Register a SA Forums Account here!
JOINING THE SA FORUMS WILL REMOVE THIS BIG AD, THE ANNOYING UNDERLINED ADS, AND STUPID INTERSTITIAL ADS!!!

You can: log in, read the tech support FAQ, or request your lost password. This dumb message (and those ads) will appear on every screen until you register! Get rid of this crap by registering your own SA Forums Account and joining roughly 150,000 Goons, for the one-time price of $9.95! We charge money because it costs us money per month for bills, and since we don't believe in showing ads to our users, we try to make the money back through forum registrations.
 
  • Post
  • Reply
Jossar
Apr 2, 2018

Current status: Angry about subs :argh:
Jossar’s Playthrough – Prehistoric 9

(Some of the pictures at the beginning of the updated glitched out and had to be edited or deleted. The invasion itself is still in one piece, but the first bits are going to be a little word heavy.)

The turn after the end of the last update, I get a message that some hidden civilization is the first to discover Sedentary Lifestyle. This is… kind of terrifying. As far as I was aware I was the tech leader before, and no one should have been able to beeline fast enough to surpass me at this point. I have a theory which makes this slightly less terrifying, but there’s no use worrying about it now. Instead I have to worry about planning the invasion of Germany.

Logistical Problem #1: Elephants are too big to fit on upgraded boats, even combined ones, for this era. Part of this is because the upgrade to Canoes took away some of their cargo space, but all our big cities upgraded to building Canoes.
Logistical Problem #2: Persepolis is really far away, which makes it really difficult to bring anything over in a timely fashion. A constant stream of production going could mitigate this except...
Logistical Problem #3: You can only have 5 of each naval unit at a time right now. You can get around this by combining the units but not by much.

All of these problems mean that we can’t use Elephants as planned and Persepolis’ contribution to the war effort is going to consist of producing a dude to accompany the Great General to Karakorum by land, and maybe the production of one or two combined War Canoes. But on the other hand it means Persepolis can keep the economy going once it does its job.



Logistical Problem #4: Since Elephants aren’t going to work, Obsidian Weapons need to be researched as the best possible alternative, but the opposite is true from before: all of the Obsidian is in Persepolis, so now Karakorum is going to have production problems.



Fortunately we were already working on this problem even before the war was projected to happen and after a few turns of canoe building in Karakorum, the trans-continental trade path system is up and running through all 4 cities. Now Karakorum can focus on creating the army itself.



The invasion fleet is assembled. Obsidian Swordsmen are the choice for the job since they have generically high city attack bonus and are Strength 6 compared to the other units at Strength 5. The goal at this point is to have Karakorum keep cranking them out and rely on the Canoes’ superior movement speed to make up for the fact that they can’t hold as many units. The Swordsmen will have to be combined onshore in German territory too.



Oh hey, that War Canoe came in handy after all. There’s another one hobbling up the coast, but frankly speaking these guys aren’t going to be doing too much after clearing the way. Their bombardment capacity is pretty lackluster.

You may also notice that we can see what Hitler is researching and the force composition of the city of Hamburg even though we aren’t at the city yet. These are the result of our superior Espionage advantage finally hitting a high enough threshold as to reveal our neighbours’ progress generally and in the city of Hamburg itself. A little late to affect strategic planning but nice to know for future opponents, perhaps? I really should start investing in espionage stuff for the future, depending on if there’s anyone left at technological parity that can’t be knocked down in a straight up fight.




The invasion begins: War is declared and the Canoes immediately rush in and spit out Obsidian Swordsmen to surround Hamburg. A few attacks are made from the boats to test the city’s defenders. This works until a really big Atlatlist is revealed, at which point several Swordsmen are combined.




Hamburg is razed and several units spawn in Berlin. Now here’s the thing, there are a lot of dudes in Berlin. So there is a relatively long period of time in which my dudes remain camped on the beach as I ferry over more Obsidian Swordsmen and the Great General.




After enough units to make around 8 combined units of Obsidian Swordsmen arrive, I begin the offensive. But Hitler does something very strange. He… refounds the city I destroyed for some reason?

I did a test run for the invasion and this didn’t happen, in the fact the opposite did – I brought far fewer men to the fight, and in response he kept everyone huddled in Berlin and ground my army down to dust. My guess is that in the real thing, I brought so many troops that the AI realized it was doomed and tried to outflank me or build a city that would survive Berlin’s destruction?




