Based on the discussion it sounds clear that we are at the point of being able to create a bug fix / feature enhancement patch at this time. Let's start discussing it :)

I've started a thread over at Poly on this ( http://apolyton.net/forums/showthread.php?s=&threadid=180785 ), this should be the parallel thread over here. I'll port things back and forth as needed, updating both OP's to be similar.

Here is the starting point (OP at Poly):

I intend to make a mod (two, actually) to fix some of the more glaring errors in the game as well as adjust the gameplay to be more 'Col'-like rather than Civ-like, which is how I see the game now.

I intend to develop this as two separate elements, one as pure bugfixes (think Solver's patches for Civ4) and one with gameplay alterations. I'd primarily like to discuss the bugfixes here, and keep the gameplay alterations to myself at the moment, until I feel more comfortable with the game to be sure I'm right.

A good point to start with is Dale's fixes incorporated in AoD2...

quote: originally posted by Dale

FIXES:
- Cargo now takes as many berths as its size requirement (eg: treasure takes 6 berths)
- AI now assigns higher priority to picking up treasures on non-colonised islands
- AI now actually picks up treasures when transport next to it
- AI uses King's Transport for treasures if it doesn't have a free transport of the right size all through the game (was use King's Transport up to turn 90)


These are all simple AI fixes, and quite valid. I'll either develop these myself, or if Dale wants to contribute the solutions that would be fantastic

Additional fixes I see:


* AI does not assign military units adequately
* AI acts overly aggressively


Feature enhancements:


* Native camps do not easily identify what they trade
* Wagons/Ships on a single trade route are not identified with that trade route's name



Let's add some more to this... Keep the feature requests light (those two are hard enough as it is, both require python adjustments and whatnot). I want to stay out of C++ as much as possible with the features, unless there's significant reason to do so; the less complex this patch/fix is the better.


So, let's get some thoughts rolling!

Just as a starting comment, one thing I don't want to address yet is the REF size, simply because we don't have enough data on it. Let's keep that as something that WILL be changed, eventually, once enough data is out there for what needs to be adjusted; but that's a question of game balance and not a straight up bug, so it requires some more complex thought. Limit this to discrete bugs and/or minor feature additions at the moment.

Thanks!!

* AI does not assign military units adequately

Do you also mean by this the way the AI defends itself? Right now, from what I've read (don't have the game yet as I'm in Europe), the other European colonies don't stand a chance against the natives or their own mother countries.

Also, don't know what you think about it, but the education 'bug' is also bothering a lot of people.


Another thing, don't you think most or all of these things will be fixed in the first patch?

That's precisely what I mean.

What is the education 'bug'? I see lots of discussion of education balance, but not a bug per se.

Hopefully they will be, but historically these patches take some time... :)

That's precisely what I mean.

What is the education 'bug'?

There's a global modifier that ups the cost of education someone by 30 percent each time you do it, making it worthless to use any education building VERY quickly.

There's a global modifier that ups the cost of education someone by 30 percent each time you do it, making it worthless to use any education building VERY quickly.

I'm fairly sure that's not how the modifier you are thinking of works ... but we'll need some more information on that I suppose.

In any event, like the REF, that's a game balance issue and not a bug.

I'm fairly sure that's not how the modifier you are thinking of works ... but we'll need some more information on that I suppose.

Nope. Went through and debugged it. That's exactly how that modifier works, unfortunately. Every time someone completes their education, the cost for the next guy goes up 30 percent in points. Fortunately this is an easy fix, change the mutiplier to '0' and your education goes back to a reasonable flat-line.

In any event, like the REF, that's a game balance issue and not a bug.

Actually, it also appears to be a bug, in that the REF multiplier is the same for all levels of difficulty.

That is a balance issue, not a bug. Still needs looking at, but it is a subjective issue as opposed to an objective issue (like something not functioning properly). It wouldn't shock me to learn that it was the same for all levels (if that's true) intentionally, because on easier levels you have an easier time building up your army...

I'm not saying we shouldn't look at it, just that it's more complex balancing the game than just fixing bugs.

I found 2 small bugs so far while playing the game:

The first one is with sending ships to Europe. If you have multiple ships selected and hit CTRL-E, only one ship will head to Europe while the other ship(s) will sit in the ocean on the tile where the other one left. They just wait for the other ship to get back. They are also removed from the unit cycle until the first ship returns so its easy to not notice they never left for Europe.

The second bug is with the city screen. The production display under each building will only display the base production. For example with one regular colonist producing rum on the regular rum building it will show up as +3. However if there are any modifies like +50% for a FF or +x% for rebel sentiment it won't show that total. (4.5 in this case). As far as I know this is only a display bug since you get the correct values showing up on the top (crosses/bells/education) and bottom of the screen (cotton/rum etc).

I am pretty sure I found a couple other bugs while playing but I can't remember them at the moment. I'll come back with anything that I find.

-Moxx

I found a thing i miss from old col1. The military. In col1 you had soldier, dragoon and cannon. Cannon had 2 lives. Once it got damaged it got reduced power. Soldier only had one life and returned to colonist after being beaten. Dragoon had 2 lives and once beaten it became just a normal soldier without horses..

Would this be possible to have in col2 also? I do not like this new civ. like fighting. Also the europeans get their arse whooped everytime. It is silly. Also I have only been able to start off on the brazilian coast in all my 10 tries. Also indian randomly places which i do not like either. And the game seem to go so quick. I like long games with lots of planning. 2 turns per month would have been cool.

What do you all think about the topics I raised now?

Except from this the game is great. But miss more of the col1 feeling.

I was just about to post a bug thread. Thanks for getting this started.

Some needed bug-fixes and tweak-desires:

* "Not Enough Tools Bug PART #1" - When you are building something, say, a Lumber Mill, and you reach the requisite number of wood-hammers to finish half of it, but do not have enough tools to finish it, you don't get warned about not having enough tools, instead you get a message that "construction on ______ cannot continue" and there is no implication as to why, nor is there an option to just leave it in your queue till you have enough tools. This could confuse the heck out a newbie, and is an annoyance if you're experienced.

* "Not Enough Tools Bug PART #2" - The only possible way to not lose your hammers on the building you want to have build, is to "Examine City" and then exit back out, where the option to build the Lumber Mill, or whatever, reappears with a 1-turn completion time beside it. You have to do this over and over and over, every turn, until you have enough tools to complete it. This is very annoying.

* "City-View Unit Type Bubble Container Bug" - When units are in a container, like a ship, and you are looking at them through the city view, there is no possible way to see what type of unit they are except for the tiny little thumbnail picture. The normal hover-bubble that would say "Master Carpenter" or whatnot is missing from this screen. It is badly needed, as some thumbnails like Master Lumberjack and Master Ore Miner look a lot alike. This can also mess up the timing if you have a ship making a circuit and you want to drop only a certain colonist in one port, and then move the ship from there.

* "Equipping in Europe not possible Bug" - For some reason, I cannot equip any colonists with tools/horses/guns in Europe, I can only bring a load of equipment to my port as cargo and then unload it into the port, then unload the colonist into the port, then remove them into the garrison to declare their type. This is also rather irritating, and prevents being able to ship some Dragoons directly from Europe onto the battlefront you want to fight in.

* "School/University Training Time Bug" - School training time increases exponentially, making it effectively useless after only a few settlers.

* "Ship in Limbo Bug" - As the game progresses, occasionally my trip to Europe will randomly increase by several turns with no explanation. I might normally have a 1 or 2 turn trip, from the moment my ship hits the "Shadow" and I send it to Europe, and have it operate like that for a dozen trips, and then all the sudden the same thing sends my ship into limbo for 5-10 turns.

* "Europe does not display inbound ships Bug" - If I have a ship headed to Europe, and hasn't arrived there yet, if I check the Europe view, "inbound ships" shows nothing. Note, that I believe this actually happened during the "Ship in Limbo Bug"

* "Liberty Bell direct translation to REF Tweak" - There appears to be significant sentiment that the REF reaction to liberty bell production is too steep, especially at the lowest levels. Please re-examine the way this is calculated.

* "AI Treasure Transport Bug" - I've seen it reported a number of places that the AI does not take advantage of treasure it has unearthed, and instead leaves it sitting out in the open.

* "Construction Time Tweak" - With a Master Carpenter given plenty of lumber, it still takes 19 turns (I think) to produce a Lumber Mill. Considering Master Carpenters are over 1000 each, and colonists are scarce early on, this seems a bit excessive in a game whose length is limited to only 300 turns. Please consider re-evaluating the construction times for early structures.

* "Zero-Profit Sale from Europe to Indians Tweak" - Monty wants his rum!!! I bring him rum. He offers me 50gp LESS for the 100tons of rum than what I paid for it in Europe, and haggling is out of the question. Is this intentional? Does this mean we cannot possibly profit buying in Europe, transporting it to the Americas, and selling it to the natives? Apparently the only way to turn a profit from the natives is to either beat them with a stick or produce the goods from scratch.

Why would you buy something Europe and then sell it to the natives? That's working as designed as far as I'm concerned. This is not a game of arbitrage, it is a game of producing stuff ;)

Also the europeans get their arse whooped everytime. It is silly.

