Carved in Stone 0.8.0 [SP Dwarven Campaign for 1.13]

Discussion and development of scenarios and campaigns for the game.

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GodlyDragon
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Re: Carved in Stone 0.6.0 [SP Dwarven Campaign for 1.12]

Post by GodlyDragon »

Hello there Kwandulin, thanks for the update. There is just 1 big problem: the Under the stars scenario don't load, could you fix it please ?

EDIT: To be precise it says; illegal tile in map: (Re^Ebn) 'Re^Eb`n' The map cannot be loaded
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Kwandulin
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Re: Carved in Stone 0.7.0 [SP Dwarven Campaign for 1.12]

Post by Kwandulin »

Ah, the downside of developing with the newest version. . . The ^Ebn is a lit brazier tile that had been introduced somewhere in 1.13.x.
I fixed the issue, thanks a lot for letting me know!

Edit: If you want to fix it yourself, you can just open the map at Carved_in_Stone/maps/Under_the_Stars.map and replace all "^Ebn" with an empty space.
ahmannar
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Re: Carved in Stone 0.7.0 [SP Dwarven Campaign for 1.12]

Post by ahmannar »

I have reached until the "earth´s maw" level, but when trying to load it the game gives the following error "game_error: unknown unit type:orcish nightblade". After that it fails to load the level at all.
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Kwandulin
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Re: Carved in Stone 0.7.0 [SP Dwarven Campaign for 1.12]

Post by Kwandulin »

Frustrating. . . and fixed. Thanks for noting.
gooby
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Re: Carved in Stone 0.7.0 [SP Dwarven Campaign for 1.12]

Post by gooby »

Re: "Under the Stars":

I am not doing more than one yeti. When the other two appeared I just went into debug mode and got rid of them.

I have have had no other issues with the campaign so far.

(EDIT: upon going further, it seems very difficult to proceed past a certain point without having the Dwarvish Roamer with cure, heals +8. I did that of course but I think it might make sense to add a subtle hint somewhere that you should focus on his healing abilities.

I'm also really not sure how I'm going to get through The Earth's Maw with only 200 gold, notwithstanding the appearance of nagas at turn 11.)

Also, what does the "Bloodlust" AMLA do? I can't seem to find it doing anything in the relevant .cfg
Last edited by gooby on August 3rd, 2015, 3:19 am, edited 1 time in total.
ahmannar
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Re: Carved in Stone 0.7.0 [SP Dwarven Campaign for 1.12]

Post by ahmannar »

What is exactly the reward for killing the troll leader on the "fire and flames level? I got him but nothing happened after that, it was like killing a regular enemy.
Also i think the 3 bootlenecks near the entrance of the "iron bulwark" level make it too much on the easy side. In those 1 enemy can be face in each one of them so defending it with the heros available, the yeti and a extra healing unit while rotating them is enough(if people don´t focus on leveling the heroes it wouldn´t be, but with such unique units it doesn´t seem a unresonable thought).
Maybe having played this campaign previously and knowing that putting the most possible amount of xp on them is a good thing to do but this method trivializes the level. Even so i have no solution for this right now to give to you, just something that should be shared anyway.
gooby
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Re: Carved in Stone 0.7.0 [SP Dwarven Campaign for 1.12]

Post by gooby »

Also is the Crusader unit human or Dwarvish? This is not made entirely clear in the campaign and the unit description.

