Multiplayer with Mods - Mac vs PC on LAN

[Vespa Jester]

Hi,
I've made a few mods recently, some tech/time altering mods and made a new Civ at my girlfriends request, the SPQR.
She has a Mac, and I have a PC.
We play with Warlords frequently over a private LAN (Just using an Ethernet cable) and sometimes use a Uni LAN.

Now the problem is the mods don't work when we want to play each other - before anyone thinks it(!)- I've zapped all the gremlins and both my mods (now combined) work fine, individually and combined on her mac, no problems. But what does not work is when we go to play on the LAN, if we both have the mod loaded, the other persons name simply doesn't appear. I assume it THINKS the mods are different, but lets be honest - because of some stupidities with the programming, of course they are bloody different! At least just in the zapping bit etc - but everything else, all important details are exact. If anyone has any ideas how I can get the mods to recognize each other in the multiplayer that would be great - it's frustrating because I made the Civ for her and we wish to play each other using it.
I am about to try placing the modded files in the CustomAssets folders of both the Mac and my PC - I know you can play a multiplayer game if the customassets are different, because i've been doing it for ages with her (just images, leaderheads etc for now because otherwise it'd be unfair!) so I will try the customassets idea I thought of, it shouldn't mess up the game because the files ARE the same - the game will read them as different - but should play with them as the same.

But any ideas would be great please, anything like that, just general help on mod compatibility (i've got some working but just stuff you know, anything would be good, especially if there is something I need to edit to get the mods to recognize each other)- all help welcome. Especially if there is something else to look at like another forum - i've heard something was posted on Civ4lerts (whatever that is) that might help in general. But please all help would be good.
Thanks in advance!

 

[AlanH]

I don't know anything about multi-player, but I do know that, if the mods are different in any way, including zapped gremlins, then the game will see them as different. If they are required to be the same then they have to be identical. The software can't tell the difference between a zapped gremlin and any other change. Why can't you run the exact same mod files in both the Mac and the PC?

 

[Vespa Jester]

Thanks for posting back
It's okay, I fixed it -
I mean running them both as the same file didn't work at first because my mod, like most pc made mods, didn't work on a mac, it needed corrected/zapping whatever it is called and upon doing this it changed the file and wouldn't be compatible. The solution was rather simple, once it's all been fixed and zapped on the mac, I just used the 'fixed' mac mod and put in on my PC, the PC ran the mac mod fine with no issues and we were both able to play so all is good!
I don't imagine there are a lot of 'mac vs pc' mulitplayer players out there but if there are they might be interested by how this was fixed, unless it was very obvious to everyone accept me! I just thought that if you made the mod on the mac, zapping and all, it might change it enough the PC couldn't run it, but not the case, and so it's just as simple as making the mod, 'maccing' it and then putting back on the PC. It's all good now though, thanks1

Cheers

 

[Vespa Jester]

ONE MORE THING;
It wasn't able to quite get the art files right, despite everything (on the mac) - but I guess that is easily fixable, I assume ther eare just some 'transfer' errors when the mac attempts to read the files, for example, the leaderhead is there but no the skin, my LH button was already screwed up so I don't know about that, something to just correct later, but it's odd it read the flag and the civ button but it 'changed them', the colouring for example was changed. Anyway the game can't tell the difference between what is within the art files so in fairness it's an easy fix, someone just needs to go into the appropriate dds files and paste in the art anew - and that should fix it. Just an interesting point I thought.