The Medieval Economy

[orlanth]

Hmm I really don't think it would be a good move to add separate meters for this for every individual unit in the game. It's the kind of thing that might sound appealing to begin with, but would add up to being burdensome and eventually impossible for players to keep track of multiple factors affecting individual meters across dozens to hundreds of separate units every turn. Besides the performance costs, in practice each additional factor could add lots of unwanted complications, eg:
you'd have to individually determine in every city what units receives extra food vs storing it for population growth, or have players frustrated when the food system doesn't do what they want
do players really keep unemployed units inside cities? if so it's already desirable to just move them out, and the same goes for starving units
there's already a very strong incentive to work specialists at the profession with their production bonus; adding even more bonuses/penalties to this won't make things more interesting & will instead just force players to clear the specialty of any unit not exactly matching its profession, with a rather boring/homogenous result.
It's a good idea to let unfulfilled Demands have some social consequence; but with the short working lifespans and non-individualist nature of medieval society it doesn't seem a good fit for every individual unit to have its own meter that you'd have to keep track of. If you wanted to make some social factors like Demand matter more it could be good to let them affect the existing Fealty score for that city; this would let each individual unit have its own effect without becoming too burdensome from having to track every individual unit separately.

However your idea about having some corruption to restrain large/decentralized empires I do like a lot. It could be possible to import the already existing code from CivBtS Civic system (eg corruption cost per number of cities, and corruption cost for distance from capitol).

 

[Kailric]

Hmm I really don't think it would be a good move to add separate meters for this for every individual unit in the game. It's the kind of thing that might sound appealing to begin with, but would add up to being burdensome and eventually impossible for players to keep track of multiple factors affecting individual meters across dozens to hundreds of separate units every turn.

Thanks for the Feedback on this. You may be right here as things often look better on paper than in actually practice. But, to address some of your concerns...

you'd have to individually determine in every city what units receives extra food vs storing it for population growth, or have players frustrated when the food system doesn't do what they want

Right now food consumtion is controlled by an xml global (FOOD_CONSUMPTION_PER_POPULATION). This change would be very simple in that you would create a new variable for each city that stores the global so that it can be altered. This could also be a Civics option, to give more food for a fealty or production bonus.

do players really keep unemployed units inside cities? if so it's already desirable to just move them out, and the same goes for starving units

I didn't mean the units inside a city, I meant the ones standing around outside your cities doing nothing as being "unemployed". When all your cities have max population and your new immigrants have no where to go that's when they start to get disgruntled. That would give the player more incentive to improve the infrastructure.

there's already a very strong incentive to work specialists at the profession with their production bonus; adding even more bonuses/penalties to this won't make things more interesting & will instead just force players to clear the specialty of any unit not exactly matching its profession, with a rather boring/homogenous result.

Units not working at their chosen profession could be waiting on a building to be built or being forced to work else where to compensate for a lack of another specialists. Depending on the circumstance, some negative effects would not lower Fealty below a certain point if at all, but mostly the unit would not gain Fealty.

How it would work from a programming stand point could be to add one additional attribute to units and then make checks on the :doTurn function. These checks would be very simple mathematical equations. Anyhow, As of now units do not have much of a personality at all which is something I want to address as I like personality. It makes you attached to your units and to be more involved in their activities which draws you into the game more. So, that is why I am contemplating these ideas.

However your idea about having some corruption to restrain large/decentralized empires I do like a lot. It could be possible to import the already existing code from CivBtS Civic system (eg corruption cost per number of cities, and corruption cost for distance from capitol).

I had thought they removed the Corruption from the Civ games at some point, is it still in BTS. I do not have it installed to check that out. I need to install it though to check out the Civics screen again. Civ5 has an interesting way of handling Civics which I haven't fully explored just yet.

 

[Kailric]

What I am wanting to do is expand on the trade system. I want to be able to form trading pacts with other Civs for certain goods. Similar to Civ 4 and actual History where there is a limited amount of resources and you had to trade for what you do not have whether it be for luxury or need. But, game wise there needs to be a reason to trade for goods because at the moment the only real reason for goods is to make money on their sale and money is then used to build up your army. So there is currently no reason to purchase finished goods or trade for finished goods.

That was one reason for my above suggestion of having Fealty per Unit, but, I am thinking maybe we could change up the way Fealty is obtained. Instead of having it produced in a building it is produced by a city's population Demands and having those demands fulfilled. The more goods your towns have access to the greater production of Fealty. Fealty could be tied into Prosperity and also Max Population or what buildings can be built, etc. So, when Fealty reaches a certain level it unlocks a new tier of Max Population, Buildings, Units, and Professions. This would set it up so that the player has to conduct trade and trade negotiations in order to advance his civilization.

Trade is what brought the people out of the Dark Ages and I really want to expound on trade and cool related features. Any suggestions or ideas on this?

 

[Lib.Spi't]

I really like this idea of goods being for more than simply gold or combat, the idea of goods unlocking higher tiers of society is very cool, it really gives you the idea of building a society and the idea of caring for your populace in order to become a great empire, rather than just the march towards the big fight at the end!

I really like Colonization as an empire building simulator, rather than just the colony/independence of the standard game, having the different workers and trade routes is really fun, and building a functioning economy and becoming the envy of the world!!

Unfortunately at this moment I don't have any good ideas to offer, I am downloading the new version at the moment, so maybe once I have had some more fun playing I will be inspired!

