Cross-Platform Civ3 Editor

Cross-Platform Editor for Conquests now available! 1.48

I recommend bookmarking this post, which has the Windows-with-bundled-Java version, formerly known as the Windows XP version: https://forums.civfanatics.com/thre...ts-now-available.377188/page-52#post-15224364 Try the 1.39 version included there.

Java 8 only unofficially supports XP, and updates after Update 111 (at least through Update 152) have bugs that cause parts of the editor to not work properly. I suspect you may be running into those bugs if you are using a fully updated Java 8 on Windows XP, but just the regular editor version from the Downloads Database.

I still run the editor semi-frequently on my Windows XP laptop, so it should work fine as long as the Java version isn't too new and buggy.

If you are having issues with the bundled Java version, please post more details about where it's failing.

Thanks, I'll check
 
@Quintillus,
I would be interested to see if a national population can be given to a city in the editor, so the game mode can start with the game starting there so that the Greek population can be set up in the Greek city occupied by the Persians. If not already, can such an option be inserted into the Cross-Platform Editor. I have also found that resettled foreign workers retain their nationality in the city as well, but this can be done while playing.
:)
There would be excellent opportunities in the pre-set ethnic population to create mods
 
Is this guaranteed to be right? I suspect not. It may be outdated. It's where I got my understanding from though.
The Pedia is certainly not 100% reliable, but I couldn't say how useful it is in this case.
That's not my experience. I only noticed it a year or so ago but I ran numerous tests that indicated these are never turned.
If you have test-data, then you have more evidence than I do. But foreign Workers and Settlers added into your own towns would be very recent citizens, and so if they never assimilate, that certainly adds weight to the suggestion that the Pedia's description of how assimilation works is not correct.

I am curious, though: what was the assimilation-probability used?
Interesting. I can confirm that when I've captured a city and then allowed new population to grow that building a Settler, far from helping me clear out the foreign nationals, would always strip MY new people from the city :-(
I always just assumed, I suppose, that they were used because they were the most recent. Your explanation works just as well of course.
My (usually Emperor-level) epic-game wars of expansion towards Domination (or farmland-acquisition) usually begin in earnest during the late Medieval/early Industrial, once I can produce Cavs, and then later Infantry/Artillery, in quantity. I am also usually running a Republic (2% assimilation probability, IIRC), so do not have the option of whipping away foreign citizens in captured towns. So my policy on town-(re)capture is to freeze its growth (or put it into negative FPT) using Specialists, and set it to build Settlers and Workers (via forest-chops, cash-rushing and/or disbanding obsolete units as practical), to shrink the foreign population down as far as possible, before allowing the town to start re-growing with my own people. So I usually only get native units built when I've failed to pay attention, and let a captured town grow by accident.

But in a relatively recent game as the Persians (for which I might still have savegames, not sure), I got definite proof that older, native citizens get converted before more recently born foreigners.
Spoiler Story-telling... :
It was a randomly-rolled (3 byo cold wet 60% Archi?) map, with a solid Wall of Hills/Mountains due west and south of my capital, where the nearest semi-viable town-sites (still lots of Hills, no freshwater) were at distance 5–6. So I'd sent nearly all my early Settlers to the large, fertile, and (most importantly!) uninhabited expanses of river-Plains to the east instead, which later turned out to be a costly mistake. My initial wars had been mere skirmishes to trigger my GA, while pushing Zulu and Dutch colonists back into the sea to the west, but when that was done, my Military Advisor got cocky (= told me we were Average vs. Sumeria!), so I DoW'd them as well, hoping to at least extend my borders some way in that direction, before making peace at the next chokepoint (where there were the Horses I needed to build Cavs).

