Probably Improved Gameplay Mod

[AveiMil]

Good to hear a fix will be out soon I'd rather not have to do all those changes manually for the LAN on sunday

No that was left off by accident. There are a couple of other things too (only minor XML changes though). I'll post an update as soon as I can. The internet at the moment won't let me upload the file so it might be about 12 hours away or more.

You really need to install a FTP client that has the ability to resume uploads and then you can just upload it to my own FTP and once it's done I can upload it on the site for you (because the web upload on the civfanatic site is probably timing out due to your horrible connection). That way you don't need to worry about that nightmare. I have 15Mbit/s connection both up and down so it should go fast

 

[AveiMil]

And GPr is a good GP in the sense that it's not a GA or GSpy. Settled GPrs are very good, obviously shrines and early game bulbs (if going that way) even better.

Great Prophets are perhaps the second worst settled great person in my opinion after GA's, but GA's are highly situational and very useful in those spesific situations.

GSpy is perhaps the best all-around great person in multiplayer games. I'm pretty sure you can do some nifty things with him in single player as well but I really don't have much experience with that.

The Great Prophet's early shrine is not worth much early in the game (I'd rather have a scientist for Academy or strong bulb) and the Great Prophet is not useful for bulbing anything worthwhile either.

Compared to a Great Scientist or a Great Merchant the Great Prophet is pretty crap.

The other way around (Writing part didn't change, it's currently a prerequisite for Theology). My from-the-top-of-my-head proposition in the last post was (current in parenthesis):

Writing AND (Monotheism OR Monarchy OR Code of Laws) -> Theology
(Writing AND Monotheism)

Monarchy AND (Theology OR Philosophy) -> Divine Right
(Monarchy AND Theology)

Was just an example on trying to make the religious side more accessible without having to dedicate 100% to it from the get-go.

I did not understand what you mean at first as this basically just delays your ability to get to these technologies. But I guess then it delays it for everyone and you get the chance to pick some of the more important techs first.

That's good and all but there's still absolutely no incentive (in my view) to go for Theology and Divine Right after you tech Monarchy/CoL or Pilo. Why would I bother with Theology after those techs? I'd just push for Civil Service and then Machinery Calander (Paper has Machinery as prereq). So it does not solve the underlying problem in my opinion, just delays it.

Especially in a mod that's core idea (in my eyes) is simplicity and not new features you need to study beforehand, which those extensive religious buffs would be. Anything that couldn't simply be found accidentally as a "hey, that's a nice change"-experience during gameplay doesn't belong to what is my perception of PIG mod and in a more gameplay-changing mod instead.

That is a pretty good point actually and one that needs to be considered carefully before making changes like these final. Actually we've already made some changes that does require further study, like Machinery being a prereq for paper, that changes things quite a bit actually. But once I got used to it I really like the change and its effect on gameplay.

 

[AveiMil]

What's the rationale behind this? They're already better than Colosseums out of the box (SPI & Culture > 1XP for melee). The AP alone makes them one of the best -investments, and UoS and/or SM make them downright ridiculous, easily the most cost effective building in the game, winning the equivalent monasteries because they don't obsolete so early.

PoM, do you mind removing the Temple 60 change back to 80 for 0.91? I think Silu has a good point. Nerfing the Temple cost does not really boost the Religious path as discussed by much anyway.

 

[Silu]

Great Prophets are perhaps the second worst settled great person in my opinion after GA's, but GA's are highly situational and very useful in those spesific situations.

GSpy is perhaps the best all-around great person in multiplayer games. I'm pretty sure you can do some nifty things with him in single player as well but I really don't have much experience with that.

The Great Prophet's early shrine is not worth much early in the game (I'd rather have a scientist for Academy or strong bulb) and the Great Prophet is not useful for bulbing anything worthwhile either.

Compared to a Great Scientist or a Great Merchant the Great Prophet is pretty crap.

I don't really care about human vs human multiplayer, nor do I know anything about it, but to a layman GSpy seems the best there by far. But in solo GPr, GM, GS and GE are all roughly on par with each other wrt settling. GSpy and GA are very situational (GA more than GSpy) and thus way worse by default - espionage isn't always useful. All of the 4 "standard" GPs have unique situational uses that can be huge in the right situation and next to useless in another.

