Military Advisor

I notice the screenie in post #71 still reads 'Thread Index' Time for a global find and replace?

Two more nitpicks:

• If you open the MA with the Sit-Rep tab displayed, switching to the Units tab doesn't draw the minimap.
• One of my maps is big enough to force the combat experience bar so low that it partially covers the Units tab text.

Okay, I don't know what's actually wrong here - but with revision 708 I have no useable MA at all ! Installed BUG anew thrice to no avail...



Solutions appreciated, BUG is running fine apart from that.

Imhotep

Crap, I committed my half-done MA changes accidentally when I applied Amra's Sevopedia addition. I've fixed the problem. Sync up and try again, please. You should also now see Amra's addition.

I apologize for the partial commit. I deselected the wrong modified file.

The Doc said:

Just a small suggestion: I think it would be better to show the threat index even when the civ is an ally or vassal, maybe as empty bar with a title that tells that the civ is an ally or vassal respectively. That way it wouldn't look as if the index is broken or something.

Click to expand...

It shows for players that have a DP with you. I was going to add 'Vassal' and no progress bar for leaders that are someone's vassal. There are two extra columns that are added if vassals or DPs exist in the game ... one showing vassals and the other showing DPs.

EmperorFool said:

Change "Strategic" label on top line to "Strategic Advantage" and change the labels below to "Theirs" and "Ours". I assumed the advantage showed their advantage, so this would make it totally clear I think.

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Good suggestion - was never really happy with what I had.

EmperorFool said:

Perhaps include a modifier to the TI for WE? +10% maybe (1.1)?

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Not so sure on this because it is a little bit of double counting. They already have a higher threat index because of the negative attitude.

EmperorFool said:

If you open the MA with the Sit-Rep tab displayed, switching to the Units tab doesn't draw the minimap.

Click to expand...

I've seen that and haven't really developed a solution. The 'bringminimaptofront' command doesn't seem to work. Solution I have is exit F5 and restart - minimap comes up then. Not idea but it works.

EmperorFool said:

One of my maps is big enough to force the combat experience bar so low that it partially covers the Units tab text.

Click to expand...

Stop playing with big maps. Ok, quite happy to move the stupid thing around. What do you think of a panal that is the background for the map, progress bar and the unitlist panal?

MA status ...

• threat index - need to settle on the initial calculation routine and put it into play
• hide threat index if cannot see power - could include comment "n/a"?
• strategic units on the main screen
• hide strategic resource information if no tech and resource trading - see if I can include comment
• scrolling - looked at this last night, copied the code and it didn't work - will look again and then probably put it aside - done and committed (revision 645)
• Add list of leaders that the current leader has a DP with
• Add list of leaders that the current leader has vassalaged
• Adjust Threat Index to include reduction value for DPs
• Adjust Threat Index for leaders that are vassals (duplicate their masters or completely remove?)
• master icon - not enough room
• remove strategic units if player can build an upgrade of a unit
• cycle thru cities so that all units possible are included
• expose all text to XML for multi-language support
• BUG: If you open the MA with the Sit-Rep tab displayed, switching to the Units tab doesn't draw the minimap

Click to expand...

MA status for future release ...

• free up the main sort criteria (currently unit combat type) so that the user can select what it is - need drop down, refresh button and auto-refresh check box <-- EmperorFool has stuck his hand up for this one - good luck!
• glance screen
• worst enemy icon (only when patch has been released)

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Currently working on improving the strategic unit list for improved units and water units.

ruff_hi said:

Not so sure on this [modifier for Worst Enemy] because it is a little bit of double counting. They already have a higher threat index because of the negative attitude.

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Good point. I don't know the AI mechanics at all. The only thing about WE I do know is that if you trade with a WE you get negative diplomacy modifiers, and that doesn't apply here really.

I do know that I've seen an AI give me a penalty for trading with their WE only to scan the Glance tab to find they were at Pleased or Friendly with every civ. So they were pleased with their worst enemy. Nice. This is right up there with being at war with an AI that is still pleased with you.

ruff_hi said:

What do you think of a panal that is the background for the map, progress bar and the unitlist panal?

Click to expand...

That sounds fine to me. I'm quite happy to have it all on one panel like the FA, a single blue (or whatever) background behind everything.

Also, I continued the thing I started earlier -- showing GG-led units as another group in the list -- so I could get familiar with the original MA code, and have it working. I have the minimap showing up correctly all the time now with a minor related quirk. Once I get that done I'll commit.

