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Indeed… standard 'subdirectory' mod kind of thing.. that I believe was first 'made popular' by quake, and expanded by halflife ?
there are a few hard coded things currently, but there are plans to remove them all and have them exist in txt/ini files. the more difficult bits of the current plan will be abstracting province & general characteristics (ie: general: war/int/chr) into file configurable. The reason this becomes more interesting immediately is RPN needs to be a bit more dynamic for it's substitution stuffs. ie: can't just do TOTALINT / TOTALWAR etc, it'll need to be GENERALTOTAL("INT") or something etc. going a bit further from that, the GUI stuff will need to be a bit more configurable concerning these configurable attributes. That is possibly going to be the most labor intensive of the immediate plans. but the attribute abstraction is post-'demo' thing.
a few concepts are probably going to have to remain constant. province, gov'ner, ruler, advisor, general (officer, employee?, whatever to call the schmoes under your command) come to mind as easy examples.
depending on exactly how mod-able the engine ends up being, i don't see why you couldn't have all of those possibilities (scenario defined maps, different graphics, etc, scenario ending conditions etc)…
oh, but quick answers:
fictional characters: yup… gotta have'em (some ppl like'em etc) … and if we're possibly promoting random soldiers with random stats / names after battle or at other times… then the 'canon' fictional should be there.
jiaozhi: given that the goal for myself is to be mostly rotk2-esque, then my stuff will have it in it.. but given that the map is modable … then… it's up to whoever makes the mods ?
i'm picturing that there will be a base version of the game (perhaps 'unfy mod!'), and then the other mods that others might do. i've obviously expressed resistance to some suggestions here, but depending on how difficult things are to implement, i don't mind implementing the ability to do stuff beyond my own personal desires etc :) … hell, there are several additions that are already going to be supported that i'm not a huge fan of but makes perfect sense for the scope of the project <3
edit:
actually, concerning fictional: again, the thing is designed to be modable with as little as possible as being hard coded… and tools will be available, etc… so… :P
Work's been busting my ass (getting overtime, when even 30hrs hurts etc)…. mixed with still having to clean here at home, been icky.
… and … the next update I was wanting to do isn't exactly trivial (relates to gui / button detection for which function to call etc). Well, not so much icky but just needs to be planned a bit. it's something i can quickly just hack in a hard coded icky nasty thing, but it'd prolly take just as much to make it configurable.
i've been avoiding thinking about the more complex things mentioned in last two pages of this forum thread… basically wanting to focus on getting stuff done for the immediate 'at hand' stuff.
iirc, this would be 'button definition -> what function to call' coupling, moving button stuff to an ini / txt file rather than hard coded, and RPN stuff. an outlier thing would be changing how animations are stored (currently images that are big/tiled, kinda pita to create by hand… wanting to move to numbered thingie… such as button_idle_frameXX.png or something).
but immediately – is gui coupling, prolly ini / txt thing, and rpn.
And for a completely off topic note, past 3 days i had a game itch that i get every few years… a game that Dragon Atma is well aware of :P. Mystery game is uncharted waters (typically 2/new horizons)… and have done so this weekend. sadly, the game gets tedious after a bit due to limitations in its economy and ship selection… but its still an itch heh. i really wish that game was 20% more refined, then it'd just be down right drool. Anyhoo, i've got my 5 teks, 5 full rigged, and mostly world dominated so…. i'm pretty much done with it.
did a bunch of laundry today as well as other cleaning…
apparently twisting / turning / lifting the heavy laundry basket wasn't the greatest idea… re-tweaked my back a bit :(
gonna take a couple days to get over it…. might mean i can get back to this…
here's hoping :)
Old people!
Work's been real busy for the last few days, back is hurting more because of it… so….. no progress on anything yet.
