Age of Imperium Mod Question

Brucha

King
Joined
Oct 22, 2007
Messages
622
With the continuation of my Soviet Earth map game, I am preparing for a series of Soviet games to play. The next game will be playing the Russians using the "Age of Imperium 1895 - 1919 Deluxe Version".

However, I wish to mod the mod so to include a new tech in the 1915-1919 era, that being Communism, or rather the Russian Revolution.

I know how to add a new tech in the tree, but wish some advice as to figuring out the best way to represent it - meaning cost to reserach, effects, how to upload a pic for the new tech, etc - as well as the stats for a Communist government.

Thanks in advance.
 
Let me rephrase my question of what I am looking for, In AoI, each playable civ has only one government during the game, but for Russia, I wish to add a new tech that will allow a change of government from Tsarist Monarchy to Communism. What I am unsure of is:

1. What should the cost to research be?
2. Should I include any prerequisites for learning Communism?
3. What would the new government's stats be? Should I keep the same flags as the other governments in the mod?
4. Most importantly, is there any empty space to ass another tech to the scenario tech tree?
 
i often thought of adding in a new govt type for russia...but ultimately did not and i don't foresee adding it in for the next version. i write this b/c a communist govt type, imho, would be worse than the tsarist type. i mean, russia was in complete disarray from 1917 until the mid '20s at least. and to put it into even sharper perspective, if one puts lenin's so-called govt against that of the already lame tsarist one, we clearly have a regression of sorts in terms of game play. and as a developer and lock-step historian, i would advise against allowing for a red october.

however, these are only my thoughts as the creator of the scenario. so feel free to mod it to your liking.

as for your specific questions, i'd follow in sequence w/ the existing model if i were to make the changes you propose - by this i mean that i'd set the costs for a communism tech relative to the other last era techs. i would likely place it somewhere in the middle or towards the end. there isn't a whole lot of existing space though. you'd have to squeeze it in there somewhere.
 
1, 2 and 3 are entirely up to you. What do you want to achieve?

Bascially, I want to be able to play AoI to the end, but with my own personal victory condition of switching over to a Communist government as well as the conventional victory conditions set in the scenario.

i often thought of adding in a new govt type for russia...but ultimately did not and i don't foresee adding it in for the next version. i write this b/c a communist govt type, imho, would be worse than the tsarist type. i mean, russia was in complete disarray from 1917 until the mid '20s at least. and to put it into even sharper perspective, if one puts lenin's so-called govt against that of the already lame tsarist one, we clearly have a regression of sorts in terms of game play. and as a developer and lock-step historian, i would advise against allowing for a red october.

as for your specific questions, i'd follow in sequence w/ the existing model if i were to make the changes you propose - by this i mean that i'd set the costs for a communism tech relative to the other last era techs. i would likely place it somewhere in the middle or towards the end. there isn't a whole lot of existing space though. you'd have to squeeze it in there somewhere.

I see what you mean that a communist gov't would be worse than a tsarist one, but thats the appeal to me - as well as continuing the chain of stories playing the Soviet Russians. I will try to sneak it in somewhere in the last tech age and go from there.
 
I haven't played the mod myself, but it's not too hard to add a tech. I'd recommend using Steph's expanded editor for Civ3 - it's a fine deal better than regular Civ3ConquestsEdit and has a nice graphical tech placer that makes placing icons on the tech tree more science than guesswork. Here's what you'll need to do:

*Open up Age of Imperium.biq (or whatever it's called) in Civ3ConquestsEdit. Go to the View menu, and choose Options (the last thing in the menu). Uncheck the option "Compress .bic files", click OK, and then save the scenario.

*Now open up Steph's editor and open up Age of Imperium.biq. Go to the Tech tab, right click on the list of technologies, and choose Add Technology. Choose the "Use same name" options, and give your tech an obvious name such as Communism. Now set the correct prerequisites (era and technologies), and then click the Tech Tree Builder icon. This'll open up the graphical tech tree editor. Choose the era your technology is in, and a civilization, and then you'll be able to move the technology to its proper location on the tech tree. If you turn on the Graphic mode at the bottom right, it'll look just like it does in Civ3. Very handy!

