Cross-Platform Editor for Conquests now available! 1.48

[Blue Monkey]

Except, Quintillus is a pro.

 

[Adrain]

I hope you realise I use the term in it's literal sense. Amateur in no way implies any lack of quality or competence. It simply means someone who does it for the love of it.

From what I've read so far that describes Quintillus to a T.

 

[Blue Monkey]

Quite true.

OTOH, like you he also has the advantage that his vocation and avocation converge. Getting paid for what you profess - that's bliss.


strictly speaking personally, I prefer to think of quite a few people here as virtuoso.

 

[Adrain]

Virtuoso? Yes. Perfectly apposite. I like that. Virtuoso it is

 

[Civinator]

Quintillus, please have a look at the posts Adrain made today in the Meet the Modders thread:

https://forums.civfanatics.com/threads/meet-the-modders.353148/page-52#post-15497752
https://forums.civfanatics.com/threads/meet-the-modders.353148/page-52#post-15497758
https://forums.civfanatics.com/threads/meet-the-modders.353148/page-52#post-15497915
https://forums.civfanatics.com/threads/meet-the-modders.353148/page-52#post-15497938
https://forums.civfanatics.com/threads/meet-the-modders.353148/page-52#post-15497944
https://forums.civfanatics.com/threads/meet-the-modders.353148/page-52#post-15497948

I hope they can help you in improving the reading of C3C save files and adding some new features to your great editor (per example nationalities of units, that are different to the nationality of a civ and Barbarian cities).

 

[Adrain]

@Blue Monkey.
Another word I had for Quintillus, and others here of similar ilk, was afficionado. That seems to fit quite well I think.

@Civinator.
Thanks for helping things along. Much appreciated

 

[Quintillus]

Hi Quintillus.

I posted the quoted post in another thread (Meet the Modders) recently and Blue Monkey was kind enough to point me to you, and this thread particularly. Are you able to share where the value of how much progress has been made towards the latest TECH is stored. I imagine it's within the LEAD object but I haven't got much further than that so far. It would save me from jumping through hoops to determine its location.

May I say that I really appreciate the work you've done. It's really cool to have such tools available, developed by community amateurs.

As it turns out, after checking notes, I can. It is indeed within the LEAD object (within the SAV, not to be confused with the LEAD within the BIQ), and to be precise is bytes 229 through 232 of that section (where 1 is the first byte, and the string "LEAD" itself is the first four bytes). This is "beakers", or how many beakers of research have been done. The next four bytes are a reference to the TECH being researched, and the four bytes after that are the number of turns that have been spend researching that TECH.

My main reference for this is some research from about 15 years ago, which is unfortunately not publicly available, but I've also implemented this part in code for the editor (specifically, code for a future version of the editor), and have code that reads this section available publicly at https://bitbucket.org/QuintillusCFC...vfanatics/civ3/savFile/SavLEAD.java#lines-169 . The code gives the structure of the first part of the LEAD section pretty well, although the section as a whole is complex, and there are parts later on that I haven't figured out, as indicated in code comments.

Thank you (et. al.) for the kind words as well.

--------

I should also note that, due to fatigue, I have only skimmed but not yet read the posts Civinator linked in post #1085, but plan to read them properly when better-rested. As for terminology, it doesn't really matter to me, but technically speaking when I started this project I was by all measures an amateur (and also a student of computer science). Nowadays I'm a professional developer, but this is strictly a non-income-producing side project, and while I have learned a lot over the years, and applied various aspects of that here, it's fundamentally driven mostly by what I find interesting to work on, and secondarily by community input. Which are different motivators than what drives my projects at work. I also had more time per year to spend working on it back in the day, so there's still a lot of code from when I was an amateur (in all definitions) in it . So the amateur/professional boundaries are nice and muddled. It's probably fair to say I'm a Civilization aficionado, though, as are many other members of CFC, and that has been both a motivator, and to some extent a factor, of this project.

 

[Adrain]

Thanks loads for all that Quintillus. I really appreciate it. I expect I'll get a chance to look into that further tomorrow. I posted my spreadsheet earlier (Adrain's Save Game Editor), which triggered great activity to tidy up some of the less-well working bits ;-) I'll have to update it tomorrow with the changes I've made since.

BTW The code's locked and signed but if you ever feel the interest I could let you have the password. It's locked to stop all and sundry playing and breaking it.

Aficionado. That's the word - and the correct spelling after my recent failure :-( I hate misspelling words - particularly publicly when spell-checkers are always available. Mea Culpa.

Your explanation sounds exactly like the sort of thing I expected. Professional developer but working with Civ because you have the interest. Much like myself, but even when I started back in the early noughties I'd been a professional for a couple of decades. I enjoy my work, but love fiddling with Civ.

I'll play further with the info you've given me and see if I can come up with a newer version of the spreadsheet file that does something to make up for lost beakers from ineffective Great Leaders.

Hopefully that all makes sense. I'm running a little low on energy myself. I'm posting from London and it's high time I plugged myself in for a recharge. I look forward to catching up with you more in future.

 

[Adrain]

That BitBucket link proved fabulous @Quintillus. I was able to determine a great deal that I was unaware of previously. I believe I may have added a whole one item that wasn't already known (Play Order at 0x0008) - and that's not fully confirmed at this point :-(
(I subsequently determined this wasn't reliable so nothing new from me I'm afraid.)

I have listed the layout in my usual form and will post it where I've posted all the other details in the The Civilization III Save Format thread. I'm assuming that you're comfortable with all that info going public as you posted your BitBucket link publicly, but if that's not cool then I'll remove it - or any part that is particularly sensitive if that works. Do let me know if there's a problem.

