Realism Invictus

[aantia]

The errors are getting more exciting! It seems weird that this could be from fixing the inquisitor details, but I don't really know how the game works.
Reverting back to the last version does seem to fix it.
Sorry for nagging!

 

[pecheneg]

All right, now you've definitely convinced me that I want to redo some of the knights. I think I found some suitable victims.

Well, I did it by accident – I just wanted to tell a funny story about the Burgundian spy. But in general, yes – with the cult of knights, one would expect a set of historical units, and there are surprisingly few of them.
Generally speaking, if we focus on historical perfectionism, then there are a number of proposals of the same kind – at the level of rename/replace an element with an element from another unit, etc. But these rationalizing ideas, to put it mildly, will wait.

 

[Walter Hawkwood]

The errors are getting more exciting! It seems weird that this could be from fixing the inquisitor details, but I don't really know how the game works.
Reverting back to the last version does seem to fix it.
Sorry for nagging!

Nah, this one has nothing to do with updates AFAIK. I usually get it when I try launching RI while I already have something in fullscreen mode running. Try updating and launching again.

 

[GeorgiaCav]

I understand that a version of the autobahn, albeit weakened, has been added to all civs in a post-3.57 SVN, and I'm looking forward to the next full release incorporating it, but in the meantime I'm way too impatient with load times to run the SVN, so I'm wondering what lines in which XML's I would need to add/change to permit American workers (at least, or all of them) to build the Autobahn. I tried what I thought would work last night but it didn't take. Thanks to anyone who can direct me to the correct files and lines.

EDIT: Nvm, just got the SVN and the load time is fine on my newer machine, so now I just have to reconstruct all my XML changes.

 

[aantia]

Nah, this one has nothing to do with updates AFAIK. I usually get it when I try launching RI while I already have something in fullscreen mode running. Try updating and launching again.

Wow, weird. Thanks for the help, it's working properly for me now.

 

[Lantarh]

Hi, a couple of suggestions about roads:

1. More advanced roads should be faster to build if you have already a previous version on the tile.
2. Time should be also dependent on terrain type.

 

[GeorgiaCav]

Now I have a question about the SVN. A few years back, Walter, I asked about a way to increase new units' experience in all cities, and you suggested I modify the Scenario Balancing building to do that by modifying the <iGlobalExperience> line in National_Wonders_CIV4BuildingInfos.xml. I've done this every time I've updated RI since then and never had an issue, but now the experience bonus from the building doesn't seem to be applying to new units, or at least they aren't getting the promotion options I'd expect the experience to unlock. Other tweaks I use the Scenario Balancing building to apply are working (a small bonus to gold and research). Has there been a change in the way this works, or is something wrong?


EDIT: AAAAANNNNDD it's working now.

 

[ThirdOrbital]

• Arquebusiers. I can't really find a use to them or atleast I seldom recruit them. On paper they are pretty nice. A bit late to be running around with 8 Strength when Spearman got theirs an almost an era before, but the attack modifiers make it useable. The problem is, that these guys share a cost-slot with Crossbowmen and Longbows. With Civs with Longbows you almost have no reason to get them instead of Longbows. Longbows are the superior defender in cities, forts and hills with an extra First Strike and it is the only thing that keeps cities safe against stacks with high numbers of city attackers. +35%-50% Attack against Melee and Charge Mounted Units makes getting Arquebusiers are not quite as important. The problem still exists with crossbowmen: You usually have an era full of crossbowmen recruited to defend stacks or cities and when you unlock Arquebusiers you have a +200% cost penalty or get rid of the crossbowmen, which would be extremely expensive production wise. Arquebusiers are also not terrible useful in actual combat; They cant really take cities, as Longbows still shred them like they shred Men-at-arms and melee units in a city are usually not the biggest problem. And field battles or battles from a fort still heavily favor cavalry protected by Archers. You could break the enemies Archer defense with them and then slaughter them, though you would need many, but that would prevent you from raising enough Archers to defend your own stack. Thus I almost never recruit these guys, but continue to shove Spearman, improved Cav, Levy and Men-at-Arms down the AIs throat, until I get to Flintlock Muskets. This is unfortunate because there are so many nice National Units and history wise I am skipping from late medieval warfare straight almost to Napoleonic warfare, about 300 years :-(Maybe make them cheaper than Longbows (currently they are even more expensive) which would fit wonderfully with history, as Arquebusiers being easily trained and effective opposed to the life long training required for Longbowmen. So while any Longbowmen are not necessarily worse than these guys, you should be able to bring a boatload more Arquebusiers than Longbowmen to a battle which would be the incentive to recruit them instead. Give Pike and Shot the viability and supremacy it had in our timeline!

