Tides of Crimson (FANTASY MOD)

[ArdanHiro]

I have a problem with the game crashing to desktop when I attempt to build the first city. Sorry for bothering you if there's an easy fix for this.

 

[haluu]

@Nwoll

Thanks for your suggestions! I am almost positive that I will implement the race-soecific natural resources. I might add multiple dragon types too, but there are different colored dragons from other races, so I'm not sure I want to dilute the game by having two different types of red dragons, for example.

@Alexej

Thanks for your kind words! I'm very glad you are enjoying the Mod! That's what I made it for! .

 

[haluu]

@ArdanHiro

What operating system are you using? I can help you more if I know what system you are using and how you installed Civ 3. I assume that your Civ 3 is updated with the latest patch?

There is a common crash when building your first city if you are playing Civ 3 through Steam. With the mod, I have included a Steam-Compatible "labels.txt" file in the Text folder of the mod. Simply delete the default "labels.txt" file of the mod (located in the folder Tides of Crimson/Text) and rename the "labels - STEAM.txt" file to "labels.txt".

If you are not using Steam, I also found a link with some possible crash fixes. It is for Civ 2 but I think the problems/fixes are similar. https://forums.civfanatics.com/threads/game-crashes-when-building-first-city-win7-64bit.373547/

If these doesn't work, please let me know and I will look for another solution for you. Cheers!

 

[Sir Henry]

Love the mod, been playing it in multiplayer with a few friends after vanilla civ got boring. However most of us were having trouble making any profit. It felt like cities didn't produce enough income and matience was sapping most of that income. I'm assuming we're used to the civ 3 vanilla system where you pump out money and don't really have to worry about it. I don't think it's something that needs serious changing but maybe a little tweaking to make turning a profit a little less difficult. Another small thing is the shipyard building. It's weird to have the shipyard act like the harbor when it comes to connecting cities when there's still a harbor in the game. Anyways love the mod and hope to see a future update!

 

[haluu]

hi Sir Henry!
I'm glad to hear that you and your friends have been playing and enjoying this mod with each other!

I'm sorry to hear you are having trouble getting income. I usually don't have this issue. What difficulty level do you guys usually play at? I usually play an easier difficulty (because i stink at this game lol) so maybe that's why i haven't run into this issue. I also build lots of financial buildings to help with income (trading posts, bazaars, etc.).
Are you trying to build every city improvement in all cities? Or training too many units? if so, this may also be the reason why you and your friends are having trouble developing income. I designed this game so that tough choices had to be made on city improvements. I don't want the gameplay to be similar to Civ 3 vanilla, because, to be honest, I dislike Civ 3 vanilla gameplay. =) Extremely useful city improvements like Fisheries and all Production Buildings have very high maintenance costs because I want to force the player to make a decision between having good income or having these buildings. For instance, if it were cheap to have a city with all upgraded Production Buildings, then the game devolves into a massive unit count warzone like in the original Civ 3, because players will be able to build units very quickly. This is exactly the type of gameplay i'm trying to avoid with this mod.
I will look into this further and see if I can make improvements on income if necessary.

The shipyard indeed acts like a harbor. You are correct about the strangeness of this. i will look into it further. thanks for mentioning this to me.

Please let me know if you have any other questions or concerns, or if you and your friends have any good ideas for the next version. I'm always willing to listen to players to help me with the next version.

By the way, i have been very busy with life (looking for a new job, getting married, etc.) so my next update may be pushed back quite a while. But I still work on it a little bit here and there whenever I have time. i'm hoping to release a new version within the next year. =)

 

[haluu]

Love the mod, been playing it in multiplayer with a few friends after vanilla civ got boring. However most of us were having trouble making any profit. It felt like cities didn't produce enough income and matience was sapping most of that income. I'm assuming we're used to the civ 3 vanilla system where you pump out money and don't really have to worry about it. I don't think it's something that needs serious changing but maybe a little tweaking to make turning a profit a little less difficult. Another small thing is the shipyard building. It's weird to have the shipyard act like the harbor when it comes to connecting cities when there's still a harbor in the game. Anyways love the mod and hope to see a future update!

I have already updated the economy and test played it. I like the results actually. I hope you will too! =) Thanks for the suggestion.

