Aeterna Civitas

[Jerec]

I've got 2 questions.

1) Does "eventual (post multiplayer) version" mean the final MP version, or the far-off SP version starring the Romans?

2) WHY GAMES FOR A RESOURCE??!! I know other games are fun and have limited educational value, but wouldn't a book be better? Being a bookworm, after all...

[McMonkey]

1) The multiplayer version balanced for seven players is close to being ready.
The single player version Roman Empire building scenario can begin once the multiplayer version is complete. All this will consist of is giving a lot of the barbarian cities to the AI opposition, tweaking the stats a bit to make the AI a bit harder and a set of events and a batch file to swap them over so that the game will be challenging. This version will take a little longer to finish.

2) A game is useful as a resource for many reasons. Reading a book gives you one kind of insight, actually recreating the historical situations for yourself can give you a deeper understanding of the problems faced by historical leaders.

For example, I am playing a game as the Carthaginians and I had ambitious plans to create a Venetian like trading empire based around the islands of the med and selected ports in Greece, Turkey and the Levant. What I have ended up with is an empire based around the western med and a war against the Romans, initially over Sicily. Sound familiar?

The many different units carefully designed by the moders with the help of historians and the various improvements have inspired me to make some alterations to Aeterna Civitas.

I love books but I think other forms of media, such as Films, TV, the Internet and computer games can enhance ones understanding of history. After all I have learned a lot about history through Civ II and all the excellent scenarios that have been created

[Jerec]

Originally posted by McMonkey
Sound familiar?

The many different units carefully designed by the moders with the help of historians and the various improvements have inspired me to make some alterations to Aeterna Civitas.

I love books but I think other forms of media, such as Films, TV, the Internet and computer games can enhance ones understanding of history. After all I have learned a lot about history through Civ II and all the excellent scenarios that have been created

Point taken. And yes, very familiar. But I usually get more geography than history in Civ2.

[fairline]

Originally posted by McMonkey After all I have learned a lot about history through Civ II and all the excellent scenarios that have been created

I find civ scenarios which cover a period of history I'm unfamiliar with lead me to research that period through books or t'internet, so I agree.

[McMonkey]

Very much so! Frederick the Great and Cassus Belli were two scenarios in particular that got me very interested in eras I had previously ignored.

[Jerec]

Still deep in Rome: Total War, or are things progressing on AC?

btw check out the pic I attached...

[McMonkey]

The effects of RTR are starting to wear off and I have been adding some of the changes. One thing I have done is increase the food/shields of the town terrain square. This has boosted the productivity of all cities but the real reason for this change is to distinguish the major cities. By putting several town squares around major cities (Rome/Carthage/Alexandria etc...) which can be mined for an extra shield bonus I hope to make these cites the powerhouses of each nation. I do not want a situation where some backwater village with a load of hills around it can end up being more powerful than Rome.

I have played good scenarios in the past where major cities were weak because of their surrounding terrain while minor towns were able to grow into industrial metropolis. Using the town terrain should avoid this problem. I have also pinched the RR/Cloud idea from Techumseh's Roman Civil Wars scenario to brighten up the oceans, hope that is ok.

BTW, I wanted my Hypnotoad's eyes to flash on my Avatar but the one I had was too big!

Heres a screenie:

[GhostOfDisco]

So, when are we going to be able to enjoy the modifications you've made?

Myself, I've made a bit of my own graphics mod for the game - mostly changing the city and terrain pics and updating just a few units (the Roman general and the village units), well, here's a pic:

[Arthedain]

Looking forward to the SP version for Rome!

[McMonkey]

Things have slowed down a little bit lately. Fist the festive period with lost of parties/visitors, then the discovery of Rome Total Realism and my "research" on that, and now I have a stinking cold (or man flu as I am reliably informed by any female within shouting distance!). However the multiplayer version should be ready pretty soon and from there it should not take too much work to get a test version for the single player game ready.

Saying that, I always seem to vastly underestimate just how much work there actually is and how time consuming it can be. I will keep chipping away at the stone!

I have written up unit descriptions but have got myself in a real pickle. They have got jumbled up and I am having a headache unjumbling them. The problem seems to be with the Units Index in the Describe file. I have tried sorting it out in a logical fasion but I keep getting more tangled. The frustrating thing is the Describe file was fine for Fortress Europe and I don't remember what I did with that one!

Anyway, my head is too messed up with the lurgie tonight to do any meaningful work or even concentrate on what I am typing here. Will look at the problem again in the morning.

[Jerec]

Originally posted by McMonkey
However the multiplayer version should be ready pretty soon and from there it should not take too much work to get a test version for the single player game ready.

Good luck with the describe.txt.

Clouds look good!

MP version almost ready? Yes! That means a PBEM can't be too far away...

Saying that, I always seem to vastly underestimate just how much work there actually is and how time consuming it can be. I will keep chipping away at the stone!

Keep at it. By now the Christmas holiday is over, and I'm in full gear plowing through piles of schoolwork again (including 3 midterms I took today), which translates into roughly 2 hours of Civving a week, give or take an hour.

You realize that upping town terrain values also ups the stakes on establishing new cities around the map? In at least 2 spots in Gaul there are wonderful new city sites, with 1-2 town squares within using distance for each city. Maybe a little cutting out is needed...

[McMonkey]

The maximum number of cities has already been reached. Most multiplayer games have a rule stating that no new cities can be built anyway, only destroyed ones re-built. There are some exceptions such as Colonization type games and Hellas.

As all of the major cities are already covered this should not be a problem. All the Celtic tribes/cities are located where a major Roman colony would later be founded. The idea is that when/if the Roman player subjugates the local tribe the player re-names the city. There is a list included with the scenario of all Roman city names.

[Gagliaudo]

@McMonkey:

little petition: please, DELETE "Rome" and put "Roma" (or "ROMA" as you prefer)... Thanks a lot !

[Arthedain]

Originally posted by Gagliaudo
@McMonkey:

little petition: please, DELETE "Rome" and put "Roma" (or "ROMA" as you prefer)... Thanks a lot !

Agreed! Roma gives more feeling to the scen!

[McMonkey]

Can do!

I sorted out my issue with the Describe file today. Not sure how I managed to get it mixed up in the first place! Got all the units descriptions done (stole quite a lot of text from RTR) and the advice popups in the city screen. Need to go through the improvements, techs, governments and terrain. Hopefully I can use stuff from Wikipedia to save time.

I have completely revised the stats for ships. The original stats were rubbish as I had little idea about the strengths and weaknesses of each type. Again I have used RTR as a source. Other than that I am still working my way through my TO DO list and making changes with the cheat menu and CivCity.

Hopefully I will be able to post an Alpha version of the multiplayer version soon for yall to have a look at and critique. As I have said before, once the multiplayer version is ready I will start on the single player version.

In the limited tests I have done so far the game is quite slow as there are so many barbarian units. This is not an issue in a hotseat game but it is a pain in the arse in single player as you have to watch every barbarian move. In the single player version a lot of barbarian cities will be given to the nations so AI turns should pass a lot quicker.