Getting Started

[Thalassicus]

@Txurce
No clue, haven't encountered that problem.

@Seek
I did what I could. Basically, since it's (I believe) impossible to alter the likelihood of the kill city state quest for friendly city-states, I modified everything else available to be more likely.

Spoiler :

<Update>
  <Where Name="MINOR_CIV_QUEST_WEIGHT_MULTIPLIER_FRIENDLY_ROUTE"/>
  <Set Value="400"/> <!-- 200 -->
</Update>
<Update>
  <Where Name="MINOR_CIV_QUEST_WEIGHT_MULTIPLIER_NEUTRAL_KILL_CITY_STATE"/>
  <Set Value="10"/> <!-- 40 -->
</Update>
<Update>
  <Where Name="MINOR_CIV_QUEST_WEIGHT_MULTIPLIER_MARITIME_ROUTE"/>
  <Set Value="300"/> <!-- 150 -->
</Update>
<Update>
  <Where Name="MINOR_CIV_QUEST_WEIGHT_MULTIPLIER_MARITIME_CONNECT_RESOURCE"/>
  <Set Value="600"/> <!-- 300 -->
</Update>
<Update>
  <Where Name="MINOR_CIV_QUEST_WEIGHT_MULTIPLIER_MARITIME_FIND_PLAYER"/>
  <Set Value="600"/> <!-- 300 -->
</Update>
<Update>
  <Where Name="MINOR_CIV_QUEST_WEIGHT_MULTIPLIER_CULTURED_CONSTRUCT_WONDER"/>
  <Set Value="600"/> <!-- 300 -->
</Update>
<Update>
  <Where Name="MINOR_CIV_QUEST_WEIGHT_MULTIPLIER_CULTURED_GREAT_PERSON"/>
  <Set Value="600"/> <!-- 300 -->
</Update>

As far as a combined mod... the primary difficulty is documentation. It'd be necessary to keep mod details synchronized in 5 places (data, readme, thread, recent updates list on site, and combined mod)... when lately I've been trying to reduce workload. I spend about 5-6 hours per week updating documentation (copying from readmes to thread/site) when I do a release.

I could provide a combined version without any documentation/readmes/web info, though, if that would be a suitable trade of feature for functionality. It'd just have everything dumped in one modbuddy project.

 

[Soduka]

The readme says it's updated Unofficial Patch to V 29 but the folder is still labeled as V 28.

 

[Thalassicus]

Thanks for pointing that out. I incremented the version.

As there appear to be no major bugs reported since yesterday morning, I'm going to put together a release version. I also tested some past bugs to ensure they're fixed, such as capturing capital cities.

 

[Zeppelin4]

Wow! That was some update you put up. Thanks to Thal and everyone else that puts in all the hard work to make Civ 5 a better game.

 

[Thalassicus]

Hopefully with everyone's help testing over the past week there should be very few bugs in this release version.

I'm glad I started reducing the number of places I need to keep information synchronized. That's one reason I put the readmes in html format... can copy-paste to the html mode of the civfanatics and wordpress post editing windows, with some minor adjustments, which saves a lot of time. It took a while, checking readmes and synchronizing their information with threads, updating mod descriptions and double-checking everything works... finally finished six hours later!

If there's any mistakes, point it out!

 

[Zeppelin4]

I noticed on your site it says Attila ver 10. Under mods I only find ver 9 is this one I have to manual download? It's the same for Copasetic UI Tweaks I find version 2 under mods. Where would I get the version 3 you list on your site?

 

[Thalassicus]

Yes, the versions in the combined download fix a few bugs listed on the site's main page. You can click the download button on that page or the first post of this thread to download them. (links to here)

 

[Zeppelin4]

Do you still have to delete the Harbor.xml with the unofficial patch?

 

[Thalassicus]

Yeah. The city development mod alters the same tooltip.

 

[Zeppelin4]

Yet another question sorry. I notice under your download combine the harder free tech says version 1 and not 2 that is under Perkus thread. Is your download the same or should I get the file listed under Perkus thread?

 

[Thalassicus]

It should have been v2. I'll fix that error, thank you for pointing it out.

Edit: I've uploaded a new version which should have the correct version of Harder Free Tech.

 

[Zeppelin4]

I notice on this site and yours the version number for leaders and policies is 7 and terrian improvments is 13 while under your combine download they say 8,8, and 14. Just a heads up.

 

[Txurce]

Jumping out of the Strategy thread over here, my mid-game observations have nothing to report on the earlier capital-capture bug, as I haven't taken one. I really enjoyed the adjusted CS rules. With the French and the new rules, I'm drowning in SPs.

But pikeman-to-lancer is not maximal. By the time it rolled around I found myself much preferring the idea of upgrading my foot soldier to a rifleman. I just didn't need a lot of lancers (or anti-horsemen). I would go back to the suggestion of pike-to-musket, or just leave it as pike-to-rifles.

By the way, Alexander had a ton of CC's in my game - more than I've ever seen. Is this part of a mod?