On a related note, the Giant Troll unit is obviously not Dwarvish and doesn't have magical attacks.
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Kwandulin
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Re: Carved in Stone 0.7.0 [SP Dwarven Campaign for 1.12]

Post by Kwandulin »

gooby wrote:Re: "Under the Stars":
I am not doing more than one yeti. When the other two appeared I just went into debug mode and got rid of them.
I agree that this situation is a really tricky one. I managed to bring them down by using Onarr and the merman entangler Ashtal (you probably found him in scenario 2) to slow them both at one time (as the yeti tend to move on the snow fields next to the water, Ashtal actually becomes a pretty beefy supporter) and use dwarvish thunderers/scoundrels and especially Skjol's lightning strike to melt them. The second yeti arrives 1-2 turns later, so separating them with some guards might be a good choice, too.
If one has given most of the xp gained to dwarvish fighters, it's pretty hard, I guess. I think I'll either remove the third yeti or release them one by one.
gooby wrote:(EDIT: upon going further, it seems very difficult to proceed past a certain point without having the Dwarvish Roamer with cure, heals +8. I did that of course but I think it might make sense to add a subtle hint somewhere that you should focus on his healing abilities.
That sounds reasonable. Did you notice you can recruit dwarvish brewers again? They can advance to a brewmaster relatively quick and heal/cure, too.
gooby wrote:I'm also really not sure how I'm going to get through The Earth's Maw with only 200 gold, notwithstanding the appearance of nagas at turn 11.)
In the previous scenario you can use your dwarvish miners to build villages (amongst other things) to bump up your income. During my last run, I used a dwarvish centurion and the human units you get to scare the enemy in the south east away (in the end they were even able to bring down my lovely centurion, but i had enough time to kill the troll leader) and moved the bulk of my army to the north.
gooby wrote:Also, what does the "Bloodlust" AMLA do? I can't seem to find it doing anything in the relevant .cfg
The bloodlust ability allows you to attack again after you kill a unit. It's advancement, the bloodfrenzy ability, allows you to attack and move again after you kill a unit. These abilities are in the tyrserker.cfg.
ahmannar wrote:What is exactly the reward for killing the troll leader on the "fire and flames level? I got him but nothing happened after that, it was like killing a regular enemy.
Good catch, I missed that one.
ahmannar wrote:Also i think the 3 bootlenecks near the entrance of the "iron bulwark" level make it too much on the easy side. In those 1 enemy can be face in each one of them so defending it with the heros available, the yeti and a extra healing unit while rotating them is enough(if people don´t focus on leveling the heroes it wouldn´t be, but with such unique units it doesn´t seem a unresonable thought).
Maybe having played this campaign previously and knowing that putting the most possible amount of xp on them is a good thing to do but this method trivializes the level. Even so i have no solution for this right now to give to you, just something that should be shared anyway.
Yeah, I don't have an idea on how to fix that, too. As Andurin can't recruit before turn 9/10/11/12 anyway, widening the entrances might be a bad idea, because you have to rely on your heroes for these first turns (and they also get smashed to pieces when attacked by more than one troll). During development I once let a troll shaman appear from nowhere at turn 13/14/15 and let him lay down a bomb to destroy the outer wall of the iron bulwark, but the surprise was too gamebreaking.
gooby wrote:Also is the Crusader unit human or Dwarvish? This is not made entirely clear in the campaign and the unit description.
On a related note, the Giant Troll unit is obviously not Dwarvish and doesn't have magical attacks.
The Crusader is human and the troll isn't a dwarf ^_^ I'll fix that. Thanks for noting!
gooby
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Re: Carved in Stone 0.7.0 [SP Dwarven Campaign for 1.12]

Post by gooby »

So I just noticed that my version is outdated. I'd better go and fix that before I say anything else.

I am curious though: how exactly does Bloodlust work in WML?

Also, when you reach AMLA with the "Merciless", Heroic has a pair of empty square brackets next to it. I imagine you don't intend this.

Anyhow, I'd like to do more than just complain about your campaign. It seems you have a lot of stub descriptions for unique units that could be improved. I've been told I'm very articulate and have helped with unit descriptions before. Here's my stab at Dwarvish Roamer:

"There are those among the Dwarvish race who stray even further from the safety of their mountain homes than their scouts. Whether driven away from home by strife in their community or simply a profound penchant for solitude, the Roamers range the great wilderness of the world, living off the game they can entangle in their nets and slaughter with their axes, as well as the numerous things growing in the earth that will feed the knowledgeable wayfarer. Theirs is not a life of warfare, and they are by no means among the mightiest warriors of the Dwarvish kind. Nevertheless, life in the wilderness can be violent and the same tools by which they secure their lives have often proven themselves in bringing death to the foe. It is even rumored that their knowledge of the woods rivals that of even the most knowing Elves, and that they can bring a vast array of herbs to bear on healing wounds that might otherwise be fatal."

