Logo Platform
logo amplifiers simplified

Announcing the Vanilla Improvement Project

Reply
Copied to clipboard!
3 years ago
Dec 4, 2021, 3:36:13 PM

Greetings! I just released the first version of a very ambitious mod project. If you don't want to read everything and jump straight to the mod page, you can find it at https://humankind.mod.io/vanilla-improvement-project


So, what is this project? it is intended to overhaul most of the vanilla game by combining several other mods. It is intended to have a "vanilla" feel, so no extra content such as new cultures, new districts or new technologies will be added. I'll be updating this thread as the project releases new versions, so your suggestions and comments are very much welcome, either down here or as a commenter directly on the patchnotes file. 


For full patch notes, check https://docs.google.com/document/d/1ls0o3E2Z5ePMvEH52GtPjPfHh8GTxD4P1Kg-jv1U8Ws/edit?usp=sharing


Our future plans include:

V0.1 - Initial Release
V0.3 - Culture Rebalance (we are here)
V0.5 - Civics Rework
V0.7 - Techtree deepdive
V0.9 - Unit Retooling
V1.0 - Finishing touches and Full release

Updated 3 years ago.
0Send private message
3 years ago
Dec 4, 2021, 6:03:29 PM

Ladies and Gentleman, here's the full scope of the Culture changes intended for v0.3 of the Vanilla Improvement Project. I've listed them all here to collect feedback before I implement them, so if you have a little time to spare could you take a look and tear it apart comment?


https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1et5n7c88C9bJEtKAJQY8_w-9ENOY3hVy5Ny6FnD1pzE/edit?usp=sharing

Updated 3 years ago.
0Send private message
3 years ago
Dec 5, 2021, 4:19:07 AM

Hello, I found that in both your mod and SmileyDA one. Aksumite +5 money/tile (in his mod), and +4 money/tile in your.

After playtest, I think it's too much. But of course I playtest with BuyThis, so, it's a bit different.

About balance, this game is like a TCG (magic the gathering), some effects can snowball or react out of control.

Here, any bonus on large scale. 

Flat bonus on a district < synergy bonus on a district < large scale bonus.

The flat simple bonus is easy to set. Any other become difficult to balance.

In my next BuyThis release, I will have to nerf also the Tenet giving +5 money/tile. I don't know how many, +3 ,+2 or even just +1. Science one too.

There is probably lot of insane bonus like that in the game. The Tenet giving +2 food on water. Already a lot so strong.

We can see how just a +1 is so powerfull. Take Egyptian, just +1 industry on tile. Harrapean +1 on food (+river one!).

More manageable bonus: Tenet +5 money on resource luxury. This one is better balanced, because there is less targets.

I can see more now how this make problems in the game, because I have to balance my DeepSea mod.

And each time, I have to think twice: this feature, is the unbalance come from my mod or from something else ?

At start of the game, I check for example my "Fishing village", and it's quite well balanced. 

It's only when some large scale bonus come in action that it become unfair. So in this example, the problem don't come from my mod.

I just need to nerf part of the game that really unbalance. 


EDIT: 

I'm in late game and anyway, there is so many global bonus everywhere than the game can only snowball. So my comment is maybe useless. 



Updated 3 years ago.
0Send private message
3 years ago
Dec 5, 2021, 1:47:05 PM

Thats why I'm creating a modpack, Enchanteur. To have things internally balanced. Of course, balance is a WIP and I'll be sure to adjust the numbers as needed.

0Send private message
0Send private message
3 years ago
Dec 10, 2021, 12:16:55 AM

Great work! All changes seem reasonable and a whole lot better. I like it, I'm re-installing the game to test. Please keep updating!

0Send private message
3 years ago
Dec 10, 2021, 10:59:00 AM

There is too much content for being agree with everything.


I note some very good ideas, here with this:

Factory Farming: +2 Farmer slots -> +8 Food per Farmer, -50% Farmer Slots 

It change a lot the gameplay, not very "vanilla feel", and could disapoint some players. I find that great.


