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

[Daveraver]

Not sure if yer still working on it... but the v.05 that I use gives me a page fault every new game at about ten to twelve years... the coracle problem I guess?

And I tried the link to the file, doesn't work, also getting the same update problem as mentioned above...

I love the changes you've made, now if I could only play with them....

[KaiserKiser]

sigh, i hate to give you more of a headache, but i cant reach the site w/ the file

i know you're probably getting frustrated w/ everyone semi-complaining, so dont take this as a complaint, im just really anxious to try out your new changes

[Kolyana]

And I'm still looking for a solution for world hunger.

And a way to diet without giving up chocolate.

C'mon. Snap to it!

[[LordLMP]]

Tried link to dl file, but get error 404.

-LMP

[Plutarck]

^*&#@@*!!

Sonunfarightmogon!!

Here's something I just found in my email:

Dear Valued HyperMart Member:

We regret to inform you that your account
crazyoddball will be deleted from our servers
within the next 48 hours because it violates our
Terms of Service, found at

http://www.hypermart.net/t/account/policies/tos.

Reason: Excessive bandwidth usage


It is for the above reason that we have been forced to
schedule the removal of your account crazyoddball
from our servers.

If you believe the action we have taken is in error,
please contact us at abuse@hypermart.net with the
following account information:


User Name: ***
Site URL: ***


Our goal is to continue to provide our customers with
the best possible hosting and ecommerce services. By
enforcing our Terms of Service, we can achieve a
secure and professional environment in which to
conduct business online.


Thank you,


The HyperMart Team

It hasn't even been 10 hours since I put the thing up! Bastards! Bastards all of 'em!


But on an extremely funny note, just those files caused me to snap the 500MB bandwidth transfer cap in like 7 hours

Lost a few things of minor importance (including the stat file, grrr), but damn. I guess I know how popular it was now, hehe.

Of course this is pretty much extortion, largely caused by warez sites but mostly it's just plain extortion. It doesn't stop it from being funny though.



Ah well, I guess it's back to the freakin' drawing board. I think what I'm going to do is learn Batch File (.bat) programming and use it to copy/create the unit animations and files. That should allow me to keep the version updates down to less than 2-3MB in size, which can probably just be stored here on the site.


It might be a day or two to actually learn how to do that (never done it before, but I'm confident that my ability to overestimate my abililty is not illplaced *EG*), but I'll try to have a makeshift update solution available by tommarrow.


Don't you just hate it when this happens?

[Kolyana]

Plut: Email me. Kolyana@bellsouth.net. I have a dedicated server, OC3 connection, 3 18gig scsi drives, dual 933Mhz cpu available.

No charge.

I'll gladly make these resources available for the help of the community if you need it.

[History049]

The Pioneer unit crashes my computer, but I believe I have beta 0.1, is there a newer ver

[jackyhei]

Plutarck

please email me : jackyhei@sinatown.com
I can't download the file.

[TheRascalKing]

What would be cool on the matter of jungles would be if you could implement slash-and-burn farming techniques on jungle squares. Instead of clearing to a grassland over a long period of time, they would clear to a plains in a matter of a couple of turns and you could get a quick food storage boost, but of course the overall effect would be decreased farm yield after it's burned down.
Wishful thinking, eh?

(Edit) Oh, and just out of curiosity, can anyone rationalize paratroopers needing oil to be constructed? I mean you could argue that the planes need oil...but they're dropped using the same planes as airlifting planes at airports, and airports don't need oil. Is it just me or is that a double-precedent? Also, the fact that you can conscript mech infantry kind of weirds me out. "Hey! They're issuing a draft! Everyone hop in the APC and let's all go down to the barracks!"

(Edit Again) Last thing, is there any way to make it so that you can load cruise missiles onto destroyers or cruisers? Since that IS how modern cruise missiles are fired most of the time...

(Edit AGAIN!) Okay okay, I know I'm rambling...but this is the last one, I swear! I think cavalry should upgrade to helicopters. Now, you may ask "Hey King of Babylon dude, why the heck should they upgrade to helicopters?" Well, that's what happened to the cavalry regiments, at least in the United States military. Our "cavalry" is our helicopters. And speaking of helicopters...what about attack helicopters? They'd essentially be bombers I guess, but they'd be so cool.