Didn't work out that way. Gil's ACavs (which I knew about) and Knights (which I didn't!) and later Cavs (eeeek!) rolled in from the west, and I had only 2 first-ring towns in their way. Although I held onto one of those (mainly because Gil simply ignored it, if I'm honest), I lost the other, giving him a clear shot at Persepolis, which he also took. While I managed to fight him to a standstill at that point without losing any more towns (mainly by decoying his units towards unguarded towns, while subjecting his stacks to heavy Treb bombardment and picking off stragglers using Immortals), it was very close-run thing. So later on, when I'd finally got a substantial stack of Cavs of my own, to recapture my towns and push west into Sumeria, Persepolis was my first priority. But by that point it was (back to) about Pop10, and mostly Sumerian — and when I started building Workers out of it, the first units were Persian! I had to take it all the way down to Pop1 (still Sumerian) before letting it regrow (also adding those Persian Workers back into it).
 
@Quintillus,
I would be interested to see if a national population can be given to a city in the editor, so the game mode can start with the game starting there so that the Greek population can be set up in the Greek city occupied by the Persians. If not already, can such an option be inserted into the Cross-Platform Editor. I have also found that resettled foreign workers retain their nationality in the city as well, but this can be done while playing.
:)
There would be excellent opportunities in the pre-set ethnic population to create mods

That would be interesting, but alas, the BIQ format does not support that. This is the BIQ structure for CITY:

Code:
CITY SECTION

  4    char        "CITY"

  4    long        number of cities



  For each city:

    4    long        length of city data (variable)

    1    byte        has walls

    1    byte        has palace

    24    string        city name

    4    long        owner type (0=None, 1=Barbarians, 2=Civ, 3=Player)

    4    long        number of buildings

    for each building

      4 long        builning ID

    4    long        culture

    4    long        owner (RACE ID, Player# (0=Player1 and so on) or Barbarian Tribe)

    4    long        size

    4    long        X

    4    long        Y

    4    long        city level

    4    long        border level

    4    long        use auto name

"size" is the only one that controls how many citizens there are, and there is no way to customize anything about those citizens.

Unfortunately, that means this is not possible in Civ III.
 
I am curious, though: what was the assimilation-probability used?
Bear in mind I was unaware even of the existence of this factor until you just introduced it to me. That said, I would assume it's somewhere within the difficulty level {DIFF}, or maybe even the Government {GOVT}, section. If you can give me an offset (and the relevant section obviously) I can look it up for you from the relevant Save Game.
So my policy on town-(re)capture is to freeze its growth (or put it into negative FPT) using Specialists, and set it to build Settlers and Workers (via forest-chops, cash-rushing and/or disbanding obsolete units as practical), to shrink the foreign population down as far as possible, before allowing the town to start re-growing with my own people. So I usually only get native units built when I've failed to pay attention, and let a captured town grow by accident.
Snap. Forest-chop is something else I never found the dating info for. Apparently a hundred years is required after the last chop before it yields any shields.
But in a relatively recent game as the Persians (for which I might still have savegames, not sure), I got definite proof that older, native citizens get converted before more recently born foreigners.
I don't doubt you. I doesn't take much to tell when someone is blowing smoke and you come across as someone who thinks and understands a great deal and notices details. Such people do make mistakes but tend not to overclaim on what they know. Also, I would infer the same understanding from your story ;-)
 
"size" is the only one that controls how many citizens there are, and there is no way to customize anything about those citizens.
I need to be careful here as the BIQ file and the Save Game files (which I have some understanding of and information for) are different animals so may not behave the same way.

So, I'll simply say what I know about the Save Game and you can confirm or deny how much similarity there is in the scenario files.

In the Save Game Format (SGF) each City has six different data structures that all start with the four letters {CITY}. These are differentiated by the length value that follows on. Following on from the last of these is a Population section - Hex values shown as \nn - {POPD\08\00\00\00}. This contains two Longs (32-bit integers using 4 bytes each). No of Specialists & Total No of Citizens.
Immediately after that follows an array of Citizens {CTZN\2C\01\00\00} that specify data for the population in the city, whether active or specialist. These include text to reflect their status and nationality, though I have yet to determine where the base data is within them that drives that text. Changing the text is easy. Setting it to behave consistently with that text I have not managed - but I'm convinced it's in there somewhere.

