Only 1 leader possible from any given elite

[sumthinelse]

Originally posted by PaleHorse76

Is there a way to delete the unit from the save so you don't end up accidently reusing that ELITE unit and wondering why you never get any leaders? That wouldn't be cheating b/c you would be just disbanding the troops.....

Deleting units in an editor is tricky. Even on un-hacked save files the Gramphos Multitool Save Game Editor always crashes or corrupts the file when I try to add or delete a unit. Maybe it's because I run WIN2000. You might know which units are "used up" but if you are like me you will lose track of them, so I use a hex editor to check the flag in the UNIT record.

When you know which one is "used up" you can just disband it in the game itself. But sometimes that is impossible without a hex editor, like when you are defending and your stack which has 100 elites in gets attacked 100 times. Which one created the leader?

I've suggested this to someone else for his findings and thought I would suggest it to you guys also:

I suggest that you post your findings in Tutorials, Reference, & Guides.

Good idea.

I'll also ask on the CIV3 Multitool forum first to see if they can think of a way to display a unit differently but leave everything else alone.

There is a way, but I don't like it. You create extra unit types for your favorite units with slightly different names for the unit type. For example, there is a unit type "Horseman" and another unit type which is exactly the same except for the name, "Impotent_Horseman." So when your horseman creates a leader you save the game, go to the Gramphos editor and change that unit type to the "Impotent_Horseman" type. I am assuming that that operation doesn't reset the "used" flag.

One problem is that you probably have to create all these extra unit types "Impotent_Tank" "Impotent_Mech_Infantry" etc. etc. etc. before you start the game, so if your games are long and carefully planned (like Killer's and mine) you don't want to have to start over.

Another one is that this procedure will be error-prone, so if you forget to do something or do something wrong you have to start over.

 

[sumthinelse]

Originally posted by IDSmoker

Can units with the 'blitz' attribute (the ability to attack more than once per turn) create GLs on any attack other than their first?

A related question would be:

Can a blitz unit that gets promoted on it's first attack, create a GL on it's subsequent attacks?

YES! In fact I have done that very thing. You can prove this by using the Gramphos saved game editor (back up your save before you do this and copy the file to a test save) to turn off the "remember random seed" option if it's on, take a veteran tank, keep attacking the first enemy and reloading until you get elite, then save again (disband your leader in the test save) and attack until you get a leader. The worst "leader drought I have seen with an elite that was not "used" was 61 times to get a leader.

(and if you aren't a programmer, you need to start thinking of changing careers! <grin>),

The last program I wrote was about a year ago, a device driver for a wireless adapter. I haven't written an application in a long time...

you should think of creating a little utility that will flip the appropiate bit, assuming it won't take much effort.


Whatever you decide to do with this hard-won information, I hope that you will at least post the hex-offset value, so that others can make use of it.

[/B]

OK, I will think about writing a program but gotta do some other high priority stuff.

If you load and save a file in the Gramphos save game editor it will un-compress the file. Then you get a hex editor and look for the ASCII string UNIT (not Unit, must be all caps). When you find one, that is a UNIT structure. At hex 30 (decimal 48) past the start (NOT the end) of the UNIT string, if the flag 0X20 is on it has been used for a leader. Be careful, there are some other flags next to it.

If you turn all those 0X20 bits off you could also be doing the AI a favor. A faster way is to use the Gramphos editor to look up the unit's ID number (given in decimal), convert it to HEX, and the corresponding UNIT structure will have that ID number at the UNIT string + 8.

So you can keep searching for the string UNIT until you find the matching ID number.

Let me know if you think of a way to change the unit display without changing the unit's other properties....

 

[Mike B. FIRAXIS]

Originally posted by IDSmoker
Can units with the 'blitz' attribute (the ability to attack more than once per turn) create GLs on any attack other than their first?

Yes.

Can a blitz unit that gets promoted on it's first attack, create a GL on it's subsequent attacks?

Yes.

Originall posted by PaleHorse76
Hopefully Firaxis will make the ELITE units visually different someday.

I'm experimenting with giving the player the option of renaming units that generate a leader.

PH76 says: Sweet!

 

[Lt. 'Killer' M.]

