Any news re PTW scenario editor

Colwyn · October 17, 2002, 02:41

Most importantly will we be able to

A. Edit railroad movement rate ie 0 = unlim, other wise as per roads 3 = 1/3rd etc 2 =1/2

B. Events files

Any updates on these??

Jon Shafer · October 17, 2002, 03:26

Neither will be in the PtW editor.

Methril · October 17, 2002, 17:12

I know from a chat log with Firaxis that there will be no diplomacy. I guess we'll have to wait for another patch

SanPellegrino · October 17, 2002, 17:20

I guess we' ll have to wait til "Civ 3: Fantastic Worlds"

Colwyn · October 17, 2002, 19:23

Arghhhh, unlimitited railroad movement is one of the biggest things that unbalance the whole game and once you get it the AI has little chance against you once you get cannons+

This one little thing has spoilt the whole game, I cannot belive we will not have the option to change it!

asleepathewheel · October 17, 2002, 20:42

Quote:

Originally posted by Colwyn
Arghhhh, unlimitited railroad movement is one of the biggest things that unbalance the whole game and once you get it the AI has little chance against you once you get cannons+

This one little thing has spoilt the whole game, I cannot belive we will not have the option to change it!

Have you not played civ 1 or 2? Its the same as its always been.
Not a real shocker.

The_Aussie_Lurker · October 17, 2002, 21:24

It might not be a big shock, but Colwyn still has a valid point! I don't have a problem with them making RR movement unlimited, but I really feel that you should be able to change it in the editor, if you want it to be different!
I'm curious, though, they said in the chat that almost ALL of the hard-coding has been removed from the editor, which will grant much greater flexibility to the editor! So, I'm wondering if this might include movement rates for RR's as well (even though they didn't mention it specifically!)

Yours,
The_Aussie_Lurker.

asleepathewheel · October 17, 2002, 21:40

Quote:

Originally posted by The_Aussie_Lurker
It might not be a big shock, but Colwyn still has a valid point! I don't have a problem with them making RR movement unlimited, but I really feel that you should be able to change it in the editor, if you want it to be different!
I'm curious, though, they said in the chat that almost ALL of the hard-coding has been removed from the editor, which will grant much greater flexibility to the editor! So, I'm wondering if this might include movement rates for RR's as well (even though they didn't mention it specifically!)

Yours,
The_Aussie_Lurker.

I've seen the reasoning recently on this board, for hardcoding, will try to find it. Something to do with pathfinding and AI.

asleepathewheel · October 17, 2002, 22:13

Quote:

Originally posted by The_Aussie_Lurker
It might not be a big shock, but Colwyn still has a valid point! I don't have a problem with them making RR movement unlimited, but I really feel that you should be able to change it in the editor, if you want it to be different!
I'm curious, though, they said in the chat that almost ALL of the hard-coding has been removed from the editor, which will grant much greater flexibility to the editor! So, I'm wondering if this might include movement rates for RR's as well (even though they didn't mention it specifically!)

Yours,
The_Aussie_Lurker.

He does have a valid point and it probably would be best to either make it editable or add another road upgrade between the two.

My point was that he shouldn't be suprised that it is this way, and will stay this way, at least through PTW. I also disagree with unlimited RR spoiling the game.

Change to RR won't be in PTW
scroll down a bit

I can't find a quote about the hardcoding of the RR limit, but it has to do with processing time.

Colwyn · October 18, 2002, 00:38

Consider me have 16 artillery units, with unliited RR movement I can reduce to 1 str point just about anything that comes into range by moving 1-2 units from each city. The AI is not so good at using artillery ie do they mv mass artillery to wipe out your bombarding sea units?? no! so its very easy to move a few stacks once you get them and clean up the AI's ability to make war on you in your teritory.

Even though this benifits the AI in defending their teritory once they cannot seriously annoy yours the game is very linear after this.

Civ3 is the best AI in any war(game) I have seen this oversight has made the game boring to me.

If unlim movement is so needed by the AI well give it to them and just have human players restricted,(hey this should work) this will even out the disadvantages of a AI oppenent.

asleepathewheel · October 18, 2002, 00:47

Quote:

Originally posted by Colwyn
Consider me have 16 artillery units, with unliited RR movement I can reduce to 1 str point just about anything that comes into range by moving 1-2 units from each city. The AI is not so good at using artillery ie do they mv mass artillery to wipe out your bombarding sea units?? no! so its very easy to move a few stacks once you get them and clean up the AI's ability to make war on you in your teritory.

Even though this benifits the AI in defending their teritory once they cannot seriously annoy yours the game is very linear after this.

Civ3 is the best AI in any war(game) I have seen this oversight has made the game boring to me.

If unlim movement is so needed by the AI well give it to them and just have human players restricted,(hey this should work) this will even out the disadvantages of a AI oppenent.

unlimited RR isn't for the AI, its to speed up processing.

I agree that the AI can't use artys effectively and you can defend this way, but they can't.

If this bores you, I guess you'll see what a human can do when PTW is released.

notyoueither · October 18, 2002, 02:10

The problem asw is that they tinkered and unbalanced the whole thing.

Used to be the number of howies you had diminished your ability to produce more. Not any more. Build 100 arty and wait for some poor sucker to come for you. Splat!

All the while your ability to produce more is undiminished.

Really. The final step is to get rid of the unlimited movement for unlimited units. From what you've said, the position I have proposed since day 1 would be feasable, would it not?

Keep the unlimited movement, but limit the number of units that can use it in any given turn. They have already done that for Airports. Yes?

