[DEPRECIATED] Campaign 4 (Old thread)

[aubergine]

Sounds good, however my only worry would be that you choose a path and then find that it's not effective against what the enemy are using and struggle to change path to something more suitable.

[Shadow Wolf TJC]

Sounds good, however my only worry would be that you choose a path and then find that it's not effective against what the enemy are using and struggle to change path to something more suitable.

That's assuming that Campaign 4 won't include anti-tank machineguns such as the Vulcan, Punisher, or Hellfury Gattling Guns, anti-personnel cannons or railguns such as the Blunderbuss and Scattershot, anti-tank and anti-structure lasers, or the anti-structure Proto-Railgun (which in Contingency, is required to research T3 Gauss Machineguns, T3 Gauss Cannons/Railguns, or T3 Gauss Artillery). Otherwise, I wouldn't worry too much, since each of the weapon lines have their own distinct playstyles.

Instead of subjecting the player to the VERY large technology tree that is a hallmark of Contingency, we're going to choose our research paths. That's right folks -- you'll get where you want to be more quickly, and quite a bit more directly.

Here's how it'll work:

- There are core topics that everyone will need (and want). All research paths will get everything non-weapon that they should.

- You'll be able to choose from the following:

- Machineguns
- Energy & Lasers
- Mortars & Artillery
- Fire
- Cannons
- Railguns
- Rockets & Missiles

Maybe it would be better to exclude Flamers from the list of primary weapon lines, since they're quite limited in number in Contingency, and are more often meant to be used alongside other weapon lines, even in T3. In fact, Contingency treats Flamers as more of a secondary weapon line (alongside TBMs and Bombs) compared to the Machinegun, Cannon/Railgun, Rocket/Missile, Laser, and Artillery lines, which are treated more as primary weapon lines.

By the way, after we choose a primary weapon line to focus on, we'll still have access to a number of T2 weapons from other weapon lines, such as Howitzers, Ripple Rockets, Sunburst AA, and Whirlwind AA to name a few?

[Goth Zagog-Thou]

By the way, after we choose a primary weapon line to focus on, we'll still have access to a number of T2 weapons from other weapon lines, such as Howitzers, Ripple Rockets, Sunburst AA, and Whirlwind AA to name a few?

That's an option for sure. I was planning to make all AA stuff part of the 'General Research' line, and everyone would get access to it regardless of which path they chose.

As for Howitzers and Ripple Rockets, I dunno really. That's Mortars & Arty and Missiles & Rockets line(s). I was planning to have those exclusive to their appropriate research paths.

As for Flamers, you're probably right. They need more topics and more weapons to bring them up to the level of the other types. On their own they might not be so good. Perhaps Fire should be enabled for all paths as well?

[Goth Zagog-Thou]

Alrighty. The Path researches are in place. Having some difficulty getting the proper weapons to enable (R-Path-Machineguns should open R-Wpn-MG1Mk1 and the MG upgrades Mk1 for example).

prresearch.txt *seems* to be correct.

Code: Select all

R-Wpn-MG1Mk1,R-Path-Machineguns,184

adding it to resultcomponents.txt results in the MG1Mk1 weapon getting auto-researched, and that's not what I want. Nor (when I do it that way) are the upgrades being unlocked. And yes, I've removed any need for them to require anything OTHER than MG1Mk1.

I need to know what file I need to be changing in order to unlock researches and not components. I've looked at every file in /cam4/research and there's no sign of something that handles that. Are we defaulting to base.wz's stuff on accident? IF we are this would explain everything.

[Goth Zagog-Thou]

Moving right along. I'm going to handle research paths directly in the script instead.

I've changed my mind about making other paths unavailable, as it would be too limiting to the player. So research everything you like.

So far this method is working, and working well. The next release will have this as a starring feature, and it will be as complete as possible. I'm sure you guys will let me know if something is missing.

I've also done some trickery to M11's map -- and placed it (and the mission) in that big, unused area in the north section of M12. Perfect use for it and I'm pleased with how well it seems to work.

More updates as they come. I plan to spend the better part of tonight getting all of the Research Paths in place and working properly.

Yay!

