Civ 4 - Fall from Heaven 2 (version .33) = 8/15 Release (aka BIG ONE)

[MrHat]

I'm game.

Is that the kind where it goes by email or whatever?  Could take us through 2012.

[Cheddar]

I am down with giving it a whirl.  Heck, I will even let the OTHER players pick my civ.  Someone want to set this up? 

I recommend at least a 6-7 player game; more if we get more live people playing.

[Lum]

Civ PBEM games are really, really slow to take off. I MOVE MY SCOUT done, wait 24 hours.

[WayAbvPar]

Can you hand the PBEM games down to future generations to finish, or do they get whacked by the estate tax?

[Cheddar]

Civ PBEM games are really, really slow to take off. I MOVE MY SCOUT done, wait 24 hours.

We could do an advance start along with bumping tech levels up.  Advance starts take a slightly different strategy, though, and tend to get bloody very quickly.  Personally I prefer them - helps make things more fair vs. the AI (FFH is a lot more dependent on where your first city is located).

[Slyfeind]

Hawt diggity, count me in. Whatever rules people come up with (quick start, etc) is cool with me.

[Cheddar]

I can get the game going, but someone else will have to track manage it; I am too busy lately to monitor things.  MP thread to be created shortly.

[Yegolev]

Keeps crashing on me (Steamy version), and since there's going to be an update tomorrow, screw it for now and I'll redownload later.

[Cheddar]

Keeps crashing on me (Steamy version), and since there's going to be an update tomorrow, screw it for now and I'll redownload later.

We are sticking with patch .32 for now - getting the new patch on the day it comes out will bring you to tears.

[MrHat]

Was fine for me on steam.

PS. I inadvertendly played this for like 7 hours last night.  God damn.

[Yegolev]

Since the 0.32 version isn't working for me at all, I can't see the new release making me cry into my keyboard.

MrHat, did you do anything other than dl Civ4 and BtS from Steam, install FfH, then patch FfH?

[Raging Turtle]

If you're using the steam version of BTS, you need to change the install path of the FFH mod, as well as any patches for the mod.  Don't recall where to off the top of my head

[Yegolev]

Hmm, OK, it seemed like a regular old zip to me but I'll try a direct-to-the-mod-dir install.  I had unpacked it elsewhere then copied it into the mod dir.

[Merusk]

FFH has its own executable that it uses to run, you don't run it through the Civ IV mod screen.  If that's what you were doing, that's why it kept crashing.    Happened to me the first time I tried to play with it, too, until Cheddar straightened me out. (Woah, Ched was useful?)

[MrHat]

Ya yegs, just run the exe for FFH 2.32 or whatever, then run the patch for L, if you do a quick google search re: "install ffh civ4 steam" should pull up the right thread showing the correct directory.

off the top of my head its' something like: "C:\Program Files(x86)\Steam\steamapps\common\sid meier's civilization iv beyond the sword\Beyond the Sword\Mods"  lol.  You install both exe's to the mod folder of bts.

Then make a direct shortcut to the FFH play executable.

[Slyfeind]

I did the default install, then had to move everything to my 2KGames folder. Worked fine after that.

Very cool stuff. The initial game was amazing as I explored all the new cultures, then I settled into my usual Civ play patterns, until OMG DRAGON!!! and I assembled a party of Argonauts to sail the seas to find the dragon. I played it on the easiest difficulty, so it got boring after a while. I didn't even scratch the surface of the mod, so I look forward to more challenging games.

[MrHat]

I got cock slapped by some fucking barbarian lizard dude for like 40 rounds.

[Merusk]

Start up BTS then go to options (under advanced) and change your starup screen to Civilizations IV. Now exit the game and start up FFH.

 

[Stormwaltz]

Making a shortcut to start FFH directly is easy. Use the link to start BTS as a base and add mod=\Fall from Heaven 2 032 at the end.

Here's mine, as an example. The placement of quotation marks is important.

"C:\Games\Civilization IV\Beyond the Sword\Civ4BeyondSword.exe" mod=\Fall from Heaven 2 032

[Merusk]

Crap.. I forgot to mention that what I posted above is an easter egg.

[Lum]

Making a shortcut to start FFH directly is easy. Use the link to start BTS as a base and add mod=\Fall from Heaven 2 032 at the end.

Here's mine, as an example. The placement of quotation marks is important.

"C:\Games\Civilization IV\Beyond the Sword\Civ4BeyondSword.exe" mod=\Fall from Heaven 2 032

For Steam:

"C:\program files (x86)\steam\steamapps\common\sid meier's civilization iv beyond the sword\Beyond the Sword\Civ4BeyondSword.exe" mod="\Fall from Heaven 2 033"

(Remove the (x86) if you aren't running a 64-bit OS)

Oh, and 033 included a CARD GAME. In CIV 4. I'm awestruck. (It's actually a kind of nifty little card game, too.)

[schild]

Alright. I'm actually going to try and get this installed. Again. I fucked up last time. But new OS< new chance. Let's see if I can do this.

[schild]

That install just got stopped dead in it's tracks, lost the first disc of BtS.

[MrHat]

That install just got stopped dead in it's tracks, lost the first disc of BtS.

