Project SYNTHESIS

[civ_king]

Well, the corporations should give food and gold to represent the urbanization and wealth, but Silk Route doesn't quite work because Italy needs the resources, perhaps on start Italy should have contact with China, an embassy and hidden relations boost?

 

[Linkman226]

Guys I had the interesting idea of moving all the euro civs back a couple hundred years so as to represent the "barbarian" kingdoms that arose in Rome's wake- the French as the Franks, the Spanish as the Visigoths, and so on and so forth. Perhaps Rome wouldn't last as long this way in the 3000 BC start.

Well, the corporations should give food and gold to represent the urbanization and wealth, but Silk Route doesn't quite work because Italy needs the resources, perhaps on start Italy should have contact with China, an embassy and hidden relations boost?

The Silk Road IS a corporation. But perhaps a 'Italian Banking Families' (or something less awkward sounding) is needed?

OR, and this idea just occurred to me, perhaps Marco Polo's Embassy should be in and give similar bonuses to the Silk Road.

 

[Linkman226]

New spawn dates:

Spain: 418 AD (Visigothic Kingdom)
France: 481 AD (Frankish Empire- I wonder if this could possibly actually form within the game)
England: 500 AD (Battle of Mons Badonicus)
Russia- 1480 (end of Muscovy's vassalization to the Golden Horde)

I will also working on removing the techs the euros start with, obviously.

And dynamic names are also almost done. I'm just gonna go put in the names above and it will pretty much be complete.

 

[civ_king]

Lisboa should be founded ~27 BC by the Romans as Felicitas Julia Olisipo

 

[J. pride]

Spain: 418 AD (Visigothic Kingdom)
France: 481 AD (Frankish Empire- I wonder if this could possibly actually form within the game)
England: 500 AD (Battle of Mons Badonicus)
Russia- 1480 (end of Muscovy's vassalization to the Golden Horde)

Besides Russia, please do not do this. From a historical point of view, it makes little sense to have the Visigoth Kingdom since the Arabs ruled Spain for the next 750 years. And this will certainly not work out if you add the Moors later on. As far as England is concerned, the Kingdom of England was unified in 927 ad so it makes little sense to push it back to 500 ad. Thats like spawning an Ottoman Empire in 1100 ad just because small divided Turkish Kingdoms existed in Anatolia. The Frankish Kingdom makes some sense historically but little to no sense gameplay wise.

Here are some gameplay damages of making European spawns earlier:

-You will mess up the Romans and other Ancient Civilizations. Its extremely hard to acheive the Ancient civs in their historical time frame. And there is not much playing turns before the Europeans come and ruin your game. By making the European spawns earlier, you will inadvertently affect the Ancient civs.

-The only reason Europe is balanced right, even though it is uber rich is because of the late spawns. If you make the spawns earlier you will make the Europeans a whole lot stronger as they will have more time to grow. Not to mention research rate which will have to be modified because Europeans have such a fast rate, the only thing making up for it is their late spawn.

-This is just a warning but if you make the Europeans spawn early, there is a high likelihood that the game will become very very ahistorical. For example, right now there are certain parameters that make sure Spain is likely to discover the new world. If you spawn the Brits early, what makes you think that they will not use that time to lets say make progress towards Optics faster than Spain. Even though this example might not be true, there will certainly be unintended consquences.

-My final point is why would you want to make these changes? I dont see any particular advantage to doing this. All I see is whole lot of editing and hardwork (which requires change in tech rates, growth rates, other modifiers in DLL, tech preference, balancing the Euro civs, balancing the ancient civs and a bunch of other stuff) that will likely not payoff in the long run and create an ahistorical and unbalanced Europe!