 

[orlanth]

Yeah I agree it's interesting to have some uniqueness and strategic value for goods. For letting goods have a meaningful gameplay purpose, letting citizens have demands for some of them will help a lot; one other cool option to consider is letting some advanced goods be used as inputs to research advanced techs like in your earlier Inventor modcomp, which is still easy to do with yieldsdemanded. Then you have an incentive to seek some of those goods out through trade and use them to advance your own knowledge.

Since there are two main city-wide "scale"-type variables Prosperity and Fealty, important things to consider are:
- each one needs to measure a separate and distinct concept, to make it clear what it stands for relative to the other. (ie if too many things all start getting combined into only one variable like Fealty it kind of loses its uniqueness.)
- each one have separate sources and benefits that are appropriate to its theme, without overlapping/redundant sources and effects between different variables
- the different sources and benefits of each variable should be fairly evenly divided across the two, without once having overwhelming importance

My thoughts are that:
Prosperity would measure the degree to which the local economy is prospering and citizens are growing in wealth and contented with their economic needs satisfied. It should get strongly influenced by how much of the city's existing domestic demand gets satisfied. As it's benefit, maybe it could boost gold from domestic sales. Since Prosperity is YIELD_CULTURE, if it uses the city Culture Level mechanism of Civ4, it could be a good fit with your idea that reaching higher levels of culture unlocks a new tier of Max Population and Buildings and boost domestic market sales cap, etc. But be careful that this doesn't get frustrating/confusing for players.

Fealty would measure the degree of subjects' obedience/allegiance/duty and the control exerted by the ruler, and the effectiveness of local governance and administration. It should be most strongly influenced by governing by Nobles (plus maybe some additional boost from local Cross production by priests); it gives the bonus to production to all local citizens from the enhanced obedience and administration, plus the FF points from noble's patronage, and gets used to enact the Victory condition. The existing system is very usable & intuitive for Col players, and I think makes the most sense and is fairly balanced & fun.

In contrast to today medieval societies were very far from a democracy concerned about citizens opinions; it was not the primary goal of feudal overlords to make peasants and other subjects wealthy or feel in a good mood, just to ensure that they obeyed and were kept in line to serve their betters and obediently fork over a big cut of wealth and labor like they're supposed to. As one case in point http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peasants'_Revolt was actually caused by *increased* relative prosperity and liberty of the peasantry arising from growing wages for rural labor following gradual recovery from the Black Death. Brutally suppressing it certainly boosted the Fealty of the remaining peasants! As with Machiavelli's motto "tis far better to be feared than loved"..

Anyway, keep in mind the mod already has a hefty amount of new rules and systems relative to vanilla (or in a sense even compared to RaR). Like nightingale and Mastrude had said earlier, it could really be time to put the brakes on adding further new rules and systems on top of this (especially any complicated ones) or it will start to detract from the mod rather than adding to its fun. Before adding any more new kinds of systems, there is plenty of room for existing ones to be cleaned up & rationalized, like enhancing the tech and civics system and economy. Hopefully nightingale may come back to help finish it but I'm not sure the domestic price adjustment system and plotgroup system are currently even working as intended. The civilizationinfos <bWaterStart> and <iTravelCommandType> and <iEconomyType> each do several overlapping & conflicting things like the message below, it seems I can't currently use any of the existing options in 2071 since there's no way to trade with Earth anymore.

<iVictoryType> This describes the type of army that you must conquer to win your conquest. The key code is :
<!--VICTORY: 0 = Kill King; 1 = Pope; 2 = Crusaders; 3 = Ottomans; 4 = Retaliation-->
<iTravelCommandType> 0 is you start at sea and can trade with "Europe" from the start. 1 is you have to discover trade routes
<iEconomyType> Is how your trade with Europe works..
<!--ECONOMY: 1 = HomeCity; 2 = Three Routes to Unlock Land Start; 3 = Inflation-->
1: Homecity is not fully supported yet, Saladin is this and he can trade with his home city from the start, but he is not supported as playble.
2: You have to unlock the trade routes and you start on land; the current default
3: This is the Vikings "Inflation" but I didn't like that idea. Vikings are not supported as playable yet.

WaterStart is already set in civilizationinfos, so water vs land start shouldn't need to be set again through other tags. It also sounds like <iTravelCommandType> and <iEconomyType> are doing kind of the same thing, but in ways that could conflict with each other and with WaterStart. How about modifying <iTravelCommandType> to simply determine whether or not you can access the Europe screen using the standard method (ie be able to sail to and trade with the Europe screen of your King civ). I don't know how <iEconomyType> is coded, but you wouldn't need to reset land/water start and Europe screen access there again. You could instead use this to set whether immigrants show up in your territory automatically, or appear in your Europe screen to be transported like in the regular game.

 

[Lib.Spi't]

I was thinking about your fealty level per unit idea, if it is too overwhelming to have every unit have a fealty bar, what about making it a just nobles feature?

So you wouldn't get overloaded checking every unit and generally making your head swim, but it could make nobles have a bit more 'personality' as well as making htem a double edged sword.

They are the strongest unit, and the best for improving fealty in your kingdom, but if you don't keep them happy they may turn on you and band together to go rogue!

This would create a bit of medieval 'intrigue' but with it being limited to a small enough number of units that it is not an overwhelming amount to manage!

