Age of Discovery 1492-1792 - v1.12 EGE Edition

Age of Discovery!
1492 - 1792

by Dale Kent
Version 1.12 - November 2006 (Melbourne eGames & Entertainment Expo edition - EGE edition)



The date is 1492 and Spanish explorer Christopher Columbus has just discovered Cuba. The Hundred Years war between England and France is over, and the only English presence on the mainland is Calais. The War of the Roses in England sees the Tudor line on the throne. Portugal has explored down the African west coast, and Genoa is the major trading port in Western Europe. The Arabs have conquered most of North Africa, except for Morocco. Burgundy has broken apart and their lands taken by Saxony, France and the Duchy of Holland.

Europe is on the brink of social, economic and religious reform as it leaves the Middle Ages and enters the Renaissance. Scientists are making major discoveries in all fields and the people are striving for new social freedoms. History is yours for the making.

Good luck Sire, may God be with you!



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*  Recognitions  *
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Age of Discovery has been recognised as one of the top mods for Civilization IV by:
- Winner Best Mod: Single Player Melbourne eGames & Entertainment Expo [November 2006]
- Strategy Gamer Magazine [July 2006]
- Computer Games Weekly Magazine [November 2006]
- Inside Mac Games Online [November 2006]
- Soren Johnson (lead designer of Civ4) in his comments in "Civilization Chronicles" [Released November 2006]



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*  Introduction  *
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Welcome to the Age of Discovery.  This mod is for Sid Meier's Civilization IV + patch 1.61.  The mod attempts to recreate the climate of Europe and the New World in the 300 years of American colonisation.  You can play from the discovery of land in the Carribean Sea till the beginning of the Age of Imperialism.  The mod finishes a few years before Napoleon set off on his attempt to conquer Europe.

Please note that there are new concepts in Age of Discovery that you will need to know how to use.  The AI is fully able to use these new concepts and you will be at a disadvantage if you do not know how to use them.  They are explained below.



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*  Installation  *
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Before installing Age of Discovery please ensure that your Civilization IV installation is at patch 1.61.  If you require the patch please download it from: http://www.2kgames.com/civ4/home.htm

1. Download and unzip the Age of Discovery zip file to a temporary directory on your computer.
2. Copy the "Age of Discovery" folder complete with all its contents to: ..\Sid Meiers Civilization 4\Mods\
3. If you previously installed an older version of AoD please delete the old map from ..\Sid Meiers Civilization 4\Public Maps\



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*  Un-Installation  *
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To uninstall AoD simply delete the folder ..\Sid Meiers Civilization 4\Mods\Age of Discovery\
Though I don't know why you would want to since this mod is so good.  :)



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*  Playing Age of Discovery  *
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To play Age of Discovery follow these steps:

1. Start Civilization 4
2. Click on "Advanced"
3. Click on "Load a Mod"
4. Click on "Age of Discovery" and allow Civilization 4 to restart with the mods settings.
5. Click on "Single Player" or "Multi Player"
6. Click on "Play a Scenario"
7. Select "Age of Discovery" and then click on "OK"
8. Choose the nation you wish to play
9. Choose the difficulty level you wish to play on



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*  Nations in AoD  *
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There are three types of nations in AoD; major nations, minor nations and native nations.

Major Nations:
- Kingdom of England
- Duchy of Holland
- Kingdom of France
- Kingdom of Spain
- Kingdom of Portugal

Minor Nations:
- Kingdom of Scotland
- Duchy of Saxony
- Republic of Genoa
- Ottoman Empire

Native Nations:
- Native Americans
- Aztec Empire
- Maya Empire

Each nation is designed to play at different levels of difficulty.  For instance, England France and Spain are easy nations to play, whilst the Aztecs and Maya are very difficult to play.  This allows for every level of player to enjoy the mod.

I recommend for your first game playing the Kingdom of England at Noble difficulty.  In the inital start situation it is possible to run a positive gold balance at 60% science, your cities have the potential to grow, and sailing directly west (for about 10 turns) from where your starting caravel is will land you in the New World with grassland, a river and bananas.  Iron and copper are located further inland in the first mountain range near this location.  The Native Americans are directly north of this location.  Researching first World Globe and then Astronomy will
allow trade over sea connecting your colonies with Europe (about 50 turns [25 years]).



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*  Tech Tree  *
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The AoD mod has a fully re-worked technology tree.  You will notice firstly that all of the pre-1492 technologies from vanilla Civ4 are maintained in the tree.  This is purely for the native nations.  As a European nation you will start with a number of technologies already known to simulate acquired knowledge pre-1492.  From this point until 1792 the technology tree has been completely re-done.  The era has been fleshed out with many new technologies, units, buildings and other components that require researching.  I have tried to create a tech tree that inter-relates with other scientific areas.  This means you will have to research technologies from every area of science to progress through the tech tree.

Please see the supplied Excel spreadsheet for the complete tech tree including what becomes available to nations at each discovery.



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*  New Concepts  *
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The AoD mod includes a brand new concept for Civ4 never before seen: Pirates & Traders!

Pirates and traders simulates the battle between honest traders sailing between Europe and the New World and pirates.  Now players have the opportunity to recreate this.

Traders are private merchants who pay a nation to fly their flag.  For this priveledge they will pay you taxes.  However, the nation who's flag they're flying provides pirate insurance to these traders.  This means, if a trader is pirated on its journey from the New World to Europe, that nation will have to pay damages to the merchant.  In-game, traders are spawned in New World coastal cities using a trading vessel of current technology (caravel/galleon/indiaman).  They are not controllable and automatically sail to Europe.  Once they near the player's capital they rejoin safe sea-lanes and pay you taxes (they are removed from the map).  Taxes are random from 1 to 10 gold.  If a trader is pirated by someone you pay the trader a random amount from 1 to 10 gold.  The more cities you have in the New World the more traders will be spawned.  A nation will only insure a trader for 10 years (20 game turns) and at the end of the 10 years the trader pays their taxes and is removed from the map.

Players are now able to build pirates.  There are three levels of pirates depending on technologies known (caravel/galleon/frigate).  Pirates have a new mission "Raid" which enables pirates to capture traders without the need to declare war.  Pirates do not fly a flag so you will not know who owns the pirate.  To use a pirate you sail adjacent to a trader, then click the "Raid" icon (the pirate flag) and then click on the trader you wish to pirate.  Be careful of normal ships though as they can capture your pirates.  So you want to capture traders but steer clear of normal ships.  Each "Raid" will net you a random amount of gold between 1 and 10.  If your pirate is captured though you will lose between 1 and 10 gold.

All normal military ships now also have a new mission, "Capture".  This mission allows your ships to become pirate hunters.  By capturing these scourges of the sea you will gain some bounty from the pirate (between 1 and 10 gold).  To capture a pirate sail adjacent to it, click the "Capture" icon (the hangman's noose) and then click on the pirate you want to capture.



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*  Credits  *
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Whilst the design and creation of this mod is all my own, I would like to thank the people of Civilization Fanatics Center (www.civfanatics.com) and Apolyton Civilization Site (www.apolyton.net) for playing this mod and making it one of the best mods for Civ4.

I would also like to thank those people who created new units for the game and allowed mod-makers like myself to download and use them in our creations.

Yes, I will admit that I ripped the AoE3 intro movie.  But it was perfect for setting the scene for this mod.  :)

Also, a special thankyou to my wife who put up without me for many hours whilst I toiled over this mod.  Thanks and I love you!

Dale