Modding tips and tricks

[chrispedersen]

Hey sombre..
It would be awesome to use this to cause baby hydra's to grow into momma hydras...

[Ragnarok-X]

Im wondering, how is the command to change shapes after x turns called ? What tag would a small hydra require to turn into a huge hydra after lets 4 turns ?

[rdonj]

It doesn't work that way. You need to give it a number of different forms that it cycles through automatically each turn, and over time it will eventually reach the final form. For an example, download llamabeast's endgame summons mod and see how the wendigo is handled.

[Sombre]

You can't do it with a tag on a single unit. You'd do it like this.

#newmonster 1
#name "Turn 0 shape"
#firstshape 2
#end

#newmonster 2
#name "Turn 1 Shape"
#firstshape 3
#end

#newmonster 3
#name "Turn 2 Shape"
#firstshape 4
#end

etc etc etc

#newmonster 25
#name "Year 2 Shape"
#end

That way you get a transformation that theoretically takes 2 years of game time before you reach that final shape. So you can have gradual growth, or something that goes BAM shapechange after x turns.

HOWEVER - firstshape is also triggered by combat ending, not just turn ends. So any combat will accelerate the movement through the 'shapes'. See the wendigo in llama's endgame summon for a way to thematically explain that (he eats corpses after combat to grow).

Or you could just make a unit that can't get in combat, such as a unit which will kill itself with a #onebattlespell, like an immobile egg or something, which you are supposed to leave sitting in a fort until it hatches.

Everyone got it now?
#end

[Ragnarok-X]

I knew about the way you described, i just thought there would be a another comment which spawns shape 2 (or x) after x turns.

i.e. newmonster 2 2

spawn to monster #2 in 2 turns.

obviously there is no such command, my bad


Doing it with 25 forms is kind of boring, its a bad copy/paste job. Basicly, you could make 25 hydra units, and after every 5 you slightly up the stats.

[Sombre]

How is it a bad copy paste job? You make it sound like some ripoff splog or spam email.

It's just the only way to do it. Obviously it's boring to do it by hand, but it's trivial to do it by script or formula.

[Ragnarok-X]

Wow you get offended easily huh. Its a bad copy/paste job because in your example you copy paste 5 templates 5 times each. How can that not be bad.

Obvious it is the only way, but its still a boring nontheless. Im not offending your creatism, because its a great idea, no doubt.

[Sombre]

I am so offended right now

I can barely even type

Hah. It isn't even my idea or discovery. You just sound like you're whining about nothing.

[Calchet]

I saw this mod, once - it was so terribly bad, you probably can't even believe it.

Instead of using a simple mind-reading device to generate a perfect game experience, it contained like, a .dm file, and a bunch of sprites! I mean, who does that? It's such a bad modding job. With a dm file, you're like, limited to stuff you can type or think of!

[Burnsaber]

Have done spell testing in the wake of the CPCS udpate. Just reporting my findings so that no one wastes time testing stuff that is already tested

First, the positive one:

*** effect 17 - song of bravery ***
Evidently is different from Sermon of Courage. Needs experimentation.

The following quote is from the "Spell effects and Damage Combos" file that comes with Dr.P's spellDB. I tested the effect and was suprised at the results. A spell with effect value 17 gives +5 morale to all affected units, but this buff is temporary. The units lose 2 points of the bonus every battlefield turn. Damage value seems to be irrelevant

Then some negative results:

*** effect 10068 - Summons animals. ***
No of effects = number.
Damage probably doesn't do anything.
We should check if effect 68 summons random animals in combat.

68 does nothing. Not even as a #nextspell

*** effect 54 - Polymorph ***

10054 (a'k'a ritual polymorph) does nothing. Not even as a #nextspell

*** effect 101 - Age ***

Does not work. Not even as a #nextspell (the ritual version 100101 works fine thought)