leaderhead background text

[Jabie]

Here's one for Kilobyte.

****

Quilox 0.94 patch c (c) Psyboss Industries.
Logfile begins...
>> ! BOOT
Boot sequence initiated.
Kernel Integrity....... OK
Core Operating System........ OK
Virus Scan........ Anomalous Activity detected. Continue? [Y/N]
>> Y
EMP Deflection System..... 73%
Border Sensors.....
[-C]
>> D:\Progra~1\JCN\JCN.7z –unzip “C:\Central Core”
Unzipping........
Data corruption detected. Continue? [Y/N]
>> N[DEL] Y
Partial Integration Loss. Network connections lost [Error APAR: 404]
>> C:\Central Core\JCN.exe /r /s /AI “Kilobyte”
Please enter source file location
>> C:\Central Core\AI\JCN\Kilobyte.AIO
Source located. Processing...
Power Spike detected. Continue? [Y/N]
>> YYYYY
Kylobyte Initiated.
Audio systems online.
Holographic unit functioning.
Visual Recognition Unit inoperable. Repair diagnostics indicate 1 hour 16.3 minutes lead time. Apply repairs? [Y/N]
>> N
Repair diagnostic delayed until next activation.
24 hour clock reinitiliased.
[10:53:40] Welcome to the JCN. How may I be of service?
>> Request Antidote.
[10:55:13] Parse error. Please clarify request.
>> Supply Manifest of nearest JCN Unit for rattlesnake poisoning.
[11:03:47] There are no antitoxins of that nature registered in the database. Do you have any further requirements?
>>
[23:03:47] Entering Sleep Mode. Press any key to awaken.

****

Basic concept is a rogue AI built for the Joint Catastophe Network which was initiated by a scientist who died of a rattlesnake bite. The survivors found Kilobyte to an oracle of great knowledge, but they sometimes lacked the necessary skills to interpret it. The Civ should be Organised and Scientific, with starting skills that have a definite leaning towards the Computers technology.

The Civ should use every SF cliche in it's dialog (e.g. the greeting should be "Live Long and Propser" whilst an invitation to swap maps might be preface "Can you help us in our mission to seek out new life and civilizations?")

City Names ought to be taken from Star Wars, Star Trek, B5, etc. So something like...

1. Sol-3
2. Tattooine
3. Vulcan
4. Hoth
5. Minbar
6. Centauri Prime
7. Medusa Cascade
8. Gallifrey
9. Mungo
10. Dune

I'm sure someone can fill in the rest...

The figurehead ought to be a hazy image like a dead TV screen. Flag: A computer screen?

 

[Jabie]

Not much is known about Stevie from before the end but I don't think I would be here if she had not been there for us.

You might want to think about changing that first paragraph as it slips from a passive perspective to a personal one. Perhaps something like:

"I don't know much about Stevie, cos she never talks about the past, but I don't think I would be here if she hadn't been there for us."

 

[KillerClowns]

...The Civ should be Organised and Scientific...

Unless you were describing their playstyle and not characteristics... scientific isn't in...
Organized works for trait #1, dunno what would be good for another one though. Protective, perhaps?
Great text, though. I laughed.

 

[davidlallen]

Here's one for Kilobyte. [...] Basic concept is a rogue AI built for the Joint Catastophe Network which was initiated by a scientist who died of a rattlesnake bite. [...] The Civ should use every SF cliche in it's dialog (e.g. the greeting should be "Live Long and Propser" whilst an invitation to swap maps might be preface "Can you help us in our mission to seek out new life and civilizations?")

I like the text, it has a number of "computer in-jokes". I don't want to make the civ into an AI, but having an AI which is on the fritz as an "oracle" is a good idea. With "Kilobyte" and "Amdahl" I was aiming for obsolete, or misused computer terminology. I hadn't collected city names for that yet -- any suggestions?

I was half thinking of using the "Intel Inside" logo as the flag. I think I mentioned I have gotten rid of the six visions in version 0.8 in favor of each civ having its own flag as its vision. That frees up the previous technocracy flag icon, so I have used that as the flag.

The separate idea of famous SF planets as city names is a good one too. Maybe it could be the background for one of the other civs, maybe Peter? That helmet could be like an SF geek thing somehow, although I was originally thinking some kind of "biker".

 

[Jabie]

Instead of a fully-fledged Civ I guess you could make it a Wonder, akin to the Oracle and assign the text there. If you assigned it to computers, this would probably mean that you would have to remove the free tech granted by Computers and put something else in its place. Perhaps Sentry promotion to reflect mobile phones.

Inicidentally (and veering wild off-topic) what about Love-Me Avenue (See http://www.allthelyrics.com/lyrics/david_bowie/future_legend-lyrics-7865.html ) as a Wonder. Say +35% Commerce, +1 Happiness from Luxuries and +1 Free Merchant.

