More bugs

[Ahriman]

1. Environmental Economics tech does not in fact seem to give +1 food from forests. Forests seem to never be worth building.
2. Promotion availability is weird. Lots of units have “barrage” available but don’t have the ability to bombard. Lots of units have “missile launcher” available despite the fact that would reduce them to 0 moves.
3. Game nearly always crashes when loading a game *or* trying to quit to main menu.
4. Python bug when armor unit attacked infantry in a city, no crash though. Sounds like some missing graphics files?
Traceback:
File “CvScreenInterface”, line 705 in forceScreenRedraw
File “CvMainInterface”, line 854, in redraw.
File “CvMainInterface”, line 2786, in updateInfoPaneString,
Runtime Error: unidentifiable C++ exception.
5. Mind worms etc. should spawn with 0 movement points. They would be much less irritating if you got a chance to wipe them out before they killed your terraformers and pillaged your improvements. This would still require you to have lots of troops everywhere, so having high negative Planet rating is still costly.
6. Wells (needed for hydrogen) say they need High Energy Chemistry to build, but they remain unbuildable.

 

[Maniac]

1. Environmental Economics tech does not in fact seem to give +1 food from forests. Forests seem to never be worth building.

Tip: forests give health even if they're not worked.
The "Forest" terrain improvement gives +1 food with Environmental Economics. That terrain improvement is just a dummy to allow creation of the Forest feature with some python code. It gives +1 food so the AI is more likely to build it. That's necesary because before the Forest is built, the AI doesn't realize they can built a Tree Farm on it right after.
It's a temporary solution.

2. Promotion availability is weird. Lots of units have “barrage” available but don’t have the ability to bombard. Lots of units have “missile launcher” available despite the fact that would reduce them to 0 moves.

I'll fix this. Again, these are leftovers of the unit workshop. I figured I'd go ahead and release it, and let you guys detail all the problems.

3. Game nearly always crashes when loading a game *or* trying to quit to main menu.

Could you please post a save? With one the problem can be found in no time.

4. Python bug when armor unit attacked infantry in a city, no crash though. Sounds like some missing graphics files?
Traceback:
File “CvScreenInterface”, line 705 in forceScreenRedraw
File “CvMainInterface”, line 854, in redraw.
File “CvMainInterface”, line 2786, in updateInfoPaneString,
Runtime Error: unidentifiable C++ exception.

Could you please post a save?

5. Mind worms etc. should spawn with 0 movement points. They would be much less irritating if you got a chance to wipe them out before they killed your terraformers and pillaged your improvements. This would still require you to have lots of troops everywhere, so having high negative Planet rating is still costly.

I guess I'll do this... until I can implement a better solution.

6. Wells (needed for hydrogen) say they need High Energy Chemistry to build, but they remain unbuildable.

You mean you can't build Wells on Helium?

 

[Ahriman]

Kept playing long past the 4. bug, sorry. That was definitely the trigger though (armor attacking infantry in city).
Here's my current save. I have high energy chemistry, but I can't build wells on Helium, and my game normally crashes on loading or quitting.

I *thought* I had installed the most recent patch before starting this game, but I may not have, since condensors still seem to be giving 3 food.
AI is using aquaformers a little though.

Speaking of the leftovers of unit workshop.... the hovertank unit graphic is still fully encased in what I suspect was its unit workshop wireframe box. Looks pretty silly.

*Edit*
Oh, and the AI keeps giving the Missile launcher promotion to mass drivers, which makes them useless. There aren't actually any units really which sensibly benefit from the missile launcher promotion. Hovertanks can't get the promotion, and nearly everything else has 1 move or is weak.
Also, opening the military advisor screen causes a bug.

The promotions obviously definitely need a reworking. Many are missing, or don't seem to be useful for the chassis.
I'd suggest that some high-end promotions give a bonus to base unit strength (or bonus attack or defensive strength) rather than just percentage changes.
You might want to get some ideas from FFH spells. Marine detachment could act as a summoning spell that creates a 1-turn duration infantry unit with the Lanun Boarding Party ability and the amphibious promotion.
You could have some promotions that act as March (something from nanites?).
Missile launcher could add a bombarding ability, that damages the top unit in the target tile by up to 20%.

Some of these promotions could also be added automatically to all units built in a city with a particular building or wonder (eg all units built in a city with a nanite facility get to heal while moving).

 

[Ahriman]

Many of the advisor screens seem to have bugs. Some cause crashes, others don't.

Robotic mine doesn't give Rubidium. Check just NE of UN headquarters; robotic mind on Rubidium, has been there for ages, but the resource doesn't show up in cities (and prevents mag tube construction).

 

[Ahriman]

Boreholes also don't grant Rubidium. Check the borehole just NE of Planetary Archives.

I guess mines do? Because clearly the Gaians were able to build Mag Tubes.

 

[Maniac]

Ooh, I think I may know the source of all your problems. Is it possible you started this game under patch b, but continued it under patch c?

 

[Ahriman]

Hmm.... I *guess*.... I'm pretty sure I started it under c though. Next time I start another game I'll let you know if any of these are still there. If thats what it was, my humble apologies

 

[Maniac]

In any case, trying to open your save files causes the game to crash for me.

 

[GeoModder]

With the latest patch in place, putting McDonalds in the worldbuilder in a base causes a CTD. Btw, in the worldbuilder McDonalds doesn't appear to have a graphic.

