Realism Invictus

[Major Tom]

@Walter Hawkwood A small wish: United Nations requires awful lot of military techs. Could it be easier to build that building. Either move it earlier or fewer military equipment.

 

[Alekseyev_]

Small bug report: The Demidov family civilopedia text has some formatting issues with bold text.

Larger bug report: When playing the huge earth map scenario in multiplayer (SVN version), we had an issue that when hosting on the faster computer, the slower computer player could never load in. I have a loose suspicion it might be related to the leader selection, but I can't back it up in any way. The host is faced with the option to select a leader immediately after loading in, but due to the other player not having loaded in, selecting an option here does not actually have an effect (just like you can't move units around while someone is still loading in). Saving on that turn 1 and reloading allows the other player to join and then get his leader selection, but for the host it will not appear again and he will be stuck with the scenario default. Hosting on the slower computer works fine, however, and both players get the leader selection, which then also works fine for both. However, both players also get the option to randomise the scenario leaders, selection of which will cause OOS. This can easily be fixed by a save and reload at this point, to load either of the two players' status. The first issue seems much more grave though, as it has the potential to make scenario play impossible.

Leader selection in scenarios remains an amazing feature nonetheless, and after working around the problems as described we've been enjoying ourselves a lot! Previously, I would have to go and edit the scenario file with everyone's leader choice each time and send it to the other player, but now we can just do it on the fly.

 

[Walter Hawkwood]

A small wish: United Nations requires awful lot of military techs. Could it be easier to build that building. Either move it earlier or fewer military equipment.

Given how it was born directly as a result of the WW2 and was founded by the dominant military powers of the era, I don't think its location on the tech tree is unfair in any way.

Small bug report: The Demidov family civilopedia text has some formatting issues with bold text.

Thanks, fixed.

Larger bug report: When playing the huge earth map scenario in multiplayer (SVN version), we had an issue that when hosting on the faster computer, the slower computer player could never load in. I have a loose suspicion it might be related to the leader selection, but I can't back it up in any way. The host is faced with the option to select a leader immediately after loading in, but due to the other player not having loaded in, selecting an option here does not actually have an effect (just like you can't move units around while someone is still loading in). Saving on that turn 1 and reloading allows the other player to join and then get his leader selection, but for the host it will not appear again and he will be stuck with the scenario default. Hosting on the slower computer works fine, however, and both players get the leader selection, which then also works fine for both. However, both players also get the option to randomise the scenario leaders, selection of which will cause OOS. This can easily be fixed by a save and reload at this point, to load either of the two players' status. The first issue seems much more grave though, as it has the potential to make scenario play impossible.

I fixed OOS on leader randomization, but I was unable to replicate, and therefore fix, the joining issue you described. Does this not happen between the same players on a random map, only on scenarios? Does it specifically happen on Huge map or on all scenarios with leader choice? What happens if you wait for the other player to finish loading?

 

[Major Tom]

Given how it was born directly as a result of the WW2 and was founded by the dominant military powers of the era, I don't think its location on the tech tree is unfair in any way.

Fair enough about location. However I don’t see the rationale for the supersonic technology and its prerequisite for «globalisation”. The UN is hardly in play at all in my games (monarch for exploring this mod and AI plays to win), some AI is often near cultural victory around 1900. Not too realistic, maybe make them more expensive. Space win seems impossible under current circumstances. I enjoy the role of being the great diplomat with UN but hardly possible with AI cruising to early culture victory.

 

[Walter Hawkwood]

Fair enough about location. However I don’t see the rationale for the supersonic technology and its prerequisite for «globalisation”.

Hm, agreed, maybe I'll drop it down to Air Superiority. Let's at least have airports for that globalisation!

The UN is hardly in play at all in my games (monarch for exploring this mod and AI plays to win), some AI is often near cultural victory around 1900. Not too realistic, maybe make them more expensive.

Interesting. What settings do you play at? I barely see any AI cultural victories ever in my hands-off test games.

 

[Major Tom]

What settings do you play at? I barely see any AI cultural victories ever in my hands-off test games.

