1.29f civ3mod.bic changes

ColdFever · July 19, 2002, 06:50

1.29f civ3mod.bic has almost NO CHANGES compared to 1.21f, only:

Code:

General Settings		1.21		1.29
----------------------------------------------------------
City Size Label	Level 1		town		Town
City Size Label	Level 2 	city		City
City Size Label	Level 3 	metropolis	Metropolis

=DrJambo= · July 19, 2002, 07:01

ARe you sure?

Well, that's good to know for us modders.

What about the Ai changes then?

Jon Shafer · July 19, 2002, 08:12

Quote:

Originally posted by =DrJambo=
What about the Ai changes then?

Wouldn't the AI be in Civ 3 itself, and not the .BICs? It's not like they really have different kinds of AI for each civ that you can change.

What about units? Were those already in the 1.21f, but there just wasn't a way to put them in yet?

KingJoshi · July 19, 2002, 08:27

The BIC changes depending upon whether there are custom rules, custom maps, or custom player data. This time around, they added SLOC (starting locations), UNIT, CITY, and CLNY (colonies).

Solver · July 19, 2002, 09:12

Question: if I install the patch, will I lose my mod?

Adm.Naismith · July 19, 2002, 09:53

Quote:

Originally posted by Solver
Question: if I install the patch, will I lose my mod?

Yes, AFAIK

Solver · July 19, 2002, 10:03

That sucks

. I don't remember all the changes I've done, and don't want to be redoing it all again. Any way around it?

Jon Shafer · July 19, 2002, 10:11

Quote:

Originally posted by Solver
That sucks

. I don't remember all the changes I've done, and don't want to be redoing it all again. Any way around it?

Move the civ3mod.BIC file somewhere else, then move it back after you install the patch.

Solver · July 19, 2002, 10:19

I did it once, and didn't get the new costs the patch had. Though, the patch doesn't change any units, so should be nice. Thanks

.

Jon Shafer · July 19, 2002, 10:26

No problem. Yep, that's the trade-off. But I'm sure most people would rather keep the settings they've spent hours tweaking than just get a few new features.

Solver · July 19, 2002, 10:49

Back then, I found a list of .bic changes for that patch somewhere on Apolyton and added by hands. My mod isn't that big at all, but I wouldn't like to again tweak all the costs, values, etc.

BTW, I can't decide all the time if I should publish my mod. Probably not, it's just another mod, everyone (almost) has one.

Jaybe · July 19, 2002, 11:28

In 1.21, I had saved my changes as a scenario and documented everything. There isn't that much. When I got 1.29, I went into the editor and made new changes based on my documentation.

One page MS Word (.doc) document. (Don't forget to rename it if you download it, due to the forum messing up download file names).

Dan Magaha FIRAXIS · July 19, 2002, 12:24

I feel like a broken record here, but you should NOT be modifying civ3mod.bic.

Create a seperate BIC file and store your rule changes in it. The easiest way to do this in 1.29 is to create a new mod, then import the settings from your old (backed up) modded civ3mod.bic.

From then on, use the load scenario command to start a new game with your modified rules.

Trust me, it will save you a lot of headache and heartaches.

Dan

Jon Shafer · July 19, 2002, 12:29

I find it funny that people are so lazy that they can't click on "Load Scenario" and find a file instead of "New Game".

player1 · July 19, 2002, 18:53

Quote:

Originally posted by ColdFever
1.29f civ3mod.bic has almost NO CHANGES compared to 1.21f, only:

Code:

General Settings		1.21		1.29
----------------------------------------------------------
City Size Label	Level 1		town		Town
City Size Label	Level 2 	city		City
City Size Label	Level 3 	metropolis	Metropolis

Cool!
That mean I would not need to rewrite my MOD from scratch.

Coracle · July 19, 2002, 19:09

Quote:

Originally posted by Adm.Naismith

Yes, AFAIK

NO YOU WON'T lose your mod!!!

Just use the IMPORT feature in the Editor to import YOUR mod values to the new one. It is simple. Worked for me. Move YOUR mod to another folder then import back in.

(I can't believe I am saying something in praise of a part of Civ 3).

Catt · July 19, 2002, 19:44

Quote:

Originally posted by Coracle

(I can't believe I am saying something in praise of a part of Civ 3).

I'm sure you're not the only one

Sinapus · July 19, 2002, 22:16

Quote:

Originally posted by Catt
Coracle: (I can't believe I am saying something in praise of a part of Civ 3).
Catt:
I'm sure you're not the only one

Okay, did someone hack Coracle's account?

Coracle · July 19, 2002, 22:48

Yea, it is surprising - I actually found something that works in Civ 3!

