[MOD] MagisterModmod

[GreedyManul]

Petitioning to give Illans a unique version of the Summer Palace that's functionally identical but just named "Other Winter Palace" as to not ruin my immersion.

Gee Auric! How come Mulcarn lets you have two Winter Palaces?

 

[plasmacannon]

Religion and Alignment.
I did read over it's link. https://forums.civfanatics.com/threads/religion-run-down.505218/
It is older and based on the original mod. I checked to see if there were changes, such as someone starting off with an "evil" leader and thru a religion changes to Good. This doesn't appear to be possible, yet the reverse is. In my current game I am dealing with Ashen Veil Elohims, which is weird but a refreshing change.
I played an Evil Balseraph leader, took Kilmorph went neutral, then switched to Empyrean and stayed neutral, went Order, stayed neutral.
If a single switch won't change one's alignment to Good, perhaps a series of changes will, to show that for this game, this leader has reformed. Just a thought.

 

[GreedyManul]

The Elohim do tend to beeline towards the Ashen Veil for some reason. I've seen them adopt that state religion quite a few times. Wonder why.

Ashes of Erebus does have a deeper Alignment system, with a lot of granularity given towards the player. Vanilla alignment, barring special circumstances, can only be changed via religion, with the Order being the only path towards Good and the Ashen Veil towards Evil. From what I can tell, the way vanilla alignment works is it represents how the entire civilization is alignment-wise. Adopting the Order means that religion's strictness forces the civilization to become Good-aligned, while the Empyrean, a more "Good" religion, is more tolerant and open-minded, letting Evil civs turn to Neutral first. Likewise for the Veil; adopting it represents a stark turning point towards a maliciously-aligned way of thinking for the entire civilization, while the Council of Esus may be unscrupulous, but it sure isn't as violently malicious as the Veil, turning Good civs Neutral, but not forcing them to Evil. I'm pretty sure adopting the Order as a state religion should turn you Good, idk why you stayed Neutral.

I'd like more options for alignment changes though, like freeing Brigit/Odio and partaking in vampirism as the Calabim (Infernal Pacts nominally turn you Evil, but if you're doing them you're already Evil thanks to adopting the Ashen Veil, so it's kinda moot). Such a thing needs some thinking out though, as you need to hash out some pretty big actions to allow the player to partake into to change their alignment. I'll see what I can hash out if something hits me.

 

[plasmacannon]

Oh, it just did. I was still in Empyrean. Order does change one to Good.

Actually, I am surprised there isn't a religion for the other alignments.
Lanun would be a prime example of one for a Chaotic Good or Chaotic Neutral alignment religion as they start with Chaos mana from their Capitol. I always felt they were just stuck in there, left with no other civ as a competitor for coastlines, water mana and naval warfare.
There are 2 Dwarven Empires that will compete for Kilmorph. 2 Elven empires that could benefit from the Leaves. Even the White Hand has Doviello that might go for it.
Yea, they can build a Kraken, but who cares? All we have to do is not build naval ships and conquer their cities. Even if they settle on islands for better defense, we can just portal over there and wipe them out.

The Hand seems like a Lawful Evil religion, seeing that the Illians start with law mana and their leaders are Evil.
I read somewhere that Hippus worked with the Illians, yet they don't seem to benefit from snow covered lands. I could see them following a Lawful Neutral Knight code/religion if it existed or the Lawful Good Order. Even a Chaotic Mongolian Genghis Khan style can be envisioned.

I am surprised the Clan of Embers doesn't have a Chaotic Neutral Freedom based Religion and a Neutral Animal based one that allows them to create more animal barbarians such as a Panther, Bear and Elephant. Ljosalfar could have a leader that might strive for that one too. Being able to create elephants for use to convert into units, seems like a decent level 3 spell.

 

[GreedyManul]

Actually, I am surprised there isn't a religion for the other alignments.
Lanun would be a prime example of one for a Chaotic Good or Chaotic Neutral alignment religion as they start with Chaos mana from their Capitol. I always felt they were just stuck in there, left with no other civ as a competitor for coastlines, water mana and naval warfare.
There are 2 Dwarven Empires that will compete for Kilmorph. 2 Elven empires that could benefit from the Leaves. Even the White Hand has Doviello that might go for it.
Yea, they can build a Kraken, but who cares? All we have to do is not build naval ships and conquer their cities. Even if they settle on islands for better defense, we can just portal over there and wipe them out.