It’s monarch and AI play to win. It seems that when they are not in position to get domination they soon go in culture mode. So for me, the endgames are pretty much about razing their cities which is getting less interesting for each game. Space race is not on the agenda for anyone including me, unfortunately. I am also satisfied with a diplomatic victory but end up needing massive and sluggish army movements to stop some of them, often intercontinental.

Map is either fractal or continents. Everything else default (no tech trading). Version is the last official downloadable.

Edit: So it’s the same endgame scenario each time here. How is yours looking? Or anyone else’s playing with «AI to win»?

 

[Alekseyev_]

I fixed OOS on leader randomization, but I was unable to replicate, and therefore fix, the joining issue you described. Does this not happen between the same players on a random map, only on scenarios? Does it specifically happen on Huge map or on all scenarios with leader choice? What happens if you wait for the other player to finish loading?

Thanks! I haven't yet had the chance to test these things, but I will report back once I do. Of course due to the ongoing huge world map game I'll still be on that SVN version before your latest commit.

Another two things: After getting the great library, every tech you can select to research says +100% tech transfer benefit, even if there is no tech transfer taking place.

And all buildings with an epidemics impact display it as a red epidemics increase net effect, even if the building reduces it. Now in the calculation, the negative effect is taken into account properly, but in the "net effect" preview a building like a public well will say +2 red biohazard.

Now, a question for the world map scenarios which I am quite a fan of personally. Do you think it would be possible for the tribes to get past the hunter-gatherer stage at some point? Maybe sufficient technological progress and contact with "full" civs? Basically some sort of breaking point after which they can play the game without their large debuffs/small bonuses, which would admittedly be reached very late so they still don't pose a threat to the full civs, but could get there eventually if left alone, traded with and catching up to a certain point.

 

[Walter Hawkwood]

t’s monarch and AI play to win. It seems that when they are not in position to get domination they soon go in culture mode. So for me, the endgames are pretty much about razing their cities which is getting less interesting for each game. Space race is not on the agenda for anyone including me, unfortunately. I am also satisfied with a diplomatic victory but end up needing massive and sluggish army movements to stop some of them, often intercontinental.

Map is either fractal or continents. Everything else default (no tech trading). Version is the last official downloadable.

Edit: So it’s the same endgame scenario each time here. How is yours looking? Or anyone else’s playing with «AI to win»?

In the current SVN version, I just ran several hands-off games with similar settings (on large maps) and saw one (rather late, within the last 100 turns or so) cultural victory and three dominations. Though the balance - and more importantly, AI behaviour - can be quite different since the last release. Also I guess especially on "AI plays to win", the winning strategies of AI will be to a large extent informed by players' actions. Can any of them grow large enough to realistically contemplate domination victory? Are there enough wonders available to realistically pursue cultural? Etc. I agree that space needs to be somewhat easier, BTW.

Now, a question for the world map scenarios which I am quite a fan of personally. Do you think it would be possible for the tribes to get past the hunter-gatherer stage at some point? Maybe sufficient technological progress and contact with "full" civs? Basically some sort of breaking point after which they can play the game without their large debuffs/small bonuses, which would admittedly be reached very late so they still don't pose a threat to the full civs, but could get there eventually if left alone, traded with and catching up to a certain point.

People really get too attached to them. They are there in the first place because there was no way for me to ensure a different flavour look for barbarians on different continents. I'd much rather simply remove them.

 

[Alekseyev_]

I understand. Please don't remove them! I like the scenario flavour stuff like them and the other civs in the Europe/Deluge/Crusades maps.

 

[Walter Hawkwood]

I feel in that particular case, barbarians could fill the same niche in a better way if they had the necessary flavour assets; to be clear, I am specifically only talking about hunter-gatherer civs. Their presence doesn't really meaningfully add anything to the game, as they're only there to be interacted with via warfare - which barbarians could do just the same.

 

[Major Tom]

Hm, agreed, maybe I'll drop it down to Air Superiority. Let's at least have airports for that globalisation!

