MOD: Long Winded Changes Mod: Improvements increasing Balance, Accuracy, and Fun

[cyberguide]

sith: as i found out with the game, it seems to ignore just the ranks that come after elite equivalent. so leaders are generated from the elite level. (at least it seems that way by having played for a while ...).

actually, i am not using leaders in my game often. that is why i would prefer to extend the ranking a bit. of course, as soon as you increase the hitpoints, the longer it will take to resolve battles. but my posted list was just a first shot to see if it would work at all. maybe 20 is really too high but that way you will have to honor your successful units and handle them with care as you dont wont to loose such a unit. i hoped that with barracks the units are at rank numbered 3 and not the second last rank which seems to be correct. so it would be really hard and take a long run to get units to the last level (which is realisitc i think as you wont find many generals in a real army, will you?).

i am just wondering that the format may allow as many ranks as you want but the game seems to be hardcoded to the fixed number (even the promotion messages are all triggered by different events [conscript->regular, regular->veteran, etc.].

cyber

[Plutarck]

I'll do all the replying later (tiired...been working on the mod all day), but here are the things I've come up with so far. Some still are left to be implemented, so I've got plenty of work left to do for ERP4, but I wanted to get this out for discussion:

-Error: Forgot to add the change to World Sizes in changes.txt, and clarified the change in pillaging there too (archer-type units can't pillage).

-Many Units: Many units have had their bombard strength changed, and some have had their rate of fire increased. All changes are decreases, because most had already had their rate of fire increased. The result was too high a chance of destroying buildings/citizens while the early bombard units were nearly useless. Along with other changes bombard units should now be highly useful units (even the early ones), but not over-powered.

-ISSUE: I'm not sure if I mentioned it, but land bombard units can no longer be captured. After playing with the changes, would you prefer it if they were capturable?

-QUESTION: When bombarding units, do the defending units defense values get modified as if they were being attacked by any other unit (like for being fortified, terrain, city defenses, etc)? I would really think they were, and am acting as if that's true.

Also, do Citizens and Buildings get any bonus from terrain or city improvements (like Walls)?

-Defense Bonus: Citizens and Buildings now have 18 and 14 defense, respectively. With the increased effectiveness of bombard units the chance of devastating a city is far too high, far too early, for far too little of a production requirement.

-Multiple Resources: The resources with the highest disappearance probability have now had that amount decreased, so they are a bit more stable now. They seemed to move a bit too much as before, but they'll be tweaked more in the future if need be.

-Tech Cost: Squirearchy(-2).

-Many Units: I've made a bunch of changes to units, from changing their stats to changing the technology they become available with. Quite the bucket'o'changes. Let me know what you think!

-Difficulty Levels: I've majorly reduced the barbarian combat bonuses on the low difficultly levels and raised the Optimum City Amount by 5% per difficulty level. The reason being that, for instance, on Chieftain the barbarian bonus was 800%. That means that a Warrior (1 attack originally, but it would be given an 8 attack after the bonus) attacking a Barbarian (2 defense) that's fortified on a mountain would have a 74% chance of victory if they were both Conscripts, a 78% of both were Regulars, or a 87% chance when it's Regular vs Conscript (which is almost always the case)! 1 lone Regular Warrior fortified on a flood plain could stand up to 3 Raiders (which have 3 attack) 77% of the time, and 6 of them (one after another) more than 28% of the time!

Chieftain should be pretty easy, but it makes barbarians totally irrelevant (that is, just free sources of gold). Basically all levels have been moved "up" one, so while Chieftain/Warlord/Regent/Monarchy/Emperor/Diety was 800/400/200/100/50/0, it is now 400/200/100/50/25/0. The other levels have also been tweaked, so barbarians should finally be reasonably dangerous! Muahahaha!

-Military Academy: Now costs 50 to build instead of 60.

-Archer-type units: Now have a 0 range bombard ability (heard the idea in the forums, and want to see if it works like I hope it will), giving them one free "bombard" against an attacking unit. I hope it'll be as good as useful as I think it will be, but testing will show if I'm right. I may also have to give them Zone of Control, but we'll see.

