Rhye's of Civilization - the fastest loading mod Expanded

[bjorn]

Some comments about your great mod;

On your map the Azores (in the Atlantic) have a goody hut on them but when the Portugese (re)discovered them in 1427 AD the islands where uninhabited. I say (re)discovered because some records state the islands were discovered by others before that, maybe even by the Carthaginians in 300 BC. In any case no people were there to actually fill the goody hut

Another idea would be to add a tile of grassland/plains in Greenland to reflect the Norman (Viking) colony that thrived there between 1300 and 1500 AD until abandoned after climatological changes (sometimes refered to as the little Ice Age).

Although I like the idea that certain terrains cant be settled by the various types of settlers I sometimes find it a bit of a shame the computer players cant get their 'head' around the trick of first clearing a forest(hill) so they can settle the area. For instance, when playing the Chinese I can take my sweet time colonizing Siberia and Russia by clearing various patches.
Perhaps you could come up with a new terrain type reflecting this type of settlement (something between grassland and tundra - which could also be used in the formentioned Greenland case). Another idea would be to allow the upgraded versions of the settler (or perhaps settlers of certain races) to settle additional terrains (like the forresthills for instance).

Just some thoughts for this mod that would help it reflect history in the mentioned areas a bit better.

 

[Rhye]

Thank you bjorn, I'll consider removing that goody hut. I'm afraid the editor doesn't allow the changes to the settlers and the addition of terrain types (apart from LM)

 

[Ged of Earthsea]

It says on Holy War that Mil Tradition makes it obsolete, so he shouldn't be getting fanatics if I've researched it. I was thinking that Constantinople held until 1492, oh well. BTW, there's a desert near Persepolis that produces two food - is that intentional?

 

[Ville]

If THEY research MT, they won't get fanatics

 

[Lucius Sulla]

I must say I'm enjoying currently this mod in a different fashion.

I have edited the mod to not use the custom map.

Still, I have used a huge archipielago map (with the less sea possible), with ALL civs (31, 32 I think). Even being archi, many islands have united, giving something quite close to a moderate pangea in the middle with several big islands.

The initial slow expansion worked wonders to provoke a more historical and logical expansion, and not the outright cutthroat expansion. I'm playing in Monarch so I have been able to lead (barely) culture, and later power (since I did a big early middle ages attack swallowing two small civs).

Only real problem in not custom maps, is the fact that since resources are more spread out, the luxuries needed for the cultural-aligned wonders specially, the pyramids were not built til 500 AD or so. For some reason, now I have wine, but I don't seem able to build the wine related wonders (I have theology and I'm not able to build the sixtine chapel, for some reason, and nobody has built it yet).

Thanks to the great library I'm leading tech just a bit (by 1 or 2 to my next competitor... there are sooo many...).

Of course, given the way non custom maps are done, some of the 'feel' of natural barriers is lost... I think BBW or using a more rugged approach (using standard in all accounts, iirc for this game) is more appropiate for this. But I would not mind using the BBW approach that wheeled can't enter forest, deserts, etc, either without a road, too.

 

[Rhye]

I have made a random map version of the mod with some changes to adapt the mod behaviour to different sizes.
If you want I can post it, but I wanted to do this only AFTER a decision about elephants addition (so that in case of affermative I would post the updated version of the random map version).
Anybody else have anything to say about the elephants? To do or not to do or to do in a different way?

 

[Blasphemous]

Rhye, it might be nice if you'd also release a map-pack for use with the mod, containing random-like maps where you the civs are in areas similar to their real-world ones, and resources are spread fairly, equally, and realisticly... Also it would be cool to play the mod on maps of Earth's Pangea and other past/future tactonic formations...

 

[Rhye]

Blasphemous, are the stats good now?

- Rename Horseback Riding to Riding
- Rename Ivory to Elephants
- Add Elephant Archer available with Riding (3/2/2, +1hp, requires Elephants, cost:50)
- War Elephant available with Riding only for India (3/2/2, +1hp, requires Elephants, cost:40 (as Indian elephants were smaller and easier to tame))
- Elephants a strategy resource instead of luxury, as it is required for some units
- Remove HP bonus for Ancient Cavalry for balancing reasons

 

[jalapeno_dude]

- Remove HP bonus for Ancient Cavalry for balancing reasons

If you're taking this away, shouldn't they get something added? An attack or defence point?