Another vote to show Arquebusiers some love. There's even a unique gameplay mechanic of the "foreign trained Arquebusier" which I think is just great - black powder feels like it should be a big deal and civs without it should be looking to trade for it at an exorbitant markup. In reality I don't really start to feel the "pinch" until flintlock musket.

 

[ThirdOrbital]

Let's talk about leader traits! What do people love to play as? What is underwhelming? I'll start with the tiers according to ThirdOrbital:

Tier 1: I'll play a leader just for one of these.

• Charismatic (less exp for promotions, +1 happy to city square line, +1 to relations): Probably my favorite trait. It doesn't take long before the less experience for promotions surpasses any of the traits that give bonus exp or a free upgrade at the start. Your lead-by-warlord troops will be killing machines! Your early anti-barb troops will have enough exp to not be useless in normal combat! Your shore defense ships might actually upgrade fast enough to survive the barbarian trireme onslaught... but probably not. The bonus happy point doesn't sound like much but in the early game, the difference between a pop 6 and pop 7 city (for example) is a big deal. And the fact that other leaders find me charming is just icing on the cake.
• Imperialistic (+100% great generals, +10% wonders, +1 happy to barracks): Who doesn't love great generals? Even if it's not necessarily more powerful than another strategy, building doctrines and making super units is FUN and that's why I'm playing the game. The bonus to wonders isn't a lot, but every hammer counts when you're trying to rush those pyramids before a bot gets them. And similar to charismatic, +1 happy in basically every city forever is better than it sounds.
• Conqueror (+3 exp to cavalry and tanks, melee and gunpowder get free city raider 1): The best of the bonus exp traits. With a humble barracks, your axemen come out swinging with city raider 2. This second upgrade is dramatic because it swings the odds of attacking an archers in a city dramatically from "most of you will die" to "half of you are actually coming home". And due to how the amount needed for each promotion grows, a free promotion is always better than initial exp... though you'll also be getting a lot of that as a conqueror!

Tier 2: Situationally brilliant.

• Expansionist (settlers build and move faster, +3 exp to recon, +1 food to cities): At a glance this doesn't seem that strong. Better skirmishers to fight your revolting peasants is nice but not game-breaking. Settlers are a pain to build but how many of them will you really need? The crucial advantage with expansionist is that in most cases (up to emperor difficulty at least), if you start on turn 1, you can build a settler and necessary defensive units BEFORE the raging barbarians appear. If you have a good map with a natural expansion site, this can virtually net you a second capital. There's all kinds of fun tricks you can do with this - ever built both Stonehenge and the Pyramids on the same playthrough? At the very least, having an additional factory for troops and workers will set you off on a great start to virtually any strategy.
• Seafarer (+1 trade routes to coastal cities, all boats get major combat boost): Seafarer has the odd distinction of being hugely strong if you're on an archipelago and almost completely worthless if you're on the interior of a continent. These leaders are the only ones who can reliably tame the menace of barbarian longships on the raging barbs setting. And there's nothing quite as satisfying as watching an opponents invasion fleet sink beneath the waves before it has a chance to drop troops on your shoreline. The additional trade route per city can quickly become a huge deal if you can start stacking bonuses such as overseas trade or the Great Lighthouse - so much so that even crappy starter cities can wind up virtually paying for themselves, allowing you to expand far more aggressively. If I want to play a leader with this trait I admit it, I'll regenerate the map until my capital spawns near the coast.
• Protective (100% great generals inside borders, drill and city garrison to archers and gunpowder): A fantastic trait for anyone who wants to sit back, go tall, and tech to the moon (literally the Apollo program in many cases). The great general bonus ensures that you get good use out of slave revolts and anyone brash enough to invade you will regret it. I don't usually enjoy the turtling play style myself, but its strength is quite readily apparent.
• Politician (+50% spy points, +2 to relations): More "situational" than "brilliant", politician can be an absolute godsend if you are playing with separatism on and intend to have a large, conquering civilization. Spies are the best way to counteract separatism, and stacking politician on top of the jail bonus is a great way to keep those pesky insurrectionists in line. +2 to relations won't do much if you're a war-mongering menace to the world, but it is a great way to get your foot in the door for early open borders and trade agreements which can become a virtuous cycle of improving relations. Unfortunately, if separatism is turned off, this plummets all the way down to the bottom of the barrel.

