Lachlan
Great Builder of Civs !
I keep an eye on it
RoC-Unleashed! Development Thread
- Thread starter Camber
- Start date
Camber
Resident Family Therapist
Rhye, I know you are pretty busy and, for the most part, won't be able to check in on this project. I wonder if I could borrow from you the spreadsheet that you use to keep track of unit stats while balancing changes to RoC and RoCX. As I add units to this mod, the spreadsheet would be an immensely helpful resource. Thanks!
My first project this morning is to make the Biopods (Forest) files. I'm mainly using a combination of two sources:
1. Hydroponics graphic by bhiita: http://cdgroup.org/forums/tbs/civ3/viewtopic.php?t=6149
2. Future/Alien cities, converted from SMAC by ozymandias and Pounder: http://forums.civfanatics.com/showthread.php?t=111965
and I might throw in a couple of these:
3. Evil techno pyramid (city graphics, but could be resized for city improvement or Biopod) by bhiita: http://cdgroup.org/forums/tbs/civ3/viewtopic.php?t=6796
I'm also going to rename the "Clear Forest" worker action as "Clear Forest/Scrap Biopod." Removing a Biopod and salvaging it would conceivably generate some shields, so I'm going to leave the shields-for-forest feature in the game. What I've considered a bit (last night and this morning) is whether to allow forests to be mined and irrigated. Since the "plant forest" action won't be available until the Future era (when it will actually be "Build Biopod"), I want to encourage the preservation of old-growth (LM) Forests in the game as much as possible, especially from the standpoint of guiding AI behavior. I think allowing these two worker jobs ontop of Forest would help in that respect. But it could also cause a visual mess when the irrigation or mine graphic is superimposed over the Biopods. I don't want a visual mess, so I'm still undecided. At least RoC and RoCX imposes an ultra-high worker cost on the "Clear Forest" worker job, so that will also work to discourage Forest removal (as it always has). If I allow irrigation and mining of Forest, I would also allow it for Jungle. I recently played the MesoAmerica Conquest, and really enjoyed the flexibility it allows to use Jungle in non-traditional ways (Irrigation). This made Jungle very useful in the game instead of something to try to destroy as soon as possible. From an ecological perspective, I liked that. On the other hand, Jungle is very intentionally used as a low-utility tile in RoC and RoCX, to help limit unhistorical growth for equatorial civs. I don't want to give too much to Jungle, as that would benefit some civs that already have oodles more real estate than anyone else.
I really love the SMAC graphics. They got me thinking that it might be fun to have a dome graphic over the Modern city graphics for the Future Era. But it isn't necessary, and I'll only do it if the reasons become compelling. Although a lot of sci-fi has put domes over cities, all of the near-future designs for Mars colonies that I've read about contain no plans for that kind of massive shielding. Venus is another story--I've seen some serious plans on terraforming Venus discussion sites for inflatable coverings for colonies there. I think it won't be necessary to use domes in RoC-U!, but I'm not against using graphics like that if they become available. It is a little embarassing to admit, but a lot of the evolution of this mod has been guided by what graphics are available. I use what is out there, and if a new graphic makes some changes possible and I like them, I usually explore the changes.
My first project this morning is to make the Biopods (Forest) files. I'm mainly using a combination of two sources:
1. Hydroponics graphic by bhiita: http://cdgroup.org/forums/tbs/civ3/viewtopic.php?t=6149
2. Future/Alien cities, converted from SMAC by ozymandias and Pounder: http://forums.civfanatics.com/showthread.php?t=111965
and I might throw in a couple of these:
3. Evil techno pyramid (city graphics, but could be resized for city improvement or Biopod) by bhiita: http://cdgroup.org/forums/tbs/civ3/viewtopic.php?t=6796
I'm also going to rename the "Clear Forest" worker action as "Clear Forest/Scrap Biopod." Removing a Biopod and salvaging it would conceivably generate some shields, so I'm going to leave the shields-for-forest feature in the game. What I've considered a bit (last night and this morning) is whether to allow forests to be mined and irrigated. Since the "plant forest" action won't be available until the Future era (when it will actually be "Build Biopod"), I want to encourage the preservation of old-growth (LM) Forests in the game as much as possible, especially from the standpoint of guiding AI behavior. I think allowing these two worker jobs ontop of Forest would help in that respect. But it could also cause a visual mess when the irrigation or mine graphic is superimposed over the Biopods. I don't want a visual mess, so I'm still undecided. At least RoC and RoCX imposes an ultra-high worker cost on the "Clear Forest" worker job, so that will also work to discourage Forest removal (as it always has). If I allow irrigation and mining of Forest, I would also allow it for Jungle. I recently played the MesoAmerica Conquest, and really enjoyed the flexibility it allows to use Jungle in non-traditional ways (Irrigation). This made Jungle very useful in the game instead of something to try to destroy as soon as possible. From an ecological perspective, I liked that. On the other hand, Jungle is very intentionally used as a low-utility tile in RoC and RoCX, to help limit unhistorical growth for equatorial civs. I don't want to give too much to Jungle, as that would benefit some civs that already have oodles more real estate than anyone else.
I really love the SMAC graphics. They got me thinking that it might be fun to have a dome graphic over the Modern city graphics for the Future Era. But it isn't necessary, and I'll only do it if the reasons become compelling. Although a lot of sci-fi has put domes over cities, all of the near-future designs for Mars colonies that I've read about contain no plans for that kind of massive shielding. Venus is another story--I've seen some serious plans on terraforming Venus discussion sites for inflatable coverings for colonies there. I think it won't be necessary to use domes in RoC-U!, but I'm not against using graphics like that if they become available. It is a little embarassing to admit, but a lot of the evolution of this mod has been guided by what graphics are available. I use what is out there, and if a new graphic makes some changes possible and I like them, I usually explore the changes.
Rhye
's and Fall creator
this one ?
