[C3C] Civ 3 Conquests - retuned

[Fergei]

Main objectives - overview

- Provide a more consistent challenge throughout the game (rather than the early game difficulty spike and routine late game victory often offered by the default settings).
- Make random maps more viable by reducing having to abandon a game as being unsuitable (e.g. lack of fresh water on your starting island).
- More variation in government types rather than the focus on Republic slingshot and often no further revolutions.
- Increase relevance of chariot, warrior and early game unique units for combat and delayed arrival of Iron Working.
- Create a greater degree of AI unpredictability prior to all land being claimed / settled.
- Mitigate dominance of Agricultural trait by improving power and/or relevance of Expansionist, Religious and Industrious traits.
- Make short term skirmishes potentially profitable rather than total war / conquest being the only obvious military strategy.
- Bolster a couple of the most legendary (but underperforming) Civs via their Unique Units
- Ensure AI utilise changes as intended and that they don’t break the game.
- Make accessible and understandable to a standard Civ3 user.
- To keep changes to the minimum required to provide the playing experience I was looking for.

The above should be sufficient to understand what is going on and have a casual basic game. However, fuller details are below for those with an interest.

Background

I can’t really give this the grand title of a Mod, but this is the only place to save it. There are no custom units, artwork or Civs here, nor any new or modified Civolopedia entries – I don’t have the time or talent for such things. This is simply a customised ruleset for the standard Civ3 Conquest that I find gives me a considerably more enjoyable gaming experience than the default settings whilst remaining recognisably standard Civ3. Obviously, these game preferences are entirely subjective on my part but I extend thanks to the many forum contributors who opened my eyes to what options were available.

I’ve tested these extensively in multiplayer* and AI only games to hone the settings. Most testing has been at Emperor difficulty to ensure it plays well at my difficulty, so that is what the ruleset is optimised for. The quality of the experience at other difficulty levels may vary but shouldn’t be wildly different.

*multiplayer version not attached, but has differences to accommodate the no war weariness bug in MP and to disable bugged defensive bombard. Multiplayer version can be made available if anyone wants it.

*v2.0 - increased focus on singleplayer experience and on Medieval era onwards.

Difficulty settings changes – in detail

- No free starting units for AI at any difficulty level
- Very minor changes to AI unit support bonuses at Emperor+ levels
- Cost factor reduced on the following difficulty levels where the default grants the AI starting units (Monarch (-1), Emperor (-2), Demigod (-2), Deity (-2) , Sid (-2)
- Increased Emperor Free unit support per city to 3 from 2 to try and encourage less militaristic AI governments in the mid to late game.

Reason:
- to prevent AI leaping out to an early game advantage but instead make them slowly pull ahead and provide a greater challenge later in the game.
- unit support bonuses appear to strongly influence government decisions. Therefore, setting tweaked to encourage AI to consider all government types depending on the game situation, irrespective of difficulty settings.
- to increase power of Expansionist trait and scouts (i.e. non-Expansionist civs aren’t flooding the map with warriors from turn 1, thereby undermining the Expansionist advantage).


Government changes – in detail

Anarchy
- Corruption reduced to Rampant (permitting continued teching and building)
- AI now endure a maximum Anarchy duration much closer to the human player
- Tech rate capped at 50% (the minimum selectable)
- Buildings require maintenance.
- Cost per unit 1, free unit support at 4/4/4

Reason:
- to reduce the penalty around Anarchy as a way of increasing consideration of changing government based on game situation (thereby enhancing Religious trait)
- to still leave Anarchy as deeply undesirable relative to any other government.
- to reduce occasions where Republic slingshot and no further changes is an optimum player strategy.
- to reduce AI cheating around Anarchy and increase relative power of AIs with Religious Trait (e.g. only 1x Agricultural Civ is also Religious)
- to ensure AI doesn’t become bankrupt during Anarchy (no building maintenance)


Despotism
- Corruption reduced to Problematic

Reason:
- Despotism already has the Standard Tile penalty, further penalisation is not required to make it less appealing than any other government state (barring Anarchy).
- Makes Despotism a semi viable option until the end of Ancient era for those who wish to shift straight into Republic.


