Imperialism Mod

[Nightinggale]

I've never played any of the Imperialism games but from your description its set in the World Wars era. I would love to see a World War II mod for Civ4Col so I'm all for it. My first priority would be to work on M:C though once I do start.

It's more like the first is from 1840 to WW1 while the second is like 1500 to 1850. I think it has years in the games, but I can't remember those. I just estimate based on inventions.

The first one is likely the most interesting era to mod. We already have a bunch of mods focusing on taking control of the new world from the 16th century, but none involving the industrial revolution. I think a new mod should intentionally try to be different from the existing mods or it might as well just be a mod of an existing one. Also if I have to point on one century, which is interesting when making a tech tree, I would say the 19th, followed by the 18th. It's the modern world, yet at the same time it's just old enough to fit well into the game engine without too many DLL modifications. On top of that, it's the era I find the most interesting from a general tech historical point of view.

 

[Lib.Spi't]

Imperialism Is more like the Victorian(Britain) Imperial/Colonial age so global colonial exploration, napoleonic age of war, the birth of monster artillery, the transition from sail to steam, the coming of electricity and culminating in the First World War.

The mod that fullerene wanted to make was more WW2 era which was the Russian communist revolution and industrialisation culminating in the Invasion by the Nazis.

 

[knuckledragger]

It's more like the first is from 1840 to WW1 while the second is like 1500 to 1850. I think it has years in the games, but I can't remember those. I just estimate based on inventions.

Wow, you must know your inventions . I just played both (for 'research' purposes)...that guess is almost spot on (The first Imperialism starts in 1815)

The first one is likely the most interesting era to mod. We already have a bunch of mods focusing on taking control of the new world from the 16th century, but none involving the industrial revolution. I think a new mod should intentionally try to be different from the existing mods or it might as well just be a mod of an existing one. Also if I have to point on one century, which is interesting when making a tech tree, I would say the 19th, followed by the 18th. It's the modern world, yet at the same time it's just old enough to fit well into the game engine without too many DLL modifications. On top of that, it's the era I find the most interesting from a general tech historical point of view.

TL DR: Use all content from Imperialism I as a base, add a SPY and DIPLOMAT profession/unit, additional yields located in minor nations, as well as additional inventions on the tech tree for Nightinggale .

Completely agree. Basically, I believe the second Imperialism is a timeline extension of the first, adding copper, tin, bronze, sugar cane, refined sugar, tobacco, cigar yields with only minor nation ('new world') territorial availability (Lib's excellent idea) with less transport micromanagement. However, it does have a Spy unit. Adding a Spy and diplomat unit/profession to the mod I think would quite helpful. Basically, with M:C as a base, part of Imperialism II content (yields) is already there.


Just thought of this---how would territorial borders be done? Culture like Civ 4?

 

[knuckledragger]

Imperialism Is more like the Victorian(Britain) Imperial/Colonial age so global colonial exploration, napoleonic age of war, the birth of monster artillery, the transition from sail to steam, the coming of electricity and culminating in the First World War.

Yep. I am reading Eric Hobsbawm's books now as research for this mod...

The mod that fullerene wanted to make was more WW2 era which was the Russian communist revolution and industrialisation culminating in the Invasion by the Nazis.

Sounds cool! I think the Imperialism mechanic would work well here as well.

 

[knuckledragger]

We have a feature in M:C already that sets this up to some extent to allow Units and Building to demand/consume goods. It isn't used at the moment however, but any "PoPs" system could use this as a basis perhaps.

One aspect of the POPs system is that it is automated according to what type of government. For example, with a laissez-faire type, goods just get produced and consumed, transport and factories just get built.

I was left to do the XML coding for this feature but couldn't find a balance that I liked so have put that on hold.

Anyway, great to see a new modder about causing a stir on the forums. I have about three weeks of obligations I need to take care of but after that I plan on revisiting M:C.

I have modded Diablo II, so I know that causing a stir is one thing, keeping momentum is QUITE another.

