K-Mod: Far Beyond the Sword

Hi noto2,

sorry, I meant no offense ;)

I just noted, that a beeline to the panzer meant that the enemy has no unit to attack my stack when I have panzers, because the only dangerous unit is the tank due to its high base power. When you talk about attacking cities yourself you are completely right - tank and panzer are the same.
Without panzers I usually have to take anti-tanks with me whiche I really don't like.
 
@Leoreth

I have to completely disagree with you that Grenadiers are already balanced. Only reason I get some of them is to upgrade them into machine guns with city defense bonuses, but most of the time, I dont bother with them, and neither does the ai.

Stacks with just Rifles and Cavlary (with power upgrades) are far superior to grenadiers mixed with anything else...
 
A simple way to balance grenadiers woud be to give them straight combat bonus against rifles, not just bonus on attack. Hence grens will dominate rifles, rifles will dominate cavalry and cavalry will dominate grens.
 
I've always viewed grenadiers as a counter unit to rifles, where they do a decent job. I don't think every unit needs to have a place in every stack of its era to be called "balanced". If it has a clear niche it should be enough.

(But as I already noted, this example was more to illustrate my general point - don't want to argue about it. I'm sure karadoc makes the right decision here.)


I hope everyone who keeps suggesting two separate mods know what they're asking for here. Once you've branched off, you'd have to implement every AI change to both mods, which is annoying merging at best. I'd rather have karadoc invest his time into active modding, to be honest :)

Of course, if it's only about optional unit or building changes, he could solve that with an optional module. In fact, everyone could make this kind of XML changes.
 
@karadoc,
Thanks for the reply. I really didn't think you had made the AI more Warlike, but have been making it More efficient.

jtanner28 has taken an old favorite of mine, Rise Of Mankind v1.03Extended, and merged it with K-Mod v1.31. My! What a difference it's made to the old girl! I'm actually getting whipped by the AI on Noble! I'm a firm believer in eXpansion (I've been called a City Spammer :p ) and the AI is now leaving me scrambling for even tundra city placement much less prime real estate.

Thank You for this Mod. :D

Oh on SotL, Buff it up! And Grenadiers, I'm with Leoreth. :)

JosEPh
 
So in summary - you are already making a mod for a game that only a small minority of players use anyway. You don't have an enormous following, but those of us who follow your mod absolutely love it and you have earned our respect and loyalty. You aren't limited by the rules of commercial saleability either. I say push the limits and dare to go further with the mod, and split it into more than one version if you want. We play the mod because it improves the game, and one of the game's worst flaws is its lack of balance. No other mod out there really attempts to deal with balance (most just add flavour). Since yours is about making the AI more competent I think balance changes suit Kmod very well. Again, I agree with your philosophy that less is more, but getting started on some balance changes for the worst aspects of game balance would really improve the game.

What you are forgeting is that a number of other mods also incorporate K-Mod. Because of its AI etc improvements. So the following is not as small as you suggest.

Not everyone plays just basic BTS and K-Mod. Some of us play other mods that also use K-Mod.

I can not speak for these other modders - but I do not think they would like to see lots of unit tweaks (or unit balance as some posters imply) added to this mod. They want badly designed routines and bad coding to be improved. AI, gameplay, user interface etc. Not making an Elephant or Panser stronger or weaker.

Just my 2 cents. :)
 
Most mods that incorporate K-Mod probably already have their own Civ4UnitInfos XML file anyway and are mostly interested in the DLL changes, so making balance tweaks here is unlikely to negatively impact most mods that incorporate it.
 
What you are forgeting is that a number of other mods also incorporate K-Mod. Because of its AI etc improvements. So the following is not as small as you suggest.

Not everyone plays just basic BTS and K-Mod. Some of us play other mods that also use K-Mod.

I can not speak for these other modders - but I do not think they would like to see lots of unit tweaks (or unit balance as some posters imply) added to this mod. They want badly designed routines and bad coding to be improved. AI, gameplay, user interface etc. Not making an Elephant or Panser stronger or weaker.

Just my 2 cents. :)

That's my opinion too. Civ 4 had an AI programmer, Blake Wash. Karadoc might well exercise this role.
 
I mean, my thought process on it is that the balance tweaks Karadoc has been making have been good for the base game's balance.