Camber
Resident Family Therapist
Yes, that is the one! That will be enormously helpful.
I'm posting a screenie of the Biopod graphics. As said earlier, these are derived mainly from SMAC city graphics and bhiita's Hydroponics graphic (which he actually intended for futuristic irrigation, IIRC).
Here is the thread: link
With that out of the way, I am continuing to add resources to the map. With starting positions so close together in Europe, wanting to allow civs there to build 2-3 cities if possible, I am considering removing the cultural value from the Palace. This would mean that city1 for each civ wouldn't have expanded borders right away, and the AI might colonize cities closer to the capital when space is tight. To compensate, I would probably make a small wonder called Palace Gardens, borrowing the graphics and civilopedia from DyP/RaR (and giving credit). What I'm unsure about is whether it would create any problems if a capital were captured, since non-culture improvements don't disappear when captured. Would this lead to a conqueror having a second palace?
I'm posting a screenie of the Biopod graphics. As said earlier, these are derived mainly from SMAC city graphics and bhiita's Hydroponics graphic (which he actually intended for futuristic irrigation, IIRC).
Here is the thread: link
With that out of the way, I am continuing to add resources to the map. With starting positions so close together in Europe, wanting to allow civs there to build 2-3 cities if possible, I am considering removing the cultural value from the Palace. This would mean that city1 for each civ wouldn't have expanded borders right away, and the AI might colonize cities closer to the capital when space is tight. To compensate, I would probably make a small wonder called Palace Gardens, borrowing the graphics and civilopedia from DyP/RaR (and giving credit). What I'm unsure about is whether it would create any problems if a capital were captured, since non-culture improvements don't disappear when captured. Would this lead to a conqueror having a second palace?
Camber
Resident Family Therapist
I suppose it is possible that capturing a new Palace (if they had no cultural value) could jump your capital to the new one. We already know that a civ can only have one building flagged "center of empire" at a time, and that building a new one causes the old one to disappear.
I just made a couple changes to the General Settings tab that help with the limited space and small empires:
Movement on roads: 2 (from 3)
Cities per Army: 3 (from 4)
Town max size: 6 (from 5)--this will help with production and research in small empires
City max size: 14 (from 10)--this will allow for more conscription and entertainers to buffer the effects of conscription in the Ancient era; also will help with production and research
Turn penalty for each hurry sacrifice: 10 (from 20)--to help with production in empires sizes 2-3 cities
Turn penalty for each drafted citizen: 10 (from 20)--to make conscription more useable
I'm considering changing the citizen value in shields from 20 to 30 or 40. I've seen it remarked before how useless 20 shields are in the modern era. With a future era and increased costs for end-game units and improvements, 20 shields will be even more useless.
I've now finished adding the RoCX resources to Europe. I'm also adding barbarians and goody huts to the RoC-U! map in the same numbers as they appear in RoCX, so far.
I just made a couple changes to the General Settings tab that help with the limited space and small empires:
Movement on roads: 2 (from 3)
Cities per Army: 3 (from 4)
Town max size: 6 (from 5)--this will help with production and research in small empires
City max size: 14 (from 10)--this will allow for more conscription and entertainers to buffer the effects of conscription in the Ancient era; also will help with production and research
Turn penalty for each hurry sacrifice: 10 (from 20)--to help with production in empires sizes 2-3 cities
Turn penalty for each drafted citizen: 10 (from 20)--to make conscription more useable
I'm considering changing the citizen value in shields from 20 to 30 or 40. I've seen it remarked before how useless 20 shields are in the modern era. With a future era and increased costs for end-game units and improvements, 20 shields will be even more useless.
I've now finished adding the RoCX resources to Europe. I'm also adding barbarians and goody huts to the RoC-U! map in the same numbers as they appear in RoCX, so far.
Bjornlo
Deity
Plotinus said:
I agree completely. If he were somehow getting on to Rhye's thread and messing with those files, then he would be messing with Rhye's stuff. Since Rhye's releases remain untouched, this is a new work that just happens to be based on Rhye's. Just like Rhye's wonderful terrain (which I use) was based on Snoopy's terrain.
--edit--
just saw Rhye gave his blessing as well.
Bjornlo
Deity
Since you are adding an era, and compressing (slightly) two others together, here is how I added eras to my game.
Since a new era basically works as a choke point, where you have to research all a series of subordinate techs before moving on to the next series, I added additional choke points. I added specific ERA techs which break things appart, or serve to create a 'pause'. For example, I added the dark ages, a long boreing tech which gives little and takes a long time to R&D, causes the game to not play into the hands of the "tech sprinters" as much. I also added, Age of Discovery, Age of Reason, Industrial Age, Information Age, Space Age.
In order to accomodate these added eras, I extended the game a bit, and start a bit earlier as well.
Since a new era basically works as a choke point, where you have to research all a series of subordinate techs before moving on to the next series, I added additional choke points. I added specific ERA techs which break things appart, or serve to create a 'pause'. For example, I added the dark ages, a long boreing tech which gives little and takes a long time to R&D, causes the game to not play into the hands of the "tech sprinters" as much. I also added, Age of Discovery, Age of Reason, Industrial Age, Information Age, Space Age.
In order to accomodate these added eras, I extended the game a bit, and start a bit earlier as well.
Bjornlo
Deity
How about just "Clear Terrain"Camber said:
Camber
Resident Family Therapist
Hmm, that is a useful idea. I remember playing a mod (it might have been RaR) that also had a "Dark Ages" tech at the beginning of the middle ages era page. One thing it did was prevent the strategy of gifting techs to a bunch of scientific civs, so they can get a free tech from the beginning of the next era, and then buying up 3-4 techs off them. Since everyone has only 1 initial tech to choose from in the new era, all scientific civs would get the same free tech.
You're right, clear terrain would work! As Soren's Powerpoint said, simplify, simplify, simplify.