Good May I also suggest Plastics. Remember it takes time to build UN too. Or perhaps the whole concept with UN could be changed. Only prerequisite is an industrial age major war. Or League of Nations could replace it earlier.

I just ran several hands-off games with similar settings (on large maps) and saw one

Are there enough wonders available to realistically pursue cultural?

Yes, maybe large maps makes a difference too. In normal sized maps most is dead or half dead so wonders are plenty for the ones left. I forgot to mention that I usually have alliances turned on, making the situation kind of stalemate for domination.

Can any of them grow large enough to realistically contemplate domination victory?

Not really, I make it too hard for them.

Etc. I agree that space needs to be somewhat easier, BTW

Thumbs up

 

[[Y]]

Variety of thoughts below. SVN 5519.

• I'm really loving the alert when a tile swapped from culture. It's been handy and informative to see it happen. At one point I even thought "did I get that Iron back from the Mali yet? Oh, no, if I did I'd be alerted", and it was nice being able to depend on that. Minor quirk is a double notification when a tile swaps on their turn and then back again on your turn (or vise versa, I don't know the actual order), but that might still be operating as desired.
• Mindaugas's greeting is for Daniel, a different Lithuanian historical figure. I think the city list is as well? Not sure, I just see Daniel a lot in the code and Mindaugas comparatively little and absent from many of the key files, but could just be outdated variable names.
• I love the dynamic flags, but it's hard to memorize them all and know by sight which civ the flag represents. Would it be possible to do something minor, like adding a 2 pixel wide border of the civ's color to the bottom of their flags?
• I used the regenerate map feature while playing with Elissa and my founding city was Hippo Regius instead of Qart-Hadasht, which is usually the founding city. I'm guessing that regenerating the map doesn't reset the city naming queue?
• Siege workshops are a weird building. It comes at a time where siege units generally don't earn XP, which should be useful, but the siege workshop only gives them enough XP to earn the Land Tactics promotion, the prerequisite for the promotions actually useful to siege units. But land tactics doesn't do anything for the very non-confrontational catapults/trebuchets, and they still don't earn XP to then get the useful promotions. The SW also gives an engineer specialist, but even if used, the specialist probably isn't generating enough hammers to compensate for the hammers needed for the workshop itself, which is not a quick build. By the time you get access to siege weapons that generate XP, you also have access to Arsenals, which obsolete the Siege Workshop. So there isn't any reason to ever build the workshop since none of the utilities are actually useful. Maybe Siege Bombardment shouldn't have a prerequisite promotion, and then Barrage should require Siege Bombardment I? That way the shop's XP is actually useful. And in both cases it should probably be a cheaper building, the benefit it offers is marginal.
• The tax break riot response is pretty easy going, since it only reduces gold output and not commerce output. For cities that mostly generate hammers or science, it's almost a freebie. Maybe it should reduce commerce instead?
• When a civ comes back to life through a revolution, you get the declaration that the parent civ declared war on them, but the alert says "ABC declared war on !", omiting the name of the rebel civ.
• Why do noble familes take so long to build? It's also funny that they have to be built. Palaces are quicker to build, hah. But it feels bad to lose the benefits of a previous civic and then have to sit through an expensive building phase in 2-3 cities, especially when coming from Civil Service giving each of your cities (not just 2-3) +20% hammers. Maybe they could be cheaper?
• Today I found out the hard way that Dravidian War Galleys have +30% attack against war galleys and +25% defense against war galleys (which translates to at least 35% defense with coastal bonuses, since all war galley combats are coastal combats). That's a bonkers bonus. Makes sense on land units since land units have a rock-paper-scissors style exchange, so you can hide the vulnerable units behind other defenders, but at a time when all naval combat is war galleys, a default +30% is crazy. They cost more, but not a problem when the other civ has to build 2x more war galleys than you do to compete.
• It can be hard to discern the aid level when the icon is very small (such as when hoving over a unit, especially enemy units). Any chance the icons can be revised a bit to increase the size of the stars that show the level of the aid/problems? Or maybe using higher-res images? Or have their background colors shift from yellow to red as the severity increases? (for supply/logistics, at least, aid would need something different)
• The Gunpowder tech quote talks about the inventions of gunpowder and romantic love but RI doesn't have any tech for romantic love???? HUGE oversight!
• I think Numidian Cavalry falls into the aforementioned unclear "What is this supposed to do?" issue. It targets range mounted units first, which is conditionally useful (depends on who you're at war with), but the only advantage it gets against them is starting with the Patrols I promotion. Ironically, the normal Horseman unit has a built-in +25% against horse archers, which can then go up to +50% with Patrols I. Since horsemen/numidian cavalry don't have access to Patrols II, that limits Numidian cavalry to a max of +25% against horse archers. It also starts with Flanking I, but I'm not sure why, since it doesn't do collateral damage, and the unit targeting means it should be aiming to kill, so it's not a unit that makes sense to attack with when there's a decent chance it'll lose.

