Modding Q&A

[Kirejara]

Theres no logical additional ability I can think of adding to the courthouse.

While I have not changed the Courthouses in my mod, I have added a great wonder, that requires three of them.

Scotland Yard (Communism) gives a free Police Station in every city.

And the KI is even building Courthouses in their capitals, even if someone els has Scotland Yard long ago.

 

[Nanuk]

If the city is unhappy then it may be losing money, so the AI may decide that city's priority is to stop losing money, but in its various flags and simplicity, it decides a courthouse to reduce corruption will increase money.

 

[Bungus]

While I have not changed the Courthouses in my mod, I have added a great wonder, that requires three of them.

Scotland Yard (Communism) gives a free Police Station in every city.

And the KI is even building Courthouses in their capitals, even if someone els has Scotland Yard long ago.

That'd be nice if AI factors in wonder requirements into its building strategy. But the Ai's production of courthouse doesnt necessarily indicate this, as it does build them sometimes. The level of prioritization Im trying to reach is courthousr construction somewhere before libraries and universitie so it can build viable oversea empires. Have you noticed it build more of them since added that requirement?

If the city is unhappy then it may be losing money, so the AI may decide that city's priority is to stop losing money, but in its various flags and simplicity, it decides a courthouse to reduce corruption will increase money.

Is that conjecture or is there any evidence to back that up?

 

[Nanuk]

Is that conjecture or is there any evidence to back that up?

Look it up yourself if you're going to be snotty.

 

[Vuldacon]

Bungus... I am assuming that you are working on a Scenario or MOD.

For example, You could make Libraries require a Courthouse to be built first, then the AI would build Courthouses before Libraries. No Matter how this may sound, it would work. Perhaps a Courthouse would be needed before a Library because Corruption and Lack of Laws would prevent the luxury of being able to build or sustain a Library for the population.

It seems you want to change the Game Play for the AI behavior and you ask questions about it, which is Good... then when members post what they have done or offer what you can do, even by extrapolation of their posts, you seem to be appalled because the solution to what you want is not already programed. This is why we all Make Scenarios/MODS... to adjust game play as we want it for our games. Sometimes to get want we want, we have to go beyond plausible sense but that does not mean we have to explain it in the Civilopedia.

IF you are Modding a Game, then as we all realize, you must make adjustments to get what you want that differs from what is programed. Best to "think out of the box" and find solutions to what you want to accomplish for your game

 

[Nathiri]

Using a 100% flavor can also provide some influence in addition to the above. Sometimes the AI just dont like building city improvements, but a little nudge if any, can push them in that direction.

 

[Bungus]

Look it up yourself if you're going to be snotty.

It's a simple question

For example, You could make Libraries require a Courthouse to be built first, then the AI would build Courthouses before Libraries. No Matter how this may sound, it would work. Perhaps a Courthouse would be needed before a Library because Corruption and Lack of Laws would prevent the luxury of being able to build or sustain a Library for the population.

It seems you want to change the Game Play for the AI behavior and you ask questions about it, which is Good... then when members post what they have done or offer what you can do, even by extrapolation of their posts, you seem to be appalled because the solution to what you want is not already programed. This is why we all Make Scenarios/MODS... to adjust game play as we want it for our games. Sometimes to get want we want, we have to go beyond plausible sense but that does not mean we have to explain it in the Civilopedia.

Yeah, I know the unfortunate drill. The idea with these workarounds is to leave as little a footprint as possible. Now the building requirement. There's a good idea, though tying the courthiz to the libra kinda messes up the early game, because Lit and Code laws are parallel on the tree, there'd then be no point in researching Lit first. Universities req Courthiz, is certainly viable in my eyes. What I wonder is how much it'd prioritize a required building. It could be also added to other later age buildings.

Using a 100% flavor can also provide some influence in addition to the above. Sometimes the AI just dont like building city improvements, but a little nudge if any, can push them in that direction.

That sounds potentially promising. I gotta read up on flavors. I guessing their effects are pretty well doc'd by now?

 

[Nanuk]

It's a simple question

Check your attitude, you're the one asking others to figure things out for you and share their knowledge then you behave so rotten.

You're essentially saying these things;
"site sucks, bro, search function is asteriskasteriskasteriskasterisk"
"well that's stupid of you to suggest, real life doesn't work like that"
"you're just lying because I've never seen that"

No kidding you have no idea, that's why you're asking. People here are really nice about imparting their experience and knowledge, not just from themselves but also from others, and you're talking down to everyone. Again, look up documentation yourself if you're not going to take anyone's word for it. It's illogical to ask people questions then act like you know better than them. I'm not answering questions from boorish people. We're here trying to help you when you cop a tone.

 

[Bungus]

Unhurt your butt

I'm not interested in opinions or conjecture. As I supsect you were not adding to the discussion. Giving a sycophantic and equovical response to unhelpful "contributions" devalues the conversation and reinforces a culture of broscience.

If my posts aren't flattering and bubbly enough for you keep scrolling. Sub's called creation and customization, not hugs and rainbows

 

[Nanuk]

Unhurt your butt

I'm not interested in opinions or conjecture. As I supsect you were not adding to the discussion. Giving a sycophantic and equovical response to unhelpful "contributions" devalues the conversation and reinforces a culture of broscience.

