Paun polje
Chieftain
- Joined
- Jun 18, 2024
- Messages
- 4
Hello,
First of all I would like to compliment all the hard work and effort that is emitting from this mod. I look at realism invictus as THE perfected civilization game formula (and 4X subgenre for that matter). I have been playing civ games (civ4+mods and civ5) for 15 around years, and this mod the last 4 years (mostly scenarios, around monarch difficulty). I am really eager to share my thoughts about RI and would be honored if my suggestions come true.
1. Spies in diplomacy
Spies are not able to influence diplomacy (the AI will just revert back to its civic choice in case of change civics mission). They could generate -/+1 or -/+2 to leader attitude. This would influence the AI to wage war against one another, have more favorable attitude towards the player, pit vassal against master, make the two strongest civs fight one another etc. This way espionage is important for a diplomatic victory.
2. Capturing cities
2.1. Spawning levy units around the razed city is a great idea, but they always get taken out easily in the next turn. When razing a city, some of its population should go to the population of neighbouring cities. This would give them a production boost, especially to training new levy units.
2.2. Is it possible to move a city to the adjacent tile after capturing it? This would eliminate razing the city and then developing a new one to an adjacent tile for better yields. This could also be used by a conquering AI to better suit its city preferences. There are also historical cases of city relocation, although not by a large amount. Maybe even giving an option for city relocating once per city? This could help if new resources are discovered but are just out of reach as a city yield (a really disappointing feeling).
3. City names
The dynamic naming of newly founded cities is perfect! Just not too predictable and not to outlandish. To take it a step further, maybe dividing the names to coastal ones and land-locked ones? The first 10ish city names could follow this rule, but the next ones do not (since the names begin to be of significantly smaller cities throughout history). This is kind of a stretch because there are so many city names and civs that are almost exclusively maritime (Scandinavia, Austronesia, Japan) or land based (Mongolia, Transoxiana, Hungary).
4. Religions
Is there a plan to divide the big religions and make it playable? Christianity divided to Orthodoxy, Catholicism and Protestantism? Islam divided to Sunni, Shia, Ibadi etc.? Dividing it in the renaissance era, maybe giving each a new wonder? At least in the Europe scenario. It would allow religion to be a more viable option in the second half of the game. Solar cult is a weird abstract foundable religion because multiple solar cults existed simultaneously (one could argue every pagan religion is a solar deity). Also, it has by far the best religion bonus in -10% maintenance cost for cities.
5. Culture spreading
5.1. Culture spreads to tiles by distance rather then by plot type. For example a city should give severely less culture to tiles which are across a mountain range or across water (or maybe even across the other side of the river?). This would be realistic since the biggest culture dividers are mountains and seas. This culture difference could be nullified by the late game with techs or even be a civ specific thing (the Incas spreading culture across mountains easier than Hungary or England, Austronesia having no penalty for culture spreading across water tiles).
5.2. Culture borders around islands are really weird. On the island outside of culture borders there is 0 culture, but on its coastal tile there is the standard amount. And some further away islands don't have culture at all, the border just kind of goes around it. And sometimes a 2-tile island has one tile in the territory and the second one outside of it. I don't know if it's a bug or I am just stupid to figure out a pattern.
5.3. Cottages (all the way up to towns) should produce culture (or at least produce a bonus). It is realistic that a city surrounded by farms or mines is not equally culturally producing as a city surrounded by towns. Cottages (all the way up to towns) could also add up to the total population count of a civ and could spawn a levy unit upon their pillaging.
6. New AI leader distinctive qualities
6.1. Frequency of changing capitals: The AI almost never does this and even keeps the capital at the corner of the empire. It also badly places the Forbidden palace national wonder).
6.2. The density of settling cities: I find this seriously needing. It is a big difference if the cities have many overlapping tiles both for economy and for culture wars. The AI settling is too predictable and doesn't make sense that bustling India or China has city frequency placements the same as for example Arabia, Zululand or the Incas. This means that on resource rich starting areas (India and China) there are more but weaker cities as opposed to fewer but powerful (this is both more realistic and makes them less OP). This should add a great deal of variety to the world map and the late game.
