CCM2 Epic Mod

[MPorciusCatoCivver]

That does not fit Fascist Italy at all. It does fit Germany. Have you ever read the Ciano Diaries, or considered that Mussolini was removed at head of the government and Fascist Party by the Fascist Party?

I disagree, but I don't have time to reply in detail to this. In fact, this description is just as accurate for Italy as it is for Germany.

 

[Fiasom]

Thanks for this.

I will give it a try with LM terrain, or otherwise simply turn the jungles in Mesoamerica, India, SE Asia and Indonesia into forests, and leave jungles in the Amazon and Kongo (and maybe Borneo), and make jungles not settlable. I want to do this because the AI's expansion policy generally turns what is supposed to be a forgotten part of the world into its geopolitical centre. I really want to avoid world wars taking place in Siberia or the Kongo, and having the Inca nearly entirely based in the Amazon.

What to do with the Dutch and Poland ? In Giant Earth they are simply not existing.

The way I am approaching this problem is to change the civs - Europe and West Asia are overcrowded, and then there is massive empty space in parts of the Americas, Africa and Asia. What I've done so far is to replace:
1. Poland with Scythians, who are based in Ukraine. With the Poles starting where they do, they can't grow well, and prevent Germany from growing either, while Russia goes to town with endless cities, dominating Europe in every run of the game.
2. Isreal with Mali. With Israel between Egypt, Byzantines (based in Konstantinopolis), Persia and Arabs, they are simply fodder for the aggressive civs to eat up (which is usually Persia), and historically, Isreal's significance is less about their empires and more about the impact of their diaspora.
3. The Dutch with Majapahit/Indonesia, because the Dutch really don't have space to flourish on a real world map with the way Civ 3 works.
4. Korea with a fictional civ called Cascadia, with its capital around Seattle. Fictional civ because I've been a little too lazy to figure out what could be a more realistic civ based in NW America. Korea is similar to Israel - between China, Mongolia and Japan; can't really do anything either on land or at sea.
5. I also moved the starting location of Bra-Po to Brazil, and Turkey to Central Asia (turning Turkish into Turkic).

Of course such changes to civs require more effort using CCM, compared to C3C, since you have gone into wonderful detail making every civ very unique with civ-specific UUs, SWs, Wonders and religion, as well as leaderheads. I'm not sure to what extent I can mod the old civs into the new ones for this scenario, since the level of quality you produce requires serious time investment. If I am able to create civs polished as well as your civs, I'll make them publically available in case someone would like to copy paste them into their own scenarios.

The problem is, that resources located in water terrain can not be connected with the trade net of a civ without using "water workers".

Isn't enough that the resource is within the city radius - especially for the case of fish? Does it also need a road? If so, yes, this would be something not really possible. Considering that, I will probably just repeat TETurkhan's approach: add supercharged bonus resources, becoming available with a late 2nd age or early 3rd age tech.

It's a shame that we can't use marine lux & strat resources very well in Civ 3. If it were possible it would open up so many possibilities. I was imagining a Polynesia civ starting perhaps in Tongo, with an oceanfearing UU from the start, letting it colonize the Pacific Islands... But without access to marine resources they couldn't really be anything more than a rump state if the islands aren't inflated by several tiles each. Oh well...

Then again, making the pacific islands a bit bigger to house both cities and some resources, making it less accurate to the real world but perhaps adding a fun wholly seafaring civ to the mix, might be interesting. (One would need to get strategic about island sizes and available resources in each island cluster connected to each other by coasts and sea tiles, but such a civ that begins in Micronesia might just be tenable?) Any thoughts and suggestions?

The one issue I run into here, however, is whether and how the AI would ferry settlers and workers to different landmasses - it does ferry settlers, but I have not seen it ferry workers yet. This is one of my main worries regarding the Majapahit - it starts in Java, and will likely colonize Sumatra and Borneo, but if it doesn't ferry workers from Java to the other islands, the civ will remain as a rump state, since the majority of its cities' tiles won't be improved. I might consider giving them a worker UU that can be built, instead of letting them rely on worker houses and then ferrying workers to other islands. (Would do the same to Australia/Oceania if I move their starting location from Australia to a small island.)

