Map and province improvements for 1.4

[AbsintheRed]

Just saying, I find that CNM changes tend to happen a lot more quickly if you do it yourself in the WorldBuilder and send AbsintheRed the files.

Yeah, I plan to ask for the help of the community with the CNM updates once again
Especially after the default map is ready - than it will be fairly straightforward to update the civ-specific CNMs based on that.

 

[SanJose]

Just saying, I find that CNM changes tend to happen a lot more quickly if you do it yourself in the WorldBuilder and send AbsintheRed the files.

I prefer to work with paper first and only then transfer everything to e-files.

 

[Mouthwash]

One of the gripes I have is that cities with lots of coastal tiles often grow to huge sizes. This is not such an issue on maps with a higher resource density, but in RFC:E Cyprus can easily be the largest city in the world while historically important cities like Damascus and Tunis are backwaters.

Maybe the solution is to reduce water tile yields by one and just add more sea resources where you see fit? You could also add a food yield to a coast-requiring building to compensate.

 

[AbsintheRed]

One of the gripes I have is that cities with lots of coastal tiles often grow to huge sizes. This is not such an issue on maps with a higher resource density, but in RFC:E Cyprus can easily be the largest city in the world while historically important cities like Damascus and Tunis are backwaters.

Maybe the solution is to reduce water tile yields by one and just add more sea resources where you see fit? You could also add a food yield to a coast-requiring building to compensate.

Yeah, I also dislike this.
There were also related suggestions, to improve health and trade of non-coastal cities compared to coastal ones. Currently coastal cities have various bonuses to those with the Lighthouse and some other coastal buildings.
I'm thinking about adding a couple more buildings to the mod. Something along the lines of River Dock and Toll House, for non-coastal cities only. Also a Water Well for cities without fresh water.

The case of food in coastal cities is a different question. Reducing the base food from ocean tiles to 0 seems strange.
Actually at some point I even considered making the base food/citizen 3 instead of the vanilla 2. That would probably be a too drastic change though.
Works reasonably well in some other mods, but I'm not sure at all if I want that in RFCE.

Probably (un)health is the key to solve this, in some form or another.

 

[Mouthwash]

Yeah, I also dislike this.
There were also related suggestions, to improve health and trade of non-coastal cities compared to coastal ones. Currently coastal cities have various bonuses to those with the Lighthouse and some other coastal buildings.
I'm thinking about adding a couple more buildings to the mod. Something along the lines of River Dock and Toll House, for non-coastal cities only. Also a Water Well for cities without fresh water.

More buildings? Isn't it better to concentrate power into fewer buildings rather than diluting them?

The case of food in coastal cities is a different question. Reducing the base food from ocean tiles to 0 seems strange.

You could just remove the extra water tile yield from Harbor and give it a flat yield of 2-3 .

 

[AbsintheRed]

More buildings? Isn't it better to concentrate power into fewer buildings rather than diluting them?

With the extra turns in the timeline there is room for more buildings.

 

[Mouthwash]

I've altered the Levant for you (I live there, so I'm pretty familiar with it). Damascus is 1NE of the Sea of Galilee, above the wheat. I also added room for an Arabian city in the desert with three incenses, which should have the bonus of not sealing away units from Europe there after a crusade.

With the extra turns in the timeline there is room for more buildings.

That's... just a really bad design philosophy. What happened to a "series of interesting decisions?"

 

[AbsintheRed]

Yeah, might be better to move the Sea of Galilee a little.
On the other hand, Damascus shouldn't be that close. It's both too south and too west a little bit.
Probably it should be on the iron's current position then.

2 imporant things:
- the map is tilted a little
- gameplay sometimes dictates a little geographical inaccuracy (i.e. we don't want to have Damascus too close to neither Tyre nor Jerusalem)

 

[AbsintheRed]

That's... just a really bad design philosophy. What happened to a "series of interesting decisions?"

I don't really get this comment.
What I said was in context with the usefulness of those buildings. They were brought up with a clear purpose.
I could understand why you said it if I wanted to add more buildings just to for the sake of having more, to fill up the extra turns by all means, but that's clearly not the case.

