The Ancient Mediterranean MOD

[Ankenaton]

The bigger map is coming in the next release, by 2.0 the latest, so it shall be here soon

Thanks Shqype and crew, I really appreciate that.

 

[Der_Meister]

Well... i would have appreciated a bit of help. I wrote a problem i found but the history discussion you are having seems more exciting...

 

[Ick of the East]

The bigger map is coming in the next release, by 2.0 the latest, so it shall be here soon

I'm not even starting a new game until I get my hands on it!

And I'm hoping that you included the St. Bernard pass in the Alps and the Fayum in Egypt.

Also, that leaderhead of Caesar that I posted way above, (the skin-textured bust with a backdrop of the Forum) - if you need any modifications let me know. That's if you're going to use it and all.

 

[Kaenash]

I know I am going to sound like a 'noob' who just needs to eat his wheaties and become a master at strategy, but having played CIV since its first incarnation and many, many mods, I just don't get this one.

the premise and choices are awesome.

I've played twice as rome, once on the included scenario and once on a pangea map. I usually lead the game with several hundred points above all other empires. I usually have plenty of units in my cities.

Then I guess because Barbarian nations love War with Rome, they all tend to declare war on me at once. I think that is fine. I do not have a problem with that at all. I am not talking about the game's versions of Barbarians in black, but all the other non-roman civilizations, which have yet to fall to mighty rome.

I am ready for them, got walls and palisades and some wonders to boost my defense, got 2-3 units in at least every city, some with more.

Then their army shows up. Their army has to be 20+ units, and they have 20+ more units shortly after if I manage to survive that wave (the AI sometimes stupidly chooses to only use a few units in a turn and give me a little time to recover).

Then the other two empires armies show up.

Then I hit "exit to desktop" in frustration.

Talk about "Hordes"

The problem with this, is to me this doesn't seem possible. I loaded up the world editor after getting wiped out and these cities have buildings in them, so I am like "So how on earth were they able to build SO many units? were they even playing the same game as me? were they exploiting slavery and just slamming their unhappiness in a desperate attempt to destroy me?"

I do not know. I think the game must just spawn units or something.

Is anyone else having this? or am I just a lightweight strategist who can't hold his milk?

(hint: in others whether it be vanilla 1.61 or other mods) I have not seen this kind of hordes.

Also I play on "normal" speed, should I not be?

 

[Shqype]

Thanks Shqype and crew, I really appreciate that.

Thamis took BenGee's base map and has been working on it to make it suitable for TAM, adding the appropriate geography and resources, etc.

Well... i would have appreciated a bit of help. I wrote a problem i found but the history discussion you are having seems more exciting.

Der Meister, can you repost your problem?

Dedelph, there are no longer missionaries in TAM (since in those days there weren't missionaries that went around spreading the religions, save for Christianity). There is instead the possibility for multiple religions to spread naturally in any given city.

About your problems, it's probably a patch/language issue. Try playing in English and see if you get the text or not.

Kaenash, 2-3 units for defense as Rome simply is not enough! Try doubling that and see if it helps.

I'll let Thamis answer other questions and comments, but just information on the status of the update: I've made the changes for v1.91 and Thamis has been working diligently on v1.92. He was reworked the combat to be more "rocks-paper-scissors" and give each unit a specific purpose. Hopefully soon it will be released. If the large map is not including in this version, it will definitely be in the next.

 

[Kaenash]

Kaenash, 2-3 units for defense as Rome simply is not enough! Try doubling that and see if it helps.

They do not normally go straight for rome. They usually pick a single city and slam that on my borders. Thats good. I have no problem with the AI. What I wonder though is, is somehow the enemy getting huge production breaks or autospawn of units?

I tried again and played a couple of turns, maybe 2 or 3 and already my nearest neigbhor had not only discovered skirmishers, but had one as well as two warriors. I had yet to finish building my first warrior.

so its not a question of just lazily building gardens all day long. In other games the unit size I build for defense, usually seems adequate.

as it stands, I can't play.

no one else getting this problem?

should I be playing on normal speed?

 

[Ankenaton]

They do not normally go straight for rome. They usually pick a single city and slam that on my borders. Thats good. I have no problem with the AI. What I wonder though is, is somehow the enemy getting huge production breaks or autospawn of units?

