MOD: New Leaders/Traits for RiFE

25Hour

Some sort of lemur
Joined
Mar 14, 2008
Messages
181
Exactly what it says on the tin.
VERSION 3.1


CHANGELOG:

4/14: This mod has moved to a new thread!
4/7:
This version of the mod actually works. WHAT MADNESS

4/5:
Added 4 new leaders: Allisol of the Dural, Ixthil of the Maztl, Felsah of the Sheiam, and Jon of the Elohim.
Also nerfed Egalitarian to +1 happiness, instead of +3 (it's pretty strong as-is.)
The mod is updated to the Trade patch.

3/24:
--Made the mod hopefully compatible with the flavor-patch (note this means that you definitely have to download that before this mod, otherwise CtD's galore.) I've gotta figure out this Modular XML thing, seriously... anyway, definitely tell me if this causes any errors.
3/22:
--Added 3 new leaders: Eurynome of the Sheaim, Rigmora the Forgotten of the Hippus, and Annika of the Lanun.
--Changed "Ardor" to "Ardent", so that there could be no confusion with the Grigori worldspell.
--Fixed the Manipulative trait. It should work properly now.

New leaders in the 4/5 version:

1) Allisol of the Dural (Urbane):

The Urbane trait grants your cities economic bonuses based on their culture level, starting at the fairly low value of 150 and progressing from there, reaching its peak at 4000 culture. It's a neat trait, and I'd love to hear some input re: balance (I'm a bit unsure of whether I made the gains too powerful or too weak for the cultural legwork required to get them.)

2) Ixthil of the Maztl (Cultist):

He gets bonuses to the build speed of Wyvern Guardians, allowing the Maztl worldspell to be cast earlier, and also grants Shadow 1 to all of his disciple units, making city conquest much easier all around. Good times!

3) Felsah the Accursed and Jon Hatless (Prophetic):

They can build Aether Beacons in their cities at Knowledge of the Ether. Though moderately expensive at 200 hammers, they grant a 2-beaker research boost to that city, as well as a civilization-wide cumulative bonus of 20% to ritual build speeds. Get enough of 'em, and you could swing the Armageddon Counter any way you wanted to with the Sheaim/Elohim-specific rituals. Not to mention those other rituals you could cast with this. Blighting the land has never been so easy.

3/22:

New leaders are as follows!
1) Rigmora the Forgotten (Incorporeal, Raiders)

Yup, we've got ourselves here a past leader of the Hippus, out for revenge against those that wronged her. Or maybe just money, I don't know.
Rigmora.jpg

Incorporeal is a trait which can be an advantage or disadvantage, depending on the situation. The deal is, her cavalry units all have the Illusion, Undead, and Sheut Stone promotions, making them somewhat stronger at the cost of no longer being able to kill units directly. This is actually an advantage when it comes to raiding; your units can't be killed nearly as easily, due to instant healing and +1 strength. Of course, it also means your invasions will require mixed forces. You also have the Raiders trait, emphasizing this. Tradeoffs, eh?

2) Annika (Smuggler)

Smuggler is an ability which grants a large research boost whenever you're researching something that a rival has researched who you have open borders with. You gain an attitude bonus with male leaders, too, which helps in maintaining those open borders. Piratical charm, I don't know.

3) Eurynome (The Key and the Gate, Impassive, Emergent)
Eurynome.jpg
Eurynome's ability really beefs up the Sheiam Planar Gate summons, but it requires you to collect mana to assist in this, the exact variety which will determine the bonuses you get. She also will always be neutral, regardless of religion.



You can't build Pyre Zombies as quickly (this particular leader has little experience with reanimation magic), but mind that these are really very significant bonuses your gates get from the mana-- water mana increases your max summons by 1 per city per mana, which really adds up, and one dimensional mana nearly doubles the rate at which your summons pour in. Finally, entropy mana increases the experience your demons start with by 2 per. It only goes up from there for each additional mana you collect.


------------


1) Duke Johann of the Mechanos (Manipulative, Emergent, Philosophical, Agnostic, Neutral)
Spoiler :

Johann.jpg

Unique Trait: Manipulative. Allows you to build False Clerics at Philosophy, which can spread any previously-founded religion (of the 7 main religions) to any city. They can also traverse rival territory, which is no small thing, since it means that you'll be able to very easily break up the power blocs resulting from early RoK or FoL religion spread. In short, this trait is meant to incite ill-will between your neighbors. Good times, eh? (Since I'm not sure how useful this will be in practice, I'm treating it as a half-trait in terms of power level, on par with Defender.)