But here:

Apothecary and Hospital: + Stability per Researcher -> + Stability per Trader 

I don't see what Traders come in this. Par researcher is the thematic of this. At least for Hospital. And if it's a problem to get X2 the same thing, Farmers would be more thematics for Apothecary.


Here, I'm neutral:

Public Fountain/Aqueduct/Sewage System: +15/+20/+25 Stability -> +10%/+15%/+20% growth gain, -5%/-10%/-15% growth loss 

It's a good idea, and I would definitely see that in game for a new content. But it's also a too big change for Vanilla feeling.
The choice to report stability bonus on military stuff (walls) look logical.


To help a bit: I posted some AI tests. Might interest you because I found the way AI don't spam the Commons quarter.

As your idea to give a base stability bonus is still good, I used that.

I added what I was dreaming (but had a lot of difficulties to do), another synergy that only apply on NON farmer/maker/market/research districts.

It make sure:

- AI need a economic district for building Commons. AI never build 7 commons with a common in the center. And AI build far less Commons.

- When AI build Commons next to the wrong district, it still get the alternative Synergy.

- As player, I also like to get the alternative synergy. This district was so boring that I never used it after weeks of gameplay, always using Garrison instead.

This alternative synergy is a bit tricky because the UI don't wan't to show this. The reason is it use more than one Validation parameter. So, it need to make it twice the thing. One only for UI (using a new tag that no district have). Then set a mapper for this new tag, so the UI show it.

Updated 3 years ago.
0Send private message
3 years ago
Dec 10, 2021, 11:11:13 AM

Thank you. Now, while I work on v0.5, can you help me with data collection to help future work on v0.7? I want to know what are your GLOBAL POLLUTION values by the last turn. To do so, please upload a small screenshot of your pollution and player counts to this form https://forms.gle/pHEVnMpcSdZDFh9KA either by sending the file or by sending a imgur (or other image hosting site) link to it. Thanks in advance for your help!

Example screenshot:






I'll take a look at the AI tests, @Enchanteur . Thanks for working on the modscene, you're always an inspiration. As for the Apothecary/Hospital thing, the idea behind moving those to Traders is to buff whats (arguably) one of the weakest specialists in the game. Having max Researchers is already a no-brainer, as techs grant you a great advantage, so by moving them to Traders you present the player an actual decision to make. I didn't want to move them to Farmers because of how automation (represented by Factory Farming and Automated Factories) reduce the number of Farmers (and Workers) you use, so that would be another hit to stability. As for the Fountain line, I decided to give stability to the Walls infra, so it needed a new bonus to go with it, and growth felt thematically appropriate. Not to mention it sorta allows for more than 100% growth per turn (in normal speed) which is something that irks a lot of players.
 

0Send private message
3 years ago
Dec 10, 2021, 12:15:29 PM

I have to find a way to test your infrastructures change.

I use only infrastructure component, OR, I use the whole pack but load it first.

I will loose some features but could get many more stuff from this than expected.

Thanks for this work. What you do and SmileyDA do is sooo a titan work. Too many isolated features to change. Time consuming. Difficulties to track all because the game use code number instead of names. And difficulties to test that all also.

0Send private message
3 years ago
Dec 15, 2021, 8:54:12 PM

It seems this mod breaks civics for me, though it didn't before, so my guess is something in your latest update(from 12/13) broke civics, or one of the two past small updates to the game itself(12/13, and 12/15) made your mod incompatible now. By "broke it", I mean the first civic never can get discovered anymore. I went into 1000 influence and a few dozen turns with a few cities without any civic ever being unlocked, though I'm uncertain for sure what unlocks them, I suspect it's reaching a certain amount of influence while being past neolithic. Besides, under those conditions I mentioned, in regular vanilla the first civic would have happened long before I got to this point. 

And this is from me testing VIP with no other mods enabled. Though, when I did have other mods, the first civic did trigger but the images of civics on the screen were gone and after the first choice, no others could be chosen(as there was nothing to click on). This led me to investigate which mod was doing it, and it appears to be this one since the above happened with VIP only enabled. 

