Rhye's Catapult

[Cannae]

I am wondering why does it say when I put the all the terrain featuers into my custom asets folder when I look at the swamp terrian and all the stuff related to it intead of saying what it would normaly say for the civalopidea it says something like this KEY_TEXT_SWAMP_TERRAIN and aslo has no civiolpidea icon for it.Also I put when I put this mod into the Main civ derictory and put the map into the public map folders and tried to play it just aboght when it was going to load it crashed.Am I diong anthing wrong??Please tell me if I am.Note could you aslo add eater some Barbainans or some more civs to block the expansion of certin contires such as the Usa and the Aztecs in North America and The Malian empire in Africa???

 

[Barak]

For now, here's v065.

Big balancement changes this time:

- Added population bonus and improvements upgrade speed modifiers
- Plains graphics slightly changed
- Added free buildings for late starts: USA in particular will benefit from this change
- Limitations for ancient wonders production by late starting civs set active
- Updated some founding areas to fix japanese settlers spam
- Reduced settler production weight in city AI for Egypt, Japan and Aztecs, increased for some European powers after Astronomy
- Barbarians warriors can’t appear on partially impassable terrains anymore
- Slightly reduced amount of some starting units
- Shrines can produce max 20 commerce. This way Arabia will be a little less rich (being Christianity so widespread, its income was huge)
- Aggressive AI game option enabled
- Tuned some modifiers
- Hinduism and Taoism founding bug really fixed this time
- Removed multiple new era splash screens
- Jungle can be mined with just Bronze Working
- Improved Incan terrain
- Removed some jungle in Brazil and Papua
- Removed some food from Japan, China, Egypt and Arabia
- Removed some flood plains from Egypt
- First 6 city name maps updated by Red Threat
- City rename correspondances expanded


http://rhye.civfanatics.net/civ4/files/RhyesCatapult065.zip

Here is the post with the most recent version of the mod.

 

[Rhye]

I am wondering why does it say when I put the all the terrain featuers into my custom asets folder when I look at the swamp terrian and all the stuff related to it intead of saying what it would normaly say for the civalopidea it says something like this KEY_TEXT_SWAMP_TERRAIN and aslo has no civiolpidea icon for it.Also I put when I put this mod into the Main civ derictory and put the map into the public map folders and tried to play it just aboght when it was going to load it crashed.Am I diong anthing wrong??Please tell me if I am.Note could you aslo add eater some Barbainans or some more civs to block the expansion of certin contires such as the Usa and the Aztecs in North America and The Malian empire in Africa???

You are certainly doing something wrong.
You should unzip the mod into the mods folder in main civ directory, then from the game load the mod, then play the scenario.
You DON'T have to put the map in PublicMaps
Also if you have some customAssets, they might screw up something, so backup and remove them.


You obviously didn't see the mod in action because there's no need for placing barbarians on the map, as:
1. Barbarians appear with scripted events and are strong enough to kill some civs
2. Most of civs don't need to be stopped in their expansion, because they already start in later eras
3. Every civ in any case already knows where to stop, thanks to a tweaked AI

Try it and let me know!

 

[Cannae]

Oh I was not thinking of that thanks for telling me.

 

[Elhoim]

The parameters could be either

("mod" means "modifier")

Trade = civic cost mod, unit support mod, maintenance mod, proximity to water, luxuries + starting techs, research cost mod
Production = hammers, unit cost mod, building cost mod, wonders cost mod
Culture = culture mod, GP mod, religions
Growth = growth mod, food, size of cities, health mod, upgrade time mod, work rate mod
Starting situation = starting location, starting era, barbarians presence, starting units, starting techs

or

Gold = civic cost mod, unit support mod, maintenance mod, proximity to water, luxuries
Science = starting techs, research cost mod
Production = hammers, unit cost mod, building cost mod, wonders cost mod
Culture = culture mod, GP mod, religions
Growth = growth mod, food, size of cities, health mod, upgrade time mod, work rate mod
Military = unit mod, starting units

Perhaps you could also add the unique unit strength compared to the one it replaces as a modifier. For example, cossacks gives the russian a great military advantage!

 

[MrThing]

is this issue specific of this mod?

No, it is a general Civ4 issue, unless you happened to reduce the cost of troop maintaince, which would make the matter worse than it already is.

I was just thinking that it may be a simple way of reducing the problem which many would agree is very much present.

 

[Blasphemous]

How about replace the Growth indicator with Expansion, and add any military modifiers to that indicator? That, I think, would give even better information. It doesn't really matter to a play when selecting a civ how big the cities will be, not as much as it matters how much the civ can expand...

 

[Crayton]

You could also add a general description on the type of civ or it's chances of winning. For example "Difficult", "Expansionist", "War-Mongerer".

I can't come up with the best names obviously, but I think it would be okay to add a subjective description, if for no other reason than to add a personal flair. I realize that it is just your intention to equalize the difficulty and that each civ already has it's path chosen to some degree. It may be nice (or not nice?) to label the civs based on their tweaked AI.

