Fall Under: A Module for RiFE

[Moosh]

Okay, so Valk's fix worked for me, yay! But I have a question. You make it a point to mention that you can "You can now convert and control mana nodes without having to spam cities nearby." The problem is, they still require a route in order to get credit for having that mana. So I just picked up this death mana with my new mage tower, but I have no death mana. I could have a worker build a route to it with a lot of body guards, but I don't own every square up to it, will I still get credit for the route? Also should I be able to build multiple academies of the same mana type or did I read that wrong, cause I'm not sure how you'd get 4 from one mana node. Sorry for all the noob questions, heh.

-Moosh

 

[MrUnderhill]

Okay, so Valk's fix worked for me, yay! But I have a question. You make it a point to mention that you can "You can now convert and control mana nodes without having to spam cities nearby." The problem is, they still require a route in order to get credit for having that mana. So I just picked up this death mana with my new mage tower, but I have no death mana. I could have a worker build a route to it with a lot of body guards, but I don't own every square up to it, will I still get credit for the route? Also should I be able to build multiple academies of the same mana type or did I read that wrong, cause I'm not sure how you'd get 4 from one mana node. Sorry for all the noob questions, heh.

-Moosh

I haven't tried it yet, but I think as long as the path to the Mage Tower doesn't go through another civ's territory, you should still have access to that mana (meaning that going through unowned territory is okay). It would be nice to have some way of making Mage Towers connect to your capital automatically, but that would require SDK work that's way beyond what I can do.

And as for the academies, yes, you can build multiple academies of the same type; just not in the same city. Each academy is a national wonder with a limit of 3, which means at maximum you'll have 3 new sources of mana plus the one you started with, for a total of 4. You can mix-and-match different types of academy in the same city all you like.

 

[Valkrionn]

I haven't tried it yet, but I think as long as the path to the Mage Tower doesn't go through another civ's territory, you should still have access to that mana (meaning that going through unowned territory is okay). It would be nice to have some way of making Mage Towers connect to your capital automatically, but that would require SDK work that's way beyond what I can do.

And as for the academies, yes, you can build multiple academies of the same type; just not in the same city. Each academy is a national wonder with a limit of 3, which means at maximum you'll have 3 new sources of mana plus the one you started with, for a total of 4. You can mix-and-match different types of academy in the same city all you like.

So long as a route goes through unowned or friendly (meaning open borders) territory, it will connect.

 

[Sarkyn]

Hello!

3 things to report:

1) Since installing the replacement python file linked in this thread, I have NOT had a UI Disappearance. For me, that's it fixed, I assume

2) From an aesthetic point of view, I think that the graphics for the towers are way too big. They become the biggest and most salient thing on any landscape, and they're not really supposed to dwarf cities and other features. Tapping the ArtDefines xml I reduced them to <fScale>12.0</fScale> for Towers, and <fScale>1.0</fScale> for Academies. They now appear to sit on the mana source nicely.

3) It does feel a little easy On Monarch level, it's not in doubt that I'll win the game from very early on. I'll up the difficulty another notch on the next game and retry.



Edit - unable to resist, I started a new game. The UI bug has reappeared. Very early on - turn 50.

 

[Sarkyn]

Sadly, I now have a repeatable CTD immediately after pressing "End Turn".

It processes a few things, Leviathan spawns, some enemy AI movements are shown, then a consistent CTD :/

I'm going to remove Fall Under for now, I think, but I'd really liked it! So would be delighted if you could see why.

Edit:

Addons installed:
- FallUnder
- FlatXp

That's it.

 

[EugeneStyles]

At Valk's suggestion, and to keep from cluttering up the Kahdi thread, I decided to add a thread for discussing my new module for RiFE 1.23.

I like the idea behind most of these changes - will definitely download and try out. A few comments:

[*]Mage Towers: Added a series of new improvement types which double as both a mana node and a fort. The Amurites can build these with either arcane or recon units, or they can get them from upgrading existing mana nodes. You can now convert and control mana nodes without having to spam cities nearby. Mage Towers will upgrade into Mage Enclaves, which have an additional ring of cultural control and can be used to train old units to use magic.

