[MOD] Medieval: Conquests

[mastrude]

This really is an innovative use of colonization! I like mods that really shake up the game and make it something totally new! I also personally really like the various kinds of town you can build, like the monasteries etc. I just like the idea of different town types and abilities. This New trade system sounds cool and the Vassal Taxation.

one Dinky suggestion, for the 'european tax rate' you could change the name to 'Tithe Rate' so it represents the churches 'Divine Right' to a percentage of every mans wealth for the works of the Holy Church. Thus the Pope decrees what percentage of a mans wealth is owed to the church to keep him Holy and Pious in the eyes of God

This reminds me, I would like the prices at markets to be based on a traditional price, not the actual price in Rome now. The price of gold crashes in Rome if you sell too much there, but perhaps you should still be able to get a good price locally. News travels slowly in the dark ages, and everybody wants gold for prestige. The latter reason is why you can still make money smuggling gold to India (in the real world, I mean.)

There is a whole "dickering" mechanic in the game which I never realized before this mod showed it to me. It's cool!

 

[mastrude]

... I think it would be cool to add in some of the independent city-state types like Venice. Where you can only found one city. In medieval times these city-states had colonies, standing armies, went to war, and where at times more powerful than kings.

They sure were! I don't know whether it's historical or not, but the film Dangerous Beauty has the King of France going to Venice to borrow money, where he is met by Veronica Franco, the unofficial "state courtesan of Venice", at the request of the Doge and the families controlling the city. Venice was very powerful, and also famed for the quality of its prostitution! It's no longer powerful, but may still be famous in the other regard--I have never had the opportunity to learn.

 

[mastrude]

.... this was the thing that made them so rich and powerful and kept them in the same league as nations.

That and the fact that they (specifically Venice) were very experienced and adventuresome traders (for example, Marco Polo, later,) and closer to the Arab and Turkish states and the Silk Route than Western Europe. With a powerful navy and experienced assassins, to boot!

 

[mastrude]

Is it uploaded yet? Is it uploaded yet? Huh? Huh?

 

[Kailric]

This reminds me, I would like the prices at markets to be based on a traditional price, not the actual price in Rome now. The price of gold crashes in Rome if you sell too much there, but perhaps you should still be able to get a good price locally. News travels slowly in the dark ages, and everybody wants gold for prestige. The latter reason is why you can still make money smuggling gold to India (in the real world, I mean.)

There is a whole "dickering" mechanic in the game which I never realized before this mod showed it to me. It's cool!

Well, at the moment there is only one base Market price. The game auto adjusts this from time to time based on several factors. The different trade markets simply modify this base price. You can in the mod buy a good at the local market, then travel to a distant market and make a profit.

So, you like the "dickering" mechanic, well get use to it cause in version 2.0 the only way to sell your goods, until you discover a trade route, is bartering with the locals. I wondered how this would play out but I rather enjoyed it. After you found you settlement take your peddler and head on over to a nearby village. There you can trade for more tools (very handy at the start), sheep or cattle to start your farms, and or maybe some wool to make coats from.

Well, the mod is uploaded to Mod DB but have to wait on the "Authorisation". In the mean time I am trying to reupload it to AtomicGamer.

 

[Kailric]

assassins!

Assassins!?! That's one aspect thats on the table also that I am looking forward to adding. Spys and assasins where a big part of Medieval times and I want to add some cool ways to use them. I've read just the other day where the crusader's had been besieging Antioch for seven months until a one of their spies persuaded a Seljuk officer to let crusader soldiers in through one of the cities towers. Spies would offer new ways to bring down a Cities defences. Also, one of the goals to victory is to prevent other Civs from completeing their Conquests first. So, spies could be used to, well spy on other Civs and disrupt their efforts in their ambitious attemps.

There is just so much that I'd love to implement. I just don't want the game to get over whelming though. That's why the new trade point system pretty much takes care of it self... you just have to keep making gold

 

[mastrude]

Assassins!?! That's one aspect thats on the table also that I am looking forward to adding. Spys and assasins were a big part of Medieval times and I want to add some cool ways to use them. I've read just the other day where the crusader's had been besieging Antioch for seven months until a one of their spies persuaded a Seljuk officer to let crusader soldiers in through one of the cities towers.

Can we have prostitutes too? I don't see how they'd fit in the game, though.

