[Religion and Revolution]: Mod Development

[Heartsbane]

No, presumably not.

I think that if we release it this weekend it will be on Sunday evening / at the end of the weekend.

Actually Sunday evening would be great since I have a free day on Monday.

But even if you don't release it this weekend, thanks yet again to the whole team for the great work!

 

[raystuttgart]

I just wanted to ask whether there is any change you are going to release 2.1 this weekend?

If we get the missing Admiral names for Portugal (see here) today, then probably yes.
If we don't, then no.

Otherwise we only have 1 little open todo:
(But it would not prevent Release 2.1 if it would stay open for now.)

* 2 small Achievments for "Sea Battles won"

 

[Heartsbane]

If we get the missing Admiral names for Portugal (see here) today, then probably yes.
If we don't, then no.

Now that's a powerful incentive.

I had already dug up 6 names from Wikipedia before I saw your post; how many more do you need?

 

[raystuttgart]

how many more do you need?

This should be enough:

8 to 10 for Portuguese Colonies
5 for Portugal Europe

 

[Schmiddie]

Picture for 10 victories at sea is uploaded and texts for 10 and 30 victories at sea.

We only need an achievement picture for 30 victories at sea. I can do that tomorrow but presumably not today.

 

[raystuttgart]

Great.

I'll wait then until tomorrow evening to see if we will publish Release 2.1 this weekend.
(If Release 2.1 is published next weekend, world will not end either. )

 

[raystuttgart]

Ok, I have asked our friends at infracta, if they could upload Release 2.1 to their server tomorrow evening / night.
(Have not yet gotten any response though.)

If things work out, we will publish Release 2.1 tomorrow then.
(Otherwise it will be next weekend, since I will be gone again during the week.)

 

[Heartsbane]

Ok, I have asked our friends at infracta, if they could upload Release 2.1 to their server tomorrow evening / night.
(Have not yet gotten any response though.)

If things work out, we will publish Release 2.1 tomorrow then.
(Otherwise it will be next weekend, since I will be gone again during the week.)

Cheers

 

[raystuttgart]

Our contact at infracta was not available today to upload Release 2.1 to their server.

Maybe we will get Release 2.1 published in the next days though.
(Schmiddie could let you know when it is uploaded.)

See you guys next weekend.

 

[Wombats of War]

Can't wait the for the next release!

 

[vetiarvind]

One of the things I feel is ahistorical in this mod (maybe vanilla) is how it punishes the player for exporting cash crops and raw yields. This is because of the way tax increases are calculated based on the absolute quantity of yields with no emphasis on the value of the goods. Historically, the new world was a huge source of raw materials to Europe whereas I always find myself trying to minimize the quantity I'm trading in Europe by producing high-value goods to keep taxes low. My suggestion would be to use value as the metric for tax increases instead of yields. Dumping fur in europe should not get the king pissed off at me, whereas selling luxury coats should since I'm competing with the king's economy. My suggestion would be to use the yield value of "10" as a normalized multiplier for a yield. So a yield worth 5 should only contribute .5 to the "yields traded" that is used for tax increase calculation whereas a yield worth 20 would contribute 2 to the "yields traded" value. Of course the "yields traded" parameter should be renamed to "yield score" or something to reflect this calculation.

 

[raystuttgart]

I always find myself trying to minimize the quantity I'm trading in Europe by producing high-value goods to keep taxes low.

Considering game play that is perfectly fine for me.
(May it be historically correct or not.)

Having a "Weighting System for Yield Sales contributing to Tax Increases" wouldn't hurt either though.
(Since it could be adjusted to personal taste by XML probably.)

Except some people that are able to read code, players won't know or care about all the details of the logic how tax increase are calculated anyways.
(I don't believe it is necessary for a player to know all the details of the logic to enjoy playing.)

I simply don't have time to spend my time on such low priorities if I don't even find the time to implement the high priorities on our todo list.

So if you want to create some "Weighting System for Yield Sales contributing to Tax Increases", go ahead.
(You could publish it as a small modmod.)

When it is implemented, I will take a look for sure.
(And if it is a good implementation, we might adapt it to the RaR base mod.)