Tier 3: Good supporting traits

• Militaristic (+2 exp for melee and gunpowder): This is mostly a strict downgrade to conqueror because, due to the scaling, it's always preferable to get the free promotion rather than bonus exp. That said, it can have the same initial impact of giving your units that all-important odds-tilting second promotion right out of the barracks. And I'll begrudgingly admit that it's better for most irregulars to be city defenders rather than city raiders. All in all, it's fine... but I wish it were better.
• Progressive (5% reseach, -50% upgrade cost): Progressive is sneaky good. Bonus research is nice, even if 5% is hardly noticeable. However, I frequently find myself with large standing armies of outdated troops. I could kill them and rebuild them, but that takes time and looses valuable experience. Meanwhile, the per-unit cost scaling mechanism ensures that upgrading a large stack will take thousands of gold. Therefore, I frequently find myself pausing my research altogether so that my best units can keep modernizing. Progressive helps this immeasurably because not only is the initial cost low, the scaling from a lower cost makes a dramatic overall difference to the cost of upgrading a stack.
• Industrious (+1 hammer on tiles with 4 hammers, +1 hammer to craftsman): I'm not a huge fan of any of the "plus X on tile that already has Y" traits, but industrious is possibly the best. 4 hammers is hard to come by in the early game (forested plains hill being 3), but as the name would imply, this really comes to life in the industrial era. By late game, your mines will be spewing productive black smoke into the air and it's not uncommon to have 10+ craftsmen in a city. Industrious probably edges out financial for me because with more hammers, you can build all your gold and science producing buildings that much faster and therefore keep your economy going strong.
• Financial (+1 gold on tiles with 3 gold): Bring on the cottage spam. Gold is everything in this game: research, army maintenance and upgrades, even espionage and a counter for separatism. Therefore, any way to create more gold is always a good thing. I just don't find financial to be especially interesting as it's a very passive and boring benefit.

Tier 4: Weak supporting traits

• Administrator (+1 health, -2% epidemics, +25% national wonder production): Health is largely secondary to epidemics in RI. A free 2% will be noticeable, but it's not going to save your jungle or swamp-infested city any time soon. Unlike great wonders, there's no real rush to build national wonders, but there's a lot of them and they can be cumbersome. None of these traits in this tier is bad per se, but I would just rather have one of the above bonuses.
• Agrarian (-1% epidemics, +1 food on 6-food tiles, faster worker builds): Agrarian takes a long time to get going as its initially difficult to get a tile to 6 food. If a standard grassland is 2 food, a farm makes it 3, iron working boosts it to 4, serfdom boosts it to 5... ironically, you start seeing the most benefits in the late game when you have mechanized farms. But when everyone can build agricultural depots, a few +1s doesn't sound like all that much any more.
• Legislator (-50% civic upkeep, +1 hammer to city): As we've established, gold is life in this game. But tell me, does anyone really choose their civics based on the upkeep costs? I sure don't! The civic benefits usually far outweigh the associated cost, which I see as a secondary balancing aspect. So while legislator probably helps, at best its hard to notice and boring as heck.

