Orbis - the original thread

[Wauthan]

Hate to say it, but looking back at the discussion I sort of feel that we've taken something that was supposed to be a minor feature and blown it up considerably. Balancing the knightly orders will be very hard, but considering that the Wild Haven already gives a serious boost to Cavalry that might be a moot point.

My thoughts on your thoughts:

Justicar - Fair enough. +1 Holy will be a good bonus in early game, and +25 versus demons is nice in the late. Though only one civilization have access to demon units. The anti religion capture is nice fluff, but won't make much impact on the outcome of the game.

Templar - Dismounted get +30% city defense? Bit of micromanagement but sounds good. +25% versus vampires is nice fluff.

Steelsworn - Please elaborate. Defensive bonuses? Dwarven weapons?

Emerald Knight - Simply granting Woodsman 1 promotion might be better (though a bit boring). No totems! That's what Wild Haven is for. Perhaps a +25% bonus against undead?

Raubritter - Not very fluffy. CoE seems not much into plunder. 25 gold version of Flare/Charm seems a bit weak. These guys will be a quick way to spread the religion into new cities. Perhaps pay 100 gold to eliminate all other religions in the city? Or cause unrest? Spy mission?

Abysswalker - Weird name, especially since it's on a mount. Waterwalking on a cavalry unit is pretty awesome. Revolt protection is less powerful, but very handy when on the offensive (no downtime for captured cities).

Black Knight - Sounds perfect. Good balance against Justicars. Extra plus for not eliminating enemy religions to symbolize resistance movement.

Dragon Knight - Fear? How about +1 Fire and Fire Immunity instead? Retreating into a burning forest to heal up sounds like a good advantage. The Clan might be upset that the dragons are moving into their ex-goddess territory though. Pillage bonus sounds appropriate too.

Agnostics - Well they would essentially be elite military units, of civilizations with very little in common. Cavalry has traditionally been used as either skirmishers, and scouts, (light cavalry) or used to counter heavy infantry (heavy cavalry). Perhaps some mechanic that lets the unit switch between these functions? +Sight +Retreat chance versus -movement +Bonus versus melee?


Of course it's all up to Ahwaric since he's the one doing all the work.

 

[arkham4269]

Currently I want this abilities to be permanent and they will set unit's religion to appropriate one. Good knights will have a chance to abandon and will have reduced abilities when at evil religions, justicars will be able to fall and become black knights.

This is a bit confusing but if I'm reading it right, your saying that if you change religions, you want something in place so that they knights just don't disappear but have a chance to change to the new religion.

I would think that due to their fanatical nature, these units shouldn't just go away. If you change religion, they should either have a (small) chance to change to the new state religion (whether by falling to the dark side or 'seeing the light') but for the most part, I would think they'd go barbarian. That is, unless there was a way for them to be instantly transported to the nearest (if any) Civ of that religion.

In a way, it's too bad there isn't some mechanic in Civ (maybe there is and I don't know about it) that would track religion in the same way as nationality. I mean just because you have two religions in a city doesn't mean you have 50% Rok & 50% Order for example. Plus having more than one Holy City would sort of set up that cities closest to that Holy City would probably have a higher % of that religion, even if it isn't the state religion.

I bring this up because I think changing religion should have lasting consequences and having a % of which religions are in a city might help. I mean one of the historical basis for the "Vichy France" was that it was old Huguenot territory and was suppressed by the Catholic minority. Bavaria is still severely Catholic even after hundreds of years of the Germanies being 'officially' Protestant. In that example, you'd expect jubilation in Bavaria if the "Germany Civ" switched to Catholicism, but most of northern Germany would be awash in dissent. In Civ, you only get a few turns of disorder when we know historically that this sort of religious dissent just doesn't go away.

Again, I don't know how you'd code it and track it, but I would think that like I said for the Knightly Orders, that each religion should have a 'mission statement' that sort of guides followers of that religion. I mean if you are order, you'd better be wiping out AV Civ's, building basilicas and Fighting For the Right(tm). If you aren't, you should start getting pressure from the priesthood that you are not a good ruler and start getting more unrest. Again, maybe this is a topic for when much of the Fall Into Revolution mod gets integrated into base FF and is available.