-Now, you work hard on this mod but don't you think that it would be better to finish off with the middle East first or do something that requires more attention like an actual represent of the Alexandrian Empire. As much as a enjoy the new Seljuks, they are still unbalanced and require your attention along with minor fixes for the Safavids, Egyptians, Mongol Conquests and the Arabs Conquests. When you do start working on Europe, my recommendation would be to work bottoms up meaning to start with the Romans and Greeks and work york up, this way is better since you will be fixing the foundation first and then work your way up instead of the other way around where you might mess up you work on the top if you edit the bottom afterwards. I hope my analogy made sense, it even confusing me

Back to the European spawns; I propose that you delay them a couple of turns instead of making them earlier than they already are. My reasoning is the following:

-Historical Accuracy:
1) Realistic growth of cities; you will not find uber large European cities in the early middle ages.
2) European powers wont be strong in the early middle ages.

-Gameplay:
1) As you know the later you spawn a civ, the easier it is for you to make it behave ideally. That is why it is much easier to have realistic looking French Empire than it is to have an Egyptian one.

2) You can give European civs extra techs that will help them achieve the things you want them to acheive so for example if you want Spain to colonize earlier and harder than you just give them a tech in that field.

So here is my proposal:

-England: 927 ad, the official union of the Kingdom of England.
-France: 840 ad, division of the Frankish Empire and the creation of the modern day Kingdom of France.
-Germany: 962 ad with the coronation of Otto I
-Russia: 1480 sounds a bit too late 1240 should be fine since that was when Grand Duchy of Moscow was formed.
-Spain: My new Spain date depends on the fact if you add the Moors in which case you will have to change the Spanish spawn anyhow. I recommend that the new spawn date be 1050 on the eve of the conquest of Toledo which was a major turning point in the history of the Reconquista.

 

[civ_king]

No, Russia should spawn in 1480, that is when the threw off the Tatar shackles

 

[Linkman226]

Alright so the earlier spawns were scrapped.

France will spawn in 843, along with the HRE. Can't see why France should spawn sooner.

Russia will spawn conditionally any year from 1240 onwards if and only if at least half of its core cities are not Mongol.

Do you guys have any LH suggestions? It's easier for me to merge it with the dynamic names now. I was thinking of adding quite a few, like one for each era per civ, as applicable.

EDIT: I did, however, add some indie cities in Spain/ France in 600 AD, decreasing settlers as appropriate.

 

[J. pride]

Do you guys have any LH suggestions? It's easier for me to merge it with the dynamic names now. I was thinking of adding quite a few, like one for each era per civ, as applicable.

Will it have any affect on game speed?

France will spawn in 843, along with the HRE. Can't see why France should spawn sooner.

Russia will spawn conditionally any year from 1240 onwards if and only if at least half of its core cities are not Mongol.

Will you be implementing this now or later? Because if your only plan in Europe is to do this then you should save it for later, but if you plan on giving Europe a total remake like you did with the Middle East then it sounds like a good idea to this as well.

Btw: I take that you will not be moving the British and Spanish back?

 

[Linkman226]

Marginal effect on speed.

Changing French and Russian spawns when I get to Europe.

J. Pride, mind making a list of some of those suggestions for the Seljuks/ Safavids/ Mongols/ Arabia?

In particular I was wondering if at least two people could try to complete the Safavid UHV to test for feasibility.

EDIT: Not sure about Spain or England... I want a Kingdom of the Asturias but not cramp Iberia too much with the Moors...

 

[J. pride]

Marginal effect on speed.

The Venetian LH from RFCE would be nice since Cavour is the only one they have.

J. Pride, mind making a list of some of those suggestions for the Seljuks/ Safavids/ Mongols/ Arabia?

Here they are:
This is the one I posted a while back but I have since made some changes/details for some of the things I proposed:

http://forums.civfanatics.com/showpost.php?p=10852773&postcount=1153

These editions include:

-Upper Egypt/Sudan is ahistorically fertile/rich; it should be nerfed and Arab settler map for the region should be lowered. Before the Arabs had to settle the region but now that there are the Egyptians; it would be better that they settle the region as it is more fitting/accurate. Also the Arabs build Al Kharijah/Aswan in almost every game; that settler is better utilized settling Tunis or something.