Tier 5: Underwhelming

• Spiritual (no anarchy): Yes, anarchy is annoying. Yes, it's nice to be able to give into the AI's annoying demand to adopt their favorite civic without major detriment. Overall the best civics take time and investment to unlock their bonus (building manors, guild halls, etc) so in the end you don't want to be swapping governments all that frequently. If you really want the benefits of this, rush on over to Cristo Redentor. Side note: this is a good way to tell the relative power level of a civic - can a wonder do it for you? If there was a wonder granting the effects of Charismatic I'd build it every game.
• Philosophical (+50% great people): I love great people as much as the next guy. However, there is a ton of ways to boost your GP output - schools, universities, the Parthenon, pacifism, the national epic, take your pick. Can't you do all of the above and go completely nuts? Well, kind of, but since each GP costs more than the one before it, there's a cap to how far you can take that strategy.
• Creative (+1 culture, +20% culture): In vanilla civ, creative was a great way to get that all-important first border expansion so that your new cities could start working their "fat cross" tiles immediately. However, in RI there are many more ways to get that initial boost: traditions, religions, the various ages of art, many wonders & ministries giving free specialists or buildings. Faster border expansion is nice and all but unless you're specifically gunning for a cultural victory I don't see any reason to play as creative.
• Humanist (+50% to golden age length, +1 gold on city plot): Easily the worst of all the traits in my opinion. How many golden ages are you possibly going to have per game? How many total turns will +50% give you? Engineers should be hurrying wonders, scientists and artists should be making great works, spies should be scouting or dealing with separatism... even the humble merchant now has a glasswork to build! Starting a golden age is a pretty weak use of a GP (unless perhaps you know a major 4+ turn revolution is coming which you can avoid). Maybe if this was something ridiculous like +300% it would be compelling, but just a handful of turns in a long long game is a huge waste of an ability.

 

[ThirdOrbital]

And also negative traits!

Tier 1: Eh I can live without it

• Revolutionary (-1 to diplomatic relations): Heck, random events or annoying requests give me a bigger malus all the time. Not gonna lose any sleep over this at all.
• Populist (+25% civic upkeep): the anti-administrator, you're unlikely to even notice this malus. Choose the best civics for your empire and don't let this impact your gameplay at all.
• Barbaric (-25% culture): Who needs culture when you can simply drive your enemies before you? It can be annoying getting into border wars with neighboring civs, but this is fairly easily combatted through the use of artists and staying on top of the current tier of great works of art.
• Foreign (-25% worker speed, slower construction of workers): An annoyance to be sure, especially when you really want to get that first cow pasture completed. However, it is easy enough to power through and by the early middle game, you'll have more than enough workers to get the jobs done. Heck, mine frequently run out of meaningful tasks to do as I am waiting on the next tech to unlock.
• Poor commander(-5% strength to recon, mounted, and armored units): No one like maluses, but 5% really isn't that bad and is easily countered by a tradition or some stack aid. Don't worry too much about it.
• Idealistic (-5% strength to archery, melee and gunpowder units): Very similar to poor commander, but a bigger impact since melee and gunpowder tend to make up the core of armies.
• Isolationist (-50% foreign trade route yield): Have you considered adopting Protectionism? It will surely bring our civilizations much closer together. Smaller, taller, diplomacy-focused civs will have a harder time with this, but I still think this is preferable to excessive.
• Arrogant (-20% spy points): The anti-politician: be very careful if you are running a large, warlike civilization with separatism turned on. Other than that, you're probably going to be fine and may not even notice this.

Tier 2: Super annoying

• Excessive (-10% gold): Gold is very important, but there are dozens of ways to make more gold. This is an annoyance, but one that the game gives you a variety of ways to handle.
• Fanatical (-25% great people): This doesn't sound too bad at first, and as I've mentioned there are a ton of ways to boost your great people output to counteract this. However, this is worse than you may think due to how Civ does rounding. In short, the game doesn't round, it truncates. Therefore, if you have 2 GP points from an early wonder > 2 * .75 = 1.5 > truncates to 1. Therefore, until you have a large enough number of points, the -25% is actually -50%! That's a much bigger deal.
• Anticlerical (+1 angry from temples): In the long run, one more angry in a city full of them really isn't that big of a deal. However, in the early game, just as charismatic and imperialistic can make use of larger cities because of their happy bonus, anticlerical folks will struggle with smaller cities. A temple tends to be a great starting building for a new city - happiness, culture, other benefits depending on religions and wonders founded. Losing the happiness makes them far less appealing initially.
• Megalomaniac (-20% wonder production): Whoopsie. Hope no one else in the world was going for that same wonder.
• Temperamental (-2 first strikes for melee, recon, archers and gunpowder units): This is actually a huge deal, much more worrying than simply losing 5% strength. Archers live and die by their first strikes, and with this malus a marauding pillager is liable to walk right in and murder archers defending a city. Since the drill line of promotions starts so weakly, it is very hard to get rid of this detriment. Even protective civs will struggle with this.