The Hand seems like a Lawful Evil religion, seeing that the Illians start with law mana and their leaders are Evil.
I read somewhere that Hippus worked with the Illians, yet they don't seem to benefit from snow covered lands. I could see them following a Lawful Neutral Knight code/religion if it existed or the Lawful Good Order. Even a Chaotic Mongolian Genghis Khan style can be envisioned.

On the primary religions:
-The Order is firmly Lawful Good, enforcing its alignment to its adherents, as Junil is not a flexible god and demands unquestioning obedience.
-The Empyrean is Neutral Good, and is less concerned about enforcing its alignment to others as the Order does, adhering to the pursuit of Truth more than anything else.
-Runes of Kilmorph is Lawful Neutral mostly, as they're concerned more about hard work and diligence than being a bulwark against evil, but they still dislike evil.
-Fellowship of Leaves is True Neutral; it only concerns itself about nature and its workings, and only works to protect it and it only.
-Octopus Overlords can be considered Chaotic Neutral/Evil, depending on the sect. Regardless, it's very Chaotic, and because of its nature, Good does not have much room there.
-Council of Esus is Neutral Evil due to its unscrupulousness, but not of the violently malicious kind. Some Aphotic Thrones can be Neutral, however.
-Ashen Veil is just Evil to a T, and can go from Lawful to Chaotic depending on the demon worshiped by its practitioners. Any who dabble in it become Evil, no exceptions.

As for the rest:
-The White Hand is Lawful Evil primarily because Ice is a dogmatic sphere and its adherents want to usher forth a new Age of Ice at the expense of literally everyone else.
-The Dragon Cult is primarily Chaotic, with Good/Evil being decided by the Dragon worshipped; Eurabatres cultings would be Good, while Abashi cultists would be Evil.
-The Children of the One seem True Neutral as they're unconcerned about the games of the petulant children that are the Angels calling themselves Gods, but in the grand scheme of things I'd put them firmly on the Good side.

If you desire more religions, take a look towards the Foxmen, Occis, Stewards of Inequity, and others; Magister expressed interest in having them around as cults due to their relative insignificance compared to the main religions, but adding Cults as its own thing requires DLL work. Maybe if you bug lfgr and he desires to do such a thing, he can add it; no guarantees, though.

BTW, keep in mind adding a Lawful/Chaotic axis on top of the Good/Evil one may require DLL work to be achieved, and would complicate things quite a bit in addition to making this mod stray from vanilla FFH2 and lean closer into Ashes of Erebus, even if very slightly. It's up to Magister and lgfr, really.

Also keep in mind the Palace mana of a civilization tells a lot about a people's personality; The Amurite Palace mana, for example, has Metamagic, Dimensional, and Enchantment, the first signifying their arcane connection, the other 2 an artifact from Kylorin due to their connection with him (Ceridwen taught him sorcery, Nantosuelta trained him even more when he wanted to undo the evil he propagated). The Bannor Law/Life/Fire bundle signifies their passionate struggle to uphold justice, order, and extermination of demonkind. The Illian Ice/Law/Enchantment bundle shows their connection to the sphere and how utterly rigid they are about it, though sadly I can't figure out what Enchantment stands for. Maybe Magister can enlighten us on this.

I am surprised the Clan of Embers doesn't have a Chaotic Neutral Freedom based Religion and a Neutral Animal based one that allows them to create more animal barbarians such as a Panther, Bear and Elephant. Ljosalfar could have a leader that might strive for that one too. Being able to create elephants for use to convert into units, seems like a decent level 3 spell.

Priests of Leaves can create lions, wolves, even elephants at a high enough level via their Call Animal spell already. You can simply go for Fellowship of Leaves and use Priests of Leaves to summon animals as any civilization. There's also Nature's Revolt, which empowers animals to a massive extent.

