Sevomod: Feedback

[Mufin]

Sevo,

At least, you have replied. It is clearer now. Now I understand. You are not a fascist. You are just a fool thinking adding Hitler as a "Great Person" is normal and reasonable. I am disappointed with you and our "knowing" community (or rather your royal guards). I am disappointed with your reply.

Pine--did I ever tell you my muffin joke? Two muffins are sitting in an oven. One muffin turns to the other and says, "Hey, is it me, or is it getting hot in here?", and the other muffin cries out in suprise, "Oh my god! A talking muffin!"

This makes clearer to me how intelligent you are. Now I understand.

Uuuummmmm...No. Guess you'll have to not play my mod.

Yes, that is what I shall do. And I believe that is what people shall do (except your sincere fans).

 

[Sevo]

Sevo,

At least, you have replied. It is clearer now. Now I understand. You are not a fascist. You are just a fool thinking adding Hitler as a "Great Person" is normal and reasonable. I am disappointed with you and our "knowing" community (or rather your royal guards). I am disappointed with your reply.

I know I said I was muting you, but I'll give you the courtesy of a more complete reply before I do so. I wasn't going to as I had assumed you were a troll of some kind as others have suggested, but I went through and looked at the other threads you've started and posts you've made and you seem to only have a problem with my mod. I had expected to find only more hostility and insults, but it appears that you've reserved that for my mod and the other posters here, who you have no qualms about attacking. I stand by my assertion that your language is inflammatory and juvenile, but I will dignify you with the reason why I'm not going to change things before I drop this.

You take the term "Great people" to be synonymous with "Good people". It is not. As others have pointed out, a great person for the sake of the game is a guy (or gal) who changes the course of history. Maybe he's Saint Augustine, maybe he's Freddy Krueger--good, bad, he/she left a mark on the world in the space and time in which they lived.

Now, certainly, I didn't have to choose to include Stalin. Or Hitler. Or Saddam. But to deny that they changed the the period they lived in would be a bit naive, no? The world that we've come to live in has been sculpted as much by the horrors and atrocities as by the kindness and progress. So they stay. To deny the evil in the world is to deny the possiblity of good.

Honestly, if we're going to have Genghis Khan as a leaderhead and you're okay with THAT, my inclusion of Stalin shouldn't be too much to handle. Really, most of the leaderheads in the game spilled far more than their fair share of blood.

And it's the same reason I kept Gazprom despite the complaints. Gazprom is a Russian juggernaut that manipulates half the countries in Asia and Europe, wielding it's oil and natural gas as a political and financial weapon. The company isn't exactly what you'd call socially responsible. But they are powerful, one of the most powerful corporations on earth and a good representation of what a gas "wonder" could be. So I keep it.

I'm not going to lose any sleep over disappointing you. That's your issue. I love this game and this mod and working on it is an ongoing source of enjoyment for me, and I've met some incredible like-minded folks here to share all the fun with. As long as that stays true I'll keep playing Civ and I hope they do, too. If you aren't enjoying it, then walk away. No one is twisting your arm there, Mufin. You won't be the first person who didn't like the mod and you won't be the last. That's my "foolish" opinion.


Now, I've answered you politely and completely and this issue is at an end from my standpoint. I'll ask you politely to refrain from further insults directed at the mod, members posting in the forum, and myself. It's just not necessary or polite.

 

[Uncle Anton]

Sevo, you're more than welcome for the support from all us guys, and I think you've been more than reasonable, mature and responsible in the measurement of your response to this situation.

What is reasonable is something easily talked about, yet not so easily practised it would seem. If anything, regardless of whether you're within the context of this online community or between various countries and demographics, you're going to get great people and also unfortunately smacktards pretty much no matter where you go. I think we can all agree this has been amply demonstrated.

I don't think anyone can reasonably make a case for offense at your mod, regardless of whether they agree with the choices you've made. As has been so adeptly said prior, if there's something here that someone doesn't like, they can always make their own version.

I only hope that the ramblings we've seen don't drown out posts of genuine feedback... In the meantime, well done, and keep up the good work.

 

[vitalie]

And it's the same reason I kept Gazprom despite the complaints. Gazprom is a Russian juggernaut that manipulates half the countries in Asia and Europe, wielding it's oil and natural gas as a political and financial weapon. The company isn't exactly what you'd call socially responsible. But they are powerful, one of the most powerful corporations on earth and a good representation of what a gas "wonder" could be. So I keep it.