Tomorrow (today? Thursday) is gonna suck as well. Dunno about friday or the weekend.
great list!
past week has been weird for trying to work on things. dunno if gonna get a chance this weekend… busy saturday, and sunday night gotta get ready for an IP change at work … so… i dunno.
an artist later, or something, can pick better fonts :P. functionality is primary concern atm. i expect NOTHING of the current screenshots posted to end up in any type of final release (or beyond this one, honestly).
the ability to animate the buttons is there, but right now they're just 3 frames total except 1 demo button. But that's still currently ~60 graphics in buttons alone.
province gui buttons done and ugly as ever.
main category click displays appropriate sub categories.
i'll continue to hard code in some 'this does that' and 'display this here' stuff tomorrow… but… now i can start actually doing some limited 'click on something, assign general(s), rpn shit processes'.
still debating how i wanna handle modable gui stuff. prolly just identify things by strings and string compare stuff for appropriate function call etc.
Quote:If Cao Cao was silly enough to let you take province 12, it's his own fault! Especially since you can reinforce it form 29 if needed.RAGE
:finger: :finger: :finger: :finger: :finger: :finger: :finger: :finger:
29 isn't apart of the battlescape!
…. moving on ….
buttons are nearing completion… code stuff to get them into the project are nearing done… (don't do anything, but they'll be there before i'm done tonight).
Quote:I specifically mean having a large number of officers in the battle. The exact number they directly control presumably depends on the battle leader's int and their title, but I can see Zhuge Liang having total control unless it's a pretty big battle (think northern campaigns).(leader int / 10) is an easy number. and 3 for gov'ner, 5 for ruler as well. then you gotta figure out how this meshes with blockies.
Zhang Fei: sigh… i thought i've made it clear by now it was used as hyperbole ? should we also argue on your Jin Xuan conqueror of worlds title ?
Unit types: having beaten 3, and played a bit of 4… I found the unit types, as implemented, to be annoyingly useless (with the AI being even more stupid with it).
An alternative might possibly be a command to say 'shoot arrows', that is affected by general stats / arms level… or something (possibly costs money or takes money to "prepare" for during civil stuff).
Skills: i'd prefer a 1-100 style stat rather than discreet levels. Keeps with the 1-100 theme of the original.
If they're a good or bad idea overall, I dunno.
Quote:I recommend that we go with lead/int/pol/cha (with high-war officers getting high skills for dueling and training).high … what ? that stat's not in the list you gave :)
2: int/war/chr
3: int/pol/chr/str/army (and possibly navy but whatever).
while i don't particularly have a problem with breaking int into int/pol, breaking up war into str/army was… irritating imho :).
after i get a lot of the current 'needs to get done' shit out of the way… i'll prolly set up a way to have dynamic general stats… so people could create as many general stat types as they want (along with a way for the math/rpn to be able to reference them). this way people can come up with whatever they want heh. Anorexia stat go!
supply depots: interesting thought.
it'd make for a bit more strategy / planning perhaps, and also make more use for gold during invasion. i wonder how difficult it'd be to setup the typical castle siege then (surrounding the castle / simul attacking, defenders are around) …
might make fire overly powerful on the defensive side too (castle ppl tend to fire a lot… that hitting a nearby supply depot seems very likely).
cost/refund stuffs: while it makes sense to get something back, 'gold' doesnt really seem appropriate heh. i agree with some kind of refund, though (even if simplified down to 'gold').
Quote:The retreat command is basically dropping everything (weapons, armor, food, game boys, etc.) and fleeing for safety, presumably while shrieking like a little girl. Okay, maybe not THAT much, but they're not going to hold onto extra weight that burdens them, nor is it in any way controlled.But again — how could you possibly make it mesh with the game ? The idea is fine, but I see ZERO way of implementing it outside of 'arms' level going down.
a) no rice pot / supply depots
a1) does starting rice/gold get split proportionally among each unit at start of battle ?
a2) lets say chen deng had the most troops and he gets mowed through by zhang yan.
a3) chen deng flees
a4) although he had few troops afterwards, he had a high proportion of the rice compared to the rest of the army
a5) the rest of the army is now fucked ?
b) rice pot or supply depots
b1) how does this affect anything then ?
Quote:If the invasion is of province 13, then only provinces adjacent to 13 can be added. 14 will become an acceptable target, but troops from 11 will simply appear on 12's border, and may have to trek all the way across 12 and halfway across 13 before they get to fight.Way to be all over the board there :(. No frame of reference, etc.
