Customized Civis screen

[Pla5ma]

Hello,

as nice as Rise of Mankind is Civics screen is annoying as hell.
Shure its difficult to get the information on one screen but it doesnt makes it better.

I customized it for better overview. Please try it and leave comments...

PS: Right now I´m working on a brand new and scrollable version...

 

[Abraxis]

how did you change it? I dare you to post a screenshot of it; no, no i DOUBLE dare you to!!!

 

[Dancing Hoskuld]

@Pla5ma, did you know that there is already a scrollable version of the Civics screen by john smith? See http://forums.civfanatics.com/showthread.php?t=317432. Naturally, yours may be better, or better suited to purpose.

I downloaded yours and had a look. Nice work

 

[Afforess]

I agree the civics screen needs some work. I can't tell what half the civics do until I research them because of how long the lists are.

 

[Deon]

Well, you can right-click them which brings you to pedia but it annoys a bit and also not the best solution to the problem. Good work!

 

[jooyo]

This is great idea. Now, I cant play without this

 

[zappara]

Nice civic screen modification. I'll add it to v2.7

 

[Pla5ma]

Nice Zap

But maybe you want my next version.
I heard you want more civis...

So take a look what will be finished until weekend.

Comments welcome!

PS: Right now i try to get a phyton loop. Its a little bit tricky because i know how to do things in C++, C# and VB.NET (I´m an application developer) but i never worked with phyton before.

 

[Munger]

Hmm, think I prefer the original as there's no scrolling required.

 

[zappara]

Nice Zap

But maybe you want my next version.
I heard you want more civis...

So take a look what will be finished until weekend.

Comments welcome!

PS: Right now i try to get a phyton loop. Its a little bit tricky because i know how to do things in C++, C# and VB.NET (I´m an application developer) but i never worked with phyton before.

Nice! How did you manage to get the text appear in correct boxes when you scroll back to start of the screen? As in this mod's warlords version I tried scrolling civics screen and I couldn't get the civic modifier's text shown correctly to those panels (I was using code made for Visa or some other modpack) and obviously I had to discard that idea for long time.

 

[Pla5ma]

Nice! How did you manage to get the text appear in correct boxes when you scroll back to start of the screen? ...

There is no way to attach multiline displays to an also attached thing.
I tried everything including tables and so on.
So i have done the hard way...

Sounds easy:
- count linebreaks in multiline string
/ Loop until line number = count linebreak
- get first occurrence of linebreak
- get substring from 0 to first occurence
- display substring as single line
- split remaining part of multiline string
\

Right now all works fine and looks very good. I never liked scrollable civics i saw in the past. First my one was new and different but after playing 1-2 test games i dont want to miss it.

Only one thing must be done before it is ready. I have some problems left with to long lines. I work on a subroutine which will cut this lines in seperate parts but due to nature of civ font it is hard to calculate length of a line before displaying.

Actual screenshot:

 

[zappara]

Once you get it all working, I think you should release it also as a python mod component so that all the other modders can find it and use it if they want. I've seen many requests for scrollable civics screen.

 

[konradcabral]

Regarding the civics screen, I would like to see two improvements:
- The description of the effects for civics that wasn't reached technologically too.
- A simulation of how it would change the total gold, beacons and etc.

BTW, excellent job!

 

[Pla5ma]

- The description of the effects for civics that wasn't reached technologically too.

Thats the main reason for my scrollable bigger screen. If you hover over a civic it is able to display all the information without scrolling.
Scrolling wasnt possible with not researched techs because you couldnt click it.

- A simulation of how it would change the total gold, beacons and etc.

As soon i finish my long line problem i will see to implement some info functions.
I said before i´m totally new to python and civ modding (2 days now) but i think some nice things would be possible.

Keep suggestions coming!

 

[zappara]

Keep suggestions coming!

Well well, this reminds we of something I've thought about: Why can't there be a panel in civics screen which shows the combined/overal effects of the chosen civics? This would help players understand better what they are getting from their civic choices. I don't know if this kind of panel would be possible to make.

 

[zup]

I'd love some more documentation on how big the effects on rebelliousness are. The only way I found in game is to change civics and then check revolution watch.

 

[Pla5ma]

There is my new version of civics screen.

I resolved the problem with to long lines and now it is able to display multilines.
All looks good now.

After a test game of my wife she told me about another problem.
Links to Sevopedia are not functional. Right now I see no solution to solve this.
Maybe i will add an addional wrapper to remove links. We all know the information behind civics and so it isnt so bad.

Right now I´m working to add additional information.
For example a "Revolution simulation". This means you will be able to show stuff like income, research and so on after civic change.

 

[zappara]

I'll put your new version to test and report in few days how it's working

 

[Psyringe]

Good work. I'm playing my first RoM game at the moment, and the civics screen was indeed a bit clunky so far.

However, I can imagine some demand for the old civics screen as well. The scrollable screen is much better if you're still learning the complex effects of the RoM civics, but the old screen *does* have the advantage that all settings are available without scrolling around. A player who already knows the civic effects miht appreciate that.

I think it might be possible to have the best of both worlds by keeping the old civics screen, but allow to click on civics that you haven't researched yet (and add a check that the "Revolution" button only appears if all selected civics are actually avaulable to the player). This way, the civic list would remain on a single screen, and people could scroll the effects lists even of civics that they can't choose yet.

However, I realize that development has taken a different path at the moment, and I'm not sure whether Pla5ma would like to work on an idea that's taking such a different approach.

 

[Pla5ma]

I´m still working on my scrolling version.

Things I have done:
- civics screen width depends on screen resolution like other BUG mod screens
- Information button added

Things I work on:
- Calculation of civilization specific values after civic change to show comparison in info screen

@Zappara:
How can I store application wide variables?
If I know it I will merge both civic screen versions for ROM. Non-scrollable and scrollable. And I will add a dropdown box to select which version should be displayed.
But for that I need a variable to store selected screen type....