Re: Bug thread
 

Save and Quit ends your turn.
If you login to a server and go to options and click "Save game and Quit," the server shows your turn as having been ended.

Re: Bug thread
 

Listed already in the SYS category. Argitoth, please check if a bug has already been shortlisted before you post something as a new issue.

Update please
 

I submitted files about a priest attacking a province without PD and with X X Retreat orders.

When X where unactionable orders, the priest would retreat even from a province with routing undead, where the enemy routed first.

Has this made it to the bug list?

Re: Update please
 

I do not see this as a bug. Sometimes I do want to force a retreat. I do not
want the AI disobeying my orders. If the commander sees retreat, he should
retreat, no matter whether the enemy is routing or not.

I absolutely hate the AI deciding that it is smarter than its orders. In my
current game I had a nature mage decide that the enemy is too wimpy for him to
cast serpent's blessing. Instead, the moron goes and casts Touch of Madness on
himself and the longbowmen around him. Not only did I have to endure the poison
of the enemy slingers, I also lost ten longbowmen who managed to squeeze between
the infantry that was on "hold and attack", and got shot up by my troops.

By no means was it a disaster, but it is certainly annoying. Please reduce the
range and worth score of "Touch of Madness", or better yet, make it 'scripted only'
like "Breath of Winter". It seems that every time a nature mage of mine refuses
to use gems, he defaults to "Touch of Madness". And given that gem users are
usually high level mages, who are positioned behind the infantry lines...

Re: Bug thread
 

So I just lost a supercombatant to the 50-turn limit thing in Dominions. As a matter of fact, the limit is 50, not 75. I'm wondering if this is considered a bug or not. Regardless, it's a serious issue. It ruins the fun of the game.

It's really funny how I lost the golem actually. The 50-turn limit hit one or two battle rounds before the battle would have been over. I was seriously unlucky in this battle. Everything I did in that battle helped me reach the 50-turn limit. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/image...s/rolleyes.gif

Re: Bug thread
 

Chris, that's not a bug, that's WAD. If units have unactionable orders, they do something else (e.g. a mage scripted to cast something that doesn't have enough range to reach enemy, he casts something else instead). If there is nothing else they can do (essentially can't shoot or can't cast a spell), they move on to the next order in the script, check if it's actionable etc. If the oreder is retreat, it's triggered. If retreat orders are not specified in the script, the default order is attack if nothing else can be done.

Argitoth, the golem issue is in the bug list with a request for clarification on whether it is a bug or working as it should. Without input from IW, that's all I can do.

Re: Bug thread
 

Edi,

Then why have me send in turn files, if its WAD?
Also, its still peculiar.

Say for example the order was

Banish, Banish, Retreat.
But there are no units within Banish range.

If you have mages scripted for fireball, fireball, retreat they will cast SOME spell (usually like fireshield) twice -it won't just skip forward to the retreat.

But the priest immediately retreats first turn. I believe this is a defect of AI, and I reproduced it like
5 times.

Re: Bug thread
 

actually the limit is 50 turns with additional turns, depending on whats there.

I don't recall all the details.. but on 50 the attacker gets a rout order. On turn like 60 mindless or enraged units start getting killed etc.

If you search around theres a thread on it.

Re: Bug thread
 

Chrispedersen, it's turn 50, not 60. I counted. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/happy.gif

And I seriously doubt it depends on anything.

Re: Bug thread
 

I've always disagreed with the "Auto_Death" after 50, 75 and 100 turns. I've tried to make the point it should be an "Auto_Retreat". For any unit or commander to be killed because of a time limitation is wrong on many levels. Unfortunately as long as this remains every Ascension War between pretenders will have to follow the rules of the all powerful union or it means "Auto_Death" on the battlefield.

Union Rules:
Attacker auto-retreats first at 5pm
Defender auto-retreats second at 8pm
Death for any which disobey these union battlefield rules.

===== anyways ====
[img]/threads/images/Graemlins/Bug.gif[/img] update:
The bug where iron will removes the blessing from shroud of the saint is also reproduced when ironskin is casted. So it's not just iron will.

