13-07-2002 20:58									#1
	A list of things never to do! Support Apolyton

I'd like to make a list of things you should never do when making a simple, or advanced mod (Advanced meaning new units, simple meaning change of rules!).
Please post things in here, like the way people post in Zulu's 'rouge FAQ'.

	13-07-2002 21:01									#2
	Increase Your PM Length

My first one is:
Never give frigates a cargo slot!
It really screws their animations! When they are fighting, or bombarding in a certain direction, they look like they are doing it in another direction!
And when they are fighting, they point the nose of their ship towards the enemt and fire to the north and south (I've only seen this in lateral combat, i havn't actualy got a chance to see them fight north to south or in anyother direction cept for west to east or east to west!)

	13-07-2002 21:16									#3
	Support Apolyton, pre-order Civilization IV

Advanced - When renaming or adding units, never forget that the name of the unit folder, game unit and *ini file all have to be the same!

	14-07-2002 01:44									#4
	Support Apolyton buy from Amazon

Never run with scissors.


Seriously, though, I hate it when scenarios make a single all-powerful unit that dominates a civ's military. Very boring. We should see some interesting ideas when the scen editor comes out. I'd love to make strategic bombing runs on Germany in a WWII scenario.

Or blast it across the trenches with my arty in WWI.

How about a napoleonic blockade of europe? Gibraltar would have real significance in any scenario.

I especially like the fact that ships must be in port to be repaired- much more realism.


Oy, I'm getting giddy!

	14-07-2002 19:42									#5
	Increase the size of your Attachments

Don't have any more than 8 luxuries. Unless you really want to have the game crash periodically. Also, don't make any changes to the worker jobs in the editor's Terrain screen for the same reason as above.

PS I guess the 8 Luxuries limit has been solved with the new patch.

Last edited by Willem on 18-07-2002 at 20:23

	15-07-2002 04:04									#6
	Support Apolyton buy from Amazon

Don’t give settlers and workers an attack value – crash on start. (Defense OK)

Don’t give naval units (with the possible exception of transport) the airlift capability – it won’t crash the game but the whole idea is ridiculous!

Never have a wonder give every city an improvement needed to build other wonders or improvements (Temple, Bank, Library, etc.) or you won’t build it.

And unless you are fond of uninstalling, re-installing and patching Civ3 and reloading all your mods – Never change the culture group of any civ to “None.” The game will start and run, you will build and improve your cities, but once the palace gets an upgrade, the first time you try to view a city – Death to your game. You might get away with just reloading the patch, but why risk it.

Edit: Grammar and punctuation - damn you spell check!

Last edited by miccofl on 16-07-2002 at 03:42

	18-07-2002 18:04									#7
	Put an end to popups!

Don't give the settler worker abilities. This causes a "sometimes" crash when building cities.

This thread deserves to live; especially with the new patch coming out.

	18-07-2002 18:13									#8
	Inflate your Upload Space

quote: Originally posted by Dan Severn Never run with scissors. Seriously, though, I hate it when scenarios make a single all-powerful unit that dominates a civ's military. Very boring. We should see some interesting ideas when the scen editor comes out. I'd love to make strategic bombing runs on Germany in a WWII scenario. Or blast it across the trenches with my arty in WWI. How about a napoleonic blockade of europe? Gibraltar would have real significance in any scenario. I especially like the fact that ships must be in port to be repaired- much more realism.

Expanding on that idea, my recommendation is to make sure and playtest all units, making sure they're balanced between A/D/M, bombardment values, traits and shield cost. And put some variety into units! If a country historically used a variety of units, then building only one of these should be a disadvantage.

	18-07-2002 18:28									#9
	Support Apolyton, buy Civilization 2

quote: Originally posted by Trip make sure and playtest all units, making sure they're balanced between A/D/M, bombardment values, traits and shield cost.

Excellent point, I use an accelerated mod just for testing new units. It’s not challenging in game terms but I can get the new units and use them with a minimum time expenditure. Besides how else are you going to see a 69K score.

Maybe I should post my test mod for coracle…

	18-07-2002 18:32									#10
	Lose 30 kilos (of popups)

quote: Originally posted by miccofl Excellent point, I use an accelerated mod just for testing new units. It’s not challenging in game terms but I can get the new units and use them with a minimum time expenditure. Besides how else are you going to see a 69K score. Maybe I should post my test mod for coracle…

I doubt you could ever please Coracle with anything related to Civ 3.

But seriously, for a scenario to be good, it has to be extensively tested. A unit imbalance makes the scenario much less fun to play.

	18-07-2002 20:22									#11
	Avatar Enlargement: We've got the solution

quote: Originally posted by miccofl Don't give the settler worker abilities. This causes a "sometimes" crash when building cities. This thread deserves to live; especially with the new patch coming out.

On a similar note, don't try to make a specialist Worker, i.e. one who only irrigates etc. You won't be able to automate it, and the AI will never be able to use it once it''s built.

	21-07-2002 04:13									#12
	Support Apolyton or Terrorists Win

HazieDaVampire, I think that the Frigate animation problem has to do with the "turn to attack" flag. If it is on, the unit turns around 90 degrees to attack.

	30-07-2002 20:41									#13
	Avatar Enlargement: We've got the solution

Never get involved in a land war in Asia.

Oops, my bad. How about...

Shop smart, shop S Mart.

Seriously, always playtest the scenario ALL THE WAY through and pay attention to any custom graphics you've added. This will save you from having to post several patched editions and won't be as frustrating to the people who play it.

EDIT: and will allow you to correct spelling errors.

	31-07-2002 03:34									#14
	Inflate your Upload Space

everyone mentions the play testing one...so I'll say this...
don't forget that you didn't play test your current mod and then accidentally copy it to the backup before you go to sleep.

