Realism Invictus

[Walter Hawkwood]

Despite the negative approach of a certain prior posting, there was one idea with which I agred--the "pandemia" term. It seems like the game action is better described as an "epidemic." As I understand it, the word "pandemic" refers to vast, continent-wide epidemics, such as the Black Death of the 14th century. Outbreaks of lethal pathogens in a single city are more often described as "epidemics." Obviously, this is a purely cosmetic change of terms, but if the motivation underlying the mod is realism . . .

Further report; the Arabic Cuirassier cavalry units' weapons turn pink when dropped in the graphic during battle. The non-European Irregular unit advances into combat as would a melee unit, but the graphic is three individuals shooting guns.

Fixed, fixed and fixed. Thanks!

Is there any way to learn what version of SVN do I use? As I understand, lots of stuff should got changed since I played it last time, but all looks suspiciously same.

I don't know of any such method. It writes the number when you update, but other than that I don't know how to check it for an already existing revision.

Glad to be of assistance And good to know that others have had similar thoughts - and that they're being considered for the future.

Couple more things (that I'm sure you've heard before):

The dreaded cannon spam - Civs running around with stacks of 50 cannons, that go back and forth and take forever to move, without seeming to know what to do with them. Not sure if this one's possible to fix..

And the 'all tanks and no men' problem - Civs destroying all defenders in player cities, but having no boots on the ground to capture them.

We're trying to fix those. It's AI coding though, so it is very tricky.

One further suggestion:

The ability to immediately move planes around is too overpowered, IMO. I think that the building of airbases, or at least airstrips should be required, before planes can be built in or moved to a city.

I fear of what that would do to AI.

Well I can do some writing like rewriting descriptions (please don't mind my posts, I don't care on forums but I have very good grades in english and I have studied journalism and writing).

I can do unit design and other art. 3D faces to I guess but im not good with textures that much.

I can probably help out with some logical conception/understanding of how things should work.

I dont know what's necessary to get it out.
I want to start an epic game and dont want to remake for the update

Great, all those skills are quite useful. You can either help by modelling some buildings (they are of more use to us right now than units) or by helping us improve various in-game texts. As most of the team (including myself) aren't native English speakers, the texts are quite messy sometimes.

Hello Ri team. First my monthy congrats to the team for this awesome mod! (SVN 3855 just before armoured warfare) I really like the reworked civics and they feel much more realistic than before. Also i really really like the new food sistem (specially +1 food shipyards and mechanized farms) and some other changes that you made like making the sioux tribe one big tribe and for that when you discover them the aztec haven't conquered north america.But i have a couple of questions and thoughts:

1-AI does not use bombards or cannons while defending a city or whe they are ships in range. (Main and mayor complain)

Trying to fix that.

2-Labor Union civic sucks (for me)

3-Proteccionism is underpowered (or sucks too xD) (maybe without the -25% trade route pennalty it would be balanced(maybe) i think)

4-Free market is too overpowered even with the 50% ww (reduce at least 75% to +50% trade route)

Civics totally rebalanced for the next version.

5-Artillery schools doctrine is just for show? it is in 3.1 also and i could not build it. i think that if the game won't use it, it should not be there.

It is currently disabled and not buildable by anyone. We won't remove it, as it will come back in 3.2 or 3.3, whenever we address the fact that artillery can't get XP from bombardment.

6-In all World Map games i have played (SVN , 3.0, 3.1 etc) the arabs always get vassalled or destroyed

Trying to make World Maps more balanced each version. Further improvements in upcoming 3.2.

7-Barbarians made cities in North america where i think they should not have spawned. (like in florida)

Trying to avoid that, but sometimes AI will unpredictably destroy some units/cities that are supposed to fogbust, causing barbarians where there should be none.

8-In middle industrial era even with hospitals around and all health resources i can't have a havy ind city +25 with without , i don't know if that is intented or not.(maybe it is, just to know)

Yes, more or less intentional. With a lot of surplus food, cities can still grow, if you are willing to tolerate large amounts of unhealth in your cities (as was historically the case in industrial era).

