Prehistoric Era

[iontom]

I just had weird idea - some combination of this mod/minor civs/religions - what if there would be some starting tribes with random names (or names from list or geographic locations (cartography mod idea from afforess would fit here well, like Tribe of Red Lake or Clan of Silent Hills etc.), then after researching certain techs (maybe make technology sounding similar to nationalism, but the idea would be that tribe realize themself as nation rather than clan, maybe make it combination of certain checkpoint techs and/or reaching certain population/territory limit), they would have an option (or it would happen automatically) to transform into full-blooded civilization (from list of ones we currently have) giving them couple bonus techs which civ they evolving into has now in ROM/AND. The way it happens with minors right now, except you wont be able to choose your final civ from beginning of game, like it is now with religions, but rather work your way towards it.

p.s. And taken Culturally linked starts let player choose at beginning of game which area of mankind he wants to be part of - european/middle east/mesoamerican/african/eastern/polinesian/whatever else. So when he reaches point to make his choose of civ, he would only be able to select from list of civs belonging to that area.
p.p.s. Another option - make particular type of Great People specifically for founding civilization with according building (obsolete after forming civ) and make that only this person is able to build Palace, necessary to form a nation.
p.p.p.s. Btw, offtopic, i would like to see Palace upgrade building line through eras/civics/religions. This could be made into separate modmod imho. Further it could be made that previous version of Palace gives penalties (for example Monarchy/Despotic ones give Unhappiness for Democracy and vice versa).

I have been having very similar thoughts Talin. I am imagining a host of barbarian units. One for every civ in the game (and can include new civs like from Hashishim's expansion) Or like you suggest, maybe 6 or so types of units-one for each region of the world. The units would be camp units.

I've heard that changing the early era techs may be difficult. So how about making minor changes to the tech tree. The "camp" or "tribe" unit has the name of a Civilization. i.e. the French tribe. The tribe unit is upgradable instead of having new techs. So your tribe can gain the experience needed to produce new unit types.

Anyway, here's my ideas for this:

Originally you could have two basic units: Hunters and gatherers.

Gatherers are like workers. They sit on top of terrain. They get more use out of corn or potatoes,etc. They do some sort of labor animation. The resource is being consumed but not domesticated, so after say 50-100 turns the resource runs out. If the tribe learns agriculture, the resource is non-perishable.

Hunters--Exists before you can build "warriors." As you develop tool types you can upgrade your hunters with either clubs, spears, 'knives', much later->bows, slings. Hunters eventually can upgrade to "domesticate." I suggest including the 'subdue animals' mod, where wild horses, cows, pigs, and sheep can be fought and domesticated if the upgrade exists. These resources can be duplicated later in the game. But if no horse is domesticated, so be it, tough luck. After domestication, Gatherers with the livestock upgrade can tend to these resources for a big food bonus. Higher level hunters can have a "warrior" upgrade which makes them good at fighting other tribes.

Tribe Splitting: Your units must stay close to your tribe. The further away they get from your tribe unit, the more likely it is they will 'rebel' and become a new tribe. You can't pay off tribes like revolutions. This way the world can become populated by enough civs later on. The AI will have to know this rule too. But, the player has the option of becoming the new tribe or not.

Limited map memory: Oral tradition cannot retain geographical information. The tribe unit has a pretty wide visibility, but a single unit cannot go far beyond the sight of the tribe. If the map is not within the visibility of a unit, it will become black again.

War: Tribe units will be well defended, but if you can kill one, you capture a number of gatherers based on the level of that tribe.

Water travel: If your tribe has the 'rafting' upgrade, you can make a 'raft' unit. Ideally the 'raftman' can travel across land and water. When on land, men carry the boats, when at sea they sit in them. Raftmen can carry one other unit in water, useful for ferrying your tribe and your units across coastlines. No ocean travel.

Sleds?--Sled units which can travel along ice terrain. Can carry one unit across ice. Allows players to cross ice bridges which may disappear before the normal eras start.

Deserts are dangerous--Crossing desert terrain does damage. Get across fast and rest along rivers for faster healing.

