Content Gaps in Mainline (Writing)

[iceiceice]

Recently I noticed that we have some races in mainline wesnoth that do not have descriptions. You can see this if you open up the in-game help and look under the Units category.

The races without descriptions are:
Falcons
Gryphons
Khalifate
Saurians
Wolves

I believe that Khalifate has a description planned but it is currently under wraps. I'm not sure if Falcons do, that's a question for noy or Wintermute/happygrue. But certainly for the others, there is no one currently working on descriptions for these. If you are interested to write some prose for these, there's a good chance that it would be committed to the project. The descriptions should be canonical. For falcons, gryphons, and wolves we most likely would not need more than we currently have for bats, goblins, or ogres, for example. But since gryphons and wolves feature in several campaigns it would be nice to have descriptions.

Saurians are trickier, we probably would want some discussion of society, similar to what we have for other major races in mainline factions, but the text found here for example, I have been told is not considered canonical. (If we had a canonical description, I guess it's likely that we would replace the wiki text also? Not sure on this point.)

Anyways, any of those might be a good project if you would enjoy writing prose like this and would enjoy seeing it in the game.

As a side note, another minor content gap in the project that irks me is that we have no sprite for the "gryphon" walking corpse variation, and instead reuse the drake sprite which doesn't seem to fit very well. I'm told that a new sprite is definitely welcome.

[Chewan]

Probably not the right place/tropic to ask but since descriptions for Gryphons and Wolves were mentioned:
I would like to question the idea of assigning wolf-riding goblins to "predators",
and gryphon-riding dwarves to "legendary eagle/lion creatures" in the Help/unit descriptions.
I mean, other riders keep their race, they still remain humans or elves, for example, and do not turn into "horses".
Maybe it is just to enlarge these otherwise too small Gryphons/Wolves groups, though.

[DuhBuhbuh]

I'd like to try the bats, gryphons, and wolves. Then, after having those three critiqued and edited maybe I could join the discussion for the Saurians, one of my favorite races who I think deserve more love.

[Xalzar]

Probably not the right place/tropic to ask but since descriptions for Gryphons and Wolves were mentioned:
I would like to question the idea of assigning wolf-riding goblins to "predators",
and gryphon-riding dwarves to "legendary eagle/lion creatures" in the Help/unit descriptions.
I mean, other riders keep their race, they still remain humans or elves, for example, and do not turn into "horses".
Maybe it is just to enlarge these otherwise too small Gryphons/Wolves groups, though.

Sorry for the...
[ot]
It's only a matter of traits: Gryphons in this way will not get the Dwarvish trait "healthy", and the Wolves of the Wolf Riders will not get the Goblins' negative traits.
Or we can easily say tha while in other factions it is the rider who makes the fighting (horses do not fight), Gryphon and Wolves instead do fight, and their riders only guide them to their targets.
[/ot]

Nice topic, I will follow closely, in particular for what concerns the Saurians...

[johndh]

Probably not the right place/tropic to ask but since descriptions for Gryphons and Wolves were mentioned:
I would like to question the idea of assigning wolf-riding goblins to "predators",
and gryphon-riding dwarves to "legendary eagle/lion creatures" in the Help/unit descriptions.
I mean, other riders keep their race, they still remain humans or elves, for example, and do not turn into "horses".
Maybe it is just to enlarge these otherwise too small Gryphons/Wolves groups, though.

I wonder if there is a way to include links to multiple races in the unit's help section, so a Gryphon Rider would have a link to Dwarves and a link to Gryphons.

Anyway, I already did bats [acronym=Almost FOUR YEARS AGO?! Wow, I think I need to lie down.]when I did the other races[/acronym]. I'm not sure if my description wasn't up to snuff or if it got missed, but here it is:

Bats come in many shapes and sizes, and most are fairly harmless, feeding on insects and other small animals. The larger and more vicious breeds are known to pose a threat to humans and other races, as well as their livestock, especially when encountered in groups. Typically nocturnal, they are often kept by those who share their love of the night.

With a little revision as of today:

Bats come in many shapes and sizes, from tiny insectivores to true monsters. Most are fairly harmless, feeding on smaller animals, fruit, and nectar, but even armed troops have cause to fear the larger and more vicious breeds. Typically nocturnal, they are often kept by those who share their love of the night.

[iceiceice]

johndh: Your description stuff wasn't ignored, I think it appears in the game right now, exactly as you wrote above, in 1.10 and 1.13. I like your revision also, would you like that to be committed now, or wait for a bit?

I wonder if there is a way to include links to multiple races in the unit's help section, so a Gryphon Rider would have a link to Dwarves and a link to Gryphons.

Hmm, so currently in the engine, a unit may have only one race. I had *thought* that adding more would be a minor compatibility-breaking change, for instance if some UMC mod had made traits like "dwarf killer" or "elf killer" giving bonuses when attacking units of certain races or something like this -- I would expect that to stop working if we made it possible to have multiple races, no matter how exactly we did it. However, to my surprise there doesn't actually appear to be any way to check the race of a unit in wml. So I actually don't see anything in particular that stops us from doing this. Edit: Actually, I guess you can check in filters, but I don't see a way to actually get the race of the unit as a string. We could probably keep the filters working just fine I would think. Edit: There might be some way with lua-only features though.