Hi Sevo

I'm the one who complained about Gazprom

At the moment I am waiting for the Warlords version (with LAN 100% supported - I only play with my wife), so haven't played in a while. I just wanted to ask re: Gazprom - is/will there be a -1 diplomacy factor from having it?

Vit

PS: loved that m***n joke!!!!

 

[Arlborn]

Good answer Sevo! He really didnt want to understand us

What about the unit statistics?(It is in Amras mod, as well as VISA and I guess Composite XL) This thing is really funny specially when you rename your units according to the top10 xD

Amd Vitallie, I think -1 in diplomacy for ALL civs is a bit a lot no? What about a new system? Like if Civs has specifics civics on like pacifism or the other one that I-cant-write-unless-I-see-about-the-ecology, then they will have -1 in diplomacy for you about some wonders or national wonders that you built like this one? Or dunno, it just seems to much -1 diplomacy with ALL civs

 

[AljayBoy]

P.S.: Hey, AljayBoy: what is your opinion about the Barter-Civic?!

Yeah thats also overpowered, I don't think I changed from it once during my last game. Although if Religious Law gets changed then Barter won't seem as valuable, as you will definately have to trade more to replace the huge amount of gold lost from when Religious Law gave you +3 per specialist.

P.S. Oh, while everyone else is making requests for Mod Add Ons, put my vote down for the Revolutions Mod, seems to me what Civilisation should be about, however I imagine it would be a killer to incorporate though.

 

[Bursk]

For Barter, how about changing it to +20% food and -33% gold? Does that seem like a good balance?

 

[Isod]

You guys rock.

1. Definitely agree w/ increasing the MI heli transport capacity (at least for infantry units)

2. Definitely agree w/ adding an early game assassin/ninja or spy-type unit (espionage/ intel has been too important in interstate relations over the course of human history to have it relegated to the late game). Like the idea where they steal workers.
Bacon's Assassin - http://forums.civfanatics.com/showthread.php?t=158213

3. Definitely believe that guys who try to use big words and constantly use them incorrectly sound like a Muppet

4. Definitely agree that relig law and barter need to be balanced

5. Stone should be appear waaaay more frequently than it does (stones for God’s sakes- they are everywhere!)

6. Would love to see forts that fire on passing enemies and/or enact REAL zone of control (ala units in civ 1). Love the fact that you can build forts outside your territory, don’t like the idea I’ve read where they spread culture. Jeckel’s ZOC Forts - http://forums.civfanatics.com/showthread.php?t=181921

7. Would love a sniper unit with the advent of rifling or later mil techs (better chance of staying invisible with promotions) TheLopez's Sniper - http://forums.civfanatics.com/showthread.php?t=169665

8. I think guys that communicate in bullets are almost as annoying as guys in # 3.

9. Love the idea of random events happening in the single player game (forget where I read it). Some thoughts:
a. bad weather decimates a coastal city/ town improvement, or an earthquake/tornado/ wildfire an inland one. (do earthquakes ever happen in CIV 4)?

b. a plague breaks out in diseased cities and spreads to connected cities (causing you to quarantine by pillaging trade routes to that city;
maybe a new medical unit to help end the plague)

c. resources go bad for a few turns and offer no benefit (to represent the potato famine, redtide, foot and mouth disease, etc.)

d. pirates can land and/ or conduct amphibious assaults (no penalty) directly on cities. There are a lot of benefits from coastal towns, like external
trade routes, an abundance of water resources and an almost impossible to disrupt resource network between two costal towns (very important in the early
game w/ raging barbarians ripping up your roads). this would make you think twice about building a coastal city without adequate naval protection.

e. foreign travelers (only in the early game) and not attached to another civ. Think of them as a goodie hut that comes to you. They show up (via a pop-up) and ask to speak to the leader. You choose the effect or it is randomly chosen. They offer things like ancient secrets (help research), share maps, some type of gold benefit, or to join a city. Or you can forgo the benefit and enslave them (rush production or turn them into slave units). If you accept the benefit, you run the chance of them spreading a disease or starting a plague (or maybe they are con men and can swindle you out of money some how). Random foreign visitors are very rare. Someone else's idea, but i forget who.

