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last updated on April 24, 2003 - by cracker
Please read all instructions before doing anything.
This month follows
the same pattern that we
have established over the past four months in the GOTM games where we want
you to read the scope of the game and instructions for the version of
the game that matches your software version. Then we want you to carefully
install any required graphics files before you attempt to play the game.
There are some basic modifications to game play that will make this version of the game
play equivalent to the PTW version of the game even though you do not have the
"Play the World" expansion pack installed.
Follow the instructions step-by-step and you will find the game simple to setup and easy to play.
We are going to examine the issues associated with the in-game changes that upgrade your
game from the standard v1.29f gameplay so that it will play like PTWv1.14/v1.21 because these issues
will help you make sure that your understand the game and that you have chosen the correct version
to match your existing computer and software installation.
You must have Civ3 installed on a PC computer and patched to v1.29f in order
to play this version of the game. This version will not run properly in any version of PTW.
Changes to upgrade V1.29f to play like PTW
A
new civilization has been added
to your game and named "neoCarthage". The leader for neoCarthage is a
distant cousin of Hannibal and Mago
named Hannabaline and she bears a strong genetic resemblance to French country folk
who may have been decended from illegitimate children who were of the Carthaginian generals
when the crossed the French Alps during the second Punic War. To avoid confusion,
Hannabaline has purchased her armor from a different source than Joan.
The Unique Unit (UU) for neoCarthage
is the Spartan Hoplite which has identical (2/3/1) statistics to the Numidian Mercenary in PTW. The
Spartan Hoplite as a mercenary for Carthage is historically accurate in that the Carthaginians
hired experienced Spartans to train and improve their military forces. This unit comes to
us courtesy of CivFanatics member Kryten.
A
new civilization has been added
to your game and named the "Keltoi". The leader for the Keltoi is King
Brennus just like in the Play the World expansion pack. To avoid any possible confusion,
this King Brennus looks different from the Brennus ala PTW and also does not look like the
leaders of any other civilizations that may exist in your game. Brennus may share some
common parentage with your military advisor but there are no written birth records to
prove paternity. Part of your
download pack for this game includes the graphics and diplomatic interface text to support
allowing you to play games with the Keltoi and neoCarthage civilizations even outside of the GOTM
games. A basic xxxxxx.bic file to support these games will be released to all players after Gotm18
is closed for submissions.
The
Unique Unit (UU) for the Keltoi
is the European Swordsman which has identical (3/2/2) statistics
to the Gallic Swordsman in PTW. This European
Swordsman unit comes to
us courtesy of CivFanatics member UtahJazz7.
A
new civilization has been added
to your game and named the "Ottomans". The leader for the Ottomans is Suleyman the Magnificent.
Very few if any Ottoman leaders were ever actually referred as Sultans and the term Padishah
was much preferred until the beginning of the 15th century when
they also began to be called Caliph, being the greatest of the Muslim leaders.
Part of your
download pack for this game includes the graphics to convert your Medieval Infantry unit into
the Azap Infantry of the Ottoman Army as well as to convert the standard Christian Caravel
into a Muslim Corsair. Thanks to Smoking Mirror for converting the Azap Infantry from
the Cossacks game and thanks again to Kinboat for the Muslim graphics update to the caravel.
The
Unique Unit (UU) for the Ottomans in the Civ3v1.29 equivalent game is the Balkan Dragoon
which is implemented with the standard Cavalry animation graphics but has
identical (8/3/3 - 100 cost) statistics
to the Sipahi in PTW. Historically the "Sipahi" units of the Ottoman Empire were raised
from the Muslim equivalent of a feudal land grant system called "Timars" and gained prominence
in battle against armored Knights when they discarded initial attacks with iron maces and swords
in favor of multiple single shot pistols that could defeat any armored knight at close quarters.
The Firaxis implementation of the Sipahi takes this Feudal+Gunpower era Muslim Knight
and transposes it later in time to be superior to the Dragoon type Cavalry of the
late Renaisance era warfare when gunpowder was commonplace. For this reason we have substituted
a Cavalry unit armed with a rifle (or Dragoon) that would have been raised from the Ottoman
occupied territories in Balkans.
Ancient age worker trade cost has
been increased by a factor of four (4x) to make it more expensive to buy most
ancient age workers. This feature has been implemented by virtue of an equivalent unit called
the "eqWorker" that is used identically to the existing worker unit in the game. Any workers or
settlers that you capture will be eqWorkers. The only feature that is disabled for eqWorkers
is the ability to disband the workers to harvest shield value. You may still join them to
towns and cities to add citizens to your population.
The improvement of the
"Stock Exchange" has
been added at a cost of 200 shields and maintenance of 3 gold per turn and increase your
uncorrupted tax output by 50%. You must have a Bank in the town and already have discovered the
technology of
"The Corporation" in order to build a Stock Exchange. The small wonder of Wall
Street has been relocated to require that you have already built five stock exchanges before
Wall Street can be enabled. The great wonder of "The Internet"
has been implemented exactly as featured in PTW; costs 1000 shields and coincides with the
discovery of Miniaturization. This wonder gives you a Research Lab in every city on the
continent and has not been extensively tested for secondary impacts on culture and pollution.
