Realism Invictus

[ThirdOrbital]

Make a universal "building" exist in each city (much as they do if one has a doctrine or tradition, which as templates for their respective effects are nevertheless functionally "buildings"), Local Manpower. What it could do, is apply, say, a 2% modifier towards military unit production for every population unit the city has, that way large population centers are naturally more capable of fielding units than more rural or unpopulated cities. I suspect (but am still totally guessing) that the underline code for mechanics contingent upon population size is already there on the basis of unhealthiness and unhappiness, and perhaps if it exists exclusively and only for these, then using "it's too crowded" or unhealthiness "from population" as the inputs would work as well. Finally, since it would exist by default in every single city, there should be no AI coding involved in adding it. It could potentially even be included as a default tradition which every civ gets automatically.

The idea of manpower as a resource is an interesting one, but I'm not certain what you're trying to achieve here. Don't large "urban" cities already have far more production than small cities, and thus build units much faster anyway?

I love a good thought provoking post on my favourite mod and I especially like your post that makes me ponder how I approach aspects of gameplay. I remember the Eureka moment of how 'Irregulars' can be used as cannon fodder! I do enjoy doctrines so I have some random comments but I am by no means a pro.



I like the thinking behind hyper focusing units for city attack and providing defensively focused support for stacks. I've been hesitant with this one as the AI seems to refuse to ever implement this doctrine. Do you find that in your games?



This is a personal favourite of mine and hadn't thought about attacking trade routes in this way. I find the wooden ship era a bit short so its a bit of a rush to get units out with this doctrine and then levelled up. Metal ships with this maxed out are great for taking down invading fleets. My favourite way to level up is to send Frigates off to the 'New World' to crush barbarian ships and they're only allowed back when they've maxed out the doctrine.



I am surprised this one was ranked so low on the list as this sets up my artillery for life... so normally I beeline to it. The right number of maxed out artillery in a city attack stack is powerful because they can arrive at a city and remove all defensive % immediately through elevated city bombard and that extra move so next turn you're softening with irregulars swiftly. Then with the extra experience points I promote the same artillery into medic units to heal the stack. It's been a while since I played but I think that's how I do it. I see the latest SVNs have some collateral damage promotions that would make these units even more valuable... maybe I should fire Realism Invictus again soon!

I frequently found Holy War myself, but of course not every game. I haven't noticed the AI avoiding it but I will keep an eye out for that.

I love artillery and I actually do the same... promoting several to medics once medicine is researched. I rarely get to utilize the bonus move for two reasons though: 1) I'm usually in a big enough stack that I have enough Logistical Problems to give me the +1 terrain movement cost malus and 2) when on campaign, I'm frequently trying to stick to hills and trees for the defensive bonuses, which eat your movement anyways. I kind of wish that RI went the way of the later hexagonal based games and made 2 the default movement with mounted units being more like 4 but that's an entirely different subject.

 

[AspiringScholar]

The idea of manpower as a resource is an interesting one, but I'm not certain what you're trying to achieve here. Don't large "urban" cities already have far more production than small cities, and thus build units much faster anyway?

Yes, I thought about it a little bit too, and realized that to the extent that population increases a production multiplier for units, it directly works against unit scaling costs to the same effect, which do already model this somewhat in that the human capital required for further construction becomes more scarce on the basis of its consumption by existing personnel. What it does leave out, however, is any variable effect that population has on this schema. I understand that we have to suspend our disbelief and indulge some imagination with many of the game's concepts already, but it feels like there's something missing here which might be improved relatively simply.

For instance, in the real world throughout much of history, the stock of fighting age men really was a crucial strategic factor in a nation's ability to sustain a war. We do already have war-weariness, but in many examples, a nation was brought to its knees because its ability to reinforce its armies dwindled to a trickle. The way that scaling unit costs work currently, however, as men die, they actually become easier to replace, which feels counterintuitive and out of place. And, your point about larger cities already being more capable of unit production is true, but outside of irregulars, this only represents its greater production capacity, not human beings who are the necessary corollary to that in fielding a military unit. Walter often says that a modern-era unit is sensibly analogous to real life division, which is thousands of human beings. For basically the entirety of the game's timeline, these would be exclusively male and overwhelmingly in the 18-35 age range, meaning, a smallish minority of the actual population of the city from which they derive, with females, children, middle aged and the elderly omitted. In real life, when they die, it takes a long time (even something which would appear on the radar of turn-lengths later in the game) for this demographic to be sufficiently replenished.

