RFC Europe playtesting feedback thread

[yoodle]

You guys are making a great mod here, really fun. Please keep it up!

 

[BurnEmDown]

I guess this should belong in the "OMG" thread which will be made in the future.
I was playing Austria and declared war on Hungary just a few turns after spawning.
I sent my whole army towards Pest and a Hungarian Crossbowman managed to sneak by it and took Wien, next thing I know I'm in ROME!

 

[3Miro]

I guess this should belong in the "OMG" thread which will be made in the future.
I was playing Austria and declared war on Hungary just a few turns after spawning.
I sent my whole army towards Pest and a Hungarian Crossbowman managed to sneak by it and took Wien, next thing I know I'm in ROME!

This is part of the RFC code. If you loose your capital, you get exiled to another nation and have x number of turns to recapture it. It may look odd, but it is exactly how it works in RFC. Maybe we should change that so that you can only get exiled to a non-Papal state. The Pope can never capture any city.

 

[jessiecat]

This is part of the RFC code. If you loose your capital, you get exiled to another nation and have x number of turns to recapture it. It may look odd, but it is exactly how it works in RFC. Maybe we should change that so that you can only get exiled to a non-Papal state. The Pope can never capture any city.

I have seen a Papal unit walk into an empty city. Though usually the Pope just demands mine when I build one.

 

[BurnEmDown]

Yes it happened to me in RFC, but I was never exiled to the Byzantine Empire or to the natives .

 

[3Miro]

Yes it happened to me in RFC, but I was never exiled to the Byzantine Empire or to the natives .

The Pope works different than the Byzantines or the Natives in RFC. The Pope is a full player, one can interact with the Pope in any way except war/vassalage.

 

[jessiecat]

The Pope works different than the Byzantines or the Natives in RFC. The Pope is a full player, one can interact with the Pope in any way except war/vassalage.

Have you read my comments on that and other suggestions on the Disussion thread? (1607) Any reply?

 

[3Miro]

Have you read my comments on that and other suggestions on the Disussion thread? (1607) Any reply?

It is all on my "todo" list in some form of shape or another. I never considered the Crusades complete for example. Capturing Jerusalem should give stability and foreign relations boost + a golden age (only once). One should be able to call for a defensive Crusade (if the Pope likes them enough). The Pope should be building Missionaries and Inquisitors and gifting them to various Catholic nations. And so on and so forth.

BTW thanks for the list.

 

[Michael Vick]

It is all on my "todo" list in some form of shape or another. I never considered the Crusades complete for example. Capturing Jerusalem should give stability and foreign relations boost + a golden age (only once). One should be able to call for a defensive Crusade (if the Pope likes them enough). The Pope should be building Missionaries and Inquisitors and gifting them to various Catholic nations. And so on and so forth.

BTW thanks for the list.

For your to-do list, there's a new list of colonies to be added in the Wonders thread.

 

[Wessel V1]

Russia is hard to play in this version. Almost all cities that wery supposed to flip, flipped to me with on average 2 crossbowmen in the city. Those two facts combined, I started with ~-25 gold per turn on 100%. Even worse, there were no river tiles without forests to I had a nett loss of -17 gold per turn on 0% research. I think we should reconsider the start date, since I don't really have a solution to it, because either growth, infrastructure or defense are neglected completely.

 

[kbk]

Domination with 36.44 population and 26.14 land area. Only Poland as a vassal.

Well, I'm proud of this, but I think stability and Arabian research are too generous. For most of the game I had an insane tech lead, and had no problem building practically every wonder. I never researched Chivalry, and relied on my houses of wisdom until the Encyclopedia gave me Chivalry.

The Seljuk invasion was enough to be annoying, and force actual defense of Antioch and Levant, but was not overpowering as it has been in the past.

On the UHV: I had amassed Hussars outside of Oran, and could have taken it for the 3rd UHV easy enough. Arabia is a pretty easy game now.

screenshots:

Spoiler :

As you can see stability is a bit borked. I buffered my massive empire mostly by having over +100 in the cities column. I'm sure this is a by product of the recent fix to Arabian instability due to religions. I stayed islamic the whole game, and never adopted free religion (I suspect stability would have gone even higher if I had)


The core of the empire:


I took most of Anatolia on my spawn, and I razed all the cities that would eventually flip to Turkey. I was hoping to vasalize Turkey, but they would have nothing of it, and so I just signed a defensive pact and opened borders with them. In previous games, I had no problem taking Constantinople on spawn, but the stationary defenders made this impossible. Instead it wasn't until sometime after 1300 that I took it from Mongol barbarians who had taken it 2 turns earlier.