Scratch this part instead I have posted an alternate over here:
http://forums.civfanatics.com/showpost.php?p=10956576&postcount=4628

The Seljuks:

-While the Seljuks expand westwards into Mesopotia, Syria and Anatolia; they often dont conquer Samarkand and sometimes Sihraz and Qandahar. I think that Merv and Samarkand should flip to the Seljuks and there conquests should be in 3 waves in random locations the first wave should anywhere in Persia, the second in Mesopotamia/Syria and the third in Anatolia

-The Seljuks are overpowered in their Anatolian conquests and underpowered in the Central Asian/Persian ones.

-There is no Seljuk "controlled collapse" mechanic in place. Anatolia, Levant and Mesopotamia should declare independence after a certain date. It is pretty wierd to see superpowered Seljuks at the Ottoman spawn.

While this is mostly correct; I have better summed it up with this:

Im guessing that you already know how Linkman implemented the Safavids; in any case there are several things that are unbalanced/ undesirable.

1) In his mod, the Seljuks go west and conquer Baghdad and Damascus and such but often forget to conquer Eastwards (Merv, Samarkand, Shiraz). My suggestion to you is to flip Merv and Samarkand to the Seljuks because when the Seljuks declared independence it was Neyshapur and Merv that were their capital and as far as Samarkand is concerned, in many of my games the Seljuks conquer most of the Arab territory and all Arabia have left is Arabian Peninsula and Samarkand way up in Central Asia. So it makes sense to flip it historically, gameplay wise and aesthetically.

2) If Shiraz is independent, then it should also flip to the Seljuks; if its not than it shouldnt. Im guessing you already see the rationale for this one (Conquerers often leave indie behind).

3) For a more historical, Contigous Seljuk Empire divide the stacks into 3 and spawn them randomly in a number of given tiles.

-Iran/Mesopotamia: Spawns in randomly in tile between Shiraz and Baghdad. Near Baghdad if Shiraz is independent in which case the will flip to the Seljuks anyways.

-The Levant/Hejaz: Spawns randomly in any tile in between Makkah and Damascus.

-Anatolia: Spawns randomly in Anatolia.

These are just approximate tiles you should make the areas larger or smaller as you see fit. Also ull have to come up with the borders which i can help if you want?

4) Random Chances that Anatolia declares independence after the rise of the Khwarezm (that how Khawarezm will be represented for now since we dont have better naming system).

Mongol:

The Mongol conquest of the Middle East seems to be very sporadic. It would be alot better if you make it into waves. If im right Central Asia flips to the so what you should do is give them two stack for Persia (east and west) and on for Mesopotamia and the Levant.

Better Explained below:

The Mongols:

- Get a conquerors event for any civilizations (Seljuks) occupying Syria, Persia and Mesopotamia. They do not get a conquerers event for the Byzantines (unless they occupy the given territories and they dont get a conquerors event for the Arabs if the Seljuks have already taken the above territory from them since I dont want Mongols in the Arabian Peninsula or Egypt (most of the time).

-Your current conquerors event focuses on the civilization (not the territory) and depends on the Northern, Southern... cities. This is rather simplistic and should be changed. The Mongol Stack should be divided up according to territory and should not depend on how many civs there are; so heres what it will look like.

Persia: spawns on a random tile in Persia on City Lemming. Just make sure its not too close to Baghdad and is relatively East.

Mesopotamia/Syria: spawns on a random tile between Mesopotamia and Syria.

If it is possible, you should make sure they dont expand into North Africa or Arabia to random cities like Musqat or Benghazi.

-The barbarians in Central Asia need to be nerfed to as Samarkand is destroyed a lot.

I propose that you take them out on the whole now since they were supposed to represent the Turks anyways

In particular I was wondering if at least two people could try to complete the Safavid UHV to test for feasibility.

