CAM - General Discussions

[gabrielbyrnei]

You must have misunderstood something here, Gabriel...

Here's a quote explaining how the fire CAPs are set in CAM:


The picture below is an early one from alpha testing with Dirty Industry.
The growth stage of each lot is clearly shown.
In this testing the fire CAP for Dirty Industry was set at 10.

You can see the fire station to the right in this picture, as well as the red coverage circle.
Only lots that were at least partly inside the circle could grow past stage 10.

So in that table what do those Numbers mean ? Blocks? Squares?

[gabrielbyrnei]

Well, i installed CAM but didnt understand the 1% that farms could provide in work, so what i want to do is somehow activate this option that is prompted while installing the CAM, is there a way of doing it or do i have to install again?

[RippleJet]

Download the MAC version of CAM.
That version contains all files without an installer.

Copy the file CAM_5%_R$$_Working_in_IR.dat into the folder a_CAM and you're done.

[RippleJet]

So in that table what do those Numbers mean ? Blocks? Squares?

Growth Stages, just as it is said:

The fire cap means that, in order to grow past the stage set, the lot has to be within the coverage area of a fire station.

For instance, for I-D the Fire CAP is set at Growth Stage 5:

RCI	Fire	Max.
Type	Cap	Stage
I-D	5	10

This means that Dirty Industrials cannot grow past stage 5 without being inside the coverage area of a fire station.

[gabrielbyrnei]

thanks !!!

[gabrielbyrnei]

yes i understood what the numbers in the ingame picture meant, i dont know what that number 5 mean for example, on the fire CAP.
Does it mean it needs to be 5 tiles from fire coverage? (the red circle that appears around a fire station) or what ?



Edit: I have another question, ho do i lay the dragable GLR rails When i choose it on the road menu and i click somewhere on the map, a GLR Rail piece gets popped, which doesent give me a chance of dragging it.

[RippleJet]

yes i understood what the numbers in the ingame picture meant

You do? 

i dont know what that number 5 mean for example, on the fire CAP.

You don't? 

Those numbers are the same, they are both Growth Stages.
If the lot is within the fire station's coverage area (the red circle), it can grow to a higher stage than 5.
If the lot is outside the coverage circles of all your fire stations, it can grow up to stage 5, but not higher.

I do hope you understand what the growth stages are...

The bigger the building is, the higher its Growth Stage is.
Agricultural lots can be of Growth Stage 1-7 (in CAM, 1-3 in Rush Hour).
Other Industrial lots can be of Growth Stage 1-10 (in CAM, 1-3 in Rush Hour).
Residential and Commercial lots can be of Growth Stage 1-15 (in CAM, 1-8 in Rush Hour).

When starting a new region, only stage 1 grows (smallest buildings).
For each higher stage to grow your region needs to be bigger.

Edit: I have another question, ho do i lay the dragable GLR rails When i choose it on the road menu and i click somewhere on the map, a GLR Rail piece gets popped, which doesent give me a chance of dragging it.

The thing you plop is a starter piece.
From that you can drag elevated lightrail and it automatically transforms into GLR.
Please read the NAM manual, it's all explained in there.

[builder]

Hey, do you need a police station to make industrial buildings grow to growth stage 10, or is it enough with only a fire station?

[RippleJet]

There is no stage CAP with police stations, so no, you do not need a police station.
However, for I-HT crime is bad on desirability, so leaving out the police coverage might affect the development in other ways.

[SimFox]

I've finally got around to give CAM a test drive! And I must say that it is a greatest thing that ever happened to SC4!
The look of the city had changed dramatically to the better!
However I do have some questions... I'm sorry if those have been answered already, but it is very difficult to scan through the entire 51 pages of this thread and I tried but got lost...

So if someone would kindly take time to address them I would be grateful.

1. Adding/removing stuff

how to get rid of Coit tower it grows everywhere like a weed! I bulldoze it and it pops-up again and again and  again. The building is clearly not an office structure for one and also it is very "non-generic" to be in many places.  What should I do? Delete from CAM dat the lot configuration exemplar?

2. Farms

Pedriana!! Bl.dy Pedriana. I thought that with CAM there will be much more balanced farmland. But in my case in 70-80% of farms grows that monster! Even in just freshly stared farming community of 120 inhabitants in absolutely empty region(! ) 7 out of 8 farms are Pedrianas . It also seems to be totally independent on the size of the lot as well.

3. Transport stuff

CAM and NAM (good title for Eurovision song) how to put those two together. I mean the traffic Plug-ins. What is a recommended setup? I remember seeing somewhere sort of discussion on this subject but can't find it no more.

[xxdita]

1) Simply remove all of the Occupant Groups from the Coit Tower, in the CAM dat file. This will allow standing buildings to upgrade, and prevent any new instances.
2) Make sure you have plenty of CAM farms installed. You should see a decent variety.
3) All depends on your playing style, and how large a city your playing. Your best bet is to download the MAC version, and give each of the traffic simulators a spin. I prefer Simulator A, on Easy for most of my cities.