Re: Bug thread
 

The first one is an auto retreat, but some units don't retreat. Paralyzed beings included. Thus the 75 turn check kills units to prevent battles from going on for ever.

Edit: mindless units that rout dies.

Re: Bug thread
 

Without auto-death, it's possible that a battle could never end. You could have two fatigued armies passed out on the battlefield, neither able to kill the other, and not even able to retreat even if they wanted to.

Oh wait ... maybe I see what you're saying. When turn 100 is reached, just treat the entire attacking army as if it *had* retreated, and flee it to the surrounding provinces. Sounds like it might work.

Re: Bug thread
 

The 75% HP loss auto-route does not take into account the full HP of additional forms. Like Cor2 above, I had a mage flee an assassination attempt because the mage was carrying a bottle of living water, and the elemental's first form dropped to 7HP. Looks pretty nonsensical when you watch the battle.

Re: Bug thread
 

I don't see why mindless beings have to die. They walked themselves to the battle, they should be able to walk themselves out of it.

I don't mind the 50 turn limit, I logically explain by saying "attacking army is tired, they are retreating so that they can regroup and make another attack." That's completely logical. Now, mindless beings ruin that logic by dieing. If mindless beings can't retreat, that means whatever is controlling them can no longer control them. They can attack, but they can't retreat. That makes no sense.

What I mean is...say a mage controls some undead to enter a battle. It's illogical to say that the mage all of a sudden loses control of the undead and cannot make the undead retreat along with the rest of the army. It's like saying you can turn something ON but you can't turn it OFF.

Really, WE DON'T NEED LOGIC TO EXPLAIN THE 50 TURN LIMIT! If my mindless supercombatant dies because of a turn limit I start to dislike Dominions. If I start to dislike dominions, that means I might not reccomend dominions to someone else. That means money loss. That means customer loss. Maybe I won't buy Illwinter products in the future. BY THE WAY, I did recommend Dominions to a friend recently, and he did buy the game. I'm not just spouting words.

I think this rule should be changed not in the name of logic, but in the name of fun. By the way, FYI, games are supposed to be fun. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/eek.gif

Edit: Wait, why are golems mindless if they can walk themselves around? I think if we remove the mindless attribute, that would solve the problem for me.

That is, in my opinion, the best solution. Even better if the armies go back to the province they attacked from. Not only that, 100 is a better turn limit than 50.

Re: Bug thread
 

Kristoffer O:

For SC commander that is mindless it really shouldn't be like that. 50-turn limit should force all creatures with their minds to retreat and thus all mindless would dissolve. On a Golem 'never routs' makes it an disadvantage, not a good thing. He is a commander, he should be able to fight till the end [auto-kill on turn 75 could be somewhat tolerated more, but still unfair].

Re: Bug thread
 

Thematically:
The golem is animated with a divine word and it acts on that principle. It is in his nature to acts and not to rout. When forced to rout the divine principle is broken and the golem is rendered inanimate.

Mechanics:
We can't make exceptions on mechanics for all units that should behave in a particular way. Exceptions are fun and interesting, but are time consuming and makes the code more jumbled.

Argitoth:
I think it is fun when my enemy's golem dies.

Retreating mages lose control over their undead just like I lose control over my students, when I rout from my classroom. I wish I could have the necromancers prudence and skill to make my students disappear when I rout.
I'm also under the rule of 50 turns. I automatically rout from my class after 50 min. If I am prevented from fleeing, I will pass out after 75 minutes.

Also I don't care much about customer loss. By now I'm pretty certain there are people who like my game, as well as people who dislike it. I'm content with knowing that there are people who like what I made, and I'm happy to continue working on projects I believe they will like in the future. It is nice if I do fix things that people like, but I will not fix things I think are OK or good. I might change my opinion on different matters though.

Re: Bug thread
 

I like to play fair games. If it were me, knowing I caused a massive lost to my enemy because of a turn limit, I wouldn't find it very fun.

"I win the battle because my tartarian got paralyzed for 50 turns and wasn't killed, so your golem is dead."

How easy is it to remove the mindless attribute from golems in a mod? That will be my solution.