You're right, clear terrain would work! As Soren's Powerpoint said, simplify, simplify, simplify.
Rhye
's and Fall creator
basically you should change columns J,K, N and P, and see what's the final "mark" in column AC.
Mantain it between 1.0 and 3.0, and compare it to the column W, which refers to B,C,F,H instead.
Ignore the formulas in the other columns, I don't even remember why they are there.
I had another sheet for naval units, but it is completely different as it had another purpose (calculating coast/sea/ocean movements)
Mantain it between 1.0 and 3.0, and compare it to the column W, which refers to B,C,F,H instead.
Ignore the formulas in the other columns, I don't even remember why they are there.
I had another sheet for naval units, but it is completely different as it had another purpose (calculating coast/sea/ocean movements)
Camber
Resident Family Therapist
Okay, that is helpful to know. I think I may have use for the naval units spreadsheet if it is still around. The resource/cost balancing is an important use for these, and I also have a more basic purpose, to keep track of the unit stats at one glance to make the process of adding them to the game faster. I'll be working out the numbers for the new units on the spreadsheet first, then adding them to the game when I get things looking right. If you don't have an air units file I'll add them to the land units spreadsheet.
Camber
Resident Family Therapist
Last night I did a test with just Europe having their resources placed yet. It was disappointing to watch how France sent its first two settlers to Russian rather than planting them at home in the two perfect city spots I had given it. It seems that the AI, as always, is wasteful of real estate at home when there seems to be plenty of it 2000 miles away. 
The distribution of borders looked surprisingly much like what is usually achieved in RoC and RoCX games. Rather than crowding 2-3 cities each into the border of present day-european nations, they instead are content to let expanding cultural boundaries fill in the empty spots (even when I took away culture from Palaces, so that was useless). So, as usual, you get French, Spanish, and Dutch cities in Siberia and Scandinavia rather than closer to home where they would be crowded. I shouldn't be discouraged by this, because Russia always became a hodge-podge of european cities whenever I played the full-size version of RoCX.
One test I tried, I gave all civs a building that autoproduced settlers every 5 turns (just to see what they would do with them--whether the failure of France and Rome, for example, to colonize close to home would be mitigated if Russia were able to colonize faster. It did reduce the problem a bit, but not by much. In Asia, on the other hand, there was a much improved pattern of growth. Next I'll try giving each civ 3 settlers to start with, and then another test with preplacing 2 or 3 settlers, per civ, in city positions where I think they should go.
The distribution of borders looked surprisingly much like what is usually achieved in RoC and RoCX games. Rather than crowding 2-3 cities each into the border of present day-european nations, they instead are content to let expanding cultural boundaries fill in the empty spots (even when I took away culture from Palaces, so that was useless). So, as usual, you get French, Spanish, and Dutch cities in Siberia and Scandinavia rather than closer to home where they would be crowded. I shouldn't be discouraged by this, because Russia always became a hodge-podge of european cities whenever I played the full-size version of RoCX.One test I tried, I gave all civs a building that autoproduced settlers every 5 turns (just to see what they would do with them--whether the failure of France and Rome, for example, to colonize close to home would be mitigated if Russia were able to colonize faster. It did reduce the problem a bit, but not by much. In Asia, on the other hand, there was a much improved pattern of growth. Next I'll try giving each civ 3 settlers to start with, and then another test with preplacing 2 or 3 settlers, per civ, in city positions where I think they should go.
Camber
Resident Family Therapist
I'm exploring whether to eliminate a few of the more crowding civs and replacing them with new ones in uncrowded areas. Likely candidates are:
Portugal
Netherlands
Austria
Byzantines
Israel
Possible replacements are:
Sioux (western U.S.)
Malay (inspired by Rod)
Joruba (West-Africa, inspired by Clash of Empires)
Polynesia/Australia (inspired by DyP and laxpimpj and tacfun
and either Brazil (CivArmy s. 1994 would love that) or a Northwestern U.S. tribe.
EDIT: I should mention that this development came out of my efforts to preplace 3 settlers per civ for a test, and finding that I couldn't even place 2 for some of them (the ones on this list). So that suggested a need for changes in the list of civs.
Portugal
Netherlands
Austria
Byzantines
Israel
Possible replacements are:
Sioux (western U.S.)
Malay (inspired by Rod)
Joruba (West-Africa, inspired by Clash of Empires)
Polynesia/Australia (inspired by DyP and laxpimpj and tacfun
and either Brazil (CivArmy s. 1994 would love that) or a Northwestern U.S. tribe.
EDIT: I should mention that this development came out of my efforts to preplace 3 settlers per civ for a test, and finding that I couldn't even place 2 for some of them (the ones on this list). So that suggested a need for changes in the list of civs.
Camber
Resident Family Therapist
Some more testing has reavealed some interesting patterns.
First, I tested settlement patterns by giving everyone 5 settlers. Once again I saw absolutely no secondary cities being built in Western Europe, with the exception of York and Corwall in England.
Second, I tried preplacing settlers so that all civs could have 2 secondary cities close to their capitals, in historically accurate positions. I got slightly better results outside of Europe, but everyone in southern and western Europe still declined to build their secondary cities in the crowded continent. I should note that almost every civ declined to build at least one of the cities with their preplaced settlers. The pattern I'm seeing is that they won't build the city unless the settler is at least three tiles from the nearest city border, and in some cases, 4 tiles. They really detest crowding! Does anyone know if there is a modifier I can adjust for this AI preference for lebensraum?
I tried adding a Palace Guard with each preplaced Settler, in case it was security for their fledgling city that they were worried about. For those unfamiliar with RoC, the Palace Guard is a starter unit with stats 1.2.0--they are good defenders and immobile. Their purpose is to prevent rush attacks from human players, and everyone is supposed to get them except Player1 (the human). Even with the additional security of a Palace Guard, there was no improvement over the previous test.
