Banned resource graphics mods

[DaveMcW]

I have been using SkankyBurns's Easy to spot Resources for months now. It has smiley faces that peek through the fog of war, but it does not modify bonus resource graphics. Is this banned too?

 

[Moonsinger]

DaveMcW,

I think it would be banned because you can see the smiley faces through the fog of war. Defending on which angle you are looking at...For example, if the fog tile is on the left, it wouldn't make no different; however, if the fog tile is on the right, you could see the the corner of the smiley face; therefore, you know that there is a resource bonnus at that particular tile while you can't possibly see with the original Firaxis graphics.

 

[cracker]

The problem becomes that some of these graphics mods are doing good things in helping to make the resources more visible on a revealed map but that they are implemented by players who may not have sufficient game play knowledge to understand that they create a cheat condition that really is unnecessary and just caused by inattention to detail.

Dave, I think that if you can define a diamond shape overlay that would fit into the resources.pcx box shapes to define the allowable visibility limits then most of the graphics mod gutys would be able to fit within those limits. The Shankyburns graphics are a great example where the illegal blips could be resized just a few pixels and moved downward and then the balance would be returned to the process.

The real solution is to have Firaxis implement an alpha display mask that limits the cheat display range of the resource graphics to fit the diamond shaped grid layout. (this probably will not get much priority in light of other issues.)

 

[Bamspeedy]

Originally posted by cracker
The problem becomes that some of these graphics mods are doing good things in helping to make the resources more visible on a revealed map but that they are implemented by players who may not have sufficient game play knowledge to understand that they create a cheat condition that really is unnecessary and just caused by inattention to detail.

Then I guess all of us are guilty of not paying attention to detail, since this has been going on for so long. I guess all of us don't have sufficient game play knowledge.

Dave, I think that if you can define a diamond shape overlay that would fit into the resources.pcx box shapes to define the allowable visibility limits then most of the graphics mod gutys would be able to fit within those limits. The Shankyburns graphics are a great example where the illegal blips could be resized just a few pixels and moved downward and then the balance would be returned to the process.

Well, considering that the game's default graphics for some of the resources has a few pixels sticking out from the fog of war already, I think it would require a massive reduction in size.

 

[DaveMcW]

Alright, I'll see if I can move the smilies down. Is it ok to have strategic resources peek through the fog?

 

[Moonsinger]

Well, I have never used any terrain graphic mods. So far, I'm using the civ2 railroad style and the larger (15x15) Smiley Mood Badges, I hope those two are ok.

 

[Bamspeedy]

Yes, Moonsinger, those are ok because neither of those 2 graphic modpacks allow you any strategic advantage whatsoever, except for not having to hover your cursor over every citizen to see if he is happy or not. I really wish they would have implemented the smiley mood badges as the game's default graphics.

 

[cracker]

Originally posted by DaveMcW
Alright, I'll see if I can move the smilies down. Is it ok to have strategic resources peek through the fog?

If the Firaxis Gods left them peeking out then so let it be written, so let it be done.

In the past, I have been able to detect the standard wheat graphic by carefully looking at things in starting positions and this effect was even shown in the "Improving Your Opening play sequences" article. The xploit comes in when the graphics get excessive as in several of the current examples that have emerged and gone over the reasonable limit.

The baseline graphics icons for any of these choices can be from the PTW or the Civ3v1.29 resouces.pcx without creating a copyright conflict because ultimately the graphics mod is to counteract the effects of an exploit bug that was not foreseen in the game implementation.

 

[Moonsinger]

Cool! Thanks Bamspeedy. I really love those smiley mood badges.

 

[flexo]

Have I completely missunderstood this, can't you just RMB over the square with the fog and select to display/view terrain type and then you get to know what is under the fog anyway. That one will be somewhat hard to get rid of won't it?

 

[Moonsinger]

Originally posted by flexo
Have I completely missunderstood this, can't you just RMB over the square with the fog and select to display/view terrain type and then you get to know what is under the fog anyway. That one will be somewhat hard to get rid of won't it?