And how is Theo not a strong bulb? Anything that bulbs a religion is very strong as nabbing it makes AIs avoid it more (entrenching your monopoly on it), most famously showcased by the ubiquitous Philo bulb. The bulb line is clearly the third strongest after GS and GE. Compared to GS they might be crap, but then again every GP is (even GE, if you consider how hard they are to get).

I did not understand what you mean at first as this basically just delays your ability to get to these technologies. But I guess then it delays it for everyone and you get the chance to pick some of the more important techs first.

That's good and all but there's still absolutely no incentive (in my view) to go for Theology and Divine Right after you tech Monarchy/CoL or Pilo. Why would I bother with Theology after those techs? I'd just push for Civil Service and then Machinery Calander (Paper has Machinery as prereq). So it does not solve the underlying problem in my opinion, just delays it.

Delays? How do purely optional prerequisites delay anything? The incentive is surely there. Founding religion, the AP (NOT for cheese; being able to choose the religion and getting a certain vote spot are huge), the SM, and the free GPr, all of which are great. Any of those paths can easily lead to being the first there. I'd certainly like the option to bulb Theology with a GPr after CoL, as a side note these changes would also make GPrs better, as their business bulbs (Theo is the best, arguably, followed by the buffed DR) would be enabled more easily.

The current tech line is broken IMO, because there are huge jumps in beaker prices between Mono<->Theo<->DR, and nothing to give optional paths and discounts. No matter the other changes, I'd do something about that, be it something like the way I proposed or something else. This also partly fixes the hardship of founding religions on high levels, as with a clever tech path and bulb usage you can nab 3-4 religions mid-game much easier than before without sacrificing your early game on a gamble, enabling a more religion oriented strategy without making it much stronger in raw power.

That is a pretty good point actually and one that needs to be considered carefully before making changes like these final. Actually we've already made some changes that does require further study, like Machinery being a prereq for paper, that changes things quite a bit actually. But once I got used to it I really like the change and its effect on gameplay.

Yeah that's the only change that jumps into my eye as one really forcing you to adapt. But that's a great example of a single, elegant change changing things for the better (discouraging ultra-deep Lib beelines).


To PieceOfMind, if you don't endorse the heated religion discussion with marathon posts in your mod's thread, say the word and I'll pipe it down

 

[AveiMil]

And how is Theo not a strong bulb? Anything that bulbs a religion is very strong as nabbing it makes AIs avoid it more (entrenching your monopoly on it), most famously showcased by the ubiquitous Philo bulb. The bulb line is clearly the third strongest after GS and GE. Compared to GS they might be crap, but then again every GP is (even GE, if you consider how hard they are to get).

Well there's one of the major problems with this. Being third strongest translates into never beneficial (or hardly ever as never is a strong word) to choose that route over the GS bulb route. Philosophy is a better technology to bulb in every possible regard than Theology (though the free GP at DR makes Theology slightly better but still does not come close in my opinion).

Delays? How do purely optional prerequisites delay anything? The incentive is surely there. Founding religion, the AP (NOT for cheese; being able to choose the religion and getting a certain vote spot are huge), the SM, and the free GPr, all of which are great. Any of those paths can easily lead to being the first there. I'd certainly like the option to bulb Theology with a GPr after CoL, as a side note these changes would also make GPrs better, as their business bulbs (Theo is the best, arguably, followed by the buffed DR) would be enabled more easily.

Oh, optional? When you say prerequisite I think "required", i.e. like Mathematics is required to research Civil Service. You're talking about white arrow-> "prereq's"? In that case we're talking past one another.

The current tech line is broken IMO, because there are huge jumps in beaker prices between Mono<->Theo<->DR, and nothing to give optional paths and discounts. No matter the other changes, I'd do something about that, be it something like the way I proposed or something else.

Not a bad idea but I'm not sure how fond PoM is about changing the structure (both coding and graphically) of the tech tree. Perhaps it's easy though, I don't know.