I decided to replace the preplaced settlers with a nearly identical unit I called Tribe that is immobile. Still no improvement! They I put a scout next to each of the misbehaving settlers to see what they were doing. I even removed the following flags from the Tribe unit: Skip Turn, Goto, Fortify, Disband, Explore, and Sentry. The only thing they could chose to do, supposedly, is Wait (or build a city). I tried the scenario, and watched in disbelief as almost every civ passed up the opportunity to build one or both of their secondary cities. It is inexplicable, and it was the exact same pattern of colonization that happened when I placed mobile, unprotected settlers in the same locations.
So I have a decision to face.
1. I can give up the idea of a densely settled planet with 31 civs, and go to the 15 that V. Soma gave to this exact same map. I would need to change the resources back to the way they used to be. I would have the reassurance of knowing that the 15 civs, their starting positions and units had all been extensively tested and balanced. This would save me the most work, but I really hate to give up the 16 civs that would be dropped.
2. Preplace 3 cities per civ, not just settlers. If I actually set the cities on the map myself, the civs probably will have to live with them (they wouldn't abandon them, I hope!). This would severely limit the choices players have when beginning the game, since I would already have decided for them where their first 3 cities would be. My decisions for placement would be based around historical dimensions of the civs, and so it would define this mod/scenario as rigidly historical.
Any thoughts?
First, I tested settlement patterns by giving everyone 5 settlers. Once again I saw absolutely no secondary cities being built in Western Europe, with the exception of York and Corwall in England.
Second, I tried preplacing settlers so that all civs could have 2 secondary cities close to their capitals, in historically accurate positions. I got slightly better results outside of Europe, but everyone in southern and western Europe still declined to build their secondary cities in the crowded continent. I should note that almost every civ declined to build at least one of the cities with their preplaced settlers. The pattern I'm seeing is that they won't build the city unless the settler is at least three tiles from the nearest city border, and in some cases, 4 tiles. They really detest crowding! Does anyone know if there is a modifier I can adjust for this AI preference for lebensraum?
I tried adding a Palace Guard with each preplaced Settler, in case it was security for their fledgling city that they were worried about. For those unfamiliar with RoC, the Palace Guard is a starter unit with stats 1.2.0--they are good defenders and immobile. Their purpose is to prevent rush attacks from human players, and everyone is supposed to get them except Player1 (the human). Even with the additional security of a Palace Guard, there was no improvement over the previous test.
I decided to replace the preplaced settlers with a nearly identical unit I called Tribe that is immobile. Still no improvement! They I put a scout next to each of the misbehaving settlers to see what they were doing. I even removed the following flags from the Tribe unit: Skip Turn, Goto, Fortify, Disband, Explore, and Sentry. The only thing they could chose to do, supposedly, is Wait (or build a city). I tried the scenario, and watched in disbelief as almost every civ passed up the opportunity to build one or both of their secondary cities. It is inexplicable, and it was the exact same pattern of colonization that happened when I placed mobile, unprotected settlers in the same locations.
So I have a decision to face.
1. I can give up the idea of a densely settled planet with 31 civs, and go to the 15 that V. Soma gave to this exact same map. I would need to change the resources back to the way they used to be. I would have the reassurance of knowing that the 15 civs, their starting positions and units had all been extensively tested and balanced. This would save me the most work, but I really hate to give up the 16 civs that would be dropped.
2. Preplace 3 cities per civ, not just settlers. If I actually set the cities on the map myself, the civs probably will have to live with them (they wouldn't abandon them, I hope!). This would severely limit the choices players have when beginning the game, since I would already have decided for them where their first 3 cities would be. My decisions for placement would be based around historical dimensions of the civs, and so it would define this mod/scenario as rigidly historical.
Any thoughts?
Camber
Resident Family Therapist
It has been a few days, and I've been hard at work, so here's an update.
As I started doing research on preplacement for cities, I came face to face with some startling realities from history.
First, is that at 4000 BC, many of the groups that are widely dispersed later on, are very tightly packed still in the Mesopotamian area. In addition to the ancestors of the Jews still being imbedded in the Babylonian/Sumerian area, you also have the Greeks, Romans, Scandinavians, Russians, and perhaps others. The Carthaginians haven't yet moved away from Tyre/Mesopotamia. The pathetic Spanish aren't even going to start developing a distinct culture (at least one that isn't swept away by the Phoenicians or Romans) for another 4000 years!
As I did my research (an I have been doing a lot of it), I found that most of the groups that I would want to represent on my map have settled into a recognizable location by around 550-500 BC. (By recognizable, I mean that they are close to where they will later end up). The Rus/Slavs are still in Caucasus, but at least they aren't in Mesopotamia. The Scandinavians are somewhere between the Sea of Azov and the future location of Kiev, but it won't be long before they reach Scandinavia. The Goths have finally left Scandinavia, to make room for our Vikings to move north (I would have hated to start the Germans in Denmark and the Vikings east of Prussia!). The movement of the Goths into Germany forced the Celts to move southwest into Gaul, so they at least are in a good spot (again, recognizeable). That would be my ideal starting point for the Celts, rather than Londinium, so that they would be on hand to oppose Roman expansion. Besides, I found a fairly well-documented article that states the "Celts" in Britain would be better classified as Picts, and were of separate racial origin than the Celts in Iberia and Gaul. I'm going along with that, so if I do have anyone starting in Britain, they will be called Picts and they will start in Scotland.
The list goes on. Ethiopia didn't become established until 500 BC. The Jews would be in Jerusalem in 500 BC (having been recently freed from Babylonian captivity by Cyrus the Great) and would be ready to begin building their Second Temple Mount. In 500 BC the Maya are just beginning to emerge as a civilization. Rome has just emerged as a power distinct from the Etruscans and other peoples of the Italia penninsula. The Joruba civ is still pretty backward; they won't have an Iron Age for another 150 years, and are still called the Nok, but at least they are on the radar. We can also finally figure out where the ancestors of the Zulu are. This is also a convenient date to start, because if we start at 530 BC, Egypt will still be independent (the last independent pharoah is about to die). Persia sweeps through just before 500 BC, and they also take about half of the Greek cities in the eastern mediterranean. So it will be good to begin before Persia gets incredibly big and unbeatable.
