Reloading - how to kick the habit?

[Flek]

Heh.. I tried the GOTM for the first time this month. I found that I made many schoolboy-type errors, and to my chagrin found the need to go back and reload too much to resist. It is probably this bad habit which caused me to not be such a good player in the first place, and make the silly mistakes. Also, of course, I could not then submit a result.

My question is: I need to stop, but it is a very hard habit to break. Can anyone offer any help or advice how to break this habit? Did anyone have this problem too, and how did you reform yourself? Was it a long process, or did you just snap into a different way of playing? What is the best mind-set to adopt?

Thanks!

 

[juballs2001]

it may be lame.... but just stop... the urge will always be there... but just train yourself to stop when you get the urge

 

[eektor]

Don't save the game. That way if you want to go back and reload, there is no recent save to go back to.

 

[AlanH]

How much do you want to improve your game? If you stop reloading you will improve by leaps and bounds, and you'll have broken the habit. It's that simple.

 

[12Voltman]

Just play the GOTM's consistently, they will break your bad ways. When you read the progression of our superior players, reloading will become an afterthought. You can't compare your results to the experts if the game was tainted...really just play, don't reload. It stinks, but after 2 games you'll never look back.

By the way, I still stink relative to our best players, but I learn more about the gameplay every month from the postings.

Good luck!

 

[drkodos]

Don't save the game. That way if you want to go back and reload, there is no recent save to go back to.

The game autosaves every four turns. At worst, you need go back four turns, or up to sixteen, because it keeps four saves in its cache.


Just don't do it.

 

[AlanH]

Autosave frequency can be set in the .ini file. I believe it actually defaults to 5 turns between saves in Civ4. Unless you have a very stable system I wouldn't recommend switching it off. In fact you *ought* to set it to save every turn, so that in a crash situation you only need to go back and replay (accurately!) the current turn.

 

[drkodos]

Autosave frequency can be set in the .ini file. I believe it actually defaults to 5 turns between saves in Civ4. Unless you have a very stable system I wouldn't recommend switching it off. In fact you *ought* to set it to save every turn, so that in a crash situation you only need to go back and replay (accurately!) the current turn.

Good idea. Thanks for the tip.



If that happens in a GOTM, can a person go back and recreate that one turn allowably? (not looking for an exploit) Sometimes my game just freezes up and I have to reboot my whole system...always fun and happens right after a real important decision and move.

 

[Memphus]

Good idea. Thanks for the tip.



If that happens in a GOTM, can a person go back and recreate that one turn allowably? (not looking for an exploit) Sometimes my game just freezes up and I have to reboot my whole system...always fun and happens right after a real important decision and move.

For my knowledge yeah you can, but the idea is to recreate the turn exactly
(i.e. even if you lost that 99.6% battle you gotta do it again, , Although I have never had to do this I could imagien it woudl hurt more the second time.)

Now Remember the mods are people too and realize a crash in the late game, where a turn could possibly have upwards of 100 different actions, if you forget to do one, like change your tech slider from 90% to 80% they probably won't reject your game.

It simple think of each action you make like RL, time can't go backwards (although damn if anyone ever invents a save reload button...don't let me know because i wouldn't want to change a thing )

 

[AlanH]

If that happens in a GOTM, can a person go back and recreate that one turn allowably? (not looking for an exploit) Sometimes my game just freezes up and I have to reboot my whole system...always fun and happens right after a real important decision and move.

If that happens you have no choice but to replay the turn as accurately as you can up to the point of the crash, adn hope it doesn't happen again. We're not going to kick you out of the competition for a computer crash. That's why I recommend autosave every turn, to minimise the replaying you might have to do.

However, if it happens a lot we are going to get concerned that it might be being exploited. So please try to eliminate hardware or software problems that make your Civ4 unstable.

 

[Spoony]

The trick to beating the habit is being able to accept that bit of imperfection in your play. From this you will remeber clearly what mistakes really hurt you later in the game and what mistakes weren't as bad as you thought.

The best players use acceptable risk when trying to get the best scores. Say leaving early cities ungarded. The only way to find out what risks are worth taking is to see the full results of what the consequences are from it. Reloading really impedes your ability to become a better player and this is coming from a compulsive reloader when I played civ 3 before finding this site. I gradually started to win on higher and higher levels when I stopped reloading.

