worm rider mechanics

[davidlallen]

I have some partly worked out design and implementation for worm riders, and I need design assistance to get something which is fun and usable by the AI.

As usual, it seems, I have been creating fun, dune-like mechanics, which the AI can't use. In some early version like 1.1.2, I added a thumper, which is an immobile unit dropped by units with the thumper promotion. If a sandworm sees this unit anywhere in its vision radius (2 tiles) it will immediately move towards it and destroy it. You can use this to control where sandworms go. There is code to create a sandworm if the thumper sits for 4 turns without being destroyed, but I don't think that part was actually working.

I have made some local changes to this. Now a thumper will actually cause a sandworm to appear. Also, and more importantly, I have added code for the case where a sandworm attacks a tile which has both, a thumper unit and any other unit with the thumper promotion. In this case a Worm Rider unit is generated, and the sandworm and thumper units are destroyed. The unit with the thumper promotion is unchanged.

I was hoping to use this as a way to create early game transport units for the Fremen civs. If the worm rider unit xml is changed to have transport capability, this will work for the human player. But the AI will not understand to (a) get the thumper promotion, and (b) send out the unit to generate the worm rider. Ideally, you would do this a few turns in advance of your amphibious attack so that the worms arrive just in time to be ridden.

There are some other ways the thumper promotion could be used. It would be possible to add code that if any unit in the stack has the thumper promotion, the worm will still attack but will be captured. Or that it won't be attacked at all. Then we can build a UU for the Fremen civs which is a scout that starts with the thumper promotion. The mid-game tech Thumpering would allow other civs to do this also. This way, Fremen will have a small advantage that their scouts never get eaten.

I was also thinking that instead of generating a worm rider unit, a sandworm attack on a thumper could give the unit a temporary promotion which allows fast movement. Say after 10 turns it expires, but during that time the unit has move 3 and cannot enter hills or peaks. Perhaps that would have to be implemented as temporarily switching to another unit type. This would also allow faster scouting.

I am not sure that is a strong benefit; it would be much better to find a way the AI could use early game transport built this way.

Any brainstorms welcome.

 

[Deliverator]

A few thoughts:

I think only the Fremen factions should be able to do this. It makes them more unique and it doesn't feel right for the Harkonnens (for example) to be able to do it. In FFH2 there is the concept of races so that all the units of each civ have a particular promotion. This is a nice idea. So the Fremen promotion is given to all Fremen, land based, human units. This promotion means that when attacked by a worm they have a chance to capture it and become a worm rider. This chance could increase with further promotions. Race promotions could be useful for other factions too.

I thought you had the worm AI moving towards units on the sand right? So why do we need the thumper unit? You could just have it so that units with the necessary promotion that get attacked by the worm have a chance to create a worm rider/get the temporary worm rider promotion. The thumper unit seems like another layer of complexity in the way of getting the AI to use this ability.

What promotions does the AI normally go for? Could we make it so that the chance of capturing a worm related to those. So the strength of the unit gives a better chance of capture for example.

It seems the hardest part of the problem is getting the AI to understand that it needs to go out onto the sand and try to capture a worm to transport its units around. Without writing a custom AI for the unit so that it has a worm capture mode where it searches around and then moves towards a worm, I've no idea how the achieve that.

You're temporary worm rider promotion idea is interesting. Kael and Dom Pedro II were talking about in this thread about making units change appearance in certain circumstances or with certain promotions. However, I think it would not really work for the worm rider which will look very different from a human unit. I think the only realistic way is to use a different unit NIF while the unit is riding the worm (has the promotion). Is this possible?

 

[davidlallen]

I thought you had the worm AI moving towards units on the sand right? So why do we need the thumper unit?

It is a priority thing. Suppose there is a thumper unit two squares away, and a worker unit one square away in the other direction. The thumper draws the worm's attention so the worker will be safe. The concept is that one unit with the thumper promotion can protect a wide area by strategically dropping thumpers. Sometimes you are looking for a worm to ride, and sometimes you just want the worm to go away. "Dropping a thumper" seems to fit the theme, but maybe it is too complex.

You're temporary worm rider promotion idea is interesting. Kael and Dom Pedro II were talking about in this thread about making units change appearance in certain circumstances or with certain promotions.

Swapping unit art based on promotions is certainly possible; the "ute" unit in Fury Road does this using python which I wrote. The problem with swapping art is that the number of models grows exponentially. If three units each have two possible promotions that is 12 different unit models needed. In Fury Road, it only applies to one unit and three promotions so 8 models were needed.

A single "worm travelling aboveground" unit art, or maybe just a new animation of the existing model, could be used to represent any number of foot units riding the worm. Because of the scale, you would not be able to see the people themselves. So in this case, perhaps one unit art would suffice for a large variety of riders.

EDIT: missed this point:

I think only the Fremen factions should be able to do this.

I agree. I am sure it will be possible to limit the promotion by civ, or by tech which is limited to civ, or a free building.

 

[Deliverator]

A single "worm travelling aboveground" unit art, or maybe just a new animation of the existing model, could be used to represent any number of foot units riding the worm. Because of the scale, you would not be able to see the people themselves. So in this case, perhaps one unit art would suffice for a large variety of riders.

I'm thinking the worm rider unit graphic will have a very small generic Fremen on top so it can be used for all worm riders.

 

[Ahriman]

I think the thumper-dropping mechanic is overly complex for little gain, and the AI will obviously never understand it.

I'd just make sandriders as buildable UU transports and warships for the Fremen.

