To Greg DLC MULTIPLAYER!

[bluexco]

I recently bought Civilization 5 with a group of friends at full price (I point out full price because a week later it went on sell on steam at i believe 66% off, I wasnt to upset about that) because after a night of our group watching this game be played we thought it would be a fun investment. Our first attempt at multiplayer failed horribly when we recieved the error for a 12 player game that said unsupported amount of players! We tried several times and we couldnt believe that a game made for 12 players wouldnt support 12 players.

I'm going to step away from that, this post isnt about the horrid time we had with multiplayer, its about your DLC. Now being as we are all different individuals, we have different tastes. One friend likes vikings, another one likes the incas, and I like the way Korea and bablyon play. We each bought our generals and tried to play with eachother. As you know this did not work! At first we choc'd it up to the list of problems we were having with multiplayer. I took the time to google this problem online and see if there was a patch coming out to fix this or if it was some error on our part. I found that everyone playing needs the DLC. Now I ask you, why is that?
is it
A marketing scheme to sell more DLC? As far as our group goes it just made everyone aggrivated!
Despite this, I thought well made their marketing ploy worked for people online, so I went to play a game of multiplayer. Two days I spent trying to gather people online to play a quick game of civ. TWO DAYS, im not talking like five minutes of trying, no im talking hours of waiting online just to try my new army against real people not pc's.

I know that it is possible to play against factions you dont own in a video games. Many successful games have this as an options. One is League of Legends, the fun filled Arena style RTS, another is Dawn of War 2 which is and exciting and thrilling action RTS.

Now Greg, I don't exactly know what power you have but am I wrong to have expectations for a game I paid full price for to have the features it says it says it has in working condition? How long as this game been out? Almost a year? I've tried to defend you to people I really have but as your 5th game, you should have all of these features down!

What I'm asking is with all these problems shouldn't we atleast as a consolation be able to play with our DLC against players that don't have our DLC.

- BlueXCo

[Pouakai]

It's perfectly reasonable. In order for the civilizations to function properly on your computer, you need the files. If you don't have the files, you won't see their Unique Units / Unique Improvements, City names, civ colours, icons, or Unique Embarction art. So, simply put, if you want the game to work properly, you all need DLC. If the game didn't stop you, I'm pretty sure you would be here anyway, complaining about how you can't see anything from a DLC civ you don't have

[Olek]

With the amount of DLC this mob have spat out can you guess at the number of combinations various Civ 5 multiplayer lobbies there would be because of different DLC on different systems.

You get morons here saying you have the choice to purchase the DLC or not, which is totally correct, but if you hope to join a online game (if you can find one), it leaves you little choice at all, as you state;

So, simply put, if you want the game to work properly, you all need DLC.

doesn't sound like choice to me.

[bluexco]

we'll ofcoarse you'd have all the files, its in an update but you only have access to them in your game when you pay for them. I guess the way it was phrased was bad, what i ment is everyone should have the files so they can be seen when another person plays them, but not have access to play them themselves unless they buy the DLC. Which is exactly how the other 2 games (League of Legends and dawn of war 2) I listed work.

[Bloody Rose]

It's perfectly reasonable. In order for the civilizations to function properly on your computer, you need the files. If you don't have the files, you won't see their Unique Units / Unique Improvements, City names, civ colours, icons, or Unique Embarction art. So, simply put, if you want the game to work properly, you all need DLC. If the game didn't stop you, I'm pretty sure you would be here anyway, complaining about how you can't see anything from a DLC civ you don't have

All the existing DLCs are already included in the game for everyone. When you buy a DLC pack, your game files don't change. The game just allows you to use them.
You could even tell that the Korea DLC has been on the way by looking into the files before the release. So, please, don't mislead anyone.

[headkase]

All the existing DLCs are already included in the game for everyone. When you buy a DLC pack, your game files don't change. The game just allows you to use them.
You could even tell that the Korea DLC has been on the way by looking into the files before the release. So, please, don't mislead anyone.

