K-Mod: Far Beyond the Sword

[karadoc]

Fluffy_Rabbit, thanks for the comments.

Re. cultural victories; it's already a bit harder in K-Mod compared to the unmodded game because lots of different culture outputs have been reduced. Do you think it's still too easy / too soon in K-Mod?

Eg. Free Speech only give +50%, not +100%. Cathedrals give +40% rather than +50%. Monasteries and temples give +1 instead of +2. Most wonders have had their culture significantly reduced, and so on. -- On the other hand, there are also a couple of things which make it easier: colosseums give +20% culture, and civilized jewelers and creative constructions are available earlier in the game. Actually, the goal wasn't to so much to make cultural victories more difficult, but rather to just shift them a bit more into the late game, so that cultural isn't all about religions and early-game world wonders. (also, a lot of the culture reductions in K-Mod are to balance the fact that culture is more powerful for pressing borders - but that's another story.)

 

[stingo]

Fluffy_Rabbit, thanks for the comments.

Re. cultural victories; it's already a bit harder in K-Mod compared to the unmodded game because lots of different culture outputs have been reduced. Do you think it's still too easy / too soon in K-Mod?

Eg. Free Speech only give +50%, not +100%. Cathedrals give +40% rather than +50%. Monasteries and temples give +1 instead of +2. Most wonders have had their culture significantly reduced, and so on. -- On the other hand, there are also a couple of things which make it easier: colosseums give +20% culture, and civilized jewelers and creative constructions are available earlier in the game. Actually, the goal wasn't to so much to make cultural victories more difficult, but rather to just shift them a bit more into the late game, so that cultural isn't all about religions and early-game world wonders. (also, a lot of the culture reductions in K-Mod are to balance the fact that culture is more powerful for pressing borders - but that's another story.)

It depends on map a lot. For example if you use not_too_small_too_big script it usually generates very productive maps, but if you try some other map gens where climate is not as great in lots of areas it often slows down research/production a little while culture growth is less affected. This creates some disbalance between cultural and space victories. I would not touch culture anymore I like how it was slowed down from bts, but not too much.

 

[noto2]

Just a quick couple of strategy comments:

--

Finally, about serfdom. It's actually pretty good... and if it didn't have the -1 on towns it would essentially be the late-game civic to use. Here's another little strategy tip: when you're deciding which civics to use, check the stats screen to see how many of each type of plot improvement you have. -- The number of farms you have may surprise you. (Those stats are also helpful for estimating the town bonus from Universal Suffrage and Free Speech.) Serfdom is particularly useful for spiritual leaders, because they can easily switch in and out of slavery when they need to build some stuff quickly...

For those labour civics, the rough balance schema I have in mind is like this:

• Early: Slavery (no other option)
• Early-Mid: Slavery / Serfdom (slavery for production, or serfdom for science; caste system isn't very useful because workshops aren't yet worth building)
• Mid-Late: Serfdom / Caste System (cities are getting bigger, so slavery's productivity is worth less*. Caste System can give productivity with its workshops)
• Late: Caste System / Emancipation (serfdom isn't much good because the farms bonus is offset by the towns; but caste system is still viable as long as you're not struggling with the emancipation unhappiness)

[* 'worth less', but certainly not 'worthless'. Slavery is still useful in the late game if you're conquering new cities. It just isn't very good for fully-grown cities.]

Even without -1c for towns serfdom would not be overpowered late game because emancipation combined with your global warming would create a crushing blow late game of -8 to -12 happiness per city. Even someone with a specialist economy running the culture slider high wouldn't bother with serfdom because they'd rather be in caste system.

I agree with your balance schema. What I'm saying is that the opportunity cost of serfdom is already the factor that makes it less valuable late game, you don't need the the -1c towns, that just makes serfdom unnecessarily weak. The main problem is serfdom won't work if you cottage your capital early and make it the main commercial city, which is a fairly common thing I think, from reading the forums.

 

[Jabarto]

One more angle that's perhaps worth mentioning is that it could be considered a good thing that it's possible for enemies to bypass your navy and do some real damage to your empire. If wars were always won by the largest army, then the game probably wouldn't be as fun; and I think it's pretty clear that if the enemy had no choice by the fight your ships to get to you, then it would basically just be a battle of numbers rather than tactics.

I tend to agree with you, but this doesn't make a lot of sense to me. If a defensive navy is powerless to intercept an invading force, doesn't that completely defeat the purpose of having a defensive navy (and by extension any tactical considerations that might arise)? I can understand your point that changes like this are beyond the scope of K-Mod, but I definitely don't think the current setup (which is frustating, illogical, and makes the whole concept of naval power pointless) is a "good thing".

That said, I really like your decision with the Musketeers getting a withdrawal chance. That fits really well with the extra moves and gives a real "resourceless cavalry unit" vibe that you don't see anywhere else in the game.

 

[Charles555nc]

That said, I really like your decision with the Musketeers getting a withdrawal chance. That fits really well with the extra moves and gives a real "resourceless cavalry unit" vibe that you don't see anywhere else in the game.

You mean like camel archers?

 

[satrapper]

@karadoc
that was an extremely helpful strategy post. building synergies is something ive never really paid enough heed to. and the explanation of slavery is also helpful. another post that i will be saving. thank you.

@charles or anyone else with l33t skillz
i am currently trying my first game of k-mod on monarch, 130 turns in and im still not dead, which is nice. trying to play along the lines you suggested, im happy with how its panning out (i stumbled onto a couple of free techs from goody huts, which is prob cheating a little tho.)

anyway, something i forgot to ask you about is best practice in plot usage, my standard strategy has always been to mix , and in the majority of my cities, unless forced to do otherwise by terrain. specialization kind of happening by accident mostly.

i was wondering if you could look at the screenshot below and make rough suggestions as to how you would approach my situation?

