Orbis - the original thread

[arkham4269]

By holk I mean (from wiki)

Funny, I looked up Holk on Wiki and didn't come up with anything. Weird.

So, I might just add carrack as Lanun caravel replacement and allow it to transport normal troops (as caravels can't). But I do not want them to sink. I do not want to add sinking to galleons, too. I doubt it would be fun.

Well there we are getting into the realm of 'fun vs. historical game play' - Many want the fun and are willing to sacrifice a lot of historical game play. For others (like me) the fun *is* the historical game play. Surely losing ships sent to sea sucks but that's just the price you pay. However, the reward is also great, especially if you are playing a map that has a New World.

Personally I don't think it would have that much affect even if you had a 1/4 chance of sinking in seas for the early ships since most of the map either has islands one or two tiles beyond the coast or you have big ocean. So I doubt you'd really have buckets of ships sinking. Now having the same 1/4 chance every turn trying to cross most map oceans is getting a lot riskier.

As for the galleons sinking, it would be a very small chance. Plus, I'm thinking of these galleons being more of the earlier big galleons with oars (Battle of Lepanto types) rather than the later galleons of the 15th & 16th centuries. I was thinking it would make the later era ships that much more special.

However, I prefer to add early ships replacement that can enter ocean squares but you will do it at your own risk. So, holk was my first thought. It is just one step away from caravels and was used a lot by Dutch merchants (I picture Lanun more after Netherlands than Portugal)

That makes sense, especially since the Dutch were often a bit more piratical due to them being enemies of Spain.

Regarding galleas, it is the reason that trireme is so strong and upgrade directly to frigate. I try keep things simple and not and too many units (well, Uniques are fine, but not too many classes). Ships have to be distinct, so I will not add any other class.

Well here is another thing of style of play. Personally I'd rather have more units (that all can upgrade as they go) because the game looks better. To me, I like having different unit types as the game progresses since it's always jarring to go from something like a trireme (ancient) to a Frigate (late Renaissance) - I'm mean it's like in ; going from Frigates to Battleships.

Plus, I'm all for expanding the tech tree. I'm a big fan of the Rise of Mankind mod because more techs means that Civs tend to specialize more. If you need more techs to get certain units, only certain Civs will tend to have them. I mean the Clan of Embers generally shouldn't go nuts with tech research and so will be stuck with very basic units...but have a lot of them and that fits their 'personality' better.

Anyway, it's your mod but I think it's a shame that most mods will have a large progression of land units (warrior - axeman - champion - berserker - phalanx) yet only have about 3 ship types.

However, in my biased opinion, it is all a moot point. Unless the sea monster problem gets fixed, you dare not go out into the ocean until you get Frigates (and then a few of them) because you're going to get eaten right quick.

Letter of marque is already in, requires combat 1, can be taken by any ship and provides ability to hide nationality and generate gold from victories (just like bounty hunter, but 10 instead of 2).

What promotion icon is that? Is it the same as the bounty hunter icon?

Also, on the question of naval tech/naval Civs. I like your idea of a Viking Doviello (as I showed in my post on that) but it does bring up a small problem with FfH in that the Luann are really the only maritime Civ. So in some respects they don't have a rival. It's like the Pirates faction in Sid Meier's Alpha Centuari, they had better ships than everyone else so it was tough to beat them. At least in you have multiple maritime Civs so they can balance out.

I'm thinking in many ways the Mechanos would be a good maritime race, but then they have their blimps. Viking Doviello don't really count since they would be more coastal and using their ships more like horses for speedy transport than fighting with their ships. The only other Civ I could think of that might be nice for a naval make over would be the Sidar. One, because like the Doviello I think they are a boring race. Secondly, the whole semi-ghost part of their lore just seems to go with the sea in the concept of mist, ghost ships and the idea in many theologies of going over water to another place to the afterlife.

 

[Isotope]

Hello.
Personally, I don't like the increase in food cost per population. I wonder if you could explain me how to undo this change. I suppose it's somwhere in python files but Im not versed in python.
Thanks.

 

[civ_king]

I'm W updated, It doesn't break saves, is it fine with Orbis 21d? BTW it installs as Orbis 014

 

[Ahwaric]

Hello.
Personally, I don't like the increase in food cost per population. I wonder if you could explain me how to undo this change. I suppose it's somwhere in python files but Im not versed in python.