I do know Orbis and Ashes of Erebus have separated barbarians in 3 groups: animals, savages, and demons. IMO this gives a high level of granularity to the barbarian group, and avoids weird scenarios where Charadon, for example, can have Skeletons go by in peace around him, even though they should be attacking everything as Undead. But again, it's big DLL work, but it's one of the things that are highly worth it IMO.

EDIT: I wonder if the Empyrean/Council can be tweaked to turn Neutral civs Good/Evil respectively, taking from plasmacannon's idea. Maybe a python check when a religion is chosen should do the trick?

 

[plasmacannon]

I searched and just found Call Animal. It wasn't listed under Priest of Leaves or others with Divine, but only under Spells. It doesn't list the animals it can Call "lions, wolves, even elephants". Good to know.
Funny. I am surprised that the tier 3 Druids and Dryads can't Call animals, yet the tier 1 Priest of Leaves, can.

 

[GreedyManul]

I searched and just found Call Animal. It wasn't listed under Priest of Leaves or others with Divine, but only under Spells. It doesn't list the animals it can Call "lions, wolves, even elephants". Good to know.
Funny. I am surprised that the tier 3 Druids and Dryads can't Call animals, yet the tier 1 Priest of Leaves, can.

It is listed under Divine though, it's the one with the Tiger picture in "Spells and Abilities enabled".

 

[Calavente]

interesting discussion about Good-Neutral-Evil.
just a reminder : you are basing the analysis on DnD G-N-E axis...

in FFH, Good/Neutral/Evil means how likely you are to side with the Mercurians or with the Demons.

Roughly Good is about how likely they are to follow the will/teaching of the "original" Angels and Archangels ... which might not be GOOD for the human worshippers :

Order is Good : "kill all demons" "better to kill 10.000 innocents than leave 1 demon worshiper alive".
it would be typically a Lawful Neutral in DnD (or even lawful evil) : Follow the Law, the Letter of the Law, no mercy for anybody... You think it's "good" because the Law is of "Divine Intervention" and that Junil is supposedly about Justice... but Justice is about LAWS and if the laws are evil, the justice is evil.... Here the only interest of that Law is to kill demons. They don't care about the people or about being misericordious, or about helping the poor, or about freedom...etc.

Empyrian is Good (but doesn't force you to GOOD) as they oppose Demons / Fallen Angels, but it's not their only focus. They would be more the traditional "Good" of DnD .. Neutral Good

Kilmorph is clearly against Demons... So I would put it in Good, like Empyrians. however in Dnd terms it's more Neutral/Lawful neutral. Not really taken by the Law, but still following the law of hardwork and hand-crafting.

Leaves is about Nature, and the law of Nature: they don't care about demons or angels : Pure Neutral.
in DnD terms, it can be Chaotic Neutral : you never know how Leaves will work : Calabim Leaves or Sidhe Leaves will follow the Hunt / Law of the strongest within the law of nature ; Elohim Leaves will follow the growth and purity part of the law of nature which opposes to demons, Ljos/Svart will follow the mysterious part of nature: generous, strong and hidden to humans, killing outsiders.

the Hand is Neutral: they fight against both Demons and Angels: Mulcarn is their only God.
in DnD they would be Lawful Evil : follow the Law of Mulcarn, up to immobility and stasis.

OO is neutral & slightly evil : they are following the nightmares of Daladin, not really of Demons. However those nightmares comes from Daladin being "cursed" by Mammon (a fallen Angel)... They use demons but don't actively follow them.
in DnD, I agree with Chaotic Evil : they follow nightmares, and Chaos is their secondary mana of influence after water.

Esus is Evil, bordering on Neutral : they would never with Angels, but don't necessarily try to advance the work of other demons than Esus. in Dnd they would be neutral-Evil (due to being the religions of the underworld, assassins, spies and thieves)

AV is pure Evil : They actively try to consort with Fallen Archangels, trying to gain personal/civ power even if it cost the life of everybody else. DnD : Chaotic Evil


Children of the One would be Neutral, but Neutral GOOD according to DnD terms.
Grigori, figthing to enforce the compact, fighting against all demons and Angels are Neutral... but would be Lawful Good for me in DnD terms: just not religious.

