Quick Questions , Quick Answers

[Thunderbrd]

R U kidding me?
Civ4 - Rhye's and Fall of Civilization | CivFanatics Forums
I've definitely mentioned it previously as well, when speaking about "making a Real World scenario".
It has "core areas" for nations on the map, which could be easily translated into Cultures needing not resources, but literal geographic spots.
Again, you might simply not WANT it, so that's that - and I understand it.
But to me, it'd be a great implementation of Cultures being represented by geography itself.
It would certainly feel more "realistic" to be able to gain Cultures by territorial conquest, as opposed to random resource hoarding.
Better yet, if it was made dependent on having a city in that Culture's "core area" - which is more or less how Real Life Cultures work in the first place.
And/or you could make Settlers carry more than just Major Culture Groups with them, but actually Minor Cultures as well.
That's how actual migration works to begin with - and it'd be a great point towards "immersion" in regards to Cultures.
Oh, and I do realize that all of that would ONLY work on a pre-made Earth map - but we have a great one already, and it could be a mod-mod in the first place.
But, again, if you are NOT interested in any of it - it's YOUR mod, so that's that.
Sorry, I'm just getting overly exited over such stuff, lol.

I have something in mind that would work a little like this eventually. I asked to be clear because RFC might've been a different game - I haven't played that particular mod though I'm very familiar with Rhye's being one and the general idea of each civ having a 'peak' period.

A side question (though inspired by the previous post).
Is it hard to implement "Promotion => Unit Evolution"?
Like, say, ["Brute" + "Club" Promotion => "Clubman"].
As opposed to the typical ["Brute" + "Club" Tech => "Clubman"] instead.
The point being something like making Cultures influence Promotions of the units built in the city.
So you don't have, say, "Neanderthal Clubman" as a stand-alone unit option, but you just have "Clubman", which can get "Culture Promoted" to "Neanderthal Clubman" either on birth or on city entering.
That way you could have much less units in your Building Screen, and actually be able to even switch a unit's Culture around on a whim (using something like a "Re-Trainer" unit that would "share" its Culture with its trainees, lol).
Again, wild ideas all over the place, sorry.
But you never know.

Equipment would somewhat work in this manner, but it does need to be an option so must work in addition to the 'typical' method as well.

 

[Somebody613]

My point is that it'd be quite fun to be able to "culture train (and RE-train)" your units, instead of having them as separate fixed ones.
This would be much closer to the Real Life situation where you CAN re-train a Russian into an Australian and vice versa, lol.
Would also drastically reduce the Build Screen clogging, and make it a bit more clear which cultural unit is which (as in, what its base unit is).
It gets quite confusing with SOME of those cultural units, actually, at least for me.
So: less stand-alone, more branching-out.
Dunno about you, but I actually like it that way.

 

[Joij21]

Equipment would somewhat work in this manner, but it does need to be an option so must work in addition to the 'typical' method as well.

Will the equipment system allow us to steal weapons? Like how Native Americans would steal muskets from defeated enemies. So if we don't have gunpowder tech, if one of our units defeats say a musketman, then that unit receives the musket weapon and can be promoted to a musketman without the technology.

 

[Somebody613]

Will the equipment system allow us to steal weapons? Like how Native Americans would steal muskets from defeated enemies. So if we don't have gunpowder tech, if one of our units defeats say a musketman, then that unit receives the musket weapon and can be promoted to a musketman without the technology.

***THIS***

 

[Thunderbrd]

Will the equipment system allow us to steal weapons? Like how Native Americans would steal muskets from defeated enemies. So if we don't have gunpowder tech, if one of our units defeats say a musketman, then that unit receives the musket weapon and can be promoted to a musketman without the technology.

Absolutely part of the concept - though it would be like you'd have an axemen or swordsmen unit that's using muskets - not exactly actual musketmen just because they have the weapon, but certainly elevated as a result. They would need the skill promo to learn an 'off norm' weapon set, then need access to the equipment itself. There'd likely be a number of different musket designs as musket options as well.