Though at the same time I don't hate the idea of basically choosing which path to go early and then sticking to that by giving buffs like I proposed earlier. It kind of makes it a trade off, an important decision than perhaps has to be made based upon what techs you start with and how the land looks etc...

To PieceOfMind, if you don't endorse the heated religion discussion with marathon posts in your mod's thread, say the word and I'll pipe it down

You play marathon exclusively? Right I think I remember from some of your multiplayer team challenges vs the AI. Anyway, although things might be quite different in some aspects on marathon your opinion is most welcome (even if I totally disagree ) in my eyes at least.

 

[Silu]

Oh, optional? When you say prerequisite I think "required", i.e. like Mathematics is required to research Civil Service. You're talking about white arrow-> "prereq's"? In that case we're talking past one another.

Prerequisites (as a concept) include both mandatory ("AND") and optional ("OR") prerequisites. You know, how Code of Laws requires:

Writing AND (Priesthood OR Currency)

Now read my post again (4 posts up). Remember that for each extra optional prerequisite you have for a tech you get a 20% beaker boost for researching it.

You play marathon exclusively? Right I think I remember from some of your multiplayer team challenges vs the AI. Anyway, although things might be quite different in some aspects on marathon your opinion is most welcome (even if I totally disagree ) in my eyes at least.

No, I play normal solo exclusively. The forum showgames are just that, a showgame (my friend really loves Marathon and it can be good fun ). Like AP cheese, Marathon speed has no real part in a serious in-depth discussion about Civ4 strategies.

 

[commodus78]

Hi
Is the CARMod been included in PIG yet? or is it in the now included BULL?
And i have to say i love this mod, i cant play civ without it anymore

 

[Fimbulvetr]

(lists reduced)

Incorporated Mods: (follow the hyperlinks to see the threads for each mod)

• 
  Global Warming Mod v1.10
• Culturally Linked Starts v1.1.3 (Custom Game option)
• Influence Driven War Mod v1.1 (Custom Game option)
• Multiple Production Mod v003 (Custom Game option)
• Some changes from MongooseSDK 3.3

Significant Changes:

• Nuclear meltdowns are now much less severe than nuclear bomb explosions, especially in terms of the number of buildings destroyed and population killed. Previously 40% of buildings and 30 to 70% of population would be destroyed. Now only 10% of buildings and 20 to 40% of population. Fewer units will be killed as well, including non-combat units.
• Espionage Process mod v1.2 by By Jon Deane - allows cities to build Espionage (like Wealth) after Paper has been researched.

(...)

From MongooseSDK:

• LakeSizeMod (CvArea.cpp)
  Makes the definition of a lake scale with map size. With an XML Globals value of 4 which is what I use, lakes will become inland seas when greater than 4 tiles in size on Duel, up through greater than 16 tiles in size on Huge.
• EventTileDowngradeMod (NEW) (CvPlot.cpp, CvPlayer.cpp, CvCity.cpp)
  Tile improvements that are hit by destruction events (like a Tornado) now behave as if they were pillaged instead; most are still destroyed, but Towns downgrade to Villages instead of being wiped out entirely, for example.

This is the updated full list of modifications that distinguish your dll from mine.

I was thinking about looking for stuff I might want for my mod too, and this seemed like a good start. Not looking for gameplay changes but MongooseSDK for example seems like a good source for fixes and tweaks and seems like not all of them made it into the Unofficial Patch or Better AI yet.

 

[EmperorFool]

Is the CARMod . . . in the now included BULL?

Not yet. I need to take some time to look over the code. Given that BULL is used by a lot of mods now, I need to be extremely careful with including new code. Given its nature (storing values to be used in future calculations without recalculating them), I need to be able to take enough time to verify that those stored values are cleared and recalculated under the right circumstances.

 

[AveiMil]

ARGH!

Not sure what is wrong but whenever I get the "What do you want to build next?" screen, if I select for instance a Warrior it gets the little asterix * infront of its name in the que signalling that it'll be built continously. What introduces this and how the hell do I turn it off?

And there's a new option in the standard civ options page:

ModPlayerOption3

What is it?