 

[Kailric]

Can we have prostitutes too? I don't see how they'd fit in the game, though.

Nope, my wife will not allow it. Not with all the techs in the world

But what you can have is the 2.0 version, almost as good anyway. Its up and ready at Mod DB.

http://forums.civfanatics.com/downloads.php?do=file&id=16337

 

[Commander Bello]

Congratulations to the release.

Downloading.

 

[mastrude]

I'd love to show Kailric my draft of my guide for version 1.5. I'm betting that 90% still applies in version 2.0 (which I haven't seen yet.) Any takers? This is why we need a code repository pronto.

 

[Kailric]

I'd love to show Kailric my draft of my guide for version 1.5. I'm betting that 90% still applies in version 2.0 (which I haven't seen yet.) Any takers? This is why we need a code repository pronto.

Haven't seen it, well download it all ready
I'd love to see it too(the guide). This mod needs a guide as it's so different than the vanilla version. I'll work with Nightinggale to get a code repository set up as soon as possible.

Edit: I actually was planning on adding a semi turn by turn screen shot guide up until you discover the Spice Route. I have the screens shots just takes time to do it.

 

[Nightinggale]

yeah that was always the issue the Col system it was better to spend than save, which makes some of the features of certain mods difficult to get, as you have to have a big pile of gold at the random moment of the event...

Part of the Col problem with this is if you say save 5000 gold, the king shows up and request maybe 3500. If you spent it and have 500, the king asks for 300. This (intentionally or not) is a real killer for stashing money.

You did give me an idea. Random events costing money shouldn't be a here and now offer, but an offer you can reply to all turn. That way if the price is 2000, you can borrow 2000 from another player (like city state) and then accept the random event offer.

Medieval times had an interesting option for interest in such huge loans. It could be the right to collect taxes in a certain area. King A borrowed money from King B and then King B could collect taxes in an area of country A. Sometimes those loans were never repaid or king B refused to accept repayment, which meant it turned into buying land, which moved borders. In other words modern day borders are still affected by unpaid medieval loans.

When a king had the right to taxes for an area and he knew he would only keep it like 5 years, he usually had insane taxes meaning when the owner got it back the population had become poor and no longer paid as much tax as they used to.

Also, right now I made it so you can only play some of the European Civs and removed the Vikings, Arabs, and Mongols from human play.

Last time I checked the Vikings came from Scandinavia, which I'm pretty sure is placed in Europe

I plan to do something different for other Civs. Like the Vikings and Mongols will have a different objective than the others, more about conquest..

The question is if Vikings are even comparable to the other invaders and if they were invaders at all. Sure the monks wrote that they were, but not all historians are so sure. It depends on how you value written evidence vs non-written evidence.

The viking era started like this:
Monks arrived in England and gradually took control in the 6-8th century.
Monasteries started to send missionaries to Scandinavia in the 8th century (maybe before but the first written account is from here).
793 vikings attack Lindisfarne, which worked like a capital for monasteries. They burned it to the ground and left no survivors.
Monkwearmouth-Jarrow Abbey took over the leader role and the vikings burned it to the ground the following year.

I'm starting to see a pattern in those attacks. There is no real evidence of vikings sacking villages. Those tales are written centuries later.

Another interesting twist is the Battle of Brunanburh in 937. England attacked Scotland, but at the time of the battle itself Scotland had help from Ireland, Scandinavia and Iceland and together they managed to drive the English king back. Why would vikings die in battle to help Scotland when they could have been sacking Scotland while the warriors were busy fighting England?

The really interesting twist to the story is: who were the local population?
Tacitus (Roman) wrote about a Scottish tribe that it was Danish because they shared language and customs.
English uses norse grammar with loanwords from non-norse languages. This indicates norse speaking people being forced to adapt to another language, not the other way around.
More than 2000 norse placenames are in Danelaw. Arguing that they were because the vikings went through would be like stating that France ditch their French place names and started using German ones even after WW2.
Norse placenames outside Danelaw.
English weekdays are still named after the norse gods (except saturday, which the Romans named after the god Saturn).
Scottish and English (specially in Crumbria) has a surprisingly high number of norse "loadwords"

All in all the question remain who invaded who? Did the vikings invade foreign England or did the monks invade norse England and the norse people fought back? Historians will most likely never agree on this one.

