Quick Answers / 'Newbie' Questions

[Elkad]

Is there a way to wake/cancelorders for ALL my units? Force every unit to wake up next turn and ask for orders...

Alt-cancel seems spotty too, at least with workers. Seems to only wake the ones I have on manual control.

Seems I remember Civ1 having a "patrol" option (especially for planes) Every turn they would fly to a patrol point and back to the city (fogbusting). Any way to do that here, other than manually doing recon missions with every plane in every city every turn....

How do I get rid of a building? In Civ1 I remember selling back walls just before gunpowder, coalplants after I built Hoover(now 3Gorges) etc..

Rally points. Darn things won't chain anymore? (cityA and cityB both set cityC as a rally point. CityC sets CityD as rally point. But only the new builds in C move to D, not the arriving units from A&B)

Edit: one more. I prefer more civs than standard for a given mapsize, is there a way to force quickplay and/or playnow to remember that, so I don't have to go add them in custom game every time?

Edit: one more. I prefer more civs than the default, is there a way to change the "Play Now" feature to remember that I want 18 civs, not 12, so I don't have to go thru custom game every time?

Rally points again. Alt-click citybar (to select all cities), followed by shift-rtclick to set rally point for all cities doesn't work?

Rally points again. any way to unset all of them at once?

one more: quickplay and playnow. any way to force them to remember that I prefer more civs than the default?

 

[Roland Johansen]

Is there a way to wake/cancelorders for ALL my units? Force every unit to wake up next turn and ask for orders...

Alt-cancel seems spotty too, at least with workers. Seems to only wake the ones I have on manual control.

Wow, a lot of questions, let's see if I can answer some of them.

Alt-cancel should remove any orders from units of the same type. However, if a unit has already moved or performed another action that turn, then it won't become available for a new action that turn. However, it will become available for new orders the next turn.

Alt-select will only select units of the same type. I don't think it is possible to select all of your units of all of the different types. However, you normally don't have to do this and there aren't that many types of units.

Seems I remember Civ1 having a "patrol" option (especially for planes) Every turn they would fly to a patrol point and back to the city (fogbusting). Any way to do that here, other than manually doing recon missions with every plane in every city every turn....

Civ1 was a very primitive game by todays standards and I can't remember those options. Air units moved in the same way as land units in that game.

The BetterAI mod has added an explore function to airplanes and they will explore random tiles in the fog of war around the city in which they are stationed. Maybe other mods have similar or other options, but I don't know of a method in the basic unmodded game.

How do I get rid of a building? In Civ1 I remember selling back walls just before gunpowder, coalplants after I built Hoover(now 3Gorges) etc..

You can't get rid of buildings. Buildings don't have an upkeep cost anymore and there are very few buildings that have a significant negative result.

Some mods (which add more buildings with negative effects) add an option to destroy buildings.

Rally points. Darn things won't chain anymore? (cityA and cityB both set cityC as a rally point. CityC sets CityD as rally point. But only the new builds in C move to D, not the arriving units from A&B)

Rally points only move units that are produced in a certain city to another spot.

Edit: one more. I prefer more civs than standard for a given mapsize, is there a way to force quickplay and/or playnow to remember that, so I don't have to go add them in custom game every time?

I don't think so. However, custom game should remember the settings that you used last time.

Edit: one more. I prefer more civs than the default, is there a way to change the "Play Now" feature to remember that I want 18 civs, not 12, so I don't have to go thru custom game every time?

Same question?

Rally points again. Alt-click citybar (to select all cities), followed by shift-rtclick to set rally point for all cities doesn't work?

You can select any spot but another city. You can cancel a continent wide rally point by ALT-clicking a city and then shift-rightclicking another city.

Rally points again. any way to unset all of them at once?

You could try the method by which one can cancel a continent wide rally point. I'm not sure if it will cancel individual rally points, but it is worth a try.

one more: quickplay and playnow. any way to force them to remember that I prefer more civs than the default?

Hey, you won't get another answer by asking the same question multiple times.