Definitely sweet. BTW, I like the fact that you have to have a route to them - I wouldn't change it even if you could. Don't wanna make it *too* easy to grab all the mana on the map. And you can always use Rivers for route. I think you can use oceans too (with proper tech), though I'm not sure I've ever tried it for routes to resources, just between towns. I'm especially unsure if you can use a road from the resource to the ocean and then ocean route to home... if you can, that would be a nice strategic option.

[*]The Grigori, Dural, and Mechanos now get Great Philosophers instead of Prophets. Right now, they're functionally identical to Great Sages, but later I plan on doing something different with them.

Not entirely sure how I feel about this... Probably thematically appropriate, but it's nice to have the option of cranking out prophets as Grigori...

[*]Catacomb Libralus is now much cheaper than before, and it grants a training bonus to adept units, making it slightly more useful for civs who don't get mage guilds anyway.

Ugh... isn't it cheap enough already? And powerful enough? As is, if I'm playing with mages at all (and usually I do), I never build mages guild because the Catacombs are so easy to get and so awesome...

[*]Aquae Sucellus now removes any unhealthiness from population. I might change it so that it grants an Aqueduct in every city if the the healthy-cap removal proves too powerful, though.

In the city or for the whole civ?

[*]Malakim Palace now grants Fire mana instead of Mind (lessens the Malakim's early monopoly on divination spells and feels a lot more thematic).

Dislike. Mind seems to make more sense for Malakim than Fire IMHO. It was a point of contention in early FfH when Malakim got Fire because there was no Sun mana yet, and it seemed strange that Malakim were one of like 3 civs that had easier access to fireballs. If I can figure out how to change this when I download the mod (never done any modding on Civ IV but did a lot on earlier versions of Civ), I will change it for my own games.

[*]Philosophy now gives a Great Prophet to the first civ to research it. In exchange, it is now the same cost as the religion-founding techs such as Way of the Forests or Message from the Deep. Mainly this was to make it more appealing to religion-centric civs and less of a speed-bump tech. Now if you beeline to the late-game religions, you'll have the help of a Prophet to get there.

I like this a lot. I always thought that Philosophy should give a free prophet thematically, and as a side effect, that makes it an actual useful tech.

[*]Each religious tech makes the others more expensive, by a percentage between %20-%200, depending on their corresponding alignments. For example, going from Order to Ashen Veil has a 200% research penalty; going from Runes to Order only has a %20 penalty. This is mostly to discourage religion spam and drastic shifts in alignment.

Like++. Awesome change. I wonder, though, how it interacts with AI trading value... do they value the tech more based on how much it will cost them, how much it will cost you, or do they ignore the discounts?

[*]Scorpion Clan Archers can no longer pillage improvements. They're already a pain to dislodge even with advanced units, so letting them pillage seemed like overkill.

Absolutely. Those guys are annoying enough even without pillaging.

[*]Some promotions have had their requirements changed. Mobility, for instance, now requires at least a level 3 unit.

Didn't like this when I first read it, but the more I think about it, I think it's a good change. Makes Spiritual better, too, and it's already one of my favorite traits. Will miss being able to give my disciple units Mobility as their first promotion for non-Spiritual leaders though.

 

[Moosh]

I just realized this today. You have the animals as -city strength, when it should be -city attack.

-Moosh

 

[Jheral]

Not entirely sure how I feel about this... Probably thematically appropriate, but it's nice to have the option of cranking out prophets as Grigori...

Ugh... isn't it cheap enough already? And powerful enough? As is, if I'm playing with mages at all (and usually I do), I never build mages guild because the Catacombs are so easy to get and so awesome...

I would tend to agree with you here; I go that route as well. Much easier, and you get a guild in every new city.

Dislike. Mind seems to make more sense for Malakim than Fire IMHO. It was a point of contention in early FfH when Malakim got Fire because there was no Sun mana yet, and it seemed strange that Malakim were one of like 3 civs that had easier access to fireballs. If I can figure out how to change this when I download the mod (never done any modding on Civ IV but did a lot on earlier versions of Civ), I will change it for my own games.

