BtS causes Version Mismatch in MP + Workaround

[Beam]

Title says it.

I found this out yesterday and had to reinstall the whole Civ 4 (except BtS) to resolve the issue and play my turn in the Rule the World Pitboss.

IglooDude got responses on a thread on that other side that Vanilla and Warlords are autopatched by the BtS installer. No patching by BtS has been announced btw.

This most likely means that if you install BtS you won't be able to play your Pitbosses because of the version mismatch.

I do not think there will be any suppport until after official release dates.

The work around is a dual install. It basically comes down to copying your existing Civ 4 install (Vanilla plus Warlords about 2 GB) prior to installing BtS:

1) Create a new directory in Program Files. It could be anywhere but this is a logical place. Let's call it Civ4copy in this How-to.

2) Copy / paste directory Sid Meier's Civilization 4 from Firaxis Games to Civ4copy

3) Basically you could start the Civ4copy version from the dir now but it is more convenient to create a dedicated Desktop Icon. Go to your Desktop and look for the Icon that launches your Civ 4 versions. Copy / paste one of these icons. Rightclick the new icon and in the Target box look for \Firaxis Games\ and replace this with \Civ4copy\. In my case I changed "E:\Program Files\Firaxis Games\Sid Meier's Civilization 4\Warlords\Civ4Warlords.exe" to "E:\Program Files\Civ4copy\Sid Meier's Civilization 4\Warlords\Civ4Warlords.exe". Repeat for the other icon.

4) Test if it works. A good test is to rename the .exe files in the Firaxis Games folder then launch with your new icons. Don't forget to rename them back correctly after testing!

5) Install BtS.

Patching with the mechanism 2k has been using so far will NOT patch the copy you created. We are using this to our advantage now but it might be a limitation in the future. I really hope they got their act together by that time.

Both installs will use the same directories and files in the My Games section. As fas as I've tested now there wasn't a need to create duplicates there but this might change of course.

Beam out.

EDIT: There appear to be issues with the Warlords 2.1.3 patch even without BtS. Imo making the dual install and play MP from the copied version allows for both uninterrupted MP, playing BtS and making the patches work on your gear. In other words double install and a couple of puzzles, looking at what is in BtS looks very promising so I say worth the effort.