PROJECT: Playtest Thread III

[sekel]

Hi everyone,

I noticed that the playtests since October introduced major problems with the AI, due to experimental changes.

What exactly were you trying to acheive?

Is the new AI getting better or it just brought more problems???

thanks,

Felipe

[Ekmek]

I heard its better but i think going to the AI thread will help better...

[rdorau]

But the september playtest is the last possible for multiplaying.

[Maquiladora]

Do you get the PW bug in the september playtest or any other bugs rdorau? Im still playing MP with the 1.1 patch unfortunately.

[rdorau]

Sorry, I don't know the pw bug. There are some bugs especially at synchronizing. It lasts very long. But with the last two playtests you can't play at all.

[Maquiladora]

Yeah, playing with the old playtests is like playing with 1.0 and using the newest playtest is worst of all for MP, which is a shame because theres some really good fixes like right-clicking for stealth units and rush-buying (i think it was fixed again)

[J Bytheway]

I fear that the attempts made to fix problems with MP based on the descriptions of what Activision's patch did have done more harm than good.

[Flinx]

Originally posted by sekel
Hi everyone,
I noticed that the playtests since October introduced major problems with the AI, due to experimental changes.
What exactly were you trying to acheive?
Is the new AI getting better or it just brought more problems???
thanks,
Felipe

iirc calvitix made many different changes to the AI. It is not clear to me that the net result is an improvement. Pathfinding is now badly broken in my opinion, which is a shame because it had been greatly improved last April by someone (Fromafar?).

[Protra3211]

Play test 2004 4.30

[Protra3211]

Soory about last post hit the wrong key

Been using this play test version for now. Seems to work great . AI expands very fast . Will hem human player in so much so that its a battle to build your empire. AI to AI diplomacy works fine. AI factions expand by war or build up in times of peace.
Now I know much work has been done since then but I have found that the first play test had the AI expanding at a perfect rate. After 300 turns on highest level was still in last place.

[Tamerlin]

Running playtest game

I have started a game with the latest playtest build this morning modded with the Updater2.

All is fine for the moment but there is still something that is preventing the National manager to be the perfect managing tool. The number of turns before the next population increase is still missing for each city. IMO, the entry named Population could be shortened to Pop which should leave enough place for an entry named Inc or Incr. The National manager would also be much more useful if double-clicking or right-clicking on the name of a city would open the City manager (which name appears in English in the French build and that is something I have to correct in the French files).

[Tamerlin]

I would have liked to mod the National Manager to create a new entry with the Number of Turns before Population growth next to the Population entry but I am afraid that simply modifying the window implies some programming as I have not find anything other than the strings in the text files. Does someone know how to do this and how could I help if someone is willing to do it?

[Maquiladora]

Peter was working on making it appear next to the pop size and the name on the map, dont know if he still is or not.

It would be useful in the city manager specialists tab too, when youre tweaking specialists.

[Ekmek]

Tamerlin,
I'd just do a search on the appropriate files (you probably can find which ones from where Flinx posted it in the Altered Source code files) and post where you think the code is. Hopefully someone may help you a long

[Tamerlin]

Thanks Maq and E, as far as I am concerned I would need a lot of help as I know nothing about programming.

I agree that the Number of turns before population increase is useful in each window of the National Manager and that it should also appear as a default information in the City Manager screen.