Ulter's True Start Earth

Ultermarto

Chieftain
Joined
Aug 20, 2015
Messages
5
Hello!

Want to play an Earth map with true starting locations (for both Civilizations and City States), historic(ish) resource placement, resized peninsulas/important landmasses (no more 3-tile Britain), and that works in Multiplayer?



This map script generates a non-procedural Earth that I've created with the aforementioned qualities in mind. Civilizations and City-States spawn in their actual starting location, and even the resources somewhat resemble their real distributions. And yes, the map works in multiplayer.

LATEST VERSION: V5

HOW TO INSTALL

1. Download the attached .zip file.
2. Unzip, and place the result .lua file in Steam > steamapps > common > Sid Meier's Civilization V > Assets > Maps.
3. Load up Civilization V and select the map in the game set-up. It should be under 'Additional Maps'.

For Multiplayer, just make sure all your friends do the same, and Host a Multiplayer game as usual.

ABOUT CITY STATES [VERY IMPORTANT. PLEASE READ THIS PART IN PARTICULAR]
When making this map, I tried and failed to find a way of specifying which City States are in the game, since it's important that City States aren't too clustered together, and that each Civ has at least 1 City State in trading range. Unfortunately, it looks like this can't be done, so I've done the next best thing; City States are placed in the game, and then the script kills the ones that are not wanted. For this to work, it's important that you SET YOUR CITY-STATE COUNT TO MAX.

That is, the script aims to kill City States until a pre-defined quantity is reached. This quantity depends on your map size (note: the map itself does not rescale with map-size). Here are the quantities:

Duel: 6
Tiny: 10
Small: 14
Standard: 18
Large: 22
Huge: 24

Feel free to go into the lua script and edit these if you want lots of City States; it's under the getCityStateQuantity() function. If you want less City States, simply lower the slider, but be aware that some City States spawn too close to each other and don't spawn, so if you specify 6 City States, you may well end up with 4.

Don't want to risk starting a game, exploring the map, only to find you've drawn the short straw on City State placement? I recommend downloading the Civ V SDK, enabling Firetuner in the Civ V config, running Firetuner while your map is generating, and taking a quick look at the City State print-out. It'll give you a good idea of how the City State placement went.

ABOUT CIVS BEING TOO CLOSE TO EACH OTHER
So I did my best to enlarge Europe to avoid true-start positions being so close that a specific two Civs can't place their capitals, but I'm afraid a few Civilizations still spawn within 4 tiles of each other. The simple solution to this is to move your settler (unfortunately, the AI are rarely so smart as to do this). The following map displays Capital spawns as red crosses, and purple lines as conflicts.

Spoiler :


The good news is, the Byzantium/Ottoman we-share-the-same-capital-with-a-different-name crisis has been resolved with a simple protocol! If the two are in the same game, the Ottomans will spawn in nice, cosy Anatolia. With a little work, and a lot of debugging, I might be able to apply a similar system that spreads out all Civs a little when they have a capital conflict. That's a maybe.

ABOUT BALANCING
Forgive me, Balancing gods. This is my first map, and I've done my best to try and balance the spawns, but my friends and I have already found some major unbalanced spawning locations on our first playthrough. In a procedural map, spawn-location balance is handled very - VERY - carefully, whereas I've basically just plopped them down. Any feedback on a Civ start which seems either overpowered or underpowered would be much appreciated, and I'll do my best to adjust the map in future iterations.

(Or, if you're up to it, you can make changes yourself by running the map script in World Builder, editing the map, converting it to a lua script (see below), and transferring all the code from the original, from the function GetCivStartPlot() onwards, into the new script. I believe in you!)

CREDIT TO
nORB Dragon, who's very useful Civ5Map to Lua converter proved instrumental in my creation of this map script. In fact, I somewhat doubt that I could have managed it without his program. Most of the code in the script is the product of his program, which converts map data into a long list of lua coordinates. If you're reading this, trying desperately to figure out how to convert a Civ V map into a 'procedural' lua file, then here's his program:

http://forums.civfanatics.com/showthread.php?t=504715

Thank you kindly Mr nORB Dragon.

GLAMOUR SHOTS
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Attachments

  • Ulters_True_Start_Earth_V5.zip
    38.2 KB · Views: 1,306
Look, its nice, but This is not the first mod that is intended to do this, so... Yeah.
 
hey I really like this mod..but for some reason it always crashes about the time I get to the classic age. im using the community patch and balance patch..:confused:
 
Look, its nice, but This is not the first mod that is intended to do this, so... Yeah.
Well, I couldn't find one that worked in multiplayer, was a decent size, and was balanced to my liking (rivers EVERYWHERE in YNAEM). So I made one.
 
hey I really like this mod..but for some reason it always crashes about the time I get to the classic age. im using the community patch and balance patch..:confused:

I'm sorry, I don't even know where to start with compatibility with other mods. Hopefully someone else will happen to know what the issue is, because I'm clueless.