You'll see from the length of each element (0x12C == 300) that there's a fair bit of data for each one in there.
 
I need to be careful here as the BIQ file and the Save Game files (which I have some understanding of and information for) are different animals so may not behave the same way.

So, I'll simply say what I know about the Save Game and you can confirm or deny how much similarity there is in the scenario files.

In the Save Game Format (SGF) each City has six different data structures that all start with the four letters {CITY}. These are differentiated by the length value that follows on. Following on from the last of these is a Population section - Hex values shown as \nn - {POPD\08\00\00\00}. This contains two Longs (32-bit integers using 4 bytes each). No of Specialists & Total No of Citizens.
Immediately after that follows an array of Citizens {CTZN\2C\01\00\00} that specify data for the population in the city, whether active or specialist. These include text to reflect their status and nationality, though I have yet to determine where the base data is within them that drives that text. Changing the text is easy. Setting it to behave consistently with that text I have not managed - but I'm convinced it's in there somewhere.

You'll see from the length of each element (0x12C == 300) that there's a fair bit of data for each one in there.

That matches my understanding of the SAV file, but this editor currently does not use any SAV-specific data structures. Even when you use the SAV Actions -> Apply Rules Changes option, the most it knows how to do is find the embedded BIQ rules in a SAV file.

Fundamentally, there's no way to shoe-horn SAV constructs into the BIQ. You'd have to find a SAV editor to be able to modify citizen status and nationality. Some scenarios that take a long time to start via Civ Content do distribute pre-started SAV files, but most don't as those are unique per civilization and difficulty. Still, that's the only way to achieve what unartis was asking about. And alas, that sort of modification is beyond the planned scope of my editor.
 
That all makes good sense Quintillus. I don't use scenarios myself but I do often start with an early saved game.

Is it possible to set up scenarios with existing populated cities? I would assume so - with as much caution involved as with any assumption of course. If it is, then I would expect (Another assumption again I'm afraid.) that each such city (or town whatever) would need to have its citizens specified. Are you sure this information isn't stored in these files? I guess you probably are but I felt compelled to ask - just to be sure.

... then it seemed only sensible to look for myself. I'm not sure why it works that way but the information stored in the BIQ file for each city, even though when played they are fully populated, is minimal. Certainly no CTZN data within cities. There is CTZN data to define the different types (MetaData) but nothing pertaining to the individual items.

I guess that means saved games are the only way to do such a thing - and they suffer from being so much less flexible of course.
 
There is a version for Windows that bundles Java (including JavaFX) in this post: https://forums.civfanatics.com/thre...ts-now-available.377188/page-52#post-15224364

Alternately, the BellSoft JDK linked in the "Java Download Links" section of this thread includes JavaFX, and will run the "main" version unmodified. It's the main one I use nowadays.

The main problem with bundling is that bundling JavaFX with the editor would make it platform-specific (as well as a much larger download, although that is less of a concern now than in the past), and require building on separate operating systems (adding more time to each release). It's also difficult to bundle it in a way that doesn't require newer versions of Java, and dropping support for older operating systems. I'm hesitant to do that for a game that is almost 20 years old, and is sometimes run on older operating systems by members of the community due to various compatibility struggles that the game, or other community utilities such as CivAssist II, have with the most recent versions of Windows or macOS.

This makes sense. Thanks again for your work.
 
That said, I would assume it's somewhere within the difficulty level {DIFF}, or maybe even the Government {GOVT}, section. If you can give me an offset (and the relevant section obviously) I can look it up for you from the relevant Save Game.
In the (Firaxis) Editor, the assimilation-probabilities are all set under the "Governments" tab (along with the corruption-settings, free-unit numbers per town-size, non-free unit-maintenance costs, etc.), so I would assume that it would be in that section of the save-file as well. But I would have no idea exactly where.

