What are you working on?

[tootall_2012]

Hi Patine,

Just a brief update. As I indicated on my post #4 of this thread, I'm working on my “Napoléon” scenario which covers the European Napoleonic Wars from 1805 to 1815. I've put aside all other projects till this one is done.

I'm working with our community member, Knighttime, who has very graciously offered to be the lead developer for my lua event file (I write the specs and he does all the coding). Given the complexity of my events, I couldn't have done it without him and I thank him for it. We are maybe 50 to 60% done. Once the lua file is completed, I will be able to start the scenario testing process.

 

[CurtSibling]

@CurtSibling, Vendetta sounds interesting - I'd love to hear more about the concept.

It's a remake of an old MGE scenario where the 3rd Reich survived into 1980. This was due to Hitler dying in 1940 and logical choices being made.
The USA has been slowly overtaken by Pentecostal zealots and other nations and empires have grown or evolved into being...The stage is set for
a modern war across the globe with (non-global warming) nukes and jets flying free...Loads more to tell, but I don't want to spoil too much.

 

[Patine]

I hope neither @McMonkey (who said he was vacationing in Greece), nor @Tanelorn (who lives there) were anywhere near those wildfires I just read about.

 

[Tanelorn]

My wife is actually working where the first fire struck, but she had the day off. We're fine -don't worry.

 

[McMonkey]

To be honest I was only vaguely aware of the fires because of friends messaging me to check I was OK. I have not seen a TV or checked the internet in the past week. I've just had a look online and seen a video of lots of people sheltering in a lake from the smoke & flames. Absolutely terrible. I can't even imagine how frightening that must be & how devastating it must be to lose homes & loved ones. I did visit a museum in a small mountain village where an artist had partially restored his ancestral family home that had been severely damaged by a huge earthquake in 1953 and that was quite sobering.

I'm glad to hear you were not directly affected by this Tanelorn.

 

[JPetroski]

So, what's in store for 2019 everyone?

With Over the Reich nearly finished, I have 3 projets I hope to complete next year (probably in this order though 2 and 3 are a bit up in the air):

1. @McMonkey and I have rekindled our work on Philip of Macedon, which details the rise of the kingdom and interestingly takes full advantage of lua dialogue boxes to create a "choose your own adventure" type gameplay. The player is presented with choices and each have pros and cons. This should enhance replay value. We are also hoping to incorporate the supply line system @Knighttime is currently exploring.

2. The Hinge of Fate: A successor scenario to "Anstieg" of sorts; my attempt to take everything I've learned over the years and put it into a WW2 European Theatre scenario. I aim to start with a single player version and expand to multiplayer. This will feature true east-west map movement to allow for a full Battle of the Atlantic and potential Axis invasion of the Eastern United States. Additionally, Over the Reich's strategic bombing system will return with a high-altitude Europe map.

3. Boudicca: The final piece of my Roman collection. A fight against tremendous odds. An entire province in flames. Can you steal a victory agains the Iceni horde, or will you go down in history as the man who lost Britannia?

What are all of you up to for 2019?

 

[committed hero]

And, as always, in the back of my mind I want to use that map Harlan made for me probably 15 years ago and finally make Boot II.

I've always loved that scenario, and I dusted off my hard drive to take a crack at making one myself.

 

[JPetroski]

I've always loved that scenario, and I dusted off my hard drive to take a crack at making one myself.

I uploaded Harlan's map I always planned to use onto this site and you're more than welcome to it!

 

[Patine]

So, what's in store for 2019 everyone?

With Over the Reich nearly finished, I have 3 projets I hope to complete next year (probably in this order though 2 and 3 are a bit up in the air):

1. @McMonkey and I have rekindled our work on Philip of Macedon, which details the rise of the kingdom and interestingly takes full advantage of lua dialogue boxes to create a "choose your own adventure" type gameplay. The player is presented with choices and each have pros and cons. This should enhance replay value. We are also hoping to incorporate the supply line system @Knighttime is currently exploring.

2. The Hinge of Fate: A successor scenario to "Anstieg" of sorts; my attempt to take everything I've learned over the years and put it into a WW2 European Theatre scenario. I aim to start with a single player version and expand to multiplayer. This will feature true east-west map movement to allow for a full Battle of the Atlantic and potential Axis invasion of the Eastern United States. Additionally, Over the Reich's strategic bombing system will return with a high-altitude Europe map.

3. Boudicca: The final piece of my Roman collection. A fight against tremendous odds. An entire province in flames. Can you steal a victory agains the Iceni horde, or will you go down in history as the man who lost Britannia?

What are all of you up to for 2019?

I'm still working on my Pacific Rim scenario, and trying to get the hang of Lua. My Fall of Rome scenario and revisions and updates of my Modern Middle East and Empire of the Rising Sun scenarios and finishing my War of the Spanish Succession idea (all three of which could greatly benefit from ToTPP and Lua possibilities that were not there when I last worked on them) would also be in the foreseeable and likely future.

 

[Prof. Garfield]

What are all of you up to for 2019?

1. Finish writing up my Get Started With Lua Events lessons.

2. Write some 'libraries' of code to be used by others. I hope to make some of the Over the Reich functionality easy to use, and I want to make a library of 'utilities', (usually) small functions that would be frequently used, and might require a little thinking about exactly how to meet the need. I'm especially thinking that things like terrain improvements and unit/city attributes could use some utilities, so that everyone isn't forced to figure out the bitwise operations if they want to remove a road or something.

