Frequently Asked Questions
- Thread starter Kael
- Start date
I have two situations:
1) I'm playing with another 10 civilizations. As they get more technologies and growing up, my game begins more slowly as before. when i pass the turn, i have to wait about 25 seconds to play again. Is it happen with anyone ?
2) Playing as a neutral civilization, against 7 Evil, one Good and 2 other neutral, I want to be good. How can I do this? My civilization is the neutral elvens.
Thanks a lot!
1) I'm playing with another 10 civilizations. As they get more technologies and growing up, my game begins more slowly as before. when i pass the turn, i have to wait about 25 seconds to play again. Is it happen with anyone ?
2) Playing as a neutral civilization, against 7 Evil, one Good and 2 other neutral, I want to be good. How can I do this? My civilization is the neutral elvens.
Thanks a lot!
I have two situations:
1) I'm playing with another 10 civilizations. As they get more technologies and growing up, my game begins more slowly as before. when i pass the turn, i have to wait about 25 seconds to play again. Is it happen with anyone ?
2) Playing as a neutral civilization, against 7 Evil, one Good and 2 other neutral, I want to be good. How can I do this? My civilization is the neutral elvens.
Thanks a lot!
Yes, I've mentioned this before. I play Epic or Marathon on a Huge map with the default 10 civs. In the later game, I have the same problem as you with up to a minute to wait after I finish my turn. I have a pretty powerful system.
One thing I mentioned that I suppose is a vanilla civ thing is the bizarre behavior of AI units that probably contributes to this lag time between turns. You can see units with multiple move just spinning in a couple of adjacent tiles and never really going anywhere. It is not like they are patrolling like in a real-time strategy game. Anyway, if those bizarre and unnecessary moves could be stopped, maybe the lag time would decrease.
I think if you convert to the Runes of Kilmorph or The Order religions you will change from Neutral to Good. I am still trying to understand, though, how Perpentach went from Evil to Good with Fellowship of Leaves after I built the Mercurian Gates.
BeefontheBone
Windbag of the sea
- Joined
- Nov 7, 2005
- Messages
- 2,018
Runes won't make you good if you're neutral IIRC - the Order definitely will, though. Evil civs adopting Runes do switch to neutral.
I noticed the same. Tried to use the option: Do not show friendly moves together with no enemy moves? Then I did not see them. I felt the system worked faster - a little. IMO it's the loading time of the pictures which consumes CPU time.
I turned off Show Enemy Moves and Show Friendly Moves a long time ago. Also I use Quick moves and Quick combat.
iamjooish
Chieftain
- Joined
- Apr 27, 2007
- Messages
- 76
The trick is founding any of them yourself, sending out the missionaries, and asking everyone to convert via diplomacy. [/QUOTE]
Do you have open borders? Do you recommend this?[/QUOTE]
I arrange open borders with every leader I can!
Do I recommend this? Well I found multiple faiths when I can. But for just one? Oh yes. You play it right you can go to war with whoever the hell you please and then have everyone else faithful to dogpile them, but not have war declared on you so much as without. You can build everything up without paying too much attention to military, until the late game where most of the techs are discovered and the world wonders are already built, then military becomes important again. (And mostly because that's my playing style.)If you have a different faith than most and doubly so if you don't have the patriarch most civs follow, you won't have much stability with the other civs, and you'll need to be ready for war at any turn; even after making peace out of your exhaustive stalemate with a neighbor that looked like a whimp at first(!).
iamjooish
Chieftain
- Joined
- Apr 27, 2007
- Messages
- 76
Immensely so, and this is using a 2.6ghz pentium4 with ATI x800. and 1 gig of ram. I had sense enough to get another gig of ram so I upgraded recently but I haven't played too much since. It does seem to perform better and remain stable for longer periods of time.
