[SDK] Combat Engineers (New Promotions and Game Mechanics!)

DOWNLOAD 0.5 alpha 6/23/08: View attachment Engineer.rar BTS 3.13

What this mod is:

This mod adds 7 new promotions that incorporate the idea of Combat Engineers. The icons and lots of the ideas in the mod where taken from the US Corps of Engineers website and actual history. In ancient times, Greek soldiers where capable of building roads and forts, and throughout history there have been regiments dedicated to Engineering tasks. This mod will be added to my Strategic and Tactical Warfare Mod as well.

Testing and Source Code
As this is alpha versions there may be bugs. Please report anything you find that doesn't seem correct or causes crashes and errors. SDK Source Code is included. Only English is supported.

New Rules:

All Siege Engines (Machine Gunners not included) no longer disappear when destroyed. Instead they become disabled (can't move, attack, heal, bombard, etc) and no longer belong to its original owner. Any player can then take a Unit with any rank of Combat Engineer and move it into the space with the Disabled Siege engine and repair it. The siege unit will then belong to the player and is no longer Disabled.

Other Rules:

• Units that are disabled can't act in anyway.
• Any unit can move into the space with disabled units if there are no Enemy
  units present.
• The amount healed on Repair depends on the level of the Unit, its Rank, and some randomness
• All Disabled Siege Engines last for 10 turns before they will decay completely and are destroyed, thus removed from the game.
• Great Engineers can now "Enlist" to join a Unit. This gives the unit all 5 ranks of Combat Engineer. Also awards 5 xp to all units in the stack, and otherwise works as a Warlord Unit.
• Forts must be connected to the working city before extra bonuses are applied.
• For units to receive stack bonuses from Engineers they must stay in the same square as the Engineer, if they leave they lose the bonus.
• When a Combat Engineers work a tile two worker units are added to the unit for the duration of the work
• Combat Engineers can now build Forest Preserves and Workshops
• When a Great Engineer enlists to join a unit its graphic changes, it now wears a uniform appropriate to the era as shown in the screen shot. Thanks to the makers of the units I used, I'll have to go back and see who originally made them and make a better note when closer to final release.
  

AI Updates and Use of new rules

• will attempt to repair disabled siege engines
• will make use of the Combat Engineer and Civil Works Promotions
• rank 4 Combat Engineers will sometimes prioritize defending Cities
• rank 5 Combat Engineers will prioritize defending forts to obtain the extra
  bonuses when not at war
• rank 3 or higher Combat Engineers will often times follow workers to help them with their tasks and defense
• rank 3 or higher will build road, forts, etc.. during times of peace

New Promotions:

Things to add:

1. Graphics for Disabled Units actually show a Destroyed Unit instead of just Damaged ones.
2. Forts must be connected by roads before they receive bonuses from Engineers. This is done !
3. AI uses all rules
4. Great Engineers can "Enlist" or join a Unit as per a General, the Unit then auto receives all ranks of Combat Engineer. This is Done
5. Improved Animations for Solders who build roads and forts -Done
6. Engineers building roads and forts need to stack with normal workers work rate as to combine efforts. DONE
7. Help note on Engineer Rank 5 should mention the increase in build rate

Things to add for the AI:
1. will sometimes Enlist Great Engineers
2. will make use of soldiers building roads and forts -Done
3. Paratroopers make use of rank 5 Gunships
4. AI makes better use of the Engineers stack bonuses


Help needed:
If you can mod some new Graphics of all the Siege Engines in a destroyed state and post them, that would be great! Or if you can come up with any better Great Combat Engineer units also let me know!

Interesting concept and implementation. However, what happens to all those siege units once they become outdated? If they are never really destroyed, does that mean that players will enter the Modern Era with a bunch of abandoned trebuchets sitting on grassland tiles near their cities?

Great idea, Kailric, and it sounds like a great implementation!

Vrenir said:

Interesting concept and implementation. However, what happens to all those siege units once they become outdated? If they are never really destroyed, does that mean that players will enter the Modern Era with a bunch of abandoned trebuchets sitting on grassland tiles near their cities?

Click to expand...

Oh yeah, I forgot to add one note:

-All Disabled Siege Engines last for 10 turns before they decay completely and are destroyed.

In that case, brilliant!

Very cool mod. :b:

Kailric said:

2. Forts must be connected by roads before they receive bonuses from Engineers

Click to expand...

Is it possible to extend this to making Medic promotions only work if the unit is on a connected plot?

Ninja2 said:

Is it possible to extend this to making Medic promotions only work if the unit is on a connected plot?

Click to expand...

Yes its possible and I actually just finished coding something to that effect. The code I have at the moment only allows healing if you are connected to a City. I was just testing to see what could be done and it works great. So, you want it coded that Medics have to be connected to Cities by roads before the can help heal? Just how would you like to get the code.. in my Engineer mod, a mod to itself, or do you just need the Source Code files that I edit?

I just upload alpha 0.2. Great Engineers can "Enlist" to join a unit is now implemented and other changes/fixes as well.

If you think it fits with your engineer mod, that medics can only heal if connected to a friendly (vassals would do) city, by all means include it in your mod. By the same token, I also think that Engineers IV should also only give their 10% to mechanical units, if they're connected to a friendly city.

I think the above will go a long way to simulate supply lines. Will it work in enemy territory, that's my only concern... and could we teach the AI to pillage its own roads to cut off an enenmy stack with medics in its own territory? That would be awesome!

Ninja2 said:

If you think it fits with your engineer mod, that medics can only heal if connected to a friendly (vassals would do) city, by all means include it in your mod. By the same token, I also think that Engineers IV should also only give their 10% to mechanical units, if they're connected to a friendly city.

