Debug mode warning for newcomers
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Debug mode warning for newcomers
Hello,
I've recently had an issue with the feedback of one of my campaigns, and this is way not the first time that this happens - that someone wants to recklessly jump through all the maps, I guess just for the story, and then they manage to get half the variables, heroes, and stuff missing, and then they give reports of normally non-existent, mysterious bugs.
I checked what's written on using debug-commands in the help, and there is not a single warning for new players to be cautious when trying to cheat, jump through maps for story.
I wonder if it would be possible, for the game, that when debug mode is turned on, not only "*debug* Debug mode activated!" to be shown, but some kind of warning not to abuse it.
Or include it in the help, that debug commands are for testing, and not for gaming, and if you use it, please do know what you are doing. In case of bugs, replay without using debug, and only contact the authors/maintainers if the bug is still present when playing normally.
Anyone else to agree?
WhiteWolf
I've recently had an issue with the feedback of one of my campaigns, and this is way not the first time that this happens - that someone wants to recklessly jump through all the maps, I guess just for the story, and then they manage to get half the variables, heroes, and stuff missing, and then they give reports of normally non-existent, mysterious bugs.
I checked what's written on using debug-commands in the help, and there is not a single warning for new players to be cautious when trying to cheat, jump through maps for story.
I wonder if it would be possible, for the game, that when debug mode is turned on, not only "*debug* Debug mode activated!" to be shown, but some kind of warning not to abuse it.
Or include it in the help, that debug commands are for testing, and not for gaming, and if you use it, please do know what you are doing. In case of bugs, replay without using debug, and only contact the authors/maintainers if the bug is still present when playing normally.
Anyone else to agree?
WhiteWolf
Main UMC campaigns: The Ravagers - now for 1.16, with new bugs!
Old UMC works: The Underness Series, consisting of 5 parts: The Desolation of Karlag, The Blind Sentinel, The Stone of the North, The Invasion Of The Western Cavalry, Fingerbone of Destiny
Old UMC works: The Underness Series, consisting of 5 parts: The Desolation of Karlag, The Blind Sentinel, The Stone of the North, The Invasion Of The Western Cavalry, Fingerbone of Destiny
Re: Debug mode warning for newcomers
I don’t know about your audience in particular, but people who do that kind of stuff knowingly should expect the game to break in one form or another unless they are literally children playing a computer game for the first time.
Still, if the dev team wants to consider this they could take inspiration from Firefox’s
Still, if the dev team wants to consider this they could take inspiration from Firefox’s
about:config
text, for example:Author of the unofficial UtBS sequels Invasion from the Unknown and After the Storm.
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Re: Debug mode warning for newcomers
It would also be useful to put some sort of flag into the save file to indicate that debug mode was activated(if that isn't done already). I know Dugi has mentioned a similar thing as happening, and it would probably be helpful to be able to tell if someone reporting some strange, otherwise unreproducible bug had used debug mode to mess with things.
99 little bugs in the code, 99 little bugs
take one down, patch it around
-2,147,483,648 little bugs in the code
take one down, patch it around
-2,147,483,648 little bugs in the code
Re: Debug mode warning for newcomers
I believe
wesnoth.game_config.debug
(and, during the WML preprocessor stage, the DEBUG_MODE
symbol) could be used to accomplish something like that if you really wanted, like, for example, display an obnoxious warning at the start of every turn. Naturally, people would still be able to remove that by editing the add-on’s source code, but at that point they can’t appeal to ignorance anymore.Author of the unofficial UtBS sequels Invasion from the Unknown and After the Storm.
Re: Debug mode warning for newcomers
I'm not so sure about that, the game could, and by 'could' I mean they probably think 'why wouldn't it?' work in a way, that when a map is jumped with :n, the important events still fire anyway. Why not?shadowm wrote: people who do that kind of stuff knowingly should expect the game to break in one form or another
Another example, spawning a Yeti next to my objective and winning the map with one move seems to be harmless, yet it can be.
So another useful thing in order to avoid corruption like these, would be to have the ability to mark events as debug_necessary. For example:
Code: Select all
[event]
name=last breath
debug_necessary=yes
[...] important stuff
[/event]
This is just an idea, I haven't deeply thought through all the consequences, whether it's worth it to implement, whether it solves every debug-induced case, what the fire-order should be in case of many of these, etc.
It's just another idea
In my opinion, a well-drafted warning when turning debug on would be sufficient.
Main UMC campaigns: The Ravagers - now for 1.16, with new bugs!
Old UMC works: The Underness Series, consisting of 5 parts: The Desolation of Karlag, The Blind Sentinel, The Stone of the North, The Invasion Of The Western Cavalry, Fingerbone of Destiny
Old UMC works: The Underness Series, consisting of 5 parts: The Desolation of Karlag, The Blind Sentinel, The Stone of the North, The Invasion Of The Western Cavalry, Fingerbone of Destiny
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Re: Debug mode warning for newcomers
I support the idea of a disclaimer appearing the first time Debug mode is enabled during a session.
I also support the idea of a flag in the save file indicating Debug mode was enabled at any time in the session.
I do not, however, support the idea of WML changes. The proposed change (the example was triggering a last-breath on the Next command) implements the correction at the wrong point. The error is NOT that the session ended, leaving the campaign in the expected state, but that the next campaign failed to check/enforce that the expected state was present when starting up. This is a programming error and should be corrected properly; which requires no changes at all to WML itself.
I also support the idea of a flag in the save file indicating Debug mode was enabled at any time in the session.
I do not, however, support the idea of WML changes. The proposed change (the example was triggering a last-breath on the Next command) implements the correction at the wrong point. The error is NOT that the session ended, leaving the campaign in the expected state, but that the next campaign failed to check/enforce that the expected state was present when starting up. This is a programming error and should be corrected properly; which requires no changes at all to WML itself.
I forked real life and now I'm getting merge conflicts.
Re: Debug mode warning for newcomers
I don't see why not.WhiteWolf wrote:I wonder if it would be possible, for the game, that when debug mode is turned on, not only "*debug* Debug mode activated!" to be shown, but some kind of warning not to abuse it.
*debug* Debug mode activated! Note: use of debug commands may cause unexpected problems and leave you unable to resume normal gameplay.
Or something along those lines.
Re: Debug mode warning for newcomers
Sounds perfect to me I guess it wouldn't be difficult to implement.
Yeah, I agree, it wasn't that great idea indeed.Tad_Carlucci wrote:I do not, however, support the idea of WML changes. The proposed change (the example was triggering a last-breath on the Next command) implements the correction at the wrong point.
Main UMC campaigns: The Ravagers - now for 1.16, with new bugs!
Old UMC works: The Underness Series, consisting of 5 parts: The Desolation of Karlag, The Blind Sentinel, The Stone of the North, The Invasion Of The Western Cavalry, Fingerbone of Destiny
Old UMC works: The Underness Series, consisting of 5 parts: The Desolation of Karlag, The Blind Sentinel, The Stone of the North, The Invasion Of The Western Cavalry, Fingerbone of Destiny