One more bug to report: putting Brewmaster.png, with the capital "B", in the associated .cfg works, I imagine, on Windows, but does not work on Linux—I just had a blank space. For cross-platform compatibility, you want the case to match (i.e. brewmaster.png)

Actually, no, one last thing for now: it should be made more obvious that the nest in Mermen Outpost (though I would say Merman or Merfolk Outpost as a native English speaker) can be used to teleport units to the beach. Until I discovered it, I beat a hasty retreat with my units in the east until the Dwarves coming in from the west could back them up. That was not really the best way of doing things.

And would you believe it: I still have something else to say: apparently the magic mussel can only be picked up by a human. But if I'm reading the WML right, doesn't it really mean only units of side 1 can pick it up? If so, plenty of non-humans can pick it up.

Another thing! I apologize. Dwarves all seem to have the same defense on rubble that they do in a real fortification. What's the point of spending 20 gold on rehabilitating the rubble?

I really hope this is the last for now: I have no idea how you're supposed to try that Miner thing you talked about and end the scenario without debt and still have enough units to win it.

OK, so not quite. When I try to find out what the "protect" attribute is I get the "corrupted original file" error.
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Kwandulin
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Re: Carved in Stone 0.7.0 [SP Dwarven Campaign for 1.12]

Post by Kwandulin »

As there is no [ability] tag for a bloodlust-like ability, I use a [dummy]-ability-tag and connect it with a "die"-event, so whenever a unit is killed, I check if the unit that killed the other unit got the bloodlust ability and if so, I restore its attacks. The feeding ability of the necrophage and ghast use pretty much an identical method (that's where i got it from).

Code: Select all

			[abilities]
				[dummy]
					id=bloodlust
					name= _ "Bloodlust"
					description= _ "After killing an enemy, the tyrserker is able to attack again"
				[/dummy]
			[/abilities]

Code: Select all

	[event]
		id=tyrserker_bloodlust
		name=die
		first_time_only=no

		[filter_second]
			ability=bloodlust
		[/filter_second]

		[unstore_unit]
			variable=second_unit
			{COLOR_HARM}
			text= _ "Bloodlust!"
			find_vacant=no
		[/unstore_unit]
		
		[heal_unit]
			[filter]
				x,y=$x2,$y2
			[/filter]
			amount=0
			restore_attacks=yes
		[/heal_unit]
	[/event]
Your unit description of the dwarvish roamer is really awesome! I think you've captured the gameplay and background aspects of the roamer very well and wrapped it in nice words! Thanks a lot for helping me out! I put your name into the credits.
Another thing! I apologize. Dwarves all seem to have the same defense on rubble that they do in a real fortification. What's the point of spending 20 gold on rehabilitating the rubble?
Mhh, you are right, that's really odd. I'll think about how to change that. I've also fixed the other (linguistic) bugs. Thanks alot for your feedback!
gooby
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Re: Carved in Stone 0.7.0 [SP Dwarven Campaign for 1.12]

Post by gooby »

If you want further descriptions, just name units without them and I'll see what I can come up with.

