Real Natural Disasters (released)

[Infixo]

@anansethespider With Lua, assuming that the game engine supports required effects, anything is possible. So, the right question is if it can be easily implemented, or requires substantial work, or basically doesn't fit the mod design and would require huge amount of work (basically easier to write another mod).
1. Possible, but requires some work.
2. Possible, same work as 1. Based on some predefined unit ability.
3. Possible, but quite difficult. The mod cannot handle more than one disaster at a time as of now. Once I implement that, this kind of ability would be possible.
4. Possible, I will be implementing something like this. The problem is that AI wouldn't know how to use such a building.
5. Possible, quite easy. But the terrain has problems refreshing in 3D. It works seamlessly in strategic view.
6. First a disaster would need to be implemented. After that it's easy. But the mod itself is not well suited for not map-related disasters. Would have to add a completely new category of events.
7. Not now. It's against the random nature of the events. They are generated at the start of the turn. To predict them, they would have to be generated in advance and stored in a save file. As for now, much work.
8. Same as 6 - new disaster type. Possible, but much work.

 

[DemonEmperor]

ideas:
- constrain wildfires to non-jungle tiles - kinda hard for a forest fire to continue when there's rain pouring down daily (modern fires occur mostly as a result of global warming/deforestation)

- On map generation, pre-select a group of mountains to be volcanoes
- constrain vast majority of volcano instances to be within x (say 3-5) tiles of continental boundaries (still mountains), remove adjacent tile only restriction (pyroclastic flows/ash cloud can go far)
==> vast majority of volcanoes are on/near plate boundaries, with fewer exceptions, which are either very docile (hawaii) or very very very very explosive (yellowstone, toba, etc.)
- have more severe eruptions from volcanoes completely destroy adjacent cities/districts (being buried in ash tends to render most things unusable)
-add in ash fallout on nearby tiles (range varies based on strength) - ash can be removed for production boost (is theorized that roman concrete used volcanic ash), or left to be absorbed onto tile after which it adds extra food/gold to yields on tile (ash good fertilizer)

- on a similar note - maybe add in superdisasters? very very rare events, but when they occur, they affect entire world
==> e.g. massive impact/supervolcano eruption that reduces food yield of all tiles cuz ash (and completely obliterates nearby tiles of course)

- constrain majority of earthquake epicenters to be within x (say, 3-5) tiles of continental boundaries or on tiles with mines, and have affect radius scale with magnitude,
==> most are along current boundaries, but the rare exception is often due to removing gigantic amounts of ore from a mine, or the location actually having been a plate boundary in the distant past

-maybe add in preparedness research/civic - if disaster happens to give warning, evacuate x percentage of civilians to nearby cities / units to safe tiles depending on randomly generated amoutn of time warning gives

But either way, still a great mod as is

 

[Infixo]

@DemonEmperor Glad you like the mod, and I appreciate the comments.

• Jungle tiles are NOT flammable at the moment. If you find one within Wildfire range, it's an error and post me a screenshot.
• Volcanoes
  • In v1.1 I have increased their range to 2 tiles. Don't know if it's the final value. I try to make the disasters area somehow comparable to each other that's why magma was only 1tile. But ashes can go really far, so it's hard to tell how many tiles could be ok, I need feedback from people.
  • Stronger - yeah, I was thinking about that, it is actually easy to change.
  • I'm thinking about how to make ash affect nearby tiles.
  • Nice idea with that ash removal, but first I'd probably go for just yield change. Until I figure out how to
    • Add perma-ash without affecting existing features and resources
    • Add new operation types for builders
• Tectonic plates (I.e for volcanoes and earthquakes)
  • Yep, I was thinking about that approach but haven't found an easily implementable algorithm for this. Your idea with using tiles only in some limited range from the coast might work. Or probably the reverse one, that would say that if a tile has only land around it (like 3-4 tiles) it is considered safe and no volcano/earthquake will affect it. Yeah, that would be easy to implement, also could add a parameter saying 'tectonic rift activity range' so we could make them wider or thinner.
  • Implementing such approach would definitely make coastal lands or islands with mountains much more dangerous
• Super disasters
  • since they are so strong, there cannot be many of them, like 1 or 2. I'd rather focus now of things that can happen more often or add new flavor like nuclear meltdown, or plane crash.
  • Superdisasters would also require a new type of effects, so quite a big change.
    • Also there were ideas about global warming / icing and pandemic.
  • Will have to wait as for now, but It's definitely on the potential future development list.
• Earthquakes
  • Yes, I was thinking about making their range dependent on magnitude. That would make their behavior more realistic.
• Early warning
  • This idea came along a few times but it's totally unrealistic considering that 1 turn in game is usually years IRL. So, whatever happens, happens within that 1 turn.
    • Btw that's the reason why I have not done any multi-turn disasters. There aren't simply any that last for years.
  • Ofc, for gameplay reasons we could violate this rule, but this would require for a mod to a) generate events in advance b) use save files to store this data
  • Also, now AI couldn't use this feature, so it would be unfair.
  • So, I was rather thinking that early warning could be rather implemented as 'less damage' approach assuming that people would have some time to save themselves and things around. I.e. You discover a tech/civic, you unlock a building like Emergency Center, and when you build it in a city, than all city-owned-tiles get less damage when a disaster happens.
  • But AI still wouldn't know how to use it