For version 2.0 there will be reduced maintenance costs of production buildings (lumber mill, wind mill, foundry, etc.)
other things i'm working on:

- 2 new races
- A new Sphere type
- new technologies
- at least 1-2 new Wonders of the World
- reduced invisibility detection to make invisible units more viable
- slightly more trade from coastal/sea tiles
- single-player scenarios to tell the storyline of Tides of Crimson

 

[Lamabreeder]

It's seldom these days I come back to Civ 3, but when I do, it's mostly for this mod. Thank you, haluu, for making and still developing it. Your efforts are much appreciated.

I can't believe it's already five years ago when I commented on your mod (see page 9). There were always things I wanted to mention. Like, despite me having a few issues with it, it plays quite well and nice and has provided me with lots of fun.

I have added a map in four variations which is one of the oldest maps I generated and modified for this mod, updated to version 1.6. It offers the player a relatively safe peninsula for 12 cities. The four versions have different sets of strategic resources on said peninsula. The description of each map says for which races this map is best suited for. The map is a randomly generated map of which I only changed a relatively small portion - namely the player area. For comparison I have added the original map before any modifications. I think this map is well suited for beginners of this mod who want to learn what this mod contains or for players like me who just want to build a nice empire in peace. I am quite content with this map because the peninsula looks so green and organic. Just one tip: Send your starting puppet immediately to the northeast, find the landbridge and blockade it.

The attached zip contains 5 files, which belong into the Scenario folder.
If you did not customize your installation then on Windows that's here:
C:\Program Files\Infogrames\Civilization III\Conquests\Scenarios

Have fun!

 

[haluu]

Thanks Lama breeder for your kind words! I'm so glad you have enjoyed the mod! If you have a specific wish list, please let me know what they are. I'm always taking input from players.

And thanks for making these maps. I'm sure many players will find them useful!

 

[jlvfr]

Hello

Just started playing this mod, and am having fun. Just one problem: I'm playing with Dwarfs, and can't build Marketplace. I have Economics, and I edited the improvement to check it, but I found no reason. Doesn't show on any city's "to build" list. Any ideas?

 

[jlvfr]

Hello

Just started playing this mod, and am having fun. Just one problem: I'm playing with Dwarfs, and can't build Marketplace. I have Economics, and I edited the improvement to check it, but I found no reason. Doesn't show on any city's "to build" list. Any ideas?

On this: I realized I could build them after building the bazar...

 

[haluu]

Hi jlvfr!

I'm glad you are enjoying the mod, and found the solution to that issue. I'm guessing the civilopedia helped you on that one?

If you have any further questions or just have ideas on ways to improve the mod, let me know!

 

[jlvfr]

Hi jlvfr!

I'm glad you are enjoying the mod, and found the solution to that issue. I'm guessing the civilopedia helped you on that one?

If you have any further questions or just have ideas on ways to improve the mod, let me know!

Hia. I think I'm going to wait for the new version, the maintenance costs are breaking my bank...

One point: late game with dwarfs. I see no way to transport units across water? Only have warships, afaik...

 

[haluu]

You are referring to the regular dwarves right? For the regular dwarves the transport ship is the Barrel Sub, which is available very early in the game. It can transport up to 4 units at a time.

For the chaos dwarves, the transport ship is the Rammer.

If you right click on any unit, you can bring up it's civilopedia description, which will tell you it's abilities such as ''transport capacity".

Hope this helps!

 

[jlvfr]

Thanks, didn't notice.

 

[ashen god]

Hi, i´m very glad that this mod has not been forgotten
Likewise lamatrader, I don´t play much civ3 lately, but this mod is really great.

I would like to ask for a small upgrade
Is it possible to have cheaper workers at some more advanced tec/sphere/era?

I usually (always) play agressivly and expand my teritory, I do have an issue connecting newly conquered cities because it is not possible to capture enemy workers (they become cows) and building one is a painfully slow process (due to corruption these cities produce only 1 shield per turn).

