RFC Classical World

[CrossRFC]

@DrZomboss: sometimes even if the city isn't coastal, we make it coastal because it is an important city and close enough to the coast. Unlike in Total War, where ports can be a dedicated structure, everything is built in cities in Civ, which is why we have to distort things sometimes. Also,

Spoiler :

tags for large images is the common convention, to speed up loading times and force windows into their usual size.

 

[DrZomboss]

sorry for the images
@Crossphazer : there are other cities you can found on these places

 

[CrossRFC]

You could found another coastal city on the spot of Sana'a, or Athens, but those cities are most significant and must be in some way included. If they are not coastal, they wouldn't be viable.

@srpt: Bactrian UB uses gold as a commerce bonus... yet there is no gold anywhere near Bactria or the Indus. Perhaps replace the stone near Pattala with Gold? I hear Balochistan has some gold.


Sakas spawning in 80 BC directly in the Indus is a bit early, and a bit unfair to the Bactrians, especially to the human player trying to achieve UHV. Retaking India from the Sakas in ~30 years is nigh-impossible, even with preparation.

They should probably spawn in Arachosia with either a sizeable stack, or spawn units at a later date.

Here are the Sakas around 100 BC:

Spoiler :

 

[Rod]

Checklist:
All AD 220 - start, always Monarch

First of all, even though the late game is not finished, yet, it already plays very stable and is amazing fun. I actually prefer this period of turmoil to the earlier Ages.

Franks : possible and balanced

Spoiler :

All three goals possible and balanced, but maybe I was lucky in my game as Arabia got crushed by the Byzantines early. Still though by the 700's I was so overpowering that I would have been able to conquer any Islamic city in Europe and "clean" it. I actually did it in "Albania" , which was not even required as it turned out.

Bugs:
1. When you reach the Saint Goal, then the Islam Goal is marked as done.
2. There is an explanation missing about what is "Europe". Normally Europe reaches from South Spain to Constantinople and in the North East till the Urals including Crimea and North Caucasus, but in the mod it seems to refer more to "Western Europe"

Sassanids: possible and balanced

Spoiler :

Note: I had changed the AD 220 map before I started the Sassanids. I added Great Library to Alexandria and Trajan's Column to Roma as it should be. This might have affected my gameplay as Sassanids especially as I conquered Egypt in my first campaign directly after the start.

All goals possible and balanced:
actually not hard, but it would be good if you give a hint to the player around 410-420 AD that the "Hephthalites" will appear in force just shortly before 450 AD.
(Something like "Foreign traders tell you that a local clan leader is uniting a huge horde, which they call "White Huns", in the steppe near Samarkand and Merv and will be battle ready within XX years")
I was lucky as I had ignored Central Asia for a long time and kept my territory smaller in order to be able to research. Then from the 400's I send my army first to Asia Minor (better cities) and then to Central Asia. So by pure coincidence my army appeared just in time when the Hephthalites spawned.

Otherwise the game as Sassanids was immense fun and I loved these horrible Hephthalites. My only solution to this recurring threat was to make peace with them and gift them Samarquand and Bactria in the process. Then the border became stable and soon after I anyway gifted all the lands east of Mesopotamia to various Indian states.

Yamato: 1st and 3rd goal possible and balanced

Spoiler :

1st goal is fine, but extremely dependent on luck. You have to reload several times to conquer Hiroshima (the cities in Emishi are fine). I actually had already planned to settle exact the same spot with my additional settler, but then suddenly this walled fortress appeared. I am also absolutely certain that you can get the 5 provinces easy as well and even much earlier. I am working on getting paper and steelworking. Steelworking I managed by 390, but still had 5 techs to go for Paper and the trading (or stealing) option were not existent anymore for these technologies as no Asian civ has any of these techs. Besides I met no civs altogether having any techs above Engineering, hence the Unique Power became useless. Bureaucracy, Education and Paper had to be researched all alone, unless somebody like the Vandals have access to these. In 450 I missed the goal by roughly 70 turns, but I think I will make one more attempt.
Please note though that AI Yamato seems to be stuck with one city only all the time.

