Plead for a new parameter for spells and promotions

[Vorpal+5]

Hi,

I have started modding some things but I would really like to have one extra tool... But first, do you guys know about a game company called AGEOD? They have made some great historical games like one on the (American) Civil War and another on Napoleon... You can mod their games rather easily (I did that ) and there is a feature which is very cool on the abilities you can give to leaders and unit...

Each ability you create (like in Civ4) have an integer tag called 'Family'. The trick is that 2 abilities of the same family don't cumulate on the same unit, the one with the highest level is taken into account (well there is no level in Civ Promotion but using the first of the list would be ok I guess).

And that's it... it works automatically... Now you wonder what's so great about this concept.

Imagine you want to create 'Mounts' in Rife. Pegasus Rider, Horse, Warhorse, Courrier, Lizard-Rider and so forth that you could buy in appropriate buildings. Mounts would be a promotion, but they are all exclusives. With the notion of family, it would works automatically, buying a mount for an unit would exclude (remove) the other one. No need to work with fields like PromotionExcludes etc. where you have to list explicitly all the proms which are exclusive to the one you describe... Forget one and you have a bug what's more, like a unit with 2 mounts at the same time

The system really lends itself to many applications, weapons... You don't want to have units with a ton of different weapons at the same time, just one. Or henchmen for heroes... how about allowing units with the Heroic Prom to attach an henchman promotion? But only one... (did you played ADD or even Munchkin? )... With 'Family' it would work flawlessly...

So ... I know it is extra work for the Modder in Chief and modders but think about the applications of this single integer field ... 'Family' !! They are so numerous...

For those interested, AGEOD games have other really great modding concepts... Appliance for example... it is the 'range' of an ability, i.e if the bonus applies only to the unit itself, to the whole stack, to a part of a stack... to several stacks nearby, etc.

 

[Korias]

You would need to add something to each promotion that already exists, which would be more work than just using the PromotionExcludes.

 

[Vorpal+5]

Correct indeed, although that would be so much cleaner and understandable in the end... This would be very easy to create groups of promotions which can or should not stacks this way. A bit too late indeed though...

 

[Valkrionn]

Yeah, given the 'PromotionExcludes' and the 'PromotionOverwrites' tags, it's not worth the effort, honestly.

Simply use the first to block all the lower-level promotions, and the second to allow the next promotion to remove the first.

 

[xienwolf]

If you made just a single integer field, then you would be unable to use it for both weapons AND mounts, unless as you said you used the integer to group them, then the order in the XML file to set the priority. But modular additions are ALWAYS added last, so what if I want to add a weapon between Bronze and Iron in a module? I cannot, I can only add something AFTER Mithril.

Maybe you mean to say that you would like PromotionClasses, similar to Unit/Building ones. Though using it just to get exclusions would be a bit strange.

Yes, Whitelist/Blacklist PromotionExcludes/Overwrites may not be as "streamlined" as simply popping in an integer, but it is FAR more understandable when someone (including yourself months later) reads your code and tries to sort out what does what (with your family idea I would have to search the whole XML file for all cases of <iFamily>2</iFamily>, AND keep track of what order they appear in. And worse yet, NOTHING could EVER belong to two families. What if I invent a Mystical WarHorse which counts as both a mount and a weapon? With Family, I have to choose, with PromotionExclude/Overwrite, I get both.