Making Cradle 3+ fully compatible with the Apolyton Edition

[Carolus V.]

Posted by Kull
Anyway, I'm not aware of any improvements which can directly affect population pollution (other than by allowing cities to grow to ever larger sizes). Any ideas?

Hello
I think the flag you are looking for is: PopulationPollutionPercent with a negativ value. For instance -0.20 gives you a reduction of 20% of Pollution caused by the inhabitants of your city. The Drugstore, Eco-Transit, Public Transport and Hospital Improvement has this flag. In Cradle Mod I think the Apothecary Improvement has it as well.

And I saw you have another little problem, choosing civilisation in an scenario (you posted it earlier in this thread). There is, probably a way, if I recall this correctly, by changing the the "RuleSets =" entry in Userprofile.txt. There you set path for the Scenario you want to play and you should be able to see the correct List of Civs in the Mod.

[Kull]

Posted by Kull
Anyway, I'm not aware of any improvements which can directly affect population pollution (other than by allowing cities to grow to ever larger sizes). Any ideas?

Hello
I think the flag you are looking for is: PopulationPollutionPercent with a negativ value. For instance -0.20 gives you a reduction of 20% of Pollution caused by the inhabitants of your city. The Drugstore, Eco-Transit, Public Transport and Hospital Improvement has this flag. In Cradle Mod I think the Apothecary Improvement has it as well.

OK, thanks! Frankly I think that extremely large cities from the Ancient up through the Early Modern era *should* have to deal with population pollution. At some point (talking both actual history AND game mechanisms) the technology to deal with that more effectively does become available, so I'll look a bit closer at some of the late game improvements in that regard.

And I saw you have another little problem, choosing civilisation in an scenario (you posted it earlier in this thread). There is, probably a way, if I recall this correctly, by changing the the "RuleSets =" entry in Userprofile.txt. There you set path for the Scenario you want to play and you should be able to see the correct List of Civs in the Mod.

Actually no, the problem was solved - exactly in the way you describe. See Post #2 for details!

[Carolus V.]

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[Kull]

Religious Attacks (5): Our first introduction to the "rat's nest" involved an analysis of the Soothsay attack (see Post #91) and how it actually functions. To the extent possible, many of those issues have been resolved so let's give it another look.

1) Soothsay: A religious attack which causes unhappiness in a foreign city and is used by the Prophet, Cleric, and Televangelist. The Button, Messageicon, and Cursor use a "grinning skull" icon and (along with the messaging), are unique to this attack. As noted in the earlier post, the Sprite & Sound are shared with the "Advertise" attack. Cradle dealt with the problem by disabling the sound and changing the sprite to the "blue cloud", which is also used by Indulgences. However, "Advertise" has an interesting sprite, in which commercial items revolve above an unhappy face. For Cradle 3+, I modified the sprite so that a skull revolves over the same face (see attached) and implemented a chant-like sound which now plays during the Soothsay attack.

This attack is controlled by the settings in units.txt, specifically the presence of "CanSoothsay" and "CauseUnhappiness". The latter includes "Chance" (of success), "Amount" (the amount of unhappiness in the target city resulting from a successful attack), and "Timer" (how long the unhappiness lasts). These settings can be different for each unit. Playtesting has shown that the AI will use this attack, but rarely. Accordingly, the cost was reduced from 500 to 300 to try and spark greater usage.

Since "Soothsay" and "Advertise" no longer co-exist in the same time frame, it's possible to give them unique sounds and sprites, but that also makes them era-dependent (so the solution will be discussed later)


2) Convert City: A religious attack which converts a foreign city to "your" religion and is used by the Prophet, Cleric, Patriarch, and Televangelist. The sprite, sound, icons & messages are all unique to this attack and required no alteration. It is controlled by the settings in units.txt, specifically the presence of "ConvertCities", which includes "Chance" (of success) and "DeathChance" (possibility that the unit could be killed when carrying out the attack). Each of these can be (and are) different for each unit. As with "Franchise", there is no time limit associated with the results of a successful attack - the city will remain under foreign religious influence until it is "reformed".