 

[Thunderbrd]

My point is that it'd be quite fun to be able to "culture train (and RE-train)" your units, instead of having them as separate fixed ones.
This would be much closer to the Real Life situation where you CAN re-train a Russian into an Australian and vice versa, lol.
Would also drastically reduce the Build Screen clogging, and make it a bit more clear which cultural unit is which (as in, what its base unit is).
It gets quite confusing with SOME of those cultural units, actually, at least for me.
So: less stand-alone, more branching-out.
Dunno about you, but I actually like it that way.

There's a system coming together along those lines sorta. It wouldn't necessarily make a culture special unit into something else or make a unit into one, though as a 'next step' it might be a possible further mod.

 

[Somebody613]

There's a system coming together along those lines sorta. It wouldn't necessarily make a culture special unit into something else or make a unit into one, though as a 'next step' it might be a possible further mod.

Would be fantastic.

 

[Joij21]

Absolutely part of the concept - though it would be like you'd have an axemen or swordsmen unit that's using muskets - not exactly actual musketmen just because they have the weapon, but certainly elevated as a result. They would need the skill promo to learn an 'off norm' weapon set, then need access to the equipment itself. There'd likely be a number of different musket designs as musket options as well.

Will the unit art change when they receive muskets? Or will they just get a buff and we'll have to use our imagination that they are shooting with the muskets?

 

[Thunderbrd]

Will the unit art change when they receive muskets? Or will they just get a buff and we'll have to use our imagination that they are shooting with the muskets?

There was some discussion to allow some art changes based on this in concert with some efforts by Sparth. Not just with muskets but basing units and their art somewhat on what weapon they had. It is probably something that would happen, provided we can get away with it without it draining resources to the point it screws up MultiMap hopes. Therefore I think for now you'd have to be just using your imagination once the equipment mod gets injected. Equipment is funny - we got a long ways towards implementation, it got a major coding upgrade, and now it sits waiting for other major projects before it can really be more fully developed. One of which being the unit review I'm doing. But equipment would also then require a building and resources review - and answering for good the question of whether we're going to do volumetric resources at all or just something approaching it. So while we were excited to get it in play and it felt really close to being there - it became apparent how many other problems and projects need to be addressed first. That said, it may also be one of the things needed before an honest approach to the Nomadic project can really be taken as well.

The unit inventory system for yields, commerces, and bonuses is one major hurdle that MUST be taken before equipment can be because it would be a big part of equipment to go along with those plans. Equipment may well be trackable as bonuses but applied to units as promotions. Thus, what and how many and so on can be carried of what is or is not in use, is some stuff to sort out. And having the intended changes to merchant units as not one shot units but transporting units is a step on that path too - thus you could then bring to the front better equipment, or take back to your people recovered war spoils, or steal from your opponent units with your criminals.

 

[Somebody613]

...

Speaking of resources, there's quite a big immersion merit in switching from [one city has it = all cities have it] to [you only have it produced locally] applying to ALL.
That way you actually have to TRADE between even your own cities, and not by building a road, but literally by bringing that resource over on Caravans.
And cultures shouldn't be spread in any other way besides through actual units carrying them.
On one hand - it WILL slow the game (or at least the tech progress) considerably.
On another hand - IMMERSION.
Yeah.

 

[Thunderbrd]

Speaking of resources, there's quite a big immersion merit in switching from [one city has it = all cities have it] to [you only have it produced locally] applying to ALL.
That way you actually have to TRADE between even your own cities, and not by building a road, but literally by bringing that resource over on Caravans.
And cultures shouldn't be spread in any other way besides through actual units carrying them.
On one hand - it WILL slow the game (or at least the tech progress) considerably.
On another hand - IMMERSION.
Yeah.

Generally, most of the time, the resource access being automatic along connected routes would continue to be a thing, but whether something is vicinity access and thus considered a locally powerful source would be more meaningful with what caravans could do.

 

[Somebody613]

Generally, most of the time, the resource access being automatic along connected routes would continue to be a thing, but whether something is vicinity access and thus considered a locally powerful source would be more meaningful with what caravans could do.

I'm just pointing out a way to make it much more immersive at the cost of slowing down the game a LOT.
And I myself would NOT want it to happen in the first place.
I'm just saying how it COULD be improved, which doesn't necessarily mean that I WANT it to happen.
Yeah, lol.

