Some questions from someone who just started modding.

[Shadow Wolf TJC]

I've decided to start practicing with modding, and am now working on one that's meant for balancing out the game, though I do have some questions:

1. Is splash damage affected by the weapon modifier? Is it affected by kinetic/thermal armor?
2. Is burn damage affected by the weapon modifier? Is it affected by kinetic/thermal armor?
3. Is splash damage added to the target alongside the direct damage from the shot itself, or does it just apply to everyone within the blast radius EXCEPT for the target?

I'll probably have more questions later on, as I continue working on my mod.

Edit: Is it a bad idea to increase projectile speeds above 2250 to, say, 5120?

[vexed]

Moving to the correct section, since most modders don't look here.

[Iluvalar]

in 2.3.9
1. Weapon modifier affect splash the armor is determined by the weapon
2. Except the burning effect that is constant (the one when the unit is on fire) you have no control on that one.
2-1 Incendiary damage have no weapon modifier ( ) and are always HEAT.
3. the target don't take splash dmg.
4. The flight speed should affect direct weapons, it could have some effect on indirect fire.

This look weird for the incendiary, we'd need to read projectile.cpp to know if it work the same for 3.1

[Shadow Wolf TJC]

Moving to the correct section, since most modders don't look here.

Sorry about that. Thanks anyways.

1. Weapon modifier affect splash the armor is determined by the weapon

I had a feeling, and was hoping, that splash damage would be affected by weapon modifiers and kinetic/thermal armor. Thanks for confirming it.

2. Except the burning effect that is constant (the one when the unit is on fire) you have no control on that one.
2-1 Incendiary damage have no weapon modifier ( ) and are always HEAT.

I figured that burn damage would ignore thermal armor, but it also ignores weapon modifiers?! <sigh> Dang. Well, I guess that, until they decide to scale burn damage based on the host weapon's modifier, I may have to limit how much burn damage weapons, including Flamers, can do when the time comes to balance them out. (I'm thinking about wanting to make Flamers ineffective against Hardpoints, whilst still making them as effective against everything else as before, though now I might need to reduce burn damage and increase projectile damage in order to achieve this balancing task.) Then again, I could possibly use this to my advantage in order to design weapons that are somewhat more well-rounded in terms of what threats they could take on.

3. the target don't take splash dmg.

OK. So if I wanted for the target to take as much damage as the others did from splash damage, then I should set projectile damage and splash damage to the same values? Thanks.

4. The flight speed should affect direct weapons, it could have some effect on indirect fire.

I originally wanted to increase the speeds of projectiles fired from AA weapons so that they'd be able to reach VTOLs much sooner, before they have a chance to get within range of their targets (since I believe that VTOLs can reach speeds of up to 1750, which seemed only a little bit slower than most AA projectiles' speed of 2250). I'm kind of worried that, if I set projectile speeds as high as, say, 5120, then I'd start seeing such anomalies as rounds passing through droids without impacting them.

This look weird for the incendiary, we'd need to read projectile.cpp to know if it work the same for 3.1

I'm currently working on modding for version 2.3.9, though I hope that I'll be able to adapt this for version 3.1 as well. If it turns out that burn damage works differently, then I'll adjust weapon balance accordingly.

[Iluvalar]

wait... the incendiary area of effect is affected by armor.

There is a 4rth type of damage that occur when a unit touch an incendiary area. They become "burning". That burn worth (15-armor)*10 second and can't be changed.

[Shadow Wolf TJC]

So what happens if a unit with 15 or more thermal armor enters an area that's burning? Will it take 5 points of damage every 10th of a second (since its thermal armor is greater than 2/3rds of the AoE burning damage of 15), or will it take no damage at all?

[Cyp]

Think VTOL top speed is 750.

...

4. The flight speed should affect direct weapons, it could have some effect on indirect fire.

I originally wanted to increase the speeds of projectiles fired from AA weapons so that they'd be able to reach VTOLs much sooner, before they have a chance to get within range of their targets (since I believe that VTOLs can reach speeds of up to 1750, which seemed only a little bit slower than most AA projectiles' speed of 2250). I'm kind of worried that, if I set projectile speeds as high as, say, 5120, then I'd start seeing such anomalies as rounds passing through droids without impacting them.

...

I'd guess up to around 4000 would be fine in 3.1.

Droids are treated as cylinders, structures as cuboids, and the change in relative position of the projectile and object between game state updates is a line segment. So it's easy to find the intersection time and position. Only problem is that the projectile only checks for potential interactions with droids and structures within a 4-tile-radius circle, each update...

So what happens if a unit with 15 or more thermal armor enters an area that's burning? Will it take 5 points of damage every 10th of a second (since its thermal armor is greater than 2/3rds of the AoE burning damage of 15), or will it take no damage at all?

If the armour is 10 or more, it takes 5 damage per second, since the damage and armour are treated as damage-per-second values.

[Shadow Wolf TJC]

Think VTOL top speed is 750.

Well, according to this guide, VTOL Propulsion has a base speed of 700, and according to this guide, a unit's speed is calculated as such:

Speed = Base Speed x Speed Penalty x Unit Experience Bonus
or
Speed = Propulsion Max Speed x Unit Experience Bonus
whichever is lower

Base Speed = Engine Power after Upgrades x Propulsion Max Speed x Propulsion Terrain Modifier / Total Weight

I now realize that I made a mistake in calculating VTOL max speeds. I previously thought that the Terrain Multiplier (which is 2.5 for VTOLs and 1 for all other vehicles) was applied to VTOL speeds in all cases. The highest speeds that I now believe are possible for VTOLs to obtain is if they were at Hero rank +1 (Hero units assigned to a Commander), which gives a 45% bonus to speed, meaning that they could attain speeds as high as 1015 (700 x 1.45). That's nearly half of the speeds of current AA projectile weapons.