I hope that I'm not too far from the lore... and that Magister will not contradict too much...

 

[GreedyManul]

Sounds about right. Sometimes I forget FFH alignment is interpreted differently than traditional alignment.

 

[plasmacannon]

Sounds about right.
Funny. I guess I interpreted it a bit differently.
In that the demons pretty much want to raise up the Armageddon counter and destroy everything we all started with, from green grass into hell terrain, to strong mobs earlier than us. Disagree with them and your toast.
So remaining neutral with them is only a strategy until you can band together with the Good and others against them.

In my last game I had a city that was perpetually in rebellion. Even after I built a Monument, Elder Council, Courthouse and an Archery Range. Those last two cost more production that the first two to build and Sabathiel builds them both faster than all other leaders. So, he's already against rebellions and for Order even without the religion. I would think the Order's temple would reduce rebellions, but it doesn't.

Auric wants to bring on the next Ice Age, snowing over everything. While snow itself is a natural event, not evil, forcing the whole world into a freezing planet, is.
So, most of the games I play, whoever I choose, I usually end up supporting Bannor and the allies of Good over Evil.

 

[GreedyManul]

In my last game I had a city that was perpetually in rebellion. Even after I built a Monument, Elder Council, Courthouse and an Archery Range. Those last two cost more production that the first two to build and Sabathiel builds them both faster than all other leaders. So, he's already against rebellions and for Order even without the religion. I would think the Order's temple would reduce rebellions, but it doesn't.

This is why I keep revolutions off, assuming you're using them. Way too opaque and just a pain to deal with when it gets finicky. I don't know why it's so liked by others, I've come to hate it myself because of all this, and the AI can't deal with it for some reason. I find Pie's Ancient Europe's approach much better, as it feels more organic and transparent (I've been playing it for a while now, hint hint). Unhappiness and being a conquered city can cause unrest leading to riots, unhealth can cause leprosy and plagues, and while it's much much more simplistic than revolutions, it's also much easier to deal with, as it doesn't decide to up and mess with you without you having control of anything.

Fall from Heaven would better work with a revolutions system specifically tailored for it, but that's a lot of work that requires dedicating it to a major feature patch.

Auric wants to bring on the next Ice Age, snowing over everything. While snow itself is a natural event, not evil, forcing the whole world into a freezing planet, is.

For some reason, I can't help but think of Arnold Schwarzenegger's ice puns from Batman and Robin.

"You're not sending me to the cooler!"

But yeah, most games I play as, I'm ruthless to a fault, keeping the armageddon counter below 20, purging everyone who's an obstacle to expansion, and just paying heed to my own objectives, regardless of civ. I do keep that on the down low as a Good civ, though, unless the Ashen Veil's involved. Then it's purging time before the Infernals show up.

Unrelated, but the Calabim not having access to Alchemy Labs strikes me as slightly odd. I feel various vampires would have their studies where they would conduct highly unethical research and experiments, which could serve as a thematic replacement for the vanilla Alchemy Lab. Instead of the normal bonuses, a Vampire's Study (the Calabim hypothetical replacement for the Alchemy Lab) could have lower normal bonuses, but have a unique bonus to make up for it, the same way Governor's Manors work.

 

[plasmacannon]

This is why I keep revolutions off, assuming you're using them. Way too opaque and just a pain to deal with when it gets finicky. I don't know why it's so liked by others, I've come to hate it myself because of all this, and the AI can't deal with it for some reason. I find Pie's Ancient Europe's approach much better, as it feels more organic and transparent (I've been playing it for a while now, hint hint). Unhappiness and being a conquered city can cause unrest leading to riots, unhealth can cause leprosy and plagues, and while it's much more simplistic than revolutions, it's also much easier to deal with, as it doesn't decide to up and mess with you without you having control of anything.

Fall from Heaven would better work with a revolutions system specifically tailored for it, but that's a lot of work that requires dedicating it to a major feature patch.