I *still* haven't got far enough in a game to see REF but it does seem like the AIs start into bells early (as evidenced by border pops - something a player holding out on bell production won't see for 200 or turns :mad:) which means, if they get the same love as the player, that they'll be facing a massive REF and it's extremely unlikely they build troops to handle it.

I was just about to post a bug thread. Thanks for getting this started.

Some needed bug-fixes and tweak-desires:

* "Not Enough Tools Bug PART #1" - When you are building something, say, a Lumber Mill, and you reach the requisite number of wood-hammers to finish half of it, but do not have enough tools to finish it, you don't get warned about not having enough tools, instead you get a message that "construction on ______ cannot continue" and there is no implication as to why, nor is there an option to just leave it in your queue till you have enough tools. This could confuse the heck out a newbie, and is an annoyance if you're experienced.


This is a possibility, I'll have to check how these messages are generated - presumably this is a straightforward tweak.


* "Not Enough Tools Bug PART #2" - The only possible way to not lose your hammers on the building you want to have build, is to "Examine City" and then exit back out, where the option to build the Lumber Mill, or whatever, reappears with a 1-turn completion time beside it. You have to do this over and over and over, every turn, until you have enough tools to complete it. This is very annoying.
I haven't had this be the case, but I'll try to cause this bug.


* "City-View Unit Type Bubble Container Bug" - When units are in a container, like a ship, and you are looking at them through the city view, there is no possible way to see what type of unit they are except for the tiny little thumbnail picture. The normal hover-bubble that would say "Master Carpenter" or whatnot is missing from this screen. It is badly needed, as some thumbnails like Master Lumberjack and Master Ore Miner look a lot alike. This can also mess up the timing if you have a ship making a circuit and you want to drop only a certain colonist in one port, and then move the ship from there.

Definitely several things like this (hover-text) are needed - this was a very difficult thing to tweak in Civ4, but hopefully it won't be that hard in Col...


* "Equipping in Europe not possible Bug" - For some reason, I cannot equip any colonists with tools/horses/guns in Europe, I can only bring a load of equipment to my port as cargo and then unload it into the port, then unload the colonist into the port, then remove them into the garrison to declare their type. This is also rather irritating, and prevents being able to ship some Dragoons directly from Europe onto the battlefront you want to fight in.

This is not the case for me - perhaps you aren't doing it right? IIRC right-click on the unit while it is on the dock brings a context menu of 'missionary, scout, pioneer, soldier, dragoons' assuming you have the cash. You don't buy the goods first, you actually do it to the unit directly.

* "School/University Training Time Bug" - School training time increases exponentially, making it effectively useless after only a few settlers.

This is a balance issue, taken into consideration.

* "Ship in Limbo Bug" - As the game progresses, occasionally my trip to Europe will randomly increase by several turns with no explanation. I might normally have a 1 or 2 turn trip, from the moment my ship hits the "Shadow" and I send it to Europe, and have it operate like that for a dozen trips, and then all the sudden the same thing sends my ship into limbo for 5-10 turns.

It would be very helpful to have a save where this has happened. Turn autosaves on and send the autosave the turn before it happens, and the turn after it happened, if possible. Same for the next bug.

* "Europe does not display inbound ships Bug" - If I have a ship headed to Europe, and hasn't arrived there yet, if I check the Europe view, "inbound ships" shows nothing. Note, that I believe this actually happened during the "Ship in Limbo Bug"

* "Liberty Bell direct translation to REF Tweak" - There appears to be significant sentiment that the REF reaction to liberty bell production is too steep, especially at the lowest levels. Please re-examine the way this is calculated.

This is a balance issue, and is being considered (at what level to tweak).

* "AI Treasure Transport Bug" - I've seen it reported a number of places that the AI does not take advantage of treasure it has unearthed, and instead leaves it sitting out in the open.

This is in the OP.

* "Construction Time Tweak" - With a Master Carpenter given plenty of lumber, it still takes 19 turns (I think) to produce a Lumber Mill. Considering Master Carpenters are over 1000 each, and colonists are scarce early on, this seems a bit excessive in a game whose length is limited to only 300 turns. Please consider re-evaluating the construction times for early structures.

I don't think this is something I'm going to take into consideration on this level of patch; this is a much more specific balance issue that would take much longer to work out the precise balance. This is in scope for a followup balancing patch later, if appropriate.

* "Zero-Profit Sale from Europe to Indians Tweak" - Monty wants his rum!!! I bring him rum. He offers me 50gp LESS for the 100tons of rum than what I paid for it in Europe, and haggling is out of the question. Is this intentional? Does this mean we cannot possibly profit buying in Europe, transporting it to the Americas, and selling it to the natives? Apparently the only way to turn a profit from the natives is to either beat them with a stick or produce the goods from scratch.
As stated in my previous post, this is working as designed. Native selling is intended to be something you do with goods you produced when taxes are too high to justify selling them in europe; you're not supposed to be able to buy from europe and then sell to the natives at a profit.

I *still* haven't got far enough in a game to see REF but it does seem like the AIs start into bells early (as evidenced by border pops - something a player holding out on bell production won't see for 200 or turns :mad:) which means, if they get the same love as the player, that they'll be facing a massive REF and it's extremely unlikely they build troops to handle it.
It's not even that, it's they get killed early on because they do NO military production. I even saw an AI actually take a veteran soldier that was fortified in a city I was advancing on, and put him in as a colonist, giving me the city for free. There is something seriously wrong here.

Moved to the Col C&C forum.

Several GLARING bugs: Setting any transports to auto (which is, at the time, the only way to go unless you want never-ending micro) causes tons of resourses to be lost, since the tranports dump stuff off reguardless if your past your Warehouse max storage or not. (I'd REALLY like to know how it the heck that got past beta-testing).

Changing or adding ANYTHING to your Wagon/Ship trade rountes can erase it completely; making you have to redo the ENTIRE thing.

The UI for trade needs tons of love; at the very least, a "priority" resouse toggle for settlements to ship out, or get in (like tools or food for example). I keep getting stuff like wood delivered, while my settlement starves for food.

I found a thing i miss from old col1. The military. In col1 you had soldier, dragoon and cannon. Cannon had 2 lives. Once it got damaged it got reduced power. Soldier only had one life and returned to colonist after being beaten. Dragoon had 2 lives and once beaten it became just a normal soldier without horses..

Would this be possible to have in col2 also? I do not like this new civ. like fighting. Also the europeans get their arse whooped everytime. It is silly. Also I have only been able to start off on the brazilian coast in all my 10 tries. Also indian randomly places which i do not like either. And the game seem to go so quick. I like long games with lots of planning. 2 turns per month would have been cool.

What do you all think about the topics I raised now?

Except from this the game is great. But miss more of the col1 feeling.

That was deliberately taken out very early on, though for the life of me the reason escapes me.

The second bug is with the city screen. The production display under each building will only display the base production. For example with one regular colonist producing rum on the regular rum building it will show up as +3. However if there are any modifies like +50% for a FF or +x% for rebel sentiment it won't show that total. (4.5 in this case). As far as I know this is only a display bug since you get the correct values showing up on the top (crosses/bells/education) and bottom of the screen (cotton/rum etc).

That's not a bug. You need to know the raw amount produced by occupants (under the building) and the final amount added to stock (above the warehouse).

Hover over the building and you get the full breakdown.

Why would you buy something Europe and then sell it to the natives? That's working as designed as far as I'm concerned. This is not a game of arbitrage, it is a game of producing stuff ;)

It's also an economic simulator. Transport of foreign goods across an ocean to a people without the technology or means to produce them themselves is what is known as "Value Added". I should be justly compensated as the middleman.

Trade Goods is a fine example of this. Without any profit in transporting them from Europe to sell to the Indians, they are a completely pointless item, and cannot be produced locally.

And the reason you would sell from Europe to the Natives, especially early on, would be to make money, since you are highly unlikely to be pumping out much in the way of high-demand salable goods.

In other words, you absolutely should be offered more from the Natives than what you paid in Europe.

Sorry Libra, but this is not how Col works, and not how it should work. The only things that are cheaper to buy and then sell to the Indians are horses and guns, at any point - and that even not the entire game - and that is how it should be, IMO. It's not remotely realistic to be shipping over vast amounts of rum from Europe to the Indians, when you can make it locally and sell it to them; realize the transport cost in the 1600s was extraordinary.

Trade Goods is a fine example of this. Without any profit in transporting them from Europe to sell to the Indians, they are a completely pointless item, and cannot be produced locally.


I agree, what is the purpose of Trade Goods?

Trade goods I suppose would also qualify (along with horses and guns), I've never used them to a profit and honestly have no idea why they're in the game. But finished goods (rum, cigars, etc.) most definitely should not generally be able to be sold for a profit when bought from europe.

In any event, this is DEFINITELY not a bug, and should be addressed in a separate mod by whomever cares about this issue. It is working as designed, regardless of whether you feel it should work this way or not.

It's also an economic simulator. Transport of foreign goods across an ocean to a people without the technology or means to produce them themselves is what is known as "Value Added". I should be justly compensated as the middleman.