I am very interested in improving this map.

It is a very strong base, indeed. Speaking of Pacific Islands, I noticed that this map hasn't really gone into depth with them. Nor with other small oceanic islands. I hope to add them in the most accurate way I can. I also noticed that the Missippi and Danube aren't very accurate. So I'm planning on taking some more time making rivers and other aspects of the map more accurate or conducive to gameplay.

I should also note, that the above is all general modding information, not directly related to CCM. So any further such questions should really be posted in the main C&C forum, rather than here in @Civinator's thread (or we could ask a Moderator to move your question and my answer into another thread, e.g. the Modding Questions thread).

Thanks for your reply @tjs282. I'm new to posting on the forum. I'll keep my responses here specific to CCM and developing this map with reference to CCM. If it gets off the ground and turns into a further discussion, I will create a separate thread for it.

 

[timerover51]

I disagree, but I don't have time to reply in detail to this. In fact, this description is just as accurate for Italy as it is for Germany.

You have your view, I have mine. I disagree with your view, but I have no intention of continuing any discussion of this subject.

 

[Ozymandias]

I begin my own Civilopedia entries for Republic (which are different - and the US is neither) as:

"A form of government where the right to vote is limited to property owning males of the dominant ethnic majority."

This fits:

• Ancient Athens.
• The Roman Republic
• The Netherlands, ca. 1648
• The Confederate States of America
• The United States of America (until the abolition of the Poll Tax in 1964.)

I also tend to differentiate stats between "Ancient Republics" and "Modern Republics" (1648 - 1964) although I'm still trying to figure out stats for the USA, which is not a democracy ("one person one vote") but a "Representational Democracy," where the 4 States of North Dakota, South Dakota, Montana, and Wyoming, with a combined population considerably smaller than New York City, have 8 out 100 Senators, whereas New York State has 2.

More poignantly, Democrats have won the popular vote for the Presidency in the past 8 elections, yet we have endured 2 terms of Bush II, and 1of the Unspeakable One.

 

[need my speed]

The USA teaches rather egocentric and wrong things with regards to what is a republic and what is a democracy. The rest of the world largely agrees on these terms, only (mostly) the USA is an exception herein.

 

[MPorciusCatoCivver]

I normally don't have time during the week, but weekend is here and I'm playing Civ besides doing housework.

I'm curious as to how Democracy, Communism and Fascism will look like. I also plan to write the Theocracy description this week.

 

[timerover51]

Having spent most of my life in Illinois near Chicago, I am not really sure about giving Democracy minimal corruption, considering the number of Chicago Aldermen and Illinois Governors that have gone to jail. That is only the ones that have been caught with enough to get a conviction. My inclination would be rating it as problematic at least. Chicago might make the Rampant category.

 

[Civinator]

Having spent most of my life in Illinois near Chicago, I am not really sure about giving Democracy minimal corruption, considering the number of Chicago Aldermen and Illinois Governors that have gone to jail. That is only the ones that have been caught with enough to get a conviction. My inclination would be rating it as problematic at least. Chicago might make the Rampant category.

timerover51, may be you should look at this relatively and not absolutely.

 

[Civinator]

I normally don't have time during the week, but weekend is here and I'm playing Civ besides doing housework.

I'm curious as to how Democracy, Communism and Fascism will look like. I also plan to write the Theocracy description this week.

At present I am working to improve the late game mechanisms of CCM. So the government descriptions are nice, the work on those game mechanisms has priority, as many hundreds of settings in the mod are depending on them and therefore this complex work must be done without any breaks, that would cause additional chaos.

 

[MPorciusCatoCivver]

Having spent most of my life in Illinois near Chicago, I am not really sure about giving Democracy minimal corruption, considering the number of Chicago Aldermen and Illinois Governors that have gone to jail. That is only the ones that have been caught with enough to get a conviction. My inclination would be rating it as problematic at least. Chicago might make the Rampant category.