Do we now have generals being transported from 11 to 14 (three provinces away) within 1 month's time (assuming 11 reinforcing 12 after a month's worth of combat has already occurred).
Quote:Why yes, province 30 would indeed lose most of its monthly commands; they know that it may get caught up in battle, so they can't risk sending out a shipment of rice only for the enemy to confiscate it! The only acceptable commands would be in-city commands (such as Reward) and military commands (such as Train).The rice command seems to be a red herring…
Yeah, was wanting to be able to implement *some* civil commands for a province while entangled in war … (rotk2 just simply locks you out completely)
But…. for the 30/13 war … ya shouldn't really be able to cheese it like that, depending on whatever you were referring to heh. Much like being able to cheese the original rotk2 was evil (locking up a province in combat).
Allowing some/many commands within the civil part of the game while within engulfed in combat would prolly solve a lot of those worries.
Quote:Presumably the combat end is not month-based; it's when every provinces has nbo enemy forces left. When Zhuge Liang sees that 13 is going to falling, it's only sensible to send the spare troops off to attack 12.You're mixing two things.
1) end of combat
2) the delineation between months for long lasting combats
Quote:As for troops being pursued as they withdraw form 12 to 13, we cna always add an exception for that case (say, "If enemy trops are within three tiles of yours, the battle continues". But we don't want things to be TOO complex!'too complex' lol.
blockies, ai's, limits on the player control, complicated battlescape situations for combat, skills, adding more base stats (int/war/chr -> int/pol/war/chr etc), a half dozen personality traits (aggressiveness, calmness, etc), abilities for generals to ignore a command, adding possibly more unit types, etc etc etc.
Something along the lines of 'within X tiles' is prolly workable. Possibly more like 'within X tiles of the boundary between provinces'.
Quote:If you go to take province A and wind up getting province B instead, that happens.No… that's not quite what I said.
Lets say that Province 30 wants Province 12.
They're not connected. Province 13 is in between them.
Province 30 and 13 are fairly evenly matched. Province 12, on the other hand is a little weaker.
Province 30 invades province 13, hoping that Province 12 will be used as reinforcements (thus putting it's castle on the battlescape). Luck works out, and it happens.
Province 30's army now completely skips Province 13's castle / army and heads directly for Province 12's castle… having ZERO interest in capturing 13.
Quote:EPIC BATTLESYeah, anyone that's played rotk2 several times has had a 2-4 province war front :). Depending on how the AI crumbles, it can then just collapse really quickly by the leader fleeing repeatedly after being defeated once and whittled down in troop counts.
Many of my rotk2 games would end with liu bei or liu biao hermitted in a single province with upwards of max soldiers… thus requiring several attacks within a single month to work it down.
should be heading home soon.
another thought.
searching for people to recruit: if a search fails, have either certainty or high confidence in a response saying if there is indeed anyone to be found or not. this way the player (or ai?) doesn't end up searching pointlessly.
similarly, would expanding the advisor's role such that they can give more hints into the inner workings of the system (ie: if someone might be available or other currently hidden stuffs). An advisor report sheet rather than singular blurb might be handy as well.
re: no one will be drunk
Just an example of extremely headstrong Fei :). Seemed like the ultimate way of expressing a hard to control general.
re: peasants are indeed peasants (able to be drafted without question)
well, rather, a draft option would be interesting (to push beyond a limit put in place that normal army->hire couldn't get beyond… such as being poor heh).
anyhoo, i suppose this is just going to mean that we'll not worry about making some stats affect the army gathering abilities ? maybe instead have it affect population loyalty, or the quality of troops received ?
ie, comparing say Sun Qian vs Zhang Fei
a) Sun Qian has godly charisma, thus population loyalty drop isn't nearly as bad as a drunk Fei beating people into line. (say, 3 points vs 15 points ?)
b) Zhang Fei has godly war stat – he happens to pick higher quality soldiers (or more hearty 'survive' the hiring process j/k), thus the soldiers he gets starts with a training of 15 vs the 3 of Sun Qian's pick ?
just an idea.