Feudalism
- made available at Code of Laws instead of Feudalism (making it probably the first government option available)
- unit support cost reduced to 2 from 3

Reason:
- so that AI and players actually ever use it!
- a form of feudalism in China dates back to around 1100-700BC, thereby pre-dating the first Republics.
- to give players an additional viable early game government option.
- to make the government type more viable for shorter military campaigns
- to reduce the sudden eye watering unit costs incurred when towns become cities (giving more time for a player and AI to consider their options)
- to ensure the government type remains largely unviable after mid-medieval era.


Monarchy
- unit support reduced to 2/4/6
- draft limit reduced to 1 from 2
- added horseback riding as a pre-requisite

Reason:
- to make Industrial Era military government options financially preferable to Monarchy for AI (i.e. make Monarchy rarer in late game industrial period)
- to extend Despotism / Feudalism era
- to further encourage uptake of ancient era horse based units by AI


Republic
- added various pre-requisites, including Monarchy

Reason:
- to reduce incidence of player or AI automatically switching to Republic from Despotism


Fundamentalism (NEW – available at Chivalry)
- high corruption, low unit cost, mid-game government
- tech rate capped at 50%
- Rampant corruption
- draft limit 2
- military police support of 4
- unit support of 8/4/2
- unit support cost of 1
- xenophobic and forced resettlement
- forced labour and no war weariness
- worker rate of 2

Reason:
- to provide an alternative, military focussed option for consideration (primarily by AI) during the expanse between learning Monarchy and Facism/Communism
- to add variety and unpredictablity in conduct by dominant AI Civs in the medieval era.
- to crudely replicate the Civ2 government of the same name.
- not considered a desirable or successful government type in real life, hence the assorted penalties.

Monasticism – (NEW – available at Theology)

- think religious controlled government with pacifistic and introspective intentions around self-enlightenment that attracts religious tourism
- Trade bonus, communal corruption, mid-game government
- tech rate capped at 80%
- high war weariness
- cannot draft
- unit support 2/1/1
- unit support cost 3gp
- xenophobia
- military police limit of 0.
- hurry production with forced labour.
- worker rate of 2.

Reason:
- Aimed to provide largely pacifist alternative to Republic to increase option for humans to bypass Republic and stick with Monarchy or Feudalism until Theology.
- Aimed to provide isolationist/peaceloving AI a good government option financially with a minimal army
- Monasticism inferior to Democracy and should fade away by industrial age.
- To create a wealth generating government type that cannot hurry production through money and therefore is more likely to use espionage.


Democracy (no change other than increased assimilation rate)


Imperialism (NEW, available at Navigation)
- think Republic but with the ability to have a larger standing army, but limitations on assimilating conquered territory.
- nuisance corruption
- draft limit 2
- military police limit of 1
- unit support of 3/4/5
- unit support cost of 3
- xenophobic (and low assimilation chance)
- standard trade bonus
- paid labour and low war weariness
- worker rate of 3

Reason:
- provides the AI with an option when pivoting between peacetime and wartime (to reduce disruption to their development when switching between those states and the massive differentials in unit support costs).
- to give the player an alternative high commerce military option compared to Republic.
- to give a viable option for players to bypass Republic entirely in certain circumstances.


Communism
- unit support increased to 6/6/7

Reason:
- so AI is largely 50/50 split when choosing between Communism and Fascism

Fascism
- unit support reduced to 3/4/5
- Cost per unit increased from 1 to 2

Reason:
- to help increase variation of government types selected by AI (specifically AI selection of Fascism vs Communism)
- to increase circumstances where a late game AI considers reverting to a government type with war weariness by making a total war option less palatable.