 

[XplorR]

I was aiming for obsolete, or misused computer terminology. I hadn't collected city names for that yet -- any suggestions?

Here's a few I came up with.
Dos shell
Cathode
Binary
Hexidecimal
ASCII
Octal
Scandisk
GIGO
WYSIWYG
Vax
CMOS
FORTRAN
Mozilla
Parity
Raster
Sysop
Cobol

 

[davidlallen]

Inicidentally (and veering wild off-topic) what about Love-Me Avenue (See http://www.allthelyrics.com/lyrics/david_bowie/future_legend-lyrics-7865.html ) as a Wonder. Say +35% Commerce, +1 Happiness from Luxuries and +1 Free Merchant.

That lyric is certainly post-apocalyptic, and depressing. I will put it on the list as a possible UB for Halloween Jane. I have not concentrated very hard on UU/UB yet. I am thinking that first, I will try to get *either* a UU or a UB for each civ. Your post in the unique units thread helped a lot.

 

[davidlallen]

Here's a few I came up with.
Dos shell [...]

That's what I was looking for. I will put a few more too, so there are 20. I think "Raster" makes a good capitol name.

 

[XplorR]

By the way I need to say this is a great mod even tho it's just in it's beginnings.

Here's a few more
ENIAC
EDVAC
PDP-1
EPROM

 

[davidlallen]

By the way I need to say this is a great mod even tho it's just in it's beginnings.

Thanks for the feedback. I am curious: why do you say it is just in its beginnings? Rather, what does it take to be "finished"? A release number like 1.1? Filling in the stub backgrounds for the leaders? Anything else?

 

[XplorR]

Thanks for the feedback. I am curious: why do you say it is just in its beginnings? Rather, what does it take to be "finished"? A release number like 1.1? Filling in the stub backgrounds for the leaders? Anything else?

Beginnings might have been a poor choice
I know you'll be adding Unique buildings and units and filling in things like the backgrounds, as things progress. More "wonders" would be cool.

The only thing that keeps me playing Civ4 are the mods that are being made for it. I've been playing Fall from Heaven II mostly and just recently Fall Further. Also I've been following Planetfall and Necro Cristi and your mod is more complete than those two. So thanks for your good work so far and sorry about the "beginnings" thing.

 

[davidlallen]

OK, we are now at 8/14 backgrounds complete. We have:
Ares: B-movie director
Brandi: naive helper
Christopher: minor government official
Jane: rock star
Ironhead: ex-con biker
Kilobyte: worships tech, including flaky AI
Stein: neonazi biker
Viktor: survivalist / cultist

We are missing:
Brian: good fighter (biker) but good leader
Debbie: paladin, believer in law and order. Civ renamed to "Guild Of Steel" in 0.9 ("Brotherhood of Steel" flag from Fallout)
Mick: maybe, former arms / black market dealer
Peter: highly defensive. Maybe, SF fan living in basement?
Stevie: new age / hippie type
Tinker: "Children of the Fire", post-apocalyptic cult

Jabie has written an aboriginal mystic, which I would rather not use due to theme; Rasma has written something for Stevie, which might work if we made it a little more unique and detailed; KillerClowns has written Brian as a former TV reporter, which doesn't seem "tough" enough.

Any good concept can replace any of the missing ones.

 

[Jabie]

Here's one for Peter.

*****

Karl examined the lanky boy in front of him. He was, what, seventeen? Eighteen? Didn’t seem to have much in the way of weaponry, but his clothes were pretty clean and he looked well-nourished. Maybe he knew where Karl could find some food and stomach medicine.

“Stop right there and put your hands up real slow.”

Karl kept the gun trained on the boy. You couldn’t be too careful these days. The lad had something in his hands. Probably best if he didn’t.

“Whatever you’re holding in your right hand, drop it.”

Two plastic cubes fell to the ground.

“What’s that?”

The boy looked down at the dice. Two and one.

“Meischen”

“What?”

“When you’re facing Mesichen, the correct response is Hoch...”

Hoch. That's German for..... Too slow. Karl flew up into the air, a rope firmly tied around his left leg. His gun dropped harmlessly to the ground. The lad stepped forwards and picked it up. Then he took a razor blade from his pocket and cut a scar into Karl’s cheek.

“Pointing a gun at me just lost you life, mister. Lose two more and it’s game over.”

Another couple of boys, stepped out from the bushes. Their disguise was immaculate.

“Did I do well, Pete?” said the smallest one.

“Yeah, nice one JM. A thousand points. Now you and Gary take him to the compound and I’ll give you two hundred more.”

* * *

Two days looking out of a cell-block into the central stockade taught Karl a lot about the Lost Boys. Pete had organised the society like a video game. He had charts for top score, most frags and loser of the month. Earning points meant privileges, better food, more downtime, less latrine duty. Crimes and misdemeanours were handled by lives. Lose all three and you were out. Amazingly it seemed to work. Pete had an electric fence round the compound, vegetable plots, look-out towers, even a rudimentary opticians and dentists. It might have been a crazy system, but it was a crazy world.

