01-04-2002 06:31									#1
	Stretching the tech/ computer player limits of ToT? Increase Your PM Length

I found the ToT no-limits addon fro the oversize maps... im wondering if its possible to extend other parts of the game? like tech tree slots, is it possible to add more or is it hard-coded into the game? fantastic worlds added some tech slots, but only about 11 i think... ToT seems to use the same amount. Was this the absolute maximum that the basic game engine could handle or is it possible to extend the tech tree even further? Extra techs are need in my opinion, as there are 18 extra units to play around with...

Also, is it possible to add more computer players, or is 7 the absolute maximum that the engine can handle? Lots of computer players would be very cool, especially on big maps or to make accurate world scenarios, with many different independant countires etc.. I dont see how game performance would be an issue, the game seems to zip along on my 450 mhz no matter how big the map or how many civs (as long as im not watching enemy moves of course)

Im just wondeirng if anyone has tried this or knows anything about wther this is possible or not?..

thanks for any help

	01-04-2002 07:09									#2
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That's actually not such a bad idea (the techs)...

But I don't think it can be done, I just had a look at civ2.exe...

These limits aren't really a matter of whether the engine can handle it or not. The limits are created by the limits of standard data types, which are usually powers of 2, or more precisely powers of 256.
The reason why the no-limits patch lifts limits is because of the datatypes the programmers chose. For the money for instance, they chose a datatype which can range from approx. -2 billion to approx. +2 billion, but for some, undoubtedly brilliant, reason they added a limit at 30000. All the no-limits patch does is move this limit up the the "true" maximum around 2 billion.

In principle these limits "true" limits could also be changed, but it is near impossible and infinitely harder.

The maximum amount of civs possible is 8 (which is 7 + barbarians).

More about the adding of techs. The first problem I can think of now are the text-codes (like Afl, Wri, X1 etc.). You'd need to create more of those for the new techs, but that is only possible if the programmers were so kind as to provide some spare room for that in Civ2.exe. And they didn't do that.

	02-04-2002 03:52									#3
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oh dear ill ahve to keep dreaming of my 'ultimate civ' game then... thanks for the info.... I know a little about programming, im doing a computing degree, but i dont really understand too much yet... is the civ limit 8 becuase there isnt a 'number of civs' variable? like is this handled by a loop that only repeats 8 times?

Why is it impossible to insert new tech slots? The tech-codes you mention like x1,x2 etc can be re-named, i have tired this and it seems to work. I presume that the civ exe is programmed to read in a certain amount of parameters from the rules.txt file, could it not be told to look for more parameters somehow? It doesnt seem to mind if you place less techs in the rules.txt, like for an old civ2 scenario. It doesnt seem to mind if you place extra tech definitions past x8 in the rules.txt, but it seems to ignore them...

I wish i could customise the exe somehow... ... id program a resources option and expanded diplomacy like in civ3, id add bombard ability, which would be the more effective alpha centauri style rather than civ3's puny bombard. Id add the air mission system too, and stuff like explorers venturing off into the blackness and returning several turns later with new map information, rather than the map revealed straight away... also fuel for boats, only certain amount of time that they can stay at sea before food runs out... but you can replenish near friendly cities or grassland... id add some of the trade ideas from europa universalis, and change the combat to a kind of hex wargame style where you assign units to an attack and then at the end of the turn you see the battles played out. units would get forced to retreat and damaged most of the time rather than destroyed.. I would also create an astounding AI that carriers out amazing co-ordinated attacks with land, sea and air forces.. no more sending all units in a suicide rush towards your nearest city. All of this would be easily customised with thousands of tech slots and unit slots to play with.

Ah the ultimate civ game! now i just need to know how to program, and make free a few decades of my life...

	11-04-2002 23:29									#4
	Yay Get a bigger avatar today!

I for one would most definatly play.
There are a fair few ppl doing their own civ clones, somebody somewhere could probably do with some help/ideas/inspiration, Look them up in the "alternative civs" section.
I look forward to playing the game. lol.

	13-04-2002 20:13									#5
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quote: Originally posted by Daftpanzer oh dear ill ahve to keep dreaming of my 'ultimate civ' game then...

Yes... I think just about every Civ fan has enough ideas to create his own personalized Civ-game, or just an adapted version of Civ2/Civ3. Unfortunately making a game takes rather long (to say the least), and the Civ2 source code isn't available.

quote: thanks for the info.... I know a little about programming, im doing a computing degree, but i dont really understand too much yet... is the civ limit 8 becuase there isnt a 'number of civs' variable? like is this handled by a loop that only repeats 8 times?

No problem... There are many places where the civs are stored in one byte, with each civ (+ barbarians) represented by one bit. Since there are only 8 bits in a byte, that's the maximum.

quote: Why is it impossible to insert new tech slots? The tech-codes you mention like x1,x2 etc can be re-named, i have tired this and it seems to work. I presume that the civ exe is programmed to read in a certain amount of parameters from the rules.txt file, could it not be told to look for more parameters somehow? It doesnt seem to mind if you place less techs in the rules.txt, like for an old civ2 scenario. It doesnt seem to mind if you place extra tech definitions past x8 in the rules.txt, but it seems to ignore them...

No I think of it. I just found a new resource editor at CivFanatics (the Civ2 utility section). If these tech acronyms are simply a text resource in the executable it might not be so difficult after all. Or well, at least the acronyms could then be added, I'm still not sure what else would be required to make extra techs work. I'll have a look. (Don't hold your breath)

	15-04-2002 19:20									#6
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2048 units
255 cities
8 civs (including barbarians)
Forget about breaking those 3.

Many have tried and all have failed. Including me.
For the techs and all, good luck, why not.
It's only when we try that we can succeed