Plutocracy (NEW – available at The Corporation)
- semi-militaristic government option with trade bonus (think pseudo-democracies with lack of independence in judiciary and media and/or end to repeated term limits for Presidents. Or Corporate States where governments obey the highest paying lobbyists and focus on retention and expansion of extreme wealth inequalities on behalf of a small economic/social elite).
- no war weariness
- problematic corruption
- tech rate limited at 80%
- draft limit 1
- military police limit of 3
- unit support of 2/3/5
- unit support cost of 3
- standard trade bonus
- paid labour
- worker rate of 2

Reason:
- to provide a semi-militaristic government option with the standard trade bonus.
- to act as a transitional government to give an option to prevent lurching between total-war governments on one hand and war weariness prone governments on the other.
- to reflect the non-ideological nature of many pseudo-democratic and non-democratic states in the 21st century.


AI Egalitarianism (NEW – available with Robotics)
- High trade, high productivity, low corruption late game government type (think neuro-links, automated workforce, energy super abundance (via renewable energy, nuclear and battery storage))
- Trade bonus, minimal corruption, low war weariness.
- draft limit of 1
- unit support 5/5/5
- unit support cost 4gp
- xenophobia & forced resettlement,
- worker rate x4.

Reason:
- Aimed at late game super-productivity for space race and cultural victories and to encourage late game espionage in space race.
- to reward Civs with a tech lead and give them some resilience if ‘dog-piled’.




All Governments

- Assimilation Chance for all Governments increased (with particular focus on Democracy and Communism as the high assimilation rate options for non-military and military governments given their theoretically ‘egalitarian’ principles)
- Changes to the Civs’ preferred and shunned governments to accommodate new options (and make Republic less likely to be selected).

Reason:
- to make military campaigns that fall short of decisive total destruction viable (i.e. player instigated border skirmishes rather than total war).
- to retain culture flips of conquered cities as a very real danger, but to reduce their prevalence significantly if a city is held for 20+ turns after it is conquered.


Civilisation Advances changes – in detail

- the first two techs in any row in the Ancient Era cannot be traded (i.e up to and including IW, HBR, Writing & Mysticism)
- Iron Working tech time increased by 33%. IW tech also requires Pottery (kilns) & Warrior Code (swordsmen combat) before it can be selected.
- Republic cannot be selected until all previous Ancient Era techs have been discovered.
- development time for The Wheel reduced
- development time for Philosophy more than doubled
- development time for Republic increased by around 40%

Reasons:
- delay arrival of Iron Working until such time as AI has developed land more and hooked resources.
- encourage use of chariots, archers and early game Unique Units rather than a race to Swordsmen and Horsemen.
- Slightly increase viability of horsemen compared to swordsmen
- dissuade humans from only making 1x government switch to Republic for the entire game.
- to increase the investment required to secure free tech at Philosophy to make it a less sure-fire option for human players.
- to make Feudalism and Monarchy the earliest government alternatives to Despotism that can be accessed.
- to add more tactical uncertainty for the player in the early game (both in terms of what techs to prioritise and in terms of what their rivals are prioritising or have discovered in goody huts).


Espionage
- Halved base cost of all espionage except for exposing spy, build embassy and steal world map (kept the same) and Initiate Propoganda (reduced to 30%).
- Made espionage available after Republic (optional tech)
- Reduced cost of Intelligence Agency by a quarter and increased culture to 3.

Reasons
- To encourage uptake of Espionage so there are more tactical options and AI unpredictability from early on in the game.
- To bring into late Ancient era as spies can only safely be planted during wartime (early game) and I can’t see a downside of early usage.

Civilisation (tribe) changes – in detail

- All AIs Civs now prioritise worker production more.
- Aggression rates for some Civs modified for game balance (generally increasing aggression for Civs with early game UUs) and/or historic accuracy.

