Planetfall newbie :)

Hi!

I can't tell you how happy I was to find this mod! I loved Civ I, but ignored the rest of the series until SMAC, and then the rest of the series until Civ IV.

I'm trying to get a feel for the Mod and wanted to ask a few questions. I've been all over this board, but it's hard from the message board to figure out what discussion applies to which version, etc.. I found the 2-question FAQ... installed the right sounds, etc..

Anyway, on to specific questions:

1. In general, is this mod still being actively maintained? I see that when I meet somebody in diplomacy, I still get messages like, "DE". I also see "Temporary" under civics for various things. Will this stuff get ironed out later?

2. Besides the Mod maintainer, who else works on this? Maybe I could contribute a bit as I have extensive C/Python experience.

3. I saw that the maintainer didn't want to add any of the Alien Crossfire factions. How are would it be for me to add them? (I always played the pirates)

4. Even though I played SMAC a lot, playing the planetfall mod is just ... strange. Anybody done a walkthrough? If not, maybe after I figure it out, I should write one up

5. Have some thoughts on "design workshop". But I see the thread on "units" so I'll post it there....

-- SJN

SJN said:

Hi!

I can't tell you how happy I was to find this mod! I loved Civ I, but ignored the rest of the series until SMAC, and then the rest of the series until Civ IV.

I'm trying to get a feel for the Mod and wanted to ask a few questions. I've been all over this board, but it's hard from the message board to figure out what discussion applies to which version, etc.. I found the 2-question FAQ... installed the right sounds, etc..

Anyway, on to specific questions:

Click to expand...

I'm sure Maniac will offer more answers, but I'll do some as well.

SJN said:

1. In general, is this mod still being actively maintained? I see that when I meet somebody in diplomacy, I still get messages like, "DE". I also see "Temporary" under civics for various things. Will this stuff get ironed out later?

Click to expand...

Yes, Maniac and some others are working hard, well sometimes.

SJN said:

2. Besides the Mod maintainer, who else works on this? Maybe I could contribute a bit as I have extensive C/Python experience.

Click to expand...

You just made Maniac's day most likely...

SJN said:

3. I saw that the maintainer didn't want to add any of the Alien Crossfire factions. How are would it be for me to add them? (I always played the pirates)

Click to expand...

All except the Cybernetics and the Cult are being planned for.

SJN said:

4. Even though I played SMAC a lot, playing the planetfall mod is just ... strange. Anybody done a walkthrough? If not, maybe after I figure it out, I should write one up

Click to expand...

I think we're all still tweaking and learning ourselves.

SJN said:

5. Have some thoughts on "design workshop". But I see the thread on "units" so I'll post it there....

-- SJN

Click to expand...

Good, more fresh ideas are always welcome.

woodelf said:

You just made Maniac's day most likely...

Click to expand...

Given that many people in the past have said the same thing, not really anymore.

Anyway, people with programming skills are always useful. Though another requirement to be able to really help, is being familiar with the Civ4 SDK, which I can't really teach you. Except perhaps give a basic example of adding something to the SDK.

Even without any specific Civ4 SDK experience so far, there are a few things you could help with right now:

1) There is this Flowering Counter event system coded by another SDKer which I don't really understand. Perhaps you could have a look at it and tell how it works.

2) Planetfall is suffering for some people from random crashes in the late game, cause unknown. Civ4 has the ability though to generate crashdumps upon crashing. Do you know what kind of information these crashdumps generate? Anything which could pinpoint to the cause of the crash? If I gave you a crashdump, would you want to have a look at it?
In posts 68 and 70 of this thread, AZSportsFan already told me something about crashdumps, but I didn't really understand it well.

3) There's lots of SDK stuff from other mods which I'd like to copy to Planetfall. The best way to get started on Civ4 SDKing is probably coding something simple yourself. However given that the simple things have already all been done, perhaps the next best thing is copying some code to get a feel of how the SDK is constructed. This may feel boring though, I don't know. It's your choice.

A C++ knowledgable person's opinion on this matter would be helpful.

Maniac said:

A C++ knowledgable person's opinion on this matter would be helpful.

Click to expand...

I have replied to this. Yes, I think I can be very useful

I'm still slowing setting up my home VC++ 2005 to compile the Civ SDK. Hopefully tomorrow, then I can actually start monkeying around with this stuff

-- SJN

SJN said:

I'm still slowing setting up my home VC++ 2005 to compile the Civ SDK. Hopefully tomorrow, then I can actually start monkeying around with this stuff

Click to expand...

Ok, I've been following the instructions for setting up the VC express 2005 with the code. Just one little thing I'm confused about. Are the files in the planetfall mod pack's CvGameCoreDLL just the files that have changed? I mean, I don't see the boost directory for example.

So, if I'm right, then to build the Planetfall mod's dll, I have to copy the CvGameCoreDll from the BTS dir, copy in the changed files from planetfalls CvGameCoreDll directory, and then build?

Is that right?

-- SJN

You're completely right!

Including all the required, but unchanged, files would just needlessly increase the mod's download size.