Gerikes
User of Run-on Sentences.
I'm pleased to announce that I'm releasing v0.5 of the GerikSpells Framework, officially putting it into the beginning of it's Beta stages.
The GerikSpells Framework is an action-creation framework that I am developing that allows users to quickly, easily, and cleanly as possible create even the most complex of "actions" (the various buttons you can click on that lay in the bottom of the screen, such as "Heal", "Move to", "Build Farm", etc). I've tried to design the entire system with a generic idea, so that others can easily take bits and pieces of different ideas and put them together to form their proper action. Although the name implies it to be used as a framework to create spells in Fantasy games, that is only one of the possible uses. Demo "spells" that come with the game range from fantasy earthquake spells to cyber terrorism bank breaches to planting forests. Check out the examples here.
Although simple actions that do immediate results can be easily created using GerikSpells, the power of the action framework is it's targetting system. It is built around the idea of a generic targetting system to allow for almost anything to be targetted, from plots (singular and multiple) to units to buildings to improvements. Built in plot coloring, texturing, popup and pie-menu user interfaces can all be utilized using minimal code. All this, and the fact that an entire spells functionality can all be located in one xml entry and one small python file means for very easy debugging (which we all know is the most time-consuming part of any programming). Finally, although this version does not yet support it, AI functionality will be built into the system to allow for instructing the AI how to use your new spell, action or abilities. All this, while still supporting multiplayer compatability and spells being pushed into mission queues.
Ok, enough selling points. I'm looking for testers. As a tester, your job would be to write spells and actions. If you have an idea of some action that you would allow a unit to do that you didn't know how to to before without modifying the SDK (or at least a ton of python hacks), such as Civ3-style bombardment, teleportation, multi-plot damage, etc., then try it out using GerikSpells. Here is what I'm hoping to get from testers:
As of now, my main priority will be to complete the documentation, which is located in the GerikSpells wiki (you can find the link in the main thread or at the download). I'm not going to say that you'll be able to pick up and use GerikSpells like riding a bike, as there might be a slight learning curve getting all the ideas it uses. With the complete lack of documentation I have now, you're basically going to have to resort to looking at the examples and the comments found within the file, and post any questions in the GerikSpell thread. In the coming days I will be finishing a script allowing for me to conver the code into the API to put on the wiki, as well as developing a step-by-step tutorial for using the system.
Note: The SDK code base is currently written for v1.61 of Vanilla Civ4. As I don't yet have Warlords, I can't support that quite yet.
Goals
My goal for this project is that I can allow for creating actions that allow for great gameplay options to those who are an intermediate level python programmer, which will hopefully help produce many great mods in the future that would otherwise be restricted.
The GerikSpells Framework is an action-creation framework that I am developing that allows users to quickly, easily, and cleanly as possible create even the most complex of "actions" (the various buttons you can click on that lay in the bottom of the screen, such as "Heal", "Move to", "Build Farm", etc). I've tried to design the entire system with a generic idea, so that others can easily take bits and pieces of different ideas and put them together to form their proper action. Although the name implies it to be used as a framework to create spells in Fantasy games, that is only one of the possible uses. Demo "spells" that come with the game range from fantasy earthquake spells to cyber terrorism bank breaches to planting forests. Check out the examples here.
Although simple actions that do immediate results can be easily created using GerikSpells, the power of the action framework is it's targetting system. It is built around the idea of a generic targetting system to allow for almost anything to be targetted, from plots (singular and multiple) to units to buildings to improvements. Built in plot coloring, texturing, popup and pie-menu user interfaces can all be utilized using minimal code. All this, and the fact that an entire spells functionality can all be located in one xml entry and one small python file means for very easy debugging (which we all know is the most time-consuming part of any programming). Finally, although this version does not yet support it, AI functionality will be built into the system to allow for instructing the AI how to use your new spell, action or abilities. All this, while still supporting multiplayer compatability and spells being pushed into mission queues.
Ok, enough selling points. I'm looking for testers. As a tester, your job would be to write spells and actions. If you have an idea of some action that you would allow a unit to do that you didn't know how to to before without modifying the SDK (or at least a ton of python hacks), such as Civ3-style bombardment, teleportation, multi-plot damage, etc., then try it out using GerikSpells. Here is what I'm hoping to get from testers:
- Feedback on limitations that they run into while using GerikSpells.
- Possible bugs that their spells pick up with the Framework that the demo spells (which also double as my test cases) don't pick up.
- Response to how easy/hard it is to actually use the system.
As of now, my main priority will be to complete the documentation, which is located in the GerikSpells wiki (you can find the link in the main thread or at the download). I'm not going to say that you'll be able to pick up and use GerikSpells like riding a bike, as there might be a slight learning curve getting all the ideas it uses. With the complete lack of documentation I have now, you're basically going to have to resort to looking at the examples and the comments found within the file, and post any questions in the GerikSpell thread. In the coming days I will be finishing a script allowing for me to conver the code into the API to put on the wiki, as well as developing a step-by-step tutorial for using the system.
Note: The SDK code base is currently written for v1.61 of Vanilla Civ4. As I don't yet have Warlords, I can't support that quite yet.
Goals
My goal for this project is that I can allow for creating actions that allow for great gameplay options to those who are an intermediate level python programmer, which will hopefully help produce many great mods in the future that would otherwise be restricted.