 

[Maniac]

I cannot recreate such a crash. Is it possible your Planetfall installation includes some personal modification to the building graphics or something?
The current art for McDonalds is a Nuclear Plant.
In the light that the game crashes with you if you place McDonalds, where do you see that McDonalds has no gfx?

 

[GeoModder]

I cannot recreate such a crash. Is it possible your Planetfall installation includes some personal modification to the building graphics or something?

Since I took the task upon me to link graphics to facilities, what do you think?

The current art for McDonalds is a Nuclear Plant.

Ah, that might be it. I changed the xml tag for the nuclear_plant to fission_reactor (and for a few more facilities too, to clarify things for outsiders who like to do a task or two for the mod. )

In the light that the game crashes with you if you place McDonalds, where do you see that McDonalds has no gfx?

In the worldbuilder, under the buildings tab. But now that I know it's linked to the nuclear plant, I'll check if I can solve it by linking it to another tag.

 

[GeoModder]

Might as well use this thread.

Check the picture below. There's still a python exception tag for native life flowering near a base. In most cases this happened at one of my own bases that the base wasn't know to python.

Thereunder a seaformer has finished a seamine, and correctly disctracts 1 nutrient. But it also removes the kelp graphic which was there. Check the cityscreen part of the picture to see the nutrient yield. I suppose you need to extend your python "hack" to energy -and mine improvements also on seaplots.

For the rest, it seems to play like a charm.

 

[Maniac]

Check the picture below. There's still a python exception tag for native life flowering near a base. In most cases this happened at one of my own bases that the base wasn't know to python.

That's not a python exception. That's a normal game message. I just didn't know if it was possible to put the name of the affected city in a python message. Now I know pretty sure it isn't possible. Therefore I'm currently converting the fungal bloom code to C++, where this is possible. And I've discovered some bugs in the process too...

Thereunder a seaformer has finished a seamine, and correctly disctracts 1 nutrient. But it also removes the kelp graphic which was there. Check the cityscreen part of the picture to see the nutrient yield. I suppose you need to extend your python "hack" to energy -and mine improvements also on seaplots.

Ah woops.

I think I'm gonna step away from the "two terrain improvements on sea" idea though. It just adds needless former micromanagement, and all that Shelf+Kelp makes it too easy to get abundant food. If only I had Trench graphics which could be placed next to land as well.

I think I'll change the sea improvements to one per tile and these effects:

Kelp: +1 food; +1 energy with Bioreactor; perhaps some Planet penalty; move the tech prereq to a third level tech
Mining Platform: +2 minerals, -.50 Planet
Windmill: +2 energy, probably a +1 bonus with some tech
Tidal Harness: +3 energy

I'm wondering how to create a meaningfull difference between Windmill and Tidal Harness, besides windmills only being buildable on Shelf. Or perhaps I should just remove the Tidal Harness.

 

[GeoModder]

I think I'm gonna step away from the "two terrain improvements on sea" idea though. It just adds needless former micromanagement, and all that Shelf+Kelp makes it too easy to get abundant food.

NOOOOOO!!! or at least not with the windmill. I can accept that a seamine and a seaharness block the good working of those improvements (seaharness turbines got cloaked by the kelp leafs, and the kelp got poisoned by the higher amounts of metals in the water due to the ore processing if you need a justification). But perhaps you should avoid fresh water kelp lakes, until some serious genetic tech comes around.

Perhaps just give an extra food when kelp is combined with the windmill. But as long as windmils don't have more then 1 energy, the output of a normal plot isn't more then 4 (3 nutrient, 1 energy). Or 2 nutrient and 2 energy if you prefer that.
Tidal harness gives 3 energy and 1 food then, if you do it without kelp. Same output, different focus.

 

[Maniac]

NOOOOOO!!!

You want to have an easy and abundant supply of food?

 

[GeoModder]

Are 3 nutrients an abundant supply of food? :hmmm: Any grass farm can give you that in civ4.

Besides, I thought your philopsophy for this mod was the ability to have specialist-abundant cities?

 

[Maniac]

Are 3 nutrients an abundant supply of food? :hmmm: Any grass farm can give you that in civ4.

And that's why grassland is not the most common terrain in Civ4. Well, besides around capitals and jungle that is.

Besides, I thought your philopsophy for this mod was the ability to have specialist-abundant cities?

But getting these should take some effort. Besides, I'd like there to be more than one way to get specialists. Having lots of food due to farms and condensers, being a terraformer in other words, is one way. If you follow the Centauri tech path, you can get some by building Centauri Preserves. And on the enclosed biosphere tech path I'd like to add some buildings which give a free specialist directly.
Having abundant sea food without much effort takes away a lot of the economic strategy in the game IMO.

 

[GeoModder]

Fact is, something needs to give 3 food returns at the start of the game, or mines/boreholes will never be worked by citizens.

Farms are far off in the future. Greenhouse gives +1 food. *some* resources give 4 food output. Is a starting base supposed to support its food and hammer/energy output by mostly 2 food plots, perhaps 1 resource 4 food plot and 1 mine/borehole at most?

 

[Maniac]

Yes. Isn't that how it works in vanilla Civ too?

 

[GeoModder]

Well, resource food plots in Civ usually give more then 4 food. Pigs and sheep, not to mention fish in the sea, can give a whooping 5-6 food.