Rallying call for all interested: Colonisation of the Moon mod!

[JBG]

As I said, the helmet and lance are showing up fine, so it can't be a problem with the folder name. Perhaps the NIF files aren't working..?

 

[woodelf]

JBG - Just look at what I did for Rabbit's other units and do that. You don't need to add many files.

 

[JBG]

And Woodelf, I agree.

Now, WTH can I do about the lancer? Looking at him in the civilopedia, his staff/lance looks good and his helmet's fine, but from the neck down he's shocking pink. According to Rabbit, White's screenies he should have pikeman-style clothes/armour/whatever, but in-game he's pink. What have I not got that Rabbit does? (in that respect )

 

[GeoModder]

Perhaps the proper pikeman texture .dds file is missing in the Lancer's folder?

 

[JBG]

The only DDS files are for the lance and for the helmet. There may be a connection here somewhere

Where can I get the original pikeman textures from? There aren't any in the root Civ IV folder...

 

[GeoModder]

You need to unpack the "art0.fpk" folder to find that one. The tool to do that is named "pakbuild.exe", downloadable somewhere on this forum.
Simply double click this executable, and it will be done for you. I recommend making a copy of your art0.fpk somewhere and copying+running the executable in the same folder.

 

[JBG]

For all the other units there are hordes of *.kf files. The files that I got in the Lancers download are: helmet and O2 tank dds files, a lance dds, and two glossiness dds files, plus two *.nif s. There are no *.kfm files or *.kf files and no *.dds files relating to any other part of his anatomy. But then, that said, for the colony transport (which looks rather familiar, btw), there's only one *.nif file. ???

 

[JBG]

I'll try it...

 

[GeoModder]

Check 2 posts above this one.

 

[JBG]

Nope. No effect. With all the pikeman files in there it altered his stance (so I changed it back) and with just the kfm there he's still all pink.



I can't help feeling that I'm missing something. The pikeman folder has virtually nothing of use in it at all - and no dds's whatsoever.

Perhaps Rabbit, White didn't put all the files in his d-l?

 

[woodelf]

I think I can get it to work, but it will be a bit later.

 

[JBG]

Crisis over - at last. It seems my own inexperience and tendency to flap has once again embarrassed me.

There are times when I disgust myself...

 

[woodelf]

What was the crisis? Inexperience?

 

[JBG]

Yup. Basically, I didn't know that because it was based on the pikeman, I had to have all the pikeman files in the folder along with the modified ones.

Anyway, the Lancer looks pretty cool in-game, now. I tweaked his stats a bit so he is a bit more... ah - useful - and will now set to work on ironing out the XML issues I pointed out earlier on. At least I know how to do THAT.

 

[Belizan]

And on the audio note, if you, or Woodelf, or, indeed, anyone, tells me which sounds are needed, I will try my utmost to provide. I can also go through my copy of the XMLs and iron out those points I mentioned in my previous post. Just say the word.

I remember there was a specific set of sounds we wanted when Woodelf and I discussed the idea that we needed a new sound guy, but I don't remember what they were. Woodelf, you recall?

 

[Belizan]

Whoa, whoa, whoa. I think before we decide to do anything like a split, we need to pool ideas and isolate the friction points. We've all put too much into this to just let it die, so let's talk before we do anything radical which we might regret later.

Belizan, if you post your and Warsong's project document, we can take a look at that and go from there.

Right now, what Warsong and I have is a lot of emails filled with ideas and implementation details, Moon related technology sites and issues, and the like. We are currently in the process of trying to distill this into an actual design document which I then intended to put up here so we could discuss it.

The talk of derailment is troubling. How close to the old game are you and Warsong sticking Belizan? Is it basically a new mod or not? If the answer is yes then maybe it should be split. I get the idea from your posts that ideas by myself, Geomodder, ect that don't fit into your new plans aren't being listened to anyway. We went from leaderless to dictatorship awfully quick...

Honestly, I'm not 100% sure how close it is to the old game. I'm not really even sure what that means exactly. Both our current version and the design being done are attempts to model the same thing. Warsong and I are working together much more closely then JBG and I did when JBG wrote the original Bible, therein Warsong is modelling moon related issues much more in line with what is doable in Civ4. Also, Warsong has played a lot more Civ4 then JBG had when he wrote the Bible, so he's more familiar with the abstractions used in Civ4 over Civ3.

As for ideas from you guys, I've been relaying them, but you haven't put many up. I tried a few times bringing ideas back in reverse, but no one particularly commented on them, so given how busy I've been, I just thought to wait until we had a complete document that would give everyone a clear idea of what we're going with. A lot of the foundation of the mod is basically a natural extension of where our thinking was when we started the design document. Tech tree branches by faction as Matt and I discussed, Ages broken up as Woodelf and I already worked up, Civics break down basically as Woodelf and I mapped out, Map-based options for major events like why Earth drops contact and when or if it comes back, etc. Warsong even checks this thread periodically (he told me JBG was back, for instance).