-Chemistry: Chemistry has basically been removed, with it's position now filled by Metallurgy (the exact explanation is that Chemistry and Metallurgy have now been rolled in together as one tech). Other than having both Chemistry and Physics (both useless techs, in that they serve no function on their own) often coming one after the other, this also serves to solve the problem of the naval units equipped with cannons becoming available before canons were invented!

There will still be a problem with the "new" naval unit that comes available with astronomy, in that it requires saltpeter to build yet comes available before the gunpowder advance. You win some, you loose some. If a tech tree overhaul is done then this is something that can be addressed, but otherwise we'll just...well, ignore it, like everyone else has to ignore Frigates becoming available before Metallurgy.

-Longbowman: England's Unique Unit is now the Longbowman, rather than the Man-O-War. The Longbowman is now no longer available to other civilizations, and it's now functionally replaced by the new Crossbowman unit. The other idea for England is the Red Coat, but this will work for now.

-Crossbowman: New unit, taking the functional place of the Longbowman unit for all but England.

-Man-O-War: Now renamed to the Ship of the Line, and made available to all civs. It is functionally the same now as the Frigate/Man-O-War.

-Frigate: Now renamed to War Caravel, made available with Astronomy, and is available to all civs. It's current function is replaced by the Ship of the Line.

-ISSUE: I wish to change the American UU to some ground unit, but I don't know what it should be. The prime candidates I can think of is the Minuteman (available in the industrial age, like an improved Rifleman?) and the M1-A1/Abrams Tank (upgrade to Modern Armor, perhaps?). For now I'm going to try out making it the Minuteman, and we'll see how it goes (I don't know what I'm going to do with the F-15...might just leave it out for now).

The reason for these 2 UU changes is because you cannot trigger a Golden Age without the unit winning a battle. The Americans have it the worst, but the English suffer from it to a lesser degree. The other is that ground units are useful on all maps in every situation, while naval units really are only useful on more land-filled (especially Pangea) maps.

However, I believe that all civs should have 2 UUs, for more reasons than I want to even get into. Depending on the results of ERP4, I think this would be a good thing to implement reasonably soon. However, I want plenty of feedback and debate as to what the 2nd UU should be for each civ. I also believe that overhauling the governments is a more pressing issue, which should be done first.

With a smoothed out unit system, smoothed out tech tree (not over-hauled or largely changed, just smoothed out a bit in terms of cost, because I think I've fixed the major other problems already), added UUs, and an overhauled government system, I think I will be ready to call it LWC version 2.0!

I especially want to hear about the change of England's unit to the Longbowman, adding the Crossbowman to replace it for other civs, and changing the American unit to the Minuteman (and currently leaving the f-15 out of the game until a use for it comes up).

[Honour_Shogun]

Well, I for one welcome the removal of England's rather useless UU. Honestly, when you talk to someone about England, about major battles that have shaped her history, Agincourt is perhaps one of the most important(yeah, 1066 is the most important, but I really think 1415 is the second most) Making the UU for England the longbowman is common sense, IMHO. As for America, it really comes down to when you want them to have their Golden Age(whcich can be achieved through peaceful means as well). If you want it very late in the game, go with the tank. Maybe make it a Sherman instead M1/Abrams Tank? So it happens at the same time as Germany's? As for earler, well Minutemen obviously.

And one last thing, the idea of having 2 UU for each civ is great! If you incorporate this, it will be great.

[JC Woodman]

LWC/ERP's-UU's

And one last thing, the idea of having 2 UU for each civ is great! If you incorporate this, it will be great. [/QUOTE]

I agree. 2 uu's ea. would be the ticket. I think we could debate real world history and potential uu"s for all civ's @ great length... If we go with the premise that uu's should be tied to our "real" world history the above comments by H-shogun are right on. As to the Brits and Americans I agree that the Man o War is weeeeeaaaaaak,but the idea is good. No question the long bowman's the early choice as is the Minuteman/militiaman for America. But later it's less clear to me. The "Redcoat" idea is very good, the sheer discipline (sometimes to a fault) of the Redcoat line Infantry from 1750ish to 1850ish was impressive to say the least, just ask Napolleon and his Marshalls. But also the role of the British Navy should be represented... brainstorming here perhaps a more effective/cheaper/ or longer ranged Ironclad. The Americans, I like the Minman idea for early, and well heck leave the F-15 for the second. Other American possibles... The Sherman Tank- granted cheap, quick to produce and reliable but it should defend lower than others, ( Hey Russia! How's about a T-34/ 2nd UU??? ) Also for the Americ's beefed up Naval units, or special Naval aviation units?? I also like the Attack Helo idea. Just thinkin out load

[NorthSwordsman]

I'm at 1360, as the Iroquis, standard map. I'm having fun, the new units throw me for a loop now and then. But they are are nice... I like the changes thus far.