 

[arkham4269]

Hate to say it, but looking back at the discussion I sort of feel that we've taken something that was supposed to be a minor feature and blown it up considerably. Balancing the knightly orders will be very hard, but considering that the Wild Haven already gives a serious boost to Cavalry that might be a moot point.

Perhaps not. Think of it this way, toward the end of most Civ games (FfH or not) the game tends to stagnate into a slugfest of remaining Civs. In FfH you also have Civ's that are basically just trying to hang on till they can build the Altar or get their culture high enough for a win. Neither of which has to be rather active.

Now if you have Knightly Orders, it puts the players into a position where are sort of 'forced' to take some actions and may have to be creative about it. Again, in regards to knightly orders and religion in general, you have to pay to play, so to speak. I don't think you can found the Order and then spend the rest of the game at peace with Civ's with AV. Your own priesthood would riot after a time. Again, as I said in my last post, perhaps a mechanic to discuss after the Fall Into Revolution mod is integrated into base FF.

My thoughts on your thoughts:

Justicar - Fair enough. +1 Holy will be a good bonus in early game, and +25 versus demons is nice in the late. Though only one civilization have access to demon units. The anti religion capture is nice fluff, but won't make much impact on the outcome of the game.

Well since you wouldn't get these guys till after you research Monasteries, there would be no 'early game' - As for the anti-religion, as I mentioned in my previous post, I think there needs to be much more of a penalty for inquisition; you generally don't get people to convert to the state religion by asking nicely. So going in and doing "the Spanish Inquisition" riff would have the affect of reducing cities. Personally I think that when 'normal' inquisitors do that mission, there should be a chance of a population reduction as well as a chance for a temporary or increase due to the outrage against the methods of the inquisition or the happiness that 'heretics' have been purged.

Templar - Dismounted get +30% city defense? Bit of micromanagement but sounds good. +25% versus vampires is nice fluff.

Well I think that they should have a bonus against all undead to include the Scions. While not the Emerald Knights, the idea around Empyrium is Light/Sun and sort of the 'Great Chain of Being' in that serfs feed the knights who protect the serfs who serve the nobles who justly rule the land under the King who is The Light of the World so to speak. Undead and the Scions are a perversion of that natural order, a antithesis of Life/Day with (un)Life/Night. So I would think that they would not be happy with any sort of undead and the quasi-life of the Scions.

Steelsworn - Please elaborate. Defensive bonuses? Dwarven weapons?

To me this sort of reminds me of "The Riddle of Steel" from the Conan film in that the Steelsworn are hardy warriors but know that weapons don't make the Knight. So they are a hardy band, almost like the old Buddhist warrior cults where they train themselves to perfection to be as one with their weapons. You could say they swear to be like their weapons, a sharp, perfect weapon to defend the Weak and be implacable in defense. These are the guys that would do "A Spartan" and all die gloriously to allow civilians to escape a on-coming horde.

So in a sense, even though they are sort of 'dwarven' related, I really see them as in light of your typical 'classic' Japanese samurai a la "Lone Wolf & Cub" where the members of the Order have trained themselves to perfection but are sort of like a Zen rock garden; they don't run around whacking folks just for the heck of it but are there when needed. Then they put on the armor, pick up their sword and go get righteous. Again, it would be neat if they could build roads and the like to reflect that when they aren't fighting, they are 'working for their community' in a way.

Emerald Knight - Simply granting Woodsman 1 promotion might be better (though a bit boring). No totems! That's what Wild Haven is for. Perhaps a +25% bonus against undead?

My complaint about these folks is in a sense all they are would be mounted rangers/beastmasters. So I think we need to think outside the box when it comes to the FoL. If you read the FFH 2m manual's entry about the FoL, there is a lot there to play around with. It says the FoL is all about natural change, works to promote life as well as crusading against wide-scale corruption of nature. So in one sense, they would work to combat the spread of Hell terrain and Haunted Lands as well as fighting (again) the spread of undead. The reference to Bhall is also interesting; one could argue that the Emerald Knights are the Forest Fire that cleanse the land for renewal.