Jon Shafer · October 18, 2002, 02:32

Don't expect this 'feature' to be removed any time soon. When I talked to Jeff Morris before he said it "was a staple of the civ series" and had no plans on removing it.

notyoueither · October 18, 2002, 02:41

His mistake, as it will reduce the legs of the product for many people. As evidenced by how often this issue comes up.

At the very least, an option in the editor could be provided. Restrict RR. Yes or No. Leave it off for the standard game, but let the Civil War and WW mods use it.

How much fun will WWII be when the entire German Army arrives in a single turn to squash Overlord? Then most of it rails back to fortify against the Sovs.

The_Aussie_Lurker · October 18, 2002, 02:51

I agree with you 100% NYE!!!
I don't care what they the "Standard Rules" are, so long as they give individual players and mod-makers the flexibility needed to change it-if we want to!
For my part, I think your idea works best (i.e. unlimited move, but limited units/turn). Failing that, though, I'd like friendly RR movement to be 1/8 or 1/10 movement, friendly roads to be 1/4 movement and unfriendly road/rail to be 1 movement! Please, Firaxis, do something about this in a future Patch or expansion!

Yours,
The_Aussie_Lurker.

jim_steer · October 18, 2002, 04:38

I think the 1 movement on enemy roads in the modern and indurstrial era's is daft. I think it should be part of the navigation tech that you are able to use enemy roads. Mapmaking would make more sense but I think it is too early. After all who is going to stop a massive army from using the roads, the police ? and it is not like you cant buy a road map of pretty much every country in the world off amazon. Maybe if there is an enemy unit with zone of control in an adjacent square then this should be slowed back down to 1 to simulate resistance. This would make zone of control a useful trait, as at the moment I feel it is largely pointless. It would also make you more likely to assault dug in units so that the rest of your army can move to its objectives more rapidly as oppose to ignoring them and concentrating on destroying/capturing cities.

As far as unlimited movement on railroads is concerned I think this is a good part of the game, it is just a deficiency in the ai that is not allowing them to use them to the full. I agree you should be able to edit though for use in specific senarios but I can see where the ai problem would come from.

notyoueither · October 18, 2002, 04:42

Ask Monty what a few 'residual' units can do to road movement.

The truth is that offensive forces have never advanced at highway speed, anywhere. Including Operation Desert Storm. Although, there they may have got close.

jim_steer · October 18, 2002, 05:50

Yeah but attacking units would still be able to use roads pretty much as effectively as the defending units and the 'residual' units could be modeled by the zone of control.
It just pisses me off when it takes 3 years to close on a city that happens to be in the middle of a mountain range.

alva · October 18, 2002, 05:57

In my current game, I set coal to show up much later then normal(IOW:no RR), and the AI does have a problem when pollution starts to kick in.
He just can't handle it, you see workers going from one side of the island to the other without actually doing anything.

It would be great to have this option for MP though

asleepathewheel · October 18, 2002, 15:35

Quote:

Originally posted by notyoueither
Keep the unlimited movement, but limit the number of units that can use it in any given turn. They have already done that for Airports. Yes?

That's certainly a reasonable solution, one that would be acceptable to me and would likely not eat the processor. Something like 1 unit per town 2 per city 3 per metro per turn could depart and arrive anwhere instantly per turn? And then the rest have to hoof it at the road rate? Sounds like a perfect compromise to me.

If there was a way to mod the number of transports per airport per turn, (is there? will there be?) I could even see a makeshift solution using them and eliminating rr's. Hmm. could you mod the airport, calling it a rail station, put it a bit earlier? but that would allow stuff to move between islands still. Whatever, I'm sure its been tried before. And even then, I doubt the AI could use it as effectively as the Human, which is the problem with the normal rr's anyway (or one of the major ones, correct?)

I don't have a problem with this being changed. On the other hand, I don't want to wait an hour between turns.

Sonic · October 18, 2002, 17:12

I think it should be so that RR should be limited to 9 tiles to all units, but airlift still would be unlimited. In this way you could also airlift as much units as you want each turn, but only between cities with airports. Airports are expensive so you wouldn't be able to build them in corrupted frontier towns unless rushing them, so, srtillery defense wouldn't be possible unless defending major cities.

Colwyn · October 20, 2002, 21:24

Modify the tech tree so RR's are the last advance to be gained but adding in another in its place for all the other pre req's that may need "steam power"? (i think this is the one for RR's)

Ie in other words whatever triggers railroads is canned.

Can some one do this and post the file, I think a lot of people would like a game without unlim movements.

WarpStorm · October 20, 2002, 21:38

Just change the worker action for railroading to a different tech.

I wouldn't play it though. It would change the flavor of the Industrial Era in a IMHO unrealistic fashion. The railroad when hand in hand with the growth of cities and expansion (at least in the USA).

Jon Shafer · October 20, 2002, 21:40

It won't be removed because some people have become dependent on it (some on the dev team even

), and because it would make the Industrial Era+ unmanageable will the massive amounts of units being flung around. I just wish the Civ 3 combat system was a little different to encourage more of an 'army' approach, rather than a mass of units wandering about.

Buster13 · October 20, 2002, 23:12

I have to admit, as far as gameplay goes it is completely unrealistic and bad for game mechanics...since it robs the strategies of misdirection and multiple point invasion forces. Once railroads are built, you can forget surprise attacks since no matter what you do, the defender can respond instantly.

On the other hand, it does seem like forces move around very quickly these days...but it is paradoxical that on friendly territory your units could span continents in a year (turn) while an invader takes three years to cover mountainous terrain.

It would be nice to be able to adjust it in the editor, of course. But I would still rather see diplomacy editing and events.