Elohim world effect (one time special)

blaise bailey · Feb 20, 2008

Well this is not just about Elohim but.. well firstly I love the addition of the one off specials but just a few minor tweaks would be nice

1. The Elohim special (which grants no access to an enemy for 30 turns) would be much clearer (and cooler) if it say.. had a glow around the civilizations boarders... like the ring of warding effect in a similar visual manner to the great wall... I had no idea why my units could not enter there boarders after declaring war.. which leads me onto part 2

2. Make it clear on both the startup screen and in the civilpedia what world effect each civ has... currently the only way to know is the play as the civilization and when crazy things happen in a game it can be hard to follow who or what it was

3. Finally, the world effect (one time use!) button is right down next to and in the same group as unit buttons (upgrades/commands etc). This can be really annoying (thankfully there is a "are you sure" type option if you click it") but also it seems a little out of place here... for something so powerful and important I think maybe it should have its own button... somewhere.. maybe next to the civilization banner button or something whilst making the banner button smaller or something..

Anyway just some minor things I thought i would mention, some of which you may have already planned...

Probably the best game modification I have played :goodjob:

P.S. Oh yea some summoned things can actually capture cities when I dont thing they should be able too, like the Azar (The big flying crown thing with a fireball inside it)

xienwolf · Feb 20, 2008

All summons except for Guardian Vines (cannot move) and Mistform (Hidden Nationality) can capture cities.

MagisterCultuum · Feb 20, 2008

Illusions cannot capture cities either, iirc. That means that no Svartalfar summons (except from druids or AV priests, or captured conjurers) can capture cities. I recommended making them all unable to capture cities when that was first mentioned for the illusions (Illusions bypass non-living units, so Kael was concerned that illusions would ignore golems and take over Luchuirp cities without a fight), so they wouldn't ba at a disadvantage.

Kael · Feb 20, 2008

A visual effect for Sanctuary would be cool, but thats a lot of work and is pretty low ont he priority list. The World Spell for each leader is already listed on the leader page in the pedia, on the dawn of man screen when you start the game, and with the leader definition when you choose the play now option.

Raizic · Feb 20, 2008

yeah but its not really clear what they do in some cases. We almost reloaded a game because my friend (attacking Elohim) thought it was bugged. He declared war a few turns after someone else had (and they cast sanctuary) so he had no idea why he couldnt' attack. Around the same time his units had been striking but he fixed that and they still wouldnt' go in. I eventually figured out it must have been a world spell and looked it up and confirmed it.

SwordofStriker · Feb 21, 2008

It is quite clear in the civilopedia when you look it up by spell, and I assure you the world spells are in there with a description of what civilization uses them and what they do. I was also under the impression it was listed on the screen when starting a new game (but I could be wrong there). If it is there, and you don't know what something is on that screen, it's entirely in your hands whether you look it up or not. If it's not, then yeah, it should be at least listed.

Are they not listed in the civilopedia under the civ entries? I don't know off hand and I'm not home to be able to check.

Also, I agree a visual effect for something like sanctuary would be pretty awesome. It always bugs me when I didn't pay attention and failed to notice they cast sanctuary. Meanwhile I'm trying to move my stack into their borders, or worse, part of one stack that was already there got frozen and another part was kicked out. Still, that was entirely my fault for not paying attention, and the game logs can be very helpful in that circumstance.

Psychic_Llamas · Feb 24, 2008

i think what Raizic means is that there needs to be a pop up when you choose your civilization explaining exactly the effects of each world spell. i know it is in the civilopedia, but there are a lot of civs, and a lot of spells to remember when you choose a civ.

i frequently have to read the civilopedia to check up on civs before i choose one to play. thats frustration going between the pedia in the menu and game start up.

A visual effect for Sanctuary would be cool, but thats a lot of work and is pretty low ont he priority list.

would it really be that difficult? i would have thought that it would be as simple as adding in a corner, horizontal, post, and vertical image to replace the great wall bits. the game would piece it toegether no? and simply re using the ring of warding effect should be simple (i havent worked with effects so i dont know here), just my 2c

Vehem · Feb 24, 2008

Psychic_Llamas said:
would it really be that difficult? i would have thought that it would be as simple as adding in a corner, horizontal, post, and vertical image to replace the great wall bits. the game would piece it toegether no? and simply re using the ring of warding effect should be simple (i havent worked with effects so i dont know here), just my 2c

I thought the same thing when I first read the thread, but it looks like it takes a fair bit of work more than I thought. The Greatwall is a fairly specialized LSystem it seems, and doesn't seem to play nicely with animated .nif effects

The first screenshot is replacing the Greatwall pieces with the ring of warding graphic, and the second is the same, but with the texture of the ring replaced by a solid-alpha colour.

Definitely possible, but as Kael said, it's going to take a while if you wanted to sort it out properly to produce a decent effect.

DharmaMcLaren · Feb 24, 2008

The first one doesn't look too bad - if it was just a solid wall that made stuff behind it see-through, the idea could be that the Elohim cast a spell that hides their entire nation, so their enemies just march right past it.

Vehem · Feb 24, 2008

Had another play around - the Great-wall graphic itself doesn't look too bad with a light-blue low-alpha texture. A bit obvious what it is and I'd still prefer the "Ring of Warding" style glow effect to a quick Greatwall reskin, but it does do the job in a pinch...

