Custom Factions??

[Bob Morane]

Well, while I had AC, but not X-fire, I had created a very first custom faction (the adventurers guild, and I wont tell you who was the leader ), which worked well except for a few black dots in the leader pict.
Then, I got X-fire, and wanted to use this faction as one of the custom factions, so I put the name of the file in the custom factions list in alpha.txt (the alpha.txt in the x-fire folder, not the old one), and copied the faction to the X-fire folder.
But the faction does not appear in the selection menu when I start a new game . Does anyone have an idea why this does happen, are AC custom factions compatible with X-fire?

[Avenoct]

Don't know as I've never had X-fire, but you might ask Cybergod, here on Apolyton, or go ask over on the Network Node (don't have the address handy) where many many custom factions live.

-Smack

[Bob Morane]

Hmm thanx, but how can i ask Cybergod 'cept by hoping he will read this thread

[Basil]

Are you aware that Alien Crossfire uses the alphax.txt file instead of the alpha.txt file - it ignores alpha.txt file completely?

I'm not sure why you're talking about different directories for Alpha Centauri and Alien Crossfire. They both sit quite happily in the same directory on my computer. That they use different alpha(x).txt files is one of the reasons this works.

[Bob Morane]

I'll check the name of the file, but it must be alphax, as the new factions appear in it.
For the directories, i don't know how the PC version works, but the mac version creates an expansion (or whatever it is called) folder in the Alpha Centauri folder that contains the x-fire specific files.

[Scipio Centaurus]

I don't think there is a custom factions section in alpha.txt, so it sounds like you got it in alphax.txt OK. In my installation the alpha.txt and alphax.txt files are both in the same directory. Did you say you used a file from a different directory? Not sure what's going on there.

When you start up a SMAX game and you see the list of factions to play, you should see a down arrows to the right of each faction name. Just click on that and you should get a drop down list of all the SMAC and SMAX factions and any factions you have listed in the custom factions list along with a RANDOM faction selection function

Hope that's what you're looking for. Good luck.

Alternatively, you can just swap one of the 7 regular SMAX factions with your custome faction and it should show up in the starting faction list whenever you start SMAX.

[Bob Morane]

I'm sure the file i used is alphax (i've checked it); and it does contain 3 factions list : a list of the original factions, a list of the x-fire factions and a blank list for custom factions.
As i said, the different directories is for the mac version of x-fire, not the pc one. The mac program install an "add on data" folder in the "alpha centauri" folder (i checked this too).
And yes i know for the arrow.
I didn't wanted to replace a normal faction, but i will do this in order to see if the faction still works.

[Scipio Centaurus]

Are you saying your custom faction does not show up in the drop down list? If so, did you remember to list the faction name twice on the same line (comma separated) in the custom faction section of alphax.txt? The second line entry is needed for terranx.exe internal search/sort routines to do things like add entries into drop down lists.

That's the only other thing I can think of that might be causing a problem.

Good luck.

PS. AFAIK, SMAC and SMAX are both limited to 7 factions per game. So you must remove one regular faction for every custom faction you want in a game.

[Avenoct]

I didn't wanted to replace a normal faction, but i will do this in order to see if the faction still works.

This seems like the best thing to do if you can't make the 'Custom Factions' list work correctly. With 14 originals to choose from, surely there's one you might not miss

-Smack