Update/Patches for v37

[JosEPh_II]

I'm not quite sure if the 'CIV4GameSpeedInfo.xml' file did its job right...... I am right now on turn 363 and the year is something like 116926 A.D XD XD. Also the game started at 50.000 B.C. And I even started a new game today, with the modified .xml file.

Anytime you start a new game with a released version or Patch you really Need to clear the cache folder (delete it's contents) before you start a new game. Between Pit's Map and your old cached data is the reason you are seeing these oddities.

For win 10 64 the path the the proper cache is this: C:\Users\"Username"\AppData\Local\My Games\Beyond the Sword\cache .

As we progress further and further from vanilla BtS this Cache clearing becomes more and more vital to getting the proper play from the latest versions of C2C.

Your current game even with you clearing the cache may never have the right Dates or Eras during it's course. This is because of the "data" it started with.

You can try Lord Brooks suggestion as well. If it works then let me know.

But please clear your cache folder as well.

EDIT: WFL is still a work in progress by ThunderBrd. It is supposed to help smaller empires keep up with the biggest Empire (in terms of number of cities as well as total pop).

In my personal games I'm finding that I can be the largest Empire city wise and still receive it's benefits. T-brd says even though I'm the largest in # of cities I maybe be smaller in pop. I'm finding this hard to understand when in one game I have 23 cities vs the next largest at 9 cities. I've captured 4 Cities of another empire that had 7 cities all in the 14-20 pop range. The only time I've not had the WFL bonus was when I actually was researching and had just researched a Tech that was further into the tech tree than anyone else. As long as I follow the tech leader I get the WFL bonus. At least that has been my experience with this new Option since it's introduction.

Further testing by all players is needed by T-brd to refine this Option.

 

[Lord Brooks]

Thanks Taxman.

 

[Thunderbrd]

EDIT: WFL is still a work in progress by ThunderBrd. It is supposed to help smaller empires keep up with the biggest Empire (in terms of number of cities as well as total pop).

In my personal games I'm finding that I can be the largest Empire city wise and still receive it's benefits. T-brd says even though I'm the largest in # of cities I maybe be smaller in pop. I'm finding this hard to understand when in one game I have 23 cities vs the next largest at 9 cities. I've captured 4 Cities of another empire that had 7 cities all in the 14-20 pop range. The only time I've not had the WFL bonus was when I actually was researching and had just researched a Tech that was further into the tech tree than anyone else. As long as I follow the tech leader I get the WFL bonus. At least that has been my experience with this new Option since it's introduction.

Further testing by all players is needed by T-brd to refine this Option.

There's also the possibility that another modifying tag is being included in the WFL/TD benefit display. I'd like to look at this later. Where was that save you gave me for this?

 

[CainStar]

Anytime you start a new game with a released version or Patch you really Need to clear the cache folder (delete it's contents) before you start a new game. Between Pit's Map and your old cached data is the reason you are seeing these oddities.

For win 10 64 the path the the proper cache is this: C:\Users\"Username"\AppData\Local\My Games\Beyond the Sword\cache .

As we progress further and further from vanilla BtS this Cache clearing becomes more and more vital to getting the proper play from the latest versions of C2C.

Your current game even with you clearing the cache may never have the right Dates or Eras during it's course. This is because of the "data" it started with.

You can try Lord Brooks suggestion as well. If it works then let me know.

But please clear your cache folder as well.

I will clear cache, and try Lord Brooks method. I'll give a "report" later.

EDIT: I Changed the starting date, by editing the UEM map using notepad, and it worked. Starting date was 200.000 B.C

 

[JosEPh_II]

There's also the possibility that another modifying tag is being included in the WFL/TD benefit display. I'd like to look at this later. Where was that save you gave me for this?

This is the latest save from the game where I have 23 cities and have conquered 4/7ths of a neighboring AI who declared war on me. Normal GS.

 

[Thunderbrd]

Thanks... Ill look later tonight.