The city was the Sidar Capitol that was captured by barbarians early in the game. I was the closest foe to him and expanded towards his city. The Kuriotates captured it, then Doviello took it from them. Doviello was my closest neighbor. They eventually declared war on me, caught me of guard and captured one of my cities. So I took this former Sidar Capitol. It might be the multiple owners that has an effect on the length of time that a given city will revolt? idk.

For some reason, I can't help but think of Arnold Schwarzenegger's ice puns from Batman and Robin.

"You're not sending me to the cooler!"

I think of this entire game taking place thousands of years ago before our last Ice Age. Where Auric won and froze over the Earth. When I play him, I make it my goal to build many cities and snow over every tile that I can. Love the blizzards too. It just adds so much to the realistic terror that he's trying to cause.

Unrelated, but the Calabim not having access to Alchemy Labs strikes me as slightly odd. I feel various vampires would have their studies where they would conduct highly unethical research and experiments, which could serve as a thematic replacement for the vanilla Alchemy Lab. Instead of the normal bonuses, a Vampire's Study (the Calabim hypothetical replacement for the Alchemy Lab) could have lower normal bonuses, but have a unique bonus to make up for it, the same way Governor's Manors work.

Sounds like a good idea.

 

[FireBlaze]

I'm a fan of revolutions on, just because it stops everyone from going full-on steamroll blob that makes the entire game decided by the start of the midgame, and can usually create some interesting and dynamic borderlands where multiple empires can contest for territory while various locals attempt to regain autonomy. Agreed that the AI is pretty bad at managing it, but I've never had too much of an issue with it as long as one manages their conquests and expansion at a reasonable pace.

 

[plasmacannon]

I have a suggestion for a New Civilization, The Lost tribe of Aifons. One that seems missing and I feel has a place, but I realize that any new Civ would by default be not maintaining continuity with the original mod. So it know won't get implemented.
It would be a positive Business Trader Civilization that uses merchant ships like a Naval version of supplies or mini Great Merchants to send to foreign cities for extra gold.
One that pursues Trade Routes with all Civilizations to increase it's profits. Have a UB Harbor or Shipyard with a bonus Trade Route and 50% Trade Route yield.
Uses mana types Water, Law and Metamagic.
This would give the Lanun pirates something to pillage (these merchant ships) and give us a Civ that builds a navy to protect something valuable. It's adepts would use water walking and water elementals to defend it's ships and to attack foes bent on Chaos and illegitimate commerce. It could have a Coast Guard-like Police ship as a UU to protect it's fleet. A similar counter to Lanun's Black Wind, buildable at Optics or one tech later and be a stronger unit designed to combat piracy. After all, no one can violate the Law and get away with it. It can carry at least one unit, such as an adept to use Dispel Magic on foreign controlled Mana nodes.
I can envision this Civ having some leaders that are Good and some that are Neutral with traits like Financial, Ingenuity, Guardsman, Defender or Organized.
The Civ would also have the Trained Sailors Trait similar to Lanun's Seafaring trait, which would grant them +1 Str and +1 ship movement to Naval ships, where Lanun's grants extra cargo space, movement and withdrawl. They would have the ability to recapture their own ships thru boarding action by seizing and impounding vessels of those that violate the Law.

Probably more can be envisioned for strengths and weaknesses of regular unit types.
It is basically a neutral civ with regards to Angels and Demons. Taking sides isn't it's main purpose. It wants to make money and will vigorously defend it's trade lanes, similar to President Thomas Jefferson's response to the Barbary pirates in 1801 and use of Marines.
It wants to regain it's former glory as the strongest Naval and Trade Civilization and it's ships search for it's former capitol on the Island of Maenalus, similar to why the Illians search for the Letum Frigis, except for this one is in water. Possibly, gaining a city there or a UU.

 

[MagisterCultuum]

There is no chance of any new civilizations being added to this mod.

If such a trading civ were added, those are not the mana types I would choose. Thematically, a Merchant civ should have to have Force (for Contracts) and Mind (for Greed).

I kind of like the idea of adding Merchant Ships to the game though, not as a Unique Unit of any civ but as something anyone can build.

I think I'll try it out to see how the AI can handle naval units using trade missions.