 

[Joij21]

There was some discussion to allow some art changes based on this in concert with some efforts by Sparth. Not just with muskets but basing units and their art somewhat on what weapon they had. It is probably something that would happen, provided we can get away with it without it draining resources to the point it screws up MultiMap hopes. Therefore I think for now you'd have to be just using your imagination once the equipment mod gets injected. Equipment is funny - we got a long ways towards implementation, it got a major coding upgrade, and now it sits waiting for other major projects before it can really be more fully developed. One of which being the unit review I'm doing. But equipment would also then require a building and resources review - and answering for good the question of whether we're going to do volumetric resources at all or just something approaching it. So while we were excited to get it in play and it felt really close to being there - it became apparent how many other problems and projects need to be addressed first. That said, it may also be one of the things needed before an honest approach to the Nomadic project can really be taken as well.

The unit inventory system for yields, commerces, and bonuses is one major hurdle that MUST be taken before equipment can be because it would be a big part of equipment to go along with those plans. Equipment may well be trackable as bonuses but applied to units as promotions. Thus, what and how many and so on can be carried of what is or is not in use, is some stuff to sort out. And having the intended changes to merchant units as not one shot units but transporting units is a step on that path too - thus you could then bring to the front better equipment, or take back to your people recovered war spoils, or steal from your opponent units with your criminals.

Wouldn't it just be easier for it to upgrade to an actual musketman instead of creating that many unique unit skins? I mean the musketman already shoots and functions exactly like a musketman. Otherwise the system memory would get clogged by too many swordsman and axemen type units carrying muskets kind of thing.

Plus why can't the swordsman or axeman just strip his armor off to become a musketman? It would be quite burdensome to lug around heavy armor while trying to shoot and very quickly they would realize armor does nothing in the way of protection from musketballs.

 

[Thunderbrd]

Wouldn't it just be easier for it to upgrade to an actual musketman instead of creating that many unique unit skins? I mean the musketman already shoots and functions exactly like a musketman. Otherwise the system memory would get clogged by too many swordsman and axemen type units carrying muskets kind of thing.

Plus why can't the swordsman or axeman just strip his armor off to become a musketman? It would be quite burdensome to lug around heavy armor while trying to shoot and very quickly they would realize armor does nothing in the way of protection from musketballs.

I'm sure you could but then you'd be relying on the tech to know how to strategically act as musketmen. That's what the upgrade point from the tech amounts to as well. You COULD strip off all the armor, and perhaps the way the equipment will show that difference in dodge vs armor (where armor is nearly useless against muskets but they tend to be inaccurate so dodge could be very useful) would still reflect that preparation to fight more gunpowder based foes - which you could also do if you DIDN'T have muskets but were planning to go up against a foe that did.

Equipment adjustments ARE likely to just be mostly non-cosmetic and if it becomes more cosmetic to the in-game unit expression, it would be a much later modding effort and would likely run against some serious challenges in the graphic engine. I'm just saying there WAS some initial discussion about the possibility of it.

The primary equipment mod intent is for units to have a variety of weapons and armor to choose from within the normal bounds of what that unit would use. Differing kinds of axes and armor picks for axemen, etc... Then if they want a different weapon arrangement entirely, they can change their base combat classes that guide this selection range by making some skill promo choices that would enable that based on the underlying weapon arrangement assumptions of their default combat classes. Those skill promos would likely immediately become disqualified due to changes to those base unit combat classes on upgrade and thus would often get immediately retrained over to some other selection after they upgrade.

Thus it would be possible for axemen/swordsmen etc... to go from using axe and/or long blade and shield over to using two handed missile weapons by promo and give them the muskets so you could get an 'early untrained musketman' that's using muskets just because they had some stolen access and took some time to learn how to use them somewhat, but it wouldn't be super common - just possible.

 

[Joij21]

I'm sure you could but then you'd be relying on the tech to know how to strategically act as musketmen. That's what the upgrade point from the tech amounts to as well. You COULD strip off all the armor, and perhaps the way the equipment will show that difference in dodge vs armor (where armor is nearly useless against muskets but they tend to be inaccurate so dodge could be very useful) would still reflect that preparation to fight more gunpowder based foes - which you could also do if you DIDN'T have muskets but were planning to go up against a foe that did.

Equipment adjustments ARE likely to just be mostly non-cosmetic and if it becomes more cosmetic to the in-game unit expression, it would be a much later modding effort and would likely run against some serious challenges in the graphic engine. I'm just saying there WAS some initial discussion about the possibility of it.