 

[Manifold]

This is GREAT! I love your icons! I will test your mod next and will report soon

 

[Infixo]

Version 2.0

I'm begining to work on Version 2.0 of Real Natural Disasters. I would appreciate comments regarding functionalities and parameters I am going to use. I have decided to implement the following key features.

1. A new event - hurricane.
2. Visualizations for events where I could find appropriate VFX and graphics within game's assets.
3. Prevention mechanisms that will appear along with tech development. There will be: dedicated buildings for damage reduction, insurance-type building and city project to be able to construct strenghten buildings.
4. Disasters will leave permanent mark on the map. New resources will spawn, some features may appear.
5. Science gains from studying disaters (must visit the site) and Eurekas when you are hit with a really big one.
6. Tweaks for disaster risk areas: hurricanes and tornadoes will be related to latitude, tornadoes should appear more inland, and earthquakes and volcanos should not appear deep inland (unless there are huge mountain areas).
7. To balance the prevention mechanisms some more damage will be introduced: loss of city's accumulated yields (gold, science, etc.) and events will get slightly stronger with Eras, so the investments in prevention will be prudent.

Ad. 1.
Hurricane - starts at the sea, at latitudes within -30..+30. It will be a 2-tile circular area moving into the land, total 4-6 tiles. Should hit only only 2-3 tiles inland. Will not be strong, like 30-50 in general, max. 60-70.

Ad. 2.
Should do some nice things for Wildfire, Flood, Volcano, Meteor and Earthquake. Maybe hurricane.

Ad. 3.

• Disaster Research Institute in Campus - gives early warning, all damage reduces by -10. Also provides +2 science. Will be available somewhere in Modern/Atomic era.
• Fire Brigade in Encampment - removes Wildfire risk within 3-tile range, also decreases damage by -10 in the City and provides +2 production.
• Shelter in City Center - pop loss probability -10, +2 faith, +2 culture, requires DRI
• Breakwaters in Harbor - less damage from Tsunami within 3-tile radius, all water tiles adjacent to HArbor gets +1 prod & +1 food
• Dam in Industrial Zone - must be river tile, requires Factory, removes Flood posibility within Regional Range of IZ, gives +3 prod, river tiles adjacent to IZ will get +1 food.
• Insurance Company in Commercial Hub - requires Bank, maintenance cost will be huge depending on how well the City is developed (e.g. for center, 3 districts and a wonder, approx. 5 gold), it will give 30-70% of the gold value of all damaged/destroyed buildings and improvements.
• City Project ‘Implement improved building construction principles’ - once completed, it will reduce damage by -10 (-15?) but cost of all new buildings in the city will increase by 10-15%.

Ad. 4.

• In general, with some probability (the higher the stronger the disaster), 1-2 resources may spawn within disaster area (with conditions). Also, some features may appear/disappear.
• Earthquake - mineable resources
• Flood - might create Floodplains or Marsh, also some Farm-type resource may spawn or Oasis on the desert
• Meteor - may spawn a metal resource
• Tsunami - may reveal some sea-type resources, on the land similar to Flood
• Wildfire - some woods will be burnt permanently; Plantation-type resource may appear in the area
• Tornado, Hurricane, Volcano - no positive effect
• Unfortunately, I have not yet found a method to implement plot yield changes for a specific plot (i.e. at given coordinates). So great ideas like +1 food around volcano have to wait.