The AI uses this attack extensively, and it is not "era-dependent". A rare example of "no changes necessary!"


3) Reform City: This attack counters the results of "Convert City, and removes foreign religious control. It is available to most units, but primarily the military ("CanReform" is appended to the bottom of each unit record in units.txt). The sprite, sound, icons & messages are all unique to this attack and required no alteration.

The AI uses this attack extensively, and it is not "era-dependent". Another example of "no changes necessary"


4) Sell Indulgences: A very simple religious attack that extracts a small amount of gold from rival civs and is used by the Prophet, Cleric, and Patriarch. Controlled by the presence of "IndulgenceSales" in units.txt, it is always successful and costs nothing to perform - the AI does use it, but rarely. The Button, Messageicon, and Cursor use "ankh+coins" icons which are (along with the messaging), unique to this attack. Although the Sprite (blue cloud) is shared with a few other attacks, it hasn't changed (couldn't think of an obvious alternative). The sound file has been shifted to a new "gregorian chant" (it previously played the CtP2 "marketing" sound).

Very little was needed here, but there is an "era-dependency" with "FaithHeal"


5) Faith Heal: Does exactly the same thing as "Indulgences" and is used only by the Televangelist. The button, cursor, sound & sprite are the same as "Indulgences", but the messageicon and messages are different and are triggered by the "isTelevangelist" attribute. I'll spare you the details, but despite strong indications that "FaithHeal" was an independent attack which could be separated from Indulgences (and thus get a full set of unique graphics and sounds), in the end I couldn't make it work. However, you get much the same result from utilizing the "era-dependent" solutions deployed elsewhere:
* Activates the existing (but unused) "hands-on-head" Button
* Activates the existing (but unused) "hands-on-head" Cursors
* Enables an existing Televangelist voice to serve as the "Attack" sound

[Carolus V.]

" Actually no, the problem was solved - exactly in the way you describe. See Post #2 for details!"
Oops. Sorry for that. Obviously I´ve totally forgotten, that you already posted the solution. At least I remembered correctly

"Frankly I think that extremely large cities from the Ancient up through the Early Modern era *should* have to deal with population pollution. At some point (talking both actual history AND game mechanisms) the technology to deal with that more effectively does become available,"

You got a point there. Historicalwise overpopulated city had to deal with diseases, hunger and so on, so that on the one hand Overpopulation reduced itself simply because people died or left the city. Gamewise, Hexagonian simulated this with the CRA_disaster.slc. And while this Script is a bit restrained in this relation, the AOM script is way too "overpowered" (In my opinion). Every fifth or tenth Turn a Plague or Hunger-Catostrophy can kill you. But 60+ cities in the early Game are nevertheless way too big.

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[Kull]

Slave-related Attacks (4): Two of these involve capturing slaves, while the others involve freeing individuals or instigating a slave revolt.


1) Slave Raid: A slavery-related attack which turns a citizen from the target city into a slave in one of yours, and is used by the Slaver and Slave Trader units. All the graphics (ball&chain related) and sounds are appropriate and required no editing. The attack is controlled by the "SlaveRaids" settings in units.txt, to include "Chance" (of success), "DeathChance" (possibility that the unit could be killed when carrying out the attack), "Amount" (the amount of unhappiness in the target city resulting from a successful attack), and "Timer" (how long the unhappiness lasts). All of these can be different for every unit. The cost is fairly low (250) and the AI uses this attack frequently.

In the original CtP2 code, the "victim civ" would always declare war, but Source Code changes make it no longer automatic. However, in my experience it still happens in most cases, probably because my civ usually has a dismal relationship with its neighbors. Also, the "whooshing net" sound was shared with the Piracy attack, but as reported in Post #98, each attack now has a unique sound. Otherwise, the only visible change is there are now different entries in the GL for "Slave Raid" and "Enslave Settler". This attack is not "era-dependent".