 

[Thunderbrd]

This is the latest save from the game where I have 23 cities and have conquered 4/7ths of a neighboring AI who declared war on me. Normal GS.

I'm not sure I understand. You aren't getting any WFL OR TD bonuses here. Indeed, you are ahead of your competitors in both city count and population and they are racking up significant modifiers as a result. But since you're ahead, you aren't getting any WFL benefit - and it's not showing that you are either.

However, a few things I just learned upon reviewing the code:
1) There is another modifier that CAN count into what shows up as a TD or WFL bonus when it really isn't. This line tallies into the modifiers that would come up as TD or WFL due to the way the python display for that is programmed:
iModifier += getNationalTechResearchModifier(eTech);
getNationalTechResearchModifier(eTech) refers to the total of direct modifiers the player may have for researching a particular defined tech. At the moment, if I'm not mistaken, only the Traits tag set has this potential and it is not being used on any current Traits. (But it will be soon so this may need to somehow be isolated out of this portion somehow.)

2) According to the code notes, apparently, even Vanilla BtS had SOME degree of simplistic tech diffusion, and that CAN show up even if TD is off. It counts the number of teams you have met that have the technology in question, and the number of teams you COULD have met, whether they have the technology or not. It then adds a modifier equal to this global:

   <Define>
       <DefineName>TECH_COST_TOTAL_KNOWN_TEAM_MODIFIER</DefineName>
       <iDefineIntVal>50</iDefineIntVal>
   </Define>

times the amount of teams you've met with the technology, divided by the amount of teams you could have met at all.

Without running some situational numbers through that formula, I'm not sure what, exactly, it accomplishes. I'm almost feeling like I should just erase this additional formula since it is really just a simplistic Tech Diffusion and it seems to me that players that wouldn't want TD wouldn't want their research influenced by this formula either. This MAY be somewhat to blame for some strange WFL/TD bonuses that sometimes show up when you may figure you shouldn't have any.

The math keeps appearing to check out on WFL though. Pretty simple stuff. I know DH said that perhaps it shouldn't kick in until you have something like a minimum of 10 population. That could be a good idea I suppose so as not to overly corrupt the earliest part of the game when small numbers can have too profound an impact and it's really not the intent to manipulate the early game progress much anyhow.

 

[JosEPh_II]

I'm not sure I understand. You aren't getting any WFL OR TD bonuses here.

I suppose I should've checked it 1st. I just copied the last save. I was getting WFL on the save point before that one and the one before that one. Which were all saved within a 24 hour time frame of playing. The other save game I previously uploaded was from 2950BC and it was definitely there. Not many turns between this save at 2794BC and 2950BC

So by how much pop was I leading the AI in 2794? Is the Domestic Advisor the screen that give Global Pops? How do you know the pop of an Empire you've never met?

Tell you what I'll re-upload the 2950BC save again If the forum will let me. Done.

But something is off/not right with WFL whether it's your Point # 2, or something else. It's too strong and comes too early and stays longer imho than it should. I think I'm going to stop using it as a Game option. All it's doing is letting me the player get Stronger, Bigger, faster than I probably should on Emperor Diff level.

And really the AI should not have to be babied this much now you would think.

And we are seriously OT with this disccusion inthis thread now.

 

[jshetley]

The download is working just fine for me. Thanks for putting this patch out Joe. I appreciate it a lot. Looking forward to seeing all the changes that have been made since last Dec.

Edit: That little game speed file works just fine too. Thanks again to Joe and all of the C2C team for their work on this great MOD.

 

[Thunderbrd]

And really the AI should not have to be babied this much now you would think.

I don't see it as babying the AI so much as any player that's fallen behind. When you get ahead in CivIV there are a lot of game design factors that promote reward for the player in the lead, which promotes the player in the lead staying there and gaining even more. We have yet to develop systems enough to compensate for that. This shows very strongly in the MP games even, so it's not just an AI deficiency we're helping to overcome... it's the original flaw in game design that goes all the way back to Civ I.