In any event Berlin is taken. I leave a few Swordsmen in case of counterattack and send the rest down to join the latest group of recruits in taking Munich. The preparations are justified when a last ditch attempt by the AI has a bunch of hidden soldiers pop out from the woods and try to retake the city, to no avail.





Fash Status: Bashed. Berlin even comes with a free captive to replace the population lost when taking the city.



I disband a lot of troops, but keep around enough Swordsmen to combine again when the next era rolls around. I send out a single combined Swordsman out to the east to explore. We get a better look at Berlin and it makes a ton of money. Of all possible cities, this one should be able to make back its costs sooner rather than later.





One of our War Canoes scouting the coast makes contact with some very erudite (ignore the typo) Neanderthals who appear to have organized into some kind of art commune.

Yeah, that seems like a good stopping point for the update.

(Techs not mentioned: Earth Oven, Tattoos, Animism, Mysticism, Nocturnalism, Warfare, Slavery.)

Bonus: Meet the New Man, Same as the Old Man



The Neanderthals are one part joke, one part innovative gameplay idea, one part kitchen sink. The devs have been floating around the idea of a civilization that came with the Neanderthal culture pre-baked in for a while now, but like many other things in the mod it’s been left on the back burner. Until that’s balanced they’re an entirely normal civilization that in a game without Developing Traits has a number of traits that make them favor certain early game strategies longer than usual.



The civilization is, as mentioned above, not to be confused with the Neanderthal culture wonder. This is a culture you can build as soon as you get Cave Dwelling which allows you to build Neanderthal type versions of regular units, which are mostly notable for being stronger than their regular counterparts at the cost of being much more expensive to build.



Neither of these, of course, should be confused with the units belonging to the barbarian-esque faction that you’ve occasionally seen floating around. These units are all functionally Neanderthal culture and some dwell in the proximity of Neanderthal Cities, which have most of the same purposes as regular cities but are missing some of the mechanics of a full civilization. In practice they’re Super-Barbarians until Neanderthal culture units stop being relevant.

So to sum up: Neanderthals aren’t Neanderthals, unless they have access to Neanderthals. But the other Neanderthals are Neanderthals, even though they’re really Barbarians. Both kinds of Neanderthals can build cities, but Neanderthal Cities are weaker than Neanderthal cities.

None of this explains why they’re avant-garde.

Jossar fucked around with this message at 14:03 on Apr 11, 2020

Adbot
ADBOT LOVES YOU

zetamind2000
Nov 6, 2007

I'm an alien.

Unless they've changed it the neanderthal cities and improvements on the map should be totally invisible when they reach the ancient era because the devs didn't make unique era graphics for them

RedSnapper
Nov 22, 2016
Might be a bit late but:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cW73KL1xres&t=6s

Jossar
Apr 2, 2018

Current status: Angry about subs :argh:
Also i'm playing through the next update and man a lot is happening all at once. Turns out the same functionality that let us shortcut our way to the German continent is letting me shortcut a lot of the rest of the world. Gonna throw up another update with a vote soon even though in practice I can keep going for a bit, just because i've discovered enough continents that after the northern one there's a lot of choice on where to go from here.

Xelkelvos
Dec 19, 2012
So we're gonna let these Hominids live for now, right?

Jossar
Apr 2, 2018

Current status: Angry about subs :argh:
Darius was blocking exploration progress and we all collectively voted to kill Hitler. Unlike those two there's no real reason to kill the Neanderthals since they're peaceful enough and there are now lots of places to explore.

And even if you think that it's a dodge and I lust for blood, we also can't because we've got bigger problems. :v:

sincx
Jul 13, 2012

furiously masturbating to anime titties
.

sincx fucked around with this message at 06:12 on Mar 23, 2021

Jossar
Apr 2, 2018

Current status: Angry about subs :argh:
Jossar’s Playthrough – Ancient 1



Nothing really interesting happens in the move up until ancient apart from getting the ability to build some National Wonders that I’m interested in and some World Wonders that I’m not. So we’re just going to start the update with the transition to the Ancient Era.




