SCENARIO: American Civil War - C3C only

Ok, here is another patch to beta2 to fix the wonder crash at Iron Works.

I've figured out what the problem is. Its the Wonder Splash screen that pops up whenever you build a wonder. I've not been referencing them properly in the PediaIcons.txt

Download the patch here.

Install instructions:

- extract Text folder
- inside the ACWC3C folder delete the existing Text folder
- replace with this new Text folder

Regards
Misfit


PS: dreadnought, the Text folder should never have 2 Pediaicon.txt files in it, only one.
 
Originally posted by The Last Conformist
DL'd beta2. Unfortunately didn't really get any time to try out beta1.

We have discussed removing the offensive bombard from Divisions - might have been in the ACW2 thread. IIRC, Procifica wanted it removed. Personally, I still consider it almost useless, but Klyden clearly isn't agreeing. If its uselessness is only due to some idiosyncracy of my playing-style, we should perhaps remove it to even the field vis-a-vis the AI.

On a technical point, it would have been easier to install the thing if the PediaIcons.txt had been in a Acwc3c\Text folder. Very minor, but would have saved me some moving around of files.

I agree that the division bombard should be removed as it is a human exploit in effect. Of course its fun to have in there but I must protect ai integrity.
 
Originally posted by Misfit_travel
Ok, here is another patch to beta2 to fix the wonder crash at Iron Works.

I've figured out what the problem is. Its the Wonder Splash screen that pops up whenever you build a wonder. I've not been referencing them properly in the PediaIcons.txt

Download the patch here.

Install instructions:

- extract Text folder
- inside the ACWC3C folder delete the existing Text folder
- replace with this new Text folder

Regards
Misfi


PS: dreadnought, the Text folder should never have 2 Pediaicon.txt files in it, only one.

Ok , Im working on it and will report back later.
 
Ok I loaded The new file and built intelligence agency and it seems to be working fine so I will restart the tech report .

Week 28 1861- infantry tactics (6 turns) science 20 percent-494 gold per turn

Week 34 1861-advanced culture (6 turns) science 20% -620 gold per turn

Week 40 1861- Higher learning (6 turns) science 30% 539 per turn

Week 46 1861-calvalry tactics(6 turns) science 20% 757 per turn

Week 52 1861- Long term volunteers (2nd tier) 6turns----20%-----809 gold per turn

Week 6 1862-improved artillery (6 turns) 30% science------587 gold per turn

Week 12 1862-combined arms (6 turns) 30% science 571 gold per turn
 
I tried restricting the luxury / science slider settings in the government type (in the Editor). I tested it and the game completely ignored it, letting me do whatever I wanted.

That's too bad, because I thought it would have been good to restrict it to something like a min / max of 30-70%, to avoid major gouging.

I'm thinking we may need to remove some of the libraries and / or banks from more of the smaller Union cities.

Misfit
 
Originally posted by Misfit_travel
I tried restricting the luxury / science slider settings in the government type (in the Editor). I tested it and the game completely ignored it, letting me do whatever I wanted.

That's too bad, because I thought it would have been good to restrict it to something like a min / max of 30-70%, to avoid major gouging.

I'm thinking we may need to remove some of the libraries and / or banks from more of the smaller Union cities.

Misfit

Yes, either that or increase the cost per unit in the govt settings.

Im back up to turn 40 now and things are going smoothly. The game is fun and time consuming but still see little activity on the confederate side as I slowly move in. I think if we give them a few auto-units it will hamper the human player alot more.

I believe they are spending all their efforts on the higher shield divisions which will be slow for them . An auto-build for confederate volunteers-shirmishers-irregular at key areas would make the human (north player) a lot less relaxing and cause more battles. I also believe calvalry on both side should be auto-built though slowly, to force some use of them. Even though weak they were used in several key battles esp. in the west.

I will be glad to propose some auto-build strutures and test some of these out a little at a time. I could upload a test file of this if you like using the current version. We could start with a little added calvarly in which case I would remove them as a in-game build option, and thus we could control the exact inflow into the game.

Regard.....dread
 
May I suggest that we coordinate the autobuild experiment as follows:

V4.0 beta2
OBJECTIVES:
- test plague system for game balance
- test tech tree for cost / speed of discovery
- test spending levels of each side

V4.0 beta3
OBJECTIVES:
- finalize plague settings
- adjust city improvements / unit costs to balance out money & tech discovery time

V4.0 beta4
OBJECTIVE:
- determine AI balance settings to improve game play
- autobuild wonders for AI
- removal of autobuild wonders for human
- balance some unit costs

I'd like to suggest that you need at least 100 turns of game time with each side to really get a proper handle on the effect of some of the changes. I think it would be in our best interests to nail down plague, tech tree and spending levels to a balance before we experiment with AI challenge tweaking.

