Crazy Spatz's Alpha Centauri Mod

[Sneaks]

Spatz, finally played your mod again after like 50 versions of not, and I love a lot of it. Only major issue I found was that the nature of buildings being so wonder heavy towards the end, if I lead tech, its an automatic win, because I will get every one of those wonders. This was on Emperor. The Centauri Ecology thing was certainly interesting boosting everyone up to that era, in that it immediately was a massive boost in CS bonuses for everyone.

 

[Spatzimaus]

Only major issue I found was that the nature of buildings being so wonder heavy towards the end, if I lead tech, its an automatic win, because I will get every one of those wonders.

This is something that should be partially fixed in the next version. What's happening right now in 1.07 and before is that the AI isn't prioritizing spaceship construction correctly, so between the free tech, free policy, long golden age, and the earlier unlocking of Centauri Ecology (which, among other things, boosts research output of farms), the human player can get to most of the late-game wonders well ahead of the AI. In 1.08 (due out tomorrow), the AI tries much harder to win the space race, and that'll help with the Digital Era Wonder race; depending on your starting era and difficulty, it might be impossible to win the space race now, and that's a pretty big boost for the AIs.

But a lot of this is just due to the inherent stupidity of the AI. Once you, the human, get a tech lead it's unlikely you'll ever lose it, and you can often sweep up most wonders (although the AI still beats me to the Maritime Control Center a surprising fraction of the time). And the tech lead is often decided by how big your empire is, which in turn depends on how easy it is to conquer an AI empire, which heavily favors the human.
I try to mitigate this somewhat through the tech-stealing national wonders, defensive promotions, and adding things like the Psi units intended to work better for civs at a tech disadvantage, but it's still a problem. I'm trying to slowly shift the turnover point; right now, you hit the point where it's clear you're going to win in the late Digital at the latest, and I want that point to not happen until the mid- to late-Fusion. So I'll continue to look into ways I can tweak the balance against the player.

 

[dezuman]

I just had an excellent idea to make RAs more AI-friendly: Instead of having boosts to their output (Porc tower and Rat starter) they should make the agreement cheaper (for both parts). This would make them better for AI I guess (The guy with boosts can settle more agreements for obv reasons) AND make them less OP for players. I mean, it's just insane how you can keep AHEAD of the deity AIs pretty much solely on RAs with both aforementioned boosts

Though I'm not sure if it's just me getting bugged by this due to my weird playstyle ...

Oh and one question: is there ANYTHING that can be done about the AIs tendency to attack you against horrible odds only to come crawling for peace a few turns later? It's sooo ruining ALL my games because I have to spend so much time figuring out things to spend all the gold on
Edit: I mean, if it's meant as some sort of "desperate charge" then why not lock them in war till the bitter end?
I suppose it's nothing you can do, but I just had to whine ask

 

[Spatzimaus]

Okay, to follow up on yesterday's discussion, here are the seven pantheons as of right now. All are subject to change for balance reasons.

GREEK:
Major gods: Zeus (Air/Justice), Poseidon (Water/Earth), Hades (Death/Wealth), Hephaestus (Crafts/Fire)
Minor gods: Hera (Fertility), Aphrodite (Beauty), Athena (Knowledge), Ares (War), Artemis (Animals), Dionysus (Plants), Hermes (Travel), Apollo (Art), Seasons (Demeter)
Missing: Healing, Darkness, Storms, Balance
Favor: Balanced (Gain x2 Favor from Priests, Buildings, and Battles)

EGYPTIAN:
Major gods: Ra (Animals/Plants), Isis (Healing/Fertility), Osiris (Justice/Water), and Set (Travel/Storms)
Minor gods: Bast (Fire), Geb (Earth), Horus (Air), Ptah (Crafts), Anubis (Death), Thoth (Knowledge), Sekhmet (War), Hathor (Art), and Nephthys (Darkness)
Missing: Beauty, Wealth, Seasons, Balance
Primary Favor method: Buildings generate x3 Favor
Secondary Favor method: Battles generate x2 Favor

NORSE
Major gods: Odin (Knowledge/Travel), Thor (Air/Storms), Loki (Fire/Darkness), Frigg (Earth/Balance)
Minor gods: Njord (Water), Freyja (Fertility), Baldr (Beauty), Heimdall (Wealth), Hel (Death), Tyr (War), Bragi (Art), Forseti (Justice)
Missing: Crafts, Healing, Plants, Seasons
Primary Favor method: Battles generate x3 Favor
Secondary Favor method: Priests generate x2 Favor