I think the above will go a long way to simulate supply lines. Will it work in enemy territory, that's my only concern... and could we teach the AI to pillage its own roads to cut off an enenmy stack with medics in its own territory? That would be awesome!

Click to expand...

It would probably work best in a modcomp to itself, like a supply lines mod, so it can be added to larger mods with ease. Is there anything to the effect of a "supply lines" mod out there now? I was actually wanting to work on something like this for my S&TW mod so figuring out how to code it all is something I am interested in anyway.

I started a new thread for developing a Supply Lines mod. Check it out here http://forums.civfanatics.com/showthread.php?p=6874568#post6874568

Wow, this is a very cool concept.

Jeckel said:

Wow, this is a very cool concept.

Click to expand...

Thanks, check it out and send some feed back.

I just uploaded the version 0.3 alpha. The major changes are:

1. Great Engineers that Enlist to join a unit now don a uniform according to the current era.
2. Engineers that build roads and forts now stack with normal workers in the same space that are also building a road or fort.
3. Rank 5 engineers build roads and forts at twice the rate.
4. Changed the animations for soldiers who build roads and forts from pillage to just fortify as modern units looked silly shooting guns when they work.

Update 0.4 is up now, this update fixes a CTD and adds the ability for the AI to use some of the new rules. More AI updates will come next patch.

AI Updates and Use of new rules

• will attempt to repair disabled siege engines
• will make use of the Combat Engineer Promotions
• rank 4 Combat Engineers will sometimes prioritize defending Cities
• rank 5 Combat Engineers will prioritize defending forts to obtain the extra bonuses when not at war

Uploaded 0.5 alpha

Changes:

-Added two new None Combat Promotions as below
-Combat Engineers who work tiles will be joined by two worker units to signify the unit is at work on a project
-Combat Engineers can now build Forest Preserves and Workshops
-Improved AI for Combat Engineers
-Changed the tech requirements on some of the Combat Engineer promotions to None

Civil Works I

• Help Workers build Improvements +50% faster when Fortified in same Tile
• -25% City Maintenance when Fortified within a City
• Tech: Civil Service
• Required Promotions: Combat Engineer IV

Civil Works II

• Civil Works bonus if Fortified within a City or Fort for all Adjacent Tiles: +1 Food to River tiles, + 1 commerce to Forest Preserve, +1 Production from Workshop or Forts
• Free Engineering Specialist if Fortified in a City
• Tech: None
• Required Promotions: Civil Works I and Combat Engineer V

This is definitely going into the next version of the Merged Mod, Kailric! Great work!

I'm a bit confused about the helicopters... can they do everything a gunpowder unit could, for instance? This rule: "Helicopter Class Units allow Paratroopers to paradrop from the space the Helicopter occupies." Sounds like the helicopter becomes a transport unit? Or can a para drop into a square with a heli, regardless of range? Or am I missing something (highly likely!)?

Would this rule: "Reduce Bombard, Air Bomb, and Air Strike Damage by 2 times Fortify Bonus (10% - 80%) for all units in the stack" work with Dale's Combat Mod, do you know?

Ninja2 said:

This is definitely going into the next version of the Merged Mod, Kailric! Great work!

I'm a bit confused about the helicopters... can they do everything a gunpowder unit could, for instance? This rule: "Helicopter Class Units allow Paratroopers to paradrop from the space the Helicopter occupies." Sounds like the helicopter becomes a transport unit? Or can a para drop into a square with a heli, regardless of range? Or am I missing something (highly likely!)?

Would this rule: "Reduce Bombard, Air Bomb, and Air Strike Damage by 2 times Fortify Bonus (10% - 80%) for all units in the stack" work with Dale's Combat Mod, do you know?

Click to expand...

Howdy, Yeah, helicopters do everything a gunpowder unit can do as far as Engineering goes. They have one extra benefit though at higher ranks. They allow Paratroopers to Paradrop from the space that the Helicopter occupies, that is Paratroopers normally can paradrop from cities and forts, now they can paradrop from any tile that a rank 5 Gunship occupies. In essence the Helicopter carries out paradrop missions, buts its the Paratroopers that actually do the command as normal.

I am not sure how "Engineering" this ability is but it was a thought that came to me as I was working on this and so I put it in.

And yeah, the "Reduce Bombard, Air Bomb, and AirStrike Damage" can easily be merged with any Mod, its just a simple math equation.

Ninja2 said:

This is definitely going into the next version of the Merged Mod, Kailric! Great work!

Click to expand...

One thing I wanted to mention, before you start to merge anything, this still needs to be tested really good for any bugs. I am currently working on the Supply Lines mod (here) but when I get enough done there I'll come back to this to test it some more. So be sure to get in touch with me before you merge and I'll work with you on it.

Thanks

Well, I might just release beta version of the next Merged Mod, specifically to test out this and the supply lines. That way, you can also get feedback from the guys that play my mod. I'm sort of stuck right now, with 3.17 in the way. I'm waiting on other people to update their stuff, before I can do my next build, though.

Ninja2 said:

Well, I might just release beta version of the next Merged Mod, specifically to test out this and the supply lines. That way, you can also get feedback from the guys that play my mod. I'm sort of stuck right now, with 3.17 in the way. I'm waiting on other people to update their stuff, before I can do my next build, though.

Click to expand...

Damn, didn't know about 3.17.. will have to check that out now.

cool mod combat engineers are a great idea, also what files are involved in adding a promotion...i know thats a modding question but what the heck