And how does the role of vikings affect M:C? I'm not quite sure.

 

[Kailric]

And how does the role of vikings affect M:C? I'm not quite sure.

That's some good stuff. I love histories as I have stated. That's an interesting point about the monks sending missionaries to Scandinavia in the 8th century and haven't heard that yet. Has anyone seen the Vikings series on History Channel. In their version the monks had no idea about the vikings it seems, I only seen the first episode though. I have a book on vikings, its something like Vikings: Blood thirsty savages or the first Christians. I'll have to read it for sure now.

I can't imagine monks bringing swords to Scandinavia as an actually military invasion but they would have brought the sword of the word. If Lindisfarne was the capital seems awful fishy that that was the first place the Vikings hit. Seems like they may have had inside information. Would I'd give to go back them days and explore!

Vikings in M:C at the moment are played by the AI and work basically like all the Other AIs. Their actually two Viking tribes. One is "European" the other is a "Native". I replaced the Huns with the Norwegian Vikings and Rollo as their leader. They are the ones who settled in Normandy.

 

[Nightinggale]

Has anyone seen the Vikings series on History Channel. In their version the monks had no idea about the vikings it seems, I only seen the first episode though. I have a book on vikings, its something like Vikings: Blood thirsty savages or the first Christians. I'll have to read it for sure now.

I haven't seen it. However with the arguments between historians I would be careful with which sources to trust. Or rather I would consider each source because they contradict each other.

Also sometimes you really have to wonder what people are thinking when they make their statements. Take for instance "A history of Scotland" episode 1. First it's stated that the Scots look bad, but that's what other people wrote about them, which always makes people look worse. Later in the same episode the written records from the monks are used as the eternal truth. While plenty of historians complains about the accuracy in that series, I haven't seen anybody who complained about this. Instead the complains were from English minded historians who bash the story of an independent Scotland (clearly political motivated). They also bashed the concept that they were not used as reference in the production. Go figure.

I can't imagine monks bringing swords to Scandinavia as an actually military invasion but they would have brought the sword of the word.

There is no written accounts for what actually happened, but I don't think it went well. We do have written accounts for some other missionaries though. Portugal wanted Japan as a colony in the 16th century. Their financial, military and political strength made it impossible though. Their plan B was to send missionaries to concert them and switch to Christian rulers (read: Portugal). The missionaries were not really that bad, but the converts tore down buddhist temples, killed people who refused to convert and so on. Japan first exiled all missionaries, then all foreigners (the 250 years of self chosen isolation) and then banned Christianity, or rather the sect like version that the missionaries had left behind. The last ban came when the converts made an army and took control of a castle. If anything remotely like this happened in Scandinavia, then I can understand the hostility from the vikings.

If Lindisfarne was the capital seems awful fishy that that was the first place the Vikings hit. Seems like they may have had inside information. Would I'd give to go back them days and explore!

That would indicate viking friendly people in England. However I'm not sure it was such a big secret. Lindisfarne was built as a fortress. It's on an island where you have to wait for low tide to walk there. High tide creates a natural moat. It was tricky to move heavy stuff across the wet sand even at low tide. Why would they need that great defense against their own land?

However they never considered an attack from the sea. Viking ships were able to land on the island and if it had been high tide, the natural moat would have turned the island into a prison with nowhere to run for the monks and no chance of getting reinforcements. It's possible the vikings were aware of this issue and picked their point of attack based on this alone. We will never know because they didn't write their reasons behind their actions.

 

[mastrude]

Haven't seen it, well download it all ready
I'd love to see it too(the guide).

My early drafts are pretty good, so I'm uploading it now. I would love to have your comments, and you can highlight items which have changed. This will help get all your other playtesters up to speed, too.

The forum wouldn't let me upload this. I'm hiding it on one of my web sites at http://www.HeritageTurkeyFoundation.org/strategyguide.html.

EDIT: Please let me know whether you have a format troubles with this web page. When Word auto-translates Word documents to HTML, it uses a ton of specialized helper items to make sure it looks almost exactly like the Word document. The Word developers still fantasize that Word is a good HTML editor. Of course I have all those items on my computers. If you don't, the format may look screwed up to you. I need your help with this, because I can't see the problem. Also, when I change and reload the file to the server it seems to take up to an hour to "cook" properly there. During that time, the file's unavailable.