Tier 3: Game wrecking, avoid at all costs

• Schemer (-40% great general emergence): Another interesting idea ruined by the dangers of truncating. Inside your national boundaries, you normally get two GG points, which schemer will truncate to 1. However, outside of your land, in a standard battle you would only get one GG point > which civ will truncate to zero! A supposed -40% is actually a -100% in some circumstances. Yikes!
• Cruel (+20% exp needed for promotions): If charismatic is my favorite positive trait, then cruel is definitely my least favorite detriment. Your generals are weak, your troops are perpetually under-leveled, and you are forced to rely on hordes of troops instead of focused strike teams. This in turn impacts the strength of your economy. It's tough to play and largely un-fun.

 

[AspiringScholar]

Another vote to show Arquebusiers some love. There's even a unique gameplay mechanic of the "foreign trained Arquebusier" which I think is just great - black powder feels like it should be a big deal and civs without it should be looking to trade for it at an exorbitant markup. In reality I don't really start to feel the "pinch" until flintlock musket.

This is true in my experience as well. (That "foreign-trained" mechanic in particular is brilliant.) I share the sense that arquebusiers themselves feel a little underwhelming, but historically speaking, it seems correct to me. Gunpowder's arrival in the western world didn't seem to immediately revolutionize warfare altogether or displace heavy melee units from their predominant status until centuries later, often fighting in tandem with them for quite a while during that transition. Its primary utility of siege is already well-represented by the bombard and the nullification of walls and castles (and it's interesting to think, for example, that Henry V made heavy use of bombards in his campaign in the early 15th century, while his army itself was composed of knights, longbows, men-at-arms, and so forth). I don't think arquebusiers should have an easy time up against well-garrisoned cities of medieval units. Do you think they should be made more viable in an all-purpose role?

Interesting choices on the traits... I have a feeling you're going to get some hard passes from people though.

While I won't be as thorough or exhaustive as your interesting read, I'd say my favorites align pretty closely with yours, though I think you're undervaluing creative and especially philosophical! Creative is still significant when it comes to early border friction (which can be a big deal when control of key resources is at stake), and building up towards the first pop happens on turn 1 of founding a city, while the other ways to spread culture would take longer than the full 40, most likely, before they even go into effect. The resistance against having your territory contract throughout the game is pretty big, IMO. I'd say creative is up there on my list of favorites. The only other one I'd seriously disagree with you on is administrator, because you're not weighing in the production bonus for other health buildings, some of which (aqueduct and public works, especially) are quite expense investments, and critical for industrializing. Agree on humanist being the worst, for exactly the reasons you describe. If there was some other way to get golden ages besides burning great people for a high opportunity cost, I think it would be much stronger.

Administrator, creative, seafarer and politician are probably my favorites. Politician actually feels almost overpowered to me. That espionage bonus alone is huge, but the relations bump tends to result in research-boosting open border agreements, and tends to mean I'm not a civ's first choice to attack, if in a weaker position.

And on your negatives. Ha! Schemer is the one that I find the least debilitating. I still get GGs all the time, though your truncation math is compelling and an interesting point.

Was also going to post here before reading your list to ask if anyone plays with tech trades on? I like the concept of tech transfer and think it is more realistic, but I find it too passive and uninteractive, while tech trades are a lot more engaging. Might be willing to sacrifice some realism and go back to it, but wanted to see if anyone else plays with them already.

 

[Snowygerry]

(...)
Was also going to post here before reading your list to ask if anyone plays with tech trades on? I like the concept of tech transfer and think it is more realistic, but I find it too passive and uninteractive, while tech trades are a lot more engaging. Might be willing to sacrifice some realism and go back to it, but wanted to see if anyone else plays with them already.

Tried one game, because it was such a pivotal part of the original game (along with whipping), entire strategies revolved around those mechanics.

I missed it, gave you something to do during otherwise uneventful turns (and considerable diplomatic leverage obviously).