 

[Thalassicus]

Yes. Alexander has the 50% slower CS friendship degradation trait, but in vanilla prioritizes killing CSs, making it completely worthless. I shifted his priority to befriend CSs so he uses the trait like an intelligent human player would.

 

[Txurce]

Thal,

As I just posted in the Strat thread, he just got shunned by the CS for being his usual aggressive self! That's with 1.0.6 or 7.

 

[bobbyboy29]

Hey thal, firstly, great update, I love all the changes you made. At first I was a bit upset at scientists being nerfed to 2 but now I realise that it makes a lot more sense, and is in keeping with the balance of the game. Although I'd say that between your changes and harder free tech, scientists don't need to be changed any more. Remember that there's a difference between something being powerful, and it being exploitative. It seems that you (unlike whoever is patching the game) are able to keep that in mind.

On that note, I was just wondering, are you already planning on changes which you will need to make to your mod post patch? It seems that the devs don't share your (and my) philosophy, that if an exploit exists, the key is to balance it out a bit in order to make decision making more important and situational. They seem to prefer to just plain remove the exploit (and all decisions associated with it entirely).

In particular, 2 new changes are particularly dissappointing:
1. Policies must be spent the turn they are earned. I mean, firstly, the saving up of policies wasn't exactly a game breaking exploit, because once you saved them up you still had to make a hard decision on what to spend them on and there was a trade off as you weren't getting early policy returns. I mean, even the ICS, considered to be the most powerful strategy at the moment is known to be more powerful if you ICS from the start using the liberty tree than holding off until you unlock the 3 order policies. All this change is going to do is cause people to do even more ridiculous strategies like avoid culture early on or quit playing altogether.

This change is clearly garbage, luckily we have people like you to fix it.
Already the one free policy at the start of each era that you added will help. But I have 2 ideas that you could try to implement when the new patch comes out.
a) All policies can be saved EXCEPT for the free policy per era. (This means that you need to spend some policies in earlier trees but still can use some strategy)
or...
b) Only one policy can be saved up at a time. I like this one better but I'm not sure how possible it will be to implement. The basic idea is that whilst you will still need to spend policies in earlier trees, there is still a level of strategy retained without being game breaking or giving reason to actively avoid culture. i.e: If I time it right, I can use my 1 free era policy+1 saved policy at the start of the industrial era then get another policy within a few turns so I can have my 3 order policies.

2. The second bad change is that promotions now have to be spent on the turn they are earned. This is just a clear case of throwing the baby out with the bathwater. The ridiculous exploit was not that people were saving up promotions, it was because they were saving up insta-heal promotions. The proper fix would have been to make you use the insta heal promotion the turn it is earned but others can be saved. Not sure if this change is possible but its definately WAY better and hopefully it can be done.

Thal, I'm really enjoying CiV thanks to your mods, please don't let the patch ruin it!
Thanks.

 

[Txurce]

On that note, I was just wondering, are you already planning on changes which you will need to make to your mod post patch? It seems that the devs don't share your (and my) philosophy, that if an exploit exists, the key is to balance it out a bit in order to make decision making more important and situational. They seem to prefer to just plain remove the exploit (and all decisions associated with it entirely).

In particular, 2 new changes are particularly dissappointing:
1. Policies must be spent the turn they are earned. I mean, firstly, the saving up of policies wasn't exactly a game breaking exploit, because once you saved them up you still had to make a hard decision on what to spend them on and there was a trade off as you weren't getting early policy returns. I mean, even the ICS, considered to be the most powerful strategy at the moment is known to be more powerful if you ICS from the start using the liberty tree than holding off until you unlock the 3 order policies. All this change is going to do is cause people to do even more ridiculous strategies like avoid culture early on or quit playing altogether.

This change is clearly garbage, luckily we have people like you to fix it.
Already the one free policy at the start of each era that you added will help. But I have 2 ideas that you could try to implement when the new patch comes out.
a) All policies can be saved EXCEPT for the free policy per era. (This means that you need to spend some policies in earlier trees but still can use some strategy)
or...
b) Only one policy can be saved up at a time. I like this one better but I'm not sure how possible it will be to implement. The basic idea is that whilst you will still need to spend policies in earlier trees, there is still a level of strategy retained without being game breaking or giving reason to actively avoid culture. i.e: If I time it right, I can use my 1 free era policy+1 saved policy at the start of the industrial era then get another policy within a few turns so I can have my 3 order policies.

2. The second bad change is that promotions now have to be spent on the turn they are earned. This is just a clear case of throwing the baby out with the bathwater. The ridiculous exploit was not that people were saving up promotions, it was because they were saving up insta-heal promotions. The proper fix would have been to make you use the insta heal promotion the turn it is earned but others can be saved. Not sure if this change is possible but its definately WAY better and hopefully it can be done.

Thal, I'm really enjoying CiV thanks to your mods, please don't let the patch ruin it!
Thanks.

