Children of Dragons

[Elvish_Hunter]

Back again.
Finally passed! Wouf...

I'm glad that you managed to pass that scenario

What a fun campaign! I'm really enjoying it so far

There is a reason if I decided to update it...

But I just ran into a speed-bump... On the level after "Sea Journey"(Where you have to scout out the fog) My level 3 Kahn was reverted to level 1 again. Is this intentional?
(Though I can't imagine why it would be, just saying..)

Of course it isn't intentional! I tried, using the debug console, to win the scenario in both allowed ways (by time over and by killing all Nagas after turn 19), and this problem didn't showed up for me. Can you kindly attach your replay of Sea Journey and your start-of-scenario saves of Sea Journey and Landing on Morogor, so I can try to check them?
In the meantime, do this:

Code: Select all

:debug
:unit advances=2
:nodebug
:clear

while keeping your mouse pointer on Kahn. This will make him level 3 again (clear is just to get rid of the debug console output).

[Hovnul]

I have seen the same bug than crunchtime

crunchtime wrote:On the level after "Sea Journey"(Where you have to scout out the fog) My level 3 Kahn was reverted to level 1 again.

In fact it happen after Landing on Morogor but anyway, I meet some problems when I try to find "Landing on Morogor replay" it doesn't work as you will see

So I send you: replay of Sea Journey and your start-of-scenario saves of Sea Journey and Landing on Morogor and some others

I think bug are in 'Landing on Morogor' because I cannot see anything in replay file and I haven't got any autosave file

Oh, and I am french so filename are different: Débarquement à Morogor (Landing...), Nettoyer l'île et Voyage en mer(Sea Journey) and sorry for my bad english.
I really enjoy this campain so I try to help you good luck

[Elvish_Hunter]

So I send you: replay of Sea Journey and your start-of-scenario saves of Sea Journey and Landing on Morogor and some others

Thank you so much, Hovnul! This was really useful!

I think bug are in 'Landing on Morogor' because I cannot see anything in replay file and I haven't got any autosave file

After opening your replay I noticed the very same thing. Kahn and Freon were recalled correctly, so - I guessed - problem should have been in side 2, that didn't recruited or moved in your replay. I opened the scenario and I found that side 2 (undead) didn't had any ID. So I added one, and also a name. Here there is a patched scenario, please test it (by replacing it in your scenario folder and restarting from that scenario) and let me know if it works. If yes, soon I'll upload a new version. Thanks again!
EDIT: Version 0.9.6 is on the 1.8 server, with the above bugfix.

[Arawn]

Great campaign! Granted, the art could use some work, but it get's the point across and besides, the sprites are good, so I like it. The story was good, it all made sense, and I think it added a lot to the game.

A few things I noticed:
About the scenario where Kahn reverts to level 1: might it have something to do with the dialogue? I can't claim to be a master Wesnoth programmer, but it looks like the first line that comes up belonged at the end of the previous scenario. Could this affect something in how units are declared? I can't see the code, but what if you're having Kahn speak before defining his side? Just a totally random thought, I may be wrong on this.

This next thing is merely a suggestion. When you're on the ship fighting off the naga's, it looks like all units belong to you and will be yours to keep. Thus, I tried hard to level up the sergent and got him up to level 3, after which I lost him. Could some humans stay with the drakes for guidance (mainly the sergent, I don't care for spearmen). On the other hand, it would probably break the focus on Drakes.

This I would like to see in future versions: could there be some sort of a healing unit? I realize that an important tactic is knowing how to fight without a healer, but going an entire campaign without one is a bit annoying. A different Drake campaign, Brave Wings, solved this by creating a wizard-drake unit (which was awesome btw). Maybe you could do something similar? Or maybe the drakes can run into a white mage on the island who is willing to help in clearing the undead? Maybe I'm just saying this because white mages are my favorite units.

These are small suggestions (other than the healing bit). This was a great campaign and congrats for making it. I especially liked how it didn't run on forever. I hate it when campaigns go on and on and on. You had a good, clear, focused objective with good dialog, interesting fights, and good maps. That's awesome.