If we don't do it in that order we can't be certain that the game is balanced enough for head to head play.

I see beta4 actually being a series of variations. One variant might focus purely on autobuild wonders for the AI as a way of stimulating the challenge level. Another might focus on removing human autobuild wonders. Somewhere in between we might tweak the cost factors of units to see if we can make the AI value units differently (and build some).

Let me know what you think.

Misfit
 
Yes Misfit, that sounds very good to me. (nice plan)

Is plague off in Beta 2, Im now at turn 46 with no plague effects.

Also, though Im researching all techs in my study, If we allow tech stealing this will change things alot as I could be doing this.
 
Tech stealing is permitted, but you have to build intelligence agency first.

That's a change from V3.x, because both sides started with Intelligence Agencies. It seemed to me that it would be a little more challenging if you had to devote some resources toward building it first before you could spy.

This is likely one of the wonders we would give the AI, but not the human player in order to help improve the gameplay.

Misfit
 
Originally posted by dreadknought
Yes Misfit, that sounds very good to me. (nice plan)

Is plague off in Beta 2, Im now at turn 46 with no plague effects.

Also, though Im researching all techs in my study, If we allow tech stealing this will change things alot as I could be doing this.

Plague is still on, but toned down a great deal (open it the in the editor, go to scenario properties, select disasters tab and take a look). Obviously I went a little too far the other way this time.

Sigh, back to the drawing board.

Misfit
 
Hi , Well plague started in week 2 1862 and seems to be hitting around 4-5 cities a turn. Week 3 I lost a New York militia to it. I dont think it is too off base where its at certainly closer than before.

As to intelligence agency , it will change the rate of the tech tree alot because I could have stolen several techs and I suspect the human player always will against the ai.

We may wont to put it as a fairly late advance or increase the cost to steal techs to slow down stealing but not eliminate it. I like the idea of the ai starting with it already in place.

SEE POST------184 for live tech updates.......dread
 
Tech stealing has been in as long as I have played ACW. I'm willing to take it out of AI vs. human games, but it should be a legitimate tactic in head to head games.

I know I can take it out of espionage missions, but I don't think the editor would let me enable later in the tech tree. I think its an all or nothing kind of selection.

Misfit


BTW, found a bug. Drafting was supposed to be enabled at game start. You are supposed to be able to draft Militia upto the point where you discover Conscription; after that you get Draftees. I've fixed it and will enable it in beta 3.
 
Ok.. Thist is still Beta 1 as the CSA and I have reached turn 31.

The CSA has overrun most of the smaller cities in the midwest in Illinois, Indiana and Wisconsin along with a few others. (Full list is Lacrosse, Oskosh, Beloit, Bloomington, Peoria, Davenport, Sioux City, Omaha, Niles, Ft. Wayne, Saginaw, and Sandusky). The larger cities now show either a 11 or 13 defence rifle unit and my cav and irregulars can't really touch it, so I am attempting to consolidate and hope the computer does not counter attack (some sign of that going on as some militias have been moving around). Davenport was a nice addition as it produced a gunboat for me.

St Louis finally fell to my massed artillery and river fleet force with a division also providing most of the ground work along with the Arkansas troops as late arrivals. Took me several turns to reduce and it was a tough fight. I have also finally captured Bowling Green as well in another tough fight. I have 4 divisions left along the Mississippi and I know Louisville has 2 divisions (my next target after my 3 divisions recover their health). Division number 4 that took Booneville is taking some r & r before heading to have some bar-b-que in the Kansas City area along with some of the river fleet, artillery, and some auxiliary units.

The Union sent in some smaller infantry units into West Virgina and we had a little scrapping going on there. My attack going into Pennsylvania ended with 2 brigades dying at the doors of Pittsburg (not enough artillery to reduce the garrison and I should have probably pulled back, but it was close and bagging Pittsburg would have really open up the rest of the state and the rear areas behind Washington. Cumberland had fallen earlier. I am now on the defensive in this area.

The Union is launching a spirited attack on Hagerstown and Winchester at the moment. They lost 2 divisions trying Hagerstown and also lost some other infantry due to some counter attacks. I am really pressed in this area and the Army of Northern Virgina is getting a work out, but there will probably be a lull in this area now.

