14-09-2003 18:24									#31
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Here is the excel file. If you have problems with it let me know. I've included macros to facilitate inserting new technologies, but the worksheet should work even if they are disabled.


johndmuller:

I just made a test with the Morgans and the joker tech seems to be determined just like with all the others factions. Basically, the joker tech is always the first one of the available choices.

EDIT: Removed the file, there's a newer version available later in the thread.

Last edited by Minute Mirage on 10-10-2003 at 21:41

	14-09-2003 18:43									#32
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Minute Mirage,

I have to say that is very very impressive work with the excel file.
Makes my attempts at using Excel look like preschooler stuff.

Last edited by Kody on 20-05-2004 at 16:27

	14-09-2003 18:58									#33
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Minute Mirage,

While you have 1-7 for the slot numbers. I believe the actual effect on the forumla is 0-6. If that is true then your mod is +1 more than what it should be.

Can you double check my answer to see whether or not I made a mistake?

	14-09-2003 19:16									#34
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quote: Originally posted by Kody Minute Mirage, While you have 1-7 for the slot numbers. I believe the actual effect on the forumla is 0-6. If that is true then your mod is +1 more than what it should be. Can you double check my answer to see whether or not I made a mistake?

How have you numbered the tech positions in alphax.txt? I numbered them starting with 0 (Biogenetics), and this seems to work for me. If you start the numbering with 1 for Biogenetics, then you have to reduce 1 from the slot numbers, if I'm not mistaken.

quote: Originally posted by Kody Minute Mirage, I have to say that is very very impressive work with the excel file. Makes my attempts at using Excel look like preschooler stuff.

Thank you for the compliment. Nevertheless, I'm not very experienced in Excel, so there might be bugs left in the file and there's certainly bound to be room for improvement. So any comments are welcome.

	14-09-2003 19:40									#35
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Hrmm maybe we haven't solved it.....

It's got something to do with tech skipping or trading.
I'm trying to figure out what's causing the problem now.

Edit:
It appears the formula changes when you make your first tech trade.
I remember having to toggle one of the techs in the simulator to make it simulate the tech availability. I don't know why that never occurred to me when we were discussing it.

Last edited by Kody on 14-09-2003 at 19:48

	14-09-2003 19:52									#36
	Remove this text

Well I figured it the last bit.

It crossed my mind that I could be a bastard and not tell anyone the final peice of the puzzle. However, if others had kept quiet I wouldn't have been able to get to where I currently am in understanding.

Basically I believe the starting tech adjustment only works until you do your first tech trade. After you have traded techs the starting tech adjustment is no longer used in the formula.

You need to do a Ctrl-F2 change tech to switch to remove the starting tech part of the formula.

	14-09-2003 19:57									#37
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Yep I think I've hit the head of the nail.

After you've traded techs the starting techs is no-longer part of the formula. I've tested it with the Hive and University, after toggling a tech it switched to a different formula. That formula didn't subtract the starting tech from the mod.

Sneaky. I think they specifically did that to stop people from figuring out how the tech availability was calculated.

	14-09-2003 20:55									#38
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Kody's explanation appears to be correct, at least in the scenario editor. I'd still like to test this in actual game play and I'm also wondering if it makes any difference whether the game is single- or multiplayer.

Anyway, I modified the file to take Kody's observation into account. There's now a "Traded technologies" Yes/No switch, which should provide the effect Kody described.

EDIT: Removed the file, there's a newer version available later in the thread.

Last edited by Minute Mirage on 10-10-2003 at 21:43

	14-09-2003 23:03									#39
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Tested it out, works great. It may be better if instead of yes/no for traded tech, a combo box could be inserted where people can add traded tech there. I will also start some SP games and look at my pbem to see if it works right.

I have one question. Now everybody could edit alpha.txt, so if in a case a tech you desired is not available to you, wouldn't it be easy to solve if you simply edit the txt file and change the order of the techs? That would be a cheat though. Just wondering if this means that.

	14-09-2003 23:23									#40
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quote: Originally posted by HongHu Tested it out, works great. It may be better if instead of yes/no for traded tech, a combo box could be inserted where people can add traded tech there. I will also start some SP games and look at my pbem to see if it works right.

You can already add the traded techs in the "Add new technology box". The only time the "Traded technologies" switch needs to be changed is when you receive the first traded tech. I could of course edit the Add_Tech macro so that it changes this switch to "Yes" automatically when a tech is added with the "Add" button. However, I like to use the "Add" button for adding other than traded technologies too, e.g. Doctrine: Loyalty when I'm testing the Hive.

quote: Originally posted by HongHu I have one question. Now everybody could edit alpha.txt, so if in a case a tech you desired is not available to you, wouldn't it be easy to solve if you simply edit the txt file and change the order of the techs? That would be a cheat though. Just wondering if this means that.

