I'm such a noob...thanks for your efforts! I'll give it a shot now.
Also, if you're looking for any unique units suggestions, I'd be glad to help!
[FULL] Putmalk's Ancient World Discussion Thread
- Thread starter Putmalk
- Start date
I'm such a noob...thanks for your efforts! I'll give it a shot now.
Also, if you're looking for any unique units suggestions, I'd be glad to help!
One other piece of the ancient world I enjoy are barbarians. I find the default settings for camp spawns are kind of weak. Raging barbarians just increases the rate of unit spawns from the camps, but not the coverage of camps themselves. Those distance requirements and spawn percentages are in the XML.
Also, I find barbarians suffer from two big problems that hurt the simulation in an ancient world setting.
1.) They can't embark to go raiding
2.) They get stuck spawning nothing but Brutes and Archers
I felt like Civ4 was much better about having barbarians keeping up with the jones in terms of the tech period. It'd be awesome to see barbarians keeping up with the most powerful non-resource dependent unit available at the same pace city-states do. So they wouldn't get Swordsmen, but they could spawn Axemen, Levies (and maybe Reavers) in later periods to still be a threat.
It'd be really awesome to just have some remote island you ignore suddenly dump a wave of ax-wielding Picts on my shore. I'd keep me on my toes, certainly.
It'd be kind of awesome to have "Barbarians Hordes" as an optional supplement you could enable (either through direct editing of a true/false flag, renaming a folder, or just installing a secondary mod).
- Marty Lund
Also, I find barbarians suffer from two big problems that hurt the simulation in an ancient world setting.
1.) They can't embark to go raiding
2.) They get stuck spawning nothing but Brutes and Archers
I felt like Civ4 was much better about having barbarians keeping up with the jones in terms of the tech period. It'd be awesome to see barbarians keeping up with the most powerful non-resource dependent unit available at the same pace city-states do. So they wouldn't get Swordsmen, but they could spawn Axemen, Levies (and maybe Reavers) in later periods to still be a threat.
It'd be really awesome to just have some remote island you ignore suddenly dump a wave of ax-wielding Picts on my shore. I'd keep me on my toes, certainly.
It'd be kind of awesome to have "Barbarians Hordes" as an optional supplement you could enable (either through direct editing of a true/false flag, renaming a folder, or just installing a secondary mod).
- Marty Lund
Well, if you've been keeping up with the updates on V7:
Barbarians now have access to stronger units the longer they survive. The strongest unit, Barbarian Marauders, have 18 strength and are stronger than normal Swordsman.
Barbarians will also have access to new ships such as Pirate ships that have lots of strength but little ranged strength...this will make them more of a nuisance and harassing your ships. Also, pirates ships will be fast....
Barbarians will also get special horseman.
And, barbarians can spawn from goody huts now!
That's pretty awesome. Any way to ramp up the baseline by era so any Late Classical era camp re-spawns aren't tracking as if they were starting on Turn 5 of the ancient era? I'd love to keep the Barbarian Menace relevant to the time period. If nothing else, tracking it to the number of game turns total (not just the number they've been alive) would keep them relevant. I love the idea of the Dark Ages looming just over the horizon if you go soft.
Nasty. I'm definitely going to enjoy that.
Ooh, I'm really liking the Warriors -> Levies upgrade path too. Warrior -> Swordsman in such an iron-poor environment was making me sad. Taking away the Iron Req on the catapult helps a lot in the early game. In the mid-to-late game my economy is good enough to import iron from city states.
- Marty Lund
PAVLOS_GR300
Greek
by this though every greek civ is covered by the term greek so no mycenean or minoan is needed.but as u have mentioned the mod has many war civs and a naval one is prefered.i just pointed out that many people like to play as Spartans and if u want to go eastwards the most civs u will find are based on trade
Whipped up a quick entry for Pirates.
Thoughts?
Yep.
For now the next civs are Assyria and Huns though, so no worries about anymore greek civs for a while.
I was about to suggest Assyria!!!
As for your entry...perhaps you should say "have posed a nuisance."
Also, second to last line, there's a little typo. "Captured."
I am currently looking for a history of Mitanni, Lydia, Gyges, and Parshatatar. I could write one myself, but it takes a while and I'd rather iron out bugs of the mod and get it out as quickly as possible.
If someone could be so kind...I'd really appreciate it....
Also came up with a new technology, Pavement.
Increases road movement by 33%.