First thing I have learned from modding D2 is that all interested parties HAVE to have a shared vision, so I ask of you as part of the 'research':

Would you have time to give Imperialism I a through playthrough, er, testing?

Here are a couple of links: http://www.gog.com/game/imperialism
http://www.freegameempire.com/games/Imperialism

Extending the timeline to WW2 would be up to Nightinggale and yourself, as Aircraft would require additional DLL work. For what it's worth, I'm in for WW2 timeline extension with the Imperialism mechanic.

Again, nice to meet you knuckledragger.

Glad I 'dragged' myself here.

 

[Nightinggale]

Wow, you must know your inventions .

Told you
I'm an engineer and is interested in history, railroads and steam engines. That all combines well with an interest in the industrial revolution.

I just played both (for 'research' purposes)...that guess is almost spot on (The first Imperialism starts in 1815)

Imperialism style railroads didn't exist back then. While the steam locomotive was invented in 1801, tracks strong enough not to crack under the load of a steam engine wasn't used until 1825 when Darlinton to Stock-on-Trent opened. However it turned out to be a showcase of what not to do. It was treated like a canal and companies were set up to transport freight. Only one used steam and the rest horses, meaning steam had to operate at horse walking speed. Even worse, it lacked traffic management. You just loaded the cars and off you went. Being single tracked, the trains almost always met headon and then one of them should reverse back to a double tracked section. However whoever reversed would lose time and hence money, which meant fights frequently broke out and line efficiency was... well did efficiency even exist there?

The next railroad went from Manchester to Liverpool and opened in 1830. That's the first railroad in the sense that we know a railroad. Double tracked line to make each track single direction (no head on encounters) and steam only. It also featured other railroad features like passenger trains driving according to a timetable. It also had the first serial produced locomotive, the 2-2-0 Planet. It's the first locomotive with "modern" controls, meaning it's essentially controlled like a 1930 engine. The same goes for daily maintenance (adding lube oil etc). That claim can't be used on any previous locomotive, not even the famous Rocket.

Prior to 1830, people preferred to dig canals rather than build railroads. Early railroads were unable to climb hills and stationary steam engines were installed to assist, making rail building as difficult if not more as canal building. A horse could transport a single ton of cargo on the roads, 10 ton on rails and 60 ton when pulling a canal barge. With horse food being the most expensive operation cost, rails needed proper steam locomotives to really be considered.

Water for the canals wasn't an issue. The oldest operational engine in the world is an English steam pump in a mine from the 1780s. It has a pumping capacity of 8 tons/minute. Even at half capacity, it would not have any issues "producing" enough water to maintain the water level in an artificial canal.

Conclusion: Imperialism I starts with at least 1830 railroads in 1815. 1815 is in the golden age of canal builders.

Just for the record: I didn't look up anything when writing this. That mean I'm not 100% sure of spelling. Also I omitted technical details, such as the cracking rails was due to sulfur and how they got it out of the iron and stuff. Do speak up if more knowledge is required. Also Kailric appears to be somewhat knowledgeable in the industrial revolution (as well as other history), but it's my impression that it is more political based than my engineering focused knowledge.

TL DR: Use all content from Imperialism I as a base, add a SPY and DIPLOMAT profession/unit, additional yields located in minor nations, as well as additional inventions on the tech tree for Nightinggale

CivEffects introduces a fixed invention production system (no modifiers to unit production) and modifiers to research cost instead. The reason is simple.

Say a tech cost 100 research points and a player has 5 RP/turn.

type|production|cost|turns
no modifier|5|100|20
+10% production|5 (rounded 5.5)|100|20
-10% research cost|5|90|18

The reason is that the calculations are done in int, which rounds down. 5 + 10% = 5.5 -> 5, which mean no change, but 100 - 10% = 100 - 10 = 90 even with rounding. When applying to the production modifier directly, it takes quite a modifier to make a difference because it takes +34% not to be rounded away to nothing when a unit producing 3 RP/turn. This mean +33% has no effect even though it looks quite big.