It also wouldn't take effect right away, so you have a bit of time to get set up and comfortable before a noble class emerges in your kingdom.

 

[Kailric]

Yeah I agree it's interesting to have some uniqueness and strategic value for goods. For letting goods have a meaningful gameplay purpose, letting citizens have demands for some of them will help a lot; one other cool option to consider is letting some advanced goods be used as inputs to research advanced techs like in your earlier Inventor modcomp, which is still easy to do with yieldsdemanded. Then you have an incentive to seek some of those goods out through trade and use them to advance your own knowledge.

Yeah, this maybe a good idea to add back, I'll look into it. Also, there was the option to require certain units producing Research in order to accumulate Research in that city. That is an option as well.

Since there are two main city-wide "scale"-type variables Prosperity and Fealty, important things to consider are:
- each one needs to measure a separate and distinct concept, to make it clear what it stands for relative to the other. (ie if too many things all start getting combined into only one variable like Fealty it kind of loses its uniqueness.)
- each one have separate sources and benefits that are appropriate to its theme, without overlapping/redundant sources and effects between different variables
- the different sources and benefits of each variable should be fairly evenly divided across the two, without once having overwhelming importance

Good points here, I have them duly noted.

My thoughts are that:
Prosperity would measure the degree to which the local economy is prospering and citizens are growing in wealth and contented with their economic needs satisfied. It should get strongly influenced by how much of the city's existing domestic demand gets satisfied. As it's benefit, maybe it could boost gold from domestic sales. Since Prosperity is YIELD_CULTURE, if it uses the city Culture Level mechanism of Civ4, it could be a good fit with your idea that reaching higher levels of culture unlocks a new tier of Max Population and Buildings and boost domestic market sales cap, etc. But be careful that this doesn't get frustrating/confusing for players.

This is a good idea to tie it all in with Prosperity. Prosperity isn't just culture but a factor of several of the yields so this would work well.

Fealty would measure the degree of subjects' obedience/allegiance/duty and the control exerted by the ruler, and the effectiveness of local governance and administration. It should be most strongly influenced by governing by Nobles (plus maybe some additional boost from local Cross production by priests); it gives the bonus to production to all local citizens from the enhanced obedience and administration, plus the FF points from noble's patronage, and gets used to enact the Victory condition. The existing system is very usable & intuitive for Col players, and I think makes the most sense and is fairly balanced & fun.

This is true. Maybe would could add extra attributes or skills to units depending on their profession. Such as Nobles having leadership/combat skills that modify Fealty production and FF's that modify Nobles leadership ability. Each unit when created could have a chance for a special skill. Such as a Fisherman being a Journeyman Farmer or maybe something very unique like granting a Fishing bonus to all units around him. The possibilities are endless here and would give more character to the units.

In contrast to today medieval societies were very far from a democracy concerned about citizens opinions; it was not the primary goal of feudal overlords to make peasants and other subjects wealthy or feel in a good mood, just to ensure that they obeyed and were kept in line to serve their betters and obediently fork over a big cut of wealth and labor like they're supposed to. As one case in point http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peasants'_Revolt was actually caused by *increased* relative prosperity and liberty of the peasantry arising from growing wages for rural labor following gradual recovery from the Black Death. Brutally suppressing it certainly boosted the Fealty of the remaining peasants! As with Machiavelli's motto "tis far better to be feared than loved"..

Well put, thanks for bringing this to my attention. I'll keep this in mind when thinking on ideas.

Anyway, keep in mind the mod already has a hefty amount of new rules and systems relative to vanilla (or in a sense even compared to RaR). Like nightingale and Mastrude had said earlier, it could really be time to put the brakes on adding further new rules and systems on top of this (especially any complicated ones) or it will start to detract from the mod rather than adding to its fun. Before adding any more new kinds of systems, there is plenty of room for existing ones to be cleaned up & rationalized, like enhancing the tech and civics system and economy.

When I set out to make this "mod" just having a reskin of Colonization was not my goal. I wanted a Medieval Simulation using Colonization's cool Profession system and trading goods system. So, new rules and systems are part of the agenda. We do however, want them all to be "fun and cool". That is the main thing. If a new system adds to the fun and simulates medieval life then it should be considered.

Hopefully nightingale may come back to help finish it but I'm not sure the domestic price adjustment system and plotgroup system are currently even working as intended. The civilizationinfos <bWaterStart> and <iTravelCommandType> and <iEconomyType> each do several overlapping & conflicting things like the message below, it seems I can't currently use any of the existing options in 2071 since there's no way to trade with Earth anymore.

I don't know if he has added the plotgroups or not, I'll check this out. So, Civs can't trade with Earth in 2071? Yeah, the travelcommandtype and economytype have not been fully utilized yet, so they virtually do the same thing atm. Hey, make me a list of things that use to work or you want to work for 2071 and I'll work on fixing that.

I really like Colonization as an empire building simulator, rather than just the colony/independence of the standard game, having the different workers and trade routes is really fun, and building a functioning economy and becoming the envy of the world!!

As I do. My ultimate goal is to create a mega mod that spans all of history all the way up to 2071 And the goal in not independence but either world dominance is different arenas or like in Civ4, a space race to colonize the stars.

In fact, one of my next features will be a new victory type. It will be similar to Civ4's where you attempt to colonize a distant star but instead the Medieval victory will be to discover and build a colony in the New World. You will have to amass a fleet of ships and goods in order to embark on this endeavor. So, instead of winning independence this will be the new main victory. I plan to make a new post with this idea as the subject...

