Playable Historical Civ ideas

[orlanth]

I went through the civs and stripped out the professions that were inappropriate to each, then changed the weights to reflect what they actually did most often, and found myself playing a game that was less balanced.

The problem was that the game splashes the native civs onto the map with no concern for historical fact. If I hand-placed the native villages on a map, it worked, but left to its own devices, the game will plop plains-dwelling civs in a tropical swamp and have them teaching "expert fisherman" or something stupid like that.

It's like the Inuit in RaR, they show up in the tropics and look quite out of place in their seal-skin parkas.

So I saw it as a "game limit".

The Tech system can also be considered to add starting specializations for certain civs, without remaining too inflexible for them the rest of the game. Eg make several "Techs" for indigenous knowledge such as Arctic Survival, Jungle Lore, Desert Survival, Foraging, etc that give a boost in certain terrains/features. Then "colonial" powers will seek out and trade for knowledge with native civs that know the local terrain; in addition to just finding a city that has profession x.

Anyway, as drjest mentions I suppose the core issue is that initial civ placement can end up very random in practice - without civ placement being consistently predictable based on environment, any customization runs at cross purposes.

 

[drjest2000]

Ray is correct, as usual

If you go into WorldBuilder and drop a native village on top of a bonus, there is a high likelihood that the village will teach the expert associated with that bonus. But only a high likelihood, not a certainty. You may need to destroy and place the village a number of times to get the desired result.

4 years ago, I tried doing this about 5,000 times (really) and what I saw was that there is a slight bias toward the terrain type and nearby bonuses. However, when you are using one of the map scripts that scramble the terrains in a random pattern (A_New_World), it's just as likely to teach "expert silver miner" on a coastal marsh tile as it is to teach "seasoned scout" or "master fur trader".

I tried several changes to the XML to test the effect of the XML weights, and the result I saw was that they can be VERY effective... to the point of making the game imbalanced.

It was almost confusing and frustrating as dealing with the GameFont files.... I finally gave up and returned everything to the values in Vanilla.

I have tried using the <FavoredTerrain> and it has very little if any influence on the placement of the native civs. Part of the problem is the way that the game portions out the "pre-game" map to the AI of the native civs. To test this, I set all the native civs to playable and started a number of Hot Seat games with 6 the native civs and 2 of the European civs. What I saw was the map is randomly chopped up and portioned out to the native civs, typically in a very imbalanced manner.

I altered the <iAdvancedStartPoints>, <iAreaMultiplier>, <iDensityMultiplier> and <iTreasure> values several times and this also seemed to have little if any influence on how territory was portioned out to the natives in the pre-game. The only change I saw was the amount of starting points the native civ had to spend, but even this is dubious in its impact and importance. My guess is that the DLL divides the territory in some other fashion than X / no. of players. The results I saw led me to believe it was something like the first native civ gets about 1/2 of the map, the second gets 1/2 of what's left, the third native civ gets 1/2 of what's left, and so on. I have seen in several of these tests that some civs will be "auto-defeated" because there simply is no room left on the map for them.

When I tested this against one native civ and one European player, I actually had less territory available to me to place my pre-game pieces than if I had set the game to start with more native civs. It was all very frustrating and irrational.

Before you try this yourself, I recommend beer....

 

[Kailric]

The Tech system can also be considered to add starting specializations for certain civs, without remaining too inflexible for them the rest of the game. Eg make several "Techs" for indigenous knowledge such as Arctic Survival, Jungle Lore, Desert Survival, Foraging, etc that give a boost in certain terrains/features. Then "colonial" powers will seek out and trade for knowledge with native civs that know the local terrain; in addition to just finding a city that has profession x.

Anyway, as drjest mentions I suppose the core issue is that initial civ placement can end up very random in practice - without civ placement being consistently predictable based on environment, any customization runs at cross purposes.

