C3X: EXE Mod including Bug Fixes, Stack Bombard, and Much More Release 19

[Vasyl-67]

Hello. Thanks again to Flintlock for the great C3X mod.
I've been playing around with the C3X_R19 mod for a bit. It works well for the most part. But there are a few small issues I've noticed.
1. Incorrect display of indicators.
Unit status indicators are a great help in the game. Many thanks for finding this and implementing it into the game. I've made some changes to the UnitRCMIcons.pcx file. When a unit doesn't fully complete its movement before the end of its turn, the indicator is incorrectly displayed on the next turn. The pop-up shows the Moving action and the "not moving/busy" indicator (A3 or A4).
It also shows the "green shield and sword" indicator (A1) for combat units that can't move at all (stationary garrisons in cities).

2. Automation error.
When you press the “Automate: Build Trade” button for a slave (captured unit), it starts building a railroad (in the game – an imperial road), although according to the scenario settings it cannot do this. When you press the “Automate” button, slaves do not build anything at all, but remain in place, although the window indicates the action “Automated” (D4). When you press such a unit, it switches to “Idle” mode (D2). There are workers in the game that are created in buildings. They are well-friendly with automation.
In the settings - disable_worker_automation = false

3. Pollution from volcanoes.
The do_not_pollute_impassable_tiles = true function (disallow pollution in impassable areas) works well. But there is a problem with volcanoes. They pollute impassable areas. Can this also be fixed?

4. Unescorted transport ships.
They remain in place, waiting for escort ships to come to them, or to be sunk. Can they be forced to flee to the nearest friendly port or warship?
5. Strange AI behavior in diplomacy.
I don't know if this is related to the C3X mod. I made a treaty with Armenia for the right of passage, hoping to use it in the future war with Pontus. Armenia treated me well, I even started building a road on its territory. But suddenly Armenia declared war on me and attacked my city.
I conducted an experiment. I went back to the previous turn, declared war on Pontus and made a military alliance with Armenia. But on the next turn, Armenia attacked me again, and I got two wars instead of one. I repeated this move several times, but each time Armenia attacked me. I tried attacking Pontus units immediately after declaring war, but the result was the same. In the game, Armenia moves before Pontus.
6. Culture in cities.
I don't know if this is related to the C3X mod. For example, in a city, one building gives +3 culture. But there are 2 more buildings that give -2 culture each. Total: -1 / turn. In the city window at the top right it says - Culture per turn: 0. The overall culture level in the city does not decrease on the next turn either.

 

[ZergMazter]

If the only point is to change the appearance of irrigation on tiles with cattle or horses, that could probably be done more easily by directly swapping to a special irrigation texture for those tiles.

Well yes that also was something I talked about in an earlier post and that would work.
My previous post was more on a similar principle but via worker job so let me rephrase it:

The point of all this is to acquire the ability to transform a tile into another tile that does not normally generate in the game via worker job. Either we make all trees generate as LM terrain so that the game's standard tile output when using the "Plant Trees" worker job is only accessible via worker job ("Plant Trees"=Regular forest/pines tiles by default), or we modify the worker job itself so that the tile becomes a LM forest/pine, a tile only accessible via worker job.

Planting trees isnt a big aspect of the game so it's not like anyone will miss it, but manipulating the AI into using "Plant trees" strategically and bringing a tile that is not anywhere else on the map can be huge. There are many applications for it and I have a plan but for simplicity's sake I wont mention yet.

Yes this is mostly aesthetic but its not so simple:

What if I make my forests look like factories? When generating a map I will have a factory hell all over.
What if I make my LMForests look like factories? Tough luck using them unless pre-generated. Ancient age with factories lurking around? Yuck!
What if I make a custom map with no trees so that I can "Plant" "factories"? It would make the map look empty, ugly, and breaks immersion since I've already seen the map.
We can keep the game mostly intact by swapping forest/pines for LM equivalent during generation or change "Plant trees" worker job output to LM equivalent (My preferred method).
This is less about randomization by the game via terrain/resource placement and more about the improvement of a tile via unused worker job (Plant Trees).

I hope I painted a better picture.