Trade Goods is a fine example of this. Without any profit in transporting them from Europe to sell to the Indians, they are a completely pointless item, and cannot be produced locally.

And the reason you would sell from Europe to the Natives, especially early on, would be to make money, since you are highly unlikely to be pumping out much in the way of high-demand salable goods.

In other words, you absolutely should be offered more from the Natives than what you paid in Europe.

This assumes
1. the natives are able to afford more than Europeans,
2. are without the technology to make the goods themselves in a more efficient manner than employing you to ship from Europe.
both are true for trade goods, horses and muskets at the start of the game, but no reason to always be true for other goods or at all times.

Still waiting for my copy, but in the original you could only sell/gift 3 resources to a settlement at any point ("We are in need of Rum and tobacco, and even sugar would be of some use"), and had to sell/gift something to be able to buy anything from the natives. Trade goods were often requested by Aztecs and Incans, and could turn a profit. Sometimes you just needed to sell at a (comparative) loss to be able buy something else for more profit, or simply to keep the natives happy.

If natives always paid more than Europe, you could just spend the entire game trying to shuttle exponntially increasing amounts between the natives and Europe.


Re damaged arty and dragoons->soldiers->colonists:
That was deliberately taken out very early on, though for the life of me the reason escapes me.

I was hoping that this game would finally allow you to repair damaged artillery. I guess it does because everything has hit points :lol: Presumably hit points made this unnecessary, and gets away from the endgame being all about having galleons full of horses to repair your soldiers to dragoons.

Build times are just too high for the game... some buildings take 50 to 100 turns , in a game of just 300 turns that seems ridiculous.. Cutting all of them by a minimum of 25% would be a good start..

Build times are just too high for the game... some buildings take 50 to 100 turns , in a game of just 300 turns that seems ridiculous.. Cutting all of them by a minimum of 25% would be a good start..

That's more a request to make of a different mod. This one should be for bugs only. Any build time problems isn't due to any bug. :)

with some specialists you can build very fast.
plus you don't need many buildings in a city.

Trade goods I suppose would also qualify (along with horses and guns), I've never used them to a profit and honestly have no idea why they're in the game. But finished goods (rum, cigars, etc.) most definitely should not generally be able to be sold for a profit when bought from europe.

In any event, this is DEFINITELY not a bug, and should be addressed in a separate mod by whomever cares about this issue. It is working as designed, regardless of whether you feel it should work this way or not.

What are you talking about? Trade goods represent high quality items that are cheaply manufactured in Europe but a rarity in the New World. These goods can include things like axe heads to sell to Indians (gee guess no market there?) furniture, glass all sorts.

* "Not Enough Tools Bug PART #2" - The only possible way to not lose your hammers on the building you want to have build, is to "Examine City" and then exit back out, where the option to build the Lumber Mill, or whatever, reappears with a 1-turn completion time beside it. You have to do this over and over and over, every turn, until you have enough tools to complete it. This is very annoying.


Each time I've had a building complete (hammers) without the necessary tools I get a box telling me the building cannot complete and giving me the option to choose the next building I want to put hammers toward. When I finally get tools to the colony another box pops up letting me choose which incomplete building I can direct the tools toward for completion. The game remembers which items are already completed and will automatically prompt you once the tools become available while you building something else. Given the 2nd prompt I would guess you could queue up 2+ items without tools and then complete them all once you get a wagon-load of tools to the colony.

The balancing of the rounds u can play is soooo off. Sorry but whoever betatested that should never touch a PC again.

As this is a remake of a classic it should feel like the classic. Ok if i got 300 rounds to play u have to use every turn perfectly, dont waste time , dont go off your originall way or your screwed and before u got a propper econemy up u get "100 turns left"

If u change the game speed cost of everything goes up, so theres no better game experience, theres just prolonging ....

Colonization is about building an empire in the New world, for an empire u need a good economy massive military and build up cities. Its not (!!!!) about using every turn perfectly and rushing to independence lategame cause the REF system is §$§"$ up.

Again in the old version u could enjoy building your empire and preparing for independence. In this remake i feel like im settling in a new world and only aim is to rush to independence or im screwed.

I finished my first game in some hours, i was shocked when the "100 turns left" counter came, just killed all indians near me and wanted to start finally building my eco.

who defends this game killing bugs and bad balancing, im sorry but u never ever enjoyed a good round of Col 1.

The Values for game length have to be tweaked.

Actually I've played Col1 for 15 years. :)

One thing I think a lot of people are confused about, you keep saying "I want to build an empire" which implies 20 cities like in Col1. You can't do that in Col2 due to the smaller map size. Sorry, but a fact.

I can have a strong economy running within 100 turns, 6 cities, 3-4 missions and steadily increasing populations etc.

It's not a matter of balance per say, it's a case of realising this is a different game to Col1.

I've been annoyed by the fact that in the new colonization if you want to move less than 100 of something you have to press and hold shift beginning from when you press down the mouse button to drag the item. In the old game I think it was so that you have to press and hold shift only during the time you release the mouse button.

Just makes the game UI a little bit less flexible to use than the old one.

Ok Dale if this new Col is ment for quick games with 4-8 citis max. , yeah then its a new game but i think its bad then.

i liked the fact that u played days or even weeks on 1 game, made it feel really intense. If u can rush an independence in work brake, personally for me it feels bad.

I was expecting the same feel of Col. 1 as it was allways said its a remake and not a follow up. Sure a game has to be changed, but changing the whole feeling of a game in such necessary points is wrongly done for me.

Im sorry im just so disapointed to not have the old gaming experience with new grafik and easier interface.

Hey don't blame me, blame the 3D Civ engine. Memory limitations, smaller map sizes blah blah.

I'm just telling you how it is. You should be able to fix it by increasing mapsizes.

If you're interested I could post the Col1 map that is in my AoD2 mod. Now that's nostalgia for ya. :)

sorry dale im not blaming u for anything :) as long as your not working for firaxis! :D

im just upset cause i had so high hopes, well they are not down totally due to the game easily being modded.

Stuff I was most annoyed by:

1) When you met someone new, the second response should default to Exit. In Civ4 it did and in Colo you can't double-tap Enter to make it go away quickly.

2) Main UI is missing a quick glance at the relationships with other factions.

3) Trade Interface should be available in the city screen. Right-click to get drop-down and select Import, Export or No Action.
Same should be possible in the Domestic Advisor's Trade Screen. Just click the corresponding column and row to cycle through actions.

4) Move Continental Congress Menu inside Founding Fathers and add a direct link to the trade interface.

5) Double right-clicking colonists in city screen sometimes causes the units not to cycle anymore.

6) Ability to assign Jobs to colonists in the 'Outside' section.

7) Make promotions more diverse to increase tactical depth.

8) Note-taking in colonies that are then displayed in Europe.

9) Totally destroying ships makes early Privateers far to powerful.

10) Some indication of what natives want to trade in their settlements.

11) Bring back the aggression flags for the natives.

Trade goods I suppose would also qualify (along with horses and guns), I've never used them to a profit and honestly have no idea why they're in the game. But finished goods (rum, cigars, etc.) most definitely should not generally be able to be sold for a profit when bought from europe.

In any event, this is DEFINITELY not a bug, and should be addressed in a separate mod by whomever cares about this issue. It is working as designed, regardless of whether you feel it should work this way or not.


Okay, I say this with all due respect to a fellow CivFanatic, but who exactly are you to decide that finished goods should not be sold for a profit, and that it is "DEFINITELY not a bug," that it is working "as designed"?

Are you a Firaxis employee? Are you a dev for the game? Are you one of the concept writers? Unless one of those is true, please do not presume to give any sort of definitive answer as if you were speaking Rote. There is evidence to support my assertion that this is a bug, or at least a serious oversight.

* The previous two iterations of Colonization (Col1 and FreeCol) both exhibited a profit when selling finished goods to the natives, especially ones that they wanted, and especially trade goods.

* If Monty wanted Rum really badly, then I should see a profit selling him Rum from Europe. If they "really want" a finished good, there should be a profit in it.

* And again, without any profit, trade goods become absolutely worthless as a game element. You cannot make them in your colony, and since zero profit can be made from selling them at the moment, then there's no point in buying them and transporting them from Europe.

* Trade with the natives was a major strategy element in the previous two iterations. Across the board zero profit sales to them means this strategy is largely removed from the game and they serve only as a source of training schools and obstacles to be removed. I do not believe this was the intent.

* And for the record, no, the Indians did not have the technology to produce Rum, as it requires a distillery. They could produce cloth in small local amounts, but nothing like the quantity and size that weaving mills could produce and far more cheaply. The technology and materials to make cigars and coats did exist in the New World, however, there was no nation-wide trade route or regular transport of goods from, say, fine Canadian beaver pelts to South America, nor did the hand-made Meso-American cigars find their way up to Innuit lands with any regularlity.

As such, the transport of a finished good to the Natives should be value-added. It worked that way in history, it worked that way in the previous two games, and the same gameplay element "tradegood" even exists in reference to those systems. Col2 itself has every other element tailored around real-life history. So please, Snoopy, do not be so quick to dismiss it out of hand unless you are a Firaxis employee. I maintain the position that this is a bug/oversight by the devs.

