Modding Q&A

[Oni Ryuu]

Hi, I could use a little help.

I want to have an improvement that only the player will build and I’ve found that I don’t know what I’m doing with flavours. Also, what percent of shield cost is returned when you disband a unit in a city and can that percentage be increased?

 

[tjs282]

Hi, I could use a little help.

I want to have an improvement that only the player will build and I’ve found that I don’t know what I’m doing with flavours. Also, what percent of shield cost is returned when you disband a unit in a city and can that percentage be increased?

I think the answer to the first question might be that you can only do so, if the human player will always be assigned to a single specific faction. Then by making the building require an untradeable, optional 'era-none' tech, then giving that tech only to the 'Human' faction you can make the improvement buildable by the Player, but no AI-Civs. If you want the Player to be able to choose which Civ they play, then obviously that solution's no good. However, AFAIK (from browsing the C&C forum, so this is not definitive), Flavours really only help to encourage or discourage the AI from prioritising building an improvement, but they won't prevent it happening altogether.

The second question is easier: in the epic game, unit-disbands in towns always give 25% of the shield-cost back, rounded down (e.g. a disbanded Worker gives 2 shields, a Settler 7 shields, a Cavalry 20 shields, etc.). AFAIK (again!), that percentage is not changeable with the standard Editor (unless it's actually the inverse of the 'gold-cost per shield' for cash-rushing, i.e. 4 g per shield by default in the epic game).

In the epic game, the tech Recycling 'Enables recycling' (well, duh...) -- which I believe is what triggers that you also get a gold-payment for unit-disbands -- and IIRC, that gold-payment's also 25% of the shield-cost. So you could possibly get a little more bang for your disband-buck by giving a specific tech that attribute in your Mod. (Looking at the Editor, having a Recycling Center in a town doesn't seem to be necessary to give the gold-payment: the only flag checked for the RC is 'Reduces building pollution'; but if an RC is needed for the gold-bonus, you could give the RC's flag to one of your buildings).

 

[Laurana Kanan]

Curious: do you know if similar logic applies to the 'doubles Worker-speed' tech-flag? i.e. there's no point giving it to more than 1 tech, because applying it to 2 (or more) techs won't then get your Workers sped up by a cumulative factor of 4 (or 8, or 16, or ...)?

It is not cumulative, but can be simulated using unit upgrades and worker strength.

 

[justanick]

In the epic game, the tech Recycling 'Enables recycling' (well, duh...) -- which I believe is what triggers that you also get a gold-payment for unit-disbands -- and IIRC, that gold-payment's also 25% of the shield-cost.

The tech applies to buildings. In addition to 25% Gold you also get 25% shields when selling them. Disbanding units is not afffcted by the tech.

 

[Oni Ryuu]

Thanks tjs282 and justanick.

I’ll try using Custom Player Data to give that “era-none tech” to player one in Free Tech that should allow for a player only building and still be able to select a desired civilization. I’ll have to make a note stating that the tech will need to be given to however many people that are playing before they start a multi-player game. One complication though, I intended to have three buildings making the previous one obsolete. The second and third buildings will have to coincide with the discovery of a resource rather than a tech. I love this game but it always seems that I can only implement 1/50 of what I want.

Again, thanks for the help.

 

[Oni Ryuu]

I have an idea, if I use a custom editor like Quintilis’ that may make it possible to have a prerequisite tech for an era-none one. I’ll have to check into that but if it works it will limit the availability of the improvement to human only and still have it placed exactly where I want in the tech tree.

 

[Oni Ryuu]

I couldn't get it to work.

 

[Laurana Kanan]

This seems more like a topic for a separate thread in the C&C forum rather than in the General Discussion, QA/NQ.

