MOD Discussion: Ages of Man!

[Dale]

Okay, so it's official. I'm working on a new MOD.

Title: The Ages of Man!

Type: Full-scale historical MOD

Span: 8000BC to 2000AD (no future)

Design Doc: Here

Progress: The first complete new concept is finished. Colonisation works. It may be changed slightly during the course of AOM's development, but at this point it works perfectly.

This thread is for discussion on the project, and I'll be making regular updates to the progress, and allowing some playing around with scripts, etc.

[Dale]

Colonisation is complete. At this point, the script works with the default CTP2 setup (no MODs) because my development is starting from clean.

If you do want to play around with this script, it's best to disallow building of settlers. You can do this by setting the following under UNIT_SETTLER in units.txt:

EnableAdvance ADVANCE_ADV_URBAN_PLANNING

Any comments welcome.

BTW, the attached picture shows the AI at 2000BC using this colonisation script on a huge map.

[Dale]

Here's the .slc file.......

[Immortal Wombat]

Very nice so far

If I get this straight, the script sets up the ColPols so that you should average a new city every third pop point, with ColPols 1 or 4, where 4 is the default AI one, and the starting human one, and also the "coastal cities" policy.
All civs start off aiming for the sea... cool.

Using ColPols 2 and 3, you get a 1/6 chance and 1/9 chance respectivly, (I guess there's also a ColPols 5 and 6 which are coastal versions of 2 and 3?) and ColPol 0 is an all stop - no colonising.

And the AI is then kicked into ColPol 0 when it reaches it's city limit under its present (likely) governement. Doesn't the code also at this point prevent the AddPop event from happening? That sounds a bit harsh, not only can you not expand further, you're stuck with the same population to get you to the next government.

The one thing that seems to be missing is a way for the human, and the AI to alter their ColPols depending on circumstances.

Have I got that right? It looks very good anyway. I'll try it out.

Those pink guys seem to have done rather well (above) whereas the light blue ones are a bit stuffed. How come the dark red one spread so far away?

[mapfi]

This idea is just so cool!

Well tried it out and here's what I found, and no I didn't read the code, sorry:
I got one city near 3 glacier tiles even though there were lots of other better spots around. I got another city right beside a barbarian stack - would be better to check for that before it's placed. I saw the cities of two AI's very close and entangled. Shouldn't the borders be respected or is that deliberate? If so, what about only allowing placing a city one tile into another players borders? The barbarians were also using colonisation. Why not...
City placement is in my opinion two close. There should be at least two tiles between the cities' radius.
If you'd like to see the game I'll mail it to you.

As I said, I'm very much looking forward to this and gladly test anything you put into the forums.

[Dale]

IW:

Yeah, you got the ColPol's correct. There is a 5 & 6 equivalent for coastal. Now the question about changing policies comes later with gov policies (not written). BTW, you don't lose the pop-point when you reach city-max. It adds on to the original city it grew in.

Mapfi:

I didn't say it was by any means perfect. But that's for the comments.

[Dale]

BTW, the barbs took a couple of light blue cities, and then pink and dark red took them from the barbs. That's why light blue is stuffed, and dark red is spread.

[centrifuge]

Dale, It's great to see you back into the *Evil* world of CTP2 modding. You're mods are one of the main reasons that I've become addicted to this game, and I can't wait to see this new one in action. Thanks for all of your work.

[mapfi]

Did my post sound like I expected it to be perfect and was dissapointed of it not being so? That's certainly not the case - I just wanted to mention the things I saw that needed to be improved because I thought that's why you posted it in the first place.

[Immortal Wombat]

BTW, you don't lose the pop-point when you reach city-max. It adds on to the original city it grew in.

Oh, ok, that would make more sense. The "return STOP;" confused me.

[child of Thor]

Dale you 'bewt'

Interesting design doc - i'm looking forward to how the religion aspect works out, could be very bloody!

Some thoughts so far:

The bit about adding to your units stat with the invention of some kind of improvement, without a complete new sprite.
I remember Hex thinking through something along the lines of using the sprite tile background in some way(like it changes colour for the 'elite' unit types of craddle) , to help out. Maybe you could use something like that, a small coloured star in one corner of the tile to indicate the upgraded unit?

And for Map sizes - if you are going to have a huge span of time it might be nice to keep the huge Apolyton maps as it will be more likely that you can fill them up with the civs cities, especially as you can do the colony thing, and also as there could be alot of religious war and thus lots of conquest going on? And if people want to play it with 27 civs. Or maybe you have other idea's on this?

It sounds great so far - i'll have another 2000 years of ancient history to play with

[Pedrunn]

Hi close is your religion project from mines and Mapfis. We are almost done with the work and we want to know what do you have in mind.

[Dale]

Centrifuge:

Thanks. It's appreciation like yours (and many others) that keeps us modders going.

Mapfi:

Yeah that's cool, that's how I took it. I just didn't say it that way.