I say it is 'working as designed' because it is working as designed. You are not supposed to always be able to buy finished goods from europe and sell them to the natives. The only exceptions to that are Horses, Guns, and Trade Goods, as noted earlier; those are things that are only available in Europe at first, and very valuable to the Natives. Otherwise it is simply a matter of things having differing prices; sometimes you can afford to do it that way, but most of the time you can't.

Regardless of the 'realistic' element, even though buying cigars in Europe to sell in America is probably the most absurd thing I've ever heard of ... it is not interesting from a gameplay perspective. If you can buy everything from Europe and always make a profit selling it to the natives, why would you ever build things? You're describing a pure merchant game, like Machiavelli/Merchant Prince, which is fine and interesting (and a wonderful game, for anyone who's not encountered it).

However, Colonization is not a pure merchant game. It is Merchant Prince crossed with Civilization. What that means is that it is not a game solely of arbitrage, it is a game of producing things and selling them. This is how the gameplay works, and how it should work, as a longtime fan of the game (and I've played it on and off for 13 years). If you want a game where you buy things from one place and sell it in another at a profit, go play Machiavelli or Merchant Prince II - an excellent game, whichever version you play - but that is simply not how Col works as a rule.

I have no idea what you're talking about with regard to Col1; you could not buy cigars or rum and sell it to Monty except when the price had collapsed to the point of absurdity. Most certainly not at the start, when the finished goods cost a small fortune.

In any event, this discussion is inappropriate for this thread. This is not a bug, regardless of your opinion on it; it does not stop the game from working properly, and does not significantly hinder anyone playing it (it's not a showstopper balance bug, like the REF size). Thus, it is not appropriate for this thread.

I say it is 'working as designed' because it is working as designed. You are not supposed to always be able to buy finished goods from europe and sell them to the natives. The only exceptions to that are Horses, Guns, and Trade Goods, as noted earlier; those are things that are only available in Europe at first, and very valuable to the Natives.


And as I have repeatedly mentioned, Trade Goods are not working. Forget all other finished goods for the moment then. Trade Goods are not working as even you have described.


it is not appropriate for this thread.

I respectfully disagree. I'm not trying to be a jerk, but the name of the thread is "Col Bug Fixes / Feature Enhancements Patch", not "Things that Snoopy agrees are Bugs". The correction (or at the very least, official clarification) of transcontinental trade is at the very least, a feature enhancement request, and at most, a bug or oversight. Regardless I'd like Firaxis's assessment on this.

However, in the interests of moving on, I'm done stating my case on the matter. They'll either fix it, leave it, explain it, or all of the above.

I've been annoyed by the fact that in the new colonization if you want to move less than 100 of something you have to press and hold shift beginning from when you press down the mouse button to drag the item. In the old game I think it was so that you have to press and hold shift only during the time you release the mouse button.

Just makes the game UI a little bit less flexible to use than the old one.

This. Please.

And the double right click for menus.

Everything else is balance changes that I can get used to, but these are annoying UI.

The trade route menu. When setting up an automated trade route all you get is a list of possible goods exported from one place and imported in others that doesn't seem to be in any useful order at all.

Being able to click on a wagon train and then look at possible routes grouped by destination, original location of goods and type of goods would be really handy once you get a load of routes going. Even alphabetically would be better than what they have at the moment.

There seems to be a bug with colonist strength, which I think is supposed to be 0 by default, and 1 after choosing the Right to Bear Arms constitutional choice...

Then it seems we've found another bug. Either Right to Bear Arms is overpowered or colonists are mistakenly getting 2 strength, out of nowhere. Coupled with RTBA, colonists would be as effective as normal soldiers without the need of guns (ironically enough). Dammit.

And as I have repeatedly mentioned, Trade Goods are not working. Forget all other finished goods for the moment then. Trade Goods are not working as even you have described.


Hmm strange.. I just bought and sold trade goods to the natives, and made a handsome profit. No idea why this isn't working for you. But I'm sure there's somekind of mechanic for what natives are willing to pay so you can't sell trade goods to them indefinitely.

Anyone noticed small bug with native units stats?

Armed Braves gain no defensive bonuses.
While Armed Mounted Braves do gain defensive bonuses (unlike regular Mounted Braves).

That's definitely off. As infantry, Armed Braves should benefit from defensive bonuses, while Mounted Braves (armed or otherwise) shouldn't, given they're cavarly units.

Exactly!


I'm already using tweaked CIV4ProfessionInfos.xml (in Custom Assets) that fixes this.

First some general bugs:

1)Dragoons are not listed anywhere. Not in the col paedia or in any stat screens.



Now some things I noticed in a Spain game on the highest difficulty level:

I declared Independence at turn 180 with 11500 pop and 26000 soldiers. Those numbers are a bit wacky, I guess 100 pop is 1 colonist, but the soldier number does not make a lot of sense. In fact the size of the Ref force is 105000, about ten times my population, which does seem a bit excessive:crazyeye:.

1) Prices in Europe seem to be completely fixed. I purchased more than 3000 horses and never produced a single tool until the declaration of independence on turn 180 and prices stayed at 3/4.

I also specialized in a tobacco/cigar economy, producing from two factories with 3 masters each and the price is about the same for cigars/rum/cloth/coats
at 11/11/12/12 each.

As a result ore miners/blacksmiths/master ranchers are all pretty much worthlerss, because it is not worthwile to produce the stuff yourself and there is no point in diversifying your goods except for space reasons.

2) Probably more of a balance issue, but founding father balance is completely crazy. Some are almost worthless and Peter Minuit the first trade FF is better than all exploration FFs combined.

3) Speaking of founding fathers, it is annoying that you don't get the chance to get one again when you pass him up once. Often I want a different one first than the one the program offers me, but after saying no once I never get the chance to get him again even after hitting his threshold again.

4) The AI of the other colonial powers is pretty worthless even on the highest difficulty level. I had no problem at all killing the English right from the start. France got massacred by the Aztecs and Holland managed to declare Indepence and is slowly losing the war. The only trouble I got were two privateers, which managed to kill my starting caravel.

I suspect they perform so poorly, because they seem to blow all their cash on colony buildings. You often find a lumbermill in a settlement that you capture in the first ten turns. Rushbuying stuff is a good thing in civ4, but it kills you in col.

5) No sugar resource anywhere on a large map.

I agree the Civilopedia is rather confusing.

Dragoon is listed as a profession, not a unit type.

Thanks for doing this for us snoopy and Dale.

I downloaded the Patch mod posted and found some weird things when starting a map. The human spawns in different places now, granted but i have spawned with my settlers already landed, i have spawned with my ship on the coast in a very strange position and the worse, i have spawned with my ship inland. Yes it was sailing inland =P

I would also ask if it would be possible to make the random maps have more rivers. It might just be me, but the maps look weird with huge continents with only a couple of rivers.

* "School/University Training Time Bug" - School training time increases exponentially, making it effectively useless after only a few settlers.

I don't see a Bug or balance issue here, dunno maybe I am looking at it different to all you otheres. I've been training up peeps from the off, and get a "Trained Colonist" every 8-15 turns.

How I think it Works:-

We have 3 Colonies, we will consider Colony 1 our Home Colony(First City Founded)

Colony 1 - 3 Trainees giving +12 ea, 36 points
Colony 2 - 2 Trainees giving +6ea, 12 points
Colony 3 - 1 Trainee giving +6ea, 6 points

That Gives us a total of 54 Training points + whatever %'s we get from building Types + any additions form Founding fathers.
Now our Home Colony(As long as you are training a person here, havnt tested the theory withotu including the home Colony) will start to produce Trained units at a rate of about 8-15 turns per one. All other Colonies will be on 30-60+ Turns for them to produce a trainee, which they never will as long as you have 1+ training in your Home Colony. Therefor producing trainees at a steady rate.

This leads me to belive that Education points are not spread throughout your colonies but based in your Home Colony. If this is so, then I realy dont see an issue with it.

I don't see a Bug or balance issue here, dunno maybe I am looking at it different to all you otheres. I've been training up peeps from the off, and get a "Trained Colonist" every 8-15 turns.


same here
i dont get bug ppl is talking about
if school could train faster or without DR would be idiot

school as it is now is fine

the cost is VERY low but after a bit is useless
still you can train some top tier specialists... thats good

Thanks for doing this for us snoopy and Dale.

I downloaded the Patch mod posted and found some weird things when starting a map. The human spawns in different places now, granted but i have spawned with my settlers already landed, i have spawned with my ship on the coast in a very strange position and the worse, i have spawned with my ship inland. Yes it was sailing inland =P

I would also ask if it would be possible to make the random maps have more rivers. It might just be me, but the maps look weird with huge continents with only a couple of rivers.

Yeah noted. I saw that this morning (but interestingly not last night when I did the change) :lol:

A suggestion: don't allow treasures to disturb ruins/ancient grounds. It makes them to be highly exploitable as a scout unit which doesn't require you to spend colonists for it and also negative damage effect is neglected since it has 0 str. Or maybe have it destroyed if the "natives attack" event happens.