Requires Aesthetics, Engineering. Leads to Future Tech.
Rationale: Romans were the masters at paving roads, and their road network allowed their armies to quickly move through their lands. Ironically, these very roads would be used by the barbarians that caused the collapse of their empire.
With Pavement, there will most likely be another unit called the Militia, which is like the Levy, and its attack is something like 14.
Maybe I'll just switch Militia and Levy around.
And yes, I'm just brainstorming ideas here. Feel free to add input.
If someone could be so kind...I'd really appreciate it....
Also came up with a new technology, Pavement.
Increases road movement by 33%.
Requires Aesthetics, Engineering. Leads to Future Tech.
Rationale: Romans were the masters at paving roads, and their road network allowed their armies to quickly move through their lands. Ironically, these very roads would be used by the barbarians that caused the collapse of their empire.
With Pavement, there will most likely be another unit called the Militia, which is like the Levy, and its attack is something like 14.
Maybe I'll just switch Militia and Levy around.
And yes, I'm just brainstorming ideas here. Feel free to add input.
I like it. Nice little idea.
As for the history of those civilizations...I am in graduate school for Early Modern European history, but I have never even heard of most of those civs you're missing entries for! :/
Militia, levy...
How about adding a second unique unit to civs who lack one?
For the Celts...the warband! Could be a bit stronger than the spearman and cheaper?
For Carthage...I don't know. The Quinquereme. Or is that already in the game? Maybe...the Sacred Band? I'll keep brainstorming...no time right now.
How about adding a second unique unit to civs who lack one?
For the Celts...the warband! Could be a bit stronger than the spearman and cheaper?
For Carthage...I don't know. The Quinquereme. Or is that already in the game? Maybe...the Sacred Band? I'll keep brainstorming...no time right now.
Gyges and Parshatatar are leaders of Lydia and Mitanni, respectively.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mitanni
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lydia
Also came up with a new technology, Pavement.
Increases road movement by 33%.
Requires Aesthetics, Engineering. Leads to Future Tech.
Rationale: Romans were the masters at paving roads, and their road network allowed their armies to quickly move through their lands. Ironically, these very roads would be used by the barbarians that caused the collapse of their empire.
With Pavement, there will most likely be another unit called the Militia, which is like the Levy, and its attack is something like 14.
Maybe I'll just switch Militia and Levy around.
Well, the Romans introduced their first major highway paving project in 312 B.C. (the Via Appia) - it is as old if not older than the Roman Legions themselves. Perhaps that technology could be the one that unlocks Levies in the Classical Era - allowing citizen soldiers and conscripts to be moved abroad rapidly?
Honestly, the idea of paved roads waiting to the end of the tech tree is a little off-beat. It might fit nicely between construction and iron working, iron working and metal casting, or next to metal casting with horsemanship + iron working unlocking it while just an iron bee-line opens metal casting (seriously, what do the horses care, you don't cast horse shoes anyway).
Levies could move onto the Pavement tech to unlock and to make Code of Laws a little more important it should become a prerequisite for trade. After all, you need some form of common law to make trade agreements work. Currency + Contracts = Trade.
- Marty Lund
Well I've done some thinking.
I'm going to place Pavement where I originally intended it to be, because really that area of the tech tree represents the late BCs. And if you think about it, Medicine doesn't really fit as it was invented somewhere in Egypt early on but it's at the end for gameplay purposes.
What I really need is some 0 AD+ techs that will go into the "Medieval Era". I'll think of something.
Here's what I thought of. And some of them aren't 0AD necessarily but they're good for gameplay. I'll keep em at the end of the tree, they seem to fit nicely.
Pavement - Movement
Glassblowing - Gold
Crossbow - Ranged
Sanitation - Growth
I'm going to place Pavement where I originally intended it to be, because really that area of the tech tree represents the late BCs. And if you think about it, Medicine doesn't really fit as it was invented somewhere in Egypt early on but it's at the end for gameplay purposes.
What I really need is some 0 AD+ techs that will go into the "Medieval Era". I'll think of something.
Here's what I thought of. And some of them aren't 0AD necessarily but they're good for gameplay. I'll keep em at the end of the tree, they seem to fit nicely.
Pavement - Movement
Glassblowing - Gold
Crossbow - Ranged
Sanitation - Growth
Well I've done some thinking.
I'm going to place Pavement where I originally intended it to be, because really that area of the tech tree represents the late BCs. And if you think about it, Medicine doesn't really fit as it was invented somewhere in Egypt early on but it's at the end for gameplay purposes.