[Shadow Wolf TJC]

prresearch.txt is the file that you'll want to edit if you're changing research prerequisites. resultcomponents.txt and resultstructure.txt enable the ability to use new components and structures respectively, redcomponents.txt and redstructure.txt disable the ability to use previously available components and structures (usually done when new technologies make older ones obsolete), and researchfunctions.txt is the file to edit if you want researching certain techs to apply upgrades to weapons, structures, etc. (See functions.txt for what each of those functions do.)

[Goth Zagog-Thou]

I've gotten it sorted. I'm doing each path "brute force" via the script.

Machineguns line is almost done. It's slow going to script it all out but I'll get there eventually. I have a few more changes I have to test and then I'll move along to another line. Hard to believe Machineguns has 96 research items all by itself

We'll get there, just slow.

[Goth Zagog-Thou]

Machineguns line is scripted and working fine. It'll take one hour (game time) on low power to get through the path.

Think I'll start Mortars and Artillery next, since it's going to be one of the longer ones to get finished.

And the changes I've made to the M11 Nexus Forward Base are very, very good. The player WILL need to pick a research path other than MG to crack that nut...

[Goth Zagog-Thou]

After reading some of Aubergine's excellent and exhaustive documentation, I was able to get each mission script running with its' own corresponding .js file (each one now found in the respective mission script folder). Yes, this is a big deal -- and gives me far more control than rules.js could.

This will help me solve a ton of little niggling issues I've experienced, and help get me more organized in the process. As an added bonus, there's nothing preventing me from doing includes() now! YAY!

What this means is that I can write every major subroutine as its' own .js file which can be loaded/unloded as needed. Eventually, instead of one very large script, it will have several smaller ones that will also have the benefit of additional horsepower offered by the new JS script engine -- improving performance.

And what's more, all the js-savvy people will finally be in a position to make improvements if they so choose, since the witchcraft of wzscript will no longer be a barrier.

I know this will make them happy -- it makes ME happy too.

[Goth Zagog-Thou]

To expand upon my previous post: Think of wzscript being 2-dimensional, where the new js API is 3-dimensional. Things can move in three directions, now -- and in one direction of spacetime Wzscript could as well, but it was gnarly to say the least, and it couldn't make calls to any other script -- thus, it was still a lowly flatlander (to use Carl Sagan's vernacular).

The more I'm using JS, the more I like it. We likes it, precious!

[aubergine]

I think Carl was probably referring to this book: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flatland

Which is why it's hardly surprising his successor mentioned it here.

EDIT: That link is to the wrong list and I can't find the list I was thinking of. It's still an interesting list none the less

Anyway, glad my docs were of help Just updated the include() page to include some more info BTW, in particular a note that it always loads in to the global scope in the context of the global object, so be careful with that if you're loading it from within closures.

[vexed]

To expand upon my previous post: Think of wzscript being 2-dimensional, where the new js API is 3-dimensional. Things can move in three directions, now -- and in one direction of spacetime Wzscript could as well, but it was gnarly to say the least, and it couldn't make calls to any other script -- thus, it was still a lowly flatlander (to use Carl Sagan's vernacular).

The more I'm using JS, the more I like it. We likes it, precious!

[aubergine]

Ah, nice, jsdebug cheat on WZ 3.2, that will be very handy for fixing script errors. ISTR that there's a dynamic eval text box somewhere as well, that lets you run arbitrary code at runtime in any of the script environments?

[Per]

Ah, nice, jsdebug cheat on WZ 3.2, that will be very handy for fixing script errors. ISTR that there's a dynamic eval text box somewhere as well, that lets you run arbitrary code at runtime in any of the script environments?

http://developer.wz2100.net/attachment/ ... 1%20PM.png

For now, results of evaluation is dumped into console.

PS It can be a nice way of doing basic household math if you can't find your normal calculator one day!

[aubergine]

It would be nice if there was bigger multiline text box for doing evals.

Do you have more screenies of the debug tool? I'd like to start documenting it's features. (I'm on Mac OS X 10.5.8 so can't currently try the latest 3.2 builds to generate images for myself)

(Maybe these posts about the jsdebug could be split in to their own topic in scripting forum? I imagine there will be much discussion about it)