To use or not to use Civassist

[rofloflo]

I read about such "helper" tools a bit lately and i came to wonder if they are really needed.

I have not checked the whole details on what they do but from some posts it almost sounds as if CivAssist is a cheat like addon. It seems to break the randomness of the game.

My question is how many of you experienced players use it in your games and what for. Do you consider it to be a cheat or mainly an addon of features that shouldve been included in the normal build?

EDIT

I just read the release post on civfanatics and i must admit it does not look so bad after all.

i would still like to have input from the big names however just to see their opinion on it

[vmxa1]

Mapstat and Civassist only give you info that you can already get in the game. I tend to use them in spots.

Say I want to know what techs are available. I could go to each civ and contact them for a trade and get the data. It is so mych easier to comprehend if it is all there in one spot at once.

Same for alerts. You can find all of them on your own and I did until about 2 or 3 months ago.

I do not load up Civassist and leave it up. I close it as soon as I see what I want. I may use 3 or 4 times in a game. It has a lot of feature, most I have not even found out about.

They have disable use in MP games as I understand it. So it helps mainly to save time and work. If you have more than 8 civs, it really helps.

[rofloflo]

Good to know

I really thought it was simplifying the gameplay to a point where it becomes a click fest. But it seems to be the other way around reduces clicks needed to gain info.

Im gonna try it on my next game i guess. I am clearly strong enough to move up a difficulty level

Warlord can't quite cut it

[Dis]

this may be a stupid question. But what is civassist?

[Sabre2th]

It's a utility program that provides easy access to information in-game. It also allows for extra popup alerts at the start of your turn. The newer version is very nice once you get used to it

[Addled Platypus]

Originally posted by Dis
this may be a stupid question. But what is civassist?

never heard of it either

sounds like to much of a bother

[vmxa1]

You can run it or mapstat and it will pop up if any events are triggered. Say a civ learns a new tech or has now got a lux for trade. You can see in an instant.

I prefer mapstat, but each has some things that it does that the other does not. Just start mapstat and leave it up. It comes will a replay function that you can run to see how things occurred. A lot like the final hist player, but you can control the speed and zoom.

So if you want to know how many leaders you had, you can run Replay and count them. It is an amazing package. Of course it is not needed, as I only learned of it recently, but it is nice for civ fanatics.

You can see all the towns founded, captured or razed. You can view it for any civ in the game.

[Addled Platypus]

got a screenie?

[Dis]

looks kind of interesting. Though an advantage for the human player learning when the ai gets techs. Though you can often see this in the diplomcacy sreen. I'm too lazy to find out .

[Kloreep]

Those sound nice.

Does Civassist actually pop up an alert for every tech the AI discovers, or can you set it to only pop up for techs that you have or can research? Because the former strikes me as a minor cheat... but if you could configure it otherwise so it was effectively checking the diplo screens every turn, that would be great.

[lmtoops]

All information in Civassist is available in the game, but is a pain to extract. For example, if you check the diplomacy screen every turn, you will see what new techs are available, what workers are for sale, who has money, etc. Any one can do that, but it is a real pain. Civassists provides an updated pop-up at the beginning of each turn.

As far as the pop-up, you get one every turn. The single pop-up has all the updated information. There is an Options screen (in the program) which allows you to choose what to report.

I sure Mapstat does the same thing. That replay option sounds really cool.

[rofloflo]

This leads me to believe that in civilization 4, most screens will indeed be a better summary of what's avaiable and what is not.

Most probably at least one dev from firaxis used civassist and learned a few design concepts from it.

[Addled Platypus]

Originally posted by lmtoops
what workers are for sale,

never heard of this before

old dog waiting to learn a new trick...please explain

[Dis]

Originally posted by Platypus Rex


never heard of this before

old dog waiting to learn a new trick...please explain

I think he's talking about if a worker happens to be inside of the AI's capitol during your turn, that makes that worker available to buy or trade for. This information is available in the diplomacy window with the appropiate civ (listed under workers). Some people probably buy a lot of workers. I never do. I enslave them through warfare.

[Addled Platypus]

Thanks for the class

keep your enemies workers, it costs them gold

I usually fortify them deep in my homeland