I also wanna know why bombers and artillery can't sink battleships...but that, of course, should be under the complaints section.

[TheRascalKing]

OK, I promised that that would be the last edit, so I'll just start a new one here. Make sure you don't require transports to use iron. Most World War II transports were largely wooden in construction. Modern ones would use iron, but I don't think it should be a requirement.

[monkspider]

Looks like you have a wonderful mod here Plutie, keep up the good work!

[Big Jim]

Corruption Horse & Trenchs

Just some ideas about corruption surely newspapers (with the printing press) would be a good building to reduce corruption, maybe a wonder such as the free press or fleet street to improve effectiveness.

Horses, how can my neighbours on the same continent have horses when i dont its like the germans not having cows when the french do!!!! can this be changed

Infantry maybe its been done allready but maybe let them build fortress in a first world war styleee
cool

[Plutarck]

Blackadar1: I discovered the problem your having from something someone said over at civfanatics.com. The problem is simple: I didn't include the Partisan OR Mercenary folders! DOH!

We'll be skipping straight up to version 0.7 full installation now to ensure every single unit crash bug and all other known bugs are totally fixed!


Kolyana: I'll take you up on your offer Check your email when you get online.

It will be version 0.7 and not 0.6, and there will only be 1 file now.

[axxessdenied]

I got a domain on my friends dedicated server if you need some space.

[Rooster]

Plutark, I really enjoy your MOD, but I have a few suggestions. I have been toying it with myself on my vacation, but unfortunately now that I am back at school, I can't really complete what I was working on. Here are some of the things I did, and some suggestions:

Governments:
Imperialism/Colonialism: I have a bit of a problem with calling these Government types. A government type should refer to a system of government. Imperialism and colonialism are policies of a government. One could engage in Imperialism and/or Colonialism and be any type of government (See United States, late 19th century.. democracy but imperialistic, the UK Monarchical and imperial/colonial, WWII Germany certainly Imperial). I understand the point of trying to duplicate these important periods, but I just don't see them as fairly being called government types.

Here are the governments I added and the changes I made (I apologize for not having the actual #s with me, but I don't have a copy of the game with me here):
Democracy: I moved Democracy to the Ancient Period and made it a government that is strong in the sciences (rate cap of 10) but weak when it comes to the military, propaganda, resitance, etc. No maintenance required.

Reasoning: Democracy, in its purest form, is one of the oldest forms of government, existing in ancient Greece. It facilitied a number of philosophical and scientific discoveries, but was pretty weak as a military government. Also, ancient democracies by nature tended to be large mostly independent city-states. Therefore, the unity within a democratic "nation" is fairly weak. Because the nation would be broken up into tiny nation-states, they maintain themselves.

Republic: I made the Republic stronger militarily, but weaker in science. It can have forced labor (plenty of slaves in ancient Rome!) and some free units. Is more resistant to military invasion than a Democracy, but also far more corrupt. Also has the highest assimilation rate of any ancient government.

Reasoning: The Republic was a fairly strong and stable form of government. It had solid balancing of power and democratic elements as well. Moreover, at least in the case of Rome, it was quite successful in assimilating foreign cultures. It could support a large military and generally kept its people happy. The downside of The Republic was that it had a lot of corruption, and was prone to civil wars. Not sure how to simulate the civil wars though.

Monarchy: I moved monarchy to the middle ages. Yes, I am aware there were "monarchs" during ancient times. However, in this case I am referring specifically to the type of monarchy based on the Divine Right of Kings theory. Thus, monarchy now requires Theology and Feudalism.

Reasoning: Monarchy as a truly important phenomenon came about during the middle ages as kings began to claim right by God to rule their subjects. This right was derived from theological preceps, and often with support of the church, and also thrived with Mercantilism (which I hope to see in the tech tree sometime). It would simply be difficult to equate this monarchy with the monarchies that developed in ancient times.