As @Quintillus points out, though, the .biq used to generate a game is (also) included in every save-file from that game. So it's possible that the .biq info is what you're actually reading in the save-file format?
Snap. Forest-chop is something else I never found the dating info for. Apparently a hundred years is required after the last chop before it yields any shields.
Again AFAIK, everything I have seen in-game and read on CivFanatics leads me to understand that once a tile has been chopped, those [10] shields are gone for good: although the tile can be re-Forested, it can never be shield-chopped again. CivAssist II also has a function in the Map-screen which shows all the tiles which have ever been chopped. CAII reads the information directly from the (auto)save-file, and to the best of my knowledge, the status of a once-chopped tile never changes.

In the original Vanilla release, it's true that tiles could be re-planted and re-chopped, but this led to an exploit whereby the human player could simply pile a tall enough stack of a Workers on a single tile, and essentially acquire 'infinite' shields for the nearest town's current build. Firaxis therefore patched in the 'one-chop only' rule very early on, possible even prior to Vanilla 1.29f. So it's possible that you may not have found the tile-chop-date info, because it simply isn't there: just a 0 or 1 for "chopped" or "not".

Although I agree that a temporary embargo on re-planting/re-chopping might have made for more 'realism', keeping track of which tiles had been chopped would have been incredibly tedious (for the human). i.e. I don't think it would have improved the gameplay, unless some element was also added to the GUI to tell the human when any given tile would become available (e.g. disabling the Worker-job button for "Plant/Chop Forests" for that tile, for X turns/years after the last chop).
 
the .biq used to generate a game is (also) included in every save-file from that game. So it's possible that the .biq info is what you're actually reading in the save-file format?
Yes & no. Some info is there from the original BIQ but in most cases where it is held it's in a slightly different format. Some of which I know about and others not so much :-(
Again AFAIK, everything I have seen in-game and read on CivFanatics leads me to understand that once a tile has been chopped, those [10] shields are gone for good: although the tile can be re-Forested, it can never be shield-chopped again.
Well, I searched for where I'd got that snippet of info from & couldn't find anything. I then went to my latest game and tested out my theory. First I went to some terrain near cities in my possession for some hundreds of years where, generally speaking, there had been no requirements for local production boosting. None of these were re-choppable for shields. Then I went back to my second oldest city (My oldest has recently been adjusted to manage food consumption while building a wonder and that was done by forestation - before being returned to its current status as Settler Farm.), and found two tiles that were re-choppable. I can only assume chopping hadn't been in play for some reason that early on in my game. I can certainly agree 100 years isn't the delay, if ever there is any sort of re-chopping possible.

If I could remember where I got the idea from originally I'd share but I can find no reference to it anywhere. As you say - it isn't in the Civilopaedia :-( Maybe it's from an earlier version. I do have a book for Civ II with the Deluxe Edition but not even sure it had the concept of forest chopping for shields.
Although I agree that a temporary embargo on re-planting/re-chopping might have made for more 'realism', keeping track of which tiles had been chopped would have been incredibly tedious (for the human). i.e. I don't think it would have improved the gameplay, unless some element was also added to the GUI to tell the human when any given tile would become available (e.g. disabling the Worker-job button for "Plant/Chop Forests" for that tile, for X turns/years after the last chop).
There's nothing now. You just have to try it and see. If you're doing it anyway it's a bonus of course.
 
n the (Firaxis) Editor, the assimilation-probabilities are all set under the "Governments" tab (along with the corruption-settings, free-unit numbers per town-size, non-free unit-maintenance costs, etc.), so I would assume that it would be in that section of the save-file as well. But I would have no idea exactly where.

@tjs282
As you wrote, the assimilation rate can be set on the Governments tab, so its speed varies from government to government.
 

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@Quintillus
I am now learning to use your editor, the maximum choice of free technology for civilizations can only be four? whether there may be more in the Cross-Platform Editor.
This is why I'm asking. Since in my last mode there were civilizations for which I set up hidden unique technology in which all four free technologies were utilized to the maximum, I could no longer display their visible technology needs on the Civilization tab in Civilization basic editor.
 
At a certain point (having added so many units) I can't seem to delete anything without the editor being unable to open the scenario a lot of times. And deleting a building results in auto produced units being shuffled up . Is there anyway around this?
 