 

[JDCP]

The Gunpowder tech quote talks about the inventions of gunpowder and romantic love but RI doesn't have any tech for romantic love???? HUGE oversight!

“Art for art's sake is an empty phrase. Art for the sake of truth, art for the sake of the good and the beautiful, that is the faith I am searching for.” What do you think that means? replace Art with Love and suddenly you have a good statement against sexual revolution, if you ask me.

Another quote from Amantine: "There is only one happiness in life, to love and be loved."

I love the dynamic flags, but it's hard to memorize them all and know by sight which civ the flag represents. Would it be possible to do something minor, like adding a 2 pixel wide border of the civ's color to the bottom of their flags?

I see where this comes from, it's a minor encumbrance for me though. Honestly that sounds like it would make flags pretty ugly lol, I mean it's just 2 pixels but it's a bit hard to picture how it'd look. I usually identify foreign units by their looks due to the large variety of flavors, so it doesn't trouble me at all... not anymore hehe, it did use to, but I reckon you can get used to it too.

I'd prefer a tab in the pedia where you can see all possible flags a civilization can have, buuuut I think that'd be hard to make.

 

[Alekseyev_]

I see where this comes from, it's a minor encumbrance for me though. Honestly that sounds like it would make flags pretty ugly lol, I mean it's just 2 pixels but it's a bit hard to picture how it'd look. I usually identify foreign units by their looks due to the large variety of flavors, so it doesn't trouble me at all... not anymore hehe, it did use to, but I reckon you can get used to it too.

Yeah, same - or just however over the units for a sec if it's not immediately clear.

 

[Walter Hawkwood]

After getting the great library, every tech you can select to research says +100% tech transfer benefit, even if there is no tech transfer taking place.

Thanks, I now only set it to display when there's an actual tech transfer bonus to be had.

And all buildings with an epidemics impact display it as a red epidemics increase net effect, even if the building reduces it. Now in the calculation, the negative effect is taken into account properly, but in the "net effect" preview a building like a public well will say +2 red biohazard.

I intentionally only use the red symbol, but I forgot to make the reported reduction negative!

Mindaugas's greeting is for Daniel, a different Lithuanian historical figure. I think the city list is as well? Not sure, I just see Daniel a lot in the code and Mindaugas comparatively little and absent from many of the key files, but could just be outdated variable names.

Thanks, that stems back from the fact that Lithuania as a civ is a retooled Halych-Volhynia (which was since simply integrated into Ukraine, as it made no sense to have them separate). Changed the greeting.

I love the dynamic flags, but it's hard to memorize them all and know by sight which civ the flag represents. Would it be possible to do something minor, like adding a 2 pixel wide border of the civ's color to the bottom of their flags?

That would only technically be possible if I added it by hand to all the flags. But I don't feel it'd look appropriate (and even the "bottom of the flag" is very hard to define, as flags have different shapes in different eras, and the same flag texture often has to work in different eras).

I used the regenerate map feature while playing with Elissa and my founding city was Hippo Regius instead of Qart-Hadasht, which is usually the founding city. I'm guessing that regenerating the map doesn't reset the city naming queue?

Probably. And I don't think I'll be fixing that. The city naming code is a piece of arcane machinery that I have absolutely no understanding of.