9-i had the apostolic palace but i couldn't vote for a diplo victory, i dunno why

All AP mechanics is 100% vanilla. There must be some vanilla cause for that.

10-Why you made some buildings to need a certain civic? i know that is realistic but lol, i wanted to make the statue of liberty with teocracy xDD (why some buildings need 2 civics? 1 isn't enough? lol

To prevent wonder hogging. We have some additional measures up our sleaves for that too. Ideally, one civ should not be able to build even half the wonders in any given era, unless it is absolutely dominanant and has already almost won.

11- Great Artist that can make great singles, musicals or movies is possible to make?

That's an idea we're considering.

12-Why in the game there isn't a chicken or bird reasource? Where i live thats the main protein we eat xD

Because it's like that everywhere. People keep poultry all over the world. It's not a "resource" when everyone grows it in their backyard. Basically any farm placed on the map in RI is supposed to keep at least some poultry.

13-I know that in some of the last SVN with mech farm you could 'discover'a food resource, i really like that, but whats the chance in %?

Three times higher than that of a mine. So still not very high.

14- There is a crusade map and a world map, but why there isn't a ww2 map? lol xD jk

Mostly because it's boring for us to make. We like to focus on less explored eras/areas. Next map will be focusing on Eastern Europe in XVII century. I don't know if it will make it to 3.2, but it is about 70% finished now.

15- whats the last stable svn?

The last one. We rarely if ever upload stuff to SVN that would make it unplayable. Not everything is finished, but everything should be working.

To report back a bit - the game is playable OK an turns do not exceed 2 min on 4.2ghz 2500k , mostly are around 1.5 min, on the gigantic world map. Yes I know - I am a megalomaniac.

For the end game on huge maps, any chance that you could add full automation - ie an option that AI plays and you just observe the result... sort of like Civ Sims ... reason being is that when you are large and powerful enough and may want to go for conquest victory, it is a slog to conquer a couple hundred cities... it's be better to let AI do it for you and you just watch, perhaps be able to stop it and intervene in some major battles if necessary.

That would be one cool feature, other than that - the game is awesome... I wish it was called Civ V and had the corporate marketing power behind it, it'd sell 10x better too.

It is already there if you are playing SVN. IIRC you pres Ctrl+Alt+X and it lets you hand your civ over to AI for a set amount of turns. It is tremendously helpful in playtesting. We disable it in the release versions though.

 

[sami_snow]

Hi

It's very good to change "pandemia" to "epidemic", but the game text needs to read "X is affected by AN epidemic" - currently it is missing the article. cheers

edit: also, when it ends the text should read "The epidemic in X has ended", currently it is missing the article and the tense is wrong (it says "is ended")

 

[Hian the Frog]

Hi

It's very good to change "pandemia" to "epidemic", but the game text needs to read "X is affected by AN epidemic" - currently it is missing the article. cheers

edit: also, when it ends the text should read "The epidemic in X has ended", currently it is missing the article and the tense is wrong (it says "is ended")

Fixed.

If you read more typo problems, tell us.

 

[Antmanbrooks]

Hi, what's the plan for climate change in the next release? I played a MP game on a large map with some friends and got to about the modern age before nuclear doomsday ended our game prematurely! None of us had noticed any climate change but I'm not sure if that is included in RI? If not, will it be next release?

 

[Ondskan]

Which texts do you want me to improve. PM me the not-done ones and i'll do those and a list of buildings if i have time for that Is it for the city "look" on the map or icons?

 

[Noddahrassa]

"Equites Romanum" is grammatically incorrect.

"Equites Romanorum" would be "Horsemen of the Romans"
"Equites Romani" would be "Roman Horsemen".

I would choose the latter.



I noticed this in a game where I also became aware of a serious strategic weakness of the AI.

I was playing with the Mongols, and have attacked the Romans on another continent. I took one city on the Eastern coast. The city has been pacified, but the tiles immediately W and SW of the city are still Roman territory (plains with paved road). The tiles N and NW are now mine (forested hills with paved roads).