*Now you need to add the government. Go to the GOVT tab, and right-click and add Communism and set the attributes as necessary.

*Now you need to add icons for your new government. Go to Civ3\Conquests\Scenarios\Age of Imperialism\Text (exact path may vary) and open PediaIcons.txt. Search for "# Small Tech Icons". This is the section that tells what icons to use for techs in the civilopedia. Go to the end and add something of this sort:

#TECH_Communism <--whatever you named it after the _
Art\tech chooser\Icons\12-Communism-small-vp.pcx <--the .pcx you want for it in the civilopedia - this is the Communism one.

Then go down to the "# Large Tech Icons" section and do the same thing, except for the big Civilopedia icon. Art\tech chooser\Icons\12-Communism-large-vp.pcx is the default Communism one.

I think the governments will automatically use the same icon as whatever technology they require. So this should be all you need to do.

You also can edit Civilopedia.txt in a similar way if you want a Civilopedia entry - this isn't really necessary if you remember correctly how Communism works when you're playing it (but would be a very good idea if you were releasing a full-scale mod).

Hope that covers it for this mod - if there's an error, post it here and one of us will know how to correct it. If you get more into modding, be sure to check out the tutorials around here - they're pretty good, even if it does require some time commitment to get the hang of it.

----------

Oh, as for #1-2-3, like Steph said, it's up to you. But I'd recommend a cost similar to what other techs of the era are, and definitely have the Communal corruption flag.
 
Thanks, Quintillus for the easy explanation! However, I am having problems with Steph's Editor. I am getting an error message when I try to open the .bic file - it reads that the "Value" is not valid and needs to be between the Minimum and Maximum, whatever that means.

I read several tutorials on modding here in the forum and have been giving it a go in Civeditor, but this method you outlined seems easier, if only I can get Steph's Editor to work.
 
If you want to get support for my editor, you'd better post in the thread ;).

You can email me faulty biq file so I can see.

However, if you really have a BIC and not a BIQ file it may be the source of the problem.

My editor is for conquest, with latest patch.
 
Oops, you are right, its a BIC file and not a BIQ file! Darn it! I guess I can;t mod it this way then and will have to try the long way.
 
Oops, you are right, its a BIC file and not a BIQ file! Darn it! I guess I can;t mod it this way then and will have to try the long way.

:confused: You have Conquests, right? I don't see how you can't since your story has 31 civilizations. If so, you can just go into Civ3ConquestsEdit, open the .bic file (choose Open, and then change the file type to .bic from .biq on the Open dialog), and then save it as a .biq, making sure you have the "Compress bic files" option disabled. Then it should work.

I'm surprised the mod is for vanilla, though. Rather rare to find one of those these days. But it should work just fine as a .biq instead of .bic.
 
:confused: You have Conquests, right? I don't see how you can't since your story has 31 civilizations. If so, you can just go into Civ3ConquestsEdit, open the .bic file (choose Open, and then change the file type to .bic from .biq on the Open dialog), and then save it as a .biq, making sure you have the "Compress bic files" option disabled. Then it should work.

I'm surprised the mod is for vanilla, though. Rather rare to find one of those these days. But it should work just fine as a .biq instead of .bic.

That's what I thought about having Conquests too. Your suggestion above worked and I can now open it in Steph's Editor, thanks Quintillus! I can now start modding this beast!
 
Arrgggg! This so frustrating! I went thorugh the entire process several times only to get the same error message each time I loaded the game, stating that, scenario/AOI/text/PediaIcon/,text is missing TECH_. I can't understand what I am doing wrong.

I added the small and large tech icons to the text file, but something keeps coming up missing.

I am about ready to give up on modding this to add a new government.
 
I double-checked the newly added government to make sure it matches up with the .text file, and it does. Here is the strange thing:

I open Steph's Editor, add in the new government of Bolshevism, add its properties, and add it to the tech tree. At this point everything looks good. The new government under the GOVT tab it is named "GOVT_bolshevism". Under the TECH tab, it is named "TECH_bolshevism". I open the Tech Tree builder and it appears exactly where it should be, minus a picture or icon. At this point everything looks good.