Eastern Europe:

In the 1500 and 1600s I began to mass produce Hussars. My technological lead meant I rarely faced a superior defensive force, and when I did, I could outnumber them and rely on withdraw chances to win. Indeed the new Hussars are very powerful, but I would not say they were overpowered until I could see how they fare against contemporary troops. Their speed made for a rapid sweep across Hungary, Austria, Poland and eventually Russia. I managed to get capitulations out of all but Hungary, but Austria and Russia collapsed shortly after. I think above posters are right that Russia has serious problems in the current version.

Africa:

I neglected to take Oran, but I was surprised to see Cordoba settle it. I like the updated Cordoban settler map. I made friends with them for most of the game, and relied on my fellow Muslims for trade. You may not be able to see it very well, but I also have privateers blockading practically every foreign port in the Mediterranean.

 

[civmademepoor]

A few notes:

General:
1) Include the music from the Warlords opening menu.
2) Remove lions from Eastern Europe.
3) I'm not lovin' the Enrico Dandolo art when compared to our other leaders.
4) Rename the Round Church of Preslav and St. Sophia of Kiev to something that doesn't indicate the city that they're in (perhaps use the Bulgarian and Ukrainian names?)
5) Perhaps include an Islamic and Orthodox crusade against. . . Mongols, Tamerlane, Byzantium. . . just an idea.
6) Make skirmishers always capture, rather than kill workers? Maybe have more units go for a capture vs kill to represent slave taking?

Some more specific notes about my Kievan game/massacre:
1) Start Kiev with Orthodox missionaries. Despite open borders with Bulgaria and Byzantium, Orthodoxy (and no religion, for that matter) didn't start spreading until I was getting creamed by the Mongols.
2) Allow combat experience to build against barbarians. This might not be ideal for France and Burgundy, but should be core to England, Kiev, Russia, and Cordoba. At the very least the first three.
3) A Kievan UHV is currently completely impossible because the Mongols, who attack from all sides, will pillage all the terrain improvements and workers won't be able to rebuild them by 1300. Perhaps have 6 or 7 grain before the Mongol attacks, rather than eight (or keep eight, but remove the "in 1300" to something before the invasion).
4) I know the Horde has been nerfed, but it might make more sense to concentrate them as a stack, rather than appearing all over the place. This would make the stack very frightening, but would allow a potentially effective defense. As Kiev I was defending all of my cities simultaneously.
5) I don't know if it's codeable, but limit city revolts while the Mongols are attacking. The common enemy should scare the bejesus out of the threatened cities - if they do revolt the units should stay with Kiev (or whoever).

 

[3Miro]

A few notes:

General:
1) Include the music from the Warlords opening menu.
2) Remove lions from Eastern Europe.
3) I'm not lovin' the Enrico Dandolo art when compared to our other leaders.
4) Rename the Round Church of Preslav and St. Sophia of Kiev to something that doesn't indicate the city that they're in (perhaps use the Bulgarian and Ukrainian names?)
5) Perhaps include an Islamic and Orthodox crusade against. . . Mongols, Tamerlane, Byzantium. . . just an idea.
6) Make skirmishers always capture, rather than kill workers? Maybe have more units go for a capture vs kill to represent slave taking?

Some more specific notes about my Kievan game/massacre:
1) Start Kiev with Orthodox missionaries. Despite open borders with Bulgaria and Byzantium, Orthodoxy (and no religion, for that matter) didn't start spreading until I was getting creamed by the Mongols.
2) Allow combat experience to build against barbarians. This might not be ideal for France and Burgundy, but should be core to England, Kiev, Russia, and Cordoba. At the very least the first three.
3) A Kievan UHV is currently completely impossible because the Mongols, who attack from all sides, will pillage all the terrain improvements and workers won't be able to rebuild them by 1300. Perhaps have 6 or 7 grain before the Mongol attacks, rather than eight (or keep eight, but remove the "in 1300" to something before the invasion).
4) I know the Horde has been nerfed, but it might make more sense to concentrate them as a stack, rather than appearing all over the place. This would make the stack very frightening, but would allow a potentially effective defense. As Kiev I was defending all of my cities simultaneously.
5) I don't know if it's codeable, but limit city revolts while the Mongols are attacking. The common enemy should scare the bejesus out of the threatened cities - if they do revolt the units should stay with Kiev (or whoever).

