Mod Idea thread

[KaoticKanine]

I'd been playing a lot of Iroquois games with 3rd and 4th UCs to try and use the Sachem's Council (Scrivener's Office replacement) to its full potential, and it got me seriously wanting my idea for Dekanawida/Skennenrahawi as an alternate leader for the Iroquois (which I previously shared in this thread) to become reality, since the UA for the Great Peacemaker incidentally synergizes with Sachem's Council. As written by Hinin (modified from pineappledan's much-improved take on my initial UA):

Spoiler Dekanawidah Iroquois :

Iroquois - Dekanawidah - Great Law of Peace
- Forests and Jungles acts as Roads for Units and can be used to establish City Connections

- Gain 15 Influence when you spread your main religion in a CState already of your main religion.

- Gain 15 Influence with all met CStates of your main religion when you expend Great Prophets.

- Gain 30 Faith when completing Diplomatic Missions, scaling with Era.

With these bonus, you are required to maintain a strong religion to be able to benefit from increased influence, which can be quite tricky, so you'll have to specialize yourself a bit (by taking the Church and Evangelism/Pacifism/Resilience/Ritual/Scripture beliefs).
Nevertheless, succeeding in keeping a strong religious grip on CStates will still allow you to maintain alliance easily. For the most faraway CStates, you can use diplomatic units, and they'll help you maintaining a strong religious core by rewarding you with Faith when expended.

If you are successful in converting other civilizations to your religion, and so in having a religion with a very wide influence, taking the Resilience belief (which decreases the cost of GProphets) will allow you to gain plenty of Influence all around the world. In a more contested religious game, increasing the conversion strength of Missionaries seems like a better choice, for it will allow you to consistently suppress rival religions.

One difficult thing with this UA is that you'll gain no faith during the "religion creation" phase, so investing in Shrines early one and expending to create more of them will be required (fortunately, the fact that one more religion can be created in all games since the last versions of VP helps a lot).

But besides the synergy with that UNW, I just think this concept would be really great in general. A big problem I have with the Iroquois is that there is no real gameplan; just pray you start in a large region brimming with forests/jungles and pursue victory from there. With the Great Peacemaker leading, the Civ has a more focused goal on diplomacy and religion, the latter of which seriously helped by the immense Production provided by the Longhouses. And this UA is a fair bit more accurate to the Iroquois, as while the civ is well-known for warfare irl (and indeed, Hiawatha's UA does lean them more towards domination), the Great Law of Peace is what founded the Iroquois, and their form of governance just lends so well to VP diplomacy.

Although I can't help but keep thinking of changing up the Great Peacemaker's UA. Like maybe remove the religion component since, though the Great Peacemaker was a prophet, he didn't unite the five nations through religion but by establishing a seriously effective law and government. Seeing how the Sachem's Council UC depends on Great Diplomats making embassies, perhaps have the UA help with that regard?

 

[SolutionIt]

https://forums.civfanatics.com/threads/mod-civ-idea-canton-pirates-return.657497/ Posting a link to an idea I had for the Canton Pirates. TL;DR coming up.

New UA: Corpiration: Can only settle cities on or next to coastal and ocean tiles. These Cities generate Great Admiral points. You and your opponents can pillage each other's trade routes without declaring war. Pillaging trade routes gives you 1 copy of an opponent's most common luxury resource, cycling through each one available. (If anyone has a less pun oriented UA name suggest one btw).

UA Strategy: The idea here is that the Canton Pirates are an economically-oriented domination victory civ capable of branching out to different victory types depending on which monopoly they are capable of stealing from other players. Their opponents are capable of "stealing back" those resources, which basically just removes 1 copy of that resource from you. They should be restricted to only being able to settle next to or on coastal and ocean tiles only that way they can't just destroy opposing caravans too quickly early in the game (would probably cause balancing issues). Considering they'd also be capable of settling in oceans it means they can actually threaten opponent's cargo ships more effectively and set up a naval base near an opponent that does't require land towards the middle and late game. On top of this, since she can generate Great Admiral points naturally, she can also make her own resources, and it also helps her get quicker access to the Unique Great Admiral's abilities that tie in with the UA itself.

UU1: Fleet Commander: Great Admiral Replacement for the Canton Pirates. In addition to providing the standard bonuses of a Great Admiral, the Fleet Commander allows any unit stacked on top of it to enter rival territory. It is also invisible when stacked on top of a naval ranged or melee unit.

UB1: Lantau Smuggler's Den: The Lantau Smuggler's Den is a replacement of the East India Trading Company National Wonder. In addition to providing the standard bonuses of said building, The Lantau Smuggler's Den boosts naval unit production by 15%, reduces their gold costs by 15%, and gives +1 Trade Route. In addition to these bonuses, it also provides the Canton Pirates with an extra copy of a stolen resource permanently that can't be stolen back by an opponent.

