[Religion and Revolution]: Mod Development

[raystuttgart]

Question: Would privateer fights contribute to Great Admirals?

Yes, they would.
All combat experience gathered by Ships will.

 

[Heartsbane]

Thanks for the texts.


About Blades:

A) Produced by Profession "Bladesmith" with Expert also being "Master Blacksmiths"

B) Some Professions need Blades

* There is a new (weak military) Profession Town Guard (see Screenshot) using Blades (already implemented and uploaded to SVN)
* Profession Cuirassier now also needs Blades (instead of Tools as it used to)
* Scouts now also need a few Blades additionally to Horses
* In the future, we will probably have more Professions needing Blades (not upcoming Release though)

C) Some Ships need Blades

* Privateers
* War Ships need a few (but less Cannons than before)

I think that's a brilliant idea; thanks a lot for implementing it. I always hated having to partition my tools between colony improvements and the Cuirassiers needed to defeat the REF; this change both improves realism and gameplay imho.

Have you and the team thought about making Conquistadors and Mounted Conquistadors professions? Those two might be candidates for professions needing blades.

Hearing what's going to be part of release 2.1 already makes me eager for my next game with it; do you have any estimate when it might be released?

 

[agnat86]

Thanks for the texts.
I have checked the attached XML and uploaded them to SVN.

But actually you have write access to our SVN.
So you could simply upload (commit) your changes to SVN server yourself.
There is no need to attach those zips here in the forum.

OK, thanks, I will do so in the future!

About Blades:

A) Produced by Profession "Bladesmith" with Expert also being "Master Blacksmiths"

B) Some Professions need Blades

* There is a new (weak military) Profession Town Guard (see Screenshot) using Blades (already implemented and uploaded to SVN)
* Profession Cuirassier now also needs Blades (instead of Tools as it used to)
* Scouts now also need a few Blades additionally to Horses
* In the future, we will probably have more Professions needing Blades (not upcoming Release though)

C) Some Ships need Blades

* Privateers
* War Ships need a few (but less Cannons than before)

OK, that's enough to work with. Seems like a great addition.

Two questions though:

- Are Town Guards going to replace Settler Militias? They seem very similar at the moment.
- Later in the game, I often put colonists on horses to move them faster to outlying colonies or native villages. Will there still be a profession (maybe one with only 1 Strength) that only requires horses?

 

[raystuttgart]

Have you and the team thought about making Conquistadors and Mounted Conquistadors professions? Those two might be candidates for professions needing blades.

Conquistadors and Mounted Conquistadors are still units.
(Just like Native Mercenaries, Hessians, Rangers, Continental Guards, ...)

We will see, what will happen in the future.
(For this release we will not change it though.)

...do you have any estimate when it might be released?

Probably in a couple of weeks.

Almost all of the coding and graphics for features and improvments planned for Release 2.1 is already done.

But we still need to work on details and finetuning.
(e.g. balancing, a few buttons, texts, translations, achievments, maybe an event)

After that we will do at least one week of internal testing (by playing).
(I hate to publish Releases without internally testing first.)

 

[raystuttgart]

- Are Town Guards going to replace Settler Militias? They seem very similar at the moment.

No, Town Guard is not going to replace Settler Milita.

They are a bit similar true, but simply because they are both weak.
But I don't think there is a problem in gameplay or atmosphere.

Settler Militia --> (weak) Military Unit (given by rare event), +25% City Defense (because they are fighting for their own homes)
Town Guard ---> (weak) Military Profession (equipped with Blades), +25% against Mounted Units (because they have Pikes/Helebards)
Musketman ---> (standard) Military Profession (equipped with Guns), stronger than Town Guards (because they have better weapons)

- Later in the game, I often put colonists on horses to move them faster to outlying colonies or native villages. Will there still be a profession (maybe one with only 1 Strength) that only requires horses?

No, I don't want to have another Profession needing only Horses.

But if it is a problem that Profession Scout needs a few Blades, we could simply revert that change.
(Actually I don't really care. But your argument seems valid.)

@Schmiddie:
What do you think ?
Should Profession Scout need a few Blades or not ?

 

[raystuttgart]

By the way:

I was thinking a bit about a new Founding Father for Coca.
(+25% Coca Leaves, 2 Expert Coca Collectors)

I even found a really good candidate:
Nicolás Monardes

* He is mainly responsible for introducing Coca in Europe (and other plants from the New World like Peanuts or Pine-Apples)
* He made a lot of his money with Slave Trading

However, I have not yet found a good image.
(Haven't yet been searching for very long though.)

@Schmiddie:
Would you like to create the that Founding Father image, if we find a good image as a base to work with ?

Edit:

This is the best image I found from him so far.

 

[Schmiddie]

By the way:

I was thinking a bit about a new Founding Father for Coca.
(+25% Coca Leaves, 2 Expert Coca Collectors)

I even found a really good candidate:
Nicolás Monardes

* He is mainly responsible for introducing Coca in Europe (and other plants from the New World like Peanuts or Pine-Apples)
* He made a lot of his money with Slave Trading

However, I have not yet found a good image.
(Haven't yet been searching for very long though.)

@Schmiddie:
Would you like to create the that Founding Father image, if we find a good image as a base to work with ?

Edit:

This is the best image I found from him so far.

Yes, ok! The Picture should work.

Originally Posted by agnat86 View Post
- Later in the game, I often put colonists on horses to move them faster to outlying colonies or native villages. Will there still be a profession (maybe one with only 1 Strength) that only requires horses?

That is a very good point. Hm... we could introduce "mounted settler", but maybe leave the scout as he is (without blades).

 

[raystuttgart]

Yes, ok! The Picture should work.

Great.

... but maybe leave the scout as he is (without blades).