A suggestion: don't allow treasures to disturb ruins/ancient grounds. It makes them to be highly exploitable as a scout unit which doesn't require you to spend colonists for it and also negative damage effect is neglected since it has 0 str. Or maybe have it destroyed if the "natives attack" event happens.

Hmm. What's in the Civ4's settler's code that makes them 'capture' targets? I would think that that mechanic would work best here, and would make it identical to ColWin as well. (It would also SOMEWHAT prevent the 'ship the unguarded treasure across the continent issue.. if there are hostiles along the way.)

Well, there is a thing that is not exactly a bug or a feature fix, but it would need some tweaking:

When we capture settlements of other european that overlaps territory of a Indian tribe and we keep them , we get a ( probably deserved ) penalty for stealing land. But we never have the oportunity of negotiating again to "regularize" the land property... IMHO it lacks a nice pop up of overlapping tribe asking us to pay or leave.

Another thing that it sorely needed is a compreensive market screen, with all the tribes requests of goods ( not only one of them ) and maybe what they have in stock. Not mentioning a glance like screen ......

Hmm. What's in the Civ4's settler's code that makes them 'capture' targets? I would think that that mechanic would work best here, and would make it identical to ColWin as well. (It would also SOMEWHAT prevent the 'ship the unguarded treasure across the continent issue.. if there are hostiles along the way.)
As it stands, don't treasure units get destroyed if attacked? It's better that way. Europeans would technically capture them, but what'd hostile natives do with a treasure unit they can't (by game mechanics and cultural principles) cash in? A new layer of coding would be needed to allow treasure units to be captured by some units/factions and destroyed by others.

Treasure units can be captured... I've seen indians with some, probably loot from the war they had with Spain

As it stands, don't treasure units get destroyed if attacked? It's better that way. Europeans would technically capture them, but what'd hostile natives do with a treasure unit they can't (by game mechanics and cultural principles) cash in? A new layer of coding would be needed to allow treasure units to be captured by some units/factions and destroyed by others.

Code-wise, let the Indians automatically cash in the treasures when they return home at a 0 percent tax rate. While this doesn't do much NOW, it does get 'rid' of the treasure, and could allow an income option for 'play as native empire' mod.

(Okay, these ads are annoying the heck out of me now... stupid UGO)

Well, the main point about treasures is to somehow allow the AI to compete with a player. Currently you can drive your treasure across the map revealing all the map tiles and grabbing all the loot. Basically the fact that I've found a single treasure usually means that I have the most connected land revealed and most villages/ruins captured by me (you capture villages/ruins, you get more treasures and your "treasure scout network" grows). The AI can't use it as a scout although it may be easy to change... The problem for this is that then AI treasures would be easily huntable... while AI doesn't capture your treasure even if it nets him almost no consequences...

I noticed a couple of more problems this weekend:

* Colopedia lists Veteran Soldiers as a 0-strength unit.

* Description of Armory, Arsenol, etc... includes "required to build cannons and artillery". Players cannot build Artillery! Of course, I didn't realize this till I kept upgrading and kept upgrading the building to its final mega-gun-producing store before I realized I was never going to get Artillery because they are a unique unit to the X Empire. Please remove any Empire UUs from building descriptions if they are impossible for the player to build.

* Schools/Colleges/Universities - For the love of god, SOME explanation here? There is absolutely nothing to explain how this works in the manual or the Colopedia. To date I've seen "It bumps up the training cost 30% globally" to "it only works right in your first founded colony" to "it requires a certain amount of money available to produce certain occupations" to "it doesn't allow you to train Veteran Soldiers" and apparently you also cannot use it to train specialized planters, like cotton planters. Of course absolutely none of this has been explained in any documentation. Could we please get some full explanation on it?

* Rebel Sentiment appears to go back down if you pull your colonists from the town hall, even though population has not increased. Is this intentional?

* Colopedia lists Veteran Soldiers as a 0-strength unit.

That's because unit strenght is not tied to unit itself, but profession.

When Veteran Solider has Solider proffession it gets +3 unit strenght. If you make Pioneer from him he'll have zero unit strenght.

I'd throw in how new colonists born from food surpluses are always Tories regardless of rebel sentiment.

If you make Pioneer from him he'll have zero unit strenght.
Ah, yes. That's another thing that needs to be fixed. I don't remember if I already said it here or if it was in some other thread.

Given all colonists have a strength of 2 by default, it doesn't make any sense that pioneers, who have hammers and axes, are completely helpless. How could a flimsy preacher with a bible be considerably deadlier than a strong pioneer with an axe? Missionaries are defenseless, and that's fine (or not, looking at their preacher brothers), but pioneers shouldn't be. I guess Right to Bear Arms doesn't affect them either, as they apparently don't fall into the Colonist category (they'd have 2 strength if they did).

Let me know which Founding Fathers I've refused in the Founding Fathers screen by some manner.

I'd like to choose what kind of "tea" party to hold.

It would be nice if you made peace with Europe when you defeat the REF rather than peace happening when you win the game. E.g. if you turn off independence victory and beat the REF you remain at war with your king.

I was mainly thinking about a different victory where the game does not end until when you have declared independence, but will also require you have x% of the land (adding this victory condition is really easy). Scoring is also a possibility, but its not as easy to implement since in order to win highest score victory you have to have the highest score even if another higher scoring player didn't declare independence. Doesn't a victory against the REF feel empty if you lose 90% of your populous?

Code-wise, let the Indians automatically cash in the treasures when they return home at a 0 percent tax rate. While this doesn't do much NOW, it does get 'rid' of the treasure, and could allow an income option for 'play as native empire' mod.

(Okay, these ads are annoying the heck out of me now... stupid UGO)
I mentioned the natives can't 'cash in' treasures due to their cultural principles. What do I mean with this? Treasures are generally golden artifacts and other relics that are very valuable to the Europeans, but sacred to the natives.

Given they're not simply gold coins, they would refuse to use them as currency, and most likely stash them for safekeeping ('destroying' the treasure unit). I don't think it'd be a valid income source for a hypothetical 'play the natives' mod, given the indians wouldn't loot and desecrate the relics of their ancestors to make themselves richer.

The treasure unit has a guy pulling a cart filled to the brim with gold bars, but I don't think the artifacts and valuables would've been smelted before reaching Europe (or at least a colonial settlement). It's not like the scout robbed Fort Knox. :p

I mentioned the natives can't 'cash in' treasures due to their cultural principles. What do I mean with this? Treasures are generally golden artifacts and other relics that are very valuable to the Europeans, but sacred to the natives.

Given they're not simply gold coins, they would refuse to use them as currency, and most likely stash them for safekeeping ('destroying' the treasure unit). I don't think it'd be a valid income source for a hypothetical 'play the natives' mod, given the indians wouldn't loot and desecrate the relics of their ancestors to make themselves richer.

The treasure unit has a guy pulling a cart filled to the brim with gold bars, but I don't think the artifacts and valuables would've been smelted before reaching Europe (or at least a colonial settlement). It's not like the scout robbed Fort Knox. :p

I don't know about that, what is one tribes sacred treasure is simply another ones treasure. If France invaded England and stole the crown jewels they would either keep them as a trophy or sell them off.

I have two idea:
1. The storehouse should be modified to hold more goods, especially guns and horses.(especially important to the AI!! because they do not know how to reserve guns, so everyone can defeat them in the middle or later game)

2. Those colonist born in the new world should at least have 50% rebel sentiment.

If France invaded England and stole the crown jewels they would either keep them as a trophy or sell them off.
I doubt they'd sell the jewels. They'd be much more valuable as a symbolic trophy. The same would probably happen between opposing tribes, from my point of view. Sometimes something that represents "haha, we proved superior to you" is much more valuable than the actual material value of the jewels, gold and silver.

It's also possible to hold such symbolic items for ransom, and England would pay exorbitant amounts to get them back, much more than the material value you'd get from selling them, say, in the black market. Not to mention England would rightfully hate you forever if you did.

During the British invasions of Buenos Aires in 1806 and 1807, local troops managed to capture the banner of at least one of the British battalions. After they were repelled, they frequently made various kinds of offers in exchange for the return of their lost flag, including paving all the roads of the then smaller Buenos Aires. They were repeatedly refused, and said battalion remains bannerless to this day.

All for a piece of cloth? The material value of the banner was insignificant, but there was strong symbolism behind it. If this was the reaction to the loss of a comparatively simple battalion emblem, just think of what they could've done to recover the royal jewels.

2. Those colonist born in the new world should at least have 50% rebel sentiment.
Hmm. If colonists can be either tory or rebel (nothing inbetween), I think each one born in a colonial settlement should have an X% chance of being rebel, where X is the percentage of sentiment in the city.

That's because unit strenght is not tied to unit itself, but profession.

When Veteran Solider has Solider proffession it gets +3 unit strenght. If you make Pioneer from him he'll have zero unit strenght.

Interesting difference. I can accept that, but then the colopedia needs to be corrected to reflect this. Either remove the strength value from unit types descriptions, or list that the "Veteran Soldier" Unit type gains +3 str from the Soldier Profession.

Founding Fathers "choice" needs to be a lot clearer. "The Big Picture" does me almost no good. I'd like it if the dialogue were changed to something like:

"Choose which Founding Father you would like to join your cause:
A.
B.
C..."