3UC/4UC

UU2: Red Fleet Junk: The Red Fleet Junk starts with promotions that excels at both naval combat and raiding cities while boasting a higher Movement Speed and Combat Strength than its replacement of the Caravel. It also gains gold equivalent to 25% of the Combat Strength unit the Junk kills or capture. (Same as the one Enginseer has on his own post).

UB1: Gambling House: The Gambling House is a replacement of the Circus that provides an additional +1 Happiness and benefits Laborers with a +2 Production, Culture, and Gold bonus while also providing a Merchant Slot. (Same as the one Enginseer has on his own post).

*Keep in mind looking at this now there is a lot of ways to improve on this idea and even give more nods to how they worked. Could probably convert the UA or the unique GA to reolve around their fleet commander's having differently colored sails or something? Personally the idea I had in mind first seems more interesting and unique.

 

[Tekamthi]

I'd been playing a lot of Iroquois games with 3rd and 4th UCs to try and use the Sachem's Council (Scrivener's Office replacement) to its full potential, and it got me seriously wanting my idea for Dekanawida/Skennenrahawi as an alternate leader for the Iroquois (which I previously shared in this thread) to become reality, since the UA for the Great Peacemaker incidentally synergizes with Sachem's Council. As written by Hinin (modified from pineappledan's much-improved take on my initial UA):

Spoiler Dekanawidah Iroquois :

Iroquois - Dekanawidah - Great Law of Peace
- Forests and Jungles acts as Roads for Units and can be used to establish City Connections

- Gain 15 Influence when you spread your main religion in a CState already of your main religion.

- Gain 15 Influence with all met CStates of your main religion when you expend Great Prophets.

- Gain 30 Faith when completing Diplomatic Missions, scaling with Era.

With these bonus, you are required to maintain a strong religion to be able to benefit from increased influence, which can be quite tricky, so you'll have to specialize yourself a bit (by taking the Church and Evangelism/Pacifism/Resilience/Ritual/Scripture beliefs).
Nevertheless, succeeding in keeping a strong religious grip on CStates will still allow you to maintain alliance easily. For the most faraway CStates, you can use diplomatic units, and they'll help you maintaining a strong religious core by rewarding you with Faith when expended.

If you are successful in converting other civilizations to your religion, and so in having a religion with a very wide influence, taking the Resilience belief (which decreases the cost of GProphets) will allow you to gain plenty of Influence all around the world. In a more contested religious game, increasing the conversion strength of Missionaries seems like a better choice, for it will allow you to consistently suppress rival religions.

One difficult thing with this UA is that you'll gain no faith during the "religion creation" phase, so investing in Shrines early one and expending to create more of them will be required (fortunately, the fact that one more religion can be created in all games since the last versions of VP helps a lot).

But besides the synergy with that UNW, I just think this concept would be really great in general. A big problem I have with the Iroquois is that there is no real gameplan; just pray you start in a large region brimming with forests/jungles and pursue victory from there. With the Great Peacemaker leading, the Civ has a more focused goal on diplomacy and religion, the latter of which seriously helped by the immense Production provided by the Longhouses. And this UA is a fair bit more accurate to the Iroquois, as while the civ is well-known for warfare irl (and indeed, Hiawatha's UA does lean them more towards domination), the Great Law of Peace is what founded the Iroquois, and their form of governance just lends so well to VP diplomacy.

Although I can't help but keep thinking of changing up the Great Peacemaker's UA. Like maybe remove the religion component since, though the Great Peacemaker was a prophet, he didn't unite the five nations through religion but by establishing a seriously effective law and government. Seeing how the Sachem's Council UC depends on Great Diplomats making embassies, perhaps have the UA help with that regard?

I enjoyed reading this idea -- for the sake of discussion though, Dekanawida was really a contemporary of the (the first) Hiawatha; they worked together side by side after all. Having Dekanawida as the alternate leader raises the question of why we are leaving out the third founding influence, Jikonsase? (sp?)... ie it was really the work of these three together that is captured in the Hiawatha reference in civ 5 afaik, though Hiawatha did perhaps emerge as somewhat of the "one leader" of these three

I'd suggest instead finding an alternate leader from the 1600-1700 era. This would match the era of the 3/4UC UU, and the final/most recent historical power spike of the Iroquois civilization irl. The only name I can think of from this time is Canaqueese. Some of his most notable achievements are diplomatic, and loosely match the spirit of the idea outlined in the quoted post, though perhaps making him the overall leader is overstating his influence, I'm not sure. There were also 3 Iroquois nobles part of what was dubbed the "Four Mohawk Kings" in early 1700s, though again I'm not sure how influential these really were amongst the people as a whole. It might make more sense to have Hiawatha as the peaceful leaning leader and the 17th century era leader as more militant. In any case, the alternative leader would have to be pre-1709, as things get really fragmented for these people afterwards.

