The BUG Mod

Tutorial: Modding with BUG

2010-02-01T15:40:00.000-08:00

Modding can be rather difficult with the sparse Civ4 documentation, and adding BUG's framework into the mix can make it overwhelming. I created BUG's framework to make it easier for modders to add features to BUG and their own mods, and while we have some fairly comprehensive reference documentation, it's mostly useful in helping experienced modders transition their mods to BUG.

What's needed is a good introduction to the BUG framework. To this end I have started a beginner's tutorial called Modding with BUG. It will work through an example mod called Lucky Charms, introducing a new BUG feature on each section with working code demonstrating how to use it. I have also created a tutorial discussion thread on the BUG forum. I will continue adding sections covering more features and eventually move on to intermediate and advanced topics.

Please give us your feedback and suggestions in the discussion thread, and subscribe to it if you want to be notified when I add significant content to the tutorial.

Subversion Flux

2010-01-24T15:01:00.001-08:00

When we started the BUFFY project we created private, parallel SVN repositories for BUG and BULL so the release would be a nice surprise. We are now in the process of folding them back into the main code repositories for BUG and BULL.

I highly recommend that any mergers wait a week or two before merging any changes made since last week so that we have a chance to thoroughly test it out. I will post an update when things have settled down.

Note that these changes shouldn't affect your mods in the end. We are merely cleaning house. :)

Release Bonanza

2009-11-15T17:24:00.001-08:00

It is my great pleasure to finally announce the release of BULL 1.0 (features)! It's been a long time in the making, and you've gotten a taste with BUFFY. The ZIP archive contains a Readme.txt with instructions for installing it stand-alone (mod or CustomAssets) or inside BUG.

Speaking of BUG . . . version 4.2 has been released with some fixes for Mac users, hover text for the Great Person Bar, civilizations that start with each technology in the SevoPedia, and a slew of bug fixes. Check out the changelog for more details.

And last but not least, BAT 2.1 has been released as well. Grab this package to get all the latest interface goodness of BUG and BULL along with the visual splendor of community unit and building art from Varietas Delectat.

BTS 3.19 Patch

2009-06-11T23:47:00.000-07:00

Firaxis surprised the community yesterday with patch 3.19 for BTS. The discussion is already well underway, but the general consensus seems to be favorable.

Most of the changes are pulled from the Unofficial Patch and Better AI. It also includes the multiplayer cargo unloading OOS fix. The only verified bug so far is in an adjustment to the overflow gold; it's all but completely eliminated.

While there are a few minor Python changes we need to add, BUG 3.5+ is completely compatible with 3.19 as-is. The missing Python fixes are remnants of 3.17's No Espionage option and only visual in nature.

BUG Subversion Renamed

2009-05-11T22:42:00.000-07:00

I have been doing some Spring cleaning on the BUG project, and the latest change will affect anyone who uses our Subversion (SVN) repository to access the latest BUG code. To match Subversion naming standards, I have renamed the folder that holds the main line of development from "BUG Mod" to "trunk".

Please update your links or checkout the latest code again. If you are using TortoiseSVN to get the code, you can use its Switch command to do this quickly. Let's assume you had created a "BUG" folder and checked out the code previously.

Right-click the "BUG" folder and select TortoiseSVN : Switch...
Change the To URL field to
http://civ4bug.svn.sourceforge.net/svnroot/civ4bug/trunk
Click OK

I have also committed the BULL changes required for BUG to this trunk. This means that "trunk" contains the latest BUG and BULL changes. If you want to start playing with BULL, feel free to grab it from BULL's Subversion repository. You'll need to manually install it until I create an installer.

Copy all the files in the Assets folder to CustomAssets or BUG's Assets folder.
If BUG is installed to the CustomAssets folder, move CustomAssets/CvGameCoreDLL.dll to BTS's Assets folder, renaming the one that is there for safe keeping.
You can ignore the files in SDK. They are used to create CvGameCoreDLL.dll.

BUG 3.6 Released

2009-02-25T02:53:00.000-08:00

The latest release for BUG is finally available. It adds many cool features such as

Dot-mapping tool: plan out future cities by placing colored outlines on the map
BUG Charts: multiple charts in one view
EventSigns: shows effects of random events that affect tiles in signs
BUG Finance Advisor: detailed breakdown of your commerce and gold sources
Min/Max Commerce Rate for assisting binary research
Field of View slider
Improved Foreign Advisor INFO page

And a whole lot more, including minor improvements, many bug fixes, and a smaller, multi-lingual installer. You can download it here. As usual, this version works with BTS 3.13 and 3.17.

