Technical issues for making v1.21g(MAC) play like v1.29f or PTW (PC)

[cracker]

I have had a number of very supportive contacts from MAC players to indicate that this is an issue that we should move to address.

We believe that we can support som game play options that let the MAC player community participate fully in a number of the CivFanatics events if we can address some of the basic gameplay issues.

I believe that the first step in this process is to ask the MAC player community to make sure we have identified the key game function issues and then to implement a xxxxxxxxx.bic level mod that can address the play compatibility.

The key differences in play between v1.21 and v1.29 were the update to the Commercial trait and the tech rate pacing for the AI and the Human on different difficulty levels.

The xxxx.bic level changes may not be enough to fix the game so that individual players can randomly generate theri own games, but from a "Games Master" perspective we need to identify the changes that can be used to by a "Games Master" to produce an equivalent game.

We also do not need to dedicate effort to fixing samll interface issues just to implement a compatible game play experience.
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I believe that we can implement a fix to the commercial trait balance by asking the GamesMaster to implement a special type of bonus resource that will give the Commerical civs an advantage. This resource will have to be manually placed into the games to benefit commercial civs but I believe that will be easily within the scope of the process.
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The tech rate pace can be easily balanced but will require a different xxxxxxxxxxxxx.bic file for each difficulty level of the game. The tech cost in V1.21 can be balanced to be equivalent to the v1.29 tech cost at that difficulty level by adjusting a combination of the map size tech rate factor and the actual set tech research cost. In the end, the MAC players will be playing a game that starts from a different set of factors in the xxxxxxxx.bic game but ends up with equivalent tech research and trading costs.
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There are other issues with making v1.21g play compatible with v1.29 and PTW but I think we have a handle on those issues, We need to support the MAC player community in defining solutions to the two issues outlined above and then ask you to implement that sort of soultion for regular game play issues.

I believe that Txurce has indicated that he and others will be available to help address these two issues and I will also be available to facilitate and implement the proposal.

Good luck and let's see what answers you guy/gals come up with.

 

[dojoboy]

Originally posted by cracker

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I believe that we can implement a fix to the commercial trait balance by asking the GamesMaster to implement a special type of bonus resource that will give the Commerical civs an advantage. This resource will have to be manually placed into the games to benefit commercial civs but I believe that will be easily within the scope of the process.
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Are you saying there will be a resource, say stone, that can only be accessed (seen by) commercial trait civs? Since stone is needed for all buildings, then the commercial trait becomes more balanced? Or, can a "tariff" be added to commercial civs' trade deals? Or, perhaps, another bonus resource just for commercial civs, say silver (adding gpt)?

 

[dojoboy]

What Mac application can be used to open the mod.bic file? I'm assuming this is wher the work is done? It wouldn't open for me.

 

[senecasax]

The BIC files are compressed in 1.21g - civ3mod.bic is uncompressed, the SAV's are. I've written a little program to decompress them. I need to add an applescript studio interface and it should be ready to go. If you want the terminal program get it here.

Additionally, you'll need a hex editor to view the file. There are file format descriptions here. Note that a few things in the 1.29 format are changed, most notably that there are two unknown long values in the CULT section of the 1.21 files (BIC version 3.08). I've looked through the Hex of the SAV files (bic format), and there doesn't seem to be THAT much of a difference otherwise. Game-play issues can be modded but:
The commercial trait is moved from 12.5% increase of optimal # of cities to 25% increase. So this needs to be hard coded into the BIC depending on the civ in the game of the month. Problem here is that any other civ's that aren't commercial will still gain an optimal increase... What to do, what to do...

If anyone else has ideas, let me know. I'm thinking about a project to work on editing BIC's but with the CIV3 editor due out shortly.. (does anyone know if it can read .SAV files? they are the same format (theoretically)).

:-D

 

[senecasax]

Oh, and about the resource thing, could one make a special - non-tradeable tech (perhaps its prereq is future tech?) that makes the resource appear. Then give that to the commerical civs. Could it work?

 

[Txurce]

I am on board to help out in any way. Once the Mac users start playing the GOTM, any Mac-related issues that pop up could be discussed here.

In the meantime, I hope that others are as excited as I am by Cracker and the GOTM staff's support of our gaming experience. For this effort to be worth their while on a continuing basis, we need to show our interest and support by playing in the GOTMs, and registering our results. These games are played at all levels at one point or another, so don't assume that they're usually going to be over your head.

If you check out the PC GOTM spoiler threads, you'll see that there is plenty of advice shared, which makes for a healthy educational experience. (I learn stuff just following along.) In addition, we can continue to discuss general strategy in this forum, so that if a game is on emperor level, for example, we could first review what that level tends to dictate... and then tackle the game. (Actual GOTM discussions should be reserved for the GOTM spoiler thread.)

 

[cracker]

Originally posted by senecasax
The BIC files are compressed in 1.21g - civ3mod.bic is uncompressed, the SAV's are. I've written a little program to decompress them.

I don't think you will need to worry about these issues too much once we define the solutions to the key gameplay issues. For the initial implementation this will not be an editor issue because we will release the xxxxxxx.sav files to you in v1.21g format.

