PROJECT: Playtest (the 4th Thread)

[Ekmek]

thanks MArtin, it reloaded form the autoslave and i played about 100 turns after without a repeat

[Protra3211]

Hi E

Have been playing with the latest playtest along with build 552c no other files ,just noticed the new build!
Played 183 turns on very hard 8 civs, lagest map with no CTD. Didnt have any problems with the turns moving slow or odd messages from slic.
AI,s are very busy building up their empires (average AI had 12 to 13 cities) almost building every wonder before me but manage one. In 5th place with 8 cites in the coner of the world. So have not had any wars yet to test out AI tactics.
AI,s for the most part are at peace so far with I think two at war. Well im enjoying playing as it looks like the AI has the smarts to build up his empire before going to war. Will of course move on to the new build .Cant wait to see how AI tactics have improved when at war.

[Fugi the Great]

Still on last game using 552c, turn 624. First Crash since last post, seems very stable. Don't think this crash has anything to do with what anyone did, it just seemed like a normal CTP2 crash - whatever that means, you know when it just crashes for no apparent reason (the occasional solar flare, gravity fluctuations or whatever). Reloaded from the autosave okay, played the next turn okay, so I saved it for another day. Well here it is just in case anyone can make heads or tails out of it.
Crash.txt:
0x00000ae0 [(unknown) + 0x0]
0x00437fd3 [?Process@Director@@QAEXXZ + 0x2d]
0x0040ed26 [?ProcessUI@CivApp@@QAEJKAAK@Z + 0x22c]
0x0040f045 [?Process@CivApp@@QAEJXZ + 0xa7]
0x00407dd0 [?CivMain@@YGHPAUHINSTANCE__@@0PADH@Z + 0x3b6]
0x00407847 [WinMain@16 + 0x74]
0x008ad26c [WinMainCRTStartup + 0x134]
0x77e814c7 [__onexitbegin + 0x772d5a2f]

[Ekmek]

LOL

Yeah it does look like the "normal" crash...bummer though because I would like a crash free ctp2 (if i wanted crashes I'd start up civ4 again, that thing repeatedly killed my computer).

How is the AI doing in the tech race? My civ3mod the AI would "quit" researching, meaning not research anything which I think has to do with the greater gold costs. If the AI is competitive in your games then I'll work on my mod more and try not to introduce anymore bugs.

[Fugi the Great]

I am finally starting to take the lead in Tech, but that was probably because I switched to Corp Rep. a few turns ago (from Communism for the shorter building times), been playing catch-up for the entire game where I was probably #2 from the bottom for the longest of times. I have the largest army, but Korea is also building a very large one very quickly - they are also #2 in science. Could be a major war down the road, but that won't be for a while since I am maxed out on my # of cities (not playing my normal modification - 1000 cities regardless of government). I am #1 in Economy by a long shot. I would probably be further advanced than I am, but I started in the middle of a swampy/jungle area that wouldn't let me grow quickly or produce anything fast enough to keep my tech up at the same time fight off multiple enemies and rebuild lost units. Most of my PW went into tearing out swamps and jungles and converting them to Prairie with farms on them so that the cities could finally start growing. The AI is not a push over in defending itself - okay wasn't until the invention of cannon, and now bombers, Cities all had 12 units defending - tore up my attackers pretty well. It still doesn't really know how to build attack armies though. I kept getting attacked by armies that half of them were settlers - or is it just using them to make armies look bigger than they are? Had a lot of suicide units that would attack one of my cities by itself and do little to nothing in damage - wasteful ( or is that reconnaissance). Or I would get attacked by a single military unit escorting a settler - nice that it was escorting the settler, but wasteful to attack with since it does no damage and just wastes the settler. Why does the AI care so little for the settler units? It should remember that each settler unit equals 10,000 citizens, it should not just throw it's population away like that.

In a side note, we need a slider bar added to the box for gifting cities.
Another thing, any possible way to change the # of cities you are allowed based on the size of the map without always change govern.txt? Just seems that if the # you get (govern.txt) is based on a normal map (I will assume that is what it is based on), but then switch to a large or gigantic map that there would be no need for wars since every nation is easily and quickly maxed out for number of allowed cities. Kind of takes away the reason for playing if you can't conquer - oops, I mean liberate - the nations of the world. If maybe something could be added to keep that # in proportion to the world size. Just an idea.