With a modifier system in place, adding modifiers from number of friends using a tech, spies in cities with the tech and so on shouldn't be difficult to add. This mimics the Imperialism II research system just fine, though I think behind the scenes Imp2 adds research points for such actions rather than modifying the goal, which as a result can make it possible to research something while spending 0 RP/$0 on research. It could be possible to add that as well, but less trivial.

The civ style steal technology could also be interesting to add.

Also worth mentioning is that the percentage regarding everything in CivEffects takes "interest of interest". This mean if you have -50% research cost and get another -50%, you end up with a -75% reduction, not -100% (which would make no sense). Also like with a bunch of other modifiers, the result is capped at 1 because the game will crash when dividing with 0. Just preventing 0 from appearing is a whole lot easier than checking for 0 each time the number is used. Other numbers are also capped at 1, like unit food consumption (imagine eating -1 food) or number of units available in the immigration screen (-1 units is also no good).

Just thought of this---how would territorial borders be done? Culture like Civ 4?

Cultural borders would be the easiest implementation. Minor nations (natives) would claim land too. We could make them more hostile to conquest if we like, possibly even treat their borders like major civs when it comes to city building.

Extending the timeline to WW2 would be up to Nightinggale and yourself, as Aircraft would require additional DLL work. For what it's worth, I'm in for WW2 timeline extension with the Imperialism mechanic.

It's planned to support something like that. However it will be ignored for a while as it is less critical than some other outstanding tasks and it's not hard to add to mods later.

 

[Lib.Spi't]

Stoke-On-Trent

Technically you would need the flight to go to WW1 too. (that could get confusing to say!?!)

I thought I had another thing to say but forgot it half way through night's post...

Ah I think it was about borders.

I wouldn't worry or bother with changing how borders work, I think civ has the better system of territory control, because in Imperialism and Victoria, borders are just fixed like board game tiles. In Civ you can carve and shape your empire to suit your needs and desires.

 

[knuckledragger]

Told you
I'm an engineer and is interested in history, railroads and steam engines. That all combines well with an interest in the industrial revolution.


Imperialism style railroads didn't exist back then. While the steam locomotive was invented in 1801, tracks strong enough not to crack under the load of a steam engine wasn't used until 1825 when Darlinton to Stock-on-Trent opened. However it turned out to be a showcase of what not to do. It was treated like a canal and companies were set up to transport freight. Only one used steam and the rest horses, meaning steam had to operate at horse walking speed. Even worse, it lacked traffic management. You just loaded the cars and off you went. Being single tracked, the trains almost always met headon and then one of them should reverse back to a double tracked section. However whoever reversed would lose time and hence money, which meant fights frequently broke out and line efficiency was... well did efficiency even exist there?

The next railroad went from Manchester to Liverpool and opened in 1830. That's the first railroad in the sense that we know a railroad. Double tracked line to make each track single direction (no head on encounters) and steam only. It also featured other railroad features like passenger trains driving according to a timetable. It also had the first serial produced locomotive, the 2-2-0 Planet. It's the first locomotive with "modern" controls, meaning it's essentially controlled like a 1930 engine. The same goes for daily maintenance (adding lube oil etc). That claim can't be used on any previous locomotive, not even the famous Rocket.

Prior to 1830, people preferred to dig canals rather than build railroads. Early railroads were unable to climb hills and stationary steam engines were installed to assist, making rail building as difficult if not more as canal building. A horse could transport a single ton of cargo on the roads, 10 ton on rails and 60 ton when pulling a canal barge. With horse food being the most expensive operation cost, rails needed proper steam locomotives to really be considered.

Water for the canals wasn't an issue. The oldest operational engine in the world is an English steam pump in a mine from the 1780s. It has a pumping capacity of 8 tons/minute. Even at half capacity, it would not have any issues "producing" enough water to maintain the water level in an artificial canal.