I know this is hard to perhaps visualize, but what we are looking for is modification based choices that can make your play in v1.21g essentially equivalent to play in V1.29f or PTW.

These solutions will not solve or even remotely look to solve the issues that may exist in the MAC editor. That is a different set of issues.

Originally posted by senecasax
The commercial trait is moved from 12.5% increase of optimal # of cities to 25% increase. So this needs to be hard coded into the BIC depending on the civ in the game of the month. Problem here is that any other civ's that aren't commercial will still gain an optimal increase... What to do, what to do...

I would not advocate thinking along this lines because it does not hold the same elegant and effective solution as does a resource based implementation. Bear in mind that we are talking about an implementation taht may require specific "Omnipotent" intervention by the Games Master in order to give this benefit to the commercial civs, but that would be in line with the intent of the process to give the Mac players an equivalent solution that would let them play games equivalent to the rest of the Civ3 software versions.

 

[dojoboy]

Question: Will the AI commercial civs be able to utilize their new bonus?

 

[cracker]

I am sure that if we find the right resource based (or tech/improvement based approach) that the AI's will be able to use the approach.

As an example, seeding some resource locations next to the commercial civs that give them access to an additional shield/coin here or there will give them an advantage.

We could discuss the option of giving the commercial civs more workers at the outset so that they could jump start roads and mine quicker and we could also discuss giving the commercial civs a larger starting treasury.

Another approach would be to give the commercial civs access to a unique improvement or an extra unit that might compensate for the commercial advantage.

The unique tech implementation is something we have to test to see if it provides the desired result. Free techs from late in the tech tree are not available if they are outside the current era and the civ that gets the free tech does not have the prerequisites.

I think the best solution that we will come up with may be a combination of all these things in table form that says, for example, a commercial v1.21g civ on Monarch level needs the following things to make it roughly equivalent to a commercial civ on v1.29f.

 

[dojoboy]

Originally posted by cracker
I am sure that if we find the right resource based (or tech/improvement based approach) that the AI's will be able to use the approach.

Now, if this is a bonus resource, can we get it to act as a bonus economically? How will it manifest itslef? If it is a luxury/strategic resource, will it contribute to AI extortion demands?

Forgive me, just thinking out loud.

 

[cracker]

If the solution proposal included a resource, I think it will need to be a "Bonus" resource because then it would not be able to be traded or extorted.

An example would be a little graphic that looks something like a small house or building and this could be set to give a +1 gold and/or a +1 shield from the terrain square where it would be located.

The worker advantage option for commercial civs could give them an allocation of free slave workers that would give them an advantage in terms of unit support costs as well as speed to lay down roads and other improvements that would increase their commercial yield at a better pace that the equivalent civs with other traits. An example of this would be saying that commercial civs in V1.21g would get a starting bonus of 6 slave workers.

Again, I think that right solution proposal may contain a combination of features that give the commercial v1.21g civs an equivalent power to the commercial v1.29f civs even though they will be technically different.

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Does someone in the Mac world want to take on the specifics of understanding how the tech pace may be adjusted by using the map tech rate factors plus some potential changes to the base tech costs?

 

[cracker]

The upgrade from v1.21 to v1.29 Civ3 includes a change that increased the power of the Commercial civ trait. MAC players have no experience with this upgrade and have lagged behind the rest of the civ world by almost a year because no one has released a solution that gives you access to an equivalent version of this commercial upgrade. Ithink we may have developed a solution that gives MAC players access to an equivalent increased commercial benefit for human and AI civs that have the Commercial trait.

We have implemented "Civ Specific Great Wonders" that can only be built by Commercial civilizations. These great wonders are called "Commerial Center"s and give the commercial civs access to the power of a city improvement called the "Commercial Guild" in every city on the continent where the Commercial Center is built. The Commercial Guild buildings fight corruption and can increase the net commercial output of your civilization equivalent to having a free extra courthouse in every city.

To implement the "Civ Specific Wonders" each commercial civ has an artificial strategic resource placed in their starting position on the map. You do not need to hook this resource up immediately but should probably make sure that it is connected to one of your cities by roads before you get beyond establishing 3 or 4 total towns. When your special resource is connected, you will be enabled to build your commercial center for the minimum cost of 10 shields. As soon as your Commercial Center is completed, you will gain a Commercial Guild in every town and city and your merchants and shop keepers will become more efficient and your empire grows.

Three special rules apply to how human players may use these equivalent features in any game:
1) You may not trade your civ specific commercial resource under any circumstances.
2) You must build your Commercial Center prior to settling your 6th city on most map sizes.
3) You may not "poach" or interfere with the ability for another commercial civ to build its own Commerical Center even if you can figure out an exploit that would allow you to accomplish this task that we think is engineered to be semi-impossible.

 

[dojoboy]

Sounds fascinating. What alterations need to be made? Is this something that can be implemented for March, or do we need to test it further?

 

[Txurce]

Dojoboy, it looks like it's going to be implemented in March.