The choices would obviously be limited by the relative points that were required and whether or not that leader had already joined another country's cause.

But the current interface of "John Smith is offering to join your cause, Yes/No?" is really annoying. I want to know what all my choices are before I make a decision, and trying to decipher who else is up based on "the Big Picture" is tedious and next to useless.

ok, bring back all col1 features!!!
... like:

1. battle features:
1.1: if a dragoon loses, it becomes a soldier. if a soldier loses, it becomes a colonist
1.2: if a brave wins against a soldier/dragoon, there is a change, the brave becomes armed / mounted
1.3: Ships have a higher chance to evade from a fight. In col1 is was nearly 50%
1.4: Ships can be damaged from battles without having a drydock somewhere near by and this happens more often then they get destroyed

2. don't increase the education time!
3. don't increase the costs of hiring new collonists in europe
4. Place the Indians at their original spots / regions at he Western Hemisphere Maps . Maybe its just a problem with my german version, but I have Incas in North America, and Apaches and Cherokee in South America!! The caribbean islands are not inhabited

5. ... has anyone found the Fountain Of Youth yet ?

.. my 2 cents..

I personally didn't mind the original game's combat system, but many players disliked it. It didn't make much sense, to be honest.

But anyway, this patch is to fix bugs and enhance existing features, so new stuff is most likely something for another mod.

EDIT: By the way, are there any plans to change how rebel sentiment accumulation works outside settlements? As it stands, units outside can't be 'converted' to rebels unless you move them inside towns and make them work there. Perhaps the units out in the field should gain sentiment at a reduced rate (say, 50%) instead of none at all, representing the fact they're less exposed to rebel propaganda. :p

Starting positions seem strange. In my first game the English settled Jamestown 3 tiles from my capital - on a huge map. Can't they be spread out a bit more?

This game is only a week old and many people have criticised it without fully understanding it (including me). Thanks for the work you are doing Snoopy and Dale.

Has anyone else found the religion immigration to be a bit light (even with the English)?

I built a church and put in a couple firebrand preachers but after 50 turns had maybe 10 colonists from that. That's with building more churches, upgrading to cathedral and some religious FFs during that time frame.

I know it's not col1 but the balance makes playing an immigration tactic worthless compared to a trade and buy specialists tactic... doubly so when you consider the construction time for the church and less desirable immigrants (servants and criminals).

Has anyone else found the religion immigration to be a bit light (even with the English)?

I built a church and put in a couple firebrand preachers but after 50 turns had maybe 10 colonists from that. That's with building more churches, upgrading to cathedral and some religious FFs during that time frame.

I know it's not col1 but the balance makes playing an immigration tactic worthless compared to a trade and buy specialists tactic... doubly so when you consider the construction time for the church and less desirable immigrants (servants and criminals).
Those strategies aren't mutually exclusive.

You can trade and buy specialists while keeping your churches staffed and drawing free immigrants to you.

Oh, also, there's something that's been bothering me for a while.

I read that REF units can attack your settlements directly from their MoWs (and allegedly without suffering any penalties). This definitely shouldn't be possible, as amphibious assaults weren't even on the drawing board back then. I can't imagine an attack led by lots of slow, extremely vulnerable rowboats, crammed with soldiers, against a coastal fortress being anything but a complete and utter disaster.

Oh, also, there's something that's been bothering me for a while.

I read that REF units can attack your settlements directly from their MoWs (and allegedly without suffering any penalties). This definitely shouldn't be possible, as amphibious assaults weren't even on the drawing board back then. I can't imagine an attack led by lots of slow, extremely vulnerable rowboats, crammed with soldiers, against a coastal fortress being anything but a complete and utter disaster.

The problem with preventing it outright is they can't attack a settlement on a 1x1 tile island (or any other small island where you could fill the boarders with troops). If there was a situation where an entire island had a fort built around it, I'm sure the commanders could come up with something interesting.

Just want to thank everyone for their input. :)

Snoopy and I are going as fast as we can.

Who cares about rum, trade goods are specifically stated in oldcol to be items that are valuable to the indians (and far cheaper/easier to manufacture and ship from europe than make in the colonies) initially...after a few trades they soon had more than enough glass beads, axe heads, cheap wooden pipes, rugs etc. Truth be told I was hoping these items could be manufactured in the colonies f=or sale to indians as a sort of one time cash boost.

Those strategies aren't mutually exclusive.

You can trade and buy specialists while keeping your churches staffed and drawing free immigrants to you.

I know they're not mutually exclusive, but the value of a preacher in a church or cathedral is much lower than the value of a colonist producing more goods in terms of number and value of colonists provided. By trade, you get a fixed return (mostly) AND you get to select the type of colonist. Thus, from an efficiency standpoint, religious immigration becomes an anchor rather than a benefit.

Just want to thank everyone for their input. :)

Snoopy and I are going as fast as we can.

Many thanks to you both.

BTW, any word on official fixes yet? The problems with the random maps and the sail to Europe zones are pretty big in my book. They need to be adressed soon.

I discovered another exploit tonight.

The king routinely seeks to extort gold from you, the penalty often being a "tea party".

All well and good; usually the player won't want to give that up. It's a good decision point especially if the king is seeking to raise the interest rate and it's already way high.

However, it seems the algorithm uses as criteria any good you've traded in Europe in the game so far. So, how about goods you don't really care about? Such as raw materials? Yes, ship 1 cotton, 1 lumber, 1 ore, 1 fur to Europe. The game will now dilute the "extortion" and the king will demand to raise the tax rate or you can no longer trade cotton. Whoo, I'll hate that.

I know they're not mutually exclusive, but the value of a preacher in a church or cathedral is much lower than the value of a colonist producing more goods in terms of number and value of colonists provided. By trade, you get a fixed return (mostly) AND you get to select the type of colonist. Thus, from an efficiency standpoint, religious immigration becomes an anchor rather than a benefit.
But 'catalog-bought' specialists cost a lot more than the free colonists immigration generates. It's hard to determine whether preachers would be better off working in the fields/shops or not.

Personally, I don't think so, because at least initially, immigration can get you a lot of colonists you couldn't have purchased with all the gold you got from trading. I'm not saying you could entirely rely on immigration to get new people, but a mix of trading and preaching would be the optimal course of action, from my point of view.

I discovered another exploit tonight.

The king routinely seeks to extort gold from you, the penalty often being a "tea party".

All well and good; usually the player won't want to give that up. It's a good decision point especially if the king is seeking to raise the interest rate and it's already way high.

However, it seems the algorithm uses as criteria any good you've traded in Europe in the game so far. So, how about goods you don't really care about? Such as raw materials? Yes, ship 1 cotton, 1 lumber, 1 ore, 1 fur to Europe. The game will now dilute the "extortion" and the king will demand to raise the tax rate or you can no longer trade cotton. Whoo, I'll hate that.
Hmm, yes. That might need to get fixed. I think a possible solution would be to increase the minimum amount of goods the player needs to trade before he gets the option to throw a 'tea party' related to them the next time the King tries to impose a tax increase. 300-400 units perhaps?

Could be linked to game speed and difficulty (without going overboard in the easier settings). If trade hasn't reached that volume with any goods type when the King shows up, the player should get the option to throw a 'tea party' and get the most traded item boycotted.

Should be very low priority, but how about a reset of the tax rate and no further communication from your former king to raise taxes or demand money once you win independence and want to mess around a little after winning?

Should be very low priority, but how about a reset of the tax rate and no further communication from your former king to raise taxes or demand money once you win independence and want to mess around a little after winning?

Good point. Once you are an independent you are no longer paying taxes to the king. You are a free nation, able to vote for your own government, which sits in congress - and sets new taxes. Oops. Well at least they could start at a lower rate.

By the way, there's another problem with the REF: they can found settlements! The King factions only have a single entry in their city name list, which is the European port they had in the original Colonization (London/Amsterdam/Seville/La Rochelle). It might be the remnant of some discarded feature, so I don't think the devs meant to have royal regulars founding new cities in the New World.

As for fixing it, it might prove troublesome, given both soldier and dragoon professions can found new cities by default. The 'colonist' of the REF is the regular (cutlass variant), which can be either a soldier or a dragoon. By default, the 'colonist' regular can found new settlements, but I don't think removing that ability would solve the problem: he'd gain it in soldier/dragoon form anyway.

That said, even if the ability of founding new settlements can be completely taken away from the King's troops (without affecting colonial units), it still wouldn't prevent them from using captured colonists to do it. So, in the end, you must strike at the REF's AI behaviour as a faction and remove their intention to build new cities.

I discovered another exploit tonight.

The king routinely seeks to extort gold from you, the penalty often being a "tea party".

All well and good; usually the player won't want to give that up. It's a good decision point especially if the king is seeking to raise the interest rate and it's already way high.

However, it seems the algorithm uses as criteria any good you've traded in Europe in the game so far. So, how about goods you don't really care about? Such as raw materials? Yes, ship 1 cotton, 1 lumber, 1 ore, 1 fur to Europe. The game will now dilute the "extortion" and the king will demand to raise the tax rate or you can no longer trade cotton. Whoo, I'll hate that.

