I'm building a new Campaign, any pointers?

[CDR Manuel]

Yes, I'm planning on making new Campaign with the WZ2100 engine, but I need tools and knowledge to make the briefing computer interface, and essentially converting my sequence data into ogg format. I have Vegas Pro 8.0c, and GimpShop, but I lack a tutorial on making custom campaigns, via modding base.wz.

Any suggestions?

[aubergine]

Take a look at Goth's Cam4: viewtopic.php?f=49&t=10665

[vexed]

Video conversion to another format is trivial. There are free utilities to do that, like ffmpeg, theora (http://www.theora.org/faq/#41), mencoder....and so on.
For actually making a full campaign, that is a rather complex process with no easy way to accomplish it, so if your dead set on this, then you need to get familiar with all the internal files inside base.wz and how everything works.
You might want to get your feet wet checking out some of the tutorial files, and see how those are put together. Then once you are happy with that and how everything works, then you can progress to making multiple levels.

I highly suggest you don't use wzscript, and instead use (the new) javascript for making your missions/levels, so you don't have to deal with all the quirks and limitations of wzscript, and get some easier ways to debug things using JS.

[CDR Manuel]

Thanks, for the heads-up, now I need to put together a story for the Komodora IX campaign, divided into three acts. They are skirmishes, and you earn new research options as you progress, just collect artifacts. And unlike the vanilla campaign, the choices you make in one act, influences the outcome of the endgame, this in effect will enable players to experience different endings.

With that said in mind, there will be forks in the campaign that lead you to take a position on the current situation. Of course, this will not involve your friends in the story, but you will have to save them at some point.

Another idea I had, was the supply depot system as introduced in StarCraft. As you grow your forces, they need supplies to last their whole life on the battlefield.

Then it occurred to me, how are the structures being built? What kind of solid resource goes into the construction of structures, or production of units? Power alone won't do you justice in my Campaign, you also need to mine a mineral called Eternium. In crystal form, it is rich in transitional and precious metals, and requires a special mining turret to collect them. Of course Construction Droids can do this if you want me to make it so. However, mined eternium needs to be refined by ordering the Construction Droids to deliver the payload to a Refinery. As Eternium is refined, however, storage must be considered, too. Building Silos allows 1000 units of Eternium to be stored (This can later be doubled to 2000 units per silo, and 4000 units per silo upon researching the compression module Mk I and II respectively).

The reason for these additions? As the engine evolves, so too, must the game. I would not consider it an official change, but if someone can help guide me as I develop this mod, I will never forget my training.

[Lord Apocalypse]

Adding new resource types would probably require a source change. Adding supply dumps probably would not be too difficult though would either require a lot of scripting or possibly a minor code change. I'm thinking scripting though.

Based on what you want for this campaign though you might be better off with another RTS engine such as Spring. Just depends on what your needs are and if you really want to get your hands dirty with C/C++ coding

[aubergine]

For resource creation, we're sorta stuck with power at the moment. If you look at Shadow Wolf's "Contingency" mod, he adds a new power source: wind turbines. But it still is power based. Currently there's really no way to have multiple types of resource - we're limited to just 'power'.

[Rman Virgil]

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Could possibly do batteries and capacitors.

.

[Lord Apocalypse]

Still only a limit of energy production rather than the more traditional dual resource method of power/ore.

Then again, thinking back on a lot of different RTS games I've played most have actually stuck with a single resouce. At least on the Westwood line of games... Dune 2, C&C, RA, etc. Or did tey use energy... Blizzard RTS games tend to favor 2 or more I think. Wood, gold, and I think oil? Though I don't remember what StarCraft used. Haven't played it in years. Cavedog (and its successor) have favored the dual metal/energy as seen in TA, SC, and SC2

There have been others I have played but I do not remember what type of resource collection those required. Metal Fatigue, Earth2150, Steel Soldiers... Dawn of War (have only played DoW2). I know I am missing a few.. It was a popular genre for awhile.

[Shadow Wolf TJC]

Another idea I had, was the supply depot system as introduced in StarCraft. As you grow your forces, they need supplies to last their whole life on the battlefield.

I heard that, in version 3.2, we'll be allowed to set unit limits in rules.js (a JavaScript file that tells the computer how to run multiplayer/skirmish matches) using the new setDroidLimit() function. It can even be set to apply unit limits to individual players, so it's certainly possible to implement a StarCraft-styled control limit system that increases by how much of a certain structure is needed on the map.

