slower turns over time?

[Saaboy]

hey guys... i LOVE CIV although I haven't played recently, I used to play a bit more... one of the things that turned me off from continuing a civ 3 game into the latter years... longer and longer turns...

now... in the beginning, things are pretty quick, between turns it's maybe like 1 second or so... but later and later into the game, i feel like im waiting 20-30 seconds for sure... its really annoying... i made sure i didnt have any settings on 'slow'... even when i dont watch the other players moves', its still super slow... why?

Thanks.

 

[civverguy]

hey guys... i LOVE CIV although I haven't played recently, I used to play a bit more... one of the things that turned me off from continuing a civ 3 game into the latter years... longer and longer turns...

now... in the beginning, things are pretty quick, between turns it's maybe like 1 second or so... but later and later into the game, i feel like im waiting 20-30 seconds for sure... its really annoying... i made sure i didnt have any settings on 'slow'... even when i dont watch the other players moves', its still super slow... why?

Thanks.

That's because the computer has to calculate all the moves.

 

[Saaboy]

cool... but does it really take that long for everyone? I didnt think that civ 3 was that demanding of a game... my comp has 1gb of ram, and 3.2ghz processor... thats not slow is it?

 

[vmxa]

It is a matter of map size and settings. If you use huge maps with lots of water and lots of civs, then it will be painful on any pc.

Yes it is very cpu intensive in those cases as it has to calculate the trade routes every time you add a road, or cut one or any town is created or razed or captured.

I have played on 362x362 with 31 enemies and you can see the animation for settlers building a town last more than 2 minutes late in the game. We do not pillage after the mid point as it is too painful.

Not to mention killing 150 ro 200 units per turn in an AW games like the ones I mentioned.

 

[Saaboy]

Fair enough.

Yea, i'd always play the biggest maps, with the most enemies. I liked the diversity... What do you usually play to keep it quick?

 

[ecuwins]

^^Standard sized maps.

 

[Alpha Killer II]

hey guys... i LOVE CIV although I haven't played recently, I used to play a bit more... one of the things that turned me off from continuing a civ 3 game into the latter years... longer and longer turns...

now... in the beginning, things are pretty quick, between turns it's maybe like 1 second or so... but later and later into the game, i feel like im waiting 20-30 seconds for sure... its really annoying... i made sure i didnt have any settings on 'slow'... even when i dont watch the other players moves', its still super slow... why?

Thanks.

Its because the RAM is being used up while Cities take more and more land, each time u take a turn, ur computer processes wat ALL the cities are moving, the AI's units movements, my turns take about 5-30 mins (startin from whenever my turn starts) mostly due to my large amount of automated workers

 

[JDAllison]

later and later into the game, i feel like im waiting 20-30 seconds for sure...

Dude. I wish my turns were that fast! I'm currently playing on a huge real-world map with 31 opponents (well, I've killed about ten of them, so 21 now) and I'm in the industrial age and the turns are taking longer and longer. Right now, it's not too bad - only about 3-5 minutes from when I end my turn. I expect to hit the 15min. IBT mark when we all go modern. It helps that only two other civs are Industrial right now, but most are close.

Sit back, relax, and savour the feeling of playing Civ!

 

[Civinator]

On the other side what El Justo did find out:
If you cut down trade with the editor, you can speed up the game tremendous.

 

[Saaboy]

On the other side what El Justo did find out:
If you cut down trade with the editor, you can speed up the game tremendous.

how would i 'cut down trade'?

 

[Civinator]

how would i 'cut down trade'?

El justo took away the seatrade and airtrade function from harbours and airports. On the other side of course then you don´t have seatrade and airtrade.

 

[vmxa]

Its because the RAM is being used up while Cities take more and more land, each time u take a turn, ur computer processes wat ALL the cities are moving, the AI's units movements, my turns take about 5-30 mins (startin from whenever my turn starts) mostly due to my large amount of automated workers

RAM has no impact on the game, it does not use more than about 768K. It is strickly cpu bound.

