HOF Questions and Answers Thread

[Methos]

I' very sad for this, even if i expected it.

It's still hard. I'm sorry for your loss.

 

[ParadigmShifter]

Sorry to hear about your cat BLubmuz.

 

[Sun Tzu Wu]

You can done load and open any vanilla game with the current HOF Mod. Changes to Warlords and BTS prevented us from doing that with those.

I tried to read some save files from the HOF that require HOF-3.13.001.

I have BTS 3.17 and HOF-3.13.001 and HOF-3.17.001. I loaded HOF-3.13.001 as directed, but BTS 3.17 still refuses to load the file.

I mainly just want to see the initial position of a HOF-3.13.001 game at the beginning of turn 0. Isn't there anyway to do this?

Sun Tzu Wu

 

[Denniz]

I tried to read some save files from the HOF that require HOF-3.13.001.

I have BTS 3.17 and HOF-3.13.001 and HOF-3.17.001. I loaded HOF-3.13.001 as directed, but BTS 3.17 still refuses to load the file.

I mainly just want to see the initial position of a HOF-3.13.001 game at the beginning of turn 0. Isn't there anyway to do this?

Sun Tzu Wu

You need a dual install with patch 3.13 installed.

I generally copy my Civilization IV directory to another name before I install a new patch. (i.e. I have a "Firaxis Games\Sid Meier's Civilization 4 [3.13]" path.) I also rename the corresponding "My Games" folder. When you run a game it will recreate a new one for the new patch.

 

[TheMeInTeam]

Just to be clear on gauntlet conditions, if you clear multiple victory conditions the same turn, does it matter which is displayed as long as you cleared the relevant one? I'm guessing no but I haven't seen an definitive answer and the search function is acting a little touchy with this kind of thing lately (how would I word such a search to not give me tons of garbage...)

 

[Methos]

Just to be clear on gauntlet conditions, if you clear multiple victory conditions the same turn, does it matter which is displayed as long as you cleared the relevant one? I'm guessing no but I haven't seen an definitive answer and the search function is acting a little touchy with this kind of thing lately (how would I word such a search to not give me tons of garbage...)

We take the displayed victory condition and ignore the rest. I know that from experience, one of my fastest culture games ever hit the dom limit on the same turn as a culture victory and went from a possible #1 culture to nothing.

 

[TheMeInTeam]

We take the displayed victory condition and ignore the rest. I know that from experience, one of my fastest culture games ever hit the dom limit on the same turn as a culture victory and went from a possible #1 culture to nothing.

Isn't this a little questionable as a rule? You can clearly see if other victory conditions were met, and as far as I can tell the one displayed/picked is COMPLETELY RANDOM . It seems the policy is unnecessarily arbitrary then and I'm sorry you got screwed that way...I'll mind it in case it makes a difference in my games...thanks.

 

[Methos]

There is actually an order to how victory conditions are determined, though unfortunately I can't currently recall what it is. In other words, certain conditions take precedence over other victory conditions. Hopefully someone here in the HOF forums can recall the order and how its determined. We take the victory that is determined by the game and part of the challenged is not only winning by your chosen condition, but by not winning by the conditions you choose not to.

 

[TheMeInTeam]

There is actually an order to how victory conditions are determined, though unfortunately I can't currently recall what it is. In other words, certain conditions take precedence over other victory conditions. Hopefully someone here in the HOF forums can recall the order and how its determined. We take the victory that is determined by the game and part of the challenged is not only winning by your chosen condition, but by not winning by the conditions you choose not to.

Hmmm, maybe it isn't completely random, but it has some random element then. I've cleared conquest and domination simultaneously numerous times in the past (although never in HoF which I just got into), typically by gaining both through vassalage of a final civ. I have, for certain, been given both victory conditions this way, and haven't been able to determine what makes the game pick one or the other or why it varied. Of course, HoF may very well have an order that standard doesn't - I never looked carefully at what the mod does.

Long story short, it means that we have to be sure to only win one victory condition: the intended one. I don't agree with the decision, but that isn't what's important here . It isn't a problem that will occur often regardless.

 

[ParadigmShifter]

There was some discussion about this in a recent-ish major, some people said if they moved all their units before hitting end turn vs. not moving all units before end turn they got a different VC.

 

[Denniz]

Hmmm, maybe it isn't completely random, but it has some random element then. I've cleared conquest and domination simultaneously numerous times in the past (although never in HoF which I just got into), typically by gaining both through vassalage of a final civ. I have, for certain, been given both victory conditions this way, and haven't been able to determine what makes the game pick one or the other or why it varied. Of course, HoF may very well have an order that standard doesn't - I never looked carefully at what the mod does.

Long story short, it means that we have to be sure to only win one victory condition: the intended one. I don't agree with the decision, but that isn't what's important here . It isn't a problem that will occur often regardless.

The victory condition awarded by Civ4 is not something we have modified. As ParadigmShifter noted, there appears to be a bug that can change the order checked. (We have a to-do to check out fixing the bug.)

Fundimentally, the HOF is for unaltered play. We restrict the mods we include to those that provide assistance with things you can do yourself if you wanted to. The only exception are the occasional bug fix, where it is clearly something not the intent of the Firaxis, and a few exploits.

The basic design of the HOF assumes only on victory condition per game. Unless Firaxis made some change I am not aware of, there should only be one victory noted in the in-game HOF. That is the one we are using.

