RED FRONT ToT REDUX

[MacGalleo]

Originally posted by fairline


Almost

Just to be pedantic, RF1.4 is the original designer Captain Nemo's final version of the scenario, made for FW/MGE. Catfish converted this version to ToT without changing any elements of Nemo's rules or events, so it's a conversion rather than an upgrade.

Colwyn and MacGalleo have both made modifications to Nemo's events and rules. I've lost track of whether they started with Nemo's mge scenario and then made ToT conversions of their own modifications, or whether they started with Catfish's ToT conversion and based their mods on that. If it's the former, you can bet they've missed some important elements of ToT conversion which are not carried out by the Scotto ToT converter program...

I use the Catfish's ToT conversion. It is the best starting point.

[fairline]

[PietH]

Bugger. I took Agricola's saved game and continued from there. I was making some very, very slow progress, and had just liberated Romania in the winter of '44, after a daring amphibious attack.
But after april '44, saving my game as RF.sav and loading the files for summer '44, the game crashed.

message:
Error "-6" in Module "3" data: 56 0

[curtsibling]

Looks like a rules.txt problem...

[Catfish]

Originally posted by AGRICOLA
In the long run, your best bet would be to obtain a copy of CIV II MGE, burn a backup disk, istall it, install the MGE 1.3 patch, and play Nemo's RF 1.4.

Alternatively, you could install Fantastic Worlds and play the scenario. After all, RF 1.4 is a FW scenario. Are you saying that the 'Too Many Units' problem is not present in earlier versions? (I only skimmed this thread BTW).

Originally posted by PietH
message:
Error "-6" in Module "3" data: 56 0

See this thread for info on these types of error messages. It's a typo in Colwyn's RF 1.5+ version (which I just downloaded) of the summer '44 rules file, specifically the prerequisite tech name in line 56 (Su-122 Tank Hunter) of the @UNITS table. It should read "U2", not "U2r".

I'm not going to make a habit of chasing up errors in other people's modifications to the scenario. Far too lazy for that.

[AGRICOLA]

Originally posted by Catfish

Are you saying that the 'Too Many Units' problem is not present in earlier versions?

No. Nemo's original suffered from it. Colwyn's RF 1.5, with its somewhat restrictive house rules, decreased the probability that it would happen. MacGalleo's current development of RF TOT has considerably increased the number of free unit slots at the start of the scen and eliminated the spawning of multiple units if a particular unit is killed.

In the final analysis, if a player is determined to reach the units limit, it is rather easy in a large scen such as RF. All that a developer can do is try to arrange that it doesn't happen if players adopt a reasonably normal line of play.

[curtsibling]

Originally posted by AGRICOLA
Colwyn has been looking for someone to playtest his RF 1.5 TOT. Are you interested? He will appreciate any feedback.


Forgot the !@#$%&) attachment.

These are brilliant - Downloaded for study/reading!

[Mercator]

Originally posted by PietH
Did that too, same result. Doesn't matter I think. As far as I can tell the game is working fine.

It is, mostly, but I'd still suggest you install the patch if you're not running the latest version already.

How to check your version:
- start/load any game, press Ctrl+O. The title of the screen you see tells you what version you have. It should be The Test of Time 1.1.0 Test of Time 07-Sep-99.

To make the patch work:
I hadn't heard yet of the Test of Time patch not working for people who didn't buy Civilization Chronicles. It sounds like the same problem, though, so try this:

http://forums.civfanatics.com/downloads.php?do=file&id=8534

[PietH]

Thanks, Mercator, it's the right version already then. I only bought the game last december, so the patch was apparantly included.

[Catfish]

Also, if you'd tried to load any of the ToT versions of Red Front using the unpatched version of ToT (1.0), you would've ended up with a 'Failed to load game: file is in obsolete format' error.

Edit: Just sniffing around and realised I'd not responded to the following:

Originally posted by AGRICOLA
No. Nemo's original suffered from it. Colwyn's RF 1.5, with its somewhat restrictive house rules, decreased the probability that it would happen. MacGalleo's current development of RF TOT has considerably increased the number of free unit slots at the start of the scen and eliminated the spawning of multiple units if a particular unit is killed.

In focussing on the Colwyn/MacGalleo ToT modifications you seemed to have overlooked the original RF 1.4 for ToT conversion, which, for all intents and purposes, would play exactly the same as RF 1.4 played with MGE. In other words there's no logical reason to switch from ToT to MGE, especially when Fairline's put together a graphics upgrade for the former.

[AGRICOLA]

MacGalleo's conversion is based entirely on Captain Nemo's RF 1.4, not Colwyn's RF 1.5.

[Catfish]

Yes, I know that; both mods started with the version I converted. You said in post #67 that neither ToT version (and I assume you're referring to the two mods) was playable, and then suggested that the best solution was to obtain MGE and play the original RF 1.4 using that. What does that solve? You must believe there's a difference between RF 1.4 for ToT (unmodified) and RF 1.4 played with MGE, right?

[AGRICOLA]

You must believe there's a difference between RF 1.4 for ToT (unmodified) and RF 1.4 played with MGE, right?

Not at all. I only said that neither Colwyn's TOT version of his RF 1.5 nor MacGalleo's current TOT redux of RF 1.4 is playable at the present.

I apologize that I was not aware of your conversion when I wrote that.

On the other hand, like the original, any unmodified TOT conversion of RF 1.4 would be child's play to win by using a scorched earth withdrawal strategy and taking advantage of the event that spawns 2 Partisans for every Red Army killed during the winter of '41-'42. This, plus the 'too many units' problem are among the most important reasons why Colwyn developed his RF 1.5 and MacGalleo is currently developing a modified TOT version of RF 1.4.

[Catfish]

Originally posted by AGRICOLA
I apologize that I was not aware of your conversion when I wrote that.

Ah, that explains everything. All of my comments were based on the assumption that you knew there was an unmodified version for ToT. Not sure how you could've missed it, though; it's in the opening post. MacGalleo begins discussing his mod in post #44.

So I guess all of the unmodified versions of RF 1.4 are equally unplayable... and buggy/untested modifications aren't much better.

[MacGalleo]

I think being close to a beta version that can be tested by anyone will be interested.
Agricola helped me a lot in this conversion and as soon as he agrees I'll post the beta version.