Large Map and New Civilizations are now playable

[banzay13]

Incas UHV became much harder. You need control more cites, more area (Andean coast now very big, it need 6 turn for worker to came from on end to another (w/o Engineering)) and some of them in foreign area (you'll get OE for sure). And (almost) you can't avoid Old world conquers now.
The good news - Andean coast now have plenty of resources - so if you go for space race - probably it will be a bit easy now.

 

[TsimTsigal]

I think the USA's UP could use some fine-tuning...

I never understood why American UHV was changed, the old one was good (plus Americans had some minor troubles with happiness after corporations begin to spread en masse even in 1.17, with essentially +8 happiness from civics).

You know, maybe America should play like your typical Stellaris empire and whip/draft all immigrants?

AI basically won't trade with the player. (You want 15 resources for 1 spices? Really?)

You can abuse it as well, AI values resources the other side doesn't have a lot more, and values strategic resources over luxuries over food. Plus relations matter. As Swahili i managed to buy Spices, Pearls, Dates, Wheat and some gold for Amber. Mughals under Akbar are happiness pinata, especially given that India lacks strategic resources (you can sell them coal for truly sinful amount of resources).

Didn't report this because i think it's fitting to have more dynamic trade rather than fair boring 1:1 ratio.

 

[urbestfriend]

I never understood why American UHV was changed, the old one was good (plus Americans had some minor troubles with happiness after corporations begin to spread en masse even in 1.17, with essentially +8 happiness from civics).

Probably because the old one of "capitalism makes Americans so happy yay!" is literally just boomer propaganda. I feel like the new American and Russian UPs are both more interesting and engaging in terms of gameplay and more accurately represent real history rather than pop sanitized history and I really enjoy them.

BTW I was wondering about some clarification on some of the UPs:

Canada: double trade route yield for years at peace, how many years at peace do you need to have for trade route yield to double?
Java: what is the size limit for an island to no longer be an island? Does their UP work on Australia?
Kushans: who is "the owner"? Is that just who owns the holy city of the religion?

A few other notes on UP that I admittedly have not played yet:

Vietnam's UP might be one of my favorite, what a great representation of guerilla warfare!
With the missionary limit being raised from 3 to 5, the Tibet UP of unlimited missionaries probably will never come into play, it's unlikely a civ that small would ever need to produce 6 missionaries at a time. Obviously they also still have the other more impactful half but just saying.
The Swedish UP might be the most underwhelming in the history of the mod unless I'm missing something, holy moly.

And one final note, not sure if it's new but it's new to me - I think the Russian Pagan religous victory might be the easiest victory in the whole mod. 15 pagan temples in the world, half your cities no religion, and 7 furs. You can easily get 7 furs and settle 15 cities with no conflict and no stability worries, and Russia spawns after the Mongols now. So you basically just play like normal and plonk down 15 cities and as long as you make sure to keep up enough muskets that the barbs and your western neighbors down get ya it's so easy you could fall asleep.

 

[Derdan]

1. Years at peace modifies trade route yield by 5% every however many years. So Canada will get 10% each interval instead (idk what it is specifically).
2. If I'm not mistaken practically any island works. Australia is definitely too large though. It's not really fair to call it an island imo.
3. It's referring to the owner of the city. If you spread a religion to a city whose civ follows a different religion, you get gold. This works on your own cities as well.
4. As far as I understand, city celebrations are still a work in progress, so hopefully it will be more impactful for Sweden in the future.
5. All pagan victories are easier now. I don't believe any have been updated for the new map, so it's way easier to meet the temple requirement and obtain the resources necessary. Civs also seem much more reluctant to adopt a state religion.

 

[Leoreth]

Canada: double trade route yield for years at peace, how many years at peace do you need to have for trade route yield to double?

Trade route yield already increases for years at peace, the UP only doubles the rate and the maximum value.

Java: what is the size limit for an island to no longer be an island? Does their UP work on Australia?

The game uses a uniform definition for islands for this UP and other island related logic. Essentially it is what you would expect, any land mass that is not a continent. Australia is a continent.

Kushans: who is "the owner"? Is that just who owns the holy city of the religion?

The owner of the city the religion is spread to.