 

[tmv]

I'm not sure it is really a flaw in game design as much as the fact that artificial ways of hindering the leading player can take a lot out of a game. You are not just "punishing success", you are depriving players of what they have earnt. And this is really bad if the rule seems arbitrary.

Of course we don't see the runaway effect in reality, unless civilizations were separated for a very long time. (And yes, that does matter - it is not about turning the game into a historical simulation, it is about doing things that might have worked in reality. Otherwise there would be some great additional ideas for this mod from fantasy.)

The real problem is that the way real life punishes the leading player are not in this mod, and they would be a bit hard to implement, I think. It's not just what Revolutions tried to do, because I think they dealt only with disloyal citizens. In reality you might have to deal with army officers or entire units turning "rogue" - like it happened in both the French and the Russian Revolution, not to mention a certain British officer who became leader of the "rebel" troops and later on their head of state - absolutely no offense intended here.

In short, disloyalty, lack of organization (with respect to country size, population, technology ...) and corruption (related to disloyalty, but a bit different, I think) are the main reasons for keeping the runaway effect in check. And (in modern times) nuclear weapons. And before nuclear weapons the mere fact that strong naval and land power didn't go hand in hand - amphibious invasions are impossible against naval (and today aerial) supremacy, and I'm not really sure that is the case in this mod.

Bottom line: It would take an overhauled Revolutions system, including units rebelling (a unity loyalty system, perhaps dependent on the state of their home city, and on civics), reintroducing corruption from / , and making naval defense much more effective. Tech Diffusion could also help, but you must be able to influence it somehow (civics or ordinances come to mind), it should not be just fate.

And please, no !

 

[JosEPh_II]

The download is working just fine for me. Thanks for putting this patch out Joe. I appreciate it a lot. Looking forward to seeing all the changes that have been made since last Dec.

Edit: That little game speed file works just fine too. Thanks again to Joe and all of the C2C team for their work on this great MOD.

Your Welcome. Just glad Dropbox did not make me have to pay and left a door open to sharing with the public.

 

[Thunderbrd]

I'm not sure it is really a flaw in game design as much as the fact that artificial ways of hindering the leading player can take a lot out of a game. You are not just "punishing success", you are depriving players of what they have earnt. And this is really bad if the rule seems arbitrary.

This is why WFL simply gives players that are behind in size and population a bonus rather than doing anything to penalize the leading player. This way it will never FEEL like a penalty or punishment.

Besides, there could be some reality to smaller nations being a little more unified and less jaded and thus more cohesive.

The real problem is that the way real life punishes the leading player are not in this mod, and they would be a bit hard to implement, I think. It's not just what Revolutions tried to do, because I think they dealt only with disloyal citizens. In reality you might have to deal with army officers or entire units turning "rogue" - like it happened in both the French and the Russian Revolution, not to mention a certain British officer who became leader of the "rebel" troops and later on their head of state - absolutely no offense intended here.

This is something I do eventually intend to design... Leadership schisms being a major cause for splits and civil wars. But let's not get too far into that intent at the moment.

 

[Dancing Hoskuld]

I'm not sure it is really a flaw in game design as much as the fact that artificial ways of hindering the leading player can take a lot out of a game. You are not just "punishing success", you are depriving players of what they have earnt. And this is really bad if the rule seems arbitrary.

Of course we don't see the runaway effect in reality, unless civilizations were separated for a very long time. (And yes, that does matter - it is not about turning the game into a historical simulation, it is about doing things that might have worked in reality. Otherwise there would be some great additional ideas for this mod from fantasy.)

The real problem is that the way real life punishes the leading player are not in this mod, and they would be a bit hard to implement, I think. It's not just what Revolutions tried to do, because I think they dealt only with disloyal citizens. In reality you might have to deal with army officers or entire units turning "rogue" - like it happened in both the French and the Russian Revolution, not to mention a certain British officer who became leader of the "rebel" troops and later on their head of state - absolutely no offense intended here.

