Cradle - 1.1

[hexagonian]

is posted at

http://www.mydocsonline.com

login: hexagonia
password: hextapul

See readme for a comprehensive breakdown for this Mod - this latest version has many changes over the past one.

All files need to be downloaded. There will be no additional units in later updates, so any additional updates will be text files only. (if any...)

[Pilfur]

This looks very nice. It is the first mod that actually decided to start on my computer without crashing the game. Unfortunately I still can't load any saved games though. It keeps reporting problems with SLIC files (failing to find functions it apparently expects) and then shuts down.

From what I saw in the Great Library though, this looks really cool

[Martin Gühmann]

Patched or Unpatched

Pilfur do you play with the patch or without the patch 1.1. The patched version a lot more functions than the unpatched. But be warned the patch is also not the best option to play this game.

-Martin

[Pilfur]

Yup, silly me. I hadn't installed the patch. Great work on these Mods! I'm now playing the MedMod2 as well.

[hexagonian]

Make sure that you launch a new game through the Mod every time before loading a saved game too...

[hexagonian]

I have sent a note to Mark to post the Cradle here at Apolyton.

Last night in my game (Very Hard, 12 civs, Raging Hordes), the Japanese gutted my empire at around turn 250, and I am happy with what happened.

Several AI civs and the Barbarians kept military stacks outside of my cities for a good portion of the game. I could not get them to agree to leave, nor did I have the military strength to deal with all of them. I monitored the AI from time to time on the cheat mode - the AI did not lose any cities to the Barbarians. The Barbarians are a little more passive than I like, but it is the sheer number of them that makes it tricky to deal with them, because they will stack up and attack any weak stacks that venture outside of your cities. It becomes a challenge to decide what to build - improvements or military. The Barbarians did attack and take one of my cities in the early going with a large stack - I had to build up and retake the city, losing time in the process.

For a good part of the game, those AI stacks parked outside of my cities were minding their own business - in fact I was a little annoyed with the AI's passivity. I knew that if they wanted to, they could do me a world of hurt. I never started a war in the course of the game - but this Mod makes it difficult to do so, because of the healing limitations placed on units.

But, in the course of a few turns, the Americans took a city with a stack, and then the Japanese launched an assault on my internal cities with a stack. As a sidenote, I had a sizable force on the southern part of my empire to deal with 2 other civs who had been harrassing my units. By the time I got that force back up to the north, the Japanese had taken my two best cities, and the trigger that guts a city of improvements had wiped out a good portion of those city improvements. I took the cities back, but it was hopeless to rebuild up, and build a military to deal with all of the attacking civs.

What was also interesing to note was the distance the Japanese force traveled to get into my heart. The Japanese had parked a stack of 12 in my empire, and after taking a couple of cities, were in the process of sending an additional stack in my direction.

So yes, this Mod is hard on the harder levels... Isn't that what everyone wants?

The Mod is still available at my site, so if you want to, go ahead and download it from there.

Below is an exerpt from the readme, describing what I wanted to accomplish in this Mod...

?One of my main purposes in creating this Mod was to address the shortcomings of the AI. I worked from the principle that if the AI was not capable of exploiting a feature in the game, then I would (attempt to) severely limit what the player could do in that same situation. This would make the game more difficult, because the tried-and-true strategies of the past may not work as well.?

a. Global Slider Adjustments
- Base Wages are at 5 gold per worker instead of 4
- Gain/Loss on the Ration Slider is at ration per worker instead of 3 per slider click
- Gain/Loss on the Production Slider is at .10 instead of .15 per slider click

It is my impression that the AI does not use the sliders too much ? therefore, these adjustments will help level the playing field. This will make it harder to max out the sliders to catch up to the AI on harder levels.

b. There is also a happiness penalty for maxxing out your sliders. Basically, you gain more unhappiness for working/underpaying/starving your workers than if you treat them well. The standard rate is (-3) for unhappiness and (+2) for happiness, although there are different settings for certain governments.

c. Rush Buy Modifiers have been increased in the later governments. It will cost more to Rush Buy later in the game.

d. Healing Rate for Units has been greatly slowed down - It has been totally eliminated if the unit remains out in the field, and is at 5% per turn in a city.

e. AI Goody Hut Priority - Increased Barbarian attacks - Reduction of free stuff from Goody Huts.

f. AI Production Boost on the more difficult levels

g. AI Power Bonus and Siege Priority Boost - this is supposed to make the AI more aggressive and more willing to attack cities - there are also many tweaks in the Strategies.txt file.

h. Happiness issues have been modified with the following...
- Base happiness is now at 75 instead of 73
- Revolutions are at 68
- Pollution has been modified to affect happiness earlier in the game

i. City Population growth has been slowed - the first cap is at 12 instead of 18.
- Aqueducts are now a food enhancement improvement (per Granary)
- The City Efficiency Improvements are now the Apothecary, Physician, and Bath House

j. There are now 2 types of Slavers. The Slaver works as a stealth unit, but it cannot be stacked with an army to capture slaves. There is also a Slavemaster, which does not have stealth capabilities, but can be stacked with an army to capture slaves. This is an effort to make slaving a little more difficult for the player, as the AI does not use slavers in stacked combat. Creating a military unit with slaving abilities will help the AI reduce the advantage that a human player has. In addition, the Chariot, Legion and Praetorian units will automatically enslave a defeated foe.

I believe that the combination of the tweaks above have given CTP2 a much-needed challenge to the player.

[hexagonian]

bump

[hexagonian]

Just a report on my current Cradle game...