 

[KaoticKanine]

I enjoyed reading this idea -- for the sake of discussion though, Dekanawida was really a contemporary of the (the first) Hiawatha; they worked together side by side after all. Having Dekanawida as the alternate leader raises the question of why we are leaving out the third founding influence, Jikonsase? (sp?)... ie it was really the work of these three together that is captured in the Hiawatha reference in civ 5 afaik, though Hiawatha did perhaps emerge as somewhat of the "one leader" of these three

I'd suggest instead finding an alternate leader from the 1600-1700 era. This would match the era of the 3/4UC UU, and the final/most recent historical power spike of the Iroquois civilization irl. The only name I can think of from this time is Canaqueese. Some of his most notable achievements are diplomatic, and loosely match the spirit of the idea outlined in the quoted post, though perhaps making him the overall leader is overstating his influence, I'm not sure. There were also 3 Iroquois nobles part of what was dubbed the "Four Mohawk Kings" in early 1700s, though again I'm not sure how influential these really were amongst the people as a whole. It might make more sense to have Hiawatha as the peaceful leaning leader and the 17th century era leader as more militant. In any case, the alternative leader would have to be pre-1709, as things get really fragmented for these people afterwards.

I'm really glad you enjoyed reading this I take it you're a Haudenosaunee player as well?

And yeah, that is a good point; Dekanawidah, I'd say, was the first to pursue the peaceful union of the five nations, but he was quickly joined by Hiawatha (whose true name may actually be "Ayenwathaaa") and the two would recruit Jikonhsaseh, who both contributed just as much to the founding of the confederacy as the Great Peacemaker. And if I'm recalling correctly, Dekanawidah never truly lead the Haudenosaunee: he just hopped into a canoe and rowed off to parts unknown, with his goal of uniting the five nations completed. So I suppose Jikonhsaseh would've been a more suitable alternative leader than the Great Peacemaker ^^; Of course, I did list Jikonhsaseh as an alternate leader alongside Dekanawidah in the linked thread lol I just couldn't learn enough about her to come up with an effective UA, while the Great Peacemaker being a prophet made for an effective "religious diplomacy" idea (which, as I acknowledge, isn't entirely accurate to his methods).

Although I really love that idea of yours! It never sat well with me how Hiawatha's UA leans towards warfare when the actual man was a peace activist, so giving him a UA that accurately reflects the "Great Law of Peace" and giving the "Great Warpath" UA to the 17th-century leader works out so much better. And perhaps to reference the Beaver Wars, the "20% increased CS near Natural Wonders" could be changed to have luxury resources be a crucial component. Like, maybe Land Units become more effective when other civilizations have more luxuries than the "17th-century lead Iroquois"?

 

[pineappledan]

I enjoyed reading this idea -- for the sake of discussion though, Dekanawida was really a contemporary of the (the first) Hiawatha; they worked together side by side after all. Having Dekanawida as the alternate leader raises the question of why we are leaving out the third founding influence, Jikonsase? (sp?)... ie it was really the work of these three together that is captured in the Hiawatha reference in civ 5 afaik, though Hiawatha did perhaps emerge as somewhat of the "one leader" of these three

I'd suggest instead finding an alternate leader from the 1600-1700 era. This would match the era of the 3/4UC UU, and the final/most recent historical power spike of the Iroquois civilization irl. The only name I can think of from this time is Canaqueese. Some of his most notable achievements are diplomatic, and loosely match the spirit of the idea outlined in the quoted post, though perhaps making him the overall leader is overstating his influence, I'm not sure. There were also 3 Iroquois nobles part of what was dubbed the "Four Mohawk Kings" in early 1700s, though again I'm not sure how influential these really were amongst the people as a whole. It might make more sense to have Hiawatha as the peaceful leaning leader and the 17th century era leader as more militant. In any case, the alternative leader would have to be pre-1709, as things get really fragmented for these people afterwards.

I agree with Tekamthi; Hiawatha seems the most worthy to take on the diplomatic iroquois alternate leader.

Canaqueese wouldn't be my first pick as a militarist leader for the Iroquois. Someone like Joseph Brant/Thayendanegea, who was far more successful and had a much more lasting effect on the Iroquois nation would be my pick.

Also of note is Nerai's Seneca civ led by Cornplanter. It's a very fun looking civ design, and you can tell a lot of research and care went into it.

 

[Heinz_Guderian]

Yes! More civs to the people!

 

[KaoticKanine]

I agree with Tekamthi; Hiawatha seems the most worthy to take on the diplomatic iroquois alternate leader.

Canaqueese wouldn't be my first pick as a militarist leader for the Iroquois. Someone like Joseph Brant/Thayendanegea, who was far more successful and had a much more lasting effect on the Iroquois nation would be my pick.