[BarbyW]

2. Use the blocker for Maxis farms and make sure you have all the farm and field packs from the LEX.

[RippleJet]

how to get rid of Coit tower it grows everywhere like a weed! I bulldoze it and it pops-up again and again and  again. The building is clearly not an office structure for one and also it is very "non-generic" to be in many places.  What should I do? Delete from CAM dat the lot configuration exemplar?

A Coit Tower Blocker is attached to this post:
http://sc4devotion.com/forums/index.php?topic=1177.msg144484#msg144484

3) All depends on your playing style, and how large a city your playing. Your best bet is to download the MAC version, and give each of the traffic simulators a spin. I prefer Simulator A, on Easy for most of my cities.

Also, if you installed CAM after the latest NAM, you might have selected one of the traffic plugins included in CAM.
As these are installed in the folder z_CAM, they would supersede any pathfinding plugin selected when installing NAM.

Thus, make sure you delete the z_CAM folder to be sure the traffic plugin included in NAM is used.
The Cleanitol file included with the latest NAM removes any pathfinder installed with CAM.

[HandsOn]

I might, of course be wrong, but I don't think it's just the Coit Tower - in fact I hav'e seen a single one since I installed CAM. But around the time CAM is about to kick in, just before that Blue Platter really messes up the picture. Worse than Brussel Sprouts!

I know there are mods that block Maxis buildings effectively, but thus far I've only seen RJ's specific ones - are ther others, a collection, say, that would let you select which to block, which to permit?

[jmyers2043]

2. Farms

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Pedriana!! Bl.dy Pedriana. I thought that with CAM there will be much more balanced farmland. But in my case in 70-80% of farms grows that monster! Even in just freshly stared farming community of 120 inhabitants in absolutely empty region(! ) 7 out of 8 farms are Pedrianas . It also seems to be totally independent on the size of the lot as well.

Pedriana's plants killer mod by Shadow Assassin is the one you want. Pedrianna's Plants is the only stage 3 Maxis farm. And it grows like a weed with or without the CAM. I use the Pedriana's plants killer as I don't like that particular building at all and you'll need to insure that the mod installs after the CAM if you want to use it. Perhaps in a ZZZ folder


And as others have advised, please download a bunch of other farms for variety.

You may recognize the following scenario. You will start a new region. Some stage one farms like the Maxis Pumpkin Acres will grow. then a few stage two farms will grow. Then finally stage three farms will grow 70% of the time. Very annoying if the only stage 3 farm you have is Pedirannas Plants. That was Rush Hour. I used to compensate and had a lhuge number of stage three farms  in my plugins for variety. But the CAM cam along and evened out the stages. So that you have a somewhat equal chance that a stage 1, 2, or 3 farm will grow. Plus other stages if you you like.

The key ( as others have said ) is to download some more farms. Using the CAM you'll get the full range (stages 1,2,&3) of farms available right from the beginning using the CAM whereas you won't when playing Rush Hour.

Hope this helps.

[SimFox]

I would like to thank everybody for help and on a note, somewhat separate, would it be possible to display some additional info about the lot in a query window? Say the Pollution and consumption?

[Rayden]

I would like to thank everybody for help and on a note, somewhat separate, would it be possible to display some additional info about the lot in a query window? Say the Pollution and consumption?

CTRL+Alt+Shift pressed alltogether and over the lot will give you extra info.

Refer to this post - http://sc4devotion.com/forums/index.php?topic=365.msg146125#msg146125

[SimFox]

hm...
that marvelous Ctrl+Shif+Alt combo doesn't seem to work for me. It doesn however take me to the God mode. But when I use it with query tool and hover over the buildings NOTHING happens. Any idea what I may be doing wrong? Could it depend on the version of the dame (SC4+RH or SC4 DeLuxe?, country version?)

[Rayden]

hm...
that marvelous Ctrl+Shif+Alt combo doesn't seem to work for me. It doesn however take me to the God mode. But when I use it with query tool and hover over the buildings NOTHING happens. Any idea what I may be doing wrong? Could it depend on the version of the dame (SC4+RH or SC4 DeLuxe?, country version?)

Sorry I should have explain that better. Press query button "?" then with Ctrl+Alt+Shif pressed click over the lots and it should give you some extra info that a normal query should give. I think you don't even have to click the lots but just hover over them. It's well explained on Jondor's post linked above.

[SimFox]

that is exactly what I did! but NOTHING happened. I still see same brief info on LOT when just hovering over (like with out holding down CTRL+ALT+SHIFT) and if i click on the lot/building I get standard query window, nothing of the sort shown in the shortcut thread. I tried it with  or without all/any plug-ins. Could it be so that it is some sort of side effect of some plug-in installed?