably needs a governmental palace (+ drydock, etc...) in a city to became the new capital. -> CIV4BuildingInfos.xml

This is a really bad idea because it could ruin the feature for AI or cause that sometimes no Captial is around:
So I would definitely not do something like this, because it will drastically drive up effort and risk for bugs.

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Would it change (moving capital) existing bonuses?
I mean like: first settlement event, which can offer food bonus/ others?

No, as I said in Civ4Col there is no such thing as an actual Captial - so the Python Event System also does not consider it.
All of that is simply triggered for the first City you founded.

Otherwise as I said here:

11) Switching the Capital of course also implies that it becomes the main City for spawning Units or triggering Python Events or DLL Diplo Events.

But that of course only applies to things happening afterwards - it will not change anything that happened before.
No existing bonusses would be moved because it would be a nightmare to code and could cause endless bugs.

 

[modmod]

@modmod

I want to keep my effort reasonable - thus not implement endless additions or special rules
My time for modding is simply not unlimited ... thus concepts may sometimes simplify a bit.

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modmod:
Like probably needs a governmental palace (+ drydock, etc...) in a city to became the new capital. -> CIV4BuildingInfos.xml


This is a really bad idea because it could ruin the feature for AI or cause that sometimes no Captial is around:
So I would definitely not do something like this, because it will drastically drive up effort and risk for bugs.

The possibility of special rules.
In case someone wish to. YOU don`t need to add any concrete special details.

A "blank" (default) line in the file for the buildings, like:
<bCapitalMovePrereq>0</bCapitalMovePrereq>
Which hardly lead to any bug.
So if someone wish to add choose a whatever building (like governmental palace), and change 0 to 1:
<bCapitalMovePrereq>1</bCapitalMovePrereq>

You don`t need to think about: which building, why, what would be good, test it in game, reconsider, etc... -> NONE of those. The one who want to have prerequistes should do that effort.

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Obviously there would be capital if only to move it somewhere else (than the first city) would have prerequistes and prereq does not apply for involuntary move (capital razed/ conquered).
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Same stands for: bonuses of capital status.
Again not YOUR effort: just keep open the opportunity if someone wants to add 10 bonuses instead of 3 which come from capital status: he/ she should do the balance itself - what to add, why, test it, etc...

(Probably in a way which can make different for each civilisations (would be useful for native capitals as well btw). -> extras in CIV4CivilizationInfos.xml ? )

Anyway there is already a:
<bCapital>0</bCapital>
for all buildings.
What is that about (what is it)?

 

[raystuttgart]

YOU don`t need to add any concrete special details.

Exactly, I don`t need to do anything that I am not motivated to invest my effort for.
I am a free modder that can still decide how he invests his spare time or not.

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So whoever wants to do it can invest the 40 additional hours of effort to programm the DLL logic to make all these XML settings work (including AI).
And whoever does it then will also be responsible for fixing all the bugs and AI problems that may come from it. (Which is actually completely unpredictable.)

You don`t need to think about: which building, why, what would be good, test it in game, reconsider, etc..

Yes, but I would have to programm the logic in DLL which is like 90% of the effort and risk - including potential bugs like CTD later on !
Are you really not capable of understanding that you are talking about my effort not yours and thus you can NOT decide about it?

XML alone does NOTHING ! It is just configuration ... itself it has absolutely no functionality.
XML will just configure DLL or Python logic that somebody needs to program ... so go ahead and do it yourself if you want it.

Go and implement the feature the way you like it and then share it !
If your version does all the stuff you want without damaging AI and causing endless bugs, I will happily integrate it.

What is that about (what is it)?

As I said there is no actual game logic applied to it and I would have to invest effort to program it.
Seriously I am not interested to invest the effort to programm it the way you suggest - I already told you that.

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So again, you can not decide how much time and effort I have to invest.
Also you can not decide for myself how I like to make a feature for gameplay.

Only when you are investing your own time and effort you would really be able to do so.
So go ahead and make your concepts come true and then we will see how much effort you are willing to invest.

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My concept is about 40 hours.
Your "ideas" would easily make it 80 hours.

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Again:
No. Seriously, you already got my answer.

You can accept a "No" that I give the first time or not.
But I will stop wasting my time in such discussions with you.

You have absolutely no idea how much effort or risk something may be to program.
Still you try to dictate how something should be programmed and how much effort others shall invest.

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Take what is offered by the people actually investing their spare time and be happy about it or leave it be.
But seriously STOP trying to tell others how much effort they should invest for their features - it is not your decision.

When you get a "No, I don`t want to do what you ask.", it is a "No, I don`t want to do what you ask".
And not some invitation to keep bugging and annoying - because that is not how it works.

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Otherwise thanks a lot for wasting my time and motivation to mod today ...

 

[Nightinggale]

XML alone does NOTHING ! It is just configuration ... itself it has absolutely no functionality.
XML will just configure DLL or Python logic that somebody needs to program

Let's make an analogy to explain this better. Let's say you want to build a house. You make a drawing and then you give it to somebody, who will build whatever is on a drawing. That went fine so you want another house, but this time to reduce the effort, you do not hire anybody to build it for you. You make the drawing and then you get surprised that you didn't get a house by itself.
Modding is kind of like that. XML explains how we want certain details in the game, but they do nothing on their own. You need a programmer to turn XML data into something, which will do anything ingame. It's easy enough to add more tags to the xml files, but if the game logic doesn't even read the new tags, then it's kind of pointless to do so.

Again not YOUR effort

As a general rule, it would be wise to assume that the people with the best knowledge about how a mod works would be the people working on said mod. If they say it's too much effort, then it's most likely correct. In fact if you want something despite the modders having turned down the idea, be ready to do it yourself or just give up on it regardless of how much you want it. Arguing against a rejection will get you nowhere.

So it's very simple: stop demanding something, which has already been rejected!