need alittle help

[brandonjm8]

hey guys, need alittle help. when im playing my game for the first 75% of the game it runs smooth and fast, i run on high settings and when i get too big with the others (map completely full and alotta units running around) the game tends to lag from time to time, it doesnt crash or anything it just starts to slow down some and im wondering first if this happens to others while running all high settings that has the same things happen, then which settings could i go lower on to stop the lag? if anyone knows thatd be great, i know im a pain but it runs smooth and fast and i have a very good comp but i can understand with all those units and cities the game slows down dependent on settings and would like to keep it fast so i can stop saving exiting the game then returning to get it to go fast again, thx for the help.

brandon

[wodan11]

How much RAM do you have, what OS?
What size map and how many AIs?

[ybrevo]

I don´t know if it works for you, but it helped me to turn off the background music (sad, because I like it a lot).

ybrevo

[brandonjm8]

i always turn off the music, ctrl M, lol.
my system specs are as follows:
vista 64x
2.4 dual-core intel
600 gigs hdd
4 gigs ram
nvidia g-force g100 (same as 9800) w/ 512mb dedicated memory graphics
all necessary installed add-ons like the direct-x ect.
as i said i have a fast comp and can play battlefield and other high end games perfectly, i can play civ4 perfectly too, its only when things get "big", i play huge maps only 6 civs (that changes but always huge map), i have 46+ cities myself, bout 150+ total worldwide, i have over 300 units, probably around 600-800 worldwide and alot of them moving, also have 50 workers myself and about 200 or so total worldwide so bout 1000 units total, when i first start playing it runs smooth but then once all the auto units (computer makin their moves, my exec/emiss moving about doing their spreading) it sometimes lags for a sec but then you notice the games lagging alittle bit too, it never crashes or goes really slow or something like that it just slows alittle but i notice it, if this has ever happend to anyone else and you found out what option you had to set to medium or whatever let me know, once again all my settings are set too high and it runs perfectly but once theres alotta cities and units it seems to slow alittle sometimes.

[wodan11]

Lagging for a "sec" is a problem?

try turning off high res textures, go to medium graphics, etc.

Seriously, though, I don't think you have a problem at all. You're playing on a frigging huge map. Are you running a mod or plain BtS?

[eris]

I think you have managed to find the perfect way to push the extremes of the efficiency of the Civ AI code and general state 0f the art computing machines. You might try some memory, but that may or may not help Otherwise,, the only answer is a monster of a machine with maxed out everything to meet your greedy expectations. I hate saying that since I would probably love to play the same extreme games, but I can't get anywhere near that level of map and situation without cooking my PC.

Actually one of the easy things you could do is add a few AI. They kill off each others' units and that slows down the tendency for the game to slow down.

[Jaybe]

Lagging for a "sec" is a problem?

Yeah, what brandon needs is a patience upgrade!

Marathon speed, Huge Perfectworld2 map (that's larger than huge, but has extensive deserts), a mod based on the RevolutionDCM mod so I'm running BetterAI and sometimes there are more than 20 civs in the game (they can spawn from barb cities).

• During late game, there can be 3-5 minutes between turns.

When you are at war and the game is showing you enemy moves, the delay can ADD to the experience as you anxiously wait to see if the AI is going to pull a surprise on you this turn!

If you've been playing a few hours in this session of the game, go ahead and save, quit, and start up the save again (I use QuickSave, with a shortcut/alias to it on the desktop; I sometimes do this routine once a day). That can save you some memory/graphics bloat, avoiding some delays and even avoiding a game failure.

[brandonjm8]

Lagging for a "sec" is a problem?

try turning off high res textures, go to medium graphics, etc.

Seriously, though, I don't think you have a problem at all. You're playing on a frigging huge map. Are you running a mod or plain BtS?

it "sometimes" lags for like less than 1/2 a sec then runs smooth, but when it does happen it happens more than once and its generally when i end my turn or its the beginning of my turn. thx for the advice will try setting graphics to medium when my "huge" worlds get maxed. i always play huge maps, did on civ2 and thats the way i like it, and its plain bts 3.19.

