Civ 4 - Fall from Heaven 2 (version .41N) and more - Updated 6/3/2010

[Cheddar]

>>Download here.<<



Developers announcement of a new FFH, non CIV engine (waiting on details).

Lums recommend mod to FFH.  <-- Awesome mob, called Orbis

[Stormwaltz]

I've been waiting for this. I admire the amount of thought and effort they've put into this mod. It's on the scale of DC for BF42.

[Cheddar]

Patch C is up now; they are extremely quick to fix bugs!  I love this mod and hope to eventually find some people to multiplay with.

Must read for fire.

Wiki, slightly outdated.

[Roac]

What coincidence.  I hopped on the civ board Friday to see if they'd updated anything, and was surprised to find the Fire update.  I got my tail whipped on the first go round (lost three warriors and a settler right off - set me back about 50y), doing better the second.  Really fun surprise; don't research Ashen Veil unless you want things to go nuts. 

There's also a slight bug, where the game will CTD on startup.  Go into options on the main menu, and turn off "Show Health Bars". 

[Xilren's Twin]

Thanks for this thread.  I had not played Civ4 in forever, but after reading up on this and DL'ing the mod, im back in turn based heaven.

To date, I honestly think this is the closest thing to a remade Master of Magic that i've seen (and i keep an old laptop around just to play MoM when the mood strikes).  The early game can be a little rough with wandering monsters and barbarians.  Game 1, I had the misfortune of having a big ass red dragon land in the middle of my empire of 3 cities.  Couldn't kill that bastard.  Game 2, legendary Barbarian chieftan spawns near my 2 cities and promptly takes over my capital, then razes my second city in less than 10 turns.

Game 3 is going much better.  As a neutral civ i've already wiped out 2 evil civ's who had the nerve to be on my continent.  Still trying to  get a good feel for the mages spell abilities they can get when leveling up.

I'd highly recommend this to anyone who hadn't tried it.

Xilren

[Strazos]

Just wondering, but will this mod work with the Direct2Drive version of Civ4? I just felt like re-downloading the game for whatever reason, and I remembered someone frothing about this mod.

[Cheddar]

Just wondering, but will this mod work with the Direct2Drive version of Civ4? I just felt like re-downloading the game for whatever reason, and I remembered someone frothing about this mod.

YES.YES YESY YES YES YESSSS.

For serious, this is the greatest mod.  EVER.  Get it.  NOW.

[GenVec]

Damn you for necroing this and getting me all excited for the next installment.

Quite seriously though, the best mod i've ever seen. For extra fun, try playing it on the "Earth 16 Civs" map. I managed to get the Calabim starting in Egypt and the Lanun in Great Britain - how sweet is that?

[Cheddar]

Unlike the normal civ game the FFH mod has tons of strategies; no one is better then the other.  And the magic addition really is rad.

Religion makes a difference.  What magic you take makes a difference.  Every style can excel in this mod.  It is the greatest thing since sliced bread.

I rave.

[Paelos]

Hmm, everytime I try to load the mod, it restarts the game and crashes on me. So, I'm kinda stumped here.

[Strazos]

There's also a slight bug, where the game will CTD on startup.  Go into options on the main menu, and turn off "Show Health Bars". 

[Paelos]

It was already off, this does nothing.

[Typhon]

I'm in the same state as Paelos.  Health bars off, game just quits on the loading screen with no errors.  Is it really like MoM?  Enough for me to struggle with it to get it running?

Edit:  I figured out what my problem was - I wasn't running the lastest version of the Civ 4.  I used the internal game update utility, it worked well, mod now loads fine.

[Paelos]

Yes, same here. I went back and actually reinstalled Civ4 completely and then updated it to the 1.61 patch. That seemed to help with the mod situation. Now, I'm playing it and enjoying it.

[Sky]

Rawk on. Cool mod, I'm impressed with the amount of changes they've made...though they need a musical advisor. Enya? Ecchya.

Played a game with the same settings I had been playing my vanilla Civ4 over hte weekend. Huge archipelago, few civs. Lots of naval fun and expansion. Took a random civ, got what appear to be neutral elves? Forget the name.

As before, I tried to rp it some. Picked my advancements as a leader logically would, given the landscape and challenges facing an isolated island nation that didn't know there were others out there.

Focused on magery and naval, being elves and island-bound. Quickly got the Octopus Overlords thing going, and decided to embrace that, not even forming other religions. Sacrificed all my warriors to be The Drown (should be Drowned?). Shuffled them underwater and beat some barbarian tail. Had the ghost ship show up and dump undead on the northern end of my island and had a nice battle taking and retaking a couple cities before getting that under control. Built up a bunch of mage characters so they can level up while I work on improving the navy.

Got totally sucked in and went to bed late. Good deal. Maybe not quite as MoM as Age of Wonders:Shadow Magic, but definitely a GREAT improvement to Civ4. I mean...c'mon, in my first game I'm an elvish Cthulhu cult! Woohoo!

[Merusk]

Oh goddamn you all.  I just failed trying to get MoM running on my new machine and now I see this mod. Yarrr, where's my Civ4 disks.