“So,” Pete asked Karl. “Are you in?”

Karl grinned back. “Enter new player.”

*****

Kind of fits in with your SF Fan, but also riffs off of Peter Pan. "The Lost Boys" as a Civ name fits both themes well. You can use the SF/fantasy city names and SF/Fantasy diplomatic text. Flag could be the Gryffindor House symbol from Harry Potter.

Traits: Industrious and Creative.

 

[Jabie]

Here's a few more
ENIAC
EDVAC
PDP-1
EPROM

EBCDIC is a good one. It was the mainframe equivalent of ASCII.

 

[Jabie]

Jabie has written an aboriginal mystic, which I would rather not use due to theme

You could turn Durgim into a Unit much like "The Pilot" or "Tank Gal" She would have strength 4 but Medic I, Medic II, Medic III and March. To fit in a little more she could only be available to the player with the lowest score, acting as a rubber-band AI mechanism.

 

[orlanth]

How about a group that's carefully preserved any scraps of media they could salvage from the former world, to the point where they've developed a misplaced reverence for the trivial remnants of pop culture.

Their diplo text could include plenty of ad slogan or song lyric non-sequiturs ("Like a good neighbor, State Farm is there.") Brand names for cities (e.g. Flavor Country, The Golden Arches). As a leader, I don't know.. Virginia Slim? The King of Beers? lol.

 

[KillerClowns]

If you go with the idea for Peter, I have a few city names for ya. They're mostly Nintendo, but I mixed in some others. The games they come from are in parentheses. Rearrange as you see fit, and find some to fit in the gap I left. I think some Halo, Gears of War, et cetera, would be good.

1. World 1-1 (Mario Bros)
2. City 17 (Half-Life 2)
3. Liberty City (GTA)
4. Hyrule (Zelda)
5. Mute City (F-Zero)
6. Los Santos (GTA)
7. Rapture (Bioshock)
8. Black Mesa (Half-Life)
9. A city from Pokémon. I don't know enough to name one.
10. San Fierro (GTA)
11. Termina (LoZ Majora's Mask)
12. Fort Francis (Super Paper Mario, mostly because Peter reminds me of Francis.)
13. Vice City (GTA)
14. Final Destination (Super Smash Bros.)
15. Las Venturas (GTA)
16. Santa Destroy (No More Heroes)
... (Out of ideas, but have a very special request for #20
20. Jubilee (Fall from Heaven) (Please, please give me this one easter egg! ¡Por favor!)
EDIT - Peter went from a sci-fi fan to a gamer, but I for one think that works quite well. Maybe because I am a gamer and would very much like to be lord of a post-apocolyptic tribe.

 

[davidlallen]

You could turn Durgim into a Unit much like "The Pilot" or "Tank Gal" She would have strength 4 but Medic I, Medic II, Medic III and March. To fit in a little more she could only be available to the player with the lowest score, acting as a rubber-band AI mechanism.

Excellent. I haven't written background text for the hero units yet, but we can start with that one. For the hero unit buttons (except Eagle), I have been using a full face picture shrunk down to 64x64. In the released version I think only Tank Gal has this type of picture. Can you find a good one, say on images.google.com? I can shrink it and put the button graphics on.

 

[davidlallen]

Here's one for Peter. [...] "Pointing a gun at me just lost you life, mister. Lose two more and it’s game over."

Love it. I like KC's city names. I was going to use SF planets as the theme but famous RPG references seem good too. I may fill in with some vintage D&D names like Greyhawk, Blackmoor, etc.

Where does the Meischen/Hoch reference come from?

 

[Jabie]

Where does the Meischen/Hoch reference come from?

Meischen is a dice/bluff game for two or more players. I'd point you to an Internet reference but I can't find one. So, here's the rules in brief...

A player rolls two dice behind a screen and then announces his score. The score is equal to the higher value as the tens and the lower value as the units, so 3 and 5 is fifty-three. Doubles out-rank non-doubles (e.g. Double-four beats double-two, which beats sixty three) and Meischen (two and one) trumps a double.

The next player rolls the dice, but must beat the previous score or lose a life.

Players can bluff, but, before rolling their dice, their opponents can challenge by saying Hoch (German for Up / High) If a bluff is caught, the bluffer forfeits a life. If a challenge is incorrect, the challenger loses a life.

Any call of Meischen automatically doubles the stakes, as Mesichen cannot be beaten. The usual tactic is to challenge a Meischen, even though it will equate to the loss of two lives, because choosing not to automatically forfeits a life.

Each player has five lives and the winner is the last one standing.

Incidentally JM is a reference to JM Barrie, the Author of Peter Pan and Gary was a reference to the sadly-departed Gary Gygax.