If my posts aren't flattering and bubbly enough for you keep scrolling. Sub's called creation and customization, not hugs and rainbows

iT's NoT huGs ANd raINboWs

If you feel the need to remind us of what forum we're on, then help yourself to the rules on civility while you're at it.

The replies you read would be helpful if you took a moment to digest them. Comparing Civ 3's AI logic to real life is not wise. No one here is expecting you to be overly kind. It's that you're being very toxic.

The game is almost 20 years old. There's an unending volume of information on this site alone about it. There's active users who continually dig down into the game's core and logic to this day. I've both used others' experience and knowledge and acquired my own by playing and modding this game since Windows 98. I've watched Sid and the devs talk about the game's quirks. I've exchanged emails with crew who have worked on the series since vanilla. I'm active on these forums and dig into other users' mods to find out how they did the things they did (as well as talk to them like a normal, non-sociopath human being). And yet, many other members have gone even deeper and further into the game's logic than I have, which is why this community is a hub for helping each other. All the answers you've received have been sensible and on-point. It's all user-end problems that you're having if you can't make sense of what you're being told.

There's over a decade of knowledge that explains how the AI builds things, why it does these things, and what it won't do - to name just a few - and you can't be bothered to look this up because of "asterisk search system," so you come here and ask us, then mouth off about how it doesn't make sense and say you need sources. There's users here who have responded to your requests who know certain aspects of the game better than anyone else. CFC has been given actual corruption code formulas and AI behavior on it. You came to the sources. You can literally put whatever anyone says to practice in the game to verify it for yourself if you don't believe anyone here.

So it's not about it being a simple question. The answer is yes, there is evidence to back it up. Go find it yourself.

 

[Nathiri]

That sounds potentially promising. I gotta read up on flavors. I guessing their effects are pretty well doc'd by now?

tom2050 used this technique in his CoMM3. I've used it too and it seems to work, but I havent experimented with it extensively. tom is a pretty good tester though and experienced modder.

To Nanuk: Just stay calm man. A slight misstep perhaps on his part, but you dont need to get this worked up.

 

[Nanuk]

Just stay calm man

To "Bungus"

 

[Takhisis]

I have map finder and mapstat on my PC and they both are able to determine the domination limit from a .sav file, how would I find that information manually?

I suppose that there is a line somewhere you can read, say, with notepad or a hex editor.

That said, don't you have the .biq from which that .sav was made?

 

[jarred!]

I suppose that there is a line somewhere you can read, say, with notepad or a hex editor.

That said, don't you have the .biq from which that .sav was made?

I found some old threads from Apolyton by Gramphos and one here by @Puppeteer...I was curious as to how they deciphered the .sav format, but it seems like a brute force approach. Each tile has its own line and to determine a domination limit, I would need to translate each tile, determine if it adds to the domination limit, then add to the total. Something best left to a program .
The .biq was the default c3c .biq, nothing special.

 

[Bungus]

tom2050 used this technique in his CoMM3. I've used it too and it seems to work, but I havent experimented with it extensively. tom is a pretty good tester though and experienced modder.

Sounds promising: it doesn't alter gameplay in other ways and the AI does eventually and sometimes build courthouses in far flung cities. Harbors at least can be influence direct via the Trade tag (when it doesnt decide to place its distant cities 2 squares in from the coast for some reason). Maybe a little push is all it needs.
Another alternative, tho more overt and heavy handed, is the addition of a small wonder with the "add x in every city" ability, made possible with Quintillius's editor. Constitution/Supreme Court small wonder, anyone?

 

[Civinator]

Another alternative, tho more overt and heavy handed, is the addition of a small wonder with the "add x in every city" ability, made possible with Quintillius's editor. Constitution/Supreme Court small wonder, anyone?

Yes, with the Quintillius editor this is possible, but in my tests it did not work (otherwise CCM2 would have very different buildings in this mods among them the SWs Ministery of trade, giving a market place in every city and some other ministeries to reduce the micromanagement of cities in the later game, and especially religions could be set much better. This were my thoughts about using this feature, but unfortunately these settings in the editor didn´t work in the game.

 

[Bungus]

****, I was afraid of that. Do you remember what the problem was? I asked Quint, he indicated that it was possible without crash. Buildable, but no effect?

 

[Civinator]

****, I was afraid of that. Do you remember what the problem was? I asked Quint, he indicated that it was possible without crash. Buildable, but no effect?

Yes, the SWs were buildable in the testgames, but they didn´t give the buildings they were set to in the editor to the other cities. You can do such a test very easily yourself and see, if you have more luck with this feature - and in that case of course report this to us.

 

[Bungus]

Yeah, I'll give it a shot tonight soon as I download quint's new editor.
edit: new editor not uploaded yet. Will try as soon as I resolve phanta resource bug

edit2: Doesn't work. Adding 'build in every' did not crash game, but did not result in any of the selected improvements appearing in any cities

 

[Bungus]

well Steph's editor was a fail.. keep getting the index out of range error, which is weird, cause I was able to open an earlier version of the biq a few weeks ago with no issues from the same laptop. In fact, I think I used it to expand the map (as well as maptweaker on another pc - same scenario). I was hoping to move resources around, no big deal, can do the old fashioned way, but that's disconcerting. I'll move onto quint's

EDIT Wierd, Steph's editor worked the day before yesterday. I remember getting a unit count
EDIT2 ok, now only the win7-64bit version of steph's editor works. Dont know what changed. Maybe Windows snuck an update or somethin