2) Valstran of the Scions (Emergent, Ardor, Evil) and Sera of the Elohim (Emergent, Ardor, Good)
Valstran.jpg
Unique Trait: Ardor. Ardor grants you extra experience for defeating enemies controlled by opposite-alignment civilizations-- if you're evil, that means good civs, and if you're good or neutral, that means evil civs. It also grants your level 7 units a promotion granting +1 strength, of a type dependent on your alignment. This trait is meant to reflect the battle of good vs. evil in a more mechanical way than is normally done in FfH.

3) Rymath of the Malakim (Emergent, Crusader, Neutral)
Spoiler :
Rymath.jpg

Unique Trait: Crusader. Crusader grants your civilization a golden age whenever you raze a holy city that's not of your own religion. It's heathen-crushing time!

4) Bertram of the Doviello (Scorched Earth, Barbarian, Emergent, Evil)
Spoiler :
Bertram.jpg

Unique Trait: Scorched Earth. Scorched Earth grants you an extra 20 gold per population whenever you raze a city. Which is nice. On the other hand, it doesn't particularly give you any help in accomplishing the task of razing cities. Still, if you can manage a rough start, it'll let you fund your entire military off of your conquests once you get the ball rolling.

5) Anasta of the Dural/Illians: (Ice Touched, Manipulative, Megalomaniacal, Emergent, Evil)
Anasta.jpg
Unique Trait: Megalomaniacal. Whenever you capture a city, you gain +10 science per population that city has. It's a small boost, but a significant one, and definitely lends itself towards a more militaristic teching strategy than might normally be done. Balance-wise, I treat Ice-Touched as no net change in power (since it forces you to the White Hand), with Manipulative and Megalomaniacal as a half-trait each. Which puts Anasta about on par with Raitlor, which is as it should be.

6) Sorah and Ecks of the Austrin (Exotic, Emergent, Defender)

Unique Trait: Exotic. This allows you to build the Joining in one of your cities, which takes a random civilization not already in the game and puts it in control of that city. And on your team (much like your own personal Mercurian Gate.) Just imagine:

Due to a zany mishap with the paperwork, the Austrin and Doviello have to share a cramped apartment together! They can survive the trials and tribulations of Erebus... but can they survive each other?

6) Shaima of the Grigori (Valorous, Emergent, Defender)
Spoiler :
Shaima.jpg

Unique Trait: Valorous.This one's pretty much a rubber-band mechanism. Whenever a city is captured by another civ, all of your units gain experience equal to the proportion of population you lost in its capturing. For example, if half of your population is captured, your units all gain 15 experience; if a third of your civ is captured, they gain 10. (Note: these are approximate figures, and you gain considerably less XP per unit if your civ is low in total population.) Yes, Shaima is all about going beyond the impossible and kicking reason to the curb, making epic comebacks where other leaders would be down for the count.

INSTRUCTIONS: Go to the other thread for the download.

Questions? Comments? Balance concerns? Ask away!
 
Term "Ardor" is already used in the game (for, I believe, Grigori worldspell). To avoid errors, which ALWAYS occur, I'd rename the new trait.
 
Term "Ardor" is already used in the game (for, I believe, Grigori worldspell). To avoid errors, which ALWAYS occur, I'd rename the new trait.

Hmm, fair enough... I forgot about the worldspell. Although there shouldn't be errors occurring, because only the displayed name is the same as the Grigori's ardor-- the trait is actually referred to as TRAIT_ARDOR everywhere it matters, which isn't at all the same tag. Or did you mean human error?

Very interesting.... Some of what you did will be easier with the next version.

:lol: Innnnteresting. I look forward to seeing this change. ;)

EDIT: Do you mean you're getting errors when you try to run it, or do you mean you hypothesize there would be errors occurring?

ALSO: Anybody have ideas for a better name than "Ardor?" Trick is, it has to apply to both good and evil leaders.
 
Hmm, fair enough... I forgot about the worldspell. Although there shouldn't be errors occurring, because only the displayed name is the same as the Grigori's ardor-- the trait is actually referred to as TRAIT_ARDOR everywhere it matters, which isn't at all the same tag. Or did you mean human error?