I'm thinking of making them defensive-only naval units with a strength of around 4, so they can defend themselves (unlike workboats) but cannot attack and are weak enough that it is better to keep them guarded.

I'm starting them out with 2 cargo capacity, but if it turns out that their cargo all die when they sacrifice themselves to execute trade missions I may have to remove that.

Edit: Conducting a trade mission does indeed kill all cargo.

For prerequisites I was originally thinking Optics, Currency, and a Harbor. Not I'm thinking maybe Trade, Sailing, and a Harbor, but requiring Astronomy to let them sail on the open seas.


I might also consider adding a second new naval unit with the same abilities, which is also Invisible (or maybe just Stealth/Hidden) and can move through rival territory. These Smuggler Ships would of course require a Smuggler's Port and Deception. It would also make sense for them to be able to investigate cities and maybe even destroy production or steal plans.


I'm thinking about maybe giving the Malakim a domain_land "Caravan" UU to replace the Merchantman.
---

I've been playing around with the Council of Esus some more lately.

Aphotic Thrones no longer require the Council of Esus state religion to build. However, if you don't have that state religion it will automatically change to an Aphotic Throne (Hostile), which has negative effects and do not allow training any CoE units.

The Nightswatch reverts to requiring CoE and an Archery Range in the city rather than an Aphotic Throne (of either sort)

There is now as 'Ally with Aphotic Thrones' resolution, which lets members of the Undercouncil have non-Hostile Aphotic Thrones.

AI players will not build Aphotic Thrones when they would turn hostile, but a human could choose to do so.

Agents of Esus require (non-Hostile) Aphotic Thrones, but no longer have a State Religion prereq so that resolution will let any Undercouncil member train them. Their combat strength has been reduced to be in line with basic disciples of other faiths instead of priests.


The Found Aphotic Throne ability no longer belongs to the Agents of Esus unit type, but any CoE unit with the Divine promotion. It adds either Aphotic Throne or Aphotic Throne (Hostile), depending on whether the city owner is CoE or Undercouncil after that resolution.


The Embezzle ability now requires Divine, CoE religion, and CoE state religion.

The Disrupt ability does not require the CoE state religion, but requires Divine, CoE religion, and the Fund Dissidents Undercouncil resolution to have passed. Disrupt may cause city revolts if the caster's owner also has CoE as their state religion. If the unit is not bNoCapture (Agents of Esus are bNoCapture, but Whisperers, Shadows, and Unseelie Shadows are not), it may flip the city, but only if it also has > 50% odds of winning combat against every defender of that city. (You can of course use Hidden Nationality unit to kill off all of the city's defenders to make flipping the city easier.)

I added spells for Destroy Production, Sabotage Improvement, and Steal Plans. These abilities are basically equivalent to the vanilla civ missions (they even have the same cost in gold and the same chance of success or failure, with the same text strings informing you of the odds and cost), except that a unit caught using them will not automatically be killed if the spy mission fails. They require CoE + Divine.

Agents of Esus still use the missions for Destroy and Steal plans, so they can still die in the process. Whisperers and Shadows upgraded from Agents of Esus instead use the version of the ability which may cause a diplomatic penalty if found out but will not cause your precious national units to die without combat.


No unit uses the vanilla Sabotage mission, only the equivalent spell, because I do not like treating the destruction of a unique feature the same as the destruction of a farm. This ability can still destroy unique features, but it costs a lot more and causes worse diplomatic penalties. In the last version it would cost 200 gold whether you were destroying a farm or the Mirror of Heaven. Now it is 20 gold for a farm, and 2000 for unique features. I will probably tweak the formula more, and maybe make destroying some features (like Letum Frigus) impossible.

The Steal spell now lets you take pieces of equipment from other players when they are on the tile as units, instead of only as promotions or buildings.

The Sinister trait reduces the price of Agents of Esus, Whisperers, Nightwatches, Aphotic Thrones, and Hunting Lodges. (The Dexterous trait halves the costs of Fawns, Satyrs, Beastmasters, Groves, and Archery Ranges. Horselord halves the cost of Stables and Hippodromes.) The Sinister trait also doubles the odds of Kidnapping, and the Sinister promotion doubles the odds of Stealing equipment.

