RFC Classical World

[xshayarsha]

Thanks for explanation. I realize that this mod is still mod under construction, but it is already quite enjoyable (RFC in the ancient world is a great idea).
Why Easter Roman Empire spawns at 305 AD? Historically it should be 395 AD.
I have also come comments about Parthians: they are supposed to conquer 7% of the map until 50 BC, but it is hardly possible (especially because around 80 BC there is a plague which decimates all cities to 1 or 2 population, and kills units too). In my opinion, either they had to have longer time to do it (e.g., until 50 AD), or they should spawn earlier (e.g., the first really independent Parthian rule begun ca. 176 BC with Phraates I). Also, 7% is a pretty large empire: much larger that Parthians had ever had. (in addition, if I am not wrong, at the beginning years change pretty quickly, like each turn 2 years or so).
Maybe it would be a good idea to add some other Hellenistic state, like Antigonid Macedonia: Romans and Seleucids could use another opponent. Right now, Romans have a great advantage: their legionaries are irresistible, and they always conquer most of the Mediterranean without problem.

 

[rrosen]

Something that helped med with the Parthians was to use Zoroastrian temples to get a great artist, which can be used to bulb the tech you need for the Heroic Epic. Thereby you can allocate more funds to mercenaries/expansion rather than research.

 

[srpt]

I picked 305AD for the byzantines based on Constantine (became emperor in 306). I wanted them to start as early as possible for balance reasons.

I tried to base other spawn dates on roughly when the civ in question conquered its core provinces. the Romans spawn in 270BC because thats when they completed the conquest of italy. similarly 140BC is roughly when the Parthians took control of Persia.

I will lower the Parthians land goal to 6%. I agree 7 is too much but I want it to be hard.

I think independent cities represents Greece well enough. adding another civ has the potential to create a lot of unhistoric situations if they expand and I don't want to add a civ just to have it die in less than 100 years.

here is a patch for the Satavahana UHV issue and the Parthian land requirement:

 

[DC123456789]

The last Satavahanan UHV goal checks, but it never says "YES", nor does the goal (and victory) ever trigger.

 

[xshayarsha]

thanks for the patch!

 

[srpt]

made some balance changes to some of the early civs to make their UHVs easier:

Literature is a bit cheaper, this will help the Egyptians and Parthians

Carthage starts with Siege Engines, making it easier for them to get Elephant Training and Naval Warfare.

the Mauryans now start with 2 axemen and 2 elephants and 1 additional city, Ujjain, and they no longer have to conquer Tamil Nadu.

and here's another patch for the Satavahana victory issue:

 

[srpt]

the Mauryans are still quite hard so I'm helping them some more:

Edicts give +1 piety if you are Buddhist (they no longer affect maintenance)

the 10 edicts goal works on a stored counter, so you need to build 10, not own 10 at once. so you can build them in the cities which are destined to flip and still get credit for them.

the Sungas do not spawn if your piety is 50 or better

as a result of these changes I will probably move the sainthood goal up from 100AD to something sooner.

edit: can't seem to upload a regular download version right now. sorry I've tried 3 times and it keeps having problems.

added a list of conditional unit spawns in the 3rd post

 

[srpt]

the feature allowing you to hire barbarians as mercenaries is now working.

like the bribing feature, it is done by a spy on the same tile as the barbs. it calculates what the mercenary cost for those units would be and only displays the button if you have enough gold. also like the bribing, there is a 20% chance they will take the gold and kill the spy.

I don't claim to have any understanding of the mercenary module, but it appears that each mercenary needs a unique name. accordingly, barbarian mercenaries are simply numbered as hired: Barbarian Cohort 1 etc.

the Byzantines will probably get bonuses for bribing and hiring barbarians as part of their unique power.

also spies now have 2 moves

 

[srpt]

there's a new regular download up including the barbarian mercenary hiring feature. the download from sourceforge is a bit buggy. it looked like it wasn't going to work, kept refreshing the page and not starting, but then after a few tries it started, so have patience.

 

[2phunkey4u]

Mmh, with this build, the mod does not properly load for me any more. Imean, it does load, but I can't select the right scenario.

 

[srpt]

I will put up a new one today. can you be more specific about the issue?

 

[2phunkey4u]

Civ4 does not crash when I try to load the mod, but I just get the generic BtS starting screen and the two RFCW scenarios are nowhere to be found.

 

[srpt]

are you sure its not in a folder within a folder from the unzip? that would cause the effect you describe.

 

[2phunkey4u]

No, that's not it. Anybody else experiencing the same issue?

 

[srpt]

I just downloaded, unzipped and ran it successfully

 

[srpt]

well I am a bit pleased with myself because I managed to clone an array from 1 xml file to another. as a result, civics can now give bonuses to specialist yields. the reason I wanted to do this was to make Caste System competitive with Slavery by having it give +1 production to Citizens.

so Caste System now gives +1 xp to units, unlimited priests, +1 production from citizens and +1 food from farms, reflecting the 4 original castes

Agrarianism now gives +2 food from farms and +1 food from orchards

Trade Economy now gives +1 gold from merchants, other benefits may be taken away to balance

edit: actually it was an array of arrays (I think)

 

[srpt]

you can also now bribe or hire pirates. this works through a popup rather than a unit action. this change is in the svn and I will probably put up a new regular version today.

 

[2phunkey4u]

While you're at it, the UHV counter for Maurya is reset to 1/3 (lose) after the 2/3 Golden Age. Have you also fixed UHV triggers for Saba, Vietnam and others I have notified of?

 

[srpt]

I definitely fixed Vietnam and Saba, or at least fixed something in them. I remember fixing Satavahana as well.

and I will fix the Mauryans. congratualtions on getting 2 of 3. was that with the new edicts that give piety?

also added some information about the mod's features to the third post.

 

[rrosen]

I tested the bribing as Byzantines. It is a very nice feature and feels historical. I think the chance of them killing your emissary is slightly to high, a spy is costly to build, and the high chance of failure means you still have to build normal garrisons, which protects for free.

At the moment, the UHVs for the Byzantines are trivial. Perhaps a dramatically increased barbarian pressure against human Byzantines would mean that it wouldn't be possible to build up as much infrastructure as I was able to. With that infrastructure in place, it was easy to conquer everything needed. The Sassanids were nice and agressive, actually capturing both Aleppo and Damascus from me during the buildup period.