[Protra3211]

Before starting the 553 build I just wanted to add a veiw comments. By using the cheat I could see that the AI had a good blend of tile improvements farms mines roads-best so far.
Am considering changing the numbers in Const file that help build the map. Numbers from Apolyton Pack Const file in Gamedata.Just those nubers that deal with contions of land not the whole file. So as not to have too much clumby land. That mod generated the best maps with perfect blend of land.
Might help the AI expand even faster.
What about changing numbers in the Goverment file so that a larger army can be build as you go from one form of goverment to the next. Since the AI is ahead in tech about 50% of the game the AI will reach new forms of gov before you. This could make for harder game.
Well on to playing 553 build.

[Ekmek]

Thanks guys! Nice to hear that science is not broke so it was the way the AI handle the negative gold in my mod

@Fugi
1) For settlers. I added the CantGroup Slic (we tried hard coding it didnt work) to a my civ3mod so settlers cant be grouped at all. It sacrificed the escorting but eliminated the settler-grouped attacking.

2) For armies I think the AI doesnt know bombarding well, it doesnt group bombing units like a player can. Plus I think bombing is way overpower in ctp2 where you can wipe out 12 stacks in a few turns. I'm looking to cut bombing power, but also my nonlethalbombard code lets you weaken defenders but you'll still have to fight to take a city.

3) As for attacking, in the civ3mod the AI would move some stacks around (ancient era) but it may be due to me adding frenzy21 to it. I did have to quit a hard game after losing two cities early in a game so its there, but I think it was due to frenzy. But also I tweaked the strategies a bit I think that stuff deserves a new look, possibly borrowing from AoM.


@Protra:
1)When you do change the Const stuff let me know I'll add it to my updated EMOD, but really the diversity stuff is an issue, I think I max the diversity slider to get a good feel and that should be in the middle. I think maybe we should change it to the "official" const. BUt once you get a happy playtest of it.

2) what do you mean larger army? more advanced army or making units cheaper? I think I can do that with the support coef, but not sure exactly what your looking for.


As an opinion from both you guys, I see you are playing hard and very hard. Maybe we should fix the playing levels so hard is the new medium? let me knowwhat you think.

[Protra3211]

What I mean by larger army is that some forms of goverment will support more units while others will not.
I think the best way to go for the AI would be to let each new goverment the AI discovers allow for more unit support.
You might have noticed that at times the AI,s military power will drop at times in the line graph. This is because units are deleted to be in line with the new goverment unit support. Like going from Communism to Democracy.The AI is ahead in the tech race so will reach advaned goverments before you.

[Ekmek]

Are there certain governments the Ai favors? Like Fascism or Communism, I think reducing the support cost for more war like governments will work, but democracies should have it be as a downside no large armies.

[Protra3211]

Hi E
Well I played 93 turns of the new build 553 and im already in first place. I didnt tweak any files as I feel that we should all use the same files.
For some back ground im playing on very hard -largest map-8 AI factions-and along with your build only have the E,s Diplomod.
Now what seems to happening is that the AI is not building as many units as in the last build. Im in first place on the military graph line .Never had that happen before so early un less I got a weak empire near by and captured their cities.
Also your right on setting diversity on max-map was perfect. Well the last build had the AI expanding more so something has changed. Hope you take another look at 552c.

[Ekmek]

Wow thats good AND bad. I havent tweake dthe AI so I'm not sure what the change is. My guess might be that withte more diverse terrain the AI is not able to take advantage of having a lot of good tiles around it, instead it has to deal with a mix of good and bad tiles (swamps etc). The human can handle that better like Fugi's swamp game.

but also the other guess might be the civs theselves, the differnt peronalities might accountfor a less expansive AI, maybe last time you had some Genghis Kahn types, now you have ghandis. BUt I'll have to defer that assessment to Martin G or J Bytheway or someone else familar with both code and the game.

