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.)
Dear Karadoc, thank you for your detailed response. All of your comments are valid - the point I was making is that AI civs can very suddenly turn their research to zero and culture to max - and the AI which you thought was winning, let's say you invade one of his cultural cities, then one still cannot deal with the other guy who has suddenly maxed his culture tab and crept up from behind. Equally, the human can max his culture after building the Internet and win too easily.
However since I always play with cultural victory disabled it is not really an issue for me, just saying imo the cheesiest way to win for either AI or human.
Have been testing my map (
http://forums.civfanatics.com/showthread.php?t=480606) with your latest version - I noticed a few things:
1. With two AI at war, both may have diplo attitude on asking to make peace "We'd love to but you will have to contact them" - have not seen that before, does not make a lot of sense. Perhaps nothing to do with your mod, idk.
2. Caesar says "Senatus Populusque Roma saluto vos" - this is incorrect - Senatus Populusque Roma = Senate and People of Rome [plural] and "saluto vos" = I salute you [singular]. So should be "vos salutamus" = [we] salute you or "vos salutant" [plural]. Not a game-play point
There is one serious defect in the diplomacy, again nothing to do with your mod, when it comes to giving units. Examples from a game I have just finished as Greece on my Earth map where I had a huge military and territorial advantage in the late game and was pursuing a peaceful space victory:
1. Late game, Aztecs attack Egypt, float huge SoD (rifles and cannons) up the Red Sea, land next to Thebes (now that is your mod, the awesome crush strategy in action), takes Thebes pretty quickly. Egypt too weak and looking to get wiped out. As Greece with most of continental Europe, the ME to Persepolis and North Africa I tolerate a weak Egypt and do not want Monty in my back yard. I give Egypt a big amount of military over several moves - tanks, bombers, infantry, machine guns - probably about 20+ units an era ahead of the enemy army - Egypt retakes Thebes and survives intact. Before this war Aztecs were pleased with me (green face) and Egypt was annoyed (grey face). And this did not change! AI could see I was giving units and Egypt could not have built those units anyway (no tech/resources).
2. Same game, Aztecs attack America. Now I had just finished wiping out Spain and had an enormous stack of tanks, helicopters and radar artillery. I had attacked Spain only because I needed access to the Atlantic to get units from Europe to North America and Isabella was not giving RoP (big mistake for her in retrospect :/). Had unstoppable winning position on space victory anyway (had most of South America as well). Aztecs still pleased/green despite the fact I gave an army to Egypt to stop them. America is annoyed/grey towards me. I give America an absolutely huge army of bombers, fighters, cruise missiles, tanks, infantry, choppers, about 30+ radar artillery, 10+ mech infantry and finally some main battle armour units and even 2 or 3 stealth bombers (!) - America survives and begins retaking territory - still annoyed with me though! Again was perfectly obvious I was giving a huge number of advanced units to America.
Got space vic while Roosevelt was slowly coming back with his new army . . .
Now I think there is a small diplo bonus to giving units in the "our trade relations have been fair and forthright" - that seems to tick up somewhat - my point is not nearly enough. Really, both Egypt and America should have been totally in love with me
and the Aztecs should have absolutely hated me
especially for flooding North America with radar artillery and mech inf
Now I think the mechanism already exists in the diplo anyway - do you agree it needs to be beefed up and/or can you do that? Should be equal negative effect "you have traded with our worst enemy!". I mean it should really get up to like +8/-8 or even more, where a lot of units are involved which change the course of a war.
Would also be a hell of a lot more realistic where IRL empires do not wage war against each other so much - they do however get involved in smaller wars, arming one side or the other (or both
). And that is how I play the Earth map (not other maps, or smaller maps) - not getting involved directly, giving units or techs, just enough to maintain the balance - however the diplomatic pros and cons of that should be very serious indeed (as is the case IRL) whereas they are almost non-existent in vanilla and with K-mod. Where lots of units are involved, it should easily be the most important diplo modifier by a long way (also as IRL) - makes the other diplo factors pretty insignificant - what would you rather have, free bananas or 30 game-changing radar artillery ?!
Also the AI never gives units, when it should do so (e.g. if Russia is crushing Mongolia, China should either DoW v Russia or give units to Mongols in its own interests of long-term survival - AI can often do nothing and then get crushed in turn by its new and potent neighbour). Not sure that can be fixed, or whether you think it should be fixed. Perhaps a strat just too complex for the AI to use properly. However this mechanic is already in the game somewhat - "you declared war on our friend!" - I think it should be beefed up a little.
I have also played versions of the game, perhaps vanilla or some mods, where the AI is much more willing to combine against the human where human is number 1 nation. In the game mentioned above I was never DoW'd, I DoW'd twice (Persia mid-game, Spain late-game) and essentially cruised to victory (maybe I should just play on a more difficult level). However I have never beaten K-Mod before on Noble, or maybe just once or twice (one reason I like it so much, I do not like easy games) - and this was an easy win with no DoWs, never really in danger. Russia and England and maybe Mali and Egypt should have dogpiled me mid-game to slow me down. So this latest version seems to be less aggressive or just easier? My diplo is good, not sure it is that good ... I will play next on monarch and see what happens, and/or use "Aggressive AI" ... [not that I ever play vanilla any more, used to play it on Emperor].
Anyway, love your work and sorry for taking a while to reply to your post, I would be honored if you would give my Earth map a spin since it was partly inspired by your excellent mod
And because it is totally awesome anyway
to build as 2 spearmen.
with no bonus vs. mounted. Such a nerf may be fair in terms of the relative strength of units, but I suspect it might provide less interesting gameplay; and it would certainly create a different feel around the role of elephants in the game.