Siege workshops are a weird building. It comes at a time where siege units generally don't earn XP, which should be useful, but the siege workshop only gives them enough XP to earn the Land Tactics promotion, the prerequisite for the promotions actually useful to siege units. But land tactics doesn't do anything for the very non-confrontational catapults/trebuchets, and they still don't earn XP to then get the useful promotions. The SW also gives an engineer specialist, but even if used, the specialist probably isn't generating enough hammers to compensate for the hammers needed for the workshop itself, which is not a quick build. By the time you get access to siege weapons that generate XP, you also have access to Arsenals, which obsolete the Siege Workshop. So there isn't any reason to ever build the workshop since none of the utilities are actually useful. Maybe Siege Bombardment shouldn't have a prerequisite promotion, and then Barrage should require Siege Bombardment I? That way the shop's XP is actually useful. And in both cases it should probably be a cheaper building, the benefit it offers is marginal.

Agreed. They do become more useful once bombards arrive, though. But yeah, siege promotions should probably not require Land Tactics.

The tax break riot response is pretty easy going, since it only reduces gold output and not commerce output. For cities that mostly generate hammers or science, it's almost a freebie. Maybe it should reduce commerce instead?

I'll consider that.

When a civ comes back to life through a revolution, you get the declaration that the parent civ declared war on them, but the alert says "ABC declared war on !", omiting the name of the rebel civ.

Does this specifically only happen to pre-existing civs that came back?

Why do noble familes take so long to build? It's also funny that they have to be built. Palaces are quicker to build, hah. But it feels bad to lose the benefits of a previous civic and then have to sit through an expensive building phase in 2-3 cities, especially when coming from Civil Service giving each of your cities (not just 2-3) +20% hammers. Maybe they could be cheaper?

I mean, those are palaces (or castles/mansions/whatever) of the respective families. But yeah, I get the argument that they probably shouldn't be more expensive than the palace.

Today I found out the hard way that Dravidian War Galleys have +30% attack against war galleys and +25% defense against war galleys (which translates to at least 35% defense with coastal bonuses, since all war galley combats are coastal combats). That's a bonkers bonus. Makes sense on land units since land units have a rock-paper-scissors style exchange, so you can hide the vulnerable units behind other defenders, but at a time when all naval combat is war galleys, a default +30% is crazy. They cost more, but not a problem when the other civ has to build 2x more war galleys than you do to compete.

They are supposed to be amazing, yes. Cholas basically ruled the waves from Africa to China back in their day. They are one of the civs in RI with a very clear naval edge.

It can be hard to discern the aid level when the icon is very small (such as when hoving over a unit, especially enemy units). Any chance the icons can be revised a bit to increase the size of the stars that show the level of the aid/problems? Or maybe using higher-res images? Or have their background colors shift from yellow to red as the severity increases? (for supply/logistics, at least, aid would need something different)

I'll think about it.

The Gunpowder tech quote talks about the inventions of gunpowder and romantic love but RI doesn't have any tech for romantic love???? HUGE oversight!

How so? My love for Medical Science is purely romantic, with no hint of carnality!

I think Numidian Cavalry falls into the aforementioned unclear "What is this supposed to do?" issue. It targets range mounted units first, which is conditionally useful (depends on who you're at war with), but the only advantage it gets against them is starting with the Patrols I promotion. Ironically, the normal Horseman unit has a built-in +25% against horse archers, which can then go up to +50% with Patrols I. Since horsemen/numidian cavalry don't have access to Patrols II, that limits Numidian cavalry to a max of +25% against horse archers. It also starts with Flanking I, but I'm not sure why, since it doesn't do collateral damage, and the unit targeting means it should be aiming to kill, so it's not a unit that makes sense to attack with when there's a decent chance it'll lose.

Very valid point; I'll give it an actual bonus vs ranged cavalry. Flanking is more about historical flavour, but also useful when there are no recon/ranged cav units to target, as against, say, melee units, it's far less certain, and you want them to survive.