HINDU
Major gods: Shakti (Fertility/Justice), Brahma (Balance/Crafts), Vishnu (Seasons/Travel), Shiva (Death/Storms)
Minor gods: Ap (Water), Agni (Fire), Prithvi (Earth), Vayu (Air), Parvati (Beauty), Lakshmi (Wealth), Saraswati (Knowledge), Kali (War), Ganesha (Art)
Missing: Healing, Animals, Plants, Darkness
Primary Favor method: Priests generate x3 Favor
Secondary Favor Method: Battles generate x2 Favor

AZTEC:
Major gods: Huitzolopochtli (War/Fire), Tlaloc (Storms/Fertility), Tezcatlipoca (Darkness/Death), Quetzalcoatl (Art/Air)
Minor gods: Chalchiuhtlicue (Water), Coatlicue (Earth), Xochiquetzal (Beauty), Yacatecutli (Wealth), Tlazolteotl (Healing), Camaxtli (Animals), Xochipilli (Plants), Xipe Totec (Seasons), Ometeotl (Balance)
Missing: Crafts, Knowledge, Travel, Justice
Primary Favor method: Battles generate x3 Favor
Secondary Favor method: Buildings generate x2 Favor

SUMERIAN:
Major gods: Anu (Death/Darkness), Enki (Crafts/Water), Enlil (Storms/Air), Inanna (Beauty/War)
Minor gods: Shamash (Fire), Ki (Earth), Ninhursag (Fertility), Ninurta (Healing), Nanna (Knowledge), Ningal (Plants), Ninlil (Travel), Utu (Justice), Anunna (Balance)
Missing: Wealth, Animals, Art, Seasons
Primary Favor method: Priests generate x3 Favor
Secondary Favor method: Buildings generate x2 Favor

SHINTO:
Major gods: Amaterasu (Fire/Balance), Sarutahiko (Earth/Justice), Inari (Wealth/Animals), Hachiman (Plants/War)
Minor gods: Ryujin (Water), Raijin (Air), Izanagi (Fertility), Izanami (Death), Omoikane (Knowledge), Uzume (Art), Kotoamatzukami (Seasons), Tsukuyomi (Darkness), Susano'o (Storms)
Missing: Beauty, Crafts, Healing, Travel
Primary Favor method: Buildings generate x3 Favor
Secondary favor method: Priests generate x2 Favor

 

[MindXX]

Awesome work Spatz! I cannot wait to see it implemented!

MX

 

[Spatzimaus]

I cannot wait to see it implemented!

What's probably going to happen is this: a couple weeks from now, I'll post a very crude preliminary version of the Mythology mod; its balance will be way off, most (if not all) of the art will use placeholders, and a lot of the units' special abilities won't be completed (similar to how the SMAC mod was back last November/December). But it'll be there for people to get a rough idea of the direction the mod is going to go, and decide whether the basic mechanisms used work well enough or need to be scrapped in favor of something else.

At that point, I'll absolutely NEED feedback from people. What works, what doesn't. Which major gods you pick, and why. Whether the three Favor methods are balanced. How many minor gods you should unlock in a typical game. How fast the techs come, and what exactly they do. How integrated the mod should be with the existing game (should I move religious Wonders to the new techs, or leave them at their current locations?) and how far into the core game my changes should extend in general. Whether people are mortally offended by calling Hindu mythology a "pantheon" of "deities" in the first place, whether the Aztec names are just too long to work with, and whether I should use the Roman names for the Greek pantheon.

It's not like SMAC, where I was creating entirely new eras using a very specific source of material that didn't leave a lot of room for adjustment. Mythologies, on the other hand, are extremely flexible and have a huge amount of content to wade through, so there'll be a lot of judgement calls on what to include. Meanwhile, I'm trying to integrate all of it inside the first three eras of the game, without destroying the game's current balance. So it'll take time, it'll take feedback, and I won't consider it ready for full release until I'm happy with all of it.

 

[CivOasis]

Awesome, with the early eras, I'll actually be able to see the changes before new patches (either for the game or the mod) come out!

 

[CivOasis]

Actually, shouldn't this go into the project forum by now?

 

[Spatzimaus]

Actually, shouldn't this go into the project forum by now?