I checked the code and have a pretty good understanding on how the code chooses teach class. (I write this as a reference for myself as well)

1. It check to see if the Native Civ uses that class and get 100 points
2. If the profession is a works in a building it gets +100
3. If the profession doesn't consume yields (scout) +100
4. Then it calculates the number of yields this profession produces around the city factoring in bonuses and features this value then does a "iValue = 25 + 125 * iPlotValue / NUM_CITY_PLOTS * the Teacher Weight".
5. Then it checks all of the Civ's other cities and if it finds a match already it cuts the value in half
6. then it does a final random calculation that "dampens the favortism towards the most abundant yields" as stated in the code.

If we want to change up the distribution of Teach Classes we need to add our own code. I think the final check should be made cycling through all Native Civs and making a note of what all is available and then make changes as needed. If say no, Expert Scouts are found then find a City that's has a teach class that several others already have and swap it out. But we can pretty much do what we want here and add our own checks and balances.

 

[Nightinggale]

I checked the code and have a pretty good understanding on how the code chooses teach class. (I write this as a reference for myself as well)

I have been thinking about the issue with such knowledge being spread everywhere and came up with the idea to add it to the wiki page on github. Add a page there with this info as well as function name and source file and we can find it later if needed.

I plan on mapping the load order of all read() functions and plan to make a page about that once I know the order. You never know when you might need that info. Looks like it's needed to fix the current old savegame loading issue.

 

[raystuttgart]

One of the most lead discussions in Civ4Col modding is the following:

Random Maps (Mapscripts and WorlbuilderSaves with random placement) vs. Scenario Maps (WorlbuilderSaves with fixed placement)

Scenario Maps do allow a lot of interesting features that are simply not possible or at least quite complicated in Random Maps.
Also, they do allow to be much more "historically authentic".

However, Scenario Maps get boring quite soon for some player.
So if you focus on Scenario Maps, you might want to create several of them.
Also Scenario Maps might need to be adjusted several times, while the mod is growing and new features are added.

So basically there are 2 choices:

1. Focus on Random Maps (with a few Scenario Maps maybe)
2. Focus on Scenario Maps (with no guarantee that Random Maps create balanced games)

Depending on that decision, you might have very different possibilities and limitations to create (or change) features.

 

[drjest2000]

Stupid question, is there a reason you are not doing modular loading? I don't know all of them, but I know modular loading has its limits and draw-backs.

Anyway, here's what I've carved out so far with the Welsh/Brythonic/Bretons:

Gwynedd (North Welsh)
Wikipedia Link

Leader:
Llywelyn the Great - Wikipedia Link

Cities:
Caer
Degannwy
Llan-faes
Aberffraw
Rhuddlan
Abergwyngregyn
Laigin
Deganwy
Dinbych
Ruthin
Llanbeblig
Rhosyr
Caergybi
Nefyn
Neigwl
Pwllheli
Dolwyddelan
Henllan
Aber Gwyn Gregin

---

Deheubarth (South Welsh)
Wikipedia Link

Leader:
Hywel Dda - Wikipedia Link

Cities:
Caer Guricon
Pengwern
Mathrafal
Y Trallwng
Caersws
Talgarth
Llandinam
Llanidloes
Amwythig
Y Drenewydd
Rhaeadr Gwy
Cwmdauddwr
Dinas Brân
Glyndyfrdwy
Caersws
Foel
Cemmaes
Erwyd
Clun
Mawddwy
Llanrwst

---

Still working on:

Kingdom of Strathclyde (Welsh Scotland) extant 5th century-11th century
Wikipedia Link

Leader:
Áedán mac Gabráin (At the beginning of the 7th century, Áedán mac Gabráin may have been the most powerful king in northern Britain, and Dál Riata was at its height)

---

Kingdom of Mann and the Isles (Insular Welsh)
Wikipedia Link

---

Dumnonia (West Welsh, Cornwall)
Wikipedia Link

---

Domnonée (Welsh France, Britanny and Normany)
Wikipedia Link

---

The city names were taken from English history books I have laying about the house.

 

[Kailric]

Stupid question, is there a reason you are not doing modular loading? I don't know all of them, but I know modular loading has its limits and draw-backs.

Anyway, here's what I've carved out so far with the Welsh/Brythonic/Bretons:

The city names were taken from English history books I have laying about the house.