 

[Fullerene]

In fact, one of my next features will be a new victory type. It will be similar to Civ4's where you attempt to colonize a distant star but instead the Medieval victory will be to discover and build a colony in the New World. You will have to amass a fleet of ships and goods in order to embark on this endeavor. So, instead of winning independence this will be the new main victory. I plan to make a new post with this idea as the subject...

Yeah, I always felt that defeating papal army was rather silly and little bit unhistorical victory condition.

I think there could be several victory conditions:

• (Protestant) Reformation - the classic col victory type. Destroy invading (catholic) army
• The New World - sail to the new world and build a colony
• Renaissance - this one should be something about reaching huge culture/science level. Maybe you should also educate your noblemen somehow. I'm not sure about the exact details yet.
• Conquest - as it's the name of the mod, this should be option too: remove all other factions from the map.
• Crusade - not sure what this would exactly be, but just want to throw an idea.

 

[Lib.Spi't]

Wow yes I want the history spanning mod!!!!!!

I have been thinking about an the industrial era mod a lot as well, that has my imagination!

Or a Cold war to Post apocalypse mod, where if there is too much aggression everyone goes to defcon 1 and the nukes fly! Then you have to rebuild in the ashes!

Any way back to the proper topic..

I was thinking about the Papal situation, First of all I really like the Papal Censure concept, I think that is really clever, but I am wondering if it is a bit over powered? Like maybe one of the four affects happen per censure, rather than all of them at once, or rather than halving the tech rate, it just disables your monks as well as priests, so if you have a more 'secular' research infrastructure, that censure is not such a threat, as your citizens and inventors can take over the monasteries and continue working. (or if you want to be real nasty, you can only research in inventor's buildings.) So it becomes much more linked to whether your society is church or 'state' dependent.

I wonder if it could be possible to make 'Donations' to the Pope, to improve his happiness, and reduce his demands?

For me right now it feels like the Pope has too much power (I know this is a standard game mechanic issue) But a Pope's position was much more of a balancing act, a give and take.. The Popes position relied on the euro nations agreeing to his moral authority, but would often come down to a quid pro quo arrangement.

I need the Pope to agree to this so I maintain my authority as king under God, what is it going to cost me?
and vice versa
The Pope is in need of funds for a project, what would you require in exchange for these funds?

Things like excommunication, in part relied upon the threat of other nations around you, if you are excommunicated, God (and the Pope's Moral authority) will not protect you, and anyone is free to attack and take a piece of your pie.

Perhaps being able to purchase other benefits from the Pope. Excommunications, Papal Bulls for marriage or other endeavours, Blessings, Indulgences for Sin. The Use of Holy Orders, Like the Knights Templar, 'Cheap' Monks and Priests, or super priests like Cardinals and Bishops, rather than the basic 'defence' that is currently available, as 1. that wasn't really the popes job, and 2. all you get is a peasant... which is rubbish!

The Bulls and such could give one time or X turn benefits to things like fealty, cross production, or prosperity and culture.
A Royal Wedding blessed by the Pope gives you a featly boost in all your towns.
Being Invested as the 'Defender of The Faith' gives you a culture boost allowing you to take control of more land and vassals.
Having a Shrine or Relic confirmed as an Authentic relic by the Pope could increase cross production or pilgrim spawning.

Also the production of crosses, churches, monasteries, and cathedrals would be good if they raised your relationship with the Pope, or if he granted you boons for these, like the appointment of a Cardinal/Bishop.

Undertaking a crusade against another player could be another way to gain favour.

I know there is a lot there, I am just laying out a bunch of possible conceptual scenarios. I just think it would be cool to be able to engage more with the Pope, rather than him simply butting in and saying gimme or else!

On the subject of Barbs and Vassals, when you conquer a barb town (I haven't done it yet so maybe this already happens) it would be cool if you could choose to Vassalize, Conquer, or Destroy them. Also is it possible to set up 'missions' in vassal towns like it is with barb towns? I haven't tried it, but I think it would be cool if it was, so you can increase your pilgrim flow. The other thing I was wondering is if it is or would be possible to 'artificially grow' Vassal towns (maybe even barb towns) by giving them or selling them X food, like 100 (or 200 or 300) per level of growth, so that you can increase your tax income from them, and in the case of barb towns, increase their production of trade resources?

Ok I am done! These are just somethings I find myself itching to do in my current game. I feel like I want to become a Patron of the Church and a Benevolent Overlord to my Vassals!

Edit: Sorry... Not Done!

This is about Workers and Cattle:

My first thought is that Hardy Workers are too expensive, being 'Hardy' is the same attribute given to a good ox.. not really a specialist skill.
One Cosmetic change may be to rename it to Engineer or Architect this makes him sound much more fancy/expensive/specialised and quite the catch for a Kingly Court!
Another thought (much more involved) was instead of him having a boost to himself he could instead boost workers on the same tile to be like Hardy Workers, so in essence he takes the role of an overseer, but you still have to provide labourers to get the work done!

Cattle:
I feel like cattle are under utilised in the game, at the moment they can only produce luxury food with spice (I think you can only get the hides if you have the spice as well?) So I have found myself with an overflow of cattle, while I am waiting for spice. But Cattle were like the medieval steam engine, they pulled carts and plows, powered mill stones to make flour, pulled ropes for pulleys and cranes for lifting heavy objects, there were a power energy source powered by oats!