I think it's asking too much of the parameters of Civ 4's engine to represent something like this, but it's a significant strategic factor of war and would add a lot of richness to the game, if it could be implemented. Is everyone else content with the way it currently is? Are there any other ways you think this could be modified, even hypothetically?

 

[ThirdOrbital]

Is manpower a local or national issue? One thing that does feel a bit strange is when you have that one city with a barracks and Heroic Epic that just becomes a troop factory, churning out unit after unit. I guess you can kind of explain it by saying that citizens from around the empire are just mustering at this city for training. Maybe there could be some sort of "manpower exhausted" mechanic which makes each subsequent unit in a row harder to produce? Something similar to war weariness that recovers over time as the city builds non combat infrastructure. Things like improvements, buildings, and civics could influence the math of the malus. It does seem like a lot of complication for a relatively minor gameplay impact though.

A simpler approach might be to make war weariness negatively impact military unit production. That way, as a long campaign drags on, you get less and less able to maintain the conflict. However, war weariness is already very strong (perhaps too strong) if you have separatism turned on. It also doesn't seem to handle the difference between "fighting aggressive war of expansion" and "fighting to save the homeland from heathen invaders" all that well.

 

[TheBirdMan]

It isn't close. I'm far from done with all the stuff I wanted for the next release. Not for several months yet, to be sure. Especially since I'm making little to no progress during the summer - partly because it's too damn hot to do stuff, partly because I'm burnt out a bit, so I mostly opt to do other stuff in my free time these days (no worries though, I am definitely not walking away quite yet).

Not so simple at all. I'd love to have an "OR" functionality for resource converters, but it's far beyond me to code it. And your suggestion would only work without it if we make supermarkets banana-specific, or if we're content with being able to build 10 different ones in one city.

I have been "thinking" a bit over that too. I don't ask for a "OR" funtionality, nor do I think it's needed here.


I now know for sure, that when a buildning consumes 1 or 2 ressorces without producing anything new, you can't make more buildings when you have used all your ressources of the required type.

I have done that for quite some time with Iron_works, were I made it consume 2 iron but not producing anything (to reduce the number of available Iron_works from 1 per city to a somewhat lower number since I didn't "liked" that buildning that much.

And I have been doing it with supermarkets in my latest game. I had 5 bananas and 5 citrus (lemon) and I was able to construct exactly 5 supermarkets. I even got the "red lines" in the supermarket pop-up telling I missed those ressources to build more supermarkets after I made a reload.

If I only had had 4 items of either bananas or citrus I'm sure I would only be allowed 4 supermarkets no matter what ressource I only had the 4 items of. I'm also sure (but not dead-sure), that this would be the matter if I needed 3 or more different ressources to make a certain building.


So for a start continue to use the Food_Factories as resource converter buildings the way they are used now, just using more different ressources than they do now - and use the supermarket to consume those new ressources in order to create a need and demand for those new ressources (of course the supermarket doesn't consumes those new ressources - it's the consumers, that do the hard work , the supermarket makes money on that).


My suggestion for
CANNED_FOOD_FACTORY: Consuming: 1 BONUS_FISH, 1 BONUS_CRAB, 1 BONUS_COW, 1 BONUS_PIG and 1 BONUS_SHEEP. Producing 3 (or 4 or 5) BONUS_CANNED FOOD.
CANNED_FOOD_FACTORY2: Consuming: 1 BONUS_FISH, 1 BONUS_CRAB, 1 BONUS_COW, 1 BONUS_PIG and 1 BONUS_SHEEP. Producing 3 (or 4 or 5) BONUS_FRESH_MEAT (new bonus)
CANNED_FOOD_FACTORY3: Consuming: 1 BONUS_BANANA, 1 BONUS_WINE, and 1 BONUS_LEMON. Producing 3 BONUS_FRESH_VEGETABLES (new bonus)
CANNED_FOOD_FACTORY4: Consuming: 1 BONUS_SALT, 1 BONUS_SPICES, and 1 BONUS_SUGAR. Producing 3 BONUS_FLAVOUR_FOOD (new bonus)

Italic : Later changes if/when time allows it, drop the italic and find more suitable names, pre_req tech_type and time for this building and the new ressource.


