Quick Answers / 'Newbie' Questions

Yes I thought of those, but I wanted to start by proposing things I knew the AI could easily be adapted to, stuff that would only mean changing a few numbers. Would those proposals be doable?

I think so, otherwise I wouldn't have mentioned them. But you'd have to be a programmer in C++ so that you can work with the SDK. But I guess that there are quite a few around on this forum that could do the things that I suggested.

Et tu, Brute?

By the way RJ, do you remember our chat about Isaac Assimov's I, Robot? (Not Will Smith's, although his kid is cute and he is perhaps America's less embarassing celebrity). I finally read it, it was very good although I still like the Foundation Trilogy best.

As long as we don't irritate people, I guess it's all right. But we shouldn't spam too much.

I still haven't read the foundation trilogy yet, I really should do that some time. I read one of the books of the trilogy, got it as a birthday present. Strange enough, it was the second book of the trilogy, so I didn't get everything. There are so many books that I still want to read. :)
 
^^you guys never heard of PMs?

I thought as long as personal conversation was imbedded in legit civ on topic conversation no one would be bothered too much. I'll cut it out.

At Noble do the AIs have an automatic diplomacy bonus with eachother or hostility towards the player? I always find them awfully cuddly with eachother right away, while I'm still trying to get open borders and some trade. It's not a matter of shared religions, I'm aware of that. Also, this is before I start racking up penalties by starting wars.
 
At Noble do the AIs have an automatic diplomacy bonus with eachother or hostility towards the player? I always find them awfully cuddly with eachother right away, while I'm still trying to get open borders and some trade. It's not a matter of shared religions, I'm aware of that. Also, this is before I start racking up penalties by starting wars.

There does seem to be a hidden modifier between certain civs. Certain civs like eachother more than they like others. So the peacelovers like eachother more and the warmongers like eachother more, but they don't like eachother. This leads to the strange situation that you have 2 civs, both at +2 diplomacy modifier with you and the exact same modifiers while one is cautious and the other pleased.

The aggressive setting also makes all civilizations like eachother less.

I don't know any more specifics about this.

How much culture do you need on Marathon mode to get a legendary city?

150000.
 
At Noble do the AIs have an automatic diplomacy bonus with eachother or hostility towards the player? I always find them awfully cuddly with eachother right away, while I'm still trying to get open borders and some trade. It's not a matter of shared religions, I'm aware of that. Also, this is before I start racking up penalties by starting wars.
To start with there is a warmonger respect value for each warmongering leader towards other warmongering leaders - which can be 0 (for peacemongers) 1 or 2. Also each leader has a base attitude of -1 to 2 towards every other player and there is a negative modifier (between 0 and -3 depending on leader) if your rank is lower, which obviously is more often the case on higher difficulties (there is a positive modifier of 0 to 4 for better rank - which makes things easier on lower levels). And to complete this there is a difficulty modifier for the human player of +2 for settler, +1 for chieftain, 0 for warlords and -1 for noble and above...
Edit: the aggressive setting has two results: a -2 modifier for the human player and in considering war with whom ever the AI's own strength is multiplied by 4/3 so that it thinks it is much stronger and a DoWar decision is made more often...
 
I have a problem about loading saved games. whenever i load one it crashes to the desktop. how may i solve this? ive tried reinstalling but it still happens. i have v1.61 and i saved this games in this version. can anyone help?
 
I have a problem about loading saved games. whenever i load one it crashes to the desktop. how may i solve this? ive tried reinstalling but it still happens. i have v1.61 and i saved this games in this version. can anyone help?

what about asking in the bug forum?
I think you should give full informations about your configuration and a detailed description of what happens (does it crash for every save, every time or only for one specific game/scenario? what do you have running in the background...)
 
what about asking in the bug forum?
I think you should give full informations about your configuration and a detailed description of what happens (does it crash for every save, every time or only for one specific game/scenario? what do you have running in the background...)

i save the games when i, say, need to rest.. i only play single player mode. and when i play again and try to load the games i saved, the program just disappears and puts me back to the desktop. i look at task manager and surely civ4 is not on the running processes. i have antivirus in the background but i dont think its the cause since i added the program to the trusted zone.
 
To start with there is a warmonger respect value for each warmongering leader towards other warmongering leaders - which can be 0 (for peacemongers) 1 or 2. Also each leader has a base attitude of -1 to 2 towards every other player and there is a negative modifier (between 0 and -3 depending on leader) if your rank is lower, which obviously is more often the case on higher difficulties (there is a positive modifier of 0 to 4 for better rank - which makes things easier on lower levels). And to complete this there is a difficulty modifier for the human player of +2 for settler, +1 for chieftain, 0 for warlords and -1 for noble and above...
Edit: the aggressive setting has two results: a -2 modifier for the human player and in considering war with whom ever the AI's own strength is multiplied by 4/3 so that it thinks it is much stronger and a DoWar decision is made more often...

This is well put, and since I always play aggressive AI settings (its the only way to get even vaguely realistic lvls of inter-ai wars), and monarch or above, Diplomacy is very hard, and with some civs a completely pointless exercise. Monty is generally furious just because I exist, the same for Izzy without even starting to consider religious differences.

Oh well, I tried a few games without aggressive AI and the world generally went about it's business for around 12 real time hours (marathon game speed btw)without any conflict, so aggressive Ais it is; either that or allow myself to be conquered by sheer boredom ;)
 
How do I evaluate when I would be better off switching to Free Market? I never do, I ride Decentralization all the way to State Property, and I assume that's foolish. So how do I know when it's the better option? (I know switching to SP is the right move regardless because I always have a huge empire).
 
