Hurricane/Tornado mod possible?

[Owain]

Could you create barbarian camps that spawn Hurricanes as sea units (with appropriate graphics) and the ability to bombard coastal tiles?

Also, could the same camps spawn tornados as land units?

Or would it be best to make these some sort of flying barbarians unit for these and is any of that even possible?

Is it possible to have a barbarian camp such as this within a civ's cultural borders? In other words, make it somehow immune to cultural border advancement so it can continue spitting out weather effects throughout the game?

Thanks.

 

[Owain]

Would it be possible to just place a barb camp in the middle of the ocean for this purpose?

Also, could you alter the "There is a barbarian uprising near xxx" to something like "There is a major tropical depression forming at xxx..?"

 

[Dom Pedro II]

Well, the computer DOES spawn Barbarian galleys, but not from camps... I don't know if you really need the camps or not for your mod.

Also, it's not possible to have Barbarian camps continue to exist in spite of culture.

 

[WildWeazel]

If you can find the graphics for it, there shouldn't be any problem with it. the100thballoon (I think) started to do this recently but wanted to use air units somehow. The only problem is that the storms will continue to roam around the map attacking cities until they are defeated in battle, which is kinda strange.
Unless.... *Weasel Op smacks head in sudden brainstorm* if you give a unit 0 def and hidden nationality it can exist in the same tile as a foreign unit, and can only be destroyed by lethal bombardment. If you give the hurricane strong bombard power, it will attack settlements and ships, and if a ship tries to attack it, it will just bombard the ship. The only issue here is that the AI tends to relentlessly follow the unit around trying to kill it.

Changing the text is simple, just find the .txt file with the popup warnings and alter it.

 

[Owain]

Any chance of someone animating something like this as a unit graphics? Just looking for a little roatation. I have no idea how to do it... Its fine if it looks jerky and unreal... I'll be happy if it looks like a time-lapse satellite photo tbh

I want to play around with this some and see how it works... I found a tornado earlier too, but now I dunno where I put it.

 

[WildWeazel]

nevermind, I forgot what thread I was reading

 

[Owain]

What did you say? I think I'm going to have to try to figure out how to make a unit... I don't need one yet to test out the idea anyway... I actually just remembered that I once played a fantasy mod that had a spell effect with lightening strikes. I think I might use that as the attacking unit and use a static hurricane graphic for the barbarian camp... And I'm very interested in trying out your idea of 0 def and HN flag for a bombarding unit... that might be just the ticket if it allows other nations to be on the same tile and can still bombard.

 

[denyd]

Owain: Try this create a new unit (hurricane) to replace the barbarian galley. Give it bombardment ala the Dromon (adding the lethal option if you want it to be really nasty). Give it a bombard range of 2 (or 3 to make it nastier) and select the number of shots per turn. For offense & defense, you'll probably want little number, otherwise you'll never be able to get rid of it. Once somebody discovers Map Making, these little buggers will begin terrorizing you coast lines.

Another idea is the 'killer fog' that was used in the GOTM (circa game #18-22) where you had to kill your way from shore to other islands.

 

[Sir Donald III]

Actually, I'm wondering what would happen if you set the "Cruise Missile" Flag on it. (And AI Strategy.)

Would it go straight to town, bypassing any ships in its path? Or would it just fizzle out on the nearest Curragh?

Or would it be impossible due to a requirement that a Cruise Missile be a Land unit

 

[Dom Pedro II]

Actually, I'm wondering what would happen if you set the "Cruise Missile" Flag on it. (And AI Strategy.)

Would it go straight to town, bypassing any ships in its path? Or would it just fizzle out on the nearest Curragh?

Or would it be impossible due to a requirement that a Cruise Missile be a Land unit

Well, if it's anything like how the AI usually uses a Cruise Missile, it'll just sit very quietly and not do anything.


On another note, I tried making a hurricane recently... so far... the results are not promising....

 

[Sword_Of_Geddon]

If I could, I'd use Hurricanes for a sci-mod involving weather control...

Heres a Hurricane unit line...

Thunderstorm......Tropical Depression.....Tropical Storm.....Catagory One Hurricane.....Catagory Two Hurricane.....Catagory Three Hurricane.....Catagory Four Hurricane.....Catagory Five Hurricane.....Catagory 6 Hurricane(The Ultimate Storm)

 

[Owain]

Ok, here's what I've found... The AI won't do anything with a naval unit with 0 def... probably because you need to give a unit at least 1 def in order to check the naval power flag... also, when i run into one of my 0def "hurricanes" it just disappears... there's no two units sharing the same tile going on.