Reason:
- Games often rendered too straightforward by the AI having not hooked resources that are readily available in their territory.
- AI Civs with 5/5 aggression rarely seemed competitive over the full length of the game and had a tendency to self-destruct


Unit changes – in detail

- Scout – given defence of 1 (to increase power of Expansionist Trait)
- Curragh – Changed from Naval Power to Naval Transport flag to make AI use it. Only available to Seafaring Civs. Cannot cross oceans. (to enhance power of Seafaring trait and reduce issue of isolated AI Civs being uncontacted and effectively eliminated from the game due to poor tech rate)
- Jaguar Warrior - enslaves (for flavour, add feasibility as a unit in mid-Ancient Era)
- Enkidu Warrior – increased cost from 10 to 15 shields (to reduce competitiveness of Sumeria)
- Numidean Mercenary – removed AI offensive unit strategy and reduced cost to 25 from 30, compared to 20 for a Hoplite (to improve competitiveness of Carthaginians and appropriate AI selection of cheaper offensive units)
- Legionary - +1HP (legendary military unit for a truly legendary Civilisation)
- Ancient Cavalry – available to all at Monotheism, requires horses. Unit cost increased to 60 from 40 gold. (to provide variety of mobile attacking units between horsemen and knights. To provide an early medieval age counter to the power of some early UUs. To give a medieval military option to Civs lacking iron and/or saltpeter)
- Keshik – increase attack from 4 to 5 (legendary military unit for a truly legendary Civilisation)
- Explorer – available at Map Making (to increase appearance rate before maps are shared)
- Galley / Caravel / Galleon / Carrack / Transport– carry capacity increased (to increase threat posed by AI attacks on other islands / continents and reduce player admin)
- Crusader – available to all at Chemistry, requires Iron (to provide variety of non-mounted attacking units between Medieval Infantry and Marine. To give a military option to Civs lacking horses and/or saltpeter or based in mountaneous terrain)
- Cavalry – wheeled unit, cannot pass mountains, movement reduced to 2 (consider was overpowered).
- Sipahi - wheeled unit, cannot pass mountains, movement reduced to 2 (consider was overpowered).
- Cossack - wheeled unit, cannot pass mountains (consider was overpowered)
- Guerilla – prerequisite is Communism (to bring it earlier into the game where it may be selected more)
- Infantry – defence reduced from 10 to 9 (to increase attack viability of cavalry and marines to prevent a period of extended defensive dominance)
- Paratrooper – attack increased to 6 from 4 (to try and increase usage)
- Modern Paratrooper – attack increased to 10 from 6 (to try and increase usage), made amphibious. Marines can upgrade. Available at Advanced Flight Called Special Forces.
- Bomber rate of fire reduced from 3 to 2 and removed lethal land bombard (to reduce power)
- Flak air defence increased from 2 to 3 (to counter Bomber strength)
- Tank, wheeled unit and cannot pass mountains (considered overpowered).
- Modern Armour defence reduced to 10, cost raised to 140 from 120, wheeled and cannot pass mountains (considered overpowered).
- Weakened army to 1 unit at 4HP (to overcome issue with AI not attacking player armies and building armies incorrectly)

Please note, changes to Curragh, medieval horse units, army unit and Modern Paratrooper were taken from suggestions elsewhere in the forum

World Map settings changes

- Optimum City Number increased for all map sizes (scaling from +1 for Tiny to +5 for Huge)
- Irrigation without freshwater becomes available at Engineering
- Railroads take 4x longer for a worker.

Reason:
- cliff-face drop off for corruption is neither realistic nor fun at such an early stage in games.
- slightly reduces power of Commercial trait (considered second most powerful trait by many)
- resolves issue with land masses with no fresh water long before the industrial era
- increases value of Industrial trait in early industrial era.


Victory Condition changes

- Domination achievable at 30% of land area and 30% of population (settings intended for Standard size map, 10x Civs, Archipelago, 60% water. Suggest increasing by 3% for each of following; large map, continents and reducing by 6% for each of the following: huge map, pangea. Suggest reducing by 3% for each of the following: small map, 70% water and reducing by 6% for each of the following: tiny map, 80% water. May also need increased if you reduce the number of AIs - not recommended with the overall settings)
- Space Race – made Satellites and Superconductor require many more techs.
- Culture Victory
- Overall Culture Victory figure reduced by 50% to 50,000.
- Research Lab Culture increased from 2 to 8
- University Culture increased from 4 to 6
- Culture of a Medieval era onwards Wonders doubled