Abysswalker - Weird name, especially since it's on a mount. Waterwalking on a cavalry unit is pretty awesome. Revolt protection is less powerful, but very handy when on the offensive (no downtime for captured cities).

Well another aspect you could take would give these "Waveridders" a temporary power up when they start an attack on a water or river tile to represent a "Tidal Charge" - imagine the charge of the Rohirrim with the wave that Eowyn conjured behind them!

The other aspect to think about would be to have them have a similar power to the Scions "weird wrack" to simulate the power over insanity. Or you could have them have a chance to cause fear due to their terrible appearance. (I sort of see these guys either looking a lot like Davy Jone's crew (encrusted with sea creatures) or being vaguely mutated in that Lovecraftian way)

Agnostics - Well they would essentially be elite military units, of civilizations with very little in common. Cavalry has traditionally been used as either skirmishers, and scouts, (light cavalry) or used to counter heavy infantry (heavy cavalry). Perhaps some mechanic that lets the unit switch between these functions? +Sight +Retreat chance versus -movement +Bonus versus melee?

You could give them the option of having the a mechanic similar to units built by that new military academy where they can switch from open order to close order. Also, one might consider giving them the marksmen promotion to show that they are so elite, they always know where to attack.

 

[Wauthan]

Good points as always Arkham4269. On a side note perhaps it's time to start a new thread for the mod Ahwaric. This one is getting a bit unwieldy don't you think?

 

[xienwolf]

Why stop so short of 1,000 replies?

 

[Seon]

Thinking about it, Abysswalker is a better name for assassins... Time for ninjaing

 

[Ahwaric]

Hate to say it, but looking back at the discussion I sort of feel that we've taken something that was supposed to be a minor feature and blown it up considerably. Balancing the knightly orders will be very hard, but considering that the Wild Haven already gives a serious boost to Cavalry that might be a moot point.

My thoughts on your thoughts:
Templar - Dismounted get +30% city defense? Bit of micromanagement but sounds good. +25% versus vampires is nice fluff.

Steelsworn - Please elaborate. Defensive bonuses? Dwarven weapons?

It is still a minor feature, not much more than animal totems/dens. The promotions will not be very powerfull, should just add a bit of spice. I need something for mounted line and wanted knightly orders at some time. So, voila. I also decided to let you do some work as I have been busy with getting xienwolf's code for promotions - and you did good, I now have names and ideas for what every knight should be good at.

To explain: Templar will get extra defense even mounted (I need to check it but think it should work) but when dismounted it will change unitcombat to melee and will be able to get the normal defensive bonuses mounted units can not - so will be able to fortify, too. Same applies to steelsworn, but they will get these bonuses while mounted. I think if I should add an ability to upgrade their weapons. Thought about allowing buing mithrill ones, but it might be a better idea to just add a promotion named i.e. dwarven weapons that add a little extra.

Also, I think if I should limit wild haven totem granting to recon units only, except Doviello? Currently basic animals are avaliable to everyone, plus spiders and extra xp to recon.

This is a bit confusing but if I'm reading it right, your saying that if you change religions, you want something in place so that they knights just don't disappear but have a chance to change to the new religion.

I agree that these knights should react to the state religion change somehow, but not too much - I am not sure it would be fun, plus priest's do not abandon even if changing from Order to AV.
My plan is, the order once gained is there for good. If you change form empyrean to order, you can't get new templars but existing ones are quite ok. But if you change to CoE, OO or AV, they will have a chance every turn to be AI-controled plus a small chance to go wild. It will be Order, Empyrean and RoK vs CoE, OO and AV. FoL will be neutral except AV and perhaps Order. Order knights will be able to fall, I think if I should add atonement for Black Knights as well...

Good points as always Arkham4269. On a side note perhaps it's time to start a new thread for the mod Ahwaric. This one is getting a bit unwieldy don't you think?

Why stop so short of 1,000 replies?

You bet I will wait till 1k
But I agree, it is really looong. And the space I have for changelog and all is preety limited. I do not know how are rules regarding it, but maybe I should petition for a small insignificant sub-sub-sub forum to separate bugs from new feature discussion (i.e. knights take quite a lot of space...)

