Steam autoupdates and HOF mods

[da_Vinci]

I've been AWOL a while, and sorry if this was all figured out in some long lost thread while I was gone ...

When I was last here a Steam update (the one that went with the death of GameSpy, if I recall correctly) cracked several things, not the least being HOF mod compatibility, which ruined HOF and GOTM for steam players.

It looks like since then, steam options have changed from having a never update option, to the least updating one being update only on launch. And it seems that once an update starts, you can pause it but you can't cancel it.

All of which on its surface would seem to make playing HOF and GOTM on steam impossible or at least very tricky. Unless we wrote new HOF mods?

Do we have an answer to this and can someone direct me to it if we do?

Thanks,

dV

 

[DynamicSpirit]

I've been AWOL a while, and sorry if this was all figured out in some long lost thread while I was gone ...

When I was last here a Steam update (the one that went with the death of GameSpy, if I recall correctly) cracked several things, not the least being HOF mod compatibility, which ruined HOF and GOTM for steam players.

It looks like since then, steam options have changed from having a never update option, to the least updating one being update only on launch. And it seems that once an update starts, you can pause it but you can't cancel it.

All of which on its surface would seem to make playing HOF and GOTM on steam impossible or at least very tricky. Unless we wrote new HOF mods?

Do we have an answer to this and can someone direct me to it if we do?

Thanks,

dV

I believe this Steam release is the answer. (It's unsupported but was released specifically in response to Steam updates breaking several things, including the HOF/BUFFY mods).

 

[da_Vinci]

Thanks, DS. I will give that a try.

dV

 

[da_Vinci]

So I have the steam beta installed, getting no error on the asset checker, and still getting warnings for BTS 90 on a windows 8 machine in steam.

Account is an admin account. Set full permissions on all the files. Not sure what else to try. Any suggestions?

dV

 

[DynamicSpirit]

What warnings are you getting?

 

[da_Vinci]

A box saying that hof won't be able to save settings, and says use a user account with admin access (or something like that).

Are there different messages for different problems?

dV

 

[da_Vinci]

Any idea if win 10 will be better or worse for all this?

dV

 

[da_Vinci]

Some progress. Found the run as admin under compatibility tab (didn't that used to be right up front under properties?)

Now I can't get any mod to load, all say that Mods\ods\(whatever the mod name is) is an invalid directory and being ignored)

Which would make you think that there is a stray folder in the path, but when I look I can's see one.

Vanilla, which was running before I set run as admin, now says it can't find steam.

Checking warlords now.

dV

 

[da_Vinci]

Curiouser and Curiouser ...

Went to the warlords beta. first tested if mods load, got HOF, alexander, and Vikings to load fine. HOF of course gave me warning because I had not yet done the run as admin activation.

So I set it to run as admin. Now warlords fails to find steam. If I unset run as admin, warlords finds steam just fine (and I get no user permission windows to jump through at the start).

Vanilla doing same thing. Mods load fine if not running as admin, if running as admin, fails to find steam.

BTS can find steam running as admin, but can't get into the mods. Take BTS off of run as admin, Buffy mod and Ryse and Fall mods load up just fine, (but with that Buffy warning, of course).

Vanilla and BTS have clean, no error asset checks. Warlords is a mess.

Am I going to need to do one of those compatibility settings?

EDIT: Well XP SP 2 isn't it for BTS ... buffy won't load (same mods\ods nonsense) and some small preload window for BTS is locked in the middle of the screen.

dV

EDIT 2: Used the autofinder for compatibility, it suggested vista SP2 which was also a bust for the same reasons as XP SP2. Moving further in that tool, it asked what did program used to run on, I gave it Win 7, it seems to have set to that (but that is not what the properties/compatibility window now says ... ) and the preload window is gone. Still getting the mods\ods error for any mod, time to check mod folder permissions again.

dV

 

[da_Vinci]

See edits above.

Still stuck on mods\ods path error, which can't really be a file path error or I would not be able to load the mods when not running as admin, right?

Taking a look at vanilla after compatibility work.

dV

 

[da_Vinci]

Vanilla fails to find steam regardless.

