FfH2 0.31 Changelog

Graphics will be added as we have need of them. As I mentioned those you mentioned will probably be returning. But as mentioned in the first post of the modding thread I wont add things to FfH that we wont use. That just increases the size of the mod, takes my time, and increases complexity. Im cool with getting good ideas, but I cant commit to adding things we wont use for others.

We probably won't mess with colonization rules. Thats something we inherited with BtS that isn't really very core to FfH. Im glad its in but its not high on my list of things to tweak.

We still have a few items on the "Shadow" design doc that I would like to get checked in. Morale and Wilderness are both promising but I dont know the implementation yet. Its one of those things that I may get inspired and drop it in on a slow Saturday or it may never get incldued if I can't figure out a good way to do it (at a code level).

Honestly we make a big design doc and then I go through adding features as they inspire me or they seem to have the most promise. At the end we always have a few features left over that don't get in. Maybe because we couldnt figure out how, or maybe because they just deem seem fun enough to justify the work. Sometimes features come in well after they are speced because something else happens (nearly all the new game options added after the BtS conversion were speced for "fire" but impossible to implement because you could only have 2 game options in vanilla). We will see.

Either way the scnearios need to be done and the team is eager to do design work (which we dont have much of for "Shadow" anymore). So they go off to the next phase while I work on bugs and stuff for this one. The only real difference here is that I wanted the team to be able to play one of the scenarios to get an idea of what I meant and I needed to make sure we could accomplish both of the 2 technical hurdles so I didnt make the team do a bunch of design work only to tell them it wasnt possible.

The side benifit to you guys is that you will probably be able to see some information on each of the "Ice" scenarios in the next patch (the scenarios themselves wont be included). There are 18 of them, and I hope that there are some for everyone.

I'm really looking forward to morale and hinterland mechanics, which I think should be a priority for the next full version (it might be a little much to include in a patch)

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Personally I won't be upset if morale doesn't get in.. I might even be secretly happy. Morale has been incredibly important in all armies in history, but from a fun gameplay perspective, it sounds really hard to make it 1) not frustrating and 2) not confusing, while still making it relevant. Is your army going to rout after a rough battle? Yuck, just have it eliminated.

Morale should really be more important at the tactical level than the strategic level where civ takes place, since (most, barring withdrawl) battles are all or nothing anyway.

Wilderness I think we should have in some form, even if it is just more varieites of lairs.

Anyway, since you've gotten Kael's attention, I'll add--please look at Magister's (I think) fix for pirate harbors (allow adjacent pirate coves in advanced form) and Xeinwolf's fix for Circle of Gaelen for one of the coming patches.

Chained events are such a pain. I really like the concept but since there is only a 2% chance per turn that event will trigger you wait at least 50 turns (on average) before you even have a chance that the next event in the series will come up. So it doesnt work out well.

I need a fix but I dont like xienwolfs solution (a building that triggers it). I need to figure out a code change to make chained events occur outside of the normal 2% so that we can start using them. the building fixes this chained event, but I dont want to do it for each of them.

i suppose it's not possible to make the occurance chance increase the longer the wait for it? say (n*x)% chance per turn, where n is the number of turns played since the last event, and x is a given number (probably somewhere between 0,5 and 5), to decrease the wait between events? I wouldn't know, i've never tried modding civ, but that's the way i'd do it if possible. The longer the next chain of the event is postponed, the more chance of the next section of the chain occurring

One thing I attempted to figure out, but couldn't do with XML is a timer. Make them guaranteed to happen, but not till X number of turns after the first one. I am pretty sure it would be rather easy to accomplish through Python.

xienwolf said:

One thing I attempted to figure out, but couldn't do with XML is a timer. Make them guaranteed to happen, but not till X number of turns after the first one. I am pretty sure it would be rather easy to accomplish through Python.

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Yeah, I use a similiar system to force the adaptive trait to trigger more frequently. It would have to be a python or SDK thing.

Well as long as we are bombarding you with wishes Kael i've got one. Is it possible to code the AI so they tend to or are forced to put more space between their own cities? The AI infamously sticks many of them overlapping each other making it almost imperative to raze as you conquer.