The most immediately noticeable thing here is that a number of minor changes to the civilization happen all at once in aggregate regarding Education, Science, miscellaneous small buildings, improvements, obsoleting buildings, etc. The two big things are that we finally get Workers who can do things besides building roads without dying and access to the Ancient Ways group wonders.



I am disconcerted to note that Ancient Way of the Centaur isn’t here, the universe really is against us getting those Elephants. Ancient Way of the Waves is more our speed anyway (although unlike Way of the Wolves it’s just a generic +1 to Strength), and I start construction on it in Persepolis. It’s also at about this time that I start work on the Grand Marine Festival in Karakorum. Gonna start off Ancient with a whole host of wonders.





Agriculture is really a game changer. Combined with adopting the civic, our cities get access to a whole bunch of food at once and some of the larger cities are even in a position to grow as a result from it. I start work on a new settler in Tenduk to make what should be the last city on the continent, covering the eastern side.



Our cultural borders expanding means that I can also start using some leftover rafts to explore and I discover a continent to the south along with… these guys.

quote:

Bonus: A World Full of Enemies

So you’re going to notice a few things here. The first is that the Romans are a Minor Civilization. What does this mean?

Minor Civilizations are civilizations that have most of the functions of complete civilizations, except for the ability to engage in large scale diplomatic action. Until the civilization in question develops Writing it is ALWAYS at war with everyone else and the AI/strategic thinking for them tends to resemble Barbarians more than a proper civilization.

This is not a coincidence. While you can start the game with all civilizations as minor civilizations, that option was not turned on for this playthrough. That means this civilization actually started out as a particularly large Barbarian City that met several requirements (mostly involving size and culture) and graduated to a Minor Civilization.

This also solves the mystery of who scooped us on Sedentary Lifestyle. Barbarian technological progress is tied to the tech leader. Either in the process of spawning or converting to a Minor Civilization the Romans were given the entirety of the tech tree up until a certain point in Prehistoric and then just brute forced their way to the Ancient Era. They are still transitioning to worrying about all the features that a normal civilization has to worry about (like Science) so they may take forever to advance in tech, but at least until mid-Ancient they are 100% as strong as us, no exceptions.

That means until the current civilizations achieve cultural hegemony over the world Barbarians/Civilizations will continue to spawn as major groups at the highest current tech level.

This seems kind of unfair, but is intentionally designed as an Option for this reason – players who don’t want to deal with this nonsense don’t have to, and players who are sick of the AI laying down and dying really early on are free to have some level of challenge (although players will still probably have superior economies by that point).



The Neanderthal City of Engis is discovered adjacent to the Romans. Guess this continent was a madhouse for a while at the start.



Tosukh is founded. It has a good balance of access to sea resources and future access to land resources that we are missing, like Prime Timber.




Community grants access to a new civic as well as the second level of the “Town Hall” series of buildings. I’ve been trying to avoid these early on as they increase costs, but I really should start building them sooner rather than later as the economy stabilizes for miscellaneous bonuses like a free specialist.



So C2C has a system where slowly over time the wildlife will change. This is why, combined with the taming of the continent, you haven’t heard me complaining about my workers being devoured by wildlife in a long while. It looks like we’ve hit the point at which the sea wildlife has started emerging in force. Presumably this whale shark didn’t mean to destroy our raft, but it accidentally smacked into it and the rickety thing fell to pieces.



The Grand Marine Festival completes in Karakorum, and really there’s no other place that it could go besides our naval powerhouse city.



I dunno whether to consider Pottery a really big tech advance (for the game), since Cottages are a bit less useful than they would be in other versions of Civ 4. Still it’s nice to have the option and I’m pretty sure pottery as a resource is useful for something later down the line.



Yeah, there goes another Minor Civilization developing somewhere in the world. I’m not sure if these guys are developing to replace the civilizations we’ve kicked off the board or are developing independently and the list just doesn’t acknowledge them as long as a “real” civilization is still present.



Alright, with Sailing coming up, I figure that the time has come to start expanding across the seas. Our first target is going to be the Northern continent. We still don’t have Seafaring yet, and so we can’t trade with cities placed on continents separated from us by Sea like Berlin.



