Tin Soldiers: Julius Caesar v1.1 Update Available!

[Erik Rutins]

Hi everyone,

We're going to make the official announcement tomorrow, but the v1.1 Update for Julius Caesar is available online now. It's on our public FTP server and can be downloded from the following link. Please let us know how it works for you.

ftp://ftp.matrixgames.com/pub/TinSoldie ... e-v110.exe

Regards,

- Erik

[Hanal]

Eric.......the install of the update brought a prompt which removed the DirectX Managed code update....the end result was that I started receiving the application-debug error again when trying to start up the game....I will need to reinstall the file again from your tech thread....

I reinstalled the Direct X for managed code update and the game is running again....

So when updating, people will need to press cancel at the prompt to prevent this.....

When starting up the game I am now finding that the game, as displayed on my montor has shifted to the right of the screen, so that 1/3 of my screen is black...so somehow, the update screwed up my monitor settings.....

I uninstalled/reinstalled the game and, without the update, the game is once again displayed normally on my monitor....

[Erik Rutins]

JP,

The pop-up that appears before the Managed DirectX installation tells you to skip/cancel if it's already installed. I realize this may be confusing, but this is how Microsoft's installer works. I have to include this step in the first update for those who may not yet have read about the manual install option.

It sounds like the second problem is likely to be that you told the resolution configuration to "never show up again". I should have had the update clear that setting. You can do it manually by adjusting your shortcut to add a /R at the end. That will bring it up, allow you reset those settings and should remove the display anomaly you reported. I'll adjust the update to clear that setting today.

Regards,

- Erik

[bhaktamichael]

just an fyi - downloaded and ran update - cancelled the directx install when prompted (is a bit confusing) and also had sdcreen resolution pop up (as I did not have it set to never show again). Net - all is well and update installed fine. Thank you Erik and Koios.

[Erik Rutins]

Good to hear, we'll be posting a new version tonight that resets the resolution configuration to always show up after patching to avoid that issue and I've also added an extra warning not to remove the Managed DirectX if that option appears.

Regards,

- Erik

[Budge4]

Erik

Installed on fresh install of Xp, chose option to install managed directx, etc, all installed great, running game at highest settings available (res, texture) running great and really smooth, no problems.

Budge

[e_barkmann]

Considering buying this one - is there a changelog for the patch somewhere?

cheers Chris

[Erik Rutins]

I'll post it right here.

Change History:

1.1.0
=====
Graphics optimization additions:
- Optimized texture loading
- Improved texture memory usage

Resolution configuration
- Added texture quality options in resolution configuration window
o Low - For video cards with 32MB or 64MB of video memory
o Medium - Earlier model video cards with 128MB of video memory
o High - Latest 128MB/256MB video memory cards
- Added support for 1280x1024 and 1400x1050 screen resolutions

AI modifications:
- For campaign games, auto promotion to elite (when entering the order of battle screen) has been limited to 4 for hard, 5 for normal and 6 for easy; additional elite units can be obtained by achieving end-of-level awards
- Game "hardness" should now scale better for easy vs. normal vs. hard; hard should now be significantly more difficult

1.0.0
=====
- First release

[Deride]

ORIGINAL: Erik Rutins
AI modifications:
- For campaign games, auto promotion to elite (when entering the order of battle screen) has been limited to 4 for hard, 5 for normal and 6 for easy; additional elite units can be obtained by achieving end-of-level awards
- Game "hardness" should now scale better for easy vs. normal vs. hard; hard should now be significantly more difficult

Just so everyone is clear on this...

If you have a saved game from prior to the patch, it will follow the elite promotion rule, but it will not take advantage of the "significanlty more difficult AI."

All new games post patch will folow the elite promotion rule as well as be much harder.

Deride

[Erik Rutins]

Excellent point Russ, I didn't realize that. Thanks for the clarification.

Regards,

- Erik

[hondo1375]

"- Game "hardness" should now scale better for easy vs. normal vs. hard; hard should now be significantly more difficult."

Can any of the developers tell me how the game at the hard level has been made more difficult? I'm interested in buying this game, but have been holding off because I want to make sure that the AI puts up a good fight (but fights by roughly the same rules as me).

Thanks, Hondo

[Deride]

ORIGINAL: hondo1375
Can any of the developers tell me how the game at the hard level has been made more difficult? I'm interested in buying this game, but have been holding off because I want to make sure that the AI puts up a good fight (but fights by roughly the same rules as me).