2) Enslave Settler: A slavery-related attack which turns a foreign settler into a slave in one of your cities, and is used by the Slaver and Slave Trader units. It uses the same graphics as the "Slave Raid", but the sound ("who's next?") is different. That's helpful, because during the end turn phase you'll hear either whooshing sounds or the Slaver's voice, and that tells you which of the two attacks is being carried out by the AI. And in fact, the AI is very good at both.

This attack is controlled by the "SettlerSlaveRaids" setting in units.txt, is always successful, and poses no danger to the attacking unit. Unlike the "Slave Raid", it always results in a Declaration of War (the only exception is in cases where the victim civ is unaware that your civ even exists). Given that (and the certainty of success), the cost has been reduced to 100 (just be aware that there isn't an on-map display of the cost, unlike what you see with "Slave Raids").

Lastly there is an issue with the "Success" message. Both attacks use the same messagebox code, and although the text can be edited, the existence of the shared message is hardcoded and can't be altered. Which is unfortunate, because the message includes a code link which gives you the name of the destination city (i.e. where the slave is going). For "Slave Raids", that city name is always correct. But for "Enslave Settler", the city is ALMOST ALWAYS WRONG! I considered removing that information from the message altogether, but since it works perfectly for one, the player just needs to be aware that it doesn't for the other. This attack is not "era-dependent".


3) Free Slaves: An attack which frees slaves owned by a different civ, used by the Patriarch & Abolitionist. All the graphics ("breaking chains") and sounds are appropriate and required no editing. The attack is controlled by the "UndergroundRailway" settings in units.txt, to include "Chance" (of success) and "DeathChance" (possibility that the unit could be killed when carrying out the attack). In playtesting, the AI has never used this attack, but that is probably related to the late appearance of the Abolitionist (the cost is only 50 gold). Even though the early-game Patriarch also has this ability, there are very few of those units (awarded only when certain Wonders are built), and they seem to prefer using their religious attacks instead.

There is one oddity - a successful attack causes TWO sprites & sounds to play - the "breaking chains" sprite first (with dog barking), and then "waving trumpets" (with fanfare). The second set of effects is hardcoded to play and are associated with the "GENERAL_SUCCESS" settings in speceffectID.txt and sounds.txt. Since they are also used by other attacks (such as "Pillage"), they can't be changed. Not a big deal, but rather a "coding curiosity". This attack is not "era-dependent".


4) Incite Uprising: This attack - when successful - causes a city with slaves to revolt and become a new civ, and is used exclusively by the Abolitionist. Although the sprite is shared (appropriately) with "Free Slaves", the buttons and cursors feature something modern, a "handing-down-a-rifle" graphic. Which is fine, because the Abolitionist is a post-gunpowder unit. The existing sounds were hard to pin down, but seemed to include whips and a creaking cart. Given the rifle symbology, I replaced that with a different file which includes rifle shots amidst a screaming crowd.

The attack is controlled by the "SlaveUprising" setting in units.txt, and can only be performed on a slave-holding city. There isn't a fixed cost for this attack - it's a formula based on count of slaves and distance from the nation's capital. It always results in a Declaration of War, regardless of success or failure.

Unlike many special attacks, there isn't a fixed chance of success. Rather, it appears to be related to the settings in "const.txt" which control "random" slave uprisings. First is SLAVES_PER_MILITARY_UNIT, which is set at "12" in Cradle (vs the CTP2 default of "3"). That means a city with 12 slaves can be safely guarded by 1 military unit. If there are 13 or more, the additional slaves are considered "unguarded", and the second setting comes into play, UPRISING_CHANCE_PER_UNGUARDED_SLAVE. The Cradle number is "2" (which I think means 20%) while the CtP2 default is "5".

