GEM generic modification

[Ace of Spades]

Merchant specialists will be very powerful this way, too. Since they produce one food each, you can basically have twice as many merchants than other specialists... it will be interesting to see how this works out, especially the human player will benefit from this I suppose, due to micromanagement. Say hello to loads of cash

Best Regards,
Ace

 

[Genghis_Kai]

Hi Genghis!

Glad to see there's people making scenarios with your map. I'm glad to see that you're going to fasten up units, specially marine ones. I still think modern ships should get an even more considerable boost on movement, since with the current change they would still take ages to cross the oceans.

I'm having final exams at uni, but will download the new scenarios you've made when I finish. Looking forward for that!

Cheers!

EDIT: Also noticed that from now on coast will produce a shield and jungles will not only stop having a food penalty, but they will produce extra commerce. How come? Wouldn't that give a big advantage to some areas?

There are so many island cities which I have implemented in the scenarios. Those cities have no hammer in the default setting which makes them useless. The one hammer/sea tile makes them usable.

For the jungle, it is just a matter of realism - I don't agree why jungle should get a food penalty while forest gets none and have a hammer bonus.

 

[Marmoteo]

Yeah, fair enough, that's pretty true. It'll be great to have a Dutch city with the Moai and the UB. The thing with the coasts tiles commerce reduced by one is that financial civs will no longer benefit from the extra commerce from coasts now, which leaves them only to benefit from resources, hamlets, etc. But that could actually be good, since the financial trait has always offered one of the biggest advantages. Who knows!

 

[Genghis_Kai]

I am starting to work on new civs and leaderheads. So far so good. I am able to implement Hitler, Mussolini, Hirohito and Chiang's leaderheads (taken from the Road to War mod coming with BTS) in the 1940AD scenario which is fantastic! However, I am facing a difficult decision to made. Should I:

a) Add new leaderheads to GEM, which would easily made GEM to be of size over 100MB (1 leaderhead ~ 8MB). It would mean GEM will no longer be a small enough mod that everyone can just download and checkout what it is. Moreover, it will exceed the 10MB upload limit in civfanatic and so I will need to store it somewhere else.

b) Just don't add new leaderheads and stick with the present pseudo-civ. I can also add new flags (such as nazi Germany, Britain and France) because these flags are very small in size. This can keep GEM still under 10MB in size.

I would like to hear your opinion on this.

 

[Bastian-Bux]

When adding flags please keep in mind that the swastika is an illegal symbol in Germany and some other european countries. So please don't use that flag, or you'll make it illegal to play your mod for those living in that countries.

 

[Genghis_Kai]

When adding flags please keep in mind that the swastika is an illegal symbol in Germany and some other european countries. So please don't use that flag, or you'll make it illegal to play your mod for those living in that countries.

Oh really? So, is the modified flag used in Road to War legal in Europe? The flag has only a black cross instead of the its arms bended at right angle.

 

[Bastian-Bux]

That one is legal ... and yes, the juristic questions are the reasons for its use instead of the more well known but illegal one.

 

[Jabarto]

Is it possible to make the leaderheads a separate, optional download that could be extracted into the GEM mod folder? That would keep the main file small while still making the leaderheads available to those who want them.

If not, I'd go with option B, though I don't have too strong an opinion on this.

 

[Ace of Spades]

I would very much like to see a larger impact of the diplomatic wonders, apostolic palace and united nations in the GEM scenarios.

This could probably be achieved by lowering the intervals on which elections and resolutions occur. Right now, due to the large number of turns, they seem to happen very rarely. I would welcome about five to seven times the frequencey of resolutions compared to the current settings. Most of my experience is from the impact on the 1500 AD scenario, though.

What's your opinion on this?

Best Regards,
Ace

 

[Traiano]

I would very much like to see a larger impact of the diplomatic wonders, apostolic palace and united nations in the GEM scenarios.

This could probably be achieved by lowering the intervals on which elections and resolutions occur. Right now, due to the large number of turns, they seem to happen very rarely. I would welcome about five to seven times the frequencey of resolutions compared to the current settings. Most of my experience is from the impact on the 1500 AD scenario, though.

What's your opinion on this?

