Cradle 1.2

[Boney]

Thanks Lou, looks like I have now found a use for my massive pw surplus.

[hexagonian]

Originally posted by Lou Wigman
This may have been mentioned before. If it has I apologise. Unit recovery is very slow (10% per turn from memory). However a unit placed in a fort will recover in 1 turn.

This is intentional, not only from a realism standpoint, but also from a limitation within the program.

A bit of background first...

I had wanted to make an aggressive war more difficult for the player. In the default game, the heal rate within a city is only one turn, so it became rather easy for a player to push forward in that type of war. The heal rate out on the field was at 10% per turn in the default game, which also seemed too quick. So I totally eliminated the heal rate out on the field, forcing a player to rotate in fresh troops, which to me added a level of strategic thinking, plus it also means that a player has to have a sizable force established to pursue an aggressive war. If a player wants to restore his forces to their normal strength, he has to return them to a friendly city and wait.

Now it could be argued that from a logic standpoint, a civ should be able to send out the fresh reinforcements to the wounded unit to heal it (why does the unit have to march back to the city to get healed) but when I was setting this up, there wasn't anything in the game engine that would similate this effect (since then, there has been a SLIC file created in MedMod that accomplished this effect.)

Added to this issue was the heal rate for a Fortification, which was 1 turn for a wounded unit. I could not locate the coding to overwrite the heal rate for the Fortification either, so I was stuck with it. So I boosted the cost (4x) - it was either keep it in the game or remove the ability to build it altogether. Forts now have a greater purpose than in the default game, because they are the only place in Cradle to heal a unit quickly.

To adjust your own settings go to the various CR_const.txt files and the entries will look like this

CITY_HEAL_RATE 0.05 # from 1
NORMAL_HEAL_RATE 0.0 # from 0.1

You can change the settings to whatever you want.

Originally posted by Lou Wigman
On a separate note. Unit maintenance is based on production points. Perhaps a gold cost could also be introduced. At its most basic 1 gold per turn per unit?

This would be nice, and in fact this was something that I wished had been a part of the game from the start. And in the units.txt file, there is a flag

FoodHunger 0

that seems to imply that there can be a food cost to maintain a unit. But when I tried to use this flag, it did not appear to work.

It's something that probably be accomplished via SLIC though.

[Shadow]

Cradle is working great!

The only query, or comment I have, is that when units are activated in a city they can't move straight away, they must wait a turn. I believe this wasn't the case pre-cradle. I guess not a huge issue for some, but it's p!ssing me off no end... [grin]

Shadow

[hexagonian]

Are you activating the militia unit? If so, militias cannot move from a city.

[Immortal Wombat]

Originally posted by hexagonian
FoodHunger 0

that seems to imply that there can be a food cost to maintain a unit. But when I tried to use this flag, it did not appear to work.

It's something that probably be accomplished via SLIC though.

Do you want it?

It would have to be a building effect, like Jules' pop boom trigger though.

[Shadow]

I'll test it Hex, never thought to check that. Just not used to the new malitia unit that start with a city automatically. Great concept that.

Ta, Shadow.

[Shadow]

Yeah you were right Hex, about the militia that is. Ta.

Another comment, I've noticed the enemy pillaging my goods, but the goods stay there and seem to remain usable at trade items. I assume this was not the intent. Do the pics of the goods remain, but the value derived from them (with a trade route) get taken away?

Shadow

[hexagonian]

Originally posted by Shadow
Another comment, I've noticed the enemy pillaging my goods, but the goods stay there and seem to remain usable at trade items. I assume this was not the intent. Do the pics of the goods remain, but the value derived from them (with a trade route) get taken away?

Shadow

Goods have been reworked in Cradle, thanks to Martin's GoodMod. They work like this...

In the default game, goods did not add any bonuses to a tile - their only purpose was tied into the ability to trade. So they could not be pillaged, only pirated.

In GoodMod, a good now also adds either a production/food/gold bonus to a tile, in addition to being the basis for Trade. When a good is pillaged, the bonus is removed for a number of turns - offhand, I do not know how many turns though (Martin can fill you in on this). If you click on a good tile before and after a tile is pillaged, you will note the difference in the values. The graphic of the good remains and after a number of turns, the bonus does return.

Since the good also works as the basis of trade, and that cannot be pillaged, then a player has to pirate the trade route in order to remove the goods worth in the trade department - at least until new caravans are built.

Ben,

If you want to create a couple of SLIC files simulating a requirement of food/gold in a unit's maintenance - one for gold and one for food, that will be great. Start with the requirement of 1 food and 1 gold per unit. I would like to have these files as separate, so a player has the option to use either or both. One thing though, these files will probably slow down the early game even more. I don't know how everyone feels about this.

A question about food though - there isn't a global pool of food like there is for gold (Rush Buy funds) and production (PW). I know in the global slider box that here is a report on how much food you have stored, but food is allocated on a city-by city basis.

How is this going to work?

Finally, my home computer monitor is on the verge of frying out, so hopefully, I will be able to test these files for crashes before having them posted. I do not know how soon it will be before I can get a new one (money is still tight), but I am here every day, and can still make suggestions and post files.

[Immortal Wombat]

Originally posted by hexagonian
Ben,

If you want to create a couple of SLIC files simulating a requirement of food/gold in a unit's maintenance - one for gold and one for food, that will be great. Start with the requirement of 1 food and 1 gold per unit. I would like to have these files as separate, so a player has the option to use either or both. One thing though, these files will probably slow down the early game even more. I don't know how everyone feels about this.