Following hint: In one of my trial starts I had a random event spawning a free Scholar in Edo around 270 AD. First I thought it was scripted, but as I had to replay the entire time because I didn't started to build a gallery quick enough to take Hiroshima the event did not occur. Then in a third attempt it happened again.
In general the early turns seem to be extremely luck based. Just one slave gained early in the sieges of Edo, Utou or Hiroshima can make tremendous difference. Other civs are less .. luck based.
I also moved my settler one tile west in reach of both iron and copper - in the hope that it later will become an industrious powerhouse. Besides I didn't make this spot (Heian-Kyo) my capital, but Edo, as I first conquered it and then settled Heian-Kyo.

 

[Brew]

Some reports from recent games

Gupta

Spoiler :

Srpt, you said you were having trouble keeping up tech-wise while conquering, and I had the same probalem, but finally I tried a game with a prebuilt Kashi Vishwanath and had success, with some lucky victories. The Hephalites are a nightmare.

Han

Spoiler :

I feel confident in saying the paper UHV is not doable as it is right now. I played several games into the late 1st c BC and despite every approach I could think of I was not even going to come close - I was usually able to research 3 techs by this time (out of the many, many required). I really like the UHV though, so hopefully someone can come up with a way to boost them enough. A quick idea is to give them Organized Religion and State Religion so they can have Confucianism as their state religion right away, which would help get some markets and libraries built.

Egypt

Spoiler :

I have so far been unable to get the wonder requirement in time. Srpt, you had said

the Egyptian UP does work but you must be producing at least 4 GPP for it to take effect. build a blacksmith and an Obelisk in Diopolis, run an engineer there and you will get the great engineers in time.

It doesn't seem possible to research Metal Casting in time to build a blacksmith in time to make enough difference in spitting out a great engineer, especially not if you want to get Literature in time. I finally tried giving myself MC at the start, but was still unable to get the second engineer in time (I'm positive this is the only way to build the wonders, given the short amount of time and the prerequisite buildings needed for each wonder). I even used 4 slaves (all that I had!) to rush the obelisk and blacksmith.
Perhaps changing the UP to 50% GP rate wouldn't be too much of a boost. That's the only solution I can think of. If anyone has managed to build the wonders in time please share. Also, Rome attacking in the mid 3rd c BC is tough to be prepared for when trying to get the wonders and Lit.. Maybe they could be set to come in the mid 1st c BC.

Arabs

Spoiler :

Success! (in my own way) - I skipped the spread Islam requirement, but I'm sure it's achievable. I wanted to see how far I could tech.

Quickly - the "first in tech" requirement checks at AD 700 instead of 800 - that's when I got the Golden Age.

I found it quite difficult to defeat the Sassanids in the first push. I feel they should become unstable around this time so they collapse earlier - they've lasted until they had just 2 cities left. In reality, this is actually why the Arabs conquered Persia so easily - the empire fractured after the defeat in Mesopotamia, so they only had to take out isolated statelets instead of a large, centralized power.

I came up with an (overly)ambitious idea for "garrison towns".

Spoiler :

These were the focal point of early Arab society, as far as culture, Arab population, science, etc.. For cities such as Babylon and Shush, the city would disappear (to avoid stability issues from razing), and the player/AI is given a settler on the spot or next to it. Most of the conquered cities have no buildings (other than wonders), so founding a new city is a nice boost. Also, that allow for the inclusion of important garrison towns such as Kufah and Basra. This would obviously be only for some cities.
The Baghdad enigma: too important to ignore, but too hard with the time frame. What about a similar mechanic to the one above, where Tisfun disappears in 750 with a settler 1 tile SE for Baghdad? It's really fun to try to make Baghdad the largest city in the world by 800 (only like 32 turns!). It's doable, and really captures the Abbasid era. But, this is probably waaay too ambitious - just thought I'd share my idea.

I've really enjoyed the mod so far, so thanks for all the hard work!!

 

[DC123456789]

For the Ptolemies, if you build an obelisk in Diospolis as quickly as you can you should be able to get a Great Engineer in time to rush one of the wonders. The other one you can probably build with a combination of normal production and slaves without too much trouble.

