Beta 12

[3Miro]

Wasn't really working on it, only started a few testruns in the background while modding.
Anyway, I noticed your revision 752 since my last post, and saw that you commented out a few lines in mercenary.py and uploaded a new .dll
I still got a crash on my first 752 testrun :/

The .dll fixed the large stacks bug and the Mercs simply removes a safeguard for a bug that should no longer be there (it was an infinite loop).

Is the crash a crash to desktop or is it an infinite loop?

Also, did you use an older savegame, often times savegames don't work between revisions, like when we add new mercs or new units in XML or the new "wait 10 turns after discovery to trade" mechanics.

If you have a consistent crash from the latest revision starting with the latest revision from turn 1, then post the savegame.

What I am puzzled about is that I managed to generate couple of Dutch starts and couple of Austrian starts without any flaws. I can't call this extensive testing, but to me this version seems more stable than ever.

 

[AbsintheRed]

The .dll fixed the large stacks bug and the Mercs simply removes a safeguard for a bug that should no longer be there (it was an infinite loop).

Is the crash a crash to desktop or is it an infinite loop?

Also, did you use an older savegame, often times savegames don't work between revisions, like when we add new mercs or new units in XML or the new "wait 10 turns after discovery to trade" mechanics.

If you have a consistent crash from the latest revision starting with the latest revision from turn 1, then post the savegame.

What I am puzzled about is that I managed to generate couple of Dutch starts and couple of Austrian starts without any flaws. I can't call this extensive testing, but to me this version seems more stable than ever.

Crash to desktop, and it's during the autorun. Starting as Austria
The crash occures either around 600 or around 1100 (if it didn't crash in ~600), I know this when checking the autosaves.
As I said it's during autorun, so I don't have normal playable (or testable) saves

 

[AbsintheRed]

I'm really curious if Opera also has problems with revision 752 or not

 

[merijn_v1]

It's possible that the game uses one of the animal arts somewhere in the game we don't know of. You can try to readd the removed lines in CIV4ArtDefines_Unit.xml and see if the game still crashes.

 

[AbsintheRed]

It's possible that the game uses one of the animal arts somewhere in the game we don't know of. You can try to readd the removed lines in CIV4ArtDefines_Unit.xml and see if the game still crashes.

Don't worry, I don't think it has to do anything with the animals
Only a few lines remained connected to them in the python files, but neither calls any functions that could crash the game
Anyway, does the latest revision crashes for you too?

3Miro, can you doublecheck your changes in the mercenaries.py in revision 748?
I'm farily sure the bug is from there

 

[3Miro]

Don't worry, I don't think it has to do anything with the animals
Only a few lines remained connected to them in the python files, but neither calls any functions that could crash the game
Anyway, does the latest revision crashes for you too?

3Miro, can you doublecheck your changes in the mercenaries.py in revision 748?
I'm farily sure the bug is from there

I will look at it tonight, 748 only added two things, a bug fix and something to guard against a bug (every turn the merc upkeep is recomputed for every player).

I will need to see the bug myself in order to try and fix it. You can turn auto-safe on during autoruns and then reload from a savegame.

 

[merijn_v1]

I load a game as Austria and I didn't have any problems. But what I did see is a very strange Europe:

France was huge. 8 Cities in France, another 5 in Spain and another 3 in Arabia (Tyr, Damascus and another city, but no Jerusalem!). Cordoba, Spain and Arabia are collapsed. If I played a few turns, France would have conquered even more.

Germany was also huge. 14 cities. They conquered Florence, Poznan and Groningen and are on the way to conquer more cities. Especially Polish ones.

Genoa managed to conquer Venice.

Bulgaria was also huge and had conquered Constantinople. They had 13 cities.

England had several cities in Brittain.

 

[3Miro]

France was huge. 8 Cities in France, another 5 in Spain and another 3 in Arabia (Tyr, Damascus and another city, but no Jerusalem!). Cordoba, Spain and Arabia are collapsed. If I played a few turns, France would have conquered even more.

Germany was also huge. 14 cities. They conquered Florence, Poznan and Groningen and are on the way to conquer more cities. Especially Polish ones.

Genoa managed to conquer Venice.

Bulgaria was also huge and had conquered Constantinople. They had 13 cities.

England had several cities in Brittain.

Well, you guys wanted aggressive AI ... beware what you wish for.

The results are not typical in the sense that those are not always the winners, Bulgaria may win or lose, France may fall to England and Burgundy, I have seen Germany squashed by Poland and Burgundy. However, this is far more dynamic than the old "build several cities, stack them with troops, turtle and do nothing" AI.

You can load a start with the Dutch , just for the fun ... BEWARE OF THE TURKS. Those are a real superpower now.

Major re-balancing is in order and we have to do it off many games, not just one or two. I have decided to start runs. Make 5 runs with England, check the situation and only after the five runs I would adjust parameters. Once I have the English start OK, move to balance the situation at the time of the Austrian start. I think England, Austria, Moscow and Dutch starts would be good sample points for balancing.