I suppose so, assuming that changing the order doesn't break anything. It would indeed be a cheat, though.

	15-09-2003 00:09									#41
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I wonder if different orders of tech exist for a multiplayer game what kind of disruption could be brought about.

For the add tech stuff, what you have now a user has to type the tech in right? Also, what is the significance of Doc Loyalty? Couse in a game I was Hive and seems the formula needs to be changed be reducing 1, or something like that. Is that because of the level 2 pregiven tech?

	15-09-2003 00:27									#42
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quote: Originally posted by HongHu For the add tech stuff, what you have now a user has to type the tech in right? Also, what is the significance of Doc Loyalty? Couse in a game I was Hive and seems the formula needs to be changed be reducing 1, or something like that. Is that because of the level 2 pregiven tech?

No, you don't have to type in anything. When you select the "Add new technology" square (G20) or any of the squares in the "Researched technology" list (A3:A100) an arrow will appear to the right of the square. When you click that arrow a dropdown box will appear, where you can select the desired tech by clicking it.

The reason I mentioned Doctrine:Loyalty, is that it can't normally be researched at the beginning of the game before its prerequisites have been discovered. This means that I can't add the tech by clicking any of the "Research" buttons which is what I normally do.

Could you explain more closely the situation where the formula didn't work? Since you were the Hive, you had probably selected the number of starting techs as 1? Was the slot number correct as well as the "Traded technologies" switch? According to my experience the level of the starting tech shouldn't matter (and it's not specified in alphax.txt either).

	15-09-2003 13:53									#43
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Minute Mirage: Very impressive spreadsheet indeed.

Haven't had a chance to do much with it, but just wanted to give you the requisite kudos for the extremely professional looking job.

Regarding differences between SP and MP - I think that you may find some differences between games started by a Scenario versus games started by the regular game process. Tech offerings in the ACDG PBEM were definitely a little different (for the Pirates at least) than with a non-scenario PBEN with the same cast in the same turn order (same slots). There is a bit of a discussion in our Death to the Unauthorized Viewer confidential forum, and maybe somewhere else also. Generating a scenario with the same cast as in the ACDG seemed to create the same tech choices (although with only a half dozen tests or so).

In a task force similar to this one which did the definitive analysis leading to the current understanding of ecodamage and the remedial effects of various GoodFacs etc, the initial barrier we faced was massive skepticism based on prior extensive testing using the Scenario Editor, which showed no benefits. It turns out that GoodFacs placed by the Scenario Editor do not have the beneficial effects that GoodFacs actually Built in-game (apparently the game engine juggles some counters that the Scenario Editor does not).

That is not to say that the Scenario Editor is not accurate in this case, I only mention that to suggest caution in generalizing results based on the ScenEd. In order for them to always track in lockstep, they would both have to be updated whenever a game tweak were made and that would require a level of professionalism like that of Minute Mirage's spreadsheet, which would be expecting a lot and no doubt more than even Firaxis themselves would want to claim in their puffiest marketing fluff.

The difference between Scenario'd games and regular ones may quite well be just a matter of the tech counter not being updated when techs are added by the Scenario Editor when the CMN sets up the game (t seems that a Scenario starts with no techs in any faction and thus all are added manually by the creator) while the counter may be upated by the game itself when it initializes the factions. For openers, there would be a difference of 1 tech in the count of techs (2 for those factions which start out with 2 techs); I imagine that just that difference (let alone the 2 tech faction thing) would effect a shift in the beelines.

Other subtle things may occur also; like the SP's that give you new techs may not update the counter - there may be some dumb omissions like not counting techs that the Borg get if they conquer a base, or ones that come from pods - who knows. I can't say that I have experienced any odd stuff with one faction versus another, but I haven't really tried to keep track of the jokers or even the beelines (a probable flaw in my game), I've only been dealing with the rotation of the unavailable group among the three groups of techs and to my knowledge, have been one of the few people interested in even that until now.

Anyway, I would expect some difference with games started using the Scenario Editor, and it could be either a 2nd set of beelines due to having the starting counter off by 1, or it could be several different sets based on how many starting techs a faction has. BTW, in a regular game the Uni's second tech is given out by the game and I think that most CMN's if not all, request Uni's 2nd tech from the player in advance and plug it in with the Scenario editor, either because it has to be done that way, or because the CMN needs to play out a turn to set passwords and timker with the AI's first turn manually by running it in the ScenEd.

Last edited by johndmuller on 15-09-2003 at 14:09

	15-09-2003 16:06									#44
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They request the 2nd tech from the university in advance mainly because they need to set the passwords and you can't delay choosing the 1 free tech for a turn.

Whether the starting techs have an effect depends on whether the CMN has tinkered with the techs using the ctrl-F12 method. If the CMN used ctrl-F12 to adjust the techs, that seems to anull the effect of the starting techs from the equation as if the faction had already traded techs.

