Announcement

**snoopy369** · September 22, 2007, 11:26

Save game compatibility issues are not related to the existence of a new dll per se.

There are two potential issues with save games. First off, the more serious one, is the save game format. If Firaxis were to change something in the save game itself, say modifying how the password were stored, that would make saves incompatible in one direction or in both - depending on what the change were. That is reflected in the save game version. That did change during the Vanilla patching at least once from what I recall, but not in Warlords.

Second, is the "lock modified assets" protection. In multiplayer games, or in "protected" SP games such as the BTS TriLeague Tournament games, they are protected from having the assets modified, say if you wanted to change your xml such that Quecha had 100 attack strength instead of 2

Any game like that will not be compatible with any new DLL, including the patch 3.13, without somehow overriding it (with MP games such as PBEM, this is possible by removing the administrative password temporarily). This was the case with the most recent Warlords (and vanilla) patches.

We won't know until it's out of 3.13 has a different save game version, unless Firaxis lets that information out.

**alexman** · September 22, 2007, 21:26

The save format will be different, but it will be backwards compatible. That means you will be able to load v302 saves from v313, but you will not be able to load v313 saves from v302.

It should be out early next week. We had to go back and fix a couple of new bugs we introduced.

**Wittlich** · September 22, 2007, 21:50

Originally posted by alexman
It should be out early next week. We had to go back and fix a couple of new bugs we introduced.

I am holding your feet to the fire on this Alexman!

**RobWorham** · September 23, 2007, 01:51

Thanks for the info alexman

**Kuciwalker** · September 23, 2007, 01:53

alexman is Greek?

**snoopy369** · September 23, 2007, 04:36

I believe so, yes. Why do you think he prefers this site to the other evil non-greek site?

**Adm.Naismith** · September 23, 2007, 08:25

Originally posted by CyberShy
civ4:bts is not a broken game.
All games receive patches. BtS has some problems, but those problems don't break the game. Even the unpatched game is still enjoyable very much.

Well, not if your game hang in a endless wait loop.

Sorry CyberShy, but in my personal experience (on a MS Windows Vista PC, DirectX 10, and that's not the most solid terrain to be fair), BTS before new patch IS the worst CIV expansion I have played, and I've played many in single player.

To be correct I wasn't able to play Alpha Centauri: Alien Crossfire, too - but that's not Civ anyway

I don't want to say that BTS is completly broken, still it seems to me it was released at a quality level worse than acceptable, for an expansion of a CIV IV Vanilla that seems to me had received a quite good quality control from the start.

I hope this new and last patch will be right to the target and let me enjoy the game once more.

**Wiglaf** · September 23, 2007, 19:32

Originally posted by wodan11

Such assurance.

I don't have insider information with Firaxis, so I can't refute your assertion. Regardless, that doesn't change the fact of what we were talking about, which is changes in the save file format.

If you're correct, then the answer to the original question of "is there a saved game comptibility issue" would be "there has never been a saved game compatibility issue with CIV and will not be with this patch".

... just my two cents....

Wodan

I was referring to the patch they have already released. There were no compatibility issues with the last one, so I'd be hard pressed to see why there would be issues with the next patch (and as we've just heard from alex there won't be).

**Wiglaf** · September 23, 2007, 19:35

Originally posted by Todd Hawks
Wiglaf, what are you talking about? The patch doesn't only consist of a new dll.

Right. But all solver's patch was was a new dll. I was saying that solver's dll is not incompatible with any future firaxis patch.

**Robert** · September 24, 2007, 03:06

Well, not if your game hang in a endless wait loop.

I've had that as well.
And I've also had crashes that kept re-occuring.
That still doesn't make it a bad patch or something to me. Just something that needs to be fixed.

It sucks, that's true.
But my wife sometimes does something I don't like either, and she's still the very very best!

**snoopy369** · September 24, 2007, 09:24

Originally posted by Wiglaf

Right. But all solver's patch was was a new dll. I was saying that solver's dll is not incompatible with any future firaxis patch.

It might well be incompatible with any future patch

At minimum it would roll back many of the changes of said patch (any changes that affected the DLL). It could also make the XML files no longer have the right format. Remember, he's not changing "a" dll, he's changing THE DLL (the core DLL for the game).

**Adm.Naismith** · September 24, 2007, 19:34

Originally posted by CyberShy

Well, not if your game hang in a endless wait loop.

It sucks, that's true.
But my wife sometimes does something I don't like either, and she's still the very very best!

Well, I never, never would put my wife on the same level and written sentence about anything that "sucks"

Man warned!

Your wife (as mine, or myself) is not built to achieve a task flawlessy, and you aren't expecting that she can be "rushed out" for the sake money income in spite of bad quality results, nor that her parents will release a new patch after some months. We take the best with the worst and live together... or divorce, sometime

**Wiglaf** · September 24, 2007, 20:20

Originally posted by snoopy369

It might well be incompatible with any future patch

At minimum it would roll back many of the changes of said patch (any changes that affected the DLL). It could also make the XML files no longer have the right format. Remember, he's not changing "a" dll, he's changing THE DLL (the core DLL for the game).

This is false since the new patch replaces the dll, which is the only relevant file in solvers patch.

**Todd Hawks** · September 25, 2007, 00:32

No, it's not. "Compatible" means you can use both, i.e. the new patch and Solver's dll. And you can't. That's what snoopy was saying.
I assume you mean that Solver's dll won't prevent the patch from installing correctly and that is true, but this still has absolutely nothing to do with save game compatibility, which is what we were talking about in the first place.

**Akaoz** · September 25, 2007, 06:43

Originally posted by alexman
The save format will be different, but it will be backwards compatible. That means you will be able to load v302 saves from v313, but you will not be able to load v313 saves from v302.

It should be out early next week. We had to go back and fix a couple of new bugs we introduced.

Does that mean this week (24th-30th Sept) or next week (30th-6th Oct)?

The reason I ask is because some people measure a week from monday to sunday, and others from sunday to saturday. And this was posted on a sunday.

Announcement

BtS Patch 3.13 - out now

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