I have red the income issue that other players mentioned. True, the income is low and many buildings have high maintenance cost and army maintenance... I am always going negative gold per turn... and thats how it should be
If you read Sun Tzu: among other wise words he states that assembling and an army and marching on is expensive. The War is expensive and the longer it lasts, the more expensive it gets.
My army´s expenses are covered by trading tecs and peace treaties with almost destroyed AI... (I am not willing to spend gold to buy workers in distant lands. One worker is never enough)

 

[haluu]

Hi ashen god! I have not considered making workers cheaper. However, the economic changes I will make in version 2.0 (cheaper production buildings, lower corruption with No Sphere, slightly increased unit support of all Sphere types) should help you make worker units more easily.

 

[Lamabreeder]

I'd like to make five proposals to help improve the mod even more. I will make two posts. This one contains the two proposals which I actually already implemented, tested and subsequently attached to this post so you can immediately play and test. I think they are straight improvements. haluu, you are invited to adapt or partly adapt my proposal into the main mod if you so wish (I would be honored), otherwise I consider this just a tiny mod-mod. The second post will contain the three issues for which there are multiple good solutions or which are more difficult to address or where we might disagree if they are issues at all.

The attachment contains two files: First the modified rules file, second a map to which the modified rules file has been applied. LM stands for "Lamabreeder's Modifications". Unzip the zip file into your scenarios folder.

Issue 1. Resources should not deplete.

Civ is not roulette or a dice game. Having resources jumping around the map degrades it to that, however. A bit randomeness is quite ok even for a strategy game, but resources are too central, especially for this mod, for them to be treated like dice.


Issue 2. I am offering a redesign for the spheres.

The existing spheres offer room for improvement.*

I have not included an updated Civilopedia (yet). However, all stats are given below.


Introductory remarks

The general premise to have (mostly elemental) spheres is very intriguing. I tried to

• stay true to the ideas layed out in the description of the now existing spheres
• make the spheres truely unique and worth switching into
• make them attractive for the AI for the right reason (see also embryodead's findings)
• make later spheres generally more powerful than earlier ones while still retaining the uniqueness of the earlier ones
• balance each and every one against each other

I made the nodes city improvements instead of small wonders (except Balance Node), with a cost of 20 shields and maintainace cost of zero. This way a more pronounced effect can be transferred to a given city. The disadvantage is that the node now has to be built in a city or the effect is not gained, and the AI often does not build it.

I also, after some deliberations*, moved some spheres: Earth sphere is now in the first era (together with Water), Balance is now in the second era (together with Air), Fire is now in the third era (together with Life). I did not move units, though, in the sense that all units that were buildable under Fire sphere are now buildable under Balance sphere which takes Fire Sphere's place. Unfortunately those units were Fire-themed, and don't fit so well under Balance, but I did not want to mess with unit balance.

I abandoned the concept of limiting the slider due to multiple reasons*.


Short description of the spheres

Earth sphere pronounces production and working the land.
Earth sphere increases worker rate by 50% and the node increases shield output by 50% (without pollution). Unit support is limited, but at the very beginning better than Water sphere (if you have more than three cities of size 6 or below). This is a perfect sphere to improve the land in the beginning and to build improvements or units for an early war. This sphere is also good in the long run for empires that build fewer but costly units (i.e. Trolls).

Water sphere pronounces water yields.
Water sphere node gives water tiles an additional shield and trade. Unit support is limited, but in the longer run better than Earth. Water tiles give the same trade as they would under Air sphere, while also giving production. For an empire with a lot of coastal cities this sphere can be good until the end.

Air sphere pronounces trade and commerce.
Air sphere has extra commerce and low war weariness. The node gives additional tax. Unit support is minimal. This sphere is perfect for very fast research while maintaining a smaller military. The extra commerce and the additional tax, however, do allow a larger military while still having an acceptable research. A flexible and very powerful sphere.

Balance sphere pronounces happiness, unit support and commerce in a single city.
Balance sphere node is a small wonder and gives +3 happiness in all cities as well as extra commerce in its city. Unit support is good. One city operates thus on the same level as it would in Air sphere, but better unit support and the extra happiness might allow for more focused slider settings. A good sphere that allows warfare while also having a smaller trade boost.

Fire sphere pronounces war, Fire Elementals and a bit of research.
Fire sphere has excellent unit support. The node gives additional research and produces a Fire Elemental every 25 turns. This is a dedicated warmonger sphere. The additional research distinguishes this sphere from Earth and Death spheres.