Also of note is Nerai's Seneca civ led by Cornplanter. It's a very fun looking civ design, and you can tell a lot of research and care went into it.

Then it's settled lol For this "Mod Idea", we'll do what the Macedon mod does and give Hiawatha a new UA while transplanting the old UA to a new leader: Joseph Brant/Thayendanegea (of course, in this case, the two lead the same civilization, rather than two separate ones as was the case with Alexander and Pericles). Although, I think the big question is, would "Great Warpath" be accurate to Joseph Brant? And the "resource component" definitely couldn't be included since, from what I'm gleaning, he wasn't leading during the Beaver Wars. And it's gonna take me a while to think of an alternate "component" that reflects the Seven Years War/French and Indian War and/or the American Revolution.

For a "Great Law of Peace" UA, though, here's what I'm conceptualizing:
-Obviously, the "Forests and Jungles act as Roads" would remain. Perhaps unless there's a different way to have Forests/Jungles useful to the UA in a different way (especially considering "Great Warpath" is in direct reference to the extensive trail network utilized by Northeast tribes).
-'Peace' should be an important component to the UA. How that manifests, I'm still trying to think up, but perhaps the Iroquois get a big bonus for making peace treaties; both for themselves and other Civs/City-States?
-For the diplomacy aspect, I'm thinking that this UA could involve delegates, in reference to how the confederation was governed. Perhaps that the Iroquois gain +1 delegate per city and/or population? As for interactions with City-States... Again, gonna take me a while to conjure up something unique ^^; Best I can think is "Allied City-States provide full Yields, as if they are an owned city", but I know that's redundant with Siam's UA and a few policies

 

[Tekamthi]

I'm really glad you enjoyed reading this I take it you're a Haudenosaunee player as well?

yes, well something akin to a "permanent resident" within that polity maybe, as my roots are mixed amongst several nations in the region... anyway She:kon

I agree with Tekamthi; Hiawatha seems the most worthy to take on the diplomatic iroquois alternate leader.

Canaqueese wouldn't be my first pick as a militarist leader for the Iroquois. Someone like Joseph Brant/Thayendanegea, who was far more successful and had a much more lasting effect on the Iroquois nation would be my pick.

Also of note is Nerai's Seneca civ led by Cornplanter. It's a very fun looking civ design, and you can tell a lot of research and care went into it.

That Seneca mod looks great -- I will have to give it a try.

I agree Canaqueese is not a perfect fit; but his name comes up right in the 1640-1660s at what I'd argue was the apex of the final Iroquois power arc... it is probably overreaching though to put him as leader of the Iroquois.

On the topic of Brant as a leader for the civ 5 Iroquois that also has as its other leader Hiawatha -- it starts to stretch the historical relevance of these references a little imo. There was a split in the confederacy in the early 1700s, and again in the late 1700s, forming 3 distinct "Iroquois" groups. Brant really only had influence over one of these.

If the "Great Peace" of the "Iroquois Confederacy" is the defining characteristic of the Iroquois civilization in civ 5, then it effectively ended its historical run by the mid 1700s, prior to or maybe during Brant's time, as the two-then-three+ Iroquois groups fought directly with one another in various conflicts after each went its own way. Given the prominence of the matriarchal tradition in Iroquois society, it might be ideal to find a prominent clan mother from the 17th century or something. The historical material is somewhat sparse in individual names from this era though.

 

[Kim Dong Un]

Supreme Leader has some good news and bad news, and I'll start with the bad: it seems that in my haste, I underestimated this wonderful community with complete obliviousness to another modder(s) (Uighur_Caesar and Chrisy15) on this very forum who'd released an amazing NK / SK split featuring Il-Sung and Park Chung-Hee. They have some great work residing both here and on the workshop, so you can check them out. I was very distraught after last night while looking through DPRK map art, only to discover their glorious rendition of Supreme Leader, complete with custom leader scene and even the exact image I'd planned to use for the Koksan. The professional quality, thought and execution left me frozen in disbelief; that I was so naive to think I could compete with the likes of some of the talented minds in this community. I knew about an older meme version of Un released years ago which I referenced in my OP, but I feel ashamed for overlooking this. Though, all is not lost...

The good news is that they've given me the ok to utilize their mod in guiding me to hopefully bring my concept of DPRK for VP to fruition. Although aiming to keep my own identity for the mod, it would be silly at this point to not utilize some of the assets available, and I'm now optimistic that this will all be a blessing in disguise. They have some cool implementations that I can already see me adopting, like swapping out my denouncement idea (if it really is impracticable) for their citadel trigger -- to my knowledge, no other civ has citadel WLTKD trigger -- and I like the simplicity of Koksan getting +1 attack if starting turn on a border tile.