Spoiler :

 

[Charles555nc]

I would mine every hill near your cap, maybe irrigate one or two of the floodplains and then get cottages on the other flood plains,

i'd see how my food was around then and get probably a couple workshops on the grasslands. I tend to not chop any plains forest near my cap either, they are decent production and get better later on with lumber mills.

Also make sure to have 1 to 2 workers per city. Take note that you have horses for your unique unit and elephants if you get construction. Its best to get those if you dont have any metal nearby.

Karadoc,

I usually play a philosophic civ, get the oracle, and a temple, maybe a couple other wonders in my cap (only place that can have that much production early). So my great people points are generally in the cap, national epic wonder can be produced quickly, and I can start stacking great priests in my cap, along with trying to max out production in my cap.

Then add 100% military production and make it so only one city in which to stack most of my great generals...most of my other cities tech, my capital and a couple other cities produces!
I generally dont feel I can wait for later national wonders to put in my capital.

Well anyway I like your feedback, because I have a sneaky suspicion you are a much better player than I am.

 

[Jabarto]

You mean like camel archers?

...yes.

Oh well, it's still neat. Plus, musketeers get defensive bonuses.

 

[TheOnlyDJCat]

Regarding serfdom: I usually play with a specialist economy based on pyramids (which is really great in team games, because one team member can build the pyramids being industrious and the other can farm great scientist being philosophic. That provides a trait combo that is not possible in single player games, because wonder effects are shared in the team.)
Anyway when I do the math between caste and serfdom, it feels perfect with the -1 nerf. Otherwise it would beat caste not only in cottage economies but in specialist economies too. ( By the way, karadoc, the main bonus from caste is not the +1 workshop, but the ability to generate great persons!).
If I want to generate great persons I need a lot of farms, so serfdom shines there too, but I also need caste to order all these scientist to work. If serfdom does not come with a -1 modifier, it would always win this decision in my games, which does not feel right.

 

[Charles555nc]

Anyone else feel like priests should be included in the caste system civic?

And I like the +1 GPP per super specialist added to a city idea.

 

[TheOnlyDJCat]

It should not be too easy to generate a great prophet on the fly, to make the religious wonders a bit more difficult too get.

 

[Charles555nc]

on the fly? code of laws is about 25% of the game in....and early game counts alot. And every caste system included priests.

Side note:
Fishing, research cost =108
Mining= 135

Agriculture=162
The Wheel=162

(epic game speed)

No wonder its harder with England and Carthage on non by the sea starts...

 

[TheOnlyDJCat]

25% ?

Specialist economies require caste system as their main setting

 

[Charles555nc]

about 25% through the tech tree is what I meant...

How about monasteries allowing you to put one citizen as a priest and turning religious wonders down to 2 priests?

 

[Charles555nc]

The ai sends 3 cats into the square next to my numidian cavalry, I kill them with 99% chance to win and in the process realize their capital has only 3 defenders, a catapult, an archer, and an axeman. So I send my cavalry and take the capital.

Can the ai be adjusted to defend better? Was it a glitch?

 

[noto2]

about 25% through the tech tree is what I meant...

How about monasteries allowing you to put one citizen as a priest and turning religious wonders down to 2 priests?

I second this

 

[Charles555nc]

How is everyone doing? Feelings? Opinions?

 

[Toys®Us]

Well, well, well...
This Mod is still alive, I'm surprised.
I was busy with Civ5, back to Civ4 (graphic problems since the most recent patch).
In front of my computer, yesterday, after many months away, while I was watching the opening (Blue Earth spinning and the sublim music), I realized how great the game was...
...
Congratulations everyone.
A piece of art (K-Mod). It will be on my hard drive for a long long time.
Next weekend, I start a new game.

 

[Charles555nc]

Might be harder than you remember

I save my games like this,

version number, then what try it is

so 1.38t1 (try 1) and so forth...

ive lost 7 partial games, and now Im dominating my 8th game, but my evil neighbor has invaded and taken two of my commerce cities, burning one!

The draft shall save me!

 

[noto2]

@Charles: Yeah Kmod is indeed challenging. I play with "random personalities" checked as well, to give it more of a tournament and less of a roleplay feel. I play on monarch and still get my butt handed to me by the AI and sometimes I feel bad, thinking I'll never be as good as those immortal/deity players. But then it occurred to me, Kmod monarch with random personalities is really damn tough. I can't use diplomacy to keep myself safe nearly as easily as a retail BTS player could. Sure the AI gets huge bonuses on immortal but the AI is much easier to manipulate and control, so I'm not so sure retail BTS immortal is any more difficult than what I play. I don't know how many people here ever played Warcraft but I liken it to Warcraft AI. The AI in that game was absolutely horrible, on any difficulty level, the only difference was that on the "insane" setting the AI got 2x the amount of resources as you. This may have been difficult the first couple of times you played against it since if you let the AI build its base it would eventually swarm you with "insane" numbers, but the insane AI was just as easy to beat as the easy AI, once you learned the tricks. All you had to do was rush the AI base right at the beginning of the game, and outmicro it in battle. It worked just as well on insane or easy settings. Once I learned that the AI was never again a challenge.

Sure the immortal and deity AI in retail BTS get enormous resource bonuses, but the AI is still just as dumb and easy to manipulate as ever. Deity is a special case because the bonuses are astounding, but still. Better BTS AI was at least 1 difficulty level higher than retail BTS, and Kmod is at least 1 difficulty level higher than BBTS. So monarch Kmod is like immortal BTS, by my reckoning. I notice the AI doing things now that it would have NEVER done in BTS, playing very smart and almost human-like. Good job, Karadoc