[MOD] Australian Colonization

[PiMan]

Rum will remain, but I was considering removing or changing it, since the only reference to rum I could find was the rum rebellion, which didn't actually have anything to do with rum.
The biggest reason as to why I didn't remove it, is because I couldn't think of anything better for sugar to be processed into.

 

[chrissifniotis]

Hmm, I asked because I've been looking at Wikipedia myself and found a line about rum trading being very popular in English Colonial trade in the history site;

The colonies relied heavily on imports from England for survival. The official currency of the colonies was the British pound, but the unofficial currency and most readily accepted trade good was rum.

- Wiki on Australian History 1788-1850
Maybe I'm not reading it right, but that's how I saw it.
Also, last question. It's more to the future, but is it likely you might change the banners of the colonies, which all currently are the English flag, to the flags imposed behind the leaders? I ask simply because I find the flags currently to be redundant to the time, and the new flags would represent the different leaders.

 

[PiMan]

Rum certainly was well traded at the time, but rum's importance has been over stated. Part of what you read there is caused by people trying to legitimise the story of the Rum Rebellion that was only invented 50 years later. If you were to travel to the early 19th century and ask about the Rum Rebellion, no one would have any idea what you are talking about.

The military in charge of the colony of New South Wales were known as the Rum Corps on account of their stranglehold on the distribution of Rum, the main currency in the colony at the time. There was considerable unhappiness with the way some of the colonies were run. In New South Wales this led to the Rum Rebellion.

(From wiki/Rum_Rebellion)

... almost no one at the time of the rebellion thought it was about rum. Bligh tried briefly to give it that spin, to smear his opponents, but there was no evidence for it and he moved on. Many years later, in 1855, an English Quaker named William Howitt published a popular history of Australia. Like many teetotallers, he was keen to blame alcohol for all the problems in the world. Howitt took Bligh's side and invented the phrase Rum Rebellion, and it has stuck ever since.

Although I also recognise that I understated the importance of rum in my previous post.


As to your other question, I'll consider it. I do like the idea of them all having the same flag, as they really are all the same nation. But for gameplay purposes, I can see where you are coming from.

 

[chrissifniotis]

Ah, I get it now, thanks for that.

 

[PiMan]

I probably wont get this by the end of Easter, due to a bug that has just turned up.

I found that entirely removing the Cigars resource required SDK modifications, I made these modifications and successfully compiled the code, but I'm getting an error when starting (or loading) a game in my mod.
Before I removed the resource from the SDK, I was getting an error blaming CivIV's dll file at the end of the first loading screen, but now I get an error blaming ntdll.dll that appears when starting a game inside the mod.

 

[chrissifniotis]

I've actually discovered a bug by accident, which I'm willing to lay blame wholely to Firaxis because of the monumental numbers, and I want to tell you if you're not already aware.
It's to do with immigration, I found it by how I personally play the game, I tend to try to produce expensive products and expand territory to keep my colony afloat. I sell a lot of the right-prised products to yield high income, so I can hurry immigration when I can and want to quickly. With the set prices for each colonist, it no longer becomes whether I can wait a turn or two to score a free colonist or buy one, but rather whether I have the gold, and most often I do, so naturally the required amount of crosses grows higher exponentally.
I have a couple of screenshots I'll post later on about this to show you, but it's when I reach the 1-1.5 million crosses when the bug starts to appear and seems to remain, one of two things happen, either nothing unusual and the crosses continue to grow, or one of the three Hurry Immigration choices, usually the lowest, cost 0, in fact grants you gold if chosen, and immigration is reset to 0/1. Even if the latter occurs and all three choices cost 60 gold, as the required crosses increases further up, the chances of the latter event occuring increases, and with that you can get two or more colonists for 60 gold each straight.
Do you have an idea of what I mean? I hope so. I felt it was best to tell you about it, I feel it's an unknown and 'useful' bug, but can only be reached in the late game and with constant rushing immigration.

 

[PiMan]

I didn't think their integer limits would be so low. What has happened is the increased amount of crosses I set as requirements has increased so fast that it has crossed the line of the highest number the engine can understand.
For example, if it is limited to 4 byte integers, then they can get as high as 01111111 11111111 11111111 11111111 (2,147,483,647), but just one more, and the number is changed to -2,147,483,647 and then starts approaching 0.
The game would probably crash entirely if you managed to get all the way back to 0.
I'll have to set the immigration figures back to more reasonable numbers, and I'll include it in the next update.

Just so you know, it is still possible to achieve these numbers in vanilla, it just takes far longer.

 

[chrissifniotis]

Ah, right, okay then.

 

[PiMan]

I still can't figure out what has gone wrong in my mod, related to the bug I mentioned earlier.
Here is my mod in its entirety, including all C++ files. (~25MB)
http://www.atomicgamer.com/file.php?id=77555

If any one is able to get it to actually play, or can give insights as to why it doesn't work, that would be great.
The error I get is a crash to desktop blaming ntdll.dll whenever I try to load or begin a new game. But the Pedia works fine.
The last thing I did in development was remove all traces of cigars from the C++, and then remove Cigars from the font files.

In trying to figure out what went wrong, I have looked for mentions of cigars in all C++ and python files, and looked for hardcoded values related to number of yields.