Time to dust off the old crash-prone W7 box and give that a try. I think it has the non- beta versions that I fixed with the replacement files when the steam bomb first happened. If I keep it offline when I open steam, perhaps I can avoid auto updates.

dV

 

[Dhoomstriker]

For my Windows shortcuts, I have to put the following, in terms of spacing:
"{Path to my installation}\Beyond the Sword\Civ4BeyondSword.exe" mod= BUFFY-3.19.003
"{Path to my installation}\Civilization4.exe" mod= HOF-1.74.004
"{Path to my installation}\Warlords\Civ4Warlords.exe" mod= HOF-2.13.004

Using alternative spacing can cause a character to be removed, showing something along the lines of "UFFY-3.19.003" as the Mod, which obviously won't load.

People have said Win 7 for compatibility mode.

 

[da_Vinci]

For my Windows shortcuts, I have to put the following, in terms of spacing:
"{Path to my installation}\Beyond the Sword\Civ4BeyondSword.exe" mod= BUFFY-3.19.003
"{Path to my installation}\Civilization4.exe" mod= HOF-1.74.004
"{Path to my installation}\Warlords\Civ4Warlords.exe" mod= HOF-2.13.004

Using alternative spacing can cause a character to be removed, showing something along the lines of "UFFY-3.19.003" as the Mod, which obviously won't load.

People have said Win 7 for compatibility mode.

Hi Dhoom, how is it going?

Are you referring to Windows 8 OS (presumably), and is that a Steam or a disk install?

Your "UFFY-3.19.003" certainly reminds me of the Mods\ods error message I am getting. Except that in my case it seems to be creating a phantom folder (duplicating Mods) and then cutting off the lead character in the second Mods folder.

The stranger thing still is that the HOF/Buffy mods load just fine in steam if I am not running as admin, and screw up if I am running as admin. Suggests to me that the file paths are intact on the disc, but somehow the OS has a hiccup if working them as an admin. Does that make sense?

Edit: The good news is that the old win 7 box is up and running (or seems to be, I will know when I try to submit), no crash yet, so I can play. Would be nice to be able to use the shinny new high end box though ...

dV

 

[Dhoomstriker]

Since your thread is not getting much traction, you might want to first look up solutions in the Help with installing BUFFY thread from the SGOTM sub-forum.

I only use the disk version, but people were talking about Steam installations in that thread, so the advice there (and several links in that thread to other threads) will probably, somewhere in that pile of information, provide you with a solution.

 

[Kennigit]

BTS can find steam running as admin, but can't get into the mods. Take BTS off of run as admin, Buffy mod and Ryse and Fall mods load up just fine, (but with that Buffy warning, of course).

Vanilla and BTS have clean, no error asset checks. Warlords is a mess.

That seems weird

I had what appears to be same problem of mods\ods\buffy but I only wrote that it got fixed with "admin setting junk." By making things run as admin.

But if you can get buffy to not have the mods\ods\buffy error, you're probably close to good.

Uninstall the steam bts and install it with a new steam library set up in c:/users rather than c:/program files.

http://forums.civfanatics.com/showthread.php?p=13645818&highlight=buffy#post13645818

or, apparently by magic, what worked for me and ChrisShaffer in that thread was the opposite for packers5280 (post 79), who deleted "my documents" steam files.

 

[da_Vinci]

Thanks to Dhoom and Kenn for the reference to the Help with Buffy thread ... at least I don't feel lonely now, and the errors I have seen appear to all be represented in that thread, from the Mod\ods error to the little load postage stamp that won't leave the middle of the screen (fixed by win 7 emulation).

Glancing at the thread I think I now understand what Dhoom was saying, that if I preset mod choices in the ini file, I might be able to get it to load (get past mods\ods error) without having to move the whole steam file set to a new home (I initially didn't get that was what you were talking about, Dhoom). Going to try that at home tonight and will see how it goes.

I'd be really curious if the current update of steam (not the beta) works fine in win 8 if I patch it up with the three files that matter (which I still have in pre-bomb versions saved on the win 8 box) without all these emulation hoops and Mods\ods issues. If so, then there is something not quite right about the beta. A test for sometime later, I think.

dV