RFC Europe Wonders

That looks really good jessiecat!

Yep, buttons, "movies", all included. I'll put that one for Magna Carta and post here the files.

Now, I think having Dome of the Rock forces to change the islamic shrine. As it is built in Damascus, I propose the Umayyad Mosque http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Umayyad_Mosque

I've found a generic "islamic palace" building with minarets, I'll make it big and use it for now.

JediClemente said:

Yep, buttons, "movies", all included. I'll put that one for Magna Carta and post here the files.

Now, I think having Dome of the Rock forces to change the islamic shrine. As it is built in Damascus, I propose the Umayyad Mosque http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Umayyad_Mosque

I've found a generic "islamic palace" building with minarets, I'll make it big and use it for now.

Click to expand...

OK. Cause I've just a couple of possible pictures to use for the Royal Academy. And there is no need to change the Muslim shrine. It is automatically built in Damascus as the Masjid Al Haram. We "moved" it from Mecca for this mod, you see. This is a "God" game. We can do that.

jessiecat said:

OK. Cause I've just a couple of possible pictures to use for the Royal Academy. And there is no need to change the Muslim shrine. It is automatically built in Damascus as the Masjid Al Haram. We "moved" it from Mecca for this mod, you see. This is a "God" game. We can do that.

Click to expand...

But doesn't it have the same graphics as the Dome of the Rock? Edit: yeah, it does.

And this one as Royal Academy?
http://forums.civfanatics.com/showthread.php?t=277504

JediClemente said:

But doesn't it have the same graphics as the Dome of the Rock? Edit: yeah, it does.

And this one as Royal Academy?
http://forums.civfanatics.com/showthread.php?t=277504

Click to expand...

Nice one. I suggested the Reichstag art but yours is much better. Lets have that.

As for the graphics for the Dome of the Rock it should look like what we using now for the Masjid Al Haram.
We might be able to swop it for this one.

It weights a bit more than I expected...

http://www.mediafire.com/download.php?utjzcugnnmy

Those are the wonders you said except the Royal Academy and the swap for the Masjid al-haram.

Minor problems: blue color in the buttons doesn't match (don't understand why, used buttonmaker from the forums) and some of the new wonders mix strangely with the rest of the city. I suppose it must be some stupid thing with the LSystem, hope 3Miro or someone else can solve that.

It's not urgent anyway.

JediClemente said:

It weights a bit more than I expected...

http://www.mediafire.com/download.php?utjzcugnnmy

Those are the wonders you said except the Royal Academy and the swap for the Masjid al-haram.

Minor problems: blue color in the buttons doesn't match (don't understand why, used buttonmaker from the forums) and some of the new wonders mix strangely with the rest of the city. I suppose it must be some stupid thing with the LSystem, hope 3Miro or someone else can solve that.

It's not urgent anyway.

Click to expand...

Thanks for all that.

I'll do those two next (Royal Academy, Masjid) and St. Basil's (easy, already have the art from regular BTS) if that's okay.

I'll also look for a new button for the Kremlin building.

I think there should be more Reinassance wonders, but finding graphics for those seems quite difficult.

Looking good JediClemente.

1) The new buttons you've made lack an alpha (transparency) channel, which is why their border looks wrong. It's not hard to add in if you have an editor that allows you to edit the alpha channel -- dxtbmp is one such free program that can work directly with .dds files. You should be able to open up one of the normal buttons in that program, see what the alpha channel looks like, and copy it into the alpha channel of your new buttons.

2) I don't fully understand the LSystem yet, but some of my buildings get placed odd in cities too. It's a bit of trial and error, but I agree it's not critically important.

3) One python file (Consts.py) needs to be updated when you edit the XML. This file contains a big old list of buildings that looks something like this:

#Buildings
iPalace = 0
iWalls = 1 ...

The number refers to that buildings' position in the XML file (starting at zero). There are some other special constants defined, like iNumBuildings and iPlague which must be set correctly for the mod to work right, since all the other Python scripts reference their buildings through this file. For example, currently with your XML files the "plague" will spread corporation HQs. If you can update this file when you update the XML that would be great, and one less thing for me to remember to do. Let me know if you have any questions.

OK. Changed all I said before and modified Consts.py also.

Strangely enough, when I last put Royal Academy in the GameText file, assigning its TXT_KEY caption, the game can't start, it closes when loading the XML. If I comment that lines and add them exactly as before below, it works.

I don't understand why it happens, or why commenting the lines and adding them again solves the issue. ?????

Anyway, here it is. I understand it will work fine now.

http://www.mediafire.com/download.php?wc2dxnemi5n

Looking really nice... I merged these files into my version of the mod and everything appears to work. Only thing I noticed was that the wonder "movie" pictures aren't all in the correct aspect ratio. For instance, the Magna Carta one gets stretched all out of whack when it is displayed. Just something to keep in mind.

You should also feel free to re-arrange the existing wonders to better locations in the tech tree. I think you (or someone) mentioned that Versailles comes too early...

Oh, and here might be a better "Magna Carta" building.

sedna17 said:

Oh, and here might be a better "Magna Carta" building.