I attacked with a huge force (10 trade junks filled with 30 units), but the Romans have kept me pinned down in this city ever since. They attack with a seemingly inexhaustible supply of middle cavalry. I have killed 176 of those in 13 turns (and also about 20 "Equites Romanum"), while losing a single unit myself. They come riding on their roads, which lead directly up to my city, and attack me. I'm fine with that, since they never win a fight.

Now, however, my spies posted in Roman territory noticed a stack of 27 bombards approaching, covered by middle cavalry. I was about to evacuate my town, since on their road, the Romans could have marched up to the city and attacked me with their bombards in the same turn, and this my army would not have survived. Yet what happened is the following: The bombards marched onto the forested hill NW of the city which was my territory. Obviously, they had to stop for a turn. In this turn, I slaughtered their cavalry cover completely and destroyed 2 bombards (25 were still left, but injured by collateral damage). So the bombards retreated to the next Roman city to heal. Rinse and repeat. The bombards come again, with cover, to my hill, I kill the cover and as many bombards as I can, the bombards retreat. I haven't lost a single unit doing this, and they have done this three times now.

It is important to note that the Romans could have attacked with the bombards without entering my territory first and allowing me to strike preemptively, since they still own two tiles with roads directly adjacent to my city. Yet they always take to my hills with the bombards. Meanwhile, their cavalry attacks directly on the road all right, but cannot win a fight.

So, somehow the AI appears to value the defense bonus of the forested hills too much, at least when it comes to siege weapons, even at the cost of being subject to an attack for one turn. On the other hand, after suffering the attack, they do not even go through with it, but retreat instead. Being strafed by 25 - even damaged - bombards would have weakened my defenses so much that their cavalry (which keeps coming all the time) could have killed a large number of units that turn. I probably would have had to retreat or make peace. As things now go, I just slaughter them with impunity, and am starting to wonder how many more waves of cavalry they can possibly send against me. They have only 25 cities, so they should not be able to replace 10-15 slaughtered units every turn.

 

[Angst]

"Equites Romanum" is grammatically incorrect.

"Equites Romanorum" would be "Horsemen of the Romans"
"Equites Romani" would be "Roman Horsemen".

I would choose the latter.

Obligatory:


Link to video.

 

[sami_snow]

I really like the new sawmill, it is a much better balanced building. good job!

(also, the poster above is correct in his latin: "equites romani" would be the best option, although iirc -um can be syncope for -orum, so perhaps you could argue poetic license )

 

[Walter Hawkwood]

Hi, what's the plan for climate change in the next release? I played a MP game on a large map with some friends and got to about the modern age before nuclear doomsday ended our game prematurely! None of us had noticed any climate change but I'm not sure if that is included in RI? If not, will it be next release?

K-mod has their own take on climate change. I think we'll stick with it for the next version. You can read more about it in K-mod's own thread.

"Equites Romanum" is grammatically incorrect.

"Equites Romanorum" would be "Horsemen of the Romans"
"Equites Romani" would be "Roman Horsemen".

I would choose the latter.

I always thought we had them as "Romanorum". Must be a typo. Our Roman name list was recently checked by an Italian for consistency and most such typos ironed out.

I noticed this in a game where I also became aware of a serious strategic weakness of the AI.

Everything regarding ranged bombardment is set for a major AI overhaul. Hopefully, we'll be able to provide a better ranged AI in 3.2, but of course this work is never done.

I really like the new sawmill, it is a much better balanced building. good job!

Thanks! We are trying to overhaul many buildings now that we have some cool new XML tags to work with.

 

[tdfriese]

I'm having a small problem with slave markets and slave farms. In two games, I have built slave farms and slave markets and greatly enjoyed the nice food and production bonuses I get. (Kudos on the work on slavery! It is a better civic now!)

Unfortunately, at some point I seem to lose the slave market bonus entirely. I'm still running slavery as a civic, I can still see the slave market in the relevant city, I still see the slave farm when I hover over the plot, but it gives a +1 bonus rather than +3 like it should be.