Very Hard
Huge Map
Raging Hordes
9 Civs

I just hit turn 400 - I have survived so far. My civ is 11 cities, which is also the size of a couple other civs too. Curently, I am running in 7th place. The Mexicans are way up on the power graph - with the strongest military and the best economy - despite my efforts to build city improvements at the expense of a full-scale military buildup. It is my hope though that I will be able to gradually catch up and surpass them with a solid economy and then use that economy to build a strong military. I have been able to build one Wonder so far (Temple of Zeus), and have yet to get a Wonder unit. However, I am aiming for Caeser...

There have been a lot of unprovoked attacks on my civ by other civs - at one time I was at a state of war with 6 civs. I have lost a city for the time being, I lost another settler stack to an unprovoked attack, and have been hit with attacks on other cities and units numerous times, but I have managed to defend them. With every attack though, I have to take time to rebuild my military and allow time for units to heal. I usually have to build up a force of 3-5 units to accompany my settler because I usually get a visit from either barbarians or other civs when my cities are built.

With all of the fighting, I have a large slave population, but due to the needs of maintaining a large garrison force in those cities with slaves, I am limited in bringing my military in prolonged offensive campaigns. I cannot have my cake and eat it too, it seems...

So far I have managed to take a Viking city, thereby cutting off an ongoing assault by them and have been rebuffed on several other city assaults with other civs.

I am enjoying the challenge - as far as I am concerned, this is how the game should of been released.

[hexagonian]

Well I do know that people read this thread based on number of viewers, so I will continue...

It is now turn 525 and I have moved up to third on the power graph. There is a logjam of 4 civs just behind me, and the Mexicans and the Ethiopians are running ahead of me. For a while, I thought I was in a good position to overtake everyone, but events have conspired to temper my opinion, at least for the moment.

To the east, the Thais, whom I have had a long running history of war/peace, sent a stack of Praetorians into my empire while I was at peace with them and managed to take one of my three best cities. The city was very well defended too, but I had not reached the Iron Age yet, so I did not have access to those powerful infantry units.

At the same time to the west, the Mexicans attacked one of my stacks and decimated it with their Praetorians. Fearing a two front war against powerful units, I decided to pull back my units and go after the Thai invaders (the Mexicans had not taken a city up to this point). I had earlier taken a city deep within Thai territory and was in the process of assembling my own counterstriking force. I sent my own stack to attempt to take another Thai city but was repelled by superior defenses.

At the same time, I consolidated my internal forces, made a beeline to Iron Working and Dictatorship and started building Legions. I also played some cat and mouse with the Mexicans. The barbarians actually proved to be somewhat of a godsend at this point in time. I was able to bypass their fortified positions (due to my vision allotted to the city radius) The Mexicans and Thais were not so fortunate, as the barbarians managed to weaken some of the incoming stacks.

After assembling my force, I marched on the city that the Thais had captured and was able to retake it. I had to rush buy an Apothecary, as the battles had gutted some of the improvements I had built earlier and the population was starving. The Thais had also done me a favor by liberating the large slave population there, thus freeing up future garrison units for more offensive-minded pursuits. I am in the process of cleaning out the rest of the offending Thai units and upgrading that city's infrastructure to its former glory.

However, there still remains the Ethiopians, which are situated to my south. I have several southern cities that are isolated from my empire. At the same time that I was fighting the Mexicans/Thais, it has been reported to me by my spies that the Ethiopians have been sending a steady stream of stacks to the north. My sorthernmost cities have also confirmed that those stacks are making their prescence known outside of their walls. They also have the largest military, according to the powergraph, though I am now close to them due to my own buildup.

At this point in time I am at peace with them, but that will probably change...

[ENGINEER]

Is the game your playing the latest update available on your website? I downloaded and can't wait to play it and yes people are reading. I find it enjoyable to read yours and others stories on the SG threads.

[hexagonian]

The latest version is the one at my site and the one I am using. I have not changed anything for the past couple of weeks.

I tend to play as more of a builder rather than a warmonger, so the changes I made were directed to counter my own tendencies.

Playing on large maps also makes warfare difficult to pursue because of the no-heal factor for units outside of a city. This has made a huge difference for attempting to pursue an expansionist war.

And of course, any imput to improve this mod is welcome....

[Immortal Wombat]

The latest version is the one at my site and the one I am using. I have not changed anything for the past couple of weeks.

Despite my best efforts
BTW, I have now got the code to create spearman militia all the time I despair....

[Dale]

Hexa:
You emailed me a week or so ago and asked me to keep you updated on Diplomod as you were using the latest version in Cradle. Well........... SHHHHHHHHHHHH. Don't tell anyone this, you're the first to get it. If I quietly slip the new V3.6 Beta to ya, maybe no one will notice it.

Contains a couple of new changes that went into Med Pack II.

[hexagonian]

Looks like the secret is out - someone has downloaded it several times already...

I will be taking a look at it this weekend. Do I have to start a new game though, or just do the reload slic trick for an existing game, since I have a good one going?

Thanks for the great work

I'm still hoping you can get that 'capture unit' coding to work Ben.

[hexagonian]

Below is Dales Diplomod 3.6 modified for the Cradle setup. The only change is to the Enable Advance for Diplomats/Embassies (in Cradle the Enable Advance is Dynasty instead of Bureaucracy) and the setting for map exchanges, which is at a lower probability than Dale's settings (but consistant to previous versions of Cradle)

Make backups of existing files, as I have not playtested Dale's update yet - but he has a great track record with his files.

Enjoy