Well, gold is easy:

HandleEvent(BeginTurn) 'gold_upkeep' pre {
          int_t  i;
          unit_t tmpUnit;
          for(i = 0; i < player[0].units; i = i + 1){
                 GetUnitByIndex(player[0], i, tmpUnit);
                 if(!IsCivilian(tmpUnit)){
                         AddGold(player[0], -1);
                 }
          }
}

I assumed you don't want upkeep on settlers and diplomats etc...
Untried and untested 'til I get home. The IsCivilian might be wrong.
Food will be more difficult.

A question about food though - there isn't a global pool of food like there is for gold (Rush Buy funds) and production (PW). I know in the global slider box that here is a report on how much food you have stored, but food is allocated on a city-by city basis.

How is this going to work?

It will come out of individual cities. Perhaps it would be possible to make food be deducted as a lump sum when the unit is built (PoWs and Goodies dont eat...) . I think in fact it will be difficult, as it would depend on having the upkeep spread out across the empire's cities. Inpractical for large armies, the'd starve whole cities...

[Martin Gühmann]

Originally posted by hexagonian
In GoodMod, a good now also adds either a production/food/gold bonus to a tile, in addition to being the basis for Trade. When a good is pillaged, the bonus is removed for a number of turns - offhand, I do not know how many turns though (Martin can fill you in on this). If you click on a good tile before and after a tile is pillaged, you will note the difference in the values. The graphic of the good remains and after a number of turns, the bonus does return.

Adding a bonus to the Goods in CTP2 was a bit tricky, you have the correct fields in the goods.txt available, but they have no effect on the terrain. Therefore technically every Good now consits of two parts: On the one hand the default one without the bonus and that is only good for trade, and on the other an invisible tile improvement. Of course the tile improvement can be pillaged, if someone own this "good improvment". So if the good is pillaged the default part of the good is left,and some slic code cause the rebuild of this tile improvement. I gave every good improvement the construction time of ten turns. If you like to change the construction time or give every good a different restoration time, feel free to edit the according tileimp.txt.

-Martin

[ENGINEER]

Hey Hex,

I was playing Craddle again, been a long time since I got used to Civ III, and I was wondering if slavers can no longer capture slaves from the babarians? I thought you used to be able to and its been too long since I played a regular game of CTP 2. Just curious and if so the logic of not allowing it?

[hexagonian]

Originally posted by ENGINEER
I was playing Craddle again, been a long time since I got used to Civ III, and I was wondering if slavers can no longer capture slaves from the babarians? I thought you used to be able to and its been too long since I played a regular game of CTP 2. Just curious and if so the logic of not allowing it?

How's it going Engineer,
So how did you like civ3 - I have it but have not played it at all - too busy playing EU2!

Make sure you have the latest update file from my site - at least the December text files update...

I just posted the Cradle 1.3 Beta there today, but it is handled as a separate option available in Modswapper. The 1.3 Beta will also make use of the files in the December update, so it is suggested that if you want to use the 1.3 Beta, you should also get the Dec. update.

Slavers can only capture slaves from a city and from an unescorted Nomad/Settler. If you stack them with an army, there is no effect. Slavers are stealth units too.

Slavemasters, on the other hand can be stacked with an army to enslave defeated enemies, including barbarian forces. They cannot enslave a worker from a city, but they can defeat a Nomad/Settler in a pitched battle and then capture them. You only need one per army to get the slave, but if the Slavemaster is killed in battle and your forces still win, it does not enslave the defeated foe.

All ancient Wonder units work the same way as a Slavemaster, as well as the the government-specific units, Pezheterois and Praetorians (not the Elephant Warriors however).

The reason why I created the dual Slaver/Slavemaster units was to force the AI to enslave in the game via military action. I had to create a military unit with an enslave ability, as merely placing the Slaver in the military build lists could make the AI build too many of a single-purpose unit with no military capability whatsoever - leading to the creation of large armies with nothing but Slavers.

In gameplay, Slavemasters are a much better buy than Slavers - but a player can drop the cost of a Slaver in their setup to make them worthwhile. (in CRA_units.txt).

Probably something I should do eventually...

[ENGINEER]

Thanks for the explanation. I had written a much longer post, but I lost it.

[hexagonian]

So is there any input on Beta 1.3???

[Boney]

I will try 1.3 at the weekend. I really would like to be able to compare the latest versions crusade and cradle, especially after reading that crusade had added some of the cradle things. It seems that no one has yet compared the latest versions of the best two mods for ctp2. I just wish crusade would not keep crashing around the 170 turn mark.

Another thing is futile AI attacks, I would like to see the AI sometimes hit a city with 3 12stacks. The AI only ever attacks with one stack per city. Is this possible?

How about AI retreating sometime too? or disabling retreat for humans if AI cannot. (I cannot resist hitting that button sometimes)

If cradle and crusade could somehow join together another interesting hybrid would have been created. Is there any possibility of this happening? (now this WOULD be CTP3) If this happened then this game should be released as a CD on its own merits. At least then Dave, Wes et al could be compensated for the time they generously donated free.

One thing I really like is the upgrade of unit feature in cradle. Sometimes I keep playing a game an extra hour or more just to upgrade before I go to bed. It is similar to the feeling I get when I either get a certain needed advance for a unit or for a wonder.

Have to say that the ctp2 modders are doing a great job, It makes me become interested in modding too. Scenarios would be good, but let's see how far the AI can be taken first.

Most of this post has been put on the medmod/crusade thread too.