Reason:
- shortens time spent in domination victories where you have to grind even though it is obvious you will win.
- means player has to keep a closer eye on any dominant AI Civs and consider options if the AI appears to be within reach of a domination victory.
- to give AI and human more time to intervene military if losing the Space Race.
- to increase exposure to modern era tech and units
- to increase potential for AI culture victory if they get a runaway tech lead


Miscellaneous
- Palace cost reduced to 70% (to encourage tactical relocation for corruption and culture flipping possibilities before Forbidden Palace is built)
- Colosseum maintenance reduced to 1GP and cost reduced to 110 shields (to encourage uptake and alternative to Temple/Cathedral.
- Raised chance of successful propaganda by 50% (to increase the power of espionage and give more weighting to the impact of Culture in the game)



Instructions for use

Access your generated maps via ‘Civ Content’ in the starting menu. If playing on a non-standard sized map, I'd suggest increasing the number of AI against the default settings when using 60% water (e.g. Large = 17 compared to 12 in default, Standard 9 compared to). Reduce Civ numbers if playing 70% or 80%.

 

[tjs282]

Downloaded! Looks interesting, since you seem to be aiming for something similar to what I've been toying with over the past couple of years...

To play this, you will have to generate a map in the Editor then:

File / Import / Rules – and select the attached file to upload the ruleset.

OR

Open the attached ruleset scenario in the Editor, save as a new filename so you don’t overwrite it and then generate a map a you see fit.

This appears to be a .biq-only mod, which should mean that there is no need to use the Editor for map-generation.

Instead, by simply selecting the .biq in the 'Civ-Content' menu, the mod should be playable on a new randomly generated map (with the map-size and -parameters set by the player), as for any unmodded epic game.

Ideally, though, Civilopedia entries should be written for the new govs, so that potential players don't need to keep their browsers open to this page while playing...

(Add a folder in ../Conquests/Scenarios called e.g. "Re-tuned", copy the Text folder from the base-game into the "Re-tuned" folder, then go into that copied Text-folder and open the civilopedia.txt file. Scroll down to the "Governments" section, copy-paste the last entry in that section, once for each new gov, and edit the new entries accordingly)

 

[Spoonwood]

A lot of interesting ideas in the mod. I applaud your ambition Fergei and you trying to reason about this. As perhaps the strongest point of your changes, scouts having a defense of 1 makes a lot more sense, since then expansionist with barbarians on roaming or raging seems more viable.

However, I would still feel that I'd want a Republic rather soon for most of my games.

Some issues:

1. For 20k games I want to do almost all, or much more than most, of my own research. Democracy comes too late to come as worth considering, and requires a 2nd revolution. Only to avoid the despotic golden age would I revolt to Feudalism once I learned Code of Laws. Based on my experience at Sid level with Carthage of first revolting to Monarchy, and then revolting to Republic, I might just revolt to Feudalism and then have a second revolution to Republic. That's better than just swapping to Republic. But, I'd still go to Repbulic and not consider the others once I become a Republic.

2. For Space or Diplomatic games, I'll probably want to do my own research also. I don't see how any of these changes would make something other than Republic attractive.

3. For builder types like myself who sometimes go to aggressive war, it's more like first build up one's infrastructure and/or research potential. Learn technology and then sell that technology for gold and gpt, luxuries, etc. Then use that gold and gpt to upgrade horseman to knights/cavalry combined with pillaging out one's iron/saltpeter, swapping builds to horseman, and then re-hooking it with upgrades. Or buying armies/wormies (with short rushing workers first usually). Republic has more attractiveness for the increased gold coming from one's empire and the gold coming from friend's empires.

4. There's still not enough motivation to become a Democracy or Fascist government. Democracy maybe becomes more worthy of consideration if worker speed got slowed more for other tasks (maybe roads take 6 turns to build on flatland and mining takes 12 turns instead of 6?), though that's a tricky issue I think. Also, since Feudalism has communal corruption, it sounds like Communism wouldn't have enough benefit to think another revolution worth it.