 

[Tasslehoff]

Sit back, relax, and savour the feeling of playing Civ!

Or do homework, read a book...

 

[T.A JONES]

cool... but does it really take that long for everyone? I didnt think that civ 3 was that demanding of a game... my comp has 1gb of ram, and 3.2ghz processor... thats not slow is it?

Thats interesting I have the same 3.2ghz and am a vocal advacate for using these type of computers for improved turn times.
How big is you L3 cache? 2MB Ive got, mybe thats why its all flyby for me?. Ya IM very puzzled with the timing also infact when you posted you must seen or read this last post I did pertaining to this topic IT was near the top

WHat 'size' maps specificly are you having long deleys with?
Ive only dared exceed 220x220 a few times but never had a problem late game. (only wait is how many AI fights I have to watch)
You must see that the city cap comes into effect well before 300x300 so lag should be the least of your concern there.

*Remember a standard "huge" map is Civ3 is only 160x160 and can still place far more cities and civ's realisticly on the map then the say, the CIv4 'huge' model before lag comes in to question. In fact you never have any notacible lag on this size when playin civ3, civ4 thats another story.
(I saw your only other thread in the 4um by chance so i see your a new fan )


How bout you give me the save file of this map set at exact period where you say the deley is at its worst. PLease Estimate here how long you waited and what year/turn. Next I'll try it out and link video format on youtube showing how fast it should be running on that speed of processor.

NOte: PLease Gimme up to a week to get the video on air and linked to your thread oh, and thanks for your cooperation!

 

[Macezek]

RAM has no impact on the game, it does not use more than about 768K. It is strickly cpu bound.

Having more RAM helps because anything running in the background takes up RAM too, including the OS, especially Windows Vista. And the faster the front-side bus (FSB) speed is, the quicker your CPU can access and process data in the RAM.

Civ3 does not require much to play (you can run it using an onboard video card), but the better your machine is overall, the faster the game runs. It does mostly depends on the CPU, but RAM and the hard drive make a big difference. Hard drive speed makes a huge difference in loading times. If you have a faster drive (more RPMs), it takes much less time to find and load data. Defragmenting you hard drive also helps since it reorders the files and folders on the drive to be physically next to each other, making it easier for the drive head to find and access any data it needs. This cuts down on loading times enormously.

A fast defragmented hard drive improves loading time, while lots of RAM with a high FSB helps with processing time. Of course, it makes very little difference if your CPU isn't fast enough to take advantage of a better hard drive and RAM.

my comp has 1gb of ram, and 3.2ghz processor... thats not slow is it?

Depends what you're using the computer for. If you're talking about hard-core gaming, you could do better seeing as almost every new game today needs 2 gigs of ram and a dual core processor. Though for Civ3 it's more than enough to comfortably play, but 2 gigs of ram could always help. Either way, it's better than my laptop and old computer, both of which would take forever to get through the kind of game you describe. I custom built a computer for myself, and I would like to see how long it would take to get through the end turn time on my machine. Would you mind sending me a copy of the .sav too? I will post back results.

 

[Saaboy]

Thats interesting I have the same 3.2ghz and am a vocal advacate for using these type of computers for improved turn times.
How big is you L3 cache? 2MB Ive got, mybe thats why its all flyby for me?. Ya IM very puzzled with the timing also infact when you posted you must seen or read this last post I did pertaining to this topic IT was near the top

WHat 'size' maps specificly are you having long deleys with?
Ive only dared exceed 220x220 a few times but never had a problem late game. (only wait is how many AI fights I have to watch)
You must see that the city cap comes into effect well before 300x300 so lag should be the least of your concern there.

