Subdued Animals in C2C discussions

[Dancing Hoskuld]

I am changing this first post to describe what needs to be done to get a new animal into C2C.

Status: beginning to draft

If you have the possible graphics for a new animal you want to add to Caveman2Cosmos this tries to explain how to get it in game. Currently it is assumes you are getting the graphics from the Zoo Tycoon community.

Before you start best practice for working on one or two new animals in C2C.

You are going to type the name of the animal many times, or copy and paste it a lot. It will be used in file and folder names.

C2C Standards to keep in mind

There can be no spaces in any of the folder or file names because parts of BUG/BULL will not work with them.

Schema files copied from the C2C core XML folders must be renamed to match the folder they are in. There are two reasons for this​

• You wont accidentally overwrite the schemas in game memory. This may have been fixed in C2C but if you are working on other mods it can cause problems if the files are not synchronized.
• C2CXmlValidator uses it.

The My_Modules folder is used for Test and First Release. Modules there include optional content but also includes stuff that will be merged into the core area before the Pre-release Freeze.​

Identify why you are adding it.

Things to that will always be needed:-

Animal Myth, Story and Stories buildings are needed by default.

Where on the planet does it spawn?

Is it a variant of an existing animal​

Other things to consider:-

Does it fit with any of the Elemental Myths or the Legend Myths?

Are there subdued and tamed versions of the animal?

Is it important to any religion?

Does it a new set of Cages/Enclosures of can it use an existing one?

Is it a megafauna animal? This requires unit art for the combat units as well.​

In the following <name> should be replaced with the name of the animal.

Step 1. Initial set up

1. Create a folder in Assets/Modules/My_Modules with the name of the animal. EG Assets/Modules/My_Modules/Crow
   
   If you are creating a lot of them at the one time consider creating a folder with your name in the My_Modules area and putting each animal in a separate folder inside that. This will cause a minor bit of extra work to get the art defines and game text schema definitions correct. You will need to add a .\ to the start of the path.
   
   
2. Copy the Unit and Buildings schema files from the core XML and rename them. IE change C2C to the name of the animal. EG C2C_CIV4BuildingsSchema.XML would become Crow_CIV4BuildingsSchema.XML
   
   
3. Copy the _Animal_Template folder from the "My_Mods (unloaded)" folder. (Note the "My_Mods (unloaded)" can have a space in its name because it is not loaded in game.)
   
   
4. Rename all the files, IE replace the initial AT with the <name> of the animal EG AT_CIV4ArtDefines_Unit.XML would become Crow_CIV4ArtDefines_Unit.XML

Step 2. Copying the art and giving credit.

1. In the work folder create an art folder called art/units/animals/<name>. EG art/units/animals/Crow
   
   
2. Use 7zip to open the Zoo Tycoon community content file.
   
   
3. Find <name>/entities/units/animals/<name>
   
   
4. Copy every thing from there (2.3) to the art folder created 2.1.
   
   
5. In the <name>_CivGameText.XML file and credit who you got it from after Graphics Source: in the pedia entry. This has not been done on most because I was just handed the art files with no idea of the source.
   
   
6. While you are here replace all CROW with the uppercase name of the animal and all Crow with proper case name of the animal. Or do it as part of the next step.

Step 3 Rough out the basics.

1. In all files in the work folder replace all CROW with the uppercase name of the animal and all Crow with proper case name of the animal.
   
2. You will now almost have a working but not playable unit.

Step 4. Create buttons...

Still waiting for TBird to put the stuff for making buttons up or I could make some guide lines for this.

I have parts of buttons for Story and Stories and somewhere for cages.

Step 5. Detailing the animal

Spoiler Old opening post :

Since I have merged many of the animals which were in the Subdued Animals mod into C2C I should probably create a thread here for discussions.

Here 'tis.