The Romans get a bit annoyed with my exploratory units running across their borders and send a War Canoe to try and take one out. The canoe survives, though barely, and has to retreat back to Khaidu to heal up. There’s Way of the Waves working out for us already. Fortunately the Romans can’t follow – the positioning of their cities means they probably won’t be able to strike us until they research Seafaring, which is a long way away for them.



Sailing is a real game changer – in addition to getting decent boats that can fulfill all functions back, those boats now no longer have a build cap on them. Additionally, trade can now be conducted by cities across coastal regions, though not Seas or Oceans, something that will be useful for our new city.




I get a Great Artist and decide to spend him to increase Tenduk’s border size. It wasn’t going to grow for something like 500 turns and I really want access to Copper and Bronze before the end of the Era.



Archery is a tech which introduces Archers as a unit, the first Bow type unit, as opposed to the various throwing units we’ve had before. They’re supposedly better at their job than Atlatls and similar units but as with most things for a while it’s kind of a toss up based on what point in the tech tree you’re on.





I’ve been keeping Persepolis busy building wonders. After Ancient Way of the Waves, I set it to build Cleopatra’s Needle, a nice wonder because it also creates duplicates of itself in other cities – resulting in a civilization-wide cultural and GPP boom.



Karakorum finishes the infrastructure for building the new boats and I splurge a bit on getting a new boat up ASAP. Hopefully this one should be strong enough to stand up to the miscellaneous sea wildlife now. But even as I start the settlement process of the Northern Continent, there are others to consider…

(Techs not mentioned: Megalith Construction, Ideograms)

Jossar fucked around with this message at 19:27 on Apr 11, 2020

Jossar
Apr 2, 2018

Current status: Angry about subs :argh:
Jossar's Playthrough - Pick A Continent

The Northern Continent only really needs a single city to be fully settled as its influence projects out in the future, unless the placement zones are awful, or I decide to go back and spam cities later. The Neanderthals are friendly enough that I don’t need to worry about the Northeastern continent, and they might claim the last bits soon anyway. Real long term growth is going to be on one of the other continents.

The Hostile West



Pros: Containment. The Romans can’t really do anything until they hit Seafaring. But leaving them alone gives them a lot of time to develop on their continent and if they figure out how to overcome the science problem they are going to be in our faces from the word go. This option hopefully limits their growth or at least ensures that we have a stable beach head somewhere

Cons: The Romans are a known threat. Both in the sense that we already know what needs to be done to hold them off and that they have no qualms about turbo-murdering any settlers we put over here.

City Sites

A. North, beyond Engis.
B. South, in the unsettled region.

The Mysterious Southeast



Pros: :iiam: Perhaps untold wonders and friendly civilizations live here?

Cons: :iiam: Perhaps we attract the attention of more people who want us dead?

City Sites

C. The southern continent, closer to home for resupply.
D. The northern continent, allowing for deeper exploration.

Voting lasts 24 hours from the time of this post.

Jossar fucked around with this message at 18:46 on Apr 11, 2020

Kangxi
Nov 12, 2016

"Too paranoid for you?"
"Not me, paranoia's the garlic in life's kitchen, right, you can never have too much."
C. The southern continent, closer to home for resupply.

Complications
Jun 19, 2014

C. The southern continent, closer to home for resupply.

I love the friendly neanderthals. I was expecting more terrible things when they popped up and am pleasantly surprised.

sincx
Jul 13, 2012

furiously masturbating to anime titties
.

sincx fucked around with this message at 06:12 on Mar 23, 2021

Seraphic Neoman
Jul 19, 2011


Let's find more friends!
C. The southern continent, closer to home for resupply.

Xelkelvos
Dec 19, 2012
C. Keep reaching out and maybe touching someone, but not too far.

Maguoob
Dec 26, 2012
M. The Moon, where Hitler obviously escaped to his moonbase.

(Real answer: C)

Playing a bit myself and I decided to see how terrible the trade mission stuff was. From one of my cities to Rome (6 tiles away) 40 gold. From that same city to Other Rome (Aachen/Holy Rome) 51 gold and 31 tiles away. So the distance calculation leaves a lot to be desired, also I'm making like 400 gold per turn already, so micro managing a merchant is not on my list of things to do.

Something that hasn't come up yet in either LP, but is the AI capable of handling Walls when invading? Unlike Civ VI where the AI can attack but doesn't, here only siege units appear to be able to attack a city with a wall that is above 50% fortification bonus. Which means a properly defended (player) city would take a lot of siege attacks to even to drop below that threshold.