:lol: Innnnteresting. I look forward to seeing this change. ;)

Human errors too) But mostly I'm pissed of by wrong Civilopedia entries (which is, possibly, not this case), when link to Illusionist unit leads to Illusionist trait, and so on.
 
Human errors too) But mostly I'm pissed of by wrong Civilopedia entries (which is, possibly, not this case), when link to Illusionist unit leads to Illusionist trait, and so on.

:lol: You know, that always bugs the hell out of me too... it's a good point, I'll change that. Any ideas for a new trait name? Note that it has to apply to both good and evil leaders.
 
Fervour, maybe? (first I thought of Zealot, but there're already 2 Zealot promotions and 1 Zealotry promotion ;)
 
Fervour, maybe? (first I thought of Zealot, but there're already 2 Zealot promotions and 1 Zealotry promotion ;)

Hmm... interesting, but carries too much religious connotation for me to be comfortable with it as a trait name in this case. On reflection, I'll likely change it to "Ardent." :lol: It'll be in the next version, wherein I'll also put in actual unique button art for its associated promotions.
 
Resurgent?

Btw, nice ideas. :goodjob:

Thanks! :D I like the idea of a Resurgent leader... possibly for a different trait, though. I plan to continue adding leader/trait combos to this mod in the future (probably not this week, though, due to thesis.)

On a completely unrelated note, I added screenshots for all the leaders I happened to take screenshots of.
 
Added 3 new leaders to the list-- they're now in the original post. It's Sheiam, Lanun, and Hippus this time around. Also did some other stuff, listed in the changelog. Enjoy!
 
question about Ardent, why the good aligned position of Neutral civs, you have them getting the bonus from attacking evil civs and I'm curious as to your reasoning for that.
 
question about Ardent, why the good aligned position of Neutral civs, you have them getting the bonus from attacking evil civs and I'm curious as to your reasoning for that.

In all honesty, it's just because I didn't want the trait to do nothing if Sera goes Octopus Overlords, or Valstran goes RoK-- I am, generally speaking, against locking leaders out of certain religions arbitrarily. The only other option I considered was having the trait give a bonus against other neutrals, but I couldn't really think of a flavor-wise reason for that bonus, so I left it as vs. Evil, who everyone loves to hate.
 
I like these traits. Potential merge material, Valk?
 
I like these traits. Potential merge material, Valk?

Not for now, as each and every leader has to be redone in RifE due to some new mechanics; We have enough to do without adding more (Though we ARE adding some for certain civs which were short of leaders). Maybe after the next version is released and these are updated. ;)
 
w00t!
 
I just installed this mod alongside RiFE (fresh install with the current flavor pack 1.2.22) and I got repeated CtDs whenever I started a game (specifically as it was setting the game up). I re-installed without the flavor pack and the game started normally. I'm not sure if I should be posting bug reports here or not, but just letting you know. I'm going to try this mod out without the flavor pack. *grins hungrily*
 
One issue we've found that caused crashes for some testers, but not all of them, was that several entries in the Jotnar civilization entry used <UnitClassType>UNIT_ rather than <UnitClassType>UNITCLASS_. The crash would only occur when adding new material; May want to fix that in the file distributed with the modmod. ;)
 
One issue we've found that caused crashes for some testers, but not all of them, was that several entries in the Jotnar civilization entry used <UnitClassType>UNIT_ rather than <UnitClassType>UNITCLASS_. The crash would only occur when adding new material; May want to fix that in the file distributed with the modmod. ;)

Wait, the Jotnar civilization entry? 0_o I didn't do anything with the Jotnar in this modmod... I'm afraid I'm not following you. What is it I need to change?

I just installed this mod alongside RiFE (fresh install with the current flavor pack 1.2.22) and I got repeated CtDs whenever I started a game (specifically as it was setting the game up). I re-installed without the flavor pack and the game started normally. I'm not sure if I should be posting bug reports here or not, but just letting you know. I'm going to try this mod out without the flavor pack. *grins hungrily*

Oh snap! I didn't realize that there was a flavor pack out... I haven't been to the download section in a while. :mischief: I'll release another version shortly with the flavorpack installed. Thanks for telling me!
 
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