CAM - General Discussions

[BarbyW]

The lot you show above is not a CAMelot but one of a set - BLS ITS Georgian Terraces BSC - that I made from ILL_Tonkso's prop pack. The lots range from stage 6 to stage 8 depending on the lot size and the one you show above appears to be the stage 6 4x3 although it is incorrectory oriented. The dependencies are all correctly linked in the lot description box and in the Readme so how that has happened is somewhat of a mystery but you are missing the model which is in NDEX ITS MEGA Props Vol01
Of course with regards to the outdated links anyone could offer to do some updating.

[HandsOn]

Downloaded the NDEX props again, because I had them, but with a different date/time stamp. Maybe my original got corrupted during a recent back-up/retore operation. Thanks for the link, BarbyW.

Now for an entirely different question: I've just had a look at what's available as CAM farms and residentials. The odd thing about the farms is that they all say they won't grow without CAM but I had quite a few of them (stage 6, I think) before I even installed CAM. But it's the residentials that convinced me that CAM is not for me - massive uglyness reminiscient of post-war Germany I'd rather not have. This begs the question: can CAM be savely removed without impacting the region too much? Because some of the recently added skyscrapers have already grown, but since the CAM counter's are not yet available, I presume they will work without CAM. Is this presumtion correct?

Thanks, folks.

[RippleJet]

Now for an entirely different question: I've just had a look at what's available as CAM farms and residentials. The odd thing about the farms is that they all say they won't grow without CAM but I had quite a few of them (stage 6, I think) before I even installed CAM.

In that case you've got the pre-CAM versions in your plugins as well.
Any farms of stage 4 or higher won't grow without the CAM.

But it's the residentials that convinced me that CAM is not for me - massive uglyness reminiscient of post-war Germany I'd rather not have.

That is of course dependent on which custom buildings you've downloaded and installed.
You do not have to install all CAMeLots that are available... especially not if you don't like them...

From what you're telling, it seems like your R§ demand is high.
You might consider establishing a neighbouring low-wealth city where they could reside.

This begs the question: can CAM be savely removed without impacting the region too much? Because some of the recently added skyscrapers have already grown, but since the CAM counter's are not yet available, I presume they will work without CAM. Is this presumtion correct?

Even if CAMeLots would already have started to grow, you can always take out the CAM.
Anything of growth stage 8 and above would of course not upgrade anymore, but they would still be functional.

However, removing the CAM won't relieve your need for R§ residents.
All your industries and commercial services will still employ mostly R§.
Thus, you should still consider establishing that low-wealth city!

[HandsOn]

From what you're telling, it seems like your R§ demand is high.
You might consider establishing a neighbouring low-wealth city where they could reside.

What I've got thus far is altogether puzzeling. the newly installed CAM C$$ are appearing in nigh every city, except for the rural communities. I've zoned for all three residentials (and have thus far no CAM R$/R$$/R$$$ installed). Of the C$ starter pack I've installed 2/3 thus far, because the installation process is lengthy, what with all the dependencies.
And since zoning only takes into account density, my low density areas are always, always populated by "fat cats" & their villas in no time at all. Below is a typical development (approx. 20 years). It's largely and industrial town with high-density & medium density commercial zones. The low density residential (villas!) is off-screen to the south. So, where did I go wrong?

[RippleJet]

Seems like most buildings youv'e got growing so far are indeed in-game Maxis ones.
And they certainly grow without the CAM as well...

Maybe you'd need some more custom CAMeLots to give them competition...
Have you installed any R§ CAMeLots?

Would you be able to take a snapshot of either the CAMeLot Counter's query or the Census Repository Facility's query?
Just in order to verify your regional R/C/I capacities (which set the thresholds for the different growth stages).

[HandsOn]

Seems like most buildings youv'e got growing so far are indeed in-game Maxis ones.
And they certainly grow without the CAM as well...

Maybe you'd need some more custom CAMeLots to give them competition...
Have you installed any R§ CAMeLots?

Would you be able to take a snapshot of either the CAMeLot Counter's query or the Census Repository Facility's query?
Just in order to verify your regional R/C/I capacities (which set the thresholds for the different growth stages).