Some possible uses:
1. Special Worker: you could make an Ox-handler type worker, that uses tools and cattle, and has one or more benefits to a regular worker. A) say 50% boost to improvement construction. B) the ability to build special improvements like (need a better name) Ox-Powered Farm, that has Millstones for making flower and ox ploughs for increased food production. (I know this is in part represented in technologies, but perhaps this could be unlocked by techs as well?) This special improvement would also require cattle to be present in town (like the pasture).
2. Supply Cart: Cattle could be a requirement for this. (honestly not that bothered though)

3. New Buildings: Crane. Butcher. Dairy Farm.

Crane: Requires Cattle to be built. Could work in one of two ways. A)Consumes Cattle, makes hammers. B) Consumes Food (feeding Ox) makes hammers. In Westward Ho! they used coal in a furnace to make hammers, same concept. (I can't remember if it was you that made that or someone else..)
Butcher: (Yes I know he already exists!) But perhaps he could be switched between making Food from Cattle or Luxury Food from Cattle + Spices. This way cattle could remain a useful food source even without spice.
AND/OR
Dairy Farm: Again requires Cattle to be built, could work in a number of ways. A) Instead of the butcher, makes Food from Cattle. B) Could do something like Food from Cattle at a ratio of 2/1, 1 cattle gives 2 food. C) Could make luxury food from cattle at a ratio of 1/3 say (In the form of Milk, Cheese and Cream) so 3 cattle gives 1 luxury food.

Now I think I am done....

 

[Kailric]

I was thinking about the Papal situation, First of all I really like the Papal Censure concept, I think that is really clever, but I am wondering if it is a bit over powered? Like maybe one of the four affects happen per censure, rather than all of them at once, or rather than halving the tech rate, it just disables your monks as well as priests, so if you have a more 'secular' research infrastructure, that censure is not such a threat, as your citizens and inventors can take over the monasteries and continue working. (or if you want to be real nasty, you can only research in inventor's buildings.) So it becomes much more linked to whether your society is church or 'state' dependent.

We could set up censures to be based on the difficulty, the higher the difficulty the more negative effects on censures.

I wonder if it could be possible to make 'Donations' to the Pope, to improve his happiness, and reduce his demands?

For me right now it feels like the Pope has too much power (I know this is a standard game mechanic issue) But a Pope's position was much more of a balancing act, a give and take.. The Popes position relied on the euro nations agreeing to his moral authority, but would often come down to a quid pro quo arrangement.

I need the Pope to agree to this so I maintain my authority as king under God, what is it going to cost me?
and vice versa
The Pope is in need of funds for a project, what would you require in exchange for these funds?.

Perhaps being able to purchase other benefits from the Pope. Excommunications, Papal Bulls for marriage or other endeavours, Blessings, Indulgences for Sin. The Use of Holy Orders, Like the Knights Templar, 'Cheap' Monks and Priests, or super priests like Cardinals and Bishops, rather than the basic 'defence' that is currently available, as 1. that wasn't really the popes job, and 2. all you get is a peasant... which is rubbish!
.....
I know there is a lot there, I am just laying out a bunch of possible conceptual scenarios. I just think it would be cool to be able to engage more with the Pope, rather than him simply butting in and saying gimme or else!

These are goods suggestions and yes, it's something I want to add in, specially when we add in the New World victory condition. I want to keep the relationship with the Popes but it will be more of a give and take like you say, you can lose favor but have options available to increase favor.

On the subject of Barbs and Vassals, when you conquer a barb town (I haven't done it yet so maybe this already happens) it would be cool if you could choose to Vassalize, Conquer, or Destroy them.

Yes, this is the options, I think, or it should be like you say. I know if a Barb city decides to join your Kingdom do to cultural pressure you have the option of making them a vassal or just taking their land.

Also is it possible to set up 'missions' in vassal towns like it is with barb towns? I haven't tried it, but I think it would be cool if it was, so you can increase your pilgrim flow.

Yes, the Barb controls the town as usual and you can still learn from them, do missionary work, build trading posts, and collect taxes.

The other thing I was wondering is if it is or would be possible to 'artificially grow' Vassal towns (maybe even barb towns) by giving them or selling them X food, like 100 (or 200 or 300) per level of growth, so that you can increase your tax income from them, and in the case of barb towns, increase their production of trade resources?

This sounds like a good idea. You could bring a load of food over and offer it as a gift.

My first thought is that Hardy Workers are too expensive, being 'Hardy' is the same attribute given to a good ox.. not really a specialist skill.
One Cosmetic change may be to rename it to Engineer or Architect this makes him sound much more fancy/expensive/specialised and quite the catch for a Kingly Court!
Another thought (much more involved) was instead of him having a boost to himself he could instead boost workers on the same tile to be like Hardy Workers, so in essence he takes the role of an overseer, but you still have to provide labourers to get the work done!

Suggestions duly noted. There could be a whole Worker promotion tree. As your unit works he gains experience and can choose from a new list of promotions.

Cattle:
I feel like cattle are under utilised in the game, at the moment they can only produce luxury food with spice (I think you can only get the hides if you have the spice as well?) So I have found myself with an overflow of cattle, while I am waiting for spice. But Cattle were like the medieval steam engine, they pulled carts and plows, powered mill stones to make flour, pulled ropes for pulleys and cranes for lifting heavy objects, there were a power energy source powered by oats!

