GSE + EoMa Crossover (1.16,1.18)

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ForestDragon
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GSE + EoMa Crossover (1.16,1.18)

Post by ForestDragon »

Together with inferno8 we present you the "Great Steppe + Era of Magic" era! This addon combines two wonderful eras to bring you a new exciting gaming experience. The combination of steppe and EoMa factions will allow you to take a fresh look at both eras, fight in never-before-seen alliances and diversify survival and other popular modes.

Unlike Ageless Era, our addon unites eras using a cool new technology that loads files directly from each era. This gives it a number of advantages:
1) the crossover era rarely needs to be updated, and unlike in Ageless era authors can work independently on eras without having to wait for the maintainer to add their changes. If there is an incompatibility between two players' version of dependency era the crossover era will print a warning showing which files don't match
2) Since the crossover era requires the original eras to work, it doesn't steal downloads from the eras' authors, unlike ageless
3) The new technology allows the creation of all sorts of new different crossover eras, and you won't need to load lots of eras you don't want just to be able to play several eras you actually like
crossover.png
Last edited by ForestDragon on March 8th, 2024, 1:28 pm, edited 2 times in total.
My active add-ons: The Great Steppe Era,XP Bank,Alliances Mod,Pestilence,GSE+EoMa,Ogre Crusaders,Battle Royale,EoMaifier,Steppeifier,Hardcoreifier
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Re: GSE + EoMa Crossover

Post by inferno8 »

As ForestDragon mentioned, the GSE+EoMa crossover add-on requires both original eras to be downloaded first. Thanks to this, its size is only 54,9kb, so if you already have these two eras, you can just download this, pick "GSE + EoMa" from the eras drop-down menu in the game creation screen and you are ready to go.

The best thing is, you don't really need to update the crossover add-on every time one a new version of one of the eras comes out. This is because both eras are independent from this add-on and if GSE or EoMa gets an update, the changes will be automatically reflected in "GSE+EoMa crossover". This can be really convenient especially that both eras are actively developed and their new versions come out frequently. ForestDragon has also coded a special check to ensure all players have same versions of both eras to prevent OOS errors - how cool is that? :D

Lore-wise EoMa and GSE are not related to each other, they are also balanced quite differently, but this crossover add-on comes with some patches to make things as much balanced as possible. And besides, just look how awesome the faction selection screen looks with these two eras together!
gse+eoma.jpg

I'd like to thank ForestDragon for creating such an innovative add-on. It is probably the first such "clever" add-on in existence. The technology and coding of this crossover are truly brilliant :) And because it's all GNU GPL you can freely modify it to create your own crossover add-on, combining your favorite eras together!
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Mechanical
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Re: GSE + EoMa Crossover

Post by Mechanical »

inferno8 wrote: June 1st, 2022, 9:15 am As ForestDragon mentioned, the GSE+EoMa crossover add-on requires both original eras to be downloaded first. Thanks to this, its size is only 54,9kb, so if you already have these two eras, you can just download this, pick "GSE + EoMa" from the eras drop-down menu in the game creation screen and you are ready to go.

The best thing is, you don't really need to update the crossover add-on every time one a new version of one of the eras comes out. This is because both eras are independent from this add-on and if GSE or EoMa gets an update, the changes will be automatically reflected in "GSE+EoMa crossover". This can be really convenient especially that both eras are actively developed and their new versions come out frequently. ForestDragon has also coded a special check to ensure all players have same versions of both eras to prevent OOS errors - how cool is that? :D

Lore-wise EoMa and GSE are not related to each other, they are also balanced quite differently, but this crossover add-on comes with some patches to make things as much balanced as possible. And besides, just look how awesome the faction selection screen looks with these two eras together!
gse+eoma.jpg


I'd like to thank ForestDragon for creating such an innovative add-on. It is probably the first such "clever" add-on in existence. The technology and coding of this crossover are truly brilliant :) And because it's all GNU GPL you can freely modify it to create your own crossover add-on, combining your favorite eras together!
Thanks for the feedback, inferno! Dragon and I now regularly play this crossover. The confrontation between the steppe and eomа's factions looks really exciting! :twisted:

I also think that the system proposed by the Dragon is a revolution in the matter of collections of eras. I hope that in the future there will be more collections that will be built on an alliance of independent projects, each of which continues to develop separately. Perhaps there will be a "Ageless new generation" :whistle:
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Deciton_Reven
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Re: GSE + EoMa Crossover

Post by Deciton_Reven »

inferno8 wrote: June 1st, 2022, 9:15 am I'd like to thank ForestDragon for creating such an innovative add-on. It is probably the first such "clever" add-on in existence. The technology and coding of this crossover are truly brilliant :) And because it's all GNU GPL you can freely modify it to create your own crossover add-on, combining your favorite eras together!
Not to diminish ForestDragon's work, since it should go without saying it is a strong backbone that will help out these kind of crossover eras in the future and certainly wasn't trivial to do, but a user going by Fog_of_Gold was maintaining an add-on called Indeterminated Era ("Ageless 2") that combined factions similarly during 2010. Though by his own admittance it was preeeetty buggy, and I'm betting was bare held together with duct tape and glue.

