Realism Invictus

[::Codehead::]

Yeah, we found that the scenarios are much better balanced without vassalization. If you don't like this change, you can try turning it back on.

Ah, I imagined there is a reason when I saw it, thank you very much for the quick response and for all the effort you and the other guys have put into this great, great mod.

 

[flitz]

Yes, the assets in SVN version are not packed (since that is where we work on them), so each time you launch, the game has to cache literally tens of thousands of files. Hence the long launch times. Our release versions have packed assets and launch instantly.

thanks for the hint

I found the description that is available for ri on how to pack the assets. I will create some kind of release script that I can use every time I update the svn wc.

 

[aml666]

The "18 civ limit" on Custom Games for Islands is not a limit to the civs themselves, if you choose more than 18 civs, you get two giant continents instead of islands. Doesn't matter how big of a map you choose.

 

[tchristensen]

So we have been playing the mod relentlessly for the past couple of days and enjoy many aspects of it. There are some things that give us pause and I am just going to throw them out and see what you think. It may well have been covered before but its challenging to go through 250 pages in the forums to spot these observations, so I apologize up front.

Civics in general seem more of a pain than any actual real benefit. I know you said that many civs could stay in early civics the entire game, I agree wholeheartedly.

For example, Slavery seems to be highly crippled. As for an institution that has been around for 5000 years I see no reason why I would want to hinder my civilization with such. I'm curious as to the reasoning of making workers 25% less productive? On top of the revolts that occur almost every other turn, it seems hard to justify the civic for a +1 food? Perhaps granting hammers for mines or plantations and removing the worker penalty would help.

Second, the civic Agrarianism has potential but if you can only build a pasture on a site of horses, cows, and sheep it seems a huge penalty since I can build a farm anywhere -- i can build five times more farm than the few selected spots for a pasture? Having the ability to build a pasture anywhere, even with a lower bonus would make the Civic somewhat more usable. Maybe there is something going on behind the scene I do not understand, but why would I choose the Civic when my numerous farms are penalized for the 1 cow pasture I could build?

On a different note, on multiplayer games have you found that the slot one player (always the host unless you play pitboss) is unevenly picked on? Playing mostly multiplayer games and me always hosting the game I am relegated to slot one (assuming we don't use pitboss) and it seems like I am unfairly picked on in the game -- with barbarian invasions, bad events, and just plain vindictive AI. Perhaps its just my imagination.

Tried to play the Huge World Map but after 200 turns the game was already churning for minutes at the start of each turn -- I am running a 8 gig 64 bit I7 and was surprised by this degradation of performance so early on. Is that normal?

And finally I find cannon in the game crippled as well. Certainly if I field 20 cannons and park it around a city firing relentlessly, I should be able to do more than 20% damage to the garrisoned army? My reference was in relation to bombards as I have yet to get to stronger units, but it just seems to be silly that my bombardments would be limited to 20% damage?

Just my observations so far -- I love the flavor of all the civs. Oh by the way, my players are yearning for North American Indian civs to play. Just had to add that!

 

[pioswa]

The formula has to be simple, since it is used for all civs at every turn. I think it would be reasonably improved by a couple of simple changes:

1) Tech transfer bonus only active if it is possible to trade with civ in question. Will eliminate many situations where a civ is too far away, beyond oceans or blocked by your aggressive neighbor.

2) If you share a land border, you get a smaller bonus even without open borders (1/2 to 1/4 of the full bonus).

3) When you are at war with a civ, you get a full tech transfer bonus from it. Trophies, defectors and other war-related discoveries were often the source of technological advances in warring states.

I really like point 1. and 2. but point 3. not so much. I will try to explain in example, why i think it isn't good mechanism: Early renaissance era. One player is able to build ocean sailing ships but is still unable to build ocean sailing troop transport. He discovers another player on faraway continent. That player instantly declares war and have a benefit of full tech transfer for almost no consequences.

Players get tech bonus for conquering cities, so in some way it reflect adapting technology through war. Maybe add more situation when player receive tech bonus for example when one of your unit kills enemy unit you get few (10 or 15) research points in a technology known by your enemy. When your unit is pillaging, apart from gold, you get few research points (number of points is determined by era).