Also, I think there's a better way to go about balancing the agricultural trait. Well, first let's review why the agricultural trait is so powerful:

1. The irrigated desert bonus. I have no idea how that might get balanced. It's probably a big balance issue on arid maps, which I tend to avoid.

2. The extra food available bonus for river tiles and lakes in despotism and out of despotism also for all towns and cities.

That means earlier shields and commerce and earlier possibility for settlers. The extra food available bonus means that in despotism a grassland town on a river or lake will grow in 7 turns instead of 10 turns, and 4 turns instead of 5 with a granary. That's 8 turns instead of 10 for settler production. For a plains start with one cow that can mean 5 turn growth instead of 7 turn growth, so 3 turn growth instead of 4, for 6 turn settlers instead of 8 turn settlers. For a grassland cow start that can mean 4 turn growth instead of 5 turn growth, so 2 turn growth instead of 3 turn growth, for 4 turn settlers instead of 6 turn settlers.

So, even with these improvements to other traits, I'd still pick agricultural, unless I was "playing for the challenge" or maybe a 20k game. Those ideas aren't bad, they just don't go far enough in my opinion.

Now, I do think there's two ways to make agricultural more balanced with other traits.

1. Take away the despotism 'standard tile' penalty. The agricultural trait still has its advantages, but other non-agricultural can now make up the food deficit in despotism with intelligent use of workers. Despotism could still have other deficiencies that make it unattractive to stay in. The agricultural tribe with it's capital on a river can still make it to 4 or 5 extra food per turn quicker than a non-agricultural tribe, but the non-agricultural tribe can still make it to that 4 or 5 extra food per turn while still in despotism.

2. Increase the amount of food given by irrigation. Yes, that will make cities grow more quickly. But, if no tiles get swapped, what's the difference between 5 food per turn and 6 food per turn? The answer is nothing. They are exactly the same for growth. The agricultural trait has no additional bonus for town growth once that much food is achieved, unless one pursues 7 food per turn. But 7 food per turn has no more use for a town with a granary than 5 food per turn.

Really, I'd think it best to do both 1. and 2. I didn't come up with these ideas. I played some of the Quick Civ mod in single player mode which is freely available with Conquests in Civ-Content after watching a YouTube video where Suede mentioned it. If you load up Civ3ConquestsEdit, one can find Quick Civ in the Scenarios folder to load up. Checking that I see that under 'terrain', terraform bonuses have gotten changed from '1' to '2'.

Agricultural still might end up better on a lake or river start, due to earlier growth. However, the power of the other traits might make up that advantage over time. Also, the agricultural trait is useful for more production later game by one more mining (or forestry or hill usage) in a city. I don't think it would be useful in as many cases for production later with more powerful irrigation.

 

[Ozymandias]

I'm sorry I missed this! It looks mighty fine & well-thought-out.

 

[Fergei]

A lot of interesting ideas in the mod. I applaud your ambition Fergei and you trying to reason about this. As perhaps the strongest point of your changes, scouts having a defense of 1 makes a lot more sense, since then expansionist with barbarians on roaming or raging seems more viable.

However, I would still feel that I'd want a Republic rather soon for most of my games.

Some issues:

1. For 20k games I want to do almost all, or much more than most, of my own research. Democracy comes too late to come as worth considering, and requires a 2nd revolution. Only to avoid the despotic golden age would I revolt to Feudalism once I learned Code of Laws. Based on my experience at Sid level with Carthage of first revolting to Monarchy, and then revolting to Republic, I might just revolt to Feudalism and then have a second revolution to Republic. That's better than just swapping to Republic. But, I'd still go to Repbulic and not consider the others once I become a Republic.

2. For Space or Diplomatic games, I'll probably want to do my own research also. I don't see how any of these changes would make something other than Republic attractive.

