The 10 Commandments of Non-Lua Trait Creation

[LuvToBuild]

...It needs some lua changes to the cityview and civlopedia lua screens. These changes were made by Thalassicus & trystero49 so be sure to credit them if you use these edited lua files...

Yeah..., but that would make a "simple" civilization/leader mod incompatible with other mods that also change those screens, right? Or am I missing something? I think the whole point of Homusubi's thread is to use different XML tricks to create interesting traits that haven't already been implemented a gazillion times by Firaxis and other modders. All without needing to use or even understand Lua. I presume the ultimate goal would be to make them compatible with other mods that use the same basic XML, without worrying about UI compatibility issues.

 

[Leugi]

It seems to me that you could use the Traits FreeBuilding and the Buildings FreeBuilding with Homusubi's suggestion #4 to give a civilization two free buildings in every city. However, the Palace will probably show up as the UB if you make it unique to that civilization. At least that has been my experience. If you want a different building to be the actual UB that shows up as such, you may need a different approach.

Not at all, once you use the Traits table it doesn't show as an UB... So, to do that you must create your own building class... And then, in the new default building put it a cost of "-1", that will make it unable to be built by anyone, and it won't even appear. So then the building you're gifting isn't an override, and it doesn't show in the load screen.

Since the building is gifted automatically, most players never notice that, and believe it is the effect of the trait. And thus, it can be used in the trait's description without talking of the new building.

I honestly don't think hiding it is completelly necessary, rather than "naming it accordingly." For example, if your fake building is for, say, the Moors, the building can be called: "Moor City Bonus", and you can use the civ's icon... And that works well and even intuitively if the player notices the fake building.

 

[Homusubi]

Thanks for clearing that up, Leugi. I'll make sure my next game features Simon Bolivar.

 

[Homusubi]

One last thing about invisible buildings. Making a shadow palace an UB does not mean that it will show up as such, so long as a) your civ does not have an UI, b) you have two other uniques, and c) the shadow palace is at the bottom of the <Civilisation_BuildingClassOverrides> table. I used this with my Augustin Konishi civ, where it looks like there is one UB (Dejima), whereas the trait involves 3 or 4 more shadow UB's.

 

[turingmachine]

Yeah..., but that would make a "simple" civilization/leader mod incompatible with other mods that also change those screens, right? Or am I missing something? I think the whole point of Homusubi's thread is to use different XML tricks to create interesting traits that haven't already been implemented a gazillion times by Firaxis and other modders. All without needing to use or even understand Lua. I presume the ultimate goal would be to make them compatible with other mods that use the same basic XML, without worrying about UI compatibility issues.

People were asking how to do the invisible building thing, that's how you do it. There is no way that doesn't use lua+sql+lua, or that doesn't edit those specific files.

 

[turingmachine]

One last thing about invisible buildings. Making a shadow palace an UB does not mean that it will show up as such, so long as a) your civ does not have an UI, b) you have two other uniques, and c) the shadow palace is at the bottom of the <Civilisation_BuildingClassOverrides> table. I used this with my Augustin Konishi civ, where it looks like there is one UB (Dejima), whereas the trait involves 3 or 4 more shadow UB's.

It would still show up in the civ's civlopedia page entry and in the civlopedia building list, though.

 

[Homusubi]

Ah, I hadn't thought of that. The Civilopedia for mods is just polish though, you can go through a game without looking at it.

 

[daviiadams]

Only just found this; Just to say the low percentages for Okinaro were because they appeared to be stacking when I was testing and seemed OTT if the empire had a great many cities, UBs etc.

That said, it's been about a few years and gets a tweek now n' then, no doubt one will be due when I get BNW...

 

[kingchris20]

Thanks! I will put these instructions to good use!

 

[EYGuy]

Thank you for necrobumping this thread, it gave me a good little chuckle.

 

[Homusubi]

"Necrobumping". Never heard that neologism before, I'll make sure to remember it.