Dov's MP Pack - Now with Shops Era

[WK1]

I found a bug in Elf Chess. When you win, the game continues. I have attached a patch to fix it. Basically, you don't want to turn the king to stone. You just want to let him die, so the game can end.

That's a feature! I prefer to not be kicked out of the game after the checkmate message--which should be a clear enough indication that the game is over.

I agree. The map probably isn't the best place to decide this. The engine should be modified to disallow further movement, but not automatically dismiss all the players and observers, just because the game ended. That way, the feature would apply to all maps, or possibly could be an option the user can set. Perhaps we should take that up with the developers.

I have a few recommendations to make the game more chess-like: 1) White and Green? How about White and Black?

Of my actual chess sets at home, one out of three is white and black. The others are light brown/dark brown, and gold/silver.

I have a similar situation at my parents house (no physical set at mine). I have a glass chess set that is transparent/translucent white, and my brother has one that is yellow/green. I guess the black/white tradition died a while ago.

[Alink]

I noticed that the circles that turns from green to red to indicate that a piece can't move, don't always do so. Specifically, if you move twice, then the circle of the second piece turns red, but all of the other ones remain green, until the mouse moves over them. This may be a limitation in the engine. I thought I should mention it.

I've noticed that too--I don't know of a way to fix that as it does seem to be an engine thing.

Probably a bug, it seems that using fog help to prevent it. You can also use :

Code: Select all

{MODIFY_UNIT side=$side_number moves 0}
[redraw]
	side = $side_number
[/redraw]

Thanks Sapient for the idea

[eyu100]

Also, Orocia is HARD - the mage wave is extremely powerful.

[Dovolente]

You can also use :

Code: Select all

{MODIFY_UNIT side=$side_number moves 0}
[redraw]
	side = $side_number
[/redraw]

Thanks Sapient for the idea

Yes, thanks!

*** .4 Update ***
(on the 1.2 add-on server)

-Orocia: fixed incorrect id
-Orocia: added hidden AI leader in the corner to allow players to stay in the game if their leaders die
-Cutthroat: all units of a player die if a player's leader dies, to prevent "kingmaking"
-Elf Chess: fixed position of green king/queen
-Elf Chess: fixed display problem of the movement balls
-Elf Chess: changed map border from chasm to cave wall

[Sombra]

Hi Dovolente would it be possible to include a kind of randomness to your maps.?I like the concept of cutthroat a lot , its simply a little bit to predictable regarding the AI.

[Dovolente]

Hi Dovolente would it be possible to include a kind of randomness to your maps.?

That's the million-dollar question. I'd *love* to add randomness in different ways to some of these maps, and other ideas I have for maps can't be done without randomness. The WML random function just doesn't work well in multiplayer, however. There is an impressive WML hack that sort of makes a random function, but some early attempts to implement it were frustrating (I'm still something of a novice at WML). So I've decided to hold out for coding that fixes it, since it has been mentioned that this is being worked on.

Oddly enough, the random WML function does seem to work okay in one map in the pack, Encampments--the position of units recruited from villages is randomized. It seems to work in this case, but for other situations where I've tried it, it doesn't.

[Rhuvaen]

Oddly enough, the random WML function does seem to work okay in one map in the pack, Encampments--the position of units recruited from villages is randomized. It seems to work in this case, but for other situations where I've tried it, it doesn't.

What are those other situations?

For WML-induced PSEUDORANDOM or MP_RANDOM to work, you need to call the <whatever>_INIT macros. What they do is generate a seed number from in-game randomness. If there's a problem with the seed your randomness will be broken.

Currently these macros come delivered with unit-based seed generation. That usually means they can only be initialized in turn 2 (after recruiting), and all the random functions are available afterwards.

If you call the random macros before, or if your scenario doesn't feature recruitment, then you'll have a problem... one option would be to use the random map generator and have a seeding macro based on terrains and their distribution. You could do seeding in prestart-event, then, and replace the random map with the actual scenario map. (I know it's ugly...)