Hondo,

The game was using the incorrect set of parameters for hard-level games previously. So, basically, the AI was playing near the level of "Easy". This has been fixed so that the AI is now using the correct set of parameters. This error was only happening for campaign games, so anyone that has played a set battle at the hard level should already understand what "hard" means.

Additionally, two pieces have been added to increase difficulty: first, the elite promotion cap has been put in place. This will better balance your army against the set AI pieces so that you will have a hard time driving right through him. Second, for hard, there is a reduction in the money that you receive at the end of each level. (This was previously implemented, but it was not being triggered correctly.)

For for fighting by the same rules as the player, our AI does not really cheat. He lives by same movement rules as the player. His biggest advantage is that he has more numbers than the player, and he is basically set on the map before you arrive. The only "cheat"that AI has over the player is that he senses threat across the map -- i.e., while he can't see beyond the fog of war, he does have an idea of where your attacks are going to come from. This last piece was necessary to keep the player from taking advantage of the AI that, while a tactical master, can not react to an infinate number of strategies you can throw against him.

Deride

[hondo1375]

Thanks for the swift reply Deride - it all sounds very reasonable.

I understand from a previous thread that the AI might be made harder by increasing the time it takes to compute its moves - any thoughts on including a setting to allow the AI to take a much longer amount of time to compute turns to satisify the grognards?

[Deride]

ORIGINAL: hondo1375
any thoughts on including a setting to allow the AI to take a much longer amount of time to compute turns to satisify the grognards?

The basic algorithm that the AI is using creates an inverse expotential curve over time. In layman's terms, that means that as the algorithm is given more time, it makes giant leaps forward in progress initially with litte, if any, improvement once it hits a pretty good solution. So, adding in "longer" time beyond "hard" really means that the AI will just be wasting your time.

When we created the "Easy", "Normal" and "Hard" levels, we cut "Easy" off during the intial part of the curve, "Normal" around the top of the curve and "Hard" after it has had some time to find non-local optimums (using a technique called kicking.) So, "Easy" will provide a decent move for the AI, "Normal" will provide one of the AI's best guesses, and "Hard" will allow the AI to explore a few potential best guesses.

Additionally, we have put some things into the campaign to make hard a bit harder beyond that (e.g., limiting elite promotions further and restricting the amount of money you get on each level.)

I suspect that all players will find the game to be a challenge at the hard setting now that we have fixed the algorithm's parameters for hard games. Remember, Will Trotter wanted to throw Alexander the Great out the window because he thought it was too difficult to get major victories -- and Will Trotter is a grognard for sure.

As always, we want to be VERY responsive to issues as they are raised by the community. Hopefully you can see for yourself that we were quick to patch the intiial release once we saw problems with mouse cursor lag and reports that the AI seemed to be too easy. We tracked these issues down and fixed them as soon as we could. If hard-core gamers complain that the campaign is still too easy, we will address that as best we can. I would be happy to implement an "Impossible" mode as a next step -- but I can gaurantee that you will not win [:D].

Deride

[hondo1375]

Thanks for the reply - that was very helpful.

P.S. With regards to the impossible level - bring it on. [;)]

[z1812]

Hi All,

I have tried the new patch and in terms of mouse cursor movement and map scrolling it seems very good. I tried at the higher levels and it was quite acceptable.

As I keep trying it I will post anything I think may be helpful.

What a good game this is. And so bug free.

Regards John

[Hertston]

ORIGINAL: z1812

I have tried the new patch and in terms of mouse cursor movement and map scrolling it seems very good.

Everything is OK for me on that front except for the rotate on the RMB. That's still way too fast (maybe 3-4x) IMHO, and however small the mouse movement I can't get a shift of less than 45 degrees or so. I was moaning about that in beta too, but maybe its just my mouse as nobody else seems unduly bothered.


EDIT: Mr Dim here has finally twigged that you can only view from 8 directions, as they are the only ones the figures are pictured from (its not a "true" 3D engine, of course). I'd been so tied up with the map whizzing round in a circle at the slightest movement I hadn't noticed [8|]

[Deride]

ORIGINAL: Hertston
Everything is OK for me on that front except for the rotate on the RMB. That's still way too fast (maybe 3-4x) IMHO, and however small the mouse movement I can't get a shift of less than 45 degrees or so. I was moaning about that in beta too, but maybe its just my mouse as nobody else seems unduly bothered.

Hertston,

The game enine works in 45 degree increments, so we made mouse scrolling go in 45 degree increments -- so that, in fact, is actually the smallest rotation you can get!

Deride

[Hertston]

Hehe... yup, I figured that out as you were typing (see the Edit)! Just ignore me, I'm having a bad week (giving up the smokes [:(] ).