Last thing of note, but my discovery last night also led me to realize another component I overlooked with this project, in that introducing NK means having to simultaneously address/tweak/recreate Sejong and/or SK. I will try to comprehend that headache if I can manage NK first, and I don't know if anybody has any foresight into that.

 

[James Ryle]

I approach the glorious leader on bended knee with an observation after infiltrating your inglorious neighbors to the south.

On my last play through as Korea, one of the things that made it all that more atmospheric was their specific music. It’s something that’s not normally mentioned. For one thing when war became overly grindy, the Korean score still made the game feel uplifting. Overall, it enlivened my romp through time. There are niches where Supreme Leader can leave his unique identity even if others have come before him.

Ps - Love the concept of the Unique abilities of your mod. Your initial ideas are some of the most innovative I've heard for ages. If you need to deviate, please still try to stay true to the spirit of those feelings.

Good luck.

 

[Kim Dong Un]

I approach the glorious leader on bended knee with an observation after infiltrating your inglorious neighbors to the south.

On my last play through as Korea, one of the things that made it all that more atmospheric was their specific music. It’s something that’s not normally mentioned. For one thing when war became overly grindy, the Korean score still made the game feel uplifting. Overall, it enlivened my romp through time. There are niches where Supreme Leader can leave his unique identity even if others have come before him.

Ps - Love the concept of the Unique abilities of your mod. Your initial ideas are some of the most innovative I've heard for ages. If you need to deviate, please still try to stay true to the spirit of those feelings.

Good luck.

Supreme Leader commends you for your bravery in conducting espionage against Worst Korea. To expose oneself to their odious existence takes the courage of a thousand Kims, and I'm glad you've made it out unscathed to tell the tale.

As for the originality of my mod and the utilization of certain assets, I basically plan to use their leader screen for the quality, but essentially everything else (including the glorious music) will be different and personally chosen by The One & Unly. I'm glad to hear you're so fond of my vision, and the plan is to not stray from intentions, yet Supreme Leader is pleased that there are options at his disposal should tweaks need to be made. I never desired porting their civ over to VP (though they'll still be acknowledged), so as the days pass, the plan firmly remains that "Dong Dynasty's DPRK for VP" will be brought forth as it's own glorious rendition. Ultimately though, if things go downhill, the option does exist to port their version over to VP with some adjustments, so that at least makes me feel a bit more comfortable knowing that we should hopefully have a VP playable DPRK one way or another at some point this calendar year -- I still have zero coding knowledge really, so despite my efforts to try and grasp the basics while interpreting the Lua, it's hard without any foundational teaching, and I may eventually need some help, but I'm stubborn.

You may now stand, honorable feline.

 

[pineappledan]

I had an idea for a mod.

1-time 'Hero' units that spawn as replacements the first time you build a specific unit type. modelled after storied, singularly interesting, or semi-mythical historical military feats from that civ.

Usually just a scaled up or 1-to-a-tile version of the normal unit that is stronger and might have some unique ability or effect, but then just reverts back to a normal unit if it is upgraded. It could be difficult to find ideas for all 43 civs, but I think it would be easier than adding yet another UU, and it would feel less bloated.

Spoiler Some ideas for civs and their unique units: :

England - the Warwolf (trebuchet)
Germany - the Red Baron (triplane)
France - Roland the Paladin (Knight)
Maya - The Hero Twins (Archer)
India - Rathagrtsa (Chariot Archer)
Siam - Naresuan (make Naresuan's elephant hero unit, add something else for UU)
Ottomans - Dardanelles Gun (change 4UC to something else)
Arabia - Muajirun (Missionary)

 

[Kim Dong Un]

I had an idea for a mod.

1-time 'Hero' units that spawn as replacements the first time you build a specific unit type. modelled after storied, singularly interesting, or semi-mythical historical military feats from that civ.

Usually just a scaled up or 1-to-a-tile version of the normal unit that is stronger and might have some unique ability or effect, but then just reverts back to a normal unit if it is upgraded. It could be difficult to find ideas for all 43 civs, but I think it would be easier than adding yet another UU, and it would feel less bloated.

Spoiler Some ideas for civs and their unique units: :

England - the Warwolf (trebuchet)
Germany - the Red Baron (triplane)
France - Roland the Paladin (Knight)
Maya - The Hero Twins (Archer)
India - Rathagrtsa (Chariot Archer)
Siam - Naresuan (make Naresuan's elephant hero unit, add something else for UU)
Ottomans - Dardanelles Gun (change 4UC to something else)
Arabia - Muajirun (Missionary)

Yeah, the other day I was thinking about how my Supreme Leader concept was even more unique because it'd be the only example of actually being able to utilize a unit in game that represents your civ's leader (your Macedon modmod essentially draws upon this as well). Building off of that idea into an entirely new modmod with a 'Hero' unit sounds like it has lots of potential as a fun sister mod to 4UC.