I'm not quite sure about that. That would not make sense: if everyone did have the files, why can't you play against others that have the DLC while you can't play what you don't have? Let's do a quick look. In my "<Steam Folder>/Steamapps/common/sid meier's civilization v/assets/DLC" folder, I see: DLC_01 - DLC_04, DLC_Deluxe, DLC_SP_Maps, and Shared. I don't own Korea or Wonders of the ancient world yet. I own all the other DLC's. Do your files match up against that? I.E. if you own Korea or Ancient Wonders: do you have extra folders there I don't?

[Olek]

I'm pretty sure with the Totalwar series much of the DLC was already in the game just waiting to be unlocked, this enabled people to play against others who had the DLC when you did not.

[Lathieza]

I just voted 5 stars because some idiot thought this thread was worth 1 star??? Are you kidding me??
The OP has some really good points and he put the context in a descent and correct way!

I really despise the people around here who come in every negative thread to choose developers side and downvote the whole thing. Most of you the downvoters are single players anyway so give us multiplayer players a break allready!! I think we suffer allready long enough, even without your ☺☺☺☺☺☺☺☺.

Like mentioned before... the game files probably are allready available on the computer so enabling DLC for multiplayer shouldnt be a problem. Its pure a marketing thing. They only did this to make more money.
When people play online they need a descent connection anyway so even if you dont have these files its a very very small and fast download. Its only some animations and some pictures thats it. (10Mb)

[headkase]

I just voted 5 stars because some idiot thought this thread was worth 1 star??? Are you kidding me??
The OP has some really good points and he put the context in a descent and correct way!

I really despise the people around here who come in every negative thread to choose developers side and downvote the whole thing. Most of you the downvoters are single players anyway so give us multiplayer players a break allready!! I think we suffer allready long enough, even without your ☺☺☺☺☺☺☺☺.

Like mentioned before... the game files probably are allready available on the computer so enabling DLC for multiplayer shouldnt be a problem. Its pure a marketing thing. They only did this to make more money.
When people play online they need a descent connection anyway so even if you dont have these files its a very very small and fast download. Its only some animations and some pictures thats it. (10Mb)

Right now that is an assumption and a number pulled out of a hat. If you know for certain then point to the proof instead of just going on a rant. I looked in those DLC folders and I saw the DLC I *downloaded*. When I purchased them there was a significant transfer of information made by the Steam client. It is almost certainly wrong to say that the files exist on all installations. Come Friday I will be purchasing Korea and Wonders of the Ancient World. At that time I fully intend to revisit this thread and let you know, what I expect will be a yes, whether or not I have any new folders in my "assets/DLC." Checking the size of my existing DLC folders they range from 28MB to 84MB with a mean of around 35MB. So, "10MB" is not based on a reason rather pulled out of the proverbial hat.

I fully expect I will get new DLC0x folders on Friday. If that turns out to be the case then there is the reason all participants must have the DLC for multiplayer. It is an option to disable DLC in multi so that is one route to take with it. The other, if again when I see on Friday, is to distribute DLC to everyone and not let it be played single player unless a person owns it. But just what I have so far: 216MB in my DLC folder. Multiply that by a few hundred thousand customers. Now, you're getting into some serious money for providing the bandwidth - just so a smaller set of people (people who play multi) can see DLC content while not play it themselves? Think about all that bandwidth: you buy your DLC and a little bit of that money (yeah, real little but still imagine if it had to be free to hundreds of thousands of people?) pays for the transfer. If all that transfer was free for everyone it might not even be viable to make DLC at all.

Anyone who purchased Korea and Wonders of the Ancient World want to chime in? I gave the location and what folders are in my install above. On Friday, unfortunately that long, I'll have my own answer and will post back here then.

