A little background first (feel free to skip):

Been playing Civ4 since it came out. Never really strayed from Noble, as I've always been more drawn to the 'world building' aspects of the game than warfare. Moved to Germany late 2007 (I'm back), and unfortunately I bought a laptop to use in Germany that couldn't run Civ4. Well, I've been back for 4+ months with a brand spanking new computer and finally upgraded to BTS.

It was a rough transition, as I had to learn that the combat % in Vanilla were to win a round, and the combat % in BTS is to win the battle. Also, the computer plays a lost smarter. At first I was kind of annoyed, but I've stuck with it, and after reading a bunch of DMOC's Immortal Games and Neal's King of the World series, I'm interested in moving up the difficulty ladder.



So, THE QUESTIONS:

1) I'm playing an Earth 18 game right now as Louis XIV, with all of Europe and western Russia conquered. (Noble game, naturally). I was manually operating about 8 workers, and had them hibernating for a long time as they had nothing to do. As I started to open up more uncontested territory, I decided what the heck and automated them. Well, to my surprise they started going into Saladin's territory, where Qin Shi Huang's men (he vassalized Catherine before the fall) started picking them off. I had absolutely no idea what they were doing there, until one made it through and started building a fort in northern Africa where where Madrid's culture was spilling over.

Is there a way to keep workers just in my lands?



2) Same game, different problem. I usually automate workers late in the game when I have very little but scrap work to do. Since they usually bulldoze my towns to put up unnecessary farms, I check "workers leave old improvements." However, I'm starting to notice that they aren't upgrading any roads to railroads.

Is there a way to have automated workers upgrade roads but not other tile improvements?



3) I love artillery. Looooooove 'em. Once I get a cities defenders (or a stack of doom trying to take a newly 'liberated' city) down to a fraction of their power, I often send the rest of my artillery to attack so I can get more XP. Yet, every time one retreats, I have to unclick it with the shift key, so they others can attack. Then, and this is more annoying when I'm attacking, once all the artillery has gone, the game automatically moves me to some other unit (like a caravel in the middle of nowhere) instead of letting me access the rest of the troops in the stack of doom.

Not usually a problem, but sometimes I'll have many other stacks of doom, and I'll forget to go back to a stack that just had all the artillery reduce a city to smoldering ruins and attack with the remaining units. So next turn comes, and all the units in the opposing city have had time to heal and regroup, while I just lost a few artillery.

Quite simply, is there a way to make it so the game doesn't 'skip' over usable units in a SOD with used artillery?



4) Like you may have noticed, I'm getting into Earth18 maps again. (Blame/praise lies entirely with Neal's amazing King of the World series). My computer is a... mess, and has problems with custom maps I download here. So, I want to create my own Earth18 maps. It's pretty easy to move units around and such in world builder, but I can't add/remove civilizations. I tried opening the map file itself as a word pad document, and have been successful in adding replacing Montezuma with Ragnar, but I can't seem to get Wang Kon or Shaka added to the game.

Is there a guide or something to creating custom Earth18 maps?



5) So the new computer is a beast. A Gateway P-7811 FX. Centrino 2 CPU, 4GB RAM, Nvidia GeForce 9800, Vista 64... a perfect desktop replacement for people that move a lot (especially to other countries) like me. I was running Fallout 3 with full specs, and I'm sure it Crysis is no problem. The one game that does cause my computer to occasionally crash? Civ4 with BTS.

From the looks of it, one of the two processors is always going 100%, which causes major overheating. With desktop replacements (a.k.a. 'gaming laptops.') it's important to ventilate, and I have a stand for maximum airflow. I don't mind if Civ4 plays slower, as I remember Earth 18 games back in the day taking 5-10 minutes between rounds in the late game, and right now it's only taking seconds. That's fine, but I can wait 30 seconds for a round as long as it keeps my computer cooler and prevents it from freezing/crashing.

Is there way to reduce the CPU usage of BTS?



A preemptive thanks for any and all advice. :goodjob:

Is there a way to keep workers just in my lands?

Yes. Don't automate them.

Is there a way to have automated workers upgrade roads but not other tile improvements?

Yes. It even has its own button, "Build Trade Networks", hotkey is N. They build roads and improve&connect unconnected resources.

Quite simply, is there a way to make it so the game doesn't 'skip' over usable units in a SOD with used artillery?

If I understood the problem correctly, you can shift+click on the stack and press 'Wake all units', so the soldiers don't sleep on their death watch ;)

You can also tick 'Stack attack' in the options menu to just have all of the artillery attack at once when you order them all to attack.

Is there way to reduce the CPU usage of BTS?

Not that I know of, except by playing smaller maps.

1) NO
2) Automate Trade Route should get the rails built for ya.
3) Not without some major coding skills
4) IDK
5) Don't think you can affect Civ directly but my laptop has a system utility that will allow you to slow down the machine for power savings (when on battery mostly) but that can be setup to be used while on power. See if yours has the same utility or maybe look online for one.

Yes. It even has its own button, "Build Trade Networks", hotkey is N. They build roads and improve&connect unconnected resources.

Huh. They must focus on improvements over travel infrastructure when on automatic. Thanks.


