Rhye's of Europe Civ Discussion Thread

[AnotherPacifist]

Three words: raze the independents.

(Just like razing Inverness, Frankfurt, Marseilles and Bordeaux will do to their respective prospective owners)

 

[sedna17]

Hey, if that inspires the human to conquer the entire Iberian peninsular as Cordoba, good on them. The AI, naturally, does not. I think that the UHV goals are reasonably demanding enough that the additional effort required to raze all those cities makes it a worthwhile prize.

 

[jessiecat]

Hey, if that inspires the human to conquer the entire Iberian peninsular as Cordoba, good on them. The AI, naturally, does not. I think that the UHV goals are reasonably demanding enough that the additional effort required to raze all those cities makes it a worthwhile prize.

A couple of suggestions. Pamplona for Navarra is a much more realistic historical flip, as it was Christian from the start, rather than Zaragoza which continued in Muslim hands until conquered by Aragon in 1118.

The UHVs look quite doable except for getting the Gardens of Al Andalus. Teching quick enough to get it has seemed pretty difficult in test games I've done. Could we make it available a bit earlier?

A couple of Berber cav at Tangier would be useful for exploring, to help their start there and also to help fight off the barb surge (which is a little too strong I think). We should encourage the early Cordoban settlement of Morocco if we can.

Also. Have you been able to fix the early stability problem with Arabia?

 

[rob-art1985]

I have some replies about independant/flipping cities:

I think, the decision to kick Augsburg and found a new city flipping to germany is . But Ulm?? I don't know... I like to found a city along the rhine, maybe Freiburg or Basel. But with Ulm and the Burgundians at the other side, the Rhinecity is more destructive.
What about Nürnberg, Leipzig or Trier as flipping cities?

And to refresh an old chapter: I am pro Salzburg (flipping to Austria). I think, it should be no problem, to set some ressources in the map, to enhance the land around salzburg

 

[Michael Vick]

I say Trier or Koln if we're going for something on the Rhine. Here's another idea though, what if we have Munich already there and flip? It's a pretty important city, yet it never gets founded. Maybe we could have some more resources there too besides the salt.

 

[Michael Vick]

Right, so I hope to release a new test version tomorrow.

I've experimented with putting Spain back to a 1085 AD start and expanding their spawn zone a bit, and I like it. Here's how things go down as of now:

Cordoba rises (711). Capitol at Cordoba, flips Tangier+Valencia and has two more settlers. Normally flips some barb axemen as well, this sets up a pretty powerful Caliphate of Cordoba.

Toledo spawns just before Cordoba. The northern Christian kingdoms spawn about the same time: Leon {Leon}, Santiago de Compostela (or La Coruna) {Galicia}, Burgos {Castilla}, Zaragoza {Aragon}. These are mostly all the same group indies, so if you attack one, you attack them all. I know the Christian kingdoms squabbled amongst themselves, but obviously these are weak indies and need all the help they can get. There's not a lot of incentive to attack them right now, except Toledo now encroaches a bit more on Cordoba, and you need to keep that barley for the first UHV.

Spain spawns in 1085, centered at Madrid (we can make room by moving Toledo a little West and South), and acquiring Leon, Burgos, and Toledo but not Zaragoza/Coruna. Stability penalty for neighbors rising has been increased, so the combination of Spain/Portugal in quick succession hurts Cordoba.

I've played the Cordoban side to about 1300. The new UHVs are coded as:

1) Cordoba largest city in 1000 AD
2) Build Alhambra, Mezquita, Gardens of Al-Andalus.
3) Don't lose a city to Spain/Portugal before 1500 AD.

1) plays about the same (i.e. reasonably challenging but quite doable). 2) I just *barely* missed, when the Arabs beat me to La Mezquita by two turns, so that's quite possible. 3) is probably easy for the humans to fulfill, but Spain starts off with some better firepower now, so they almost took Valencia from me in their first war.

Oh boy, where to start...?

 

[Michael Vick]

Lots of issues... why Burgos? I get that it was the head of Castille or whatever, but it's really kind of a useless city with no natural resources. In my game playing as Cordoba the Spanish started the game with their capitol at A Coruna, but then again I did found Cuenca on the Madrid tile so that might have affected it. Also, Spain starting with Madrid as their capital? That's rather inaccurate. If we must have Burgos then put THAT as their capital, not Madrid. If not Burgos then Toledo should be the capitol. Can we code it so that Spain spawns on Toledo? Madrid was a very minor town until Phillip II moved the court there.
And now why is Toledo even further away from Madrid??? Toledo is too far West, Madrid too far East. Now that I look at it there are many things wrong about this area... Toledo is on the North bank of the Tagus, Madrid is not on the Tagus at all, it should be farther North, yet further North is the Duero River, it shouldn't come into contact with that either, hmmm. Why are these mountains here? there are some hills to the North of Madrid on the Duero but...
Ok, I don't agree with much of the map in this area. Look, here is something I came up with. Changed it up just a bit. Changed the two rivers slightly (keeping into consideration the map is angled), moved the proper place for Madrid Northwest, Moved Toledo Northeast to original spot. Moved Leon 1 tile up to coincide with changes made to the Duero. Also, the spawning location for Zaragoza I think should be 1 tile North. Consider this? If you go with it, I'll make the city name map for the area.