Ad. 5.

• A unit must visit a starting plot (epicenter) or an adjacent one, then some amount of science will be granted. It must be done within 5 turns of the event. For some type of events also other yields will be granted, e.g. from Volcano - production. It will scale according to game progress.
• Eurekas will be granted when event bigger than 60 will happen. First one - for DIR, then specific type for prevention related to it, the 3rd one - for Insurance.

Ad. 6.

• Tornadoes will be limited to latitude of 20..60 degrees (and -20..-60 on south hemisphere)
• Hurricanes will be limited to -30..30.
• Tornadoes will not start on the coast, nor on adjacent tile. Should be more inland.
• Earthquakes and volcanos will not start deep inland. This should simulate a tectonic plate. There are rarely such events deep inland.

Ad. 7.

• Era progression - +3 Magnitude per Era.
• Will lose gold, science and culture. This simulates costs associated with direct rescue missions, help for people, and slowed down tech and cultural progress.
  • Amount will be calculated based on average of all civs times Magnitude percent. This should balance the situation when a particular civ will accumulate lots of gold, vs. the one with little. Direct disaster costs are always similar, only some can afford and some have problems with that.

 

[Thibaulthc]

I like your mod a lot, although I dont like when randomness plays a too big part; thus the prevention buildings are really welcome.
Mostly nice ideas and placement excepted for the insurance company IMHO.
I'm a little bit afraid for the AI though.

 

[Thibaulthc]

1: hurricanes : those would be the perfect disaster to last several turns, (3-5), we would see it slowly getting deeper inland and have time to move units and launch some "protection" project maybe

2: would love that!

3 prevention: I'd nerf the dam; especially the +1 food on rivers adjacent to IZ. coverage zone is already huge.
Be careful that insurance company could give horsehocky loads of money
Regional effect for the DRI would be nice, like 9 tiles

4: resources : great ideas, especially flood plains. But stay logical, like I don't see how a wildfire would make a plantation appear...
Removing resources or making tiles totally useless permanently might be to harsh imho

5:eurekas: perfect

6: disasters positions : maybe just add earthquakes along two different continents on the same landmass!

7: I don't agree with that part: losing accumulated yields is illogical, and might lead to too big differences even with your calculations based on average. I'd rather make the city not producing anything for 1 to 3 turns.
I'm not too sure about the era progression. Doesn't need to get stronger, when we have more to loose instead.

Thanks a lot for your work!
Thibault.

 

[Infixo]

@Thibaulthc Thx for comments I'm working on the changes and some ideas are now more clarified.
1. It's gonna be 1-turn event. It can lasts even couple weeks, true, but turns are like years in game. Anyway, introducing multiturns events is still in plans.
3. The dam will only work within city limits. Why do you think that adding +1 food to river tiles is OP?
Insurance will be quite expensive and will give money related to production costs, using similar formula. And never 100% ofc.
I'm not sure about regional effects for any building, tbh. They stack too fast. And in the end you will be able to get 2-3 reductions, so it's a lot.
4. Features turned out to be quite troublesome, so I won't use them in v2. I'll focus on resources, they are more flexible. I will not remove any resources, rather add new ones, some disaster specific will be temporarily available, some permanent.
As for wildfire:
Rejuvenation of the forest months and years after the fire.
This period provides food for deer, moose and elk, which eat low-lying shrubs, grasses and flowers — plants which disappear as the forest grows and prevents sunlight from reaching the ground.
Well, I was surprised too. But don't worry, standard game resources will not spawn very often, rather a rare occasion.
6. That's actually also a very smart idea. I'll certainly look into the continents stuff.
7. Interruption in city production - very good idea.
Era progression - well, many events don't do much damage, actually. Being hit with 30-40 magnitude will not harm you. If you add reductions, those events will be harmless. So, it's kind of balancing, like everything in the game, when you progress things get more difficult. Progression will be balanced to cover 1-2 reductions available.

