The AoM Travel Guide

[Ozymandias]

The tech tree looks good so far My only question -- and this cuts to the heart of history, historiography, anthropology, et. al. -- is, Do you think the Aztecs would ever have developed the Republic?

-Oz

 

[Dom Pedro II]

As I said, this is the crudest and earliest changes I've made. Some of the main line tech tree advances will be shifted to only certain cultural groups. The Republic may be one of those. Polytheism and Monotheism are getting the axe completely.

It is quite likely that they would not have developed the Republic until much later... it probably would've taken some kind of violent revolution in their society.

Btw, it's good to see you again, ozy.

 

[Ozymandias]

Btw, it's good to see you again, ozy.

Gracias. I'm doing a lot of travelling this month, but will be firmly back on Sept. 3rd. I'm glad you're keeping up the good work

-Oz

 

[Dom Pedro II]

The biggest problem I'm finding with this mod is that so many of the aspects of these societies that are really the only things to make advances out of are hard to simply sum up with one descriptive noun or term.

 

[Ozymandias]

The biggest problem I'm finding with this mod is that so many of the aspects of these societies that are really the only things to make advances out of are hard to simply sum up with one descriptive noun or term.

Why not post them and see what the gang might come up with?

 

[Dom Pedro II]

I'll take you up on that!

 

[Dom Pedro II]

This is concept work. Not so much the techs for these civs but rather observations about their culture.

Japanese

Yabusame (horse archery)
Kyudo (archery)
Bushido Code
Red Light District
Haiku
Kabuki Theater
Terakoya School

Chinese

Acupuncture
Confucianism
Block Printing
Taoism
Buddhism (for a few other civs too)
Alchemy
Prefectural Schools
Herbal Medicine

Korea

Compulsory Education

Bantu

Umtshiza (stick fighting used for fun and training)
Rites of Passage
Beadwork
Goat Herding
Basket Weaving
Zimbabwes

Mongols

Naadam (national sports festival)

Babylon/Sumeria/Assyria

Hammurabi's Code
Ziggurats
Architecture
Bridge Building

England

Magna Carta
Habeas Corpus

America

Manifest Destiny
Trapping
Jazz

Inca

Quipu
Terrace Farming
Llama Herding
Data Machines (explained in first post)

Maya

Celestial Calendar

Greece

Drama

Celts (thank you, frenchman )

Druidism
Gallic Reaper

 

[Ozymandias]

Some VERY random thoughts ...

A unique Improvement for Islam might be the Ribat, which was a sort of warrior-monastery mosque in northwest Africa.

Given your goals, I'd be inclined to (1) give each Civ an Era=None unique tech (2) have Advances be generic, and (3) derive as many Civ-specific improvements as possible from the generic advance -- e.g.:

"Advance" is "Military Culture" which allows the Japanese to "build" Bushido which generates Samurai and "Umtshiza" which generates some other Civ-specific military unit.

Likewise "Code Of Law" might allow the building of both Hammurabi's Code and the Magna Carta (yes, of course the latter came far after the former, but the dark ages did tend to knock civilization back on its heels rather a bit, and if you're starting England and the Babylonians at the same time, you've no right to complain ).

In my own personal mod I also have an advance called "National Art Form" to summarize those unique artforms (from Drama to Gamelan, etc.) with which a culture defines itself. I use it to allow a Civ to build a Shakespeare's Theater equivalent, but you could just as easily use it for Haiku, Beadwork, and Drama etc.

-- I'll continue if this is the sort of help you're looking for.

-Oz

 

[Dom Pedro II]

Some VERY random thoughts ...

A unique Improvement for Islam might be the Ribat, which was a sort of warrior-monastery mosque in northwest Africa.

Given your goals, I'd be inclined to (1) give each Civ an Era=None unique tech (2) have Advances be generic, and (3) derive as many Civ-specific improvements as possible from the generic advance -- e.g.:

"Advance" is "Military Culture" which allows the Japanese to "build" Bushido which generates Samurai and "Umtshiza" which generates some other Civ-specific military unit.

Likewise "Code Of Law" might allow the building of both Hammurabi's Code and the Magna Carta (yes, of course the latter came far after the former, but the dark ages did tend to knock civilization back on its heels rather a bit, and if you're starting England and the Babylonians at the same time, you've no right to complain ).

In my own personal mod I also have an advance called "National Art Form" to summarize those unique artforms (from Drama to Gamelan, etc.) with which a culture defines itself. I use it to allow a Civ to build a Shakespeare's Theater equivalent, but you could just as easily use it for Haiku, Beadwork, and Drama etc.