But I felt it detracted from the intention of this mod, so switched it back off..

 

[ThirdOrbital]

This is true in my experience as well. (That "foreign-trained" mechanic in particular is brilliant.) I share the sense that arquebusiers themselves feel a little underwhelming, but historically speaking, it seems correct to me. Gunpowder's arrival in the western world didn't seem to immediately revolutionize warfare altogether or displace heavy melee units from their predominant status until centuries later, often fighting in tandem with them for quite a while during that transition. Its primary utility of siege is already well-represented by the bombard and the nullification of walls and castles (and it's interesting to think, for example, that Henry V made heavy use of bombards in his campaign in the early 15th century, while his army itself was composed of knights, longbows, men-at-arms, and so forth). I don't think arquebusiers should have an easy time up against well-garrisoned cities of medieval units. Do you think they should be made more viable in an all-purpose role?

Perhaps they could have a bonus to attack vs melee and mounted, but a malus to defense, to emphasize how they should be defended by pikemen? Maybe a higher base strength but a malus to cities (attack and defense)? I guess my problem is they are worse than longbows at defending, worse than man-at-arms at attacking, not mobile, not cheap enough to spam... what are they supposed to be good at?

Interesting choices on the traits... I have a feeling you're going to get some hard passes from people though.

While I won't be as thorough or exhaustive as your interesting read, I'd say my favorites align pretty closely with yours, though I think you're undervaluing creative and especially philosophical! Creative is still significant when it comes to early border friction (which can be a big deal when control of key resources is at stake), and building up towards the first pop happens on turn 1 of founding a city, while the other ways to spread culture would take longer than the full 40, most likely, before they even go into effect. The resistance against having your territory contract throughout the game is pretty big, IMO. I'd say creative is up there on my list of favorites. The only other one I'd seriously disagree with you on is administrator, because you're not weighing in the production bonus for other health buildings, some of which (aqueduct and public works, especially) are quite expense investments, and critical for industrializing. Agree on humanist being the worst, for exactly the reasons you describe. If there was some other way to get golden ages besides burning great people for a high opportunity cost, I think it would be much stronger.

I hope I get a hundred replies telling me that I'm a moron and pointing out a bunch of new ways to play that I haven't thought of yet.

An interesting point re: administrator - I've long felt that the trait-specific bonuses to building production were kind of a wash, and didn't even include them in my descriptions above. You get a faster granary, I get a faster barracks, the other guy gets a faster library - most cities want all three so isn't the difference marginal? Maybe I should pay closer attention to that.

Tried one game, because it was such a pivotal part of the original game (along with whipping), entire strategies revolved around those mechanics.

I missed it, gave you something to do during otherwise uneventful turns (and considerable diplomatic leverage obviously).

But I felt it detracted from the intention of this mod, so switched it back off..

I agree. Back to at least Civ3 my whole style was to be a total pushover and give in to any request in the hopes of making strong allies that I could continuously trade techs back and forth with. Taking that out completely was the biggest thing to get used to in RI, but I won't be going back now. I especially like how you have to be careful who you sign open borders with now, and I do find myself making strategic choices based on who is researching what and where I think I can get that sweet sweet 40% transfer bonus.

 

[AspiringScholar]

Tried one game, because it was such a pivotal part of the original game (along with whipping), entire strategies revolved around those mechanics.

I missed it, gave you something to do during otherwise uneventful turns (and considerable diplomatic leverage obviously).

But I felt it detracted from the intention of this mod, so switched it back off..

Replied at the bottom. For some reason I cannot move the quotation there.

Perhaps they could have a bonus to attack vs melee and mounted, but a malus to defense, to emphasize how they should be defended by pikemen? Maybe a higher base strength but a malus to cities (attack and defense)? I guess my problem is they are worse than longbows at defending, worse than man-at-arms at attacking, not mobile, not cheap enough to spam... what are they supposed to be good at?

I particularly like the idea about the defense malus. This would make existing units which already conceptually combine the two like Tercio more interesting for lacking this penalty. I don't have the game up right now, but don't they already get a huge attack bonus against melee already? That I thought was their intended role: heavy infantry counters, which right before gunpowder are the dominant all-purpose units.