 

[Rhye]

thank you I've made my decision, which you'll soon see.
I don't think we need another difficulty parameter. You can judge from the stars, and adjust the level from the next screen.

 

[Barak]

In terms of Greek survival, should we add a few units to greece at the start to help them live? More often than not, they are the first civ destroyed.

 

[Eddiit]

I agree. The greeks need some serious help. On top of units they need their starting position adjusted. It's very poor.

 

[Jaguar]

I've come up with a great gimmicky way of making the Greeks strong when I play as them, but it's too creative for the AI to think of.

I'll share it when we begin writing strategy guides for this.

 

[Rhye]

0.69 coming tonight

- Reenabled religion founding through tech
- Tweaked AI tech preferences
- Taoism moved to Writing, Confucianism moved to Mathematics (necessary to achieve the correct founding areas without automatizing anything)
- Barbarian XP cap lowered to 12
- Rebalanced some starting units
- Hopefully fixed Spanish preference of moving the starting settler to the coast
- New AI tweak that will stop AI from building settlers if there are no „appropriate” locations available (rather than building and storing them: settlers spam bug should be even less likely to show up)
- Updated some no-founding areas
- Added 5 parameters rating in startup menu
- Added one „military bonus” for each civ: a free promotion for one unit type. Each combination is different
- Added civ specific unit support costs modifiers
- Added civ specific inflation modifiers
- Removed leader traits
- Tuned modifiers to rebalance trait changes
- New main menu logo
- Added Arabian city names map
- A few passages through the Andes now open

 

[Lachlan]

Hourrah Rhye is alive !

What night ? In the next night ....

 

[Rhye]

http://rhye.civfanatics.net/civ4/files/RhyesCatapult069.zip

Please remember to report how Incas behave.
I don't want them to expand in the Buenos Aires area.

 

[Arkaeyn]

Hi Rhye, et al -

Looking at just the Python on city names wasn't very fun when there was a new mod to play (especially cause Rhye's XL sucked up 6 months of my life), so I decided to play and take notes. They're first, gameplay notes come later.

I decided to play as Rome, starting with China. I wanted to see what Europe would look like. I kind of messed up with China at the start, spent too much time building barracks, only had 3 cities when Rome showed up.

By the way, switching Civs is a brilliant bit of design. Did you ever play Medieval Lords of Europe? Great utilization of switching.

Early on, a few Gauls snuck through and razed Mediolanum. This kind of forced me to expand north instead of into Africa, though I did raze Carthage and Lbqy (???). This also prevented me from heading east to take on the Greeks, so they survived quite easily. The Huns showed up, did some damage. The Spanish flipped Valentia to Valencia(and also built Madrid in the proper location), and the French showed up to take Paris. I let those go, neither was useful enough to start a fight. However, the Germans wanted to take two of my cities, and I was feeling feisty, so I said no and decided to see what would happen. Not much - they took a Sarmatia Europa I had just founded, and when I brought the French in they took Rheims (in Belguim).

Meanwhile, in the Middle East, the Persians did their thing, expanded to the Meditarannean before petering out. Then the Arabs showed up and....did nothing. Before about 800AD, the only thing of notable interest was Rosetta being captured by the Barbarians and then by the Arabs, but it should culture flip. Meanwhile, the Persians finally declared war on the Arabs and started beating them, capturing Mecca and Jerusalem. That's where I saved.

Historical notes:

The Persians seem overpowered. Obviously, this is in part because the Greeks are weak. But they pretty much led the game since it started. I'll be interested to see where the Chinese end up, as they should lead the tech race historically til the end of the Middle Ages. But I set them back pretty far, I think. Neither Germany nor France seem terribly interested in expanding to the south.

The mod might be very interesting with the addition of the new civs - Carthage, Korea, and the Vikings could all do interesting things

Gameplay notes:

The ancient age moves VERY fast. I played an earlier game as Persia and never felt like I was settled - wars hit and there were big wins or big losses. No time for, say, a few invasions of Greece followed by a counter-invasion which knocks Persia out.

There seem to be gaps in civs. I can imagine the ancient world being so much fun with the Sumerians, Assyrians, Hittites, and Babylonians. Obviously this would require a complete rethinking and reworking of the mod, but as I play in the Middle East I keep thinking "There should be MORE here".

I also miss a lot of the little things which Sevomod has - like the one which has happy faces next to each leader's name so you can tell what they think of you at a glance. So useful.

More later, I'm sure.


Also, if you're interested in getting my history/geography skills on some of the countries you don't have naming conventions for (France looked kind of weird with Lyons in the north!), let me know. I'm doing the research anyway.

 

[MrThing]

0.69 coming tonight
- Added civ specific unit support costs modifiers
- Added civ specific inflation modifiers
-

Thanks a lot again for the great work Rhye.

So how do the support costs and inflation modifiers differ from civ to civ?
I think a remember somone saying at some point that there were civ tech modifiers as well. What text files do I want to look at to check these out?

 

[Rhye]

Thanks a lot again for the great work Rhye.

So how do the support costs and inflation modifiers differ from civ to civ?
I think a remember somone saying at some point that there were civ tech modifiers as well. What text files do I want to look at to check these out?