This mod makes this game sooo much better (been playing since CIV I). Thank you so much for all your hard work. I’ve had Warlords for 2 months and I haven’t installed it yet (waiting for that big day where Sevo causes my GPA to take a nose dive and I fail out of grad school).

Thank God that other thing is over; kudos to all for taking the high road.

Isod

 

[mqrt]

I hope it is over now *g*
That reminds me another problem in Civ-games:
You always come to a point, where you know, that you have won or lost the game... this often happens very early, when you have rushed an opponent or, on the other side, are enclosed by some Civs and have no early metal-ressources... or are on an island without coastal access to other islands.
When you know, you have lost, that should be no further problem. You just start a new game or finally leave the computer alone for some hours/days.
But when you know, that you will win the game, it becomes boring (espacially when it's a military victory), because you just have to 'finish it'. In Civ II, when trying a space-victory, the AI suddenly came with diplomats or spys, stealing the key-tech, when not yet having it... ok, that was a bit like cheating, but it brought back some action.
In Chess for example you can, although nearly having won the game, accidently loose your queen, so the game turns again...
but in CIV4... I don't know to 'fall back' in CIV4 again :-/

although I think it s a civ issue rather than sevomod; I do think this is something sevomod might solve ...

tech leaking goes some way; but i understand choosing the right civic completely blocks this ?

maybe if the lead becomes to big, have some sort of leaking regardless of civic?

and offcourse some good old spies might be cool too...

 

[Titi]

tech leaking goes some way; but i understand choosing the right civic completely blocks this ?

Right: free market, barter and mercantilism.

 

[Grave]

Sevo, how about adding this one:
http://forums.civfanatics.com/showthread.php?t=187622
I really like the idea...

Aaaand.. , any news on the warlords release?

Say, that IS a mighty fine idea!

 

[vitalie]

Amd Vitallie, I think -1 in diplomacy for ALL civs is a bit a lot no? What about a new system? Like if Civs has specifics civics on like pacifism or the other one that I-cant-write-unless-I-see-about-the-ecology, then they will have -1 in diplomacy for you about some wonders or national wonders that you built like this one? Or dunno, it just seems to much -1 diplomacy with ALL civs

Actually I like your idea. If wonders have some negative impact with other civs, it may somewhat balance down those Civs that build a lot of wonders - at some point building another one will cost too many negative diplomacy points and you'll have to decide what you want most. I guess Chichen Itza or whatever wonder gives bonus defence would be the easiest choice

Or an alternative could be: you get negative diplomacy points for gazprom, but get a gold and/or happiness bonus.

Is it possible to have not -1, but -0.5 or -0.25 diplomacy at all?

Anyway, having some way of a maintenance cost for wonders (I don't mean money, but for example diplomacy), brings another interesting aspect into the game. I am not sure about the game balance though

Thanks for reading

Man I am still laughing at that muffin joke

Vit

 

[Sevo]

For Barter, how about changing it to +20% food and -33% gold? Does that seem like a good balance?

Probably a good balance. (At least a step in the right direction!).

@Vitalie: -1 diplomacy would work for the AI, but the problem is that is doesn't work for human players. I'm not sure if that makes a big difference or not. But it could be done.

Also, I wish I had a reason for the LAN problems. I've tried a few times to fix it and it's frustratingly resistant to resolution. I'll keep cracking at it.

@Isod: Stones. I've noticed that as well. Most world maps have like...1 set of stones. They're rocks! For the love! Hm...

And ZOC forts is another idea I've liked. My concern (as always) has been whether or not the AI could be properly taught to USE the forts. I think they could, but I'll have to look into it again. Perhaps after the warlords release.


@MrQT: I have another mod I'm almost done with (that will go into this) and hopefully help balance that "I've won this game and now I have to waste time" issue. I'm hoping it will keep the game interesting to the very end.

 

[Hived]

Jepp, +20% food and -33% gold sounds better for the first...
-50% gold seemed to be too hard...
@sevo: May I ask, how you balanced Religious Law?! Would it be hard to implement, that only priests get the +3 bonus?!
In my games priests were always the worst specialists, when not having Angkor Wat... Scientists seem to be overpowered (all in CIV not especially in Sevomod). If Religious Law gave the +3 only to priests, that would maybe balance this circumstances.
...on the other hand, on this way it seems to be easier to build up a technologically backward empire with many priests and getting the majority of your science by tech-leak.

