Question about Manipulating Anarchy Periods in Multiplayer

[theperezident]

Hi all! New poster, long-time lurker on these forums here. I wanted to ask anyone's opinion on the following issue I'm looking to address.

In the "Future" multiplayer scenario that is very popular in the CivPlayers Civ 3 League group, based off the Future start mod that came pre-packaged with Conquests, all players start on turn 0 by changing governments from Despotism to whatever gov they wish to play throughout the game.

For Religious civilizations, this is easy enough, you can switch to your new government on turn 2, no questions asked. However, for non-Religious civs, anarchy is VERY random, spanning from 2-6 turns, completely RNG based. "Future" is the only common multiplayer mod that uses government changes like this, besides the "Modern" multiplayer mod, which guarantees that all Civilizations are Religious.

My goal is to implement a system where Religious civs still maintain a tempo advantage in game with their short anarchy, but for non-Religious players to have a consistent anarchy period that isn't so inconsistent, adding to the incredible uncertainty that already exists in MP games (land imbalance, resource imbalance, random Civilizations, etc.)

Despite my best efforts to scour the internet for resources, and even attempting to hex-edit my .biq files, I've found no way to create a fixed anarchy period for non-religious civs. I've even attempted some unconventional workarounds, such as all governments being locked behind a technology that is researched in 4-5 turns with no science spending (default citizens produce science in Future), but that punishes players that would otherwise spend their 4-5 turn anarchy moving their settler to a better starting location, as they don't start researching until their capital is planted and their citizen starts producing science.

I'm open to any ideas/brainstorms here, I appreciate your time and attention!

 

[Civinator]

theperezident, welcome at CFC!

The marvelous Flintlock Mod holds a fix for this problem for single player games with the GOG (or steam) version of Civ 3 Complete:

The problem is, that multiplayer is not officially supported by this mod, but some features will work in MP. So you have to try, if this feature will work for MP, too.

Without this mod the question arises what will happen, when the "government" Anarchy is set to an era None tech or if it can be completely thrown out of the game. I have never tested this with an editor but if this should work this second way can only cut out Anarchy but not dim it down to more tolerable values.

 

[Fergei]

If you can't find a solution from the above post I would suggest modifying the government type 'anarchy' so it is much more mild. For example, comparable productivity with the least productive government type in your mod but with a lower max tech rate (the lowest you can go is 50%).

Its not meeting your requirements but it would reduce the RND impact amongst non-religious Civs.

This is what i did for single player.


Anarchy
- Corruption reduced to Rampant (permitting continued teching and building)
- AI now endure a maximum Anarchy duration much closer to the human player
- Tech rate capped at 50% (the minimum selectable)
- Buildings require maintenance.
- Cost per unit 1, free unit support at 4/4/4

 

[theperezident]

I'm actually quite familiar with Flintlock's C3X mod! I've been working on a separate passion project scenario using the special abilities from his extension I was also able to get into the "injected_code" C file and change the "anarchy reduction" mechanic to a more standardized "If Religious => 2t anarchy, else => 4t anarchy". Unfortunately, this only works for my computer when I'm hosting the MP game, and the same anarchy mechanics cannot apply to other players (which I've tested), unless they install the C3X mod + have the right scenario .ini file, which isn't practical for the less tech-savvy players.

For government types that are either the "default type" or the "transition type", the editor bars you from setting a tech wall

The "watering down" of anarchy has been the approach I have been taking recently (no tile penalty & irrigation is faster so cities can grow, but no shields/gold still) to make the random period less painful for non-Religious players. It feels a little unnatural, since anarchy is more or less supposed to just be the "walk settler until you find best capital location" period, but it's currently my best solution.

 

[Civinator]

Set government Despotism as Transition Type and at least remove the setting Transition Type from government Anarchy (better to set Anarchy additionally to an era none tech or remove it).

Now all civs start with Despotism in "Anarchy" and in my test in the next turn the change to another government was possible.