I kind of look at it in 4 distinct eras:
Bronze Age - pretty much what's currently in the "Ancient Era" of the tech tree.
Iron Age - mostly what you have right now as "Classic Era"
Early Classical Period - around 500 BC to 1 BC
Late Classical Period - 1 AD to around 450 AD
After that you're officially in the Medieval Period.
If you want a later technology to upgrade road movement I recommend "Logistics," since pavement is already covered in the Early Classical Period. Logistics is the art of putting those paved highways to proper use for large amounts of people all at once.
Pavement might be a good buffer in Early Classical to move some stuff down into the later Era, though. Maybe it could give you a small production or gold boost like Railroad does in the vanilla game?
You could pad it out a little more with Glassblowing early in Late Classical for revenues and Stained Glass at the end of the tech tree - maybe unlocking a Cathedral as a national wonder equivalent to the Heritage but keying off of churches.
Crossbows are a little premature for Europe, but China had crossbow infantry very early, so it is a good compromise.
Vassalage might fit on this end too, as the concept was already being used by Huns and would eventually replace Roman imperial rule and barbarian tribalism. It could generate some more gold (especially from puppets) and mayve extra resources from city-state allies. Heck, it could provide the catalyst tech for building something to trigger a diplomatic victory like the U.N.
- Marty Lund
Yeah I was thinking of updating tech names and shifting around the eras a bit, to balance out the length of each era and to be a bit more realistic. This will happen, eventually, however with every change to era I have to manually update every help/strategy text to match accordingly.
Crossbows were actually invented around 400 BC in Greece, they were called Gastraphetes, and they will be the unit that Crossbow grants (not Crossbowman). So actually it fits quite nicely on the timeline.
I try not to put social developments (read: not religion XD) on the tech tree, so you probably won't see stuff such as Feudalism or Vassalage on the tech tree, unless I really would like some ideas. Plus I attribute that stuff to Medieval Era, around 800 AD, which is beyond the scope of this mod.
Stained glass won't do, I don't see a purpose and Cathedrals are, like Feudalism and Vassalage, above the scope of this mod.
I don't think I'll need more techs after these four...I expect the mod to pace quite nicely with these additions.
Since I can't sleep I'll work on getting all the new assets playable. They're going to need art assets. I'm too bad with art, I'm not even going to try. If I don't get custom icons I'll just slip some default Firaxis ones and put a request in, making art is exhausting work. Especially when you suck at it.
Building - Glass Workshop
Tech - Crossbow
Tech - Glassblowing
Tech - Pavement
Tech - Sanitation
Unit - Militia (Sorta like Legions except less armored)
If I released the version as it is now:
- there would be no non-DLC version
- the file wouldn't be under 10 MB, which means I have to host on a different site and it runs the risk of being taken down (they don't like my mod)
- you would run into a littany of bugs that I need to iron out (like unit upgrades)
- the game may be out of balance
Version 7 will not come out this year but shouldn't take much longer after the new year
Crossbows were actually invented around 400 BC in Greece, they were called Gastraphetes, and they will be the unit that Crossbow grants (not Crossbowman). So actually it fits quite nicely on the timeline.
I try not to put social developments (read: not religion XD) on the tech tree, so you probably won't see stuff such as Feudalism or Vassalage on the tech tree, unless I really would like some ideas. Plus I attribute that stuff to Medieval Era, around 800 AD, which is beyond the scope of this mod.
Stained glass won't do, I don't see a purpose and Cathedrals are, like Feudalism and Vassalage, above the scope of this mod.
I don't think I'll need more techs after these four...I expect the mod to pace quite nicely with these additions.
Since I can't sleep I'll work on getting all the new assets playable. They're going to need art assets. I'm too bad with art, I'm not even going to try. If I don't get custom icons I'll just slip some default Firaxis ones and put a request in, making art is exhausting work.
Especially when you suck at it.Building - Glass Workshop
Tech - Crossbow
Tech - Glassblowing
Tech - Pavement
Tech - Sanitation
Unit - Militia (Sorta like Legions except less armored)
Sneaks said:
If I released the version as it is now:
- there would be no non-DLC version
- the file wouldn't be under 10 MB, which means I have to host on a different site and it runs the risk of being taken down (they don't like my mod)
- you would run into a littany of bugs that I need to iron out (like unit upgrades)
- the game may be out of balance
Version 7 will not come out this year but shouldn't take much longer after the new year
Just wonder if anyone else feel Huns a bit "out of date"? AFAIK they were active in Middle Ages; earlyest upcome in 4th - 3rd Cent. AD (there is no evidence for 100 AD upcome theory connected to Xiongnu).