What will this look like?
Well, I will have to still preplace some cities. It would be completely a-historical to have the Goths (as Germany), the Rus (as Russia), and the Celts (as Spain-France-England) get a settler and worker to begin at 500 BC, and then also give this same starting material to Egypt, Persia, China, etc. I moved the starting point to 500 BC so that we could have historically recognizeable starting locations for everybody, but I'm not going to ignore the 3500 years of history that has already passed at that date.
So Egypt is going to have Memphis, Thebes, Sais (the current capital of the 26th dynasty, located in the Nile Delta), Elephantine (the southern border), and Meroe (a Nubian city, the capital of the 25th dynasty of Egypt, and still a very egyptian city). There will be a Monument and Temple preplaced in most of these cities, and the Pyramids will be located already in Memphis (the closest city to Giza that will be represented). I can't age the Pyramids to give double culture already, and I won't give Egypt 500 culture to start with (that would be accurate but too unfair), so there will be some historical concessions made to playability.
That is an example of city preplacement using Egypt. Other civs with preplaced cities will include Greece, Carthage, Rome, Persia, India, China, Maya, (and maybe the Olmecs--they are in decline in 500 BC, so I may be able to leave them out, in favor of putting the Aztecs nearby).
Civs with preplaced cities are ones that are already established in 530 BC. Some of the cities will already have temples, etc. Elephantine, for example, will have a Marketplace. Rome will have a Barracks (they need it--they are practically suffocated by Carthage and Greece at this date). I will be preplacing completed wonders in all the appropriate cities, like the Hanging Gardens of Babylon, The Oracle, The Temple of Baal, etc. (Damn, I just remembered that I need to preplace Stonehenge or remove it from the game, and I don't have a civ there. It looks like it will be out, sorry.)
Civs that are in decline (like Egypt), or have already received the benefit of their Golden Age (like Persia), will have the "triggers Golden Age" flag removed from their UU. Persia is already about as big in 530 BC as it ever gets, so I would say that they shouldn't have a Golden Age triggered, even though historically they are IN their golden age in 530 BC. I don't want them to get too powerful, or else Greece and India won't be able to defend themselves against Persia. Greece, on the other hand, is indeed about 30 years away from triggering a golden age, so I'd say leave the golden age flag on the Hoplite.
To make the Advanced Civilizations (the ones with preplaced empires) truly advanced, I am giving them the entire first row of techs in the ancient era to start with. How? I am rolling them into two techs, probably called "Foundations of Civilization" and "Advances of Civilization". These techs will both occupy the first row of the tech tree, and will contain, collectively, the following techs: The Wheel, Warrior Code, Pottery, Masonry, Bronze Working, Writing, Mysticism. They will also enable building roads, irrigating, and seeing domesticated animals and foods on the map. The Advanced civs will start with these two techs. Although most of all of these civs are also already in their Iron Age, I won't lump Iron Working into the two techs. These advanced civs will also have NO access to Settlers in the ancient era, so their only means of expansion will be through conquest. Still, with up to 7 cities at the start, many of them will already exceed the optimal city limit.
The civs that are not yet established in 530 BC (many of them are still moving around a lot) will be called Migratory Civilizations. These are peoples that have been moving a lot in the past 500 years before the start date, and are about to start settling down (within the next 300 years). Anyone not emerging within this time period on the historical timeline, just won't be included. So...there won't be an American civ. Or Spanish, English, French, etc. The Scandinavians, Celts, and Goths who were the forerunners of these civs will be in their places instead.
Migratory civs, probably in most cases, will not start with any techs at all (there might be an exception, but it wouldn't make sense since the two starting techs equal about 3-4 techs apiece). They will be able to build settlers (at half cost), and they will also be able to build Warriors at half cost. Because the migratory civs will already be in place to block one another from settling too far out of their historical territory, and because there will be no settlers generated by the advanced civs until Feudalism, I don't think there will be so much of a need to preplace Barbarians to block certain areas of the map, with the exception of Australia and the southwest Pacific. Anyway, that is my hope.
There might be a need to help Migratory Civs "catch up" technologically at some point, with something like the Statue of Liberty. The Goths and Celts, for example, should probably have a "Renaissance" small wonder that gives them the effect of a Great Library for a short period of time. This might be placed on the Printing Press tech and go obsolete with Naval Tactics or Enlightenment.
Like RoC and RoCX, the "difficulty" of the scenario will be controlled largely by which civ you choose to start with. Starting with Rome you might have a bit of a challenge. Starting with Ethiopia, you would have a big challenge. Persia would be easy in comparison (and I'll really have to work to make sure they are overpowered). The reality was that Persia in 500 BC had reached the manageable limits of an empire, so they spent the next 250 years trying to hold the empire together rather than expand it. If I can recreate that challenge through a forced starting government, corruption, and/or optimal number of cities, it will be great.
I'm working on the civs and map right now, and have them about halfway done. Hopefully this plan will be more sound than the last one.
As I started doing research on preplacement for cities, I came face to face with some startling realities from history.
First, is that at 4000 BC, many of the groups that are widely dispersed later on, are very tightly packed still in the Mesopotamian area. In addition to the ancestors of the Jews still being imbedded in the Babylonian/Sumerian area, you also have the Greeks, Romans, Scandinavians, Russians, and perhaps others. The Carthaginians haven't yet moved away from Tyre/Mesopotamia. The pathetic Spanish aren't even going to start developing a distinct culture (at least one that isn't swept away by the Phoenicians or Romans) for another 4000 years!