We've also added a FAQ for the most common questions.

See the Download thread for further details and continuing coverage.

City Planning the Better Way

2009-01-15T15:19:00.000-08:00

We all know that planning your future city locations--while essential to the game--can be a real pain in the a**. Do you edit screenshots in Photoshop, print them out and use crayons, or wrestle with Civ4's line-drawing tool which only works when zoomed so far out as to make seeing tiles nearly impossible?

Just say no!

Enter the Strategy Layer: an in-game dot-mapping tool by Del69 and myself--based on Eunomiac's original idea. It works very much like the sign tool (ALT + S). You can add and remove colored city outlines with a simple click. As someone who used to use signs to mark future city locations, this is probably my new favorite BUG feature!

See the New Features thread for instructions on using the tool.

BUG 3.5.1 and BAT 1.1 Released

2008-12-06T14:50:00.000-08:00

We have two releases for you today.

BUG 3.5.1

This is a minor update to BUG that fixes the loading and interface problems from 3.5. This version works with BTS 3.13 and 3.17.

BAT 1.1

This is a major update to BAT that includes BUG 3.5.1, VD 4.0, and Improved Graphics 2.0. Note that due to the inclusion of VD 4.0, BAT 1.1 requires BTS 3.17.

See the Download thread for further details and continuing coverage.

BUG Brings new Graphs to Civ4 BtS

2008-10-21T06:53:00.000-07:00

The latest release of BUG ... v3.5 ... includes many new additions. One of these is the new charts or graphs shown on the Info Screen. The BUG graph discussion thread contains a complete history of their development but if you jump to the end of that thread you can see some illustrative screenshots.

The thumbnail below is a link to a animated gif which flips between the 7-in-1 view and the larger view. We have also added some text below the graphs to highlight the ability to flip between these two views.

Making War Less Painful

2008-09-10T01:29:00.000-07:00

I've added a couple new features to make life planning for and executing wars a little easier on your wearied warlord brain.

We Have Enough on Our Hands

The scoreboard now displays an orange fist next to AIs that are mobilizing for war or are involved in too many wars already. In terms of game mechanics, this is normally found by entering diplomacy with an AI and hovering over a red "Declare War on" entry and seeing the reason "We Have Enough on Our Hands."

This same orange fist is displayed next to each leader on the BUG Military Advisor Situation Report tab. As with everything else on the scoreboard, you can turn it on or off and move it to a new location using the BUG Options screen [ALT + CTRL + O].

Military Advisor Deployment Grouping

The original Military Advisor grouped units first by Combat Type (Melee, Archery, Gunpowder, etc) and next by Unit Type (Warrior, Archer, Rifleman). The BUG Military Advisor extends this by adding three new grouping methods and allowing you to pick any two.

Level: 1, 2, 3, . . ., 50+
Promotion: Combat 1, Drill 2, Ambush, etc.
Location: Domestic/Friendly/Enemy/Neutral Territory/City
Orders: Fortify, Heal, Sentry, Blockade, Intercept, Go To, etc.

Adding new groupings is quite easy, so please don't hesitate to suggest new ones in the Feature Request thread.

Major Update in Subversion

2008-08-28T01:59:00.000-07:00

Over the past few weeks, I have completely rewritten BUG's core and committed it to our Subversion code repository. Users won't notice much of a difference (except all their settings will be reset to default, but just this one time). However, modders and mergers will find it much easier to merge BUG with other mods.

My main goal was to allow merging without modifying the core BUG files. Merges become difficult when two mods modify the same files. Dr. Elmer Jiggle's CvCustomEventManager went a long way toward easing this process, but it still required you to modify that file. This is no longer the case. All events can be added via separate mod config XML files.

I will write a detailed HOWTO article in the next few weeks. For now, this post has the paper napkin version. For those that are handy with Python and XML, check out the directory CustomAssets/Config for examples on porting your mods over to the new BUG core, creating your own options and INI files processed entirely by BUG, and hooking up your event handlers -- even define new events. All of the mods in BUG have been ported to the new core, so there are several meaty examples to help you started.

For continuing coverage, check out the forum thread.