But if it is personalities I think long term we have to make it where the human has to switch strategies to deal with it...hmmm

[Protra3211]

Well I tried again with build and playtest with same settings but did allow for more land. . This time after 200 turns AI has picked up the pace and is building more units. I have 65 and the averge AI faction has about the same. One Civ already has 17 cites (China) and is going to be tough to beat!
Love the new diplo pictures and how the whole interface looks.
What I should do is look for bugs for you as I know your hoping to finish up. Will only post if I have a crash or odd problems such as odd AI behavior in this forum and save that game.

[Ekmek]

Thanks Protra. Actually if you can post some of your screenshots (even with diplo pi ) in the screenshot thread. This place could use some publicity.


GOOD NEWS! My message about running into players without war works! ...well kind of... its a yes/no about declaring war but yes doesnnt do anything (yet). But I went to diplo a formally declared war and war kicked off. So No more accidental wars in the future !

ANd other good news is that the AI appeared to be doing tech normally again in my Civ3mod so I should be getting that out soon (unfortunately I'll be out for the next three days).

[Ekmek]

Ok guys I have a 553b out now because I cant commit to 554.

Anyways, the BIGGIEST change is that there are no accidental wars. You cant bump and you cant just attack. You have to go to diplomacy and declare war.

But you will notice that a popup asks if you want to break the treaty. Answering yes, does NOTHING even though I tried to make it be a 'declare war' button. So just hit no until the pop up goes away. Also it wont put the other civs name in there. I havent worked with SLIC messages before which is probably why i havent got it totally working. I'm hoping someone can help (the message is '110 break treaty' IIRC) with that.

but in the meantime let me know how the popup helps or hurt. Thanks for playtesting guys.






attached is the updated playtest readme and if you havent noticed my builds have a db flag zip that has all the cdb files. they can be read with notepad and you can see all the flags available for the txt files.

[Ekmek]

anybody else getting this crash?

0x004cd700 [?GameObj_Get@@YAPBVGAMEOBJ@@PAV1@K@Z + 0x9]
0x00484524 [?Get@ObjPool@@QBEPBVGAMEOBJ@@K@Z + 0x24]
0x004844f3 [?GetUnit@UnitPool@@QBEPAVUnitData@@K@Z + 0x13]
0x004ffcea [?KillUnit@Unit@@QAEXW4CAUSE_REMOVE_ARMY@@J@Z + 0x1a]
0x004dea34 [?Settle@Player@@QAEJAAVArmy@@@Z + 0xca]
0x004f11eb [?GEVHookCallback@SettleEvent@@EAE?AW4GAME_EVENT_HO OK_DISPOSITION@@W4GAME_EVENT@@PAVGameEventArgList@ @@Z + 0x6d]
0x005bc74f [?Run@GameEventHook@@AAE?AW4GAME_EVENT_ERR@@AAViter ator@?$list@UNode@GameEventHook@@V?$allocator@UNod e@GameEventHook@@@std@@@std@@PAVGameEventArgList@@ AAJ@Z + 0x63]
0x005bc6e6 [?Activate@GameEventHook@@QAE?AW4GAME_EVENT_ERR@@PA VGameEventArgList@@JAAJ@Z + 0x7e]
0x005bd35a [?ActivateHook@GameEventManager@@QAE?AW4GAME_EVENT_ ERR@@W4GAME_EVENT@@PAVGameEventArgList@@JAAJ@Z + 0x3a]
0x005bb004 [?Process@GameEvent@@QAE?AW4GAME_EVENT_ERR@@AAH@Z + 0x2f]
0x005bd1b8 [?ProcessHead@GameEventManager@@QAE?AW4GAME_EVENT_E RR@@XZ + 0x33]
0x005bd15b [?Process@GameEventManager@@QAE?AW4GAME_EVENT_ERR@@ XZ + 0x7b]
0x0040f031 [?Process@CivApp@@QAEJXZ + 0x103]
0x00407dc0 [?CivMain@@YGHPAUHINSTANCE__@@0PADH@Z + 0x3b6]
0x00407837 [WinMain@16 + 0x74]
0x008adebc [WinMainCRTStartup + 0x134]
0x7c816d4f [__onexitbegin + 0x7bc6a157]