Anyone else seen this? Thoughts? I could try uploading a save file at some point.

 

[Walter Hawkwood]

I'm having a small problem with slave markets and slave farms. In two games, I have built slave farms and slave markets and greatly enjoyed the nice food and production bonuses I get. (Kudos on the work on slavery! It is a better civic now!)

Unfortunately, at some point I seem to lose the slave market bonus entirely. I'm still running slavery as a civic, I can still see the slave market in the relevant city, I still see the slave farm when I hover over the plot, but it gives a +1 bonus rather than +3 like it should be.

Anyone else seen this? Thoughts? I could try uploading a save file at some point.

Yes, I think a save would be useful, along with revision number.

 

[Babri]

Some feedback on National units :-

In the current stable version Ottoman national unit Timariot is a bit OP. U can't siege & attack Ottomans for a long period of time because they would simply destroy your siege equipment as they always choose to fight siege units first outside city. I would suggest to change the 'first pick siege units' to something else like high withdrawal chance or doing higher flank damage to siege units. This unit is even more exploitive in hands of a human player. Ottomans simply become unconquerable for a long time.

Lately I played SVN version as Egypt. I felt that War chariot is a bit unnecessary to be national unit & has some disadvantages when compared to other good national units. Firstly it comes too early for a resource requiring national unit. This means that it is too much luck based, which is not good when considering national units. So I would suggest to make this the standard chariot unit for Egypt (perhaps a bit expensive) just like some civs have great standard units like Keshliks, minutemen, Welsh lbows etc. The second reason is that it is quite similar to a normal war chariot in terms of usability & if u don't find horses in ur 1st or 2nd city it is time to rage quit. , nothing much fun in other words. Instead I would say add a Royal Mamlukes national unit, set in medieval times. We already have few medieval knights equivalent national units so that would be fun.

 

[Peregrine]

another report; the English Light Brigade unit does not advance into combat. The unit stands in place, the figures swinging sabres, and inflicts casualties, but no advance.

I second the OP of the early Turks. Believe I mentioned that earlier. Also second the AI not using its siege/artillery units aggressively. Many times I've blasted a city with my own artillery/cannons, brought down the defenses and weakened the garrison, only to discover, in the concluding assault, that the AI had a number of its own artillery/cannons within the city and didn't use them. I've also found non-mobile fortress artillery in cities, not used to attack my besieging forces. If the AI started shooting with artillery/cannons inside cities, it'd be a whole different ballgame on the offensive. If it's any help, I recall a Warlords scenario, the Roman one, in which the AI certainly DID use their siege units inside cities to bombard my besieging forces. They did so without fail if they had siege units in the city attacked.

 

[Sanguivorant]

I am going to make a second comment.

I've played a few games so far, and two on the world map (large), and I have to say I am really, REALLY enjoying this game.

The only flaw, which is a common one, is that world maps take too long to load. It is 100BC in my game so far and it is taking 3 minutes to load a new turn. It's probably because I am not playing this game on a super-computer, so I can't complain. At the very least I can take a turn and go exercise or something.

In the two times I played world map, I played as the same civilization, Egyptians. On my first game, I got a memory allocation error while trying to save, and I had no autosave on, so my file got corrupt and I was forced to start again. I solve this situation by having two saves which I alternatively save in between turns.

So far, it is 100BC, and I conquered the Nubian and Ethiopean civilizations, taken Carthage coastal cities and razed two desert cities, leaving them with one city in the middle of the Sahara. I converted to Judaism early on so that Jerusalem, Armenia and Arabia (Who were Jewish) would act as barricades, allowing me to lightly guard the Suez area.

I have not declared war on any other nation ever since 1200 BC (Meaning all my conquests were ancient), and I am now focusing on developing my cities. I'm the first one to Medieval, love the textures.

Some points to make:

•This has probably been said before, but Jerusalem is a religion-hogger. They have researched Taoism, Judaism and Christianity in the city. I actually gave Taoism holy city to Hanno's city (Which already had Taoism, and really needs this bonus anyways), and I placed the Christian holy city in Armenia.