The Union invasion force turned back on turn 16 or so, but has now appeared again and seems to be headed for the Charlston area. I will play a few more turns to see what happens on this version, but am out of time for now.

Out west, the CSA controls all the easy towns with just the two forts left to the Union. I have also beaten off an indian attack or two. Two of my New Mexico units are now Vets, so I feel with some patience, it is time to start reducing the forts.

West Virgina sees the CSA now on the defensive (sent most of my better units to help with Pittsburg) and the CSA spending some of their money to get some infantry into the area to help thwart Union incursions.

Other things of note. Saw an open city with an infiltrator up north and took it. It had plague on it and I assume the garrison died. This was confirmed 2 turns later when I had one of my own garrisons die as well.

Tech wise, it took awhile to get the first one, but I was able to adjust science up a couple notches with the additions to my tax base and the fact that I have lost over 14 harbors to the Union navy. I will get Army Org in 6 turns.

Other things of note:

1. Can't build ships on the rivers in the interior. I can build whatever I want at New Orleans for example, but I can't at say Vicksburg. This is also something I forgot to mention in that the Union has the same issue. They can build on the coast and on the Greatlakes, but not on the rivers.

2. Can't build Irregulars in many places, except for a few in Missouri.

3. When I took Ft Wayne, my elite unit produced RE Lee. Problem is that Ft Wayne remained in Union hands (despite me killing the last unit there) and RE Lee appeared in FT. Wayne. I was able to move him out. When I attempted to form an army with him, he disappeared and nothing came in his place. I also seem to can't hurry production either (wanted to see if I could complete a rifle division someplace). I have him in Richmond cooling his heals until I get the tech to build armies and will see what happens.

As a side note on divisions getting artillery, perhaps reducing it to 0 range works as both the player and the AI will get some benefit of artillery on defence should they be attacked.

Overall, I am having a great time with this and there is good game tension in both West Virgina area and also around Richmond.

*edit*

Would be happy to e-mail you any saved games you would like. Just PM me a e-mail address and let me know if you are interested.
 
Klyden:

1) Ships on rivers

In order to build ships, there needs to be a sea square on the river. This wasn't possible with the ACW scale map. That's why there are wonders to autobuild ships. There is no way to fix this (short of totally destroying the map).

2) Irregulars can only be built in Missouri and Arkansas. Historically this is where they were utilized. They would be game unbalancing if they could be built everywhere by the CSA.

3) The Leader created, but city doesn't fall bug has been experienced in other CIVIII games. Its a bug in the core program, not the scenario. With the pending release of a Conquests patch by Firaxis, I'm hoping this bug will be fixed.

Regards
Misfit
 
The "Non-Advancing Leader Creation Bug", as I've christened it, only rears it ugly head if the battle-created unit (Leader, normally) has a defense rating >0. I suggest we set it to zero, until and unless Firaxis should eventually fix the bug.

No-one's suggesting we remove the defensive bombard of division, I hope? It's tolerably useful, and arguably more useful to the AI, since the human, typically, is the one making the most attacking.
 
Originally posted by The Last Conformist
The "Non-Advancing Leader Creation Bug", as I've christened it, only rears it ugly head if the battle-created unit (Leader, normally) has a defense rating >0. I suggest we set it to zero, until and unless Firaxis should eventually fix the bug.

No-one's suggesting we remove the defensive bombard of division, I hope? It's tolerably useful, and arguably more useful to the AI, since the human, typically, is the one making the most attacking.

No , but the range should be 0 so the human cant use it as extra artillery. The ai wont bombard at range with it unless its flagged as artillery. I agree its good for ai at 0 range.
 
One tech note Ive just run into is that Propaganda in the first era (2nd tier) doesnt give you anything and isnt needed to advance so it can be skipped over with no impact.

Is is tied to something or should it be?

regards......dread



LIVE tech updates on tech timeline ( post 184)
 
No, not suggesting we remove the bombard on divisons, but I think it will be better set at 0 (like the skirmishers). This provides a bit of extra defence for both the AI and the player and does not allow the player to use them as extra artillery in game.
 
Propaganda was supposed to give a happiness city improvement. Hmm, I look into that to fix it for beta 3.

We lowered the effectiveness of Churches and Cathedrals in order to add a third happiness city improvement. I was going to call it Prisoner of War camp, but there were some objections. I'll probably make it a Newspaper or something like that.

It was in the project plan to add, but I guess I missed it.
 
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