Conclusion: Imperialism I starts with at least 1830 railroads in 1815. 1815 is in the golden age of canal builders.

Completely agree, but I was referring to the game. Download the game and you will see Imperialism the game has railroads but is ahistorical with an 1815 start.

Just for the record: I didn't look up anything when writing this. That mean I'm not 100% sure of spelling. Also I omitted technical details, such as the cracking rails was due to sulfur and how they got it out of the iron and stuff. Do speak up if more knowledge is required. Also Kailric appears to be somewhat knowledgeable in the industrial revolution (as well as other history), but it's my impression that it is more political based than my engineering focused knowledge.

Yes it is more political based.

According to what I read, the Industrial Revolution occured in non-feudal areas where people could keep benefit from their own labor and the rule of law (Constitution), thus restraining the grasping aristocracy. That is why the United States (Constitutional Republic) and Britain (Constitutional Monarchy) did so well early on.

After Napoleon, the Congress of Vienna restored absolute monarchies throughout Europe save Britain (Constitutional Monarchy), Netherlands(Merchant Republic), and Belgium (Republic). Interestingly, those countries did best, while France lagged...

CivEffects introduces a fixed invention production system (no modifiers to unit production) and modifiers to research cost instead. The reason is simple.

Say a tech cost 100 research points and a player has 5 RP/turn.

type|production|cost|turns
no modifier|5|100|20
+10% production|5 (rounded 5.5)|100|20
-10% research cost|5|90|18

The reason is that the calculations are done in int, which rounds down. 5 + 10% = 5.5 -> 5, which mean no change, but 100 - 10% = 100 - 10 = 90 even with rounding. When applying to the production modifier directly, it takes quite a modifier to make a difference because it takes +34% not to be rounded away to nothing when a unit producing 3 RP/turn. This mean +33% has no effect even though it looks quite big.

With a modifier system in place, adding modifiers from number of friends using a tech, spies in cities with the tech and so on shouldn't be difficult to add. This mimics the Imperialism II research system just fine, though I think behind the scenes Imp2 adds research points for such actions rather than modifying the goal, which as a result can make it possible to research something while spending 0 RP/$0 on research. It could be possible to add that as well, but less trivial.

The civ style steal technology could also be interesting to add.

Also worth mentioning is that the percentage regarding everything in CivEffects takes "interest of interest". This mean if you have -50% research cost and get another -50%, you end up with a -75% reduction, not -100% (which would make no sense). Also like with a bunch of other modifiers, the result is capped at 1 because the game will crash when dividing with 0. Just preventing 0 from appearing is a whole lot easier than checking for 0 each time the number is used. Other numbers are also capped at 1, like unit food consumption (imagine eating -1 food) or number of units available in the immigration screen (-1 units is also no good).


Cultural borders would be the easiest implementation. Minor nations (natives) would claim land too. We could make them more hostile to conquest if we like, possibly even treat their borders like major civs when it comes to city building.


It's planned to support something like that. However it will be ignored for a while as it is less critical than some other outstanding tasks and it's not hard to add to mods later.

Nightinggale, two questions.

Have you played Imperialism lately?
What are your projects in order of priority? Fix CivEffects first, then?

Thanks,

KD

 

[Lib.Spi't]

I think he is writing a bug finder code of sorts, to then use that to fix civeffects.

The new civeffects architecture needs finishing, because when it is done it will basically break everything that was done before that until it is rewritten into the new architecture.

 

[knuckledragger]

I think he is writing a bug finder code of sorts, to then use that to fix civeffects.

The new civeffects architecture needs finishing, because when it is done it will basically break everything that was done before that until it is rewritten into the new architecture.

Break everything? Whoa.

 

[knuckledragger]

Just some thoughts before I forget---

Have a Diplomat Unit build a legation (Diplomatic relations to communicate) trade consulate (trade of goods, trade subsidies, embargoes, outright cash grants) and embassy (to enable this mod: http://forums.civfanatics.com/showthread.php?t=497863)


Be the first to research the tech, can you sell a tech in Civ4Col?