 

[Rob (R8XFT)]

I had lots of unique buildings in Anno Domini and here's how I did it. As per the non-era techs advised above, ALL civilizations would get a non-era tech (actually they'd have four of them, but that's not necessarily relevant here). I'd choose certain areas of the tech tree to implement unique techs at which point unique buildings could be granted. Let's say for example that Bronze Working normally led to Iron Working, which had a smithy building. You could make it so that non-era tech A was a pre-requisite of Iron Working and was only granted to those not requiring the special building. Bronze Working + non-era tech B could lead to Metalworking, which could grant a metalworker building which would have different attributes to the smithy.

 

[Oni Ryuu]

Thanks Rob (R8XFT).
I'll give that a shot and hopefully i'll have my merchant navy.

 

[Oni Ryuu]

This is a simplified version of what I tried.

Tech A = Era none, none tradable, Free tech for player 1
Tech B = Not required for era advancement, none tradable, requires tech A, allows building.

Spoiler My previous attempt in full :

Trade Network = era none, not required advancement, not tradable, prerequisite tech X (e.g. Masonry)
TECH Trade Network1 = BLDG Storehouse (Goods), auto-pro 20, maintenance 6
= BLDG Gold Foundry (Gold), auto-pro 20, near gold, maintenance 5
TECH Trade Network2 = BLDG Warehouse (Cargo), auto-pro 20, maintenance 6
TECH Trade Network3 = BLDG Depot (Freight), auto-pro 20, maintenance 12
TECH Trade Network4 = BLDG Storage Yard (Shipping Container), auto-pro 20, maintenance 18
UNIT Gold – flag unit, nationless, immobile, foot, worth 200
UNIT Goods – 200 cost (=50), nationless, immobile, foot
UNIT Cargo – 300 cost (=60), nationless, immobile, foot
UNIT Freight – 500 cost (=125), nationless, immobile, foot
UNIT Shipping Container – 1000 cost (=250), nationless, immobile, mech

Anything requiring era-none tech will not show in-game no matter what convoluted system I try. I don’t know why and I’m sure I’ve used era-none tech as a prerequisite before.

EDIT: I've checked out you Anno Domini mod and noticed that you've used the civilisations page to assign free tech rather than the player page. It demonstrates a functional work-around but i'm worried that people will be discouraged by all the pregame editing (especially for multiplayer games). I'll consider that method a last resort although i am pleased that it's at least achievable.

 

[tjs282]

Trade Network = era none, not required advancement, not tradable, prerequisite tech X (e.g. Masonry)

Not sure I've understood this right, but if I have, then... I am pretty sure that era-none techs should not be given a prerequisite tech(s). They can themselves be prereq-techs, but not vice versa.

 

[Oni Ryuu]

I was hoping that “era-none” wasn’t part of the sequence of ages. It seems to work only as a pre ancient age.

 

[Rob (R8XFT)]

It does work as pre-ancient age, but does allow you the flexibility I described above. People won't be "put off" as it's all behind the scenes and hidden.

 

[tom2050]

Although Flavors may work somewhat well, as was mentioned they won't always work 100% of the time.

Not sure if this method is known or not, but I tested this, and it works 100% of the time for exactly what you need.. super easy to implement. Here is what I did, you can modify it as you need...
Set all civ's to Never build Happiness. Don't worry the AI still will build things like temples and colleseums and cathedrals, etc if the happiness building has something like culture also.

Set your human-only buildings to have 1 happiness, and nothing else (no culture, etc). It can have maintenance. AI will never build it ever again. Normal happiness buildings need to have something like culture, etc and AI will build them like normal.

And that's it. I tested it till like 1000 AD several times, first with temples, then I altered some other buildings properties to same thing, and works.

 

[tjs282]

Although Flavors may work somewhat well, as was mentioned they won't always work 100% of the time.

Not sure if this method is known or not, but I tested this, and it works 100% of the time for exactly what you need.. super easy to implement. Here is what I did, you can modify it as you need...
Set all civ's to Never build Happiness. Don't worry the AI still will build things like temples and colleseums and cathedrals, etc if the happiness building has something like culture also.