I then open my Civ3/Conquests folder and into "Scenarios/AIO/text and open the PediaIcons txt document. I find the "# Small Tech Icons" section, scroll to the bottom. At this point, I have not changed anything, so what the end of the Small Icons reads is:

# TECH_Revolution
Art/tech chooser/Icons/Socialism_sm.pcx
#TECH_

Right at the end of "#TECH_", I replace it with:

#TECH_Bolshivism
Art/tech chooser/Icons/Socialism_sm.pcx

Next, I go the end of the Large Tech Icons section. Again, before I add anything it reads:

#TECH_revolution_LARGE
Art/tech chooser/Icons/Socialism_lg.pcx
#TECH_
#TECH_LARGE

I replace the last two lines of "#TECH_" and "#TECH_LARGE" with:

#TECH_LARGE_bolshevism
Art/tech chooser/Icons/Socialism_lg.pcx

So, everything is in place. I start the game and get the error message:

"Missing entry in Scenario/AOI/text/PediaIcons.txt: TECH_"

The game then crashes.

Now, at this point let me explain that I found in the PediaICon the unused "Socialism" .pcx, so figured I could use it also for Bolshevism, and save me time in creating a pic for the new government. I am also replacing the AoI3.0-26civs-FULL biq file with one that has the new government of bolshevism in it.

So, the game crashes. I go back, remove the added lines of the .txt file and restore them exactly the way they were as above. I replace the original biq file, save everything - ay this point I am exactly back to where I started. I re-start the game and it works.

Any hints as to the crash and what I am doing wrong?

Edit: I just thought, do I need to end the Small Icon with "#TECH_" and the large Icon with
#TECH_
#TECH_LARGE
 
Crud, I just answered my own question. The ending lines that I was copying over need to be there, sort of like html ending tags! By simply inserting the new txt lines before the ending ones that I had removed it works. Go figure for my ignorance! In addition, by using the old Socialism pcx file I get the scenario's description in the civiliopedia, just as I thought it would.

So, now it shows up on the tech tree correctly as well as the civiliopedia entry! Now the question is, when I start the game and open the Domestic Advisor, if I click on the Government button ("tsartist monarchy") I still get the message that "there is no government switching in AoI". Does this need to be changed in the editor somewhere or is the message coming up because I have just started the game and have not yet learned Bolshevism?
 
I seem to be typing faster than my brain works. I changed Bolshevism so that the russians start with it. I selected to start a revolution and anarchy, like normal, occurred. After 3 turns, I switched governments.

I must apologize for all the questions that, in the end, I was capable of answering myself. I am brand new to any sort of real modding for this game and have ALOT to learn.

I now have to tweak the Bolshevik stats and determine if i should increase the length of anarchy during revolution when switching governments.
 
Now that I have that mess figured out, let me outline what i am considering doing.

The new government for the Russians will be Bolshevism, overthrowing the tsarist monarchy, although historically, the tsar was overthrown and replaced by the Russian Provisional Government first then replaced by the Bolsheviks which lead to the Civil war in 1917. Besides the provisional government only lasted 9 months historically before being taken over by the Bolsheviks so leaving them out would greatly stop from muddling the entire affair up.

Historically there was 6 years of civil war before the Soviet Union was formed with Stalin. before then it was the Second Congress of Soviets that formed the Council of People's Commissars, the new Soviet government. So, for the scope of this scenario, ending with the Bolsheviks will work just fine. Besides, unless I create a scenario begining with the civil war, there is no way to represent it in the middle of a game beyond a governmental switch.

The Bolsheviks will have very similar stats to Communism, specifically no war weariness. I am also playing around with a new tech called "The Red Guard" which was the precursor to the Red Army. This would allow the creation of Red Army units and would be something between militia level troops and partisans, so basically politically motivated troops with little formal military training.

In the game, the these units are as follows:

Russian WW One Infantry 10.12.2/730 shields
Russian Infantry 7.7.2/580 shields
Russian Home Guard 1.5.1/100 shields
Militia (not available to Russia) 1.4.1/40 shields

So, I was thinking of this for Red Guard stats:

3.6.2/240 shields

Basically better than the old Home Guard but inferior to the Russian Infantry.

Any suggestions?
 
Top Bottom