 

[vetiarvind]

Very well, I will wait for the release this weekend before doing\testing a modmod.

 

[raystuttgart]

@vetiarvind:

If you like to do some modding, maybe you could also consider to implement Rallying Points.
(Or whatever you would like to call that feature.)

It would be incredibly useful and most players would probably kiss your feet for such a feature.

Other useful additions would be:

1) Adding Africa and Port Royal as destinations for Goto-Command (just like Europe already is)
2) Adding Africa and Port Royal as destinations for Trade Routes (just like Europe already is)
3) Allowing Travel directly between Europe-Africa-Port Royal by SailTo-Command

 

[vetiarvind]

Hmm...I finished the implementation of the tax-score feature, but I haven't modded anything on this machine for a while and have to install a lot of things. (I don't even have nmake ) Once, I get my dev setup working , I will try to take a look at more features. If you're keen on getting\reviewing the code for the tax score feature I could send it to you. You can msg me if you are interested. I also added a feature where buying from europe only contributes 50% of the score that you will get from selling. (it makes sense to me, since buying promotes the king's economy and puts money into his royal pocket, therefore is not as likely to get him anxious to increase taxes). Of course, you are free to add\remove it from the R&R mod. (it is a simple change)

 

[Nightinggale]

(I don't even have nmake )

It's usually a path issue rather than missing exe file. I wrote a guide for CMC, but the compiler setup applies to all mods.
https://sourceforge.net/p/colonizationmodcollection/wiki/compiler setup/

 

[raystuttgart]

You can msg me if you are interested.

I will keep this in mind and will come back to you once I have some time.

Until the end of August this will probably not be the case though.
Within the next 2 weeks (after this weekend) I won't even be at home.

Problem with your changes also is the following:

Balancing needs to assure that your changes don't slow down (or speed up) rate of tax increases too much.
(The rate of tax changes should stay about the same as it currently is.)

Modding simply is a lot more than just changing some logic.
(Good gameplay / balancing is much more important to me than "pure realism".)

------

Also currently my main priority is to finally get Release 2.1 out.
(After the upload is available at infracta we need to announce it in the different forums incl. proper changelog and credits.)

 

[vetiarvind]

Balancing needs to assure that your changes don't slow down (or speed up) rate of tax increases too much.
(The rate of tax changes should stay about the same as it currently is.)
Also currently my main priority is to finally get Release 2.1 out.
(After the upload is available at infracta we need to announce it in the different forums incl. proper changelog and credits.)

I did keep balance in mind, since the change will encourage exports of cash crops as well. A player who only exports high-value goods will hit the tax increase ceilings more quickly (of course, as the price of the high-value good goes down, this rate will slow down). The change basically encourages a more balanced export system without any "gamification" like what I described in a previous post. Also, if we need a recalibration of the tax increase, the code only needs a change in one place (using a multiplier). Anyway, since the tax rate probability of increase does not depend on the tax score directly, the gameplay should not be affected much. (it only affects the ceilings after which the probability of tax increase is triggered)

It is sad that you are free only later, but it will do for now I will try to fix my dev box setup and play-test a game by that time...And if i find time between work and real-life, will try to do modding of the go-to features.

 

[raystuttgart]

Hm, since there have been a lot of posts in wrong threads last week I had asked a moderator to clean them up.
(Moving the post to the right threads.)

However something seems to have gone wrong.

Currently these 2 threads don't seem to work properly:
(Pages cannot be reached and posts seem missing.)

[Religion and Revolution]: Feedback and Questions
[Religion and Revolution]: Bugs and Todos

I told the moderators and maybe they can repair the issue.

Edit:

Seems to be fixed.
(Posts seem to be there again.)

There is some small issue left in "[Religion and Revolution]: Bugs and Todos" with wrong "last page" but that will probably fix itself when new posts are created.

 

[raystuttgart]

Release 2.1 is now finally available for Download.
All further information (e.g. changelog) here.

Thanks again to everybody who gave us support.

Hope you will enjoy.

Edit:
I will be gone the next 2 weeks.