Recommended map size/AIs?

So I played a warm up match and gonna start now a proper match.. I was thinking Giant (PerfectWorld2f) map with 22 AIs on Noble.
I just wanna know if I delay the game, not killing AIs constantly, can I get to the last techs on the techtree without at some point running to constant MAF errors?

I have 4GB for Civ to use. (Win7 64bit)

bobwwd said:

So I played a warm up match and gonna start now a proper match.. I was thinking Giant (PerfectWorld2f) map with 22 AIs on Noble.
I just wanna know if I delay the game, not killing AIs constantly, can I get to the last techs on the techtree without at some point running to constant MAF errors?

I have 4GB for Civ to use. (Win7 64bit)

Click to expand...

I asked a similar question when I started off with it and got some very good advice back then that I now share with you.

In terms of number of AI i would not go higher then 15, and not bigger then huge in terms of mapsize. Lower the amount if you play with revolutions and or barb civs since those spawn extra civs that can and will take a toll especially in lategame.

I played a full game with 15 civs on a huge map with revs and civs on and it went to a crawl so I would suggest large and 10 civs. This is not really a matter on how beefy your comp is (which to a degree only helps with turn times), but the limits of the civ 4 engine in parts, and the guys developing this mod doing a mighty fine job on adding and optimizing stuff.

I don't mind the turn load times since I can do other stuff during those with my other PC (on my last match on another mod with 34Civs, my turn load times were at about 5 minutes), I just don't wanna get so many MAF errors that I have to abandon the match.
I have also Barb Civs disabled in the settings, no Revolutions either, Vassal States are disabled too because I believe they prevent AIs from creating Colonies.

I'd like to play a big map as many Civs as possible (without crashes, don't mind if crashes are every 20-50 turns, had that problem in my other match)

EDIT: Although I'm gonna destroy atleast most of the Civs from my island in the early turns. I was originally gonna pick 18 Civs but I picked 4 extra for me to destroy with the early tech units

Also I'm playing on Eternity gamespeed. Most likely will finish the match next year..
But don't wanna start a match and to abandon it because of MAF errors, so should I play safe and go Huge with 16 Civs or something like that?

I would strongly recommend to go huge map size max playing with 16 civs and your settings should set you up for a smooth playthrough in terms of memory problems. Are you playing the latest stable or the SVN Version?

Keyalha said:

I would strongly recommend to go huge map size max playing with 16 civs and your settings should set you up for a smooth playthrough in terms of memory problems. Are you playing the latest stable or the SVN Version?

Click to expand...

latest stable and I'm gonna go with that, it's V36. even if it gets or is updated I'll play my match with that version. Because I've read so many topics about save errors in the earlier versions when updating to new versions with old saves and I'm so busy myself that this Eternity match will probably take a year for me to finish to the endgame techs

bobwwd said:

latest stable and I'm gonna go with that, it's V36. even if it gets or is updated I'll play my match with that version. Because I've read so many topics about save errors in the earlier versions when updating to new versions with old saves and I'm so busy myself that this Eternity match will probably take a year for me to finish to the endgame techs

Click to expand...

Afaik the problems mentioned are only regarding actual updating during a game which normally works fine but they had to break savegame compatibility.

Nontheless if you think your game might take that long the stable version still might be the better bet since the current SVN is sort of cutting edge atm.

Once the bump with savegame compatibility is done it should be no problem to use it in a long term game.

Alright thanks, I'm gonna go with Giant mapsize and 22 AIs, which from I'll destroy 3-5 in the early turns (turns 100-700). And hope for the best..

One thing that scares me is the savefile size that is already almost 1.5MB on first turn.. In my past experience, once my 34 Civ match on other mod savefile reached 10MB it became riddled with MAF errors in the end game

EDIT: However, if I get my friend playing Civ4 again and we play this mod in coop. Sadly he hasn't warmed up for Civ4 yet... If that co-op match ever happens we're gonna pick Huge with 18civs.. I like really large and long games and my friend is the opposite hehe. We are rivals always until Permanent Alliance is possible, usually I leave my friend in peace to build his cities and keep the AIs off him because he's not really good with Civ4. I hope he never reads this comment... lol. He'd be so mad.. so mad..

@bobwwd,
Giant with 22 AI Hmm...what game speed are you going to use? Don't use anything slower (more turns) than marathon to start.

And Giant is not good for an learnig game. The Bigger the map, the longer the gamespeed (Snail, Eon, Eternity), the Less likely to ever finish Except on Conquest only. Do Not use Mastery Victory unless you are a masochist for extremely long games Or you can Conquer the World in 180 days!

Large Map, Perfect Mongoose (Toffer Edit), 9 AI on Epic will give you a good 1st time experience to get a feel for how things play out.