I tried again and played a couple of turns, maybe 2 or 3 and already my nearest neigbhor had not only discovered skirmishers, but had one as well as two warriors. I had yet to finish building my first warrior.

so its not a question of just lazily building gardens all day long. In other games the unit size I build for defense, usually seems adequate.

as it stands, I can't play.

no one else getting this problem?

should I be playing on normal speed?

What level are you playing on? Also in this mod even though you have explored a region does not mean that it stays bug-free (without barbarians) for very long. I play as Egypt and the barbarians come at me from the east, west and south. Build up defensive units and keep a rapid deployment force of mainly offensive units (warriors with a promotion will do in a pinch) and station this force along a road (just in case you need it fast against another civ) near the last entry point of a horde and this will give you some preparation for the onslaught. After a couple of games under your belt, you will then be able to use them for easy promotions. Hope this helps.

 

[Ankenaton]

In the first versions of TAM3, I actually named the Nubians "Kush". For some reason lots of people protested that, and I renamed them to Nubians...

I remember...is there a possibility of returning to the original name. I would be willing to help out with the city list. And I know that Mayan Raptor would be interested in helping and probably Ick of the East. I always preferred Khemet (Kmt) over Egypt, but that would probably start a riot... .

 

[Shqype]

I tried again and played a couple of turns, maybe 2 or 3 and already my nearest neigbhor had not only discovered skirmishers, but had one as well as two warriors. I had yet to finish building my first warrior.

Which difficulty level are you playing on, and which neighbor of yours had the skirmishers? The "barbarian" nations (which surround Rome) begin with the Hunting technology which allows for Skirmishers, so they pretty much get them from the start.

 

[Hypnotoad]

Kaenash:

I find that this mod is harder than vanilla Civ even when it is set one difficulty level lower. You might try 2 difficulty levels lower than normal. My only suggestion is to match your units against your enemies (the units have bigger bonuses against specific units than they do in vanilla) and try to get a technological edge. If you have stronger units you can often take out all of their units without losing any of yours...

-- Hypnotoad

 

[schlappi]

Will the trade barge thingy be fixed in 2.0? Or is it deliberate you can build as many as you wish?

 

[schlappi]

Then I guess because Barbarian nations love War with Rome, they all tend to declare war on me at once. I think that is fine. I do not have a problem with that at all. I am not talking about the game's versions of Barbarians in black, but all the other non-roman civilizations, which have yet to fall to mighty rome.

Several possible causes:
a) they might hate you because of your religion
b) they know your cities are poorly defended which makes them horny for loot
c) you lack some diplomatic skills

In fact, romans were very skilled diplomats, in northern italy or later, in germany they played one tribe versus the other, keeping them busy and prevent efforts to unite versus rome.

In gameplay, try to get atleast one of your strong neighbours on your side, by signing open borders, sharing resources and maybe trading some techs.
If they are pleased or even friendly with you, you can persuade them to join war with you, usually 2-3 techs are sufficent.
You also should watch out you do not trade with the wrong side; usually Aeetes has some nice resources he's willing to share, but has the wrong religion, so many nations will hate you for trading with him.

 

[Seven05]

They do not normally go straight for rome. They usually pick a single city and slam that on my borders. Thats good. I have no problem with the AI. What I wonder though is, is somehow the enemy getting huge production breaks or autospawn of units?

I tried again and played a couple of turns, maybe 2 or 3 and already my nearest neigbhor had not only discovered skirmishers, but had one as well as two warriors. I had yet to finish building my first warrior.

so its not a question of just lazily building gardens all day long. In other games the unit size I build for defense, usually seems adequate.

as it stands, I can't play.

no one else getting this problem?

should I be playing on normal speed?

The AI gets a lot of bonuses outside of the obvious, for example all of their cities start with a higher production (default is 10, don't know if TAM changed it). So early on when you're struggling with cities that have single digit productions the AI isn't.