If you wish to test the mod with the last working versions of the font files, they have been provided one folder higher up. The last working version of the dll is just as it was in vanilla(+patch) and the mentions of cigars, tobacconists and cigar buildings have merely been commented out in the XML rather than removed entirely.
Change all these things back and the mod works, but not as I want it to work.

Resource changes reference:
Food - Food
Lumber - Timber
Silver - Gold
Cotton - Grapes
Cloth - Wine
Fur - Wool
Coats - Coats
Sugar - Sugar
Rum - Rum
Tobacco - Coal Ore
Cigars - REMOVED
Ore - Iron Ore
Tools - Tools
Muskets - Firearms
Horses - Horses
Trade Goods - Trade Goods
Hammers - Hammers
Bells - Bells
Crosses - Crosses
Education - Education

 

[PiMan]

The working version of the patch is less than 24 hours away.
In fact, the "non working" patch actually works. The problem was with my computer, not the mod. There are still a couple of edits I've yet to make, but this is playable.

 

[PiMan]

v0.40.01 is uploading as I type. Get it while it's hot.

See first post for details.

 

[Dryhad]

I finally got around to finishing my Military founding fathers. Three of them are Dutch, but it took me this long with just the once I have so I'll leave it to others to find new ones.

Robert Ross (Provides 2 Petty Criminals)
Philip Gidley King (+25% Education per settlement)
Francis Grose (Increases Rum production by the tax rate)
William Bligh (Free promotion of Skirmisher I for Naval Units)
George Johnston (+1 Liberty Bells per Armory, Magazine, and Arsenal)
William Cox (+1 movement for Pioneers)
Hendrik Merkus de Kock (Free Veteran1 promotion to Naval Units, +1 movement for Frigates)
Charles Fremantle (+50% strength for Frigates)
Johan Harmen Rudolf Köhler (Provides 3 Veteran Soldiers)
Eeldert Christiaan van Daalen (+50% Great General emergence)
Ned Kelly (Increases Gun production by the tax rate, +50% strength for petty criminals)

Still looking for two more religious founding fathers to finish the set.

 

[Blackbeard]

This MOD is really great. Thanks for your effort PiMan!

Is there an australian map available, I can´t find one...

 

[PiMan]

There is no Australian map available yet. I have been swamped by uni for ages now, but exams are only days away, so I will have plenty of time after that.
I still need to tweak resources, then I will follow that up with implementing the founding father suggestions and getting some sort of Australia map going. I'm not sure whether I will create the full map first or the map script (to be based on an existing Pangea type script).

 

[Blackbeard]

Make it a full one with parts of Indonesia and New Zealand that would be great.

 

[PiMan]

As I think I stated earlier in the topic, it is not part of the scope of this mod to include Indonesia, and I'm hesitant to include New Zealand because of how much further east it is when everybody is arriving from the east. The result would be either lots of open sea or lots of "To Europe" squares.

 

[Dryhad]

As I think I stated earlier in the topic, it is not part of the scope of this mod to include Indonesia, and I'm hesitant to include New Zealand because of how much further east it is when everybody is arriving from the east. The result would be either lots of open sea or lots of "To Europe" squares.

I thought you were planning on the primary route to Europe being north? Even west makes sense, both geographically and historically.

Also, Religious founding fathers. Once again, these are for Australasia, not necessarily Australia, so there's a bunch from Vanuatu, but here they are anyway:

Christovao Rangel (+25% defense per settlement)
Richard Johnson (Increases Cross production by the tax rate)
Samuel Marsden (+50% native conversion rate from Missions)
John Williams (Provides 3 Jesuit Missionaries)
Edward Gibbon Wakefield (+3 Crosses per Town Hall)
Robert Clark Morgan (-25% Crosses needed for immigration)
Elizabeth Darling (Free Schoolhouse for each settlement)
Caroline Chisholm (Free Church for each settlement)
George N. Gordon (+25% conversion rate from Missions. Strengthens relations with the natives)
John Gibson Paton (Provides 3 converted natives)
Maurice Leenhardt (Native land costs 50% less to purchase. Strengthens relations with the natives)

By the way, Blackbeard, as I said earlier I was originally working on a mod that would include Australia, Indonesia, and New Zealand so if there's enough interest and PiMan doesn't object to me stealing his thunder and I can find the time I might procede with that.

 

[PiMan]

I thought you were planning on the primary route to Europe being north? Even west makes sense, both geographically and historically.


By the way, Blackbeard, as I said earlier I was originally working on a mod that would include Australia, Indonesia, and New Zealand so if there's enough interest and PiMan doesn't object to me stealing his thunder and I can find the time I might procede with that.

The primary route is and always will be East for this mod. The point about north is that it is now possible to travel that way, just as it is possible to travel west in this and the original. The only direction that Europe can't be found in is south. While the other routes make a little sense historically, East is where nearly everything happened. More than half of all Australians today live in the eastern three states.

If you want to make your mod, don't let me stop you. Just make sure to tell me in this topic about any of my content that you use.
If you are just referring to making a map or map script for this mod, go ahead. You would be appropriately credited in-game.

 

[lapens]

While the other routes make a little sense historically, East is where nearly everything happened. More than half of all Australians today live in the eastern three states.

Ahem... live in the eastern four states... (he says while looking at his location...). Although we don't have a large population we are certainly one of the eastern states - we're just always forgotten!!

Great work though PiMan - what's the latest update?

 

[Dale]

Thought you were part of Victoria.