Changes to other differents benefits/maluses - no/maybe/sure......, I simply do not have any ideas for that.

 

[TheBirdMan]

EVENTS.

My changes if any have interest in that.

Spoiler :

I "think I remember" one was writing about a "feature" from old days (CIV 2???), where ships were lost on sea.

You can say, that the Bermuda_Triangle Event in this game works same way.

I have made 4 small changes to the ....\XML\Events\CIV4EventTriggerInfos:xml. The game engine accept this, but I havn't testet it yet.

1st: Event should happend in every game, so.
<iPercentGamesActive>100</iPercentGamesActive>

2nd: Every type of ships should be in danger. So lines below are added to the UnitsRequired list:
<UnitClass>UNITCLASS_KOGGE</UnitClass>
<UnitClass>UNITCLASS_MERCHANTMAN</UnitClass>
<UnitClass>UNITCLASS_PADDLEWHEELER</UnitClass>
<UnitClass>UNITCLASS_CARAVEL</UnitClass>
<UnitClass>UNITCLASS_SLOOP</UnitClass>
<UnitClass>UNITCLASS_GUNBOAT</UnitClass>
<UnitClass>UNITCLASS_STEALTH_CORVETTE</UnitClass>
<UnitClass>UNITCLASS_TRIREME</UnitClass>
<UnitClass>UNITCLASS_WAR_GALLEY</UnitClass>
<UnitClass>UNITCLASS_GALLIOT</UnitClass>
<UnitClass>UNITCLASS_IRONCLAD</UnitClass>
<UnitClass>UNITCLASS_STEALTH_DESTROYER</UnitClass> edit: Found out that this unitclass is replaced the R:I mod and should not be added.
<UnitClass>UNITCLASS_FRIGATE</UnitClass>
<UnitClass>UNITCLASS_IRONCLAD_FRIGATE</UnitClass>
<UnitClass>UNITCLASS_AEGIS</UnitClass>
<UnitClass>UNITCLASS_LINE</UnitClass>
<UnitClass>UNITCLASS_EARLY_BATTLESHIP</UnitClass>
<UnitClass>UNITCLASS_PREDREADNOUGHT</UnitClass>
<UnitClass>UNITCLASS_COASTAL_SUBMARINE</UnitClass>
<UnitClass>UNITCLASS_ATTACK_SUBMARINE</UnitClass>

3rd: With every type I do mean every type. Therefore this line is added to the TerrainsRequired:
<TerrainType>TERRAIN_COAST</TerrainType>

4th: I do not care if this happens more than one time each game to me (or the AI ). Therefore this last change:
<bRecurring>1</bRecurring>



While we are at Events:

I do want (in my own games) that both I and the AI are hit very hard, when a natual disaster occurs.

A forrest fire is a forrest fire - the feature is gone (until replaced with a new feature*...... forrest, savanna, jungle, swamp or scrubs). No easy solution to pay gold or something else.
If I'm able to do it, I'll like to see both the savanna and the scrubs be included as possible features too.

Same will be made for all other natural disasters.

*As some might recall: I already have changed the growthfactors in the ....\XML\Terrain\CIV4FeatureInfos:xml for forrest, savanna, jungle, swamp and scrubs, so when a feature is "deleted", a new might spread to the empty tile - if some specific conditions are meet.


Last:
Now Forrest Fire has 3 different outcomes I can choose from. Where this happens, I'm going to edit all 3 choices, so the result will be the same. I wish I could split events like this up into 3 different disasters, but I'm not sure how to do it,

 

[AspiringScholar]

I decided to playtest the pushing the envelope with the "hero unit" approach instead of going for doctrines and must say that I'm quite pleased... Anyone else manage a 400xp unit by early Renaissance on Monarch or higher?