 

[ori]

Edit: one more. I prefer more civs than standard for a given mapsize, is there a way to force quickplay and/or playnow to remember that, so I don't have to go add them in custom game every time?

Edit: one more. I prefer more civs than the default, is there a way to change the "Play Now" feature to remember that I want 18 civs, not 12, so I don't have to go thru custom game every time?

one more: quickplay and playnow. any way to force them to remember that I prefer more civs than the default?

Hey, you won't get another answer by asking the same question multiple times.

But it sure adds emphasis
Actually there is a way:
open CIV4WorldInfo.xml which you find in the following directories
for Vanilla: ...\Firaxis Games\Sid Meier's Civilization 4\Assets\XML\GameInfo\
for Warlords: ...\Firaxis Games\Sid Meier's Civilization 4\Warlords\Assets\XML\GameInfo\
In this file all Mapsizes are defined, now change the following line for each mapsize to whatever you want (you can do this using any texteditor):

iDefaultPlayers 2 (the "2" is for duel size and hast to be changed to "18" if you want play now to start 18 players on a duel size map )

WARNING: Do NOT change it to anything higher than 18, you don't want to do this in an unmodded game!

 

[Elkad]

heh, my edits (about number of civs) weren't showing up for some reason after I hit submit. About the 3rd try, it showed just that one (but not the prior attempts).

changing the xml works for me. The game definitely doesn't remember what I had it set to last time (When I hit custom game, it remembers the huge/fractal/monarch/marathon part, but not the 18civs and random water/climate part). Playnow does 12 civs as well.

I'm using betterAI already, I'll try the explore thing. I distinctly remember the animation of all my planes dashing out from my city/carrier every turn in 8 different directions and returning (tho its possible that memory is from some other decades old game). And other tricks, like kamikaze attacks out of range for them to return to base. If I felt nice, I'd send a carrier with enough room to land about half of them.....

Getting rid of buildings.. I realize they have no upkeep, but trashing coal plants to get rid of the health penalty would be nice (and occasionally drydocks, etc..)

Global rally.. I was selecting another city, which explains why I couldn't get it to work

 

[Samson]

if i download a scenario for a mod where do i put it?

one of them said something about a worldbuilders save file but i cant find it..
thnks 4 the help
nm. just figured it out. great site..thanks guys

There will usually be instructions in the 1st few posts of the mods thread, and / or in downloaded mod. It usually involves unzipping the downloaded file either in the program files/civalisation 4/mods folder or the my documents/my games/civalisation 4/mods folder.

The worldbuilders save is usually in the public maps folder, and if you have the rest of the files in the right place you can just double click that file.

 

[Roland Johansen]

Getting rid of buildings.. I realize they have no upkeep, but trashing coal plants to get rid of the health penalty would be nice (and occasionally drydocks, etc..)

A hydro plant (or Three Gorges Dam) or a nuclear plant will remove the health penalty from the coal plant. A recycling center will remove the health penalty from drydocks. Of course, these options will not always be available.

I have not had the desire to get rid of buildings yet as there positive effects are usually a lot better than their negative effects. But some specific circumstances could of course make it a desireable option.

 

[MusX]

why option "regenerate map" not always work? i'm trying to play OCC on tiny map with 11 AI's, every time i want to regenerate map i must go to main menu and add 9 AI's again and launch, sometimes option "regenerate map" is available but not every time... why?

 

[ori]

why option "regenerate map" not always work? i'm trying to play OCC on tiny map with 11 AI's, every time i want to regenerate map i must go to main menu and add 9 AI's again and launch, sometimes option "regenerate map" is available but not every time... why?

I am quite sure that you are talking about Warlords.
There is a bug in the game which does not properly reset contacts once you (or any AI) have made contact with another player when regenerating a map, i.e. if you met another AI due to very close starting positions this contact remained even after regenerating the map. This screws early research modifiers and a lot more stuff.
The bug fix for this is not trivial and the programmers used the "easy" way out by disallowing regenerate map once any two players have made contact. This bug fix was introduced into the game in Warlords (and was introduced much earlier into the HOF-Mod from this site).