[Elvish_Hunter]

Great campaign! Granted, the art could use some work, but it get's the point across and besides, the sprites are good, so I like it. The story was good, it all made sense, and I think it added a lot to the game.

This was a great campaign and congrats for making it. I especially liked how it didn't run on forever. I hate it when campaigns go on and on and on. You had a good, clear, focused objective with good dialog, interesting fights, and good maps. That's awesome.

Thanks, also on behalf of MarkP.

About the scenario where Kahn reverts to level 1: might it have something to do with the dialogue?

No, it was totally unrelated.

I opened the scenario and I found that side 2 (undead) didn't had any ID. So I added one, and also a name.

This next thing is merely a suggestion. When you're on the ship fighting off the naga's, it looks like all units belong to you and will be yours to keep. Thus, I tried hard to level up the sergent and got him up to level 3, after which I lost him. Could some humans stay with the drakes for guidance (mainly the sergent, I don't care for spearmen). On the other hand, it would probably break the focus on Drakes.

I see. I think that the best solution will be to add a message saying "Your human units will leave at the end of the scenario."

This I would like to see in future versions: could there be some sort of a healing unit? I realize that an important tactic is knowing how to fight without a healer, but going an entire campaign without one is a bit annoying. A different Drake campaign, Brave Wings, solved this by creating a wizard-drake unit (which was awesome btw). Maybe you could do something similar? Or maybe the drakes can run into a white mage on the island who is willing to help in clearing the undead? Maybe I'm just saying this because white mages are my favorite units.

Maybe the best place where to put one loyal White Mage is the forest with the Ghosts. About the healer from BW, the sprite was originally from the 1.2 version of LoW. Probably a Drake Healer with an AMLA system (starting from heals +4 and gaining heals +6, then heals +8 and cure) will be the best option, considering that a White Mage (especially if not quick) will have problems keeping their speed.

[Arawn]

Maybe the best place where to put one loyal White Mage is the forest with the Ghosts. About the healer from BW, the sprite was originally from the 1.2 version of LoW. Probably a Drake Healer with an AMLA system (starting from heals +4 and gaining heals +6, then heals +8 and cure) will be the best option, considering that a White Mage (especially if not quick) will have problems keeping their speed.

Hmm... I see your point. Still, I personally don't see the problem with a white mage. This is a poor example, but in the 3rd or 4th scenario of A Tale of Two Brothers, the player can choose to add a shock trooper to the party. An adviser suggests that the unit is too slow and will only slow the party down, but in the end it is left up to the player. Maybe we can be given the choice of getting a white mage in the forests with the ghosts, while starting out with a drake healer unit. Maybe Kahn gets such a drake servant after becoming leader? I would find it acceptable for the leader of the Drake race to have a healer/wizard drake following him around. But I'll leave that up to you. The only thing that I will add is that if you stick to the healing progression you have listed above, +4, +6 and cure, +8 and cure might be a better choice. Not having the cure ability until L3 would be a pain. But again, up to you. Great campaign.

[Elvish_Hunter]

Given my work on TSoG, on Lua, and my relative silence on this campaign, some of you may have thought that I abandoned Kahn and Freon. Nothing more wrong: Children of Dragons is now on the 1.9 server, this means that the 1.8 version is now unsupported. These are all the changes that I made for 1.9.8:

Spoiler:

• Ran wmllint.
• Added Drake Magi (healers) from FtF. You can recruit 5 of them overall on Easy, 4 on Normal and 3 on Hard.
• Added flag variants to all sides.
• Bildor in scenario 3 can recruit Dwarvish Scouts. Limited his recruitments of Thunderers and Guardsmen.
• A bit reviewed maps in scenarios 1 and 3.
• Added {INDOORS} as schedule in scenarios 1 and 2.
• Variable check -> [have_unit] in scenario 1.
• Now player's team_name is "good" in every scenario.
• Freon can recruit Drake Gliders.
• The Drakes have their own flag, courtesy of JAP.
• Fixed an "Invalid WML found: [set_variable] not supported at scenario toplevel" in scenario 4 and made variable check -> [have_unit].
• Augthais in scenario 4 can recruit Dwarvish Scouts.
• Raised Kahn's starting gold to 175 on Normal and 150 on Hard. Lowered Zuug's gold to 175 on Normal and 200 on Hard.
• Variable check -> [have_unit] in scenario 5.
• Integrated sighted event with moveto+[filter_vision] in scenario 5. Also, added a scroll and gave a message to Freon.
• Fixed a variable not set in scenario 5.
• Slightly modified map in scenario 6.
• Variable check -> [have_unit] in scenario 8. Also, added missing name for Alamar and added find_vacant=yes when unstoring him and Freon.
• Raised gold for Kahn from 100 to 200/175/150 in scenario 8 (it resulted impossible to win without the Drake Magi).
• Added a few more terrains in scenarios 7 and 8. No gameplay change.
• Added sound=open-chest.wav to messages in scenario 7.
• Added [gold_carryover] bonus=yes carryover_percentage=40 to every scenario objectives.
• Converted four add=- to sub= in scenario 9. Also, gave sound=hiss.wav to Sekol's first message.
• Removed variable nagas_alive and replaced with [have_unit] check in scenario 9.
• Converted several turn_number variable checks to [event] name=turn (number) in scenario 9.
• Converted code of one victory event to [filter_condition]. Also, merged ANOTHER_NAGA inside MORE_NAGAS macro.
• Reworked amount and type of generated Nagas in scenario 9: on Easy 2 Fighters, on Normal + 1 Warrior, on Hard + 1 Myrmidon.
• Raised Kahn's starting gold to 150 on Easy and 125 on Normal in scenario 9.
• Since mainline now has enough Drake portraits, removed old portraits from scenario 2 and 8.
• Kahn now use the portrait that BLM originally made for the Fighter line, so he and Freon have a portrait in the same style.
• Fixed custom terrains (barrel and box) not giving village defense in scenario 9.
• Integrated two sighted events with moveto+[filter_vision] in scenario 11. Added a [scroll_to_unit] and gave a message to Freon.
• Reworked RISE_UP_RISE_UP macro for scenarios 10, 11 and 12.
• Converted five events to [filter_condition] and one store/unstore to [heal_unit] in scenario 12.
• Hopefully solved again the instant-win bug at start of scenario 10, by replacing some [endlevel] with [fire_event] name=victory in scenario 9.
• Added the following CLEAR_VARIABLE: unitx and unitx in scenario 4, enemies_seen in scenario 5, unit_freon and unit_alamar in scenario 8, can_win, unit_x, unit_y, side_number, village_count, village in scenario 9, mal_bronam_found, talisman_destroyed, talisman_found, talisman_y in scenario 12, recruited_healers in epilogue.
• Removed six unuseful [store_unit] from scenario 2.
• Added a few more terrains in scenarios 10, 11 and 12. No gameplay change.
• Added wmllint spelling directives. Ran wmlindent.
• Version bump to 1.0.0.

[Elvish_Hunter]

Double post, but this is to answer publicly to a question that I received via PM.

In the first scenario in line 61 there is extra_recruit= which results in unplayable campaign; main hero isnt able to recruit anything.

It Works For Me™. On which Wesnoth version are you playing? extra_recruit= is supported only on most recent versions, like 1.9.7 and 1.9.8, and here it works well. As a proof of this, I attach my screenshot:

[Neuromancer]

Im playing on 1.9.6 and that is apparently causing the problem.

[Arawn]

Alright... you added healers! I will replay this soon then. It has always been one of my favorites.