Other features are based on how to model issues we discussed but never represented. Brown outs for buildings from Dust damage in early colonies. Dust migration from solar wind. The Mod Shop, the Earth Factions and the Colonization screen. Building Kits and Power Grids.

Then there are new features that Warsong and I have developed together, or that Warsong has suggested based on his knowledge of real world Moon colonization plans and technology. Material Fabrication plants, Hidden Unhappiness, etc.

Warsong and I have refined various models sufficiently that I had thought it would be more productive to get the design doc worked up sufficiently that the overall design and flow of the new mod would be clear, so that we could work within the framework to improve it and add what we like.

I am quite disheartened by your attitude Woodelf. You all asked me to take over, and to corale Warsong into helping us with a new design for the mod. You complained that even when JBG was here he was too hands off, left everything up in the air without a clear direction or decisive answers on issues. What's up with you, man? I have to say, this is not turning out to be a very rewarding job for me. Just a lot of work to hear a lot of complaints and a lot of stress from having to juggle too many activities at once.

I'm going to be busy, as I said, for another 10 days still I suspect. Hopefully you can be patient. In my view, the only thing that's gone wrong is that our current version of the mod is bugged and we can't find the bug. I wish I had the time to debug it now, but I don't. I will get to it in 10 days. There are a lot of features we want to test out. We don't have Matt at the moment, and I need to test out a number of terrain related issues (feature migration being top on the list). That was my plan, it was what you and I discussed, Woodelf, and it hasn't changed. Test out new ideas in the current mod while building up and refining our design doc for a rebuild to clean up the design and tech tree and take advantage of all the features we've implemented. You just have to have some patience.

 

[Belizan]

So, the problem with adding more eye candy right now JBG, is that our current version which has a lot of work in it, vis a vis modified XML files, would then have to be merged with the new version you are creating now. We are in a very awkward version state, and adding more units to whatever version is in the public thread is just going to muddy it up further.

Matt and I both took a pass at debugging the current version, and therein we have two sets of "debugged" XML files which are different. You can piece them together yourself from the files Matt and I posted back and forth on this thread, but given how much back and forth there was, that will probably be prone to error.

I started merging them myself, but I haven't had time to finish the process.

If you really can't wait 10 days, then make sure that you put all your changes at one isolated end of each XML file and maintain a log of the files you've touched, so that when we get a debugged new version the merging process will not be so difficult.

 

[GeoModder]

*GeoModder goes into hibernation for the slow voyage to Luna.

 

[woodelf]

I'll enter stasis as well Geo.

 

[JBG]

No, no, that's fine, don't worry.

The reason I left things 'up in the air' a bit while I was here last time was because I wanted to leave room for you guys to make your own mark on the project too. I didn't want to direct with a firmer hand for fear of forcing through things you guys weren't happy with - I thought that in so doing I was helping give us all a freer reign to make this a tuly group project instead of being a dictatorship.

Anyway, all I've done in terms of modifying (so far) is changing the art directory reference for the Lancers and giving them slightly more attack and a bonus against heavies too. I was going to leave nerfing those nitpicks for today and tomorrow - looks like its going to have to be tomorrow, now, but hey-ho.

If you need a de-bugged version, then the one currently linked on the first post of the SotM thread (which is the one I'm using now) works fine. I've not encountered any crashes, major bugs, CTDs, freeze-ups or error messages (touch wood). I've played games that were 213, 245 and 312 turns long and in none of them have I encountered any major problems. To add the new Lancers art, I made a complete copy of the mod and renamed it. As I said, so far the only files I have altered in any way (aside from adding a new Lancers art directory) are the Art_units and unit_stats XMLs - and even then, one-figure or one-word changes were the max. I'm going to work from this 'new version' when I try to deal with the nitpicks - and I'll keep you posted on my progess.

I'm very sorry to hear you're not enjoying this as much as ther rest of us are (or at least I am). Meaning no disrespect, but it might be to do with the fact that you've probably been doing rather more on it than most of us (I know I'm hardly one to talk ). We're all very grateful for the work you've done - and especially your brilliant work implementing those emergency civics. I am the first to admit that I ploughed into the moon mod before I fully realised the limitations of the XMLs and the AI. If everyone will find it useful, I'm more than willing to work on a newer, more feasible version of the bible, but I've been holding off on it so far for fear of treading on toes. In my opinion, once we have a firm list of achievable, incremental, compartmentalised objectives, we will be able to move on and get this mod back on tack.

In the meantime, if you need a version that works: I repeat, the version currently linked on the first page of the SotM thead works. You can link there via my sig if you like.

Stay cool people!