3. For builder types like myself who sometimes go to aggressive war, it's more like first build up one's infrastructure and/or research potential. Learn technology and then sell that technology for gold and gpt, luxuries, etc. Then use that gold and gpt to upgrade horseman to knights/cavalry combined with pillaging out one's iron/saltpeter, swapping builds to horseman, and then re-hooking it with upgrades. Or buying armies/wormies (with short rushing workers first usually). Republic has more attractiveness for the increased gold coming from one's empire and the gold coming from friend's empires.

4. There's still not enough motivation to become a Democracy or Fascist government. Democracy maybe becomes more worthy of consideration if worker speed got slowed more for other tasks (maybe roads take 6 turns to build on flatland and mining takes 12 turns instead of 6?), though that's a tricky issue I think. Also, since Feudalism has communal corruption, it sounds like Communism wouldn't have enough benefit to think another revolution worth it.

Also, I think there's a better way to go about balancing the agricultural trait. Well, first let's review why the agricultural trait is so powerful:

1. The irrigated desert bonus. I have no idea how that might get balanced. It's probably a big balance issue on arid maps, which I tend to avoid.

2. The extra food available bonus for river tiles and lakes in despotism and out of despotism also for all towns and cities.

That means earlier shields and commerce and earlier possibility for settlers. The extra food available bonus means that in despotism a grassland town on a river or lake will grow in 7 turns instead of 10 turns, and 4 turns instead of 5 with a granary. That's 8 turns instead of 10 for settler production. For a plains start with one cow that can mean 5 turn growth instead of 7 turn growth, so 3 turn growth instead of 4, for 6 turn settlers instead of 8 turn settlers. For a grassland cow start that can mean 4 turn growth instead of 5 turn growth, so 2 turn growth instead of 3 turn growth, for 4 turn settlers instead of 6 turn settlers.

So, even with these improvements to other traits, I'd still pick agricultural, unless I was "playing for the challenge" or maybe a 20k game. Those ideas aren't bad, they just don't go far enough in my opinion.

Now, I do think there's two ways to make agricultural more balanced with other traits.

1. Take away the despotism 'standard tile' penalty. The agricultural trait still has its advantages, but other non-agricultural can now make up the food deficit in despotism with intelligent use of workers. Despotism could still have other deficiencies that make it unattractive to stay in. The agricultural tribe with it's capital on a river can still make it to 4 or 5 extra food per turn quicker than a non-agricultural tribe, but the non-agricultural tribe can still make it to that 4 or 5 extra food per turn while still in despotism.

2. Increase the amount of food given by irrigation. Yes, that will make cities grow more quickly. But, if no tiles get swapped, what's the difference between 5 food per turn and 6 food per turn? The answer is nothing. They are exactly the same for growth. The agricultural trait has no additional bonus for town growth once that much food is achieved, unless one pursues 7 food per turn. But 7 food per turn has no more use for a town with a granary than 5 food per turn.

Really, I'd think it best to do both 1. and 2. I didn't come up with these ideas. I played some of the Quick Civ mod in single player mode which is freely available with Conquests in Civ-Content after watching a YouTube video where Suede mentioned it. If you load up Civ3ConquestsEdit, one can find Quick Civ in the Scenarios folder to load up. Checking that I see that under 'terrain', terraform bonuses have gotten changed from '1' to '2'.

Agricultural still might end up better on a lake or river start, due to earlier growth. However, the power of the other traits might make up that advantage over time. Also, the agricultural trait is useful for more production later game by one more mining (or forestry or hill usage) in a city. I don't think it would be useful in as many cases for production later with more powerful irrigation.

In terms of Republic there will be many situations where it can see you through to the end of the game. The factors that might influence matters compared to vanilla are:

- you get it later
- it probably won't your first government choice outside of despotism
- anarchy is less painful, so you may be more open to a post-Republic revolution
- Imperialism is superior to Republic for defensive play / territorial consolidation / isolationism and tech focus.
- Monarchy and Feudalism can be viable bridges to Imperialism (bypassing Republic)
- the mid to late game is considerably harder due to cost factor, so war weariness /may/ become more of a factor and make a player consider a non-war weariness government option.