Because of the "Victory Enslavement" feature (creates slaves simply by engaging in battle) and the large number of units which have this attribute, slaves are more common in Cradle games. In addition, prior to the Source Code fixes, all slaves would accumulate in the city nearest to the action (those gained in battle AND those from Slavers). So it was very easy to have individual cities with vast slave populations. Factor in the inability of AI civs to properly manage garrison counts, and large AI civs were soon torn apart by revolts of all sorts, which tended to make victory much easier for the human player. The AE version addresses most of that, so these settings will DEFINITELY be re-examined, and almost certainly revised for Cradle 3+, at least in part because there is one more issue, and it specifically affects this attack.

A "random" slave revolt is always successful. If the combination of unguarded slaves plus successful "uprising chance" come together, you get a revolt. The code does not allow for unsuccessful revolts. By contrast, "Incite Uprising" forces a revolt to be attempted and when it fails (as it will certainly do since the Source Code AI is EXCELLENT at maintaining large garrisons), two things will happen. All slaves in the target city are killed and it PERMANENTLY removes one unused civilization from the list of those eligible to form new nations in the event of successful revolts.

So what does that mean? Let's assume you start a game with EIGHT civs and set TWELVE as the "maximum number that can be in the game at the same time". The code will invisibly set aside FOUR civs - by name - as those which are "eligible to appear". When an Abolitionist-inspired revolt fails, one of those names is removed. You'll even get a message saying that "<Target Civ> have conquered the nation of <Revolting Civ>", after which that "nation" will never appear in your game (see attachment). After only four failed slave revolts, it will be impossible for new civs to appear, and all revolts henceforth (even if "random" or non-slave related) will produce only Barbarians.

Sorry for the long dissertation, but players should be aware that unless you choose a target city with a large population of slaves, and actively attack the city with an army in order to drive the size of the garrison down to one unit and ONLY THEN attack it with your Abolitionist - the attack will ALWAYS fail. Which makes it hardly worth doing, but I will (reluctantly) keep it in-game. Albeit with a "Caveat Emptor" warning in the GL. In closing, this attack is not "era-dependent".

[Kull]

Terror Attacks (5): Most of these are "future era" attacks in AE, but several have been repurposed to the Ancient Era in Cradle.


1) BioTerror (was "Create Atrocity", is now "Siege"): A biological attack which reduces city production and happiness for 5 turns and has a chance of affecting additional cities linked by trade routes. Originally performed by four Wonder Units (Sargon/Hannibal/Attila/Genghis), plus the late-game "Infector". This attack offered a mix of graphics (mostly "skull & crossbones") but also included a Sprite (rising green gas), Sound (screaming populace) and Cradle-specific Messages. After a successful attack, a blinking bio hazard sign appears next to the city status bar (in the color of the attacking civ).

The attack is controlled by the "BioTerror" setting in "units.txt", to include "Chance" (of success). Additional settings are present in "const.txt" which allow you to customize the duration of the event (5 turns), unhappiness level (-5) and the amount of production loss (30%). To my knowledge, the AI has never used this attack, but that could be because so few units can perform it in the early game. Also the cost is high (1,000 - same in AE) and it is considered an Atrocity. Unfortunately there isn't a way to "flag" particular attacks as "Atrocities", although it would be nice to have that as an option.

I always found this to be a rather disconcerting attack, especially as redefined in Cradle. How exactly would a "Wonder Unit" go about creating an atrocity like this? There are certainly tales (albeit mostly from medieval times) of armies hurling infected carcasses into a besieged city. But even when that occurred, it ALWAYS meant the besiegers were infected as well, and just looking to share the misery. Which is not how this attack works, since the attackers are always "disease free". Also, why those specific units? Hannibal but not Caesar? Sargon but not Rameses? The more I looked at it, the less I liked it. Which eventually led to a new approach - the "Siege"

Historically, the population effects we see from this attack would definitely apply to Cities under Siege. And in fact that is how the attack is deployed in CtP2. The army has to be adjacent to the city, and the Wonder Unit has to deploy the attack against the city itself. Which is the very definition of a "siege", especially since there isn't any way to perform an actual siege in CtP2. Armies can either assault cities directly or they sit outside conducting bombardments and pillaging tiles, but there's no way to affect productivity or the civilian population. Whereas this attack reduces production and makes people unhappy for five turns, which very much sounds like the effects of being under siege. Even the "chance of spread" makes sense in the context of the Ancient Era. As other cities learn of an ongoing siege (and how better than via trade routes), fear and loss of production will definitely affect those who think "we might be next!"

