Damage System MOD(or Less Luck MOD) by A&J

[ArtuR]

Did you ever get frustrated with bad luck in Wesnoth? Sure many will tell you there is no such thing as luck in this game. However, many players, and many good players feel like even matches are often resolved with a little bit of unfairness from RNG.

Theory that RNG is fair and there is really no luck in this game would apply if not for 2 details:

1. Small maps. Sure, on a large map with a lot of troops and battles, over time RNG will even out and if you get unlucky few times in one place, you will almost surely get lucky somewhere else. However on smaller maps with fewer troops and early encounters When 1 unit can comprise 20% of your army, lucky strike from your opponent can cripple your gang in a serious way with no time for you to recover. Sure RNG is fair, but it'll not have time to even it out. Once you are crippled, the rest of your troops can fold like a house of cards.

2. Morale/Unfair RNG for certain periods. Even though RNG is in principle fair, it's rather hard to keep it cool when it favors your enemy first. By the time you get lucky you might already have made many mistakes. Surely this is not really the game's problem, but human nature is human nature. Nothing is more discouraging when your clearly superior strategy and tactics gets shoved by RNG. And even if you, being the world class player that you are, didn’t make any mistakes. You might have lost too many units that by the time RNG balances out, you don’t have enough left to make a difference.

So we decided to produce a MOD that will still have the luck factor, but not as big. The inspiration comes mostly from Heroes of Might and Magic game. We noticed also that there were MODs that addressed this before as well.

Our plan of attack was the following:
-Reduce the influence of RNG
-Get rid of those situations where a 1hp unit escapes all the attacks and more often than not levels up
-Modify the game as little as possible for easy maintenance
-Try not to change the gameplay
-Keep it simple (KISS)
-Try to not disturb the balance(if the original game is balanced, the MOD should be too)

The solution: Damage each unit inflicts is centered around (100%-Defender.Defence). The range is from -25% to 25% of the original damage.
Ex: If the attacker can make 10hp damage on a particular turn, and attacks a 70% defence unit, it'll do anywhere between 5% and 55% of its original damage, or from 1 to 6(rounding up). In a more obvious way, if the unit could do 100hp damage, then while attacking a unit on 70% defence, it would inflict anywhere between 5hp and 55hp. Thus the unit always inflicts damage. But the average damage is the same as it was in the original game. Thus old statistics applies. Note that in the MOD the defence influences the damage in a direct way, there are no misses.

So in other words, defence in the original game influenced the chance to hit so it might take many attacks for the statistics to balance out due to. In our mod, defence directly modifies the damage to reflect those changes so you don’t need as many attacks.


Minimum damage is 1hp (It does change the game a slight bit). Minimum drain is 1hp unless at full health. Poison and slow are the same as before. Although you always inflict damage, you are not guaranteed to poison your enemy's unit.

Note that best results seem to be achieved when the game is played in the same way as before(take good defence position, overpower, account for the time of day, etc). Resist the urge to push only because you see you can inflict some damage.

Let us know how it is.
The attached are changed source files.
Ubuntu binary and Windows binary are to be uploaded shortly.
Version is 1.6.2

ArtuR and Jed(NarajinX)

Edit: Changed the title. Hope this is better. Thanks Turuk.

[NarajinX]

You can download the .exe file for Windows and Linux at

http://sites.google.com/site/narajininc/Home/downloads

Just unrar it and put in wesnoth directory. No need for compiling.

Replace /usr/games/wesnoth with this file in ubuntu.

Post if any problems.

[Turuk]

Theory that RNG is fair and there is really no luck in this game would apply if not for 2 details

You are aware that this statement is a contradiction, correct? There has been no claim that there is no luck in the game, in fact, quite the opposite. One developer, zookeeper, even nicely provided a Less-Luck mod for those users who desired it.


Still, more power to you for creating a mod to make the game function best in your mind.

[ArtuR]

Theory that RNG is fair and there is really no luck in this game would apply if not for 2 details

You are aware that this statement is a contradiction, correct? There has been no claim that there is no luck in the game, in fact, quite the opposite. One developer, zookeeper, even nicely provided a Less-Luck mod for those users who desired it.


Still, more power to you for creating a mod to make the game function best in your mind.

I agree that this might be poorly worded. I've read few forums and saw negative responses to people complaining about RNG. My statement was directed more at people who say the game is absolutely fair and there is no luck involved. I guess people who are absolutely happy with RNG would not consider this MOD anyways. I guess a better way to say it would be that RNG is actually fair, but has very wide swings, which can make short games of the nature that Wesnoth is quite unfair.
The only other MOD I am aware of is Sauron's MOD. It was outdated and (although I haven't tried it) we felt like it might not be too balanced given that you have a slider for deterministic/random portion of the damage. Is it the mod you refered to?

Cheers

[Turuk]

Nope, this was much more recent, and was done by zookeeper.

Less Luck Era

[grrr]

The main difference being that these two guys realized how important minimum damage > 0 is. Compared to that, zoo's era is an vastly inferior solution - it can be easily abused, and the hidden CTH modifiers are a step in the wrong direction.

[Turuk]

The main difference being that these two guys realized how important minimum damage > 0 is. Compared to that, zoo's era is an vastly inferior solution - it can be easily abused, and the hidden CTH modifiers are a step in the wrong direction.

I was not making any effort to compare the two, merely noting that the statement about RNG is fair and the game having no luck was a bit off, as well as providing reference of another add-on made to put less luck in the game.

[NarajinX]

Yes, doing 10, 20 or 0 damage is a big difference.

Anyways, I was thinking if putting this in an era and make it easier for people to download and lessen their worries about malicious code. Can stuff in era's change pretty much anything?

Can anyone tell me where to find out how to make eras/addon?

[Caphriel]

Minor nitpick, but the name of it sounds like something that deals with modifying the ranges of attacks (I thought it was something to allow attacks over a greater distance than adjacent hexes, or something.)

[NarajinX]

Yea, we had the title at Range attack mod..now that would have been mmore misleading.

Attack range makes more sense.

[Turuk]

Attack range makes more sense.

It does once you realize what the add-on is modifying, but to anyone who just comes across it, they will most likely think that it has to do with attacks reaching across multiple hexes.

[Dauntless]

Hi guys, I tried a match in this MOD with NarajinX and quite liked it. Even though it changes some tactical details, the main strategy remains the same and the luck factor is very well lowered It delas with EV deviance not overally, but in each attack, thus reducing the chance of a rng swing which can lead to village losses etc..

Ill try to play some more games in this MOD soon, to make sure it works well, but for now Id like to encourage you to at least try it out.

(the rng changes arent irreversible, its just a new mod, so nothing to be afraid of)

DL

[NarajinX]

OK. Maybe damage range system MOD?

[Gambit]

Even though RNG is in principle fair, it's rather hard to keep it cool when it favors your enemy first. By the time you get lucky you might already have made many mistakes. Surely this is not really the game's problem, but human nature is human nature. Nothing is more discouraging when your clearly superior strategy and tactics gets shoved by RNG. And even if you, being the world class player that you are, didn’t make any mistakes. You might have lost too many units that by the time RNG balances out, you don’t have enough left to make a difference.

I actually made a patch too. It fixes human nature.

[Turuk]

OK. Maybe damage range system MOD?

Take out the range part. Just Damage System Mod.