In terms of Feudalism vs Communism, I have used unit support levels in cities to coax the AI (and player) over to the upgraded / newer 'equivalent'.

In terms of the Agricultural trait, yes it remains overpowered, but Expansionist gains value due to a significantly greater chance to get out to a head start (due to reduced AI starting units) or the Religious trait gaining value (in games with lots of revolutions, which generally my govenrment changes/additions encourage even if Fundamentalism and Plutocracy are primarily done with AI in mind rather than the player). The fact that border skirmishes are a more feasible tactic (rather than all out conquest) raises the value of culture and therefore the value of the Religious and Scientific traits to be a bit closer to Agricultural than in vanilla.

Definitely there are many things beyond my technical ability and knowledge that can be done. Come the winter I'll look at those suggestions you have for Agricultural though. It is overpowered and even more so in the early turns. Nothing sinks the heart quite like being stuck on a continent with the Iroquois.

 

[Ozymandias]

I almost forgot! - From the Spoiler on THIS PAGE (of course, I'd recommend the entire thread ) -

“Important Observations About The Aztec Jaguar - "The only UU I would give serious consideration to building in the modern era. For the money, you just can't by a better terror-unit. Fast, able to slip deep into enemy territory and disrupt things, capture workers, tear up improvements and roads....generally make a grand nuisance of themselves, and in the Ancient Era, I'd argue that they're very nearly broken. No per-requisite techs, cheap to mass produce, retreats when wounded against almost everything, capable of bringing down much more expensive horses and chariots, overrunning towns en mass.... perhaps TOO powerful a UU." - source unknown.

 

[Takhisis]

I'm sorry I missed this last year. Thanks for the bump, oz!

Now I need to point out the weakness of the Jaguar warrior, which is its often triggering a golden age when you're still in despotism (and the Aztecs aren't religious anymore, so cannot switch readily to monarchy or republic).

For me, it should be like a swordsman but requiring no iron (obsidian FTW) and with less armour to compensate.

 

[Theov]

Good ideas!
I've also changed the Governments, but mostly by adding new ones instead of changing the old ones.
Now I REALLY start thinking about moving Feudalism to COL...

The original Anarchy already didn't require building maintenance?
I like reducing the corruption though...

My brain hurts now.

 

[Fergei]

Good ideas!
I've also changed the Governments, but mostly by adding new ones instead of changing the old ones.
Now I REALLY start thinking about moving Feudalism to COL...

The original Anarchy already didn't require building maintenance?
I like reducing the corruption though...

My brain hurts now.

I'm tweaking the settings a bit more and was close to posting an update, but I'm still not sure of a few of my changes - you change one thing and it can have adverse effects on lots of other things. I have since added building maintenance to Anarchy as I'm confident it won't bankrupt anyone. That one was me being extremely conservative from a position of ignorance about the AI's financial situation with far larger unit numbers with such a low cost factor - so no wonder you were confused.

Feudalism at COL is a bit of a no-brainer in my opinion but I'm struggling to make the AI ever stick with it for more than a turn after they learn Monarchy. Ideally, I'd like it to be a viable AI option all the way to mid to late Medieval but the AI seems to hate the idea of shifting into low war weariness during wartime and also hates communal corruption. It's a combination that means I'd have to make Feudalism unit support truly ridiculous for cities of pop 1-5 in order for the AI to consider it against Republic or Monarchy (even when I revert Monarchy to its default corruption levels). I don't really want to make Feudalism a superpower government type!

Excluding that generally I'm extremely happy with my rules at the ancient era (I find it so much more varied and enjoyable than vanilla) but the rest is a work in progress. Medieval is almost there and when I'm happy with that I will post it. Then move on to Industrial.

 

[Fergei]

v2.0 uploaded. Changes to original post marked in blue. Espionage (still a lack of uptake by AI) and Space Race (weird bugs if I make it require more than 1x number of each spaceship component) are not optimum to my preferences but I still prefer these to the default. Apologies for the lack of knowledge/time to create a proper mod with Civ-o-pedia entries etc.