Now, let us see Firaxis fix Culture Flipping, Settler Diarrhea, give us Diplomatic control of scenarios, useful subs and privateers, and a number of other things. . .

Switch · July 19, 2002, 23:37

Quote:

Originally posted by Coracle
Now, let us see Firaxis fix Culture Flipping, Settler Diarrhea, give us Diplomatic control of scenarios, useful subs and privateers, and a number of other things. . .

Would you like some cheese?

Oerdin · July 20, 2002, 00:20

Quote:

Originally posted by =DrJambo=
ARe you sure?

Well, that's good to know for us modders.

What about the Ai changes then?

The Firaxians reported sometime ago that fixes/changes for the AI was not the focus of v1.29f. Which is a shame because so much needs to still be done. Personally I consider it a MAJOR bug that the AI won't use arty.

kring · July 20, 2002, 01:23

He will lose his mod if it is the original bic file he modded. Because the patch overwrites the bic file, among other things. Rename it something else, then download the patch, then import the file into the game.

Be sure to rename stuff like the pedia and other text files if you changed them also.

SpencerH · July 20, 2002, 09:14

Quote:

Originally posted by Dan Magaha FIRAXIS
I feel like a broken record here, but you should NOT be modifying civ3mod.bic.

Create a seperate BIC file and store your rule changes in it. The easiest way to do this in 1.29 is to create a new mod, then import the settings from your old (backed up) modded civ3mod.bic.

From then on, use the load scenario command to start a new game with your modified rules.

Trust me, it will save you a lot of headache and heartaches.

Dan

The reason some of us started modifying the civ3mod.bic was because the load scenario command caused the game to crash. It may have been the early versions, or the hard coding, or the excessive changes that some of us did, or whatever .... but in my hands 1.17 (for example) didnt handle mods very well as scenarios. But then since we had to hack almost every change with those versions, they werent really supposed to were they?

Solver · July 20, 2002, 09:20

Dan - why? Ever since I made my first modifications to the game, even before the first patch, I've been modifying Civ3mod.bic file. And had no problems with it, except for having to re-do it once, but no crash/stability problems. And since you're not going to release another patch.

BTW, Dan, will I be able to play PtW with all the new stuff there, but also using some modified rules from my mod?

Grunthex · July 20, 2002, 09:45

Quote:

Originally posted by Trip
I find it funny that people are so lazy that they can't click on "Load Scenario" and find a file instead of "New Game".

Quick question. If you set it up as a scenario instead of the civ3mod file, does the Quick Start use your scenario, or default back to the base rules?

Jon Shafer · July 20, 2002, 13:39

Quote:

Originally posted by Grunthex
Quick question. If you set it up as a scenario instead of the civ3mod file, does the Quick Start use your scenario, or default back to the base rules?

Quick Start and New Game always use the civ3mod.BIC in the main directory, whether it's the original or a mod.

isak · July 20, 2002, 14:22

Quote:

Originally posted by Trip
I find it funny that people are so lazy that they can't click on "Load Scenario" and find a file instead of "New Game".

In the DyP mod we have made changes to the tech screens, added (about 60) units, renamed existing units, altered their order in the BIC (and thus in the Units_32.pcx), added (about 80) buildings, altered their order of appearance in the BIC (and thus the Buildings_large and Buildings_small.pcx). We have added resources, adjusted the Pediaicons.txt, Script.txt, Civilopedia.txt, and Civilopedia icons.

If you installed our mod and then tried to use the original Civ3mod.bic to start a game, it would be so full of errors, in the form of incorrect graphics and totally messy tech advisor screens. It might even produce crashes with the new tech icons scheme.

So what is the point in keeping the original Civ3mod.bic ???

If an alternate search path was added, so that we could store All modified files in a sub-directory under the Scenarios folder, then there would be a point in keeping it.

Willem · July 20, 2002, 15:25

Quote:

Originally posted by Trip
I find it funny that people are so lazy that they can't click on "Load Scenario" and find a file instead of "New Game".

Well they've made it even easier now since the ini file now keeps a record of the last scenario loaded. So it will automatically open up to the last one you played.

ColdFever · July 21, 2002, 01:25

Quote:

Originally posted by isak
If an alternate search path was added, so that we could store All modified files in a sub-directory under the Scenarios folder, then there would be a point in keeping it.

Firaxis told us in the last Apolyton chat, that PTW will have a mod-manager, so that every mod can have its own directory and there will be no need to change the original files anymore.

isak · July 21, 2002, 03:05

Thanks for the tip ColdFever - I never really doubted that they would eventually let us store mods in a separate scenario. I was just hoping it could have been in v.1.29f, but I guess that would have required one or two of those 8-day working weeks.