 

[Rod]

Ptolemies: As you start being in war with both Seleucids and Antigonids it is possible to go for Babylon and then to rush an Obelisk there. In this case you will have a guaranteed Great Engineer in time as both Ishtar Gates and Hanging Gardens provide each +1 Great Engineer Point. As the road network is already provided you can also easily get this Engineer back to Alexandria in around 4 turns.
Please note that you need to station at least one, better three, Spearmen in Babylon due to the Nabataen Riders which appear from time to time. But in fact Babylon is such a good city that I made it my army training center (I actually lost quite a lot of Spearmen in Yerusalem due to Camel Riders and Maccabees) to replenish my troops.

 

[Sitalkas]

Do you think that a new food resource should be added?
To help new cities built in plains not lose population due to unhealthiness in the first few turns?

 

[srpt]

Thanks for all the feedback. I've been away from my computer for a bit but tonight I'm back and I should have some time to make some changes.

for the Sakas, I'll try having them attack Arachosia first and then the other provinces gradually and we'll see how that goes. I'd rather buff the Bactrians than nerf the Sakas to help with their conflict since AI Bactria underperforms anyway. I will try boosting their production, although I have feeling the AIs biggest problem might be properly exploiting Samarkand. maybe they should flip it and get free walls.

about the Ptolemy's UP, it is the Philosphical trait from BtS and not the Abbassid UP from SoI (which is era specific) because way back when my mod branched off of SoI there was a bug in the Abbassid UP so I got lazy and just used the trait. then I nerfed it to +25% so it wouldn't be too OP in the later game. I will make it work as originally intended which is +50% but only during the games first era. this will obviously make the wonder goal easier. (nice Babylon strategy though, I like that)

speaking of eras, I would like to have better names for some of them. I like the migration era but the otheres seem awkward to me. the broad geographic scope of the mod makes it difficult.

Guptas: I'd like the player to have to choose between building the shrine, making the golden age goal harder, or go for the GA and use other means to keep the economy up. to help them I'd rather start them closer to their tech goals.

Yamato: first, the Jin and Goguryeo need to be told research towards paper so the Japanese UP will help. the UP could also be buffed further. I will also change the spawning code so that AI Yamato flips both provinces but the human player flips nothing. that way the other cities can be pre-placed and not magically appear after the flip mechanism is over. I want the unification goal to be hard so it will always be a bit luck-based I think. they have a very short load time so rerolls are easy.

Han: the state religion idea seems good, but it may be possible to get organised religion from one of the Indian civs. they all start with it now. the state religion tech could be gotten from Judea in 160BC. another idea is the Chinese UP from DoC, research boost for techs known to no one. our current Han UP is a bit useless. did anyone get the population goal?

Arabs: the thing about Baghdad is that is was founded in 750 by the Abbassids and the focus of this mod is the Rashidun and Umayyad Caliphates. by 750 the UHVs should be nearly complete and the game almost over, so I'd rather represent the pre-750 situation than the post. overall the founding of new cites right next to existing ones, as the Arabs did, is hard to represent and is only a factor in the last 150 years of the mod, so I'm not that fussy about it.

one thing I would like to represent though is religious controversies in the muslim and christian worlds and I was hesitating to do this but I think the only way to do it is to just add Arianism, Monophysitism and Shiism. the relationship between the Goths and the Byzantines just isn't right without the heresy controversy and the Arab civil wars could be really fun.

about the Bactrian UB, the Peryplus of the Erythraen Sea map has gold in S Persia/Gedrosia. that could really spice up that area and break the Egyptian/Nubian monopoly a bit for gold trading east. the question is which city gets it: Qandahar, Pattala or Gwadar?

the Byzantines should not be crushing the Arabs. I will fix that somehow.

 

[Rod]

Do you think that a new food resource should be added?
To help new cities built in plains not lose population due to unhealthiness in the first few turns?

At the current moment the resource distribution seems to lead to very accurate historical results. Ancient centers of population can be (and often are) centers of population in the mod as well. Good examples: Roma, Constantinople, Babylon, Alexandria, Dionysos, Antiochia.

Other less important cities are existing but not as large as these metropolises. I absolutely love it.

