Forced reload of xml data

No

And 90% of the reason people aren't going crazy making mods = this problem. Once I finish up the stamps im working on im done til this is fixed, the constant reloading of the client is infuriating.

I don't understand the reasoning behind this. It works the same way in GalCiv 2 and I have no problem with it there.

Sure, it can be a little frustrating at times when you find and fix a bug in your mod, yet it still remains in the current game. However, it also allows you to make changes without having to fear that they may brake your savegame. Just imagine what would happen, if the requirement for one of the buildings or items got changed, after you or the AI unlocked it. Would the building suddenly disappear from all cities? Would all trained and queued up troops with the item disappear? Would you just no longer able to build/train either of them? Would the save simply not load because the data is incompatible? Would the game just crash? And what would be the difference in how it is now and how it would be then? What would removing this "problem" accomplish? What would it make "better"?

I think it's a minor inconvenience, making a "90%" claim is silly without proper information about the subject. Not saying it's not an issue.

Honestly, I dont' find it to be an issue, per se. What would be nice (for modding) is if the game started _faster_.

Now if we want to talk about genuine issues, we'd need to discuss the Map Editor. Egads.

It's really not an issue.  SD has supplied us with a lot of cheat codes for testing stuff in an efficient manner.

I just threw out 90% cause thats more my own frustration level with it. Ok so 90% of anyone making maps or stamps maybe thats where the main rub comes from, you make one change to a map and you want to save and see it and do any versioning, restart the client. It is beyond frustration. And one simple button that ran the event/function that loaded the xml on game startup,put into the tools and invoke a refresh, would fix the issue.

And I appreciate that its not a concern with everyone, especially people modding and not really utilizing the toolset (which you pretty much have to for maps/stamps), i.e. data/balance mods where your not making alot of objects in the tools. The comment that para. "Its always been this way and we have learned to deal" that argument just doesn't make any sense.

Any object(map/stamp/particle/prop) that you make a change to in any of the tools in order to see that change you have to restart the client. Any object you create that you want to use inside another object requires a restart. So I will rephrase, the reason you don't see people going crazy making CONTENT mods is because of this problem.

I also suspect that alot of the weird "phantom" problems in cartographer, like the starting position graphic not showing up other than on your very first map thats opened for the client session (and there are others), have to do with the reload of data and the refresh of the UI objects in the tools.

It is very common with creating objects in any tool to save an objects state make a whole bunch of changes and not like the changes, or run into a limitation of the tool and reload the saved version, anytime that is done in the elemental tools you have to reload. In addition to this problem the lack of an undo last change button in the editor is also annoying. Or let me put it in a more real world perspective. I have a library of about 50+ stamps I am getting happier with  over the last couple of months, to get there I have probably restarted the client appx 500 times? Just to work with those stamps not including games, probably more. 

For me it's more like "It's always been this way and it makes sense to me". Still, I can understand your reasoning now. For map-making and object-creation this really doesn't work. For the rest of the game, however, I stand with my original comment.

I just want to BEG every other Elemental modder ou there to take these issues seriously and give them alot of weight. I know most of the mods right now are being done just through the xml and focus on data/balance with some minor content texture replacement and the like.

There is a potential rich world of content modding with these tools, creating stamps for more random maps, creating more static maps, creating all sorts of interesting props and particles.

For instance I looked at the wildland stamps and the DLC world map and almost had it where i could add the wildland props and events to that map, i.e. put the ruins of the imperium where it should be lore wise and have the props fit the terrain and not just look like the default ruins of the imperium wildland stamp.

None of this stuff is going to happen though without some basic object GUI features.

Object Save/Load - Concurrent with client session, i.e the problem listed in this thread

Dropper/Piipet - ability to hit a key and turn the cursor into a dropper that allows you to click an object and attach that object to the cursor for placement (instead of looking through the object library.

Cut/Copy/Paste/Undo - Ability to handle objects similar to a word processor, especially undo with an undo buffer

Sorting for the Object Library - It can take forever to find objects there needs to be much better sorting and classification of objects

These features are pretty much standard in any object manipulation GUI I can think of (just think of any 3D tool for instance), when you see threads bringing up these topics take them seriously.

Well now we're talking about the map editor. Its current state is indeed dismal, and you have to have the patience of a saint to undertake an serious map making endeavor.

Well it actually applies to all tools in the toolset. But you are actually right there is the discussion of restarting the game to see changes in a game and the restarting for the toolset, the former is an tolerable the latter is a nightmare.

I can tell you that while messing with the tech tables to make sure it was all set up correctly I had to constantly reload the game because of small editing errors on my part.  I would love a refresh XML ability for final versioning of data and corrections.