One bug, not sure if it has been commented on before (haven't read the whole thread yet) is that on the Technology Advancement Popup box, the picture doesn't usually match with the Technology. Sometimes the Civilopedia is that way as well. For example, I recently discovered Theology. The picture? Communism. Isn't that a hoot?

Other than that, the game is enjoyable.

[Bill_in_PDX]

Good morning,

I'd like to visit the website so I might view the breadth of all the changes that you have provided in this mod, but the links in this thread and over on Civ Fanatics all link to a dead web site.

Is there a new site link? Or another way to see the summary of all the modification features?

Thanks!

[Gutz]

They are all outlined in the readme and changes documents in the download.

[cyberguide]

Originally posted by NorthSwordsman
I'm at 1360, as the Iroquis, standard map. I'm having fun, the new units throw me for a loop now and then. But they are are nice... I like the changes thus far.

One bug, not sure if it has been commented on before (haven't read the whole thread yet) is that on the Technology Advancement Popup box, the picture doesn't usually match with the Technology. Sometimes the Civilopedia is that way as well. For example, I recently discovered Theology. The picture? Communism. Isn't that a hoot?

Other than that, the game is enjoyable.

I have experienced the same. it seems to happen quite often. a few more examples: Currency goes with the pic of Electricity or so.
I think it was Mathematics that goes with the pic of Monarchy. have not yet checked the civelopedia entries though.

i am sure there are more than the few being mentioned.#

cyber

[NorthSwordsman]

Cyberguide:

Yup. Every one of them. A few of the Civilopedia entries are "empty", no description, but Plutarck did say that it wasn't complete. For example, no explaination for "guild hall", but I built the blasted thing anyhow. Have no idea what it does, what it costs in upkeep... but I figure it's doing SOMETHING.

Plutarck, do you need help with the Civilopedia? I could help out if you need it. But I'm willing to learn. I enjoy this mod.

[Plutarck]

Announcement #1: The LWC website now has a domain name, thanks to Realm! Give 'em a big thank you for providing it. It is: lwc.realmofgaming.net. To get directly to the main LWC page just add /civ3 onto the end of it.

Nifty, huh? Now you don't need to remember a whole IP addy


Announcement #2: The website is back up, thanks to some quick reinstatement of service by Kolyana.

(inside joke, don't try to figure it out)



Now, about the unique units. I'll be posting a thread about it in the general forum to get lots'o'opinions on what a 2nd UU should be for each civ.

I'm currently decided on 2 UU for each Civ, instead of more (such as one for each age). The reasons for this are many, with the most important being:

- It'll be quite a bit of work to add 16 units to the game anyhow, and have them fit in with their Civ, be worthy of UU status without being unbalancing, and be significantly different from other Civs UUs.

- For each civ to have one for each age I'd have to add 64 units! Um...no.

- Having 2 UU instead of 1 is twice as good, but adding more comes with greatly diminishing returns.

- It won't be hard to come up with 2 units for each civ, as every civ at LEAST somehow existed in 2 eras, even if just the early Middle Ages and the Ancient Age. So Zulu/Persians/Aztec/etc could get one in the ancient and middle, while America could get one in the industrial and modern.

- Each civ will have a greater amount of custom strategy, without becoming too much so.

- How much of a stretch would it have to be to come up with a unit in the industrial and modern age for the ancient civs like the Zulu and Aztects? Or an ancient and middle age unit for america?


So I think just about everyone will agree that 2 UU per civ is the optimal solution. I'll include them as soon as I'm reasonably convinced of what civs should have what UUs, but no earlier than ERP5-6.