I feel I am getting ahead of myself

 

[Lib.Spi't]

Yep! BOOM!

It basically allows 6 or 7 different things like civics, techs, etc. to all be able to unleash the same abilities. However it will change the structure of the Xml files, so all of the old stuff will need to be proted across to the new structure or.....



That's why a lot of mods went on hold, because there was not a lot of point doing a lot of xml work to just redo it again when the change occurred.

At least I think that was what we decided... it was a while ago now and I have been wandering the wasteland for too long!

MC already has a 'Trade Relations System' where you need to get diplomatic access, then a trader can build a trading post in any city of a nation and if they are connected by plotgroup (road, rivers, docks, etc.) then it will auto sell your wares from your markets, to them.

They can also generate gold for your empire per turn I think (or perhaps under a civic choice... I forget now, maybe not...or maybe it was tech points)
A similar thing can happen with foreign religious missions. (get crosses per site under a certain civic)

There are some more diplomatic options in M:C (I forget them all), one of which was for a victory type of become emperor, where you ask for other nations support. Then when you declare yourself your emperor everyone attacks (With the Pope REF) you, except those that support you, they come as allies. So this could probably make some kind of Pact crisis WW1 setting.

 

[knuckledragger]

Yep! BOOM!

It basically allows 6 or 7 different things like civics, techs, etc. to all be able to unleash the same abilities. However it will change the structure of the Xml files, so all of the old stuff will need to be proted across to the new structure or.....



That's why a lot of mods went on hold, because there was not a lot of point doing a lot of xml work to just redo it again when the change occurred.

At least I think that was what we decided... it was a while ago now and I have been wandering the wasteland for too long!

MC already has a 'Trade Relations System' where you need to get diplomatic access, then a trader can build a trading post in any city of a nation and if they are connected by plotgroup (road, rivers, docks, etc.) then it will auto sell your wares from your markets, to them.

They can also generate gold for your empire per turn I think (or perhaps under a civic choice... I forget now, maybe not...or maybe it was tech points)
A similar thing can happen with foreign religious missions. (get crosses per site under a certain civic)

Well, then we can hash out the design and import models from Civ4. I do not want to pressure Nightinggale. What is your project schedule, Lib? I know you would like to do WHM. How about the two of us do a design using content from WHM using the Imperialism base Nightinggale likes?

 

[Nightinggale]

The new civeffects architecture needs finishing, because when it is done it will basically break everything that was done before that until it is rewritten into the new architecture.

Everything is quite a lot and it doesn't look like it is the case. It acts like everything, which can be invented is available from the start (or turn 2, not quite sure).

To simplify the code (and hence make the game faster), I decided that everything must be available in a CivEffect to be present in the game. Since some stuff is available from the start, they aren't made available by any CivEffect in the XML files. To compensate for that, the game makes a CivEffect at startup, which enables everything, which isn't made available by anything else and give this invisible CivEffect to all players. I suspect this autogeneration might enable everything. It would certainly match what I have encountered in my test games.

I wrote about units getting free promotions with 0 XP. However I realized that whatever is causing the first problem might give free promotions to all units and as such is a symptom of the same bug. A game breaking bug, but still just a single bug.

I need to step through the generation, but if it says that profession 24 should be available from the start, I don't know if it is correct or not because what is profession 24? My new script will make the debugger replace it with say PROFESSION_FARMER, in which case it looks ok to have it available from the start even without looking up what each profession is.

 

[Nightinggale]

Have you played Imperialism lately?

The second, yes. The first no. I looked at the link, but the music isn't included. I better dig up my CD as it has the music tracks. The gameplay feeling is so much better with the actual music as it is very well done.

Be the first to research the tech, can you sell a tech in Civ4Col?