Well modular loading only really works for small mods you can drag and drop into other mods. This mod is way to expansive to do that, it's not a mod it's a whole knew game Sense you're not on Git we'll have to figure out a way to get your additions into the game. For the new Civs if you can create an update like I did then I can create a test version and see if the patching goes well. Maybe you can start a Mod Mod thread wih links to your updates that people can test out.

I'd love to check out your books you keep taking about laying around your house. Sounds like you have an extensive and very cool library!

 

[Nightinggale]

Sense you're not on Git we'll have to figure out a way to get your additions into the game.

I made a new bat file, which is available in the download thread. I think you should try it. It can use git portable to avoid the need for installing anything for this to work and communicates using HTTPS. I really see no reason why it shouldn't work for you.
Getting your changes to github is another issue as you lack write permission. We can deal with that once you have a working git cloned source (it's not a tricky problem).

For the new Civs if you can create an update like I did then I can create a test version and see if the patching goes well. Maybe you can start a Mod Mod thread wih links to your updates that people can test out.

Git can actually branch a source and later merge them again for tasks like that. It would not even use much disk space as it just saves changes compared to the revision it branched off from, which mean in this case the branch would only contain some XML.

I'd love to check out your books you keep taking about laying around your house. Sounds like you have an extensive and very cool library!

It's easy to have a cool library if you invest in air conditioning
But yeah it sounds like a really nice collection of books, which sounds rather interesting. My collection is a bit flawed when it comes to medieval times. It's about ancient Greece and Roman and then it jumps to the industrial revolution with only one book (actually one series) in between. That book is the complete collection of Icelandic sagas, which could be useful at some point.

 

[drjest2000]

I'm guessing, I've never actually counted them, but I have about 4000-4200 (?) books. They're spread into almost every room of the house and take up most of the basement (which incidentally is rather on the coolish side most of the time).

There's no real pattern in the collection, I just buy books about the past and receive them as gifts. Unlike Nightinggale, my collection pretty much ends at the start of the Industrial Revolution. Although there are some notable exceptions, like a pop-up book of Frank Lloyd Wright buildings and a photographic history of the automobile in America 1900-1920. There is even one rather distrubing book that I received as a gift eleven years ago, it's a photographic medical atlas ... a freeze-dried cadaver sliced into paper thin sheets... *shudder* ... that one's still in the shipping plastic, you can have it if you want it >_<

And Bibles... I must have 200 different versions of the Bible, some in Koine Greek, some in Latin, even one in Coptic and another in Syriac (neither of which I can read). And then there are all the "lost books of the Bible" collections... heretical, every single one of them... just like me >_<

 

[drjest2000]

I've been reading about the Hanseatic League and the Italian Republics (Genoa and Venice). Admittedly, they're all late medieval "trade empires", but these guys were "the trade routes" for most other civs. I'm not sure how well they would fit into the M:C environment, they did all the same things that Spain, Portugal, England, the Netherlands and France did 500 years later, but they were somewhat limited by both a certain mental attitude and the ship-building technology of the time from "going global" in the same way as later powers.

They fall into the timeline after the Viking Age and sort of on the crest of the Crusader Age. So at best they're late medieval phenomena and not high middle ages civs. The Genoese and the Venetians both evolve out of the stumps of the Western Roman Empire, but they both have large amounts of "barbarian" blood-stock added. So they may in fact represent late stages of the Lombards or Burgundians... I don't know for certain. It's very difficult to tell from the history sources, they rather like to stress the Roman connection and bury the barbarian connections.

It's kind of blurry for just when the cut-off date should be for civs that are appropriate to M:C.

The Normans for instance take over England in 1066, which is about 50 years after the Republic of Genoa forms and starts spreading across the Mediterranean, North Africa, and the Black Sea regions. They even went as far as setting up trading colonies in Flanders and England, so they were kind of important to the wool and spice trade. But do they belong in M:C?

 

[drjest2000]

I was reading more about Abyssinia the past couple of nights and it seems that they could be made playable in a different way than I had originally thought. From what I've read, the King/Emperor of Abyssinia was like the Emperor in Constantinople, meaning head of both the church and the state. So I'm thinking that the king/emperor of Abyssinia could be set up as a Pope/Caliph/vanilla king and then Yemeni, Somali, Oromo, and Rendille civs could be made as "revolutionary" sub-civs. Or, he could be set up like a clone of the Byzantine Emperor facing an invasion force of Turks/Muslims of some kind.