I'll have it done by next Friday or Saturday. Ill take some sceenshots and post it here. I have played the Safavids a couple of times, the thing that threw me off was the fact that I could never please the Europeans enough to open borders with me unless I decided not to convert to Shiite or even Sunni Islam.

If you are planning to start work again, I think it would be best to merge the new features from DOC first or if you don't want to start work on Europe yet and since fixing the Middle East would be a bit time consuming ( because Ill have to look at everything and see whats wrong; the fixing part would be easy), adding the Moors would be a nice project since they will have little affect on the balance.


A short list of what needs to be done in the Middle East is:

-Fix the Arab Conquests, city spots they settle, flps and add a new UHV.
-Fix the Seljuk conquests, flips, and introduce a system where they are weakened like Anatolia declaring independence.
-Fix the Mongol Conquests and spawn them correctly.
-New UHV for the Ottomans and fix their flips.
-Barbarians need to be fixed.
-Byzantine needs a new feature involving human type collapse.
Optional:
-Egyptians need to be added as a civ.
-Moors need to be added as a minor civ.

 

[Alexius08]

Russia will spawn conditionally any year from 1240 onwards if and only if at least half of its core cities are not Mongol.

When would Russia spawn if the human tries to start a game with them?

 

[Linkman226]

Lisboa should be founded ~27 BC by the Romans as Felicitas Julia Olisipo

Ah, if only the AI was that competent

When would Russia spawn if the human tries to start a game with them?

1240, the first date, as with the other conditional civ, the Byzantines.

 

[civ_king]

Ah, if only the AI was that competent



1240, the first date, as with the other conditional civ, the Byzantines.

Then spawn it for them!

PS Rome should improve Hispania very much, it was a very important thing for them

 

[The Turk]

Yes, having a Minor Moor civ, would be critical, and would remove that annoying Arab UHV to go after Spain -__-"

As for the Egyptians, I support instead a China type thing, where they respawn with a new LH such as Saladin/Baibars, Muhammad Ali Pasha and lastly Gamal Nasser, that would be ideal!

 

[Linkman226]

civ_king- Too scripted, IMO

The Turk- Minor? I was thinking a normal Moroccan civ.

Concerning the Egyptians, i will be working on a rebirth soon.

Right now I decided to enter a brave new world: Leaderhead making. I'm attempting a proper Shivaji Bhosle, I'll let you guys know how it goes...

 

[Leoreth]

Oh you're doing a Shivaji? Awesome!

 

[J. pride]

Ok, so I guess Ill start with all the changes required for the Arabs as agreed upon:

Terrain Changes/ City Placements:

Edit: I previously suggested moving Tebriz one tile north but the following might be a better idea; nonetheless the map changes and screenshots are still present at the end. You can choose whichever idea you like best (or none at all for that matter). The basic point of this suggestion is that the Early Middle East does not become as crowded as Europe while lacking the similar resources. Specifically so there are not 3 cities overlapping Baghdad in the early game. If Tabriz can be founded later on than that would be fine as my idea below demonstrates.

A) -Tabriz should not be founded by the Arabs that early it is too close to Isfahan and Baghdad; which results in all three cities useless and bad for gameplay; currently Tabriz seems to always be the first choice for the Arab settler that spawns in Baghdad; the city is settled somewhere around 70-90% of the time

-I suggest that you lower the value for Arabs settling Tabriz and instead encourage them to settle Isfahan . As recommended to Leoreth, I think that Isfahan should be the city founded by the Arabs and the Safavids should spawn in Tabriz (right now it is the other way around with Tabriz being already founded and the Safavids spawning at Isfahan). Then in 1600, there can be capital change enacted for them. This would also be historically more accurate as the Saffaviya movement started in North Western Iran and Tebriz was the first capital of Iran.