Click to expand...

I agree that might be a better choice. And I've got something else in mind for the one I suggested as placeholder anyway. Still collecting art for a couple of additional wonders to include. I'll post some further suggestions later today.

OK. Here's my list of more possible new wonders with buildings that might be suitable.

Magellans Voyage (as in BTS) - enabled by Shipbuilding -art below

Belem Tower (replaces the Great Lighthouse) -enabled by Shipbuilding -art below

The Gardens of Al Andalus (replaces the Hanging Gardens) - enabled by Arabic Knowledge and Civil Service -uses BTS art

The Tomb of Al Khalid (replaces the Statue of Zeus) - enabled by Arabic Knowledge and Chivalry -requires 4 conquered cities -art suggested below.

Leonardo's Inventions (replaces The University of Sankore) -enabled by Classical Knowledge - art to be found

The Golden Bull (replaces the Shwedgon Paya) - enabled by Divine Right - could use art first suggested for Magna Carta

Kalmar Castle (replaces the Pentagon) - enabled by Professional Armies - art suggested below.

The Temple Mount (replaces The Temple of Solomon) - enabled by Banking - could use the Bethlehem art suggested below.

The Escorial Palace (replaces Wall Street) - enabled by Nationalism - art suggested below.


The first pic is for the Belem Tower. In the first row, the 2nd. could be a better Dome of the Rock and the 3rd. The Tomb of Al Khalid ibn Walid. In the second row the second one could be Kalmar Castle. In the 3rd. row the 4th. could be the Escorial Palace and Bethlehem could stand in for the Temple Mount. The button shown has been designed for Magellan's Voyage.

A wonder replacing Shwedgon Paya that is enabled at Liberalism? Seems pretty weird to me. After all Liberalism enables Free religion which is supposed to be the last Religious Civic enabled no?

BurnEmDown said:

A wonder replacing Shwedgon Paya that is enabled at Liberalism? Seems pretty weird to me. After all Liberalism enables Free religion which is supposed to be the last Religious Civic enabled no?

Click to expand...

You're right. It should be earlier. I'll change that.

Below are the files for the art strips above and some screen art for the suggested wonders. Pictured here are Kalmar Castle, two for the Escorial and a better pic of the Krak Des Chevaliers.

EDIT art removed.

Don't worry about the graphics for a wonder about Leonardo, I think there are files for that already in the mod (just not the XML).

Yes, I said Versailles comes too early, as do some other wonders. The problem is to find a proper later tech related to them, it's not easy. I'll think about it.

Also, never quite understood why Versailles had that "another capital" effect in Civ4, after all it's just a palace 20 km from Paris, isn't it? Should its effect be changed?

What is the problem with the wonder splash image? It's supposed to have a specific resolution?

Completely unrelated to those, there could be another national wonder, something like "National Bank" instead of Wall Street. The Spanish and English ones were founded in the XVIII century.

Here are the instructions for a Wonder "movie":

Crop an image to be rectangular, with a ratio of 2:3 (i.e. the width should be 3/2 the height). Then resize the image to be 512x512 pixels. This will distort/stretch the image, but that's okay because Civ re-stretches it when it displays it. Then convert to DDS. DXTBMP seems to be the best free tool on the Windows side. Just import your picture into the image side (ignore the alpha channel) and save as DXT 3.

Actually, re-sizing to 512x512 may be optional, I think Civ will scale the image down if it's bigger than this. The important thing is to to have the correct ratio (2:3) distorted into a square. For some of the wonder art you've used, it looks fine stretched out (La Mezquita for instance).

There are lots of buildings/units sort of barely tangentially connected to the tech that enables them. I wouldn't worry too much about it. On the other hand, in RFC Versailles gets enabled around 650 AD when the Arabs spawn. So even if Versailles is a bit early in our mod, maybe that's not too big a problem.

JediClemente said:

Don't worry about the graphics for a wonder about Leonardo, I think there are files for that already in the mod (just not the XML).

Yes, I said Versailles comes too early, as do some other wonders. The problem is to find a proper later tech related to them, it's not easy. I'll think about it.

Also, never quite understood why Versailles had that "another capital" effect in Civ4, after all it's just a palace 20 km from Paris, isn't it? Should its effect be changed?

What is the problem with the wonder splash image? It's supposed to have a specific resolution?

Completely unrelated to those, there could be another national wonder, something like "National Bank" instead of Wall Street. The Spanish and English ones were founded in the XVIII century.

Click to expand...

These might be OK for Leonardo as screen art. Also a couple for Khalid ibn Al Walid.
I agree Versailles should come later. So too should the Alhambra, Topkapi Palace and the Palacio De Pena. When I suggested The Escorial Palace replace Wall Street I didn't mean it should be it. Just that it should provide a significant boost to wealth in the later period of the game, like after Nationalism.
I've also found a nice old map circa 1500 which might be used for Atlantic Access or something else.

IMO we should change the palace Art, because if you compare it to the Summer Palace, it looks very silly. I propose the last picture of the 2nd row of jessiecats post. (354)