 

[TsimTsigal]

Probably because the old one of "capitalism makes Americans so happy yay!" is literally just boomer propaganda. I feel like the new American and Russian UPs are both more interesting and engaging in terms of gameplay and more accurately represent real history rather than pop sanitized history and I really enjoy them.

I honestly don't catch your drift where "capitalism makes Americans happy" (i mean, the power isn't named "the Power of American Dream" for nothing, and it isn't just Free Enteneurship but also Democracy, Constitution and Individualism that are affected) is a pop sanitized history while Russian permanent Despotism and entire civilization revolving around sacirificing your own population isn't. Moreover, American UP used to be pretty much necessary to not drown in unhappiness from all these corporations, and the US shouldn't have incentive to go Planned Economy (and they already have it,s from specs and lots of rivers nudge them towards it) nor Public Welfare.

As result both civs are forced to pick up civics that they never used IRL, the Americans work the best with communist/socialist eco and monarchy (the former UP was a crutch but that crutch at least was historical and immersive), while Russians who used Monarchy/State Party have to use Despotism instead (let's be honest, whipping > drafting, especially given that Russians don't have any warmonger UHV goals and have core/historical huge enough to expand without conquering Europe).

 

[AOS9001]

while Russians who used Monarchy/State Party have to use Despotism instead (let's be honest, whipping > drafting, especially given that Russians don't have any warmonger UHV goals and have core/historical huge enough to expand without conquering Europe)

I wonder if Leoreth's planned civic changes have something to do with Russia's UP? State Party is absolutely great for Russia because of the no city maintenance, so I did find it odd that the game wants you to run despotism the whole time to take advantage of it. Maybe this will change in a future update.

Come to think of it, this could be why America's UP changed too. If, hypothetically speaking, Leoreth had changes in mind to the civics that would make despotism as an end-all be-all and America's old happiness bonus from the free enterprise/individualism/democracy/constitution both obsolete, these changes would make a lot of sense. I'm just speculating though.

 

[BaneFire]

How are people finding the Malay?
They're definitely a fun and interesting civ so far, but the first UHV has me stumped. I spam out some cities, whip out lighthouses, I even whip out+buy enough war elephants to conquer Java - yet come 1000AD I barely have half the trade route commerce requirement.
Here's my city setup, your starting city has enough food to whip out most of your infrastructure, every other city is just building lighthouses to shart out more trade routes.
It definitely seems easier on Marathon than Normal speed, but that's true for most UHVs I think.
My next few tries will see:
- More workers maybe, but I feel like my infrastructure is generally strong enough.
- Whip out settlers earlier and harder from my capital.
- Explore more to get some Dravidian/Chinese trade routes.
- Run some culture to grab those third ring tiles earlier, therefore acquiring more trade routes earlier.
- I don't see how I can conquer Java earlier than 900AD... maybe without barracks.
- I also don't know if putting cities into Philippines/Borneo is viable, but worth a try.
Maybe that'll pull it all together.

 

[TsimTsigal]

How are people finding the Malay?
They're definitely a fun and interesting civ so far, but the first UHV has me stumped. I spam out some cities, whip out lighthouses, I even whip out+buy enough war elephants to conquer Java - yet come 1000AD I barely have half the trade route commerce requirement.

If they use same mechanic as the Tamils, then Great Merchants also count.

 

[BaneFire]

How are people finding the Malay?
They're definitely a fun and interesting civ so far, but the first UHV has me stumped. I spam out some cities, whip out lighthouses, I even whip out+buy enough war elephants to conquer Java - yet come 1000AD I barely have half the trade route commerce requirement.
Here's my city setup, your starting city has enough food to whip out most of your infrastructure, every other city is just building lighthouses to shart out more trade routes.
It definitely seems easier on Marathon than Normal speed, but that's true for most UHVs I think.
My next few tries will see:
- More workers maybe, but I feel like my infrastructure is generally strong enough.
- Whip out settlers earlier and harder from my capital.
- Explore more to get some Dravidian/Chinese trade routes.
- Run some culture to grab those third ring tiles earlier, therefore acquiring more trade routes earlier.
- I don't see how I can conquer Java earlier than 900AD... maybe without barracks.
- I also don't know if putting cities into Philippines/Borneo is viable, but worth a try.
Maybe that'll pull it all together.

Venturing to India and Japan ensured 4800 trade commerce was easily met.
Conquest civic made conquering Java super easy, just bought out an entire army.
Culture isn't needed I don't think.