I haven't found resource material for the history of Ethiopia that isn't tinged with myth and legendary information treated like facts. I suppose that is to be expected when a nation has a history that stretches back to Biblical times.

One thing that stands out is that the Ethiopians had a high culture during the time that most of Europe was in a technological black hole. And they were working with iron ore that was mined rather than grubbed from a swamp, there is even pretty reliable evidence that they were using coal as early as 1200 BC. But like any long-lasting civ, they had their own ups and downs and "dark ages". So I'm not sure how I'd rank them against European civs during the period covered in M:C.

 

[Kailric]

@ drjest2000

Please, continue enlightening us on your readings as I enjoy it. I am swamped at the moment with work/school/family/sleep/eat and haven't had much time to read or code here of late.

 

[drjest2000]

This is a portion of a list of colonization efforts I posted in another thread, but this portion of the list relates to M:C more than anything else.

NORWAY/VIKING AMERICA:
------
- Iceland (ca. 874-present, not counted as part of Europe until the modern era; Norwegian rule 1261-1814 de jure, 1261-ca. 1430 de facto; 1814-1918 Danish rule dejure, 1721-1918 de facto, full independence achieved in 1944)
- Greenland (settled ca. 980, abandoned ca. 1430; Norwegian rule 1261-1814 de jure, 1261-ca. 1430 de facto; 1814-1918 Danish rule dejure, 1721-1918 de facto)
-------Norse Greenland had a bishopric (at Garðar) and exported walrus ivory,
-------furs, rope, sheep, whale or seal blubber, live animals such as polar
-------bears, and cattle hides.
--- Eystribyggð (Eastern Settlement, ca. 985 - ca. 1430)
--- Vestribyggð (Western Settlement, ca. 985 - ca. 1430)
- Vinland (ca. 985 - ca. 1012)
--- Leif's camp (1001-1002)
--- Thorvald's camp (1004)
--- Thorstein's camp (1005)
--- Straumfjord Settlement (1009, relocated to Straumsöy)
--- Straumsöy (1009 - ca. 1012)
- Markland (ca. 1000 - ca. 1430, known only from archaeologial evidence)
- Helluland (ca. 1000 - ca. 1430, known only from archaeologial evidence)
--- Tanfield Valley
--- Nunguvik
--- Willows Island
--- Avayalik Islands
- Lac Saint-Jean/Saguenay River (attested by Iroquois legend, Beluga whale breeding ground so highly probable, unknown dates, reports of "blonde indians" are fairly commonplace throughout the colonial period in New England and Canada. The presence of Haplogroup X2A mitochondrial DNA among Native populations along the Great Lakes and the St Lawrence Seaway gives strong support to this being a reality. It may however also point to Vikings having slaved the region heavily as the same Haplogroup is found in the Middle East, where Vikings traditionally took most of their slaves to market.)


VIKING RUS':
-----------
Prince Rurik settles in Holmgård (Novgorod, 862)
***Varangian/Varyag/Væringjar/Viking Rus' era begins***
Kievan Rus' (882-1283)
Kipchak-Cuman Confederation (900-1220)
Principality of Pereyaslavl (988-1302)
Principality/Grand Duchy/Kingdon of Polotsk (987-1397)
***Culturally assimilated by East Slavs about this time***
Principality of Turov-Pinsk (10th-14th c.)
Principality of Chernigov (10th-14th c.)
Principality of Tmutorakan (10th c. - 1378, afterwards part of Genovese Gazaria)
Principality of Peremyshl (1031&#8211;1124)
Principality of Smolensk (1054-1387)
Muromo-Ryazan Principality (until 1166)/Principality of Ryazan (after 1166) (1097-1521)
Principality of Halych (1124&#8211;1199)
Principality of Kiev (1132-1471)
Novgorod Republic (1136-1478)
Grand Duchy of Vladimir (1168-1389)
Kingdom of Galicia-Volhynia (1199-1349)
Principality of Yaroslavl (1218-1463)
***Mongol Invasion Begins (1223)***
***French attempt to form a Franco-Mongol Alliance (1240-1304)***
Grand Duchy of Tver (1247-1485)
***Franco-Mongol Invasion of Syria & Palestine(1280-1304)***
Grand Duchy of Moscow (1283-1547)
Principality of Rostov (13th c.-1474)
***Death of Ghazan, End of Franco-Mongol Cooperation (1304)***
Tsardom of Russia (1547-1721)
***Effective End of Mongol Sphere of Influence in Europe (1600)***