It would be a minor complication, in that normally we only use races to determine the random name generator used, and to determine racial traits as Xalzar pointed out. But I guess there wouldn't be any harm in having "secondary" races that don't affect those things.

It would also smooth over some disconnects -- so the Human Knight is of the human race, while the Goblin Knight is of the wolf race, and the Gryphon Rider is of the Gryphon race? But I guess in the case of the human, the human is actually doing most of the fighting, while for the other two it is the mount that is actually doing most of the fighting I suppose.

That being said, I'm not sure if it's worth it to add this, even if it would allow to reorganize the help pages slightly.

[Iris]

There are plenty of ways to make unit types cumbersome to work with already — we do not need another one.

[johndh]

johndh: Your description stuff wasn't ignored, I think it appears in the game right now, exactly as you wrote above, in 1.10 and 1.13. I like your revision also, would you like that to be committed now, or wait for a bit?

Gah! I thought they were on the list of missing races, but I don't know where I got that idea from. I don't mind waiting to see if anybody has any critique before committing.

But I guess in the case of the human, the human is actually doing most of the fighting, while for the other two it is the mount that is actually doing most of the fighting I suppose.

That was my initial thought as well.

I believe that Khalifate has a description planned but it is currently under wraps.

I really don't like the idea of the Khalifate having a race description if they're the only human race to be listed separately. As I recall, they're just ordinary humans. It seems... well, glaringly racist to single them out while having whitey as the "regular" human race. One of my pet peeves with the game Age of Wonders is that there's a "Human" race and a "Nomads" race who are also human but not white, and therefore listed separately. So if we have them listed as their own race, then Wesnothians, Islefolk, Wesfolk, and every other major culture group would need their own as well, and I don't think anybody wants to see that.

Edit: First draft of a description for falcons:

Falcons share many characteristics with hawks and eagles, but form their own distinct lineage. Their unusual cunning and unrivaled speed allow them to hunt prey that would easily escape other raptors.

[Xalzar]

I really don't like the idea of the Khalifate having a race description if they're the only human race to be listed separately. As I recall, they're just ordinary humans. It seems... well, glaringly racist to single them out while having whitey as the "regular" human race. One of my pet peeves with the game Age of Wonders is that there's a "Human" race and a "Nomads" race who are also human but not white, and therefore listed separately. So if we have them listed as their own race, then Wesnothians, Islefolk, Wesfolk, and every other major culture group would need their own as well, and I don't think anybody wants to see that.

I agree. Better add a subsection in the Human race description.
But there is a but: I think that currently the Khalifate is a distinct race for the sake of order (human race section is already very crowded), and then mostly for the different-flavoured names.

If we want to rejoin them with the human group, we should change something (a macro in the units' cfg for the names?).

Falcons share many characteristics with hawks and eagles, but form their own distinct lineage. Their unusual cunning and unrivaled speed allow them to hunt prey that would easily escape other raptors.

I think it's ok (my two cents), since most of the description is already in the single units' page. It is general, as it has to be, IMHO.

[Turuk]

I agree. Better add a subsection in the Human race description.
But there is a but: I think that currently the Khalifate is a distinct race for the sake of order (human race section is already very crowded), and then mostly for the different-flavoured names.

Agreed. If they get their own description than it should be done as a subset, with the current human description rewritten in a way to apply to all groups (as they are part of the same race), and another subset description for the other culture groups.

[johndh]

Agreed. If they get their own description than it should be done as a subset, with the current human description rewritten in a way to apply to all groups (as they are part of the same race), and another subset description for the other culture groups.

So do we need a generic human description (I'm assuming it would mostly be a pruned version of the current one) and then a set of more specific ones? I don't really know how the data are organized, so I'm not sure what's the best way to do this.

[Turuk]

So do we need a generic human description (I'm assuming it would mostly be a pruned version of the current one) and then a set of more specific ones? I don't really know how the data are organized, so I'm not sure what's the best way to do this.

Honestly, the current description does a fairly great job of acknowledging the potential for diversity among humans. I would just give the Khalifate a header underneath like the other categories.

As it stands now for humans in help:

"The race of men is an extremely diverse one. Although they originally came from the Old Continent, men have spread all over the world and split into many different cultures and races. Although they are not imbued with magic like other creatures, humans can learn to wield it and able to learn more types than most others. They have no extra special abilities or aptitudes except their versatility and drive. While often at odds with other races, they can occasionally form alliances with the less aggressive races such as elves and dwarves. The less scrupulous among them do not shrink back from hiring orcish mercenaries, either. They have no natural enemies, although the majority of men, like most people of all races, have an instinctive dislike of the undead. Men are shorter than the elves, but taller still than dwarves. Their skin color can vary, from almost white to dark brown.

