01-10-1999 06:10									#61
	Full PM-box? Change here!

One important aspect that the ai hasn't gasped is how to use nukes. It should drastically limit the use of nukes except when its existance is threatened or when it was nuked. In civII I've seen the computer lob nukes around all the time without any respect for what its doing.

	01-10-1999 06:11									#62
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<font size=1 face=Arial color=444444>[This message has been edited by Mo (edited October 01, 1999).]</font>

	03-05-2000 10:16									#63
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One thing I would REALLY like to see is scripts for terraformers! this is such an essential concept I'm surprised it has not been mentioned much. I'm a SMAC gammer mostly, and I profess I have not played CivII much, but I cannot count the number of games played where I spent too much bloody time micromanaging everything cause the formers didn't know how to terraform if they were compelled by god himself! So the game lands up being so long that I have rarely finished one. So please, let us use scripts for the formers. Have a right click menu item called "Select Script". You would then go to a dialogue box where you could select a script out of a list of game defaults, including custom scripts you make up yourself. That way you could have your formers (and any other unit for that matter) react intelligently to any given situation you write for it in the script. Even moreso for the non-builders, if the script idea were extended for all units what you might have is people who would win based not only on their own in-game strategies, but on the merit of their unit's scripts. You might have battles run entirely by scripts and script contests to see who's scripts win! A true simulation come of age it would be.

As far as the script vs .dll debate, I for one am not a programmer but I do have some experience with VBscript and Javascript, and, having spent many an enjoyful hour modifying the script files in SMAC to acheive some pretty cool results, I favor text file scripts. AND, you could compensate for speed by putting in a script compiler in the game which upon startup would convert all those unweildly scripts into .dll's or anything else you want. That way you have ease of use AND speed. And if you're worried that too many units X too many scripts = game meltdown (or slowdown), just put in a ruling limiting the total number of different scripts usable across the board to a number, say 25 or 50.

And while you're at it, why edit pure text files for the scripts and worry about trying to find the right file to modify? Include a script editor in the game which would categorize and sort all scripts into one big text file to be compiled upon game startup or in game whenever you create a new unit script.
<font size=1 face=Arial color=444444>[This message has been edited by AlexanderIII (edited May 03, 2000).]</font>