In short, disloyalty, lack of organization (with respect to country size, population, technology ...) and corruption (related to disloyalty, but a bit different, I think) are the main reasons for keeping the runaway effect in check. And (in modern times) nuclear weapons. And before nuclear weapons the mere fact that strong naval and land power didn't go hand in hand - amphibious invasions are impossible against naval (and today aerial) supremacy, and I'm not really sure that is the case in this mod.

Bottom line: It would take an overhauled Revolutions system, including units rebelling (a unity loyalty system, perhaps dependent on the state of their home city, and on civics), reintroducing corruption from / , and making naval defense much more effective. Tech Diffusion could also help, but you must be able to influence it somehow (civics or ordinances come to mind), it should not be just fate.

And please, no !

I have been thinking on this a lot of late. The idea that the way you get ahead is by exploration, resource management and technological expansion is a modern one. Early civilizations were more about "keeping the wolves from the door" which includes getting enough to eat. Later as the nation grew it was about stability. I just don't know how that can be implemented.

 

[CainStar]

Just to pitch in about "hindering the succesfull player". Hopefully if you do integrate these gameplay features, you will make them optional in the game setup menu. But if you think about it: In the real world, especially during modern eras, if one nation is dominating it is more likely to to become even bigger, and stronger, rather than to fall for something like internal strife. I mean it would be quite hard to "simulate" things like fall of rome without "killing" the fun out gameplay.
In my previous game, which ended in the "too much money" bug, I actually had 3 sort of "national slumps" so to speak.
1. At some point criminals started to run rampant in my "empire", somewhere around medieval era I think, and caused a lot of "oh my god what is happening", but I prevailed with producing LE units, which of course didn't solve the problem in a day, but still I prevailed.
2. Somewhere around renaissance, once again I think, I hit economical problems where I was struggling to just to stay a float, now of course there insn't a real solution to this, but to "stay alert" about what buildings you are producing in cities, and so try to avoid adding to city maintenance. Once again I prevailed.
3. Then there is the pollution problem during modern era etc. once again can cause a lot of headaches, but even this "challenge" can be beaten. All these three "challenges" felt natural, and in hindsight, were sort of fun.

To halt "steam rolling nations" perhaps the focus should more on the diplomatic side. I don't know if the C2C still has, or ever had(at least one of the previous versios did), the U.N units. Perhaps more U.N and "nations of the world" involment in diplomacy, and pressure throught economical means. Perhaps trading could be more linked to national relations in overall, or perhaps you could gain boost to economy if you are part of U.N etc. And considering how much you guys have put work in to some many new features, the U.N/Apostolic palace referendum/directives could use an overhaul. Perhaps adding those prohibitions(alcohol, drugs etc.) to the list, which would force all members to abide by.

The A.I does need some work, as I have previously stated, as "they" intent to outright suicidal. Declaring war against player of 60+ cities, when they only have one. I understand that this was most likely caused by another A.I pressuring for them to go to war. Perhaps A.I players could actually form alliances against big empires, that is if they have bad relations with said empire. And maybe instead of declaring war on the player(suiciding), they could contact player saying "we need help nation A is trying force us to go to war with you" etc. One thing would also be nice. When you are singing a defence pact, or if you are willing to accept a nation at war as your vassal, that you could force, or intimidate, the nation that are in war with, to make peace with the said vassal.

Plus any addition to diplomacy, and "spy games", which allow you to affect things in the "shadows" would be a nice addition.
1. Change the "change civic" spy mission so that you can actually pick, which civic you want the player change to, instead of just offering the civics which you have active.
2. High cost, long term, spy mission where you can change one players attitude towards another, not just you.
3. Spies lobbying for your corporations, or perhaps even invoking things like prohibitions.
4. Spreading another nation culture, which would lead to city revolting or just flipping to said culture.