From a lore-centric perspective, with their connection to Lugus and the Empyrean religion, they would most definately be closer to Mind than to Fire.

It's a fairly easy change to make on your own, actually. Just go into the FU_CIV4BuildingInfos.xml file, find the <Type>BUILDING_PALACE_MALAKIM</Type> building, and either delete the <FreeBonus2>BONUS_MANA_FIRE</FreeBonus2> tag or change it to <FreeBonus2>BONUS_MANA_MIND</FreeBonus2>

 

[Calavente]

Not entirely sure how I feel about this... Probably thematically appropriate, but it's nice to have the option of cranking out prophets as Grigori...

Ugh... isn't it cheap enough already? And powerful enough? As is, if I'm playing with mages at all (and usually I do), I never build mages guild because the Catacombs are so easy to get and so awesome...

I would tend to agree with you here; I go that route as well. Much easier, and you get a guild in every new city.

Dislike. Mind seems to make more sense for Malakim than Fire IMHO. It was a point of contention in early FfH when Malakim got Fire because there was no Sun mana yet, and it seemed strange that Malakim were one of like 3 civs that had easier access to fireballs. If I can figure out how to change this when I download the mod (never done any modding on Civ IV but did a lot on earlier versions of Civ), I will change it for my own games.

From a lore-centric perspective, with their connection to Lugus and the Empyrean religion, they would most definately be closer to Mind than to Fire. [/B]

Well for the "great philosopher", if he can do ALL THAT A PROPHET CAN DO, + more, it would be ok. What I wouldn't like is if he can do less.
(such as I don't really like luonnatar that are like druids.. but 1 no magic (no religious magic I could understand... but no magic at all...bleeh) +no affinity at all. At least they should have a bonus somewhere or an unique mechanism.)
For fire, I don't know the Lore, but ot seems to me that mind is good for malakim, and Fire + Sun would be a bit "redondant"... especially as you can already find the pyre and the mirror in desert.

So long as a route goes through unowned or friendly (meaning open borders) territory, it will connect.

True. BUT : if there is a barabrian on the road, the trade network is cut.
If there is a barb on the river side, I'm not sure. So defending the "trade" routes by appointing some strategically positionned units would be good : the aim is to raid the wandering barb to make them leave the road. You can even put them in forts as it would ensure that the route is in your cultural borders (but fort commander would not be sufficent as you can't raid the barb).
Would be best to have cultural extension of forts be reduced if there is only a fort commander so as not to make lone castle being huge culture-focus and it make the defense of a trade ntework a bit easy to maintain (cultural protection without any maintenance) (it is easier to own territory by posting many forts than by building cities). Maybe make the culture/turn depend on the number of units in the fort ?

 

[MrUnderhill]

Ugh... isn't it cheap enough already? And powerful enough? As is, if I'm playing with mages at all (and usually I do), I never build mages guild because the Catacombs are so easy to get and so awesome...

It depends on how many cities you've got. CL looks great in a vacuum, but when you do the math it's often better just to build Mage Guilds directly.

Unaltered, CL costs 600 hammers: more than any other early-game wonder besides the Mines of Gal-dur or the Tower of Complacency, and enough for 5 mage guilds not counting the one you have to build in order to get it. By the time you can build it, however, you probably won't have more than 3 or 4 cities, which means that CL will only start pulling its weight in the late game as you expand. It's actually even worse if you're Arcane, since Mage Guilds get a 50% discount while CL remains full price, which means that you won't be seeing the benefits of CL until you've got 8-10 cities. You could argue that tying down a production city with CL is preferable to tying down your entire empire (including border towns) with Mage Guilds, but really you only need Mage Guilds in your unit-producing cities, anyway, and this way the production that would've gone into CL can be used to actually train mages or build more worthwhile wonders like the Great Library. In my games at least, CL was always the most expensive wonder in my queue and the one I waited on building the most. I might make it so that the reduced cost only goes to Arcane leaders (to counterbalance the Mage Guild discount), but I still think it needs to be changed.