Tough call. Once I have a second content mod then I'd say so, since it'll get too confusing to mix the future-era and mythology discussions together; we're nearly at that point right now. But honestly, if you look at this thread and filter out my own comments, it's not a very active thread overall. There are a few hundred people downloading the mod (probably more once I have it put on the front page or in the in-game browser), but there's not much discussion, nothing even close to Thal's mods, and significantly less than NiGHTS or CtP.

 

[Zilurtrav]

I reverted to lurking for a bit, since I haven't been playing much Civ V as school started up, but I want to express my excitement over the direction you're going. First a SMAC mod, and now an Age of Mythology mod? You're spoiling me, Spatz!

I don't have a whole lot of input to offer other than saying that I'm very pleased with everything I'm reading. As far as suggestions go, I have but a few:

For the "beginner" pantheon, I'd definitely suggest going with the Greek for that. Beyond player familiarity, it makes good sense, as the Ancient Greeks had a history of attempting to gain favor with their gods through all three methods, while you don't exactly see temples in Native American tribes (if you do go for a Native American pantheon--which I think would be a lot of fun, having researched some of their mythology myself--I'd suggest the pluses to x3 Priest and x2 Combat favor).

As for allocation of mythological units, I agree with previous sentiment: While I wouldn't really want to see the Norse pantheon building sphinxes, limiting it to whichever primary god you have may be too... limiting. That being said, there may be a way around it that combines the two. Each primary god might unlock different myth units to build at different techs (rather than through the shrines/churches/cathedrals/basilica, or through favor), and some gods might share certain units that make sense (particularly within a pantheon). Such that only Poseidon would be able to build the Kraken, but both Zeus and Poseidon (and maybe others) could build Pegasuses, and Sphinxes could be built across several Greek and Egyptian gods.

Another point: I take issue with Loki's foci! Fire/Crafts would put him in Lawful to begin with, and to me that just doesn't seem right. Admittedly, I don't fully understand your criteria about balancing different pantheons with regard to what foci are excluded, but switching out Crafts for Darkness (assuming Darkness is Chaotic) on Loki would make more sense to me.

And those are my thoughts. Let me just add that I'm very enthusiastically awaiting this project, and I am sure there are many like me in those 250 downloads who are silently cheering you on.

 

[Spatzimaus]

For the "beginner" pantheon, I'd definitely suggest going with the Greek for that.

That's basically what I'm leaning towards now. I've got some complex metrics by which I balance the pantheons, and everything I've got has told me the Greeks are going to be the easy choice. (Not the BEST choice, but the least likely to cripple you if you don't know what you're doing since they focus the most on the simpler choices.) The main reason I hadn't put them at the 2/2/2 slot initially was the AoM game itself, where the Greeks got their Favor from priests; since they were the cause of one of the three methods I'm using, it felt wrong to take that from them. But I don't worry about that too much.

while you don't exactly see temples in Native American tribes (if you do go for a Native American pantheon--which I think would be a lot of fun, having researched some of their mythology myself--I'd suggest the pluses to x3 Priest and x2 Combat favor).

This is one of the reasons I put the Aztec as Battle/Buildings; they DID have temples. Right now the Priest/Battle combo is the Sumerians, but if the Greek Priest/Building slot is freed up by moving them to the 2/2/2 combo, then Priest/Building is good for the Sumerians. Now, the Hindu one at Buildings/Priests is kind of strange, so I might give that one to the Sumerians instead and shift Hindu to Priest/Building. That'd keep Priest/Battle free for the seventh set I'll add.

That being said, there may be a way around it that combines the two. Each primary god might unlock different myth units to build at different techs (rather than through the shrines/churches/cathedrals/basilica, or through favor), and some gods might share certain units that make sense (particularly within a pantheon).

That's not bad, but let me explain what I've got right now. Currently, all myth units unlock with specific levels of religious buildng, but the caps for building level depend on tech. There are four levels of building: Shrine, Church, Cathedral, Basilica. But ignore the names, and go L1 to L4.

When you take the first religious tech (Mysticism), you unlock L1 in you main god's primary focus. All cities immediately get a Shrine for that focus, but it can't improve yet. Since very few foci add a unit at level 1 (I think only Animals does, currently), it doesn't really enter into this discussion.
The second religious tech (Deism) unlocks L2 in the primary and L1 in the secondary. Your Shrines don't immediately grow to L2; you have to upgrade them through generating Favor.
The third tier (late Ancient Era) has two religious techs branching off Deism: Polytheism (unlocks level 1 buildings for minor gods) and Hierarchy (allows your capital to be one level higher than the cap).

