Civ number 8

[Henrik]

Last night, I got an Idea: Since there is an eight flag (the brown one) in the cities.gif, what will happen if I insert number eight as civcolor for one of the civ's in the rules.txt.
I tried and, well the game didn't crash (good sign ) and it still didnt crash when I chosed the manipulated civ (the romans in my case).
But when I started I got the purple (seventh) flag.
Although I considered the Idea lost after this (although it might not be totaly over, anyone out there who can handle a hexeditor?) I also tried to edit the game.txt, I edited the "chose competition" dialog, and add an eight row. When I tried it in the game and chose to play whit 8 tribes I got seven. The new line was actually considered to be the last one.
So when I chosed the last one I could play whit 2 civ's (normally the limit is at 3), working downwards I could limit the number of civs to 1 (myself) this way. Although this is a new feature, it is quite the opposite of what I was trying to do and totaly usuless (unless you want to play a game whit only one opponent that is).
When you hit 0 the game crashes.

[Allard HS]

quote: When I tried it in the game and chose to play whit 8 tribes I got seven. The new line was actually considered to be the last one.

This is known for quite some time now. Though you can achieve the same via hex editing, you can add a line in Game.txt to offer more options.

This results in: higher levels of difficulty, less civs in play (up until only 1). Also other Barbarian levels, climate settings (when setting up a new game on a new map), etc.

If you add 8 on top of the row, it still sees as if a new row below has been added, and as it does not look to the actual number or name given to it, it will assume the uppermost is for 7, the next for 6 etc.

Why there is an eighth flag in cities.gif has always been a bit of a mystery to me, but I suspect it was added just for fun, as so many other graphics in the gif files.

[Henrik]

I did have the feeling that it would have been tried before, but I thought that it wouldn't hurt to report it annyway.
The zero terrain movement cost ( http://apolyton.net/forums/Forum4/HTML/001096.html?12 ) seems to have been largely unkown (I thought it was a new discovery to, how come that no guide mentions that feature) so this might have been news to some people.
[This message has been edited by Henrik (edited January 30, 2001).]

[Allard HS]

It is known to some, but perhaps indeed not to all.

If you are interested in writing one on the subject, I'm sure that the SLeague will be very interested to publish a design tip on the subject to make it more generally known than it is now.

[zyxpsilon]

And i thought the 8th. civ (incl. flag & all) was there for "schism" advent when all seven active players would still be there to witness one of their Capital-city falling under an invader's grasp!
I am pretty sure, it >could< be possible to actually use the extra brownie, since the "rules.txt" has the necessary provision.
As for making it, say, playable it is much more of a challenge to test.
The matter was discussed in great lengths (way back then), and i have yet to see someone code it into the FW (and further versions) files.