Here's the census for that city:

As I said, some of the towers only appeared after I installed CAM and the starter packs, like the Diamond Center in the top centre quadrant in the previous pic. There are a few others from Dusktrooper, but I don't think I've reached the right stage for them because the CAM counters are still inactive.
Thanks

[RippleJet]

Your regional capacities are definitely large enough to enable most growth stages.
Currently you should have the following probabilities of growing different residential and commercial stages:

RCI	Stage	Stage	Stage	Stage	Stage	Stage	Stage	Stage	Stage	Stage	Stage	Stage	Stage	Stage	Stage
Type	1	2	3	4	5	6	7	8	9	10	11	12	13	14	15
R§§§	1 %	2 %	2 %	4 %	7 %	13 %	16 %	15 %	14 %	12 %	9 %	4 %	1 %
R§§	1 %	1 %	2 %	4 %	7 %	12 %	14 %	14 %	14 %	13 %	10 %	6 %	2 %
R§	1 %	1 %	2 %	4 %	7 %	12 %	14 %	14 %	14 %	13 %	10 %	6 %	2 %
CS§§§	22 %	12 %	10 %	9 %	8 %	7 %	7 %	6 %	5 %	4 %	3 %	3 %	2 %	2 %
CS§§	20 %	11 %	10 %	9 %	8 %	7 %	7 %	6 %	5 %	4 %	4 %	3 %	3 %	2 %	1 %
CS§	16 %	11 %	10 %	9 %	8 %	7 %	7 %	6 %	5 %	5 %	4 %	4 %	3 %	3 %	2 %
CO§§§	1 %	1 %	2 %	3 %	6 %	10 %	12 %	13 %	13 %	12 %	11 %	8 %	6 %	2 %
CO§§	1 %	1 %	2 %	3 %	5 %	9 %	11 %	12 %	13 %	12 %	11 %	8 %	7 %	4 %	1 %

What type of building is the Diamond Center? If it's a CAMeLot, it can be:
   1. Stage 14 R§§
   2. Stage 11 R§§§
   3. Stage 11 CO§§
   4. Stage 14 CS§§§

Only the first one, R§§, is currently unavailable for you, as R§§ hasn't reached the threshold for stage 14 yet.
It can of course also be a Stage 8 CO§§§ if you've left DuskTrooper's original lot in your plugins.

Looking at your demand figures, you shouldn't have any problems getting more CAMeLots to grow.
However, with 373,428 vacant jobs in the region, you should definitely provide more residential zones.

You've also hit the High Tech CAP...
Hover with your mouse above the IH 100% and you'll get some suggestions for IHT CAP relievers.

[HandsOn]

Thanks, RJ, I will definitely follow your suggestions. Because I am beginning tohave real problems with this massive growth. Buildings rise to unprecedented heights real quick, and delapidate just as quick: CO$$$/CS$$$ never have enough employees, R$$$ never have enough jobs, and airports decline so fast, I can barely keep up. And to cap it all: The growable golden bank now shows up with an empty lot despite having grown elsewhere, in other cities, without a hitch(see pic).
Ask for Dusktrooper's buildings - I never had any until I've installed the starter packs - I don't like the idea of plopping massive edifices, not even as landmarks. So, the puzzle continues. I just hope I can solve all this without having to restart the entire region from scratch (12 cities thus far, 750,000 Sims)..
I also post the Diamond Centre, because the stats are beginning to blurr before my (delapidated) eyes. You may notice the two other buildings by DT on the left, despite full employment, they're going down the tube, rather fast..

[BarbyW]

It seems to me that you have kept the original lots from the NDEX buildings you have downloaded as the Golden Bank doesn't have a CAMelot query showing. When you collected all the NDEX buildings from the STEX you should only have kept the models and not the lots. As it is growing on an empty lot you would appear to have kept not only the original growable but also the ploppable lot. This Diamond Centre is also not the CAMelot but the original as it has the NDEX query.

This is from one of the main pinned CAM threads in this forum:

If the Model File is included in a previously uploaded lot (on STEX or a Japanese site), you only need the file that contains the batted model from that upload. Normally this is a SC4Model file, but in some cases it might be a DAT file. In no cases will you need any SC4Lot files, SC4Desc files or custom queries contained in the original upload, or any dependencies mentioned for that upload.

[RippleJet]

The following line is extracted from Growing Empty Lots and How to Correct them

Building Exemplar Name	Jobs	Container file where Building Exemplar can be found	Uploaded by
Golden Bank HQ	2000	CO$$$golden_bank_4d707fb9.SC4Lot	oneil_1

To get rid of all such landmarks growing on empty lots, download and execute the Cleanitol file that's attached to the first post in that thread.

That is clearly also a SC4Lot file that is pre-CAM and which shouldn't have ended up in your plugins folder...


Another line in the same post that Barby quoted from states:

If you have old non-CAMpatible lots that are using models included in these starter packs, you can use the CAM Remove Lots BSC Cleanitol to remove them.

Maybe you should download that Cleanitol file as well and make sure you get rid of all pre-CAM lots...