The new "Siege" concept required a number of changes:

* Graphics: The existing "fortify unit" button features the "tower" portion of a city wall and there's also a cursor (unused) with the same graphic, so I decided to use these for "Siege". Since the "fortify unit" command places a small brown berm around the unit (representing either wood or earth), I took a copy of that graphic from the TIMP file and created a new button image (and another for the GL) which matches the in-game appearance of unit fortifications. However, I discovered during playesting - to get ahead of things a bit - that there was a strong mental association between the "tower" button image and it's former purpose. To eliminate that confusion, I added flames around and behind the tower, and it's now a much better representation of a city under siege. That in turn was extended to the messagicon and the GL picture. This attack also places a small icon on the city status bar, which appears for the duration of the Siege effect (5 turns). Previously this was a blinking bio-hazard sign, which was not only inappropriate as a representation of the new attack, but the blinking effect was EXTREMELY annoying, almost game-killing! Anyway, I created a new icon which represents a city tower and gave it an unchanging background, so no more blinking (thank god!)

* Sound: The "screaming populace" likewise was no longer appropriate, so I created a new "moving siege tower" sound.

* Units: It now makes sense to give this attack to most of the Wonder Units, with the only exception being the two modern ones (Eisenhower & Schwartzkopf) since sieges of the ancient sort aren't really a feature of modern warfare. Surrounding a city and bombing it into oblivion, sure, but not for the purpose of starving the population into submission. Also, since even Ancient-era Wonder Units can co-exist in time with the Infector, we'll remove this attack from him, rather than restoring it's modern appearance at some point.

* Chance of success can be different for each unit, and in fact it already was (settings of .25, .33 and .5) I'll keep those three levels and will grant them to the various units based on an estimate of their efficacy at siegecraft.

* Button-location issue: As with most other unit types, Wonder Units utilize the second tier of the "Button screen" (bottom right of the interface) for their Special Attacks. The current button location (2-1) is shared with two other attacks used by Wonder Units: Pillage and Convert City. The latter is an important attack for Wonder Units with a religious aspect (David, Muhammed, etc) and those units should ALSO have the "Siege" ability so we'll look at moving the "Siege" button to one of the other locations on the row, which are 2-2 (Piracy), 2-3 (Expel) and 2-4 (Reform city). Of those, "Reform" is a necessary complement for the units which have "Convert". "Expel" is harmless enough and there's plenty of other units which could do this, but ultimately I think that "Piracy" is the one which needs to go. The main reason is that AI units tend to park on trade routes and keep pirating them for multiple turns, but we want Wonder Units to be included in moving stacks, and not encourage the AI to keep them immobile for extended periods. By contrast, Expel and Reform are "one and done" activities that don't include an incentive for "parking".

* Cost reduced from 1000 to 700 (might help stimulate AI usage)

* All five Messages have been revised to fit the "Siege" attack narrative.

* Changed the GL entry to describe the concept behind the new "Siege" attack

* This attack included a "terrorist death chance" of 10% in "const.txt", but I reduced that to ZERO as it's no longer a biological attack delivered by terrorist-type units

* The Sprite has been revised to and now features the "metal-mask" from the "Reform City" sprite, in combination with a different fiery effect sprite from CTP1.

In closing, both the "BioTerror" and "Plague" (to be reviewed next) special attacks use the BIOTERROR entry in "specattack.txt" as the link to their (shared) sprite and sound. Unfortunately these cannot be separated but there is an "era-dependent" solution which should suffice.