In fact you might think about nerfing some places, like Armenia, Merv or Trapezunt, which can become way too populated .. given the right leadership.
This is especially the case in Frankish times and lands. E.g. I settled Rotterdam (with the second starting settler) as it is a perfect spot for a large city. Later it became my research center (population 16) bypassing even Paris for some time which had an population of 8 to begin with. In general by 800 just the whole of France (not including Aachen or Rotterdam) had at least 1 million inhabitants with no city smaller than 10, even though I late founded cities like Tours, Brest (or Rennes) and even Calais (latter ones always in reach of some sea food). Paris had reached a population of 20 even though I also had founded 3-4 cottages around Paris of which some had grown into towns. I mean we talk about France time wise just barely at the end of the historical Dark Age ...

The reason is one course the plough and the vast amount of grassland. And that you are "forced" to found Christian Monasteries early is helping as well. France seems to be the most fertile area of the whole Classical world. (didn't play China, yet)

 

[Sitalkas]

At the current moment the resource distribution seems to lead to very accurate historical results. Ancient centers of population can be (and often are) centers of population in the mod as well. Good examples: Roma, Constantinople, Babylon, Alexandria, Dionysos, Antiochia.

Other less important cities are existing but not as large as these metropolises. I absolutely love it.

In fact you might think about nerfing some places, like Armenia, Merv or Trapezunt, which can become way too populated .. given the right leadership.
This is especially the case in Frankish times and lands. E.g. I settled Rotterdam (with the second starting settler) as it is a perfect spot for a mega city. Later it became my research center (population 16) bypassing even Paris for some time which had an population of 8 to begin with. In general by 800 just the whole of France (not including Aachen or Rotterdam) had at least 1 million inhabitants with no city smaller than 10, even though I late founded cities like Tours, Brest (or Rennes) and even Calais (latter ones always in reach of some sea food). I mean we talk about France time wise just barely at the end of the historical Dark Age ...

The reason is one course the plough and the vast amount of grassland. France seems to be the most fertile area of the whole Classical world.

That is, if you chop down all forests! and it should be a fertile area since it has so many flat area! I think that the trick here is to have some European/Asian spots capable of supporting mega-cities but not earlier than the late game. I mean spots like Cordoba, Constantinople, London, Paris, Rome etc etc. This can be done by spawning some food resources near cities after a specific time (Just like corn near Byzantium in vanilla RFC)

But there are some civs (Kushans and Gokturks and other) that settle/conquer a large amount of cites on plains, and these cities suffer a lot from unhealthiness even in low levels (3rd level).

So I was thinking about a chicken/poultry resource to help some cities stay healthy, but not reach mega size !

 

[Rod]

about the Bactrian UB, the Peryplus of the Erythraen Sea map has gold in S Persia/Gedrosia. that could really spice up that area and break the Egyptian/Nubian monopoly a bit for gold trading east. the question is which city gets it: Qandahar, Pattala or Gwadar?

What about next to the gems deposit north east of Quandahar, east of Herat? Seems to be geographically the appropriate location.

 

[Rod]

But there are some civs (Kushans and Gokturks and other) that settle/conquer a large amount of cites on plains, and these cities suffer a lot from unhealthiness even in low levels (3rd level).

So I was thinking about a chicken/poultry resource to help some cities stay healthy, but not reach mega size !

I really have an issue imaging these very tribal civilizations as healthy areas of prospering flourishing cities. Besides as human player you can vassalize some Indians and get all health resources you need, can't you ?

About spawning some food resources late. Yes, that might do the trick.

 

[Sitalkas]

flourishing, no!

But having your newly founded cities starving to death, well that's an occasion we should look at. Let alone that you have to build health buildings to avoid unhealthiness, which takes valuable time from your units building queue when you have a UHV that wants you to conquer a vast amount of territory

 

[Rod]

flourishing, no!

But having your newly founded cities starving to death, well that's an occasion we should look at. Let alone that you have to build health buildings to avoid unhealthiness, which takes valuable time from your units building queue when you have a UHV that wants you to conquer a vast amount of territory

Given that horses were an important source of food for these steppe tribes what about following idea (don't know whether it can be implemented). Horses provide health, but only to all the horde civilizations: Huns, Awars, Gokturks, Hepthalites, you name it.
This should solve your health issue without the need to create a chicken resource.