Changes to the Victory Screen (F8)

2008-08-11T08:27:00.000-07:00

The BUG team is slowly working its way though the whole Civ4 interface ... the latest target ... the Victory Screen. We've added a few features like the ability to tell at a glance how many Civs you have yet to meet, how many you have managed to vassalize, what space ship parts you cannot build due to missing techs and how many turns until your 3 cities hit their legendary status.

We've also modified the diplomatic members tab to include the two candidates and we've estimated who will vote for whom. We had some fun here by including mythical 'BUG Poll' results including statistical errors. Information (and mod development history) can be found at our forum hosted by CFC.

Sevopedia Index Page

2008-07-28T19:45:00.000-07:00

I've ported fitchn's Civilopedia Index mod to Sevopedia and added it to BUG. It creates a sorted list of all Civilopedia entries (technologies, buildings, leaders, traits, terrain, bonuses, concepts, etc) just like a book index.

See the forum post for a legible screenshot. :)

How to Add BUG to Your Mod

2008-07-21T15:32:00.001-07:00

Merging together Mods can be difficult, and even more so with the BUG Mod. To add the BUG Mod to your mod, or even to combine with other mods, there are some things we will have to explain before you even attempt the merge.

The BUG Mod currently holds all of its options within a single file, "BUG Mod.ini". This file should be installed within your "...\My Documents\My Games\Beyond the Sword\BUG Mod\" folder. The reason why we have done this is to allow the user to keep their settings, regardless of which Mod containing BUG they are playing. It also allows us to store our other files in one location, reducing clutter in the root Beyond The Sword folder. For BUG Mod to work properly, this file must be in this location.

If you are just creating a Mod for the first time, I strongly suggest to use the BUG Mod as a base for your Mod, before adding any others. There is a good chance that any Interface Mods you will be adding, will already be included in BUG, and we've done a lot of the work for you already. If you have already added some changes, then you will need to use comparing software (such as Eclipse, or WinMerge) to find the differences between the files. I won't go into detail on this step, but if you have more questions about this, there are several good post at Civilization Fantics Forum.

The next piece of advice I can give: Take the latest files we have from the SVN on our SourceForge Page. Don't wait for us to make a new release, or you may miss alot of good features that are contained on the SVN. We keep the SVN in a fairly stable state, and have several users who give us good feedback on the current state of the SVN, so don't worry about bugs popping up to much. Steps for downloading from the SVN are located on the first post of the thread here.

Here are the steps you should follow to ensure BUG will work with your Mod. The directions are giving assuming a new install.:

Either download the latest full release, or as recommended, download from SVN.
I like to work from the desktop, so I'll use that as a reference here. Create a directory on your desktop called "Beyond the Sword".
Within that directory create another named "Mods".
Place a copy of your Mod within the Mods directory you just created.
Copy "CustomAssets" into "Mods\Your Mod's Name".
If you have no other modifications done yet, then you can just rename CustomAssets to Assets, within your Mod's directory. If you already have modified files within your Mod, then you will need to merge any conflicts you get with a program like WinMerge, then copy the contents of CustomAssets to your working Assets directory.
Copy "BUG Mod" directory into the main "Beyond the Sword" directory.

That should give you a complete working copy of BUG within your mod. To make sure, copy that directory in the your "My Docs\My Games" directory. Copy the whole thing, even the Beyond the Sword directory. Once you have done this, then go ahead and fire up a game. You should see a blinking Message that says "Press Alt + Ctrl + O for BUG Mod Options..." Go ahead and do it. You should see all the options displayed there. If not, make sure you didn't forget a step.

Now to Customize the Mod. You can change the display of the Mod name withing the BUG Mod Options by editing the file within the "Python\BUG\Contrib" folder called "CvModName.py". You only want to edit two of the lines, and they are:

displayName = "BUG Mod". Change "BUG Mod" to the name of your Mod.
ModVersion = "X.X [Build XXXX]" The X's will be replaced by the current Mod Version of the BUG Mod. Change "X.X [Build XXXX]" to reflect your Mod version. To help with tracking of errors, please change [Build XXXX] with the current revision you got from SVN, or else keep the same if taken from a full release.
Be sure to include the Quotations!

After this, you should be on your way! You may want to keep a working copy in a safe place, to make sure you can return to a clean version to prevent having to repeat these steps. And update the SVN regularly to ensure your users are getting the most update version avaliable.