JosEPh

JosEPh_II said:

And Giant is not good for an learnig game. The Bigger the map, the longer the gamespeed (Snail, Eon, Eternity), the Less likely to ever finish Except on Conquest only. Do Not use Mastery Victory unless you are a masochist for extremely long games Or you can Conquer the World in 180 days!

Large Map, Perfect Mongoose (Toffer Edit), 9 AI on Epic will give you a good 1st time experience to get a feel for how things play out.

JosEPh

Click to expand...

I did already play a good amount of time to get used to the mod (at least on early game turns and gameplay on Eternity to about 1000 turns or something).

I like learning as I ago even if I play bad, gives more challenge towards the end if I'm far behind AIs etc.
I have a game waiting with the following settings: Giant map size, 22 AIs, Eternity game speed, difficulty: Noble, Conquest victory condition only. I don't mind how long the match is gonna take, even if it takes a year or two (in real life).

I just don't want MAFs which force me to quit the match. If necessary I'll turn down memory using settings from the .ini towards the end game. I just wanna know if I reach the +8000 unit limit with these settings. One of my 34 Civs matches on another mod forced me to quit on Warlord difficulty because the game glitched or it was something else that AIs built around x3 more units than they were supposed to on Warlord and I crashed eventually constantly on the same turn because Civ ran out of ~4GB memory limit.

Well I'll play it safe with Huge map size and 20 civs. I just need to figure out how to decrease the amount of Peaks generated on PerfectWorld2f, because anything smaller than Giant seems to be filled with Peaks.. I hate those peaks/mountains (not hills)!

Haven't seen many MAF's lately. I know a number of causes for them were sorted out this version. I'm not claiming everything's stable, just that that particular problem hasn't been encountered of late.

My biggest game was 13MB save file, rev on, gigantic earth map and 40+civ. It was version V33 of mod and i reached limit of mod with MAF errors. Since then i reached only 10MB save file but without any MAF errors.

I highly recommend playing without REV if you really wish to play gigantic map and v36+crime patch(its stable and solve some minnor MAF problems).Dont use SVN version!

Best setting i found playable and enjoyable is huge map with 9AI.

And yeah turn time on gigantic map is around 20-60min(depends on how many wars are active and how many civs are alive)

If you really wish to test limits of your PC i can send you save file.
My PC is 4GB ram, win7, dual core 2,2Gh.

As long as you keep in mind that balancing is off for slower gamespeeds (it is not recommended to go slower than snail), you can keep MAFs off to some extent by enabling viewports (the smaller the size the longer this can keep up, but you get to see only a small portion of the map at the same time).

There is another option besides viewport (I cannot remember the name right now) that basically blends out parts of the map until they are focused on - that option is on by default and you should keep it on, it is far less irritating to use, but for the full effect you might need both.

Other than that, the usual tips apply: Keep your drivers updated, and if you want to improve your computer go for more RAM and/or an SSD.

Another point against using slower gamespeeds right now: For the first time in years, savegame compatibility is broken right now. As soon as the next save-breaking update arrives, you are stuck with your current version - and you will be cut off from the next regular version with your current game. You might not want to invest that much time into a game that you would have to abandon when it gets interesting.

At least for me starting a game with gigantic, snail-speed and 30 civs (or even more) is on the limits that can be finished with viewports. Usually enough of the AIs get killed off before the game reaches a point where it is unplayable so the worst performance peak hits somewhere around late medieval - industrial range.

I had a save that got too big so I just erased insignificant part of the map through the map editor so I could finish the game.

Also you can try to adjust the giant or gigantic map size slightly smaller through XMLs.

Nakkimunakas said:

Also you can try to adjust the giant or gigantic map size slightly smaller through XMLs.

Click to expand...

How do u do that???

Thanks for the replies, I've been playing Giant map with 24 civs, 3 are already dead so 20 AIs remain.

Works pretty good so far, short turn times but I see them getting longer. Savefile at about 4MB

I noticed also that the AI seems to be pretty weak, they are far easier than on Vanilla game. I'm playing on Noble. They attack with defensive units and their cities have basically two units defending it. I hope it gets harder towards the end game when there's no space to expand anymore on the map.

No crashes so far except in the beginning everytime I got hostiles from tribal villages. Good thing that I turned random seed on in the XMLs

bobwwd said:

Thanks for the replies, I've been playing Giant map with 24 civs, 3 are already dead so 20 AIs remain.

Works pretty good so far, short turn times but I see them getting longer. Savefile at about 4MB

I noticed also that the AI seems to be pretty weak, they are far easier than on Vanilla game. I'm playing on Noble. They attack with defensive units and their cities have basically two units defending it. I hope it gets harder towards the end game when there's no space to expand anymore on the map.

No crashes so far except in the beginning everytime I got hostiles from tribal villages. Good thing that I turned random seed on in the XMLs

Click to expand...

