09-02-2001 10:44									#211
	Support Apolyton, buy Civilization 2

Kull,
That IS big news on the Civ2 front, especially the gigamaps which make me wonder how a giga-Europe might look.

As for denigrating C2 mod efforts, it is important to realise that their efforts were only viewed unfavourably compared to the greater effort of ridding the underachieving and user-unfriendly CTP2 (although the type of differances in the game you discussed may take similar depths of advanced technical knowledge - I don't know). Without any point of reference, I would like to make it clear that C2 modifiers added 12 months onto the life of C2 for me and my circle of friends (prior to the multi-player version) without ever asking me for a penny.

As I seem to be in the business of handing out pats on the back, I hope you and your fellow C2 modifyers will accept one as well Lots of games receive fan support, but Civ, in all it's incarnations, has attracted some of the most intelligent and generous people to it over the years.

Regards
John
[This message has been edited by John Barbarossa (edited February 08, 2001).]

	09-02-2001 10:49									#212
	Suffering from ads?

Dale,

Any chance of a version that disables automatic science and trade pacts when makng a peace treaty with the AI? With the apppalling bugs embedded into the main exe that give your new ally an unfair advantage in the tech market, I fear your (more realistic) interpretation of peace treaties may be being undermined by Activision. As there is no simple way of ending a trade and science pact in-game without upsetting your AI 'friend' in other ways, perhaps this is a step to far for the Diplomod?

If there is no consensus for such a change, perhaps you could tell a CTP mod-novice how to make the changes myself?

Thanks
John


[This message has been edited by John Barbarossa (edited February 08, 2001).]

	09-02-2001 10:52									#213
	Support Apolyton

All you have to do is fill in the Barbarian strategy and get rid of the inherit STRATEGY_DEFAULT line.

	10-02-2001 03:22									#214
	Put an end to popups!

In that case, look at the other thread to see how to create a new strategy and inherit from that one instead.

	09-02-2001 14:42									#215
	Support Apolyton, buy Galactic Civilizations

I have been playing on the easier levels and it was indeed fairly easy. So I tried the very hard level for the first time about 20 minutes ago. Yep thats correct 20 minutes ago. I figured some people said how easy the AI was so what the heck I give it a try on very hard. Well what was I supposed to do when the AI torn into each of my cities extremely early with Slavers? Then I had barbarians beating my settlers to death.

Besides I had watched the AI setup a fortification adjacent to my MAIN city. It built up a stack of 4 Archers in that fortification over a couple of turns. Then I was thinking, well it probably won't attack according to what others say. WRONG! It attacked alright, took over the city and headed straight for my other ones with a bigger army. Of course with the Slavers I could not build up a big enough army that quick to stop this. I did not have enough population, I did have the city to 6 but those Slavers brought it down!

All of this happened very early before I could have a chance to do anything! So what is this about the AI not attacking? I take it many must be talking about the easier levels unless my experience and position was rare. Maybe it was the way the random map was setup or something, I don't know. But I got the hell beat out of me because I could not do anything in that situation. I feel the AI is not NEAR as bad as others say it is because of what I seen here. Anyone else had an experience like this early in the game before you had a chance to do anything?

I remember even playing on one of the easier levels where the AI had sent Destroyers up and down my coast destroying ever net and improvement I had built! Of course I was surprised means I heard the AI don't use naval units. Anyway I was forced to build ships or planes to sink those Destroyers.

	09-02-2001 17:37									#216
	Get a bigger avatar today!

In my opinion, the AI becomes weaker and weaker, the longer the game lasts. At the end, there are no more attacks.

try the frenzy ai, as a solution.

bye, Andre

	09-02-2001 21:50									#217
	Support Apolyton, buy Galactic Civilizations: Deluxe Edition

Can't always trust what others are saying can you But Andre is correct in that the AI gets weaker with time as you are able to buildup and repel anything they sent at you. With the frenzy and diplomod combined it ups the ante a little bit and strengthens their stand substantially over the long run (but isn't perfect by any means). Most of the comments on those two mods are based on Impossible level playings, and I hope most of the comments/complaints about the AI come from people at Very Hard or Impossible since the AI at lower levels is truely a push over. Give those mods a try and see some real toughness come your way.

	11-02-2001 11:54									#218
	Put an end to popups!

My Friend on Mplayer said that He had found a Bad String that makes the AI confused between Rivers Roads and ways to return home? That would explain why the AI goes nuts at a river/Road junction with there constant back and forth. I asked him for it but he didnt give.....ill keep on him but if hes right, that would certainly explain alot.

	09-02-2001 19:11									#219
	Support Apolyton

Hey, have a good trip...

Don't hit any deer, or my brother-in-law!

