Warlords of China update

[Patine]

Techumseh, is this scen anywhere near ready for a general release? I'm dying to try it! So far, only AGRICOLA's had any of the fun.

[techumseh]

Yes it is. I modified it to make it more difficult, based on AGRICOLA's romp in playtesting. Then I found it was too hard, so I adjusted the victory conditions. It's now possible to win a marginal victory, although a draw is more likely. I left the decisive win out of reach of even AGRICOLA's like. So now it's just about right and I've started working on unit and improvement descriptions and a readme.

[fairline]

Finally found time to play after hopeless England were knocked out of the World Cup...

Been playing as KMT:

1) It's brilliant
2) It's hard
3) I'm struggling to find any problems worth commenting about

If I were to nitpick, I'd point out the messages which pop up informing you that the barbs have just discovered Confucianism etc are a bit anachronistic. Not much you can do to get rid of those or stop barb research of the base tech's, although I guess you could rename some of these to more modern sounding techs.

There were a couple of occasions when building a temple didn't appear to influence the happiness level of my riotous KMT cities.

The terrain gfx are nicely done, although reducing contrast and making them a tad lighter would help the player locate units. I've gone for much lighter / lower contrast hills and left your other terrain gfx as they were - this helps a great deal with locating units.

I've played up to 1927 thus far, and there doesn't seem to be much attempt by the Kwantung army to expand into China. I haven't checked future events, so I don't know if you've arranged a helping hand for them in the 1930's...

I guess you could hardwire the KMT-Communist alliance until the late 20's to stop budding Chang Kai-Shek's from trying to exterminate them from the outset, although I see you have a 'Comintern' city to preserve their civ should the player manage to wipe out their Chinese cities. Should this be hidden from view?

Unit choice / stats are excellent, although I'm struggling on the offensive with mortars - I've resolved to stick to building arty exclusively as it has a better chance of success / survival.

I love the tech arms races to get foreign planes and tanks. Brilliant touch.

[Ecthy]

Sidenote: why don't you portray all city names in Pinyin but rather in old-fashioned spelling?

Tianjin, Qingdao etc. have been used since the 50s rather than Tientsin, Tsintao...

Even HOI uses Pinyin. Ichang/Yichang...

[AGRICOLA]

Originally posted by techumseh
I left the decisive win out of reach of even AGRICOLA's like.

Hmmm? I'm intrigued by the fun possibilities.

Is everybody a Monarchy now, trying to cope with unhappy citizens running amok with torches and knives in all cities?

Did you cut off all diplomacy? Without it, how can that murderous hotbed of intrigue, treachery, double-dealing and mayhem possibly function properly?

Are events so thoroughly flagged that, if a civ gets too big, insurgents start to overrun the countryside and/or all other civs declare war?

[techumseh]

Originally posted by fairline
Finally found time to play after hopeless England were knocked out of the World Cup...

Been playing as KMT:

1) It's brilliant
2) It's hard
3) I'm struggling to find any problems worth commenting about

Thanks!

If I were to nitpick, I'd point out the messages which pop up informing you that the barbs have just discovered Confucianism etc are a bit anachronistic. Not much you can do to get rid of those or stop barb research of the base tech's, although I guess you could rename some of these to more modern sounding techs.

It is a bit silly, the barbs research a few base techs repeatedly.

There were a couple of occasions when building a temple didn't appear to influence the happiness level of my riotous KMT cities.

This has been fixed with the addition of Monotheism (now Buddhism) to the tech tree.

The terrain gfx are nicely done, although reducing contrast and making them a tad lighter would help the player locate units. I've gone for much lighter / lower contrast hills and left your other terrain gfx as they were - this helps a great deal with locating units.

Can you send me your hills?

I've played up to 1927 thus far, and there doesn't seem to be much attempt by the Kwantung army to expand into China. I haven't checked future events, so I don't know if you've arranged a helping hand for them in the 1930's...