Originally posted by Mike B. FIRAXIS

I'm experimenting with giving the player the option of renaming units that generate a leader.

that would be soooooo cool!!!!!!!!

 

[kring]

That would be wonderful. If you do that, can you go one step more? Allow us to name all units?

 

[sumthinelse]

Originally posted by kring
That would be wonderful. If you do that, can you go one step more? Allow us to name all units?

I would think that might be simpler to do, programming-wise, than having special-case logic for leader creation only. Of course there is a size limit for the name.

One example.... I have a bunch of settlers to go to various city founding sites. I have enough fast moving military units to keep the barbarians under control, but I don't want to the settlers to "GO TO" their sites in a multi-move "GO TO" command because they might get attacked somewhere along the way. So I move them 1 turn at a time. But when I take a "work break" for 2 or 3 days and return to my game I can't remember where they were all supposed to go. So I could write a *brief* note to myself in the name field.

I might forget other things about units too if I don't write myself a note.

We could imagine things like "this unit is the US 2nd Marine Division."

What else could we do with a name field?

 

[Sanaz]

I would love to see stats for each unit - when they go up in rank, you can see how many battles they've fought and stuff like that. You can have a little more attachment to your units (a history with them), rather than just having anonymous units going off to battle to die for their leaders. You could have favorites, etc. Of course, I wouldn't want to name ALL units (imagine 500 units all with names?). But, there could be some fun options here.

 

[sumthinelse]

Originally posted by Mike B. FIRAXIS

I'm experimenting with giving the player the option of renaming units that generate a leader.

Much obliged, Mike. Always glad to see you here.

As some of us asked in other posts: Is it possible that it would be simpler to just make the unit name editable by the player?

I have hacked a little with saved games, and the way it seems to work is that the name is not stored in the unit record itself, but with the record for the unit type. So while it might be possible for me to change the name of the unit type, that would change all the names of the units of that type. So it seems like this would take a real programming change, whether for all units or only units that generate a leader. And we know that such changes have to be weighed against the cost in money, time, etc.



I was going to say that the units should default to the generic name in the unit type, e. g. "Swordsman". I was thinking that if you leave space for a 31 letter name in 300 units the uncompressed file would be 9300 bytes bigger (not even considering the possibility of double byte languages). However, since file compression compresses identical strings very well, then if I have 300 tank unit structures, each one with the string "Tank" followed by 27 blanks or 0s, the compression should take care of the problem. So people who don't edit the names would not really be paying much of a price in file size.

 

[kring]

What if when the unit was created, a name was given to it: 1st Imperial Impi or something along those lines.

I probably wouldn't rename all my units, only ones that did something special; like defeating 10 Barb Horsemen. If it was simpler, just allow renaming; with either no name or the default I mentioned in the last paragraph.

 

[maniacalmonkey]

That would be SO cool! Hi Kring, I'm with you on this one - why not name/number every unit that gets built? It could be real simple, like 12th Berlin Riflemen ([automatic number] [city of origin] [unit type]), and perhaps a rename option if people want to do something funky with their "special" units, like that unit of spearmen, the "Panzer Slayers"?

Come to think of it - I remember we had a discussion over at 1BigCommunity about what size a unit was supposed to represent. Guesses varied from Battalion to Corps size, but Brigade and Division seemed most realistic. Anyone care to shed some light on this?

 

[Mike B. FIRAXIS]

Originally posted by sumthinelse

As some of us asked in other posts: Is it possible that it would be simpler to just make the unit name editable by the player?

I'm trying to stay away from being able to rename units arbitrarily for a variety of reasons, the most obvious being that the size of the right-click menu becomes GIGANTIC when you add a rename option for every unit in the tile. However, when placing units with the editor, you will be able to give them a name.

I have hacked a little with saved games, and the way it seems to work is that the name is not stored in the unit record itself, but with the record for the unit type.

There is a name stored with the units themselves but it is currently only used for leaders.

 

[etj4Eagle]

Originally posted by IDSmoker
Can units with the 'blitz' attribute (the ability to attack more than once per turn) create GLs on any attack other than their first

Can a blitz unit that gets promoted on it's first attack, create a GL on it's subsequent attacks?

