Locking Starting Locations

[nbarclay]

Is there any way to have the scenario editor "lock in" which starting locations will be assigned to which players automatically, or is that something that has to be done by hand? (What I'd like to be able to do is set up random scenarios that will use the same map, including the same civs in the same locations, regardless of what difficulty level people play at, but I want to learn as little as possible about the map myself in the process.) I've looked through the editor controls with no success, so I thought I'd ask here to see if anyone might have found something I missed.

Nathan

[Level]

Right click on the starting location and asign to player/civ, or press space before placing the starting location and chose a player/civ.

[nbarclay]

Originally posted by Level
Right click on the starting location and asign to player/civ, or press space before placing the starting location and chose a player/civ.

Thanks for the thought, but that's what I was hoping to avoid. That kind of explicit assignment process gives the person who sets up the game so much knowledge of the map that it takes most of the fun of exploration and discovery out of the early game if he plays it himself. Basically, I'm looking for a way to set up "Apolyton University" style games where the same map with the same starting positions can be played on different levels without spoiling the game for the person who sets it up.

The thought occurs to me that since I'm a programmer, one option might be for me to write a program to modify .bic files to lock in the starting positions. I've never dug into .bic files before, but it looks like it might not be too hard if no better solution is available. (Any opinions from people who have more experience with .bic files?)

Nathan

[WarpStorm]

Well, a low tech approach is to get someone who won't actually play set things up.

[WarpStorm]

Unfortunately, short of coding (either by Firaxis or someone else), I don't see a good way in the editor.