'Subjects of the Crown'
Many different groups of men exist, but the majority of them on the Great Continent live under the rule of the Crown of Wesnoth. The humans first appeared on the Great Continent from a land far across the ocean to the West, the Green Isle, and soon established their capital at the inland city of Weldyn. Over the following centuries they have built up a number cities across the continent. The soldiers from the Crown of Wesnoth protect the country, forming the most organized military force in the known world. Its warriors come from the main provinces, where all men are conscripted at an early age.

'The Clansmen'
The eastern provinces of Wesnoth, known as the Clan Homelands, have a geography consisting of more open plains and rolling hills than the western, more civilized provinces. They are home to the Horse Clans, who are allied with the Crown of Wesnoth but operate independently and maintain their own identity. Some consider them to be a tributary state, which sends food and soldiers to Crown in exchange for protection. Others say they are on equal footing with the western half of Wesnoth. In any case, the eastern provinces do not have a conscript army the way Western Wesnoth does. Training for fighting is part of the way of life of the Clans; the parents teach the children to ride horses, fight and shoot a bow from an early age. In general, the Clan warriors are less organized than the civilized fighters, and the strengths and weaknesses of these groups complement each other."

[iceiceice]

"I would just give the Khalifate a header underneath like the other categories."

This is not as easy as you might think.

Spoiler:

In the help file, all the pages under Units are autogenerated, based on what unit types have been discovered in-game. The categories under units are auto-generated, one for each race, and they are hidden if there are no known units of that race. The topics associated to a race don't appear in help.cfg, the descriptions are taken from the definition of the race, in data/core/units.cfg. There's currently no mechanism to have "subraces" or subcategories of races. I think it would be a pretty big project to add this, and unless you completely change how the system works, I guess you would have to label all the loyalist / outlaw units with their subcategory so that it can be autogenerated.

Rather than try to squeeze Khalifate in under the Human race, (which won't work because they have separate naming conventions), or trying to make multiple subcategories under a race (Human > Khalifate, Humans > Outlaws, Humans > Loyalists?) (which would require multiple changes at the C++ level), it might be better just to have two races "Western Humans" and "Eastern Humans", and leave the outlaws where they are? It does seems sensible make a distinction between the Khalifate race and the Khalifate faction.

If I understand correctly, these races have different origin stories in the wesnoth lore, so treating them as separate races seems reasonable. (But, I'm not actually so knowledgeable about the lore in general...)

Edit: I think I misunderstood what you wanted to do actually, I thought by header you meant, another category that you can expand after human? I guess you just mean a header in the text of the human description. Regardless, the only way to get Khalifate units to appear under the Human category is to make their race human, as the system currently works.

[Andrettin]

"I would just give the Khalifate a header underneath like the other categories."

This is not as easy as you might think.

Spoiler:

In the help file, all the pages under Units are autogenerated, based on what unit types have been discovered in-game. The categories under units are auto-generated, one for each race, and they are hidden if there are no known units of that race. The topics associated to a race don't appear in help.cfg, the descriptions are taken from the definition of the race, in data/core/units.cfg. There's currently no mechanism to have "subraces" or subcategories of races. I think it would be a pretty big project to add this, and unless you completely change how the system works, I guess you would have to label all the loyalist / outlaw units with their subcategory so that it can be autogenerated.

Rather than try to squeeze Khalifate in under the Human race, (which won't work because they have separate naming conventions), or trying to make multiple subcategories under a race (Human > Khalifate, Humans > Outlaws, Humans > Loyalists?) (which would require multiple changes at the C++ level), it might be better just to have two races "Western Humans" and "Eastern Humans", and leave the outlaws where they are? It does seems sensible make a distinction between the Khalifate race and the Khalifate faction.

If I understand correctly, these races have different origin stories in the wesnoth lore, so treating them as separate races seems reasonable. (But, I'm not actually so knowledgeable about the lore in general...)

Edit: I think I misunderstood what you wanted to do actually, I thought by header you meant, another category that you can expand after human? I guess you just mean a header in the text of the human description. Regardless, the only way to get Khalifate units to appear under the Human category is to make their race human, as the system currently works.

I feel the "races" in the encyclopedia are more like different species, or even more general forms of classification. With that in mind, I think that it would be a bit weird to have the Khalifate's human units be grouped under a separate category, as the biological differences between them and Wesnothians is minimal. I don't really see much of a problem with them being all under the "Human" category; these aren't faction lists after all, and Wesnothians are already under the same header as humans of the Northlands, so why not the Khalifate humans as well?

[Turuk]

Edit: I think I misunderstood what you wanted to do actually, I thought by header you meant, another category that you can expand after human? I guess you just mean a header in the text of the human description. Regardless, the only way to get Khalifate units to appear under the Human category is to make their race human, as the system currently works.

Yes, I just meant another text header in the same way humans are currently broken up between those of the Crown and Clansmen.

I did notice that they had a separate macro for names which would case issues, but I didn't know if there was a way to limit name selection to only apply to certain units, so it would filter unit type against which macro it would use. That would seem a more straightforward way to keep them all under humans, if possible. If not, or not easily developed, it could be split geographically instead of splitting them out as if they were a different race.