Actually, it is all XML. You need to edit 4 files:

• GlobalDefinesAlt.xml - change FOOD_CONSUMPTION_PER_POPULATION from 3 to 2 (or just remove this field)
• CIV4ImprovementInfos.xml - change farm yeldchange to 0 0 0 (leave irrigated yeld change as it is - it is the normal farm production)
• CIV4CivicInfos.xml - set iFoodConsumptionPerPopulation for CIVIC_SACRIFICE_THE_WEAK to 1 (from 2)
• CIV4YieldInfos.xml - set iMinCity for YIELD_FOOD to 2

All except the last one are part of Orbis editor. If you know how to use it, go get it at the first post of this thread and your life will be even easier

This said, I would like to know why exactly you do not like this change. Or, for that matter, is there anyone that likes it? I do not have much time to play (modding Orbis is almost full-time job ), so I am really interested in any feedback I can get.

Also, I plan to nerf financial trait to only give extra gold on tiles that already produce 3 (instead of 2) and would be interested in your opinions

I'm W updated, It doesn't break saves, is it fine with Orbis 21d? BTW it installs as Orbis 014

That is why I stress that you make sure that you install it in Orbis folder, without numbers Unfortunatelly, it saves last directory used somewhere (and I do not know how to fix it...)
It should work on w, but there are always some possibilites for incompatibility.
I plan to post an update today, so please wait.

Funny, I looked up Holk on Wiki and didn't come up with anything. Weird.

That is because there is just this one sentence in the article on the hulk as an old ship.

By the way, you had convinced me on adding just one last ship class. Please welcome galleas
So, the ships will go as follows:
transports:
galley -> cog -> galleon -> clipper
heavy combat ships:
trireme -> galleas -> man-o-war
exploration/light combat ships:
caravel -> frigate

Should galleon be buildable when clippers come? It only has more cargo space, but is slower and weaker.
Clippers can be treated as weaker but faster frigates, too.
I am tempted to rename man-o-war to ship of the line (would fit the actual ship design better).

 

[arkham4269]

Letter of marque is already in, requires combat 1, can be taken by any ship and provides ability to hide nationality and generate gold from victories (just like bounty hounter, but 10 instead of 2).

I realized last night while I was winning a game as the Scions what you were talking about. The problem I had was the icon you used for the Letter of Marque is a pirate flag so I never moused over it to actually read it. I like the promotion but I think you should change the icon. I mean you are a LEGAL pirate.

Any chance that the Scions and Mechanos will get their own entries in the Victory Scroll section that shows all the different wins you've unlocked?

 

[arkham4269]

Should galleon be buildable when clippers come? It only has more cargo space, but is slower and weaker.

Clippers can be treated as weaker but faster frigates, too.
I am tempted to rename man-o-war to ship of the line (would fit the actual ship design better).

I think so because it all depends on the map you are playing on. I've noticed that the Scions on flavored start often end up on an island by themselves and thus often need a LOT of cargo space to launch an invasion.

As for the MoW, I would go with SotL only because in researching my earlier posts, it said that the MoW was the end product of the SotL type of vessels. Perhaps the Luann have a UU of a MoW that is a slight tougher version of the SothL. Or if you take my advice and have another race (like the Sidar) be more maritime the MoW could be their naval UU. I think with the Luann 'pirate' motiff, the mobile carrack fits better. A MoW could be like a Sidar 'Ghost Dreadnaught' type ship.

 

[Isotope]

Thanks for the info. I wanted to know how it's done before installing the new patch.

This said, I would like to know why exactly you do not like this change. Or, for that matter, is there anyone that likes it? I do not have much time to play (modding Orbis is almost full-time job ), so I am really interested in any feedback I can get.

I haven't really tested this change, but i remember changing population food consumption from 1,5 to 3 given by sacrifice the weak in exchange for several boosts. While under this civic, my cities never grown past 7-8 population.
Things that I have deduced:
Firstly, Kuriotates are crippled, you can no longer have both towns/enclaves and high population and you still have limited cities.
Since you'll have less population per city (therefore, less production and wealth), you need more cities, with it's maintenance and time building settlers. Also, you must divide your military and the cities are vulnerable to horsemen (experience from kuriotates oversettling)

I think that, instead of increased food consumtion, it would be nice to have a trait that limits to 1 square radius the exploitable terrain or limits population per city to 6, halving the city maintenance (or just giving you +2 or 3 gold/city, easily done by xml) in exchange and increasing settler production.
Even better, a flavoured civ with this trait. Either way, as a doviello (northern barbarians living in small tribal towns, like barbarian civilizations' cities in Rome: Total War) or bannor (medieval flavoured civ) trait.

 

[arkham4269]

This said, I would like to know why exactly you do not like this change. Or, for that matter, is there anyone that likes it? I do not have much time to play (modding Orbis is almost full-time job ), so I am really interested in any feedback I can get.