This thing is insane and can directly attack unbesieged cities by itself with good odds. Within the stack bonuses, it does so with 99% odds and a similarly high withdrawal chance. This game was mostly experimental and so I have been deliberately fighting with and XP mining with this unit almost continuously for most of the whole game thus far. I don't think cavalry should feasibly be this good at city taking, but who's complaining?

 

[TheBirdMan]

Most exprienced unit I have had was a Mountain_Ranger with 325 xp-points.

I'm not sure if a cap is needed here - but personally I think units with that many xp-points are too close to a war-hero from a modern movie.......

 

[AspiringScholar]

Most exprienced unit I have had was a Mountain_Ranger with 325 xp-points.

I'm not sure if a cap is needed here - but personally I think units with that many xp-points are too close to a war-hero from a modern movie.......

Yeah, here is an instance (IMO) where the fun of the game trumps any kind of realism. I don't think from a gameplay standpoint something like "experience atrophy" would be very enjoyable or rewarding at all, even though it does make sense from a realism standpoint. A unit, which could very well last millennia through the game retaining its exact skillset over the generations isn't realistic at all, but it is an aspect of progression in the game which probably nobody would want to remove.

I do wonder though if units essentially being able to supercede their intended roles through ridiculous amounts of XP is anything to consider... For instance, the -40% city attack for mounted units is just totally blown out of the water by having almost every single promotion with this unit: granted, I did get lucky early on in letting it get to that point, but still, for all intents and purposes this unit is a monster that can win almost any battle, in any circumstance. Of course, I as the player am having fun, but this may break the mold of the desired typecasting of unit categories, where cavalry, no matter how experienced, should not be able to waltz into cities casually and take out fortified and fresh gunners and longbows.

In any case, Spain is really fun. I think they have some of the most powerful NUs I've encountered so far, especially since their day in the sun at early Renaissance coincides with the beginning of widespread conquest being generally doable from an empire-management and economic standpoint.

--

A few more miscellaneous playtesting remarks and comments, spoilered for those who would rather skip them:

Spoiler :

- I had a city undergo an epidemic at size 1, while I thought the minimum for this was supposed to be 4. I bookmarked a save in case Walter would like to look at it.

- In my current game, religious shock seemed to take effect and remove all of my cities' religions for every single newly-founded religion. Granted, I believe the founder was somewhat near (7 or so tiles away) to my capital, but it applied to all of my cities, not just the capital, with each new religion. It makes enough sense, although it did not seem variable or randomized as I've encountered before. Just want to make sure this is along the lines of what is intended.

- The Chivalry promotion from Code of Honor was not applicable to the Conquistador NU, although it worked for all of my other cavalry, as Spain.

- The Culverins looked really good, not only the unit models but the animations!

- Would it be possible to list building destructions from conquest similarly to how this is shown for natural disaster events? It can be tedious doing mental algebra with newly-available buildings upon reconquering a city and trying to remember what you already had before, and I think this would streamline and improve play a little bit if it is possible.

 

[PKSRoman]

why AI dont use additional espionage points in modern era? in my last game on monarch difflucty i won, because in 1960 all four main civs start to fight each other starting a first world war and turn into barbarism - literally ~35%, maybe 50% of world belong to barbs after that. in modern era with security beauro and all this stuff they had a power to prevent it, or at least to prevent enough to not be so drastic in the end

I mean, did AI use spy buttons, like humans? they can umm swap from 0% to 20% when they need? why they dont try maintain public order when they see that half of their empire start to rebel?

 

[Deder]

why AI dont use additional espionage points in modern era? in my last game on monarch difflucty i won, because in 1960 all four main civs start to fight each other starting a first world war and turn into barbarism - literally ~35%, maybe 50% of world belong to barbs after that. in modern era with security beauro and all this stuff they had a power to prevent it, or at least to prevent enough to not be so drastic in the end

I mean, did AI use spy buttons, like humans? they can umm swap from 0% to 20% when they need? why they dont try maintain public order when they see that half of their empire start to rebel?