Some possible uses:
1. Special Worker: you could make an Ox-handler type worker, that uses tools and cattle, and has one or more benefits to a regular worker. A) say 50% boost to improvement construction. B) the ability to build special improvements like (need a better name) Ox-Powered Farm, that has Millstones for making flower and ox ploughs for increased food production. (I know this is in part represented in technologies, but perhaps this could be unlocked by techs as well?) This special improvement would also require cattle to be present in town (like the pasture).

I really like this idea. To start, we can add a new profession that uses Oxen and Tools for a bonus, a Teamster Worker.

2. Supply Cart: Cattle could be a requirement for this. (honestly not that bothered though)

This is a good idea as well. I also had an idea of Supply Carts actually being a profession and when you built a Supply Cart it gets added to the town as an Icon that tracks the number of Carts you have. Then your units can have the Teamster or Ox-Driver profession but that may be too much. Ships could be used this way as well.

Crane: Requires Cattle to be built. Could work in one of two ways. A)Consumes Cattle, makes hammers. B) Consumes Food (feeding Ox) makes hammers. In Westward Ho! they used coal in a furnace to make hammers, same concept. (I can't remember if it was you that made that or someone else..)

Yes, that was me. Idea duly noted.

Butcher: (Yes I know he already exists!) But perhaps he could be switched between making Food from Cattle or Luxury Food from Cattle + Spices. This way cattle could remain a useful food source even without spice.
AND/OR
Dairy Farm: Again requires Cattle to be built, could work in a number of ways. A) Instead of the butcher, makes Food from Cattle. B) Could do something like Food from Cattle at a ratio of 2/1, 1 cattle gives 2 food. C) Could make luxury food from cattle at a ratio of 1/3 say (In the form of Milk, Cheese and Cream) so 3 cattle gives 1 luxury food.

At one point I had it so that Cattle Herdsmen produced Food and Cattle but it removed the need for Expert Farmers. The Dairy Farm sounds like a good idea, maybe a new Building in Town. Like you say, Cattle were a huge part of medieval life so yeah, there is a lot we can add here.

Yeah, I always felt that defeating papal army was rather silly and little bit unhistorical victory condition.

I think there could be several victory conditions:

Those are good victory suggestions. I will start a New Victory thread when I get the chance and add your suggestions at the start.

Thanks to both you fellows for the excellent input

 

[Lib.Spi't]

We could set up censures to be based on the difficulty, the higher the difficulty the more negative effects on censures.

That's a cool idea!

Yes, this is the options, I think, or it should be like you say. I know if a Barb city decides to join your Kingdom do to cultural pressure you have the option of making them a vassal or just taking their land.

Yeah, I have played that, when you culture them you get to vassalize or destroy the town, I was just curious to know if it was the same with conquest. I think it should be if it is not because it gives the player tactical choices.

Yes, the Barb controls the town as usual and you can still learn from them, do missionary work, build trading posts, and collect taxes.

Yes I discovered this this afternoon when I started playing again

This sounds like a good idea. You could bring a load of food over and offer it as a gift.

Exactly! I often find that my vassals or barb towns begin to shrink as I take the land through culture (I can't use it because it is often outside my reach) So I vassalize the town and it shrinks to one and becomes not that great. That was my experience in my last game (before patches). In this game they seem to be around size 3 and 4, but to be able to enlarge them would be a good investment for future tax and trade pay offs.

Suggestions duly noted. There could be a whole Worker promotion tree. As your unit works he gains experience and can choose from a new list of promotions.

Yeah I really like this idea as well, there is a bts modcomp called super workers that does this sort of thing (workers gain experience from building improvements) It is a feature I would like to incorporate in my own mod in the future. It is also a good reason to get your workers going early, so they can get up their exp.

I really like this idea. To start, we can add a new profession that uses Oxen and Tools for a bonus, a Teamster Worker.

Exactly!

This is a good idea as well. I also had an idea of Supply Carts actually being a profession and when you built a Supply Cart it gets added to the town as an Icon that tracks the number of Carts you have. Then your units can have the Teamster or Ox-Driver profession but that may be too much. Ships could be used this way as well.

I think this might make my head hurt... I know in Dawn of a New Era they had Crews for ships, which was kind of fun as you could switch crews around and put your best crews on your best ships, but I think it might be a bit much for this mod(I found it sometimes got a bit much for me in Dawn), especially as sailing was not really a major power base until the imperial age.(But my head does hurt quite easily so I am not necessarily the best judge..) I think the carts and ships system is fine for this Mod, as you have the added complexity of needing to combine a land and sea route to get the most out of the trade zones(I love this feature! Becoming a Merchant Maestro is so much fun!), I think having to have a peasant for each 'vehicle' as well might get tedious and slow down empire development too much.. Unless you could do it some how that you had say a merchant that can change from Cart to Ship, so the one unit can go along both the Spice and Silk Route..

Alternatively, the carts could be turned into a resource made by a Wheel Wright or such(From Wood), Then you need X Carts(Imagine them as cart components), X Cattle or X Horse as equipment for the Various Cart Professions..(That might be less mentally exhausting, as it is all part of the existing systems and concepts)

Yes, that was me. Idea duly noted.