Well since I've been playing the Scions, I haven't noticed much in the way of food changes.

However, going back to an earlier question of yours, I don't think that cities should grow past 12-14 without having certain buildings help it along. In many mods, it isn't just the resources that allow you to grow but do you have the milling, the canning, the salting, etc. resources/buildings to keep that high of a population. Sure this is a magical mod, but unless they have magical reefer trucks/trains bringing in food and storing it, high population cities are rare and usually only happened on coast right next to some choice land.

Considering our discussion on River Ports, since food tends to spoil quickly, only those cities on rivers or coasts could bring in enough food from elsewhere to really pump up their population. So to me, having some limitations are more realistic.

As for the Kuriotates, I agree that this probably really puts them in a bad way. My view on them is that they have a similar problem the Scions do in regard to Basium; even if you want to build the Mercurian Gate, you generally can't afford to lose a city to do it. Plus, last time I played them, after I 'lost' a town to Minister Khoun, I didn't seem to be able to kick-start a settlement into a city. Maybe that was a bug and has been fixed but it really just destroyed my game since I was only allowed 3 cities due to map and now I only had 2.

I don't know, since I have to play on really small maps, I'm stuck with only having 2-3 Kuriotate cities. I wish there was a mechanic that would allow settlements to mature into cities after 100 turns or so or maybe every 100 turns the Kuriotates could build a Great Person that could change a settlement into a city.

Plus, while I'm sure it's the way it is for a reason, I don't understand why the undead Scions can take over a city and in Orbis most of the population stays (not complaining!) but if the Kuriotates take over a city (no matter what the population) it reverts to a settlement? I mean did the Dragon Kid have all the excess population put to death?

I think that cities conquered should be allowed to remain cities but maybe have some sort of 'Garrison' building that would be created that would limited the size of the city as well as it's growth so not to unbalance the game. I mean I know the Kuriotates are special, but why are they the only race that can't take over people's cities and keep them? That's almost as bad as when the Clan of Embers had to raze cities they took. At least they got workers out of doing that. The Kurioatates don't even get that.

Note! I haven't played them in a while so with all the patches and playing FfH to FF to Orbis it's hard to know which mod does what these days.

 

[Swodhawk]

Waiting with eagerness the pacth E.

The pop changes look promising, although I did not have time to play since 0.21a.

 

[Ahwaric]

I haven't really tested this change, but i remember changing population food consumption from 1,5 to 3 given by sacrifice the weak in exchange for several boosts. While under this civic, my cities never grown past 7-8 population.
Things that I have deduced:
Firstly, Kuriotates are crippled, you can no longer have both towns/enclaves and high population.

Khem, I thought you tested it... Also, what do you mean by sacrifice the weak limiting population? As much as I remeber, it was always causing reduction in food used, so the cities could actually grow larger. Another thing is hell terrain, it is not that good for food growing. Plus 1,5 food consumption is only possible in fall further.
Personally, I do not think this change hits Kuriotates much more than other civs. They need more food, but first, they get more plots that can be worked. And second, just a few farms will allow more population.
The problem I see is sea... It is already preety bad terrain unless you are lanun), so I think I should increase food output of coast... Planting kelp? Sea farms? Or just plain increase of food to 2 from 1.

@arkham4269
I agree on your point about Kuriotates. I think they should get some big cities as they have now plus settlements should be normal cities (with reduced maintenance perhaps), but with workable area limited to 1 plot around the city. Now, if only I could code that...

 

[civ_king]

I salute you and your hard work

 

[arkham4269]

I agree on your point about Kuriotates. I think they should get some big cities as they have now plus settlements should be normal cities (with reduced maintenance perhaps), but with workable area limited to 1 plot around the city. Now, if only I could code that...

You know, this discussion reminds me of something out of a thread that came out of the Fury Road (the Mad Max mod). I had proposed that you could build a cheaper settler that would only create settlements a la the Kurioates. This way you could stake out land without taking a long time to crank out settlers (which in that mod were a lot more expensive in and time). These settlements could be upgraded later by sending in a 'real' settler to upgrade it to a town.

However, in Orbis, you can use forts to do the same thing. Sure you have to get to construction, but the point is that EVERY race can now build 'settlements' through the use of forts. This is GREAT, especially for the Scions who may want fewer cities so they can concentrate their Awakened and Reborn. As long as you also work to keep your culture up, your forts allow you to snag nice resources and even start building improvements as the fort's cultural radius expands.