Set your human-only buildings to have 1 happiness, and nothing else (no culture, etc). It can have maintenance. AI will never build it ever again. Normal happiness buildings need to have something like culture, etc and AI will build them like normal.

And that's it. I tested it till like 1000 AD several times, first with temples, then I altered some other buildings properties to same thing, and works.

Awesome, I knew someone in C&C would have a better solution than mine!

So if Oni Ryu wants to have a human-only building that actually does something useful (e.g. auto-produce a unit, or boost production), all he needs to do is make that useful building require a 'human-happiness-only' building in the city (like a Uni-build needs a Lib first)?

 

[tom2050]

Awesome, I knew someone in C&C would have a better solution than mine!

So if Oni Ryu wants to have a human-only building that actually does something useful (e.g. auto-produce a unit, or boost production), all he needs to do is make that useful building require a 'human-happiness-only' building in the city (like a Uni-build needs a Lib first)?

Kind of.. but it only works on exact matches with the options the editor gives.. For buildings, editor allows AI to never build Culture/Trade/Science/Happiness/Production/Growth. I picked happiness just as example.

So if all Civs are set to Never Build Production in the editor, the AI won't build improvements if Production is the only item on that building (out of the above list).
So for example (AI set to Never build production):
If you have a Factory that makes 1 production, but also gives Happiness and Science, the AI will still build it.
If you have a Factory that makes 1 production, and has auto-production (the AI won't build it). - Is now human only
If you have a Factory that makes 1 production, and has a growth option set, the AI will build it.
If you have a Factory that makes 1 production, and is a barracks, (the AI won't build it). - Is now human only

Hope that makes more sense

 

[Oni Ryuu]

Hi tom2050. Thanks for the info.

All my improvements that increase culture have other desirable attributes (and some of my buildings are happiness only). One point of culture per turn will have less of an impact on the game than one happy face. So “never build cultural improvements” may work better for me.

I’ve summed up the ideas put forward by Civ 3’s greatest into three working models.

Spoiler :

Never build building type
Set all civilisations to never build a building of a specific type (e.g. happiness). All buildings intended to be accessible to the AI must not have that trait without the addition of another benefit that the computer recognises (e.g. culture, science or production). The player only buildings must have only that one AI recognised trait with the unrecognised attribute you want. This method restricts what a player-only building can do but no pregame editing for solo or multiplayer games is required.

Civilization free tech
Give an era-none tech marked as “none tradeable” and “not required for era advancement” to the desired civilisation(s) in the editor before each game. Then place the tech required for the building in the tech tree as normal. That tech must be marked as “none tradeable” and “not required for era advancement” and require the era-none tech. this method causes the player to have more techs than the AI and all games will need pregame editing.

Player free tech
Give an era-none tech marked as “none tradeable” and “not required for era advancement” to the desired player(s) in the editor before a game. Set the player-only building to require the era-none tech and a building close to the desired time period. This method would mean player-only buildings would be limited to cities of a specific level of development (technologically advanced enough to have access to the building and have it built). Only multiplayer games will need pregame editing.

I think I’m going with the “never build building type” option to avoid pregame editing.

If anyone has any alternative methods please feel free to post them here.

 

[Oni Ryuu]

Everything’s working except for the gold flag unit won’t be consumed and give up the cash. I set it to immobile, nationless, foot unit and flag unit. The AI strategy was set to flag unit and flag unit was set to gold in the general settings page. The unit will be produced like the cargo units and I can take it to the capitol (I’m told that’s the only place that will work) but it won’t do anything. The writing of the unit appears in red I don’t know if that’s unusual.

Essentially, I don’t know what to do.

 

[tom2050]

Do you have the victory locations on? I think on the scenario setup screen, something like auto set victory location. It will start at the capitol at beginning of game, should show a little tower looking thing, then they will cash in the gold.