There are more techs, but that last bit is important to this discussion: since the normal unlocks cap at L3 for primary/secondary and L2 for minor gods, you'll only EVER be able to reach level 4 in your capital, and only for your main god (both his primary and secondary). Even the minor gods will only hit L3 in your capital, and only in a very narrow tech window (since Monotheism LOWERS the minor god cap). So, any units placed at L4 within a focus will be, by the nature of the system, exclusive to those gods that have that Focus, and the Primary focus will hit L4 two tech tiers before the secondary does. (In fact, it's likely you'll have the Enlightenment before you ever see your secondary hit L4, so I'm not worrying about that.) L3s will be almost as restricted, in practice.

For 13 of the 21 foci, only one single pantheon has a god with that focus as his/her primary (and no Focus has more than three pantheons with it as a primary). Loki is the only fire-primary, Inanna is the only beauty-primary, Isis is the only fertility-primary, Ra is the only animals-primary, and so on. So, if I make that L4 unit be something specific to the appropriate pantheon, then it's very unlikely that you'd ever encounter it outside of someone who went with that pantheon; no need to make pantheon-specific alternatives. For instance, Poseidon is the only major god to have a Water primary, so if the L4 Water ability is to unlock Scylla, only Poseidon devotees will generally be able to build that particular creature.

Another point: I take issue with Loki's foci! Fire/Crafts would put him in Lawful to begin with, and to me that just doesn't seem right.

Loki was a tough fit, no question. But actually, Fire is CE (which as the primary would be -2,-2) and Crafts is L (which as a secondary is +2,0), so he'd start off at (0,-2). Balanced on the law-chaos axis, negative on the material-ephemeral. I'd also been looking at having Favor generation methods shift by +1 or +2, but that was back when I had four methods instead of three. (The method I dropped involved creating Missionary units, but AI limitations killed that one.) Battle-generated favor, obviously, was originally the one on the C direction, which would have deliberately skewed the Norse and Aztecs in that direction a bit.

Admittedly, I don't fully understand your criteria about balancing different pantheons with regard to what foci are excluded, but switching out Crafts for Darkness (assuming Darkness is Chaotic) on Loki would make more sense to me.

Darkness is Ephemeral; the Chaotic focus in the fifth set is Storms, which Thor has as his secondary (partially canceling his LE Air primary). So switching Loki to Fire/Darkness would put him at (-2,-4), somewhat chaotic and VERY far down on the E axis. While that'd give him early access to the Art and Beauty domains (great for culture and happiness), it'd make a pretty large number of foci unreachable. One reason I like that change, though, is that in my old setup I'd put both Thor and Loki at (0,-2) to start; they'd play too much the same, then.

As to which is more appropriate, thematically? Crafts is basically +Production (it's Hephaestus' specialty), while Darkness is the Hunter-Seeker Algorithm. That's the National Wonder in my SMAC mod that reduces enemy units' visibility and range once they enter your territory; I want that to be the L2 Darkness effect, with the L4 being basically -3 visibility. Units would never be able to see anything but the cities (at least, once they enter your lands; from outside they could see in) and would attack blindly, which'd be a HUGE boost to your defensive ability. Now that does sound pretty Loki-ish, so I'll probably shift it; I set up his foci back before I added that particular focus to the game. I want to check my grids at home before deciding on this, though.

And what I meant about balancing is this: let's take Loki as I had him before. He wouldn't be able to pick Travel, Storms, or Balance, because those are the secondaries of the other Norse major deities (if you add a major deity as a minor you only get his primary). He also wouldn't be able to pick Healing, Plants, Seasons, or Darkness because no one in the Norse pantheon has those. Every god has a different set of seven off-limits foci like this. Now, that particular group of seven consists of two Ms, one L, one E, two Cs, and Balance is the neutral focus (0,0); add those to the CE and L he starts with (and therefore can't add again), and you're still very balanced in your remaining 12 choices. So it's a very safe mix; no one part of the mandala becomes inhospitable to him, where an AI could quickly get stranded with no choices. (I've got a script that plots out numbers for this. It's messy.) If I were to switch his secondary to Darkness and not change anyone else to pick up Crafts, then his banned seven would include 2 Ms, 2 Ls, 2 Cs, no Es, and Balance, but the 12 available foci would stay the same as before so it's still safe as long as I don't decide to switch anyone else around.

