How do I turn off Hardcore Mode in Mount & Blade?

Question

I regret choosing to play Mount & Blade in hardcore mode. Is there a way to turn it off?

Answer

There isn't a way to do this, unfortunately, unless someone goes and deciphers the savegame format and figures out where the hardcore mode flag is.

What you can do though, is export the character, then import them into a savegame that is not on hardcore mode.

If you do this, you keep your skills, attributes, money, and experience, but you lose your reputation, honour, army, and items. Its not really a great method, but if you're attached to your character, its a better alternative than starting over.

Here are the steps to take to export your character and import them into a non-hardcore save:

1. Load up your hardcore save
2. Go to the Character tab
3. Click on the Statistics button
4. Click on Export Character
5. Return to the main menu
6. Make a new non-hardcore mode character with the same name as your old character (don't worry about the stats and stuff, they get imported)
7. Play through until you get outside the city
8. Go to the character tab
9. Click on the Statistics button
10. Click on Import Character

I know this isn't exactly what you want, but its about as close as you can get.

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How does a Terran stop a canon rush from Protoss?

Question

On a small 1v1 map, Protoss v Terran, how does a Terran stop a canon rush from protoss?

If the protoss player brings the probe to build a pylon and forge in a corner of the Terran base-- what should the Terran player do?

It seems the probe is fast and sending all the SCVs to kill the pylon/probe would slow down mineral gathering.

Answer

When playing on a small map, you should be careful and scout your starting location. When you see a probe coming, try to kill it with two SCVs (micromanagement needed, you will have to round it up). If it starts building a pylon, send about 5 SCVs to destroy it, since without the pylon all buildings are useless. You should have at least one or two SCVs gathering minerals at all times and build more while getting rid of the rush. Then build barracks asap and you should be fine.

So the strategy is like this:

1) if you suspect a canon rush, scout your base 2) once a probe comes in, send 2 SCVs to kill it, micromanage the hunt 3) if the probe starts building a pylon, go for the pylon with more SCVs 4) always have at least 2 SCVs gathering minerals and build more 5) Build Barracks ASAP

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What are the Endermen?

Question

Notch's twitter feed has been talking about something called an Enderman. I can sort of gather that this is a new mob coming in minecraft 1.8, but neither Notch's twitter account or his blog contain anything substantial in the way of explanation.

What (or who) is an Enderman?

Answer

Notch first disclosed the existence of a new mob in development on his Google+ account in a screenshot. He gave no information other than it was "creepy".

The screenshot was immediately enhanced and posted onto Reddit, where a commenter suggested the name "slender man", a popular meme: Notch liked it and decided to use a variation of that name, "Enderman".

After days of speculation and idea generation on Reddit and elsewhere, Notch decided to use some of the more popular ideas to define what the mob did, and described the Endermen's behavior on his Twitter account:

• The Endermen are peaceful. If you look straight at them, they freeze and look at you. When you look away again, they run fast. And teleport. (Source)
• They run TOWARDS you, not away. So if you happen to look at one, do not look away. (Source)
• (they stop being peaceful if you look straight at them) (Source)

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Where can an Orbital Weapons Platform be purchased?

Question

I've searched much of the galaxy, probably more than 100 sectors, but I haven't found any shipyards producing orbital weapons platforms.

I would love to get one of these to upgrade the defenses around my factories and to hold spare weapons and drones.

Can a player purchase or build a small, medium, or large orbital weapons platform?

Or are orbital weapons platforms only for the AI-controlled Core Sectors?

Answer

A quick look at the Egosoft forums turns up a few posts that indicate that it is not possible for the player to control an Orbital Weapons Platform - they cannot be purchased or captured.

However, there are also posts on the forum that indicate that mods or scripts can be used to add this functionality to the game, but I don't currently have the game available to test any of them and I'm not going to recommend any of them blind - but have a look around on the forum if that's something you're interested in trying.

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Do I need a harbor in the capital to make trade routes from other harbors work?

Question

The manual (and the civilopedia) state for the harbor:

Effects: Forms a naval Trade Route with the Capital City, +25% Production of Naval Units, City must be on a coast.

It is unclear to me though whether I need a harbor in the capital to make the trade routes from other harbors work ... ?

Answer

The trade network is just that - a network.

In the same way that a city can be linked by road via another city already linked by road - they don't all need their own roads directly to the capital - your trade network will spread via harbours.

What this means is you need at least one harbour within each "sub network" of your trade network. Here is a quick diagram:

Continent A     Water     Continent B
            |~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~|
     1------2 ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ 3------4-----5
            |~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~|

City 1 is your capital, and linked by road to city 2. If city 2 and city 3 both have a harbour then they extend the trade route across the water, this means 4 and 5 are also connected, because they are linked to 3 and so, by proxy, use it's harbour link.

If in this example, even if 2 was your capital it would still need a harbour to extend your trade route accross the water, having a harbour in 3 alone is not sufficent.

This also works if 2 and 3 were on the same continent, but not connected by road/rail.

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Best way to play Defense of the Ancients (Warcraft 3) on a Mac?

Question

I own a Macbook Pro. I want to play a PC game called WarCraft 3 - Defense of the Ancients. I have googled and done some research on how to play DotA on a Mac.

Most of resources I found recommended I buy Warcraft 3 for Mac version (yes, there is warcraft 3 for mac). However, I already own the PC version, and I don't want to waste another $60++ bucks to buy a Mac version (it's an old game as you guys already know).

I also came across some forums suggesting using a virtual machine or using Bootcamp to install Windows and play.

Using bootcamp and installing Windows sounded good for me, but after I did more research, I found that since I don't have experience with using Bootcamp, I might crash or need to reformat my Mac(when partitioning). Apple also recommends doing backups for your Mac when using Bootcamp. I do not want to go through all this troublesome things, thus I will not choose this method.

My last option is to install virtual machine. I used VirtualBox and already installed Windows XP. It runs and works perfectly fine. Now, I am wondering, if I install Warcraft into this virtual machine, and play the game, approximately 5 hours a day, will it crash my Mac?

Okay, to give a summary, following are my questions about running Wacraft 3 on VM Windows XP on MacBook Pro:

1) Will the game lag, the video render okay, etc? 2) Most importantly, will it damage my Mac?

If you have others methods of playing DotA on a Mac other than what I mentioned above, those are welcome too.

Answer

Firs, you should reconsider not buying it. You can have i for 20 USD, available for download at Blizzard site. Furthermore, IIRC you can register you activation key on the new Battle.net site and download the mac version for free.

As for you questions about the VM machine:

• First, it should not damage you mac in any way, that's the point of a virtual machine. It's software computer, using a software hard drive. If it damage your machine, there is something really wrong with the program.

• Warcraft 3 could run on it, but if it require graphic acceleration, don't expect too much. Some VMs have implemented graphics acceleration, but it is mostly experimental. Although, I think it should be OK for Warcraft3.

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688 Hunter/Killer torpedoes not finding their targets

Question

I'm trying to complete the training missions in "688 Hunter/Killer" and I'm having trouble hitting the training submarine targets. I've turned on active sonar and I can see the target, I load two ADCAP torpedoes and:

• Set the target
• Set the floor to be 1500ft
• Set them to enable before they reach the target (say 4500 yards)

Once they launch they head towards the target, their little target thing goes reddish but then they "conduct a turn away manoeuvre" and disable instead of exploding.

Any suggestions would be great!

Answer

It turns out that this only happens for the training missions! In the actual mission the torpedoes correctly find their targets.

In the training mission once the torpedo has "conducted its turn away manoeuvre" point are awards in the goals list.

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