 

[Thibaulthc]

I would not stack the reductions!
For example, being warned one or three times that a earthquake is going to happen doesn't change anything.

I'd make the "warning" systems regional (like the dri).6 or 9 tiles large.
Systems like a Dam, fire brigade ... Should affect a less wide area. Like just the city for example.


I thought Dam might be OP because of the addition of the regional effect, the production bonus and the food bonus

I'm glad you're taking our remarks into account, team thinking is what makes a mod great

 

[Infixo]

Reductions stack because there will be 2 'general purpose' helpers (early warning and damage resistant structures - city project), and a few specific. Two warnings will not stack, that's for sure. But each will be placed in a different district, and you usually don't build all districts.

The dam will not be regional, also you need IZ close to river and a factory will be needed (dam will be built in parallel to power plant, actually I was even thinking about making it a Hydroplant). I think some river-based effect is ok since dam always affects large areas.

Fire brigade definitely only city. I think I could agree on DRI with regional range, I believe IRL such institutions give warnings for wider areas than a single city.

 

[Infixo]

Version 2.0 - first playable build (alpha)

Hi, all. I present the first playable version of RND 2.0. I've managed to implement the following.

1. Visualizations for events
   • Earthquake - there are small fires and smoke coming from the ground, area is covered in light ash-clouds.
     
   • Meteor - there's a hit on the ground, and explosion and meteor shards are scattered around with some dust.
     
   • Volcano - there's an eruption out of the mountain, then it's covered in smoke, you can see sparks and fire, and ash cloud covers surrounding area.
     
   • Wildfire - there are fires all around!
     
   • If disaster area is visible, the camera will move there, so you can see those animations. However, if they are far, you might miss the begining.
   • Also, there's some glitch in the game and not all assets are displayed. You can observe this in Earthquake, some tiles have all animations, and some just few or none. No idea why this happens.
2. Prevention mechanisms
   • Prevention basically means that Magnitude of a disaster on a tile that has some active protection is decreased by some number (10-20 usually). This in turn means:
     • All HP-related damage is decreased (so, units and district defenses)
     • Probability of damage and destruction is decreased
   • There are 2 buildings that actually prevent a disaster from happening within some radius around them.
     
   • Disaster Research Center - gives early warning for everybody within 6-tiles radius; decreases Magnitude by 10 for all disasters; Campus, +3 science
     
   • River Dam - prevents Flood within 3-tile radius (flood cannot start there but can spread to those tiles); Industrial Zone, must be adjacent to a River and needs Factory; gives +1 prod and +1 food to all River-tiles within a City
     
   • Fire Station - prevents Wildfire within 2-tile radius (fire cannot start there but it can spread there) and protects entire City from all disasters (Magnitude -10); Encampment, +2 prod
     
   • Breakwaters - protection against Tsunamis; Magnitude -20 within 2-tile radius; built in Harbor, also give +1 food and +1 prod to tiles adjacent to that Harbor
     
   • Emergency Shelter - this is the only building that protects city's population; Magnitude -20 for probability of citizen loss; must have DRC to built ES (need a warning to use shelter)
     
   • Project 'Disaster Resistant Structures' - protects all buildings and districts; once completed, it decreases Magnitude by 10 for all disasters; the price is increased cost of buildings (when constructing a building, -5 prod modifier is applied to the city); also the project itself is quite expensive (simulates cost of upgrading all existing buildings to new standards)
     
   • The parameter 'Disaster Range' in Advanced Options is also applied to the range of prevention buildings, i.e. if you choose +1 not only disaster will have bigger range, but also all buildings will have range increased by 1, too.
   • Prevention is additive but only from different buildings i.e. you can have -10 from DRC and -10 from Fire Station totaling -20, but additional DRC in range will not give anything more.
3. Disasters will change some tile yields within their area, temporarily or permanently
   • Standard game resources spawn sometimes
     • Disaster area and magnitude are used to randomly decide how many resources are spawned. They should be rather rare, e.g. Earthquake of Magnitude 70 and area 37 (quite powerful) has ~60% chance to spawn a resource, Wildfire/Flood of Magnitude 40 and area 15 tiles (typical) has 25% to spawn a resource.
     • Earthquake - "mineable" resources (mine+quarry)
       