As I did my research (an I have been doing a lot of it), I found that most of the groups that I would want to represent on my map have settled into a recognizable location by around 550-500 BC. (By recognizable, I mean that they are close to where they will later end up). The Rus/Slavs are still in Caucasus, but at least they aren't in Mesopotamia. The Scandinavians are somewhere between the Sea of Azov and the future location of Kiev, but it won't be long before they reach Scandinavia. The Goths have finally left Scandinavia, to make room for our Vikings to move north (I would have hated to start the Germans in Denmark and the Vikings east of Prussia!). The movement of the Goths into Germany forced the Celts to move southwest into Gaul, so they at least are in a good spot (again, recognizeable). That would be my ideal starting point for the Celts, rather than Londinium, so that they would be on hand to oppose Roman expansion. Besides, I found a fairly well-documented article that states the "Celts" in Britain would be better classified as Picts, and were of separate racial origin than the Celts in Iberia and Gaul. I'm going along with that, so if I do have anyone starting in Britain, they will be called Picts and they will start in Scotland.
The list goes on. Ethiopia didn't become established until 500 BC. The Jews would be in Jerusalem in 500 BC (having been recently freed from Babylonian captivity by Cyrus the Great) and would be ready to begin building their Second Temple Mount. In 500 BC the Maya are just beginning to emerge as a civilization. Rome has just emerged as a power distinct from the Etruscans and other peoples of the Italia penninsula. The Joruba civ is still pretty backward; they won't have an Iron Age for another 150 years, and are still called the Nok, but at least they are on the radar. We can also finally figure out where the ancestors of the Zulu are. This is also a convenient date to start, because if we start at 530 BC, Egypt will still be independent (the last independent pharoah is about to die). Persia sweeps through just before 500 BC, and they also take about half of the Greek cities in the eastern mediterranean. So it will be good to begin before Persia gets incredibly big and unbeatable.
What will this look like?
Well, I will have to still preplace some cities. It would be completely a-historical to have the Goths (as Germany), the Rus (as Russia), and the Celts (as Spain-France-England) get a settler and worker to begin at 500 BC, and then also give this same starting material to Egypt, Persia, China, etc. I moved the starting point to 500 BC so that we could have historically recognizeable starting locations for everybody, but I'm not going to ignore the 3500 years of history that has already passed at that date.
So Egypt is going to have Memphis, Thebes, Sais (the current capital of the 26th dynasty, located in the Nile Delta), Elephantine (the southern border), and Meroe (a Nubian city, the capital of the 25th dynasty of Egypt, and still a very egyptian city). There will be a Monument and Temple preplaced in most of these cities, and the Pyramids will be located already in Memphis (the closest city to Giza that will be represented). I can't age the Pyramids to give double culture already, and I won't give Egypt 500 culture to start with (that would be accurate but too unfair), so there will be some historical concessions made to playability.
That is an example of city preplacement using Egypt. Other civs with preplaced cities will include Greece, Carthage, Rome, Persia, India, China, Maya, (and maybe the Olmecs--they are in decline in 500 BC, so I may be able to leave them out, in favor of putting the Aztecs nearby).
Civs with preplaced cities are ones that are already established in 530 BC. Some of the cities will already have temples, etc. Elephantine, for example, will have a Marketplace. Rome will have a Barracks (they need it--they are practically suffocated by Carthage and Greece at this date). I will be preplacing completed wonders in all the appropriate cities, like the Hanging Gardens of Babylon, The Oracle, The Temple of Baal, etc. (Damn, I just remembered that I need to preplace Stonehenge or remove it from the game, and I don't have a civ there. It looks like it will be out, sorry.)
Civs that are in decline (like Egypt), or have already received the benefit of their Golden Age (like Persia), will have the "triggers Golden Age" flag removed from their UU. Persia is already about as big in 530 BC as it ever gets, so I would say that they shouldn't have a Golden Age triggered, even though historically they are IN their golden age in 530 BC. I don't want them to get too powerful, or else Greece and India won't be able to defend themselves against Persia. Greece, on the other hand, is indeed about 30 years away from triggering a golden age, so I'd say leave the golden age flag on the Hoplite.
To make the Advanced Civilizations (the ones with preplaced empires) truly advanced, I am giving them the entire first row of techs in the ancient era to start with. How? I am rolling them into two techs, probably called "Foundations of Civilization" and "Advances of Civilization". These techs will both occupy the first row of the tech tree, and will contain, collectively, the following techs: The Wheel, Warrior Code, Pottery, Masonry, Bronze Working, Writing, Mysticism. They will also enable building roads, irrigating, and seeing domesticated animals and foods on the map. The Advanced civs will start with these two techs. Although most of all of these civs are also already in their Iron Age, I won't lump Iron Working into the two techs. These advanced civs will also have NO access to Settlers in the ancient era, so their only means of expansion will be through conquest. Still, with up to 7 cities at the start, many of them will already exceed the optimal city limit.
The civs that are not yet established in 530 BC (many of them are still moving around a lot) will be called Migratory Civilizations. These are peoples that have been moving a lot in the past 500 years before the start date, and are about to start settling down (within the next 300 years). Anyone not emerging within this time period on the historical timeline, just won't be included. So...there won't be an American civ. Or Spanish, English, French, etc. The Scandinavians, Celts, and Goths who were the forerunners of these civs will be in their places instead.
Migratory civs, probably in most cases, will not start with any techs at all (there might be an exception, but it wouldn't make sense since the two starting techs equal about 3-4 techs apiece). They will be able to build settlers (at half cost), and they will also be able to build Warriors at half cost. Because the migratory civs will already be in place to block one another from settling too far out of their historical territory, and because there will be no settlers generated by the advanced civs until Feudalism, I don't think there will be so much of a need to preplace Barbarians to block certain areas of the map, with the exception of Australia and the southwest Pacific. Anyway, that is my hope.