While this has been answere already, this is how I did my tests that began this thread in the first place. I did not go and run 30 turns. Instead I just used a blitz capable unit many many times (extra movement points ).

 

[Loopy]

Off topic but since I know we've got a Firaxian reading this thread. . .

I wish there was a button on the diplomacy screen that would just swap Civ faces with all of the hidden Civs (when applicable). I know you can shift right click and cycle through, but the ordering isn't always consistant. Or to keep things simpler, add another option to that menu that changes swaps all leader faces.

Back on topic. . . I like the idea of being given the option to rename a unit that generated a leader. But what happens if you upgrade that unit via barracks? Unless by rename you mean rename the experience level from Elite to somethingelse. . .

 

[Cartouche Bee]

When you right click on a square why can't all the units in the list that produced Great Leaders just have a star (*) beside them? No renaming and if you upgrade the unit the star disappears cause it's eligible to produce a GL again.

CB

 

[Mike B. FIRAXIS]

Originally posted by Cartouche Bee
When you right click on a square why can't all the units in the list that produced Great Leaders just have a star (*) beside them? No renaming and if you upgrade the unit the star disappears cause it's eligible to produce a GL again.

CB

Good idea!

 

[sumthinelse]

Originally posted by Mike B. FIRAXIS


There is a name stored with the units themselves but it is currently only used for leaders.

Thanks for the tip, Mike. It won't take me long to see if I can add that name to a non-leader unit. Of course, the software might be designed to display that name only on leaders. I'll take a look....

(OK, 15 min. later) It looks like the name field is displayed only on leaders. In fact, the name field may overlap important flags in the other units' structure.

Note: The following is speculation about how to hack a file to visually indicate that the elite is "used." I don't think any of it is really worth doing except for.... well, I don't really know what for except for curiousity.

I suppose I could make leaders have the combat/movement characteristics of horsemen, and then when an elite horseman created a leader I could change it to a leader with the name "EliteHorse" but there are several interesting things that would happen. In the first place, I would have 2 leaders. Now the game does not crash (at least not immediately) when I have 2 leaders. Another thing is that leaders would now move 2 instead of 3. And maybe a bigger problem is that you probably could not create another leader until you used both leaders. I'm not sure about this. Of course, the unit that used to be elite horseman would really be a leader with different combat properties and a funny name. Anyway, this idea does not sound like it would help much.

Is it possible that we could get some solution like the * in a patch before PTW comes out? Note, I said possible, not a promise.

 

[Mike B. FIRAXIS]

Originally posted by sumthinelse
Is it possible that we could get some solution like the * in a patch before PTW comes out? Note, I said possible, not a promise.

Both this and the option to rename units that spawn a leader will probably be included in the editor update (though I can't make any guarantees...).

 

[Lt. 'Killer' M.]

Originally posted by Mike B. FIRAXIS


Both this and the option to rename units that spawn a leader will probably be included in the editor update (though I can't make any guarantees...).

nuff said!

 

[sumthinelse]

Originally posted by Mike B. FIRAXIS


Both this and the option to rename units that spawn a leader will probably be included in the editor update (though I can't make any guarantees...).

Not a guarantee, but you are acting in good faith, and that's good enough for me.

 

[Lt. 'Killer' M.]

@ sumthinelse: I've done some more tests and found an interesting thing:

I always ahev long waits for the first leader. Like 35, 40, 28 fights. Often, the second or third one is preceeded by a wait like that, too. It has nothin gto do with me breaking treaties or not (so there is no hidden penalty for that). It does have to do with somthing els I'm sure, because it is a reproducable thing: if I start a game, the first leader will take very long. Now if I load a game where I already had more than two, play some, load the new game again (!) I can get one at a normal probability, often faster tahn expected (average of 13,7 victories needed. Sample size: around 40 tires of starting game, reloading until leader (average: 35,98 victories needed) loading old game, average of 15.6 victories needed until leader appears, reloading new game...

strange!


what this reminds me of is Falcon 4.0. On some systems, it wouldn't run properly, you'd always crash on landing.
On others it ran smooth as silk. So it got some outside input into whatever, maybe a variable of some kind, that lead to a Bug appearing, while other systems didn't show that.....

I 'solved' my problem accidently when I had to replace my main board.....