Mod ID Registry: Preventing Mod Conflicts

[Psientist]

Separate from the work of Edi and Sombre, I thought it would be useful to have a centralized record of which mods are using which unique IDs for monsters, items, weapons, spells, etc. Right now, everybody has to pick IDs at random and hope there isn't a noticable conflict if more than one mod is installed at a time.

I propose that this thread is used to share a spreadsheet of ID registries used by Dominions 3 mods. Whenever a mod author adds items or monsters, they can download the most recent copy, add their changes, and upload it to another post within this thread.

Hopefully, this thread and the registry will then be self-maintaining.

• Please save the registry as a Microsoft Excel 97 spreadsheet, so both Excel and OpenOffice can open it.
• If you discover an unintentional conflict, please contact the author(s) and work out among yourselves which mod should reassign their Ids. In general, let's give preference to mod seniority (eg, whomever posted their mod to the Forums first).
• Where there is an intentional conflict, such as a balance mod that re-writes a monster or item's attributes, please provide some indication in the "notes" field (eg., "rewrite")
• Before uploading/posting, make sure that you have downloaded the most recent version of this file. It is possible for other people to have downloaded a copy,
  made changes, and uploaded their changes to this registry before you yourself have gotten around to uploading!

NOTE: PLEASE DOWNLOAD THE REGISTRY ONLY FROM THE LAST/MOST RECENT POST!

[Sombre]

One issue is that you really only need to get rid of conflicts between mods that run in the same era, since you can easily switch mods on and off. For example if my Vaetti SE mod conflicted with my Avernum mod it wouldn't matter, because you never need to have them both on at the same time. The good doctor might have something more to say on this subject (there is, for example, an extremely limited pool of nametypes) since he was working on that seven nation mod and made an app that automatically sorts out some conflicts.

[DrPraetorious]

It's also fairly easy to automatically resolve conflicts in mods - I have a script that does it, it just renumbers everything.

Of course, if you then want to cross-pollinate the mods (for example, one of my nations totally wants some of Amos' sweet-looking horror summons) you either have to consolidate mods in multiple steps (which can be done) or make changes to the post-processed file, which as a computer programmer is something I regard as doubleplus ungood.

Finally, there's the problem of running out of numbers. Mods will tend to want to use continuous blocks 24xx for example. That only leaves room for ten mods - if you let the computer handle the unit numbering, you can go ahead and have one mod use 2375-2416, which would be a pain to administer but causes the computer no problems at all.

Of course, at the moment you can only run custom sprites for ~110 units, so mod compatibility isn't much of an issue.

[Sombre]

There are actually more numbers available for user made mods than you might think. As long as you are making a set of mods or a combined mod for one era only.

For example, there are a lot of unit/nation/weapon numbers used up by Illwinter units that will never appear in the early era. Stuff like the LA ulm units for instance. That means in an early era mod you can overwrite lots of stuff used by LA Ulm, using #selectmonster and the #clear commands. One big problem with this solution is that you can't really free up that many nametypes (for instance) since they're the same in all eras.

[Amos]

DrPraetorious feel free to use my spells.

One of the problems, I mentioned earlier, is that #clear commands don't clear national spells. So, you have no choice but to turn off same-nation different-age mods.
There is a problem with different ages turned on regardless, they seem to disable each other (like only one age out of 3 will work for the same nation).

[Sombre]

Well I don't see that as a major problem, although it's annoying. You can just choose not to use the ritual national spells and the battlefield ones can be mostly avoided by having the nation you copy over a vanilla one use different paths of magic.

[Psientist]

One issue is that you really only need to get rid of conflicts between mods that run in the same era

Interesting point! I wasn't aware of that. I did however find out that trying to make a monster that is available in more than one age doesn't understand the "#copystats" command unless you assign completely unique ids.

Of course, if you then want to cross-pollinate the mods (for example, one of my nations totally wants some of Amos' sweet-looking horror summons)...

Actually, that's part of what I was looking to streamline. In my mind, I want to make every mod out there that is balanced and interesting available all the time, for me and my PBEM players. More surprises, more interesting! However, if players default to "all mods disabled except for just the one we are currently choosing to use" there is far less need for any type of collective list.

Finally, there's the problem of running out of numbers. Mods will tend to want to use continuous blocks 24xx for example. That only leaves room for ten mods - if you let the computer handle the unit numbering, you can go ahead and have one mod use 2375-2416, which would be a pain to administer but causes the computer no problems at all.

And this is *precisely* why I thought a collective list might be a good idea. Mod authors would know which "blocks" other mods are using. If there are conflicts, they can either be noted for the sake of the player, or intentionally left (e.g., they are for different ages or intentionally rebalance or change something).

It seems, however, that the idea is probably more trouble than it's worth.

[Sombre]

Psientist said:
Interesting point! I wasn't aware of that. I did however find out that trying to make a monster that is available in more than one age doesn't understand the "#copystats" command unless you assign completely unique ids.

Conflicts generated between nations that are in different eras will still be conflicts and may cause problems,.. if you have all the mods loaded. My point was simply that you only need to have loaded whatever mods effect a certain era, since each game you play will only take place in one era.

I actually think making a spreadsheet is a good idea - one spreadsheet for each era that is. The problem is getting the modders to fill it out (I might, but since I'm very new to the game all the other modders would be within rights to tell me to move my id numbers, so it would make sense for me to go last.)

The best solution right now, as I see it, is to make small collections of mods which go nicely together. Using the good doctor's utility you can merge a few (within 220 images or whatever) and create something like..

LATE ERA PACK 1.
Contains Vaetti SE, Dwarf Pirates and Themiskyra (amazons).

So then you could at least play games with three or four new nations working together - more if they don't use lots of new graphics.

Or,..

PRETENDER MEGAPACK
Contains Mytheology, Nova Deus II and others - works with all ages.

Just my thoughts. The main thing I'd like to see is more new nations able to fight eachother. I believe it's quite doable as long as there aren't too many of them.

[Psientist]

That's a good idea.

Or just have people post to the forum (either to the specific mods, or to a common thread like this one) when a conflict is found. That way "play nice together' lists can sort of self-develop.