Now if I had it giving, say, 3 Ms and 3 Ls, then that'd be a serious problem because it'd basically force anyone who picked Loki to play in one small area of the grid, which means you'd end up with the same minor gods every time you played. I wanted to avoid that if possible.

 

[dezuman]

Wait, how low can your LoS be? 1 tile away or none at all?

Hmm ... One thing that I always wondered was if any aspect of the AI is "omniscient", or if they are always limited by LoS. If so, making them blind might be INCREDIBLY powerful!

 

[Spatzimaus]

Wait, how low can your LoS be? 1 tile away or none at all?

Honestly, I'm not sure. It's one of the things I intend to test out. If it's zero, then does it let you attack by moving into a hex you didn't know was occupied? Does it reveal the blocking unit if this happens?

Hmm ... One thing that I always wondered was if any aspect of the AI is "omniscient", or if they are always limited by LoS. If so, making them blind might be INCREDIBLY powerful!

I believe they're generally limited by LoS, but I think there's a small tweak in there to help the AI, since the AI doesn't handle "spotter" units like a human would (where a ship or unit might move in, let your ranged units attack, and then the spotter uses its remaining move to back out). It's something I'll want to keep a close eye on.

 

[MindXX]

Is 1.08 still coming out tonight? I just finished my last game and don't want to start another until the next version comes out. Thanks again Spatz for the hard work!

MX

 

[MindXX]

Tough call. Once I have a second content mod then I'd say so, since it'll get too confusing to mix the future-era and mythology discussions together; we're nearly at that point right now. But honestly, if you look at this thread and filter out my own comments, it's not a very active thread overall. There are a few hundred people downloading the mod (probably more once I have it put on the front page or in the in-game browser), but there's not much discussion, nothing even close to Thal's mods, and significantly less than NiGHTS or CtP.

I'll offer what feedback that I can. I follow the Asatru philosophy (Old Germanic/Norse pantheon) and looking forward to your work implementing religion in CIV.

By the way, is this going to be a "fantasy" mod or historical add-on?

MX

 

[Spatzimaus]

Is 1.08 still coming out tonight?

Yes. There's one bug I have to fix first (in the Victory Progress display), I need to double-check my disabling of the science victory, and I haven't added the icons for the Magna Carta to the .dds files yet. I'm still at work, though (Pacific timezone), so it'll be several more hours before it's ready to be uploaded. When I say "tonight", for most of you it really means "tomorrow morning".

I have to say, the changes I made to the space race have helped significantly, but it still feels a bit too easy to win the race. The AIs will start well, quickly building the Apollo Program and the first couple of pieces, but they seem to stall out a bit after that. I think it's a question of Flavors again, and I can tweak that some more, but I'll need to look into changes on a more fundamental level for future versions.

 

[Spatzimaus]

By the way, is this going to be a "fantasy" mod or historical add-on?

Generally fantasy, since there's nothing really "historical" about most mythology, but I get what you're asking. I want to integrate it in a way that won't drastically change most parts of the existing game's balance, but I also want the first three eras to feel like three distinct phases of a single Age with a natural progression (just like how the Digital, Fusion, and Nanotech are three parts of the final Age of Ascension). That is, start off in a mundane setting like in the vanilla game, go towards a fantastical setting, then back off from that to where at the Enlightenment you're playing something fairly close to vanilla again.

So in the Ancient, you'll still want to build the usual assortment of archers, swordsmen, horsemen, and catapults; it's just that now, those units will sometimes be accompanied by a few fantastic creatures, like Minotaurs. Your cities will have quite a few religious buildings, with very different effects.
In the Classical Era (which I'm doubling the size of) it sort of explodes into a full-fledged fantasy setting, to where you might add a Hydra to your attack force, and a Hero like Odysseus whose job is to explicitly counter the enemy's Myth units; at that point the "mundane" units are seriously outclassed and it's all about throwing god powers and massive monsters around. Likewise, most of your empire's bonuses will be coming from your high-end temples.
But in the Medieval, things start to wane as you unlock things like Paladin and Inquisitor units (mundane military units with a Hero-like anti-Myth bonus), and Myth units stop being quite so great to have around. Similarly, on the building side of things you'll shift from depending on the bonuses of your religious buildings to relying on more dependable mundane things like the Workshop and University. So by the time you trigger the Enlightenment, you'll already have moved on to a more normal playstyle. My goal is for it to (after the Classical) become steadily worse to stay "mythological", until you have basically no choice but to make the transition by the Renaissance if you want to stay competitive.