Just to make sure history is properly archived and stuff.
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Re: GSE + EoMa Crossover

Post by inferno8 »

Deciton_Reven wrote: June 2nd, 2022, 12:47 am a user going by Fog_of_Gold was maintaining an add-on called Indeterminated Era ("Ageless 2") that combined factions similarly during 2010
Yeah, I remember that person. They were even involved in development and balancing of EoMa 1.x and I had a really good experience working with them :) Well, given the fact that Wesnoth modding scene is more than 15 years old (almost 20?), it is not surprising that someone else had the similar idea in the past. Isn't this exciting? :D But yeah, ForestDragon's actual implementation of this old concept surely deserves attention, especially that his add-on works with the latest stable version of the game and has some really innovative features, which were impossible to implement 12 years ago.
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ForestDragon
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Re: GSE + EoMa Crossover

Post by ForestDragon »

Deciton_Reven wrote: June 2nd, 2022, 12:47 am but a user going by Fog_of_Gold was maintaining an add-on called Indeterminated Era ("Ageless 2") that combined factions similarly during 2010. Though by his own admittance it was preeeetty buggy, and I'm betting was bare held together with duct tape and glue.

Just to make sure history is properly archived and stuff.
Hmmmm... the bugginess could be the result of players having different versions of the dependecy eras. My implementation addresses that problem with the fancy version-comparing code that checks most files for differences.
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Re: GSE + EoMa Crossover

Post by Deciton_Reven »

I'm sure that was a big issue. It didn't even require you to have installed the same factions as your opponent. You just had to ask them politely to use something you had. Plus since it was being an Ageless type era it was intended to get updated regularly with new Eras and Factions and was probably OoS'ing even with itself. I can greatly appreciate a crossover add-on that just works.
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Re: GSE + EoMa Crossover

Post by ForestDragon »

Deciton_Reven wrote: June 2nd, 2022, 12:57 pm I'm sure that was a big issue. It didn't even require you to have installed the same factions as your opponent. You just had to ask them politely to use something you had. Plus since it was being an Ageless type era it was intended to get updated regularly with new Eras and Factions and was probably OoS'ing even with itself.
I see. Yeah, OOS are a huge issue for such add-ons if not handled properly.
Deciton_Reven wrote: June 2nd, 2022, 12:57 pm I can greatly appreciate a crossover add-on that just works.
Thanks ^_^
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Re: GSE + EoMa Crossover

Post by Ravana »

Mechanical wrote: June 1st, 2022, 3:54 pm I also think that the system proposed by the Dragon is a revolution in the matter of collections of eras. I hope that in the future there will be more collections that will be built on an alliance of independent projects, each of which continues to develop separately. Perhaps there will be a "Ageless new generation" :whistle:
It is a lot of work, and many included eras do not live anymore on their own. Currently used hack to check file content also has massive performance issues as soon as there are bit more files involved. If you havent already, I suggest asking for _info.cfg to become readable. When you have power over all involved addons, you can rely on version number file instead of checking all files.

I do not plan to try it personally.

By macro including source addons you also run into conflicts about macro names, losing default preprocessor context separation. There are multiple addons which dont bother using identifiers. For unit types too not just macros.

It is very closely related to source eras, like one addon in multiple folders, and any kind of independent refactoring in any involved addon would completely break this addon. So if one of addons is not your own, you need to be always available to fix it after files or macros change.

Code: Select all

    {STEPPE_RANDOM_SIDE_GSE}#loaded from GSE utils.cfg
    {STEPPE_RANDOM_SIDE_EOMA ()}
    {~add-ons/1The_Great_Steppe_Era/factions/ogres.cfg}
    {EOMA_SIDE default skykingdom}
    {EOMA_EVENTS}
    {STEPPE_NERF_PVP_LEADERS}
    {TURNS_OVER_ADVANTAGE}
    {GREATSTEPPE_OPTIONS}
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Re: GSE + EoMa Crossover

Post by ForestDragon »

Ravana wrote: June 4th, 2022, 8:07 pm Currently used hack to check file content also has massive performance issues as soon as there are bit more files involved. If you havent already, I suggest asking for _info.cfg to become readable. When you have power over all involved addons, you can rely on version number file instead of checking all files.
Checking _info.cfg was my initial idea too. Very well, I have submitted an issue on the wesnoth github. Once the feature is added I'll probably keep the current implementation as an optional feature for testers tho
Ravana wrote: June 4th, 2022, 8:07 pm By macro including source addons you also run into conflicts about macro names, losing default preprocessor context separation. There are multiple addons which dont bother using identifiers. For unit types too not just macros.
True, that can be an issue with some add-ons, but EoMa and GSE generally use identifiers for most stuff.
Ravana wrote: June 4th, 2022, 8:07 pm It is very closely related to source eras, like one addon in multiple folders, and any kind of independent refactoring in any involved addon would completely break this addon. So if one of addons is not your own, you need to be always available to fix it after files or macros change.
I am aware of that, yes. But it is a price I am willing to pay for the advantages that the implementation brings.
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Re: GSE + EoMa Crossover

Post by ForestDragon »

Made some comics about the crossover, in a style similar to EoMa jokes I made long ago
eomajoke_tarbynn.png
eomajoke_gse_metal.png
eomajoke_orcs_and_ogres.png
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Re: GSE + EoMa Crossover

Post by Lord-Knightmare »

ForestDragon wrote: June 12th, 2022, 6:21 pm Made some comics about the crossover, in a style similar to EoMa jokes I made long ago
eomajoke_tarbynn.png
eomajoke_gse_metal.png
eomajoke_orcs_and_ogres.png
:lol: :lol: :lol:

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Re: GSE + EoMa Crossover

Post by ForestDragon »

Released a small hotfix update (1.0.3) for the crossover, as previously I forgot to add ogre kingdom to the AoH and RPG versions of the era. Now they are finally playable here too
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Re: GSE + EoMa Crossover

Post by ForestDragon »

Released update 1.1.0 for the crossover. Now the RPG variant of the era uses code from the newly-released EoMa RPG Unbalanced mode, added in EoMa 4.5. This ensures that abilities like summon will work properly in crossover RPG.
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Re: GSE + EoMa Crossover (1.16,1.18)

Post by ForestDragon »

ported crossover to 1.18
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