Request : Savegame CRACK for Civ3v121f

[W.i.n.t.e.r]

Hi everybody- hope sb. can actually help me (and all the other less fortunate ones that are customizing their runing games and creating mods for the Civ3 fan community.

The problem: The changes made in the bic file (civ3 editor) are not passed to the savegame- this is particularly anoying since I am currently experiencing trouble with some units (either sud launcher, penguin missile or specops? trying 2 find that out)... and I cannot edit their functions, thus not see how to keep my savegame from crashing

Comment: - THX Firaxis- great way of solving problems with game crashes after cusomisation- make it impossible to customize :aargh3:

Request: If only sb. could make a svegame crack to make it possible again for bic file rule changes to have effect on the saved games

 

[King of Camelot]

Actually I thought it was done differntly. Here is my theory. When you start a new game it uses the settings in civ3mod, when you start a scenario it uses the settings from that bic. It is just like normal except that now if you start a game, save it, change the civ3mod bic, and load the game then it won't have an error. Plus if you couldn't change settings for a new game then the civ3mod bic would be useless and they wouldn't have included it. Hope this helps.

 

[W.i.n.t.e.r]

Originally posted by King of Camelot
Actually I thought it was done differntly. Here is my theory. When you start a new game it uses the settings in civ3mod, when you start a scenario it uses the settings from that bic. It is just like normal except that now if you start a game, save it, change the civ3mod bic, and load the game then it won't have an error. Plus if you couldn't change settings for a new game then the civ3mod bic would be useless and they wouldn't have included it. Hope this helps.

Well, yeah- but what about my savegame ??? Cannot change that anymore. Actually only (!) when a game is started the particular setting s are used- but that doesn't protect us from errors. In my case I added some units and played a new random game... everything went nicely until when the AI got to build that one buggy unit... that was in 1979 (!). With the old patch: no problem- just make the unit obsolete- (correct it in the bic file- for later use in future games) and continue playing with the same savegame AVOIDING the crash. Great once one knows which units contains the bug...

But now, if the error is in and U realise that after 3 weeks of playing, and then I cannot even change anything- well it makes one wonder what the logic behind this is: Again, this "feature" does not keep errors out- it keeps them "in".... and me rather puzzled (thought I'd seen it all...

ps. there was a guy at Apolyton today that canceled his membership at the site and offered his game for sale after installing this thing they call "fix"...

 

[GIDustin]

I am a mod maker and I see it differently.

I add many things to my mod that COULD crash the game, but before i get really into the game and start wars etc, I beta test everything. Can i build this certain item w/o the game crashing? I do this until my mod is crash free, then sit back and start a new serious game without the fear of getting really addicted to the current game and then having it all ruined by an illegal operation.

I actually like how the new patch works. It makes modding quite a bit easier. I still wish we could add luxury resources, but that is besides the point

That is my .02 anyway.

GIDustin

 

[W.i.n.t.e.r]

U could do sth similar before- just make the custom units available from the start and lower their cost so u could try it out instantly- didnt need this patch for it

 

[Frink]

I'm with winter here. I like to mod a lot, including adding new units. Constantly I come up with the problem:
those new late game infantry - you can't kill them when they are fortifed in a city: solution, tweak down their defensive value
that new armor unit just steamrolls its current age defensive unit: solution tweak down its attack (or up the def unit defense)
those jet bombers come too late to be of any use: solution, change the preq tech
that artillery unit can't cause any damage: solution increase the bombard strenght / rate of fire
or maybe the stock units need a tweak to accomidate your tastes / playing style: fighters with a range of 4 are found to be worthless, change it to 6
or maybe an edit to a stock unit could stand to be undone - 6 is too much range for those fighters, change it back to 4 or 5.

its not just units. Say you adjust the world size, and you didn't set the tech rate or optimal # of cities to a good value. Just change it. Stuff like this isn't often seen until midgame, after several hours of playing.

the point is, why not have fun while playtesting your mod. With the ability to tweak values midgame, you can fix a minor balancing error and contiune your game. I would rather not exhaustivly test each new unit I place in the game by removing preq's, and playing in 4kBC until it is adjusted to my satification. Moreover, some balancing issues don't show up right away. Things like tech rate, corruption rate and preq don't show up until mid or even late game. If something is broke here, you have 3 options (well two now):
1) fix it and contiune playing
2) live with the error, but make a note to change it for the next game
3) quit your game entirly and start a new one.

I think I understand the Firaxis wanted to prevent people from breaking games they already saved by adding a unit or deleting something, as this would cause the game to crash. But unfortnally, IMO the cure here is worse then the disease.

 

[W.i.n.t.e.r]

Hey, sb. actually agrees with me on this Thx Frink !!!

I thought about a way of minimising the possibility of people destroying their saves entirelly- it is called "backup the pre-change bic file"!!!
Actually I never got people's problem with doing this 3 second task- but then again this has been made somewhat trivial *Doh*, and I don't really understand at all Y the ominious company, creator of this lil game has made backups useless for ongoing games to be corrected.... beats me!

 

[damunzy]

While I am not a big time mod-er I like the new way. One file is nice...plus it allows me to play GOTM (which I haven;t done in a long time) without havingto juggle around the .bics when I switch back and forth between the GOTM and my saves. Once they have gotten the editor to where it should be I bet they will allow you to set the year and techs and you will be able to try out all the functions no problem.

 

[Frink]

If you did it right, you could have it that way as well before. Just save the bic as a scenario. You could have an infinate number of different rules files and play with them all. Just instead of hitting "new game", just hit "play scenario": vola new rules, new map, etc. Here I just want to be able to tweek values in game so that I can balance without restarting the entire game.