So wouldnt other horse people fit better to existing Civs? Skythians for example or Parthians?
How about a simple soulution: Just dont call it "Medicine" (add "Medicine" to the first Age, which is in need to be improved anyway
). Instad name it Hippocratic Oath or Healthcare or so. Same way you could rename some other technologies, which are a bit early for this mod or placed to late there.
- Compass [even in china not really used(!) before 1000 AD] -> since you connected it to sea, maybe call it "High Sea Navigation" ?
- Optics -> "Coastal Navigation"?,
- Physics -> "Siege Warface",
- Trade [much to late there, Trade was in place before Writing] -> why not name it more specifical: "Oversea Trade" for example or "Foreign Trade" and then you could connect it with Silk Route Wonder.
Just a few toughts.
Just wonder if anyone else feel Huns a bit "out of date"? AFAIK they were active in Middle Ages; earlyest upcome in 4th - 3rd Cent. AD (there is no evidence for 100 AD upcome theory connected to Xiongnu).
So wouldnt other horse people fit better to existing Civs? Skythians for example or Parthians?
How about a simple soulution: Just dont call it "Medicine" (add "Medicine" to the first Age, which is in need to be improved anyway
Same way you could rename some other technologies, which are a bit early for this mod or placed to late there.
- Compass [even in china not really used(!) before 1000 AD] -> since you connected it to sea, maybe call it "High Sea Navigation" ?
- Optics -> "Coastal Navigation"?,
- Physics -> "Siege Warface",
- Trade [much to late there, Trade was in place before Writing] -> why not name it more specifical: "Oversea Trade" for example or "Foreign Trade" and then you could connect it with Silk Route Wonder.
Just a few toughts.
Huns were actively involved in the fall of the Roman Empire, iirc. Which makes them perfectly eligible for inclusion in this mod.
As for the tech names, we'll see about those.
At the moment, existing techs are low priority.Loads of tech tree changes coming up, there are the notes (as of now, didn't update the first post).
Putmalk's Ancient World said:
Bronze Age - 19 Techs (1415 Research)
Iron Age - 12 Techs (4600 Research)
Classical Age - 8 Techs (9200 Research)
Late Classical Age - 7 Techs (17000 Research)
Medieval Age - 1 Tech (30000 Research)
Work-in-progress screenshot:
Spoiler :
Back to the idea of grouping civs and giving each group a special unit path...
My idea is that, once your special units have been used (such as Carthage's Numidian Mercenaries (Horseman) or the Mycenaean's spearman replacement) in the early game, civilizations aren't as attractive and fun to play later on because they have lost what made them unique.
I don't know about you guys, but personally, I love it when I have my own set of units fighting another civilization which uses a slightly or completely different set of units.
To me, it is much more fun to see hoplite vs. legionary (a bad example...) and Numidian Mercenary vs. Celtic Headhunter than swordsman vs swordsman or spearman vs. spearman!
Okay, I'll be quiet now.
My idea is that, once your special units have been used (such as Carthage's Numidian Mercenaries (Horseman) or the Mycenaean's spearman replacement) in the early game, civilizations aren't as attractive and fun to play later on because they have lost what made them unique.
I don't know about you guys, but personally, I love it when I have my own set of units fighting another civilization which uses a slightly or completely different set of units.
To me, it is much more fun to see hoplite vs. legionary (a bad example...) and Numidian Mercenary vs. Celtic Headhunter than swordsman vs swordsman or spearman vs. spearman!
Okay, I'll be quiet now.
A change like that is not on the table for Version 7. It would require a lot of time to perfect and the game's systems might interfere with its functionality. I'll think about it.
I can throw ethnic units in there that wouldn't be considered unique units, but in fact would be unique to certain civilizations. It involves reversing the effects of unique unit defining, and instead of defining what civs can use a unit (like a unique unit), you define what civs can't (like a Barbarian).
My last post contains important new tech tree information!
I think I'm almost done with the content generation. The next step is creating new artwork and suring up the installation process. Which will be annoying and tedious.
Completed tech tree. No other changes are expected to the tree.
Spoiler :