Edit:

If the armour is 10 or more, it takes 5 damage per second, since the damage and armour are treated as damage-per-second values.

You mean that droids take 5 damage per 1/10 seconds, right?

[Shadow Wolf TJC]

I'd like to expand on some weapon lines' upgrades in the near-future, though I wonder how you can add new upgrades to existing lines, or change existing ones? Is it even possible to do so, or is it too hard-coded to be modable?

I'm getting ready to start adding in some new weapon turrets, as well as some new defensive structures and research topics to support them, and even a new feature (Starcraft 2 style destructible debris), though I wonder where I should place these at. In the end? Somewhere in the middle?

By the way, while looking at features.txt, I noticed that OilResource's "VisibleAtStart" variable was set to 0. Would setting that variable to 1 make them visible to players at the start of a map? If so, then would it cause beacons to appear on every Oil Resource on the map, which disappear once a Derrick was being built over it?

[Iluvalar]

To add upgrades :
Add a research R-Wpn-Cannon-Dmg10 (copy from dmg9)
Add a prerequisite to it in prresearch.txt between Dmg9 and Dmg10
Add a prerequisite to it in prresearch.txt between Dmg10 and the next generation research upgrade (i believe it is in cam4 as well so you might check the name of it to look legit )
Create a function for that upgrade in function.txt
Add the function to Dmg10 in researchfunction.txt
"FIX" the research stuff count in research.txt (the number of prerequisite and result might differ from dmg9 at that point)

You are done.

[Shadow Wolf TJC]

OK. After peering through functions.txt and figuring out which is which, it looks like we might be able to implement an exponential upgrade system after all, if we wanted to that is.

By the way, I believe that the Txt Editing page on the development wiki is in need of some serious updating, since it seems as if functions.txt, prresearch.txt, and researchfunction.txt (and probably many more .txt files) don't appear at all on there.

Edit: Here's a list of which variables I'm guessing are which from functions.txt so far:

1st variable: Upgrade type
2nd variable: ID of the upgrade

If the 1st variable is VehicleBody Upgrade, then the following variables should follow:
3rd variable: % added to engine power
4th variable: % added to HP?
5th variable: % added to Kinetic Armor?
6th variable: % added to Thermal Armor
7th variable: Applies to vehicles?
8th variable: Applies to Cyborgs?

If the 1st variable is Weapon Upgrade, then the following variables should follow:
3rd variable: Weapon class to apply upgrade to
4th variable: % subtracted from how much time is needed to reload
5th and 6th variables: % added to short and long range accuracy (I don't know which goes to which though.)
7th variable: % added to projectile damage
8th variable: % added to splash damage
9th variable: % added to burn damage
10th variable: ???

If the 1st variable is WallDefence Upgrade, then the following variables should follow:
3rd variable: % added to Kinetic and Thermal Armor
4th variable: % added to HP

If the 1st variable is Structure Upgrade, then the following variables should follow:
3rd variable: % added to Kinetic and Thermal Armor
4th variable: % added to HP
5th variable: % added to resistance towards being absorbed (via NEXUS Link Turret)

If the 1st variable is Sensor Upgrade, then the following variables should follow:
3rd variable: ???
4th variable: % added to sensor range

If the 1st variable is Research Upgrade, Power Upgrade, Factory Upgrade, Repair Upgrade, ReArm Upgrade, or VehicleConst Upgrade, then the following variable should follow:
3rd variable: % added to research speed, power generation speed, production speed, repair speed, rearm speed, or construction speed respectively

Edit #2:

As for the entries that don't have "upgrade" in their 1st variable's names, I'm guessing that it pertains to the base build points, research points, etc.

[Iluvalar]

10th variable: ??? . I believe there is a splash radius upgrade... must be that one. I'm not sure it is functionnal... nothing in the standard game use that...

I dont know for the sensor... would need to open the souce code to be sure...

[Shadow Wolf TJC]

I'm thinking about adding a few electronic weapons that, like the NEXUS Link Turret, are used to convert enemy units and structures towards your side, though they'd instead be very short-ranged units (with a role that's similar to the Command & Conquer series's Engineers, which are designed to capture enemy and neutral structures for your cause). However, I'm not yet certain as to how to adjust their rate of assimilation, though I do believe that their weaponSubClass variable would need to be set to ELECTRONIC in order to be able to assimilate anything at all.

BTW, nobody has answered these questions as of yet:

I'm getting ready to start adding in some new weapon turrets, as well as some new defensive structures and research topics to support them, and even a new feature (Starcraft 2 style destructible debris), though I wonder where I should place these at. In the end? Somewhere in the middle?

By the way, while looking at features.txt, I noticed that OilResource's "VisibleAtStart" variable was set to 0. Would setting that variable to 1 make them visible to players at the start of a map? If so, then would it cause beacons to appear on every Oil Resource on the map, which disappear once a Derrick was being built over it?

[Shadow Wolf TJC]

You know how Trucks can repair structures as well as build them, right? I wonder if adjusting the Truck turret's build points would affect its repair speed as well as its construction speed.

Edit: I also wonder if Truck upgrades, such as Engineering, would also increase their ability to repair damaged structures, in addition to increasing the rate at which they can build new structures. I may have to provide more advanced versions of the Truck turret in order to allow them to keep up with the pace of increasing weapon damage and structure durability as matches progress onwards.

[Shadow Wolf TJC]

If I wanted to give some Indirect or Erratic Direct weapons (especially Indirect weapons), such as Seraphs or Archangels, or certain Bombs, the ability to home in on their targets, how would I do that? Would I need to change those weapons' movement stat to something like HOMING-INDIRECT or HOMING-ERRATIC-DIRECT, or would I need to do some coding in order to add support for this?