Too bad Civ V and VI are complete poo poo when it comes to mods, because I would have liked to seen overhaul ones like this one (or FFH) done in them.

Jossar
Apr 2, 2018

Current status: Angry about subs :argh:
I don't recall Siege Weapons being that relevant?

In fact you can see from one of the previous screenshots that Berlin was at 58% fortification when I took it out and I didn't build any kind of rams at all. That's probably one of the combat Options that I somehow missed because it didn't explicitly say it was part of the C2C Combat set. So at the very least I can't say anything about how the AI will react to them for this game.

EDIT: According to the 40.1 Player Guide it used to be bundled default with the mod and was since moved to an Option. I still wish there was a bit more standardization in Options for figuring what's sensical to turn on/off.

Jossar fucked around with this message at 21:01 on Apr 11, 2020

Maguoob
Dec 26, 2012

Jossar posted:

I don't recall Siege Weapons being that relevant?

In fact you can see from one of the previous screenshots that Berlin was at 58% fortification when I took it out and I didn't build any kind of rams at all. That's probably one of the combat Options that I somehow missed because it didn't explicitly say it was part of the C2C Combat set. So at the very least I can't say anything about how the AI will react to them for this game.

EDIT: According to the 40.1 Player Guide it used to be bundled default with the mod and was since moved to an Option. I still wish there was a bit more standardization in Options for figuring what's sensical to turn on/off.

It isn't just the fortification, it is tied to actual Walls from Masonry. The Pedia entry for walls has "Enemy Units will not be able to invade the city until the defenses drop below 60%". I only noticed this in one of my games when the AI got walls up and I could no longer use my stealth cats to run around and kill all their defenders with wave tactics.

I guess it is the "realistic siege" option since apparently I have that on, but I don't recall ever changing it myself. It is possible I did, but forgot about it. Since unlike Civ VI, Civ IV was designed by people that actually gave a gently caress and your game options don't reset every time back to default. So check your settings and see if you have it on, if you do then you'll need siege units once actual Walls get built. Otherwise, siege units aren't required.

zetamind2000
Nov 6, 2007

I'm an alien.

C. The southern continent, closer to home for resupply.

zetamind2000
Nov 6, 2007

I'm an alien.

sincx posted:

This mod is fantastic.

Fixing it would require making a set of graphics for the neanderthal culture group but that would clash with the fact that each culture group has their own set of graphics and any civ can acquire the neanderthal culture group as an extra if they have caves in their cultural borders. Possible solutions include:

a) Make the neanderthal culture group exclusive to the neanderthal civ and give it graphics and sub-cultures (probably based around where the major neanderthal archeological sites were) to make it compliant with the mod's obsession with culture groups

b) Downgrade the neanderthal culture group to be a sub-culture of another group and give the neanderthal civ the existing european civ graphics

c) Turn it into a map resource that only appears on cave tiles and disappears when you research sedentary lifestyle so that people can still get neanderthal units without the neanderthal civ looking like poo poo when they reach the ancient era

d) Pick option c it's the easiest and makes the most sense

e) Forget it and move on to more important things like making a good chunk of the game only reachable on certain maps

zetamind2000 fucked around with this message at 22:15 on Apr 11, 2020

President Ark
May 16, 2010

:iiam:
C. I've always been more of a fan of exploring over conquest in these games, anyway. (Are there any 4x games where the emphasis is on the expanding and exploring parts of things all game long?)

Grapplejack
Nov 27, 2007

the new philosophical question: do you kill baby hitler? is out, do you kill caveman hitler? is IN

Jossar
Apr 2, 2018

Current status: Angry about subs :argh:
The worst part of the game... is all the racist and biotruth stuff.

But on a less obviously awful level, i'm kind of starting to get creeped out at how despite all the horrible jank it seems to have hacked my brain so easily. Despite normal civ not really appealing to me that much, I am really feeling the "One More Turn" vibes at this point, even as I sit here waiting for the results of the vote.

I suppose it helps to ensure that i'll see this thing through to the end, especially because i'm LPing it for an audience this time around, if nothing else.