At the risk of dragging this argument in here from its two existing threads, but I disagree. Not saving SPs makes you play the game, rather than "game" it. Given the mods' addition of an extra SP at the start of every era, I don't think there's much worry that you won't get far enough into the later trees. This doesn't even get into the historical argument, reflected in many of these mods, which would make stockpiling social change absurd.

The promotions also make more sense to me as per the upcoming patch. The instant heal is an exploit that should be addressed, but saving promotions is also gaming the system. A promotion is earned by an action - combat or specialized training. You "are" that promotion when you earn it. To me it makes no sense at all that a unit could save a skill it has earned... as opposed to a player deciding when to upgrade a unit, for example.

 

[bobbyboy29]

I understand your viewpoint Txurce, I think this is a case of gameplay vs realism but I think it's really possible to have both. I also think that it is valid to argue about these changes here(although Thal is allowed to disagree and tell us to move the discussion elsewhere) as rather than the other threads in which people hurl their opinions at eachother, here we can actually discuss what can be changed and why.

At the risk of dragging this argument in here from its two existing threads, but I disagree. Not saving SPs makes you play the game, rather than "game" it. Given the mods' addition of an extra SP at the start of every era, I don't think there's much worry that you won't get far enough into the later trees. This doesn't even get into the historical argument, reflected in many of these mods, which would make stockpiling social change absurd.

My objection to this change has much less to do with exploits than it does with a blanket removal of what should be a very important choice. I do believe that although we want to stop people from saving up all SP's full stop, forcing them to use them on that turn is overkill. It removes the choice of when to time your SP, especially early on when you just plain won't yet know which of the trees you want to take. In terms of realism, yes absolutely hoarding 5 SP's and spending them at once makes no sense. But surely just delaying 1 for 10-15 turns is reasonable both from a gameplay and realism perspective!

The promotions also make more sense to me as per the upcoming patch. The instant heal is an exploit that should be addressed, but saving promotions is also gaming the system. A promotion is earned by an action - combat or specialized training. You "are" that promotion when you earn it. To me it makes no sense at all that a unit could save a skill it has earned... as opposed to a player deciding when to upgrade a unit, for example.

Here I just plain disagree, it seems that our definitions of "gaming" are quite different. For me, this purely means exploiting a mechanic not as intended (i.e saving up instant heals) to create an overpowered, unrealtistic tactic. I really don't see how waiting until your next battle to decide whether you want a bonus on rough or flat terrain is an exploit. Instead, I feel it adds an extra layer of strategy to warfare which ultimately makes the game more fun.

For me, CiV boils down to a series of decisions, the fun is had in seeing the effects and repercussions of these decisions. The more of these that you take away in the name of getting rid of exploits or realism, the less fun the game becomes for me. I think that a balance can be found and this is much better than fluctuating between extremes as we are currently.

 

[Thalassicus]

@Txurce
The Alexander priorities change is something I might have added at the last minute in the release version. I'm not sure it was in the dev versions or not.

@bobbyboy29
The changes to policy and promotion saving are 99% likely to be c++ changes we can't alter with the current tools.

The thing is, saving policies/promotions was inherently disadvantageous because you weren't getting any benefits from the saved policies until you spend them. It had a built-in cost. This led to decision-making between "should I save" or "should I spend"... instead of enhancing one of those choices, they removed the decision entirely.

This is actually very similar to the method used to nerf horsemen. Instead of enhancing other options, they simply removed one - cannot effectively attack cities with horsemen anymore. By buffing the iron reveal and reducing the cost of iron working, plus reducing the cost of spearmen, and improving the Siege promotion (which horsemen cannot get), I nerfed horsemen without removing the option for them to attack cities.

It's not so much between gameplay vs realism as more choice vs less choice. They took a route of reducing decision-making... I can see the rationale, though I prefer addressing the specific problems at hand instead of simply blocking the choice from players.

I feel the problems with saving policies were specifically the Free Speech policy and Christo Redentor wonder. The better solution would have been to change these from a cost reduction to a culture rate increase, like MasterDinadan did for the Culture Calibration Mod. Likewise, the only promotion that was really an issue was the insta-heal. They should have changed it to a healing-over-time promotion. Instead they removed the option to choose promotions in the field, which reduces the capability for players to adapt to unexpected events.

The biggest problem with the change to policies is it will NOT prevent people stockpiling. People will just stockpile gold to buy all their culture buildings and CSs after the renaissance unlocks Free Speech, instead of stockpiling policies. I think it might be even worse than the previous situation.

 

[MarcolePoutrole]

I enabled all Balance mods as well as the unofficial patch and started a new game this morning. I noticed that every few turns, one of my units would simply not cycle through the units needing orders even though it had moves available.

When I clicked on it, the "Cancel all queued missions" icon was enabled even though I didn't queue anything. Clicking on the icon would fix things for a while but quite regularly (Every few turns), this unit or another one would fall to the pattern.

Did anyone else run into this?

-Marco