On a sadder note, I was only able to complete Earth's Maw in 34 turns starting from 500 gold, which was barely adequate.
Whiskeyjack
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Re: Carved in Stone 0.7.0 [SP Dwarven Campaign for 1.12]

Post by Whiskeyjack »

gooby wrote:"There are those among the Dwarvish race who stray even further from the safety of their mountain homes than their scouts. Whether driven away from home by strife in their community or simply a profound penchant for solitude, the Roamers range the great wilderness of the world, living off the game they can entangle in their nets and slaughter with their axes, as well as the numerous things growing in the earth that will feed the knowledgeable wayfarer. Theirs is not a life of warfare, and they are by no means among the mightiest warriors of the Dwarvish kind. Nevertheless, life in the wilderness can be violent and the same tools by which they secure their lives have often proven themselves in bringing death to the foe. It is even rumored that their knowledge of the woods rivals that of even the most knowing Elves, and that they can bring a vast array of herbs to bear on healing wounds that might otherwise be fatal."
Small note: I would cut the first "even". Great description!
Under blood-red skies, an old man sits
In the ruins of Carthage - contemplating prophecy.
gooby
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Re: Carved in Stone 0.7.0 [SP Dwarven Campaign for 1.12]

Post by gooby »

I suppose it's a matter of taste. Since we're talking about physical distance and not metaphorical distance, if we're going to be very grammatically correct, it should be "(even) farther", although I suspect a lot of English speakers just use "further" now. For me the appearance of "even" here is something to give it a little more emphasis, in much the same way that you might say "immer wieder und wieder" in German to put emphasis on how a thing just keeps happening over and over again. The concept I want to get across is that the Roamers go very far from home.
GodlyDragon
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Re: Carved in Stone 0.7.0 [SP Dwarven Campaign for 1.12]

Post by GodlyDragon »

Hi there, it's me again, just here to say that ALL your custom made abilities don't work on 1.13 ( exception of bloodlust and bloodfrenzy who work only in the scenario they were learned )

I also have a question: What is the legendary bonus you were supposed to place on the troll leader in the Fire and Flame scenario? I'm curious.

Continue your awesome work!
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Kwandulin
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Re: Carved in Stone 0.7.0 [SP Dwarven Campaign for 1.12]

Post by Kwandulin »

gooby wrote:If you want further descriptions, just name units without them and I'll see what I can come up with.
The hero units are probably the highest priority right now and the protector or tyrserker might be a good start, I guess, as they play rather important roles in the campaign.
gooby wrote:On a sadder note, I was only able to complete Earth's Maw in 34 turns starting from 500 gold, which was barely adequate.
How did you distribute the xp during the campaign? I had like one centurion, one stalwart and a few thunderguards and the rest has been distributed among the hero units, mostly to Grim, Norn and Skjol. The trio is pretty tough and they can bring down of many L1-L2 units in a few turns (if you get lucky with Grim)
But I think lowering the difficulty (or at least increasing the turn limit) in this scenario is a good idea, especially if the player hadn't feeded so much xp to his heroes and prefers a gameplay with normal units.
GodlyDragon wrote:Hi there, it's me again, just here to say that ALL your custom made abilities don't work on 1.13 ( exception of bloodlust and bloodfrenzy who work only in the scenario they were learned )
I remember that I had severe problems with the bloodlust/frenzy ability in previous versions. But it works fine here in the current version (even in scenarios after Grim learned the abilites). The troll hunter ability works fine, too; yet I am not sure whether the protect ability works or not, because it unfortunately gives no visual feedback (theoretically it should work, though). I'll take a look at them
GodlyDragon wrote:I also have a question: What is the legendary bonus you were supposed to place on the troll leader in the Fire and Flame scenario? I'm curious.
In the previous scenario "The Iron Bulwark" you probably picked up the armour of the decimator with Grim and if you reached the maximum AMLA with Onarr you can get a tougher melee version of him, too:
tyrserker-armoured.png
roamer_bear.png
I am planning something like that for the other heroes, too. I'll put the legendary bonus on the leader of the drakes (because he is a lot tougher to bring down) and let him drop a dragonscale-armour that can be picked up by Skjol (if you find a way across the lava. . .) and that improves his fire resistance and changes his lightning strike to a stronger fire breath attack and/or equips him with an aura that damages nearby units at the beginning of a turn.
Last edited by Kwandulin on August 5th, 2015, 3:37 pm, edited 1 time in total.
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