 

[bacchant]

That's right, the third config would be stored in its own file. I've been referring to it as the "third config" instead of its file name because I haven't decided on a name yet. Maybe "custom" dot c3x_config, or maybe "user" or "preferences". I'm not sure.

I think I finally understand. Many thanks for your patience. Whatever you decide, it'll be convenience sprinkles on top of an already great mod.

 

[Virote_Considon]

5. Strange AI behavior in diplomacy.
I don't know if this is related to the C3X mod. I made a treaty with Armenia for the right of passage, hoping to use it in the future war with Pontus. Armenia treated me well, I even started building a road on its territory. But suddenly Armenia declared war on me and attacked my city.
I conducted an experiment. I went back to the previous turn, declared war on Pontus and made a military alliance with Armenia. But on the next turn, Armenia attacked me again, and I got two wars instead of one. I repeated this move several times, but each time Armenia attacked me. I tried attacking Pontus units immediately after declaring war, but the result was the same. In the game, Armenia moves before Pontus.

Very sure this is normal Civ3 AI behaviour - sometimes there's nothing you can do to avert an AI attack, even roping them into your wars.

6. Culture in cities.

I don't know if this is related to the C3X mod. For example, in a city, one building gives +3 culture. But there are 2 more buildings that give -2 culture each. Total: -1 / turn. In the city window at the top right it says - Culture per turn: 0. The overall culture level in the city does not decrease on the next turn either.

The net culture per turn of a city can't be a negative value, it has a minimum per turn value of 0 (no culture growth). Again, this is default Civ3 behaviour.

 

[tjs282]

Very sure this is normal Civ3 AI behaviour - sometimes there's nothing you can do to avert an AI attack, even roping them into your wars.

Given that @Vasyl-67 is obviously playing a mod (an expanded version of the RoR Conquest?), I did wonder if maybe the town which got attacked by Armemia had been inadvertently garrisoned with a Hidden Nationality unit? Because even AIs you're on good terms with, and/or have favourable deals with, will still eagerly attack any of your towns where the strongest defender is an HN unit.

(Note to self, when playing CCM: If your neighbours have bombard-capable aircraft, DO NOT use Partisans alone to garrison your inner towns, or any peace treaties you sign will be broken before the ink is dry...)

 

[Vasyl-67]

Given that @Vasyl-67 is obviously playing a mod (an expanded version of the RoR Conquest?), I did wonder if maybe the town which got attacked by Armemia had been inadvertently garrisoned with a Hidden Nationality unit? Because even AIs you're on good terms with, and/or have favourable deals with, will still eagerly attack any of your towns where the strongest defender is an HN unit.

(Note to self, when playing CCM: If your neighbours have bombard-capable aircraft, DO NOT use Partisans alone to garrison your inner towns, or any peace treaties you sign will be broken before the ink is dry...)

This is the Rise and Fall of the Roman Empire (RFRE) scenario. At this stage of the game, Rome has no units of hidden nationality.

 

[Arexander]

The net culture per turn of a city can't be a negative value, it has a minimum per turn value of 0 (no culture growth). Again, this is default Civ3 behaviour.

I'm sure I've seen cultural borders shrink before due to negative culture production. I imagine the game limits it to 0 when the city has no culture whatsoever, though.

 

[bacchant]

At the risk of being annoying, would it be difficult to fix civ3 ignoring barbarian levels and map-size of any player made maps and/or scenarios, instead always inserting settings from the last new/random game?

Apologies if this has been brought up before.

 

[SayHayKid]

@Flintlock would it be possible to prevent units from being built if the building that is a pre-req (e.g. I made tanks require a factory) exists anywhere in your empire? For example, I have Cavalry obsoleted by Early Tanks and Early Tanks require a factory. However, if the city doesn't have a factory it can still build Cavalry. I'd like it to so Cavalry couldn't be built anywhere once Early Tanks can be built in any city.

 

[Flintlock]

1. Incorrect display of indicators.
Unit status indicators are a great help in the game. Many thanks for finding this and implementing it into the game. I've made some changes to the UnitRCMIcons.pcx file. When a unit doesn't fully complete its movement before the end of its turn, the indicator is incorrectly displayed on the next turn. The pop-up shows the Moving action and the "not moving/busy" indicator (A3 or A4).
It also shows the "green shield and sword" indicator (A1) for combat units that can't move at all (stationary garrisons in cities).