[brandonjm8]

I think you have managed to find the perfect way to push the extremes of the efficiency of the Civ AI code and general state 0f the art computing machines. You might try some memory, but that may or may not help Otherwise,, the only answer is a monster of a machine with maxed out everything to meet your greedy expectations. I hate saying that since I would probably love to play the same extreme games, but I can't get anywhere near that level of map and situation without cooking my PC.

Actually one of the easy things you could do is add a few AI. They kill off each others' units and that slows down the tendency for the game to slow down.

i may be greedy but thats why i bought this machine, it plays other high end games perfectly and civ4 perfectly til the huge map gets maxed out. i play continents but on others yes other ai's pop out too but i doubt that would help speed things up(when one conquers another it just makes them bigger so whats the point right). as far as my RAM i got 4 gigs so i have plenty, civ4 only uses alittle less than a gig when the maps maxed out, i have almost 2 gigs in reserve when civ4's running, my comp specs arent the problem but maybe it is the game code or something, will try medium graphics when i encounter this problem and will post results.

[brandonjm8]

Yeah, what brandon needs is a patience upgrade!

Marathon speed, Huge Perfectworld2 map (that's larger than huge, but has extensive deserts), a mod based on the RevolutionDCM mod so I'm running BetterAI and sometimes there are more than 20 civs in the game (they can spawn from barb cities).

• During late game, there can be 3-5 minutes between turns.

When you are at war and the game is showing you enemy moves, the delay can ADD to the experience as you anxiously wait to if the AI is going to pull a surprise on you this turn!

If you've been playing a few hours in this session of the game, go ahead and save, quit, and start up the save again (I use QuickSave, with a shortcut/alias to it on the desktop; I sometimes do this routine once a day). That can save you some memory/graphics bloat, avoiding some delays and even avoiding a game failure.

yes i have show enemy moves on too, i want to see what they are doing when they are that close to me, and yes when it starts to lag i save then exit then return and it runs smooth and fast. as far as patience goes i have plenty (could use more but couldnt we all, lol), i only have to save exit return once or twice a day when my patience runs out.

[wodan11]

Brandon, you've got to realize that CIV uses way more 3D models / polygons than just about any game out there. Yeah, the 1st person shooters and whatnot appear more realistic, but the actual animations are far less demanding of the machine than CIV.

[brandonjm8]

Brandon, you've got to realize that CIV uses way more 3D models / polygons than just about any game out there. Yeah, the 1st person shooters and whatnot appear more realistic, but the actual animations are far less demanding of the machine than CIV.

today no problems, the game lags "sometimes" like maybe every other day or something like that but no problems today, when it happens again i'll adjust the graphics to medium and see if that solves it when things start to get "big". got 50 cities now and well over 400 units and ran smooth, as far as the game goes and its requirements my comp has plenty enough of everything for me to run in high settings, its either in the code or "normal" meaning when things get big the comp needs alittle more time to process everything which is to be expected but when it lags it lags with my cursor movement and everything tends to lag so who knows, i'll just try the lower settings when it happens again. thx for the help guys.

[rah]

Save the game and reload it every now and then. With you machine I doubt there's much else you can do that will help as much as reloading every hour or so.

[Lord Avalon]

He could edit the civilizationiv.ini (is that the right name?) file to autosave every turn and increase the number of autosaves.

[Calvin Vu]

i always turn off the music, ctrl M, lol.
my system specs are as follows:
vista 64x
2.4 dual-core intel
600 gigs hdd
4 gigs ram
nvidia g-force g100 (same as 9800) w/ 512mb dedicated memory graphics
all necessary installed add-ons like the direct-x ect.

I have to check but I think my system is almost identical to yours. Maybe the only notable difference is I probably have a 1G on the graphic card. The problem I have is much worse though since the game crashes very often after 1200 AD (every 15 minutes or so).
A few days ago, I had that system in the shop to fix the BIOS so I played on a spare machine at home (with built-in graphics and only 2G of memory). It actually worked much better and I rarely had any crashes !! That backup system has Vista 32-bit Basic instead of Vista 64 so I suspect my problem has something to do with Vista 64.
Vista, by itself, can cause some serious lag sometimes and it has nothing to do with Civ. That's why a lot of people dislike it. If that's all the problem you have then I have worse problem with Vista just net surfing .