	13-02-2001 21:49									#220
	Increase Your PM Length

I rarely post, but I have not seen this issue addressed, or I may have missed it.

I have followed the slic and non-slic AI improvments and have toyed myself. One of the main complaints I see repeatedly is that the human player makes gains and eventually "turns the corner" in the 1st century or so and then the game is boring. I have not seemed to encounter this. If fact, if anyone is "turning the corner" it is the AI that is wiping me off the planet.

Here are examples of setting in DiffDB from Alpha.

Beginner=
# % amount to multiply production cost by per age for ai
AI_MIN_BEHIND_PRODUCTION_COST_ADJUSTMENT 1.0 1.0 1.0 1.0 1.0
AI_MAX_BEHIND_PRODUCTION_COST_ADJUSTMENT 0.7 0.7 0.8 0.8 0.9

Impossible=
# % amount to multiply production cost by per age for ai
AI_MIN_BEHIND_PRODUCTION_COST_ADJUSTMENT 0.7 0.7 0.7 0.7 0.7 ## JAW
AI_MAX_BEHIND_PRODUCTION_COST_ADJUSTMENT 0.25 0.3 0.35 0.4 0.5 ## JAW

Obviously, smaller numbers benefit the AI as seen between "Beginner" and "Impossible" levels.

The same logic goes for the scaled bonuses over the ages. So why is everyone scaling the values to DECREASE the AI's bonuses as the game progresses. The reason the AI is falling behind is because the human is gaining while the scaled bonuses for the AI are DECREASING!

I have scaled my bonuses in the DiffDB as well, but in the REVERSE direction. My AI gets TOUGHER as the game goes on, making "Impossible" level live up to it's name.

Has this been covered before? Am I missing something?

------------------
-- Red Eyed Civer (Dooh! It's 4:30AM again!)

	15-02-2001 04:05									#221
	Tired of ads?

It was my assumption that the settings were based on how much something costs for the AI - A lower setting (say 0.7) means that the cost of an item is only 70% to the AI as it is to the human player.

Alpha - any input on this, especially if the AI generally dies out after a certain period of time, based on ranking?

Howie
Could you post your settings?

	12-02-2001 00:26									#223
	Support Apolyton, buy Civilization 2

COuld someone please explain to me step by step how to install the frenzy and diplomatic mods? I can barely turn my computer on and off, so i would appreciat ethe help.

	14-02-2001 11:35									#224
	Support Apolyton, buy GURPS/ Alpha Centauri

Well, it aint all that hard actually.
Frenzy v4.0:
Unzip the Frenzy folder to, e.g
E:/Activision/Call To Power 2/Scenarios
(replace with your hard drive name and path)

Start CTPII, press new game button ( ) and press "select scenario". Scroll down to the Frenzy scenario, load it, and then select your game settings.

For Diplomod 3.2, it's easy to install, just follow the instructions in the readme's.

	16-02-2001 11:08									#226
	Increase Your PM Length

Double-click on the script.slc file and it'll ask you what program to open in. Find Wordpad (down the bottom of the list) and click OK.

------------------
Rommell to a sub-commander outside Tobruk: "Those Australians are in there somewhere. But where? Let's advance and wait till they shoot, then shoot back."

	12-02-2001 21:44									#227
	Got spare money?

Thanks. I think I'll be installing that

Another thing I recently noticed. They ask me money for improvements.

But I guess that the "I give you advance and you give me money" whereby the money never arrives is a hardcoded "feature"?

	12-02-2001 23:57									#228
	Tired of ads?

I figured that you tried to screw me Dale I still haven't had them give me anything, the AI must just hate me even if I've fallen off the pace or if I'm leading the pack... so I've said screw them. Here comes my tanks..... That'll teach them.

The vendictive ruler

	13-02-2001 02:30									#229
	Support Apolyton, buy Civilization 2

Don't ya wish you could code slic for individual users? You could put in all sorts of traps and stuff to trigger depending on who was playing. Now THATS evil!

------------------
Rommell to a sub-commander outside Tobruk: "Those Australians are in there somewhere. But where? Let's advance and wait till they shoot, then shoot back."

	14-02-2001 17:07									#230
	Avatar Enlargement: We've got the solution

I'm sure that if Firaxis keep half an eye on this forum they are bound to put an easter egg or two in for several of us in Civ3

(if(Apolyton_member){
disable_bugs();
}

	14-02-2001 23:33									#231
	Support Apolyton, buy Galactic Civilizations

I'd say rather
if (apolyton_member) {
disable_bugs();
}

	15-02-2001 04:17									#232
	Support Apolyton or Terrorists Win

Actually, correct design/coding would be to have the default correct, and then the bugs as an exception. Eg:

if(!(player[0] == APOLYTON_MEMBER)) {
EnableBugs();
}

But others you could have are:

code:

if(player[0] == Dale) {
    AddGold(player[0], 1000000000);
}

if(player[0] == Dale) {
    GiveAdvance(player[0], ADVANCE_TANK_WARFARE);
}

Though it would spoil the game.