[Sky]

Oops, apparently I'm a human! Couldn't really tell from the 3d units. Playing as the Amurites with Dain the Casswallawn as leader. Still...the cthlu...errr Octopus Overlords stuff is a really cool vibe compared to the vanilla game I was playing beforehand. And as an island naval nation, the (at least early game) naval options are much cooler.

These guys are really spanking Firaxis and need to be hired STAT. Instead of a chintzy galley, I get the galley and a couple types of similar ships...all of which I can then slightly modify for speed/attack/cargo? Oh hell yes.

I can't wait to dig in some more, and it's still at .22! The release shall pwneth, verily.

[GenVec]

Octopus Overlords are great for their upgraded religion tech - mind stapling or some such. Allows you to enable the slavery civic, which gives a significant chance of creating an orc/elf/human/whatever worker whenever you beat a rival unit.

Playing as the Calabim on the 16 civ world map, I started in Egypt and made a big early push into the Levant. Adopted the Octopus Overlords, maximized economy and battoned down the hatches. All was going pretty well until the Centaur Folk and Mercenary People (forget their names) staged a big attack from Iran and Asia minor. Solution? Hold on in Gaza until I can found the Ashen Vale in the dark heart of Africa, then switch to the Hyborem faction, permanently ally with the beleagured Calabim, and restart my dark conquest of the planet.

My one complaint about the mod is the AI's inability to handle magic well. They use it occasionally, but with nowhere near the possible effectiveness a human player would.

[Merusk]

My one complaint about the mod is the AI's inability to handle magic well. They use it occasionally, but with nowhere near the possible effectiveness a human player would.

That was always a huge stumbling block for the AI in MoM, too.  The computer could be counted on to cast a heal once (if available) it's highest damage spell, and the same series of enchants (depending on color).  Don't know why that was, but there was more than enough times that if it'd cast Flame Strike instead of a maximized firebolt or doombolt it could have wiped my army out.  Silly machine.

[Typhon]

I'm also finding it very cool.  It's not MoM, but it's definitely not Civ 4.  Not that Civ 4 doesn't have a much improved interface (from Civ 3), but somewhere along the way Civ 4 seems to have lost it's heart.  This mod has heart.

[Paelos]

I'm also finding it very cool.  It's not MoM, but it's definitely not Civ 4.  Not that Civ 4 doesn't have a much improved interface (from Civ 3), but somewhere along the way Civ 4 seems to have lost it's heart.  This mod has heart.

Well, Civ 4 just made too many decisions about their features which have zero consequences on the actual game. Religion? Meaningless. Civics? Basically meaningless at the top. Units? All homogonized with no attack v. defensive tradeoffs. It just became extremely beige even with "upgraded" items like flashier graphics and better AI.

This mod actually makes things matter. Your civics have tradeoffs and balance, and they really piss off the AI. Religion actually affects units, civics, and technology. It's a much better use of the system.

[MrHat]

So what difficulty does everyone play on?

I've already restarted like 8 times.  Each civ plays very unique.  Currently enjoying my role as a barbarian.

[Stormwaltz]

Well, Civ 4 just made too many decisions about their features which have zero consequences on the actual game. Religion? Meaningless. Civics? Basically meaningless at the top. Units? All homogonized with no attack v. defensive tradeoffs. It just became extremely beige even with "upgraded" items like flashier graphics and better AI.

Religion - I've always suspected this was a victim of politically correct tooth-pulling. There's a mod somewhere that makes religions more like their RL counterparts (Jewish cities don't gain health from pork, Christians get awesome missionaries, etc.).

Units - I think promotions were supposed to take the place of unit variety. I'm still missing the Firepower stat from Civ2.

Civics - Better than the handful of basic governments in previous games, but not enough variety in effects. Fun to mod, though.

Strategic Resources - I like the concept of this. Scarcity can really enrich the game, but it doesn't happen all the time. I enjoy "New World" style maps, where some of the most valuable resources aren't available on the starting civ continent. I've also run across the odd super-site on random maps. One city in my last game of FFH managed to hit four wine regions. (It also ended up being the birthplace of Octopus Overlords, which made it my biggest source of both money and culture.)

[Paelos]

Strategic Resources - I like the concept of this. Scarcity can really enrich the game, but it doesn't happen all the time. I enjoy "New World" style maps, where some of the most valuable resources aren't available on the starting civ continent. I've also run across the odd super-site on random maps. One city in my last game of FFH managed to hit four wine regions. (It also ended up being the birthplace of Octopus Overlords, which made it my biggest source of both money and culture.)

Drunk Octolords? How could you ever go wrong!

[Merusk]

Cursed mod keeps crashing on me as one particular city completes production.  I may have to abandon my summoning octolords for a new game. 

Oh.. and "Desert Rose" for the OO music.  NOoooooooooooooooooo.

Ashen Veil is looking attractive.. wonder what their music is.

[Paelos]

The Order's music is well-picked. I'm using that one at the moment as I pump out legions of Crusaders to smite my heathen enemies.

[Stephen Zepp]

Cursed mod keeps crashing on me as one particular city completes production.  I may have to abandon my summoning octolords for a new game. 