That is the intended behavior. Row A in your chart is for units that have not yet moved on the current turn, in other words that still have all their movement points. The unmoved/moved/finished turn distinction matches the colors of the LEDs that the base game puts on top of unit HP bars. In your screenshots the highlighted units have green indicators on their HP bars so they'll use right-click menu icons from row A.

Similarly, immobile units use icons from rows A, B, and C as long as they have movement points left. If a unit can only defend, it will use the "noncombat" columns 2 and 4. That's supposed to help you skip over those units when you're looking through the menu for attackers. It was a bit of a mistake on my part to call those columns "noncombat", a better word would have been "nonattacker". Units that can be ordered to do damage, meaning attackers that can move or units that can bombard or bomb, use columns 1 and 3, and all others use 2 and 4.

2. Automation error.

Are you sure this is related to C3X? Did you try with the unmodded EXE? I can't think of any changes I've made that would cause this.

3. Pollution from volcanoes.

Sure, I forgot about eruptions when I added that option. It would be easy to cover them too. I'll do for the next version.

4. Unescorted transport ships.
They remain in place, waiting for escort ships to come to them, or to be sunk. Can they be forced to flee to the nearest friendly port or warship?

I could try inserting a bit of code after the naval transport AI method that puts transports in the fleeing state if the base method leaves them standing still out in the open unescorted. That should work, the only problem is it might cause problems elsewhere.

At the risk of being annoying, would it be difficult to fix civ3 ignoring barbarian levels and map-size of any player made maps and/or scenarios, instead always inserting settings from the last new/random game?
Apologies if this has been brought up before.

I don't think this has been mentioned before. I'm not sure if it would be difficult to fix, I'd have to look into it first.

@Flintlock would it be possible to prevent units from being built if the building that is a pre-req (e.g. I made tanks require a factory) exists anywhere in your empire? For example, I have Cavalry obsoleted by Early Tanks and Early Tanks require a factory. However, if the city doesn't have a factory it can still build Cavalry. I'd like it to so Cavalry couldn't be built anywhere once Early Tanks can be built in any city.

This would be possible but pretty awkward. For one thing, the game doesn't keep track of what regular improvements have been built by each player, so I'd either have to add the code to track that or search through all cities every time. For another thing, the rule would have to cover knights, horsemen, and anything earlier in the upgrade chain. Otherwise, making cavalry unbuildable would cause the game to fall back on one of those earlier unit types. That's why cavalry are an option in the first place when the building requirement for light tanks is not met.

 

[Vasyl-67]

Are you sure this is related to C3X? Did you try with the unmodded EXE? I can't think of any changes I've made that would cause this.

Hello. I checked the automatic actions of workers in the base Civilization, on the same saved file. Slaves were also able to build the imperial road and did not do anything when the "Automation" button was pressed. This is a bug in the base version. It is not related to your wonderful mod.

 

[SayHayKid]

This would be possible but pretty awkward. For one thing, the game doesn't keep track of what regular improvements have been built by each player, so I'd either have to add the code to track that or search through all cities every time. For another thing, the rule would have to cover knights, horsemen, and anything earlier in the upgrade chain. Otherwise, making cavalry unbuildable would cause the game to fall back on one of those earlier unit types. That's why cavalry are an option in the first place when the building requirement for light tanks is not met.

Ok. It is just a little awkward. In my current test game in cities with a factory, I can build destroyers and cruisers, but in other coastal cities that don't have factories, I can still build Frigates/Ship of the Line in modern times. It is easy enough to just not build them, but aesthetically seeing units that should be obsoleted in the build queue is weird. But not game-breaking. I thought I'd mention it in case it was a relatively easy fix. Thanks.

 

[general-jcl]

Thank you Flintlock for this fantastic Mod that revolutionizes civ3!
It's been a long time since I played this game, but I seem to remember that it wasn't possible to create terraforming units that didn't use all the possibilities (all the boxes checked in the editor). Well, yes... you can create such a unit, but the problem is that the AI doesn't know how to use it. For example, if we create a worker who can only do roads, the AI doesn't know how to use it. Is it possible to correct this?

