Population-Sensitive Improvements

[Mithadan]

There wouldn't be some trick which y'all are aware of but I ain't, whereby an improvement goes obsolete once a city or empire becomes a certain size?

Walls become unbuildable (but obsolete too?) with city size, but can that be done to custom improvements too?

The Forbidden Palace needs a certain number of cities to be built, but can this be added to custom improvements...and in reverse?

(I'm trying to figure out a way to provide tech-improving buildings for small civs that don't help out the large gigantic civs...)

 

[Micaelus]

Walls become unbuildable (but obsolete too?) with city size, but can that be done to custom improvements too?

I don't think walls actually go obsolete. I'm pretty sure it's that the defensive bonus of a city size 2 or city size 3 is greater than or equal to the defensive bonus provided by walls, so the walls' effect is ignored.

 

[Rob (R8XFT)]

I'm not sure about this, but it may be worth a try. I think what makes the walls unavailable to a size 2 and size 3 city is the bombard value of 8, so why not try giving your improvement a bombard value of 8 on top of its other credentials and see if that does the trick?

Here's a couple of other thoughts:

Make the aqueduct (or "allows city size 2") an improvement that cannot be built by anyone (e.g. having it require an unavailable resource) and have a small wonder that allows an aqueduct in every city. You can then give the SW the "forbidden palace" ability; although that reduces corruption, it at least can't be built until a certain number of cities are built.

The "allows city size 2" improvement could also make one or more citizens unhappy, therefore negating a previous "happy" improvement.

 

[Ozymandias]

AFAIK any improvement with defensive Bombardment strength becomes moot when Size 2 is hit.

Best,

Oz

 

[Wolfhart]

Giving any improvement or wonder a Bombard defense value means that this improvement/wonder can't be built in cities larger than size level 1 (in epic C3C size 7 or more).

But any other effects of such an improvement/wonder will still be working in a city that's built it and then grown beyond size 6.

E.g. if I for some reason would give Walls a 25% increase on production and give 1 happy face, it will continue to do so when the city grows larger than size 6. If I should disband/sell it I'll lose the shield increase and the happy face, and I couldn't build it again until my city is back on size 6 or less.

 

[Wolfhart]

BTW, that was from a post I wrote in the FUBAR Editor Documentation thread. Very useful thread for modders, both beginners and seniors, and so is also Da Rules - Explained.

 

[Rob (R8XFT)]

I've just had a look at "da rules explained" and it states, under the "combat" section that any positive value for bombard will render the improvement obsolete once the city reaches size level 2 .

 

[Wolfhart]

It all depends on how 'obsolete' is defined then... Me thinks Da Rules need some further explaining Excellent thread nonetheless!

 

[Ozymandias]

All it takes is a very simple test.

 

[Mithadan]

Thanks for the great responses! Oz, you're the empirical researcher here, how hard would it be to set up this "very simple test"? I'm terrible at modding buildings, but I should try at getting better.

 

[Ozymandias]

Thanks for the great responses! Oz, you're the empirical researcher here, how hard would it be to set up this "very simple test"? I'm terrible at modding buildings, but I should try at getting better.

Simple, Amigo. Set up a "scenario" with two Civs, one City each. Set the Population(s) to 6. Make sure some conveniently nearby resource yields a preposterous amount of food. Create the Improvement(don't bother adding a new building, just change the stats of an existing one) to be tested, place it in said city, and see if it works when City size=7.

,

Oz

 

[Leaven]

I was reading this thread and really wanted to know the results, since they could be used in a scenario I'm working on, so I ran a few tests myself. For anyone interested, here are the results:

As Oz said, 2 civs, 1 city each, the cities have aquaducts and are near a ton of food. I modded basic walls to give a variety of bonuses: They now function as a barrracks, harbor, marketplace, and temple, while still being walls.

On the first turn (city size 6) all the new bonuses work fine, however after upgrading to size 7, I did not seem to get all my content faces from the walls. The happy faces from the marketplace bonus still worked (I forgot to mention that I placed tradeable luxuries around the cities for testing purposes) but they are from the luxuries, not the improvement itself. Veteran units and sea trade also worked fine.

Hope this helps

 

[Ozymandias]

On the first turn (city size 6) all the new bonuses work fine, however after upgrading to size 7, I did not seem to get all my content faces from the walls. The happy faces from the marketplace bonus still worked (I forgot to mention that I placed tradeable luxuries around the cities for testing purposes) but they are from the luxuries, not the improvement itself. Veteran units and sea trade also worked fine.

Hope this helps

(It's laugh or cry) So the AI is programmed in a helter-skelter fashion. What a surprise ( )

Best,

Oz

 

[Mithadan]

Well isn't that completely random!

Now I just have to figure out whether or not science bonuses come or go with the growth to size 6.

 

[Mithadan]

Well, placing the "+50% Research Output" flag for a modded Walls improvement doesn't seem to change when the city grows past size 6. I was getting 3 commerce icons at size 6 and 3 commerce icons at size 7,8,9 & 10 (I made wheat give 25 food, and put a wheat in every hex available around the city). So that doesn't work!

Similar results occur when I mod Walls into a great wonder, and give it only the "doubles research output" flag. Same thing again when I mod Walls into a small wonder and give it both the "doubles research output" and "+50% research output" flags.

So I can't obsolesce the science bonus based on city size...