One final Note: Please do not change the Credits tab within the BUG Mod Options Screen, and if you would like to call up your own help file, then include all the help files for BUG as well, to ensure the user will have all information they need for the BUG Mod, without having to go to the forum. Thank you!

Traits in Sevopedia

2008-07-21T03:46:00.000-07:00

The Sevopedia now has a section for leader traits. Each trait lists the leaders with that trait, the effects of the trait, and strategy for maximizing the trait.

The strategy articles were written by Sisiutil of ALC fame and include useful technologies, buildings, wonders and civics.

Example screenshot of the Charismatic trait here.

Great job, EF!

Score Deltas by Caesium

2008-07-21T03:42:00.000-07:00

The scoreboard now has an option to include the score delta for each civ: the change in score during the previous turn. There is also an option to include the current turn's delta so you can see the scores change while you make your moves. Note that this second option can get confusing.

Score Deltas

Thanks Caesium for the idea and code. To enable, update from SVN and select "Score Deltas". If you use the Advanced Layout, you must also add Z to the Display Order field (shown to the right of S in the screenshot above).

Whip Assist

2008-07-13T02:38:00.001-07:00

With the successful release of BUG 3.0, it's time to once again start adding new stuff.

Tired of calculating the whip overflow?

Epic, shoot, it's 45 not 30
+25% for the Forge, so that's 56 . 2 population, so that's 112 ? No, 113 ?
Oh I have stone, so that's, um, carry the 2 . . . divide by pi . . . It's Tuesday, so drop the 6 and add 8 . . . #$!&@

Us too!

Whip Population and Overflow / Purchase Cost

The next feature of this mod will help you determine the optimal time
to whip so you can maximize your overflow. No more missing that 89 overflow by 1 lousy !

Nice one, EF!

BUG 3.0 and BAT 1.0 Released

2008-07-12T00:00:00.000-07:00

The BUG team is happy to announce the release of BUG 3.0 and BAT 1.0. They are compatible with Beyond the Sword 3.13 and 3.17 as well as the unofficial patches by Bhruic and Solver.

Significant additions include an easier to use Plot List Enhancements interface with hover help text and nicer buttons, Raw Yields that shows a detailed breakdown of food, production and commerce for a city and can include tiles the city isn't working yet to assist in planning, Keyboard/Mouse Shortcuts and CFC Strategy Articles in Sevopedia, the display of each rival's Worst Enemy in the Military Advisor, and plenty of bug fixes.

As always, if you find a bug or are having other problems, please post a description of the issue in the Bug Reporting thread. If you have questions about either mod, feel free to ask them in the Questions thread.

Unofficial Patches

2008-07-09T12:29:00.001-07:00

EmperorFool has confirmed that both unofficial patches (from Bhruic for 3.13 and Solver for 3.17) are compatible with BUG, so long as you don't use the Python files. BUG includes all the changes (plus much, much more, of course), so you don't need them. If you've already installed them, don't worry. You can overwrite them with the BUG files without problem.

Raw Yields

2008-07-06T00:55:00.001-07:00

At the start of the BUG Mod, EmperorFool extended Sevo's Raw Commerce mod with Raw Production. This has finally been fully expanded into a more comprehensive version.

We present to you Raw Yields!

Instead of a separate area that shrinks the Buildings list, the information is displayed in the Trade Routes table with buttons for changing the view and options.

Trade Routes View with Buttons

The buttons from left to right:

Views: (only one is active)
- Switch to the Trade Routes view (default) *This icon will be changed for release*
- Switch to the Food view
- Switch to the Production view
- Switch to the Commerce view
Tiles to Count: (only one is active)
- Worked Tiles
- City's Tiles (tiles that the city controls)
- Owned Tiles (tiles that you culturally own)

For more details, see the thread here.

We're considering adding an "All Tiles" option to count tiles you do not culturally own in order to inspire you to conquer your neighbors. However, during certain points in the game (tech differentials) the yield values would be incorrect. Would you like this option anyway?

Sunday is Huge!!

2008-07-04T09:40:00.000-07:00

Lots of Stuff is happening.
This Sunday, we finally decide to get professional as we launch The BUG Mod v3.0. Why professional? Well, for two reasons. Firstly, we are having a code freeze and, secondly, EmperorFool and I are on the Apolyton ModCast. I'm not sure which is the funniest ... us having a code freeze or appearing on the ModCast.

Anyway, welcome to our Blog and watch here for announcements.