•In both of my games, Taoism has been founded near the middle-east, and not in Asia. Not that it bothers me, but it would be complimentary if Taoism was in Asia.

•Classical age is much more awesome, and actually has some depth into it.

•For some reason, Greeks are warring with the Bantu kingdoms, but I have no idea why.

•It appears that Egypt might have a large advantage. In both games I played, I am at least 100 points higher than the next person (In the current one I'm 200 points higher).

That's all I have to say. I love this mod, and I hope I can complete my world map.

 

[Uncle Anton]

Obligatory:


Link to video.

Big Nose!

 

[Catsil]

I suddenly crave for Civ 4 again and realize I haven't gone through mods. I'm utterly convinced through 137 pages here that Realism: Invictus is a good one.

Problem is I don't have enough time playing. I know this has been asked 1000 times already, but is there a Civilopedia for R:I online through which I can live vicariously?

 

[Lt_Cmdr_Data]

Hello to all,

we are eagerly awaiting the new version here in Croatia

I've been seriously playing the old one for the last few months and there were a few ideas that came to mind. I forgot most of them but here are two of them. I don't know if it is possible, but you should know better.

About Future Tech, as for now it gives +1 happiness and +1 health bonus. Wouldn't it be better if every FT would give a different bonus? For instance, FT1 could give +1 happiness, FT2 +1 health, FT3 could give +5% production in all cities, FT4 +5% gold, FT5 +5% strength to units while the old ones could be upgraded, and so on.
This is just roughly summed up as I hadn't given it much thought, but I'm sure you get what I mean. This way the game wouldn't just stop as you research all technologies, and it could go on forever

The second thing is the possibility to give away certain tiles. Territory trading is and was very common in RL, and it would come in handy. Especially regarding the borders with the vassals bordering your empire, as their bordering cities most commonly get killed by the superior culture of their master. In my latest game, at the dawn of the modern era, my borders come all the way to the cities of my neighbor vassals, effectively suffocating them. It is pointless because it isn't making me any stronger, as I can't make use of those tiles, while my vassals' cities are getting smaller and smaller and thus they are becoming weaker. Would it be possible to somehow integrate the idea in RI?

I have one last question to all. If one aims for realism, would you suggest playing with "AI plays to win" or without it? What are the real differences?

 

[Ambassador]

Everything regarding ranged bombardment is set for a major AI overhaul. Hopefully, we'll be able to provide a better ranged AI in 3.2, but of course this work is never done.

Isn't it possible to set a routine like "For all ranged units - if: enemy units on adjacent square then: bombard" and the Ai would just have to bombard when cycling through his units?

 

[Lt_Cmdr_Data]

they'd probably never retreat, but still it would be better than not doing anything with their cannons

 

[mortenciv]

Hi, playing a World Map (huge) game - a couple of typos:

The Subarctic Tribes are in the game as the 'Subartic Tribes'.

When a Holy City is lost, the text says:
`The Holy City of (X) has been lost is a foreign country.` (should be in)

Ideas about the game:

My big idea is about how to lessen the tedious bombing and tank spam problem. Once one gets a stack of bombers, one feels the need to use them each turn, and it quickly becomes a real chore to keep doing this. My idea to cut this down is to introduce a finite fuel reserve (FFR). For each fuel commodity that a nation has, I propose that it will add 1000 litres to the fuel reserve. For each move that each mechanised unit makes, 1 litre of fuel is taken from the reserve. This would mean that we would have to think about every bomber sortie or massed tank movement - the late game would become strategic again, rather than tiresome - plus, it would add another layer of reality to Realism Invictus. You would have to think really carefully about whether to use your bombers, or move tanks. Also, rebasing aircraft should cost 2 litres of fuel for each square travelled, as should using airports to move units to other cities (you would also need an airport in the city being transported to). At the moment, it's just too easy to shuttle them around vast distances at no cost.
The finite fuel reserve should also solve the AI's artillery stacks of doom, that run around aimlessly like swarms of headless chickens.

