"Pick your recruit list" MP scenarios

Post by **zookeeper** » August 16th, 2006, 4:42 pm

The idea originated from this thread.

In this scenario, the first round will be spent on handpicking the recruit list from all lvl0 and lvl1 units from the default era factions - you cannot move or recruit, only select unit types. The game begins normally on the second round, and proceeds normally from there on. You pick your recruit list by choosing the unit types from the recall menu - there will be one recallable "unit" per each unit type, and this type will be added to your recruit list when you "recall" it. The limit on your custom recruit list is the overall recruit cost of it's units, which in this case cannot exceed 70 gold (very easy to change). While your recruit lists are initially cleared when starting the game, your leader doesn't change, so it will be whatever you pick at the game creation screen.

This one is just a modified 2p_Charge.cfg, so anyone with any familiarity with WML can easily port this to other maps. Just copy the macro definitions, the start event and add the {CUSTOM_RECRUIT_LIST 1} lines (one per each side) to another scenario file, and everything should work ok.

There are a few minor problems still. Mainly, the interface isn't of course very clean - the recalling part is ok, but you can't see the recruit costs of unit types in the recall menu (without going to the unit descriptions to check them out), which is rather bad. Also, without fog/shroud to cover your opponents castle, you can actually see what unit types he picks on the first round (since the mechanism works through recall, you can see the helper unit fading in before it vanishes). I think this could be circumvented by placing shroud on the map (or simply around the leaders) for the first round and removing it when the game really starts (except that it would mess up games played with shroud, but that's not a big loss). And of course, the ToD cycle is off by one because of the wasted first round, but that would be very easy to fix.

EDIT: Updated the attached WML code. In this one I've fixed the bug that causes recruiting on turn 1 to make you unable to pick further recruits into your list. I stripped the scenario code out, so you have to paste the code to a scenario of your choosing yourself.

scott · Post by **scott** » August 16th, 2006, 8:31 pm

If you don't know where to put this, it goes in your userdata/campaigns directory. The value of userdata varies based on OS. The explanation is here: http://wesnoth.org/wiki/EditingWesnoth# ... rectory.3F

The OS "discussion" was split to another thread, but doing so also excised a useful piece of information, so I made this post to reproduce the question. Please keep further posts on topic.

Post by **Becephalus** » August 16th, 2006, 9:13 pm

cool idea here is a test match between JW and I

JW Longbowman

Wose 20
Orc Archer 14
Footpad 14
Assasin 17

65

Becephalus Shocktrooper

Burner 21
Ulfserker 19
Shaman 15
Skeleton 15

70

here is the replay for those interested

Elvish_Pillager · Post by **Elvish_Pillager** » August 16th, 2006, 9:16 pm

I can guess who won that one.

joshudson · Post by **joshudson** » August 16th, 2006, 9:35 pm

So can I. slow + beserk kills anything for 19 gold.

Post by **zookeeper** » August 16th, 2006, 9:42 pm

A bug: if you try to recruit something (you shouldn't, but if you accidentally do) on turn 1, you can't recall anymore and thus can't pick more recruits. I'll try to clean this (and maybe some other things) up a bit tomorrow, but in the meanwhile...don't recruit accidentally.

JW · Post by JW » August 16th, 2006, 9:49 pm

Hopefully I did these right:

2p_Blitz , 4p_Loris_River, and 4p_Path_of_Daggers.

Enjoy! =)

-edit-

75g to choose recruits from!

Flametrooper · Post by **Flametrooper** » August 16th, 2006, 10:03 pm

I tried playing this against the AI to test it. You can imagine how THAT worked out.

(it didn't recruit anything)

Post by **zookeeper** » August 16th, 2006, 10:08 pm

Flametrooper wrote:I tried playing this against the AI to test it. You can imagine how THAT worked out.

Yeah, I forgot to mention: don't try playing with an AI.

Elvish_Pillager · Post by **Elvish_Pillager** » August 16th, 2006, 10:12 pm

joshudson wrote:So can I. slow + beserk kills anything for 19 gold.

I even completely missed the Shaman there! I was just noticing the total vulnerability to Ulfserkers of all JW's units.

Flametrooper · Post by **Flametrooper** » August 16th, 2006, 10:19 pm

My choices were:
Ulfserker 19g
Mage 20g
Horseman 23g
Walking Corpse 6g

I basically chose my 3 favorite units in the game, and then all I could buy with the leftovers was the cheap WC. (Of course, I don't know how well this setup would have worked, since I only playtested against the AI and it didn't work.)

zol · Post by **zol** » August 17th, 2006, 3:19 am

Woohoo!

I was just thinking, the GP limit is not horribly less than starting gold, so, is it feasible to tie the list limit to the gold settings?
That way, the limit could be set per game using the existing slider.

I realise that this cramps the initial recruitment a bit, but that can be seen as part of the challenge, too.

JW wrote:75g to choose recruits from!

I feel vindicated in my initial choice of limit for the purpose of a challenge knowing that even JW feels it's a bit too low for real use.

Post by **zookeeper** » August 17th, 2006, 7:17 am

zol wrote:I was just thinking, the GP limit is not horribly less than starting gold, so, is it feasible to tie the list limit to the gold settings?
That way, the limit could be set per game using the existing slider.

I realise that this cramps the initial recruitment a bit, but that can be seen as part of the challenge, too.

I thought about that a bit, too. It would be nice to be able to set the limit via the normal gold slider, instead of changing it in the scenario .cfg every time.

tsr · Post by **tsr** » August 17th, 2006, 9:20 am

zookeeper wrote:
zol wrote:I was just thinking, the GP limit is not horribly less than starting gold, so, is it feasible to tie the list limit to the gold settings?
That way, the limit could be set per game using the existing slider.

I realise that this cramps the initial recruitment a bit, but that can be seen as part of the challenge, too.
I thought about that a bit, too. It would be nice to be able to set the limit via the normal gold slider, instead of changing it in the scenario .cfg every time.

Well you could also tie it to the experience slider so that initial recruit types cost equals
starting gold*experience requirements

That would mean that in a 'normal' game (gold=100, experience=70%) you'd have that 70gold.

You could of course have a standard modifier that is not tied to the experience requirements too.

/tsr

Post by **zookeeper** » August 17th, 2006, 9:29 am

tsr wrote:Well you could also tie it to the experience slider so that initial recruit types cost equals
starting gold*experience requirements

Hmm, actually I couldn't. I don't think there's any way to figure out the xp modifier setting from inside a scenario. Theoretically...yes, I could make a hack that calculates it from the xp requirement of some bogus unit, but I really don't want to do that.

EDIT: And apparently, even that couldn't be done.