NOTE: Some of the Russian principalities were vassal states of the Grand Duchy of Moscow or the Grand Duchy of Kiev, there was a lot of horse-trading going on as the Grand Duchy of Lithuania came up, so loyalties tended to shift wildly. The Mongols played an increasingly significant role in the politics of the region after 1230. By the mid-15th century, Mongol power was beginning to wane, although there were periods of revitalization and there was always the constant threat of having your cities and peasants slaughtered if you didn't play along.

The problem I faced with the history of this era is that it has been revised in the interest of nationalism several times, with each author turning the truth to fit his particular national interests. It comes down to three very distinct versions that favor either Moscow, Novgorod/St Petersburg/Leningrad or Kiev, with each claiming sole responsibility for driving the Mongols out of Russia and saving Western Society.

Then there is the Finnish, Swedish, Lithuanian/Polish and German/Prussian nationalist versions of history to consider.

In modern Russia, there is still a very distinct rivalry between Kiev and Leningrad and Moscow that colors the history books being written. So, I don't know how much of any of them I would trust for accuracy. It's all rather confusing really and I found several articles on Wikipedia that were obviously based on highly questionable data, so I won't link them here for that reason.

What I can say with confidence is that during the period, the Mongols were a complex, sophisticated society that is poorly reflected in the history books written in the interest of nationalism. The bugaboo image of the vile eastern barbarian has been used and re-used to paint over the truth. So I'm of the opinion that the Mongols were no worse than the Spanish conquistadors and probably more sophisticated.

NATIVES IN RUS' TERRITORIES
---------------------------
Beormas (possibly another name for Sami)
Cheremis
Chuds
Galindai (Galindians)
Khazars (618-1048)
Krivichi
Kurs (Curonians, culture became extinct by the 16th century)
Leti (Latgalians)
Livs (Livonians)
Sami (also known as Lapp or Lopp)
Seli (Selonians)
Skalviai (Skalvians)
Slovenes (also known as the East Slavs)
Veps
Ves (possibly the same people as the Veps)
Volga Bulgarians (7th c.-1240, over-run by the Mongols)
Votyaks
Yotvingians (Sudovians)
Zemaiciai (Samogitians)
Zemigali (Semigallians)

The Teutonic Knights fit into this, but precisely how, I am not sure. They were a crusade against the pagans that ended up becoming a sort of collection of crusader states like we see in the Middle East. In a very narrow reading, the Teutonic Knights were Prussians or Germans, so I'm not sure that they would count as a separate culture/civ. As with the Russians, the bulk of histories written about them date from the 1800s and 1900s and are more or less nothing but nationalist propaganda painting the East Europeans as little more than successor states to the Mongols with plenty of racially charged language.



The Italian trade empires are another complexity of re-written history. Other than the dates that they took over some bit of land here or there, I'm not sure that I would rely on the accuracy/truthfulness of textual sources written in the past two centuries. What I can say about them with confidence is that for their time, they were the powerhouses of the Mediterranean and woe be unto any nation who tried to stand against them. They were vulture capitalism's finest hour. And compared to them, the Hanseatic League was most definitely very minor league stuff.

My thinking is that they wasted their energy and resources butting head with one another, so that by start of the Age of Discovery, they had created the very conditions that led to their own decline. Within a century of Columbus landing in Hispaniola , they were under varying degrees of domination by the Spanish monarchs. But that they held out against the might of the Papal States and the Hapsburg kings until the arrival of Napoleon says something favorable about them.