I'm guessing there are really only two different ways the techs are added to a faction. Either via normal research, this would probably include researching normalying, bonus techs that the player gets to choose and shift-F12 in the scenerio editor. Then there would be specifically added techs which aren't choosen through the normal research screen. These would include tech steal, probe tech steal, pod popping techs, AA techs, tech trading, and ctrl-F12 in the scenerio editor.

I haven't tested the possibilities, but I'm guessing the game has two different ways to add techs. The way which adds specific techs forces a recalculate of the tech counter. While the way that researchs techs via the research screen doesn't recalcualte the tech counter just adds one. Which is why the tech counter seem to start at 0 not counting the starting techs and then updates to the correct number of techs when you do your first trade.

Of course this is all theory until someone attempts to apply the formula and finds a discrepency. However, it looks like we've covered many of the possibilities. When I complained about the formula being wrong back in this post (http://apolyton.net/forums/showthre...034#post2336034). It was because I was double checking the forumla in two PBEM games I have access to. One which Googlie set up (but didn't get very far), and another I setup (seems stalled too).

So that's 2 PBEM games where the forumla appears to work. HongHu asked me to double check one of her PBEM games, and it appeared to apply there too. The cases where there may still be problems would be in the case of techs via probes and CyCon tech steal. However I'm fairly certain those would work the same as tech trading.

	15-09-2003 18:02									#45
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The only exception I've found to Kody's theory is with the University in the democracy game. I don't want to bore you with unnecessary details about the technologies we have researched, but the choices are off by 1 regardless of whether I assume that Googlie has used CTRL+F2 or SHIFT+F2. That means that the choices are incorrect both when I set "Traded technologies" to "Yes" and when I set it to "No". If I want the choices to be correct I have to change the slot number away from "2".

This would suggest that there's still something that changes the numbering of techs and I'm trying to do some additional testing to find out what it could be.

	15-09-2003 19:34									#46
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Right now in my pbem it seems that when the mod is 2 then the tech would not be available for me. This may have something to do with how the game was set up. I am Hive and only had one given tech but cent ecology was not among the first batch of available techs.

	15-09-2003 19:44									#47
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quote: Originally posted by HongHu Right now in my pbem it seems that when the mod is 2 then the tech would not be available for me. This may have something to do with how the game was set up. I am Hive and only had one given tech but cent ecology was not among the first batch of available techs.

So you mean that you currently have Doctrine:Loyalty and when you chose your first tech to be researched, Centauri Ecology wasn't in the list? I assumed that all the techs should be available in the first choice, but I guess that is not the case.

	15-09-2003 20:26									#48
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That's right. Isn't that odd? Never figured out what is the reason. What I know for sure is that Darsnan had made a change so that flexibility was not required before you build sea colony pod. In the game we had to add a rule so that nobody would build sea bases before flex. Don't know if that means anything.

	15-09-2003 23:04									#49
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As I understand the theory to date, it is a variaation of the basic equation published by Minute Mirage - I'm quoting the basic version below so we can look at it on this page of the thread and to be sure we are talking about the same thing.

quote: Originally posted by Minute Mirage t = position of tech in alphax.txt (0-88) n = total number of technologies for the faction b = number of technologies at the beginning of the game for the faction s= slot number of the faction (1-7) The condition is (n + t + s - b) mod 3 != 0 Worth noting here is "b", which for normal factions (Gaians) is 1, for some others (University, Pirates) 2 and for the Progenitors 5.

If I understood the variation correctly, once the faction trades a tech for the first time (or if the game had been originally set up by the Scenario Editor and the CMN had inserted techs in there) then the "b" term is zero. (I think I got that straight, if I got it backwards, perhaps Kody or MM will point that out.)

There is still a problem with the University needing an additional +1 adjustment.

--------------------------------

This is purported to have worked for SP and for PBEM's started both by the built in "NewGame" mechanism and by utilizing the Scenario Editor.

As I understand it, the spreadsheet is supposed to work for the initial choices as well; if so, ther may be a problem, at least with the Pirates, having 2 starting techs, slot 5, for which the spreadsheet offers CentEcol. ProgenPsych, Biogen, InfoNets, and AppPhysics, withholding IndBase and SocPsych, whereas the actual initial offering (assuming my test notes are accurate, and I am reasonably confident of that) is instead all 7 possible techs in an SP or "New Game" generated PBEM. No combination of slot numbers or initial tech settings seemed to make it show all 7. I know you'all mentioned the initial offerings earlier in the thread, but I thought that you said that you had that covered; that does not seem to be the case here, maybe I misunderstood something, or maybe there is a problem.