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@Quintillus

I really like your editor, but I have a few comments to make. (I numbered in the pictures).:mischief:
(if I write nonsense, close your eyes to it because I use the google translator):blush:


1. I noticed these in the map editor view: Would this mini map be a viewer?
2. What do these numbers mean?
CPEditor139_001.jpg

3. I encountered a problem on the map editor tab that when I get to this point the map editor gets stuck. can a large amount of LM terrain (sea) cause? This is where the image gets stuck and I can't use any part of the editor. the map is 180X180 tile size, made with the conquests editor. I modified it so much with the Cross Platform Editor that I also loaded LM terrain oceans. I'll see if the previous map gets stuck without any changes.
CPEditor139_002.jpg


I read earlier here on the forum that barbarian units can also evolve, where can this be set?

Thank you in advance for your reply.
 
@Quintillus

I really like your editor, but I have a few comments to make. (I numbered in the pictures).:mischief:
(if I write nonsense, close your eyes to it because I use the google translator):blush:


1. I noticed these in the map editor view: Would this mini map be a viewer?
2. What do these numbers mean?
3. I encountered a problem on the map editor tab that when I get to this point the map editor gets stuck. can a large amount of LM terrain (sea) cause? This is where the image gets stuck and I can't use any part of the editor. the map is 180X180 tile size, made with the conquests editor. I modified it so much with the Cross Platform Editor that I also loaded LM terrain oceans. I'll see if the previous map gets stuck without any changes.

4. I read earlier here on the forum that barbarian units can also evolve, where can this be set?

Thank you in advance for your reply.

Hi unartis! Thanks! I can answer two of the questions right away, and comment on the others. I appreciate the numbering of the issues in the picture, that made it nice and what the questions were referring to.

1. That is a tile viewer. When you click on a tile on the map, it should show that tile in that area. This is mainly for visual feedback on which tile has been selected.

There isn't a mini-map viewer in the editor. However, you can zoom out to a fairly high degree, via Map -> Change Zoom (Ctrl+Shift+Z), as an alternative option.

2. Those are the radius of the paint brush when you are changing terrain - either 1x1 tile, 3x3 tiles, 5x5 tiles, or 7x7 tiles. They correspond to the square icons of different sizes in the Firaxis editor.

You are the second person to ask recently, which means I should probably add a tooltip or perhaps a label indicating their purpose. Or a better icon, but we'd probably need to find an artist for that.

3. Most likely, there is some tile at that point on the map that the editor is having trouble with, probably something to do with graphics. It usually will give the user a message when it encounters such a tile, but should at least put something in the log.txt file it creates. The ultimate way to test, however, is for me to load up the BIQ in the scenario. LM Sea shouldn't cause this issue, although I do notice some unusual things going on with sea-side mountains, so perhaps that has something to do with it.

I'll try to remember to download your mod and give it a try, but if it isn't available or if I don't remember (it is late here), remind me some time next week.

UPDATE: Downloaded the mod (already had Globalism, but not Fantasy). The editor is having trouble loading resource icons for some reason, and in some cases units_32.pcx icons. I haven't figured out exactly why yet and will probably have to look at it when I'm less tired, but I see resource icons in the Firaxis editor that I don't see in my editor, so there is probably an editor bug of some sort at play.

4. Other than the basic/advanced barbarian settings on the RULE tab, I am not sure of a way to do this. I didn't add anything specific for this beyond what Firaxis's editor offered. This is an area where another community member may well have a better idea than I have. The "it is late" may also be contributing to my lack of ideas here.
 
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2. Those are the radius of the paint brush when you are changing terrain - either 1x1 tile, 3x3 tiles, 5x5 tiles, or 7x7 tiles. They correspond to the square icons of different sizes in the Firaxis editor.

You are the second person to ask recently, which means I should probably add a tooltip or perhaps a label indicating their purpose. Or a better icon, but we'd probably need to find an artist for that.

Please feel free to use these. They are a token of my appreciation for this magnificent editor.
 

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