I hope I get a hundred replies telling me that I'm a moron and pointing out a bunch of new ways to play that I haven't thought of yet.

Well, you said you were playing emperor, so I'm not even on par with you it sounds like. I can only boast a few near-wins on monarch in this mod, though I've gotten increasingly comfortable on this level. My playstyle prefers REXing or conquering early to a moderate size (6-10 cities or so on a standard map), vertical growth through midgame, then get really aggressive in the late industrial/modern era (even though that can be situationally different from game to game). I'd venture to guess that the emperor/immortal players are more aggressive than me. I do like how this mod cripples unthoughtful and constant expansion, even further than in the base game with city maintenance, even while ensuring that you'll have to be aiming for it anyway or you'll get eclipsed.

An interesting point re: administrator - I've long felt that the trait-specific bonuses to building production were kind of a wash, and didn't even include them in my descriptions above. You get a faster granary, I get a faster barracks, the other guy gets a faster library - most cities want all three so isn't the difference marginal? Maybe I should pay closer attention to that.

These are rather important to me. Again, the waterworks in particular is extremely expensive, and by the time they roll out, pretty much mandatory in every city. When you're past slavery, that infrastructure bottleneck with underproducing cities can really slow down getting them up on their feet (and able to support the industrial buildings necessary to make food a viable source of hammers via craftsmen in the first place!). Think of the economic cost not only of this, but also of the gained productivity and commerce from fewer epidemics throughout the game. If that trait nets you an average of -4% from the flat bonus in addition to the longer extent of time you've got those health buildings constructed, that should be weighed against the several turns under epidemic when a full quarter is shaved off of net output, in addition to food and whatever the population that dies was outputting before. I haven't done any specific math, but I imagine it adds up to quite a lot. Then there's also the fact that you can get away with more unselective expansion for whatever other reasons you have than other civs. That might mean getting towns up in a flood plain and working them earlier than your rival could.

Or maybe it's truly an inferior trait and it just appeals to the desire of the builder in me for cohesion and stability.

I agree. Back to at least Civ3 my whole style was to be a total pushover and give in to any request in the hopes of making strong allies that I could continuously trade techs back and forth with. Taking that out completely was the biggest thing to get used to in RI, but I won't be going back now. I especially like how you have to be careful who you sign open borders with now, and I do find myself making strategic choices based on who is researching what and where I think I can get that sweet sweet 40% transfer bonus.

Eh I guess you guys have persuaded me to stick with it off. I do think that concessions from tech trades are a tad game breaking when a military superpower can just demand every tech and catch up without having a native capacity for it.

 

[AspiringScholar]

Also, could I get a show of hands on anyone who's ever waged nuclear war successfully? It seems almost entirely incompatible with playing with revolutions on. In a recent game, I tried a gambit where I nuked the world 3 turns before time victory would trigger, in hopes that I could wipe everyone's score to nothing and jump to the lead myself, but my revolt risk became 100% in every city after the one turn of rioting, so my entire empire seceded, but if I had done it 2 turns before, it likely would have worked. Granted, the civic selection I was running had plenty of positive WW modifiers, but I'm curious if anyone has managed to use more than say, an individual nuke, and get away with it, especially if playing with revolutions.

I like the concept of them in the game and they are immensely powerful, but they are also almost unusable (even in defense) because of the WW ramifications. It makes complete sense that they are diplomatic suicide, but your own empire shouldn't necessarily fall apart internally just because you use them, IMO. I think this is just another symptom of the direct separatism from WW being a problem, since WW already generates unhappiness which makes additional separatism from it somewhat superfluous.

 

[ThirdOrbital]

Also, could I get a show of hands on anyone who's ever waged nuclear war successfully? It seems almost entirely incompatible with playing with revolutions on. In a recent game, I tried a gambit where I nuked the world 3 turns before time victory would trigger, in hopes that I could wipe everyone's score to nothing and jump to the lead myself, but my revolt risk became 100% in every city after the one turn of rioting, so my entire empire seceded, but if I had done it 2 turns before, it likely would have worked. Granted, the civic selection I was running had plenty of positive WW modifiers, but I'm curious if anyone has managed to use more than say, an individual nuke, and get away with it, especially if playing with revolutions.