Jossar fucked around with this message at 02:19 on Apr 12, 2020

sincx
Jul 13, 2012

furiously masturbating to anime titties
.

sincx fucked around with this message at 06:12 on Mar 23, 2021

paragon1
Nov 22, 2010

FULL COMMUNISM NOW
A gently caress off rest of the world, the Arctic is Mongol pasture!! :argh:

Grapplejack
Nov 27, 2007

Jossar posted:

The worst part of the game... is all the racist and biotruth stuff.

But on a less obviously awful level, i'm kind of starting to get creeped out at how despite all the horrible jank it seems to have hacked my brain so easily. Despite normal civ not really appealing to me that much, I am really feeling the "One More Turn" vibes at this point, even as I sit here waiting for the results of the vote.

I suppose it helps to ensure that i'll see this thing through to the end, especially because i'm LPing it for an audience this time around, if nothing else.

I think the reason c2c does this is that it is loving loaded with a billion things to do, so you can always find at least one close-term goal.

turol
Jul 31, 2017
D just to be contrarian

Anzrel
Dec 15, 2010

Grapplejack posted:

I think the reason c2c does this is that it is loving loaded with a billion things to do, so you can always find at least one close-term goal.

That has been my experience with it. You can always tell yourself, well I'll just go till I have this tech, or I'll just finish this war, or I'll just found this city or just finish this wonder and end up going on well past your intended stopping point, especially with how things are right now.

That said, I do wish there was less problematic stuff in it, but I'm the sort of nerd who will play in a deliberately suboptimal fashion if it means ignoring some bit I don't like, so it works.

Oh uh. C as well, if it still matters.

Jossar
Apr 2, 2018

Current status: Angry about subs :argh:
Vote is closed, but per sincx's advice I went and played through so you get the update asap.

Jossar’s Playthrough – Ancient 2




I get this message about a famine happening in Berlin which the Neanderthals decided to help me with. I didn’t notice any actual change at the time and kept playing, but a few turns later the same event popped for me! I return the favor and we get improved diplomatic relations.



Beshbalik is founded up north. It has access to Horses and Mammoths. More importantly it’s centrally located so it will have the chance to devour the entirety of the continent in its cultural radius if it ever gets that high of a culture level.



Taxonomy is researched. It’s noticeable because it makes a number of animal myths that were previously locked available, which is going to lead to an increase in science production.



A goody hut gives us Naval Warfare, notable for providing the upgraded equivalent of the War Canoe, the War Galley.




While preparing to settle the Southeast Continent, I send some leftover canoes further eastward. What I discover is that there wasn’t really another continent here at all, just a couple of islands with a small Barbarian City. I’m kind of getting nervous at this point that there may be nothing interesting at all down here and the vote was a waste of time.



Minor wonders are being constructed all the time. I thought it was particularly appropriate after the series of famine events that the Strategic Grain Reserve be constructed in Berlin.



The Wheel is researched. Honestly the most important thing here is probably the upgrade to better roads, which might allow us to start traversing the central continent in decent time if I can ever get my workers organized enough to build the pathway network.




Khokh Nuuriin is founded on a spot with decent food resources, access to Pearls and Beavers, but mostly so I can look at this really cool Natural Wonder all the time. Unlike many other natural wonders the Aurora does nothing except look pretty and give you an initial gold bonus for finding it. But it also rotates around in game, so it is extra pretty.



Rome settles another city. This one’s mostly notable because it now mean the Romans are really well forward placed for future invasions, though my culture border should still be able to block anything too stupid from happening for a while yet.



Another Natural Wonder is discovered while exploring the Southern Continent. This one actually does have an associated building, but its location is so awkwardly placed that it would be ruinous to build a city close enough to take advantage of it.





Mining is researched and reveals a lot more gem and metal resources, a mine improvement which can properly take advantage of them, and buildings that take advantage of those resources to make a lot of money. It also comes with a civic that’s going to throw me into anarchy for a few turns.

I decide that now’s as good a time as any to pop a Golden Age, consuming my Great Hunter to do so. After a few turns of deliberation, I decide that there’s no better time to adopt some other civics as well, even if they might be a bit expensive in execution.





The West also turns out to be a much more chaotic mishmash of small islands than I had initially expected. One of those islands also happens to contain another Natural Wonder, the Dead Sea.