Yes, I have. Based on my last playtest, perhaps more is needed. The problem is that the Fengtien Faction (Manchuria) is right in the way of the Kwantung Army, so if you build up the KA in Korea too much, the FF is at a disadvantage. I'm routing more KA reinforcements to Tsingtao. Another problem is that I can't really get the KA to make a respectible threat from Formosa.

I guess you could hardwire the KMT-Communist alliance until the late 20's to stop budding Chang Kai-Shek's from trying to exterminate them from the outset, although I see you have a 'Comintern' city to preserve their civ should the player manage to wipe out their Chinese cities. Should this be hidden from view?

As the Koumintang, I actually find the Comms valuable allies, since they fight with just about all the other civs while I expand by capturing barbarian cities. You can always deal with them later.

Unit choice / stats are excellent, although I'm struggling on the offensive with mortars - I've resolved to stick to building arty exclusively as it has a better chance of success / survival.

I use mainly use artillery as well.

I love the tech arms races to get foreign planes and tanks. Brilliant touch.

And aren't they pretty!

[techumseh]

Originally posted by Ecthy
Sidenote: why don't you portray all city names in Pinyin but rather in old-fashioned spelling?

Tianjin, Qingdao etc. have been used since the 50s rather than Tientsin, Tsintao...

Even HOI uses Pinyin. Ichang/Yichang...

Since the scenario takes place in the 20s and 30s, I wanted the historical spellings as far as possible. Just part of the atmosphere, really.

[techumseh]

Originally posted by AGRICOLA


Hmmm? I'm intrigued by the fun possibilities.

Is everybody a Monarchy now, trying to cope with unhappy citizens running amok with torches and knives in all cities?

Did you cut off all diplomacy? Without it, how can that murderous hotbed of intrigue, treachery, double-dealing and mayhem possibly function properly?

Are events so thoroughly flagged that, if a civ gets too big, insurgents start to overrun the countryside and/or all other civs declare war?

No, no, and no.

I stepped up the number of 'minor warlord' provinces represented by barbarians and found a way to spawn barbarian units when each of their cities is captured instead of just the first one. I also set new "challenges" for those wanting to capture Peiping or Shanghai. Overall, the barbarians are now much more challenging and interactive, both with the human and the AI civs. The game is a lot busier now than it was.

I took away the ability of diplo/spy units to bribe cities. Of course the AI is unaffected by this edit, and happily bribes away, so this is a good way to handicap the human player.

I increased the flow of 'Moscow Gold" to the Communists slightly. Combined with the fundy government and exlusive use of the Commissar unit in the spy slot, this makes them a very subversive bunch. Keep an eye on them!

Japanese aggression is increased as a result of new Kwantung Army reinforcements. There are also large reinforcements to the KA if anyone is foolish enough to insult the Emperor by capturing cities in Korea.

Finally, I increased the number of objective cities from 9 to 15, including some on the mountainous western areas of China like Yunnan and Chengtu. You need all 15 for a decisive victory.

Most people will be challenged to achieve a draw. Good players should be able to get a marginal victory. It remains to be seen if anyone can get a decisive victory. I sure can't!

[AGRICOLA]

Sounds thoroughly nasty and very interesting.

Final product is definitely on my "must try again" list.

[:) Smiley]

While on the topic of sounds, here's a site that has MP3s of some of the music of the period.

http://www.ibiblio.org/chinese-music/

[techumseh]

Thanks Smiley, that's a good site. I did include Chinese music throughout the scenario, as a soundtrack and as various sounds like Movpiece, Neg1 and Pos1. I particularly like some of the music from Chinese Operas, such as "The Execution of Mah Su" and "Birds Singing Tranquil Mount". I used excerpts to make some sounds like the spysound (attached):

[Ecthy]

Guys, where can I download this?

[techumseh]

Not for a few days at least, Ecthy. Sorry.

[Alinestra Covelia]

Well you'd better finish it before August 23! Or I'm going to have to play this during my first year at law school (never a good time for extra curricular activities).

Because unlike other law students, I have my priorities right. Civ2 all the way!

[techumseh]

Don't worry Bing, it will be ready before classes start. However, you may well have been long called to the bar before you ever beat it! Just don't play in court!