How do I evaluate when I would be better off switching to Free Market? I never do, I ride slavery or serfdom all the way to State Property, and I assume that's foolish. So how do I know when it's the better option? (I know switching to SP is the right move regardless because I always have a huge empire).
First off, Slavery and Serfdom are labor civics, not economic ones, so you can run them with Free Market or SP or whatever. As for when to go to FM--I usually run Decentralization or Mercantilism for a long time. Someone else may be able to provide a more mathematical answer, but I base the switch on two things: (a) how close am I to Communism and SP, and (b) what economic civics are the other civs running?

If Communism and SP is far off, and if the other civs are running Decentralization (or, preferably, Free Market), I'll switch to Free Market. But if I'm either close to Communism OR everyone else is running Mercantilism (no foreign trade routes), then I'll avoid switching, it's just not worth it.

I'm in the same boat as you regarding SP being preferable: I too usually have a large empire, and the saved distance maintenance is worth more than the extra trade routes. It also means I don't have to waste hammers on the Forbidden Palace, Versailles, or even courthouses.
 
Hey , quick question .
Is it possible to delete the entries in my HOF ?
I havent played in a few months and my HOF has quite a few of cheesy high score wins with quecha/immortal/praets rushes that I would like to remove and get a fresh start without having to reinstall .
Playing with the better AI seems a lot more challenging (or else I just sux now) and I wanna earn those scores without cheesy rushes / map setups :P

Thx in advance .
 
Hey , quick question .
Is it possible to delete the entries in my HOF ?
I havent played in a few months and my HOF has quite a few of cheesy high score wins with quecha/immortal/praets rushes that I would like to remove and get a fresh start without having to reinstall .
Playing with the better AI seems a lot more challenging (or else I just sux now) and I wanna earn those scores without cheesy rushes / map setups :P

Thx in advance .
Open the directory called Replays and delete whatever .CivReplay or .CivWarlordsReplay file you want to remove - this will also remove the HOF entries
 
How do I evaluate when I would be better off switching to Free Market? I never do, I ride Decentralization all the way to State Property, and I assume that's foolish. So how do I know when it's the better option? (I know switching to SP is the right move regardless because I always have a huge empire).

I agree with Sisiutil (exception: I still build courthouses under State Property and will have build many before I even get there).

Your empire gets one foreign trade route for every foreign city with which it is connected (open borders, no mercantalism civic for the other nation, connected trough ocean-river-road-airport-route). You can easily count how many trade routes your cities have (probably 3 or 4 per city) and thus you'll know if any extra trade routes from the free market civic will be foreign or domestic trade routes. If they're domestic trade routes, then they're not worth a lot, probably 1 or 2 commerce per city. If they're foreign trade routes, then their value will be lower than the average foreign trade route value before switching to the free market civic, but a lot higher than the value of domestic trade routes.

If you want to compare the things mathematically, you could do the following. Just estimate, don't do it exactly.

The cost of switching is probably 1 turn, maybe 2 if you play on large maps at the slower speed settings. Take the mfg goods value from the info screen and multiply it by 2. Add the amount of science from the financial advisor that you'd produce at your break even point (you're not losing or gaining money). That's the cost of one turn lost (roughly). I value hammers here twice as high as science points.

The gain of switching would be the added commerce from the extra trade routes multiplied by your average science multiplier (from libraries and such) in your cities (probably around 1.5). That's the gain per turn. Multiply it with the expected number of turns that you'll use the civic.

I must say that I never saw the need to do the calculation. Usually the outcome was obvious, one way or the other. Whether you do it exactly with a calculator in your hand (nerd ;) ;) ;) ) or not, this is the comparison that you should make.
 
1. For Always War and Permanent War or Peace games, is War Weariness calculated just as during normal games? In other words, is it a huge problem in these games?

2. How do I set up a game vs the AIs where every player, human or AI, is permanently at war with all other players? I thought simply selecting Permanent War or Peace and leaving all players in separate teams should do it, but that got me a game that started with everyone at peace and no possibility to declare war.
 
1. For Always War and Permanent War or Peace games, is War Weariness calculated just as during normal games? In other words, is it a huge problem in these games?

No. Yes. :D More precisely WW is 50% of what it would be. So it is not calculated just as in a normal way but will add up to quite enormous problems...

2. How do I set up a game vs the AIs where every player, human or AI, is permanently at war with all other players? I thought simply selecting Permanent War or Peace and leaving all players in separate teams should do it, but that got me a game that started with everyone at peace and no possibility to declare war.
Always War only means all AIs are always at war with you. You can however go into worldbuilder and manually do this - there is no simpler option...
 
1. For Always War and Permanent War or Peace games, is War Weariness calculated just as during normal games? In other words, is it a huge problem in these games?

It's at 50% of the normal value.

2. How do I set up a game vs the AIs where every player, human or AI, is permanently at war with all other players? I thought simply selecting Permanent War or Peace and leaving all players in separate teams should do it, but that got me a game that started with everyone at peace and no possibility to declare war.

I don't know what the option 'Permanent War or Peace' does. How does the game decide whether it's war or peace? Maybe it needs to be combined with another option. I don't know, I've never been interested in such a game. Hope someone else can help you.
 
Thanks guys. Just to show off my mathematical ineptitude:

Say I have a city producing 30 hammers (shields dammit!) a turn, and it's building something that costs 12. After one turn, I cash rush it.

Turn one: 30/120 hammers produced
Turn two: 90 hammers bought
Turn three: Production finished, 30 hammers go to something else
Turn four: Production would have finished naturally, 30 hammers go to something else

Are you losing a turn's worth of hammers in there, the hammers that you would have produced the turn you pay?
 
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