The primary equipment mod intent is for units to have a variety of weapons and armor to choose from within the normal bounds of what that unit would use. Differing kinds of axes and armor picks for axemen, etc... Then if they want a different weapon arrangement entirely, they can change their base combat classes that guide this selection range by making some skill promo choices that would enable that based on the underlying weapon arrangement assumptions of their default combat classes. Those skill promos would likely immediately become disqualified due to changes to those base unit combat classes on upgrade and thus would often get immediately retrained over to some other selection after they upgrade.

Thus it would be possible for axemen/swordsmen etc... to go from using axe and/or long blade and shield over to using two handed missile weapons by promo and give them the muskets so you could get an 'early untrained musketman' that's using muskets just because they had some stolen access and took some time to learn how to use them somewhat, but it wouldn't be super common - just possible.

You could simplify it by just changing the rules of how units upgrade. That way equipment could be an alternate upgrade choice to spending gold and having the tech perquisite. That way if my axeman gets a musket item I can promote him instantly to a musketman without paying gold or knowing the tech of how to build them (you know like the Native Americans).

 

[tmv]

You could simplify it by just changing the rules of how units upgrade. That way equipment could be an alternate upgrade choice to spending gold and having the tech perquisite. That way if my axeman gets a musket item I can promote him instantly to a musketman without paying gold or knowing the tech of how to build them (you know like the Native Americans).

A musket is a lot more difficult to handle than an axe, how would they know how to do that?

 

[Thunderbrd]

You could simplify it by just changing the rules of how units upgrade. That way equipment could be an alternate upgrade choice to spending gold and having the tech perquisite. That way if my axeman gets a musket item I can promote him instantly to a musketman without paying gold or knowing the tech of how to build them (you know like the Native Americans).

I don't want to make it confusing that you can 'train' or upgrade units before you have the tech to manufacture their base weaponry. The hell this would do to a player's mind when looking at the tech tree... or worse, you wouldn't have units limited to when they can be trained by the tech tree at all. Go ahead, give that suit of power armor to your Brute and see what he becomes with it.

Naw... I don't wanna get THAT guideline-free.

 

[MacCoise]

Here's my quick question:

I was building the Ikhanda wonder. Playing in Eons so it was taking about 100 turns...then with 3 turns to go it disappeared.

I thought at first I had been pipped to it by another Civ but it's still not built. Basically it is 97% finished but I can't complete it...

I think I know why but am looking for confirmation...

I discovered Pottery so now Granary is available. The Ikhanda wonder has a prerequisite of Storage Pit OR Granary. So I think Storage Pit has gone obsolete and now I need a Granary which needs Pottery which needs a river and clay...

My question is , am I right about what happened>? and is this as intended? Seems a bit unfair !

 

[ScubaV]

Is it intended that certain animals continue to block improvement tiles beyond the typical hunting phase? This is without the aggressive animals option. I'm playing an old save based on the SVN just before the save breaks. Various animals like lizards proliferate but don't block tiles. Then I get things like red foxes, stellers eagles, and tarantulas that pop up and block improvement tiles from being used.

I can and do use hunters on patrol border mode to clear them out, but they somewhat regularly die to assassins near my borders and the limit of five affects civs that are spread among multiple land masses. The other option is to have fast military units patrolling the borders, more to kill animals than invaders.

Just seems kind of silly to be in atomic age and having jeeps driving around killing foxes so they don't stop a factory from being usable.

 

[irishhombre]

Is it intended that certain animals continue to block improvement tiles beyond the typical hunting phase? This is without the aggressive animals option. I'm playing an old save based on the SVN just before the save breaks. Various animals like lizards proliferate but don't block tiles. Then I get things like red foxes, stellers eagles, and tarantulas that pop up and block improvement tiles from being used.

I can and do use hunters on patrol border mode to clear them out, but they somewhat regularly die to assassins near my borders and the limit of five affects civs that are spread among multiple land masses. The other option is to have fast military units patrolling the borders, more to kill animals than invaders.

Just seems kind of silly to be in atomic age and having jeeps driving around killing foxes so they don't stop a factory from being usable.

Use dogs on patrol, they help a lot with animals and hidden units.