Useful to know. In the early game you will be trading those raw materials anyway so you might be able to dodge a few tax rises as you are changing your economy to finished goods. It's not a major exploit though because for most of the game you will be selling rum, cloth, coats and cigars and you don't want them boycotted.

Does it relate to all goods traded or just those you have sold? You wouldn't want to be cut off from guns at an early stage.

Hey Snoopy and/or Dale,

I was trying your patch (1.04) and found a crash bug, so I thought that might interest you. The savegame is attached (just hit end turn to crash). I noticed that the game reaches the next turn and then plays a sound as if an AI (or maybe the player) got an FF, then boom. Also a merchantman is just about to reach Europe. Of course I'm not 100% sure that the crash is patch-related.

Keep up the good work!

Now that I think about, the crash is probably due to the new REF algorithms. I hadn't yet gotten a king increases REF message, and the first statesmen just started gathering bells. Here's another one.

Thanks offworld.

I have been playing 1.04 and find it improved.

Whatever is done to increase the military preparedness of the other factions, I think it still needs some 'upping'. It would be nice if they scaled their military to the players, or to all the other factions, in an 'arms race' fashion.

Bottom Line: I still find it quite easy to buy some cannon and go and take all their towns.

Yeah the balance is crippling the AI by keeping a standing army, or good colonies able to be taken over. It's a fine balance eh? :)

I just noticed that in the localization strings related to founding fathers in CIV4GameText_Colonization.xml, the father name is highlighted in the english strings but not for other languages. Most trivial bug ever?

Yeah the balance is crippling the AI by keeping a standing army, or good colonies able to be taken over. It's a fine balance eh? :)

Yes, I understand. If a balance has to be chosen, it is probably to opt for slightly more defence rather than slightly less, or be horribly exploited by the player.

Of course, if some subtlety can be employed, then the AI can scale its defence to the kind of attitude and military capability that the player is showing. Requires much coding of course.

* Schools/Colleges/Universities - ... apparently you also cannot use it to train specialized planters, like cotton planters.

I'm not sure that's true. You have to have one of the unit in the colony to train others in his profession, have you tried this?

Oh, also, there's something that's been bothering me for a while.

I read that REF units can attack your settlements directly from their MoWs (and allegedly without suffering any penalties). This definitely shouldn't be possible, as amphibious assaults weren't even on the drawing board back then. I can't imagine an attack led by lots of slow, extremely vulnerable rowboats, crammed with soldiers, against a coastal fortress being anything but a complete and utter disaster.

Perhaps this was programed in to counter former Col1 players who would put a colony on a one tile island so that they could put the REF at a big disadvantage during the war. I recall reading that strategy on GameFAQ's.

Offworld:

Your bug is fixed (will be in 1.05).

Sometimes after a few turns of playing vanilla/1.03/1.04 small popups stops to appear (like selecting prefession when you se a unit working on a tile in city window), and a new unit is not selected when the movement are depleated (so you need to manually press net turn).

This is temporary fixed by saving and reloading (then all pupups come at the same time since they stopped). After a while it starts again.

Hade you heard of this bug? Have you fixed it? Hard to show a savegame when it get fixed by saving/reloading.

Maybe I should have posted this at the bug forum.

Sometimes after a few turns of playing vanilla/1.03/1.04 small popups stops to appear (like selecting prefession when you se a unit working on a tile in city window), and a new unit is not selected when the movement are depleated (so you need to manually press net turn).

This is temporary fixed by saving and reloading (then all pupups come at the same time since they stopped). After a while it starts again.

Hade you heard of this bug? Have you fixed it? Hard to show a savegame when it get fixed by saving/reloading.

Maybe I should have posted this at the bug forum.

Yeah that one's on the list. But it's proving difficult to track down. :(

Offworld:

Your bug is fixed (will be in 1.05).

Good to hear! Thanx

Ive got a huge bug that needs immediate attention!!!


*MIDDLE MOUSE BUTTON DOESNT EXIT CITY SCREEN*


lol seriously, after playing so much cIV I think I press it everytime before looking around for the 'exit' button.

-Ive also gotten the 'no unit cycle' bug, needed to reload to fix it, no biggie.

-I also think this is a bug: The REF will stay in your captured settlements after taking it, even after theyve 'healed up' they will still leave a lot, if not all the arty in there, perfect for my cannons to come in and eliminate them. In my last game for all intents and purposes I lost, but b/c they stayed in 2 colonies they captured, I was easily able to destroy the last 25 of their units. There was still 60 turns left, so its not like they could 'out-wait' me. Please make the REF more aggressive after taking colonies.

-Thanks for doing this =D

Ive got a huge bug that needs immediate attention!!!


*MIDDLE MOUSE BUTTON DOESNT EXIT CITY SCREEN*


lol seriously, after playing so much cIV I think I press it everytime before looking around for the 'exit' button.

Sorry, I'm pretty sure that'll be in the actual exe file and not the SDK == Firaxis only can fix this.

-Ive also gotten the 'no unit cycle' bug, needed to reload to fix it, no biggie.

On the list.

-I also think this is a bug: The REF will stay in your captured settlements after taking it, even after theyve 'healed up' they will still leave a lot, if not all the arty in there, perfect for my cannons to come in and eliminate them. In my last game for all intents and purposes I lost, but b/c they stayed in 2 colonies they captured, I was easily able to destroy the last 25 of their units. There was still 60 turns left, so its not like they could 'out-wait' me. Please make the REF more aggressive after taking colonies.

-Thanks for doing this =D

That's a case of bad AI. We're working on bugs and severe game balance problems first. The AI has gotten some work already, but most of that will come later. :)

Ive got a huge bug that needs immediate attention!!!


*MIDDLE MOUSE BUTTON DOESNT EXIT CITY SCREEN*


lol seriously, after playing so much cIV I think I press it everytime before looking around for the 'exit' button.
ESC works like a charm. :p

ESC works like a charm. :p

Or the <enter> key.

Dale,

This morning I found one bug and one umm, disturbing loss of a CIV feature.

1) When there is an AI of the same nationality as you (e.g., you're both Dutch), when the AI establishes a mission, and the converted native shows up, the game gives it to YOU rather than the AI.

2) When loading onto a ship from a non-port tile (i.e., you have 2 ships off shore and you move the guy onto the ships), the game does not prompt you which ship you want to load on (as CIV does). This is especially problematic since treasures now take up the whole capacity of a galleon AND since it appears the default is the galleon. So if you have a galleon and a merchantman in the same spot, and move a guy from the land to the sea tile, the guy goes onto the galleon.

1) I'm not sure this is a Dale-mod problem, Wodan.

2) Are you sure both boats carry units? Frigates and Privateers can't carry humans anymore, for instance.

1) I'm not sure this is a Dale-mod problem, Wodan.
I can't imagine why it wouldn't be. Unless it's fixable only by Firaxis because it affects the core engine. In which case it goes on their list to provide to them. Either way, it is something for them to act upon one way or another, I believe.

2) Are you sure both boats carry units? Frigates and Privateers can't carry humans anymore, for instance.
Yes I'm sure.

Try it yourself. Easy enough to set up in WB.

Where can I download the changed SDK files for this mod?

EDIT: Nevermind, I think I found it. Snoppy should put a link to the download page or atleast the other thread in the OP of this thread.

Wodan, I think I may have misunderstood you. I thought you were saying that these problems were caused by the mod. Apologies.

No worries. :)

A problem I'm seeing with team play in custom mode right now is that if you have two teammates who aren't of the same nation, one will overthrow the other's mission. Doesn't seem very cooperative to me.

Bugs I have noticed:

Occasionally you get cotton as a bonus on a tile, but the tile doesn't produce any cotton.

Num-Lock must be on for numpad movement to work. (Ordinarily I would keep it off)

Num-Lock must be on for numpad movement to work. (Ordinarily I would keep it off)
That's how numpad has worked since its creation. It has to be on to accept arrow key entries, and off to accept number ones. It's the way most desktop keyboards work, and is independent from software.

Bugs I have noticed:

Occasionally you get cotton as a bonus on a tile, but the tile doesn't produce any cotton.
I think cotton only "works" if it's on grassland. Tabacco on plains. Or vice-versa, I forget. So if the mapscipt puts it on the wrong tile type, it won't produce the bonus.

Where's the link for the *patch* version 1.04 or 1.05? I'd like to D/L the latest please.

Thank you for your efforts in making Col better. :thumbsup:

JosEPh :)

Where's the link for the *patch* version 1.04 or 1.05? I'd like to D/L the latest please.

Thank you for your efforts in making Col better. :thumbsup:

JosEPh :)

In the Mod files section is the unofficial patch thread, or this link to DL it:

http://rtw.apolyton.net/aod2/patch.html

I *still* haven't got far enough in a game to see REF but it does seem like the AIs start into bells early (as evidenced by border pops - something a player holding out on bell production won't see for 200 or turns :mad:) which means, if they get the same love as the player, that they'll be facing a massive REF and it's extremely unlikely they build troops to handle it.

