Civ IV in-game World Builder Manual

[Dale]

Follow the linky to the Civ IV in-game World Builder Manual!

Now that CivIV is on the way, I'm sure some folks are just itching to get in and start modding. So here is the first of a few (that I know of) manuals on how to mod CivIV.

Dale

Civ4 in-game World Builder Manual available here:
Civ IV World Builder Manual

In depth analysis of the WBS file available here:
http://forums.civfanatics.com/showthread.php?t=135669

IMPORTANT NOTE:
To enable the full features of the World Builder it is important you follow Soren's instructions. This will hopefully resolve all the issues encountered:

Originally Posted by Soren Johnson
Some of you may have noticed 'CheatCode=0' in the ini file. If you want to enable it, the cheat code is 'chipotle'. This enables various cheat options (doesn't work in mp, though).

The reason we are posting this is that it fixes the various issues with the world-builder (like not being able to place units in areas in the fog-of-war and the minimap being wrong) if you have it set.

[Weasel Op]

Awesome!
Where did you find this?
I'll put it in my mod thread if you don't mind.

[Dale]

Check page 2. I wrote it as a beta tester.

[Weasel Op]

I don't know whether to laugh or cry.
It says "Volume 1", does that mean you will be covering other topics as well?

[Feet]

Top stuff Dale. I have already written a 3 page outline and plan for my scenario adn I'm sure this manual will help me when I'm making decisions about how I want the scenario to play out.

Watch this space.

Well not literally this one ¬_¬, but I'm sure I'll post again soon asking n00by questions about how to do stuff on a practical level. :P

[Sabre21]

Dale

As it turns out I have more questions.

I have your modding manual and you state that you must first remove all the units on the map. I am following the instructions you wrote. Unfortunately, I get to the map, remove my units...but there are no other AI units visible on the map...none. So how do I actually see these units in order to remove them? Do I need to turn something else on?

I am editing this to add another question. I went ahead and continued with the modding instructions even though I could not find the other civilization's units to remove. So I changed everything to ocean. But I can still see the outlines of the original terrain, even though its all blue. Is this supposed to happen? I scroll out using my mouse wheel and can see the continents that were created even though they are blue. Any comments on this?

Next question. You state that the 3rd row of buttons in the Map Mode box are Mountain, Hills, Flatten, and Ocean. The 3rd button is Plains, and although you can change mountains or hills to plains, you still can't get rid of the original terrain indentations. Do these original terrain indentations dissapear when you go back into the game mode?

This is my 3rd edit. I am just gonna overlook all these oddball terrain contours that were the result of the original terrain. I am placing resources on this middle island. I tried to place copper, but can't see it. Why? I went to the button that has the Reveal All Tiles mode and selected the light blue button that says Reveal all Tiles. But this didn't help any at all.

OK..I went thru everysingle resource and placed it on the island to see what happens. As it turns out, I can see all of them..including fish, clams, crabs, and whales on the land except I cannot see copper, coal, iron, uranium, oil and when I select musicals, singles, or movies I get something that looks like a wheatfield. So what's up with all this?

Ok..this is my 4th edit and it is starting to get pretty frustrating. On page 12 of your manual you describe the save procedure. I followed it to the letter and placed it in the public maps folder. But when I went to reload it, I get failure message. I just found the problem though. You must EXIT the game before you can reload the map. Once I did that it loads ok. What a pain this editor is. Definitely some nasty little bugs.

5th edit. Well I got back into where I left off, and it appears all the oddball outlines of the original terrain are now gone as I stated in the second paragraph. So I answered that question myself. But my units are appearing out in the middle of the ocean..sheesh and I still can't see any of the AI units.

6th edit. I placed my own city as you describe on page 13 without a problem But again I selected one of the other civs and tried to place their city and can't see it. So I tried the Reveal all Tiles tab again and this time I could see where the city was placed. This is not a user friendly system by far.

7th edit. Well this about did it for me. I tried to place the other 2 civs to no avail. I got one of the AI civs to appear, I even tried selecting the Reveal all Tabs button on each one but then I happened to see a boat in the ocean next to my own city and wondered how did that get there..I didn't create any ships. I left clicked the little ship and a darn Russian city appeared out in the ocean next to my own city and a road appeared connecting the 2.

OK..that's it. This editor has really got to get some work on it. I have land stuff appearing out in the water, water things on land, some units and resources I can see while others I can't. Never press a delete on any item or use the erase function because you wipe out everything that is layered there..resources, units...rivers!

It was nice that you made a manual for modding. But since you did this in beta, obviously whatever tweaks they made once they went gold pretty much screwed this thing up.

Sabre21

[Dale]

Sorry but I don't have the retail version to be able to check all these issues.

It may just be that there were some changes done from all reports.

Dale

[Weasel Op]

Originally Posted by Soren Johnson

some of you may have noticed 'CheatCode=0' in the ini file. If you want to enable it, the cheat code is 'chipotle'. This enables various cheat options (doesn't work in mp, though).

The reason we are posting this is that it fixes the various issues with the world-builder (like not being able to place units in areas in the fog-of-war and the minimap being wrong) if you have it set.

Dale, could you mention that in your first post, since this is a sticky? (Or add it to the manual?)
edit: Soren's thread is stickied, but it would still be good to include in the manual if you can edit it.

[Dale]

Cheat code added to OP.

If anyone else finds issues with the World Builder please let me know.

Dale

[King Jason]

When I turn the world into ocean, it seems like an imprint of where the land existed ends up on the map.

also, when I turn peaks into grassland, if the peak was shadowed, the shadow ends up on my grassland, so now I have grassland with a black spot.

Clearing to ocean gives me ocean with a black spot. any ideas why this is happening?