Ok, I will revert that change.
(Scouts will still need only horses and no blades.)

Edit:
It is reverted / changed and uploaded to SVN.

 

[Schmiddie]

Wow - I really like the Admiral!

Please, Schmiddie, don't bother about the achievement pics. I'll do them with pleasure, if you keep on serving such beautiful units instead


Didn't see/realize this - very very very good job, Ray! I will love this feature!

I'm very sorry Willi! I did not think about it and have already implemented the new achievement "first great Admiral"...

Maybe you would like to focus on one or two new achievements for the "coca collector"?

 

[raystuttgart]

I'm very sorry Willi! I did not think about it and have already implemented the new achievement "first great Admiral"...

Willi wanted to create images for these Achievments:

• 10 Sea Battles Won
• 30 Sea Battles Won

So there is no problem.

Maybe you would like to focus on one or two new achievements for the "coca collector"?

Yes, would be nice, if we would have an Achievment for that as well.

 

[vetiarvind]

Both, Great Generals and Great Admirals are really valuable if you want to boost your units.
(As I said, they give XP but they also unlock special promotions that are otherwise not available to the units.)

Just wondering if Great Generals will add onto ship's XPs and vice versa? (I'm guessing they shouldn't but just want to check). Looks like a very nice addition though!

I think that's a brilliant idea; thanks a lot for implementing it. I always hated having to partition my tools between colony improvements and the Cuirassiers needed to defeat the REF; this change both improves realism and gameplay imho.

Not sure if this will help in that regard since you'd need ore(or is it tools?) to make blades anyway and you'd have to balance production of blades\tools either way..So, this will make your gaming life harder/"more interesting".

 

[raystuttgart]

Just wondering if Great Generals will add onto ship's XPs and vice versa? (I'm guessing they shouldn't but just want to check).

Great Generals can only be attached to Land Units.
Great Admirals can only be attached to Ships.

So they will only unlock special promotions to these.
And of course they will usually give the free XP to these.

But:

If you attach Great General to a land military unit, the XP is spread to all units on the plot.
So if there will be a ship on that plot as well, it will also get some of the XP from the Great General.
(vice versa with Great Admirals)

That is the way it has always been.

However I don't believe that is a real problem.
(Please don't have me code this more complicated than it needs to be.)

Looks like a very nice addition though!

Thanks.

So, this will make your gaming life harder/"more interesting".

Well yes, you will need to balance a bit between Tools and Blades. (both produced from ore)
But I don think it will really be "hard". I do consider "Blades" a really nice addition considering gameplay and atmosphere.

By the way:
There is logic for AI so that it will not have problems balancing Tools and Blades.

 

[Schmiddie]

By the way:

I was thinking a bit about a new Founding Father for Coca.
(+25% Coca Leaves, 2 Expert Coca Collectors)

I even found a really good candidate:
Nicolás Monardes

* He is mainly responsible for introducing Coca in Europe (and other plants from the New World like Peanuts or Pine-Apples)
* He made a lot of his money with Slave Trading

However, I have not yet found a good image.
(Haven't yet been searching for very long though.)

@Schmiddie:
Would you like to create the that Founding Father image, if we find a good image as a base to work with ?

Edit:

This is the best image I found from him so far.

Image and Button created and uploaded to SVN - FF XML-entries still need to be created.

 

[raystuttgart]

Image and Button created and uploaded to SVN -

Great.

FF XML-entries still need to be created.

I can take care of that.

 

[agnat86]

No, Town Guard is not going to replace Settler Milita.

They are a bit similar true, but simply because they are both weak.
But I don't think there is a problem in gameplay or atmosphere.

Settler Militia --> (weak) Military Unit (given by rare event), +25% City Defense (because they are fighting for their own homes)
Town Guard ---> (weak) Military Profession (equipped with Blades), +25% against Mounted Units (because they have Pikes/Helebards)
Musketman ---> (standard) Military Profession (equipped with Guns), stronger than Town Guards (because they have better weapons)

Yes, in gameplay terms, they're quite different, but atmospherically, they seem similar. I've just uploaded the pedia texts for town guards, and they are quite similar to the texts for settler militias, because they seem to be describing more or less the same thing historically. But as you said, that's not much of a problem.

 

[Schmiddie]

I think that should be no problem. Settler's Militia is a unit, town guard a profession; settler's militia is a rar unit; town guard is not...

 

[raystuttgart]

I implemented and uploaded to SVN:
Founding Father Nicolas Monardes

All (Pedia and Strategy) texts for German and English are done as well.
(French Pedia is still missing.)

@Schmiddie:
Great image for that Founding Father.

@agnat86 and @Marla_Singer
Thanks a lot to both of you for your great support with texts and translations.

 

[agnat86]

When doing research for pedia texts, I came across this picture. I thought it could be good art for an achievement about naval battles. According to the wiki page it comes from, it may be freely used for any purpose.

 

[raystuttgart]

When doing research for pedia texts, I came across this picture.
I thought it could be good art for an achievement about naval battles.

It is a really nice picture.

But it is a completely different style compared to the Achievment images we already have.
Our Achievments images usually show ingame graphics combined with less realistic backgrounds that also look like game graphics.

I am convinced that Willi will come up with really awesome images for the "Sea Battle Achievments".
If he doesn't have time for those Achievment images I wouldn't mind using such images as well.

However, I will leave such graphical decisions to Schmiddie, our graphical specialist.

 

[raystuttgart]

I have implemented 2 new Events for Coca Leaves.
(They are tested and uploaded to SVN.)

So of course, there are new TXT_KEYs in:
CIV4GameText_Colonization_Events.xml

I have tried to take care of German and English texts already.
(French translations are still missing.)