At first glance, there are a handful of civs such as Sweden, Celts, Greeks, Huns, Songhai, and Mongols (yeah they already have Khan, but no Genghis specifically) that could have GG representations of themselves as playable units in game. Like you mentioned, you'd really have to do some digging to find viable examples for all the remaining civs, but if there's a community to help bring that idea to reality, it's probably this one.

 

[Hinin]

I've been thinking about making an adaptation of JFD's Charles De Gaulle Free France for VP since last week (the project for this year). Of course, the approval of the team who made the original mod is required here, even more since there are a lot of modifications to the base elements, but while keeping (I hope) their original spirit.

Spoiler Charles de Gaulle Free France :

Spoiler UA "Price of Blood and Tears" :

"Price of Blood and Tears"

When you found or build a courthouse in a city, it gains the "Résistance" trait (free building). Whenever you conquer or liberate a city, gain a temporary boost to Culture and Production in all Cities and a small Influence boost with all known City-States (doubled when liberating a City). Cannot raze cities.

Spoiler Résistance trait :

Building which is always captured and cannot be destroyed.

Gives the following perks :

• The City cannot be razed.
• If the city is Occupied by another civilization (neither Courthouse nor Liberated), spawn Partisans at a frequency scaling with game speed. These Partisans have the "Partisans" promotion (Doesn't use supply ; combat malus when not near a city with the "Résistance" trait).
  
• When lost, the City lowers your tech/culture/tourism/need penalty from number of non-puppet Cities (regain the penalty if the City is taken back).

Strategy : The idea here is to use the Partisan mechanic of base VP and use it as a fully-fledged mechanic which acts as both a safety bonus (prevent the city from being razed, disrupts your enemy back lines and allows an easier retaking) and a way to better establish your presence on the map (makes forward-settling less risky and allows you to make conquered cities in which you built Courthouses hazards for other civs). While keeping the French bonus from conquering, it is tweaked to have a more diplomatic accent and synergize with the first part of the UA.

Cons :

• First, it is a quite complexe set of bonus, even if I tried to make it understandable.
• Second, if the enemy liberates a city with the Résistance trait, it doesn't spawn Partisans (since the City isn't occupied).
• Third, the impossibility in the UA to raze cities is made both for thematic and gameplay reason, but still limits your choices.

Spoiler UM1 Char B1 :

Char B1 (replaces the Landship)

Additionnal CS compared to base Landship, but a bit more costly.
Has the "Cover I" and "Staunch" (Ignores aoe damages, Cannot be flanked) promotions
Can be set up (1 MP) to use a Ranged Attack (-25 % strength compared to base CS) with 1 Range.

Spoiler UB1 Café :

Café (replaces the Grocery)

Always captured and cannot be sold or destroyed.
Reduced maintenance cost.
Provides a Culture boost scaling with the number of Cafés in the World, and a Growth boost scaling with the number of Policies you have.
When in a City not owned by Free France, provides no yield or bonus and has the same effects as a lvl 2 spy acting for Free France (vision and advanced actions).

Spoiler UM2 Maquisards :

Maquisards (replaces the Gatling Gun)

Uses Production and Food conversion to be produced (pop. stagnation when produced).
+1 MP, but weaker stats.
Has the "Partisans" (Doesn't use supply ; combat malus when not near a city with the "Résistance" trait) and "Pillage without cost" promotions (in addition to "Covering Fire").

Spoiler UW Quai d'Orsay :

Quai d'Orsay (replaces Foreign Bureau)
Unlocked at Industrialization instead of Radio

When built, gain additional Spies (based on number of City-States in game), and City-States in which you have a Spy gain +25% CS, +50 % Production and have increased Supply.
Diplomatic units gain the "Insider" promotion (Important Influence bonus when expended in a City-State in which you have a Spy).
You gain double the Resources from allied City-States.
(in addition to base bonus from the Foreign Bureau)

Spoiler Music :

Peace - TBD
War - Chant des Partisans

I'm aware that all of this seems overly complexe, but I'm working a lot on that period nowadays (since I'm specializing in matters of security in France during the 30's and 40's) and wanted to at least put these ideas on "paper".
Of course, the risk here is a excess of "Résistancialisme", but I would like to use the historical parts of the civilopedia, the "Pillage without cost" and the Quai d'Orsay effects to counterbalance what could be seen as a overpositive view on XXth century France.

As for the fact a large part of the kit is during the last part of the game, I don't think that's a big problem : it is a civ meant to be played by players who know how to make use of the already powerful UA and UB1 and later can use the UMs and UW to either conquer key cities, protect their land, or return city-state alliances (with good synergies with some specific policies of the Statecraft PT and the Freedom Ideology).

Personally, I would either go Authority/Statecraft/Imperialism/Autocracy or Progress/Statecraft/Industry/Freedom with this kit and target a diplomatic or domination victory.

