Utility RanDom v2.03 - Map gen & Semirandomizer... Updated

Ballbarian · #1 July 9th, 2007, 11:45 PM

Quote:

I kept pushing Johan and Kristoffer to get a player to do the manual and Im very pleased with the results. By the time a programmer gets to releasing something he has beta-tested it to death so he can no longer think like a newbie.

Maybe someone who is just tackling your programs for the first time will keep good notes and post us a small documentation file.

I thought that I had tricked Honeybadger into handling the documentation awhile back. I dazzled him with my archaic readme files, but he came to his senses and wandered away.

Ballbarian · #2 July 10th, 2007, 02:16 AM

Attached to this post is a late addition.
VINESET.zip
Includes 3 new province files and an additional name set to support them.

To use:
1. Place the '.GAN' files in your GAN_BIN directory.
2. Place the '.txt' files in your NAME_VAULT directory.
3. Open the LIST_CRATE directory and open NameList.txt
4. Append the following lines:
UNOTMPFOREST_DATA1
UNOTMPFOREST_DATA2
5. Open the GanList.txt file and append the follwing lines:
VINESET1_HOT_M_R_OR_FST_S_N_L_
VINESET2_TMP_M_R_OR_FST_S_N_L_
VINESET3_CLD_M_R_OR_FST_S_N_L_

That's it.

I haven't had the pleasure of playing a map with these forest provinces in them yet, but hopefully the reward vs the fight are worthwhile without being too much.

Enjoy.

dmentd · #3 July 10th, 2007, 06:57 AM

I just tried your suggestions and it did work. I got the program to randomize a map again by adjusting the AI starts. Thanks.

Ballbarian · #4 July 10th, 2007, 10:00 PM

Great! Thanks for letting me know dmentd.

I will try to at least put in some filler gods for any future releases, and I will spend a few more brain cells on default settings to help make life a little easier for everyone.

Stryke11 · #5 July 11th, 2007, 02:52 AM

What's a "name set"? That is, why is updating those three files more complicated than just putting the gans in the gan bin? For every gan I make I don't have to change the ganslist.txt and namelist.txt files do I?

PS I'm still trying to find a good fiddle ratio. I'm playing at 200% right now and at turn like 10 I have two provinces. It feels like an RPG. Every province is crazy strong. I sent my prophet and a full army to a province with just some heavy infantry and archers, and was completely decimated by a Lady of Storms and a bunch of Sylphs.

Ballbarian · #6 July 11th, 2007, 09:14 AM

A name set is just 2 files ("_DATA1" & "_DATA2") that SemiRandom uses to generate random names. There are several methods that it uses which I discussed in this thread.

When you add gan files (province files) with the Province Editor, it does the foot work for you, but if you download a gan file, you have to add it to the gan file list so that SemiRandom knows about it. (I couldn't find a simple way to read the directory with Yabasic.)

Name files are the same way. You have to let SemiRandom know that they are there by adding them to the name list.

With the provinces you have been submitting, the province name is stored within the province file itself. It is possible to use external name lists that can be utilized by other province files as well.

Oh, and SemiRandom should never place special provinces right next door to your capital. These neighbor provinces should all be marked as off limits if you are using it's internal start placement. (I suspect you are using the settings that let Dom3 handle start placement.)

I recommend the following method:

To use the custom start placements without using the custom AI gods:
1. Go to the 'Starts' tab
2. Uncheck 'Lock Player Counts to Nat Cfg'
3. Set 'Desired Num Players' to your desired number of players.
4. Go to the 'AI Gods' tab
5. Set 'AI Land Players' & 'AI Sea Players' to 0 (zero)

Stryke11 · #7 July 11th, 2007, 02:05 PM

Well, I had fun...I loved it.

Thanks Ball!

TienIsCoolX · #8 July 13th, 2007, 04:57 AM

Hey, I've been lurking here for quite a while but I registered because I need help. I'm a fan of HUGE maps and I've generated a 1500 province map with your program and the settings posted by Gandalf, I am able to load this map in about 10 minutes and play it.

When I do the semirandomize thing, the 1692 error came up and so I turned off the "lock players to nat config" and put desired # of players to zero, and the semirandomizer goes smoothly. But, when I try to play the SR version of the map, it just stays at the loading screen, and when I CTRL ALT DEL, it says Dom3 isn't responding. I noticed that it does this even when its a small map if I CTRL ALT DEL so I tried waiting for the map to load, and my longest time was around 40 minutes before I got impatient, so I'm wondering if its actually LOADING or did it lock up due to some error (possibly related to the start locales?) I noticed that the normal .map file is 100 kb, whereas the modified SR .map file comes in at 800kb, so maybe the wait time is proportional to the size of the .map file?

Please help, I'd love to get a huge game going with SR settings (I tried SR Aran map and it was just freaking awesome, with 9 indy strength, I saw a province with 400 hoburg militia *WOW*) If you don't mind, maybe you can help me on AIM or something? I'd like to get a game going as soon as possible. Thank you.