With the "Traded" toggle on, it offers CentEcol. ProgenPsych, Biogen, IndBase, SocPsych, and AppPhysics, withholding InfoNets, which is correct for a Scenario Generated version. I doubt that it matters, but if you're interested anyway, the other factions were set up to mimic the ACDG cast and turn order in all cases and the Scenario Generated version was either the ACDG itself or a similar verion I created adding the techs in manually via the ScenEd.

-----------------------------------

I couldn't see in the macros where the formula was applied or how the "traded" button changed it or where the program stored which techs were discovered or its other variables, but they are obviously in there somewhere.

If I might suggest an improvement or 2:
- I would find it helpful if the techs that were otherwise available but for the floating mod 3 withholding were also listed, differentiated somehow, like with a different color scheme or in a separate table
- a "Reset" button to clear the tech list would also be nice
- if it were possible to present the Researched Technologies column in a different sequence from the current one (which appears to be in Alpha(x).txt order), that could be helpful too. Ideally, there would be several alternatives, including: the order they were researched; alphabetically; a Tech Tree form (like Build 1-n, Conquer 1-n, Discover 1-n, Explore1-n); and the Alpha(x).txt order. I imagine this could be a PIA, so don't bother unless you feel inspired.
- when I run the spreadsheet I get a message that says that a document by that name is already open ... cannot open two docs blah blah. Perhaps it is due to my old version of excel (form office 97) or perhaps it is something interesting I am blowing off when I click OK (like the variables, etc. I couldn't find) or some cosmetic thing you could easily correct.

On the whole, it looks like it could be a very useful tool - very good work.

Edit, I see now that the basic order of the techs is not exactly that of the Tech Tree in Alpha(x).txt, but what I suppose is the order of joker selection - earliest Green first, then rest of greens; then Discover from earliest to latest; etc. I see also those 'Only-a-mother-could-love-them' horrible expressions in the preqs_ok columns and I suppose that is where the bulk of the action occurs, a fine example of 'self documenting' code if I ever saw one, although truth be told it looks decipherable enough given a couple of aspirins. I'd still rather ask you how the details work than figure them our for myself, given a choice and god forbid having to debug it - counting parens is ever so much fun, even with the would be helpful color coding.

	16-09-2003 01:27									#50
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quote: Originally posted by johndmuller As I understand the theory to date, it is a variaation of the basic equation published by Minute Mirage - I'm quoting the basic version below so we can look at it on this page of the thread and to be sure we are talking about the same thing. If I understood the variation correctly, once the faction trades a tech for the first time (or if the game had been originally set up by the Scenario Editor and the CMN had inserted techs in there) then the "b" term is zero. (I think I got that straight, if I got it backwards, perhaps Kody or MM will point that out.)

Yes, that is the current theory.

quote: Originally posted by johndmuller There is still a problem with the University needing an additional +1 adjustment.

Is this something you have observed yourself or do you mean my post concerning the DG? If you mean the latter than I must note that it has been the first time I have seen this effect, and IIRC I actually had to make a -1 adjustment.

quote: Originally posted by johndmuller As I understand it, the spreadsheet is supposed to work for the initial choices as well; if so, ther may be a problem, at least with the Pirates, having 2 starting techs, slot 5, for which the spreadsheet offers CentEcol. ProgenPsych, Biogen, InfoNets, and AppPhysics, withholding IndBase and SocPsych, whereas the actual initial offering (assuming my test notes are accurate, and I am reasonably confident of that) is instead all 7 possible techs in an SP or "New Game" generated PBEM. No combination of slot numbers or initial tech settings seemed to make it show all 7. I know you'all mentioned the initial offerings earlier in the thread, but I thought that you said that you had that covered; that does not seem to be the case here, maybe I misunderstood something, or maybe there is a problem. With the "Traded" toggle on, it offers CentEcol. ProgenPsych, Biogen, IndBase, SocPsych, and AppPhysics, withholding InfoNets, which is correct for a Scenario Generated version. I doubt that it matters, but if you're interested anyway, the other factions were set up to mimic the ACDG cast and turn order in all cases and the Scenario Generated version was either the ACDG itself or a similar verion I created adding the techs in manually via the ScenEd.

What the spreadsheet currently does is only to check how many techs have been researched and if no techs or only 1 tech have been researched, then all the choices are available. I could of course change it so that it is dependant on the number of starting techs so that all the choices are available when only the starting techs have been researched. I actually meant to do this, but left it for later because I experienced some discrepancies when the number of starting techs was 2 or larger. That is, I didn't always get all the choices even though it was my first tech selection.

Having said that, I wonder if I encountered the problems only when I was testing the University? I think it's possible that with the Uni the choosing of the free tech is considered as the first selection.

In addition to this is the problem HongHu pointed out: not all the choices were available even though it was the initial selection. I think more research is needed in this regard, especially checking the differences between scenario started and normal games.