To handle different groupings, I'd like to rewrite all the unit location code from scratch as I said earlier, and I won't be able to complete that today.

I'm flicking the whole 'deployment' screen to you - get wild!

Is it really necessary to copy the Glance tab to the MA? By enabling the hover for the leaderheads, you'd get the list of diplomatic modifers, and if you really want to you could add the attitude icons to the Sit Rep tab.

For the label "Will Declare On" how about "Will Declare War" or "Will Go To War"? Hmm, "Will Declare War On" would be great, but it makes the column so wide.

I can see myself want to go sit-rep, glance and back and forth - thought it would be good to have it very handy. The sit-rep uses icongrid which doesn't seem to support all of the hover text that you might want. I looked into adding the attitude icons but, again, icongrid does some fairly draconian text formatting. I'm thinking of freeing that up with format parameters but that is certainly something for down the track.

What about "Declare?" or "Declare On?"

True about IconGrid, though it does have the hovers for techs in the trade screen. How about at least getting the hovers for the units? Regarding the attitude icons, they are just characters in the font like the fist you already have.

This just popped into my head, though I don't think I'm sold on it. The fist is currently being used as "at war" in the scoreboard. Perhaps instead of using it again here for "mobilizing" (WHEOOH), we could use the flexed arm (power) or the movement (foot, as in mobilizing). Ick, I don't much like any of those. Just tossing out (bad) ideas.

I wanted to get "war" in the label since "declare" is ambiguous to me (you can declare peace). I was thinking "Will Attack", but then the AI will often DoW without actually attacking.

I did have attitude in there originally and icongrid made it look horrible.

The hover for units is 'WIDGET_TRAIN' which works ok for units that you can train but causes a crash for units that you cannot (ie roman preat). Is there another unit based hover that we could use? Also, I couldn't get the hover to come through correctly - kept saying that a phant was a stealth fighter (or something like that).

"Go to War?" or "War?"

You might have a problem late game. I tested revision 709 with my recent Emperor game. MA broken. Went back to a save from 275 BC, same game. MA absolutely fine. The save for investigation is attached. Oh, and can you win the game for me ?

Imhotep

·Imhotep·;6785642 said:

You might have a problem late game. I tested revision 709 with my recent Emperor game. MA broken. Went back to a save from 275 BC, same game. MA absolutely fine. The save for investigation is attached. Oh, and can you win the game for me ?

Click to expand...

Thanks for this game - I'll take a look at why the sit-rep isn't showing up. I cannot believe that you built your capital on coal - what were you thinking?

Edit: I put in some code to try and add columns for vassals and DefPacks but only if they are present. It seems my code for doing this is broken. I'll revisit and see what I can do.

Try WIDGET_PEDIA_JUMP_TO_UNIT.

Stealth oliphants!!! "Wait till the boys back at the Shire hear about this!"

Dunno about the heading. It's probably fine as it is now.

@ruff:

My guess it has something to do with PAs - as I have one with Ramesses but hadn't one 275 BC of course. Yet 275 BC Monty was a vassal of Mehmed and the MA worked just fine...I have the save if you want it.

Imhotep

Okay, I've committed what I have on the deployment screen. The redraw problems should be fixed, so please play around with clicking lots of things. I can now start on the new version.

Here are the two groupings I know of:

• Combat type + Lead by GG
• Location
  • Your Cities
  • Your Territory
  • Friendly Cities
  • Friendly Territory
  • Enemy Territory
  • Neutral Territory

For Location, do we need to separate Friendly into Team and non-Team? I doubt it, but just asking. And do we care about Cities vs. Territory for Friendly?

The determination of own/friendly/enemy should be made regardless of the unit's owner, right? Meaning selecting an AI will show you their units in your territory under "Your Territory/Cities", right? Can you think of a better word than "Your"? "Home"? "Own"? "Domestic"? Your civ's adjective, e.g. "Indian Cities"?

What other groupings can you think of?

Now that I think of it, for the Location grouping, will the secondary grouping still be unit type? If so, that means you'll see each unit type under each grouping. This will make the list much longer. For combat type, Archers only appear under the Archery group. With Location, it will appear under each group where there is at least one Archer. Should we group by combat type instead?

Certainly, it would be nice to have a secondary grouping dropdown as well, so you could select "Location"/"Combat Type" or "Location"/"Unit Type" for more detail. I suppose you could then select "Combat Type"/"Location". Is this much detail desired, and more importantly, truly useful?

I need more ideas for groupings as that will help me in designing the code and interface.