Other notes:

-I hope to do the government overhaul by ERP6, at least. It sooo needs doing. It's the number one sore-thumb in the game, or it will be after ERP4.

-No ETA on ERP4, but I'm working on it. Probably will be available next week, as there's no way I can finish it this weekend.

Gotta do plenty of other stuff IRL, so I can't give anything firm. Car troubles, car shopping...ah well, what can ya do.

-I don't know what ERP5 will be about, but probably will be more tweaking and adjusting than anything else.

-Later on, perhaps even after ERP4 (depending...), I'll try to wrap LWC up into some maps and make them available in an add-on pack! So you could play the earth maps with LWC rules and units

The only thing required, other than using the CopyTool, to import the maps into LWC, is to place Oasis where they should be and decide if the disappearance ratios should be changed for that map.

Since you can ensure everyone get's a fair shake from the begining, you might just make all disappearance ratios 0, and things like that.

Other than that, I know of no obstacles.



Replys going in reverse order:

NorthSwordsman:

The historical entrys for new items are empty, but those rarely (if ever) tell what the thing does anyway. But now they'll at least tell you what they do...except maybe units (for now, might fix them).

All will be available in ERP4.


cyberguide:

It's hard-coded into Civ3, and not easily fixable. To fix it I'd have to change the names of at least 83 graphic files, then make them available for download, and I'd still have to figure out which techs to rename to what. And that's assuming that would work...

So if it's not fixed in the next few patches by Firaxis, I guess I'll go to the trouble of fixing it.

But Theology showing up as Communism...almost too good to want to change


Bill_in_PDX:

Temporary downtime, and it's back up again




Back to Ye Olde Grindestone for me

[bloodysmurf]

Wow!

I'm very impressed by the enormous number of changes made in this mod... but I'm curious about how well the AI is able to utilize the changed units/buildings/techs? For those of you that have downloaded the mod, what are your impressions of the AI behavior thusfar?

BTW, the link to the readme file on the LWC site is currently dead.

Keep up the good work!
-ollie-

[NorthSwordsman]

Bug report sent to Plutarck along with the game save and a screenshot of the bug...

MINES IN FOREST. I'm getting 1-3-3 from those forests, under Democracy. (Tried to attach a screenshot, but the board hung up on it. Forget it. Plutarck has it)

[Plutarck]

snip from changes.txt:

-Forest: Can now be Mined, providing +1 shields (think Tree Farms/Sustained Logging).

But thanks for reporting it anyway, hehe.

Hm, but now that you mention it, it does end up making a mined forest give as many resources as a mined Hill...then again, is that all that bad a thing? After all, Hills have a better chance of having bonus resources and provide more of a defense bonus, but Forests can be cleared...hmm.

If I increased the shield bonus of Hill, I'd have to do it to mountain too. I'll probably try giving Mountain a boost anyway (since it provides 0 food), but aren't Hills valuable enough already?

I'm thinking that they are, so I'll leave Hills alone, give Mountain an extra shield when mined, but I am also increasing the amount of turns it takes to Mine (since mining is more valuable now, AND provides the nice effect of slightly curbing the "mine all the grasslands" problem).

And if I can find a graphic for it, I'm going to include Bananas in ERP4 (showing up in Jungles only, methinks).

It will be a Strategic Resource, required to build Damn Dirty Apes.





...just kidding about that last part...

[MicMc]

Nice thinking

I like the idea of the changes, I've been playing a test mod along those lines, in addition to the changes you mentioned we set up irrgatating hills, (think Terraced hills) so it comes to be 2/1/1 the grapic isn't great, but it suits.

Sumthin I was thinkin' about, since there is an upper limit on stra/lux resources and you can't control the bonus resources and since any graphic past +2 won't show up for the human player, to use the same graphic in multi renamed versions of the basic item. Like the oasis idea, so you could end up with Palm Oasis, Desert Spring, same grapic same perks, twice as many occurances, desert only and it would help take some of the sting out of all that sand. The same basic idea could be applied elsewise.

Love LWC, extremely well thought out. It's the mod I go back to when I'm playing for fun rather than testing stuff. So far I haven't run into any problems with it, Keep givin' us stuff!