[bluexco]

Right now that is an assumption and a number pulled out of a hat. If you know for certain then point to the proof instead of just going on a rant. I looked in those DLC folders and I saw the DLC I *downloaded*. When I purchased them there was a significant transfer of information made by the Steam client. It is almost certainly wrong to say that the files exist on all installations. Come Friday I will be purchasing Korea and Wonders of the Ancient World. At that time I fully intend to revisit this thread and let you know, what I expect will be a yes, whether or not I have any new folders in my "assets/DLC." Checking the size of my existing DLC folders they range from 28MB to 84MB with a mean of around 35MB. So, "10MB" is not based on a reason rather pulled out of the proverbial hat.

I fully expect I will get new DLC0x folders on Friday. If that turns out to be the case then there is the reason all participants must have the DLC for multiplayer. It is an option to disable DLC in multi so that is one route to take with it. The other, if again when I see on Friday, is to distribute DLC to everyone and not let it be played single player unless a person owns it. But just what I have so far: 216MB in my DLC folder. Multiply that by a few hundred thousand customers. Now, you're getting into some serious money for providing the bandwidth - just so a smaller set of people (people who play multi) can see DLC content while not play it themselves? Think about all that bandwidth: you buy your DLC and a little bit of that money (yeah, real little but still imagine if it had to be free to hundreds of thousands of people?) pays for the transfer. If all that transfer was free for everyone it might not even be viable to make DLC at all.

Anyone who purchased Korea and Wonders of the Ancient World want to chime in? I gave the location and what folders are in my install above. On Friday, unfortunately that long, I'll have my own answer and will post back here then.

I bought Korea and wonders of the Ancient World. I do agree with you the file was larger than 10 mb but, i disagree with you on your words of a "smaller set of people" just like you want him to provide evidence I'd like you to provide evidence that the multiplayer community is small and minute. Heres my proof its not. http://forums.civfanatics.com/index.php this is a forum for civ players one of many where people get together and set up games, there was also a group of programers that got together and made a civ Network to try to fix the multiplayer problems themselves, the only problem was it ment you had to iso the game to play and this lead to piracy, because people believed if you could get a game with working multiplayer why pay for a game that doesnt work?

HeadKase my points are valid and I can see your side as someone who only plays single player but, you have to remember this game advertises multiplayer feature and is run through steam which must have a huge bandwith (can't back it up with a number) because millions of people are constantly downloading and updating games all the time.

In addition to the races they also come with senerios which im not asking be included unless you buy the DLC I'm only saying the races which should be smaller (again no number to back it up) seeing as you don't have added sounds, progaming, and CGI.

[Pouakai]

All the existing DLCs are already included in the game for everyone. When you buy a DLC pack, your game files don't change. The game just allows you to use them.
You could even tell that the Korea DLC has been on the way by looking into the files before the release. So, please, don't mislead anyone.

I'm not misleading anyone. I had downloaded all the latest patches, and then when I bought Korea and WOTAW, the game needed to download another 60-odd MB before I could play with them

[Bloody Rose]

headkase, even if you are right about this (though I don't remember downloading anything after I got Polynesia), think about Left 4 Dead 2, the game from Steam developers that constantly gets 60-300MB updates. It's not so hard to make every patch for Civilization V 30-60MB larger. They don't come out that often.

What should be noted is that Steam has been tracking everyone's bandwidth, hardware specifications and installed software for quite a while now. They know if weekly patches of the size I mentioned are acceptable, so they release them regularly. It could have been the same with this game.

[arsyn1c]

The precedent has already been set with multiple games to allow players without new expansion packs or dlc to participate in multiplayer games with players who have purchased the dlc or expansion packs. Case in point: Dawn of war, Company of Heroes, Dawn of War 2, and Shogun total war 2. The patch enabling players to participate in company of heroes sans the expansion pack was close to 2 gigs. I find it very hard to believe this issue is anything but a conscious design decision to force players to purchase all dlc in order to participate in the majority of multiplayer matches. Whether the required patching to fix this issue be 100mb or 1000mb the solution to this problem has been found and successfully implemented multiple times by other games. Shame on firaxis and 2k for so blatantly gouging their customers and failing to deliver on their promises. And shame on all you who defend their actions when a year after release they still have not delivered the product promised.