14 resources by 1300 is possible but silly. I bought an army and conquered Burma and Vietnam lol. Got me up to 12 resources. Traded for cotton with mughals. But then Arabs stopped trading Wine with me, despite a surplus!!! Annoyingly luck dependent, oh well it happens.

Make sure you keep ships in India, Korea, Arabia to keep trade routes open.

Spammed some cities in resource rich Indonesia after conquest. My tech died but shouldn't matter after you have key techs.

Lastly, Islam didn't spread to me even by 1300. Maybe I need to play on, but getting Islam whipped out mught be tough.

Fun civ!

 

[urbestfriend]

Wanted to play as Japan, did 3000 bc start as I almost always do. Is it time to start talking about balancing?

Leoreth I'm scared.
(Regent btw)

 

[Hickman888]

I honestly don't catch your drift where "capitalism makes Americans happy" (i mean, the power isn't named "the Power of American Dream" for nothing, and it isn't just Free Enteneurship but also Democracy, Constitution and Individualism that are affected) is a pop sanitized history while Russian permanent Despotism and entire civilization revolving around sacirificing your own population isn't. Moreover, American UP used to be pretty much necessary to not drown in unhappiness from all these corporations, and the US shouldn't have incentive to go Planned Economy (and they already have it,s from specs and lots of rivers nudge them towards it) nor Public Welfare.

As result both civs are forced to pick up civics that they never used IRL, the Americans work the best with communist/socialist eco and monarchy (the former UP was a crutch but that crutch at least was historical and immersive), while Russians who used Monarchy/State Party have to use Despotism instead (let's be honest, whipping > drafting, especially given that Russians don't have any warmonger UHV goals and have core/historical huge enough to expand without conquering Europe).

From reading other players experiences in this forum, the lack of happiness in the late game seems to be an issue for many civilizations, not just America. Reverting to the old American UP would be like putting a band aid on something more systemic. Besides, historically speaking, the old American UP didn't make too much sense, and I was glad to see it removed. American history is full of protests, rebellions, draft resistance, etc. Practically speaking, it just gave you a bit of buffer in your first several turns for drafting out units to achieve your first goal of ridding North America of European colonies. Now that that the Monroe Doctrine is no longer UHV 1, that extra isn't as necessary.

 

[1SDANi]

I personally like how America currently plays in its early game. Your cities are going to be running 1 or 2 unhappiness and you have to choose whether to invest in things like weavers, coffee houses, and jewelers, curry favor with countries like Portugal, France, China, and Japan so you can trade your food resources for luxury resources from them, and/or abandon democracy for despotism or monarchy. If we want to talk about plausible alt-history, there was the Prussian scheme for Monarchy and the Newburgh Conspiracy for Despotism. I've also noticed that, unless I build a ton of workers early on, a ton of my cities can end up working a ton of unimproved plots for quite some time, making Elective Monarchy tempting, though I prefer how many Great People I can spam with Democracy so I haven't even bothered experimenting with it. Rather fitting as historically, the elective monarchy plan proposed at the Constitutional Congress wasn't even considered for debate, much less a vote.

 

[TsimTsigal]

From reading other players experiences in this forum, the lack of happiness in the late game seems to be an issue for many civilizations, not just America. Reverting to the old American UP would be like putting a band aid on something more systemic.

The idea is that Americans used to uniquely run Free Enterneurship and not drown in unhappiness from corporations. I remember having several dozens of corporate
in size 32 city in 1.17, which would otherwise require me to switch to otherwise useless Public Welfare (or just expell all corporations with Planned, but i really wanted that GDP for UHV3). And i'm not sure how you managed to avoid lots of unhappiness as America in 1.17, with cities easily growing to 15+ sizes and housing 2-3 corporations, even having lots of luxuries stops working. +8 carried me a lot on my American UHV run until i got Gardens by the Bay.

American history is full of protests, rebellions, draft resistance

But not revolutions and active rebellions (save for the ACW which was dictated more by incompatiable economics than civil unrest). I mean, compare with France (at least 3 revolutions since American spawn, not counting mass civil protests), Russia (4, if we count the fall of the USSR as one), Germany (2) and so on.

