RFCEurope 1.5

[QManNL]

But wow I must say, the dedication of some of you guys is truly admirable. Sadly though, life for me has changed considerably since the last time I played this game. Last time I touched RFC:E i was still single, jobless and living with my parents. As of today I am.... single... jobless... and living with my parents... actually you know what, not much has changed for me really LAWL

Ayyy I'm also jobless and living with my parent, but I'm not single

We could use another troll around here it's been too pristine... jk lol -- Absinthe PM'd me as well; I was just laying low for a long time but decided to try to become more active since he seemed pretty productive and determined, and I just really appreciated the direct correspondence--I thought it was super nice of him.

I don't remember seeing you around but it's great to have another RFCE veteran lurking.

 

[FakeShady]

I don't remember seeing you around but it's great to have another RFCE veteran lurking.

i was from around 2010-2011... not sure if my Civ 4 CD still works LOL. Who the heck still uses CDs, am i right?!

YO The Turk!! I see you're still here regularly, don't be shy come out and say hi at least!

 

[Mouthwash]

So I just opened the mod and saw:

1. Normal speed only.

2. Incredibly undetailed mapmaking. Something I would expect from 2007 Civ4 mod.

I'm not optimistic.

 

[El Bogus]

Well... that's constructive!

2. Incredibly undetailed mapmaking.

Why don't you explain what you mean by that? I would be interested in examples.

 

[Mouthwash]

Well... that's constructive!

Why don't you explain what you mean by that? I would be interested in examples.

Compare the RFC:E map to the Giant Earth Map or scripts like PerfectWorld.

 

[AbsintheRed]

Compare the RFC:E map to the Giant Earth Map or scripts like PerfectWorld.

GEM is bigger, allowing bigger detail? Or has more tile-types? I'm curious what are you talking about.
Last time I checked it was totally inaccurate geographically compared to the RFCE map. Which is the most important thing by far IMO.
On PerfectWorld: how can you compare the map to a script?

 

[AbsintheRed]

I did take a look at the various scenarios at GEM.
In fact the map is much smaller, and it has much less terrain and resource types (vanilla Civ IV stuff, with only the resource art changed).
No real room for anything on the map. I honestly can't put your post about "incredibly undetailed mapmaking in RFCE" anywhere, apart from trolling.
Here are a couple screenshots from the supposedly more detailed GEM if anyone else is interested:

 

[AbsintheRed]

So I just opened the mod and saw:

1. Normal speed only.

2. Incredibly undetailed mapmaking. Something I would expect from 2007 Civ4 mod.

I'm not optimistic.

Oh and about the speed levels:
How can you say anything about the quality of the mod based on a design decision like this?

Actually it came up recently:

Marathon? I'm not even sure how could an early conquest goal like this be balanced for both a normal and a marathon speed.
The starting army totally dominates the gameplay. If it's doable in normal, would be laughably easy on a speed where you have (for example) twice as many turns. Even if everything is set to take double time to produce/research/grow/etc. all those things would mean nothing compared to the initial army being way more useful on the slower speed.

Sorry, was confusing with SOI where there is an option to play on the Epic timeline. It does make tough conquest goals like the Ayubbids much easier, but then the rest of the game drags out for aaaaages

Yeah, that's my first impression with it. If it's balanced to one speed, it will be much easier/harder on the other one.
I don't see any solutions for this, not without adding different starting stacks too, or anything similarly huge balancing change.

The point is different speed levels have to be balanced individually (for almost all nations), at least if we want to keep the challenge roughly at the same level (between the different speed levels) for a given civ.
Thus multiple speed levels is not something I even consider for the mod. I'm sure it's fun in many aspects, but I would rather aim for a better overall balance.

 

[Mouthwash]

I did take a look at the various scenarios at GEM.
In fact the map is much smaller, and it has much less terrain and resource types (vanilla Civ IV stuff, with only the resource art changed).
No real room for anything on the map.

Civ4 works just fine on maps like that. You don't need to have fields of grasslands punctuated by the occasional resource.