Karakorum finishes constructing this World Wonder, the Great Bath of Mohenjo-Daro. The freshwater bonus is a bit wasted, but the population bonus will be amazing in the future. Not for right now though, as I discover much to my dismay that settling more cities at this point is utterly financially ruinous: a test showed me to be losing something like 60 gold a turn unless I cranked science all the way down.



Copper Working is researched, giving access to a lot of miscellaneous units (including the next part of the normal melee line) and quality of life buildings at the cost of finally starting the weakening of the Stone Tool Maker.



The Southeast Continent is finally explored. There wasn’t anything too game changing here, but it was refreshingly pleasant and there’s enough land to settle for a little while when I can start doing so without crashing my economy again.




Case in point, my economy crashes with the end of the Golden Age, though I do get a Great Hunter right as it ends to be saved up for another Golden Age. Fortunately, the first mining buildings come online and Berlin finishes building a World Wonder which is ostensibly about troop production, but also provides a hidden bonus of a lot of money. So we’re back to decent shape in time for another trait selection.

(Techs not mentioned: Standardization, Consciousness, Ancestor Worship)

Jossar
Apr 2, 2018

Current status: Angry about subs :argh:
Jossar’s Playthrough – 3rd Trait Vote

A single positive trait vote, with the same options as always, and the ability to remove Covetous. If you were wondering where the 2nd stages of the traits are, I looked it up and they don’t show up until the Renaissance. So don’t hold your breath.

We could try picking more oddball choices, but unlike last time where they simply weren’t what we needed at the time, we’re starting to run into the problem that they don’t synergize well with what we already have going. I would highly recommend that you pick a single facet of our civilization (Food, Hammers, Wealth, Science, Culture, etc.) and focus on that. Or remove Covetous, since that trait’s pretty annoying too. Of course, I’ll take whatever wins the vote in the end and will describe traits from the original list (found here) if people want to know what they do.

Since as mentioned before, votes are starting to drag on and are often decided long in advance of 24 hours, I will pick the first option to receive 7 votes or whichever option has the most votes by 8:00 AM EST tomorrow.

Cythereal
Nov 8, 2009

I love the potoo,
and the potoo loves you.
Focus on Science.

Geshtal
Nov 8, 2006

So that's the post you've decided to go with, is it?
Take the Strategist trait, so a focus on military traits to synergize with our Seafaring trait. Not only is it a boost to unit experience (starting and earned), but it automatically fires off a Golden Age every time a Great General is born. Considering you can build up one from fighting nations/animals, or spawned by a city, or even a handful of techs that award a free one if you research first, there's plenty of ways to keep a near continuous Golden Age going.

Seraphic Neoman
Jul 19, 2011


IMO remove covetous I'm all for fun negative traits but anything that lowers our science in this mod needs to loving go.

We can replace it with another trait, pref something that can increases science and doesn't touch gold. If you wanna handicap yourself, then just ensure it increases science.

Seraphic Neoman fucked around with this message at 19:37 on Apr 12, 2020

Kangxi
Nov 12, 2016

"Too paranoid for you?"
"Not me, paranoia's the garlic in life's kitchen, right, you can never have too much."
Remove Covetous. With how many techs we've got in this mod? That's got to go.

Arcanuse
Mar 15, 2019

Wealth.

Servetus
Apr 1, 2010
Remove Covetous, that trait sucks

megane
Jun 20, 2008



Sounds like ditching Covetous is probably the best call. Industrious or Financial might be good too.

Maguoob
Dec 26, 2012

Kangxi posted:

Remove Covetous. With how many techs we've got in this mod? That's got to go.

:emptyquote: but seriously, negative science when there are a million techs is dumb.

zetamind2000
Nov 6, 2007

I'm an alien.

Kangxi posted:

Remove Covetous. With how many techs we've got in this mod? That's got to go.

Remove covetous. Have you seen the tech tree in this game? My god, it's full of techs.

SIGSEGV
Nov 4, 2010


Remove covetous. It's been a good joke, but it's also a bad joke that needs to go.

Adbot
ADBOT LOVES YOU

Complications
Jun 19, 2014

Remove Covetous

It made good sense as fluff, but the crunch is horrific.

  • 1
  • 2
  • 3
  • 4
  • 5
  • Post
  • Reply