Thinking about it, Abysswalker is a better name for assassins... Time for ninjaing

You read my mind - I have almost started working on ratcatchers guild, but cut and paste activity on Xienwolf's code really took a lot of my time.
They will be more on intelligence and espionage, but still, it is part o ninja work, isn't it?

 

[xienwolf]

IIRC Fall Further had gotten a subforum made when the thread for it hit 1,000 (somewhere around then). And you've mentioned in a few places that you are a team of 1 so far, so I imagine you are getting close to the point of recruiting some members? Having a team forum will be quite useful if you get to the point of working with more than 1 other person.

 

[Seon]

IIRC Fall Further had gotten a subforum made when the thread for it hit 1,000 (somewhere around then). And you've mentioned in a few places that you are a team of 1 so far, so I imagine you are getting close to the point of recruiting some members? Having a team forum will be quite useful if you get to the point of working with more than 1 other person.

Hmm... New thread for Orbi... *_*(glint). Team forum seems like that it would make life much easier for Ahwaric. Not that I can help him, I can only write "hello you" on the c++. It would also attract many potential new moders that will help with the stretegy with this mod. I hope that if this happens, one of them will finally gift FfH the Asianic civ with bunch of ninjas the mod so deserves (oh wait, is that the sidar?

Wait!!!!!! Isn't Order Knights supposed to be Oathtakers? As in Rosier the Oathtaker?

 

[Valkrionn]

I have to say, I love the art you found for the yurt improvements.... Mind if I 'borrow' them?

 

[razzach]

I can't download the main modmod 0.21... Only patch g. Is patch g all that is required for this mod?

Can I use this mod with Fall Further? How?

Thanks...

 

[Ahwaric]

IIRC Fall Further had gotten a subforum made when the thread for it hit 1,000 (somewhere around then). And you've mentioned in a few places that you are a team of 1 so far, so I imagine you are getting close to the point of recruiting some members? Having a team forum will be quite useful if you get to the point of working with more than 1 other person.

For now I mostly want to have a few threads to spearate different things, plus allow people a place to discuss a new feature ideas...
Regarding team members, it would be hard to share my child , but seriously, it would save me some work and I really can use someone to check my C++ code
But it is just a theory, every modder seems to move to FF sooner or later... And I want to keep Orbis as a semi modmodmod - get what I need but keep FfH as an install base.

Hmm... New thread for Orbi... *_*(glint). Team forum seems like that it would make life much easier for Ahwaric. Not that I can help him, I can only write "hello you" on the c++. It would also attract many potential new moders that will help with the stretegy with this mod. I hope that if this happens, one of them will finally gift FfH the Asianic civ with bunch of ninjas the mod so deserves (oh wait, is that the sidar?

Wait!!!!!! Isn't Order Knights supposed to be Oathtakers? As in Rosier the Oathtaker?

And you say it just after I become attached to Justicar name
But you are right, it could be an order name. Or simply a nickname... Now what to do...

Regarding ninjas, giving them to Sidar is a good idea. Or simply adjusting them a bit.
Sidar are quite boring I think and focused on shade economy (which the AI can't use BTW - is blocked to do so).
Funny you mention asianic civ - they got their art in Orbis the way: "I have a nice unused art, now where to put it... Hmm... Does not fit sidar all that good, but will do..." Now we can adjust them - the "mistical" east That would fit swampdwelling (rice growing way) as well (I want to add a trait that lets them negate swamp negatives, but first I want to play Against the Gray).

Regarding C++ I do not think I could do what you can . I just look for the right lines and then copy them (file comparision software is your friend . Compile. Does it work? Then the next one...
If it comes to actually editing something, I am best at deleting And can't sincerly say I can write anything...
All little programing I know (and bunch of graphic edit) I learned modding civ, so you get the picture. It worked for python after some time, so I have my hopes for C++ as well

I have to say, I love the art you found for the yurt improvements.... Mind if I 'borrow' them?

Sure, take anything you want. Also, I do not remeber the creator...