You will note that the architect for the Internet Building may have gone to the same school as
the architect for the UN. The improvement of "Civil Defense"
has been implemented exactly as featured in PTW; costs 120 shields to build, has a maintenance
cost of 1 gold per turn, and requires a barracks prerequisite in that city. This improvement adds
a 50% defensive bonus in that city. Civil Defense is available with the discovery of Radio. PTW implements an improvement called
Commercial Docks that cannot be exactly duplicated, but all civilizations in your
game have been provided with the ability to build "Ports-of-Entry" as equivalent game
features. Ports of Entry function differently from Commercial Docks but can produce an
equivalent impact on game play. Ports of Entry are small wonders that increase the uncorrupted
tax output in selected coastal cities by 50%. Each civilization only has access to build 4
of these Ports of Entry and they require a progressively increasing number of harbors in your empire.
You will need 2, 5, 8, and 12 harbors respectively to enable the Ports of Entry. Technically you
could build all 4 of these features in the same coastal city, but this exploit is
not allowed for the human player and can be detected in the game replay.
PTW includes two new units (Mace and Rambo) that
allow for upgrades of the ancient age units of swordsmen and archers/longbows. This upgrade
sequence seems to reduce the need for strategic decision making and also may not be
effectively programmed for use by the AI in Single Player games. This upgrade
sequence has been converted to a game setup preference and was turned off in
all versions of Gotm17-Carthage and Gotm18-Celts. The option to upgrade Swordsmen and Longbows
is turned on for all civilizations in Gotm19-Ottomans, Gotm20-Spanish and Gotm21-Melee.
The
"Outpost" feature of Multiplayer is disabled and does not appear in any version of
the GOTM Games.
Two features of PTW that are not incorporated
into the V1.29f equivalent game at this time are Radar Towers and Airfields.
Not including equivalent options for these PTW features
at this time is designed to provide better testing
of the differences between a game that includes the features versus a game that does
not include the features. Our initial testing indicates that these features have no value
in Single Player game score except in those cases when a player may be avoiding an impending
defeat late in the game. Players who are in command of a balanced game will probably obtain
no scoring or victory timing advantage from these features.
War Mobilization that normally
becomes available with Nationalism has been disabled to prevent a game killer exploit.
All of these features are built into your game and you need not do anything special to make them function during game play. If you would like to discuss the details of implementing the Single Player features of the PTW Expansion Pack, we have an open discussion thread for those topics in the Civ3 GOTM discussion forums.
Loading the Graphics Packages
If you have not previously installed additional unit graphics into your Civ3 game, do not be concerned that is process may alter or change your regular games. Additional unit graphics can only be recognized by those game files where the units have been inserted internally into the game rules.
The Game Graphics for Gotm19 are divided into FIVE pieces:
The "Squid" unit graphics first
used in Gotm16 are now potentially required for all GOTM games. If you already have
this unit properly installed from Gotm16, Gotm17, or Gotm18 then
need to do nothing else for the squid to function. If you need to install the squid, you may
download that unit independently by clicking on this link.
The
"Spartan Hoplite" unit created by Kryten is the permanent substitute Unique Unit for
Carthage in the Civ3v1.29 version. If you already have this unit installed, all you
need to do is confirm the exact spelling of the name of the unit on the unit
graphics folder and xxxxxx.ini file
and then you should be ready to go. If you do not have the unit installed,
you may download the unit by clicking on this link and then loading a
single folder as described in the readme_spartan.txt file that is included in
the download zip folder with your starting save game.
Unit graphics for Gotm17-Carthage are
cummulatively required to support this game and all future GOTM games for Civ3v1.29.
If you do not have these unit graphics installed,
you may download the folder (361kb) clicking on this link and then
following the directions described in the readme_v1_29.txt file that is included in
the download zip folder. This graphics package includes Fog, Volcanos, and the graphics
controls to make your workers function properly.
Unit and Leaderhead
graphics for Gotm18-Celts are
cummulatively required to support this game and all future GOTM games for Civ3v1.29.
If you do not have these unit graphics installed,
you may download the folder (~2.0MB) clicking on this link and then
following the directions described in the readme_v1_29.txt file that is included in
the download zip folder. This graphics package includes fantastic unit animations provided
by Utahjazz7 and Kinboat that give you access to unique barbarian warriors as well as the
most of the replacement units for the Mace unit in PTW.
Every player for Gotm19-Ottomans
must install
additional graphics files that are included in the Gotm19 setup zip folder.
This file this month is again large due to the free civ/leadherhead graphics and
diplomacy interface files that are required to make your game functional with
new civilizations and the supporting unit animations. This month also includes
several equivalent unit implementations that help to replace the appearance of
some Christian icons on units for historically Muslim civilizations just as
a courtesy and in an effort to bring the game more in line with a truer historic
presentation and feel. All of these graphics
will add substantial value to your game experience and will be made available to
you for use in other games that you may play on your own if you choose to do so.
Please read and follow the instructions in the readme.txt files that are included with your game download pack before you attempt to load and play the game.