 

[Stew Pid]

When using this editor, how would one go about exporting a unit from one biq/scenario file with all its stats, art, pedialocon/civlopedia entries and importing it in another biq/scenario file with everything intact?

Any help would be appreciated.

 

[Adrain]

Hi Stew.

If you hear nothing back by the weekend (I'm not assuming here. I don't want to jump in but I'd like to help if none is forthcoming elsewhere.) I may be able to help with a more manual process so post again then and I'll respond more directly.

I certainly understand doing it using the tool is a much easier approach, but if that's not one of its abilities then I'd be happy to explore a more manual approach for you.

As I say, post back here on the weekend if the easy answer doesn't appear here by then.

Good luck

 

[Stew Pid]

Hi Stew.

If you hear nothing back by the weekend (I'm not assuming here. I don't want to jump in but I'd like to help if none is forthcoming elsewhere.) I may be able to help with a more manual process so post again then and I'll respond more directly.

I certainly understand doing it using the tool is a much easier approach, but if that's not one of its abilities then I'd be happy to explore a more manual approach for you.

As I say, post back here on the weekend if the easy answer doesn't appear here by then.

Good luck

Well I've heard nothing over the weekend.

 

[Adrain]

Well I've heard nothing over the weekend.

Well in that case I suggest you post a ZIPped copy of your two biq/scenario files and explain what you wanted copied across.

Bear in mind I can make no promises at this stage other than I'll look into it for you. I'm quietly confident, but it's new territory so results are not guaranteed.

 

[Quintillus]

When using this editor, how would one go about exporting a unit from one biq/scenario file with all its stats, art, pedialocon/civlopedia entries and importing it in another biq/scenario file with everything intact?

Any help would be appreciated.

Alas, that is not currently possible in an automated fashion. Along with a (perhaps surprisingly) low number of requests for it, the other problem is the same problem that affects doing so manually - how far do you follow the chain of things it depends on? E.g. art, tech (and transitively tech icons), buildings for unit telepads (and all that they depend on), other units that are valid stealth attack targets, required resources... if you follow it to the reductio ad absurdum state, it could wind up bringing in almost an entire BIQ's worth of things the unit depends on.

There's also the issue that currently, the editor has fairly limited support for things not directly related to BIQs, such as civilopedia entries.

That said, a limited approach could be possible in the future. As an example, the Import Map function currently imports only those resources that are present in both BIQ files. An approach of "connect the unit to its dependencies if they exist, otherwise set them to None" would be doable. However, I'm only sporadically working on the editor at this point, and already have an extensive goal for 2019-2020, described in post #1074.

If importing all units would be of use, I can recommend Mike B's Firaxis editor, which supports that.

 

[Stew Pid]

Alas, that is not currently possible in an automated fashion. Along with a (perhaps surprisingly) low number of requests for it, the other problem is the same problem that affects doing so manually - how far do you follow the chain of things it depends on? E.g. art, tech (and transitively tech icons), buildings for unit telepads (and all that they depend on), other units that are valid stealth attack targets, required resources... if you follow it to the reductio ad absurdum state, it could wind up bringing in almost an entire BIQ's worth of things the unit depends on.

There's also the issue that currently, the editor has fairly limited support for things not directly related to BIQs, such as civilopedia entries.

That said, a limited approach could be possible in the future. As an example, the Import Map function currently imports only those resources that are present in both BIQ files. An approach of "connect the unit to its dependencies if they exist, otherwise set them to None" would be doable. However, I'm only sporadically working on the editor at this point, and already have an extensive goal for 2019-2020, described in post #1074.

If importing all units would be of use, I can recommend Mike B's Firaxis editor, which supports that.

I mean the unit stats and specific abilities aren't that important, it just sucks having to constantly edit the civilopedia and pedialocons of a scenario everytime you want to add a new unit in.

 

[Kirejara]

Hi Quintillus,

could it be possible to alter the dificult levels via the SAV-Action?

In the last few games I found, that the KI could no longer pose a thread in late game, simply because my own empire has become too large and strong.

On my old PC I used the CIV3 Multitool to increase the dificult level, but I am no longer able to use it under Win7.

Thanks!

 

[Glutius Max]

I'm getting a message that it can't find the pcx file. Does anyone know how to correct this?

 

[Adrain]

Hi Glutius.

As there are many PCX files required I guess we're talking about one of many of them. I think I've seen a similar message myself but it always comes with a level of information that explains what's wrong.

If you could share the message in full then we could consider what may be wrong &/or what might be able to be done to fix it. Bear in mind we only know what you tell us about your particular situation so it may be helpful to explain what has been changed recently. There's a very good chance that has more than a little bearing on this issue.

Cheers -Ade.

 

[Adrain]

Hi Kirejara.

I'm afraid I have no idea how to change the difficulty level in use. It might be possible to update the settings for whichever is selected so that they match those of a higher level of your choice but I'm not sure if that's what you're after. That can be done simply enough in the SAV file.
Otherwise, I'm curious to hear that the MT doesn't work in Win7. I still use Win7 but haven't looked at the MT for ages. I can't even find it on my system. I do remember having used it to great benefit in the past however.

Do you have more details of why it doesn't run?

Cheers -Ade.

 

[Glutius Max]

Hi Glutius.

As there are many PCX files required I guess we're talking about one of many of them. I think I've seen a similar message myself but it always comes with a level of information that explains what's wrong.

If you could share the message in full then we could consider what may be wrong &/or what might be able to be done to fix it. Bear in mind we only know what you tell us about your particular situation so it may be helpful to explain what has been changed recently. There's a very good chance that has more than a little bearing on this issue.

Cheers -Ade.

The problem seems to have disappeared after reinstalling the game. It was happening when ever I tried to open a biq file. It may have had something to do with the file path being wrong. Thanks for the quick reply though.