 

[civ_king]

*Watches hundreds of units pour from the Ottomans*
Oh God, the Mohammaden hordes, run for you life

 

[3Miro]

*Watches hundreds of units pour from the Ottomans*
Oh God, the Mohammaden hordes, run for you life

I hope you have used all of your Hapsburg diplomacy skills to get a Defensive Pact with Poland

Balance needs a lot of work, but this is the first time I can say that the Ottomans are what they should be.

 

[AbsintheRed]

@3Miro
The regions in the xmlconsts.py are only handled there right?
I noticed a few mistakes, will change them if it won't cause any problems in the dll

For example you added Silezia to Hungary
Probably you mistaken it with Slavonia, which should be in the this region.
Silezia should either be part of the Poland or the Austria region. Or even both.
Does it mess up anything in the merc code if a province is part of more regions?

 

[3Miro]

@3Miro
The regions in the xmlconsts.py are only handled there right?
I noticed a few mistakes, will change them if it won't cause any problems in the dll

For example you added Silezia to Hungary
Probably you mistaken it with Slavonia, which should be in the this region.
Silezia should either be part of the Poland or the Austria region. Or even both.
Does it mess up anything in the merc code if a province is part of more regions?

You have two things, one is tRegionMap and the other is lRegionXXX.

The tRegion is given the C++ for AI purposes and this is one of the reasons why the AI is much stronger now. We can readjust those if needed, but I think they are overall OK.

The lRegions are only approximate. I got tired of writing the same list of provinces and thus I just created approximate regions. Right now those are only used for Mercs and considering that we have mostly generic mercs, changing the lRegions wouldn't change anything.

 

[AbsintheRed]

Yep, this was the lRegions, only wanted to update the mercenary regions
I don't want to mess up your tRegion settings, they seem to be fine the way they are now

But when I moved a couple provinces in the lRegions, the game crashed on start
I must have missed something, but I thought they are only appear in the mercenaries, rfcebalance and xmlconsts python files

 

[3Miro]

Yep, this was the lRegions, only wanted to update the mercenary regions
I don't want to mess up your tRegion settings, they seem to be fine the way they are now

But when I moved a couple provinces in the lRegions, the game crashed on start
I must have missed something, but I thought they are only appear in the mercenaries, rfcebalance and xmlconsts python files

Check PythonErr.log, crash on start means that Python did not load. Probably syntax error.

BTW, I found the crashing bug and I think I fixed it.

 

[ezzlar]

Tonight I am probably gonna drink too much alcohol, would be great to have beta 13 to play when confined to the couch tomorrow with a hangover

 

[amrod]

Probably there were lots of requests for this, but anyway I'm gonna say it too:
It would be nice to have some feedback on the victory screen about the UHV goals (like in SoI)

Eg. different color for provinces already controlled; number showing percent of land controlled, amount of food collected etc. It's annoying when I don't know how close am I to the 20% land etc.


Another suggestion I think I've already read, is the separating of right of passage and open borders treaties (some mod has it, don't remember which, though).

A question: why exactly is Atlantic Access needed for colonies such as Malaya and East Africa? They could be accessed by someone controlling Arabia or Egypt as well.

A Siberia project could also be made for Russia, though they probably don't need any more help

 

[3Miro]

Probably there were lots of requests for this, but anyway I'm gonna say it too:
It would be nice to have some feedback on the victory screen about the UHV goals (like in SoI)

Eg. different color for provinces already controlled; number showing percent of land controlled, amount of food collected etc. It's annoying when I don't know how close am I to the 20% land etc.

We already have some feedback for the UHV and more would be added once we settle on the exact UHV conditions.

Another suggestion I think I've already read, is the separating of right of passage and open borders treaties (some mod has it, don't remember which, though).

What's the difference, trade and religion vs military units?

A question: why exactly is Atlantic Access needed for colonies such as Malaya and East Africa? They could be accessed by someone controlling Arabia or Egypt as well.

Atlantic Access is the right to make colonies. The purpose is to prevent Poland and Russia from building colonies (unless they get far west in expansion).

Cordoba can make colonies by keeping Tanger.

A Siberia project could also be made for Russia, though they probably don't need any more help

This was discussed several times, there is no point of adding a single a Colony for a single nation. Vinland is a race against time for the Norse, there is no way Siberia can be made challenging for the Russians.

 

[amrod]

What's the difference, trade and religion vs military units?

No, a weaker kind of treaty allows trade and maybe non-military units (scout, worker, missionary, caravan) to pass. A stronger treaty allows military units to pass.

 

[3Miro]

No, a weaker kind of treaty allows trade and maybe non-military units (scout, worker, missionary, caravan) to pass. A stronger treaty allows military units to pass.

What is the gameplay benefit? In what scenario would this help?

 

[dragodon64]

No, a weaker kind of treaty allows trade and maybe non-military units (scout, worker, missionary, caravan) to pass. A stronger treaty allows military units to pass.

This would would be helpful if AIs constantly conquered random independent/barbarian cities with roving Mounted Sergeants or Horse Archers, but limited warmaps mostly solve that problem.