Grand Menagerie feedback

[Asthix]

Does the bounty hunter promotion not work on animals normally? It's not working in this scenario.
& for the record, I think this scenario does what it was designed to do pretty well.

 

[Jabie]

IMO, that's the purpose of the trophies; to reward you for accomplishing something difficult!

As it is, you may as well not have the "Build the Grand Menagerie" trophy, as it's (virtually) implicit in the "Complete the Grand Menagerie Scenario" trophy.

Looks like you got your wish. I hadn't completed the GM scenario til patch c. I played through and started building the GM and was told to capture an elephant and a griffin. I caught both in short order before I had fully constructed the GM. The scenario was over and, although I received the GM Scenario trophy, I missed out on the GM Trophy.

I tried a reload from an old save. This time I didn't go hunting til I had completed the GM. Still no GM Trophy.

I loaded patch d, replayed the scenario from scratch, built the GM before hunting Elephants and Griffins, still no GM trophy. Is this intended behaviour or a bug? If it is intended behaviour, how about an event for FoL followers that grants you an animal of your choice to help build the GM in the main game?

Other things that might be nice in this scenario:

* Capacity to build Hawks, as has been mentioned by others.
* A road from Belseraphs to Lanun.
* Open Borders.
* The ability for the Spider to build the spider pen for Silk...
* ...and thus, implicitly, the option to sell Silk to the Belseraphs, more for flavour than economy.

 

[Lost & Confused]

Does the bounty hunter promotion not work on animals normally? It's not working in this scenario.
& for the record, I think this scenario does what it was designed to do pretty well.

I remember reading somewhere that the bounty hunter promotion doesn't apply to animal kills.

 

[tiberion02]

Has anyone who had an issue with scenario progress tracking (IE not getting a new 'goal' after caging the first 5 animals) had any luck in getting it working properly?

 

[YonatanBlum]

Yeah, any solutions for this problem? I am afraid to try other scenarios with this unresolved, since events like these not triggering would probably make many scenarios unplayable.

 

[Saytr]

The only improvment I can think of is a Giant Spider intro (You can be gifted the necessary tech by Keelyn), as well as renaming the towns. I dislike that Jubilee and Innsmouth are on the same island, as so close.

 

[petcarcharodon]

The only improvment I can think of is a Giant Spider intro (You can be gifted the necessary tech by Keelyn), as well as renaming the towns. I dislike that Jubilee and Innsmouth are on the same island, as so close.

We should probably rename the towns in all the scenarios. But I doubt that would be high on the priority list.

 

[tiberion02]

Yeah, any solutions for this problem? I am afraid to try other scenarios with this unresolved, since events like these not triggering would probably make many scenarios unplayable.

Well I'm officially stumped. I did a complete uninstallation (including deleting old save games and replays etc) and reinstall of Civ 4, Warlord, BTS, patches, FFH2, and still I cage my last bear and the scenario just stops progressing. No prompt to build Menagerie, no contact from Keelyn, no prompt to capture a new animal, nothing (even built the Grand menagerie with no improvement on the situation).

 

[Schmoe]

It's a fun scenario and a good introduction to capturing animals. I had to wait 70+ turns for the griffin to show up, so that was the only frustrating aspect of the scenario.

One idea that might be nice is a dungeon with a scripted, repeating event upon exploration. The event would be something like the following:

"Your unit delves deep into the earth and meets an ancient, wizened old man. The man says he has wandered these lands for many years, and offers to tell you something of its inhabitants."

1. Ask him about Wolves
2. Ask him about Lions
3. Ask him about Bears
4. Ask him about Tigers
5. Ask him about Gorillas
6. Ask him about Spiders
7. Ask him about Griffins
8. Ask him about Hill Giants

Each answer could provide some information specific to the map, and perhaps some hints on how to find the animal. For example, the Wolf answer could be:

"Ah, wolves. They are a constant threat and dwell in the tundras north of here. You needn't search long before you will find one."

For the Griffin:

"I see you seek the most rare of all creatures, the wonderful Griffin. Know that these beasts roam the skies and sail on the winds of the oceans. They will prey on the weak, so if you wish to find one, you must bait them with a tasty morsel."

And for the Hill Giant:

"Yes, yes, the legends are true, I've seen him with my own eyes! If you travel east through the hills, be wary, for the Hill Giant roams those lands and will kill any who trespass there. It is a powerful beast, and only the most experienced can have any hope of defeating it."

 

[Asthix]

Well I'm officially stumped. I did a complete uninstallation (including deleting old save games and replays etc) and reinstall of Civ 4, Warlord, BTS, patches, FFH2, and still I cage my last bear and the scenario just stops progressing. No prompt to build Menagerie, no contact from Keelyn, no prompt to capture a new animal, nothing (even built the Grand menagerie with no improvement on the situation).

I'm not an expert but if you want to get more info posted so that someone else might be able to help there's something you could try that Ori taught me.