If I understood the problem correctly, you can shift+click on the stack and press 'Wake all units', so the soldiers don't sleep on their death watch

You can also tick 'Stack attack' in the options menu to just have all of the artillery attack at once when you order them all to attack.

The units are awake (I believe). The problem is that they're grouped with an artillery that already attacked that turn and retreated. Unlike say, a cavalry, when an artillery unit attacks, they stay attached to the group instead of removed. Since the SOD has a unit with no moves left (the artillery) attached, the stack can no longer attack, and the game skips the entire stack and goes to another available unit.

I've tried mitigating this by ctrl-clicking just the artillery, but they seem to get re-attached to the rest of the stack after I go through all the artillery... which is a process of shift-clicking to remove artillery that's already attacked, so that the remaining - unused - artillery can attack that turn.

I guess I could move the artillery as a separate stack on the same tile with my SOD so that this doesn't happen, but I like the convenience of moving them with one click. It also helps a lot over long hauls so that they don't get split up. No one else has this problem?


Not that I know of, except by playing smaller maps.

Lame.



1) NO
2) Automate Trade Route should get the rails built for ya.
3) Not without some major coding skills
4) IDK
5) Don't think you can affect Civ directly but my laptop has a system utility that will allow you to slow down the machine for power savings (when on battery mostly) but that can be setup to be used while on power. See if yours has the same utility or maybe look online for one.

Thanks for the Automate Trade Route tip. I'll have to look at the power saving mode. AFAIK, there's only an option for brightness, and since it's more of a desktop replacement than a laptop, it's almost always plugged in. I'll have to check it out anyway, though.

Quite simply, is there a way to make it so the game doesn't 'skip' over usable units in a SOD with used artillery?


The only way I know of to do this is to simply ungroup all the units and then regroup them once you're done attacking.

Is there way to reduce the CPU usage of BTS?

Actually there's a mod called CAR Mod: Civ AcceleratoR: http://forums.civfanatics.com/showthread.php?t=332196

which speeds up the wait time, that may help.

The only way I know of to do this is to simply ungroup all the units and then regroup them once you're done attacking.

That's frustrating. Oh, well. Thanks.



Actually there's a mod called CAR Mod: Civ AcceleratoR: http://forums.civfanatics.com/showthread.php?t=332196

which speeds up the wait time, that may help.

Huh. I guess I can give that a shot, but quicker turn time isn't exactly the problem. I was just using that as an example of my computer's speed. I think someone mentioned something about a computer mod about (computer) resource consumption somewhere. I might give that a try.

Rather than clog things with a new thread, I'm going to throw a quick question into this one:

I know I got a quest to build colosseums earlier, but I can't remember how many or when it ends. Is there anywhere I can check to see what the requirements and/or status of the quest is?

Ctrl + tab -> Quests

Ctrl + tab -> Quests

Thank you!

I've tried mitigating this by ctrl-clicking just the artillery, but they seem to get re-attached to the rest of the stack after I go through all the artillery... which is a process of shift-clicking to remove artillery that's already attacked, so that the remaining - unused - artillery can attack that turn.

I guess I could move the artillery as a separate stack on the same tile with my SOD so that this doesn't happen, but I like the convenience of moving them with one click. It also helps a lot over long hauls so that they don't get split up. No one else has this problem?



yeah it's a little annoying, but I got used to it by now. Main thing is to focus, usually my turns consist of a: finished production in city/switch to new production, b: naval action, c1: airstrikes/raids c2: land action (stack attack city or hostile stack), d: clean-up (kill any pillaging and/or hurt enemy units), e: defence and army movement check/micro management if nescesarry. end turn.

For me that worked great, i wouldn't move an infantry unit b4 I finish my navel movements. Some scrambling of the numbers might occur tho cuz here and there I simply can't stick to it. When I have to bombard city defenses with arty, then put in an airstrike to weaken the units and then go back to the land action to take the city.

But u get the general idea. Mid-late game I usually have an huge empire, if I don't work like that I get distracted and start forgetting things, like u did with the arties lost for no reason. I must say tho, shift+clicking to de-select used arties are ideal for me, although with huge stacks i seperate my arty from my attackers and defenders. But this would have to be a reaaaly big stack for me to do that.

For me that worked great, i wouldn't move an infantry unit b4 I finish my navel movements.

Slightly off topic, but is that some kind of abs exercise you can do while sitting?

Ya, I got one huge ab :goodjob:

Slightly off topic, but is that some kind of abs exercise you can do while sitting?

A light chuckle.

+1 :goodjob:

@LegioCorvus: "Quite simply, is there a way to make it so the game doesn't 'skip' over usable units in a SOD with used artillery?"

But this is what I do.
1. At beginning of turn, ALT+Click stack -> this select all active unit on tile
2. Hit enter or click the un-group button -> this make all units on separate into its own group
3. CTRL+Click Artillery -> this select all active artillery
4. Proceed with bombardment
5. Continue with siege attack with stack attack
6. At this point when the artillery stack attack is done, instead of jumping to next SoD, it should jump to your first non-artillery

I know it seem like a lot of steps, but once you get it into routine, you can do it without thinking quite quickly