	31-07-2002 15:11									#15
	Inflate your Upload Space

Don't give units large numbers of hitpoints (10-15 or more). This will make combat take forever. Especially between armies.

When placing Barbarian units on the map, remember to set their combat experience to Conscript, otherwise you have to fight off barbarians with Regular experience.

If you are increasing the Optimal number of cities to reduce corruption, remember that the AI will get these bonuses as well. I had a Continent game where the Romans owned 30% of all the world's land (most of the other continent) by the time I met them - they were almost unstoppable.

Always remember game balance when changing something. While 50-move Galleys might be fun, they are not balanced.

When changing what a unit can upgrade to, keep the choice sensible. Pay attention to the AI strategies. For example, Swordsmen work best when they Upgrade to Marines because both are offensive units. Swordsmen to Riflemen will work okay if the AI can use the Riflemen to attack.

Units should not upgrade to another unit where any of the A/D/M values for the new unit are lower than the old.

Keep an eye on the likely attackers and defenders at each point in the game, and make sure they are fairly evenly matched at all times. For example, a typical game might progress through the Knight/Pikemen era, Knight/Musketman era, Cavalry/Musketman era, Cavalry/Riflemen era, Cavalry/Infantry era and Tank/Infantry era. There should not be the equivalent of the Tank/Spearman era or the Horseman/Infantry era, because combat would be frustrating.

	31-07-2002 20:23									#16
	Support Apolyton, buy GURPS/ Alpha Centauri

I remember that in civ2, the AI would build more of a particular unit if you made two of it. (A viking scenario benefited quite a bit from this idea.)

	31-07-2002 22:08									#17
	Support Apolyton buy from Amazon

Don't make the online modder unit graphics completely new unit upgrades in between the old ones. Make them a flavor unit or something compeletly different (exchange a defence for an attack or visa versa keeping the older unit still buildable, and then have them both upgrade to the next level). Having an extensive unit upgrade ruins the game, and ruins the advantage of being technologically advanced.

	01-08-2002 00:16									#18
	Support Apolyton buy from Amazon

Don't add a whole bunch of things at once, then go play everything out. There's a number of things that can cause the game to crash, and if you make alot of changes or improvements without testing each one first, it's going to be difficult trouble-shooting in order to find the problem.

	01-08-2002 16:16									#19
	Support Apolyton, buy Civilization 2

dont make workers population cost more than 1.. if it's worth more than 1, whenever a worker is caputered it ill split up into new workers (ie if your worker cost 6 pop points, it would split up into 6 other workers, each worth 6 pop points).

	01-08-2002 18:22									#20
	Support Apolyton, buy GURPS/ Alpha Centauri

can you split them up into another 6 workers each?

	02-08-2002 00:46									#21
	Support Apolyton, buy Galactic Civilizations

didnt try it. when I saw the problem i quickly quit the game. What I wanted to do was make workers more expensive to build. The splitting thing made that a bad idea

	02-08-2002 04:17									#22
	Increase the size of your Attachments

i lowerd the cost of settlers to 1, i'll get back on yous if i find problems! (And sombody get in contact if they've found a problem with that!)

	02-08-2002 04:22									#23
	Support Apolyton, pre-order Civilization IV

quote: Originally posted by HazieDaVampire i lowerd the cost of settlers to 1, i'll get back on yous if i find problems! (And sombody get in contact if they've found a problem with that!)

I haven't tried that myself, but I'll bet you're going to end up with a bad case of Settler diarrhoea!

	02-08-2002 12:08									#25
	Support Apolyton, buy Galactic Civilizations: Deluxe Edition

quote: Originally posted by Willem I haven't tried that myself, but I'll bet you're going to end up with a bad case of Settler diarrhoea!

A good solution for the settler diarrhoea if settlers cost 1 pop each - raise the shield cost for the settler to 40 or 50.

	02-08-2002 16:59									#26
	Get a bigger avatar today!

well, i like playing on an island by my self, so settler diarrhoea isn't much of a problem, unless you havn't settled on every square before they can build galleys!

	04-08-2002 19:54									#27
	Support Apolyton, pre-order Civilization IV

quote: Originally posted by miccofl Don't give the settler worker abilities. This causes a "sometimes" crash when building cities. This thread deserves to live; especially with the new patch coming out.

I don't understand. I am working on a mod where settlers have all the worker abilities, and even ICSing like mad, I've never had a crash when building a city.

	05-08-2002 00:30									#28
	Support Apolyton, pre-order Civilization IV

quote: Originally posted by Father Beast I don't understand. I am working on a mod where settlers have all the worker abilities, and even ICSing like mad, I've never had a crash when building a city.

Perhaps you may have noticed that he had "sometimes" in quotation marks?

I hope you understand as well that the AI will have no idea of what to do with a Settler/Worker. By giving that unit those particular abilities, you're giving yourself a very big advantage. Considering how stupid the AI is overall, I wouldn't consider it very fair myself.

	05-08-2002 01:33									#29
	Support Apolyton, buy Civilization: The Boardgame

quote: Originally posted by star mouse A good solution for the settler diarrhoea if settlers cost 1 pop each - raise the shield cost for the settler to 40 or 50.

OTOH, 1 pop/50 shields for the human player is 1 pop/35 shields for the AI on Deity, which means the AI's will REX you out even more crazy than now.

(2 pop/30 shields vs. 2 pop/21 shields, as it is now, isn't that much of an advantage - normally, the AI will get the necessary shields for a settler very fast, but the city won't have grown to size 3 yet.)

	05-08-2002 03:04									#30
	Support Apolyton, buy Alpha Centauri

Don't complain that Deity is too hard. It should be!