Best Regards,
Ace

Good idea.
I'll see what can be done in this regard. I'd like to see resolutions voted and enforced more often.

The only annoying point is that unfortunately firaxis didn't open the AP to python so we can't do anything with it to have the AP Leader declare war more often rather than just ask to stop the war.

What would be great, but tricky to do, is to incorporate the HolyWars Mod done by Surdanis, into GEM.
It add tons of options for the Apostolic Palace.
I'm currently looking into it, aint easy but maybe with some hard work or Surdanis help...

 

[Ace of Spades]

I would suggest modifying the financial trait to have it add +1 trade to any plot with at least 1 trade, or maybe +2 trade to any sea plot.

As of now, the trait is rather useless for coast-loving civs, especially since great merchants are so powerful with your changes.

Another option would be to make the trait add a flat 15% to commerce production in all cities.

Best Regards,
Ace

 

[Ace of Spades]

...wrong thread, sorry.

 

[Genghis_Kai]

I would suggest modifying the financial trait to have it add +1 trade to any plot with at least 1 trade, or maybe +2 trade to any sea plot.

As of now, the trait is rather useless for coast-loving civs, especially since great merchants are so powerful with your changes.

Another option would be to make the trait add a flat 15% to commerce production in all cities.

Best Regards,
Ace

Yes, that's something I should think about.

But in general, are we all happy with the +1 hammer in coast/sea tiles? I am quite happy with it. In 1940AD, I saw a lot of pacific islands can now grow like normal cities.

 

[Genghis_Kai]

I would very much like to see a larger impact of the diplomatic wonders, apostolic palace and united nations in the GEM scenarios.

This could probably be achieved by lowering the intervals on which elections and resolutions occur. Right now, due to the large number of turns, they seem to happen very rarely. I would welcome about five to seven times the frequencey of resolutions compared to the current settings. Most of my experience is from the impact on the 1500 AD scenario, though.

What's your opinion on this?

Best Regards,
Ace

I personally don't like apostolic palace and united nations. They are a bit unrealistic.

 

[Ace of Spades]

Battleships currently still upgrade to Missile Cruisers.

However, with your custom changes, it's mostly a downgrade, as you lose 5 strength. Personally, I'd rather keep my Battleships, especially since I can always get Misslie Cruisers from upgrading my Destroyers.

Best Regards,
Ace

 

[Genghis_Kai]

Battleships currently still upgrade to Missile Cruisers.

However, with your custom changes, it's mostly a downgrade, as you lose 5 strength. Personally, I'd rather keep my Battleships, especially since I can always get Misslie Cruisers from upgrading my Destroyers.

Best Regards,
Ace

Oh ok. that needs to be reviewed.

 

[Genghis_Kai]

I would like to continue the discussion on +1 trade on sea tile in this thread.

So would you think making sea tiles back to +2 trade be ok? It seems to be the easiest fix for the financial trail. But I am unsure whether sea tiles would be too good to have. Being 2/1/2, it will be the best type of unimproved terrain!

 

[Bastian-Bux]

2/1/2 is to good. I like the 1/1/1 as it is. What would be sensible would be to give Financial a raw 25% commerce bonus. But make sure its commerce not just income. Income is worthless when you are researching heavily, while commerce is always usefull.

 

[Genghis_Kai]

2/1/2 is to good. I like the 1/1/1 as it is. What would be sensible would be to give Financial a raw 25% commerce bonus. But make sure its commerce not just income. Income is worthless when you are researching heavily, while commerce is always usefull.

Oh yes, I meant 1/1/2 (I assumed you already got lighthouse for that additional food).

 

[Ace of Spades]

From a balance-based view, I guess it would not hurt. Most of the civilizations that would benefit from this are rather weak anyway (from the 1500 AD map, at least).

GEM does not have extensive coastlines - to my mind it's a map that favors land based strategies over sea based strategies. It rarely makes sense to settle coastlines only.

However, I have no idea how it could work out in other scenarios. Personally, I'd prefer to boost the financial trait itself by lowering the threshold for the bonus rather than improving ocean for all coastal civilizations, therefore supporting more diverse strategies.

Best Regards,
Ace