EDIT:Those black smudges around Madrid are where the mountains used to be, the Madrid tile is a hill, the tile to the right is a plain.

 

[jessiecat]

Michael. See my post in the playtesting feedback thread.

 

[sedna17]

I'm continuing the discussion of Spain here, so as not to derail the play-testing threads' debates about other civs.

It's a deal.

@Sedna. We have an agreement. There will be peace in our time.

As I understand it, your proposal is that Spain spawn at the location of Toledo. As I explained before, it is not possible to do this without a major re-write of the spawn code, which is not going to happen. If Spain spawns at the location of Toledo, it will delete Toledo (which Spain could then re-found from scratch, I suppose, but then I question the wisdom of having it as an indy city). If Spain spawns elsewhere, the AI will just found a capitol on the spot. If Spain spawns without any Settlers, then the capitol will be chosen from one of the cities that flip -- but that completely breaks the RFC mechanism that you start with at least one settler for your capitol (and if all the other cities had been razed by barbs or the AI, then Spain would die on spawn).

If you insist on Toledo as the capitol, then it will have to NOT exist as an independent city. I'm not quite sure why you are so opposed to Madrid, since it was the capitol for a large portion of the mod, but whatevs.

The rest of the changes: the positions of Leon, Pamplona & A Corunna and the removal of Zaragoza and Burgos are fine.

 

[Verily]

Porto should actually be north of the Duoro/Duero. I propose moving the Wine southwest onto the tile where "Porto" is on Vick's map in order to encourage settlement on a correct location of Porto (which conveniently also gets the Pigs into the BFC and has less overlap with other cities and less ocean, making it overall a better city-site anyway).

 

[Michael Vick]

Yes, I agree with Verily.

@Sedna: I don't understand what you mean by a "complete rewrite" of the codes...
Listen, play a game as Germany, and build Wien exactly where Austria spawns. It will flip to them as their capitol, no problem. Why can't we have this for Spain?

If this still doesn't work out I propose going back to the 720 start, no additional work on the code required and the player gets more freedom to choose where the cities are built, no more arguing about where each city starts, blah blah blah...

 

[jessiecat]

Yes, I agree with Verily.

@Sedna: I don't understand what you mean by a "complete rewrite" of the codes...
Listen, play a game as Germany, and build Wien exactly where Austria spawns. It will flip to them as their capitol, no problem. Why can't we have this for Spain?

If this still doesn't work out I propose going back to the 720 start, no additional work on the code required and the player gets more freedom to choose where the cities are built, no more arguing about where each city starts, blah blah blah...

The best way to do it, and easiest to code, is have Spain start in 1080 as now with 2 settlers. It founds Leon and flips the indy cities of Toledo and Pamplona. Then, with its 2nd. settler founds another city where it likes.
If the human player wants to transfer the capital to Toledo later then that's up to them isn't it.?

 

[3Miro]

Yes, I agree with Verily.

@Sedna: I don't understand what you mean by a "complete rewrite" of the codes...
Listen, play a game as Germany, and build Wien exactly where Austria spawns. It will flip to them as their capitol, no problem. Why can't we have this for Spain?

If this still doesn't work out I propose going back to the 720 start, no additional work on the code required and the player gets more freedom to choose where the cities are built, no more arguing about where each city starts, blah blah blah...

The way all civ capitals work is as follows:
1. On the first turn of the spawn, found one city (on the spot of the capital) and since it is the only city owned, it auomatically becomes the capital.
2. All other cities flip/are being build.

In the case when there is already a city at the spawn location, the AI tries to found a city elsewhere. If it succeeds in one turn, that city would become the capital (not the originally intended capital). If a lot of cities flip before the AI can build one city, then the capital is chosen among all the available cities by looking at the largest city available.

If you found Wien and upon Austrian spawn that becomes their capital, well it is accidental. There is currently no way to guarantee that.

 

[Michael Vick]

I see what you're saying. Well you could give toledo a big population... but that really wouldn't sit well, all the civs founding cites and then Spain just taking Toledo...
The problem we're having is that it doesn't feel right in the game to "build" a city that historically existed a long time before that. That was the problem with spawning with Madrid, that is the problem with spawning on and "building" Toledo, and that is the problem with your suggestion of spawning on Leon in 1080.

