[Bug 1.0] AI creating 30 population city

from Elemental Forums

As mentioned in this post  https://forums.elementalgame.com/435073/get;3261574  I have seen the AI (on beginner difficulty no less) magically spawning 30 population cities with no expenditure of a pioneer.

Find 2 save games showing this issues at

http://dl.dropbox.com/u/14105530/pop30.zip

q30 has a Magnar army of 2 champions plus a pioneer about 8 tiles south of New Pariden (you will need to reveal the map to see them).

q31 shows the same game a turn later.  A city has been founded on the tile which still contains the army and pioneer.  This city has 30 population.

I clicked through a number of turns after this with the map revealed and in that viewing I saw the army and pioneer proceed south and magically found another 30 population city without expenditure of the pioneer.

I also saw Yithril found a city normally and Magnar found one normally with a different pioneer up north of Imperium.

Hope you can track down this issue for us. 

15,775 views 6 replies
Reply #1 from Elemental Forums Top

I'm pretty sure this is an issue when the AI pioneer is in an army with a hero. Basically, what's happening is the game thinks it's the same as a Sovereign founding the first city (which starts with 30) and doesn't get destroyed. So the army can just walk around building as many cities as it wants.

When the pioneer is NOT in an army with a hero, it works as it should.

Or at least that's what I've noticed.

Reply #2 from Elemental Forums Top

I suspect you are right.  I didn't want to draw any conclusions myself though.

Providing the developers with immediately before and after saves should make it easy for them to isolate what is happening... and fix it for 1.01.  :grin:

Star Control: Origins
Reply #3 from Elemental Forums Top

Pioneer was in army.

Only a pioneer can spawn a city (other than the sovereign when CityCount==0)

Reply #4 from Elemental Forums Top

Yes, but when a pioneer spawns a city it should be consumed.  And the city should start with population equal to the pioneeer figures (always 3 now we can't customise pioneers?).

Neither of these happens in the saves I posted.  The pioneer does not disappear when the city is founded and the city starts with 30 population.

Why this happens and how to make it not happen is up to someone from Stardock... unless of course you intend it but then it should be made clear that the AI is playing by quite different rules to us.

Reply #5 from Elemental Forums Top

This bug is still present in 1.02. It seems that if the AI sovereign is stacked with the pioneer creating the city, then the city has 30 initial population.

Reply #6 from Elemental Forums Top

In this case the sovereign was not present.  There were two champions.

It does look like the game thinks that when this pioneer with army/champions founds a city that it is the sovereign founding the city - the pioneer is not consumed and the city starts with 30 population.

Could be a confusion between the two types of 'build_city' in the code?