Subdued animals can be used to

- create buildings
- be butchered for food , hammers and gold; You get more from butchering in one of your cities than you do in the wilderness and somewhere in between if you are within your cultural boarders.
- fight in "games" in your arena for money and happiness
- be studied for science and culture. All these bonuses are small.​

Captured Sea Creatures come in two types "Tales of..." which are adventurer and fisherman stories told about the creature; and "Subdued .." which is the actual creature. Which version you get depends on the animal and the tech you have.

Sea Creatures

Sea critters are different to land animals because your capital may not be on the coast. Which means that if it was not on the coast you would not have any sea critter myths. To fix that I made it so that you can choose where you want the myths to go by making a "Myth of the Sea" which is the same restriction as Palace for the other myth buildings. The "Song of the Sea" stops you being able to build any myth buildings in other cities.

At the start of the game you only get "Tales of ...". When you capture a sea creature you get , and "Tales of..." back at the nearest city. The "Tales of..." can then be used for a Myth building or +1 and +1. You can't butcher them because you already have.

As time goes by you start to be able to capture sea animals, the smaller fish first. Depending on your latitude and what Admin buildings you have subdued fish can build "Fish Pens" and later "Coastal Fisheries".

At "Marine Biology" you can start to capture the larger sea animals. "Marine Biology" opens up a number of sea creature related buildings.

"Tales of Narwal" and "Tales of Dugong" can build myth buildings in any city.

Options

There are ways you can modify how Subdued Animals work in caveman2Cosmos

• how alter animals spawn
• if subdued animals teleport back to the nearest city or not. Originally you needed to escort all animals safely home and many people like that aspect but others don't. The AI knows how to escort animals.

These are set in the XML file A_New_Dawn_GlobalDefines.XML found in the Assets/XML folder. The variables are

• ANIMAL_SPAWN_MODIFIER for the rate animals spawn at a value between 100 and 200 seems to work best. Set this value to zero (0) if you want to play without animals.
• DONT_ESCORT_SUBDUED_LAND_ANIMAL if set to 1 subdued animals will teleport to the nearest land city. Default is teleport.
• DONT_ESCORT_SUBDUED_SEA_ANIMAL for sea creatures rather than land animals.

 

[Hydromancerx]

I am curious, now what the new spawning system for animals what resources spawn what animals?

Also can some animals be limited (or at least more frequent) in some of the new terrain features such as Pandas in Bamboo or Giraffes in Savanna?

Also I think the Giraffe Archer, Zebra Chariot and Zebra Knight should get like +25% Savanna Attack.

 

[Dancing Hoskuld]

I am curious, now what the new spawning system for animals what resources spawn what animals?

Also can some animals be limited (or at least more frequent) in some of the new terrain features such as Pandas in Bamboo or Giraffes in Savanna?

Also I think the Giraffe Archer, Zebra Chariot and Zebra Knight should get like +25% Savanna Attack.

I repeat animal spawning is resource based at the moment, not terrain based so noting spawns in bamboo or savanna if there is no resource there.

Frequency is by animal as is which resources they spawn from. So while most cows spawn from the cow resource some do from other resources also. Cave Bears spawn mostly from their natural food resources - deer and bison with some from horses and cows.

 

[EldrinFal]

Since I have merged many of the animals which were in the Subdued Animals mod into C2C I should probably create a thread here for discussions.

Here 'tis.

The main thing I am looking into is allowing subdued animals to be butchered for food , hammers and gold. This has some difficulties, mostly to do with not causing OOS in multiplayer mode. As a short term fix, I am looking at using the current missions for hurry production or trade.

Glad to hear you're working on that. I think you mentioned before that the animals could be "sold" so the trade option makes sense (sell or butcher then sell parts). For hurrying production... I'm on the fence. I think maybe once the right Domestication tech is researched I suppose that could work for a small amount of hammers.

 

[philipschall]

Animals could also be given as gifts for a relation bonus with another leader. There would have to be a limit on this, however.

 

[Dancing Hoskuld]

Also I think the Giraffe Archer, Zebra Chariot and Zebra Knight should get like +25% Savanna Attack.

Done.

