Not enough time in second half of game, what settings to change?

[Caltone]

Originally posted by Cordelayne
Here's an explanation I posted in another thread a few days ago. It's extremely cool that we can easily make mods like this--

Epic is better, but I still find it very frustrating--it usually takes far too long to create military units, and it's still a bit too fast to my taste for science advances.

I solved this by modding the "Epic" speed setting, which is ridiculously easy.

Find the file CIV4GameSpeedInfo.xml in the Assets/XML/GameInfo directory. Open with notepad (or any editor). Make a backup copy. Make a written list of what you change. Change some numbers. Save. And play using the new version of the Epic speed.

I did the following:

--changed Construct from 150 to 75;
--changed Create from 150 to 100;
--changed Research from 150 to 250;
--changed Build from 150 to 75;
--changed Growth from 150 to 100;
--changed Inflation% from 18 to 5; and
--changed the final group of "1 year turns" from 200 to 500, extending the game for 300 years.

That's all from editing one text file! One can twiddle in many ways, of course, but I like the above. Production of units and buildings is much faster. Production of wonders is a little faster. Science research is slowed way down. And there are plenty of turns, so you can go all the way to the end of the tech tree.

I'm extremely pleased with the balance with these settings. And I can go back to the original in 15 seconds whenever I want by just changing the extension on the backup file and removing the modded file.

Thanks for taking the time to work through some of this Cordelayne, excellent choices all. This has now become my standard game (along with the Great Person Mod
)

[Tae]

Bookmarking this thread.

I am going to try these settings. Do you recommend turning off tech trading like so many others? Also why mod the original file when Firaxis set up the mod folders. I just copied the file un program files, then pasted in the Civ 4 My documents folder under the same tree in game assets and modded it there.

[Adagio]

Funny, for me it's more like the opposite. The early ages goes by way too fast, but the last half of the game is nice (playing Epic)

[Cordelayne]

I'm really happy that some people like my custom settings!

It really did change the flavor of the game. I like having plenty of units. I like staying at one tech level long enough to check it out.

It will be interesting to see if the upcoming patch affects that .xml file. I'll definitely have backups ready before applying the patch.

To answer a question above, yes, I always play with tech trading turned off. I just hate competing with the AIs on that. You have to be too twitchy, automatically and immediately doing lots of diplomacy the moment you get a new advance. That's like in Civ3 where you had to always set science spending down to 1 the very turn before a new advance, to maximize income. That was not fun. And when one is playing one more turn until very late at night, it's easy to lose track of that kind of crap and then realize, oh crap, either I go back for 150 years or I've squandered away a great advantage. I prefer to avoid that by turning off tech trading and earning all my advances.

Also, when you turn off tech trading, it's kind of interesting to see the different paths that the AIs take through the tech tree. In my current game for example, I invaded the English when they started building spaceship parts--but they have ships only up to galleys. In contrast, I have battleships, etc., but I hadn't gone to rocketry yet. The English have learned a painful lesson, heh heh.

[Datajack Franit]

Mr. Fun

Buy Civ4

[Datajack Franit]

edit: DP

[mike2h]

Cordelayne, any changes? since patch?

[Cordelayne]

Hi Mike, I replied in email, but I guess it would be useful to reply here too.

The 1.09 patch overwrote the gamespeedinfo file, so I did experiment with several different sets of changes. But they all seemed bizarrely unbalanced in different ways, so I went back to the above exact combination. I expect I'll be using that for a long time.

[mike2h]

thx! i figured that info would be good for everybody. appreciate your work!

[Hengist]

Are Firaxis going to include these changes, or one's that are similar in a patch?

[Cordelayne]

Hengist, I don't think there is much chance that Firaxis will include THESE changes in a patch--because they have ALREADY opened up the game so that it is truly trivial for a gamer to make this kind of change for himself. Check it out. Please see my note above. I guarantee you can implement all these changes (and others you might want to experiment) in less than 15 minutes (even if you're VERY slow about moving around your computer), with complete confidence that you won't wreck your install of the game. In other words, you can do this just as you wish yourself, and much faster than it would take to download and install a patch.

This highlights one of the really great features of Civ4--the complete openness to modding. I haven't done any real programming in more than five years, but when they open up the Civ4 engine in a few months (as promised) I just may have to take a look. It's really, really, really cool that one can twiddle with the deepest roots of a game so great!

[Datajack Franit]

There's something wrong with tech rate in second-half of the game, AI shouldn't get genetics in 1700 on Epic speed

[Hengist]

Hi Cordelayne,

Thanks for the reply.

I know it's easy to mod (well for me it seems easy, but I acknowledge that there will be plenty of people out there that wont find it easy, and will be reluctant to 'mess' with game files), but what I was really hoping for, was that Firaxis would make the changes to create a 'level playing field' for all in the community, so everybody is singing from the same hymn book, so to speak.

What I mean by that, is that if everyone is using the same settings, then when it came to sharing tips and strategies on great web sites like Apolyton, then eveyone would be able to relate to them without grey areas being present. My greatest fear is that we will end up with a divided community with regards to this, with people using multiple settings and no generic, overall standard being achieved. Also how will this affect multiplay, if everybody has different settings? This I have sadly witnessed occuring in other titles over the years, which has lead to a disjointed community.

The one thing that I constantly read about Civ IV, is that the mid pacing of the game feels wrong. Has the pacing of the game been designed for multiplay with the emphasis on creating something similar to a speedy online RTS style environment, from which to play, at the expense of the single turn based player? I ask because like others, I also find that when playing single player, the years from 1100AD to 1900AD, just passes by so quickly.

With the last patch making changes to the SS technology, I was under the impression that Firaxis was going to continually keep making game tweaks, based on feedback from their fanbase, and not just concentrate upon the technical issues that are abound? Do Firaxis now think that the pacing and speed of the game is correct, with regards to the single player experience? I have no interest in playing this game online, hence my question.


I guess I'm just looking for an oppotunity to use my 16th to 18th century period, arsenal of weapons, mainly because this is one of the eras of history that I'm deeply interested in. However, like others have said, by the time I've built them, the game has moved along into the modern age.

I will mod the game, based on great posts like this, but at the end of the day, I'd rather have Firaxis do it as a global standard for everyone, and not have to do it myself.

[Blake]

One thing to note is that the pace is much better with tech trading off. Tech beelines have far more signifiance and you can end up spending much longer playing with toys like musketmen and cannons, as these can actually be got quite early if you focus on them.

[Hengist]

Hi Blake,

Thanks, I'll try your suggestion. It's just disappointing, that to try and get a fix for the game speed, you have to loose part of the game, i.e. Loosing the tech trading aspect.

Do you know if there has there been any word posted from Firaxis representatives, on whether or not they are still looking at considerations for adjusting the single player game speed in the future?