Open your civilizationIV.ini and set all items with log in their name from 0 to 1 and then start the game, load the game in question, exit the game and then post all items in my games\beyond the sword\logs as a zip file attachment here.
(Although I'm not sure if that will show the problem you're having, it just posts the technical logs from the last game you load)

You could also try opening a new thread on the troubleshooting page to get more opinions, though the moderator might move it back here.

 

[tiberion02]

I'm not an expert but if you want to get more info posted so that someone else might be able to help there's something you could try that Ori taught me.

Open your civilizationIV.ini and set all items with log in their name from 0 to 1 and then start the game, load the game in question, exit the game and then post all items in my games\beyond the sword\logs as a zip file attachment here.
(Although I'm not sure if that will show the problem you're having, it just posts the technical logs from the last game you load)

You could also try opening a new thread on the troubleshooting page to get more opinions, though the moderator might move it back here.

Thanks for the help. I attached rar file with all the logs in it.

 

[Mesix]

I finished this one. It was a fun diversion from the normal warfare. The griffon was tough to find at the end. I had a lions and tigers and bears (oh my!) that all had five combat promos.

There were a few gramatical errors that I saw in the writeup. As was previously mentioned, the intro is written in the 3rd person and the conclusion is written in the 1st person...they should match. In the sescription for the griffion the work may is used instead of the work make. In the intro there is a repeated word in one of the paragraphs...I will load it up ad give more info on this one since I can't remember right now.

Is there any way to make the popups only appear one time each?

edit: The other gramatical error is in the intro. Towards the end a sentence reads "...he had been serving with since Familiar since they were boys." The first since is unnecessary in that sentence.

 

[tiberion02]

For those who had my same issue, I went thru and did another reinstall, but this time I tracked down every civ or ffh related file on my computer before I reinstalled and deleted them, including prefetch files and saves on my brothers user account.

Seems to be working for me now, realized things were going well when I got the pre-game pop up with backstory and more then 1 of each animal spawned (making it more challenging to get the animals back to town then I remember.

 

[Old MacDonald]

To be honest, I thought this was a pretty boring scenario. Repetitive, and not much fun. Far too many annoying animals (wolves, lions, et.c) that kept attacking my hunters (without ever having a chance to do any real damage), and not enough to do. No strategy involved, just capture this (boring searching) and capture that (more boring searching). And the griffon killed itself on my elephant and the replacement decided to spend an eternity on the sea where I couldn't reach it.

I think the scenario could be more interesting if there was someone or something that tried to keep you from achieving your objective. Or something to make it more varied. Also, more events during the gameplay could probably help. Hawks would almost definitely make it better, as the searching would feel a bit more strategic.

(though I would probably just ditch this one and concentrate on perfecting the other scenarios)

 

[Breunor]

Ok, can any one tell me how my hunter got mutated? Is Kaelyn up to some tricks? I just noticed it, one of my hunters (near the center of the board) is diseased, has stoneskin and mobility and is mutated!

Best wishes,

Breunor

PS. Why does the scenario have the giant tortoise? Is it to make sure there is always a barbarian unit on the map?

 

[Switchblock]

Silly kaelyn, up to your nasty tricks again?

I think the tortoise is in their for decoration, it's a sweet island full of animals, why not give you guys something to look at in the water. Realise that in Erebus, the world doesn't revolve around you, so why should everything on the map benefit or inhibit you?

@Old MacDonald-- I think this was just an introdution to the quest system and to animal capturing for newer players, realise that technically we have been playing a BETA, so this being the first true release there should be stuff to help the learning curve with new players.

 

[Old MacDonald]

@Old MacDonald-- I think this was just an introdution to the quest system and to animal capturing for newer players, realise that technically we have been playing a BETA, so this being the first true release there should be stuff to help the learning curve with new players.

Still, I don't think new players will find it very entertaining either. It's just too limited in terms of what you can do. You just run through it on autopilot, trying not to get annoyed by the constant attacks from animals that just get in the way.

And if it was nothing but a tutorial it should just have ended when you built the menagerie (adding the possibility to build a hawk would also be sensible if it was a tutorial). The rest just felt like a boring way to make it longer, and there's the obvious problems with the griffon (who might leave the island) as well.

 

[Breunor]

Ok, I figured out why I got the mutated hunter -- I didn't realize that the Lanun palace has chaos mana! Therefore, your troops will get these enraged promotions and the like eventually.

Best withes,

Breunor

 

[marioflag]

The Scenario has a really limited replay value...because it's one sided and there is no way to lose...in my opinion there should be other civs trying to capture animals so that it's a rush for building the Grand Menagerie before others...otherwise i would suggest to make The Momus scenario available without completing The Grand Menagerie for the reasons already given.

 

[Bringa]

If this scenario is a tutorial, why are there other scenarios that require you to complete this one? Are they also tutorials?

I played this to the point where I was supposed to look for the griffin, got very bored, and quit. I don't think I'm going back to it. So unless there's a way to cheat my way around this, I don't think I'll see the scenarios that require you to finish this one.