In my previous game I send a large group of criminal units to another continent, and started conquering another nations cities. Now this was more about farming slaves, too keep those cogs turning in my empire, but when I think about it was kind of like I was funding criminal organizations to wreck havok in another nation, and it was fun . Also it would nice If you could send your LE units, into another nation to help them quell criminal, or revolutionary, waves(yes once again thinking about farming slaves ). Sure this could be exploited, but perhaps you would need to a permission from the other nation to come and help. Maybe A.I players could even ask for help. I did find an "criminally" easyway of farming slaves, but I won't say it so you can't fix it XD XD. Once again sorry for going on for so long.

 

[Thunderbrd]

@CainStar: You've just proposed a year or two of amazing projects! Seriously, some great stuff. I know that diplomacy, and vote mechanisms, and the spy side of things (even if not all done necessarily through spies specifically) can really use some deeper development. These aren't exactly high on my lists of priorities because I simply haven't put focus there, but that's the kind of thing that could hopefully inspire the next all star modder who joins us. Yes, these areas would definitely benefit from more development. No doubt about that. And the AI simply catching up to improved use of existing game features and strategies could be pretty helpful too.

All that said, I don't think those would be effective means to stop a steamroll necessarily, but you have a point that better undermining methods can help with that, and maybe already has with some of the stuff done for v37 that I've not yet fully explored nor pointed the AI in the direction of exploiting fully.

 

[JosEPh_II]

What really amazes me is that a Thread for providing Non SVN players with a "current Full Mod" version becomes the breeding ground for multiple discussions. Never fails.

 

[CainStar]

What really amazes me is that a Thread for providing Non SVN players with a "current Full Mod" version becomes the breeding ground for multiple discussions. Never fails.

You talking about moi(french)? But yes I got way off topic there, my apologizes. You try to answer, or write about one thing, and an hour later you have damn essay in front of you. Anyway back to topic.
Forgot to mention earlier, but cleaning the cache and changing the date in the UEM map worked. The dates seem to fit better to the tech I have, and there are no longer "out of time" barbarian units running around.
But there is one thing I would like to mention. At the start of my previous game, the one that ended in the money bug, I expienced a lot of MAFs during Prehistoric Era. It got to the point that I had to change auto-save interval to 1 turn. But then when I got to Classic Era the MAFs stopped. I am experiencing this same, constant MAFs, in my current game which still in Prehistoric Era. It once again got so bad that I could play maybe 4-6 turns before the game crashed, or rather "flip" to desktop. I "traced" the problem to having too many animal(Greenman) units on the map, and yes I had raging barbarians option on, which I disabled through WB. I solved it my killing all the units from all 3 Greenman factions, and now the game run smoothly. I will see if this issue comes up again, or if it stops when I hit Classic Era.

 

[JosEPh_II]

@CainStar ,
It's been said by several much better modders than me that Autosaving at too close an interval actually makes the chance of a MAF more likely. What relieves the stress on the game from holding too much data till memory runs short is to Manually save more often. The Manual save creates a "hard point" were it locks in the data and can start storage over again. This "flushing' of the built up storage is solves the root problem, holding too much data.

So...my suggestion especially since you are using Pit's "Ginormous" map is to manually save every 4-8 turns and let auto save go back to it's default setting (not saving every turn but iiirc every 4th turn).

 

[CainStar]

@CainStar ,
It's been said by several much better modders than me that Autosaving at too close an interval actually makes the chance of a MAF more likely. What relieves the stress on the game from holding too much data till memory runs short is to Manually save more often. The Manual save creates a "hard point" were it locks in the data and can start storage over again. This "flushing' of the built up storage is solves the root problem, holding too much data.

So...my suggestion especially since you are using Pit's "Ginormous" map is to manually save every 4-8 turns and let auto save go back to it's default setting (not saving every turn but iiirc every 4th turn).

Will do!