[Kull]

2) Plague (was "Create Plague Conditions", now reverts back to "Plague"): A biological terror attack which kills a percentage of the city population, and is performed by three Wonder Units (Hannibal/Attila/Genghis), plus the late-game "Infector". As with BioTerror, this attack utilized "skull & crossbones" graphics and featured the same Sprite (rising green gas), Sound (screaming populace) and Cradle-specific Messages (but nothing on the city status bar).

The attack is controlled by the "Plague" setting in "units.txt", to include "Chance" (of success). An additional setting is present in "const.txt" which allows you to customize the death rate (currently 20%). As with BioTerror, to my knowledge the AI has never used this attack, probably for the same reasons. Again, the cost is high (1,000 - same in AE) and it is considered an Atrocity.

As with "BioTerror", I found "Plague" to be an unlikely "attack" for ANY units in the Ancient Era. Again, there were similar concerns about the deliberate spread of disease in a way that was so controllable as to leave the attacking army completely unaffected. While it was possible to contrive a realistic disease alternative for BioTerror (i.e. "Siege") there was nothing equally plausible to explain this attack. The solution I chose was to dump the whole idea and just restore the attack to the modern era (along with some of the graphics, and all the sounds and messages).

Interestingly, in CtP2 (even AE) this is actually not a "Modern Era" attack at all, but rather one which only becomes available with the discovery of the Far Future "Nano Warfare" Advance and the accompanying advent of the Infector unit. That didn't make any sense because the Infector doesn't utilize any Nano Tech special attacks. Even worse, the reality is that Biological Warfare is not something that might appear in the distant future, but (sadly) is available RIGHT NOW (hello, COVID). I gave the whole matter some thought and decided to separate Biology from NanoTech in the following way:

* A new Advance ("Biological Warfare" - see attachment) will become available after "Modern Medicine" (the first pre-req), but also requires "Global Economics" (which contributes to the easy spread of a manufactured disease). In addition, it will be a "Dead End", so it can be researched (or not) as the player desires, but is not a pre-req for something else. That also allows us to place it on the list of technologies which the AI "seeks to keep from enemies" (see the bottom of "AdvanceLists.txt"). All the required text file changes have been made to activate this Advance, including a new GL entry.

* The Infector is now available with the discovery of "Biological Warfare". Although he loses the "BioTerror" attack, "Plague" is sufficiently deadly to justify his existence, especially since it is available to no other units. Whether the AI will use the attack is an open question, but the far earlier availability of this unit will give us a much better chance of learning the answer.

* The original button, cursor, and messageicon for this attack utilized the CtP2 "Gas Mask" graphics. However, the mask looks like something intended for fending off a Chemical attack, where-as this is clearly biological. Fortunately, the BioTerror attack had a full set of BioHazard symbol graphics (no longer needed since the attack is now "Siege-based"), and those have been switched over to "Plague"

As noted in the last review, "Plague" is hardcoded to use the same sprite and sound as "BioTerror" (now "Siege"), so an "era-dependent" solution is required in order to restore the originals. And one final thought. If you were to infer from this screenshot that a fully revised Tech Tree will be included with the Cradle 3+ download....well, you wouldn't be wrong!

[Cyberguy]

In playtesting, I've definitely seen that happening in some of the larger cities. In one game - for reasons that I still don't understand - two civs were sending all their excess Nomads to a single city and having them "settle-in-city" at that location. The populations EXPLODED (size 60+ in the ancient era!?!) and they were ringed with Dead Tiles! Crazy to see. Anyway, I'm not aware of any improvements which can directly affect population pollution (other than by allowing cities to grow to ever larger sizes). Any ideas?

As to mitigation, Cradle 3+ will allow the player to restore "Dead Tiles" with the discovery of Tribunal Empire. Those are the most damaging effects of unrestrained pollution, so at least you will have the ability to address the impact, if not the underlying cause.