I think some aspects of the base game's overall system cannot be fixed by balancing efforts (for instance, I consider the entire implementation of the military system to be backwards and weird and annoying, even though I love the game overall). Fixes for those aspects should probably be attempted by other modders, or (if Karadoc himself gets so-interested) by Karadoc himself in a fork of K-Mod that isn't precisely the base K-mod.

But I think the base K-Mod should, in any case, retain Karadoc's already stated goal of improving upon the base game by improving coding, fixing bugs, clearing kludge, and making small gameplay-improving changes, similar to what PieceOfMind had previously been doing with PIG Mod. The DLL work Karadoc has done to improve the AI and implement basic features that really should've been there in the first place has been stunning (and that DLL is really the solid-gold-brick core of K-Mod when you get down to it).

I also think that if anyone ever somehow figures out some way to get the game to take advantage of multi-core processors, that stunning accomplishment plus K's work on making the AI more efficient could leave Civ4 beating out new TBS games for years to come. Seriously. The streamlining of the code K has done is amazing.
 
I'm playing a game now with K-Mod v1.31 and can't see war weariness for my own civ; is this a bug or an intended change?

It says in the changelog for v.1.28 that war weariness for a target civ would only be visible if you have enough EP to see their demographics. I'm not sure whether that refers to the WW that my people have about the war or the WW that India's people have. Anyway, I can see India's demographics but I don't know how much WW my people have from my war with India. I didn't see anything in the changelog about hiding the exact amount of WW from the player, so thought I would ask. I have a save if needed.
 

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in the city screen, hover over the unhappy face and it should show a breakdown of the causes of unhappiness in the particular city??
war weariness="war?..what is it good for?"

for anyone who's interested, i uploaded a quick compile of kmod 1.32 .dll for someone else, upping the max civs to 25.
here's the link: http://forums.civfanatics.com/downloads.php?do=file&id=19479

er, sorry karadoc if i'm stepping on your shoes here btw, i'll remove the link if you wish, i just thought i may as well post it.
 
@jmas Although you need espionage to see the war weariness of other civs, the information is actually displayed in the foreign advisor screen; and you don't need any espionage to see your own war-weariness.

yqUw7.jpg


To see the war weariness of civ-A's people due to war with civ-B: select civ-B in the foreign advisor screen and then point to civ-A.


@satrapper, That's fine - just as long as people understand that it isn't compatible with the normal (18 civ) version. Don't try to load save games or play multiplayer games with different max civ DLLs. (also, it is likely to run a bit slower)

--

Speaking of running a bit slower... the next version is going to be pretty good. I've fixed a bunch of bugs and inconsistencies in the unit selection system; and improved the efficiency of the calculations done by the game when selecting units - so that it should be a bit more responsive.

(Unfortunately, it's difficult to get to the heart of the selection slowness, because a lot of the code for that is in the .exe itself; but this next version will probably be a noticeable improvement.)
 
(Unfortunately, it's difficult to get to the heart of the selection slowness, because a lot of the code for that is in the .exe itself; but this next version will probably be a noticeable improvement.)

Some of these older games already released the exe after many years?
 
Is it normal that I can't get the Sevopedia to work? I have checked it in the Advisors tab but I still only get the regular pedia. No autolog produced.
 
I love this mod!

Just would be even better with balanced units and civilizations. If there is a merged mod with k-mod + balances i would be most grateful.
 
I love this mod!

Just would be even better with balanced units and civilizations. If there is a merged mod with k-mod + balances i would be most grateful.

That's basically what I'm doing with my copy of K-Mod right now. I didn't have any intention of releasing it, but if you want I could post my changelog, might give you (or others) some ideas.
 
That's basically what I'm doing with my copy of K-Mod right now. I didn't have any intention of releasing it, but if you want I could post my changelog, might give you (or others) some ideas.

Are you still making custom maps too? Haven't seen you around for awhile now. Would love to see the change log too.

@teejing,
Check out a WIP mod called KROME, it's in the Rise Of Mankind Modmod sub forum. It's based at the moment off of K-Mod v 1.31, but will soon be updated to v1.32. Karadoc's K-mod is going to revive many older mods. It's just that Good!

@karadoc,
Thank you for continuing to improve the core game play of BtS thru your efforts here with K-Mod. It's very impressive what you've accomplished.

JosEPh :)
 
Are you still making custom maps too? Haven't seen you around for awhile now. Would love to see the change log too.