Yeah, they should be tradable. Do be aware that techs work differently from Civ4. They are stored in player, not team. Most of the time the game has one player on each team, in which case it makes no difference. However is a player makes another his vassal, the vassal change team to join the powerful one, in which case they share team. Team data like Founding Fathers then has to be shared while player specific data like techs can be kept apart. If you invented the brilliant machine gun, you don't have to share it with your sword fighting vassal states.

 

[Lib.Spi't]

Yes, 'Everything' was my 'short version' of the weeks/months of discussions we had about Universal Source Mod, etc.

The final conclusion was 'no point adding loads of xml entries till the change was finalised for civeffects or we may end up with another 2071 (Why you no work!?) quandry!'

Yes techs can be shared/traded. There was a plan to make natives 'wake up' as major players if you give them enough technology.

@Knuckle

I don't really have a schedule with WHM, it was more like a let's see if we can actually do this. Trade winds had built the skeleton of the tech tree (and there were some quirky bugs that needed resolving (which should maybe come with the civeffects update)) and I did the yiels (just to see if it could be done).

Other than that I had a design sheet and then we pushed pause.

 

[knuckledragger]

Anybody interested in skype tomorrow?

 

[Nightinggale]

I'm not interested in skype at all. I am reachable on AIM though. Well most of the time. It requires me to remember to open it, which appears to be an issue

Edit I'm actually using jabber on the xmpp protocol. I thought it was AIM.

 

[knuckledragger]

Hi Nightinggale,

When you get time (no rush), Lib and I discussed the Client States Mod from BtS. Basically, it is five different forms of vassalage, which exists in Civ4Col.

To wit:

Protectorate: Vassalage negotiated while at peace, and can trade its cities. Declaring war on this nation causes the protecting great power to intervene. Liege guarantees independence, protectorate controls its own military and gives no discount for yields.

Puppet State:Vassalage negotiated while at war. Can trade its cities. It is the surrendered vassal from BTS.

Colony: Vassalage which results in deeply discounted prices (or free) for yields for the master state. Military units also controlled by the liege state. You can trade the bonuses of vassal.

Annexed territory: Territory lost to the liege unwillingly in peace or as a result of war. There is a greater rebellion chance in annexed territory. Annexed territory has fixed borders, but with continued cultural transmission.

Dominion: Vassalage which allows some independence. Dominions control their own military and provide some discount for yields and somewhat higher prices for yield sales from the liege. Dominions can declare war and make peace as a sovereign nation. Dominions have a military alliance with their master.


Basically, with additional clarification, can these five versions of vassalage exist in Civ4Col?

Thanks for reading!

 

[Nightinggale]

can trade its cities

This is used multiple times, but I'm not sure what you mean by it. Cities can be traded in the diplo screen. Also it is possible to send peddlers to minor state cities to trade your goods. It can even be automated where picks up the yields you set in a city (like wine and beer) and then travel to cities, which wants to pay for those, then buys what you requested (if possible), returns home and restarts the cycle.

If it means something else, then do tell.

Basically, with additional clarification, can these five versions of vassalage exist in Civ4Col?

Protectorate is how vassals work right now. When a major civ gets a vassal, the vassal moves into the major civ's team. Diplomatic relationships like war is between teams, not individual players. This mean with two players on one team, you can't declare war on one without also declaring war on the other.

Yield discount should not be difficult to implement. I think it's already modified by relationship to the player. Making that modifier act more active for vassals seems trivial.

Controlling units belonging to another player sounds quite tricky. I don't think it would be worth the coding difficulty.

Dominion sounds more like a diplomatic relationship (extended alliance) than a vassal. Actually it's an alliance with an added price modifier.

I'm not sure about Annexed states. I suspect it requires quite a bit of coding. Fixed borders would have to mod the plot's function to change owner to the player with the highest influence. I'm not even sure where to start regarding rebellions.

Looking at it, I get the impression that adding price modifying abilities between players would make most of this. The rest could be a lot of work.


Also I'm sure Kailric would have something to say about this when he gets back in a week or two.

Thanks for reading!

Got you. I didn't bother to read and you can't make me. Also you can't take back your verbal reward