 

[gwennog]

Maybe add something around vassals (colonies) and their liberation (independence), with positive or negative effects.
The post-war periods when De Gaulle was in power were strongly marked by the end of the French colonies and the Quai d'Orsay is at the heart of that.

Vive le Québec libre !

I'm sorry, it escaped me .

 

[pineappledan]

Vive le Québec libre !

Lol, yeah. De Gaulle was such a massive tool...

 

[Hinin]

All that said (I won't go further on risky terrain by talking about De Gaulle), I have some concerns about some of the elements of the mod :

• Can a building influence a promotion ? (so that the "Résistance" building has an effect on the "Partisans" promotion).
• Is it possible to make a unit immune to aoe damage (by that I mean splash damage from some promotions) ?
• Is the code allowing the "set-up" action still existing, and is the AI still capable of using it to make ranged attacks ?
• Is it actually possible to obtain the same effects as a spy in a city through a building ? I was thinking about using the code that automatically provides an ambassador in the capital of vassal civs, but I fear it would count in the spy total, which would be op with some policies and wonders. Because of that, I've been thinking about a reworked version of the Café (see spoiler below).
• Do City-States actually have a supply limit, or is another elements responsible for the small size of their military (outside of pure production problems I mean) ?

Spoiler Café (alternate version) :

Café (replaces the Grocery)

Always captured and cannot be sold or destroyed.
Reduced maintenance cost.
Provides a Culture boost scaling with the number of Cafés in the World, and a Growth boost scaling with the number of Policies you have.
When in a City not owned by Free France, provides no yield or bonus and gives Free France vision of the city (city tile and two tiles around, with vision of what happens within). If it's owner has low global happiness (so below 50 %), then the city has the "blockaded" status (so no hp regeneration and bonus attack against it for units).

 

[HungryForFood]

When I was doing more civ adaptations, de Gaulle was one of the civs I looked at, but eventually passed over for several reasons. Link to original mod for reference.

The main reason is that the civ bonuses are set up such that it is a lose less civ, rather than a win more civ. You only gain bonuses if you allow yourself to lose cities, which makes the civ not as fun to play, and I would argue is fundamentally weaker than a win more bonus.

Now looking at your proposed changes, the only part of the UA that is not a lose less bonus, is the yield boost when conquering cities (shared with Napoleon). The Cafe also has a lose less bonus, but at least you gave it a significant Culture bonus if you go wide.

What to change though? That I am not sure, I am not familiar with France of that era, hence why I passed over this civ in the end.

 

[Hinin]

When I was doing more civ adaptations, de Gaulle was one of the civs I looked at, but eventually passed over for several reasons. Link to original mod for reference.

The main reason is that the civ bonuses are set up such that it is a lose less civ, rather than a win more civ. You only gain bonuses if you allow yourself to lose cities, which makes the civ not as fun to play, and I would argue is fundamentally weaker than a win more bonus.

Spoiler Long answer :

My goal here was to keep the idea of a safety mechanism (a 'lose less' mechanic), but to turn it in a way that makes it also a sort of bonus.
If it had been been simply bonus to yields per lost city like in the original mod, then it would have still been a net loss when losing a forward-settled city, especially in the early game (and nothing forbids the enemy to simply raze the city to negate your bonus in the original mod).
Here, your forward settled city cannot be razed, no longer increases to cost of your policies/techs (or lowers your tourism) and spawns partisans for at least as long as it is in revolt (if made a puppet city, it will continue spawning them continusly). Plus, when you recuperate your city, you'll gain an important bonus in culture, production and influence (2 times the basic bonus of the UA). Basically, you may have won far more than the AI in the end when losing your city.

What it means is that it encourages a very risk-taking playstyle based on a mix of aggressive settling and diplomatic manipulation : if you play Authority, you can stick some of your early cities near the capital of another empire, and this player now only has the choice of conquering them early and obtaining military hazards in his/her heartland spawning enemy units every couple of turns or so, or to let them be until courthouse are available, and risk a capital rush.
Later, the Café further reinforce this idea (and I prefer the second version all things considered) : with vision and blockade imposed on some enemy cities, you'll have a way to easily retake them if the happiness of the enemy is low enough (which can be obtained through war weariness or having your partisans pillage a maximum of tiles).

What I also had in mind was to allow this bonus to be used as an offensive tool when you're conquering : once you've built a courthouse in a conquered city, you'll transform it into a hazard for the enemy. It doesn't matter if the city is liberated (which means you have to adopt an all-in playstyle to ensure the enemy cannot regain enough of a foothold to regain those cities), but if another conqueror tries to attack you, you can still wear him down quite a lot, and any comeback you make can really be a game changer in term of yield and influence.