 

[MusX]

yep, warlords. thx. i think this is it

 

[frankcor]

Regarding the use of air units for fog busting, it's been my experience that using Recon to reveal tiles does not prevent barbarians from generating. I have flown recon missions in one turn and not seen any barbarians but barbarians appear well within the recon area on the very next turn. I'm almost certain they didn't travel into the recon zone from outside the zone. Can anyone verify or counter this observation with fact?

 

[carmen510]

Open the config (ini) file in notepad, and find the line which reads HideMovieBackground = 0, set it to HideMovieBackground = 1

Where's the config file?

 

[Gainy]

carmen:
C:\Documents and Settings\Colin\My Documents\My Games\Sid Meier's Civilization 4\CivilizationIV.ini

Colin being my account name. You can probably skip a few steps by just going into My Documents.

My own question:

In the Civelopedia for Ironworks (vanilla civ4) its affects are written as,
+50%with iron
+50%with coal

I've noticed this allows me to build the wonder quicker in cities with iron/coal in their radius. However this is the only part I understand.
Would someone be so kind as to explain the full effects of the Ironworks wonder and accordingly how having coal/iron affects it?

 

[cabert]

Regarding the use of air units for fog busting, it's been my experience that using Recon to reveal tiles does not prevent barbarians from generating. I have flown recon missions in one turn and not seen any barbarians but barbarians appear well within the recon area on the very next turn. I'm almost certain they didn't travel into the recon zone from outside the zone. Can anyone verify or counter this observation with fact?

I think you're right about that. barbs will spawn in the "due fog of war", even if it was removed in the turn by a wandering unit (even a plane).

I think it works this way :
- your turn ends
- FoW is recalculated
- barbs spawning is calculated

In the Civelopedia for Ironworks (vanilla civ4) its affects are written as,

+50%with iron

+50%with coal

I've noticed this allows me to build the wonder quicker in cities with iron/coal in their radius. However this is the only part I understand.

Would someone be so kind as to explain the full effects of the Ironworks wonder and accordingly how having coal/iron affects it?

I'm kind (although my wife says I'm not, she's a liar ) and will try.
I don't remember any effect on the building of the IW itself from coal or iron, but the effect comes after that, when IW is built.

the city with IW in it gets a production bonus of 50% if it has access to coal, and another production bonus if it has access to iron, making a grand total of 100% production bonus (+25% from the necessary forge=125%).
note that you don't have to have coal or iron in the city radius, only to have them as a resource connected to your trade network. You can even trade for some.

 

[Gainy]

Thank you!

Not sure where I got the quicker build time idea from

 

[MusX]

are there any spectators mode available in warlords? my friend is a newbie and i would like to spectate his game and give him some advice (even on external comunicator) during his game.

 

[BrantleyL1]

Rally points: There was some discussion on this, I used this on a different game... Let me just make sure I understand this. Let's say I'm planning to go to war on a civ to my north. I am amassing an army in a particular city (call it "X"). So, I build (axemen) in a variety of cities and send them off to "X". Rally will do this automatically??

If so, How do I set a rally point??

 

[frankcor]

I think it works this way :
- your turn ends
- FoW is recalculated
- barbs spawning is calculated

Thank you! Perhaps your wife is not a liar, just a poor judge of character

Rally will do this automatically??

If so, How do I set a rally point??

You are correct. To set the rally point, select the city by clicking once on the city name bar, then Alt-right-click on the desired location.

 

[MusX]

are there any spectators mode available in warlords? my friend is a newbie and i would like to spectate his game and give him some advice (even on external comunicator) during his game.

 

[DrewBledsoe]

are there any spectators mode available in warlords? my friend is a newbie and i would like to spectate his game and give him some advice (even on external comunicator) during his game.

Not that I know of I'm afraid......if he doesn't live too far away, maybe the best option is to go and sit with him in person, and offer help and comments.

 

[MusX]

ok thx for help. the problem is that we are playing generally at night and he lives with family