B) In the game Upper Egypt/ The Sudan is an extremely food rich area which is simply not true. I have had plenty of games where Kharijah was a larger than Cairo. On the contrary, while the Sudan was rich in gold, incense and ivory in the middle ages it wasnt that rich (agriculture wise) nor is it now. So I have made a couple of terrain changes; I don't recommend that you use them on the 3000 bc map since it might make Egypt and Ethiopia unbalanced but they are definitely applicable for 600 ad map. Here they are (The terrain changes for A and B can be found in the attachment below):


As you can see the following changes were made:

1) A couple of floodplains were removed from the Sudan.

2) The cotton in Sub-Saharan Africa was tranferred to Egypt; this is because Cotton is the staple of Egypt, additionally Egypt was renowned in the middle ages as the cotton producing center of the Arab world.

3) A floodplain was added under the marble in lower Egypt. I see no geographical or historical reason why it was removed. Cairo was on several occasions the largest cities in the world in the late middle ages. While I would not pursue representing this in the game, i think the floodplain will help Cairo grow just a little bit bigger, especially now as it is the capital of respawned Egypt.

C) As you know, with the recent adjustments the AI Arabia always founds a city in Upper Egypt which is fine except that the city founded is most of the times called Al-Kharijah. It would be extremely inaccurate to name the city on the west bank of the Nile into Al-Kharijah; It should be called Luxor (Al-Uqsur in arabic). Al kharijah is a meagre oasis 350 km west of the nile while it is Luxor that should occupy that tile. Not only is it more accurate but also because Luxor is the single most important ciy in Upper Egypt/ Nubia. (i have already made the change, u can download it from the attachment below)

D) Lower the Settler values for the following tiles in Arabia; because these cities represent Al-Kuwait which wasn't founded until the 1900s by the British in the middle of the desert and b) they overlap Baghdad. Just so you have an idea these are the tiles im talking about:


E) Remove the copper and mine from Cyprus in 600 ad; it really doesnt affect gameplay since Cyprus is not in any cities cross but it does look useless and aesthetically unpleasing.

For Your Convenience, I have already made the map changes/ city name changes which include:

-The terrain changes around Sudan as stated above.

-Changed the road a little bit around Persia (linking Shiraz to a road; just look at the attachment to get a better idea).

-Added the Sphinx and Granary in Cairo and a market and a wall in Tisfun (This is to give those cities just a little added boost).

-Moved the Sheep near Trapezues one tile lower (near Damascus) and added a clam above Trapezues to make up for it; this will not be much of a boost but will make both cities grow a little bit higher which is always a good thing.

-Corrected the name for Al-Kharijah.

-The barb.py is only updated because the Baku spawn was on; i disabled that in order for Tabriz to get founded.

Files can be found at the bottom But you still have to fix the settler map for the new Tabriz tile and Kuwait in CvRhyes.cpp since i'm having problems with compiling and without compiling Tabriz will still get founded on the same spot no matter how many terrain changes.

Arab Conquests:

Currently the Arab AI gets more than enough troops to conquer the Middle East but as seen in most game it does not do that. This is mainly because the AI just fortifies them or wastes them in Anatolia. The number of troops that the Arab AI gets are the following:

2 Camel Archers and 2 Archers initially.
5 Camel Archers and 4 Swordsmen after city flip.

-The 2 initial Camel Archers for the Arabs are useless. The AI uses them to explore Arabia most of the time. What I suggest you do is spawn them after the flip near Libya and Persia alike. You can give them a command like this UnitAITypes.UNITAI_ATTACK_CITY, DirectionTypes.DIRECTION_SOUTH)
to help them with the direction (East for Persia, West for Libya). So they can spawn west of Alexander and East of Baghdad alike. So what you can do for the AI is 2/3 separate spawns:

-One stack spawns with 2 Camel Archers and a swordsmen on a random tile in Libya.