6.3. A proclivity towards settling next certain plot types or a resource: Meaning maritime civs stay maritime, the Incas and Spain always next to hills, America and Rome settling everywhere, Mongolia preferring steppes, Greece being coastal and on islands, Portugal wanting lots of overseas cities whereas China doesn't etc.
6.4. The attitude towards vassal states: This just means some leaders take in many vassals and some don't (they finish the job and destroy the other side). This means less awkward 1 or 2 city vassal civs that don't impact the game. Mid game the strongest civ will often have many vassals and become unstoppable (the only hope is their economy and techs stagnating, meaning a less powerful military).
7. New features
7.1. Can civ starting locations on custom games be close to their respective unique improvement resource? Also civs which are geographically closer could start closer, for example all European civs on one part of the map and Asian on the other? It would be much more realistic and can be an off/on game option.
7.2. Will natural wonders be a thing? Giving bonus yields to a tile similar to civ 5.
7.3. Also one of the few good editions from civ 5 is a need for a specific tile for a certain wonder. Can this be used in the mod? The Pyramids requiring desert, the Hanging gardens requiring a river, Bamyan Buddha statues requiring a mountain etc?
7.4. Adding a building that boosts the yields of fresh water lake tiles would be really good. Without that you are stuck with a mere +2 food and +1 commerce bonus for a landlocked city. So maybe adding a version of fishing docks/lighthouse/shipyard for lake tiles in the renaissance/industrial era?
7.5. Why wouldn't you be able to grow a forest on a tile? At least in the industrial era when cultivation is available.
7.6. Unhappiness can destroy something important like a forge, a jeweler or a market (causing more unhappiness). Even better if unhappiness only causes improvements to be destroyed instead of buildings? This would come at a perfect time when workers become kind of unneeded in the midgame (late medieval, renaissance era) and there is a stagnation in city growth. All of the tiles have improvements on them (paved roads can be built earlier) so rebuilding the improvements would give workers something to do. Workers again become important only when mechanized farms (i don't know why they are a last renaissance tech, instead of a first industrial tech) and railroads appear.
7.7. It is kind of weird for some civs to have more ancient leaders and some to have more modern ones in the same game. Maybe adding an option to spawn only ancient or only medieval or only modern leaders for a custom game?
8. New civs and resources
8.1. Of course no thread is complete without asking for new civs. Are there any plans for that? Full-fleshed out Portugal, the Netherlands, Indochina (Burma, Siam, Cambodia, Vietnam), a Mesopotamian civ (Akadia, Assyria, Babylon, Iraq), the Levant civ (Phoenicians, Israel, Lebanon, Syria), a south slavic/Balkan civ (Bulgaria, Serbia, Romania), a Guarani/Paraguay civ, Swahili or Bengali civ?
8.2. I would suggest even dividing the Transoxianan civ into its northern Turkic part (the Khazars, the Golden horde, the Tatars) and southern (the Uzbeks, the Tajiks, Afghanistan, Bactria). Transoxiana is a broad term and I think this split could work.
8.3. New important real-world resources: gourd fruits (the Americas are in need of a healthy food resource), forest fruits (Europe lacks a healthy food resource), cocoa maybe?
9. Buffes and nerfes
- increased chance of resource discovering on civ specific improvements (maybe once per era, in later eras discovering more frequent?)
- seaside resorts come really late (at the end of the game basically, bonus also not relevant for any victory)
- hot springs terrain feature bonus is weak (would add +2 commerce and -2% epidemic chance even), hot springs park improvement is never worth it (would add +2 happiness and -4% epidemic chance)
- the AI regularly sabotages the clock tower building with spies, upping the cost of its hammers or espionage points would help (a couple of turns longer build is not much)
- some of the late game civics have a bonus on improvement building turns, this bonus is negligible since it is faster to just have more workers (I see it only being useful in building railroads all-around but still weak) and it is just better to have other civic's bonuses
- the colossus starts out as an ok wonder (assuming of course you have lots of coastal cities) but it gives an insane advantage in the medieval era, so maybe giving only one city +2/+3 commerce per water tile
- the Kremlin's reduced maintenance bonus is either really good or essential (high probability that you will have lots of cities), so maybe a -5% cost on maintenance or acting as another Forbidden palace/Versailles
- the Sistine chapel is THE most OP wonder, at max +1 culture per specialist (easy win in culture wars, easy culture victory, should be built even if not going for culture victory so the AI doesn't get it)
10. Scenario feedback
10.1. Will there be an option to have other leaders leading their civs in scenarios? This would skyrocket their playability and fix some things. For example often in World map Huge scenario Arabia is weak from the start because it gets out-cultured by Ramesses and Zara Yaqob, Cyrus dies because he doesn't build many units, Caesar doesn't conquer, Russia is isolationist, Ashoka is a cultural powerhouse, Robert the Bruce does nothing the whole game.