So in the Ancient and Medieval you could say that it's a bit more historical, and the Classical is mostly fantasy, but I doubt I'll include real-history things like the Crusades or the Plague as anything other than abstract Events or the backstory for certain units.

 

[Sneaks]

Question about religions:
Can you do a quick and dirty 1-2 sentence synopsis on each God focus type and what that would equate to in in game bonuses?

 

[Spatzimaus]

Can you do a quick and dirty 1-2 sentence synopsis on each God focus type and what that would equate to in in game bonuses?

Okay, but this is VERY tentative. Some of them I haven't really decided yet; a lot of these are going to depends on which gods they mapped to, and until I add the final pantheon none of that will be adjusted. Understand that what follows are gross simplifications; each Focus will have four tiers of abilities, but those will generally be along a theme.

GROUP 1: (the Elements, the only group that really works along the diagonals)
Earth (LM): A little production/food, a defensive boost for all of your units, and a Myth unit.
Water (CM): A Naval boost, a Fishing Boat boost, increased relationships with Maritime city-states, and a Myth unit.
Air (LE): Ranged combat boosts, Pegasus (helicopter), and the ability to throw a Lightning Bolt (orbital weapon).
Fire (CE): Attack bonuses for all units (especially anti-city) and a couple strong Myth units.

GROUP 2: (get far from 0,0 along any one axis)
Crafts (L): Production
Fertility (M): Food
Wealth (C): Gold
Beauty (E): Happiness
These are more complex than those one-word answers, but exactly how is still being tweaked. Crafts, for instance, goes like this:
L1: +2P, -1F, -1C, -1G per city
L2: +10% Building Production
L3: Add another +2P per city, and remove the -1G
L4: Colossus (giant Myth unit)
That pattern holds for all four: L1 is generally a break-even sort of city bonus (since a negative only affects things when the city had some to begin with), L2 adds a different small bonus, L3 builds on L1, and L4 is a monster unit or really powerful effect (Beauty's L4: all Priests generate 2 Happiness instead of 1).

Note that groups 1 and 2 are the only ones that encourage you to go far from (0,0). The rest pay to stay closer to 0,0.

GROUP 3: (these overlap near 0,0; at many points you'll have 2-3 of them available)
Knowledge (L): Research and "espionage" (see Nethack Terminus and KGB)
Healing (M): Two healing promotions for units (the L4 being Regeneration), a city healing bonus, and a Valkyrie UU that heals nearby units.
War (C): Military production, two special promotions, and a boost to relations with Militaristic city-states.
Death (E): A "vampiric" healing promotion and a couple UUs.

GROUP 4: (these are arranged about 0,0 but never overlap with each other)
Plants (L): Bonuses to some farms and "organic" Luxuries, and a couple Myth units.
Animals (M): Four types of Myth units, nothing else.
Travel (C): Movement increases and a boost to Scouts. See the Planetary Transit System and Space Elevator for examples of what I mean by "movement increases".
Art (E): Culture boosts and a boost to relations with Cultural city-states.

GROUP 5: (centered around 0,0; each quadrant has two of them)
Justice (L): A custom promotion that harms units that harm yours, a Hero unit, and it'll make conquered cities go through their unrest twice as fast.
Seasons (M): Each turn increment by one "season". Depending on the result, you'll get various bonuses applied to all cities. (So if it's Autumn, all of your cities might get Food boosts, while Spring would give Happiness boosts, and so on.) I know, 20 years per turn, but it's all abstract. Oh, and a Hero unit.
Storms (C): Enemy units take damage in your territory (like being near a Citadel), a Myth unit, and a Hero unit.
Darkness (E): Enemy units have lower visibility in your territory, and a Hero unit.
See a trend? Unpredictable-but-strong focus effects, and a Hero.

GROUP 6: (square around 0,0)
Balance (X): What I'm looking to do is, through Lua, adjust each city's yields. So cities with a lot of production and low food might add food and subtract production. Higher ranks would increase the amount it can adjust each turn.

 

[CivOasis]

Sounds like Fire, Death, and Justice would fit warmongers nicely.