A new mod enters the ring - Introducing "Close to Home"

[Amicalola]

I agree the very lush maps recently have definitely contributed towards IMP being seen as positively as it has been.

[Charriu]

We now have 5 (soon 6) games of CtH running. The traits haven't changed much except for minor changes to Protective and Aggressive from PB53 onward. I will soon (T100) be able to reveal more and interesting data from my tracking tool in PB54s lurker thread. But before that happens I want to take the chance and collect some unspoiled data from you players and lurkers of this mod. For this I provided this survey, which should be fairly quick to fill out:

CtH 1.5 Pre-Tracking Survey

Thanks in advance for all the feedback and thank you for playing this mod.

As a small reminder I will close the survey on T100 of PB54. Anybody who wants to participate has to do that before that.

[Old Harry]

Not sure if changing it on the Mods folder will fix it for all current and future versions of the mod (depends on whether newly created folders inherit the permissions or not).  But if you change it individually for each CtH folder it will work for that version of CtH.

I just tried and I think you have to set the permissions for the folder individually.

[Mjmd]

What do people think of the current circumnavigation bonus and can anyone think of a better alternative?

[superdeath]

What do people think of the current circumnavigation bonus and can anyone think of a better alternative?

I think it would be best to just be removed completely

[Old Harry]

I like it.

[Amicalola]

I like it, although I think it works best when it can only be achieved after optics.

[Miguelito]

I like it, although I think it works best when it can only be achieved after optics.

+1

Also,  remove the dependence of its availability on % of water on the map,  and just make it an option to be set by the mapmaker (maybe hidden to the players if we want the intrigue, although that sounds like it will mostly least to frustration).

[civac2]

Yes, I'd be fine with it if you get the trade route with Optics or Astronomy. Early one it's a bit strong especially for PRO leaders.

[Charriu]

I like it, although I think it works best when it can only be achieved after optics.

So first of all I like that circumnavigation gives trade routes. Back in BtS it gave +1 movement to one player. I think it's fair to say that that is unbalanced, also it made for an interesting race for circumnavigation. One other problem in BtS is for players to notice this extra movement if they haven't met the player before. I removed this for these reasons and because I wanted to ease the tensions of naval combat/invasions like Krill did in RtR with his big naval change by reducing the speed of ships overall.
At the same time I wanted to keep the quest for circumnavigation as it's a nice mini goal in the game. It just needed something else for a reward that's also fitting in the theme of circumnavigation. I thought that trade is a nice fit.

Now with all that in mind I definitely see the problem that circumnavigation is available early on some maps due to no ocean barrier across the map. The easiest way as you have already said would be to unlock this circumnavigation quest with Optics or something else.

I like it, although I think it works best when it can only be achieved after optics.

+1

Also,  remove the dependence of its availability on % of water on the map,  and just make it an option to be set by the mapmaker (maybe hidden to the players if we want the intrigue, although that sounds like it will mostly least to frustration).

Making it an option for the map maker is unfortunately not that easy or at least I don't know about an easy way. At the same time I don't want to hide it from players as its an element you want to plan against and don't want to stumble about it by accident. The original developers tried to present as much information to the player as possible and I think that's the right way.

Yes, I'd be fine with it if you get the trade route with Optics or Astronomy. Early one it's a bit strong especially for PRO leaders.

I'm treating on spoiler territory here, but I am safe to say that circumnavigation does not make PRO too strong. This will become more clear when I can present more data.