First of all in order to produce early political points I suggest you build them through production rather than through elder statesmen. I put my statesmen to work in the colony and reproduce them through the education system and build some of my political points through production. This way you do not anger the king. When time advances and my colonies are stable and ready for revolution I take my statesmen out of the fields and factories and put them in the town hall to generate political points. I usually use 2 of my 5 or 6 colonies:king: to produce political and military points so that I have a better balance of points and get a better shot at some of the harder to reach FF's.

One small request: Can you guys make it so that when I press Ctrl-R, it will pop up the special resource on each tile. I used it all the time in BTS but I can't get use to it now in Colonization.

One small request: Can you guys make it so that when I press Ctrl-R, it will pop up the special resource on each tile. I used it all the time in BTS but I can't get use to it now in Colonization.

Hold your cursor over the forth button from the top of those that are on the right side of the MiniMap. You will see that it is Alt + R in Col2.

Since no-one else has mentioned it, I'm going to go with the assumption that I must be nuts, but let me throw it out there anyways...

The Warehouse and Warehouse Expansion buldings, and overflow (waste) concept, do not function properly.

eg: with no Warehouse, I cannot stockpile more than 100 of any good/resource. However, upon completion of a Warehouse, I can now stockpile as much as I please. I get the pop-ups saying I'm over my limit, and the good shows up in red on in the stockpile bar of the colony in question, but nothing ever gets "dumped". This was a key management feature of Col1, and I think must be a bug here.

Also, although the streamlining of the Col1 Customs' House into the Warehouse Expansion is kinda convenient, it over-powers the early game a little. Moreover, it also doesn't work properly, as I can still go way over the storage limit (I saw over 700 cigars at one point), and the proposed sell-off never seems to sell more than 5-10 of the item at a time, instead of knocking it right back to 300...

I was playing the shortest game on easiest & the 2nd-smallest map size for my first forray back to Col. Other than the severly unbalanced REF (already noted several times, I'll not belabour it) and the unusually short play-length (I know, duh, I picked quick) I'm really quite happy with this incarnation.

draco,

First, warehouses do not let you store "as much as you please". But if you produce excess goods faster than they can be trashed, you will build up a really high surplus.

Depending on the game speed, your warehouses may hold more than at other times. I believe the limit is 200 on normal speed and 300 on epic, and probably more on marathon.

I strenuously agree that the way dumping works is a problem. Civ4Col is very forgiving if you accidentally unload more goods than you should and I'm glad. Losing ~5 guns per turn stings but doesn't kill you.

The WOI option to cease trading with Europe is a problem for warehouses. They should have a benefit in such cases to replace the 50% of Europe's price. Maybe 33.3% of the highest Native price.

tour86rocker, I'll thank-you to not use so denigrating a tone.

Now, to expand upon my previous post, and perhaps explain things a bit more clearly:

On the 'Normal' gamespeed (the one it turns out I was using) having no Warehouse is supposed to allow you to store 100 of a good. Constructing the Warehouse is supposed to up that storage to 200, and the Expansion allow 300. Epic would increase these limits to 150/300/450, and Marathon to 300/600/900. Now, although the limit appears to function properly when you have no Warehouse, and the game correctly dumps all goods in excess of 100 (on Normal), as soon as you build a Warehouse, things go, for lack of a better word, wonky.

Whether it be the regular Warehouse, or the Expansion, excess goods are no longer dumped to bring the stockpile right back to the supposed limit. In both cases, the game will dump a (apparently) random amount of goods between 3 and 12, regardless of how far over the storage limit you actually are. If the Expansion is present, you receive some cash, and the amounts earned seem correct for the tiny amount of goods being sold, although I haven't calculated them exactly.

For a comparison example: In Col1, if I had three Master Tobacconists working a Cigar Factory, I would produce 48 Cigars a turn. Easily done with a trade route supplying Tobacco. If I didn't have a Customs' House selling the Cigars off though, or a ship picking them up for transport to Europe, then on the seventh turn, my colony would dump 36 Cigars. And it would continue to dump 48 Cigars every turn after that, until I got rid of the first 300.

My point is that with even modest, heck, poor, production in Civ4:Col, you can easily overtake the game dumping only ~6 of a good per turn. Warehouse limits are supposed to be limits, not suggestions. All the Civ games are about management, and limits are there to ensure you are forced to manage well. If the game doesn't impose a given limit properly, or to the fullest extent, then this is an oversight on the part pf the programmers. "Bug" may be debatable, because perhaps someone, somewhere, intended Warehouse storage limits to be implemented in this fashion, and a "bug" is defined as an unintended consequence. But if this implementation was deliberate, I can't for the life of me fathom why. I maintain that the Warehouse storage and dumping concepts are broken, and need correcting. I will grant you that losing only ~6 Guns in a given turn when a Wagon Train drops 100 off in a colony that already has 298 is a nice grace, but it is, nevertheless, a grace we should not be granted.

But if this implementation was deliberate, I can't for the life of me fathom why.

It's called not punishing players too much if they forget to move their goods.
After all, you get message that there is an overflow only after you lose some goods.

If you want to make the Storage Limit more strict there are two GlobalDefines that control it.


<Define>
<DefineName>CITY_YIELD_DECAY_PERCENT</DefineName>
<iDefineIntVal>10</iDefineIntVal>
</Define>
<Define>
<DefineName>MIN_CITY_YIELD_DECAY</DefineName>
<iDefineIntVal>5</iDefineIntVal>
</Define>

If you don't want any Yield kept above the Storage Limit, then set the first one, CITY_YIELD_DECAY_PERCENT, to 100 or the second one, MIN_CITY_YIELD_DECAY, to something super high like 50000. That will solve the problem. Its amazing how many of these "bugs" can be "fixed" with the change of a single number in a single xml file. Its why they gave us such an easyly modable game. Every one can have the game they want to play with the use of Notepad and the changing of a few numbers. It just takes a few minutes to look through files. :)

It's amazing how many of these so called "bugs" aren't actually bugs at all. :)

Jeckel, you are a genius! Thank-you so much! I actually saw those tags, but couldn't figure out what they were. Like I said before (and Dale said again), "bug" is debatable, but for me, I will definately be changing those two values. Thanks again!

This patch is great... thank you!


Have you considered reducing the 'Boston Tea Party' effect?

I mean the effect when you turn down the king's desire to raise taxes, and your citizens throw out your current stores of the good that can no longer be traded with Europe.


It seems like a broken feature to me. I often feel like I have no choice but to just concede to whatever the king wants, because I can't afford to have my stored goods stolen :(

Don't build warehouses... build wagons instead.

Wagons are flexible. You can move them around to wherever they are currently needed. Or, you can simply "park" them and leave the goods inside.

You can make as many as you want, so you have effectively unlimited warehouse capability.

And, they aren't affected by "tea party" theft.

This patch is great... thank you!


Have you considered reducing the 'Boston Tea Party' effect?

I mean the effect when you turn down the king's desire to raise taxes, and your citizens throw out your current stores of the good that can no longer be traded with Europe.


It seems like a broken feature to me. I often feel like I have no choice but to just concede to whatever the king wants, because I can't afford to have my stored goods stolen :(
It's not broken. It's been like that since the original. It's annoying sometimes, yes, but I'm not sure how it could be "fixed". How balanced would it be if the goods type was boycotted but your stores weren't discarded (or perhaps discarded in random amounts)? No clue.

That said, it's probably a too fundamental feature to be touched by this mod.

Ah, that's a good idea, Wodan. Thanks.

It seems, though, like it adds some additional tedium, because the best strategy would be to frequently transfer goods from your cities to parked wagons, as the king can raise taxes at any time.

So it still sounds like a broken feature to me, though that work-around does limit its costs (for the player, but not for the AI).

Re: "How balanced would it be if the goods type was boycotted but your stores weren't discarded (or perhaps discarded in random amounts)?"

Perhaps this is a feature that could benefit from being cut in half, the same as the education time rate increase was?

The game gives the player the choice of either a tax increase or of losing the ability to trade a good with the Old World, but it seems like a broken choice because, though both options have significant costs, only one is generally viable. (Unless you use the exploit cited by Wodan).

I have no problem with the 'boston tea party' effect itself, if you throw tea into the harbour it aint going to be very drinkable after that. However according to other posts it does not in fact avoid a tax increase, only postpones it. So you still get the same tax rise as well as losing your goods. That's not such a good result.

It has always postponed the increase. The tea parties were always meant to slow down the rise of taxes, not stop it permanently. The King will go on bugging you till you declare independence (at which point he moves on to punching you repeatedly in the face).

It has always postponed the increase. The tea parties were always meant to slow down the rise of taxes, not stop it permanently. The King will go on bugging you till you declare independence (at which point he moves on to punching you repeatedly in the face).

As I understand it though the trigger for the tax increases relates to the volume of goods traded. So when you reach that threshold you are due (at a random time) for a tax increase. Holding a tea party does not change that volume trigger, so you will still get the tax increase you thought you had avoided although it may be delayed.

In PatchMod, once you hold a party the blockaded good is no longer counted. This staves off the King a bit longer.

What do you guys think of a "Check all" button for wagon trains' trade routes?

Am I the only one who gets tired of re-checking a dozen boxes for each wagon train after every war? :)

Uh..... the "fully automated" button does that already. :)

Huh... look at that. Lol.