Quote:The player has direct control, EXCEPT for battles involving blockies and/or large numbers of officers'large numbers of officers' is quite dubious… complete dislike for the phrase or it's implications. maybe it'd require more explaining, i dunno.
blockies / ai / etc …. still in a massive state of flux lol. with trying to focus attention on other things haven't given it too much thought in trying to bring block-stuff into clarity. i really really really need to march forward with the gui stuff… sigh.
Quote:Deciding that the battle is over can mean no forces being left in a province the other side owns. , but if Zhuge Liang throws everything at 13 and it falls (along with all wei forces there), the battle ends before he can take 12. Of coruse, it's his fault he didn't send any forces to attack 12… XDThis seems abusable. Note, the whole prospect of expanding the battlescape to beyond the sole province under immediate contention is rife with abuse possibilities that we're still exploring heh.
First example: leaving a unit just inside of 12's boundaries just to keep the combat going at the end of the month.
Second example: 13 falls while 30 continues to march in 12. 12 starts to overcome attackers, but 12's forces are a day behind of 30's. 30 manages to cross the 13/12 border (back into 13) with 12 in very hot pursuit. Well, 13 now has only 30's forces in it despite 12 being right on the border ?
Third: 30 launches attack on 13, but the real goal is 12. Defenders happen to decide to send reinforcements from 12. Battlescape is now 30/13/12, just as 30 had hoped. 30 sends its troops, virtually ignoring 13 and pound on 12. During this process… all of 30's troops end up being not-within-13 while they are marching on 12. 13 is no longer being immediately contested ? What happens now ? Perhaps 12 falls, 13 and 30 have no enemy troops within, is the battle over ? Did 12 fall because the ruler clicked a checkbox (or whatever) ? Is there a special rule that states you have to take the original targeted province ? Does 30's ruler get to keep 12 ?
A simple solution to many of these questions would be:
1) battlescape only includes the initiating province of the attack and the contested province
2) victory is via either castle falling or a particular side completely withdrawing.
This does still have some abuse spots.
Keeping with 30/13 combat, but adding a situation for credibility… Ma Teng is in 14, expands with just himself and one other general into 13. Liu Yan Decides to attack 30->13. Ma Teng gets reinforcements from 14. Battlescape in this situation is 30/13. Ma Teng happens to send the spare general he had with him across provincial borders into 30, just to keep things "going"…. while stoutly defending 13 castle all by his bad-ass-self. Reinforcements arrive, but Liu Yan's forces can't really retreat / withdraw because of that place-keeper-spare-general within 30's territory… thus buying time for the reinforcements to march down and take 30's castle. 14 just took 30 ????
Another thought on the matter. If a big powerhouse province attacks a little one that has some stout defenders… and the defenders happen to park a general inside the attacking province's boundaries… they could theoretically keep the attacking province tied up in the battlescape stuff… forcing the big power house to abandon their province if they're unable to bring combat to a close (or to just suffer the loss of civil/planning turns).
One last thought on the matter (for the moment) – could always limit units in such a way that they can't advanced 2 provinces.
In the 30/13 war. If 12 comes to the defense of 13 — 12's units can't push into 30's provincial map.. only 13's units can ? This defies some logic given that at high levels of training, a unit can typically walk the height or width of the battlescape many times during the course of a month (providing that general is bored).
Quote:The battle will only expand to include a reinforcement province if it's adjacent to the original target — it will not expand the way a minor squabble [originally, anyway] in 1914 did!So no recursion. Once the battlescape is set (for what's involved), it's do or die for those 2-6 provinces (or more depending on map layout and who's involved).
Just to extend the question a bit further….
The month comes to a conclusion and there's no victor, thus the battle rages on. Reinforcements to the area affect the battlescape how ?
Battle starts out as 30 invades 13. 12 immediately decides to help defend 13 (same ruler for simplicity sake). Thus we have a battle scape of 30, 13, 12… right ?
The month of battle finishes out with, say, a complete stalemate. Can 20, 11, 33, or 32 join the battle ? Technically, the provinces near them are in a state of combat…
A slightly off question…. with, say, just the 30 invades 13 battle… if the battle lasts more than a month … does 30 lose it's monthly civil / planning "turn" because it's embroiled in a battle (much like how 13 would traditionally) ?