- feydras

Well, that is a viable strategy though. See the posts by Dalladin in the Cynergies thread under Strategy subforum And especially with the bonuses which the AI gets to production/commerce, it is a strategy which makes sense.

xienwolf said:

Well, that is a viable strategy though. See the posts by Dalladin in the Cynergies thread under Strategy subforum And especially with the bonuses which the AI gets to production/commerce, it is a strategy which makes sense.

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Except when the Kurotai do it with their 5 core cities. That's frustrating to watch.

Kael said:

It is "Ice" spec stuff. I have 2 technical hurdles I need to accomplish for the Ice scenarios so I spent a lot of time over the weekend getting one worked out and Talchas is working on the other.

The team is mostly working on "Ice" stuff, but Im split between that and fixes. The reason you are seeing frostings, Lucian, polar bears, etc showing up in the change logs is because they are used in the "Ice" scenarios (and the game options to disable orthus, disable acheron, etc are all because I dont want them in certain scenarios).

Remember "Ice" is nothing but the scenarios. We still need to add all the features that are used in those scenarios.

@kenken244: yeap, still gotta add that.

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So does this mean Auric Ulvin will be getting a world spell and be playable in this or an upcomming patch of shadow?

Auric already is playable in custom games, but for some reason his civ won't appear as an option until after you select him as a leader. You cannot play as the Illians in unrestricted leader game.

It has been specifically stated that the Illian world spell will not be implemented until Ice. (Although I'm going ahead and giving them one in my modmod, along with implementing the ice sphere and giving them disciple of the hand UUs)

MagisterCultuum said:

Auric already is playable in custom games, but for some reason his civ won't appear as an option until after you select him as a leader. You cannot play as the Illians in unrestricted leader game.

It has been specifically stated that the Illian world spell will not be implemented until Ice. (Although I'm going ahead and giving them one in my modmod, along with implementing the ice sphere and giving them disciple of the hand UUs)

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yes, but if ice is scenario only, why not unlock him, his civ and his world spell now?

Many of us understand how to make Auric playable, but I would like to second the worldspell idea. I hope that an Illian world spell is not scenario only and is available for random maps as well, just like the winterborn promotion. Kudos to Kael and company to finally come up with something that makes you want to play the Illians and Doviello in Tundra.

any timeline on the release of "n"?

also, which werewolf event is it?

thomas.berubeg said:

any timeline on the release of "n"?

also, which werewolf event is it?

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No timeframe.

The werewolf event is one of my own. Its a fairly simple judgement event. I thought about your foxford event (and I liked the reference) but I havent implmented anything like that.

Penguins ?

"Smile and wave, boys." (from Madagascar)

Kael said:

Chained events are such a pain. I really like the concept but since there is only a 2% chance per turn that event will trigger you wait at least 50 turns (on average) before you even have a chance that the next event in the series will come up. So it doesnt work out well.

I need a fix but I dont like xienwolfs solution (a building that triggers it). I need to figure out a code change to make chained events occur outside of the normal 2% so that we can start using them. the building fixes this chained event, but I dont want to do it for each of them.

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Can you just piggyback off the ability of an event to call another event on a later turn? i.e. the AdditionalEvents tag. If you need to add in some buffers perhaps create dummy events that are just roadblocks for the subsequent events in the chain and set the actual event as every other one. Flavor text can be put in the dummy events such as descriptions of some of Galen's experiments now that he has been allowed to continue or people are flocking to see him in action. Setup the follow up event to happen six times with increasing chances of happening, maybe 10% the one scheduled in five turns happens, 25% the second one in the list happens in ten turns, etc.

Maybe PythonCanDo as additional roadblocks on the actual events and set them up to automatically occur. I am not sure how many roadblocks you would want to put up.

Kael said:

Its to expensive. It would require checking on every move, and there is a lot of moves that happen each turn. Its a cool function, but isn't worth the cost.

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I have just started getting my hands dirty with the python aspects of Civ IV and I have a question about this:

Is there something inherent in the check for ancient forest Treants (which also uses the onUnitMove) command that is less expensive? I am trying to setup reactive fire from archers in forts, would an initial check to make sure it is in hostile territory make it less expensive?

I do believe that one is quicker because it is only checking the tile you moved to, not all the tiles around it.