New Governments:
Federal Republic:
Late Middle Ages. Requires Gunpowder and The Federal Republic (I'll explain later in the tech section). I had a lot of trouble with the modern governments because, frankly, the editor does not allow very much versatility. Basically, the Federal Republic has a rate cap of 9, no draft but some free units (states take up the bill, like the National Guard, eg). It is resistant (compared to ancient governments) to propaganda, but not as much as a Social Democracy. I'm not going into too much detail really, just trying to present a basic overview.

Reasoning: The Federal Republic was made possible really with two things: The notion that a government is a social contract with the people, and the ability of the people to revolt (gunpowder provided the people with the ability to make effective weapons fairly cheaply). A Federal Republic has a fairly strong central government, and therefore some stability, but also is composed of a number of states with a mid-high level of autonomy. Therefore, it may not be as stable as other forms of government.

Social Democracy:
Modern Era. I don't remember what I set for its tech. Has a science rate of 10 (more gov't funding), can draft, gets not as many free units. Very stable government, resistant to propaganda, etc. etc. They are more corrupt than federal republics,however.

Reasoning: Social Democracies provide a more unified country generally. They are more prone to corruption (less distribution of power) but offer a stronger central government.

Anyways, I made a Fundamentalist and Fascist government as well. Fundamentalist has 50% rate cap (since that is as low as it can get) and of course draft, military police, resistance to propaganda, etc. etc. Many free units. Fascism has less free units, but a higher rate cap. Sorry I am not going into more detail here but since I do not have the game here it is difficult. I am hoping that they will release a new editor that will allow much more versatility, especially one that will allow you to affect the happiness of the people... I appreciate the fact that you put Violent Extremism given the limited options in the editor to encompass both government types. But, I personally made both Fascism and Fundamentalism just to see. I personally toyed with the idea of just making one "Modern Democracy" or "Constitutional Democracy" government since I couldn't really make very large differences between the two democracy types.

I made a Small Wonder, Constitution:
You can build this with the aquiring of the new technology Social Contract. It requires a production of 90. Very high, but my reasoning is, a truly working Constitution can take a lot of time and effort. I made it extremely worthwhile though, as a Constitution provides a lot of stability to a nation. Usually, it takes a lot of growing pains to develop one. The ups to making this a small wonder is that any government can have a constitution. Therefore, you can have Constitutional monarchies, democracies, etc. Yes, even Fascist governments had constitutions (Hitler used to brag that he legally became dictator) I wanted to make the Constitution a requirement for Social Democracy and Federal Republic but unfortunately you can't do that.

Techs:
Social Contract: I believe I made this available with Education and Economics, though I honestly don't remember. In any event, the concept of a social contract was first actualized with the Magna Carta, but was first laid down in philosophy in Jean-Jacque Rousseau's The Social Contract. This idea is that the government is a contract between the people and the government. Along with the philosophies of others like Locke and Payne, this became the basis for modern concepts on government and freedom.

The Federal Republic: Can research after the Social Contract. Allows change to the federal republic system.

Also, I moved Sun Tzu's Art of War into the Ancient Era and made a new tech, Advanced Tactics, which is required to build Sun Tzu's Art of War.
Reasoning: Sun Tzu's Art of War was written about 350 BC. The tactics were not particularly appropriate during the middle ages... medieval warfare tended to be mostly disorganized peasant armies. Huge battles involving complex troop movements (In europe, for instance, Agincourt) were not particularly common. Even in these cases, they tended to be very ceremonial with primitive tactics (even more so in China).

Just a quick note before I end this: The government designs I am putting are supposed to be reflective of what the setup of a government, _in its barest form_ would be. So, while I am well aware that the United States is a very unified, very strong country, we can't forget that the U.S. initially did not have a very big military nor a particularly powerful federal government, and that it took a large number of growing pains to achieve such. Don't forget the U.S. was pretty close to collapsing into two countries at one point. So, I tried to be general in how I describe these governments rather than how we recognize them today. After all, the point is to make our own history, right?? :-) I hope to hear your comments/suggestions though. While I did implement a number of these changes into my own game, I did not have a lot of time to play test them, nor am I a particularly good mod-maker. There are a number of other techs I would like to add to the game, but that I have not outlined here. Besides, I didn't want to write a novel here ;-) Let me know what you think!
-- Rooster