Cavewars FAQ

Cavewars FAQ

1. What is Cavewars?

	Cavewars is Avalon Hill's game of exploration and conquest
	underground in the world of Ibido. 8 races, each with their
	own special abilities and weaknesses, wage a war for survival 
	in the 5 levels of caverns under the surface of Ibido.
	Research Technologies and Magic to develop new weapons to
	overcome and conquer.

2.  Are there any cheat codes?
	CAVE Godmode, gives you 250000 of everything, and all the spells 
	and technologies.


3. What are the system requirements?
	-IBM or 100% Compatible
	-100% Microsoft Compatible mouse
	-VESA (1.2) Compliant SVGA video card
	-CD-ROM drive
	-8MB Ram
	-MS-DOS 5.0 or higher(will run in Win95)
	-486DX or better
	-15MB free hard drive space

4. I have an ATI Video card, and I am getting an error about the video, or

a blank screen when I try to run the game.
	
	You need to load a VESA driver for your video card.  You can get
	a shareware VESA driver, UNIVBE, from Scitech Technology.

5. I have a Rendition based 3D card (3D Blaster, Screamin' 3D) and the
game
crashes with a DOS4/GW error every time I try to play.

	Some of the newer 3D cards are not completely VESA 1.2 compatible.
	However, download the Cavewars 1.2 patch, and this will solve
 	this problem.


6. When I start the game, I get a message about sound effects being
disabled,
even though I have a sound card.
	
	You must have a 100% Soundblaster compatible sound card.  In
              addition, the "SET BLASTER" line needs to be in the
Autoexec.bat file,
              and the IRQ must not be higher than 7.


7. The game locks up when I try to save a game.

	You select a slot, then the mouse cursor is locked until you type 
	in a name for  the saved game at the top entry box and hit enter. 

	Then you can choose SAVE,  or just Close if you decide you don't
	
	want to save that game.

8. How can I tell how far along I am in researching something?

	You can't.  Since there are no random events in the game, this 
	gives the feeling of chance to the game, since you never know when

	the next breakthrough will come.  This is after all, research,
just 
	as it is in real life.  It also adds some tension to the game, 
	since you can't plan based on having a researched item by a 
	particular time.  

9.  How can I tell if food or minerals are in my cities range?

	Click on the Eye, choose control.  That will show a colored 
	square on the small map around each of your cities, anything in 
	that square is in that particular cities control.

10.  When I ship population between cities, they don't use food.

	Correct.  They don't use food from the cities,(they eat off the 
	land en route).  There is a trade-off involved, however.  You
might 
	try shipping population back and forth to alleviate food
shortages, 
	but population in transit does not contribute to research, 
	production, defense, or magic.

11.  I use some of the magic spells multiple times.  Is there a quicker
way 
than going to the spellbook, choosing the spell, etc.

	Hit the "s" key.  That will cast the last spell chosen. This comes

	in handy when you're mapping the levels.

12.  Do I need the CD in to run the game?	

	You need the cd in to start the game, but once the game is up and 
	running, you can take it out and replace it with your favorite 
	music cd.    Hit TAB to bring up the cd player within the game.

13.  How do I change the CD play mode?

	There is a small button in the lower right-hand corner of the 
	cdplayer box that switches between random, repeat, and regular
mode.
 	The current mode is listed in the cd info, random, repeat,
regular(shows
              nothing).

14.  The manual says that all the races must be unique, but I ran across a

city the same race as mine.

	The computer player races will be unique, but neutral cities(those

	with white flags) will sometimes be the same race as your own.

15.  I am constantly running out of food.  What can I do?

	Build your cities in the area of food deposits.  Make sure you 
	research Cave tech, since that increases the food production of 
	your cities.  Once you get high enough, you can get food from
blank 
	spaces as well as those with food deposits.  Try shipping 
	population back and forth some, since they don't eat from you food

	stores.(see 9 above for the trade-off).

16. I'm trying to select a city with units on it, and I keep selecting the

units.

	Right-click on a city to select it.


17.  Can I tell what the enemy units are before I attack them?

	As long as you can see them(they are visible to your units), just 
	right-click on them like you do with your own units.  You can then

	tell what you are going up against. Note: Invisible units in a
stack
	with visible units will not be shown when you right click.

18.  The playback toggle doesn't work.

	The playback toggle is only active when there are more than 1
human 
	players.  If you are just playing against the computer, that 
	function is disabled.

19.  I don't have the manual handy.  How can I tell what a spell does 
before I cast it?

	Right-click on the spell in the spell book and in the space below,

	it will describe what that particular spell does.

20.  Are summoned creatures shackled by the particular race's range/melee 
modifiers?

	No.  Same goes for tanks and things like that.

21.  How many people die per turn if you don't have enough food?

	How ever many people you don't have enough food for, plus 2-3%, 
	so you don't get the not enough food message every turn.

22. How do mounts affect combat?

	Faster movement, and the modifiers spelled out in the index.
	(i.e., +1 to attack for Balthi).

23. Do my excess resources go to waste?

	When you allocate production via the slider bars, any excess 
	production goes toward your next unit, then to research.  Toil is
	never wasted.

24. What is the best race to play?

	Each race has their own unique strengths and weaknesses. There is
	no way to say which particular race is the best.  Check future 
	issues of the General(call 1-800-999-3222 to subscribe) for 
	articles detailing strategies and play from the viewpoint of the 
	different races.

25. Can I choose how many cavern levels to play with?

	If you download the latest version (1.11 or 1.2), you can select
	how many levels to play with. Note that you may dig to any level,
	but the computer players will not. Make sure the levels.fdg file
              is in the DLGS subdirectory.

26. Where can I get the latest patch?
	Updates to all of Avalon Hill's games are kept on http://www.
avalonhill.com.

27. Is there a tutorial for the game?
               Yes. The "Beginner's Guide to the Underworld" can be found
on
www.avalonhill.com.