I honestly can't put your post about "incredibly undetailed mapmaking in RFCE" anywhere, apart from trolling.
Here are a couple screenshots from the supposedly more detailed GEM if anyone else is interested:

I was actually looking at France. Specifically, northwestern France. Although I think Italy and Tunisia are less fertile than they should be.

Oh and about the speed levels:
How can you say anything about the quality of the mod based on a design decision like this?

I'm not claiming you could simply alter the speed without rebalancing it, but certain players (including me) can't stand playing on normal speed. In fact, I only use Marathon. So it's just hard for me.

 

[El Bogus]

The game speed isn't even comparable to vanilla BTS. You have a whole new time frame and time/turn is already slowed down.

Civ4 works just fine on maps like that. You don't need to have fields of grasslands punctuated by the occasional resource.

The whole point of this mod is to center gameplay in Europe which is as a result massively enlarged. If you want to have a smaller Europe you can always play vanilla RFC, not to mention DoC.
Also, the map is undergoing some changes. I'm looking forward to AbsintheRed revealing the altered map!

 

[Mouthwash]

The game speed isn't even comparable to vanilla BTS. You have a whole new time frame and time/turn is already slowed down.

The whole point of this mod is to center gameplay in Europe which is as a result massively enlarged. If you want to have a smaller Europe you can always play vanilla RFC, not to mention DoC.
Also, the map is undergoing some changes. I'm looking forward to AbsintheRed revealing the altered map!

I didn't say I wanted it 'smaller.' The map isn't bad at all, I just got a bad location.

 

[Chep]

I think you might just want to play something like RFC: DoC instead, Mouthwash. There you got the whole world, your classic Civ4 resources and speed choices, while adding the RFC mechanics. RFC:E is more focused than your "normal" civ. Which should already be clear from the name itself.

Playing on Marathon is just like lowering the difficulty to "easy". Especially when you have conquest-oriented civs, which is pretty much standard in a mod that actually wants to emulate the countries historical development. I used to play a ton of Marathon as well, just because it really makes things a lot easier. But this is after all the speed that the game actually was intended for.

 

[El Bogus]

The Tercio has very low upgrade cost (10 from Arbalest).

 

[El Bogus]

The AI on the other hand seems to love these civics. In my opinion way too many civs adopt Merchant Republic.

Wanted to provide evidence:

It's 1550. 12 Nations have adopted Merchant Republic including a very large Burgundy which vassalized France and Portugal.

 

[AbsintheRed]

I didn't say I wanted it 'smaller.' The map isn't bad at all, I just got a bad location.

No worries.
And as it was mentioned, some bigger map changes are coming to 1.6.
Apart from adding some recently introduced terrains and terrain features all around the map (semidesert, islands, reefs) and revising the Northeastern part of Europe and North Africa, some smaller changes will also be implemented, many based on user feedback. Like improving a couple significant city positions, resource rearrangements, etc.
I actually agree that Northwestern France looks a little plain, that can also be improved.
Suggestions are always welcomed, preferably in the map thread.

I'm not claiming you could simply alter the speed without rebalancing it, but certain players (including me) can't stand playing on normal speed. In fact, I only use Marathon. So it's just hard for me.

The game speed isn't even comparable to vanilla BTS. You have a whole new time frame and time/turn is already slowed down.

Playing on Marathon is just like lowering the difficulty to "easy". Especially when you have conquest-oriented civs, which is pretty much standard in a mod that actually wants to emulate the countries historical development. I used to play a ton of Marathon as well, just because it really makes things a lot easier. But this is after all the speed that the game actually was intended for.

While I'm pretty sure I don't want to introduce another game speed in RFCE, and would have pointed out that with one speed in a scenario you can't really compare it to any of the vanilla speed options, also that game speed in a scenario-type mod is mostly modifying the difficulty (so basically the combination of what El Bogus and Chep said):
actually there is a very good chance that the turn number will be increased from 500 to ~600.
Here is the thread, it's fairly recent: https://forums.civfanatics.com/threads/turn-timeline-changes.614941/

 

[AbsintheRed]

The Tercio has very low upgrade cost (10 from Arbalest).