What I'm getting at is that there are city improvements that can reduce a cities population pollution to 35% of its level without the city improvements/ However there is no way, short of reducing the population size to get below 35%.
In cradle there is a 'Sewer System' improvement but i'm not sure if this further reduces population pollution.
So its possible to reduce a cities Production pollution to zero by a combination of city improvements and moving population to be specialists (any except Labour).
There is no current mechanic to bring population pollution to zero, so in an advanced game with pollution on and very high tech, even the greenest of planets possible will still keep the pollution counter rising till eventually you get the oceans rising catastrophe happening. So what I was suggesting, is a new late game city improvement that would further reduce population pollution by 35% to finally bring it to zero and if implemented widely enough (could be a wonder) will avert the oceans rising catastrophe. Dead tiles can be reworked (terraformed) currently once tech is sufficiently advanced.

So in the attached image, the city generates 45 points of pollution, all from population, none from production, and this can't be reduced further currently.

[Kull]

What I'm getting at is that there are city improvements that can reduce a cities population pollution to 35% of its level without the city improvements/ However there is no way, short of reducing the population size to get below 35%.

Took a second look at this question and provided a different response. See Post #134 below

[Kull]

3) Nano Infect ("NanoTerror"): A terror attack which has a chance of destroying improvements in the target city and can spread to additional cities linked by trade routes. It is used exclusively by the late game Eco-Terrorist unit. With one exception, all the graphics ("gears"), messages (3), and sounds are appropriate and required no editing. Successful attacks place a blinking red "nano symbol" on the city status bar (background color is that of the civ which performed the attack) while both success and failure put the "watchful" (blue eye) marker on the target city.

The attack is controlled by the "NanoTerror" setting in units.txt, to include "Chance" (of success). A failed attack generates the "red X" and the "general fail" sound. War results only from Success. There are several additional settings in const.txt:
- Duration of the event (5 turns)
- Chance of destroying an improvement (30%)
- Terrorist Death Chance (25% - this does work, as I've seen an Eco-Terrorist die after a failed attack)
- Chance of spreading to additional cities (20%)

This is another attack which I've never seen the AI use, but that's not a surprise since there isn't an Ancient Era version in Cradle. Also the cost is VERY HIGH (4,000 - same in AE) so even if the AI knows how to use it, they are unlikely to have that much gold available. Apparently (per the GL) it is considered an Atrocity.

As with "BioTerror", this attack places a small icon on the city status bar, which appears for the duration of the Nano effect (5 turns). This too was a blinking icon (displaying a nano-hazard sign), and again it was practically seizure-inducing. According I edited out the "blinking effect" (see attached), and even though that eliminates the background color-link to the attacking civ, the symbol is now easier on the eyes (and the brain).

Although it seemed possible to develop an Ancient Era version of this attack, in the end I opted to keep everything the same and just move on. (I am soooo ready to finish up the special attacks project!) Accordingly, this attack is not "era-dependent".

[Kull]

4) Nanite Cleanse ("CreatePark"): A terror attack which causes the target city and surrounding units and improvements to disappear. It is used exclusively by the late game Eco-Ranger unit. With one exception, the graphics ("highlighted tree"), message (1), and sounds are appropriate and required no editing.

The attack is controlled by the "CreateParks" setting in units.txt. Although there are no settings for chance of success or death (nor is there anything in const.txt), testing shows that success is 100%, death of Eco-Ranger is 100%, and there's no limit to the number of "Nanite Cleanse" attacks that can be launched in any given turn (Yikes!)

Although the AI has never used this attack in any of my games, none have reached this far into the future. I suspect that since it is only available to one unit and one gov, that it's probably been hardcoded for the AI to use it. Cost is ZERO, so that makes it even more likely.

Even though there's only one message (sent to the victim), the messageicon used "Gears", so I created a new one which uses the same "highlighted tree" symbology as the others. There's not an Ancient Era version of this attack, so as you might expect, it is not "era-dependent".

