Recon Pay Terrain Cost -- All-you-can-move Buffet edition

[Tekamthi]

Just confirmed it: Quick = Unit Ignore Terrain Cost, vanilla Recon promotion.
And mystery of Dirigible slow on Ice resolved, it didn't get Quick promotion, my mistake.

okay i just did a quick test w/ new xtra3 in OP -- i don't know how to spawn the CAS fighter but I did the other 3 -- none have the slow woods promo (good), all of them are also missing the 'can move all terrain' promo (bad), but they are getting the ignore promo aka quick promo (good).

Re: the all-terrain promo, I infer that CAYM has spread out some parts of this to different mod files, and I am only using the one with the zeps and predator for testing. It seems these specific mod files refer to the all terrain promo but don't actually define it. There shouldn't be anything in any mod in this thread that removes any all-terrain promos, though. I'm thinking anything to do with that is a quirk of CAYM's mod setup. Especially if you're seeing some units get it and others not, this is definitely something to do with mod load order or the SQL itself in CAYM's mod. If you notice anything else about these ones applying inconsistently, let me know, but I think that will be for caym to fix. @CAYM you may want to double-check that the all-terrain move promo is setup as intended in your various mods.

 

[Yerltvachovicic]

Just tested, current state of the affairs in CAYM Tweaks:
Dirigible - doesn't have Quick
Zeppelin - has both, so no problems
CAS Fighter - has both
UAV (80CS) - doesn't have Move All Terrain; <-- another mystery resolved, this UAV is from another CAYM mod - Future Age

I'll also test PineappleDan VP Tweaks with his version of Dirigible/Zeppelin/UAV

 

[Tekamthi]

Dirigible - doesn't have Quick

this is odd -- when i tested just now it did. Something else must be taking it off

edit: i just remembered you are using counter-reconnaissance -- that mod is probably taking it off. I'll revisit that mod as one of my next projects, but I have bigger things planned there, no quick fixes.

UAV - doesn't have Move All Terrain

I am thinking this must be something in CAYM's mod -- is there a specific component here that, when you do not load it, this unit shows up with move all terrain? I am guessing it will be the same either way.

I'll keep these issues in mind but I'm out of quick fix ideas, and am thinking something else outside of this mod is behind each tbh. Sounds like we're kinda in 'good enough' territory on caym compatibility?

 

[Tekamthi]

unrelated to recent compatibility revisions -- added new Core1 and Xtra2 versions to OP -- both are just for cleaner in-game text; no gameplay changes.

 

[Yerltvachovicic]

From PineappleDan VP Tweaks:
Dirigible - has Obstructed Movement in Wooded Terrain
Zeppelin - has Obstructed Movement in Wooded Terrain
UAV (70 CS; in CAYM Tweaks renamed as CAS Fighter) - has Obstructed Movement in Wooded Terrain
All have alternative promotions giving them movement while ignoring terrain cost, so no need for Quick.

From Future AGE:
UAV (80 CS) - doesn't have Move All Terrain (this one was mistakenly mentioned by me as from CAYM Tweaks before)
There are also Hybrid Drone and Biodrone from Future Age, but there is no movement related problems with them.

 

[Tekamthi]

Dirigible - has Obstructed Movement in Wooded Terrain
Zeppelin - has Obstructed Movement in Wooded Terrain
UAV (70 CS; in CAYM Tweaks renamed as CAS Fighter) - has Obstructed Movement in Wooded Terrain
All have alternative promotions giving them movement while ignoring terrain cost, so no need for Quick.

good catch... PD's are trickier to work with -- I should be able to fix nonetheless. another new xtra3 inbound

Future age is another one of caym's that I suspect has to be dealt with by caym. Either that or its another mod.

edit: new xtra3 in OP

 

[Yerltvachovicic]

Confirmed everything is working as intended now.
Actually after closer look Dirigible/Zeppelin/UAV from PD Tweaks are classified as Airships, not Recon units, and have completely different possible promotions from standard Recon, which makes more sense IMO. Time to play with PD Tweaks for a change.
Thank you for your quick help, appreciated.

 

[Tekamthi]

Confirmed everything is working as intended now.
Actually after closer look Dirigible/Zeppelin/UAV from PD Tweaks are classified as Airships, not Recon units, and have completely different possible promotions from standard Recon, which makes more sense IMO. Time to play with PD Tweaks for a change.
Thank you for your quick help, appreciated.

you may want to check the last post I added in PD's thread -- PD's zeps are actually bugged cuz of how they are assigned to "airship" -- "airship" is not properly a category that can be used, and as a result PD's zeps are missing their attack animations. It can be relatively easily fixed with text editor (i posted steps in the other thread), though you may need to do some testing as we've done here to make sure all the text aligns

 

[Yerltvachovicic]

Good news everyone! ... is what I would like to say, but no such luck.
After replacing all unitcombat_airship for unitcombat_helicopter in Zeppelin.sql as per your advice, promotion Obstructed Movement in Wooded Terrain came back with a vengeance.
Dirigible/Zeppelin/UAV from PD Tweaks are again moving slower in a forest.