Life sphere pronounces commerce, city growth and pollution reduction.
Life sphere has extra commerce, high war weariness and increases worker rate by 50%. The node acts as granary and reduces pollution from population as well as from buildings. Unit support is bad for small and good for big cities. This is a dedicated peacemonger sphere that nevertheless helps you preparing for war through the granary (important for those units that need population) and generous unit support for big cities as well as the extra commerce.

Death sphere is for war.
In Death sphere the military does not need maintainance. The node acts as barracks and shipyard and produces a Death's Shadow every 10 turns. This is the endgame sphere for world conquest.


The spheres in detail

No Sphere

• corruption 4
• no extra trade
• worker rate 100%
• draft 0
• military police 2
• forced labor
• no war weariness
• unit cost 2
• unit support:
  • free 2
  • town 3
  • city 3
  • metro 3

no node
No despotism malus

Anarchy

• corruption max
• no extra trade
• worker rate 50%
• draft 0
• military police 0
• no extra labor
• no war weariness
• no unit support

no node
Please note: No despotism malus to encourage sphere switching a little more!

Earth Sphere

• corruption 3
• no extra trade
• worker rate 150%
• draft 1
• military police 2
• paid labor
• no war weariness
• unit cost 2
• unit support:
  • free 3
  • town 3
  • city 3
  • metro 4

Earth Node:

• +1 culture
• +50% production

Water Sphere

• corruption communal
• no extra trade
• worker rate 100%
• draft 1
• military police 2
• paid labor
• no war weariness
• unit cost 2
• unit support:
  • free 6
  • town 2
  • city 4
  • metro 5

Water Node:

• must be coastal
• +1 culture
• +1 trade/water
• +1 shield/water

Balance Sphere

• corruption 2
• no extra trade
• worker rate 100%
• draft 1
• military police 3
• paid labor
• no war weariness
• unit cost 2
• unit support:
  • free 6
  • town 3
  • city 5
  • metro 7

Balance Node:

• is a Small Wonder
• +1 culture
• 3 happy in all cities
• +1 trade/tile

Air Sphere

• corruption 2
• extra trade
• worker rate 100%
• draft 1
• military police 1
• paid labor
• low war weariness
• unit cost 3
• unit support:
  • free 3
  • town 0
  • city 1
  • metro 2

Air Node:

• +1 culture
• +50% tax

Fire Sphere

• corruption 1
• no extra trade
• worker rate 100%
• draft 2
• military police 4
• paid labor
• no war weariness
• unit cost 1
• unit support:
  • free 6
  • town 4
  • city 7
  • metro 10

Fire Node:

• +2 culture
• +50% science
• auto-produces Fire Elemental every 25 turns

Life Sphere

• corruption 1
• extra trade
• worker rate 150%
• draft 0
• military police 0
• paid labor
• high war weariness
• unit cost 4
• unit support:
  • free 3
  • town 1
  • city 3
  • metro 5

Life Node:

• +2 culture
• granary effect
• reduces pollution from buildings
• reduces pollution from population

Death Sphere

• corruption 1
• no extra trade
• worker rate 100%
• draft 3
• military police 5
• forced labor
• no war weariness
• no unit support

Death Node:

• +3 culture
• veteran units for all domains
• auto-produces Death's Shadow every 10 turns

_{*I am not giving details due to overlong post already. If interested just ask.}

 

[Lamabreeder]

This is the second post containing proposals, this time the three ones which have multiple good solutions or are more difficult to address or we might disagree if they are issues at all.


Issue 3. Names for Humans and Dwarves could be changed.

There are actually a number of civilizations whose people seem to belong to the human species: Humans, Jade Empire, Amazonians, Osiri, Archons, Ramayanians. Calling all the latter civs by a specific name and the first one "Humans" is actually a veilled racist slur on the latter ones, whose "human-ness" is implicitly called into question. Since they are recognizably based on existing ethnic groups, it's not just racism against fantasy races. I suggest changing the name of the "Humans" to something more specific, like "Westerners" or "Knightors" or something that more reflects their specific nature. The same goes for the "Dwarves" which might be renamed to "Hill Dwarves", "Mountain Dwarves", "High Dwarves" or something more specific.

This is merely a cosmetic change and one that potentially (I don't know) requires a lot of changes, so I do not expect it to be fixed quickly, if at all.


Issue 4. Resource requirements for some civs are potentially difficult.