Make the US a Republic and not a Democracy, as it is in my playbook. That will make corruption bigger.

 

[Civinator]

A small part in the changes in the late game mechanisms of CCM seems to be solved. From the year 1936 on the game changes from yearly to a half-yearly counting, so the game can end around 2030 with the 540 turns, that many civers wanted to have many posts ago.

Entering the Cold War in my current test game in 1948 AD seems not so bad for a game, that started in 4000 BC. Other changes are in the techtrees of era 3 and 4 and the stats of many units.

 

[timerover51]

timerover51, may be you should look at this relatively and not absolutely.

I may do some experimenting with this on some of my own mods, and see what the AI does.

 

[MPorciusCatoCivver]

THEOCRACY​

You rule as the divinely appointed supreme theocrat of your nation, now redrawn and reorganized according to the picture of a godly, pious government. As a supreme theocrat, “Archbishop”, “Pope”, “Spiritual Leader”, or even “Caliph” you have nearly absolute power over your subjects, who believe in your divine right to rule – however, the consistent lack of personal liberties and widespread nepotism and abuse committed by your ruling officials under an extremely centralized regime that rewards loyalty far more than competence means your corruption is high, and you also get a tile penalty because your production efforts consistently suffer and have a much lower efficiency than otherwise.

However, you’re benefited from the ability to use force to quell unrest among your subjects, thanks to your overreaching powers. Unit support is high, and you have access to the Monastery line of buildings that grant your civilization a research boni and veteran status to your units, which combined with your military focus allow you to build a large, well trained army against any foe.

Overall, as a Theocracy your research will be quite good and your military will be fairly large, which means you can project your power and stay advanced on the tech race against potentially larger and stronger neighbors.

HISTORY: This government denotes management by what was historically termed as the “Lords Spiritual”, who were often a separate more privileged caste and estate in medieval Europe and beyond. It might also denote management by a supreme spiritual authority, like the Papal States, a Caliphate, historical competitors and interlopers like the Avignon Papacy or the Shia Imams, who were recognized and granted lodging in different places at different times in the Muslim world.

STRATEGY: This government is often advised for smaller civilizations who need military and technological parity with bigger rivals, or who for a variety of reasons find themselves often at war or want to role-play a spiritual lord.

 

[MPorciusCatoCivver]

That's my final contribution for a while btw. Too busy now.

 

[Civinator]

MpCC, thank you very much for your contributions. I will show how they are looking in the civilopedia, when the current modding step of CCM is finished.

 

[timerover51]

THEOCRACY​

You rule as the divinely appointed supreme theocrat of your nation, now redrawn and reorganized according to the picture of a godly, pious government. As a supreme theocrat, “Archbishop”, “Pope”, “Spiritual Leader”, or even “Caliph” you have nearly absolute power over your subjects, who believe in your divine right to rule – however, the consistent lack of personal liberties and widespread nepotism and abuse committed by your ruling officials under an extremely centralized regime that rewards loyalty far more than competence means your corruption is high, and you also get a tile penalty because your production efforts consistently suffer and have a much lower efficiency than otherwise.

However, you’re benefited from the ability to use force to quell unrest among your subjects, thanks to your overreaching powers. Unit support is high, and you have access to the Monastery line of buildings that grant your a research boni and veteran status to your units, which combined with your military focus allow you to build a large, well trained army against any foe.

Overall, as a Theocracy your research will be quite good and your military will be fairly large, which means you can project your power and stay advanced on the tech race against potentially larger and stronger neighbors.

HISTORY: This government denotes management by what was historically termed as the “Lords Spiritual”, who were often a separate more privileged caste and estate in medieval Europe and beyond. It might also denote management by a supreme spiritual authority, like the Papal States, a Caliphate, historical competitors and interlopers like the Avignon Papacy or the Shia Imams, who were recognized and granted lodging in different places at different times in the Muslim world.

STRATEGY: This government is often advised for smaller civilizations who need military and technological parity with bigger rivals, or who for a variety of reasons find themselves often at war or want to role-play a spiritual lord.