Re: Bug thread
 

Here's the major problem... what should be done is an 'auto-retreat' instead of an 'auto-killed' . This 'auto-retreat' means at turn 75 any units remaining on the battlefield are instantly retreated to a friendly neighboring province. The 'auto-retreat' means instant and automatically completed thus ending the battle.


The 'auto-retreat' means very powerful SC's unable to conquer provinces leave and return another day to continue the battle. The 'auto-death' currently in existence means every Ascension War has this all powerful union establishment which enforces death on the battlefield.

Re: Bug thread
 

The auto kill is there as some units don't retreat. Target was paralyzed, stunned and immobile units, as other units supposedly already had been auto-routed.

What units do not get routed by autorout?
Berserkers

Re: Bug thread
 

If it's too hard to remove auto kill from the game, the only solution is to raise the turn limit. Why 50? Why not 100? Why not 500? Why not the limit be a game setting before a game is created? Maybe that's too complicated to program.

It's easy for the computer to process turns in which not much is happening. By turn 50, turns can be processed very quickly because most units have died and the rest are paralyzed or locked in a very small never-ending battle. 500 sounds good to me.

Re: Bug thread
 

He's not saying that there doesn't need to be a mechanism to handle units that don't rout.

He's suggesting they get automatically moved to a neighboring province, as if they'd routed instead of just being killed.

Re: Bug thread
 

The link leads to a video I created of the battle in question.

http://www.elanhickler.com/misc/batt...tle_flash.html (Flash Encoding 6.5mb)

Tartarian gets paralyzed, but can't be killed by the melee units. Tartarian gets unparalyzed, my golem dies before it can end the battle by killing the tartarian.

Re: Bug thread
 

Beserkers, sleepers, paralyzed, immobile units are auto_killed. Here are two scenarios I experienced which display why auto-retreat works better than auto-kill.

One scenario I experienced was my beserked SC was trying to kill over a thousand mindless units such as skelletons... the enemy retreated yet my beserked SC could not kill all the remaining mindless units before being auto-killed himself by the time limit.

Another scenario I experienced was my SC was killing hundreds of different types of units. Eventually the enemy was retreating yet enemy dispossed spirits fleeing ran into my SC and paralyzed him. The dispossed spirits could not flee or harm the SC yet they had him continously paralyzed. My SC was then killed by the time limit.


I understand and agree we don't want the battles lasting forever yet a better solution is having an auto-retreat instead of the auto-kill. Auto-retreating meaning the battle ends and units/commanders flee to a friendly nieghboring province.

Re: Bug thread
 

> He's suggesting they get automatically moved to a neighboring province, as if they'd routed instead of just being killed.

I'm more unfond of a sphinx reappearing in a neighboring province than a golem dying because he was too slow on killing stuff.

Re: Bug thread
 

I'm more inclined to raise the limit, but I don't see the point, since it affects everyone the same. Just like starvation rate or income or whatever. It is a feature you know and have to deal with.

Re: Bug thread
 

Easy solution... auto-retreat only the attackers. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/wink.gif

Re: Bug thread
 

NT Jedi, I hate to argue against your ideas, but how can you solve the part where immobiles attack via teleportation? For the sake of getting rid of auto-kill, I'd just say it's fair to move the immobile to a neighboring province, but Kristoffer probably wouldn't agree with me.

If Kristoffer does agree to do this, I hope he can also raise the turn limit a little bit; a one-two punch to this "problem." It would make me happy, anyway. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/happy.gif

Re: Bug thread
 

With regards to immobile the end result should be the same result as what happens now when using map edit commands and placing two different nations on the same province. This scenario would have the defender still owning the province and the attacking immobile sitting on top without access to anything within the province. Thus next turn results in an instant battle.

This might be too much programming... so as a second option leave the auto-kill for only immobiles and provide an auto-retreat for only attackers.

An increase for battle turns would be appreciated... as time passes it's inevitable gamers will need to upgrade their computers. The computers of today and tomorrow can handle the increased battle turns. On reflection for increasing battle turns... anytime we've seen in increase for commander and unit limits we've only seen praise and happiness in the community.