If a tank is stuck in open ground, without fuel, an enemy Civ should be able to capture it, in the same way that workers can be captured. This would give a great boost to a small Civ, fighting a guerilla/partisan war against a powerful aggressor (if their fuel supply could be cut, or they run out).
It could be conceiveable to have the same set-up for ammunition.

My other thought is about colonies/AI. I created the Americans in my current game, but they are useless at building themselves up. I gave them a swiftly growing 6 city, which within a few turns had shrunk back down to 2. Many cities seem to sit there and do nothing, not even build a mine on a valuable resource - the city sign shows no food or production activity - just blankness. Surely there must be a way to get the AI working better at growth and intelligent actions.

All for now, all the best..

Oh, one small addition. ICBM's should cost 5 litres per unit to move, and each Uranium source should provide enough for 10 ICBM's. After this, the mine would become depleted, and require a random number of turns to be replenished.

One final thought: Civs change their religion too many times, and too quickly. I think that there should be more upheaval for changing religions - riots, unhappiness, even splitting a nation into factions over the schism.

(I should also add: Loving the attention to detail in the map/nations/tribes - great work! )


I almost forgot another idea: Axis and Allies!
These would become possible, by discovering 'Ideology'. A Nation that has spent most of their time at war (or declared unjust wars), is able to discover Ideology - and is able to build one from a choice of `World Shakers` - this could be Eugenics (against their worst enemy - 'The Final Solution'), or Industrial Behemoth (which would destroy Nature and create Global Warming), Modern Slavery, etc.. It would require a Great Prophet to build one of these (could be a Doctrine rather than a Wonder, like Nuclear Expertise). When this has happened, it triggers an event that sends a message to all Civilisations - to either join the Axis or the Allies, or remain neutral - forcing the player to make a moral choice, in the face of a more powerful oppressor. Once all have chosen, a World War would begin, between the opposing sides. Neutral Civs could be drawn in at a later date, if either side can convince them to join, or either sides' actions go against the Ideology of the neutral nation (they would have to choose in theory to be one or the other, even though remaining neutral). The Civ that created the World Shaker would be the head of the Axis, and make decisions that the other nations would have to go along with, or leave. The losing side would have to pay reparations to the opposing nations, and possibly cede some of their land to them too. They would also lose a proportion of their armed forces, and not be able to build any more for, say, 30 turns.

This could work in a similar way to Overcouncil and Undercouncil, in Fall From Heaven II - so I think that it should be possible, and add a great late game dynamic that could last until the very end. It could also allow new, special A&A (or 'World War') units, spawned from the crucible of global conflict (think of all the new units created in the two World Wars), and open a new branch of Technologies (like Ration Books, Land Girls, Air Raid Wardens etc..) These would need to be Era specific, of course.

Other ideas:
POW camp - each defeated enemy has a chance of being captured, and sent to the nearest POW camp. Each unit in the camp would produce 1 Happiness, and 1 Unhealthiness (the unit would cease to exist, just add to the Happy/Unhealthy count - but would be returned to their nations as population in the cities that created them, when peace is declared - the H/H count would then be removed from the city).
Holy War - similar to Access and Allies, but involving religions. Again requiring a Great Prophet to build the Doctrine. To win, one side would have to capture the Holy City of the other). This could also allow special Crusade units and Technologies (Inquisition, Knights Templar/Hospitaller etc..)
Pilgrimage - By sending a priest (Missionary/Rabi etc..) to the Holy City, a nation can start a Golden Age, and increase the bond with the Holy City nation. (Unlocked for religious units by discovering the technology 'Pilgrimage' - which could lead to the technology 'Holy War'.)
Great Diplomat (variant of Great Prophet) - can mediate in wars, by sending him to an enemy city - will have a chance of making peace.
Great Author (variant of Great Artist) - can write great works, adding to the Happiness of the nation (a random, Era specific one is written, depending on the Civ.)
Great Inventor (variant of Great Scientist) - can unlock new Tech/unit, either for peace-time or for war.
Great Admiral (variant of Great General) - can be added to a naval unit.


If just some or one of these could make it into the game, I would be very happy..