Sorry for not replying sooner, Wes. I think the forum cookie messed up, so I didn't see this thread as containing unread items. Only just found this, down on page 2!

Quote Originally Posted by WesW
The port for Morocco was originally set in the Atlantic Coast. It screwed up the AI pretty bad, so I moved it to the Straits for the Medmod way back in v1, over two years ago.
Now that is odd. It took me nearly a year to get around to installing VI, so I've a good recollection of both games in their default state. Since I knew I was going to add VI, I think I consciously chose NOT to install the 1.1 patch, so if you had a hand in that one, I didn't get to see the difference.

I now have a dual-install, for purposes of multiplayer but I've not launched any campaigns in MTW 1.1 yet.

Basically, I can't remember EVER seeing a port for Morocco in the Atlantic Coast sea region.

The only difference I can think of is that my copy of the game was manufactured in the EU. THere isn't an obvious date stamp on it but my guess is that it was at the tail end of the manufacturing run and maybe had changes like this incorporated into it on the CD. Early edition (2003?) US-made disks might have been the only ones to have Morocco's port in Atlantic Coast.

It's a real pity that it screws up the AI as I was going to ask around to find out how the ports can be repositioned on the map. If I was a modder (I'm not), this is something I'd look to change, so that the user has to build an extra ship to trade to or from here but, at the same time, a blockade in the Gibraltar straights can't cut your link completely.

The real trouble is that it will mess badly with troop movements. If the land bridges were modded away, the Almos would need two ships to get anything in or out of Spain, meaning you'd have to gift them a starter fleet and hope they use it correctly. Also, I think Cordoba would be their only landing point - they'd need a third ship to get troops into Granada, if I recall the sea zones correctly.

In other words, you can't mess around with the port/sea zone interfaces willy-nilly, as the joins between sea areas and land areas are just as important. The AI probably messes up its ship positioning because it prioritizes troop movements and regards trade income as a handy side-effect, instead of a fundamental reason for being. It will get confused when the two paths fail to coincide.


Quote Originally Posted by WesW
The port for Tunisia was indeed a bug, and probably the result of a last-minute change.
I saw a thread somewhere where the fix for this was described and it seems it could be done with some simple text file changes but I haven't tried it myself. I'm in mid campaign at the moment and wary of making such changes in case it triggers gamesave corruption and so on.