REPUBLIC OF GENOA (1005 - 1797):
-------------------------------
Trading posts and colonies from the Atlantic coast of Africa to the shores of the Black Sea, frequent wars with Venice for control of Mediterranean trade
- Azores (1300s)
- Canary Islands (1300s)
- Madeira (1300s)
- Amastra/Amasra (1261-1460)
- Gazaria (Crimea, 1266&#8211;1475)
- Vicina (Danube, 13th-14th c.)
- Lordship of Chios (1346-1566)
- Corsica (1347-1768)
- Tabarka (Tunisia, 1540-1742)


REPUBLIC OF VENICE (697-1797):
-----------------------------
Trading posts and colonies from the Atlantic coast of Africa to the shores of the Black Sea, frequent wars with Genoa for control of Mediterranean trade
- Dalmazia (900s-1797)
- Negroponte (1204-1470)
- Candia (Crete, 1204-1669)
- Arcipelago (1204-1714)
- Isole Ione (Ionian Islands, 1363-1797)
- Corfu (1386, added to Isole Ione)
- Cipro (Cyprus, 1489-1571)
- Morea (1685-1715)

 

[Kailric]

I miss drjest 2000, please come back.

Ok, while 2.5 uploads I am going to post my latest ideas. I am excited to get 2.6 going so I can actually start on these things.

First off, I have been studying some history and I am working up a plan for major Civ changes so please give your input to the ideas below:

Lombards(Italy) will be made a playable Civ
Papal States (the Pope) will be placed on the Map in every scenario.
Byzantines will no longer be playable but instead played by the AI.
Domain of Soissons and Dalmatia (rump states of the fallen Roman Empire) will be new Civs

Papal States: The Pope will be placed on the map with his own domain. For now all players will interact with the Pope as before. There will be one Market Price List effected by all players. There will be two means to gain a Conquest Victory. One being you can appease the Pope and he will eventually crown you Emperor, you then must defeat the Forces that comes against you to take your crown. Or you can tick off the Pope, eventually declare war on the Holy See and attempt to Capture Rome (like the Lombards). You can not declare war on the Pope until you have reached 50% Fealty. Meanwhile, the Pope will be manipulating diplomacy behind you back to thwart your efforts as he knows that any one Leader gaining enough power is a threat to his domain.

Byzantines: Will be locked in an alliance with the Papacy. They also will be manipulating events behind your back. If you attack the Papacy they will rush to their defense. Perhaps to keep the Byzantines in check they will be in constant war with Ottomans. So plan your war strategies accordingly.

Minor Civs: There will also be a new Civ type called "bMinorCiv". Instead of rewriting "Natives" I feel it would be best to just leave them alone as they are and create a new Civ type in order to preserve moddability. We can then add new code for the minor civs. Papal states and Byzantines will be Minor Civs of a different sort as they will be part of the Victory Conditions. Minor Civs will advance, howbeit at a slower pace, but will not compete for Victory Conditions. They will just be part of the playing field, obstacles or allies. All current "Native" civs in M:C will be made MinorCivs.

That's my brain storm so far.

 

[Trade Winds]

I know you want to concentrate on M:C and make it richer in features rather than advancing to other ages. This is an issue for other mods, I guess

So following to this also great idea, I want to share with you something that I thought some time ago, but it is up to you as a wizard to decide if this idea is too big to fit into our civ4col engine.

As you know, medieval times were subject to vassalage, where land was awarded to noblemen, clergymen or military orders and this way kingdoms expanded. Therefore, taking England as an example, there was Leicestershire, The Barony of Kendal, the Earldom of East Anglia, the Marquisate of Halifax, Dukedom of Lancaster, and also Priors with Priories, Deans, Bishops, Archbishops and so. And there were no patch of land without lord, and no lord without land, exceptions assumed.

Making it fit into our game, when a village is founded, a noble lord takes hold of his fiefdom (or priory if it is a monastery), by occupying one (or the only) slot of the town hall or chapter room (once it is built, if not given for free). The lord can stay in the town hall generating fealty, being entertained and consuming rich resources; or be given a horse and expand his territory. Once more fiefdoms are joined into a plotgroup the town hall can be upgraded or a manor can be built to continue holding the Lord but also to hold a Baron, a lord of several fiefdoms. This way, the number of noblemen is subject to land possession, and Knight power is also subject to amount of Noblemen.
So if you are short of noblemen and you want to expand, you need to create a military order, to have Knighted priests able to found new monasteries or hold castles.