-- I'll continue if this is the sort of help you're looking for.

-Oz

I'm a little confused... how do I make civ-specific buildings without having their prerequisites being civ-specific advances??

 

[pinktilapia]

A possibility could be to give access to a different strategic resource for each civilization (through the Era=None unique tech) and make the civ specific buildings and wonders require this resource. Could that work?

 

[Dom Pedro II]

It could, but it would also make it very difficult to find those resources for 31 civilizations. On pre-placed maps, that'd work, but not for an epic game mod like this...

 

[pinktilapia]

Humm, yes, I get the point. I have to think 'epic'.
Another try then... for the civ-specific improvements/wonders, there could be a chain of required buildings starting with the one given to them by their unique advance. It would mean the civ has to build all his unique buildings in sequence but that could work!

 

[Dom Pedro II]

Ozy, I didn't specifically say so earlier, but please, do continue...

 

[Dom Pedro II]

Ozy seems to have disappeared... I just wanted to bump this up as a reminder if he should pop his head in.

 

[Justinian I]

Hey I've got a question: How do the tech trees look different for each civ? Or are they simply there to look at even if you can't get them...which of course means that the civ specific tech can't be required for era advancement...How do you plan on working around this (I assume you're not going to make 31 different mods), as those seem pretty important! I wish I could help, but I don't know any suggestions.

EDIT **
Idea! Why don't you, instead of having different techs, simply have lots of buildings/units granted by the non-era tech that require different resources (discovered later), luxury or strategic, that are of cultural importance to these cultures.?

 

[Dom Pedro II]

Hey I've got a question: How do the tech trees look different for each civ? Or are they simply there to look at even if you can't get them...which of course means that the civ specific tech can't be required for era advancement...How do you plan on working around this (I assume you're not going to make 31 different mods), as those seem pretty important! I wish I could help, but I don't know any suggestions.

From what I understand, if you can't research a technology, it doesn't appear in the Scientific Advisors screen. So if you are the Inca, you will only see the Inca technologies and the mutual technologies. (Thank you, Firaxis for at least getting that much right). But you can still look up the techs in the Civilopedia of course.

And as you said, the techs can't be required for era advancement unfortunately... which does sort of put a dent in my plan. In theory, somebody could then just rush through the skeleton main tree straight to Motorized Transportation while everybody else is in the Dark Ages and just go to town... but I'm trying to make it so that the only way you can really advance is by researching these techs because 1) A lot of the civ-specific units are only accessible through these techs, and 2) The civ-specific buildings are only accessible through these techs.

So you can try to rush your way to Motorized Transportation, but you'll also be fighting with Warriors until you get there, and you won't have any city improvements to boost your science and happiness.

 

[Justinian I]

Oh, that's pretty cool, then! To counter the rush through the tech tree, you could make the mutual techs more expensive...but then maybe the AI would go for them too quickly, but if you make them less expensive, a human will rush through, like you said...I think this mod is perfect for multiplayer with individual techs, but I'm not sure the AI will handle it like you want.

Correction, not individual techs, civ-specific techs

 

[Dom Pedro II]

Oh, that's pretty cool, then! To counter the rush through the tech tree, you could make the mutual techs more expensive...but then maybe the AI would go for them too quickly, but if you make them less expensive, a human will rush through, like you said...I think this mod is perfect for multiplayer with individual techs, but I'm not sure the AI will handle it like you want.

Correction, not individual techs, civ-specific techs

We'll see. That's why I'm doing a lot of play-testing.

So the AI goes for the most expensive techs?

Because I'd planned to make civ-specific techs relatively cheap since you can't trade to get them.

Basically, this is how it breaks down in that respect:

Civ-specific techs: Cheapest
Culture-specific techs: More expensive
Mutual techs: Most expensive

 

[Justinian I]

From my experience the AI goes for more expensive techs, and that's what your advisor suggests...I could be mistaken, of course...just keep testing!

 

[Dom Pedro II]

From my experience the AI goes for more expensive techs, and that's what your advisor suggests...I could be mistaken, of course...just keep testing!

Well, are there any other factors taken into account like number of units or buildings made available by the tech?

But also, does the AI set flavor advances as a higher priority? So that if there's flavored techs they have a higher desirability than techs without a flavor?

Or actually... I could give all mutual technologies a flavor that is only like 75% compatible with all of the civilizations in the game, so maybe they won't simply go for the most expensive techs...