Would you like me to add a new "Initial choice: Yes/No" switch until we've figured this out? When we do get this sorted out I can incorporate the switch into the formulas but until then this would be an easier choice.

quote: Originally posted by johndmuller I couldn't see in the macros where the formula was applied or how the "traded" button changed it or where the program stored which techs were discovered or its other variables, but they are obviously in there somewhere.

All the information is basically on the second sheet of the workbook, titled "Techs". More precisely, the formulas on column N ("preqs ok?") check whether both the prerequisites of the tech on that row have been researched, and returns a boolean value (TRUE/FALSE). The formulas on column O ("other ok?") deal with the issues we have been researching so I might give them a brief explanation. Here's what's in cell O2:

={IF(MATCH(TRUE();$N$2:$N$90;0)=ROW(B2)-1;TRUE();IF(SUM(IF(NOT(EXACT(Main!$A$3:$A$100;""));1;0))>1;NOT(MOD(SUM(IF(NOT(EXACT(Main!$A$3:$A$100;""));1;0))+Techs!C2+Main!$H$21-IF(EXACT(Main!$H$22;"No");Main!$H$20;0);3)=0);TRUE()))}

The logical test in the first IF-clause ( "MATCH(TRUE();$N$2:$N$90;0)=ROW(B2)-1" ) checks whether the tech in the current row is the joker tech. The way this is done is checking where the first TRUE value is on the N-column and checking if that value happens to be on the same row. The reason this works is that the Techs on the "Techs" sheet have been sorted first by their type (Explore, Dicover, Build, Conquer) and then by their line number in alphax.txt. This is incidentally the same order in which the techs appear for choocing in SMAX, which has two consequences:

1) The first tech (in the top left corner) in the "Choose new technology to research"- screen in SMAX is always the joker tech.

2) The tech order in my "Available choices" list is the same as in SMAX, which is quite handy.

Anyway, if the tech is indeed the joker tech then TRUE is returned, otherwise we have to check for the other condition. Next comes:

IF(SUM(IF(NOT(EXACT(Main!$A$3:$A$100;""));1;0))>1

This checks how many techs have already been researched, and if the number is not greater then one, then TRUE is returned. This is the "Initial choice" clause which needs to be changed.

Finally:

NOT(MOD(SUM(IF(NOT(EXACT(Main!$A$3:$A$100;""));1;0))+Techs!C2+Main!$H$21-IF(EXACT(Main!$H$22;"No");Main!$H$20;0);3)=0)

Here we calculate the number of techs researched:
SUM(IF(NOT(EXACT(Main!$A$3:$A$100;""));1;0))

Add the line number in alphax.txt to it:

+Techs!C2

Add the slot number to it:

+Main!$H$21

And subtract the number of starting techs, depending on whether techs have been traded or not:

-IF(EXACT(Main!$H$22;"No");Main!$H$20;0)

From all this we take the modulo 3 and see whether it is equal to 0 or not.

Worth noting are also the braces ( {} ) around the whole formula, which means that it's an array formula. If the formula is edited, you have to remember to press Ctrl+Shift+Enter to add the braces.

quote: Originally posted by johndmuller If I might suggest an improvement or 2: - I would find it helpful if the techs that were otherwise available but for the floating mod 3 withholding were also listed, differentiated somehow, like with a different color scheme or in a separate table

I actually had all the "possibly available" techs in another list next to the "Available choices" when I was testing my formulas so it will be easy to add. In fact, I could also add the mod 3 numbers next to the techs.

quote: Originally posted by johndmuller - a "Reset" button to clear the tech list would also be nice

I was actually thinking of doing this and it shouldn't be too hard.

quote: Originally posted by johndmuller - if it were possible to present the Researched Technologies column in a different sequence from the current one (which appears to be in Alpha(x).txt order), that could be helpful too. Ideally, there would be several alternatives, including: the order they were researched; alphabetically; a Tech Tree form (like Build 1-n, Conquer 1-n, Discover 1-n, Explore1-n); and the Alpha(x).txt order. I imagine this could be a PIA, so don't bother unless you feel inspired.

The current order is the same as in the listing in the F2 screen in SMAX. That is, the technologies are first sorted by their Level, then by their Type and then by their order in alphax.txt.

I think I can add the different sorting options if I can figure how to add an IF-statement to a macro. Surely that can't be too hard (*knocks on wood*). In fact, if I can figure that out, I think I could also add a button that removes the last addition from the Technology list. This would be useful since you can't undo the effects of a macro.

Could you clarify the Tech tree form a bit? Should I first sort the techs by Type, then by Level and then alphabetically?

quote: Originally posted by johndmuller - when I run the spreadsheet I get a message that says that a document by that name is already open ... cannot open two docs blah blah. Perhaps it is due to my old version of excel (form office 97) or perhaps it is something interesting I am blowing off when I click OK (like the variables, etc. I couldn't find) or some cosmetic thing you could easily correct.

