[ian-reeds-games] A few things

  • From: Ian Reed <support@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
  • To: ian-reeds-games@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
  • Date: Wed, 02 Jan 2013 22:59:14 -0700

Hi all,

Austen, you had some numbered items as bugs.
1 Isn't this correct? I thought it was you who said that if you can't see them you shouldn't be able to hear them and I agree. 2 This is by design, if the skill has a range higher than 1 and the move_self flag then it is a teleportation skill. You could potentially put the blocks_sight flag on the terrain as well as not_flyable, then the skill could not be used since the unit can not see passed the terrain to use the skill. But as I mentioned in the dev 6 release email I still haven't finished making not_flying + blocks_sight work correctly for flying units so you may want to wait till that's done. 3 This sounds like a really bad bug. I wasn't getting it in my maps but I'll have a look at yours. We may also want to have a tic toc type sound to indicate when the AI is doing things behind the fog as this would not reveal what types of units the AI is using but would help the player know if the game has stopped. Then again, fixing the bug might make this not a problem as I expect the AI should think pretty quickly when it is not waiting for sounds to play.

Allan, the sight range bonus does not currently exist and the existing range_bonus does not affect sight_range. Regarding the bug where flying units take damage, healing and other effects from moving over terrain: I realize this is a problem, but it would also be a problem if I made them not take damage, healing, or effects from moving over terrain. Because if you had a poisonous cloud or a cyclone then it would not matter if the unit is flying or not as it should take damage and effects. Additionally if a flying unit was on a healing well tile you would expect it to benefit from the healing. So while it seems strange for the flying unit to take damage from a pit I think the correct solution is more a feature than a bug fix. Maybe you could think through how we could handle all these situations in a good configurable way and present it on the list.

Everyone, before the mailing list started I got the top 3 most wanted features from 4 of the map creators.
A number of them have been completed and a few still have not.
My apologies to Carlos and Craig as their lists had the fewest completed.

I've shortened some of them and added my own comment at the end of each item indicating whether they were completed or not.
Sorry if the intermingling of voices is confusing.

Austens items:
1 sub map buildings
A good idea but not completed primarily because it's a very large feature.
2 A way to limit a unit to only moving on certain terrain types, such as boats or water elementals.
Completed.
3 Regions and the ability to do block placement in the map editor.
Completed.

Allan's items:
1 First letter navigation in menus, especially for the map editor menus.
Completed for all menus.
2 Terrain that cannot be attacked through.
Mostly completed through line of sight, still a bit of work to do with flying units. 3 I would like to see the map editor become a fully fledged, intuitive tool for people with little experience with customizing games and lots of great creativity. Not completed because it's a very large feature, but the importance is duely noted.

Carlos' items:
1. unit flag setting for effects, like attack_hp_inflict_mod. This would make the unit’s attack skill, and only his attack skill, do more damage.
Not completed, but still a good idea.
2. make the AI smarter by making it smart enough to remove cursing effects and to not killing itself like with life transfer, or add an AI difficulty setting that would govern what kind of stuff the AI would do, like in easy it might just attack your units, the next level up it might attack and buff and defend itself, and the next level up it might adding healing and removal of detrimental effects as well as more splash damaging spells. The AI can now uncurse and some of the bugs with AI have been resolved, but I think this request wanted a lot more.
3. teamwide points that are not linked to a single unit but to the player.
Still a good idea and would have been my next item after fog of war and line of sight.

Craig's items:
1. Move_unit / move_other. Jedi telekinetic throws and other such fun sound good to me. Also could have some kind of varient that just moves a unit to any free adjacent square for blasts and such, if any.
Good idea, but not completed.
2. Team points: As already stated, good for globally held things such as money and stuff. Might not come into play in my SW campaign, but would be great for a different kind of strategy theme where production and economy could come into play.
Still a good idea and as mentioned above was likely to be my next item.
3. AI controlled friendlies: E.g. distraction teams and similar. So you don't have to necessarily control all aspects of the battle. Or another scenario would be for base defence structures and such, where you wouldn't necessarily want to do all their targeting for them. Just a thought.
This one was completed.

I wanted to share those to recognize how giving me your top 3 items can help shape the game.

And also in preparation for my next email.

Ian Reed


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