A few questions before I begin...

[javaslinger]

Ok, now that I've finally got the game...

Should I first play the standard (patched) game?

Or should I go ahead and use the TDM modpack as I understand that is actually and improvement in AI but still the standard game?

The Proportions mod... Is that only for human play or can you use it with the computer players?

Same goes for the Pirates and Nomads mod?

And finally the Devenul? mod... what exactly is it? Human only or can you play versus the computer?

Thanks,

Ken

[DavidG]

Play whatever is fun I would say. But depends on were you want to go. Personally I would suggest playing standard first. The differences between say standard and Proportions are quite significant. So if you start off playing Proportions and then go into a multi standard game you are gonna get smoked.

[Fyron]

All of those mods can be played SP or MP.

[oleg]

Immediate AI upgrade with TDM makes perfect sense - what is the reason to play against inferior opponents ?

An old Version of Proportions (as on CD) had very bad AIs. Upgrade it to 2.42 and it will be OK for single play.

[Fyron]

Get SJ's AI patcher, and you can patch the TDM AIs to work in P&N.

[jimbob]

Hmmm.. okay, I'll display my ignorance and incompetence by asking how do you use SJ's AI patcher to convert the TDM into P&N. I've tried to figure it out from the instructions, honest, but I just couldn't get it to work.

Harder (AI) opponents would be great!

[Fyron]

Umm... I don't know. Never done it myself! I'll just let SJ get to that.

[dumbluck]

Ok, I've got AIpatcher 2.1b.

First off, there's a drop box beside "Patch AI's for: ". Since you now have gold, chose "P&N v3.0".

Next, use the explorer window on the left to locate the first AI you want to patch. For Example, mine would be: SE4/P&N 3.0/Pictures/Races/Abbidon. Now OPEN the Abbidon folder. (It took me about 15 minutes to figure out that I was only selecting the AI folder instead of opening it. Doh! ) The big window in the lower right should now read, "Changed to <your file path>. Found AI_General.txt."

If it doesn't say that it found the .txt file, then you need to get one in there! The patcher changes two files, AI_general.txt and Designcreation.txt, so make sure that you have those two files.

Then, assuming it says that it's found the .txt file, hit "Patch this AI". The Big window will then report what it did. Watch this window, it will tell you if something didn't work.

[ August 16, 2002, 11:14: Message edited by: dumbluck ]

[oleg]

small notice (just in case) - like any other mod, P&N uses AI files from its folders - for example /SEIV/P&N/pictures/races/abbidon.
Thus, do not forget first to copy TDM AI files to P&N folder and only then apply patcher.