Great mod btw! I do hope you can get it to work with vanilla again soon though :) it would be a shame if it can't. 

Updated 3 years ago.
0Send private message
3 years ago
Dec 15, 2021, 9:06:45 PM

Danisloth, there are a few possible culprits for this mod. First, it may be the very common UIMAPPER issue. It happens with any mods if you change your mod loadout during the same game session. To avoid that bug, open up the game, select all mods you want, choose apply, play. If you go back to the mod screen and apply another mod loadout the game UI and civics will break.

If you want to play with different mods, close the game, reopen it, then select your mods. This works to avoid the MISSING UIMAPPER bug on any and all mods you choose. MISSING UIMAPPER can ALSO show if you open the game, try to load your last modded game by clicking "continue", fail, go to the mod screen and apply the correct mods, then load the game. Always always always make sure you open the game and select the mods as the first thing you do.

If this does not solves it, then it is probably something in the new Amplitude patch (v1.06) that broke the mod. I'd ask you to submit your diagnostics file so I can try do debug it. You can send it here on g2g by adding it to the post as an attachment. The diagnostics file should be in your "/documents/Humankind/temporary files" folder or something like that, and look like this:

0Send private message
3 years ago
Dec 15, 2021, 9:42:51 PM

Yeah, I am aware of the game being finicky like that for mods lol. I did try that, possibly again, in case I forgot the first time. The issue seems to still persist unless I am mistaken on what triggers the first civic to appear.

For sharing the file, I would just copy and paste my local directory, as it appears in a web browser, to it then right?

Updated 3 years ago.
0Send private message
0Send private message
3 years ago
Dec 15, 2021, 10:57:46 PM

Hi danisloth, you somehow just made a link to a local file, which obviously does not work. Use the upload file button from the reply box.

0Send private message
0Send private message
3 years ago
Dec 16, 2021, 11:15:26 AM

Ok, I think I found the problem. Its asking for files which I haven't included in the mod or even had the intention of altering somehow. I think it is related to the new patch and the new mod tools update. I'll try to come up with a fix and update the mod once I have a sliver of free time... I'm absolutely swamped by my job right now.

0Send private message
3 years ago
Dec 16, 2021, 5:49:16 PM
docktorkain wrote:

Ok, I think I found the problem. Its asking for files which I haven't included in the mod or even had the intention of altering somehow. I think it is related to the new patch and the new mod tools update. I'll try to come up with a fix and update the mod once I have a sliver of free time... I'm absolutely swamped by my job right now.

No worries, take your time, I mean this would have happened literally yesterday or something, so I wouldn't expect that quick of an update. At least you were able to find the issue quickly. I hope all goes well with your job ?

0Send private message
3 years ago
Dec 17, 2021, 11:33:47 AM

Hey! I've enjoyed the majority of the changes when I was testing the mod with a discord group. However, when I picked the Mongols I lost 2 movement points instead of gaining them. Could you look into that?

0Send private message
3 years ago
Dec 17, 2021, 4:29:39 PM
Eudaimania wrote:

Hey! I've enjoyed the majority of the changes when I was testing the mod with a discord group. However, when I picked the Mongols I lost 2 movement points instead of gaining them. Could you look into that?

Strange... the file clearly says "add 2 land movement". I'll change the descriptor target and publish a hotfix.




EDIT: Pushed a hotfix to try to ensure the Mongol LT is working properly. Also changed the naval CS bugfix to a better version so both Norse LT and Lighthouse of Alexandria should properly buff transports without touching disembarked land units.  

Updated 3 years ago.
0Send private message
3 years ago
Dec 20, 2021, 8:24:06 PM

I'm very happy to announce release of v0.5! Now we have hit the Civics rework! For vhe v0.7 update, I want to tackle technology costs and effects, pollution and stability, alongside other general effects before we dive into final unit pass. We're nearing 1.0, so what you want to see for the tech overhaul?

0Send private message
?

Click here to login

Reply
Comment