I like the concept of them in the game and they are immensely powerful, but they are also almost unusable (even in defense) because of the WW ramifications. It makes complete sense that they are diplomatic suicide, but your own empire shouldn't necessarily fall apart internally just because you use them, IMO. I think this is just another symptom of the direct separatism from WW being a problem, since WW already generates unhappiness which makes additional separatism from it somewhat superfluous.

I think you've nailed it. I have only ever found nukes to be effective as a last-ditch effort when you are about to lose the game for some other reason. They can buy you another few dozen turns but you better have your own endgame in sight. The question of what constitutes a "successful" nuclear campaign is the subject of quite a few Cold War era debates but thankfully we don't have a way to verify it's realistic applications.

I do wish that the math behind war weariness was more transparent but I generally find it manageable through the use of spy specialists and dedicating some portion of the economy to espionage during long campaigns.

 

[AspiringScholar]

I think you've nailed it. I have only ever found nukes to be effective as a last-ditch effort when you are about to lose the game for some other reason. They can buy you another few dozen turns but you better have your own endgame in sight. The question of what constitutes a "successful" nuclear campaign is the subject of quite a few Cold War era debates but thankfully we don't have a way to verify it's realistic applications.

I do wish that the math behind war weariness was more transparent but I generally find it manageable through the use of spy specialists and dedicating some portion of the economy to espionage during long campaigns.

True, regarding espionage - I did run 100% and as many specialists as I could, but I actually had forgotten that WW was a global modifier as well as a source of happiness within individuals cities themselves, and I also went absolutely mad and nuked literally every foreign city in the entire world! I had built nearly 100 ICBMs and nobody had any interception capability. I was close enough in score where wiping out everyone's population factor brought me to the top, but that was probably way overkill and fewer would've sufficied.

How have you used them to buy you a few dozen turns? I take it you play with revolutions on, and if so, you'd just get revolts everywhere I would think. But maybe not in your case, since you likely didn't go ham like me.

 

[ThirdOrbital]

Imagine you are in a close game with a handful of relevant rivals left. No one is strong enough for a domination/conquest victory, so you're all rushing towards science or culture. Suddenly, you realize that one of your rivals is going to get across the finish line before you and there's not much you can do about it... or is there?

I declare war on the offending party, and beg or bribe as many other civs as I can to come with me. I then launch a targeted nuclear salvo at key research/production/cultural facilities. If possible, I follow up with fast moving ground troops to raze the damaged areas before they can be repaired. There's no need for Armageddon; I just need enough to disrupt the impending victory condition. It's a desperation move: public opinion is irrevesably damaged, I will lose most of my trade agreements, and I may have just started a war I can't win. But hey, it beats losing outright. Many times my spaceship has blasted away from the burning wreckage of the planet!

 

[Snowygerry]

The only nuclear war I ever witnessed in RI was between 2 AI civs, it was actually neat, and in my experience quite rare.

It was an isolation game where I just defended my continent and organized foreign expeditions to prevent my opponents from becoming overly powerful on the other, much larger continent.

The nuclear threat caused me to withdraw my forces that had been intervening in their wars for centuries...and accept a draw

 

[TheBirdMan]

Info:

I know that one of my favorite mapscript (Smartmap) hasn't been updated in years - or rather: I thought so.


The use of a slightly "outdated" map script has of course given me some challenges and in particular I have spent a lot of time with WorldBuilder before a new game could start. So actually, my thought a few days ago was to ask if "some" (guess who) couldn't - at some point - take a look at this mapscript, because it's actually really good - even with the bugs and shortcomings there were.

But first I wanted to check once again whether there really wasn't anything newer. And after a lot of searches on and reading about Smartmap in our CIV4 forums, I finally found something interesting. The MapScriptTools. And an updated Smartmap generator.

I can see, that you/we already have the - probably latest - version of the MST included in the .....\assets\Python folder. But I can't find the updated corresponding mapscript files in the ....\PrivateMaps folder. Now I can't see if it actually is the updated mapscripts - just renamed - that are included in the latest RI-version - but if not, this is for everyone's information.

Anyway, I'm very happy with "my" new Smartmap_MST.py file.