 

[[Y]]

That would only technically be possible if I added it by hand to all the flags. But I don't feel it'd look appropriate (and even the "bottom of the flag" is very hard to define, as flags have different shapes in different eras, and the same flag texture often has to work in different eras).

Makes sense. Plus it seems it's a problem unique to me anyway.

They do become more useful once bombards arrive, though.

Bombards come packaged with access to arsenals, though, so currently it makes more sense to just wait for the (arguably) more useful arsenal. But removing the Land Tactics requirement takes care of that.

Does this specifically only happen to pre-existing civs that came back?

As far as I can tell it's only happens with pre-existing civs. But it's hard to tell since the nature of the problem is not knowing which civ is rebelling. Every time I bothered doing a thorough search to see who it could be, I found a previously dead civ back on the leaderboard.

How so? My love for Medical Science is purely romantic, with no hint of carnality!

Very valid point; I'll give it an actual bonus vs ranged cavalry. Flanking is more about historical flavour, but also useful when there are no recon/ranged cav units to target, as against, say, melee units, it's far less certain, and you want them to survive.

Thanks. I think that will give them a needed buff. Considering how strong Barbary Pirates are, I don't think the Cavalry needs to be an impressive unit, but it did need to be at least a bit better at its signature move.

 

[RezerCuid]

How do you feel about adding +1 to gold from copper when learning currency technology?
Money was mostly made from copper

 

[Alekseyev_]

I don't think techs can change the yields/commerce of a resource, only of improvements.

Also the argument could be made that having copper in your territory at that stage is already strong enough as it is.

Thanks, I now only set it to display when the

Awesome! I guess this affects paper/scientific experiment as well.

I intentionally only use the red symbol, but I forgot to make the reported reduction negative!

Ah I see, I was still remembering an older icon that had a green version (I think!), but yes, a minus should work


And yet one more thing. I think the main menu music is very loud. I typically have my music volume at 100% so I can hear the music well ingame, but with the current music track I have to turn it down to 50% or less while in the main menu to not get my ears blasted - using voice chat as a reference, at 100% ingame I can communicate well, but 100% in main menu I cannot understand my conversational partner (hope that's the right term) anymore.

 

[Ahnarras]

Does this specifically only happen to pre-existing civs that came back?

As far as I can tell it's only happens with pre-existing civs. But it's hard to tell since the nature of the problem is not knowing which civ is rebelling. Every time I bothered doing a thorough search to see who it could be, I found a previously dead civ back on the leaderboard.

Playing on a SVN old enough to be before the change that made cities under 4 Pop unable to revolt, I have encountered this same bug many, many times.
It's always when a dead Civ come back to life : the alert pannel will spamm many alerts, telling the name of every Civ that were in war with the Coming-Back-Civ and saying that they are now in peace with (empty space where the name of the CBC should be). It makes little sense since they are by default at peace when the CBC is rez, so it's not really a necessary information I think.

It will also announce which Civ is declaring war on the CBC, which is useful, but again it will only tell the name of the Civ declaring war, and the place where the name of the CBC is will be empty. For the named and non-buggy Civ, it's always the name of the "parent" civilisation, the one from where the revolting cities are going out (and, I think but not 100% certain, the vassals of this parent Civ).

Side note but I'm really curious to see how the change that makes cities under 4 unable to revolt changes the global dynamic of the game. In my current game, the world is mostly stall, as every big country except mine is fighting unending wars against their own rebels. Each time they manage to take their cities back and erase the rebels, it will only take a few turns : they will then start attacking another neighbor to expand, deplete the garrisons of their cities and *surprise* a chunk of their empire revolt again.

I'm only able to counter that because I have almost twice as much units as the second empire in the game, and I'm playing really pacific so they are all staying at home. This game would probably have turned out really different if IA empire would have been able to continue their expansion and win their wars without their opponents spawning back every time they are defeated.

 

[tebriz]

Side note but I'm really curious to see how the change that makes cities under 4 unable to revolt changes the global dynamic of the game

The gameplay is much more interesting after this change since big civs don’t get distracted by war with 1 pop 1 city rebel civilizations.