 

[EmperorFool]

Not sure what is wrong but whenever I get the "What do you want to build next?" screen, if I select for instance a Warrior it gets the little asterix * infront of its name in the que signalling that it'll be built continously. What introduces this and how the hell do I turn it off?

It is in BULL and can be disabled on the options screen: ALT + CTRL + O : City Screen : Build [Civilian|Military] Units Forever.

Before you suggest to have this work using the ALT key like normally adding items to your queue, I tried that. For some reason no keyboard modifier keys are detectable in the widget actions.

 

[AveiMil]

It is in BULL and can be disabled on the options screen: ALT + CTRL + O : City Screen : Build [Civilian|Military] Units Forever.

Okey, really weird, I probably imagined this but it felt like the City Screen option page was not scrollable at first but then after 10-20 seconds became scrollable, as if it had not finished loading. If I did imagine it I simply did not notice the scroll because I looked all over the page for such an option

Before you suggest to have this work using the ALT key like normally adding items to your queue, I tried that. For some reason no keyboard modifier keys are detectable in the widget actions.

You mean on the "What would you like the build next" screen you cannot use keyboard modifiers? Because it works just fine on the city screen even with BULL.

Kind of funny, because in a game I played one hour ago I decided to test it, I thought to my self "hmm, wonder if the ALT key works when selecting what to build next?" Then sure enough it seemed to work fine! Little did I know that it did not work but it was just the BULL option that enabled it .

Well, anyway, thanks for the help.

EDIT: That option really should not be left on by default though. That's bound to confuse more players than me, and there's a gazillion options on the BUG page so most probably will just leave things default.

 

[EmperorFool]

Yeah, bummer. I even thought to add a checkbox at the top of the screen, but the way that popup is coded prevents that from working. The action for the button itself determines what gets built, and that code has no reference to the popup from which to pull the checkbox's value.

Hmm, I think maybe a good compromise would be to insert a message at the top of the popup if that option is enabled. I could also color (maybe) or add a * to those units that are affected by it. It would mean more scrolling to get to the lower items. I could add a third option to disable that message (ugh) but that's a lot of options.

 

[PieceOfMind]

Version 0.91 has just been uploaded.

No SDK changes this time so no new source files to upload.

Changelog:

***********************
Experimental changes:
-Lumbermills available with Machinery. No hammer bonus for Railroad but instead extra hammer at Replaceable Parts.
-Scouts now only get 100% vs. animals (down from PIG's previous 150%) but they get free Sentry promotion!
-Explorers get Sentry promotion. They are increased in cost from 40 to 45 hammers.
***********************



**************************
Bugfixes:
(These were accidentally omitted from v0.90. Sorry!)
-Engineer specialist buffed to 3 (experimental change, might get removed in later version)
-Divine Right gives great prophet to first to discover.
-Paper requires Machinery. (Paper removed from prereqs for Printing Press as it's redundant)
-Education requires Construction.
**************************

Bugfix:
-MPM was accidentally switched with another game option in the Custom Game Menu (I think it was global warming's rising seas option). Now fixed.

 

[PieceOfMind]

Note the change to scouts and explorers is a significant one and I have doubts it will stay for long. However I want to see if anyone likes it or how much people hate it first. It comes under the category of changes that are more likely to benefit the human player than the AI, which is one problem I have with it. There's problems involving being able to use their promotion while on boats etc. as well.

Anyway, I'm out of town for a few days so I won't be able to change it til I get back. If the changes are unbearable (I suspect AveiMil won't want them for the LAN), it is not hard to remove the free promos in UnitInfos.xml and repackage the zip file.

 

[PieceOfMind]

To PieceOfMind, if you don't endorse the heated religion discussion with marathon posts in your mod's thread, say the word and I'll pipe it down

No, please continue posting like that. Feedback and discussion on the balance changes is important and one the main reasons this thread should be used. The thread size is getting a bit unwieldy now and I'll have to think what to do about that.