I don't really know what could be causing this since I don't get the message. Weird.

quote: Originally posted by johndmuller On the whole, it looks like it could be a very useful tool - very good work.

Thanks, let's hope I can make it better still.

	16-09-2003 03:14									#51
	Lose 30 kilos (of popups)

MM, We had a bit of a cross-post (see the trailing edit to my last post), but I'll try to tie up whatever loose ends there might be, although given that you said that you weren't really trying to emulate the SP/AutoGenreatedPNEM initial tech selections, there is probably no substantive problem on the table from my side.

I take it that a ScenarioEditor generated game (with the manual tech insertion) is equivalent to an Autogenerated game where a trade has taken place - is that the official theory? In that case, some mention of Scenarios might be a good idea in the context of that toggle.

As to my mention of the University adjuustment, I was just feeding that back from yours or Kody's post earlier, that was not something I had personally experienced - my business with the Pirates was covered by your initial selection disclaimer. As near I can tell, the ACDG Pirates selections, including the initial selection, are what is shown in the spreadsheet if the trade toggle is on from the beginning.

When it comes to the initial selections, I can't say I know what the "correct" selection should be - whether the version generated in SP games (I'm going to stop mentioning autogenerated PBEMs, as most of the PBEMs seem to be manually generated anyway) where I take it that all the techs are available (I couldn't personally testify to that, but I have no problem believing it either) - or the version of the initial selection you get with a manually created PBEM where the tech selection is limited according to the post-trade logic. There also seems to be another version possible, in the spreadsheet at least, where the selection is limited by the pre-trade logic - which, in the case of the Pirates at least, does not correspond to any actual initial selection AFAIK; is this the part you are still working on? Anyway, that aside, I don't know what a supposed "correct" initial selection would be, so I guess that either the Complete, or the Scenario Generated PBEM limited one should be supported (if there is another possible set of starting choices, then that too, I suppose). Basically, the idea would be to have the spreadsheet start out showing the initial view as the player would see it, with maybe a toggle or two to adjust between SP and PBEM (possibly just the current 'trade' toggle. I imagine you already had something like this in mind and are just waiting to make sure that the rest of the logic is OK before making those formulae even more complicated.

Having discovered that it was 'safe' to just delete the Researched Techs from their column, the reset button became less pressing, but still nice. Along the same lines, when a tech is removed from that column, say to see what the effect of researching something else would be, if the sheet were recalculated then, it would probably clean up the column to get rid of the disquieting gap in the column - again, nice, but not necessary as it turns out. You seem to be already thinking along those lines with you thoughts on another button to remove the last addition - they would each make it more user friendly, as one might otherwise be afraid to mess with the cells and/or not be particularly adept at excel.

I meanwhile noticed that the spreadsheets order was not exactly the Tech Tree order, but was actuallly the 'joker' order - the fact that it is the order used by the program displays is an indication that the whole joker theory is correct. This is indeed a very uiseful ordering.

The other order I was talking about was indeed the categories (types) and levels (rows on the poster) as you guessed. At the time, I was thinking it more complicated than it actually is (I was thinking that each one had a unique index, but acually they repeat the same identifier (E1, B2, ... whatever) if there are more than one of a particular type on the same level. In any case, you seem to have already suplemented the Tech Tree data with the necessary info, so that should be easy.

I would be happy to see the 'might-have-been' techs displayed somehow, as I think that is useful practical info - showing as it does, what would become available if an optional trade is made before the current tech is researched. By the same token, some way of easily seeing which set of currently offered techs are the next to be withheld would also be helpful - just having the mod 3 groupings identified would probably be enough, although there may be more interesting ways to display the distinctions between the 3 groups and the joker.

A fact that is becomming clear if we are indeed on the right track, is that the joker is not necessarily going to be around if the prereqs for an earlier joker tech become available - for example Doc:AP could replace Ethical Calc if you traded for an intermediate tech or two, so thinking of the joker as being there until you decide to research it is not necessarily true.

I am getting convinced that this is going to be right on; It doesn't look like there are any more hidden zingers to be tripped over. Where exactly are the problem areas anyway. I'm not sure I understand the University problem; I gather it revolves around the extra tech, but what exactly is it? Is the problem that it only offers a subset of the possible techs for tech #3 when we want it to offer all of them? If so, perhaps it needs its own special button or toggle. Or is it something to do with the exact subsets offered, where there are seemingly only a few possibilities, like it is counting or not counting the extra tech and it either triggers the trade logic or it doesn't; if we figured out what is was doing that we didn't like, if it was strictly University driven, then that same (regretably tacky, but maybe necessary) toggle could be a part of the solution. One approach to any uniqueness issues like that would be to just to allow/require the user identify the faction and have the program set up the initial conditions and any special flags that might apply. The user could still add or remove techs or change toggles, just that it wouldn't be necessary to know all the wrinkles to be able to use it.