Re: Bug thread
 

I'm with NT-Jedi. For me, auto-killing is worse then un-teleporting them back, or vortexing them home, or just declaring they successfully left the field, with or without immobiles. They are all arbitrary solutions to keep the game playable but killing a unit *because* it's safe from whatever it's fighting is just ugly. YMMV.

Re: Bug thread
 

Somebody's going to wake up and start bashing again.

I think the answer is different: Starting at turn 40 count the total hp's of the real (not battlefield summons) units in the fight. Note the highest value in the 40-50 turn range. In every subsequent 10 turn range note the highest value, compare with the saved value. If it's equal or higher it's time for a rout. If it's lower, replace the saved value with the new value. Note that since the hp's must always be declining the battle will end eventually.

If it's determined that a rout should happen look at the retreat options for both sides. If a side can retreat, rout that side. Do not rout a side that can't retreat at this point. These routs apply to *ALL* units, even those normally immune from routing.

Continue the hp checks, if they call for a rout *AGAIN*, rout both sides.

If the check hits a third time then you force everything off the battlefield. Anything capable of teleporting to the capital does so, anything else dies.

So long as the battle is making progress it will continue. If it deadlocks the guy who can retreat does so--realistically the guy who has noplace to go won't stop a useless battle.

The second case is to deal with the possibility that nobody can retreat. Two armies teleport into battle or the like. The final case removes any units that can't move.

Eep
 

Many of us don't *like* SC's. So theres a game balance question between SC's and nonSC's.

One of the ways to defeat an SC is just have so much chaff that he CANT kill it all in 50 turns.

Leave as is.

Re: Bug thread
 

I've made a new thread where we can discuss our ideas about this without cluttering the bug reporting thread:

http://www.shrapnelcommunity.com/thr...;Number=600558

Oni First & Second Shapes
 

Perhaps I'm not understanding things:

According to the ONI uni descriptions (e.g.,Kuro-Oni)

"Oni are almost immortal. If their body is slain, their spirit will survive.....if the spirit is not slain or banished as well, it will reform a new body over time."

Now, according to the unit db, kuro oni - and others use the 1rstshape / 2ndshape commands. Whats the big deal?

Well, according to manual, changing upon death should be handled by the secondtmpshape command.

The issue as I see it - is that the Oni currently change upon any significant damage, rather than upon death. So, not only does this vary with the unit as described it has game implications, nameley:

1. Oni units may change from a missile troop to a non missile troop.
2. Effective strength decreases. Instead of being able to absorb one hit, damage irrelevent and then revert to a second shape, the unit reverts somewhere around 50%. This means a 4-12 effective hit point difference.

Or am I completely misunderstanding something?

Re: Bug thread
 

Chris, regarding the priest issue that you reported, it was covered earlier, but to recap and clarify:

It is not a bug, as you suggest. The reason why priests rout much more easily from an unactionable script items is because they do not have alternatives they can use unlike most other mages. Take your example of a fire mage who's out of range of a fireball and thus can't cast it. Since the order is <cast fireball> and it can't be done, the AI reads it as <cast something else that is usable, if possible>. So the mage is likely to cast fire shield, or fire resistance, or fire fend or phoenix power or any number of other fire spells that could either buff the mage, buff troops or hurt the enemy.

A priest has very few options in this regard. Sermon of courage is one, holy avenger another, but a Lv 1 priest can't do that or anything else useful, so when out of range he skips cast orders until he hits retreat and then does that because it is actionable. If you want the priest to stay on the field for the full five turns regardless of actionable orders or not, the proper script would be <blessing><hold or cast><hold or cast><hold or cast><hold or cast><retreat>.

So everything is working exactly as it should. As long as a caster can cast something that actually does something useful, they will, and only then will skip to next order. If retreat orders are involved and absolutely must not be executed before specified, <hold or cast> is your only option.

The reason why turn files should be sent with unusual bugs is that they can be analyzed if necessary. Often things can be puzzled out without them, such as now, but I simply do not have the resources to immediately jump on everything. It is also important to take into account how things work in Dominions, because the mechanics can sometimes cause behavior that looks like a bug if you are not familiar with it. The manual does a good job of describing most mechanics and observation of the game in action should provide a lot of additional information if one pays attention. This was one such example.