10.2. I am in love with the Crusades scenario. It is magical and fun in every way.
10.3. The Deluge scenario is ok. I really like its smaller scale and zoomed in map. It has a spelling error in the city of Skojpe instead of Skopje.
10.4 The Europe scenario is really lackluster. Only a third of the map is the actual Europe. If you just rotate the map section counterclockwise a little bit you would not have empty swaths of Sahara and Siberia. The map looks really off because every European tile has a river on it and because of the artificial limiting mountain ranges. Northern Africa is as green as Europe is. Resources are REALLY unevenly spread. I don't know why Germany, Ireland, Britain, Greece or Egypt have this many variety of resources. On the other hand some barren places have the space for a new civ. Places like Catalonia, the Balkan (outside of Greece) or the Eurasian steppe (I get the empty steppes idea but that only applies to an ancient world scenario not a medieval/renaissance Europe). Chernozem and Androsol can be discovered late in the game with a technology so that Ukraine/new steppe civ doesn't became too powerful early on.
I guess the scenario is trying to have strong civ core areas, and weaker border cities. The main problem is that it can't decide if it is an ancient world scenario (Mediterranean + Middle east) or a medieval/renaissance Europe scenario. I would opt for the latter or splitting the scenario into two. Only a Europe map with many secondary civs would be the best. There would be space to fill the map with Scotland, Wales, Norway/Vikings, Denmark, Catalonia, Cordoba, Lombardia, Venice, Naples, Aquitania, Burgundy, the Swiss, Austria, Bohemia, Serbia, Bulgaria, Romania, the Crimean Tatars, the Ottomans, the Khazars, Georgia, Novgorod, Lithuania). New European resources can be added exclusively to this scenario to replace the bonuses of corn, potatoes, sugar, silk etc.
10.5. Triassic Period Earth is good also. In the middle of the map there are many civs but few resources, no rivers and even no forests. Is this a deliberate choice to make the more central civs weaker and more faraway civs stronger? The edges of Pangea are clear resource hotspots.
I think there are some mistakes. The Sahelian empire has a Berber leader (Ahmad al-Mansur) and Berber city names. I believe the starting positions of Carthage and Berbers are accidentally switched? Also the starting positions of South China and Taiwan are switched. Shouldn't Japan be on the northeast part of the continent (there is clearly space and resources) instead of next to Russia and Ukraine? I think Persia is in place of the Khmers (there is an empty space between Ukraine and Mongolia where Persia can fit.
10.6. The World map Huge scenario is amazing! The map design and resource distribution is really good. Needing Patagonian open borders to circumnavigate the globe, tribal forts acting as expansion limiters, having just perfect amount of rivers, every civ having space for a couple of starting cities are just some examples of how well-thought-out this scenario is.
I have only minor nitpicks with the map:
- adding more variety of resources in the Atlas mountain region (the Berbers and Cartage always get destroyed early on and the area in general has less settleable places)
- more resources in the Swahili lands (there is a much less incentive to capture this area in comparison to the Americas)
- adding resources in the Caribbean (I don't know why it is almost empty, it would allow the Mayans to not be destroyed every time in the early classical age)
- removing tribal forts from Hittite and Ugarit barbarian cities, this creates a barrier and causes Pericles is to wage war only with Russia and Tigranes to demolish Babylon and Persia since they have no other place to expand (this also breaks civilization the continuum from Portugal to India)
- nerfing the two Chinas somehow, in classical age one beats the other and just stacks vassal states throughout the game (adding tribal forts in Yi, Ba and Lac Viet cities or generally more barbarian presence)
To anyone who reads this I thank you for your time. This took a while to compile. I wanted to stick to the point of a suggestion. If need be I will further elaborate on something said here. If something doesn't make sense or I am wrong please let me know.