What version are you using? AI using only 2 defenders was Fixed sometime ago.

And I hope you did Not pick Mastery Victory Option. I've gotten to the point that I will only have 2 or 3 Victory Options selected. Mastery just splits the AI into too many decision paths to be effective opponent.

Experienced players of Vanilla BtS should start at Monarch or above with C2C. New players and players that want a slower paced game should start with Noble or lower.

And with the current SVn there have been No reports of CTD's from goodie Huts that give Hostiles. Perhaps it's your xml change to random seed that is causing this CTD(s)?

JosEPh

strategyonly said:

How do u do that???

Click to expand...

Generally in CIV4WorldInfo.xml:
<iGridWidth>10</iGridWidth>
<iGridHeight>6</iGridHeight>

Some custom maps have parameters in their script:

e.g in C2C_PerfectWorld2f.py

self.landPercent = 0.4 (how much of the map is land)

def getGridSize(argsList):
grid_sizes = {
WorldSizeTypes.WORLDSIZE_DUEL: (12, 8),
WorldSizeTypes.WORLDSIZE_TINY: (15, 10),
WorldSizeTypes.WORLDSIZE_SMALL: (18, 12),
WorldSizeTypes.WORLDSIZE_STANDARD: (24, 16),
WorldSizeTypes.WORLDSIZE_LARGE: (30, 20),
WorldSizeTypes.WORLDSIZE_HUGE: (36, 24) #,
# 6: (42, 28),
# 7: (48, 32)
}
if (argsList[0] == -1): # (-1,) is passed to function on loads
return []
[eWorldSize] = argsList
return grid_sizes[eWorldSize]

Just change (48, 32) parameters. The actual size in tiles is apparently 4 times the result so size 1,2,3... would be 4,8,12... tiles.

Hmm maybe the random seed is/was causing the CTD. No idea myself
I'm using the version 36 downloaded from moddb a while back.

I could call myself experienced but I'm not, eventhough I've been playing Civ4 many years I've always sucked at it (sucked at strategy / RTS games in general lol). Usually been playing on Warlord and barely beating Noble on vanilla games. My only victory condition is Conquest.

(PS. I've been getting familiar with the DLL sources in the past few days, any specific pieces of code or such that ThunderBrd want me to take a look at for any errors or mistakes? Should I PM TB or where should I post about these kind of DLL related questions?)

Nakkimunakas said:

Generally in CIV4WorldInfo.xml:
<iGridWidth>10</iGridWidth>
<iGridHeight>6</iGridHeight>

Some custom maps have parameters in their script:

e.g in C2C_PerfectWorld2f.py

self.landPercent = 0.4 (how much of the map is land)

def getGridSize(argsList):
grid_sizes = {
WorldSizeTypes.WORLDSIZE_DUEL: (12, 8),
WorldSizeTypes.WORLDSIZE_TINY: (15, 10),
WorldSizeTypes.WORLDSIZE_SMALL: (18, 12),
WorldSizeTypes.WORLDSIZE_STANDARD: (24, 16),
WorldSizeTypes.WORLDSIZE_LARGE: (30, 20),
WorldSizeTypes.WORLDSIZE_HUGE: (36, 24) #,
# 6: (42, 28),
# 7: (48, 32)
}
if (argsList[0] == -1): # (-1,) is passed to function on loads
return []
[eWorldSize] = argsList
return grid_sizes[eWorldSize]

Just change (48, 32) parameters. The actual size in tiles is apparently 4 times the result so size 1,2,3... would be 4,8,12... tiles.

Click to expand...

Good Info! And Thanks. Learned something new today.

JosEPh

Nakkimunakas said:

Generally in CIV4WorldInfo.xml:
<iGridWidth>10</iGridWidth>
<iGridHeight>6</iGridHeight>

Some custom maps have parameters in their script:

e.g in C2C_PerfectWorld2f.py

self.landPercent = 0.4 (how much of the map is land)

def getGridSize(argsList):
grid_sizes = {
WorldSizeTypes.WORLDSIZE_DUEL: (12, 8),
WorldSizeTypes.WORLDSIZE_TINY: (15, 10),
WorldSizeTypes.WORLDSIZE_SMALL: (18, 12),
WorldSizeTypes.WORLDSIZE_STANDARD: (24, 16),
WorldSizeTypes.WORLDSIZE_LARGE: (30, 20),
WorldSizeTypes.WORLDSIZE_HUGE: (36, 24) #,
# 6: (42, 28),
# 7: (48, 32)
}
if (argsList[0] == -1): # (-1,) is passed to function on loads
return []
[eWorldSize] = argsList
return grid_sizes[eWorldSize]

Just change (48, 32) parameters. The actual size in tiles is apparently 4 times the result so size 1,2,3... would be 4,8,12... tiles.

Click to expand...

No idea what u just said, sorry??