[Plutarck]

Here are my latest entrys in changelog.txt:

01/19/01:

-Mining: Costs 16 turns instead of 12. Mining is a bit more valuable now, and also curbs the "mine all the grasslands" problem a little.

-Fortress: Costs 12 turns instead of 16. Is there

-Plant Forest: Costs 20 turns instead of 22. I'd make it 18, but I don't think the AI knows how to use it, so it would purely be for the benefit of the player.

-Clear Forest: Costs 12 turns instead of 10. They do provide an extra 5 shields now, and deforestation should take a bit more effort (since it comes with few consequences).

-Clear Pollution: Costs 22 turns instead of 24.

-Fruit: New resource. Like Oasis for Jungles, but gives +2 food and +1 commerce.

-Mountains: Now provides 1 commerce instead of 0. Thus it now has a base of providing 2 production and 1 commerce, and when roaded and mined provides 4 production and 2 commerce.

-Tundra: Now has 2 movement cost instead of 1.

-NOTE: While playing with units in the LWC calculator I suddenly realized a whole new dimension of units that needs to be tested. Cost must be factored together with stats to decide what is a more powerful unit. I have failed to do this up till now, because I was assuming that 1 old unit would equal 1 new unit; which can reasonably be true because of how production increases over time, but we'll put that aside for now. Thus the LWC combat system still works pretty darn well, but I'm refiguring the details now. Consider this:

I had given the War Caravel (WC) a Cost/Attack/Defense/Movement of 7/8/6/4, and the Ship of the Line (SL) 10/13/10/5. I figured this would allow the WC a reasonable chance of success if attacking first (36% chance, it turned out), but it would be pretty easily thrashed if the SL attacked first. However, I failed to factor in cost.

For the cost of 21 (210 shields ingame, though the AI can build it for less on higher difficulty levels) you can build 3 WCs, and for 20 cost you can build 2 SLs. If 3 WCs attack 2 SLs (assuming all ships are Veteran), one right after the other, the WCs have roughly a 68% chance of victory (2% less of a chance if all ships were Regulars)! That means it is actually better NOT to be able to build the SL so you can just build WCs instead, as it regards ship to ship warfare! Obviously not acceptable, even if that's only when the WCs are on the attack.

If the WCs have only a 7 attack the chance of success is reduced to 55%, but that still isn't all that good. But if the SL also gets 11 defense, then the problem is altogether solved, leaving a (reasonable) 46% chance of success (20% when 1 on 1) when attacking. But if the SLs attack first then they have an, appoximately, 80% chance of success.

This is of course ignoring other factors involved, but it's not a bad rule of thumb to go by. So warfare should be alot more balanced now, without tipping the scales too much in any one direction.

One more calculation which is important to make: Figure the chances of 2 attackers winning against a defender, not just one. Otherwise the stats may look good at first, but once you add another attacker right behind you see that it gets pretty darn Ugly.

-NOTE: It is only now that I realise how awful and difficult Civ3 is to actually make "good", because of the lack of any ability to give increased hit points to units as well as the lack of firepower (and to a lesser extent, armor). Why?

Well, I'll tell you why. To get the ships balanced properly so that it's actually worth developing in technology to conduct warfare, by the advent of Steel I must have ships with 37 Attack and 30 Defense. It's not even the second half of the industrial age! It's a darn good thing the maximum stat for a unit goes over 99, because otherwise I'd have very little room left for the Modern Age!

To figure out the chance of one unit winning over another with such high numbers (and I mean with only a LITTLE accuracy), you just about HAVE to use a combat calculator or just settle for "well, this should be a better than 50% chance of not totally loosing...I think. ...well, I guess not."

I sware, the more I think about the sickeningly sad state of Civ3 the more I like the idea of accepting the offer to join the Clash of Civilizations development team - after I finish with the LWC Mod, of course (don't want to let anyone down, and I'm sure I can make Civ3 at _least_ be a major step forward for the series...as long as you only count Civ1. Otherwise, I might as well try to bend the golden gate bridge with the power of "PSI"...which might actually be easier, come to think of it).

Ah well, never let it be said that I did not make headway into doing the impossible in my lifetime.