3. Re-making Imperialism with Lua Events. As much as it might be an interesting project in its own right, I expect to use this for testing library code and for thinking up new things to put in the library.

4. Documenting the existing lua functions. While most are pretty self explanatory with what TNO has provided, some are not, and it would be helpful to have a reference. I found out a little while ago that func.splitlines doesn't actually do what I thought it did, and was unnecessary just about everywhere that I wrote it.

Finishing my lua lessons is likely to be done first, for the practical reason that if I do them relatively quickly, I won't have to figure out what I've already covered each time I come back to write a new lesson. Items 2,3 and 4 will probably be done concurrently, since in some ways they contribute to each other. I'm thinking I'll probably join the Scenario League Wiki, since the message board structure isn't particularly well suited to items 2 and 4, especially if others also want to make contributions also (assuming, of course, that this is considered a worthy addition to the SL Wiki).

 

[JPetroski]

I think that this would be a great addition to the wiki. The "tips" section is entirely comprised of scenario making tips and it would be great to have a new subsection for lua help.

 

[techumseh]

I agree. The Lua tutorial and library Prof. Garfield is suggesting would be a godsend to those of us who would like to use Lua in our scenario, but don't have a programming background. Please and thank-you!

 

[JPetroski]

I agree. The Lua tutorial and library Prof. Garfield is suggesting would be a godsend to those of us who would like to use Lua in our scenario, but don't have a programming background. Please and thank-you!

This would be great but until it is available, what I'd suggest you do is become engrossed in Napoleon, Over the Reich, and Caesar, see what is done in each of them, dream about how it could apply to one of your scenarios, and try and reverse engineer particular lines of their code. Start with something fairly simple like ranged attacks/"k" units.

Also, download a free copy of Notepad ++ and just start reading the events from the other scenarios - but take your mouse pointer and click on things like "end" and "end)" and "( " and ")". The one you click on has a little red line that goes to the other end that corresponds with it. In the case of ( and ), the corresponding ones turns red. It really helps with visualizing what all the "ends" mean - which is likely going to be one of the main things that throws up errors for you as you develop.

local function cityTileWarszawa (tile)
if tile.x == 116 and tile.y == 46 and tile.z == 0 then
return true
else
return false
end
end


local function cityTileWarszawa (tile)
if tile.x == 116 and tile.y == 46 and tile.z == 0 then
return true
else
return false
end
end


if item.name == "Bombarde" and not(civ.hasImprovement(city, findImprovementByName("Dockyard")) and civ.hasImprovement(city, findImprovementByName("Siege Workshop"))) then
permitted = false
end

if item.name == "Bombarde" and not(civ.hasImprovement(city, findImprovementByName("Dockyard")) and civ.hasImprovement(city, findImprovementByName("Siege Workshop"))) then
permitted = false
end

if item.name == "Bombarde" and not(civ.hasImprovement(city, findImprovementByName("Dockyard")) and civ.hasImprovement(city, findImprovementByName("Siege Workshop"))) then
permitted = false
end

I feel like half my problems with lua were caused by "end" or ")" and understanding how to diagnose it is half the battle.

Anyway -- Techumseh -- Is your Bismarck scenario more or less complete aside from events, or do you still have a long way to go on the scenario design too? If you're just missing events, start a build thread. The people who can help you are here and engaged with lua at the moment. There's no time like the present

 

[techumseh]

Thanks John. Bismarck (Blood and Iron) is not near completion I'm afraid. Most of the easy stuff is done: the map and units are finished, some work on the Rules. txt, units are not placed nor any events started. It's been a number of years since I touched it, and in light of what I've learned since, it will need a major re-think. I will say that what Tootall and Knighttime have done with Napoleon would fix the design problems that stymied me years ago. Foremost of these was Bismarck's desire to defeat the Austrians without annexing any of their territory, lest they attack the Prussians for revenge while they were dealing with the French.

 

[committed hero]

If anyone is interested in playtesting my Italian WW2 scenario, I could upload it. I'm not quite sure but I think I am too impatient and cautious a player at the same time.

 

[JPetroski]

If anyone is interested in playtesting my Italian WW2 scenario, I could upload it. I'm not quite sure but I think I am too impatient and cautious a player at the same time.

I'd be pleased to revisit sunny Italy. Is it for MGE or TOT?

 

[committed hero]

ToTTP! Although I love Harlan's work, as is my wont, I rotated the theater so the boot is extra long.

 

[tootall_2012]

We don't have the opportunity to get many new scenarios so by all means you should feel comfortable to share your project with the community.

For my part, I still recall how much I enjoyed playing your Roman Britain scenario and how challenging it was.

 

[committed hero]

Here are the files sans sound (I have sounds, also a first for me).

 

[tootall_2012]

Hi commited,

I've taken a very brief first glance and based on the care and quality of the components you selected and map you created, it already feels like its going to be a very interesting scenario to play (though it will take a little getting use to play with the map on the horizontal axis ).

Just a couple of quick questions:

• It doesn't look like you made this an objective base scenario, i.e. it's your basic empire building victory conditions in place. Is that your intent or you simply haven't added the city objectives yet?
• I don't see that there is any time limit on the game (the number of game turns is set to zero). Again is that simply because this is an alpha version?