He-Who-Hunts
2nd Legionary Cohort
Just wondering if anyone out there familiar with modding experience thinks this would be possible, just an idea now but I think im gonna dedicate some time in trying to work it out.
There are 2 things I love about this game: Being able to survive with small empires (1-3 cities) and the terra map (ok that's nothing new but I always love having an unsettled continent to explore).
I'd like to make a mod where civilizations can build colonies to gather far away resources, unlocked somewhere in the late Medieval / early renaissance ages, perhaps with the commerce policy tree.
A colony would function similar to a city in that a unit would found one, maybe an unlock-able feature for the settler or maybe a colonist unit all on its own. The colony would also act like a city in that immediately upon being founded it encompasses all the surrounding spaces in culture although unlike a city a colony does not expand culturally after being founded.
List of characteristics:
-A colony has no happiness penalty right away, however as it grows it increasingly demands its Independence and adds to empire wide unhappiness. Players have the option to take this penalty on the chin or liberate them which immediately turns them into City States. The big choice for a player will be when they want to give up their usable luxuries, colonies are really meant to make money so you'll more then likely be trading the luxuries away to make some cash however when they become a CS you only get the benefit of the luxury resource toward your happiness as you do with normal CS... if they still like you (see below)
-A colony turned City State will be angry/friendly toward you depending on how long it took for you to liberate them. liberate them right away and you have an ally, wait a long time and they will be angry. perhaps an added penalty of being in -10 happiness would be that any colonies in revolt automatically claim independence.
-Although a colony has no Social Policy or initial Happiness penalty it does incur a huge maintenance cost, im thinking around 4 gpt a colony.
-Colonies are very vulnerable to attack (including barbarians), enemies just need to move a land unit over the colony to destroy it (but it can be repaired by a worker). So included in the maintenance cost is an army upkeep cost to defend them. Also, a colony will stop working if its health is bombarded to zero, this will require proper naval defense as well.
-A colony requires workers/work boats to harvest resource tiles like a city, except a colony cannot build anything, it can only purchase items. Its either sail over the working force or the civ must make enough gold to buy. I'm also thinking about including a colonial military unit that can be purchased at a colony only, like a frontiersman, or ranger gunpowder unit or something, thoughts?
-Thinking about adding colonies maintenance cost are half price for England's UA. (along with 2+ ship moves)
-To make them more strategic im thinking that as the colony grows it incurs a greater maintenance cost but it also produces more instances of the luxuries (similar to a Bazaar). Again the idea behind colonies is for civs who are into trading.
List of potential Problems
-colonies could be abused to get a quick diplomatic win, could fix this by changing the liberated colonies to "minor nations" and have them excluded from the voting process. Could also make them more expansionist when they're liberated, to give them a distinct personality.
-Not really sure what would define the type of CS a colony becomes on liberation. again working with the "minor nations" concept above perhaps a liberated colony could JUST give you the resources they have upon being allied. Or it could be that the CS is completely random.
-A.I; will in all likelihood be difficult to get them to use colonies properly.
-I think there might have to be a limit on the number colonies per civ, perhaps to related to the population/number of city/map size.
There are 2 things I love about this game: Being able to survive with small empires (1-3 cities) and the terra map (ok that's nothing new but I always love having an unsettled continent to explore).
I'd like to make a mod where civilizations can build colonies to gather far away resources, unlocked somewhere in the late Medieval / early renaissance ages, perhaps with the commerce policy tree.
A colony would function similar to a city in that a unit would found one, maybe an unlock-able feature for the settler or maybe a colonist unit all on its own. The colony would also act like a city in that immediately upon being founded it encompasses all the surrounding spaces in culture although unlike a city a colony does not expand culturally after being founded.
List of characteristics:
-A colony has no happiness penalty right away, however as it grows it increasingly demands its Independence and adds to empire wide unhappiness. Players have the option to take this penalty on the chin or liberate them which immediately turns them into City States. The big choice for a player will be when they want to give up their usable luxuries, colonies are really meant to make money so you'll more then likely be trading the luxuries away to make some cash however when they become a CS you only get the benefit of the luxury resource toward your happiness as you do with normal CS... if they still like you (see below)
-A colony turned City State will be angry/friendly toward you depending on how long it took for you to liberate them. liberate them right away and you have an ally, wait a long time and they will be angry. perhaps an added penalty of being in -10 happiness would be that any colonies in revolt automatically claim independence.
-Although a colony has no Social Policy or initial Happiness penalty it does incur a huge maintenance cost, im thinking around 4 gpt a colony.
-Colonies are very vulnerable to attack (including barbarians), enemies just need to move a land unit over the colony to destroy it (but it can be repaired by a worker). So included in the maintenance cost is an army upkeep cost to defend them. Also, a colony will stop working if its health is bombarded to zero, this will require proper naval defense as well.
-A colony requires workers/work boats to harvest resource tiles like a city, except a colony cannot build anything, it can only purchase items. Its either sail over the working force or the civ must make enough gold to buy. I'm also thinking about including a colonial military unit that can be purchased at a colony only, like a frontiersman, or ranger gunpowder unit or something, thoughts?
-Thinking about adding colonies maintenance cost are half price for England's UA. (along with 2+ ship moves)
-To make them more strategic im thinking that as the colony grows it incurs a greater maintenance cost but it also produces more instances of the luxuries (similar to a Bazaar). Again the idea behind colonies is for civs who are into trading.
List of potential Problems
-colonies could be abused to get a quick diplomatic win, could fix this by changing the liberated colonies to "minor nations" and have them excluded from the voting process. Could also make them more expansionist when they're liberated, to give them a distinct personality.
-Not really sure what would define the type of CS a colony becomes on liberation. again working with the "minor nations" concept above perhaps a liberated colony could JUST give you the resources they have upon being allied. Or it could be that the CS is completely random.
-A.I; will in all likelihood be difficult to get them to use colonies properly.
-I think there might have to be a limit on the number colonies per civ, perhaps to related to the population/number of city/map size.