IW:

Remember, "return STOP" just ends the current function being run, not the entire event. Therefore, since there's still a pop-growth point, CTP2 would still run the normal AddPop function giving you the city growth.

CoT:

Yeah, religion could be very messy if you ignore the Pope. BTW, your suggestion on units is good, but I don't want anyone to know the different upgrades. EG: If you're looking at an AI's tank, untill you fight it, how are you supposed to know it has Laser-Radar-Guided-Nuclear-Tipped-Copper-Plated-High-Explosive rockets to your standard HE round? It adds to the suspense.

Pedrunn:

I think our religions are different. Mine's focusing only on the high-level religion. I'm not having any city-level/pop-level religion. The Civ has a state religion, and bands towards other Civs of the same religion.

[HuangShang]

^_^ know i know

[Pedrunn]

Originally posted by Dale

Pedrunn:

I think our religions are different. Mine's focusing only on the high-level religion. I'm not having any city-level/pop-level religion. The Civ has a state religion, and bands towards other Civs of the same religion.

Actually in my code every civ starts with its religion and the religion level is only the percentage of the world population converted to this religion. The higher the number of converted pop more money and happiness will be given to the cities with this religion. Plus regard to others plyers with same religion.
Every player can only have one religion although he can change to another religion as the game goes.

[Dale]

Pedrunn:

In my religion concept, I don't have growing religions like you do. You can't convert another Civ's cities to your religion. Oh, there'll still be clerics, but not in the use you've used.

[Dale]

Here it is! The first playable build of The Ages of Man!

There isn't exactly too much different from original CTP2 (it even still uses the original AI ) but we all need a beginning.

Installing:

- Requires CTP2, CTP2 Patch, SAP v2.0 (for the graphical elements which I didn't put in the zip).
- Download the attached zip file.
- Unzip to your Call to Power 2 directory.
- Select through ModSwapper.

Active elements:

- Colonisation. No longer is the Settler necessary to expand your empire's borders. The level of your government's encouragement (see Gov Policies below), will influence where and how often a colonist will leave a city and begin a new settlement! Colonists being as individual as you are, will assess the surrounding lands of the city they were built in, and give each area a "score" based on what's available at/near that square. If a high score is attained, then the colonist will pack their bags, and move to the new location. When they build their new settlement, it becomes a new city in your empire, with all the normal rights, demands and needs. Colonists love the following: goods; rivers to bath in; plains, grassland, forests for food and wood; fortifications or military presence for defense; coastal squares for fishing; being within the Civ's current borders. Colonists avoid the following: enemy military presence; close to other cities; desserts or swamps; the middle of the sea. These are your boundaries for indirectly influencing colonists (EG: building a fortification with military units on a coastal/grassland/river/goods square will be very attractive to a colonist, especially if it's not next to an existing city).

- Government Policies. In your first built city (not necessarily the capital mind you), on the Buildings tab, is a new buildable element called Government Policies. It only takes one turn to build, and is buildable as many times as you require to change your policy. Once built, you will be presented with the option to encourage Land, Coastal or No colonisation (note: this encouragement doesn't guarentee adherence ). If you opt to go with Land or Coastal encouragement, you can then choose whether you want Fast, Normal or Slow colonisation. By choosing one of these options, you are using your only means to directly influence colonisation.

- Maps. I have played around with the maps a fair bit, and have settled on what I see as a very good setting for Huge and Gigantic maps. I hope you enjoy them.

- Governments. Due to almost unanimous support, I have upped the government city maxs a lot. This will most likely change before final release. But it at least gives a setting where you can bloodlust to your hearts content on the huge and gigantic maps.

PLEASE NOTE:

You MUST have the SAP installed and running to use this Alpha of AOM. This is because I have not included the city sprites, diplo-photos and other graphical elements active in AOM. This will be done at a later stage. Basically, I wanted to keep the zip size down.

Please feel free to have a play around with this Alpha and make some suggestions. BTW, try it with DebugSlic=Yes. I don't get any errors, but I want to make sure on other systems/setups.

Have fun.

[child of Thor]

Originally posted by Dale
CoT:

Yeah, religion could be very messy if you ignore the Pope. BTW, your suggestion on units is good, but I don't want anyone to know the different upgrades. EG: If you're looking at an AI's tank, untill you fight it, how are you supposed to know it has Laser-Radar-Guided-Nuclear-Tipped-Copper-Plated-High-Explosive rockets to your standard HE round? It adds to the suspense.

I didn't mean on the actual Sprite - just the sprite 'tile' - the bit that appears on the UI when you click on your unit, and the bit you use to move your units around within your armies. Agreed the last thing you want is to see it on the field of play!!!! Just so the player can keep track on which of his units have been upgraded or not - or maybe the upgrade thing works differently?