Fog = the unmasked square or the unexplore land. If you right click over those squares, it would simply say "No information available"; therefore, you can't select the display/view terrain information option.

 

[DaveMcW]

I made a resources.pcx overlay from the 3 darkest colors in FogOfWar.pcx. This provides a pretty accurate measurement of what is visible in the fog.

Here it is applied it to various resource mods.
Clockwise from top left: Firaxis's, Harlan's, Dr Alimentado's, SkankyBurns's

Edit: changed the fog radius from 4 to 3

 

[cracker]

Thanks for your efforts Dave. This has been one of those issues we have sort of known about but just not gotten to yet.

What we will do for the next Gotm20-Spain is to close this loophole in the game features to make sure that all players have equal access to the resource information and hopefully without having to just alter the gameplay and give up on the game concepts related to resource locations beyond the edge of the FOW.

 

[Ribannah]

This is bad.

A clear consequence of not publishing any rules for the GOTM, as some of us have been begging you to do for a long time already.

Now we have a frequent prize winner who has been playing all this time with an advantage over the other participants.

 

[CruddyLeper]

I see a lof of "star" players are spooked by this "no mod pack" rule. OK, I can understand you are all highly motivated to play these games a) to the best of your considerable ability and b) within a set of rules that offers a level playing field.

As a new player, it matters not a fig to me who won previous games or why. I could spot some kind of bonus from the start tile in GOTM19 - as it turned out, it was an accidental red herring.

OK, so the playing field has shifted slightly. I honestly can't see it making a major difference to future games. As for the current one, well, I should have worked through Cracker's excellent tutorials before starting any GOTM. I've got no one to blame but my own arrogant self.

Let's try to keep some perspective, please?

 

[Moonsinger]

Originally posted by Ribannah
A clear consequence of not publishing any rules for the GOTM, as some of us have been begging you to do for a long time already.

Since this is pretty much a new exploit and most of us aren't aware of it until now, Cracker can't really publish something that he doesn't know. Of course, now that we all know about it, I'm sure no one would use those graphics in the next game.

Now we have a frequent prize winner who has been playing all this time with an advantage over the other participants.

Actually, I don't think any "star" player has taken advantage of this exploit. IMO, after we discover Map Making, the fog of war isn't that big of a deal. If we want to know what is hidden in a certain region, we can just simply trade the map with the AIs. Therefore, I don't think anyone would gain any benefit by checking the tiles with a magnify glass.

 

[cracker]

Originally posted by Ribannah
Now we have a frequent prize winner who has been playing all this time with an advantage over the other participants.

Ribbannah, it was not that bad until the new cheat pack was released on the 3rd of this month after the Gotm18 was already in progress.

I have been aware of the slight left handed advantage of skanky-spanky graphics but have just not considered it a significant exploit that has not been addressed by map layout issues that you may not have just not picked up on.

The real exploit is the new double whammy bogus graphics that pushed out the exposure in both the NW and NE directions. The addirtion if the bonus food, shields, and gold icons look coll at first glance to novice players but are almost istantly a nuisance because the food, shield, and gold output is altered by terraforming and government status. Clearly these new graphics represent a game altering cheat while the old graphics where on the edge. The new graphics pack is just too much and gains some of its emotional support directly from the expanded cheat factor that reveals the resources from under the fog when they should not be exposed.

The bug/exploit report to Firaxis asks them to suppress the display of all resource icons and map overlays of any type using the same software flag that is used to to determine if the FOW graphics should be displayed. Firaxis can do this and set a flag in the scenario properties that allows the feature to be engaged or suppressed in any preconfigured game. The default status request will be to suppress these displays so that all you will see in the intended terrain and FOW view.

You have to look at the game profiles before playing Henny Penny and screaming that the sky is falling. You cannot reasonably look at the start positions in recent games and say that Dave or any other player had a functional advantage.