[headkase]

We're guessing. I'm pretty sure you only have the files if you purchase the DLC. I remember reading a long time ago it costs in the neighborhood of a dime to transfer a GB of information. Steam will let you download practically unlimited times: most of my purchases don't even have physical media from them so each install it's download again for the ones I forgot to back up. So on.

So, delivery-wise it could be done that everyone has DLC files but not everyone can employ them. Can be done. If it is done: what about "nerf" situations? Where a certain DLC conveys an advantage that is not easy to ignore and not all players have access to the DLC?

[LordIronhead]

I think the DLC comes as what it is named, as download of course.
However, these kind of DLC work well with single player titles, but very bad with a multiplayer envoirement.
Everyone participateing a MP session need the same content, or MP won't work at all. Specific units as example and artwork.
BUT, a better way would have been to rollout the DLC's to every client with a patch, hey we got steam do you remember?
Civ5 can always do the verification if you actually can start a single player session with these DLC content pretty easy via steam.
So that is a non problem to make sure only those who paid can play it... I don't want to buy every DLC nor play it. But other might want to play a diffent nation. Forcing me to buy ALL DLC's to be able to play a MP session is just ......

So in summary, i think it's just another example of a overall shoddy implemented multiplayer in Civ5.

[bluexco]

We're guessing. I'm pretty sure you only have the files if you purchase the DLC. I remember reading a long time ago it costs in the neighborhood of a dime to transfer a GB of information. Steam will let you download practically unlimited times: most of my purchases don't even have physical media from them so each install it's download again for the ones I forgot to back up. So on.

So, delivery-wise it could be done that everyone has DLC files but not everyone can employ them. Can be done. If it is done: what about "nerf" situations? Where a certain DLC conveys an advantage that is not easy to ignore and not all players have access to the DLC?

well its DLC so if you made the room you'd still have the option to turn it off, i mean we all have mongolia and we all have to option to turn them off so why would other dlc be any different?

[Xill]

I think the DLC comes as what it is named, as download of course.
However, these kind of DLC work well with single player titles, but very bad with a multiplayer envoirement.
Everyone participateing a MP session need the same content, or MP won't work at all. Specific units as example and artwork.
BUT, a better way would have been to rollout the DLC's to every client with a patch, hey we got steam do you remember?
Civ5 can always do the verification if you actually can start a single player session with these DLC content pretty easy via steam.
So that is a non problem to make sure only those who paid can play it... I don't want to buy every DLC nor play it. But other might want to play a diffent nation. Forcing me to buy ALL DLC's to be able to play a MP session is just ......

So in summary, i think it's just another example of a overall shoddy implemented multiplayer in Civ5.

What a good company does it give the dl content with a patch, and then you simply buy the unlock. This way everyone has the same content and people can use what they paid for independently of what others paid for.

[Olek]

It does not matter if steam say's it's downloading, I have backed up the steam directory multiple times for customers, copied it back over to the new system, when you choose to install the game it always says it is downloading, yet it is not, it's retrieving the info already there in the Steam apps directory.

[CanuckSoldier]

What a good company does it give the dl content with a patch, and then you simply buy the unlock. This way everyone has the same content and people can use what they paid for independently of what others paid for.

Stean certainly has this ability to give all players the DLC, encrypted except for those that buy it, and that way players that don't buy it can still have their game use the art and xml assets to render the other guys civ, with out clogging the network traffic with asset transfers.

Why 2K/Firaxis chose not to take advantage of this is beyond me, but it could be that they didn't want to hear all the complaints from all the SP only players and the players on metered internet service, about Steam pushing 100's of megs of files to them that they will never use :-/ You can never keep everyone happy!

Of course the solution to that is to transfer the assets "on the fly" but that is much more complex from a network code point of view, and Civ5 current code is certainly not upto that, which is why the currently only enabled DLC when all players have it, negating the need to tranfer files and handle that seamlessly.