Hi
Is the CARMod been included in PIG yet? or is it in the now included BULL?
And i have to say i love this mod, i cant play civ without it anymore

CAR mod is not included yet, unfortunately. However, it has been said that roughly 1/3 of the speed improvements are already built into Better AI. The main reason it is not merged yet is that it has no effect on gameplay (other than speed) and is a substantial merge of code with code that is already used in Better AI and probably BULL. It's fairly difficult for an amateur code merge like myself to know what to do when code clashes. As EmperorFool said in his reply as well, one needs to be extremely careful with checking how the changes behave.

Before today though, I didn't realise CAR was being considered for inclusion in BULL. In that case, I'm likely to hold off and see if it is merged into BULL. If yes, Fuyu will probably merge it with BBAI then I'll finally merge it in PIG. lol, less work for me.

Is this the full list of modifications that distinguish your dll from mine?

I was thinking about looking for stuff I might want for my mod too, and this seemed like a good start. Not looking for gameplay changes but MongooseSDK for example seems like a good source for fixes and tweaks and seems like not all of them made it into the Unofficial Patch or Better AI yet.

I can't give a definite yes or no right now but it looks roughly right. I have a folder on my comp at home with all of the SDK mods marked "(done)" when I have merged them.

Note however the runaway AIs by martinharper is not SDK - it's only XML. For PIG users who want to try it they have to go in and manually extract an archive in one of the XML folders.

I'm curious now as to what direction your mod is headed. If you begin using the above changes is there not a distinct possibility my DLL will essentially just be a copy of yours? Are you intending to make a mod with similar goals as PIG? If so it might be worth talking about whether it's better to work together on one or the other project. Having looked at the changes you've made to your DLL (I pretty much agreed with all of them) I'd probably have no problem relying mostly on your DLL if you start including the same SDK changes as listed for PIG. You seem to have a better grasp of how the code works and would be a lot less likely to make SDK errors than me.

 

[EmperorFool]

Congrats on the quick releases! Don't forget to update your sig.

 

[Fimbulvetr]

I'm curious now as to what direction your mod is headed. If you begin using the above changes is there not a distinct possibility my DLL will essentially just be a copy of yours? Are you intending to make a mod with similar goals as PIG? If so it might be worth talking about whether it's better to work together on one or the other project. Having looked at the changes you've made to your DLL (I pretty much agreed with all of them) I'd probably have no problem relying mostly on your DLL if you start including the same SDK changes as listed for PIG. You seem to have a better grasp of how the code works and would be a lot less likely to make SDK errors than me.

I don't know your goals but mine are simple: better AI.
Our dlls might become really close.. No wait, they already are
Combining efforts when it comes to dll changes sounds like a good idea, I doubt I will be able to include everything you do though.
As I said, big gameplay changes are out of the question, even as optional components I don't feel like adding any. So the only parts I'm interested in is the worst enemy trade fix (why hasn't that been suggested for the Unofficial Patch yet?) and the MongooseSDK part minus lakesize.

 

[PieceOfMind]

Congrats on the quick releases! Don't forget to update your sig.

Good point. Thanks for the reminder.

I don't know your goals but mine are simple: better AI.
Our dlls might become really close.. No wait, they already are
Combining efforts when it comes to dll changes sounds like a good idea, I doubt I will be able to include everything you do though.
As I said, big gameplay changes are out of the question, even as optional components I don't feel like adding any. So the only parts I'm interested in is the worst enemy trade fix (why hasn't that been suggested for the Unofficial Patch yet?) and the MongooseSDK part minus lakesize.

Ok. Looks like I'll be working from your DLL for the most part now. What do you say about keeping track of the changes you make in "dot point" form? That would be a huge help for using it with PIG Mod because I want people to know what they're getting without unexpected surprises.

Anyway, you gave me the impression before you wanted to include a lot of the changes that I had already gone ahead with. A lot of them like Influence Driven War and Culturally Linked starts are big gameplay changes.

 

[Fimbulvetr]

I just wanted to know where the differences are, so I can look through them, that's all. And if you go back to that post, you'll notice the list already got shorter (I didn't even commit any of it yet but it's all done)

Adding proper comments in the standard dot-point-form way is what I have planned for the very near future. Atm I just need to sleep