     • Meteor and Volcano - metals
     • Flood - farm-type
     • Wildfire - camp-, pasture- and plantation-type
     • Tsunami - sea resources on water and same as flood on land
   • There are 10 new resources specific for disasters.
   • Permanent disaster sites - meteor crater, volcano crater, earthquake epicenter
     • They spawn randomly after a really huge disaster (>70); they give science, culture and faith
   • Temporary disaster sites - for tornado, tsunami and 3 above in case when no permanent site will spawn
     • They can be Small or Large; small last 4-8 turns, large last 8-12 turns
     • They give science, culture and large ones also faith
   • Disaster specific resources
     • Can be temporary or permanent (random process); temporary means that the resource will disappear after several turns; you can see in the popup window for how many turns it has spawned
       
     • Flooded land - +1 food, always temporary
     • Meteor shards - +1 prod and +1 gold
     • Volcanic Ash - +1 food and +1 prod
     • Burned Ground - +1 science, -1 food (yes, minus)
     • Burned Ground with acess to Fresh Water - +1 science, +1 food (plus)
   • All disaster resources except permanent sites can be harvested by a Builder. Those harvests are quite juicy.
4. Tweaks and improvements
   • Events will get slightly stronger with Eras, so the investments in prevention will be prudent; as for now 1 point of Magnitude per 25 turns (game speed adjustable)
     
   • Earthquakes - seismic areas are "smoothed" - singular / double tiles are removed, some gaps are filled, they are "more continuous" now; check Earth map for this!
     
   • Tsunami - slightly better algorithm that produces less tiles but better placed, ignores small (1-2 tiles) islands and focuses on real land masses
   • Tornado - limited to latitudes 20..60 on both hemispheres, also they don't start on coastal land tiles.
     
   • Volcanos - appear now only in within seismic areas detected by Earthquake algorithm
   • Wildfire - responds to forest/jungle removal and re-forestation
   • Sounds are not so loud (I actually managed to change this within WWise, not touching the .wav files at all)
   • Also, the sound will only play if disaster area is visible (at least 1 tile). If not - the window will open, but with no sound.
   • Mod saves data into save files. So, when you reload the recent (or current) disaster will be available, also places where all previous disasters had happened.

The following is yet to be implemented:

• A new event - hurricane. Since there are 7 natural disasters already, I don't consider it a high priority any more, I might rather try to implement technological disasters instead.
• Visualizations for Flood and Tornado.
  • I have not found any assets that could be used for Tsunami
• Insurance money for damaged/destroyed buildings.
  • The building is ready and it's charging extra for every new district, but not giving any money yet.
• Implement some way for AI to utilize the prevention mechanisms.
• Eureka boosts from huge disasters.

 

[chrisgatt7]

This is amazing I can't wait to try it out !

 

[chrisgatt7]

Hey Ed Beech needs to come in here and still some Ideas lol

 

[Infixo]

Thx

 

[Thibaulthc]

I'll try that again soon! But it looks very nice on the paper

 

[AngelofSloths]

I can do models if you need them.

 

[Infixo]

@AngelofSloths That would certainly be a great improvement to the mod. There are new resources that would look nice with some graphics, and buildings ofc. However, I've no idea if they would fit into current district models.

 

[AngelofSloths]

@Infixo What resource models would you want?

 

[Infixo]

@AngelofSloths Probably the ones that actually stay on the map for some time, e.g. Flooded land, Meteor shards, volcanic ash, burned ground.
TBH, I have not yet think about it in details. Also, I don't know what could be done that would look good. E.g. Flooded land can be placed on anything flat (plains, grass, forest, jungle, etc) and should resemble marsh/ Floodplains. Burned ground - same, can be placed on many terrains/ features. So, e.g. can you make a resource look differently depending on the terrain or feature it is placed?
Btw, Have you played with RND in version 2.0 already? If not, just give it a try with high level of disasters and map revealed. That way you could come up with some ideas as well.

 

[Thibaulthc]

tried really fast just to have a look
fire is nice
can't see for how many turns resources bonus will stay, it disappears too fast!
tried on tiny map with max power disasters, my whole map was flooded (...) with bonus resources lol
resources icons are ugly btw
volcano craters should appear ON the mountain