[Kull]

5) Assasinate Ruler (Conduct Hit/Bomb Cabinet): A terror attack which switches the target nation's gov-type over to "Anarchy", and is used by the Assassin, Poisoner, & Eco Terrorist units. Surprisingly, whether the attack succeeds or fails, it never results in a Declaration of War! This attack was previewed in a rather tongue-in-cheek fashion way back in Post #93, when I was first unveiling the many issues associated with these Special Attacks. I won't repeat any of that, but will instead focus on some of the changes implemented since then.

* The new icons (a knife pointing up) were also given to the "Assassinate Civilian" attack. Since the same units could perform that attack AND this one, the use of identical icons for two different attacks was potentially confusing. Accordingly I created a new set (button, cursor, messageicon, GL pic) which use the same knife, but now pointing down (see attached), which also matches the "angle of attack" used by the knife sprite.

* The AI has never used this attack, but that may be driven by the extremely high cost (10,000). As previously discussed, that was understandable under the old system - a switch to Anarchy would cause all the gov-dependent units to disband! As that is no longer the case, the cost has been reduced to 500 (see attached). Since the AI is very good at using Assassins to perform "Sabotage" (cost is 300), there's a decent chance that a lower cost will spark usage.

* The knife is a weapon which will probably always be with us, so there's technically no reason not to keep these graphics for the duration of the game. However, the "BombCabinet" graphics are excellent, and a bomb-based attack is a more likely assassination tool for the modern era and beyond. Given that "Era-dependent" switches are planned for a number of other Special Attacks, it's easy enough to implement that process with this attack as well.

Ok, that completes the individual "Special Attacks" reviews, but we aren't quite done yet. Next up is a discussion of the approach I'm taking to resolve the Era-Dependency problem. The issues range from cosmetic (such as with Assassinate Ruler) to fundamental (such as the shift from Sabotage to Filing Injunctions), but the solutions are identical.

[Kull]

What I'm getting at is that there are city improvements that can reduce a cities population pollution to 35% of its level without the city improvements/ However there is no way, short of reducing the population size to get below 35%.

I took another look at this, and your statement is incorrect, at least insofar as it applies to Cradle. Take a look at the attachment. The inset has the list of all Cradle Buildings which can reduce population pollution, and they total up to 95%. The majority of the Screenshot shows the City manager screen for the city of Ebla. It has 19 total citizens and is generating 252 points of population pollution. However, it also has 6 buildings which together reduce that pollution by 85% (Green rows in the inset). The combined effect of those six buildings should be to reduce actual Population Pollution to 38, and if you look at the number circled in Red on the City Manager screen, that is EXACTLY what they have done.

From a game realism perspective, the Ancient Era offers 4 structures which together provide a 40% reduction in population pollution. I think that's a good number for the era, as it will encourage the player to be cautious about building large Super Cities, as otherwise the pollution numbers can quickly spiral out of control. Not until the Modern & Future Eras will additional structures become available, finally taming the problem

To that point (and for the sake of completeness), I will add a 5% reduction to the "Body Exchange" improvement, thus eventually making it possible to achieve 100%, albeit only near the end of the game.

[Cyberguy]

Hi, thanks for looking at this again and for the extra 5% you will add. I definitely need to get on Cradle.
One more thing regarding pollution, do you know if it either currently exists or is possible to have some building or wonder that actively reduces pollution.

So where i am going with this is that its all well and good for my civ to get to 0% pollution in every city i own but if the AI's don't do the same the the global warming catastrophe happens nonetheless.
From what i have seen the AI's do not go out of their way to reduce the pollution they produce so one way to counter this is to have a city, tile or wonder improvement that actively scrubs pollution out of the system, ie reduces the overall pollution as indicated by the red bar at top right of a game screen causing it to go backwards, thus countering & even slowly reversing the pollution being emitted by AI civs.