In the city or for the whole civ?

Just the city it's built in. Now that would be overpowered.

Dislike. Mind seems to make more sense for Malakim than Fire IMHO. It was a point of contention in early FfH when Malakim got Fire because there was no Sun mana yet, and it seemed strange that Malakim were one of like 3 civs that had easier access to fireballs. If I can figure out how to change this when I download the mod (never done any modding on Civ IV but did a lot on earlier versions of Civ), I will change it for my own games.

Maybe before Mammon's fall it would have worked, but now it doesn't. It always just seemed weird to me that one of the most freedom-respecting of the default civs has the same access to mind control that the Balseraphs and Svartalfar have. You could argue that they should have Spirit instead, but that wouldn't change the fact that the Malakim are the only civ to have three mana types of the same school, and with the changes I made to the tech tree, leaving it like that would give the Malakim an even bigger advantage towards Divination than they already have. Fire seemed like a suitable replacement.

 

[Calavente]

Unaltered, CL costs 600 hammers: more than any other early-game wonder besides the Mines of Gal-dur or the Tower of Complacency, and enough for 5 mage guilds not counting the one you have to build in order to get it. By the time you can build it, however, you probably won't have more than 3 or 4 cities, which means that CL will only start pulling its weight in the late game as you expand. It's actually even worse if you're Arcane, since Mage Guilds get a 50% discount while CL remains full price, which means that you won't be seeing the benefits of CL until you've got 8-10 cities. You could argue that tying down a production city with CL is preferable to tying down your entire empire (including border towns) with Mage Guilds, but really you only need Mage Guilds in your unit-producing cities, anyway, and this way the production that would've gone into CL can be used to actually train mages or build more worthwhile wonders like the Great Library. In my games at least, CL was always the most expensive wonder in my queue and the one I waited on building the most. I might make it so that the reduced cost only goes to Arcane leaders (to counterbalance the Mage Guild discount), but I still think it needs to be changed.

On the other hand, later cities always have so much to do to catch on that it is generaly better to build the CL in your capital, with God-King on (+50%) than building Mage guilds in surrounding cities + don't discount the support to the magic-supporting house. It's true that generaly I'd rather build another wonder instead

 

[fieari]

I was about to report this bug in the general bugs thread, but the last comment there suggests that this might be a Fall Under bug.

The interface is completely vanished in the following save:

 

[Moosh]

Okay, so I saw a drake yesteday that had -120% city strength and a great lizard today that had -120% city attack, not sure if they two promos got mixed up or not.

-Moosh

 

[Torugu]

On the other hand, later cities always have so much to do to catch on that it is generaly better to build the CL in your capital, with God-King on (+50%) than building Mage guilds in surrounding cities + don't discount the support to the magic-supporting house. It's true that generaly I'd rather build another wonder instead

Aren't the houses a Wildmana mechanic while this is a module for Rife?

BTW, I sometimes built the Catacombs when I got nothing better to do in the early game but I never miss them when I don't. Even if your playing a very magic heavy strategy you won't need more than 2 or 3 cities with mage guilds one of which you'll need to build anyway and the Catacombs are just too expensive if all you get are 1 - 2 free guilds.

 

[EugeneStyles]

It depends on how many cities you've got. CL looks great in a vacuum, but when you do the math it's often better just to build Mage Guilds directly.

While I see where you're coming from with your further explanation, I don't necessarily agree with the conclusion. Mostly for a point that has been mentioned - i.e. that your non-capital cities don't generally have the production that you have with God King early game, and your late game cities have so much to do to catch up as far as buildings... It turns out to usually be well worth it for me. Sometimes I even build it with Khazad, but that's usually due to just having excess production and the fact that I hate spamming too many units.

However, having played a partial game with your mod (got a bug that others have mentioned where half of the UI disappears so I can no longer cast spells or use unit abilities), I didn't find the discount on CL to be excessive. Especially because I was playing with Amurites and like you said the discount for Mages Guilds doesn't apply to CL and makes it borderline not-worth-building otherwise. I would suggest that Arcane should give a bonus to hammers for CL instead of a blanket discount, but even leaving it the way you have it now is fine by me - the discount doesn't make it ridiculously cheap or anything...