(The black line around it is the shadow - I should probably have made that completely transparent)

EDIT - Second screenshot is a closeup without the shadow

xienwolf · Feb 24, 2008

Will it remove itself when the spell ends though?

kenken244 · Feb 24, 2008

I think that a great wall reskin actually would look good. It is magic after all, and a giant wall is a good representation of a giant protective spell.

desemondez · Feb 24, 2008

Kinda off-topic, but Sidar's default border needs to be changed.... it's difficult to distinguish grey and the normal terrain

Vehem · Feb 24, 2008

xienwolf said:
Will it remove itself when the spell ends though?

With

Code:

	def doTurnElohim(self, iPlayer):
		pPlayer = gc.getPlayer(iPlayer)
		pCapital = pPlayer.getCapitalCity()
		iSanctuaryWall = gc.getInfoTypeForString('BUILDING_SANCTUARY_WALL')
		if (pPlayer.getSanctuaryTimer > 0) :
			pCapital.setNumRealBuilding(iSanctuaryWall, 1)
		else :
			pCapital.setNumRealBuilding(iSanctuaryWall, 0)

this code it would (plus the addition to doPlayerTurn to call it and the XML entry for SANCTUARY_WALL - a clone of the GreatWall XML, but with the effects removed - only bBorderObstacle is important to the behaviour), but it also requires that "getSanctuaryTimer" be exposed to Python - it's currently only visible within the DLL. It's a minor addition, but should allow the visual effect.

==
EDIT:

Code:

	def doTurnElohim(self, iPlayer):
		pPlayer = gc.getPlayer(iPlayer)
		pCapital = pPlayer.getCapitalCity()
		iSanctuaryWall = gc.getInfoTypeForString('BUILDING_SANCTUARY_WALL')
		pCapital.setNumRealBuilding(iSanctuaryWall, 0)

		if (pPlayer.getSanctuaryTimer > 0) :
			pCapital.setNumRealBuilding(iSanctuaryWall, 1)

It would probably work better this way - it means that the wall-effect should update with the cultural borders as well.

==

Code to be added to CyPlayerInterface2.cpp (I think)

Code:

		.def("getSanctuaryTimer", &CyPlayer::getSanctuaryTimer, "int ()")

I'm not going to make the changes to the DLL unless there's a huge demand for it - but I think this should cover the mechanic for adding the effect if Kael does decide that he wants it and adds the DLL changes.

==

The attachment includes the modified GreatWall skins

Vehem · Feb 24, 2008

desemondez said:
Kinda off-topic, but Sidar's default border needs to be changed.... it's difficult to distinguish grey and the normal terrain

But who really knows when they stray into Sidar territory anyway? A land of shadows and mystery indeed...

I did once have a game where I made contact with the Sidar early on (through a scout) but didn't notice that I could see a portion of their border for about 200 turns afterwards (despite looking for them). I kinda liked it - seemed appropriate somehow.

Psychic_Llamas · Feb 24, 2008

i actually really like those Vehem, especially the shadowless one. any chance of stretching the wall taller? or giving it a shimmering effect like water ripples or such, similar to what Winddelay did with his wraith?

But who really knows when they stray into Sidar territory anyway? A land of shadows and mystery indeed...

I did once have a game where I made contact with the Sidar early on (through a scout) but didn't notice that I could see a portion of their border for about 200 turns afterwards (despite looking for them). I kinda liked it - seemed appropriate somehow.

the same thing has happened to me countless times, and i also like it, its very, sidar-esqu. it would even be better if the sidar world spell made their borders and cities invisible to all players unless they were right next to them

desemondez · Feb 24, 2008

Vehem said:
But who really knows when they stray into Sidar territory anyway? A land of shadows and mystery indeed...

I did once have a game where I made contact with the Sidar early on (through a scout) but didn't notice that I could see a portion of their border for about 200 turns afterwards (despite looking for them). I kinda liked it - seemed appropriate somehow.

That's from the perspective of a non-sidar civ viewing a Sidar...

I was sidar and each time my borders expanded I had to strain my eyes (literally) to see where my border boundaries lie now and if I had any acquisition of new resources. In a sense it's more unnecessary micro-management to the casual player, and this problem is exacerbated as the game goes on when you acquire new cities :shifty:

Vehem · Feb 24, 2008

Psychic_Llamas said:
i actually really like those Vehem, especially the shadowless one. any chance of stretching the wall taller? or giving it a shimmering effect like water ripples or such, similar to what Winddelay did with his wraith?

What I've managed to do so far using the Greatwall LSystem is quite limited - it seems to ignore most of the settings from the ArtDefs and the .nif itself, including the scaling variables.

It also seems to not like animated textures/effects - when I used the .nif from the ring of warding it caused only a strange, static transparency effect (see above)

Psychic_Llamas · Feb 25, 2008

What I've managed to do so far using the Greatwall LSystem is quite limited - it seems to ignore most of the settings from the ArtDefs and the .nif itself, including the scaling variables.

It also seems to not like animated textures/effects - when I used the .nif from the ring of warding it caused only a strange, static transparency effect (see above)

oh thats a bugger

oh well, its still great

TheJopa · Feb 25, 2008

I don't even think its too hard to add. Spell effect is as-is, just as extra add a Great-wall like building in the capital for graphical effect and remove it when spell end.

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