Maybe I could help you.
Go to:
\Sid Meier's Civilization 4\Beyond the Sword\Mods\Realism Invictus\Assets\XML\GameInfo\CIV4CommerceInfo.xml
open with notepad++
At the line 104 there is :
<iAIWeightPercent>25</iAIWeightPercent>
It is about espionage. You can try to make it bit higher, ( maybe 35 ? ) and give us feedback how it worked.


Also I have a question. Is the war wearinnes turn off in that mod?

 

[PKSRoman]

<iAIWeightPercent>25</iAIWeightPercent>

what it give ? max level of espionage used by AI? hell, i give 50

 

[[Y]]

Maybe I missed it, but did we get all this discussion on Traditions/Doctrines and no mention of how they improve your relative power score? I tend to build them for the promotions, but it's the global politics from being seen as stronger which I'm usually most thankful for.

 

[AspiringScholar]

Maybe I missed it, but did we get all this discussion on Traditions/Doctrines and no mention of how they improve your relative power score? I tend to build them for the promotions, but it's the global politics from being seen as stronger which I'm usually most thankful for.

I didn't realize they did that...

 

[TheBirdMan]

Below quote this from the CIV4 General Forum.

I'm not able to help due to my many personal changes.

Hello everyone,

I tried some RI games but I always end up at some points which i don't know how to react to the current situation. (I'm new at CIV 4)
I did read some guide in here but somehow i don't know to apply it.

Game setting
Mod: Realism Invictus - stable version
Nation: German
Leader: Hitler
Difficutly: Noble
save file is attached

My current situation: I can't finish the AI capital, please help
I'm on a continent with another AI. We had a long long long *ss war, i captured all his cities except his capital.

1. Any strategy to finish his capital?
Enemy: Aburk Bar II (seafarer, hummanist).
My current strategy is:
- His ship is monster, I tried to tech up to Sailing but my ship still can't beat him, so i gave up on sea warfar
- 1 stack cuts off his copper (resource for mele troop) supply and defend on the nearby hill,
- 1 stack cuts off his farm and defend in the nearby forest
- my plan: send another stack to cut off his iron (resource for mele troop) and timber (fast ship building) supplies. Then i will make a final push with all I have
Beside of that, I have no idea to penetrate his capital, It looks like his troop is better than me, and his ship is ever stronger. The war cost so much on my research and money

2. Any strategy to specialize my current cities?
I don't know how to specialize my cities. So i end up with a bunch of stuff all over every cities and my workers are uasually on their holiday.

3. Any advice on other aspect of the game?

 

[AspiringScholar]

One puzzling question left in my mind after many games, is why revolutions were turned off by default. My (now 400+ XP) cuirassier is absolutely a game-breaking unit and I can conquer empires almost single-handedly with it, but I have not been able to hold my conquests together. They keep collapsing, rioting, and several cities re-joining their culture-dominant civ. While one would expect that that should feel frustrating, it actually feels deeply gratifying to the sense that this is how that should function. It always felt cheap and exploitive in Civ that your people were forever locked into perpetual loyalty to you, no matter how unhappy or unproductive they become from being abused or exploited. Unless I have the civic infrastructure and institutional strength to maintain large and unruly populations, I shouldn't be able to hold onto a large empire, no matter how powerful my units themselves are. I am very glad for this feature and know that I can simply play with it on as I prefer, but I fail to see how others don't appreciate the strategic balance and historicity that this adds, as it is probably the most glaring omission from vanilla civ of all the things that this mod brings to the game.

Who here actually prefers to play with it off? Those of you who do: mind explaining why? The AI being somewhat bad at managing it doesn't seem equivalent to what it adds.