Competing in the GOTM's is the easiest way to kick the habit. Take pride in being able to submit a game, even if it is a loss.

 

[drkodos]

However, if it happens a lot we are going to get concerned that it might be being exploited. So please try to eliminate hardware or software problems that make your Civ4 unstable.

Of course.


It doesn't happen that much. I am definitly NOT looking for an exploit. I am too old for those types of shenannigens. I play for the fun of the game and little esle, but understand you position.


BTW: Home computers will never be "stable" 100 percent. (No offense.)

Amyway, thanks for the hard work and the games. I really enjoy it and thanks for all the tips!

 

[AlanH]

BTW: Home computers will never be "stable" 100 percent. (No offense.)

Probably never 100%, but how close you get depends who you buy the hardware and the OS from (no offence, either)

 

[malekithe]

Probably never 100%, but how close you get depends who you buy the hardware and the OS from (no offence, either)

Which OS would you recommend for playing Civ 4?

 

[AlanH]

Patience is a virtue

 

[drkodos]

Probably never 100%, but how close you get depends who you buy the hardware and the OS from (no offence, either)

True.


However, I use cutting edge (maybe even bleeding edge ) good equipment. When you stay on top of the curve, you get more crashes! Always buying new stuff! I NEVER use any bootleg or grey market stuff. Only real name and always make sure to pay for the good stuff.



Either way: I rarely reload, even in games I play just for myself for fun. I like it when something bad happens and I deal with it. It's more fun that way. I will, however, replay games just to see if I can do better, though and sometimes see what the MAX is I could have done if had played better.

 

[Flek]

Thanks for the advice. Seems obvious but I like the not saving idea (I can make myself 'forget' the autosaves). Thinking about it I always instinctively save before a hard decision. No more (hopefully ).

Next GOTM coming up, and I hashed up the last one.. hope I can hold it together heheh.

 

[inkydoo]

Autosave frequency can be set in the .ini file. I believe it actually defaults to 5 turns between saves in Civ4.

I looked for an appropriate .ini file, but didn't find anything. What file should this be in, and will it exist by default, or only if I create one?

Updated: Never mind, I found it under my user Documents and Settings. It's in My Documents\My Games\Sid Meier's Civilization 4 just for future reference

 

[Ruffin]

What gets me - and when I find myself re-loading - is barbarians. Every game I get a half dozen cases where I have three, four, or five axemen coming out of the woods near my heartland on the same turn. And all I have to defend myself with is a pair of archers. Or three+ archers when I'm still defending with warriors. If I somehow manage to survive, then two turns later I have another three or four. In the game I just quit I'd wiped out all but a handful of AI cities - none of whom defended with anything better than an archer - only to have a horde of barbarian axemen swamp me back home. It's ridiculous that barbarians are using units no civ has yet. The only solution is to back up eight or twelve turns, reload, and rush build defenses. (Playing marathon, prince, so I have to back up that far to build even warriors.)

Addendum: Trying to play completely re-load free... getting my tail kicked by barbarians. In the past ten turns I've lost four axemen to barbarians - three to archers where I had better than 85% odds, one to an axeman where my heavily promoted axer was defending on a wooded hilltop against an unpromoted, wounded barb axeman. Now that I'm defenseless Asoka has decided to invade. Oh, and I'm confined to two cities as I've been able to build nothing but archers until a few turns ago. Does the incidence of barbarians decrease (as it should) on marathon, or do they come just as often as the faster paced games? With the slower game it's impossible to build units fast enough to keep up with them. Without reloading, that is. If the game cheats, why can't we?

 

[Spoony]

Can't answer your marathon question, but if you are experiencing axes as barbarians and you only have warriors it means the AI are far in advance of you in technology. Also you may need to concentrate your early research on military advancements to make sure you don't get caught out.

One of the keys to preventing barbs is to keep the fog preventing sight as far back as possible. Scouts can be great at this once you've found close civs and are goody hutted out. Leave scouts or warriors on hill tiles (hopefully with forrests on) about three or four tiles from your cities and the chance of barb cities appearing near you will be greatly reduced.

Reloading isn't helping you beat this problem but improved gameplay will.