The problem with the stage 8 Diamond Center you've got, is that it has too high a capacity for being a stage 8.
Those badly modded pre-CAM skyscrapers easily become weeds due to the high occupancy.

Besides, they will effectively block further development of that particular lot, since they often have a higher population density than corresponding stage 9-13 lots.

If you do not want high-rises to appear, and do not want buildings to upgrade too soon, why do you zone for high density?
Keep the zoned density low or medium in the bulk of your region, and zone high density only in your CBD.

[HandsOn]

Am beginnign to see where the problem lies (with me) but now what do I do a bout it, short of restarting the entire region. If I clean out the errant lots, I must surely endup with a lot of brown boxes. What irks me here is the fact that I did not, repeat, did not have any of the lots in question until I installed the starter kits. The only problem prior to that was a greenish NDEX tower, called NDEX_DAT.. or some such, and that usually gets solved with a rezoning.

The entire affair gets way to complicated - seeking out to keep models but not DESC's or UI's, doing that but not that - it actually starts becoming work, something a lazy sod like myself tries hard to avoid.

Since the large lots will have to go, zoning for medium density will not satisfy the demand the industries and residentials have built up thus the entire balance will probably become skewed. I guess, that a restart is the only solution. What a mess I made of things..

Thanks for explaining it all, RJ

[BarbyW]

If you remove the lots using the Cleanitol file that is referred to in the quote I made, you will not end up with brown boxes. You only get brown boxes when you remove the models and the Cleanitol will only remove the lots. You should bulldoze all these errant lots and see how that affects things as the lots are all badly modded and will cause problems such as you are experiencing.

[HandsOn]

If you remove the lots using the Cleanitol file that is referred to in the quote I made, you will not end up with brown boxes. You only get brown boxes when you remove the models and the Cleanitol will only remove the lots. You should bulldoze all these errant lots and see how that affects things as the lots are all badly modded and will cause problems such as you are experiencing.

Thanks, BarbyW, I'll go for that. Meanwhile another, perhaps strange question occured to me - although I think I know the answer:  is it actually possible to swirch all of this relation between jobs and stuff off? My main interest is to build towns and cities for their looks, not for their economic relationships. This may at first sound like a dumb question, but I wonder if it is possible.

[xxdita]

The best way to have your cities look exactly how you want is to only have the files in your Plugins that fits your playing style, or to select which plugins are used for each city with Start Up Manager. There's not really a way to turn the game simulator off, but you could always use cheats to take care of any specific issues that you don't care to focus on as a mayor.

[HandsOn]

CAM Residentials: Anyone know where I can find DuskTrooper's Evil Vanadium HQ? The link in the residential starter pack points to an invalid file, and a search for DT's lots produced nothing as ST seems to be down with the flu..  

[xxdita]

I believe I corrected the link for the Cleanitols for Free thread, but of course no way to be certain until the STEX is back up again.
The link to that thread is in my signature.

[HandsOn]

I believe I corrected the link for the Cleanitols for Free thread, but of course no way to be certain until the STEX is back up again.
The link to that thread is in my signature.

Thanks - it was only later I noticed that ST/STEX are down. I'll copy & paste & create the CT file, though, I'm sure I'm missing other stuff this file may well resolve. The hunt goes on.. 

[Hahayoudied]

I am sorry if I made this tread in the wrong place. I just downloaded CAM. When I read the README document, it had a link to to a manual to show how to correctly install and use CAM with an existing region. However, when I clicked on the link, I get this error that says the manual doesn't exist.How do I use CAM with an existing region without causing any unwanted changes?

[SC4BOY]

It's very easy.. you type "Camelot" into the search.. you  get some entries.. you scan down a few lines and WOW.. there's an entire section called "Colossus Addon Mod" .. you click that section and see.. WOW AGAIN!!! there are like a page of cool SECTIONS on Camelot .. you glance down and WOW AGAIN!!! there is one called "CAMELOT . WELCOME and manual + Downloads".. now you say.. "why do something so silly as look?".. well

1. You get an immediate answer.. takes like 2 minutes
2. You don't start another thread that is already WELL COVERED
3. You don't let ppl think.. "huh? who is this guy?"

Happy Cam'ing   

[M4346]

How do I use CAM with an existing region without causing any unwanted changes?

It is suggested that you start a new region with the CAM, not because they try to be funny or sadistic, but because it was found that it is detrimental and would cause more unwanted changes and undesirable consequences if you use it with an existing region in which the demand and all those other complicated simulators have run.

I know it's not what you want to hear, but as the README suggests, do not use it on an existing region that has considerable development.

Unless someone else would like to go against what I've just said.

Happy CAM'ing!