 

[Civinator]

Thank you Flintlock for this fantastic Mod that revolutionizes civ3!
It's been a long time since I played this game, but I seem to remember that it wasn't possible to create terraforming units that didn't use all the possibilities (all the boxes checked in the editor). Well, yes... you can create such a unit, but the problem is that the AI doesn't know how to use it. For example, if we create a worker who can only do roads, the AI doesn't know how to use it. Is it possible to correct this?

This can be done with C3X. Per example railroads in CCM 3 can no longer been built by normal workers. There are two "superworker units" (steam rollers and bulldozers) for building railroads.

 

[general-jcl]

Great! This is great news for game script creators. To sum up, what are the remaining limitations?
- the 32 strategic/luxury resources
- 256 buildings/wonders

I suppose. If one day these limitations are abolished, it's not impossible that I'll make new scenarios!

 

[Civinator]

The phantom resource bug (32 strat./lux. resources loop) is fixed by C3X, too. The 256 buildings limitation is still remaining.
Here is a list about the current features of C3X: https://forums.civfanatics.com/resources/c3x.28759/

 

[ajb]

@Flintlock once again terrific mod!

Has there been any efforts to create a popup similar to the disorder popup for building something that has the attribute "replaces all buildings with this checked".

I have a number of very useful buildings which will replace each other, ideally, a pop up warning would be extremely useful.

Thanks a million for updating the unit RGY, I was able to add colors to my liking. Also, the no pollution on impassable is amazing! Thanks!

 

[Ran]

This exe mod is incredible. Just the quality of life changes and papercut bugfixes are huge. It's incredible to have for such an old game too, thanks so much!

Results of sound test over Ambience Sfx and the parent Sounds folder, the following files loop:

Hawk.wav
Barbarian Raid.wav
City Fortress.wav
LoveTheKing.wav
PopupAdvisor.wav
Unrest.wav
Wonder.wav

This leads me to ask... is it just any wav file over a certain length?

Doesn't look like it. wolf1.wav is 6.49 sec long but doesn't loop versus Hawk.wav at 5.27 sec.

Edit: Length does seem related though. Importing Hawk.wav into Audacity then exporting it back out does not fix the looping, neither does cutting it down to 4 sec, but cutting it down to 2.5 sec does.

^ This was really great info too; I've been playing on mute since I'm on linux, but I created cut-down length versions of all the files WildWeazel mentioned and haven't had the audio glitch strike since. (It may not help with the why, but the shorter hawk sounds are better IMO anyway.)

 

[Lord_Hill]

Thanks for that, I occasionally have a casual game on my steam deck and it'll be nice to turn the sound on for once. It's a weird bug that they all need to be cut to different lengths to stop looping (and those lengths don't completely correlate with the original length of the file). You'd think if a buffer was overflowing or something there'd be more consistency to it.

 

[Flintlock]

Great! This is great news for game script creators. To sum up, what are the remaining limitations?
- the 32 strategic/luxury resources
- 256 buildings/wonders
I suppose. If one day these limitations are abolished, it's not impossible that I'll make new scenarios!

As Civinator mentioned, I've fixed the 32 resource limit. However the game still has a soft limit of 11 luxury resources. If a city has more than 11 luxuries, the extra ones won't contribute happiness.

The 256 building limit is still in force. It should be possible to lift it since it's similar to the 32 resource limit. Also there's the 512 city limit, which I'd like to work on eventually, though I'm not sure I can actually solve it since it's baked in pretty deep. And of course there's the 32 player limit which can't be removed without rewriting most of the game.

Has there been any efforts to create a popup similar to the disorder popup for building something that has the attribute "replaces all buildings with this checked".
I have a number of very useful buildings which will replace each other, ideally, a pop up warning would be extremely useful.

Not yet but that's a good idea, I'll look into it.

It's a weird bug that they all need to be cut to different lengths to stop looping (and those lengths don't completely correlate with the original length of the file). You'd think if a buffer was overflowing or something there'd be more consistency to it.

It's a very weird issue. Back when I was playing around with it, I took one of the longer working sound files in Audacity, deleted its sound data, and copied over the contents of one of the looping files, leaving silence at the end. Amazingly that did not work, it still looped, as if the audio data itself were the problem.