Disc?

You're doing it wrong.

[Typhon]

Not sure if this was mentioned elsewhere - With the 2.33 patch, I was crashing to desktop when starting a scenario until I got the BtS 3.17 patch (Firaxis only mentions the 3.13 patch on their website, you need to hunt for the 3.17).

[Yegolev]

No need to hunt for patches if you bought it from Steam.

My problem was where I unpacked it to some other dir and copied it.  It worked perfectly after I deleted the mod dir and reinstalled.

I'm still trying to figure this game out, meaning how to do things mechanically as well as gameplay things.  I had to go read the Civ IV manual, which was mildly helpful since it's been YEARS since I have played Civ II.  Once I win or lose this game, I'll read up on the FFH instructions, assuming they exist.

[Merusk]

There used to be a wiki for FFH, I don't know if there still is.  The in-game help files have been modded, but it breaks things down in such unintuitive ways it's hard to find information sometimes.

But, wow, from Civs2 to jump into IV would be killer.  The combat system changes alone are huge, and then you have the Culture and Corps and Religions to tangle with.  Good luck, sir!

[Yegolev]

Yes, I seem to be taking in the ass from my neighbor's religion.  Well, only a little, but it's bugging me that two of my three cities have a predominant religion that isn't my state religion.  Ungrateful bastards.  I'm considering switching but I'm afeared of the ramifications, and it bothers me a great deal that I can't just force my religion on my populace.  I should have went military on my first game.

[Stormwaltz]

There used to be a wiki for FFH, I don't know if there still is.

The original at civ4wiki.com crashed or was hacked last year (I forget). IIRC, the amount of work to restore it was such that the admins threw up their hands and abandoned the project.

There's another up now at wikia.

[Stormwaltz]

Yes, I seem to be taking in the ass from my neighbor's religion.  Well, only a little, but it's bugging me that two of my three cities have a predominant religion that isn't my state religion.  Ungrateful bastards.

If you want to keep your current state religion, promote a priest to be capable of using the Inquisition ability (there will be a brief period of increased unhappiness, you intolerant bastard), or switch to Theocracy civic (no non-state religions allowed or spread in your territory), or build the Purge the Unfaithful ritual (possible revolts in cities where multiple religions are removed).

[Murgos]

Thanks to this thread I just dropped 20 bucks on BtS off of steam.  Played the crap out of it this weekend, didn't quite get my ass kicked but it's not looking like I have enough time left to win by doing anything other than bribing everyone to vote for me in the UN election.

I'll kick up FfH once patch 33 is a little more stable.

[Merusk]

Keeping all your cities your home religion only matters a lot in the early game for organized religion with its sweet, sweet +25% to building construction bonus.  If you plan on Keeping Theocracy or Pacifism as your primary civic rather than Free Religion for the mid to late game, I'd go with Stormwaltz's purge suggestions.  Otherwise, just build a temple and train some priests to spread your state religion around (There's an auto-spread toggle "R" so you don't have to micromanage them once they're built.)  My fav is to spread everything for those awesome happiness bonuses on the extra large cities.

Read up on corporations a lot using the civilopedia once you get to a point they show up.  They matter a lot for strategic resource micromanagement, but they can wind-up costing you a lot of money if you build the wrong ones in your own cities.  Yeah, having the corporate HQ as your world wonder gives you money, but not enough to make up for it in some cases, IMO.  My grief strat is to found General Cereal Co or Sid's Sushi (since their bonuses are only food or culture in the city) and spread them to all the foreign civs so I get the gold bonus and they get something of less benefit than oil or aluminum access or production and gold bonuses. (More food = larger cities = more discontent.. buahahha.)

[MrHat]

Corporations? Wtf.?

[Cheddar]

Keeping all your cities your home religion only matters a lot in the early game for organized religion with its sweet, sweet +25% to building construction bonus.  If you plan on Keeping Theocracy or Pacifism as your primary civic rather than Free Religion for the mid to late game, I'd go with Stormwaltz's purge suggestions.  Otherwise, just build a temple and train some priests to spread your state religion around (There's an auto-spread toggle "R" so you don't have to micromanage them once they're built.)  My fav is to spread everything for those awesome happiness bonuses on the extra large cities.

Read up on corporations a lot using the civilopedia once you get to a point they show up.  They matter a lot for strategic resource micromanagement, but they can wind-up costing you a lot of money if you build the wrong ones in your own cities.  Yeah, having the corporate HQ as your world wonder gives you money, but not enough to make up for it in some cases, IMO.  My grief strat is to found General Cereal Co or Sid's Sushi (since their bonuses are only food or culture in the city) and spread them to all the foreign civs so I get the gold bonus and they get something of less benefit than oil or aluminum access or production and gold bonuses. (More food = larger cities = more discontent.. buahahha.)

This is about FFH.  Completely different beast - start your own thread if you wanna discuss BtS.

[tar]

It can also be quite useful to have multiple religions in a city. It means more temples which means more happy faces (with incense/gold depending on religion), more culture and each religion's temple also has some sort of bonus like more culture from OO, gold from RoK, military production from Order (iirc)