My perspective of the game review is that up to now the graphics were a nuisance but now the cat is out of the bag and we will need to waste some resources (human type) to make sure that we can continue to have a high level of confidence in the game processes in addition to relying on the continued honor and integrity that most of the high level players have demonstrated.

I would like to not have to have the perception that you are the volunteer keeper of the moral compass. We do have rules and standards of play even if you do not feel they adequately cover every legal alternative. We have been very proactive in identifying and addressing new exploit issues that emerge.

It is unfortunate that these issues seem to arise where we find new non-players that develop new ways to exploit and downgrade the game play process, but we adapt and I can assure you that the games will still be fun and interesting. I can also assure you that you will always be able to find something you do not like, but we hope you won't spend most your time in that area or search since there are lots of positive issues to focus on.

As I indicated, prior to May 3rd this was mostly a non issue. Effective with Gotm20 we will implement an in-game solution that substantially eliminates these features from the potential issues column.

This will mean that the bypass will reduce the ability of players to use resource graphics of their own choice in the GOTM games and other semi-competitive game events. This is an unfortunate consequence of the unintentional but perhaps poorly thoughtout choices made by a few individuals who are mostly external to the functional gaming community.

 

[Ribannah]

It just got worse.

 

[anarres]

The addirtion if the bonus food, shields, and gold icons look coll at first glance to novice players but are almost istantly a nuisance because the food, shield, and gold output is altered by terraforming and government status.

The mod to which you refer (by DrAlimentado) is useful. Your opinion is just that. This appears like a poor attempt to slander the mod creator and anyone who likes the mod, on your own ground.

Remember the mod was never made for GOTM, and yet you have still taken personal offense to it.

Clearly these new graphics represent a game altering cheat while the old graphics where on the edge.

That simply isn't true now is it? With skank's mod you could see the top left corner if you looked closely, many people use this mod and post screen pics with this mod in the threads here. With DrAlimentado's mod you can see it also in the top right. Not exacly the world of difference is there?

The new graphics pack is just too much and gains some of its emotional support directly from the expanded cheat factor that reveals the resources from under the fog when they should not be exposed.

You refer to the creator's thread in the customisation forum. From your remarks you are explicitly saying that at least one of the following people are only supporting this because it's a cheat:

Dr Alimentado
Bamspeedy
Cartouche Bee
anarres

I would like to know exactly what it is you are saying here please. The four listed people are the only people to raise any kind of issue with you in that thread or to say more than "well done" or something similar.

It is unfortunate that these issues seem to arise where we find new non-players that develop new ways to exploit and downgrade the game play process...

Please, this is plain offensive. It's simply slanderous. You consider it an exploit and you consider it a "downgrade [of] the game play process". You are giving an opinion like it is fact, and belittling people who have disagreed with you in another forum.

I find your remarks offense and without substance, and if I was being skeptical I would see this as a thinly veiled attempt to make either DrAlimentado or myself post in this forum so you could ban us. I really don't want a ban, but I have principals. If you are going to openly slander me or DrAlimentado in your forum (even if you veil it well) I will respond to it.

 

[Ribannah]

Originally posted by Moonsinger
Since this is pretty much a new exploit and most of us aren't aware of it until now, Cracker can't really publish something that he doesn't know. Of course, now that we all know about it, I'm sure no one would use those graphics in the next game.

That is why their should be a general rule saying:

No Mods Unless Explicitly Allowed

instead of silently allowing some participants to use exploits at will until 'the cat is out of the bag'.

Actually, I don't think any "star" player has taken advantage of this exploit. IMO, after we discover Map Making, the fog of war isn't that big of a deal.

I'm sorry Moonsinger, but you should really think this over. The opening stage is critical. If someone can see where the nearby good tiles are before other players can that is very significant.

Surely someone who heavily depends on having the best possible start (in contrast to the 'milkers') knows this very well.

As I already wrote on the General Forum before I knew that someone was actually using it for the GOTM, using this particular exploit is cheating. There is no other word for it.