I loved Westward Ho! I was heart broken that all the glitches didn't get worked out! (Random CTD stuff)

At one point I had it so that Cattle Herdsmen produced Food and Cattle but it removed the need for Expert Farmers. The Dairy Farm sounds like a good idea, maybe a new Building in Town. Like you say, Cattle were a huge part of medieval life so yeah, there is a lot we can add here.

Yeah I think the production system you have is good with herdsman producing only cattle. Those cattle are then sold to dairies (for milk based work, and who wouldn't love a few milk maids around town!) or to farmers as labour animals (boosting the output of farms and farmers), to butchers, or to the labour/constuction industries. So Cattle can be used for simple foods, complex foods and labour, making the acquistion of herds much more valuable.

Those are good victory suggestions. I will start a New Victory thread when I get the chance and add your suggestions at the start.

Yeah the Protestant Victory is kind of like the Papal Victory now, it's really just the cosmetic change of Founding your own church (which you could set your own religious laws/beliefs), like with the 'Constitution', get Excommunicated and have the Pope call all good Catholic Kingdoms to Crusade against the Heretic

I think it would even be great if this was not even a Victory, just an option when you have enough Kingdom Fealty, Become a Protestant Nation, lose the Pope Benefits, Gain the 'Constitution' Benefits, and survive the Storm! You also have the added benefits of not being taxed!

What would be equally cool, is if you could build a mega double size giant map, where everyone starts in the old world (like the mod is now) and the other half of the map is cut off with a strip of 'Here be Dragons' Ocean that can only be passable by the X Special Super Hard To Make Advanced Technology Ship, then when you complete it you head to the New World and start CivilizationIV Colonisation!!!

 

[orlanth]

I liked your idea of adding some new Promotions that can have civilian benefits, as well as the vanilla ones that have only military significance. That would add individuality to your units and make it an interesting tradeoff where you'd choose between military and civilian benefits rather than automatically being given one or the other. For example
Pious (adds +1 Cross per turn to settlement, even when working outside a Church)
Journeyman Farmer etc, (adds +10% production for that unit)
Taskmaster adds +5% to Hammers production for entire settlement
This could be done with adding some new XML tags to PromotionsInfos (maybe one that adds +x per turn of a yield, one that adds +x% bonus for a yield to that unit, one that adds +x% bonus for a yield for the entire settlement) so wouldn't need recoding from scratch of any additional new systems and meters for every unit. Don't make getting these too common or automatic & given for free though or they'll lose their uniqueness. Maybe one of the benefits of producing Education in a settlement is it also adds some Experience to the unit which will eventually let it choose a special Promotion. Promotions can have unit type as prerequisites and can also have other Promotions as prerequisites so it's very customizable (e.g could have a title like Viscount as a prereq for advanced Noble promotions). The basic bottom-tier promotions could be modest in power and the more desirable ones would become available only after you have another high ranking promotion such as a Title.

 

[orlanth]

I wonder if it could be possible to make 'Donations' to the Pope, to improve his happiness, and reduce his demands?

For me right now it feels like the Pope has too much power (I know this is a standard game mechanic issue) But a Pope's position was much more of a balancing act, a give and take.. The Popes position relied on the euro nations agreeing to his moral authority, but would often come down to a quid pro quo arrangement.

I need the Pope to agree to this so I maintain my authority as king under God, what is it going to cost me?
and vice versa
The Pope is in need of funds for a project, what would you require in exchange for these funds?.

Perhaps being able to purchase other benefits from the Pope. Excommunications, Papal Bulls for marriage or other endeavours, Blessings, Indulgences for Sin. The Use of Holy Orders, Like the Knights Templar, 'Cheap' Monks and Priests, or super priests like Cardinals and Bishops, rather than the basic 'defence' that is currently available, as 1. that wasn't really the popes job, and 2. all you get is a peasant... which is rubbish!
.....
I know there is a lot there, I am just laying out a bunch of possible conceptual scenarios. I just think it would be cool to be able to engage more with the Pope, rather than him simply butting in and saying gimme or else!
These are goods suggestions and yes, it's something I want to add in, specially when we add in the New World victory condition. I want to keep the relationship with the Popes but it will be more of a give and take like you say, you can lose favor but have options available to increase favor.

Yeah it would be good to have more ways that relations with the "King"/pope can increase or decrease (such as giving a gift, or fulfilling demands or quests using the event xml system), when it gets to the minimum relationship it causes a Censure & resets relations to 0; when it gets to the maximum relationship it gives you a benefit (free Bishop/Crosses/Relic/Promotion) and resets to 0.

What would be equally cool, is if you could build a mega double size giant map, where everyone starts in the old world (like the mod is now) and the other half of the map is cut off with a strip of 'Here be Dragons' Ocean that can only be passable by the X Special Super Hard To Make Advanced Technology Ship, then when you complete it you head to the New World and start CivilizationIV Colonisation!!!

I had thought about in 2071 having the map dividied into sections by a strip of impassible terrain; with one "Sail to Europe" plot types for each region, then you can unlock travel access to each region separately. Not sure if that's possible though.