	17-09-2003 06:22									#52
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I programmed computers for 4 years, an experience which tells me nothing stops the developers from putting dozens of little conditions in there to slightly randomize it or change the formula altogether in an arbitrary situation. Normal programming practice is to keep it simple, so the mechanisms (and problems) are easily traced from the results. But if your objective is to complicate and appear random, that's completely different.

Once you guys confirmed that the formula is complicated and can even change depending on events, all bets are off as to just how complex it will finally be. These are things that would take extremely exhaustive testing to reverse-engineer. The game does not lend itself to quick tests of all conditions.

I don't mean to be a party pooper. I just think there are areas of the game that can benefit more from all that brainpower.

We could get philosophical here and say this formula refining is a metaphor for science. Newton thought he had gravity figured out, but people came along later with more information that changed the formula. The old formula works in certain situations, but that doesn't make it "correct". Someday Einstein will likewise be corrected/refined.

This complexity springs from fundamentally simple rules (conventional wisdom AFAIK). The code of SMAX is not fundamentally simple. It's as complicated as the developers wanted it to be. I'll stop short of saying SMAX will one day become sentient and start discussing its secrets with you ("I display techs i like"), but the possible number of outcomes of SMAX games are astronomical. That's nice, but then consider that the complexity itself can feedback into the rules, and from here we should all read "Goedel, Escher, Bach" by Douglas Hofstadter-- sentience is the logical extreme of feedback loops.

***

This confirms my theory that I'm most bizarre when I have a fever... days like today.

	29-09-2003 17:15									#53
	Support Apolyton, buy Galactic Civilizations

Well, I've finally made a new version of the spread sheet. I was somewhat busy with my studies, which is why this took a lot longer than expected. Here's what's changed:

Added "All choices"- list, which lists all the techs the prerequisites of which have been researched.

Added "Remainder"- list next to the "All choices"- techs. There are three possible values here -- 0, 1 and 2. If the value is 0, the tech is not displayed in the "Available choices"- list, unless it is the first tech in the "All choices"- list (the joker tech).

Added "Remove Latest Addition"- and "Remove All"- buttons.

Changed "Add"- button to "Add/del" so that the same button can be used to both adding and deleting technologies from the "Researched Technologies"- list, depending on whether the desired technology is already in the list or not.

Added a "Sort"- button and included four sorting options: Alphabetical, Order of research, SMAX order and Tech tree order. The "Researched Technologies"- list is automatically sorted according to the selected sorting option whenever technologies are added or removed.

Added the "Initial selection"- switch, which makes all the choices available if set to "Yes".

Technologies can no longer be entered manually, so I made the sheet protected. There's no password, so the sheet can be unprotected if need be.


Any comments are welcome.

quote: Originally posted by johndmuller I'm not sure I understand the University problem; I gather it revolves around the extra tech, but what exactly is it? Is the problem that it only offers a subset of the possible techs for tech #3 when we want it to offer all of them? If so, perhaps it needs its own special button or toggle. Or is it something to do with the exact subsets offered, where there are seemingly only a few possibilities, like it is counting or not counting the extra tech and it either triggers the trade logic or it doesn't; if we figured out what is was doing that we didn't like, if it was strictly University driven, then that same (regretably tacky, but maybe necessary) toggle could be a part of the solution.

The problem is that even though Uni's slot position is two, the tech choices are correct if I select three as the slot number. This means that somehow the remainders are off by one.

EDIT: Removed the file, there's a newer version available later in the thread.

	01-10-2003 06:41									#54
	Support Apolyton or Terrorists Win

Since nobody else is commenting, I'll just say I've downloaded your new spreadsheet and I am using it.

It's very good, and I like the addition of the "remove last", and the addition of "All choices".

	06-10-2003 22:10									#55
	Support Apolyton buy from Amazon

Well, I don't think we've got the formula wholly figured out yet. Like I said, I'm having problems with the University's choices in the ACDG and now I've also got problems in the 'Blind Leaders' PBEM game where johndmuller is the CMN.

The problem in both the games is that even though my faction is in slot #2, I get the choices I should get if the slot was #1. What makes the whole thing more weird, is that I've tried replicating the Blind Leaders game technology- wise, and I've gotten the choices I should get according to theory, but not the choices I got in the actual game. Therefore, there must still be a hidden rule somewhere. Maybe it's related to how the CMN started the game, or how the turns are passed to different players.

Has anyone else experienced similar problems in PBEM (HongHu seemed to have some troubles)?

	07-10-2003 02:23									#56
	Support Apolyton or Terrorists Win

I don't know if it will help you or not, but as best as I recall, the way I started out the University in the Blind Leaders game was to assign Centaur Ecology (adding the tech in the Scenario Editor to an otherwise blank slate) as the initial tech and to select Infomation Networks during the 1st turn, which I played in the Scenario Editor while assigning passwords and making sure that the Chairman did certain things with his first turn. (If I assigned InfoNets, as you might have expected me to have done, the game didn't offer CentEcology in the next turn, so I had to do it the other way.)