In the end, I find it a lose less/risk more playstyle, with specific uses throughout the game :

• In the early game, a way to make forward-settling and capital rushing more interesting;
  
• In the midgame, a tool to ensure that, whatever the results of the first big wars are, you can wear down your opponents with partisans and later regain some cities and rip the rewards;
  
• In the endgame, where a lot of cities can be captured in a short amount of time and victory conditions become far more important, your potential to wear down attackers on one hand and use your bonus on conquest/liberation to rush some specific elements in order to win are very important. This, added to Quai d'Orsay which is designed to flip and keep CS alliances, means that the civ is designed to be able to win through both attrition and surprise bursts of power.

I don't think of course that it is the most competitive civ out there, but it could be an interesting kit for an "iron-man" playstyle (which most of use aren't used to, since a city loss can usually be devastating in VP).

Now looking at your proposed changes, the only part of the UA that is not a lose less bonus, is the yield boost when conquering cities (shared with Napoleon). The Cafe also has a lose less bonus, but at least you gave it a significant Culture bonus if you go wide.

Actually, the idea to keep parts of the original civs' UA when making alternate leaders was from pineappledan's far back in the days of the More Alternate Leaders for VP project, which died for good reasons but is still a source of ideas from time to time.
As for the Café, being the first UC available to the civ, it must both be in synergy with the UA and provide something else that is meaningful : the fact that one of its bonus scales with the number of Cafés in the world (counting those in lost cities) while the other scales with your number of policies (which is big, considering the number of policies by the end of the game) means that you'll gain something from it whatever your playstyle is.

What to change though? That I am not sure, I am not familiar with France of that era, hence why I passed over this civ in the end.

Spoiler Another long answer :

Apart from the elements pointed out in my previous post, my main concern is if the civ is enjoyable to play with : a city-loss is still a city-loss, so making it a more interesting and not game-leaving event is the major goal here.

As for the history itself behind it, it is of course a very complexe matter, even more so when the events aren't that far from us and we're only beginning to fully grasp some of its elements (we're only beginning to have full access to the archives for the last years of the 40's, so I can tell you that there is so much work to do here for historians to go beyond the oversimplified notions on that period that are still prevalent).

One thing I wanted to avoid when making the mod was to present an overly positive view of the country (my country) : "résistancialisme", the idea that the French Résistance was a unifying cause for the entire French people, is an ever-tempting but dangerous idea (especially when you see how diverse the résistants themselves were : you have no idea how many horrible stories I can find each month on that matter, especially in 1944-45).
This is why I think some of the elements in the UA, UB and the Maquisards are particularly important :

• Once a Courthouse is built by the enemy, the trait doesn't spawn Partisans anymore;
  
• The blockade malus of the Café is only triggered when there is global unhappiness in the enemy empire;
  
• The Maquisards have the "No cost for pillaging" promotion (reference to the "Maquis noirs").

On the matter of colonization/decolonization, the UA and the UW present different aspects :

• The UA part is a reference to how De Gaulle used French colonies as the cornerstone of its plan to reconquer the mainland and "French pride" : Free French troops (colonial and from the metropole) played an important role in the African and Italian campaigns (see for example the battle of Bir Hakeim);
• The UW is more a reference to the post-war period, where France first tried to keep controle of its colonies despite rising tensions within them (most notably because the sacrifices of their populations weren't rewarded with more economic and political power) and later (most notably in Africa) kept a indirect controle on its former territories through political manipulations, economic monopolies and sometimes direct military interventions (see Françafrique).

All of that of course is much more complicated (see for example the Thiaroye massacre), but there is always a limit on what we can do to try to expose these elements through gameplay.

N.B. : Did you know that the Chant des partisans (see war theme) became the unofficial French anthem during the last months of the war and is in fact still sung for Bastille day each year ? We French like our war songs.

 

[gwennog]

On the matter of colonization/decolonization, the UA and the UW present different aspects :

• The UA part is a reference to how De Gaulle used French colonies as the cornerstone of its plan to reconquer the mainland and "French pride" : Free French troops (colonial and from the metropole) played an important role in the African and Italian campaigns (see for example the battle of Bir Hakeim);
• The UW is more a reference to the post-war period, where France first tried to keep controle of its colonies despite rising tensions within them (most notably because the sacrifices of their populations weren't rewarded with more economic and political power) and later (most notably in Africa) kept a indirect controle on its former territories through political manipulations, economic monopolies and sometimes direct military interventions (see Françafrique).

It is this post-war vision that I wanted to highlight in my proposal (sorry for the joke). The same mechanisms that you propose could be implemented with the vassals according to their attitude and the liberation of the colonies (liberation of a vassal) could trigger identical bonuses (or others). In any case, the degree of thought instilled in your proposal makes it enticing. On the other hand, I wonder what the AI will be able to do with it?

Later, the Café further reinforce this idea (and I prefer the second version all things considered)

Me too for what it's worth.