Good points.
1. Maybe eventually.
2. There used to be lions on the Balkans (the animal symbol of Bulgaria is a lion).
4. Yea, those have to be renamed, but that would take a thought or two.
5. AFAIK there was never anything like this in history (actually Byzantines and Bulgarians used the Mongols against each other).

Moscow and Kiev are being rebalanced right now. I will take your notes in consideration.

 

[civmademepoor]

Good points.
1. Maybe eventually.
2. There used to be lions on the Balkans (the animal symbol of Bulgaria is a lion).
4. Yea, those have to be renamed, but that would take a thought or two.
5. AFAIK there was never anything like this in history (actually Byzantines and Bulgarians used the Mongols against each other).

Moscow and Kiev are being rebalanced right now. I will take your notes in consideration.

I had no idea about Balkan lions! That'll go in the trivia bank.

In re. no. 5, I don't think there was something quite like it in history either, but the sack of Kiev got much of Europe concerned about the Mongol invasion, and my thinking was something akin to the crusades for our non-Catholic players to have the option to participate in, even if it's not strictly historical. To me, Catholicism seems a little overpowered before the Reformation: why wouldn't a civ be Catholic, especially compared to Orthodoxy, with the benefits it currently has, let alone with the potentially new and improved AP?

On something tangentially related, if we wanted to give a disincentive to be Catholic, could it perhaps require that gold be sent to Rome?

 

[3Miro]

I had no idea about Balkan lions! That'll go in the trivia bank.

In re. no. 5, I don't think there was something quite like it in history either, but the sack of Kiev got much of Europe concerned about the Mongol invasion, and my thinking was something akin to the crusades for our non-Catholic players to have the option to participate in, even if it's not strictly historical. To me, Catholicism seems a little overpowered before the Reformation: why wouldn't a civ be Catholic, especially compared to Orthodoxy, with the benefits it currently has, let alone with the potentially new and improved AP?

On something tangentially related, if we wanted to give a disincentive to be Catholic, could it perhaps require that gold be sent to Rome?

There were lions on the Balkans brought from Africa by the Byzantines and legends also speak of loose lions. I believe it is just a question of animals spawning at random in the mod.

I have always been in favor of Orthodoxy having more scientific boost than Catholicism, while the Catholics have Crusades and such. Crusades are not complete yet, it is on the immediate "todo" list.

 

[operafantom]

Maybe the idea is too late, but what about to simulate the Schism of 1054? The same way as reformation is simulated. And another thing: what about making the missionaries go through borders like spies or something? For better spreading.
EDIT: Or it may be only an event, and would make -2 relationship between catholic and orthodoy nations. Or I don't know, something.

 

[kbk]

Playing as Cordoba, Tanjah flipped to me, while it was affected by plague. The plague does not spread, nor does it go away.

Let me know if you need the save file on this.

 

[jessiecat]

Playing as Cordoba, Tanjah flipped to me, while it was affected by plague. The plague does not spread, nor does it go away.

Let me know if you need the save file on this.

I reported this in an earlier post. Also, in my game, the barbs never turned up to attack Tanjah. Not even one.

 

[jessiecat]

A word of warning to everybody. I've just installed the new 3.19 version of BTS and RFC Europe will not open at all anymore. Be warned.

EDIT I've managed to fix it through system restore. ie. restoring my computer to yesterdays settings.
Apparently you aren't able to play any version of RFC or RFC mods if 3.19 is installed.

 

[3Miro]

operafantom, the two churches were separate in many ways long before 1054, however, we do need to put something extra in terms of the schism. An easy thing to do would be to give diplomacy bonus to Catholics and Orthodoxes that will expire in 1054. That way, at least initially, they will be friendly to each other.

In the next version, Roman units (including Missionaries and Prosecutors) will move trough independent territory without declaring war. That should help the Pope spread some religion.

jessiecat, this is bad news. I will try to update the game today, since I am using Linux it may take some time. I will make sure the mod work well on either version of BtS.