Beginning Play for Gotm19-Ottomans
Prior to May 1st, when you download the Gotm19-Ottomans game pack, you will have
all the components that you need to setup the game but you will not have the starting save game file.
You must read the instructions included in the Readme.txt file for your version of the game to
properly locate the download location for the starting game file that will match or installed
graphics version.
The starting game files will not be available until May 1st to help us avoid risk of spoilers while
allowing players to freely discuss what they think the game announcement means
and how they expect to use certain strategies in the game. If you would like to carefully read
the Gotm19-Ottomans game announcement, then you may participate in the
Pregame Discussion thread in
in the CivFanatics Discussion Forums. Once you open the starting save game file to begin play,
you must either be very careful not to spoil the Pregame discussion or you must choose to
no longer participate in the Pregame discussion in any way. This is a player courtesy to
all the other players who may not have started their games and who do not want to have their games
spoiled or disrupted in any way by release of any information about the surprise
features of the game.
If you need any assistance with getting your game to play or if you have any questions
about what you may post of discuss about the Gotm19-Ottomans game, you may contact a knowledgable
GOTM staff representative by email at one of three email addresses:
gotm@civfanatics.net
gotm_submit@civfanatics.net
quick_start@civfanatics.net
You may not post any messages or questions related to internal content of the game in any public discussion forum outside of the Civ3 Game Of The Month discussion forum on CivFanatics.com as long as the game is open for play by other players. This prohibition is designed to protect you and other players from inadvertent spoilers or leaks that could disrupt your enjoyment of the game.
You may freely discuss features of the games, strategy, and tactics in the spoiler discussion threads in the Civ3 Game Of The Month discussion Forum when those discussions have been opened by a moderator and when you meet the tests of being far enough along in your game to join in the discussion of events that have already taken place. Spoiler discussion threads ARE NOT designed to provide you with tips and cheats to help you play your current game.
Gotm19-Ottomans is a mystery map game on Emperor difficulty. This means you may need to follow a flexible but aggressive strategy. The first spoiler discussion thread will not open until May 5th, 2003 and this initial discussion will require that you have revealed some specific milestones in the game that should answer many of the mystery questions.
Goody Hut locations
for this map game were randomly generated by the Civ3 map generator and
then pre-evaluated in an attempt to eliminate that random variable difference between games of
different players who other wise play similar games. The Goody Hut benefits for you as the Human player
included one hut that was essential in the starting position that yielded an additional "skilled warrior"
according to the in-game dialog.
To keep the
games consistent between players, all players begin the game with the benefits
that would have been obtained from two additional huts that yielded 25 additional gold and
nothing of value in the first 8 to 15 turns of play.
Note that pre-assignment of these benefits is not meant to imply that it will or will
not be important for you to explore your surroundings on the map.
These will still be decisions that you will need to make in order to succeed at this game.
Later in the game, you may encounter units that look different from the standard units that you may have expected to appear at specific points in time in the game. The reason for these visual differences is because you are playing as a Muslim civilization and when we had access to an appropriate substitute graphic for the standard in game units they have been implemented. There are no functional changes to any units that you control in the game.
Remember that the upgrade path for Swordsmen and Longbows is turned on in your game for all civilizations just exactly as implemented in the current standard patched version of PTW.
Again you will help the discussion a great deal if you plan ahead for
this first discussion break and try to preserve save files and/or
screenshots that correspond to the time periods just before and just after events when you make contact
with new civilizations. For some players these contacts will be direct encounters and
for other players they will be sequences of contact trades and/or map trades.
Try to save map views of the world immediately before
you gain contact with any of your rivals and then immediately following any events where
contacts or maps or partial maps of the world may be traded.
The discussion of these events of discovery will again be very enlightening and if you can help us discuss
the status of your rivals at specific time points in the game it will help to put the progress
of your game into a clearer perspective.
Participation and reports posted in the discussion threads are one of the elements that other players come to value very highly as they try to get to know each other and explore the different levels on which each GOTM game can be played. We also look to these contributions to help us nominate players who may be eligible for the own personal GOTM Player Profile page as well as recognition in a news announcement on the frontpage of the CivFanatics web site.
Quick Start Challenge: If you would like to participate in the optional QSC portion of the GOTM competitions you will need to prepare a timeline of events covering the details of your game and your decisions up to the end of the 1000bc turn. To participate in the QSC, you must submit your timeline and a copy of your 1000bc save file to quick_start@civfanatics.net prior to May 20th, 2003. If you would like more details on how the QSC event is processed as a separate competitive learning event, you may view the QSC Information Pages. Plus you may view the current discussion of scoring updates that will be implemented into the review of results for Qsc19-Ottomans.
Good luck in playing Gotm19-Ottomans and we hope you find the game and enjoyable and exciting opportunity to share your Civ playing experiences with other CivFanatics. Remember that discussing and sharing your experiences in the GOTM games are an important part of what continues to make the GOTM on Civfanatics one of the premier Civilization gaming experiences in the world. Here is your link to download your Gotm19-Ottomans game pack to begin installation and play:
Civ3v1.29 for PC or Mac (2.2 MB)