I still think this is a really great package and I haven't personally noticed any problems to date, but neither have I tried checking it too closely against existing games, in part because some of them are SMAC, with its slightly different tech tree (a SMAC or SMAX option would be another useful enhancement btw), but mostly because I haven't had the occasion to do any serious tech planning/worrying in those games yet.

	07-10-2003 03:40									#57
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quote: Originally posted by johndmuller I don't know if it will help you or not, but as best as I recall, the way I started out the University in the Blind Leaders game was to assign Centaur Ecology (adding the tech in the Scenario Editor to an otherwise blank slate) as the initial tech and to select Infomation Networks during the 1st turn, which I played in the Scenario Editor while assigning passwords and making sure that the Chairman did certain things with his first turn. (If I assigned InfoNets, as you might have expected me to have done, the game didn't offer CentEcology in the next turn, so I had to do it the other way.)

Do you remember how exactly did you assign the techs? Did you use Ctrl+F2 or Shift+F2? If you used Shift+F2, how did you set the technology to be researched to none? Also, since I'm not very experienced with the scenario editor, how exactly do you play a turn there?

quote: Originally posted by johndmuller I still think this is a really great package and I haven't personally noticed any problems to date, but neither have I tried checking it too closely against existing games, in part because some of them are SMAC, with its slightly different tech tree (a SMAC or SMAX option would be another useful enhancement btw), but mostly because I haven't had the occasion to do any serious tech planning/worrying in those games yet.

Adding the SMAC tech tree is a good idea and it should be quite easy since the necessary information is in alpha.txt.

	07-10-2003 23:31									#58
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quote: Originally posted by Minute Mirage Do you remember how exactly did you assign the techs? Did you use Ctrl+F2 or Shift+F2? If you used Shift+F2, how did you set the technology to be researched to none? Also, since I'm not very experienced with the scenario editor, how exactly do you play a turn there? . . .

I think I used the (Scenario) Menu to add the techs (there's a selection that opens the Technology sub-window); I'm not familiar off-hand with the keyboard variations or what the difference might be. I didn't consciously set the tech-to-be-researched to "None", perhaps it 'researched' your second tech during the turn I played getting Yang ready and so when your first turn came about it was ready for another selection. I don't remember exactly how I set up the Uni - I think I was just happy that the number of techs came out right (and with the right 2) and that it looked more or less like an actual Uni startup, asking for the other tech - sometimes I end up with 1 or 3 techs with the Uni. I don't set up so many scenarios that I have the Uni setup down pat, plus I had the problem of not getting offered CentEcol as the extra tech - the workaround for that used up whatever academic interest in the Uni setup there might have been.

To play the turn 'within the Scneario Editor', the sequence was more or less like this (much of the necessary info is in Googlies guide:
Preliminaries:
--Start up a new game with the desired cast of SMAX factions, play it briefly and save it (this primarily creates the appropriate faction list in the AlphaCentauri.ini file - I think you could just do this manually, but this way is just as easy and you don't have to worry about spelling mistakes).
--Create a map and figure out where each of the factions will be located, what they should have in the way of units, etc.
Basic Scenario setup:
--Start a new scenario and load in the map. Without 'activating' the Scenario Editor, do the initial setup things like the techs, energy,year, personalities, etc and put in all the units at the locations you liked from before (it's a good idea to save the scenario occasionally - especially if you are placing a lot of units - as it sometimes crashes; sometimes I get effed up scenarios that leave the map partly visible or worse, so I use a lot of different filenames in case my last one(s) is/are bad).
Playing a turn or two:
--Using the Scenario menu (or some keystroke if there is one), select the item (something like) "Set Player / Change Faction"; select the sub-item (something like) "Play All Factions".
--Hit Ctrl-K (or use menu) to 'activate' the Scenario Editor; you will now have a seemingly live game (hopefully with the first faction in control. You can now play turns for each faction, doing whatever things you might want to do - like found bases (to make sure the AI puts them where you want), give orders to bases and individual units (some of this may be futile if the AI overrules you right away as soon as you go away). Play through to some reasonable stoppinig point (like to the the beginning (or end maybe) of a round of turns) - I don't know it matters or not where you stop playing, but I wouldn't be surprised if the resulting game will start from wherever you leave off - or not.
--'DeActivate' the Scenario Editor (I think this is very important) and save the Scenario - it should be good to go. It may be possible to further edit the scenario details here, but I can't say for sure; by this time, I'm usually happy enough if it works OK.

	08-10-2003 05:50									#59
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you guys are way too hard-core for me...

	09-10-2003 22:02									#60
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In SP I always play blind research. Otherwise it is too easy.