@teejing,
Check out a WIP mod called KROME, it's in the Rise Of Mankind Modmod sub forum. It's based at the moment off of K-Mod v 1.31, but will soon be updated to v1.32. Karadoc's K-mod is going to revive many older mods. It's just that Good!

@karadoc,
Thank you for continuing to improve the core game play of BtS thru your efforts here with K-Mod. It's very impressive what you've accomplished.

JosEPh :)

Hey JosEPh. I haven't done anything with maps in a while. I do have some ideas in mind but who knows what'll come of them.

Anyway, here's what I've done with the mod so far:

Spoiler :
Code:
Units and Promotions

•	Axemen bonus against melee units has reduced to 25% (was 50%), strength reduced to 4 (was 5), and have a 25% bonus against swordsmen. This brings their strength in line with other units of the era, and as an aside, makes the Sumerian Vulture able to defeat a regular Axeman due to the equalized melee bonus.
•	Praetorians have 7 strength instead of 8, but their cost has been reduced to 40 and they have a +10% city attack bonus (i.e, they are regular Swordsmen with +1 strength in all regards).
•	Spearmen require Bronze Working. Since Spearmen already need metal anyway, this change doesn't affect the player much, but it does delay the appearance of barbarian Spearmen and make the early game a little more manageable.
•	Scouts ignore terrain costs.
•	Explorers begin with March and Sentry instead of Woodsman and Guerilla. They also have the ability to attack enemy units (allowing them to capture guarded goody huts), though they can’t pillage. Hopefully they’re a little more useful now.
•	Ironclads have 3 moves instead of 2.
•	Musketmen start with 1 first strike, like archery units.
•	The Drill line of promtions has been expanded and revised:
◦	Drill I: +1 First Strike
◦	Drill II: +1 First Strike, -20% collateral damage
◦	Drill III: +2 First Strike chances, -20% collateral damage
◦	Drill IV: +1 First Strike, +1 First Strike chance -20% collateral damage, +10% against Mounted Units
◦	Drill V: +2 First Strikes, -30% collateral damage, requires Great General
◦	All promotions that list Combat as a prerequisite will now accept Drill as well.
•	Turning a Great General into a warlord grants 26 XP to units on the same tile (up from 20), which is enough to bring an unpromoted unit to level 6. This, along with the new Drill V promotion, makes it a little more feasible to create a warlord unit instead of a Great Military Instructor.

Buildings and Wonders

•	The Customs House increases the commerce of local water tiles by +1 (this increase stacks with the Feitoria unique building).
•	The Drydock increases the production of local water tiles by +1.
•	Nuclear Plants no longer cause meltdowns (their high cost and late position in the tech tree are plenty to balance them against the other power plants).
•	The Carthaginian Cothon has a cost of 80 (down from 100), just like regular Harbors.
•	The Byzantine Hippodrome allows 2 artist specialists, just like regular theaters.
•	The Roman Forum increases great person rate by 50% (up from 25%).
•	Monuments no longer go obsolete with Astronomy. The Ethiopian Stele’s culture bonus has been reduced to +15% (was +25%).

 
Terrain, Resources, and Improvements

•	Lumbermills are available with Machinery instead of Replaceable Parts. Replaceable Parts increases production by +1, but railroads no longer affect lumbermills.
•	Aluminum and oil can now appear on grassland, forest, and jungle tiles.
•	Coal, copper, and iron can now appeat on forest and jungle tiles.
•	Horses no longer appear in tundra.
•	Rice gives +2 food with a farm, up from +1. This gives it a value equal to that of wheat and corn.
•	Oil increases production/commerce by 3/3 when improved, up from 2/1.
•	Uranium increases production/commerce by 2/3 when improved, up from 0/3.
•	Sugar provides +2 commerce when improved; all other Plantation resources provide +1 commerce when improved.
•	Deer increases production by 1 when improved.
•	Crab and clam receive +1 commerce when improved. 

Misc

•	Divine Right now grants a free Great Prophet to the first civ to discover it.

I plundered a lot of these ideas from things like the PIG mod and Antilogic's Minimal Mod. Some of these are experimental and probably outside of K-Mod's scope, but maybe there's something useful here.
 
This looks very interesting, Jabarto.

Why the changes for horses (not on tundra) and plantations?
 
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