 

[Hickman888]

The idea is that Americans used to uniquely run Free Enterneurship and not drown in unhappiness from corporations. I remember having several dozens of corporate
in size 32 city in 1.17, which would otherwise require me to switch to otherwise useless Public Welfare (or just expell all corporations with Planned, but i really wanted that GDP for UHV3). And i'm not sure how you managed to avoid lots of unhappiness as America in 1.17, with cities easily growing to 15+ sizes and housing 2-3 corporations, even having lots of luxuries stops working. +8 carried me a lot on my American UHV run until i got Gardens by the Bay.


But not revolutions and active rebellions (save for the ACW which was dictated more by incompatiable economics than civil unrest). I mean, compare with France (at least 3 revolutions since American spawn, not counting mass civil protests), Russia (4, if we count the fall of the USSR as one), Germany (2) and so on.

Either I misunderstood you, or I have no idea how you had dozens of corporate anger in your cities. I don't think I ever had more than maybe 5 from corporations in any given city. Each acquired resource for a corporation only gives a fraction of , easily offset by the luxury resources you can trade/take around the world. And with your production modifiers being so strong, you can easily construct more happiness buildings in your cities that need it.

 

[TsimTsigal]

Either I misunderstood you, or I have no idea how you had dozens of corporate anger in your cities. I don't think I ever had more than maybe 5 from corporations in any given city. Each acquired resource for a corporation only gives a fraction of , easily offset by the luxury resources you can trade/take around the world. And with your production modifiers being so strong, you can easily construct more happiness buildings in your cities that need it.

Had to unearth an ancient save. Iirc at the end of the game i had 35 somewhere, but my memory might be a bit blurry. 20 or so were present in at least 4 more cities. As you can see, i have enough luxuries, +17 from the Gardens of the Bay making Sewers and Hostpitals happiness sources, and still have only 8 points of difference (surprise - caused by the American Dream).

 

[Leoreth]

Please also show the amount of resources you control, and the yield and commerce generated by these resources.

 

[TsimTsigal]

Please also show the amount of resources you control, and the yield and commerce generated by these resources.

Resources are shown on the image (that's why it's so big, but in retrospective i could trim it a lot more); unless you need precise amounts, each corporation generated 4-6 unhappiness and around 20-30 commerce (a bit less hammers). I don't think it's a bug, it's a direct outcome of controlling Europe and both Americas, which leads to corporations generating lots of profit and from all these resources.

If you need precise amounts, please tell me; i'm just too lazy to dig up 1.17, renaming it and waiting 1000 years to load the mod/save again. It's not 1.18.

 

[Leoreth]

That's fair. I am not trying to imply or determine that there is a bug, my main concern is the trade off between corporation income and the unhappiness they create. If you have a lot of corporation resources, you will have a lot of unhappiness, but you will also receive a lot of yields and commerce in turn that are not tied to population and therefore is received regardless of the unhappiness impact. I would argue the gains still outweigh the costs.

If that is true, it does not mean that there isn't an issue with this. In that context I see two issues:

• You do not get to choose where corporations spread so you do not get to make that trade off yourself as a conscious gameplay decision. That can feel limiting/punishing even if the full cost/benefit analysis is in your favour
• It can produce edge cases where heavy corporation spread suddenly incentivises running happiness civics like Monarchy, which feels immersion breaking and historically incorrect.

To be honest, my main approach to address situations like these is to make them less likely to happen. For example, corporation unhappiness could play a much larger role in determining the spread of corporations (or rather, any role at all - currently it is not considered). Meaning that if there already is a high amount of corporation unhappiness, the city would be less attractive to corporations and instead the corporations would spread somewhere else. That would introduce an indirect mechanism to prevent corporations from spreading somewhere and immediately creating angry citizens. Having corporations spread out more across your cities would be introduce more room for play as well, and help spreading corporations across different civilizations as well.

 

[TsimTsigal]

To be honest i don't think it's a problem at all; after all, majority of modern developed states are much closer to Public Welfare than Free Enterneurship... save for America, at least until recently. Forcing the player to deal with growing economic inequality (i guess that's what the unhappiness represents) is a nice little lategame mechanic.

My point was that the American UP allowed the US to uniquely play as super-duper capitalist superpower, especially given that the World Trade Center and Free Enterneurship have amazing synergy. Any other civ in such situation would have to switch to either Public Welfare or Planned Eco.