 

[davidlallen]

Building a worm rider in a city seems to miss the theme altogether.

At the risk of making this too abstract, one very simple possibility is to make the Fremen have a UU set of worker, warrior, scout, settler which all have move 2 and a promotion allowing double move in desert waste or deep desert. This gives them a strong early game expansion. We can visualize them doing that by riding worms in our imagination, even if the game graphics do not show that.

This may be a little overpowered when combined with the existing Sietch UB which gives +1 movement. But we can try it.

 

[Deliverator]

Too abstract to be fun IMO.

Does the AI really need to understand how to create the Worm Riders anyway? It just means it won't play the Fremen very well. But it's something the human player will really enjoy. I'm sure that quite a few of the FFH2 spells aren't used properly by the AI, but they're in there because they're fun.

We should keep thinking about it. There's got to be a better way than building worm riders in cities, or abstracting them away to nothing.

 

[Deliverator]

How about this. You build an Unmounted Worm Rider unit in a city - just a human unit on its own. This unit can move across Deep Desert. As soon as it moves onto a Worm or is attacked by a Worm a Worm Rider is created. You can write basic AI for Units. Have a new AI for the Unmounted Worm Rider. This can be really simple. Move onto the coast/ocean desert and then move around until you see a worm. If you see a worm then move towards it. Then you've just got to ensure that the AI actually builds some of these units.

 

[koma13]

I think building worm riders in cities is fine.

 

[Lord Tirian]

I think building worm riders in cities is fine.

Hmmm... I have to throw in a "ditto" here - a lot of things here are going towards the thing that Kael described as "Flavour Trap".

I mean, flavour is good, but it shouldn't impinge too much on the core gameplay. I think altering the basic unit creation process for a single unit this much is highly irregular - for an unit that's not going to be an one-off/hero unit or so.

Unit building is pretty abstract already - it constitutes training, actual production and organisation. Just as some wonders are really more processes than anything else, explaining away the "production" of worm riders as seeking them out is fine. Perhaps add a pre-requisite building to it, like "Wormseeker Gathering" and make them national units to represent that only a few can be captured at the same time.

Gameplay-wise, this will almost be the same as the manual catching, just with waaay less micromanagement and unit-shuffling. I mean these concepts are neat and cute the first, perhaps the second time you play it - but after some while, the novelty wears off and it just becomes a bother to catch worms.

Cheers, LT.

 

[Deliverator]

I think building worm riders in cities is fine.

I've come around to this way of thinking too. If you think about vanilla, you can build mounted units by having access to Horses or War Elephants by having access to Ivory.

Let's just make it so the Fremen can build Worm Riders in coastal cities. The desert is the resource in effect. If you have the ability to catch and ride a worm it is enough just to have access to the open desert. The important thing is that Worm Riders are made and used by the Fremen. How they are built is not that important in the grand scheme of things. This way the AI will have no problem building and using them, which is enough of a reason in itself.

Will barbarian Worms be able to attach Worm Riders? That would seem a bit weird. And wars between Fremen and Sietch Tabr could be interesting.

 

[koma13]

Let's just make it so the Fremen can build Worm Riders in coastal cities.

There are no non coastal cities in dw. Else you could build the all terrain transporter only in certain cities.

I thought about spawning the worm rider in the desert after it is trained but we have to bear in mind that wr is a transport that has to be stationed in a city to be usefull for ai at all.

 

[Deliverator]

Mmmmm, worm rider moving through rock is not a good look...

 

[koma13]

I don't worry about sandworms moving through rock terrain, what me bothers more is having sandworms inside a city (do they follow traffic rules? ). But if we assume that fremen cities are sietches (the only imagination I have of a sietch is from the first dune game for dos you mentioned), I think it's ok to have them in the same tile.
Btw, what is about new city sets? Current cities don't look very dunish.

 

[Lord Tirian]

Btw, what is about new city sets? Current cities don't look very dunish.

How do you imagine they would look like, if they were more "dunish"?

Cheers, LT.

 

[Deliverator]

I'm the other way around, it's the moving through rock that'd bother me. Worms being in settlements I can live with.

Btw, what is about new city sets? Current cities don't look very dunish.

I'd like that too. I've not done citysets before, but something that looks like sietches in the early stages and then Arrakeen from the Children of Dune miniseries in the later stages would be great. But I have so much art to do right now, I'm struggling to prioritize. It would be great if one of the city set specialists like Geomodder could help us out. I think he's focused on Planetfall though. There may be something slightly better for us in his Ethnic Artstyles.

Edit: Hi LT, up for doing some citysets? I can probably get you some reference material...

 

[Lord Tirian]

Edit: Hi LT, up for doing some citysets? I can probably get you some reference material...

Would be great. The city sets are bothering me a lot and they're a thing that's probably going to stay (units/improvement are in flux right now, so I'm not really touching that stuff until the next big patch comes out) - but I'm drawing a blank inspiration-wise, because "desert caves" and "desert industry" over and over again seems a bit... repetitive and bland.

Cheers, LT.

 

[koma13]

How do you imagine they would look like, if they were more "dunish"?

No timbered houses with thatched roofs please.

Something like that would be cool:

Spoiler :

 

[Deliverator]

OK, I can go through the Children of Dune DVDs and take some screengrabs of buildings. I think some sort of cave like dwellings for the early stages would be great. I'll post something in the Art Thread this evening since we are taking this thread off topic...

 

[keldath]

wowo finally!!!

i wanted for a lot of time new city art!!!

great gret work!