-One spawns on a random tile in Persia with 3 Camel Archers and moves westwards

-One stack spawns just south of Central Asia and moves north wards with 2 Camel Archers.

(For each spawn, you should give them an area in which they randomly spawn)

And Instead of having so many swordsmen, they should get Longbowmen or Archers after they conquer a city to hold on to their gains mainly from Barbarians.

Note: All of these suggestions should only be for the AI and should not affect Human players as the Human aspect is just fine.

Flips:

--The Arabs have 50/50 chance of making either Cairo or Baghdad their capital; this was great in DOC but should not occur in your mod since you have/ are going to add the Egyptians. It would make sense that your capital always be Baghdad as Cairo is going to flip to the Egyptians.

--Flip Damascus to the Arabs as they don't seem to conquer it and that defeats the whole purpose of adding the city.

Both of these features are implemented in DOC so you can just import but I have a feeling that would take longer.

New UHV:

--Conquer (or settle) Mesopotamia, Levant, Egypt, Persia, Central Asia, Afghanistan, Spain, Libya, Maghreb (4 cities minimum) and Constantinople by 900 or 1000 AD. (This represents the Ummayad Empire). The long list isnt really necessary; in a short phrase you can say to conquer North Africa, Middle East, Central Asia and Constantinople.

--Make Baghdad the largest and most productive city in the world and build the Dome of the Rock, La Meszique, Spiral Minarat, Imam Hussain Mosque , an Acadamy in Baghdad (to represent the House of Wisdom) and the Masjid-al-Haram by 1150-1200 ad. (Represents both but mainly the Abbassids)

--Be the tech leader in 1300 ad. (Represents the Islamic Golden Age).

The reason I replaced the spread the Islam to 40% of the world is that with all these extra civilizations it becomes a whole lot easier for that to happen; for example:

-Leoreth has made a partial system where Islam is likely to spread to Indonesia after a certain date; Indonesia grows pretty big.
-Having an Egyptian Civ means that there will be more and larger cities in Egypt (growing Islam).
-You and/or Leoreth plan on adding the Mughals which will make Islam a whole lot more larger with Indias population especially Delhi which reaches 17.
-Leoreth plans on adding a Morrocan Civilization.
-The Seljuks spread Islam to all the cities missed by the Arabs.

In the last game I was playing Islam was at 27% and I could have easily spread it to 40% just by gifting persecuters and missionaries to the Mughals, Mongols and the Indonesians as they were like half the population.

I think my current goals are pretty good, historical and gameplay wise challanging.

 

[Linkman226]

Hey guys, I'm back after a three-day ban.

Thanks, J.Pride. I'll add what I think is appropriate from that list.

In other news, Shivaji is coming along quite nicely . I'm beginning to overcome my fear of all things graphical

 

[J. pride]

Hey guys, I'm back after a three-day ban.

Thanks, J.Pride. I'll add what I think is appropriate from that list.

Didnt know you were banned, Howd you get banned?

OK, there might be some confusion on my idea on Tabriz as i edited it; my first one was moving the city one tile north and the second one was spawning the Safavids in Tabriz and having Esfahan being the city that is founded early (it is the other way around right now with Tabriz being founded early and Esfahan often spawing with the Persians). I was too lazy to reupdate the map or take out the pics at the end from my first idea so I just wanted to let you know so you dont get confused.

Also after you are done, let me know I will post on the next civ in chronological order? Also who do you want to edit next, the Byzantines or the Egytians (or do you have somebody else in mind)?

 

[Linkman226]

Off topic, but there was some guy saying it was a good thing the Iran-Iraq war happened (because it distracted America's enemies) and that America should sell weapons to the Saudis and Iran to make it happen all over again between those two. I cursed him out for ignoring the chemical warfare, deaths, etc., and then defended my cursing by saying that he was as worthy of flaming as a neo-Nazi or a supporter of the Janjaweed.

And I'll let you know about what's next, when I'm done.