-NOTE: By the way, did I mention that Civ3 handles Submarines like a complete POS? I didn't? How, I must have LOST MY FREAKIN MIND. X-|

-Nuclear Attack Sub: Has now been deleted and will not be in the LWC Mod any further. I find that there is simply no need for it, and it's whole use is now completely taken by the Nuclear Submarine that comes with Civ3.

-NOTE: Oh, how cruel the hands of fate! I soo wished to make a Naval Army (Armada, perhaps?), but guess what? There isn't an AI Naval Strategy for Army, as there is for Land! So if I added it, and it didn't crash the game (as unlikely as THAT is), only the player could use it! *weeps*

-Factory, Manufacturing Plant, Coal Plant, Nuclear Plant: Changed.

-Oil Plant: New improvement, alot like Coal Plant, Nuclear Plant. More expensive to maintain, but produces less pollution and requires Oil instead of Coal, as well as making 1 less person unhappy (compared to Coal Plant).

-Automated Factory: New improvement, takes the place of what Manufacturing Plant use to be.

-National Bank: New Small Wonder. Yeah, another Forbidden Palace, but this time for the later Middle Ages. Inspired by the Bank of England.

-Mass Transit System: Back down to production 1 pollution, because it seems 1 = 25% increase. Bother...

-City Dump: No longer requires a Sewer System be in the city.


01/18/01:

-Settlers, Pioneers: Now take 3 pop points to build. This is purely for testing purposes, but in theory it seems like a reasonably good idea...we'll see.

-Civilizations: I have incorporated some city/leader names from the "Changes to some annoying name errors, plus Canada civ" mod by Wyz_sub10. The Iriquous first 20 or so citys are now new, with the old ones following right behind (with a few removed). The Zulu's capital is now properly Ondini, and "Zimbabwe" has been removed, along with my changing around of leaders and adding "Bongoza", who led Zulu enemys (the Boers) into an ambush at the Battle of Opathe. Germany now has...Hitler. If Stalin can be counted as a leader of Russia, Hitler can be counted as a leader of Germany - and if you look over the leader lists, you'll probably notice worse butchers than either of them, so just delete his name if you have a problem with it.

There are also plenty of other little changes in city and leader names, but not worth listing every little change.

For those who didn't know, I already had included Sevorak's city/leader name mod since at least ERP1, which is why you'll note that there are far more city and leader names for all civilizations.

-Errors: Fixed a few more civilopedia errors.

-Catapult, Trebuchet, Canon, Artillery, Radar Artillery: Now capturable again.

-Note: Three cheers for Gramphos, for creating a Unit Organizer from my request! I really, REALLY love having my units back in order now. You don't know how nice it is unless you play around and try to compare the units like they were.

Definately will ease my unit comparisons and customizations.


01/17/02:

-Errors: Fixed some civilopedia errors, and added correct requirements and effects of small wonders.

-Minuteman: New unit, now the unique unit for America instead of F-15.

-F-15: No longer available in the game, but it may be used for something later. For now it has no tech requirement and is not available to any civilization.

-Military Academy: Now available with Education instead of Military Tradition, and is down to costing 45 instead of 50. Academy, University...makes sense to me. The effect should be armys becoming available earlier now, so that should make things a bit more interesting on the whole. And remember, to build it you only need to have 7 barracks built in citys you control, so don't think you _have_ to use a Leader to build an Army. Hell, I STILL haven't gotten a leader since I've been playing the game, which is why I changed the way Military Academy became available.

Now you can actually build Heroic Epic at some point, so long as you got have a victorious army. Yay

-Jungle: Now provides 1 less shield to start, but can be mined providing +1 shield. So it will start by providing 1F/1P, with a road it will give 1C, and once mined it will give 2P instead of 1P. But if you're going to go to all that trouble you'd probably do best to Clear it out instead.

-Longevity: Now gives an Aqueduct to all citys, in addition to everything else it does. I could have added a "Longevity Effect" with the "allows city size 2" ability and have Longevity provided that, but then if you built it you'd want to go into each city and sell any Aqueducts you have. So this is the best way of doing it, even if it doesn't make the most sense in the world. The effect remains the same

I could also have had it allow city size 3 in all citys, but we'll just stick with this instead. Easier and more balanced, I think.