DESCRIPTION:
Adds the Mammoth map size option. Replaces the original Game Speeds with custom game speeds which are all longer than Epic. Adjusts the camera behavior. Adds persistient time and turn number displays. Adds 20 new Unique names for each category of Great Person.
DETAILS:
The Mammoth map defaults to 40x25 Plots which is a grid of 160x100, or 16,000 map squares on the Archipelago, Balanced, Continents, Custom Continents and Islands map types. The Great Plains, Highlands, Hub, Ice Age, Inland Sea, Lakes, Maze, Mirror, Oasis, Pangea, Ring, Team_Battleground, Terra, Tilted Axis and Wheel map types will require that you obtain and install the FexFX--PublicMaps(v1.52.0) map pack in order to work properly with this map size.
The Four Available Gamespeeds in this MOD are:
FX-Marathon(1200)
FX-Grand(1000)
FX-Endurance(875)
FX-Extended(750)
The FX-Marathon(1200) speed is a modified and re-balanced version of the Marathon speed included in the official 1.52 patch.
Each of these four Game Speeds have been carefully tweaked to maximize addictiveness.
The camera has been modified somewhat. It now takes longer to reach 90 degrees vertical, the camera zooms out farther overall to give you a more complete Globe view, and the cloud layer now takes longer to appear resulting in the cloud layer only appearing as you are about to enter Globe mode. The cloud layer was changed in this way to improve peroformance.
The Main Interface screen has ben changed to display the turn and the time constantly in this manner:
Checking or unchecking the option to display the time in the options menu will have no effect with this mod loaded. This was the only easy way to avoid a lag in the display of the aditional information at the beginning of every turn.
EXTREME DETAILS:
In all Four Game Speeds the math has been balanced in a much more detail oriented way. Culture, Training, Research and Contruction each use four separate numbers which are then used as the basis for all of the other speed options except for Barbarians, Hurry gains, Golden Ages and Inflation which use completely unique numbers.
Here is the rough Schema I used:
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Flat% - This number represents the relationship between the Normal number of turns (460) and the number of turns in the selected speed and is calculated as (460/target speed)%. This is used for Culture or anything else which should closely match the overall length of the game.
Rsrch% - This number is used for research and is slightly different for each of the game speeds: FX-Marathon(1200) it's (Flat%+20%), for FX-Grand(1000) it's (Flat%+16%), for FX-Endurance(875) it's (Flat%+14%) and for FX-Extended(750) it's (Flat%+12%).
Train% - This number has two versions, for FX-Marathon(1200) and FX-Grand(1000) the number is (Flat%-20%), and for FX-Endurance(875) and FX-Extended(750) it is (Flat%-16%). This results in 1/5th and 1/6th faster unit production, respectively, relative to the timeline.
Build% - This number has two versions as well, for FX-Marathon(1200) and FX-Grand(1000) the number is (Flat%-10%), and for FX-Endurance(875) and FX-Extended(750) it is (Flat%-8%). This results in 1/10th and 1/12th faster building construction, respectively, relative to the timeline.
Barb% - The formula I used for this was ((50%*(turns/660))+100%). This results in a gradual increase in Barbarian production and agression with a direct relation to the 150% figure used on the original Epic mode. The result is also a lot less harh than the straight multiplication of 150% which resulted in the original Marathon mode having barbarians set to 300%.
Golden% - Used to calculate the Golden Age duration, this number is reached by (Flat%/1.2).
Hurry% - Based on the numbers in the default gamespeeds this number is reached by (100/Flat%).
Inflate% - Based on the numbers in the default gamespeeds this number is reached by (27/Flat%).
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These number resulted in these percentages for each gamespeed by number of turns:
HTML:
Turns Flat% Rsrch% Train% Build% Barb% Golden% Hurry% Inflate%
1200 260% 313% 208% 234% 190% 216% 38% 10%
1000 217% 252% 173% 195% 175% 180% 46% 12%
875 190% 216% 158% 174% 166% 158% 52% 14%
750 163% 182% 135% 149% 156% 135% 61% 16%
And these numbers are then applied like this:
<iGrowthPercent> Flat%
<iTrainPercent> Train%
<iConstructPercent> Build%
<iCreatePercent> Build%
<iResearchPercent> Rsrch%
<iBuildPercent> Train%
<iImprovementPercent> Flat%
<iGreatPeoplePercent> Build%
<iCulturePercent> Flat%
<iAnarchyPercent> Build%
<iBarbPercent> Barb%
<iFeatureProductionPercent> Build%
<iUnitDiscoverPercent> Rsrch%
<iUnitHurryPercent> Build%
<iUnitTradePercent> Flat%
<iUnitGreatWorkPercent> Flat%
<iGoldenAgePercent> Golden%
<iHurryPercent> Hurry%
<iHurryConscriptAngerPercent> Build%
<iInflationPercent> Inflate%
<iInflationOffset> -(Build%)
For city size I took these values: 0, 0, 10, 100, 500, 5000, 50000
and multiplied them by the Flat%.
Further changes were made to the ResearchPercent modifiers for each difficulty level found in CIV4HandicapInfo.xml, and for each map size as found in CIV4WorldInfo.xml. Beyond that, minor changes were made to the ResearchPercent modifiers for the eras as found in CIV4EraInfos.xml to make the Ancient, Modern and Future era researches take just a hair longer. In the case of Ancient, this is because ancient was the era most stretched in its average length, and for Modern and Future it was to slow down the end game just a little.
You will see that in FX-Marathon(1200) mode, Research and training both have been slowed down a bit form the default version of Marathon, while Building has been sped up. This should prevent games from ending in 1400AD by winning the Space Race! The change to the training percent is minor and is more the result of following a chosen mathematical formula than the result of any feeling that 200% was not a proper choice in the original mode.
NOTES:
The reason that all of the original game speeds were removed was that there was no easy way to balance short games without throwing off the long games, and vice-versa. Further, if someone is choosing to run FexFX--Bigger-&-Longer(v1.52.0) they are probably not going to be running one of the standard game speeds! If someone wants to use the Mammoth size I have packaged it separately as FexFX--Bigger(v1.52.0).
Attempting to use the Great Plains, Highlands, Hub, Ice Age, Inland Sea, Lakes, Maze, Mirror, Oasis, Pangea, Ring, Team_Battleground, Terra, Tilted Axis and Wheel map types without the FexFX--PublicMaps(v1.52.0) map pack will result in an unusual map type. You will get a 40x25 Plots map with no oceans or lakes. The terrain will gradiate from Tundra at the edges to junlge at the Equator smoothly passing through each terrain type along the way. While this map type may be an accident, some may find it interesting to play.
INSTALLATION:
Extract the contents of this archive into your main MOD folder, most likely located:
Program Files\Firaxis\Sid Meier's Civilization 4\MODS
TO PLAY:
Launch Civilization 4, go to the Advanced Menu.
Select Load a MOD.
Choose FexFX--Bigger-&-Longer(v1.52.0) from the listed MODs.
You will be notified that the game will restart to utilize the MOD.
COMPATABILITY:
This MOD been tested under version 1.52 of Sid Meier's Civilization IV.