 

[Sitalkas]

yep, thats fine with me!

chickens were just an example! someone could also say "apples" or "oranges" etc

 

[srpt]

eliminated the extra population you get when founding cities in later eras. all cities start at 1 population.

changed terrain and resources in Gaul/Germania and Arachosia, adding hills and forest to Gaul/Germania to nerf food and giving Kabul gold and moving its gems to Qandahar. also added hills to Trapezus and Artashat.

fixed the Ptolemaic UP. its now +50% in the 1st 2 eras. I still couldn't get the wonder goal in time though. maybe remove the Library requirement for the Great Library.

Paper and Education have switched places in the tech tree and the Jin now spawn with Paper and with its prerequisites, which it was missing before.

Nalanda University now requires Jurisprudence and Buddhism

there is now an Emperor difficulty and all difficulty levels have an effect on the strength of barb spawns for the human player

 

[Cetrix]

there is now an Emperor difficulty and all difficulty levels have an effect on the strength of barb spawns for the human player

Excellent !

 

[Rod]

Paper and Education have switched places in the tech tree and the Jin now spawn with Paper and with its prerequisites, which it was missing before.

This definitivly will improve chances for the Yamato UHV.

Please also change following mostly for historical reasons:
(I put emphasis on the islands, as these normally never get settled by the AI)
(Especially Crete was certainly in decline during the Classical Age, but it is still the first European civilization and was continuously settled since thousands of years.)

AD 320 BC start
Add Statue of Zeus to Athens
Add city in Cyprus (south in reach of seafood), make it Ptolemaen
Add city in Sardinia (south on grassland in reach of both seafood) make it Carthagean
Add city in Corsica (north in reach of seafood) make it independent
Add city on Baleares (call it Palma), make it Carthagean
Add food resource to Crete (Cow) on the east tile
Add seafood resource to Crete (clam) north of Knossos
Add City (Knossos) to Crete (in the middle tile) make it Ptolemaen

Add Corsica to flip area when Rome spawns
Add event that flips Sardinia and Baleares to Rome, when war is declared against Carthage


AD 80 BC
Add Great Library to Alexandria
Make Rhodes Roman
Add Statue of Zeus to Athens
Add city in Cyprus (south in reach of seafood), make it Ptolemaen
add mine and orchard
Add city in Sardinia (south on grassland in reach of both seafood) make it Roman
add pasture
Add city in Corsica (north in reach of seafood) make it Roman
Add city on Baleares (call it Palma), make it Roman
Add food resource to Crete (Cow) on the east tile
Add seafood resource to Crete (clam) north of Knossos
Add City (Knossos) to Crete (in the middle tile) make it Roman
add orchard and pasture

AD 220
Add Great Library to Alexandria
Add Statue of Zeus to Athens
Add Trajan's Column to Roma
Add city in Cyprus (south in reach of seafood), make it Roman
add mine and orchard
Add city in Corsica (north in reach of seafood) make it Roman
Add city in Sardinia make it Roman
add pasture
Add city on Baleares (call it Palma), make it Roman
Add food resource to Crete (Cow) on the east tile
Add seafood resource to Crete (clam) north of Knossos
Add City (call it Gortys) to Crete (in the middle tile) make it Roman
add orchard and pasture

Add Sardinia, Baleares, Corsica to flip area when Vandals spawn
Add Corsica to flip area when Visigoths spawn

AD 550
Add Great Library to Alexandria
Add Trajan's Column to Roma
Add Theodosian Wall to Constantinople
Add city in Cyprus (south in reach of seafood), make it Byzantine
Add city in Sardinia make it Byzantine
Add city in Corsica (north in reach of seafood) make it Visigoth
Add city on Baleares (call it Palma), make it Vandal
Add food resource to Crete (Cow) on the east tile
Add seafood resource to Crete (clam) north of Knossos
Add City (call it Gortys) to Crete (in the middle tile) make it Byzantine

Add Corsica to flip area when Lombards spawn

 

[Sitalkas]

AD 320 BC start
Add City (Knossos) to Crete (in the middle tile) make it Ptolemaen

Knossos was well abandoned by then, perhaps another city will do it! Though I don't think Crete was ever Egyptian :s