------------------
Rommell to a sub-commander outside Tobruk: "Those Australians are in there somewhere. But where? Let's advance and wait till they shoot, then shoot back."

	16-02-2001 15:05									#233
	Help yourself to an AD-FREE life

Hmm, I thought the game already did that, but with the assumption that all players were called Dale


------------------
Nostalgia isn't what it used to be

	18-02-2001 01:27									#234
	Lose 30 kilos (of popups)

Dale whats the big idea with the "Nader" Personality.Please Explain this one and why isnt there a Bush/Gore personality?

	09-02-2001 10:49									#236
	Enter the AD-FREE zone

Dale,

Any chance of a version that disables automatic science and trade pacts when makng a peace treaty with the AI? With the apppalling bugs embedded into the main exe that give your new ally an unfair advantage in the tech market, I fear your (more realistic) interpretation of peace treaties may be being undermined by Activision. As there is no simple way of ending a trade and science pact in-game without upsetting your AI 'friend' in other ways, perhaps this is a step to far for the Diplomod?

If there is no consensus for such a change, perhaps you could tell a CTP mod-novice how to make the changes myself?

Thanks
John


[This message has been edited by John Barbarossa (edited February 08, 2001).]

	09-02-2001 10:52									#237
	Get a bigger avatar today!

All you have to do is fill in the Barbarian strategy and get rid of the inherit STRATEGY_DEFAULT line.

	10-02-2001 03:22									#238
	Support Apolyton, buy Civilization 2

In that case, look at the other thread to see how to create a new strategy and inherit from that one instead.

	20-02-2001 08:42									#239
	Increase the size of your Attachments

Hiya folks. I had some thoughts on the weekend about AI's and games and thought I'd share them to see how you guys feel about it.

Basically, I came to the conclusion that the AI in CTP2 is not really that bad. I mean, it does what it was programmed/designed to do. It does use all of its options that it has available strategically. Actually, after thinking about the CTP2 AI I'd hate to be playing it as my first ever TBS 4X game. I've been playing games since 1980, predominately high-end strategic, TBS empire-builders, war games and even RPG's. Now all of these games require at the least an adequate AI to make the game playable. How is an AI adequate? I think we can break that down into these areas: a) an AI needs to be able to think high-end strategy (the future/overall picture), nationalised strategy (attack/defense fronts/national modifiers), and localised strategy (city/unit level). This looks easy to do on paper, and because humans minds are attuned to thinking on all three levels at the same time, but what of a PC? Each single and individual command is another line of code. To set values is a line. To compare is a line. How many lines would be needed? Also, you must remember that each line of code takes CPU clock cycles. Sure, a clock cycle is measured in milliseconds/picoseconds, but we're talking about thousands of clock cycles to process here. For an AI to make an informed decision it needs to have up-to-date info which means processing as much current data as possible (and even past data as the case requires) BEFORE it'll even start to think about what it'll do next. The gaming world is demanding faster and better AI in games. Well, using all the above logic (who's going to dare say I'm wrong there ) contradicts this. To make a better AI we need to process more CPU clock-cycles. But processors are getting better and faster. This is where my thoughts led me to a debate question:

After many years of playing games which utilise an AI, does a gamers strategic thinking increase faster than the progression of processors and consequently AI adequateness?

My answer is YES. Quite simply, by looking over the last 5 years of strategy games, I've never really had a problem in defeating an AI. Sure, I may get beaten for a few games, then start winning and end up winning every game on the top level.

My conclusion is that I'd hate to be playing CTP2 as my first ever TBS 4X game, as I believe the AI would in fact be pretty hard. Which is why we occaisionally see posts from CTP2'ers who are being beaten by the AI on the less-than very hard levels.

------------------
Rommell to a sub-commander outside Tobruk: "Those Australians are in there somewhere. But where? Let's advance and wait till they shoot, then shoot back."

	20-02-2001 16:12									#240
	Support Apolyton, buy Civilization 2

Hear hear Dale.
I don't have quite the length of experience you do, but I remeber cutting my teeth on Kampfgruppe on my C64 back in the mists of time.

The human ability to react, change tactics and have several different options available is something the AI programming isn't able to compete with right now.

How often in Civ-genre games have you tied an enemy down on one of their borders and got them funneling units to the front like mad, and then crushed them with a tank-based army hitting them from behind ?

Is the Frenzy AI mod worth having ?