So in Orbis, the Kuriotates have sort of lost what made them special in that their settlements could stake out territory. So what is the solution? I'm not sure but I think you mentioned it in your reply. Instead of building settlements that can't build anything, perhaps the settlements could be cities w/only a 1 hex production radius. I think you said you didn't know how to code it. If so, check with the owner of the Jotnar mod as all the Jotnar cities only have a 1 hex production radius as well as being limited to a population of 8.

Now since these settlements would be cities (only neuter ones in a way) you'd still run into problems with too many cities costing too much so maybe the Kuriotates would automatically get a building that cuts this down or have access to that building but make them have to build it (A super courthouse if you will). Now the Kuriotates can build lots of settlements, still get the benefit of having their culture go out (although the production only stays to 1 hex) as well as being able to produce more stuff instead of relying on a few cities.

Obviously this probably would need lots of tweaking. Perhaps 'outposts' start out like regular settlements and then in 50 turns or so upgrade to a 'settlement' which would be a city with the 1 hex production radius.

Which brings up another point. In the above, it seems since now that forts can expand cultural boundaries and can have hexes be worked in that radius, they seem to be what I'd consider 'garrison towns' so perhaps if you created a city using a settler on the site of one of the fort, I think you should get a +1 bonus to your starting population to reflect this. Maybe this bonus (not sure how hard to code this) would only happen if the fort has cultural radius of more than just the tile it's in. Plus, by building on a site of a fort, you get a 'free' defender!

 

[TimSLS]

I like the change in food - With the availability of markets and and putting out plenty of farms, it is very possible to grow huge cities. Especially if you adopt agrianism or serfdom.

I'm not sure I would think the financial trait needs a nerf in base FfH - I've always thought it great for seafaring civs like Lanun, and good for the others, but not overpowering. Still, with the various techs increasing commerce yield from farms, and the way feudal contract interacts now with farms (without a loss of food), I can see why your proposed change makes sense. On the whole, I would think it depends on whether the leaders currently having financial are handling things, and I haven't played enough to make a judgment on that.

 

[Ahwaric]

I have seen many people talking that financial is the best trait. Hannah and Flauros are doing great compared to Falamar and Alexis I think
Some people even forbid choosing Hannah the Irin in multiplayer - she does just too good. And that is before extra commerce I put on taxation.
That is why I decided to put it more in line with other traits. If the nerf is too strong, I will remove it.
With the change I propose, you will still get extra commerce from towns, pirate coves and bonuses generating commerce, just not from every single water square/riverbank farm with taxation.

I have some bad news, too. Kael did not post source code for patch w yet, so I have to wait with my patch - probably till saturday as I will not have access to a machine where I can compile the code tomorrow...
I tried the game and it works, but pedia gives python errors so I would prefer not to release now.

 

[arkham4269]

I have some bad news, too. Kael did not post source code for patch w yet, so I have to wait with my patch .

How DARE Kael pretend to have a life outside of modding!

 

[KingArthur666]

Would it be possible to make it so the fort commanders cannot get the mobility promotion? They can't move anyway, and I hate it when I accidentally waste a promotion on it.

 

[Ahwaric]

Patch E is ready.

On top of financial triat, I have also changed industrious. Wonder what do you think.

 

[arkham4269]

Great now I have something to test while I'm recovering from an upcoming operation to test my insides that I dare not name!

 

[arkham4269]

Whoa! I'm at Turn 17 and already I'm having problems.

1. I'm noticing that many of the animations don't 'move' normally; they just glide at you with their arms open. I noticed this today while playing one of the FfH scenarios but it was only Donald Lugh.

2. Sometimes I can't get to the unit task icon bar. Sometimes it comes back the next turn.

3. I'm not being able to do the Right Mouse "check the combat ratio" with my units!

Help Me Obi-Won Ahwaric; you're our only only hope!

(I'm running a HP full keyboard laptop running Win-XP. I have all current patches for FfH, FF and the new patch E for Orbis. I'm running on low graphics but don't have the single graphics toggled on.)

UPDATE: I went to graphics and hit the 'restore defaults' and exited out of the program. (Oh and after I had loaded patch e, I had rebooted) I then did a "Play Now!" to clear out any odd things. However when my random race came up as Mechanos, I noticed that again the Warrior did the whole glide around with it's arms out. So I exited out of that and went back to my previous Scion game. There my warrior was still doing the 'arm/glide' but my scouts weren't. However the Sheiam scouts were. The only other units I have seen were Frostlings and barbarian Lizardmen who all seem to be moving normally. (Oh and I could do the combat check w/my scouts)

 

[KingArthur666]

Did you reinstall Orbis like Ahwaric said?