Right now I'd like to suggest two possibilities.
1. We could revert to the 720 spawn but I'm the only one that likes that.

2. I guess Leon would be fine, but a few points:

Spain's flip zone should include Galicia, Asturias, and Castille. Leave out Navarre and Aragon. They were seperate in history and they were only united a couple hundred years later. I believe that early Spain in this game represents the Crown of Castille, no?

-Spain spawns at Leon (1 tile North of it's current position) with two settlers, and three catholic missionaries, then the military units.
-Cities that flip to it will be the Kingdom of Castille. Toledo, Santiago de Compostela, and maybe a city in Portugal to give it water access. (Porto?)
-Indy cities that will be there but WON'T flip are Pamplona, Zaragoza, and Barcelona. These will represent the Kingdoms of Navarre and Aragon.
-The locations of all of these cities are shown in above screenshots.
-Their flip zone will run along the River Tagus, that will be it's border with Al-Andalus. The North-South strip of tiles that includes the horse, the coal, and the hill tagged as Bilbao, starting at the forested hill under the horse and running North, that will be the Eastern edge of the flip zone and Spain's border with Pamplona.
NOTE: this is all only possible with the new terrain suggestion in my screenshots. In no way does it make any sense otherwise.

 

[Michael Vick]

Ok, I think going back to 720 would be a good option but here's one more look at 1080. This would be the scenario described if Spain spawned at Leon and with all the requirements mentioned in the last post.

This is actually like, the IDEAL situation though, I mean I don't expect the AI to come out with this result ever but... well this just a look at what the area SHOULD look like in 1080. Of course, the indies will all be there, but Cordoba wouldn't always necessarily conquer toledo, Zaragoza and settle the Madrid tile. Morocco was done with worldbuilder and I used the new name maps I made which I hope will be included next version. Yes Jessiecat, that's Tangier on the Northern tip of Morocco.

 

[Wessel V1]

I won't discuss where Tangier should be, since I give the city away whenever my economy asks for it. What I find interesting though, is the 3rd picture. Is it that necessary to build a fence around the Garden?

Back to the topic now. Moscow's first UHV has to be changed, since it's start has been delayed. "Reconquer the lost Kievan empire from the Mongolians", does that sound interesting? Or maybe, ensure there are no barbarian cities east of x by 1450 AD, or whatever is more appropriate.

 

[Michael Vick]

Of course I had to build a fence, the Arabians got jealous and they kept coming to try and steal the flowers.
However, I am glad you brought up the gardens, see that segment of a river I put under Granada? That's not supposed to be there. the reason it IS there, is that the game would not allow me to build the gardens in that city otherwise. It worked fine in the other cities, just not Granada, the city that the gardens are actually supposed to be in. I tried troubleshooting for a while, tampering with resources, population, eventually, putting a river there solved the problem.

But back to the reason I made the screenshots, what do you all think of the setup?

 

[Samsa]

Hello again

I'm continue the discussion about spains spawn date. Since my last post was a bit wierd and got misunderstood. The new spawn date (1080) represents a turn in the reconquista since the spanish handled it to conquer stratetic important cities unlike before.
I thought its not in the spirit of the mod to let spains spawn shoot down cordoba. It has more like a real development between those two. But also the 720 spawn date is far to early, cause as someone mentioned there was no real "spanish identity" they understood themself as visigoths.
Concluding this it may be more accurate to set spains spawn date to the first real "spanish identity". I don't really know when this would be, but there Kingdom of Castille is a good hint imho. Maybe their decision to establish Leon as their capital.

(hope this post clears something, to make my thoughts accessable )

 

[Michael Vick]

Good idea, Samsa
The Kingdom of Leon was officially founded in 910. We could have them found the capital at Leon, and then have Santiago de Compostela and a city further South on the coast like Porto flip to them. That would be a fairly accurate depiction of their territory. The rest of Iberia would look the same but the spawn zone would just have to be smaller. They'd need about three settlers total, some missionaries, crossbowmen, and long swordsmen, maybe two or three lancers. We're not going to give them all of Iberia on the flip like we do now, but they atleast need the firepower to get some kind of expansion going, enough for the AI to overtake Cordoba, but not too soon.

910 is a good date because they are now somewhat unified and are thought of as a unified Iberian kingdom. Not necessarily Spanish, that term came a bit later, but Iberian and Catholic. Also it's earlier so now Cordoba has some time to recover before Portugal spawns. Ok... What do you think?

 

[Samsa]

Perfect, you just put my thoughts in the right shape. Even your proposals seem to be pretty fair in the way of balance and historical accuracy.