The major problem about implementing special units with special abilities is in my opinion, that it is f***ing hard to teach the AI how to use them. Nice, if they work, but unbalanced, if the AI doesn't have a clue what this unit is for.

btw.: I can't await your "Dunno-if-I-have-won-this-game-yet"-Mod ...and I'd love to know how you manage it!!!

 

[Zorn]

I think forts are fine as they are.
When Monty attacked me, he killed my whole army in a city.
I reloaded, buildt a fort and was able to repell his attack easily.


Let me add a few opinions on units:


Ancient/classic:
Great balance.
The only worries I have are horse archers in the hands of a human. With flanking promotions, they can get a retreat possibility of more than 100%, making them effectively immortal. After you got that, start stacking attack promotions for total killers.

Mediveal/renesaince:

Also very good, except that muskets still suck. Knights of an agressive civ stacked with attack promotios seem a little overpowered - even pikes with formation have a hard time.
The art of artillery: Brutal thing. Bronze cannons rock, maybe too much. With right civics, barracks and westpoint or war academy you can get them with 3 promotions from the spot. This means that even the first one has "good" (>30%) chances against a strong city defender - and it gets easyer every time. In the open it`s not even a contest. The AI doesn`t use them much, but in the hands of the player they can be gamebreakers.
This without considering the new bombardement rules wich make artillery even stronger.

Industrial/modern

Not so sure about the MarkV tank. Whats it`s point? It is weaker than infantery.sure, it has a bonus vs gunpowder, but so has inf, and the movement of two - it`s nice, but just doesn`t cut it. It´s window of use is also very small.
Motorized infantery: The bread and butter unit of the late game. Excellent all rounders. Citygarrisons, assault troops or just stack defender - they do the job. Even when IFVs are available, I often still build motorized inf for taking cities. Quite realistic, and I really like it.

A10: The concept of needing a small wonder to build a certain type of unit is great (I´d love to see this in earlier ages more (besides AoA)). Maybe Fairchild is a little too expensive for what it does (also you need a lot of techs for it), but I build quite a lot of A10s when games last that far.

Mobile SAM: Ugh. The worst unit in sevo mod. It just has no purpose. First, it comes waaaaay too late in the tech tree. Second, the national wonder is way, way, way too expensive for what it does (and you run out of good cities to put national wonders in it). Third, it can do very, very little - stop a few planes, that`s it. For that, you need just a couple of them - again not worth the nat. wonder. And last, what it does can be done by IFV, wich are just a much better investment of hammers.

The F117

This one is a quite interesting unit, but again it comes quite late, and you will be hard pressed to have enough time left to build enough of them to make the inverstment for Lockheed worth while. Wich is also much too expensive, imo.

Nuclear submarine: Awesome unit, but has the same problem as the horse archer. Gives the AI a hard time (btw, did you know that transported gunships defend against ships?)

UUs: I don`t know all UUs yet. Just some observations:

Teewana: Very strong. Circumnavigation in the ancient times.

Mohawk archer: Gaining woodsman II but losing the hill bonus. Seems like bad trade to me, making this UU weaker than the unit it replaces.

Woomerang wielder: For crying out loud, it`s a joke. I mean - has anyone ever had an animal attack a worker?



Besides these few nitpicks, the unit balance in Sevomod is incredibly good, considering how many units were added.

 

[Alkemift]

Hi. Why not to add :
1. Hot springs
2. a function for a worker- A distillery (Whyskey)
On a patch of wheat
3. An English early unit: yeoman (bowman).
4. A French cavalry unit: Dragun(Ulan ?)

 

[Quiet Man]

... I go away for a couple of months because Sevo says 3.0 is "the last update" and I take that at face value being totally content to immerse myself in 3.0 and what happens?

• New site
• New version
• New patch
• The Hitler thing resurrects itself ...AGAIN!

I haven't checked all of the posts; did anyone complain about whether or not tanks could/should or not capture a town, or has that finally been put to bed?

So, Sevo, while I'm waiting for 3.2 to finish downloading, thanks yet again for doing what you do for Civ IV.