 

[Samson]

One puzzling question left in my mind after many games, is why revolutions were turned off by default. My (now 400+ XP) cuirassier is absolutely a game-breaking unit and I can conquer empires almost single-handedly with it, but I have not been able to hold my conquests together. They keep collapsing, rioting, and several cities re-joining their culture-dominant civ. While one would expect that that should feel frustrating, it actually feels deeply gratifying to the sense that this is how that should function. It always felt cheap and exploitive in Civ that your people were forever locked into perpetual loyalty to you, no matter how unhappy or unproductive they become from being abused or exploited. Unless I have the civic infrastructure and institutional strength to maintain large and unruly populations, I shouldn't be able to hold onto a large empire, no matter how powerful my units themselves are. I am very glad for this feature and know that I can simply play with it on as I prefer, but I fail to see how others don't appreciate the strategic balance and historicity that this adds, as it is probably the most glaring omission from vanilla civ of all the things that this mod brings to the game.

Who here actually prefers to play with it off? Those of you who do: mind explaining why? The AI being somewhat bad at managing it doesn't seem equivalent to what it adds.

For me, more in other mods than RI though, is that it is more a hindrance to a monster AI than the human. An equivalent size AI is no threat to a competent human, to pose a real danger the AI has to be able to become "monster", as in much bigger than other civs. Revolutions stops this because the AI cannot handle the mechanics. I prefer them off.

 

[TheBirdMan]

Correct - the AI can't handle the revolutions. Each and every huge AI-empire will without doubt break down.

2nd: If you - as I - play on huge map with relative many nations, those "new" nations takes many ressources. So if you with your setup of the game "choose" to walk close to the limit of what the game-engine can handle, then you can be sure to get quite a number of CtD. And often you are not able to find the reason and have to abandon the game. Actually this IS the reason why I stopped having "Revolutions On".

 

[aantia]

I like it on. I'm bad enough at the game that it doesn't make it too easy for me, and I like seeing all the separatist civs.

 

[AspiringScholar]

In my experience on standard sized maps on Monarch, the separatism does tend to occur, but it doesn't seem to be a guarantee, and I do see civs maintain a dominant (or at least game-winnable) position throughout the timeline. Also, what about the difficulty this adds to the player? It is just a game after all, so if someone simply doesn't find having to manage that feature to be enjoyable, that makes sense, but from the strict standpoint of the game becoming too easy because of AI mismanagement, I find that it also restricts the player quite a bit. You can't do cheesy stuff like garrison enormous cities with a token force and let them simmer in their disgruntled hatred of you, while devoting all of our forces to the frontlines. I find it satisfyingly hard to maintain a large empire this way, unless you are equipped with the right institutions, infrastructure, garrison, more natural circumstances of culture and religion, etc.

I've been reading through this whole thread, and am about 75% of the way through it now. Some of the advanced players used to remark on being able to steamroll the map and win conquest by the middle ages, opining that the late game thereafter if they haven't already won is too easy. With this feature, I don't think that's very feasibly done anymore. (The higher industrial building costs helps with that too, I think.)

 

[ObiMark]

First of all, thank you for giving us this masterpiece. The amount of content is insane and very much appreciated. That said, there's 4 things I found in Dune wars mod that, hopefully, could be implemented that I found intriguing.
1. air combat experience, including experience for bombing missions / striking units. currently, it's practically impossible to level up bombers (be it tactical or strategic) and merely difficult to improve fighters. I do believe that bombing missions and partial interceptions should give at least some experience to units. Even bombers should get at least some experience for being intercepted, especially if they survive, also planes unable to sink ships... ruins immersion slightly.
2. Great general can join the city and provide bonus +2 experience to units built in that city. Up to 5 generals can join, giving rather large boost. Perhaps it could be limited by requiring
pentagon or west point wonder. To prevent exploiting
3. Spy handling - dune wars has extensive set specializations and promotions for spies, some enabling defensive bonuses, some enabling mission specific bonuses. makes spies much more valuable, as well as building (bulit by great spy) that gives bonus of +2 expereince to new spies. Would be great to have, but don't know if it's too much work.
4. air unit limit in cities /outpost (forts) - while technically mod has limits, they are not enforced, I can mass 50 planes in city. Not so in dune wars, there's strict limit of 3(7 with appropriate tech/building) for cities and 3 for outposts - forts. Perhaps limit should be higher for Realism invictus, with 4(11 with tehc/airport building).