Re: Bug thread
 

Personally, I'd like to see this re-handled. Little memory would have to be reserved for "total hp including shapechanges" stat, but it would only have to be calculated once for each monster type, and that'd be automatic. The amount of hp would be shown when you viewed extra info about hp; alternatively, it could be shown instead of the hp left for the current form. It would work fine for hydras or elementals, but not so well for e.g. Machakan sorceresses whose spider-form shouldn't be seen, or for units whose second form disappears after battle.

Modding Bug
 

#magicskill 8 1
#custommagic 13312 100 will work

#custommagic 46080 100 won't and will make a unit old?

Whats up? AKA., Random priest seems not to work.

Re: Modding Bug
 

> Whats up? AKA., Random priest seems not to work.

It is not possible in the code I recently discovered, so I would would be surprised if it was possible in modding. THere are however instances where I can do less in the code then you can in modding so I'm not sure here.

Re: Modding Bug
 

Well, the manual says you can... #custommagic
Woohoo Bug! Do I win a donut?

Bug / Wishlist
 

Modding spells is much less than ideal in many circumstances. The AI has no knowledge of the spell and therefore will not weight nor cast it.

Similiarly, it is a frustrating feature that carefully scripted orders go awry as the AI makes its own weighting.

It would be interesting if there were a modding method, and an ingame option table, where one could creating weighting tables.

For the ingame option - it would perhaps only allow you to create a table of maybe 5 entries. And you could add up to 100 weighting for up to 5 spells. Or deprecate 5 spells by a like amount.

This weighting would be added to the AI determined weighting value. Since the same table would be used in all random events, battles, assassinations etc it still prevents micromanaging while allowing players to hopefully have some better control, especially on really important battles.

Stolen Prophet
 

I managed to Enslave Mind my opponent's prophet. Now I've got it as a normal unit, but ... it's still a Prophet!

It's a unit, not a commander. Its title is "Prophet". But it's blessed (outside combat), with my bless, and has the Prophet icon.

I'll GOR it in a couple months and see if it's still an H3 priest. I wonder if my opponent will be able to make a new prophet in 6 months, or if he'll have to wait until 6 months after the one I stole dies.

Re: Stolen Prophet
 

I think the prophet is counted as dead, so he should get a prophet. But GoRing him would be an interesting experiment.

Re: Stolen Prophet
 

THe question is not if he can make a new prophet. THe question is if you can make another. Prphet is yours now after all.

Re: Bug / Wishlist
 

I've seen modded spells cast unscripted. Happens all the time with Skaven for instance. The AI does the usual comparison of fatigue cost and potential damage in order to decide whether to cast it.

Re: Bug / Wishlist
 

It might be that the AI is bad at recognizing buffs. Damage dealing spells are more straight forward and the AI can compute how much damage they would deal.

Re: Bug / Wishlist
 

If you give two shields to an non-mounted unit with no legs (eg. Unit #333 Starspawn), it will get a Fist attack (Wpn #92).

Re: Bug / Wishlist
 

A minor oddity, probably related to the debate about poison darts/arrows:

A Phantasmal Warrior attacked an Atlantian Light Infantry, then died of poison damage from "touching" the Atlantian's Coral Curaiss.

Re: Bug / Wishlist
 

Phantasms made poison resistant.

Missing description: The Ark
 

It causes a battlefield effect that has no description.

Re: Bug / Wishlist
 

WAD. Default weapon for units that have no other weapon is fist. It also assigns fist if you only give a unit a missile weapon when you define them. The only way to totally remove weapons from units is using the mod command #weapon to give them a weapon outside the range of existing weapons (results in no weapon at all).

So when 2 shields defaults to useless kick if the unit has legs, everything else defaults to fist.

Re: Bug / Wishlist
 

Suggestion:
Two shields -> Useless Kick
Two shields + no legs -> Headbutt
Two shields + no legs + no head -> Bodyslam