Utility SemiRandom version 095

Endoperez · #1 February 23rd, 2007, 03:01 PM

Quote:

Ballbarian said:
Thank you very much for contributing Endoperez!

It looks like you have found a way to allow external defenders of "independent" forts. Very cool!

First let me point out that you are using _M_ to denote a medium sized or otherwise "Normal" size, which should be _N_.

That said, currently _U_nique provinces must have a specific terrain for them to be truly unique. Creating a single unique province that can appear on a variety of terrains is not an option right now, though I feel your pain and I am looking for an alternative approach.

Yeah, I'm proud of coming up with that ownership change trick. It seems to work without any problems, too.

Thanks for pointing out the "Medium"/"Normal" thing. I'll remember it for the next one.

Good luck on coming up with an alternative.

Gandalf Parker · #2 February 23rd, 2007, 07:54 PM

WOW THANKS for figuring out that castle defence thing! Do you mind if I make extensive use of that immeadiately on all my map routines?
(slap head, cant believe I didnt try that long ago).

Using special monsters will be ok for awhile altho Im pretty sure that something is planned for that. Did you test 23 (independents) to see if that worked. It might not since part of what it was doing originally had to be removed. And does 25 work the same? Im not sure of the difference in how the code plays #24 Special Monsters and #25 Special Monsters but Im sure there is something.
I hope Johan doesnt fix this now that we found it.

Gandalf Parker · #3 February 23rd, 2007, 08:37 PM

On the algorythm for finding a start position, here are some ideas for programs to use it.

(A) Based on a comment by someone in another thread.. a 3 age scenario. The same graphic map (RGB) but zipped up with 3 .map files. For example a scenario for abit of extended roleplaying with Ermor.
Map 1: Early Era Ermor, a set starting position with one province.
Map 2: Middle Era Ermor, same as above but start with 3 provinces.
Map 3: Late Era Ermor, same as above but 9 provinces.

If the 9 provinces were the same on each map (same poptypes and sites even though you wont see the sites on earlier maps) then it might give a real feel for a 3 game campaign And it would give a real feel for Kristoffers work in giving storyline progression on some nations.

(B) The Pipeline or Tower maps. I like the concept of the Tower map (very tall but only wide enough to have one nation stacked above the other) but the concept of starting at one end and fighting your way thru successive nations gradually getting stronger and stronger seems to require preset starting positions.

Of course both of those can be done manually (If anyone wants to, please feel free to do it for us all). But personally its going to sit on my ToDo list for ever. But if it can be programmed you could make it available for nightly generated new versions in your web directory.

Endoperez · #4 February 24th, 2007, 05:11 AM

Quote:

Gandalf Parker said:
WOW THANKS for figuring out that castle defence thing! Do you mind if I make extensive use of that immeadiately on all my map routines?
(slap head, cant believe I didnt try that long ago).

I don't mind that at all. The original idea I had for this province was just to make an example that would let others create their own castled, double-defended provinces for SemiRandom. It grew a bit from that.

Ballbarian · #5 February 25th, 2007, 04:31 AM

It's in the early stages still, but here are a couple of examples to give a visual of the start distribution.

This one is a 103 province map with 6 players and a 4 province minimum distance buffer.

This one is a 145 province tower style map with 9 players and a 4 province minimum distance buffer.

Both maps were processed using the current default SemiRandom settings of 15 provinces per player & minimum neighbor count of 4 land for land starts, or 4 water for water starts.

Until this weekend, I had been too busy to work on it more than 30 minutes here and 30 minutes there. Very hard to stay focused that way.

Gandalf Parker · #6 February 25th, 2007, 09:36 PM

It looks good. Excellent coding.
Personally Im going to want more of a spread than that.
Will it evenly distribute on larger maps?

Ballbarian · #7 February 26th, 2007, 10:47 PM

You will be able to increase the spread by specifying a smaller number of players. It seems to distribute well on your MegaMap, but I am not happy with the water start consistency. That is being corrected now. I am also working on a little fidgeter to make the start placements less "optimized" and more random on multiple generations of the same map.

Ballbarian · #8 March 5th, 2007, 10:31 PM

It has been hard finding time for coding, but finally have enough working to sit back for a little while and enjoy a test game. Decided to use the Eventide random map that is being used in a multiplayer game. They have 18 players in that game, 16 being land and 2 being water. With the settings that I used, my distribution was a bit looser, so I ended up with 11 land & 2 water starts. Trying out a SC Gorgon with one of my favorite nations... Pangaea.

So pardon my laziness for a little while.

I intend to look more at some method for supporting "kingdoms" or thematic province clusters. The base is there, but I haven't decided quite how I want to approach the format via the GAN files. Then there are those pesky multi provinces for varied terrains.