Regards,

Quiet Man

 

[bryanw1995]

It's good to see that hitler is still having a positive impact on society. I've always wondered if civ would introduce him as a "great" leader, and I've wondered even more about the reaction that would commence. I did notice last night that the ethiopians built "adolph hitler", and that was my excuse to invade and assimilate them. I must admit that it is rather humorous to me that hitler is the ultimate bogeyman in our society these days, while stalin, castro, genghis khan, etc are considered to be mainstream enough that few eyebrows are raised at their inclusion in civ 4 or other similar (albeit inferior) games. Stalin probably killed more people than hitler did, but he had more to do with hitler's failure than roosevelt or churchill. The best thing about Genghis Khan is, um, well, he doesn't have a lot of redeeming features, does he? He was what hitler could have been if there had not been others to stop him. Why is Khan or Stalin ok but hitler not?

 

[Dr.Oak]

I am currently in a game in 1300 AD (turn 664/1200), Monarch level on a huge map.

The A.I., Kubla Khan managed to get to industrialism and can now use WWII tanks and Battleships without having combustion. This seems very odd and unbalanced to me, because you need combustion for destroyers. And that same rule should apply to battleships and probably to the tanks as well.

I have been doing well throughout the game and pretty certain I am gonna win, cause K.K. is now my perment ally. I had been researching railroad when I signed him on and saw how very advanced his research was. I could backtrack our reasearch and go for the infantry and old tanks I suppose. Not!
I am going for combustion so I will have some destroyers to escort those batlleships and troop transports.

The rest of the civs are now patheticly outmatched. Which before the signing they were gonna be a little tougher. Now, I am gonna roll in with WWII tanks, destroyers, marines , SAM infantry and battleships over the opposing cavalry, grenidiers and riflemen.

This is a great mod though and really enjoyed playing it, I am itchin to play a Warlord version of this mod, keep up the good work!

 

[Arlborn]

I think forts are fine as they are.
When Monty attacked me, he killed my whole army in a city.
I reloaded, buildt a fort and was able to repell his attack easily.

Almost never used 0.o

Mediveal/renesaince:

Also very good, except that muskets still suck. Knights of an agressive civ stacked with attack promotios seem a little overpowered - even pikes with formation have a hard time.

But knights supposed to be the strongest unit then, not?

The art of artillery: Brutal thing. Bronze cannons rock, maybe too much. With right civics, barracks and westpoint or war academy you can get them with 3 promotions from the spot. This means that even the first one has "good" (>30%) chances against a strong city defender - and it gets easyer every time. In the open it`s not even a contest. The AI doesn`t use them much, but in the hands of the player they can be gamebreakers.
This without considering the new bombardement rules wich make artillery even stronger.

I dont build much military wonders anyway..Only used them once and worked fine but didnt seem overpowered for me..

Not so sure about the MarkV tank. Whats it`s point? It is weaker than infantery.sure, it has a bonus vs gunpowder, but so has inf, and the movement of two - it`s nice, but just doesn`t cut it. It´s window of use is also very small.
Motorized infantery: The bread and butter unit of the late game. Excellent all rounders. Citygarrisons, assault troops or just stack defender - they do the job. Even when IFVs are available, I often still build motorized inf for taking cities. Quite realistic, and I really like it.

MarkV? I always build some of them, put colleteral damage promotions and use and abuse of the blitz(atk more than 1 time in same turn) lol, if they go far in promotions, I can even add 1 more moviment point and then they can atack 3 times in same turn 0,o
Love motorized infantary as well!

A10: The concept of needing a small wonder to build a certain type of unit is great (I´d love to see this in earlier ages more (besides AoA)). Maybe Fairchild is a little too expensive for what it does (also you need a lot of techs for it), but I build quite a lot of A10s when games last that far.

Too expensive the wonder, never built, normally Im busy with other thingsd in my main cities..

Mobile SAM: Ugh. The worst unit in sevo mod. It just has no purpose. First, it comes waaaaay too late in the tech tree. Second, the national wonder is way, way, way too expensive for what it does (and you run out of good cities to put national wonders in it). Third, it can do very, very little - stop a few planes, that`s it. For that, you need just a couple of them - again not worth the nat. wonder. And last, what it does can be done by IFV, wich are just a much better investment of hammers.

Man, I really agree lol, built them 1 time to se how it was, what a waste

The F117

This one is a quite interesting unit, but again it comes quite late, and you will be hard pressed to have enough time left to build enough of them to make the inverstment for Lockheed worth while. Wich is also much too expensive, imo.

Too late and too expensive, never built..

Good points guy