It still eats up more memory with time, and that usage goes away once I reload (even after some hard drive grinding and taking a glance at cities, units, some animating resources). It doesn't clean up after itself well, figuretively speaking. I can also play some really developed maps for the longest time, start a much smaller map that isn't populated yet, and crash. Smaller maps and fewer players tend to help, as well as having enough memory available for Civ4 to "breathe". Quit and reload your last save occasionally. It helps, but not too much for big maps and not enough memory for them. It makes a significant difference during the first 100 or so turns. Consider changing the civ4 ini file that's found, provided you have some idea of what you're doing. I wouldn't be surprised if there was an FAQ about tweaking the settings and defaults of Civ4 around here somewhere, but I haven't checked, and against my own advice I've poked around in the dark with this.
And as I hinted at, using a smaller map size can help a good bit. Using fewer civs helps as well. You can still have an interesting game with 5 AIs, instead of 18 like I tend to do. You'll just be able to finish and go through turns more quickly.
What else... OH! In the game options, under the graphics tab, there's a ton of things you can do to speed it up. I suggest setting the two menus on the left to "Low". Lower resolutions may help too, for some of the older gfx cards with lower "fillrate" (don't ask).
One last thing, I remember seeing something about a mod that disables some extraneous graphics and speeds it up. I wouldn't try to use it with FFH2, because there is just no simple way to make 2 different mods overlap, that I know of.
Thanks for some useful information on speeding up the game, although I don't think I would want to reduce the map size or number of civs. 
One other thing I noticed is that if I am deep into an Epic/Marathon game after some turns (maybe 50), some of the units turn black. Not, all, but some. I have to mouse over the units to see what they are, or, preferably, exit and restart.
I have a video card with 256mg, but I'm guessing it happens because I play with the high resolution turned on.
Does anyone play FFH2 on a laptop? I had real graphics issues with mine and gave up.
One other thing I noticed is that if I am deep into an Epic/Marathon game after some turns (maybe 50), some of the units turn black. Not, all, but some. I have to mouse over the units to see what they are, or, preferably, exit and restart.
I have a video card with 256mg, but I'm guessing it happens because I play with the high resolution turned on.
Does anyone play FFH2 on a laptop? I had real graphics issues with mine and gave up.
How interesting! I play completely with another strategy by blocking whole landscapes with my closed borders. So some civs cannot spread quite easily, this becomes a certain disadvantage for them. So they are behind in expansion and can be overcome more easily.
iamjooish
Chieftain
- Joined
- Apr 27, 2007
- Messages
- 76
Thanks for some useful information on speeding up the game, although I don't think I would want to reduce the map size or number of civs.
Me neither. Huge, epic, 18 players. WIIIIDE turns! Followed by "where has the day gone?"memory problems, definitely. save, exit completely, load the save back up and continue until the problems start again.. rinse, repeat
I have one with 256. What resolution are you using, just to be sure?
Screen resolutions shouldn't be a problem on memory(i think), compared to 'fillrate'. Fillrate is how fast your card puts 'dots' on the screen, including the surfaces of any object or person in the game. For example the Oblivion game eats fillrate like godzilla; moreso as you turn on all the options in graphics. Oblivion is also the reason I bought ATI's x800. (Bastiges!
) A high resolution could make the game 'choppy', or play a bit like a slideshow...
It would help to know a few general facts about ram, cpu, and video card.
I don't use a lap' but my dad does and it's a POS. Bit of a broad brush, but last time I bothered to check, laptops don't offer nearly as much speed for dollars spent. Not that it matters, but laptops also need to be handled as gently as a glass phone book. Meh!
gabriel21 said:
Nah... let them build cities so mine can get fat and well-to-do off their trade.
What difficulty level do you use or plan on using?
Thanks for your response.
Yes, that's what I do - when the black units start to appear, I save, exit and restart and I am OK for about another 50 or so turns.
My laptop has a decent processor and memory, but no graphics card to speak of. I think it borrows from the RAM for graphics.