Some civs obviously have a shtick with certain resources, like for example the Jade empire who is even named after one. The other ones are Wood Elves "with their innate ability to harness wood" (citation from their description), the Osiri who use Camels a lot and the Ivory/Elephant-obsessed Ramayanians.

There are two ways to handle this: Either let the civ require the resource a lot, or not at all, implying that this necessary resource is automatically available for the civ.

Both ways are used in the mod: Wood elves are implied to have access to lumber, all others are dependent on their resource, in case of the Ramayanians to the point where no unit except very basic ones are builable without it.

The problem is: What do you do when you are dependent on that resource - and then don't have it? You can of course argue, that, to stay in theme with the mod's name, you just have to acquire it the hard way. I won't argue against that.

I would, however, prefer to have the named civs have their units builable without their shtick resource.

Then a new problem arises, of course: What to do with that resource? Jade is actually used by three civs (Jade, Human and Naga), Ivory by four (Ramayanians, High Elves, Wood Elves and Osiri). Ivory is also needed to build the city improvement Circus and an Ultima Artifact. Camels however would be without use.

There are multiple things that could be done with the now-orphaned Camels: Change it into a luxury resource or make it necessary to build a building, i.e. a Caravanserei, which gives a tax bonus. Make it necessary for a military unit buildable by many civs, if they happen to have access to Camels. And I'm sure you could think of more.


Issue 5. Zorge Swarm combat-produced units are underpowered.

I'm not conquering a lot, so I don't feel I'm an expert on this issue, but I have the feeling that the Zorge Swarm's Larvae is too weak and you have far too few of them to make any difference, and that the promoted units are not really any better, so that the whole cool idea of the unit promotions is effectively wasted. Compare this to the Trolls, who build the Snow Troll who can relatively quickly gain new really great combat units. And that almost from the start.

I'd be interested if other players, especially veteran conquerors, also see this as a problem, or if I just haven't done it right yet.

If other players agree, however, there are multiple good ways to address this issue. The stats of the Larvae could be altered to make it more competetive. In this case I suggest to increase its attack value while decreasing its defense (i.e. to 8/2). Or you could change the Spawning Nest from being a small wonder to being a city improvement. This way much more Larvae could be obtained, rising the chances of some nice battlefield promotions. I would also suggest to increase the stats for the spawned units a bit. Having a Larvae spawn a Squito which has just one more attack point which is still less than the attack value for some civ's standard unit is an underwhelming experience. I don't think that it would be too powerful if the Mothra, last unit in the promotion chain, would have stats that were in the range of some powerful endgame units. You need a lot of combat wins to get there.

 

[ashen god]

Hi Lamabreader.

The "human" renaming issue was already mentioned and Haluu agreed that there should be some other name
The resource issue: I have never had any problem. I just conquer a lot of territory and i get it from somewhere.
Zorge spawns. On the contrary, i believe they are very strong; however it depends on map generating details. I always play raging barbarians. My first larva goes to some mountain near barbarians and gets defensive victories and start the evolving/spawning chain reaction (alternatively, larva should attack cows). Before the end of the first age/era i already have mothras. Playing agressively The zorge swarm gets like a snowball, growing in numbers without building units. Zorge can get powerful being bacward in science.
As I said, if you play without barbarians zorge would have a very hard time surviving. Likewise zorge would do very poor in archipelago map.
and... well I'm not a real expert i play only emperor (and sometimes demigod) always on huge map 22civs.
Sphere: i have no complaints about the current funcionality... but true, I never change spheres during the game (even if i play religious civ) i use water sphere and untill the end of the game. And at the end i still have tiles to improve, and my workers never get rest.
Hope it makes sense
have a nice day.

 

[haluu]

@ Lamabreeder

This is amazing what you have done! Thank you for taking the time out to do this, and I'm sure many players will find your mod-mod useful! I love some of your ideas and am definitely going to incorporate them into the next version! This is exactly the type of input that I will need to keep improving the mod! Thank you!

I want to touch on all the points you mentioned.

(1) I agree that resources should not be so random, but it is also more "realistic" that resources deplete. I wish there was a better way to handle this than the hard-coded way that Civ 3 handles it. For example, a gradual depletion over time would seem to make more sense, but is just not possible with this game. I agree with you that resources matter more in this mod, and will look into it more to see if a change should be made.