Settlement--As you play, you earn 'civilization points.' Every time you domesticate a crop or animal you gain points (say 5 each). Every time you kill another tribe you gain many points (10 pts per tribe level of that tribe) [You've captured there elders and derived more knowledge and culture.] Once you hit 100 points you can turn your tribe into a city. (probably near the stuff you domesticated)

Once you've settled, you can no longer build hunters or gatherers. Gatherers upgrade to workers. Hunters to warriors. (this should be automatic or else each unit would rebel and become another tribe)


Other tribes can settle either before or after you. But if you kill a tribe unit you get workers and you lose competition. There is a limit to the number of tribes that can settle into civs based on map size.

The date starts once you settle, 6000 bc. You are given access to the tech tree. Starting techs are based on accomplishments in "Prehistory Era." If you built boats, and upgraded hunters to bowmen, you get seafaring and archery... Etc




Alright, that's my input. I may be able to help with this mod starting in July.

 

[BlackZiggerat]

I'm all for this mod... already in development. What I've found elsewhere, I've integrated. What I havn't found, I've been developing myself.
@iontom
I like your ideas, I've juggled several of them for a while now, but my programming knowledge is limited. I havnt' had any significant difficulty in adjusting the techtree, adding and rearranging. The graphics are more of a challenge for me.
In my current modding, I make warriors tech-dependant, so you can't build warriors or any kind till you discover the warrior way. This makes for an interesting early game, what w scouts and hunters and animals only. I play w the subdue animals mod. I've also integrated Cultivation & Horticulture before agriculture. These would work nicely w your idea of plant bonus' petering out, but they work out nicely on their own anyway.
Edit:
I've also been working on a camp that functions like fort w culture. The camps would be tribal camps, each would take up a tile, each would have your culture, and if too far from your tribal center(city), it may get absorbed by the omnipresent barbarous tribals, or wonder off to start its own tribe. A tribal center is a family center, trade center, etc. The center accrues tech points, and functions as the city, as it is the center of the tribes. And eventually, the civ learns how to move stone and build structures, then the tribal center becomes established, though it'll be hundreds to thousands of years b4 an actual city emerges. Such tribal camps still exist today, and can get up and go from place to place. The only reason why such a camp would not exist would be if the land itself was already being used by a different function. Nationalism can chaffe w this type of unit. The tent camps existed well into the classic era, though in the case of the greeks and romans, they strove to 'establish' built structures, particularly around religious cites.
Edit2:
I start my games in 10000bc, and have it going longer than snail.

 

[Hydromancerx]

@BlackZiggerat

Its because RoM has so many techs! Moving a ton of tech over just seems tedious. And whats worse is trying to fit in other mods like AtoM which is based in the future. And thus would have to have its techs moved over too. Too bad you can't just add negative values to the tree and have them move left instead of right.

 

[Dancing Hoskuld]

Or wrote a script that would move all techs to X+10 or whatever . That way it could be run over all the mods as well

 

[Hydromancerx]

Or wrote a script that would move all techs to X+10 or whatever . That way it could be run over all the mods as well

That would be nice to have in AND. Having the techs all spread apart more.

 

[BlackZiggerat]

Its because RoM has so many techs! Moving a ton of tech over just seems tedious.

Ahhh Hydromancerx... it doesnt seem tedious, it IS tedious. ExTREMELY tedious. BUT, having already done it, I feel better about the whole thing.
The only way I can think of to merge many mods would be to have dedicated module tech placement, which would be orchestrated by the master-mod tech placement file. None of this exists of course, so we must blend by hand. EVERY time new techs are added.
The recourse to this would be to arrange it in display like they did in Alpha Centauri. Where it only shows you a list of techs available for research at the time. I prefer that type of display myself, and think one such display could be blended into RoM.AND without too much work. The techtree itself doesn't do a lot for me personally, and at this point would definately benefit from a search engine.

 

[Dancing Hoskuld]

Ahhh Hydromancerx... it doesnt seem tedious, it IS tedious. ExTREMELY tedious. BUT, having already done it, I feel better about the whole thing.
The only way I can think of to merge many mods would be to have dedicated module tech placement, which would be orchestrated by the master-mod tech placement file. None of this exists of course, so we must blend by hand. EVERY time new techs are added.
The recourse to this would be to arrange it in display like they did in Alpha Centauri. Where it only shows you a list of techs available for research at the time. I prefer that type of display myself, and think one such display could be blended into RoM.AND without too much work. The techtree itself doesn't do a lot for me personally, and at this point would definately benefit from a search engine.

OR you just do a mod for RoM and let the other modders move their own techs. Oh wait I am one of those that move techs around.