Unseelie Shadows start with Divine, so they have all the abilities of a Shadow upgraded from an Agent of Esus even when trained directly or upgraded from a normal Assassin or Scout.

I'm am thinking of maybe changing the way random affinity for disciples are applied. I like the idea of low level disciples having a very small chance of getting affinity, but the way the code is currently written is less efficient the lower the chance of being granted and I cannot recall ever actually seeing the affinities given to basic disciples anyway. I may decide to instead ignore unitcombat and only grant religious affinities to units that start with Divine and a religion. (That would mean Unseelie Shadows would be eligible for random Shadow Affinity at the same rate as Agents of Esus, but well below Whisperers.)

--

As mentioned before, the Eyes and Ears Network now steals visibility from every team with whom you have contact.

I'm thinking I'd like to make the Sidar immune to that effect. (Canonically it seems hard to steal plans pertaining to shades, whose closest friends and family tend to forget exist). since the code works on a per team basis that may be a bit tricky. I just added but have not yet tested some code to reduce the stolen visibility counter from the Sidar each turn, which I think may stop you from actively seeing their units and line of sight but not until your maps already revealed the territory.

 

[plasmacannon]

Yea, I was trying to avoid the stereotypical greedy Ferengi-like culture. As a legitimate business seems neglected in a lot of in many games. The Law vs Chaos over the water concept seemed like an interesting competitor, both with different ways to gain gold. One thru legal commerce, the other thru piracy.

If anyone can build a Merchant ship, it would still give the Lanun something to capture and others an incentive to defend, like sending a settler out alone and unguarded would be foolish.

Wow. I guess you have been doing a lot.
Esus and the Palace. I look forward to the next update.

 

[plasmacannon]

I remember reading somewhere that the Dovello were another Civ that could would pursue and adopt the religion of The Hand.
Which opened new questions.
What would happen if the Dovello founded it before the Illians did?
Would the Doviello get those free units that the Illians usually do? or if the religion spread to the Illians later naturally or from the Illians conquering one of the Dovello's cities, it would permit the Illians to convert to The Hand religion. Would they then get these free units?
Doviello gain +1 food on tundra tiles, but the Temple of the Hand converts the land to snow. Which means the Dovello need to scorch the snow to tile to gain their +1 food.
I don't recall if there is a way spell or otherwise to convert land tiles from plains to tundra.
If not, it would be interesting for a Dovello caster to do so. This would be great if it were an Ice 1 spell to cool the land to a tundra state, but I see Slow is already there.
Have you considered adding a 4th level to the Mana types to increase options? This would also if interested permit a Master Caster level above Archmage or Great Phophet Disciple type unit.

 

[GreedyManul]

FYI, for all the suggestions I have made, there's a very good reason I never recommended new civilizations. Adding them haphazardly would seriously destabilize the fine balance of the thematic of the world (there's a reason we have 3x7 civs in total, including summonable ones). If I were to try adding new civs, I'd keep the total of them to a multiple of 3 or 7 and ensure they're integrated to the world as seamlessly as possible, but not before marking them as "aberrants" to subtly point out their mere existence will REALLY mess things up in the long run in-universe. I'd also blame Amathaon having too much to drink when he celebrated the end of the Age of Ice.

I should mention though, compared to other civilization games where you have most essential improvements available after 1-2 easy research steps from the start of the game, researching early things at the beginning of the game is a complete torture and kinda makes the game very painful at the start, much more than other civ mods. I've started messing around with the tech tree slightly to mitigate this without messing things up too much, but only time will tell how beneficial such efforts will be.

Also, an idea for those with time to kill and CPUs to burn: larger map sizes. Huge ain't big enough!!!!!!!! /joke

But seriously, I'd like some more breathing room with larger maps allowing for more civs to be packed together without feeling like we're in a proverbial can of sardines. I feel some maps would glitch out when selecting those sizes, however.