Yeah, upgrades costs are generally too low around Arbalest, given that the production cost for those units are way too close.
Will be changed anyway with the new unit roster.

Wanted to provide evidence:
View attachment 471175
It's 1550. 12 Nations have adopted Merchant Republic including a very large Burgundy which vassalized France and Portugal.

Thanks! Already noted to adjust the values.
Since the code is already in place in the corresponding AI function, it's only about the right balance now.
I think I also mentioned that I'm thinking about adding further penalties for not being coastal - i.e. if the given civ doesn't have at least 50% of it's cities by the sea, it should also get heavy penalties for this civic.
How would that sound?

EDIT: Under penalties I mean that decreasing the AI value to choose that civic. So no actual ingame penalties of course, even if it still chooses that civic for some reason.

 

[El Bogus]

Sounds good, maybe even 66 % of cities should be coastal. The English wikipedia even redirects Merchant Republic to Maritime republics. It would definitely make sense.
What about a stability bonus for coastal cities or island cities? That would soften the stability penalty for empires with more than 5 cities.

 

[Mouthwash]

Requests:

Please please please change the color of either Lithuania or Prussia.

The Maghreb is just too empty. No Tunisia, no Rustamids, no Tlemcen?

Castile is way too weak. I've yet to see it take Andalusia, much less become the superpower that it should be. On the other hand, Kiev is too strong and often is (by far) the dominant power in Russia by the sixteenth century. There's a Mongol event, right?

It's easily possible for the AI to own 30+ cities and remain stable. While this seems realistic for the Ottomans, it's much less so for (say) Burgundy.

It would be nice if mousing over the stability values could give us detailed information on it, like in Dawn of Civilization.

 

[AbsintheRed]

Sounds good, maybe even 66 % of cities should be coastal. The English wikipedia even redirects Merchant Republic to Maritime republics. It would definitely make sense.
What about a stability bonus for coastal cities or island cities? That would soften the stability penalty for empires with more than 5 cities.

Or maybe it should give stability penalty for non-coastal cities?

 

[AbsintheRed]

Requests:

Please please please change the color of either Lithuania or Prussia.

Maybe. When the new civs are added, I need to revise some civ colors anyway.
Aragon and Burgundy are also too close, and usually share a border.
Any color suggestions?

The Maghreb is just too empty. No Tunisia, no Rustamids, no Tlemcen?

Tunisia, Sicily, Egypt and Crimea are the next 4 full civs coming to RFCE.
Here is an interesting thread about the Arabia-Egypt split: https://forums.civfanatics.com/threads/egypt-as-a-full-civ.614631/
Tunisia is also somewhat related, so it's mentioned a couple times.
It will be mainly focused on the Hafsids and the Barbary Pirates though.

Castile is way too weak. I've yet to see it take Andalusia, much less become the superpower that it should be. On the other hand, Kiev is too strong and often is (by far) the dominant power in Russia by the sixteenth century. There's a Mongol event, right?

Ohh, you will hate the Mongol Keshik spawns when you play as Kiev
Their food UHV is really fun though, there is constant urge with the Mongol invasions and the need for religious buildings for the other UHV.

As the AI, they were significantly buffed recently. In all my games they still collapsed by the end of the 13th century, which should be the general outcome of course.
Probably it was a rare occasion where they didn't collapse somehow? Or was it a respawn?

It's easily possible for the AI to own 30+ cities and remain stable. While this seems realistic for the Ottomans, it's much less so for (say) Burgundy.

Burgundy has most of France as a potentially historic province (i.e. no penalties if they don't own it, but turns to histroric if they conquer it), so the can become an alternative France in the mod.
For civs with small core/historic areas it's not really possible to do that.
Having said that, I also noticed that some AI civs are a little too stable nowadays.

It would be nice if mousing over the stability values could give us detailed information on it, like in Dawn of Civilization.

Yeah, it's on my todo list, but it's a little hard to do it here with the huge number of different modifiers for each category.
If I manage to do it, it will probably be just showing some lumped together subcategories, like buildings, religion, health, etc.