 

[Tekamthi]

Good news everyone! ... is what I would like to say, but no such luck.
After replacing all unitcombat_airship for unitcombat_helicopter in Zeppelin.sql as per your advice, promotion Obstructed Movement in Wooded Terrain came back with a vengeance.
Dirigible/Zeppelin/UAV from PD Tweaks are again moving slower in a forest.

Okay I'm not at my PC, iirc I added tag for helicopter as well -- like the check that excludes unitcombat_airship should equally exclude anything setup on unitcombat_helicopter -- it's possible that one of us misspelled this unitcombat? If you're seeing attack animations in game then you got it right, and maybe want to double check that I didn't misspell in the xtra3 SQL.

Its odd cuz i also made this switch in PD Zeppelin mod and when I was testing last night it seemed to be doing the job with helicopter! Maybe I'm misremembering, was doing a lot of changes in different files.

It's another weird one, I'll have a look later on. Let me know if you catch any obvious spelling errors in my xtra3 SQL, that's just about the only thing I can think of here. Or it's possible that between all the files I was editing last night, I got the conditional right in one file and not another... Pretty sure I put something in this one for helicopter though.

 

[Yerltvachovicic]

More testing:
With unitcombat_helicopter game hangs after clicking next turn button, after quick searching in VP Units folder found that perhaps it should be unitcombat_helicopter_gunship like I found there, but even after changing to that no attack animation, still slow in the forest, but at least no hanging the game when clicking next turn.
My limited knowledge is spent, waiting for advice.

Edit:
Promotion Obstructed Movement in Wooded Terrain disappeared which is good, but endless loading after clicking next turn still persists, I'll slowly test which mod causes conflict.
Edit 2:
After some trouble tested only VP and PD Tweaks 4VP and finally got to see some animations, not much to see when attacking with Zeppelins, but UAVs definitely have one, and Dirigibles have... something ;p

 

[Tekamthi]

okay i think your zep sql must be off somehow -- i'll do some testing on my end shortly

edit: check PD's thread I added sql for you to copy/paste. All appears to be working on my side.

 

[Tekamthi]

there was a missing custommodoption in the fast rivers (Rec2) & fast coast (Xtra2); I infer this was enabled in some recent version of VP -- may have been enabled by other mods on many playthroughs, and even if not, effect was minor.

New xtra2 and rec2 versions in OP

 

[Tekamthi]

Updates to all Core and Recommended components in OP. Requirement: VP 4.17+

This is my first recon-related post since the changes ~6 months ago. We are indeed in better shape! Big congrats to community for achieving some progress on this issue via congress, and even bigger thanks to the devs for implementing the necessary code!

That said, I am not in love with the new recon movement regime -- its best "feature" is it enabled some better movement controls under-the-hood. We will now adapt the "Recon Pay" components to our newly-available DB additions, while respecting the general direction taken by the community in re-shuffling some of the abilities around in the recon promo tree.

Unlike some of my recent updates to other mods , this one has seen a good couple hundred turns of testing, and the core features definitely work (those others should now be working too). I'll need some help finding the smaller oversights.

Change notes:

Spoiler :

• Core 0 now resets early recon to base 2-moves. It still deletes ignore all terrain costs for anyone/anything that tries to re-add it, but this is moot in normal play now
• Exploration balancer (now Core1) adapted to match new ability distribution in the TB promo branch, using ignoreFrom version of movement bonuses
• Ignore ZoC now relegated to extra status (formerly core, as consolation to losing ignore all terrain cost; consolation of this magnitude is no longer required)
• water scouting (formely recommended) component is gone, as its effectively been integrated into base VP (a water extra may return in future)
• fast coastal moved up to recommend -- this mod collection now takes away VP's flat speed boosts to recon, and replaces with terrain-based speed.,, ie value of this one increased.
• fast coastal and river code updates for efficiency, more consistency in catching feature additions/removals

edit: didn't bother me, but I can see how some might complain these mods make recon too slow, compared to base VP -- added an Xtra5: Horse Thieves to speed things up again

edit2: adapted the xtra3 to slow down xtra5's new horse theft slightly, so that a promo'd recon will not move any faster in trees with this component active (doesn't need to, few horses will move more than 1 in forest -- affects xtra3/5 combo only)

 

[Tekamthi]

Another round of updates adapting to new tables and fields in recent versions of VP: we can now do all the most important things necessary to fix recon movement in the DB; all recommended components are now db-only. +speed lua stuff still available in the extra's.

Spoiler :

• new recommended component: fast coast
• fast rivers converted to db-only
• fast coastal relegated to xtra status due to lua reliance and available db alternatives
• compatibility updates to some of the 'xtra' components
• edit: update as well to the tree obstructs mounted/armor:
  • its such a nerf to mounted, and since the point is realism, added 'can use enemy roads' to compensate.
  • ensure helicopter gunship does not receive (nor any other with 'helicopter' in the name, should any be added)

edit: few more pre-holiday updates for balance, text corrections, and compatibility with new counter-recon update