 

[culdeus]

Super dumb question, but how do you add a user comment to the log ingame?

 

[BLubmuz]

Super dumb question, but how do you add a user comment to the log ingame?

I already answered to my teammate's question in our SG thread (Alt+E, anyway).

You can spend the time i saved you by better check my rejected submission, and maybe that stupid SW you're using.

One more mistake like this and you can definitely throw it in the toilet

Just to be clear, since i'm sure i do not replay a single move, i wanna know exactly where you find this, and in public.

 

[Methos]

Super dumb question, but how do you add a user comment to the log ingame?

I suggest looking over the Autolog feature of the HOF mod, but in the simplest terms, turn on the autologger and use Alt E to insert your comment.

Just to be clear, since i'm sure i do not replay a single move, i wanna know exactly where you find this, and in public.

I apologize, but we feel it is for the best if we do not discuss publicly why we accept or reject a submission, even if the player permits it. We do take all requests for a second look seriously and discuss it among staff and make our decision.

 

[BLubmuz]

I apologize, but we feel it is for the best if we do not discuss publicly why we accept or reject a submission, even if the player permits it. We do take all requests for a second look seriously and discuss it among staff and make our decision.

I don't wanna start a war, but if needed...
I want publicly discuss this for 2 reasons:
a) i'm absolutely sure i played that map accordingly with the HoF rules
b) given the point above, and the fact that you are making a mistake, in the interest of the staff/members relations and of the clarity of your procedure, it's better to know what tells you i replay that map, since i didn't.

on topic, let's see what i did:
1) start a custom game, choose map, opponents, etc.
2) saved first map
3) regenerate some dozen maps, saved some 10-12. this is a1, so it's probably the first good start point saved
4) stop the generation process, re-open some maps and choose which can be better (just looking at it)
5) in this game i remember i made an attempt i abandoned after 15 turns or so, but with another map
6) decided to play this one, 2 sessions since it was late night
7) after saved the victory, re-opened some map until i found the correct one (i use the autolog to identify the start map, but i called it a6 instead of a1)
8) submitted, and unfortunately, deleted all the remaining maps: i don't like games not starting in ancient age.

Now, i wanna know *exactly* where do you found a sign i replay this map.
Sure i loaded the start 2 or 3 times before actually play and once after victory, but *never* made a single move or else, just look at it.
Never crashed in game.

eagerly awaiting an exhaustive and public answer.

 

[karmina]

Sure i loaded the start 2 or 3 times before actually play

I might be wrong, but wouldn't that violate the two rules of
1. performing a manual save at the end of each session
2. playing at least 1 hour per session?

(1.) could generate the same fingerprint as actually replaying some moves.

Which leads me to a related question: Is it okay to let mapfinder save a number of starts, then quit civ and load any of these saves? If you read it literally, this would violate the second rule mentioned above.

What you did after victory doesn't matter since the HoF mod doesn't alter or overwrite your actual victory savegame.

 

[ruff_hi]

I've found myself in this situation too (hunting for the start save in a pack of mapfinder starts) and always worried that opening the save to verify it is the one I played from would cause a HOF rejection issue.

Thus my comments a while back about getting the mapfinder to change the in-game players name (which gets used as a basis of the save name) so that each game had a unique in-game name and generated unique save file names.

Here is another suggestion ... have the mapfinder utility write a permanent entry into the in-game log that contained the mapfinder file name. Then you could just scroll back your log to the beginning of time (or lift it during the victory replay) to get the mapfinder file name.

Or you could use the python utility to save that information in the save file and have it displayed on one of the HOF option screens.

[tab]"Game created via Mapfinder - fiile XYZ"

 

[berserks01]

Off topic for a moment and probably a stupid question, but ...

Is it valid for me to install and use graphic mods and still submit a valid HOF entry?

 

[BLubmuz]

@berserks01
A graphic mod like Blue Marble is OK, unless you have compatibility problems.

@ruff-hi
i didn't used MF, just Alt+G to regenerate and evaluate the map.
But your suggestion to log the initial save seems good

@karmina
no, i did not violated any rule: if you do nothing but just look at the map, it is NOT considered a playing session, see also the XotM. There's people opening the initial save, look at it, think to the possibilities, close and actually play in another moment.
If i only moved an explorer (we're talking about an Industrial start) i would have saved to follow the rules. But i'd have violated the "time" rule, so i generate a lot of maps, and play until i abandon or win.

@ Staff and all
i started this 'cause i'm sure there's an error somewhere in the checking SW, and to help to correct it.
I'm also sure the Staff will give the max consideration to this, and to avoid this error causes mistakes in future.
Needless to say my appreciation for their work.

Who do something can make a mistake, only who do nothing never make mistakes - Blub

 

[TheMeInTeam]

Correct me if I'm mistaken, but the following would actually net you EQM status:

1. Win every victory and with every civ on tiny maps exclusively. Use each map type eligible for HoF once. After doing this, run starting eras again on tiny exclusively. Use each different speed at least once too, probably quick for culture and whatnot.
2. Win major/minor gauntlets to clear that requirement.
3. Win one of each map size, regardless of victory method or map type.

This doesn't sound like a method to get 'er done in the fewest # of games, but it certainly sounds like the easiest approach. Q scores be !@#$ though .

I might wait until Oct 25, then try to attain EQM status in one month, just for fun. I'm not sure I'll have time but it'd be a blast to try.