*Remember a standard "huge" map is Civ3 is only 160x160 and can still place far more cities and civ's realisticly on the map then the say, the CIv4 'huge' model before lag comes in to question. In fact you never have any notacible lag on this size when playin civ3, civ4 thats another story.
(I saw your only other thread in the 4um by chance so i see your a new fan )


How bout you give me the save file of this map set at exact period where you say the deley is at its worst. PLease Estimate here how long you waited and what year/turn. Next I'll try it out and link video format on youtube showing how fast it should be running on that speed of processor.

NOte: PLease Gimme up to a week to get the video on air and linked to your thread oh, and thanks for your cooperation!

this sounds cool... I always played on the biggest map... with the highest amount of civs... wat is the size of this map?

edit: not a new fan... ive played civ3 for lots and lots of hours... and civ 2 before that... but one of the main things that i hated was how long it took between turns... and wasnt exciting like it was earlier in the game.. wanted to fix that...

 

[Saaboy]

Having more RAM helps because anything running in the background takes up RAM too, including the OS, especially Windows Vista. And the faster the front-side bus (FSB) speed is, the quicker your CPU can access and process data in the RAM.

Civ3 does not require much to play (you can run it using an onboard video card), but the better your machine is overall, the faster the game runs. It does mostly depends on the CPU, but RAM and the hard drive make a big difference. Hard drive speed makes a huge difference in loading times. If you have a faster drive (more RPMs), it takes much less time to find and load data. Defragmenting you hard drive also helps since it reorders the files and folders on the drive to be physically next to each other, making it easier for the drive head to find and access any data it needs. This cuts down on loading times enormously.

A fast defragmented hard drive improves loading time, while lots of RAM with a high FSB helps with processing time. Of course, it makes very little difference if your CPU isn't fast enough to take advantage of a better hard drive and RAM.



Depends what you're using the computer for. If you're talking about hard-core gaming, you could do better seeing as almost every new game today needs 2 gigs of ram and a dual core processor. Though for Civ3 it's more than enough to comfortably play, but 2 gigs of ram could always help. Either way, it's better than my laptop and old computer, both of which would take forever to get through the kind of game you describe. I custom built a computer for myself, and I would like to see how long it would take to get through the end turn time on my machine. Would you mind sending me a copy of the .sav too? I will post back results.

I might hvae to start a new game for that... unless i can find some older game... gime a day or so

 

[vmxa]

Like I said c3c use about 768K and I have not seen it use more than than regardles of the map and I have played the max size.

All the other crap is beside the point. It is not using the hard drive as you watch it say please wait, it is not using much ram either. Faster ram or better l2 or 10000 rpm drive, is all well and good, but you will still wait on a really large game.

I play most of my civ games on 10000 rmp drive on a 3.2 gh processor with nothing running and 2gb of ram. It does not matter when you have 20 or more civs still in the game and have 512 cities down.

Raze a town and you will be waiting. Cut a road and you will get a fair wait as well.

 

[T.A JONES]

this sounds cool... I always played on the biggest map... with the highest amount of civs... wat is the size of this map?

edit: not a new fan... ive played civ3 for lots and lots of hours... and civ 2 before that... but one of the main things that i hated was how long it took between turns... and wasnt exciting like it was earlier in the game.. wanted to fix that...

My godness if your only playin on a biggest map with higest default number of civs, that means you are gettin dragged down by a 160x160 with only 16 civs while using a 3.2 processor!(ram don't mean a thing past 512 and seprate g card plus, dual core is only good for overclockin higher monocore speed)

Ya something is wrong man. Like I say I play around in the editer to max things as best you can before the 512 citycap kicks in. Trust me No big thing, those maps pale yours in comparison in civs and citys and never backup. Thanks to the speed the info is processed at you should be lookin at flawless default play. (3.2ghz, is excellin mind you Ive overclocked at the moment I have two 3.2 CPU's workin at 4.1 ghz mono)

Heck on 160z160 I could show you a faster time on a intel 2.0 if you send me that save. IN the mean time heres something to help you out.

 

[Alpha Killer II]

RAM has no impact on the game, it does not use more than about 768K. It is strickly cpu bound.

Oopsie!, thanks for correcting me!