| Civilization StuffThis page offers modified XML files for the wonderful strategy game Sid Meier’s Civilization IV by Firaxis Games. Civ4 exposes a large number of game parameters in XML files. You can change these parameters as you wish and put the modified XML files in a specific subdirectory of your Currently, you can download two different sets of modifications. They are stored in different XML files and can be applied independently or together, as you wish. Important Note for Beyond the Sword: All modifications for this expansion are based on the current patch version 3.19 which changed many of the default XML files. You can find direct download links and a complete change log for the patch in this forum thread on the Apolyton Civilization Site. Sadly, this patch once again contains a bunch of obvious bugs. I recommend that everyone download the Unofficial Patch for the patch, hosted by the Civilization Fanatics Forum. Speaking of patches, I also suggest that you take a look at the The BUG Mod. This is a collection of excellent UI tweaks that make all kinds of important game information much more accessible. I wouldn’t want to run Civ4 without it! Note: Make sure to install the BUG Mod after the unofficial patch, and let it overwrite any files that came with the latter. My BtS modifications listed below are all based on the file versions in the unofficial patch. (Fortunately, there is no overlap with the BUG Mod.) Reduced Unit BusyworkThis section applies only to the Beyond the Sword expansion. Some of the new features in this expansion tend to make gameplay rather laborious, compared to the basic game and the Warlords expansion. All of the patches in this section come in small ZIP archives that contain any modified XML files nested inside their proper subdirectories. Unzip in Weakened SpiesThe new espionage system is based on Spy units that expend accumulated espionage points on a variety of missions. By default, both the Spy unit and many of the destructive mission types are very cheap. Late in the game, this can lead to hostile AI players incessantly spamming their opponents with hordes of spies attempting to destroy barracks, poison water supplies, and so on. This tactic is not only immensely annoying but also contributes to the game’s sluggish performance. Most human players probably don’t want to emulate this behavior anyway, due to the massive micromanagement involved. While you can disable espionage entirely (as of patch version 3.17), some players may prefer a less radical approach. So I have raised the cost of spies and “harrassment” missions to discourage “spy spamming”. To further reduce micromanagement, spies move faster and counter-espionage lasts twice as long.
These increased costs are not prohibitive, merely high enough to discourage a scattershot approach with multiple spy attacks per turn. The other mission types are either purely informational or already sufficiently expensive, and therefore remain unchanged. Download: Spies-Weakened.zip containts the new unit costs in Eliminated SpiesPatch version 3.17 added a custom game option to disable espionage entirely, but the implementation of this new option is sadly clumsy: espionage points are converted into culture but otherwise remain in the game; you can still construct buildings that do nothing but produce espionage points; and you can still get random events based on the disabled espionage system. The one feature the option does completely remove is automatic intelligence gathering – which is also the one thing I like about the espionage system in Beyond the Sword! So I made a small patch that provides an alternative (and hopefully more elegant) way to remove Spy units from the game. Espionage points still provide intelligence on foreign empires and cities, though nothing else. Along with spies, we also remove the two buildings whose sole purpose is to produce espionage points.
Great Spies and Scotland Yard remain in the game since attempting to remove them produced crashes. However, without the Security Bureau and the Intelligence Agency your cities won’t generate Great Spies very often – and you can always use them to trigger a Golden Age, or to increase a city’s production. Fortunately, the computer players don’t seem to have any trouble playing without spies. Overspending on espionage points could cripple AI performance since they are now fairly useless, but in my experience the AI doesn’t seem to do that. Download: Spies-Eliminated.zip contains the new unit list in What About Executives?You might also want to eliminate Corporate Executive units which can be a similar nuisance. I didn’t remove them in my patches since corporations provide little benefit without branches, and some quests are related to spreading corporations. However, if you want to try for yourself you can easily remove executives by commenting out their Unit UpkeepArmy management has always been a huge timesink late in the game, and Beyond the Sword exacerbates this issue with the (re-)introduction of additional production facilities and unit types. AI players are prone to build as many units as their production capacity permits, which is a hundred or more even on small maps – and the human player must keep pace or risk losing the next war. Civilization IV allows for unit-specific maintenance costs but this feature is unused by the default rules. In order to curb late-game unit proliferation, I have added a maintenance cost of 1-10 gold per turn for most military units. Maintenance costs are derived from build costs and start out with 1 gold for archers. Since archers cost 25 shields to build, a unit’s support cost usually equals 1/25th of its build cost.
These costs also apply to nation-specific variants of each unit. The smaller army sizes enforced by the growing maintenance costs for upgraded units should reduce micromanagement, and may somewhat even the odds between players at different tech levels. Moreover, the added drain on the treasury makes the Space Race victory condition rather challenging, rather than a mere formality once you manage to survive until 2050. Note: The AI cannot quite handle this patch. The computer players will nearly bankrupt themselves trying to build as many units as they can. I’m keeping the patch online anyway since increased unit upkeep is an obvious change that many player will want to try, but you may be disappointed by the results. Download: Upkeep-Increased.zip contains the new unit costs as well as the changes listed under Weakened Spies. The new unit costs are stored in Reduced AI CheatingCivilization IV always allows its computer players some amount of cheating on all difficulty levels, even on and below the “Noble” level which supposedly puts human and AI players on an equal footing. This is both annoying and, in my opinion, unnecessary. The game seems challenging enough even with these cheats turned off. So I made the following changes to the “Noble” difficulty level (all values apply to the basic game):
Alan Au was kind enough to adapt these changes to the remaining difficulty levels, as shown in the following tables. The downloadable files contain the full set of changes. Computer players on levels below “Noble” are not further penalized beyond disabling the listed cheats. For example, the “Settler” level pays 100% unit supply costs, just as on “Noble”. The bonuses vs. animals & barbarians were changed to match those for human players on the same level. On levels above “Noble”, cheating is gradually re-introduced at a steeper grade, up to “Deity” which is identical to the unmodified game. Original Release and Warlords ExpansionThe values shown in the first table apply both to the basic game and to the Warlords expansion. The two XML files differ only in the hostility of wild animals (not shown here). Warlords increased iAnimalAttackProb for lower difficulty levels, and capped it at 90% for higher levels.
Beyond the Sword ExpansionThe values shown in the second table apply only to Beyond the Sword.. This expansion features a greatly improved AI that cheats much less by default, as you can see. This XML file also contains a number of new entries (not shown here) that are unique to Beyond the Sword.
Download FilesThe modified XML file is available in three versions, one for the basic game and two for the expansion packs. All versions come in a small ZIP archive that contains the XML file nested inside its proper subdirectory:
This page was last updated on 11 September 2009. Current version available at http://www.kynosarges.de |