[Dale]

It's a peculiarity of the WBS. Just save it and reload it. It clears up.

[loler]

Originally Posted by Sabre21

Dale

As it turns out I have more questions.

I have your modding manual and you state that you must first remove all the units on the map. I am following the instructions you wrote. Unfortunately, I get to the map, remove my units...but there are no other AI units visible on the map...none. So how do I actually see these units in order to remove them? Do I need to turn something else on?

I am editing this to add another question. I went ahead and continued with the modding instructions even though I could not find the other civilization's units to remove. So I changed everything to ocean. But I can still see the outlines of the original terrain, even though its all blue. Is this supposed to happen? I scroll out using my mouse wheel and can see the continents that were created even though they are blue. Any comments on this?

Next question. You state that the 3rd row of buttons in the Map Mode box are Mountain, Hills, Flatten, and Ocean. The 3rd button is Plains, and although you can change mountains or hills to plains, you still can't get rid of the original terrain indentations. Do these original terrain indentations dissapear when you go back into the game mode?

This is my 3rd edit. I am just gonna overlook all these oddball terrain contours that were the result of the original terrain. I am placing resources on this middle island. I tried to place copper, but can't see it. Why? I went to the button that has the Reveal All Tiles mode and selected the light blue button that says Reveal all Tiles. But this didn't help any at all.

OK..I went thru everysingle resource and placed it on the island to see what happens. As it turns out, I can see all of them..including fish, clams, crabs, and whales on the land except I cannot see copper, coal, iron, uranium, oil and when I select musicals, singles, or movies I get something that looks like a wheatfield. So what's up with all this?

Ok..this is my 4th edit and it is starting to get pretty frustrating. On page 12 of your manual you describe the save procedure. I followed it to the letter and placed it in the public maps folder. But when I went to reload it, I get failure message. I just found the problem though. You must EXIT the game before you can reload the map. Once I did that it loads ok. What a pain this editor is. Definitely some nasty little bugs.

5th edit. Well I got back into where I left off, and it appears all the oddball outlines of the original terrain are now gone as I stated in the second paragraph. So I answered that question myself. But my units are appearing out in the middle of the ocean..sheesh and I still can't see any of the AI units.

6th edit. I placed my own city as you describe on page 13 without a problem But again I selected one of the other civs and tried to place their city and can't see it. So I tried the Reveal all Tiles tab again and this time I could see where the city was placed. This is not a user friendly system by far.

7th edit. Well this about did it for me. I tried to place the other 2 civs to no avail. I got one of the AI civs to appear, I even tried selecting the Reveal all Tabs button on each one but then I happened to see a boat in the ocean next to my own city and wondered how did that get there..I didn't create any ships. I left clicked the little ship and a darn Russian city appeared out in the ocean next to my own city and a road appeared connecting the 2.

OK..that's it. This editor has really got to get some work on it. I have land stuff appearing out in the water, water things on land, some units and resources I can see while others I can't. Never press a delete on any item or use the erase function because you wipe out everything that is layered there..resources, units...rivers!

It was nice that you made a manual for modding. But since you did this in beta, obviously whatever tweaks they made once they went gold pretty much screwed this thing up.

Sabre21

bump to this
answers please!

[Isak]

Originally Posted by loler

bump to this
answers please!

Are you experiencing the same problems?

I know that's not an answer, but Dale doesn't have the retail version of the game yet, so he has no way to check what's going on himself. If you could go through the same steps that Sabre21 tried, and see if you experience the same problems, it might help us all get the answers much sooner.

[Dale]

Okay, I don't have the retail version but I think I can answer the questions:

1. Finding AI units/cities:
A: Add the cheat code to the ini file as mentioned in the first post.

2. Terrain outlines in new oceans:
A: A peculiarity of the WBS. If you save then reload it it clears up.

3. Plains button (flatten icon):
A: It actually IS flatten, but mountains can have a terrain type. EG: you can assign a terrain type to a flat plot, then make it a mountain, and the plot will still have the terrain type.

4. Not seeing copper resource:
A: This is due to not having the cheat code in the ini file. Basically, if you go into the WBS without the cheat code, then because you don't have "copper mining" knowledge you can't see the resource. Also, you can't see in the WBS what you can't see in-game. So the cheat code in the ini file resolves this.

5. Units in the ocean:
A: You need to assign yourself some units where you wish to begin. If you do not it will assume the original starting location from before you started editing the map. If you don't assign units on the map to yourself, then the map doesn't know where to start you.

So basically, that cheat code should fix most of your issues.

Dale

[Fenryial]

Also when I enter the WBS and change things then exit the whole map is explored. How do I get it where the map is all unexplored like a new game? I did use the cheat code and I can see all the things you were talking about (THANKS). I just want to make a map and place the units where I want then play like I started the game from scratch.

Thanks
Fenryial

[civ4dreamon]

I'm having a lot of trouble with the rivers in the world builder. The random maps do weird stuff with rivers and I often want to fix them so they look 'right.'

When I go into the world builder I can add rivers, but they end up all over the place and usually oriented wrong and often have four tributaries entering the intersection of the tiles.

Is there any way to make this behave better? I end up erasing a lot (of bonuses, etc.) and which part of the river is erased seems arbitrary. Guidance?

-Berserk

[Thorn]

Can't seem to unzip the World Builder Manual file. I tried two different extractors but I keep getting an error

[Daze]

Having the same problem as Thorn, giving a crc error when I try to extract it using winzip... any ideas

[Dale]

Try this one then: http://members.dodo.com.au/~thesdale/Manual.zip

I'll let Thunderfall know.

Dale

[Fenryial]

I didnt have that problem at all. Im not sure what could be wrong. I have winzip 9.0 on my system and its over writing the XP default.

Fenryial