So what i was thinking... If you had an naval unit, with say a lethal bombard of 5 or so with one movement it could simulate a hurricane int he following manner:

1. The bombard explosion animation would have to be some sort of gusty windy thing... maybe make it just have gathering clouds and lighting and windy sound effect?

2. The unit would either be invisible or maybe a gathering of clouds, or maybe even just a static hurricane.

3. It would have a def of one and naval power flag

4. its death animation would basically be the same as the bombard animation, so when a regular unit runs into it, it won't just sink or really even look like its fighting at all... it will trigger more windy sound effects and just sort of disappear... this can cause it to do damage, or not necesarily... but the point is, it doesnt look like a unit dying, so much as a storm dissipating... only REAL problem there is that the unit running into it will look like its attacking.


Does this sound reasonable/plausible? Does anyone have any more suggestions? I'm new to this stuff myself, so sorry if i'm missing anything obvious.

 

[Dom Pedro II]

Ok, here's what I've found... The AI won't do anything with a naval unit with 0 def... probably because you need to give a unit at least 1 def in order to check the naval power flag... also, when i run into one of my 0def "hurricanes" it just disappears... there's no two units sharing the same tile going on.

So what i was thinking... If you had an naval unit, with say a lethal bombard of 5 or so with one movement it could simulate a hurricane int he following manner:

1. The bombard explosion animation would have to be some sort of gusty windy thing... maybe make it just have gathering clouds and lighting and windy sound effect?

2. The unit would either be invisible or maybe a gathering of clouds, or maybe even just a static hurricane.

3. It would have a def of one and naval power flag

4. its death animation would basically be the same as the bombard animation, so when a regular unit runs into it, it won't just sink or really even look like its fighting at all... it will trigger more windy sound effects and just sort of disappear... this can cause it to do damage, or not necesarily... but the point is, it doesnt look like a unit dying, so much as a storm dissipating... only REAL problem there is that the unit running into it will look like its attacking.


Does this sound reasonable/plausible? Does anyone have any more suggestions? I'm new to this stuff myself, so sorry if i'm missing anything obvious.

Okay, did you remember to set the Hidden Nationality flag for the Hurricane unit? That's very critical for the sharing-tile feature to work...

Secondly, can you at least set it to explore? That way it'll just sort of cruise around and if it happens upon a victim, it will strike...

 

[Owain]

Okay, did you remember to set the Hidden Nationality flag for the Hurricane unit? That's very critical for the sharing-tile feature to work...

Secondly, can you at least set it to explore? That way it'll just sort of cruise around and if it happens upon a victim, it will strike...

Yes... see first attached for my editor settings.. I also had lethal sea bombard set. With these settings it just sits there and does nothing and when I run into it with a ship it just dies.

Only way I've gotten them to do damage this way is via ZoC, which is sort of pointless since you can then just run into it with no trouble rather than bothering to go around it and ZoCed

I can't get it to move with zero def and no naval power flag...

 

[Dom Pedro II]

But did you remember to give it an attack value and hidden nationality to allow it to occupy the same space as another unit??

 

[Owain]

Yeah... sorry.. you prob missed the attachments since i edited them in right after i postex... didn't expect such a quick response... it has an attack rating and HN flag. it just dies if you run into it and doesn't move. am i missing something obvious? :/

 

[Dom Pedro II]

Get rid of the operational range... that might be the problem.

 

[Owain]

ok, did that and they still just die.. I don't get it. I also created a tornado (land-based) unit to see if it was just a problem with sea units and the same thing happens.. I must be misunderstanding something here... Oh well, gotta get to bed... thanks for the help Dom.

Edit: Did one last test... here's the problem: It doesn't work with barbarians. I placed some tornadoes on my debug map owned by civs other than barbs and they could ocupy the same tile... I guess "hidden nationality" doesn't work when you have no nationality.

Is there any workaround for this? Can I sacrifice a civ slot of "weather effects?" arg... bedtime.

 

[the100thballoon]

if you are still looking for a unit, I once converted the "chaos spell effect" so that it appears to look like a hurricane/tornado. I was really hoping to implement them in a patch in my Realism_Mod! If you figure it out PLEASE LET ME KNOW!!!

 

[Orthanc]

I've been recently thinking about a similar mod and here's my idea.

I don't think making it a unit will work out, however you could possibly have hurricanes and other disasters effect towns another way.

If you're using Conquests, try changing plagues into natural disasters. You could have them last a really short time and reappear alot. It might effect too big of an area for it to be normal, but hurricanes can be HUGE.

Just my idea.