 

[Kailric]

What would be equally cool, is if you could build a mega double size giant map, where everyone starts in the old world (like the mod is now) and the other half of the map is cut off with a strip of 'Here be Dragons' Ocean that can only be passable by the X Special Super Hard To Make Advanced Technology Ship, then when you complete it you head to the New World and start CivilizationIV Colonisation!!! :D[/QUOTE]

Heh, yeah, I had the same idea almost. After you discover the new world the map resets and you start out with a lone ship, you then basically play Civ4 Col and have to win your independence from yourself, or your previous Kingship, heh. I actually have a grand idea for a mega mod where you advance through time and different stages. I posted the idea in [URL="http://forums.civfanatics.com/showpost.php?p=12551119&postcount=2"]THIS[/URL] thread.

[quote="orlanth, post: 12964210"]I liked your idea of adding some new Promotions that can have civilian benefits, as well as the vanilla ones that have only military significance. That would add individuality to your units and make it an interesting tradeoff where you'd choose between military and civilian benefits rather than automatically being given one or the other. For example
[B]Pious[/B] (adds +1 Cross per turn to settlement, even when working outside a Church)
[B]Journeyman Farmer[/B] etc, (adds +10% production for that unit)
[B]Taskmaster[/B] adds +5% to Hammers production for entire settlement
This could be done with adding some new XML tags to PromotionsInfos (maybe one that adds +x per turn of a yield, one that adds +x% bonus for a yield to that unit, one that adds +x% bonus for a yield for the entire settlement) so wouldn't need recoding from scratch of any additional new systems and meters for every unit. Don't make getting these too common or automatic & given for free though or they'll lose their uniqueness. Maybe one of the benefits of producing Education in a settlement is it also adds some Experience to the unit which will eventually let it choose a special Promotion. Promotions can have unit type as prerequisites and can also have other Promotions as prerequisites so it's very customizable (e.g could have a title like Viscount as a prereq for advanced Noble promotions). The basic bottom-tier promotions could be modest in power and the more desirable ones would become available only after you have another high ranking promotion such as a Title.[/QUOTE]

These are excellent ideas for when we start on this. We can start a post about this at some point. I really want this in the game at some point. I keep thinking back to Master of Orion where you were able to recruit certain "hero" like people that gave Civ wide or special bonuses, actually I guess its much like FF's, heh. We could maybe make the FF's an actually unit though that you receive and you have to keep alive for the bonuses, but then your normal units would only have local bonuses.

 

[Fullerene]

Heh, yeah, I had the same idea almost. After you discover the new world the map resets and you start out with a lone ship, you then basically play Civ4 Col and have to win your independence from yourself, or your previous Kingship, heh. I actually have a grand idea for a mega mod where you advance through time and different stages. I posted the idea in THIS thread.

Sorry to continue off topic but I just love the idea of Colonization game spanning through all the history.

However I don't think that the idea you linked would be that fun, since it's like starting a new game couple of times. I mean you can already get the same effect by playing Mare Nostrum, Medieval Conquest and RaR one after the other.

For me one of the most interesting things about civ like games is how they tell a continuous story. That's why I would take more Civilization series like approach to this kind of project. It would be damn interesting to see how nations develop through the time, and how certain resources get more important or less important. And how the socities change over time. Colonization game mechanics offer much more interesting possibilities for such a mod than civ4 engine, in my opinion at least.

Of course it would be a big project with lot of problems to be solved and work to be done. But at least we already got lot of graphics from ancient to renaissance era in other mods. Maybe it could be Medieval:Conquest sub mod, since there's already a tech tree. Some ideas are rising...

 

[Lib.Spi't]

Ok to save us all from forever falling off topic where ever we go!

I started this thread:
World History Mod Conversation

 

[Lib.Spi't]

Man Kailric.. I have been looking through the XML on medieval, I am in the Civic Options at the moment... man there is a lot of interesting stuff in there. I like how you managed to make all those multiple uses, like inventions, censures, trade perks (and linking those to the FF Points system..) it's all very clever. Have you put some code somewhere that stops all those extras from appearing with the regular civic options?

 

[Kailric]

Man Kailric.. I have been looking through the XML on medieval, I am in the Civic Options at the moment... man there is a lot of interesting stuff in there. I like how you managed to make all those multiple uses, like inventions, censures, trade perks (and linking those to the FF Points system..) it's all very clever. Have you put some code somewhere that stops all those extras from appearing with the regular civic options?

You mean in the Pedia? I haven't fixed up the Pedia yet but it is doable. The game does know which Civics you are suppose to decide on when you declare independence and which are techs. Looking at the XML its looks complicated. I sorta built my own system around the original Civic options. I should make a post that explains the system.

 

[Lib.Spi't]

No no, I meant when you declare independence, that you don't suddenly have to choose all the techs and everything else as well, I was just curious to know where the check to stop them appearing at independence was. Is it SDK?

A post explaining how it works code wise would be great though. It seems like a really clever multi-use of the same system, for Techs, Trader Advances, Constitution Choices, AND Censures... i was pretty amazed how you did so many different things!

I would love to know how to add things and such, making sure I put everything where it needs to be, multi files etc.

 

[Kailric]

No no, I meant when you declare independence, that you don't suddenly have to choose all the techs and everything else as well, I was just curious to know where the check to stop them appearing at independence was. Is it SDK?

A post explaining how it works code wise would be great though. It seems like a really clever multi-use of the same system, for Techs, Trader Advances, Constitution Choices, AND Censures... i was pretty amazed how you did so many different things!

I would love to know how to add things and such, making sure I put everything where it needs to be, multi files etc.

Ok, give me some time and I'll make a post explaining the tech system today.