(2) I love your ideas here! There are some things that I want to avoid however. For instance, I don't want later spheres to be more powerful than earlier ones per se. I want all spheres to be equally as powerful, so that sphere choice is simply a matter of ruler preference. Using an early sphere til the end should be an option that makes sense. This also helps differentiate A.I. choices for spheres, so that all different spheres are in use by various civilizations, even at the end of the game.

I also toyed with the idea of having each "node" be an improvement instead of a small wonder. However, I didn't like this for several reasons. First, I think it's tedious. For instance, if I switch from one sphere to another, I need to build a new "node" in every singe one of my cities. If I have 10+ cities, I'm going to be pissed. lol. Secondly, I found that the AI will often not build "node" improvements but WILL almost always build "node" small wonders. The AI has enough shortcomings as it is, and not having the AI build nodes that allow them to benefit from their chosen government type feels wrong to me... I feel like I'm cheating against the AI.

I also don't want the benefits for each node to be too extreme. For instance, if the Balance Sphere gave +3 Happiness in all cities as you propose, that is 3 times as useful as some Great Wonders. Why would I waste time building a Great Wonder that gives +1 Happiness to all cities when I could just switch to Balance Sphere and get 3x that benefit in a flash? I think it also slightly hurts the player's motivation to gather luxury resources, build other great wonders, and build small happiness buildings.

I also wouldn't want Death Sphere to have no maintenance cost at all for units. That would lead to way too many units on the map at the end of the game. My goal in making this mod was to decrease the amount of units on the map, and make each unit feel more important, at least compared to the original Civ 3. Having the default 1 maintenance cost for Death Sphere I think helps a lot already in allowing the player to have flexibility for larger armies.

I do love your ideas for uniqueness in the Spheres in general though. And I will see if I can somehow re-balance them.

(3) You are 100% right about the naming of Dwarves and Humans. This will be changed in the next version.

(4) The fact that some races require certain resources is counted as a "weakness". Not requiring them (i.e. wood for the Wood Elves) is counted as a strength, to help outweigh their weak military units. I did this, among other things, to keep races unique while being balanced. So while it might suck that the Osiri need camels, for instance, their strengths outweigh this slight weakness. Not only that, but all races heavily dependent on a resource also are heavily dependent on a resource that is readily available. For example, it is rare to play as the Ramayanians and establish 4 cities and have no cities with access to Ivory. Almost always, at least one of those cities can access Ivory. I can play test this further, but I've never had much of an issue using these races as far as resource availability. Even if it's not available, it adds a total dimension of uniqueness and strategy to using the Ramayanians (or any resource-dependent race). Only with the Ramayanians am I constantly concerned about my Ivory supply. And if my enemy is using the Ramayanian Empire, I want to cut off their supply of Ivory. I think this makes the game more fun.

(5) As Ashen God mentioned, Zorge are extremely powerful with many barbarians, and weaker with less barbarians (or a less aggressive strategy). Using the Zorge, you almost innately have to play a more aggressive style to be successful (again, different races have different strategies, which makes it more fun in my opinion). Ashen God is also right that sometimes you can get Mothras by the end of the 1st era, and making them as powerful as end-game units would greatly hurt the balance of the game vs. other races.

I can't give the larvae 8Att 2Def stats however, because the A.I. will disband them (if they are at peace). I needed to give larvae a greater defensive value so the A.I. will use them as defenders and not disband them as soon as they spawn.

I do agree with your idea of making the larvae spawn slightly more often, and I might incorporate that into the next version. I also like the idea of differentiating the different levels of "evolution" a bit more and will most likely incorporate that too. Thank you!

****
Thank you for your contribution. I'm simply explaining why I made my Mod the way I did. Hopefully, you can see my reasoning on some of it, even we might might disagree slightly. =)

I'm sure many players will find your Spheres and ideas to their liking. Which is why what you have released here is wonderful. It gives options to our small but hopefully, growing, Tides of Crimson community.

Lamabreeder, I'm so glad that you enjoy this game enough to make a mod-mod of it. And PLEASE, keep giving me ideas on how to improve the Mod. I will always listen to other's ideas. Eventually, most of them make their way into the next version. =)