There are really two ways to handle on the fly transfers, you simply do it in a visiable way in the staging room, were as soom as a player picks a DLC civ(if DLC is enabled by the host) all other players get a progress bar of the DLC transfering to them if needed, and the host is locked out of launching the game until all players games report the transfer done.

The second and more complex way is to do it in the background, invisable to the players, but this would require alot of load balancing code, and you would want to suspend asset transfers or give them a very low priority during the game launch from the staging room and at the end of turns when alot of other stuff is going on. You also would not want to bog down the DLC players machine to much either. But the assets still need to be tranfered or the game would possibly crash if a DLC players was to meet a non-DLC player in the game before all the assets were transfered. Or they would have to code in failsafes, just substituting assets from other civs when needed.

I certainly hope that what ever road they take that they soon patch MP's stability so they can enable MP mods, mods have always been the life blood of the longjevity of Civ, without them we risk gettting bored with the same old game in MP.

CS

[Olek]

I don't think it's the downloads, Civ 5's memory footprint is very small by todays standards.

My machine, no DLC

Civ 5 : 4.61GB
Shogun TW 2 : 21.8GB
King Arthur : 8.07GB

Just a couple of examples, I'm sure adding a couple of hundred more MB to their download is not gonna cause a riot.

[bluexco]

All I have an interest in is getting this to the people that program this game

[Sombra]

Its a good idea without doubt and for example shogun2 handles it this way. Besides I think you would dell more dlc if you see other players use these interesting new factions, besides it would mp more colourful

[Lathieza]

All I have an interest in is getting this to the people that program this game

Than you better try something else. Just go and see how many posts are made by Greg in this sub forum. Thats right... 1 or 2?

[Olek]

Why would you bother, your talking about the people who said "awesome multiplayer"

[Simkill]

It's perfectly reasonable. In order for the civilizations to function properly on your computer, you need the files. If you don't have the files, you won't see their Unique Units / Unique Improvements, City names, civ colours, icons, or Unique Embarction art. So, simply put, if you want the game to work properly, you all need DLC. If the game didn't stop you, I'm pretty sure you would be here anyway, complaining about how you can't see anything from a DLC civ you don't have

This is a pretty douche comment. Every other game in the world downloads the files as they are released, and unlocks them when the player enters the code so they can use them, which allows others to use the DLC and not the player. This, on the other hand, does not download the files until they are paid for, which leaves the players up ☺☺☺☺ creak without a paddle

[bluexco]

yup this is pretty bad, and I think i need to start finding another way to contact them :-/ this forum isnt working and they're man office is in Rhode island

[2K Elizabeth]

yup this is pretty bad, and I think i need to start finding another way to contact them :-/ this forum isnt working and they're man office is in Rhode island

Hey there -

We're actually in California, but Rhode Island is close. ;-) That being said, I apologize for the delay - a lot of threads come through here every day and we don't post regularly on weekends - but PMing if you want us to reply specifically like you did is definitely the way to go.

I also wanted to let everyone know here (rather than just replying via PM) that this has been sent to the team and will be investigated. If and when we have more info, Greg will post about it (probably not back here, but in a sticky) - but you have not gone unheard.

Thanks.

[dokebi1221]

Wow! Thanks to you bluexco, we at least got a reply back from 2k!

[bluexco]

I also wanted to let everyone know here (rather than just replying via PM) that this has been sent to the team and will be investigated. If and when we have more info, Greg will post about it (probably not back here, but in a sticky) - but you have not gone unheard.
Thanks.

That is progress! I love it!

[Xill]

Hey there -

We're actually in California, but Rhode Island is close. ;-) That being said, I apologize for the delay - a lot of threads come through here every day and we don't post regularly on weekends - but PMing if you want us to reply specifically like you did is definitely the way to go.