Cheers!
First of all I would like to compliment all the hard work and effort that is emitting from this mod. I look at realism invictus as THE perfected civilization game formula (and 4X subgenre for that matter). I have been playing civ games (civ4+mods and civ5) for 15 around years, and this mod the last 4 years (mostly scenarios, around monarch difficulty). I am really eager to share my thoughts about RI and would be honored if my suggestions come true.
1. Spies in diplomacy
Spies are not able to influence diplomacy (the AI will just revert back to its civic choice in case of change civics mission). They could generate -/+1 or -/+2 to leader attitude. This would influence the AI to wage war against one another, have more favorable attitude towards the player, pit vassal against master, make the two strongest civs fight one another etc. This way espionage is important for a diplomatic victory.
2. Capturing cities
2.1. Spawning levy units around the razed city is a great idea, but they always get taken out easily in the next turn. When razing a city, some of its population should go to the population of neighbouring cities. This would give them a production boost, especially to training new levy units.
2.2. Is it possible to move a city to the adjacent tile after capturing it? This would eliminate razing the city and then developing a new one to an adjacent tile for better yields. This could also be used by a conquering AI to better suit its city preferences. There are also historical cases of city relocation, although not by a large amount. Maybe even giving an option for city relocating once per city? This could help if new resources are discovered but are just out of reach as a city yield (a really disappointing feeling).
3. City names
The dynamic naming of newly founded cities is perfect! Just not too predictable and not to outlandish. To take it a step further, maybe dividing the names to coastal ones and land-locked ones? The first 10ish city names could follow this rule, but the next ones do not (since the names begin to be of significantly smaller cities throughout history). This is kind of a stretch because there are so many city names and civs that are almost exclusively maritime (Scandinavia, Austronesia, Japan) or land based (Mongolia, Transoxiana, Hungary).
4. Religions
Is there a plan to divide the big religions and make it playable? Christianity divided to Orthodoxy, Catholicism and Protestantism? Islam divided to Sunni, Shia, Ibadi etc.? Dividing it in the renaissance era, maybe giving each a new wonder? At least in the Europe scenario. It would allow religion to be a more viable option in the second half of the game. Solar cult is a weird abstract foundable religion because multiple solar cults existed simultaneously (one could argue every pagan religion is a solar deity). Also, it has by far the best religion bonus in -10% maintenance cost for cities.
5. Culture spreading
5.1. Culture spreads to tiles by distance rather then by plot type. For example a city should give severely less culture to tiles which are across a mountain range or across water (or maybe even across the other side of the river?). This would be realistic since the biggest culture dividers are mountains and seas. This culture difference could be nullified by the late game with techs or even be a civ specific thing (the Incas spreading culture across mountains easier than Hungary or England, Austronesia having no penalty for culture spreading across water tiles).
5.2. Culture borders around islands are really weird. On the island outside of culture borders there is 0 culture, but on its coastal tile there is the standard amount. And some further away islands don't have culture at all, the border just kind of goes around it. And sometimes a 2-tile island has one tile in the territory and the second one outside of it. I don't know if it's a bug or I am just stupid to figure out a pattern.
5.3. Cottages (all the way up to towns) should produce culture (or at least produce a bonus). It is realistic that a city surrounded by farms or mines is not equally culturally producing as a city surrounded by towns. Cottages (all the way up to towns) could also add up to the total population count of a civ and could spawn a levy unit upon their pillaging.
6. New AI leader distinctive qualities
6.1. Frequency of changing capitals: The AI almost never does this and even keeps the capital at the corner of the empire. It also badly places the Forbidden palace national wonder).
6.2. The density of settling cities: I find this seriously needing. It is a big difference if the cities have many overlapping tiles both for economy and for culture wars. The AI settling is too predictable and doesn't make sense that bustling India or China has city frequency placements the same as for example Arabia, Zululand or the Incas. This means that on resource rich starting areas (India and China) there are more but weaker cities as opposed to fewer but powerful (this is both more realistic and makes them less OP). This should add a great deal of variety to the world map and the late game.
6.3. A proclivity towards settling next certain plot types or a resource: Meaning maritime civs stay maritime, the Incas and Spain always next to hills, America and Rome settling everywhere, Mongolia preferring steppes, Greece being coastal and on islands, Portugal wanting lots of overseas cities whereas China doesn't etc.