There might be a need to help Migratory Civs "catch up" technologically at some point, with something like the Statue of Liberty. The Goths and Celts, for example, should probably have a "Renaissance" small wonder that gives them the effect of a Great Library for a short period of time. This might be placed on the Printing Press tech and go obsolete with Naval Tactics or Enlightenment.
Like RoC and RoCX, the "difficulty" of the scenario will be controlled largely by which civ you choose to start with. Starting with Rome you might have a bit of a challenge. Starting with Ethiopia, you would have a big challenge. Persia would be easy in comparison (and I'll really have to work to make sure they are overpowered). The reality was that Persia in 500 BC had reached the manageable limits of an empire, so they spent the next 250 years trying to hold the empire together rather than expand it. If I can recreate that challenge through a forced starting government, corruption, and/or optimal number of cities, it will be great.
I'm working on the civs and map right now, and have them about halfway done. Hopefully this plan will be more sound than the last one.
Lachlan
Great Builder of Civs !
Great but i couldn't running Pinktilapia's mod because too big map 
Camber
Resident Family Therapist
This will be less than 1/3 the maximum size of a map (102x362, rather than 362x362 I believe is the limit). So that may help. Also, most of the map will be unsettleable space tiles (basically water), so hopefully loading times will be low.
Bjornlo
Deity
Perhaps make use of Aaglo's wall? It is a immobile unit which must be hacked away to get through. You could my means of this secure a nations borders (for a little while).
Camber
Resident Family Therapist
That is a possibility. Before I try that though, I'm going to see how it plays with a more simplified startup.
I really want this to be playable. So although having preplaced cities would be more realistic, I think it might hamper gameplay and replay value. So before I go all-out on finishing a map with preplaced cities for the more "advanced" civs, I'll try it without any preplaced cities. Instead I would let tech differences distinguish the advanced from non-advanced nations at 550/500 BC (I might move the start date to 550 BC to allow for a realistically smaller Persia). Then maybe at 10 years per turn or some similar slow pace, the game could proceed and we'd see empires of historical size by 300/200 BC. This would also mean giving settlers to everyone and not making settlers half price for everyone. Basically, a simplification across the board.
One thing I've been considering for a week or so is having three different versions: an ancient era start (around 550 BC), a medieval era start (around 900 AD), and an industrial era start (around 1800 BC). The idea came from hearing that you'll be able to select your starting era in Civ4.
So there would be three different .biq files to choose from. In each one, there would only be civs represented that are accurate for that starting point. So although there will be no Americans or Ottomans in the ancient era start, you would see both of these in the Industrial era start.
I would also keep all the 31 civ slots filled by the same civs in all three versions. So even though America won't be in the ancient or medieval start versions, I won't have something taking its place. This would allow for some continuity, and also make it easier for me to produce the three different versions. It would be a matter of disabling some civs in each version, rather than going through the work of completely replacing them.
For some empires (such as the British), I might have civs in locked alliances. So rather than give the British a settler in both the British Isles *and* India, I might give them a locked alliance. It's one possible solution.
So here are the ones I would likely use, divided into the three eras:
Rome...Papal States...Italy
Egypt...Arab-aligned Egypt...?British-aligned Egypt?
Greece...(part of Byzantines)...Greece?
China...China...China
Rus...Russia...Russian Empire
(part of Celts)...England...British Empire
(part of Celts)...France...French Empire
Goths...Holy Roman Empire...German States
(part of Iroquois)...(part of Iroquois)...America
Japan...Japan...Japanese Empire
Zulu...Zulu...South Africa (locked alliance with Brits)
(part of Maya)...Aztecs...Mexico (locked alliance with Spanish)
Scandinavians...Vikings...Scandinavians
Koreans?...Korea...Korea
India...India...India
Persian Empire...Persia...Persia (locked alliance with British?)
Mali/Joruba...Mali/Joruba...(colony, in locked alliance with a European nation)
Ethiopia...Ethiopia...Ethiopia
Jomon/Malay...Thailand...Thailand
Celts...Scotland-Ireland...(part of British Empire)
Inca...Inca...(not sure of name, but locked alliance with Spanish)
(part of Celts)...Spain...Spanish Empire
(part of Celts)...Portugal...Portugal
Arabs...Arabs...Arabia
(part of Persian empire)...Turks...Ottoman Empire
(part of Greece)...Byzantines...(part of Ottoman Empire)
Maya...Maya?...(locked alliance with Spanish Empire)
Iroquois...Iroquois...Native Nations
Mongols...Mongols...Mongolia
(part of Goths)...Dutch...Netherlands
Huns...(not sure of name)...Austro-Hungarian Empire
If having locked alliances causes problems, I might move the start date for the Industrial era to 1600 AD, before spheres of influence and major empire-building had advanced so far into the imperial age.
I really want this to be playable. So although having preplaced cities would be more realistic, I think it might hamper gameplay and replay value. So before I go all-out on finishing a map with preplaced cities for the more "advanced" civs, I'll try it without any preplaced cities. Instead I would let tech differences distinguish the advanced from non-advanced nations at 550/500 BC (I might move the start date to 550 BC to allow for a realistically smaller Persia). Then maybe at 10 years per turn or some similar slow pace, the game could proceed and we'd see empires of historical size by 300/200 BC. This would also mean giving settlers to everyone and not making settlers half price for everyone. Basically, a simplification across the board.
One thing I've been considering for a week or so is having three different versions: an ancient era start (around 550 BC), a medieval era start (around 900 AD), and an industrial era start (around 1800 BC). The idea came from hearing that you'll be able to select your starting era in Civ4.
So there would be three different .biq files to choose from. In each one, there would only be civs represented that are accurate for that starting point. So although there will be no Americans or Ottomans in the ancient era start, you would see both of these in the Industrial era start.
I would also keep all the 31 civ slots filled by the same civs in all three versions. So even though America won't be in the ancient or medieval start versions, I won't have something taking its place. This would allow for some continuity, and also make it easier for me to produce the three different versions. It would be a matter of disabling some civs in each version, rather than going through the work of completely replacing them.