I am editing this document on the web, so the version you see is the master document.

Forgive the early state. When you criticize this, please be kind. Remember I'm a semi-lousy player (and a whiner.) I am writing this guide to learn how to play better myself. Others who know the mod better may not be as fast or good at writing as I am.

 

[mastrude]

The question is if Vikings are even comparable to the other invaders and if they were invaders at all. Sure the monks wrote that they were, but not all historians are so sure. It depends on how you value written evidence vs non-written evidence.

I'm finding this extremely interesting. My paternal line is Norwegian, and my last name is a Viking name (Mastrude, referring the plot of land where masts were cut.) My aunt can trace our ancestry back for over 650 years--no warriors--shitkickers all that way back. The worst thing that ever happened to the Vikings was converting to Christianity and getting all depressed.

[If I'm not allowed to use the word shitkickers, please change it to farmers. Same thing.

 

[mastrude]

I have to say, posting and reading in this forum is a lot of fun, as is participating in testing the mod and following its changes. It's really sucking me in and I'm neglecting other work I should be doing.

 

[Kailric]

Part of the Col problem with this is if you say save 5000 gold, the king shows up and request maybe 3500. If you spent it and have 500, the king asks for 300. This (intentionally or not) is a real killer for stashing money.

You did give me an idea. Random events costing money shouldn't be a here and now offer, but an offer you can reply to all turn. That way if the price is 2000, you can borrow 2000 from another player (like city state) and then accept the random event offer.

Yep, this is one area I want to fix. When I have been play testing I always spent my money asap just for that reason, to get it away from the greedy Pope! You could instead of gold, make it so the Pope asks for certain trade goods, "Hey, we have a shortage of wine for our sacraments, we need 100 units now! Kiss me ring, blah blah.", stuff like that. And then make it so the AI will keep a percent of their gold for making trade deals, buying techs, and suchs.

I really liked in Civ4 where you could set up trade deals and swap like Iron for Ivory each turn, if you had a roads connected. That's something to I wanted add to Col. First I'd have to add in my Forts mod because it adds in PlotGroups. Without that code there is no easy way to determine if two plots are connected by a trade route, or roads.

Btw, In this new version I have added shortcuts to help playtest. I wrote it in the Hints section of the pedia. In Cheat mod- Press K to reasearch any tech, ctrl K for 500 free Trade Points, V to autoplay for a turn, shift V for 5 turns, ctrl V for 25, and so on.

Autoplay helps me because it can take a whole day just to play through a game. So, I use it to fast forward for a bit to test out different things, very handy.

 

[mastrude]

Has anyone seen the Vikings series on History Channel. In their version the monks had no idea about the vikings it seems, I have only seen the first episode though.

I've seen all the first season; it's fun. The monks in the History Channel series on Vikings didn't know about the Vikings, because the series deals with the first Viking attack on England.

By the way, the Viking version of my first name is Ragnar. My business logo is a Viking raiding ship.

The Vikings were making some pretty good swords by the 10th or 11th century as I recall--maybe this was later. Very pure crucible steel, with inlays (the trade name, amusingly) in different metals. This is info from another History Channel show I think--but maybe it was Nova instead. Those top-technology swords cost a bundle!

I don't know the historical state of the parallel development of layered steel swords in Damascus, Japan, and Spain. Anyone? Those swords were superior, and are legendary to this day.

The Vikings were said to attack monasteries because they accumulated gold and other wealth--they offered the best pickings.

 

[Kailric]

I'm finding this extremely interesting. My paternal line is Norwegian, and my last name is a Viking name (Mastrude, referring the plot of land where masts were cut.) My aunt can trace our ancestry back for over 650 years--no warriors--shitkickers all that way back. The worst thing that ever happened to the Vikings was converting to Christianity and getting all depressed.

[If I'm not allowed to use the word shitkickers, please change it to farmers. Same thing.

On my mothers side we are Danish. My great, great, great grandfather Fredrick Nelson Anderson, was born in 1822 in Copenhagen Denmark. I would love to see how far back we could trace it from there.

I've always heard that "history is written by the winners" and I believe that's true. While the Vikings won a lot of battles in the end they lost the war of religion and converted. Anyway, yeah, we have to be careful of what we call true history for certain.

Yep, posting on forums and working with Mods is fun stuff and time consuming. Its a good trick to manage it all.