Oh.. and "Desert Rose" for the OO music.  NOoooooooooooooooooo.

Ashen Veil is looking attractive.. wonder what their music is.

Interesting--I'm getting a crash as well with the exact same setup--locks me up completely, have to restart :(

Any idea on what it is you are building? For me, it seems to be when a certain city absorbs Octolords religion...

EDIT: "patch d" fixed my crash problem, but omfg do they have a breeding wolves problem. Looks like they didn't bother to check the total number when breeding--about 100 years in or so and I have literally 300+ wolf pack units all across any of the north/south tundra.

I never ever thought I would see "the grind" in Civilization, but I spent 20+ turns with 3 summoners chain summoning to try to thin them out, and finally opened the world builder in frustration to find the den--only to see the horde in all it's glory.

[Stormwaltz]

Ashen Veil is looking attractive.. wonder what their music is.

Looks like Arcana for the most part, with at least one song taken from Ben Houge's soundtrack to Arcanum.

[Merusk]

Ashen Veil is niiice.  NIfty feature, too.  Once you research "infernal pact" (AV only) you get a popup that says, "You have brought demons into this world. Do you want to abandon your civ and begin as Hyboreim?" (Infernals)

The infernals start out with a powerful hero 2 settlers and some nice units.  As a nice touch, any place your borders are turns to ash/ lava rather than natural pastoral settings.   Opposing civ units that die can produce Manes which are able to hurry production or promote into minor melee units. 

Buahah.

Don't worry about abandoning to try them out, either.  It changes the savegame name since your leader's name changes, so you can return to your previous civ if you find Demons aren't for you.

Cursed mod keeps crashing on me as one particular city completes production.  I may have to abandon my summoning octolords for a new game. 

Oh.. and "Desert Rose" for the OO music.  NOoooooooooooooooooo.

Ashen Veil is looking attractive.. wonder what their music is.

Interesting--I'm getting a crash as well with the exact same setup--locks me up completely, have to restart :(

Any idea on what it is you are building? For me, it seems to be when a certain city absorbs Octolords religion...

It wasn't anything in particular.. I found it was when i selected the next item to build from the normal "you have completed.. what next" window.  If I went into the city via that option, then picked whatever I wanted, it wasn't a problem.  Odd, but hey, I can live with it.

[Stormwaltz]

It seems FFH will be included in the next Civ4 expansion pack, "Beyond the Sword." News found on civfanatics.com.

EDIT: The mod finally has a homepage.

PC Gamer has reported in its latest issue that these scenarios/mods would be included in the Civ4: Beyond the Sword expansion pack.

Final Frontier: A space scenario where you control a human colony and expand your territory in space.
Afterworld: A squad-based tactical "thriller" where the player fights undead in the X-com style.
Gods of Old: A scenario focused on religion.
Chaos: A game of Civilization where you constantly face exciting random events.
Next War: A futuristic sci-fi scenario with clone armies and more.
Charlemagne: Conquer Europe during the renaissance.
Crossroads of the World: A late medieval age scenario where you explore and conquer the crossroads of the world in Africa, the Middle East and Asia.
Broken Star: Civil war has struck the Soviet Union. Unite the russian bear!
Superrobo: Be the first civilization to find and collect the parts to a giant mysterious robot that crashed on Earth.
WWII Road to War: Atlast! Play as the Allies or Axis in both the Pacific and Europe.
Fall from Heaven: A popular fantasy mod for Civilization IV, improved for the expansion.
Rhye's and Fall of Civilization: Another improved and updated favorite among the fan's mods for Civ IV.

A lot of SF scenarios, but I bet not a one of them will have a galactic-scale map. Long ago (Civ2) I had made a stylized spiral galaxy map for a personal Star Wars mod. "cities" were "Sectors," and each square of terrain encompassed thousands of stars. It boggles me that modders - including Firaxis' own - are still obsessed with having maps on the scale of individual planets or solar systems.

[Typhon]

So weird that you should mention that (galactic-scale map) as I was recently thinking about Outreach - a board game created in the late 70s by a company called SPI.  They had a galactic scale map similar to what you are talking about (game was one of three, Star Force, Outreach and Star Soldier).

[Stephen Zepp]

I absolutely love this mod, problems and all (minor ones in the big scheme of things).

The one thing that bothers me is that they flat out ripped a lot of commercial games' graphics--specifically, a lot of the promotion icons are straight out of Guild Wars.

I hope that Firaxis is giving them some support art wise to get this fixed up for that CD--hate to see a law suit happen and taint this incredible mod.

[MrHat]

<3 Planar Gates.

Edit: Well, I built the Mercucial Gate and unlocked some new race that took over the city.  It was all very confusing, maybe if I get a few mins at work this week, I'll read the wiki.  Or print it and read it on the train.

[schild]

The froth for this mod has officially reached me. The moment I can play this, it shall be done. I've wanted a reason to get back into Civ 4, this looks like a good damn reason.

[Azazel]

Nod. I'll be installing this as soon as my PC arrives. Mioght even check out the expack as well....