 

[Rhye]

that's because A.Cavalry and Elephants would have identical stats.

 

[Horton]

Putting in elephant units will add some flavor so I say go for it. Maybe even reduce the price for the Indian units a bit because their starting area is very poor in shields.

One other thing. Would it be possible to add a fresh water source that would accessible to the carthaginians? As it is, they can't get any decent sized cities until electricity. If they grew a little faster it would change the whole dynamic in southern europe and they could be more of a rival to the romans and spanish.

 

[Blasphemous]

Sounds good Rhye... But how about go a bit further with the idea, and add a Camels resource and a Camel Rider unit (3.1.2, requires Camels, costs 40s or 30s, ignores movement cost for desert [there is such a cost, right? I keep forgetting.])
Horses aren't the only riding animal around, it makes no sense that you can't build Camel units while you can build Horses and Elephants...

 

[jalapeno_dude]

Sounds good Rhye... But how about go a bit further with the idea, and add a Camels resource and a Camel Rider unit (3.1.2, requires Camels, costs 40s or 30s, ignores movement cost for desert [there is such a cost, right? I keep forgetting.])
Horses aren't the only riding animal around, it makes no sense that you can't build Camel units while you can build Horses and Elephants...

I agree... you should add camels, maybe for Ottomons and Arabs. But has anyone made a camel unit?

One other thing. Would it be possible to add a fresh water source that would accessible to the carthaginians? As it is, they can't get any decent sized cities until electricity. If they grew a little faster it would change the whole dynamic in southern europe and they could be more of a rival to the romans and spanish.

I agree with this. The Carthaginians were major rivals to Rome. I remember that the Romans salted the fields of Carthage, meaning they must have had fertile fields to salt. And that would require irrigation, which would require fresh water.

 

[Rhye]

OK, I'll add a river near Carthage and consequently rebalance the civ.

The camel rider addition is intriguing...but I'd say 2.1.2, same cost as Horseman, available with Riding and ignores desert cost.

 

[Blasphemous]

Sounds good...
Jalapeno, there's no need to limit it to certain civs... Whoever populates the area with camels will build camels....
Rhye, perhaps Horsemen should upgrade to Camel Riders and then to Knights (etc), so that civs with both Horses and Camels will build Camels rather than Horses (because camels have a small advantage with their desert movement)?
Also there should be a very very small amount of Camels on the map, so they don't get traded too much... Perhaps just one source for each of the middle eastern civs.

 

[Rhye]

Yes I agree to give only the necessary camels and elephants and perhaps reducing the number of horses if there are too many in excess in some areas. (BTW there are more than one camel units)
But I think that they must be out of the upgrade path: a horseman upgrading to camel rider upgrading to knight is a bit odd - I'll leave camel riders and elephants as bonus for the civs who have the resource, without altering too much the flow of the units.

I'd like to know the speed of an army of elephants in march and in change. I'm not sure if they are closer to horsemen or infantry. I'll choose 2 or 1 movement for them from this info I haven't still found in the web.

 

[CyberChrist]

A quote from animalplanet.com

"Asian elephants can move at surprisingly high speeds of up to 6.8 meters per second or 25 kilometers per hour (15 mph)."

Anyway without a movement of 2 Elephants will be at a heavy disadvantage as they wont be able to withdraw from combat when loosing to infantry units.

 

[Rhye]

I have often heard that when Elephants retreat they cause disasters because they go crazy and crush friendly army

 

[Blasphemous]

I have often heard that when Elephants retreat they cause disasters because they go crazy and crush friendly army

Which could be represented pretty well by not allowing them to retreat (because they die while retreating, which happens just as well if they don't retreat.)

 

[CyberChrist]

You are missing my point - War Elephants is the UU for India replacing the Knight. If that is suddenly crippled something else needs to be done to compensate for this or India is without a Knight type unit.