6.4. The attitude towards vassal states: This just means some leaders take in many vassals and some don't (they finish the job and destroy the other side). This means less awkward 1 or 2 city vassal civs that don't impact the game. Mid game the strongest civ will often have many vassals and become unstoppable (the only hope is their economy and techs stagnating, meaning a less powerful military).
7. New features
7.1. Can civ starting locations on custom games be close to their respective unique improvement resource? Also civs which are geographically closer could start closer, for example all European civs on one part of the map and Asian on the other? It would be much more realistic and can be an off/on game option.
7.2. Will natural wonders be a thing? Giving bonus yields to a tile similar to civ 5.
7.3. Also one of the few good editions from civ 5 is a need for a specific tile for a certain wonder. Can this be used in the mod? The Pyramids requiring desert, the Hanging gardens requiring a river, Bamyan Buddha statues requiring a mountain etc?
7.4. Adding a building that boosts the yields of fresh water lake tiles would be really good. Without that you are stuck with a mere +2 food and +1 commerce bonus for a landlocked city. So maybe adding a version of fishing docks/lighthouse/shipyard for lake tiles in the renaissance/industrial era?
7.5. Why wouldn't you be able to grow a forest on a tile? At least in the industrial era when cultivation is available.
7.6. Unhappiness can destroy something important like a forge, a jeweler or a market (causing more unhappiness). Even better if unhappiness only causes improvements to be destroyed instead of buildings? This would come at a perfect time when workers become kind of unneeded in the midgame (late medieval, renaissance era) and there is a stagnation in city growth. All of the tiles have improvements on them (paved roads can be built earlier) so rebuilding the improvements would give workers something to do. Workers again become important only when mechanized farms (i don't know why they are a last renaissance tech, instead of a first industrial tech) and railroads appear.
7.7. It is kind of weird for some civs to have more ancient leaders and some to have more modern ones in the same game. Maybe adding an option to spawn only ancient or only medieval or only modern leaders for a custom game?
8. New civs and resources
8.1. Of course no thread is complete without asking for new civs. Are there any plans for that? Full-fleshed out Portugal, the Netherlands, Indochina (Burma, Siam, Cambodia, Vietnam), a Mesopotamian civ (Akadia, Assyria, Babylon, Iraq), the Levant civ (Phoenicians, Israel, Lebanon, Syria), a south slavic/Balkan civ (Bulgaria, Serbia, Romania), a Guarani/Paraguay civ, Swahili or Bengali civ?
8.2. I would suggest even dividing the Transoxianan civ into its northern Turkic part (the Khazars, the Golden horde, the Tatars) and southern (the Uzbeks, the Tajiks, Afghanistan, Bactria). Transoxiana is a broad term and I think this split could work.
8.3. New important real-world resources: gourd fruits (the Americas are in need of a healthy food resource), forest fruits (Europe lacks a healthy food resource), cocoa maybe?
9. Buffes and nerfes
- increased chance of resource discovering on civ specific improvements (maybe once per era, in later eras discovering more frequent?)
- seaside resorts come really late (at the end of the game basically, bonus also not relevant for any victory)
- hot springs terrain feature bonus is weak (would add +2 commerce and -2% epidemic chance even), hot springs park improvement is never worth it (would add +2 happiness and -4% epidemic chance)
- the AI regularly sabotages the clock tower building with spies, upping the cost of its hammers or espionage points would help (a couple of turns longer build is not much)
- some of the late game civics have a bonus on improvement building turns, this bonus is negligible since it is faster to just have more workers (I see it only being useful in building railroads all-around but still weak) and it is just better to have other civic's bonuses
- the colossus starts out as an ok wonder (assuming of course you have lots of coastal cities) but it gives an insane advantage in the medieval era, so maybe giving only one city +2/+3 commerce per water tile
- the Kremlin's reduced maintenance bonus is either really good or essential (high probability that you will have lots of cities), so maybe a -5% cost on maintenance or acting as another Forbidden palace/Versailles
- the Sistine chapel is THE most OP wonder, at max +1 culture per specialist (easy win in culture wars, easy culture victory, should be built even if not going for culture victory so the AI doesn't get it)
10. Scenario feedback
10.1. Will there be an option to have other leaders leading their civs in scenarios? This would skyrocket their playability and fix some things. For example often in World map Huge scenario Arabia is weak from the start because it gets out-cultured by Ramesses and Zara Yaqob, Cyrus dies because he doesn't build many units, Caesar doesn't conquer, Russia is isolationist, Ashoka is a cultural powerhouse, Robert the Bruce does nothing the whole game.