 

[MrUnderhill]

Okay, so I saw a drake yesteday that had -120% city strength and a great lizard today that had -120% city attack, not sure if they two promos got mixed up or not.

-Moosh

I think what happens is that when the city attack and city defense bonuses are equal, they're lumped together under city strength, but when they're different, they're listed as attack/defense. I only added one promo, and it reduces city attack AND defense (so animals can't hold or take over cities), but the Great Lizard may have some kind of city attack or defense bonus that makes the two values unequal.

 

[odalrick]

While I see where you're coming from with your further explanation, I don't necessarily agree with the conclusion. Mostly for a point that has been mentioned - i.e. that your non-capital cities don't generally have the production that you have with God King early game, and your late game cities have so much to do to catch up as far as buildings... It turns out to usually be well worth it for me. Sometimes I even build it with Khazad, but that's usually due to just having excess production and the fact that I hate spamming too many units.

So what if the border cities have a hard time catching up? If they're not great centers of production, they shouldn't be building mages anyway, they should be building whatever they need to catch up.

And my capital is usually too busy to waste three (just to name a number) turns building a useless wonder. I might farm it out to a border city, one that will never contribute more than whatever commerce it is producing to the empire, but that's just busy work.

Bottom line: If the best reason to build the wonder is "I have nothing better to build." then it's a weak wonder.

 

[Calavente]

Aren't the houses a Wildmana mechanic while this is a module for Rife?

oups, you're right.
But on the other hand, while it is not a necessary wonder. and it is not necessary to have more than 3-4 cities with mage guild, it is useful.
I mean, when I need some adepts for "bodyI" that I just built, I won't necessarly use some hardwon promo on my current mages. I won't either use my big-production cities to build those adepts as i'd rather they build wonders, longbows, champions TIV units...etc
thus, the (almost) good for nothing cities (only size 12-14) that have some building they can build to pursue their upgrade, will make an "upgrade stop" and spent 4-6 turns in order to build the adepts. and lo.. I have 5-6 adepts with bodyI.

So, while on a tactical level you would think you need only 3-4 cities with mage guild, I think that on a strategical level, mid-late game, the investment on the CL is worth it's cost, but not on a production level, on a flexibility level.

In theory you would need 3cities specialised for siege, 3 for melee, 3 for cavalry, 3 for recon, 3 for arcane, 2 for naval, 3 for disciples. And you combien it in some cities, even with one or 2 "unit-prod city" that can build almost all units.
But in reality, if sometimes you can build an archer / longbow, a chariot/horsearcher on other cities than the "specialised" ones, it can help you, when you are in a tight spot or if you try for a wonder but are simultaneously expending or under attack. It is even more useful if you can gold-rush.

So if archery, stables and barracks cannot be free in every cities, mage-guilds can.

Take what you can when you can.

 

[MrUnderhill]

Came up with a possible cause for the late-game UI issue. I don't know if it is the problem but it might be worth looking at.

The problem might have something to do with the fact that most of the Unique GP have the same names as the regular ones. For example, both the Amurite Great Sage and the regular Great Sage have the same names, so when the game tries to pick a name for one that was already picked for the other, that might cause a crash. The only way to test this would be to give the Unique GP's new names and see if the crash still persists, but it's something.

EDIT: Scratch that. I tried using Worldbuilder to see if I could replicate the bug. I spawned a ton of Amurite GS's as well as regular ones without a problem. No duplicate names, even. The pop-up code may have something to do with it, but so far I don't think the naming system is the problem.

 

[EugeneStyles]

FWIW, when I had the UI issue, it was still pretty early game. Like turn 110 or so. I was using the religion-based UI option, which I thought might have been causing a conflict (though I've used it once or twice before with no issue). I can send you a save game if you want, but not anytime soon - gotta run out the door for now, and not sure if I'll have time to find it tonight...