I was wondering if there are laptops out there that don't cost an arm and a leg that can be used for FFH2. I take very long plane trips and it would be great to kill some time playing my favorite game/mod.
Yes, that's what I do - when the black units start to appear, I save, exit and restart and I am OK for about another 50 or so turns.
My laptop has a decent processor and memory, but no graphics card to speak of. I think it borrows from the RAM for graphics.
I was wondering if there are laptops out there that don't cost an arm and a leg that can be used for FFH2. I take very long plane trips and it would be great to kill some time playing my favorite game/mod.
Greeneyedzombie
King
Disciple units don't count as living units?
I can't seem to cast spells on them, with the discription, can be cast on all living units.
I can't seem to cast spells on them, with the discription, can be cast on all living units.
Nikis-Knight
Deity
Most should be living. Some spells have damage caps which would not work on overly injured units, regardless of type. What is the specific situtaion?
iamjooish
Chieftain
- Joined
- Apr 27, 2007
- Messages
- 76
pricegrabber
Regarding Staphanos: In a .21 game I weakened him quite easily and effectively by Air III. In my new .22h he is absolutely immune to Air III and only sometimes can be hit with Fire III (one meteor out of six showed an effect). But he is almost killed by a single chariot (from 18+ to 2-3)! Is this normal or just an outcome of statistics (i.e. good luck or bad luck)? Stephanos is strength 18+ and strongly hit by an unit with a third only?!
Can anyone give me here substantial hints?
Can anyone give me here substantial hints?
Gabriel, I play my games at the slower speeds and usually do not have Level III spells available to deal with the likes of Stephanos.
Yes, it is shocking that you brought Stephanos down that far. If I remember correctly, he is not only strength 18, but has about 6-7 unholy damage too.
First, as mentioned in another thread, I am surprised the Chariot (I am assuming it did not have Courage) was even able to engage the Horseman, but it is possible as Xanaqui explained. Second, you always see very bizarre victories and defeats in this game/mod. Although the Chariot didn't win, it was a great victory as it brought the Horseman down to where he could be easily killed by another unit. I imagine your odds of winning that battle were less than .01%.
But, as you know, you can also lose your share of battles 99.9% and even 100% in your favor. I think you just had some very incredible luck in that one my friend.
Dear SarisinGabriel, I play my games at the slower speeds and usually do not have Level III spells available to deal with the likes of Stephanos.
Yes, it is shocking that you brought Stephanos down that far. If I remember correctly, he is not only strength 18, but has about 6-7 unholy damage too.
First, as mentioned in another thread, I am surprised the Chariot (I am assuming it did not have Courage) was even able to engage the Horseman, but it is possible as Xanaqui explained. Second, you always see very bizarre victories and defeats in this game/mod. Although the Chariot didn't win, it was a great victory as it brought the Horseman down to where he could be easily killed by another unit. I imagine your odds of winning that battle were less than .01%.
But, as you know, you can also lose your share of battles 99.9% and even 100% in your favor. I think you just had some very incredible luck in that one my friend.
, exactly this should not be the case in our game. I am aware of the probability calculation and you are quite right in it and its result. I prefer calculabe effects and dislike dices. So the probability shall have its limits otherwise you can overcome a tank with a stone and a sling. And such things should not be considered seriously. But that means, try so often as you will, in one case you are able to win. Regarding the loading times ... good night. Sounds uninteresting.
Your assumption is right, the cariot had no Courage. But why Staphanos was almost immune to Air III or Fire III? I did not notice any information about it in his properties.
By the way, I used to play epic or marathon, but eraded too many cities in an early game, so the AC got so high. Now I am better informed and more careful. But I have learnt to develop such III-spells (and fireball too) very soon, they are decisive - but nontheless not always as pictured out above. And this I want to know to finetune my strategies.
kenken244
Grammar Nazi
all apocolaypse horsemen are magic immune