 

[civman110]

But I guess there are some masochistic people who like this level of difficulty

Lol.

- or, for instance, it could be good for people playing cooperative multiplayer.

That's true.

I still like the new direction you're taking things in. It's a very clever idea.

They were buffed quite a lot in one of the recent revisions.

Nice! One step ahead as always .

---

Have you ever considered adding an option that would prevent certain civs from founding religions that have no, or very little historical basis in that country? For example, European civs can't found eastern religions, but they can found Solar Cult, Christianity, Judaism. Spain could also found Islam. Scandinavia can't found Judaism.

Undoubtedly, it would leave some civs, like the Mayans and Aztecs with only being able to found 1 religion (Solar Cult), but the vast majority of civs would be able to found at least 3 religions. It would also prevent some civs from founding a ridiculous amount of random religions. It could add an interesting element to world maps, so when you finally explore eastern Asia people follow different religions.

 

[Jwitti]

Maybe more "Unique religions" like what middle-eastern and Mediterranean civs have for solar cult? I'm drawing a blank on what any of them would be atm, but that's because my meager historical knowledge is kinda west-centric... I know, shame on me.... anyway, I'm sure there's enough various religious sub-groups in Asia and America to fill them in..

 

[civman110]

Maybe more "Unique religions" like what middle-eastern and Mediterranean civs have for solar cult? I'm drawing a blank on what any of them would be atm, but that's because my meager historical knowledge is kinda west-centric... I know, shame on me.... anyway, I'm sure there's enough various religious sub-groups in Asia and America to fill them in..

I believe in RI Solar Cult is meant to represent Aztec/Mayan/Incan solar religions, just judging from the design of the temples... however, many parts of the world had some form of solar cult at one point. For example, the Carthaginians worshipped Phoenician solar gods, as well as many other places along the Mediterranean, Egypt had Atenism etc. Mostly every part of the world at one point had solar gods, or some components of a solar belief system. I'm not sure on the specific solar religions the middle-east had, but I do know that they had them. Parts of the ME worshipped the Phoenician gods in Syria and Hittie. The only other type of pagan religion that was more common than solar worship was sex/fertility worship. Both were very common and often these solar/sex/fertility religions from different regions were all mixed together and people worshipped a mixture of gods originating from different cultures.

 

[tchristensen]

I am curious as to the strategy for the use of the Republic civic? The technology required to obtain it comes so late that the player will have no doubt more than 6 cities? It carries among other determinants with a +35% increase to the cost of city maintenance -- not a savings but a penalty!?! All of this for +1 happiness? Reading up on the Senate it is an okay building but is it worth losing that much gold a turn?

 

[tchristensen]

Always wondered what the Favored civic or religion really does for a civilization? So if I am playing the Japanese and I gain Buddhism how is that better than let's say Christianity for that culture?

 

[tdfriese]

I really like point 1. and 2. but point 3. not so much. I will try to explain in example, why i think it isn't good mechanism: Early renaissance era. One player is able to build ocean sailing ships but is still unable to build ocean sailing troop transport. He discovers another player on faraway continent. That player instantly declares war and have a benefit of full tech transfer for almost no consequences.

Players get tech bonus for conquering cities, so in some way it reflect adapting technology through war. Maybe add more situation when player receive tech bonus for example when one of your unit kills enemy unit you get few (10 or 15) research points in a technology known by your enemy. When your unit is pillaging, apart from gold, you get few research points (number of points is determined by era).

I love the idea of a small tech bonus coming from shared borders, even if not open. I also dislike the idea of a big bonus coming from just being at war with someone, though I would say the current system of getting a tech bonus when conquering a city seems underpowered.

So we have been playing the mod relentlessly for the past couple of days and enjoy many aspects of it. There are some things that give us pause and I am just going to throw them out and see what you think. It may well have been covered before but its challenging to go through 250 pages in the forums to spot these observations, so I apologize up front.

Civics in general seem more of a pain than any actual real benefit. I know you said that many civs could stay in early civics the entire game, I agree wholeheartedly.