For resource creation, we're sorta stuck with power at the moment. If you look at Shadow Wolf's "Contingency" mod, he adds a new power source: wind turbines. But it still is power based. Currently there's really no way to have multiple types of resource - we're limited to just 'power'.

Indeed, though it might be possible to implement pseudo-resources through modifying rules.js. I believe that Iluvalar's NRS mod did this on order to add interest and/or debt as a pseudo-resource.

Still only a limit of energy production rather than the more traditional dual resource method of power/ore.

Then again, thinking back on a lot of different RTS games I've played most have actually stuck with a single resouce. At least on the Westwood line of games... Dune 2, C&C, RA, etc. Or did tey use energy... Blizzard RTS games tend to favor 2 or more I think. Wood, gold, and I think oil? Though I don't remember what StarCraft used. Haven't played it in years. Cavedog (and its successor) have favored the dual metal/energy as seen in TA, SC, and SC2

There have been others I have played but I do not remember what type of resource collection those required. Metal Fatigue, Earth2150, Steel Soldiers... Dawn of War (have only played DoW2). I know I am missing a few.. It was a popular genre for awhile.

I believe that most game developers agree (myself included) in that diversity in resources in strategy games should be simplified or limited in order to make the games easier for novices to pick up and play. However, that doesn't necessary mean that most game developers care about making their strategy games easy to learn, as can be seen with games such as Civilization 3 and 4 (which feature many strategic resources such as Iron, Oil, and Saltpeter), though Supreme Commander (which only features mass and energy as resources) is difficult to pick up and play for other reasons...

At least on the Westwood line of games... Dune 2, C&C, RA, etc. Or did tey use energy...

They did indeed have power, though only as a "secondary" resource, since it's not as difficult to generate more power (by building more power generators) as it is to gather more Tiberium/Spice/Ore, which were the games' sole "strategic" resource, since it can only be collected from key resource points such as Tiberium/Spice/Ore fields (or in certain cases, from capturing structures such as Tiberium Spikes or Oil Refineries). Besides, power (provided by power generators) was only necessary for powering defenses, superweapons, and ensuring that factories run at optimal performance (they suffer from a production penalty when low on power), while Tiberium/Spice/Ore was necessary for building new structures, producing new units, researching upgrades, and even using certain support powers or special abilities.

[aubergine]

@Shadow - I did consider mentioning NRS mod, but using usury as an example seemed somewhat at odds with my sustainable worldview.

Regarding multiple resources, the pace of the game seems to be the main factor. So in many online games, such as Travian and Grepolis, there are usually 3 or 4 resources (eg. wood, rock, silver, favor). Because attacks can take hours to reach target, there has to be other things to keep player occupied, and also the multiple resources add to the 'grind' factor that's essential to develop habitual repetitive actions needed to keep players logging in regularly; without them, players simply forget to log in and wander off to somewhere else on the internet.

With WZ, quarries and iron mines are replaced by research labs - the research tree is so extensive (especially in mods like Contingency) that it takes up most of the time that would be otherwise available for dealing with multiple types of resource, it deals with most of the requirements needed to immerse the player in the game. At the same time, learning the research tree is a challenge and makes the player feel that they have invested in the game - so they keep coming back to it. Then there's the droid designer - learning the pros and cons of different component combinations is another form of cognitive investment.

There are, however, some games which have huge numbers of resources. One particular example is the Stronghold series of games from Firefly studios. In Stronghold 2, there were dozens and dozens of resources - candles, cows, cheese, arrows, wood, wheat, bread, etc. The research tree, however, was relatively limited - just a few troop types (maceman, archer, etc) to accommodate the vast number of resource chains.

I think it would be extremely interesting if WZ had the option to define multiple resource types, in particular the ability to chain them - so there would be production of some raw resource, that then gets processed in to something else, that can then be combined with some other processed (or unprocessed) resource to generate yet another resource. This could be particularly desirable in a scavenger campaign where, shortly after The Collapse, the main focus would be on getting basic necessities like food, water, building materials, etc. The research tree could start out very basic with the main focus on resources and gradually, as tech level increases, the focus shifts from resources (and resource chains) to research (and droid designs). The common thread would be battles - it's just that the nature of battles would change as tech advances.

[Lord Apocalypse]

...games such as Civilization 3 and 4 (which feature many strategic resources such as Iron, Oil, and Saltpeter)...

The Civ games are more 4x than RTS though and 4x games normally have huge tech tress and a great deal of resources, though resource management is far more limited.