 

[Hydromancerx]

Yay!

 

[ori]

not sure where to put it:

could it be changed (back, I think) so that the subdued animal spawns on the tile the capturing unit is after the battle? Right now what happens is that the subdued animal is placed on the tile the capturing unit occupied prior to the battle, in cases where the animal attacks this is fine, but if I attack a lone animal my hunter (or whatever) moves into the attacked tile while the animal spawns on the tile my hunter came from, leaving it essentially defenseless to any nearby units.

 

[Dancing Hoskuld]

not sure where to put it:

could it be changed (back, I think) so that the subdued animal spawns on the tile the capturing unit is after the battle? Right now what happens is that the subdued animal is placed on the tile the capturing unit occupied prior to the battle, in cases where the animal attacks this is fine, but if I attack a lone animal my hunter (or whatever) moves into the attacked tile while the animal spawns on the tile my hunter came from, leaving it essentially defenseless to any nearby units.

The previous way had the same problem but less often. I will see what can be done.

 

[ori]

is it by design that zebras are now strength 2 but magically double their strength after a hunter wrestled them into submission?

 

[EldrinFal]

is it by design that zebras are now strength 2 but magically double their strength after a hunter wrestled them into submission?

Dancing Hoskuld lowered the Str of the Zebra unit. He must not have lowered the Subdued version.

 

[strategyonly]

Wow some of these NEW changes are really getting fantastic, its like a mini-mini-mod inside a mod-mod-mod-mod

 

[Nevets_]

Just wanted to let you know that the new Subdued crocs can build Governor's pets but can't build Governor's Menagerie.

 

[Koshling]

I just came across subdued hyena belonging to the barbarians! How can that happen?

 

[Dancing Hoskuld]

Just wanted to let you know that the new Subdued crocs can build Governor's pets but can't build Governor's Menagerie.

Thanks I'll fix it.

I just came across subdued hyena belonging to the barbarians! How can that happen?

Someone subdues an animal and then the barbarians capture it back. You can capture it back or capture other nations subdued animals.

 

[strategyonly]

I just came across subdued hyena belonging to the barbarians! How can that happen?

Someone subdues an animal and then the barbarians capture it back. You can capture it back or capture other nations subdued animals.

Yeppers thats exactly what happened to me also, i subdued one, then the barbs took it back, then i subdued it back to me again, all the same animal, i thought that was pretty nifty. And hence killing the barbarian at a lower health str.

 

[Nevets_]

You guys were talking about having trouble using the herd buildings like you wanted to in the SVN, that having them give the FREE_BONUS was causing infinite loops, etc. I was wondering if you though about making the herd building into an ability the animals would use that would place that resource on a random tile within range of the city.

You could restrict the ability to only be usable on a city square, and only if there wasn't an identical resource in range already (because you can't have multiple herds now). This would have the side effect of also enabling all the vicinity buildings without require any changes to them.

 

[Dancing Hoskuld]

You guys were talking about having trouble using the herd buildings like you wanted to in the SVN, that having them give the FREE_BONUS was causing infinite loops, etc. I was wondering if you though about making the herd building into an ability the animals would use that would place that resource on a random tile within range of the city.

You could restrict the ability to only be usable on a city square, and only if there wasn't an identical resource in range already (because you can't have multiple herds now). This would have the side effect of also enabling all the vicinity buildings without require any changes to them.

Yes, it has been thought of. It requires some fairly simple changes to a complex bit of code, will cause turn slow downs (although we may have a way around that now), and wont be multi player safe. By which you can take it that I have tried but not gotten very far with it. The initial method I tried was incompatible with the Great Farmer mod. You could have one or the other but not both.

 

[strategyonly]

An alligator in the Grasslands?? I have heard of "Snake in the Grass" but not this?

 

[Koshling]

An alligator in the Grasslands?? I have heard of "Snake in the Grass" but not this?

Speaking of gaters - in my game the sea is totall evoid of any animal life so far (almost to 1AD, have boats - no animals at all)