You can't look at them, they're hardcoded in the dll.
However they're generally higher for ancient civs and lower for modern to allow them to catch up.
In the case of inflation, financial civs have lower modifiers.

 

[cece84]

Ciao a tutti!
Gioco a civ da molti anni ma ho da poco scoperto questo splendido mod!
Volevo riportare qualke dato sulle mie partite....

Ho giocato con i Romani sia con la 0.65 che con la versione precedente (dove spagna,francia ecc... non mi fanno flippare le citta ma non appaiono se controllo i loro territori).
Con l'ultima versione (difficolta emperor) ho trovato non impossibile costruire un impero anche se con l'avvento delle nuove civilta europee i romani subiscono veramente un brutto colpo (cosa che non succede a persiani, egiziani e cinesi che di fatto sono sempre in testa!). Per tenere testa a questi ribelli ho dovuto rushare molti pretoriani e alla fine sono riuscito a costruire il mio impero romano d'occidente (peccato che l'ho finito nel 1500 e sono rimasto indietro con le tecnologie parecchio...) I piccoli greci mi hanno attaccato con stack di cavalleria mentre io sto a guardare con i miei pikemen!!!

CONCLUSIONE

L'idea delle citta che flippano e' veramente grandiosa ma perche non applicarlo anche ad altri popoli oltre Roma?? Per esempio se non abbiamo civilta da fare nascere in africa che rubano terre agli egizi si potrebbe far flippare le citta in barbs...(per esempio i nubiani e i libici)..
idem per cinesi & persiani.. i mongoli dovrebbero nascere a mio avviso con parecchie unita nei pressi del nord della persia e della cina in questo modo limiterebbero lo strapotere di queste 2 nazioni.
Grecia= spesso muoiono e lo sappiamo... è possibile modificare il comportamento di questo popolo spingendoli verso oriente contrastando persiani o cmq nel mediterraneo (simulando l'espansione di alessandro? si potrebbe aiutarli facendo flippare la turchia dopo qualche tempo come succede per i romani)
Islam=in diverse partite non si è diffuso come dovrebbe.. tutti preferiscono il cristianesimo..

Complimenti Rhye!!!!
PS: FORZA ITALIA!!!!!

a short explanation in english (i'm very bad here...)
Rome with 0.65... it's very difficult build an empire (emperor difficulty).. an when you built it you see it destroyed by french spanish and germans!!!!
i've destroyed them all but the price was high... i felt behind in tech... (my little neighbours greeks declared war with cavalry and my stronger defender is pikemen!!)

Conclusion

i love the flipping ctiy system but i would like see applied also to china egypt and persia! If there is no possible to create new civs in their territories it could be possible to flip their cities in barbs cities with many raging hordes!! (nubians, libians for egypt) A real horsemen horde is necessary in the russian steppe to destroy the northern part of persian empire ad the manchurian part of chinese emp. (mongols can grow a little with this modifications i hope!)
I would like to see greeks expands to east and south (alexander like expansion! we can help them giving them turkey after some years in their land.. rome has this system..)
Islam= we must help the spread of islam!!!

 

[Rhye]

so I decided to play and take notes.

Which version are you playing?

I decided to play as Rome, starting with China. I wanted to see what Europe would look like. I kind of messed up with China at the start, spent too much time building barracks, only had 3 cities when Rome showed up.
Then the Arabs showed up and....did nothing. Before about 800AD, the only thing of notable interest was Rosetta being captured by the Barbarians and then by the Arabs, but it should culture flip.

The switch happens the turn after they found their first city.
The following turn the nearby area cities will have a chance to flip too, but it should be both wrong and predictable if I flipped all their cities within the range of their maximum extent in the spawn year.
So, if you want to see how they become big, just for the sake of that, use the americans or at least and then reveal the map.

By the way, switching Civs is a brilliant bit of design. Did you ever play Medieval Lords of Europe? Great utilization of switching.

What's Medieval Lords of Europe?


Early on, a few Gauls snuck through and razed Mediolanum. This kind of forced me to expand north instead of into Africa, though I did raze Carthage and

Lbqy (???).

Punic name of Leptis

The ancient age moves VERY fast. I played an earlier game as Persia and never felt like I was settled - wars hit and there were big wins or big losses. No time for, say, a few invasions of Greece followed by a counter-invasion which knocks Persia out.

There seem to be gaps in civs. I can imagine the ancient world being so much fun with the Sumerians, Assyrians, Hittites, and Babylonians. Obviously this would require a complete rethinking and reworking of the mod, but as I play in the Middle East I keep thinking "There should be MORE here".

I know, but with no mesopotamian civs, it's better to start in 3000BC.
Some of those will be added as minor civs with Warlords, that will unlock the 18 civs limit, as you may already know.

Also, if you're interested in getting my history/geography skills on some of the countries you don't have naming conventions for (France looked kind of weird with Lyons in the north!), let me know. I'm doing the research anyway.

Thank you, but the rest of the name maps are in the works. Soma made a 1st version, now they're been revised by RedThread and then by me.
I'll tell you if I need something ok?