You could try generating a standard continents map, converting it to lua, and trying that lua script with those patches. If you can get to the classical no problem, then we know it's not inherently the way the lua script works. Might also be worth keeping Firetuner open and recreating the bug, to see if it gives any useful messages. I'd do it myself, but I'm about to head back to University and I'll have no free time. Hopefully I can come back to this in the distant future.
 
Very cool!
 
Hello!

Want to play an Earth map with true starting locations (for both Civilizations and City States), historic(ish) resource placement, resized peninsulas/important landmasses (no more 3-tile Britain), and that works in Multiplayer?



This map script generates a non-procedural Earth that I've created with the aforementioned qualities in mind. Civilizations and City-States spawn in their actual starting location, and even the resources somewhat resemble their real distributions. And yes, the map works in multiplayer.

LATEST VERSION: V5

HOW TO INSTALL


1. Download the attached .zip file.
2. Unzip, and place the result .lua file in Steam > steamapps > common > Sid Meier's Civilization V > Assets > Maps.
3. Load up Civilization V and select the map in the game set-up. It should be under 'Additional Maps'.

For Multiplayer, just make sure all your friends do the same, and Host a Multiplayer game as usual.

ABOUT CITY STATES [VERY IMPORTANT. PLEASE READ THIS PART IN PARTICULAR]
When making this map, I tried and failed to find a way of specifying which City States are in the game, since it's important that City States aren't too clustered together, and that each Civ has at least 1 City State in trading range. Unfortunately, it looks like this can't be done, so I've done the next best thing; City States are placed in the game, and then the script kills the ones that are not wanted. For this to work, it's important that you SET YOUR CITY-STATE COUNT TO MAX.

That is, the script aims to kill City States until a pre-defined quantity is reached. This quantity depends on your map size (note: the map itself does not rescale with map-size). Here are the quantities:

Duel: 6
Tiny: 10
Small: 14
Standard: 18
Large: 22
Huge: 24

Feel free to go into the lua script and edit these if you want lots of City States; it's under the getCityStateQuantity() function. If you want less City States, simply lower the slider, but be aware that some City States spawn too close to each other and don't spawn, so if you specify 6 City States, you may well end up with 4.

Don't want to risk starting a game, exploring the map, only to find you've drawn the short straw on City State placement? I recommend downloading the Civ V SDK, enabling Firetuner in the Civ V config, running Firetuner while your map is generating, and taking a quick look at the City State print-out. It'll give you a good idea of how the City State placement went.

ABOUT CIVS BEING TOO CLOSE TO EACH OTHER
So I did my best to enlarge Europe to avoid true-start positions being so close that a specific two Civs can't place their capitals, but I'm afraid a few Civilizations still spawn within 4 tiles of each other. The simple solution to this is to move your settler (unfortunately, the AI are rarely so smart as to do this). The following map displays Capital spawns as red crosses, and purple lines as conflicts.

Spoiler :


The good news is, the Byzantium/Ottoman we-share-the-same-capital-with-a-different-name crisis has been resolved with a simple protocol! If the two are in the same game, the Ottomans will spawn in nice, cosy Anatolia. With a little work, and a lot of debugging, I might be able to apply a similar system that spreads out all Civs a little when they have a capital conflict. That's a maybe.

ABOUT BALANCING
Forgive me, Balancing gods. This is my first map, and I've done my best to try and balance the spawns, but my friends and I have already found some major unbalanced spawning locations on our first playthrough. In a procedural map, spawn-location balance is handled very - VERY - carefully, whereas I've basically just plopped them down. Any feedback on a Civ start which seems either overpowered or underpowered would be much appreciated, and I'll do my best to adjust the map in future iterations.

(Or, if you're up to it, you can make changes yourself by running the map script in World Builder, editing the map, converting it to a lua script (see below), and transferring all the code from the original, from the function GetCivStartPlot() onwards, into the new script. I believe in you!)

CREDIT TO
nORB Dragon, who's very useful Civ5Map to Lua converter proved instrumental in my creation of this map script. In fact, I somewhat doubt that I could have managed it without his program. Most of the code in the script is the product of his program, which converts map data into a long list of lua coordinates. If you're reading this, trying desperately to figure out how to convert a Civ V map into a 'procedural' lua file, then here's his program:

http://forums.civfanatics.com/showthread.php?t=504715

Thank you kindly Mr nORB Dragon.

GLAMOUR SHOTS
Spoiler :

Spoiler :

Spoiler :

Spoiler :

Spoiler :

Spoiler :

Spoiler :



Is there any way to have the map WITHOUT the TSL? Just the map file itself. (tiles, resources, a bunch of OK SLs.)
 
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