[mapfi]

I'm amazed. This is just about a new game I get here!
I played with DebugSlic=Yes and got no errors. I've just got two things to mention:
-I had a unit fortified on a great tile when a barbarian attacked it and just the moment I lost I saw for a brief instance the flicker of a new city. Were my colonist just about to try to settle there?! What a pity - but actually, I wouldn't chnage anything to that.
-The second thing is more grave. The diplomod included is that Peter's or is this your work Dale? I got a request for a research pact and accepted it and afterwards I even had an embassy with that player. Problem is - that's just plain impossible, bureaucracy not researched on either side and when I got the request I actually only had a cease fire with that ceratin player.

Anyway,

[Dale]

COT:

The upgrade will be automatic. So you'll always know what level your troops are at. Sorry, I didn't mention that bit.

Mapfi:

Thanks.

1. Yeah, that was a colonist trying to settle. I've found the bug you mentioned, and have swatted it with another piece of checking code.

2. It's Peter's new diplomod. Hmmm..... wierd. Maybe Peter can help on this one. Peter? *looks around for him*

[Turambar]

I tried it out today and it looks great so far.

One problem was that when the AI tried to contact me to make a demand etc the proposal would automatically disappear at the end of the AI's turn.

The new diplomacy stuff looks great though.

[child of Thor]

Ok automatic upgrade - that makes it easy to keep track of. How much will it cost? will it work like in med mod - ie require you to pre-plan the cost and save it up or you lose the chance to upgrade most your units? or will you have an option to upgrade when you like? or will it be a free upgrade? How you going to do it cause of the different versions of the upgrade option we've got(ie the medmod and craddle versions i'm thinking of), neither one is very player friendly.

Maybe i'm being too 'anal' about it! I just like the idea of upgrading a units stats as opposed to just getting a whole different sprite - in the long run i think this option will give more depth to the combat in CTP2, and will maybe help flesh out those annoying periods when you just can't invent anything new for decades and longer!

I'll download as soon as i can(maybe this weekend), mapfi sounds to be enjoying it so far!

[Peter Triggs]

A couple of answers

when I got the request I actually only had a cease fire with that ceratin player.

It's set up so that whenever a ceasefire is accepted, diplomatic relations (mutual embassies) are established automatically.

This was one of the first things I did. Last Summer (2001) I had some very simple code that would establish mutual embassies after a war. It was really a follow on from CTP1 because there I noticed a correlation between AIcivs that were diplomatically isolated and those that were scientifically underdeveloped. It's not so important in CTP2 since we can now control the conditions under which they offer and accept embassies.

Actually, the version you've got here is, I think, the very first version that got posted. As I recall it's far too easy to get research pacts with this version but I'm pretty sure I toned this down and posted a better version in the same thread as the one where this started from.

One problem was that when the AI tried to contact me to make a demand etc the proposal would automatically disappear at the end of the AI's turn.

This, unfortunatly, looks like it may be an unsolvable problem. I tried everything I could think of to try to stop that happenning but never could do it. It's not, btw, limited to the NewDiplomod code. I regularly get it when I'm working on other mods where I haven't messed with the diplomacy events at all.

[Dale]

This, unfortunatly, looks like it may be an unsolvable problem. I tried everything I could think of to try to stop that happenning but never could do it. It's not, btw, limited to the NewDiplomod code. I regularly get it when I'm working on other mods where I haven't messed with the diplomacy events at all.

Yeah, happens with the colonisation code if you got auto-turns running. I can't stop it either.

But thanks for your answers, I'll look for the latest version.

[Zaphod Beeblebrox]

well, wanted to try this out tonight, but unfortunately i seem missing pics and get targa load errors, as soon as i click on the buildings row in buildmanager:

cm2_upip016l.tga

well actually its the same error message three times then the game terminates

where do i get that (and maybe other missing ones) ?

thank you so far for the great job all of your modders are doing, was quite a good idea to reinstall ctp2 and having a look back to apolyton after such a long time

[Dale]

Zaphod:

I didn't include any of the graphics (would have made the zip over a meg), but all the graphics come from SAP2. If you have that installed, there should be no problem.

[Zaphod Beeblebrox]

oops, thanks forgot to reinstall that after my last reinstall of the vanilla game last night. thank you!

[Zaphod Beeblebrox]

how exactly is the spot for a new city chosen?
i agree that lots of grassland at a river is a much finer place than coastal swamps, but only 2 fields from citycenter to citycenter?

disbanded the third city which was placed directly between the first and the second and had to make that settler look for a spot the old fashioned way ( you see i really love this idea and already got used to it ) but the fourth city appeared at the same place again.
this is a bit annyoing.

btw. polsettings: fast/coastal

[Zaphod Beeblebrox]

city #5 even overlapping with #1 and #2

[Dale]

Zaphod:

Yeah, it does need a little work. I have actually fixed it so those little things don't happen. The worst bug I found was it didn't check for other player's cities, and would try to put one of mine on top of an AI's. Very frustrating that one. But the next version is a whole lot better.