For example, Slavery seems to be highly crippled. As for an institution that has been around for 5000 years I see no reason why I would want to hinder my civilization with such. I'm curious as to the reasoning of making workers 25% less productive? On top of the revolts that occur almost every other turn, it seems hard to justify the civic for a +1 food? Perhaps granting hammers for mines or plantations and removing the worker penalty would help.

Second, the civic Agrarianism has potential but if you can only build a pasture on a site of horses, cows, and sheep it seems a huge penalty since I can build a farm anywhere -- i can build five times more farm than the few selected spots for a pasture? Having the ability to build a pasture anywhere, even with a lower bonus would make the Civic somewhat more usable. Maybe there is something going on behind the scene I do not understand, but why would I choose the Civic when my numerous farms are penalized for the 1 cow pasture I could build?

Interesting to hear your thoughts about civics, and I have to say it's a bit more complicated than you portray. Take an early-game city with one cow and a river. The cow under pastoral nomadism provides something like 6 and then if you cottage 3-4 riverside grasslands or plains you can grow to size 5 or so and be an early-game economic powerhouse. Early farms are so weak that you would need 2 or 3 of them to support a city of the same size and even then you're missing out on so much commerce. Check out my recent story to see pastoral nomadism lasting well into the midgame.

The issue with early farms is a big part of the reason to run slavery. Slave farms outproduce early regular farms, and slave markets provide extra gold. The revolts are a bit tedious to micromanage, but they're actually nice - free experience!

Well, I think there is already plenty of uses for Prophets in RI. This mission would be pretty hard to code...

It is true that there are a lot of uses for prophets, but the option to spread a religion to a few cities seems very cool and game-changing, especially when you don't have open borders.

I believe current civic balance is actually quite good. Republic, for instance, is an often misunderstood civic. It is true that it isn't useful for players most of the time, but if you only have a limited amount of cities (less than would put a strain on your economy), it is the best out of all early government civics.

Agreed. I don't often run republic (just like in the real world it wasn't that common in the classical era), but when I do run it I love it.

I am curious as to the strategy for the use of the Republic civic? The technology required to obtain it comes so late that the player will have no doubt more than 6 cities? It carries among other determinants with a +35% increase to the cost of city maintenance -- not a savings but a penalty!?! All of this for +1 happiness? Reading up on the Senate it is an okay building but is it worth losing that much gold a turn?

See above. Happiness is probably the most precious 'resource' in the game, and this is one of the best ways to get it early game. It's especially good for civs that by luck have good health (from resources, forests, traits, etc.) but not much happiness and/or civs with lots of points. And that increase to city maintenance you mention can be more than recuperated from another very productive citizen (or specialist!).

 

[tchristensen]

I have a passion for playing civilizations that used the oceans to build massive empires. One of the problems with Civilization IV is coastal cities and island cities are gutted without any appreciable ways of creating hammers to make anything. Have you ever thought of adding a civic such as Agrarianism but for the sea? I was thinking of one called "Maritime Powers" that would allow the construction of a specialized harbor that's benefit was +1 hammers to all coastal zones.

 

[tchristensen]

Difficulty levels are very important. The last three can be very challenging and in some cases almost impossible without a good knowledge of RI.

Barbarians are our "babies", and especially mine. I want to make them a real pain, a awesome problem and as annoying as possible. Despite they are still not as intended -but close to - the goal is reached.
They got their own units, some very special buildings, their leaders with a unique trait. As soon as I will find time, some updates will be made to give them even more taste and dangerousness.

Good game !

The barbarians are simply fantastic. I do not play on Raging on the Invictus mod. Up until I started playing RI it was simply the standard option but you have made these buggers so outright mean, that I find it a bit more enjoyable on normal.

Still fighting through economic issues in the game. Just seems like I am always running at 20% which doesn't work.

 

[sami_snow]

That may very well be true. I am under no illusion that I would be able to pull off a decent performance on Immortal myself. But I guess there are some masochistic people who like this level of difficulty - or, for instance, it could be good for people playing cooperative multiplayer.