 

[Mouthwash]

Yeah, might be better to move the Sea of Galilee a little.
On the other hand, Damascus shouldn't be that close. It's both too south and too west a little bit.
Probably it should be on the iron's current position then.

2 imporant things:
- the map is tilted a little
- gameplay sometimes dictates a little geographical inaccuracy (i.e. we don't want to have Damascus too close to neither Tyre nor Jerusalem)

Damascus was always a trade city. Maybe you could give it a unique building to help growth?

I don't really get this comment.

It's what Sid Meier said a game should be.

What I said was in context with the usefulness of those buildings. They were brought up with a clear purpose.
I could understand why you said it if I wanted to add more buildings just to for the sake of having more, to fill up the extra turns by all means, but that's clearly not the case.

But if buildings are so diluted that building them only gives you incremental bonuses, then decisions aren't interesting anymore. I'm not saying that's what's happening here, just to be careful.

 

[Mouthwash]

Okay, here's an updated map. I didn't do a great job on the first one (plus it now suits where you wanted to place Damascus).

I noticed you have an unused apple resource and maybe others I didn't notice? Also, there's a Pyramids of Giza terrain feature which is not placed on the map.

 

[AbsintheRed]

It's what Sid Meier said a game should be.

I meant I don't get the comment within the context of our conversation.

But if buildings are so diluted that building them only gives you incremental bonuses, then decisions aren't interesting anymore. I'm not saying that's what's happening here, just to be careful.

Yep, but I'm just saying that if that's not the case right now, it most certainly won't be with a couple more buildings and the +100 turns either.

 

[AbsintheRed]

Damascus was always a trade city. Maybe you could give it a unique building to help growth?

Let me guess: are you from Damascus?

I noticed you have an unused apple resource and maybe others I didn't notice? Also, there's a Pyramids of Giza terrain feature which is not placed on the map.

Pyramids were added recently. Will see if I put it on the map when Egypt is added. Depends on how much useful terrain will be there for Cairo.
Apples are the only currently unused resource, but some parts of the art for it was also updated recently, along with the various resource art updates for RFCE 1.5.
It was done because I plan to reintroduce it to the mod, along with a couple more resources mainly for the Levant and North Africa: Citrus definitely, probably Camels and Dates too.

 

[Mouthwash]

You can click reply to each post if you want to answer them in the same post.

Let me guess: are you from Damascus?

Nope, I'm in Israel.

 

[AbsintheRed]

You can click reply to each post if you want to answer them in the same post.

I'm pretty sure you saw that I already use it wherever I think it's better to have my replies in the same post.

 

[Mouthwash]

I'm pretty sure you saw that I already use it wherever I think it's better to have my replies in the same post.

I don't really notice that sort of thing. I just saw you were taking up a lot of space in my alerts list.

 

[AbsintheRed]

I noticed you have an unused apple resource and maybe others I didn't notice? Also, there's a Pyramids of Giza terrain feature which is not placed on the map.

Just to be sure, you would have Damascus between the Iron and the Wheat?
As I said I agree that it's better geographically. The question is whether the majority of the players would hate that it's in 3 distance from Tyre or not.
While IMO 3 distance is not bad for gameplay at all (also resource placement can compansate all possible issues), I know that there are many players who love to have all their cities in at least 4 distance.
Since Damascus gets to be an unrazeable holy city, it's quite important in this case.

 

[Mouthwash]

Just to be sure, you would have Damascus between the Iron and the Wheat?

Yeah. I also thought about adding marble under Antioch (which is certainly realistic) but I wasn't sure how it would affect the game's balance.

As I said I agree that it's better geographically. The question is whether the majority of the players would hate that it's in 3 distance from Tyre or not.
While IMO 3 distance is not bad for gameplay at all (also resource placement can compansate all possible issues), I know that there are many players who love to have all their cities in at least 4 distance.

Those people are spoiled and probably can't play BTS above Prince difficulty.

 

[gilgames]

It smells like flamewar in disguise.

On Damascus. I personally wouldn't mind the 3 tile gap, but in this case, Tyre has only a few worthy tile anyway and those are toward damascus. If you push them closer, 1 won't have production. Sounds bad....