For some empires (such as the British), I might have civs in locked alliances. So rather than give the British a settler in both the British Isles *and* India, I might give them a locked alliance. It's one possible solution.
So here are the ones I would likely use, divided into the three eras:
Rome...Papal States...Italy
Egypt...Arab-aligned Egypt...?British-aligned Egypt?
Greece...(part of Byzantines)...Greece?
China...China...China
Rus...Russia...Russian Empire
(part of Celts)...England...British Empire
(part of Celts)...France...French Empire
Goths...Holy Roman Empire...German States
(part of Iroquois)...(part of Iroquois)...America
Japan...Japan...Japanese Empire
Zulu...Zulu...South Africa (locked alliance with Brits)
(part of Maya)...Aztecs...Mexico (locked alliance with Spanish)
Scandinavians...Vikings...Scandinavians
Koreans?...Korea...Korea
India...India...India
Persian Empire...Persia...Persia (locked alliance with British?)
Mali/Joruba...Mali/Joruba...(colony, in locked alliance with a European nation)
Ethiopia...Ethiopia...Ethiopia
Jomon/Malay...Thailand...Thailand
Celts...Scotland-Ireland...(part of British Empire)
Inca...Inca...(not sure of name, but locked alliance with Spanish)
(part of Celts)...Spain...Spanish Empire
(part of Celts)...Portugal...Portugal
Arabs...Arabs...Arabia
(part of Persian empire)...Turks...Ottoman Empire
(part of Greece)...Byzantines...(part of Ottoman Empire)
Maya...Maya?...(locked alliance with Spanish Empire)
Iroquois...Iroquois...Native Nations
Mongols...Mongols...Mongolia
(part of Goths)...Dutch...Netherlands
Huns...(not sure of name)...Austro-Hungarian Empire
If having locked alliances causes problems, I might move the start date for the Industrial era to 1600 AD, before spheres of influence and major empire-building had advanced so far into the imperial age.
Camber
Resident Family Therapist
Update:
I've posted a new .biq on the first post.
Things are going much better now that I've simplified my map. Rather than use V.Soma's map (100x100 with 15 civs), I have decided to go with the original RoC map by Rhye (170x170 with 31 civs). That removes a lot of headache and has allowed me to focus more on the parts of the mod that I really enjoy doing.
I have added Space above and below the map, 170x140 above and 170x52 below. I also reduced the sizes of the planets represented so that they would still be mostly surrounded by empty space.
I switched my "Space" terrain from Sea to Ocean. It makes things a little harder since I won't have 2 types of space terrain (Ocean doesn't have LM), but it makes more sense intuitively, and I was able to use LM Sea as "Ocean" and keep Sea as "Sea."
The Map Tweaker utility deleted all the Barbarian units from Rhye's map, so I'm going to have to put those back. I'm using all of RoCX's placement of starting positions, techs, units, and such pretty much as-is, and then adding to that. Hurray, no more obsessing about what condition a civ would be in at 4000 BC!
I've placed all my futuristic resources, added in all the future techs, and have started doing the planning work for what units will be added and where. I'm trying to not have units tyed only to a resource where possible, so that they will actually appear on the tech tree if there is room. To do this, I am making a "Units Planner" file in Microsoft Excel. I've gone through the Ancient and Middle Ages so far, and am about 1/5 of the way into the Industrial-Modern Era. I've included it here as a work in progress, so you can see what I'm up to.
In the Units Planner file, new additions are marked with double asterisks (**), except in the case of the Improvements, which are all new. I've also listed any Wonders that will be altered; wonders that were already in RoCX but will have their properties or required resources altered have been marked with a single asterisk. Also, any units that have been altered from RoCX are marked with a single asterisk, and the changes are also marked. These changes have already been incorporated into the .biq file, but most of the new units (**) have not. I'm not adding any of them until my Units Planner file is done, and I've finalized the values for all numbers involved.
I've posted a new .biq on the first post.
Things are going much better now that I've simplified my map. Rather than use V.Soma's map (100x100 with 15 civs), I have decided to go with the original RoC map by Rhye (170x170 with 31 civs). That removes a lot of headache and has allowed me to focus more on the parts of the mod that I really enjoy doing.
I have added Space above and below the map, 170x140 above and 170x52 below. I also reduced the sizes of the planets represented so that they would still be mostly surrounded by empty space.
I switched my "Space" terrain from Sea to Ocean. It makes things a little harder since I won't have 2 types of space terrain (Ocean doesn't have LM), but it makes more sense intuitively, and I was able to use LM Sea as "Ocean" and keep Sea as "Sea."
The Map Tweaker utility deleted all the Barbarian units from Rhye's map, so I'm going to have to put those back. I'm using all of RoCX's placement of starting positions, techs, units, and such pretty much as-is, and then adding to that. Hurray, no more obsessing about what condition a civ would be in at 4000 BC!
I've placed all my futuristic resources, added in all the future techs, and have started doing the planning work for what units will be added and where. I'm trying to not have units tyed only to a resource where possible, so that they will actually appear on the tech tree if there is room. To do this, I am making a "Units Planner" file in Microsoft Excel. I've gone through the Ancient and Middle Ages so far, and am about 1/5 of the way into the Industrial-Modern Era. I've included it here as a work in progress, so you can see what I'm up to.
In the Units Planner file, new additions are marked with double asterisks (**), except in the case of the Improvements, which are all new. I've also listed any Wonders that will be altered; wonders that were already in RoCX but will have their properties or required resources altered have been marked with a single asterisk. Also, any units that have been altered from RoCX are marked with a single asterisk, and the changes are also marked. These changes have already been incorporated into the .biq file, but most of the new units (**) have not. I'm not adding any of them until my Units Planner file is done, and I've finalized the values for all numbers involved.
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