So I've decided to hold out for coding that fixes it

So am I, but in the meantime I'm developing my scenarios with MP_RANDOM. It'll be easy to convert that to true randomness later on. When the change happens, it's going to SVN, and it'll take some time to get into the next release of the dev version.

[Dovolente]

Oddly enough, the random WML function does seem to work okay in one map in the pack, Encampments--the position of units recruited from villages is randomized. It seems to work in this case, but for other situations where I've tried it, it doesn't.

What are those other situations?

I may have been unclear. I used the basic WML random=[range] and it *seems* to work okay in Encampments. One reason I haven't used PSEUDO is that I usually want to randomize the starting map/setup, before turn 2. Also, I don't like using WML I don't really understand.


*** Lords of Orocia ***
There are rumors out there of several people having beaten Orocia on the MP server with default settings. I say rumors, because we have yet to see a game posted! (KrimZon, soul_steven, ping... post those games!)

So... here's the "Lords of Orocia Challenge":

Post to this thread a saved game of a win on the map (played by 3 players on the MP server, with default settings of 75 gold and +2 gold/village).

I'll keep a running list of players who have won (and how many times, and with which factions). I'll periodically update the map with a "Lords of Orocia" list to be displayed at the start of the game.

[assassin]

I have a similar situation at my parents house (no physical set at mine). I have a glass chess set that is transparent/translucent white, and my brother has one that is yellow/green. I guess the black/white tradition died a while ago.

As to the chess sides being white and green!
Well it seems fine to me!
As to you chess sets that you have, the reason for most chess sets for not being white and black is because it is not good to stiar at opposit colors for more that 1 minute, this is the reason most chess sets are not white and black!
[/quote]

[Krimzon]

Ok, here is an Orocia, with default settings

I have beaten it before, but unable to get the replay posted.

[eyu100]

Ok, here is an Orocia, with default settings

I have beaten it before, but unable to get the replay posted.

Quick summary of the game: Mythological was doing badly for a while in the beginning, but he recovered. Everything went with no losses (?) until the knight wave (turn 31). Myth and Bear took several losses from the knight wave and mage wave (turn 33), while Krimzon took none. Krimzon lost 3 drakes and his soothsayer on the saurian wave (turn 36). After the assassin wave (turn 38), he lost another level 3 drake and his leader. Myth and Bear had few losses. I asked Krimzon to kill an (orcish) assassin with his almost-leveled inferno drake with ~10 hp left. The drake died . This was on turn 40; after Bear pressed Turn Done, the game was over.

[Dovolente]

*** Version 0.5 *** is now up on the 1.2 add-on server.

• Orocia: added "Lords" info -- hail the conquering heroes!
• Orocia: expanded shrine bonus to terrain next to shrine, per popular request
• 3D Rumble added (officially; rough draft accidentally included in previous update I was surprised to see it being played!). Some differences in the earlier and finished version of 3d rumble:
  • Top and bottom levels have varied terrains to help improve the unit balance a little (though balance in a rumble is always nominal ).
  • The top is friendlier to elves, and the bottom to water and flying units.
  • one ai unit spawns every other turn on each level, instead of several on the upper and lower.

[Jami]

I finally defeated Orocia!

Granted, I used a non-standard tactic that required I be the host of the game... but that's besides the point. Default settings, Default era. x2 Rebels and x1 Undead. (only the Undead leader survived)

[Dovolente]

Nicely done! The file had errors after turn 20 or so, but your wose/shaman/necro/white mage strategy seemed very effective.

[Jami]

Getting a full heal after every attack makes for an easy win... particularily once you have over 100HP (the max a paladin can dish out during day with his Holy melee).

You should see my 100gold Kalfia Haram/Steppe Orc shieldbearer strat. It's nearly as crazy. >.> (A sea of Red outside the gates..)