Having lived since 1978 right next door to a town settled as a theocracy, and also having read the original town ordinances, plus being a student of history for pretty much all of my life, I will simply state that this view reflects a pronounced hatred of any form of religion, and there is no way that I would ever use it as a definition. Civinator, please do not consider using this highly warped definition.

 

[MPorciusCatoCivver]

Having lived since 1978 right next door to a town settled as a theocracy, and also having read the original town ordinances, plus being a student of history for pretty much all of my life, I will simply state that this view reflects a pronounced hatred of any form of religion, and there is no way that I would ever use it as a definition. Civinator, please do not consider using this highly warped definition.

This is ridiculous. I'm religious myself.

So now lemme say, in response to the dubious criticism, the "highly religious towns" of today's America have nothing to do with with the way Catholic Europe structured itself.

You should take the French model as an example. Or the Byzantine one, which was pretty much copied blindly in the whole Orthodox world: lords spiritual were the "first Estate", or "first Caste", they had access to upper chambers like the House of Lords in England, or the parlements in Monarchical France. They had many many privileges, tax exemptions, and ruled their fiefs like absolute monarchs or caudillos - their subjects being constantly reminded that ta Bishop's right to rule was divine right, no less. Ecclesiastical law of the Church, which is still updated in our days regularly btw, and not civil law, was what governed them.

 

[need my speed]

I suppose ancient Mesopotamian civilisations are not in-scope for what Theocracy is supposed to represent?

 

[Civinator]

Gentlemen, please no quarrel about those descriptions of forms of government. Those descriptions in my eyes in CCM only have a "secondary character", as the important facts for playing CCM with these governments are all listed at the effects page of each government in the CCM civilopedia. Here is a screenshot about the effects page of the government "Monarchy" in CCM:

In standard Civ 3 there exists no government "Theocracy". When looking for descriptions of the government "Theocracy" in other C3C mods here at CFC, I found the following:

Expanding Civ3: a Theov Mod:

timerover51, I post this as the first example, as you are posting, that you are frequently playing this mod.

In another prominent C3C mod, the RAR mod, there stands the following description for government "Theocracy":

Here is the current description of the government "Theocracy" in my CCM mod:

In my eyes, this is by far the most cautious description and this discussion shows, why I made such a cautious description.

In C3C mods (and even in CCM) this form of government is mostly connected with the term "Holy War". Therefore in CCM the government allows a SW, that provides Crusaders, Ansar Warriors and Warrior Monks to a civ with that government. For the human player in CCM this form of government can be very interesting in the time of about 600 AD, if successful with researching tech Philosophy first, or otherwise 800 AD up to about 1200 AD - the time of the bloody Christian Crusades (Deus lo vult!) and the Islamic expansion. In later time that government should not be useful for the human player, but it was observed that mostly broke AI civs used it even in era 3 of the game.

Of course there is, per example, a difference between a medieval pope, who demands a bloody crusade against people with a different belief and an actual pope, who demands for peace and not for a Holy War. As I tried to explain, in CCM, as in other C3C mods, there is the focus on the "Holy War-forms" of that government.

In my eyes, there is also to distinguish between Religion and government Theocracy. Forms of Religion in CCM always give additional benefit for some people in happiness. The government "Theocracy" is using Religion as a means to an end (I hope here I use that term as a not-English-speaking person correctly - in German: Religion als Mittel zum Zweck). As such a not-English-speaking person I would like to write that form of government "Theo-cracy".

 

[Civinator]

While having a look into the descriptions of the government "Theocracy" in other C3C mods, the following problem appeared:

The texts and formats of some of the suggested self-written civilopedia texts for CCM 2.6 seem to be identical with the texts for similar governments in the great mod Civilization III Worldwide by Anthony Boscia, written in 2010 (btw. Anthony Boscia was one of the beta testers of CCM 2.5).

Here are some examples (on the left the suggested CCM version, on the right the description in the Worldwide mod):

MPCC, of course it can be, that you have written those texts for the Worldwide mod, but in this case I think that the question is allowed about the source of those description texts.