[Anonymissimus]

01_Leader_of_the_Drakes.cfg: A few recruited drake magi in the opponent's team could make this much more challenging. Telling how many drake magi I'm allowed to recruit would be nice.
03_The_Emerging.cfg: Tedious bottleneck-fights. Freon in the village at 21,22 can alone block several whelps since they don't attack. Maybe make the tunnels wider.
07_Bandits.cfg: Player is forced to fight in the midth to defend the allied leader. Being able to tell the allied leader where to go (such as in some LoW versions) would be great here and go along with a fundamental strategy change.
08_To_the_Ships.cfg: A few recruited drake magi in the opponent's teams could make this much more challenging. IIRC it was here: disallow_extra_recruit for the drake magi doesn't work since the key is not type= but extra_recruit= ! I restricted myself to no longer recruit them though. (That code is ill-placed in deaths.cfg...)
09_Sea_Journey.cfg: IMHO the toughest scenario in an overall relatively easy campaign. Maybe make shorter, quite tedious.
10_Landing_on_Morogor.cfg: bug: Load attached save and proceed to this scenario. It ends after the start event! Not a wml bug I guess. Note that it doesn't reproduce when using the start-of-scenario save.
11_Clearing_the_Island.cfg: The map is way too large.
12_Showdown.cfg: I looked in the code to find out where to move to to reveal the talisman. This should be made somewhat more obvious. Also, if the lich attacks he doesn't get healed the retaliation damage (before the talisman is destroyed).

[Elvish_Hunter]

Anonymissimus, thank you for the report.

Telling how many drake magi I'm allowed to recruit would be nice.

IIRC it was here: disallow_extra_recruit for the drake magi doesn't work since the key is not type= but extra_recruit= ! I restricted myself to no longer recruit them though. (That code is ill-placed in deaths.cfg...)

12_Showdown.cfg: I looked in the code to find out where to move to to reveal the talisman. This should be made somewhat more obvious. Also, if the lich attacks he doesn't get healed the retaliation damage (before the talisman is destroyed).

All these issues will be fixed.

10_Landing_on_Morogor.cfg: bug: Load attached save and proceed to this scenario. It ends after the start event! Not a wml bug I guess. Note that it doesn't reproduce when using the start-of-scenario save.

I have absolutely no idea of what triggers this bug. I even attempted twice to fix it in the past...

01_Leader_of_the_Drakes.cfg: A few recruited drake magi in the opponent's team could make this much more challenging.

08_To_the_Ships.cfg: A few recruited drake magi in the opponent's teams could make this much more challenging.

Hmm... Drake Magi have a powerful cold attack against other Drakes, but are very weak. I'm not sure if it's a good idea.
All the other balancing issue will be dealt later.

[Anonymissimus]

10_Landing_on_Morogor.cfg: bug: Load attached save and proceed to this scenario. It ends after the start event! Not a wml bug I guess. Note that it doesn't reproduce when using the start-of-scenario save.

I have absolutely no idea of what triggers this bug. I even attempted twice to fix it in the past...

Well it must be something related to carryover. In the next scenario after the unexpected victory, the leader is "resetted" to the default one. The recall list is still present, didn't look at gold.
Somehow I think [endlevel] behavior is inherently buggy since it got rewritten in 1.7.

Hmm... Drake Magi have a powerful cold attack against other Drakes, but are very weak. I'm not sure if it's a good idea.

What's the difference to suicide-dark-adepts ?

[Elvish_Hunter]

Version 1.0.1 is on the 1.9 server. Changes this time are mainly bugfixes:

• In the first scenario, you are told exactly how many Drake Magi you can recruit.
• Fixed [disallow_extra_recruit] not working.
• Fixed Mal Bronam not healed if he attacks.
• Moved code for Drake Magi recruitment to its own common_utils.cfg file.

Later I'll fix also the other issues, including finding the piece of WML that triggers the [endlevel] bug. I'll also try adding Drake Magi to enemy sides, and see what happens.

[Imperios]

I liked the campaign! I am the Drakes' fan generally, and the whole thing is great! Here are my advice
* On that "ship" mission where you defend against the nagas, why does ship look like a big island of rock floating in the water? You could add castle tiles, at least- and mark them so they would be counted as plain/grassland/whatever.
* Make a Level 3 Drake mage, I would like if he will have illuminate or something.
* That's all, generally.