EDIT:
@razzach

DAMNED Filefront. When they informed my that they delete some of the files I assumed it will be old files, just like the last time... And they did it to a most recent file too, with almost hundred downloads last week... Guess I will have to check if informed. Or simply ask someone to let me upload my 50 MB here... Now who to beg for it...
Anyway, reuploading now. Will inform you when ready.
New version should be ready in a day or 2 (decided to move to 0.22).
And sorry, Orbis is just for FfH. There are many shared things with FF, but some are not in.

EDIT2:
Ok, here it is: 0.21
I have updated link in the first post as well.

 

[razzach]

Thanks Ahwaric. Just discovered Fall from Heaven last December and I was addicted. Now I'm browsing the forums and discovered Fall Further. Yay!

Anyway, can the corporations be added to Fall Further? I love the idea of the corporations and was surprised there wasn't any in FfH2 so I was excited when I read this.

Thanks again!

 

[Ahwaric]

Anyway, can the corporations be added to Fall Further? I love the idea of the corporations and was surprised there wasn't any in FfH2 so I was excited when I read this.

Thanks again!

Actually, a few guilds are already in FF since the last vrsion, but I did not really play them. I do not even have time to play my own mod - modding addiction . You should be glad there is AI autoplay that lets me do the testing
Orbis have a more expanded guild system, even compared to BtS. I have added special abilities and such, hope you like it.

 

[[to_xp]Gekko]

quick question: will the new version have FF "haste" system? i.e. you cast it and it remains active as long as there's a caster capable of casting it on the stack, instead of having to recast it each turn.

 

[Jabie]

A better way to do that might be to have a auto-buff option on any spellcasters which can be turned on/off. Where two or more casters are on rebuff duty the lowest level caster takes precedence so your Adept casts haste freeing up your Archmage to summon Fire Elementals.

The main problem is in determining which buffs should take precedence. Maybe you could sacrifice an Adept capable of casting a given spell to build a Circle of .... which automatically granted that promotion to all units within the City. (e.g. Circle of Courage casts Courage)

 

[Isotope]

Hello.
I see people giving a lot of new ideas but... what about spionage? This is the only concept which has yet to be incorporated from vanilla BtS.
Spionage would add a lot of new possible ideas (spy UU's for stealthy civs like Svartalfar, a spionage flavoured trait, improved CoE, new buildings...)

 

[Ahwaric]

@[to_xp]Gekko
Not sure. After all, it afects balance. You can cast and then use other spells while haste is still active - there is a reason it has 100% expire chance.
But it cuts a lot of micromanaging, too. So not sure...

@Isotope
Well, espionage is definetly planned the way it is in BtS (more or less). That is why I did not remove ratcatchers guild - it will be their job.
But the key word is time. I recently spend all (well, most of) my free time modding, and will have to take a little break (lot of work ahead...).
Every feature that I add also means I release the new version a bit later, which I should not do as I have some nasty bugs fixed in 0.22. And espionage is a lot of work to make it behave properly...
Also, the more I add the harder it is to get a proper graphics - these resources are scarce already...

But I agree, CoE and Svart should have bonuses. Same applies to government buildings (i.e. basilicas, gallows...)

 

[[to_xp]Gekko]

@[to_xp]Gekko
Not sure. After all, it afects balance. You can cast and then use other spells while haste is still active - there is a reason it has 100% expire chance.
But it cuts a lot of micromanaging, too. So not sure...

it does not affect balance actually. for haste to stay active, there must be a unit in the stack that's capable of casting it, and the unit must NOT have casted the turn before. so it doesn't give a free spell per turn, it just means you don't have to manually cast it every turn. in FF you also gain the "fatigued" promotion for a turn when it wears off, which gives a negative combat bonus, but I don't think that's strictly necessary.

 

[xienwolf]

Actually it does count as a free spell. If it required that the unit didn't cast anything on the turn prior then you would need to have 2 Haste casters present to start the spell (as casting Haste means that you cast this turn, so next turn everyone's haste would wear off...) I could probably work around that decently well and make it work like you mention, but the reason for fatigue was due to the ability to cast other spells with the adept while maintaining haste.