I greatly enjoyed an old strategy game based on a two dimension map of England where you started as a Prior or a Count , and you had to promote up to control as much territory as possible, making alliances with other Bishops or Dukes. I barely remember that game.

But I know that having civilizations inside our civilization is something not really supported by our engine. I know professions even in the case of Bishops and Princes are mere pawns in the player’s hands, but this could be a way to give more realism to the historical period.

 

[Nightinggale]

I think I'm missing the point. All I see is a new profession, possibly new building and a new unit. I completely missed how it is about "civilizations inside our civilization".

We can do quite a lot as we control the DLL. However first step is to explain the idea in a way that a programmer would understand

 

[Trade Winds]

What I mean can have two difficulty levels:

Easy playable addition:
-Not building Knights if they have not fiefdoms or room in manor houses. Knight creation is dependant to city hall room in cities.

What my perverse and illiterate mind takes as a difficult addition:
-Giving knights certain AI autonomy.

I was thinking that lords who hold several cities in the plotgroup could lose favor to you (the king) and not offer the troops built in their cities or their cities could stop supplying with taxes or goods to the kingdom feeding system, or could stop building ships for you the king, or grab some weapons made at their forges and conquer a neighboring city for you from a different civilization and therefore starting a war….
So if you give a plotgroup Duke of yours much power, it could create a different Dukedom within your Kingdom, who could seek independence from you and have different civilizations within your civilization.

 

[Nightinggale]

While it sounds interesting, it will add a whole lot of AI code, which is the hardest part to code. Also I'm not convinced I like the result. I think I will pass on having an AI for your own kingdom like that.

If you think it could be fun to be a king and have your kingdom run by an AI, then there already is a game for that: http://www.majesty2.com/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=75&Itemid=150

 

[Kailric]

What I mean can have two difficulty levels:

Easy playable addition:
-Not building Knights if they have not fiefdoms or room in manor houses. Knight creation is dependant to city hall room in cities.

What my perverse and illiterate mind takes as a difficult addition:
-Giving knights certain AI autonomy.

I was thinking that lords who hold several cities in the plotgroup could lose favor to you (the king) and not offer the troops built in their cities or their cities could stop supplying with taxes or goods to the kingdom feeding system, or could stop building ships for you the king, or grab some weapons made at their forges and conquer a neighboring city for you from a different civilization and therefore starting a war….
So if you give a plotgroup Duke of yours much power, it could create a different Dukedom within your Kingdom, who could seek independence from you and have different civilizations within your civilization.

I think I see what you are saying here. I've had similar ideas actually, but they would fit more into a more focused mod about feudalism. M:C at the moment spans a more broader time period.

We do have the "vassalage" feature. In vanilla the Indians would offer you their towns, which would destroy the town and you would get the land. You may have not experienced it yet so I will explain what happens in M:C. If a Minor Civ (I'm calling the natives Minor Civs now) is in awe of your Empire they may offer to join you as a Vassal, or individual cities may offer to join your Empire as well as Vassals.

If a town offers to join you as a Vassal you are given three options; to refuse, accept them, or just take their land. If you accept them they keep their city as before but you will have a few amenities. They will send you tributes more often, you can actually send a Trader unit there to pick up "Vassal Dues" once every 10 turns, you can Send a Tax Collector profession unit there to collect taxes each turn, and you will be locked into a permanent Alliance with them and if the Popes declares war on you, he must fight both of you.

I have plans to expound on this as this was only the functions of the initial release, plus the code needs optimized as well.

 

[Trade Winds]

Yes, I have come to that offering a lot of times, but I never actually accepted them as vassals. And why? Because I didn’t want to loose control of an area inside my boundaries.

So now that you make me rethink about that point, if more autonomy were once given to your vassals, you should be able to assimilate them eventually with treaties, or civics.