I play RI on Immortal. It is EXTREMELY difficult, but you can win, I promise. Some maps/starts may be unwinnable

You will need to think very carefully about diplomacy and balance-of-power politics. If a civ starts running away ahead of you, you will not be able to catch up due to the bonuses

The barbarians are simply fantastic. I do not play on Raging on the Invictus mod. Up until I started playing RI it was simply the standard option but you have made these buggers so outright mean, that I find it a bit more enjoyable on normal.

Still fighting through economic issues in the game. Just seems like I am always running at 20% which doesn't work.

that's fine. I recommend running your tech bar as low as possible, maximizing the amount of open borders bonus you are getting (i.e., it is often a better idea to lag behind a bit in tech and build up a gold reserve, than to spend money to race to techs when you can get them a LOT cheaper a little bit later.), and generating as much of your beakers as you can with specialist scientists (also, build as many story circles as you can, those are a very important building). You won't be running you economy slider in quite the same way that you do in vanilla BTS

 

[PKSRoman]

you should add this to RI: http://forums.civfanatics.com/showthread.php?t=439060

thanks these options like double agent and bigger promotion spy tree make game more.. realistic

and my little dream its economic victory - computer check how many gold u gain via trade routes. if u have more then world 50% gold global trade, you win. or if u have more then 50% of world`s hammers per turn..? ( it mean all civ`s count togheter have less gold via trade then you)

or or.. scientific victory, first who reach "future tech 1" win..?

 

[tchristensen]

I play RI on Immortal. It is EXTREMELY difficult, but you can win, I promise. BTS

I am curious when you play at this level how big a world, how many opponents, and do you play from a single save? When I say a single save I mean you play through and do not go back to an earlier save if you lose battles or AI does something unpredictable.

Cheers!

 

[Jwitti]

I believe in RI Solar Cult is meant to represent Aztec/Mayan/Incan solar religions, just judging from the design of the temples... however, many parts of the world had some form of solar cult at one point. For example, the Carthaginians worshipped Phoenician solar gods, as well as many other places along the Mediterranean, Egypt had Atenism etc. Mostly every part of the world at one point had solar gods, or some components of a solar belief system. I'm not sure on the specific solar religions the middle-east had, but I do know that they had them. Parts of the ME worshipped the Phoenician gods in Syria and Hittie. The only other type of pagan religion that was more common than solar worship was sex/fertility worship. Both were very common and often these solar/sex/fertility religions from different regions were all mixed together and people worshipped a mixture of gods originating from different cultures.

Very true, and you'll notice that RI reflects this by making it so that mediterranean and other european civs have Sol Invictus replacements for all the buildings and units associated with Solar Cult, and Egypt/Middle eastern civs have Atenism replacements

 

[Antmanbrooks]

Hi,

I've been playing RI_svn in multiplayer for a long time with no issues at all. Me and two friends play regularly across a number of versions. We use Hamachi.

I updated to v4771 and installed the mod for my girlfriend on her PC, right next to my PC in our living room. We both have RI_svn v4771 and hamachi, and managed to get a game playing across the same internet connection with no problems at all.

My two other friends that I play with all the time then updated to RI_svn v4771 and checked they could connect to each other. They can.

The problems all start when all 4 players try to connect. Any given two of us can connect but after that if another player connects they get a failed to connect pop-up saying check the firewall settings? That includes the 3 players that play all the time. Even if I take my girlfriend off Hamachin we now can't connect more than 2 players?

Any ideas what might be causing this? We've all tried turning off our firewalls too, and we have the same message popping up.

 

[civman110]

Very true, and you'll notice that RI reflects this by making it so that mediterranean and other european civs have Sol Invictus replacements for all the buildings and units associated with Solar Cult, and Egypt/Middle eastern civs have Atenism replacements

Yeah, the historical accuracy of this mod is quite spectacular.

 

[tchristensen]

Does it seem odd to anyone else that religion is based on technology. As far as I can determine only the first civ to reach a specific tech is given a religion. Thus it is possible to never gain a religion unless is spreads from a nearby culture.

Wouldn't it be better to have Great Prophets give up a selected religion?