10.2. I am in love with the Crusades scenario. It is magical and fun in every way.
10.3. The Deluge scenario is ok. I really like its smaller scale and zoomed in map. It has a spelling error in the city of Skojpe instead of Skopje.
10.4 The Europe scenario is really lackluster. Only a third of the map is the actual Europe. If you just rotate the map section counterclockwise a little bit you would not have empty swaths of Sahara and Siberia. The map looks really off because every European tile has a river on it and because of the artificial limiting mountain ranges. Northern Africa is as green as Europe is. Resources are REALLY unevenly spread. I don't know why Germany, Ireland, Britain, Greece or Egypt have this many variety of resources. On the other hand some barren places have the space for a new civ. Places like Catalonia, the Balkan (outside of Greece) or the Eurasian steppe (I get the empty steppes idea but that only applies to an ancient world scenario not a medieval/renaissance Europe). Chernozem and Androsol can be discovered late in the game with a technology so that Ukraine/new steppe civ doesn't became too powerful early on.
I guess the scenario is trying to have strong civ core areas, and weaker border cities. The main problem is that it can't decide if it is an ancient world scenario (Mediterranean + Middle east) or a medieval/renaissance Europe scenario. I would opt for the latter or splitting the scenario into two. Only a Europe map with many secondary civs would be the best. There would be space to fill the map with Scotland, Wales, Norway/Vikings, Denmark, Catalonia, Cordoba, Lombardia, Venice, Naples, Aquitania, Burgundy, the Swiss, Austria, Bohemia, Serbia, Bulgaria, Romania, the Crimean Tatars, the Ottomans, the Khazars, Georgia, Novgorod, Lithuania). New European resources can be added exclusively to this scenario to replace the bonuses of corn, potatoes, sugar, silk etc.
10.5. Triassic Period Earth is good also. In the middle of the map there are many civs but few resources, no rivers and even no forests. Is this a deliberate choice to make the more central civs weaker and more faraway civs stronger? The edges of Pangea are clear resource hotspots.
I think there are some mistakes. The Sahelian empire has a Berber leader (Ahmad al-Mansur) and Berber city names. I believe the starting positions of Carthage and Berbers are accidentally switched? Also the starting positions of South China and Taiwan are switched. Shouldn't Japan be on the northeast part of the continent (there is clearly space and resources) instead of next to Russia and Ukraine? I think Persia is in place of the Khmers (there is an empty space between Ukraine and Mongolia where Persia can fit.
10.6. The World map Huge scenario is amazing! The map design and resource distribution is really good. Needing Patagonian open borders to circumnavigate the globe, tribal forts acting as expansion limiters, having just perfect amount of rivers, every civ having space for a couple of starting cities are just some examples of how well-thought-out this scenario is.
I have only minor nitpicks with the map:
- adding more variety of resources in the Atlas mountain region (the Berbers and Cartage always get destroyed early on and the area in general has less settleable places)
- more resources in the Swahili lands (there is a much less incentive to capture this area in comparison to the Americas)
- adding resources in the Caribbean (I don't know why it is almost empty, it would allow the Mayans to not be destroyed every time in the early classical age)
- removing tribal forts from Hittite and Ugarit barbarian cities, this creates a barrier and causes Pericles is to wage war only with Russia and Tigranes to demolish Babylon and Persia since they have no other place to expand (this also breaks civilization the continuum from Portugal to India)
- nerfing the two Chinas somehow, in classical age one beats the other and just stacks vassal states throughout the game (adding tribal forts in Yi, Ba and Lac Viet cities or generally more barbarian presence)
To anyone who reads this I thank you for your time. This took a while to compile. I wanted to stick to the point of a suggestion. If need be I will further elaborate on something said here. If something doesn't make sense or I am wrong please let me know.
Cheers!