However, that being said, it's not hard to raise a HUGE army as rome. Remember, you don't have to build defensive units in the city that they'll be defending. You also don't need a big stack in every city, I normally have 2-3 defenders per city. At the same time I tend to have 3+ offensive stacks, each with 6-10 units in them. The trick is simply to never stop producing units, ever. You don't have to constantly produce them from a single city but you should have a constant stream of them being produced. So if you look around and you see that all of your cities are building infrastructure you need to change at least one of them to producing units, at least one city at all times should be producing units don't forget that part. Just pay attention to the city when selecting the unit to produce, for example if I have 5 cities and only 2 of them have smithies anytime I produce a unit form the other 3 I just don't produce a unit that gains the weapon upgrade, so I make javelineers & archers in towns without smithies. They make good fodder and they add to your power just the same.

The second important bit is politics. You didn't explain what you did but I'll guess that you were pretty indifferent towards your neighbors. So you refused demands, didn't help in wars and then traded a bit here and there with just about everybody. Nothing special, the end result being that you have no real friends and no real enemies. Next time, pick a neighbor (Illyrians are good targets for Rome) and go to war early. Of at the very least, threaten your neighbors and demand tributes. You need enemies, the more they hate you the better. This means that if empire "a" hates you and empire "b" trades with you empire "a" will not like empire "b" and empire "b" will be less likely to jump on the dog pile when empire "a" attacks you.

 

[davbenbak]

I haven't seen any discussion around alchemist and slave markets. Personally, I never build them. Does any one else? I usually only have a few techs left to research so the pollution caused by the alchemist isn't worth the tech boost. Maybe as more techs are added I'll feel differently. I always keep the slavery civic as any easy way to pacify newly conquered cities by building culture and happiness improvements while draining off the local malcontents. I know ethnic cleansing my not be politically correct but it seems to work wonders in TAM. Maybe the slave market could give extra commerce to those with the slavery civic? Seems like most of the ancient civs portrayed here allowed slavery so maybe it shouldn't be a civic choice at all. Maybe the slave market should allow those with the slavery civic to rush improvements with cash instead of population or the other way around allow those without the slavery civic the choice to rush projects with population instead of cash? Just wanted to get this in before TAM 2

 

[Ankenaton]

I haven't seen any discussion around alchemist and slave markets. Personally, I never build them. Does any one else? I usually only have a few techs left to research so the pollution caused by the alchemist isn't worth the tech boost. Maybe as more techs are added I'll feel differently. I always keep the slavery civic as any easy way to pacify newly conquered cities by building culture and happiness improvements while draining off the local malcontents. I know ethnic cleansing my not be politically correct but it seems to work wonders in TAM. Maybe the slave market could give extra commerce to those with the slavery civic? Seems like most of the ancient civs portrayed here allowed slavery so maybe it shouldn't be a civic choice at all. Maybe the slave market should allow those with the slavery civic to rush improvements with cash instead of population or the other way around allow those without the slavery civic the choice to rush projects with population instead of cash? Just wanted to get this in before TAM 2

An interesting idea. I never use slave markets; and seldom use alchemists for the same reason as yours. Maybe some incentives should be added to make these improvements more attractive?

 

[Shqype]

Well, I doubt you guys will have the same science issue in the next version

 

[Sword Dancer]

I never use slave markets because of the hit to the happiness of the city.

I like the idea of the slavery civic rushing builds with population, and if there is a slave market, that *then* changes to gold. If we allow the market to grant the same effects of the civic, then what use is the civic?

 

[thamis]

TAM v1.92 is finally there. It fixes a lot of issues, including AI, technology speed and unit balance. Follow the download link on the first page of this thread. Only one mirror is up now, others coming soon.

There are two new maps, and all maps now start with “TAM…”:
- TAM Mediterranean (Small)
- TAM Magna Graecia (Huge)

New Unit Balance:
- Archers: High of collateral damage, good vs Javelineers, high withdraw chance, can defend cities.
- Javelineers: Very low collateral damage, good vs Cavalry & Heavy, low withdraw chance.
- Catapults: Low collateral damage, good at reducing city defenses.
- Fire Catapult: Extremely high collateral damage vs cities, bad a reducing city defenses.
- Cavalry: Good vs Medium, horrible at city defense, bad at city attack.
- Chariots: Good vs Medium & Skirmishers, horrible at city defense, bad at city attack.
- Horse Archers: Low collateral damage, very high withdraw chance, horrible at city defense, bad at city attack.
- Mounted Javelineers: Very low collateral damage, good vs Heavy & Cavalry, horrible at city defense, bad at city attack.
- Medium: Good at city attack.
- Heavy: Good vs Archers, can defend cities.