I also wanted to let everyone know here (rather than just replying via PM) that this has been sent to the team and will be investigated. If and when we have more info, Greg will post about it (probably not back here, but in a sticky) - but you have not gone unheard.

Thanks.

Thanks, we really think someone who bought for examples the latest Korean DLC should be able to play with it online, regardless of what DLC the other people he's playing against have bought. Fixing this would be a huge improvement and would certainly help to sell more DLC.

[Lathieza]

And we definitly need the diplomacy on AI with multiplayer. Its hard to get complete games full with players so an AI like in SP is very much needed.

[Hamhawk]

Thank you for finally acknowledging the issue almost a full year after release.

[Olek]

California? now it's starting to make sense.

[bluexco]

why does California make sense?

[headkase]

I'm not quite sure about that. That would not make sense: if everyone did have the files, why can't you play against others that have the DLC while you can't play what you don't have? Let's do a quick look. In my "<Steam Folder>/Steamapps/common/sid meier's civilization v/assets/DLC" folder, I see: DLC_01 - DLC_04, DLC_Deluxe, DLC_SP_Maps, and Shared. I don't own Korea or Wonders of the ancient world yet. I own all the other DLC's. Do your files match up against that? I.E. if you own Korea or Ancient Wonders: do you have extra folders there I don't?

I just bought Korea and Ancient Wonders. I had the Assets/DLC folder open prior to the purchase. Before purchase, as above those folders. Immediately after purchase two new folders appeared: DLC_05 and DLC_06. They then downloaded and together represent an additional 69MB of files. So, as of right now, DLC is only present on a users install if they have purchased it.

Other than that we'll have to see what happens as 2K Elizabeth did make a post in this thread as well.

[bluexco]

one week in and still waiting on some type of word, I just want to hear if they plan on working on this or not, just some type of hard evidence

[Nefliqus]

I just bought Korea and Ancient Wonders. I had the Assets/DLC folder open prior to the purchase. Before purchase, as above those folders. Immediately after purchase two new folders appeared: DLC_05 and DLC_06. They then downloaded and together represent an additional 69MB of files. So, as of right now, DLC is only present on a users install if they have purchased it.

Other than that we'll have to see what happens as 2K Elizabeth did make a post in this thread as well.

You should include also additional +15 MB, +13MB of fpk files from resources folder. It make average 60-70MB to download per civ. I think that they can include it as patch part without any problems. Why they didn't?

[Xill]

You should include also additional +15 MB, +13MB of fpk files from resources folder. It make average 60-70MB to download per civ. I think that they can include it as patch part without any problems. Why they didn't?

I could see your question on a Television Gameshow:
Gameshow host: ..."they can include it as patch part without any problems. Why didn't they ?"
Participant 1: "because they couldn't find a multiplayer programmer!?"
[machine sound] beezzz
Gameshow host: ..."wrong answer... (repeat question)"
Participant 2: "because they didn't care!?"
[maching sound] chingching
Gameshow host: "and you've won ... a brand new car"

[bluexco]

hey XIII i didnt want this thread to be a flame thread, this was to address a real problem in the game, please don't have this thread closed because of flaming

[Xill]

hey XIII i didnt want this thread to be a flame thread, this was to address a real problem in the game, please don't have this thread closed because of flaming

I posted about this problem many months ago, when the first DLC came out:
12-14-2010 http://forums.2kgames.com/showthread...59#post1301459
04-16-2011 http://forums.2kgames.com/showthread...06#post1376606
and other threads I can't find and wont bother...

I created the Mac group (now almost 250 players) and is the ONLY way to really get a MP game going on Mac:
http://steamcommunity.com/groups/CIVMAC
It's not like I did not try to make the game playable. I do care.

What I said wasn't "flammatory" anyway, it's what I believe to be the truth said in a humorous fashion. If they do care then they can at the very least answer the question of Nefliqus.

I can't believe fixing things are to be so complicated here.

You can always bump my old posts if this one ever closes for some esoteric reason.