 

[plasmacannon]

FYI, for all the suggestions I have made, there's a very good reason I never recommended new civilizations. Adding them haphazardly would seriously destabilize the fine balance of the thematic of the world (there's a reason we have 3x7 civs in total, including summonable ones). If I were to try adding new civs, I'd keep the total of them to a multiple of 3 or 7 and ensure they're integrated to the world as seamlessly as possible, but not before marking them as "aberrants" to subtly point out their mere existence will REALLY mess things up in the long run in-universe. I'd also blame Amathaon having too much to drink when he celebrated the end of the Age of Ice.

3x7? I don't follow.

Also, an idea for those with time to kill and CPUs to burn: larger map sizes. Huge ain't big enough!!!!!!!! /joke

But seriously, I'd like some more breathing room with larger maps allowing for more civs to be packed together without feeling like we're in a proverbial can of sardines. I feel some maps would glitch out when selecting those sizes, however.

It's funny that you say that. I do hear (well read) that many clamor for this. I can't seem to see a need past Large.
I have found that I can beat a Small map on Epic speed before reaching the end of the tech tree.
I can beat a Standard size map on Marathon game speed around the time of reaching the end of the tech tree.
On any larger map size, I would simply spend most of the time stuck at the end of the tech tree not improving my units.
If anything, I think the tech tree would have to be longer and a slower game speed added to accommodate Larger maps.
It's easy to see what could be added, Spearmen were removed, so adding them back in as well as separating the charge and range mounted upgrade paths would add realism and depth to that area. Add a melee unit type between Axeman but before Immortal. Either before or after Champion.
Perhaps, maybe, even adding a Cataphract type of unit as an end game range mounted unit after Arquebus and Warhorses are discovered.
One could even add an additional tech to migrate the more powerful mana types to a later tech. Such as must know Water (which has no direct attack spell) before learning Ice.

On a side note, are there plans to add leaders to those that have only 1 leader for their Civ?
Also, We have promotions vs most types, shock is vs melee, cover is vs archers.
I couldn't find one vs Recon, just Beast slaying, which I think effects vs Beast Masters.
Nothing to combat strong Rangers and Assassins. Did I miss it?

 

[GreedyManul]

3x7? I don't follow.

You have 21 civilizations in the game, including summonables. Each civilization represents a specific precept that exists on Erebus. Fall from Heaven as a setting has a lot of patterns involving the numbers 3 and 7: when the One left from creation, he assigned 7 Good gods to guide humanity and battle the 7 Evil gods who have fallen, leaving 7 Neutral gods to do whatever (giving you the 3x7 figure). This is only one example, but you can find a lot more within the setting.

If anything, I think the tech tree would have to be longer and a slower game speed added to accommodate Larger maps.
It's easy to see what could be added, Spearmen were removed, so adding them back in as well as separating the charge and range mounted upgrade paths would add realism and depth to that area. Perhaps, maybe, even adding a Cataphract type of unit as an end game range mounted unit after Arquebus and Warhorses are discovered.

I'll see what I can do with my copy, as currently I'm clamoring to make the tech tree narrower and longer, alongside adding a spearman analogue, among other things. I have a small idea where a civ can have either an axeman/spearman combo, an axeman/swordsman combo, and a spearman/swordsman combo, depending on their general disposition (the Doviello, for example, would have axemen and swordsmen due to their wild nature; spearmen require tight formations to work right, something the Doviello just won't do). This will also extend to Men at arms, where the tier will also have macemen and pikemen in the equation.

Maybe we can also have an Age of Invention technology bundle for more late game shenanigans. I'll make no promises, but I'll see what I can think of.

One could even add an additional tech to migrate the more powerful mana types to a later tech. Such as must know Water (which has no direct attack spell) before learning Ice.

Not a good idea IMO. I like how things are atm, with more powerful spells being unlocked once you can have Mages with Sorcery, and the most powerful stuff being bundled with Archmages at Strength of Will, with no needless dependencies. One way to have more spells is make spells that combine different mana types for unique effects (such as needing Fire and Air proficiency to cast Heatwave, a spell that causes fire damage to surrounding units), but the more you combine, the more overbearing things get for Magister to implement. I'd rather just have things as is tbh.