- AI is less influenced by religion (+/- 2 max modifier)
- AI is more likely to build military units for assaulting cities
- AI places more weight on certain units for certain tasks (skirmishers for attacking rather than defending, etc).

- All Archer-type units given +50% when attacking Javelineer-type units , collateral damage effectiveness doubled
- Dacian Peltast takes the place of the Armored Javelineer
- Spearmen: Terrain defenses removed, given +10% city defense, Mycenaean Hoplite given +15% city defense (Kambsor nothing)
- Armored Spearmen: Terrain defenses removed, given +15% city defense
- Pikeman: Terrain defense removed, bonus vs. Cavalry units reduced to 25% (from 50%)
- Shrines: No longer give global religion commerce, or religion spread, but +2 commerce and +4 culture
- Alchemist: Requires 3 libraries
- Merchant Vessel: Trade mission gold halved
- Trade Barge: Trade mission gold halved, limit 2 per player
- Mounted Skirmishers removed, now part of the Skirmisher Unit Combat Type
- Initial City Maintenance: 1 gold (from 0)
- Max Distance City Maintenance: 40 (from 25)
- Initial Gold Per Unit: 2 (from 1)
- Vineyard: +1 gold (no commerce bonus)
- Public Court: -25% maintenance (from -50%)
- Public Baths: No longer gives commerce bonus, or ability to turn 2 citizens into merchants
- Observatory: Requires Library, can build 1 for every 3 libraries
- Caravan House: +2 gold, Trade route modifier 25% (from 40%), only 1 merchant allowed, cost 120 (from 75)
- Smithy: Only 1 citizen into Engineer (not 2)
- Cottage, Hamlet, Village: +50% upgrade time, +1 build turn
- Financial trait now gives +1 commerce for every plot with 3 commerce (not 2)
- Upkeep slightly increased
- Minoans added as a playable civilization
- Two new maps added: Magna Grecia
- All cavalry units given -80% city defense
- Elephant withdrawal chance removed
- Kambsor withdrawal chance removed
- Heavy Unit cost raised ~20% , Spearmen cost raised to 45 (from 35)
- Defensive bonuses removed from chariots and chariot archers
- Included SimCutie’s colour values
- Changed Civilization colours
- Legionary is now heavy
- Infantry is now heavy
- All archers & comp archers, bowmen withdraw chance when attacking now 50% (promotable to 80%)
- All archers have +25% city defense, access to city defense promotions
- Composite archers have +25% city defense, access to city defense promotions
- Chariot Archers more powerful, more withdraw chance, less collateral dmg
- Mounted Javelineer more powerful, less collateral dmg
- Cavalry units: +100% vs Siege, +50% vs Medium, -25% vs city attack, -80% city defense
- Chariots: As cavalry, plus +25% vs Skirmisher
- Fire Catapult: +100% city attack, more collateral dmg
- Falxman: +25% city defense, no longer gives hills defense bonus
- Onager: Reduces city defenses by 50%
- Renamed religious buildings
- Changed access to promotions for more diversity
- Council of the Elders: Gives more free units, no free XP, but allows Conscription
- Conscription order: Javelineer, Armored Javelineer, Bowman, Berserker (UU), Pikeman, Huskarl (UU)
- Forum: -25% number of cities maintenance
- Aristocray: +1 Trade Route per City
- Bureaucracy: +1 hammer per Town
- Civil Laws: No longer gives Town bonus
- Exploration: +1 Trade Routes
- Currency: No extra Trade Routes
- Added “Archer” UnitCombat, all archers and horse archers are part of it, all javelineers and mounted javelineers are Skirmisher

 

[thamis]

Regarding text not showing up: Try the English version, that works. I'll look into other language version for 1.93, which will come soon.

 

[Dedelph]

Thanks to Dyonisius , I am now able to post some screenshots of my menus with v 1.9