Friday, April 13, 2012

[REL] Gilbot-X's Mod Pack v2.05

[:1]***Please note that the first couple of pages of replies on this thread are talking about the Supreme Commander version of my mod pack, not my Forged Alliance version. I am not updating the Supreme Commander version of this mod anymore, as I prefer to focus my efforts exclusively on my FA version. My FA version is described in this first post, but not discussed until the latter part of this thread, starting from page 4 onwards. You are probably better off just reading this first post and the last 2 pages of this thread if you only want to know about the recent developments.



What's In Gilbot-X's Mod Pack 2



Resource Networks System

This is a system that extends the range of adjacency bonuses so that more structure units can give and receive adjacency bonuses. This gives more strategic significance to where you build your economy and defense structures.



Diagonal Adjacency

The first thing you'll notice is that units are now classed as adjacent even if their boundaries only overlap at the corners. For example, this means you can now get 20 T1 Powergens giving adjacency bonuses around a factory, instead of the normal 16.



Indirect Adjacency

Two units are directly adjacent if they have touching boundaries. But adjacency can now also be passed indirectly through units. If structure 1 is directly adjacent to structure 2, and structure 2 is directly adjacent to structure 3, then in my mod, structure 1 is considered indirectly adjacent to structure 3. If you're a mathematician, you'll understand if I say that adjacency is transitive, i.e.
    1 --> 2 (direct) and
    2 --> 3 (direct) so
    1 --> 3 (indirect)
Networks: 100% or 50% Bonus
Units that are directly adjacent will pass on full bonuses to each other. Units that are only indirectly adjacent will only pass on 50% of the bonus amount. For example, let's say that building a T1 powergen directly next to a shield will reduce that shield's energy consumption by 10 per second. If that is true, it means if we build a T1 powergen not directly next to the shield but we build other things between them so they are indirectly connected, then this will only reduce energy consumption of that shield by another 5 per second - only half as much bonus as it would give if they were built directly next to each other. When units are connected together in touching chains of units, we say that they are all part of the same Network. Networks have an N number to identify them. N=1, N=2, etc.
Pipelines
To further extend these bonuses, engineers can now build pipeline units that are small and cheap connectors that do nothing apart from link up units that do not have touching boundaries, so they can pass on adjacency bonuses.
All factions have T1, T2 and T3 pipelines. All pipelines can be built on land, some can be built on the seabed, and some float on water.
    T1 Pipelines
    These are built closely next to each other in chains to provide indirect links between other structures that can exchange adjacency bonuses. These T1 pipelines are easily destroyed and will often explode together in a chain reaction if one is destroyed.
    T2 Pipelines
    These are more expensive but have better armour and can also remotely connect to other T2 pipeline units that are not within touching distance but still within range. So unlike T1 pipelines, they can pass on adjacency bonuses without being built closely together. To think of it another way, if connecting structures by T1 pipelines is like connecting them by cable, then connecting them by T2 pipelines is more like wireless networking.
    T3 Pipelines
    These are like T2 pipelines but have even heavier armour and have a much longer wireless range.
    Other Network Connecting Units
    The Cybrans have an Experimental Pipeline generated by a base that disguises itself as a T1 wall piece. It only connects other pipelines to each other, but it has a massive range and the base is heavily armoured.
Bonuses are Capped
All connections between structure units also form part of the resource network. Currently the networks are capped so that units attached to a network can get at most a 50% boost in resource production, and at most a 50% reduction in running costs. This can be changed easily and I'm curious to what you players out there will prefer.
Wireless Range
The wireless range of T2, T3 and T4 pipelines is indicated by a red circle when you select it or get an engineer to build it. The wireless ability has a small energy cost, but it the wireless ability can also be turned off. You can also use a slider control to reduce the range of T2/T3/T4 pipelines, which reduces this cost. The overall gains in using these pipelines usually makes the small cost worth it.
For example, in a large network with T2 and T3 pipelines, several factories can be all linked to a set of several distant mass extractors. the bonuses from these mass extractors could reduce the amount of mass it takes any factory to build by up to 50%, so it is worth losing a bit of energy on the wireless network costs to make larger savings on mass in the factories.
Strategy
Just using T1 pipelines is very simple (using dragbuild to lay the pipeline) but setting up T2/T3/T4 pipelines takes an initial bit of planning and micromanagement to set correct positions and get maximum efficiency (i.e you can intersperse them with T1 pipelines for maximum efficiency but then the link is easier for the enemy to cut as T1 pipelines have weaker armour). So there is a 'planning and building time' cost in using them, as well as the initial investment in mass and energy you need to build them. Using pipelines to link your main base to a firebase will also lead a trail to your main base. You have to decide if (and how) using pipelines is going to suit your strategy.
The Role of the ACU
The ACU is responsible for calculating the distribution of bonuses through these networks. Without the ACU, no structures units on a network will receive any bonuses. You can think of the ACU as being the network manager, responsible for routing of bonuses in the network. You can build physical links between structures to create a network, but without a manager to route network traffic, the network will not do anything. As a result, if your ACU dies, all of your network links and pipeline units will instantaneously be destroyed and no more network links will be created. This will make your ACU a more special unit and more important to keep alive.
Network ID Display Overlay
To view which structure units are in which networks, press CTRL and the / key on the number pad. This toggles a display on units in a network. N=2 means the unit is in network #2. N=17 I=3 means that a unit is in network #17 which is remotely-connected to all other networks that have internetwork ID #3.
New Type of Adjacency Bonus Added for Shields
Aeon faction now has an Experimental Shield Enhancer that can be attached to a network. It can increase the amount of damage any shield can take, from as low as a 10% increase up to 100% increase depending on power settings (set with slider control). It consumes a lot of power at its top setting. It is also one of the units that your ACU will automatically switch off to prevent the economy running out of energy.

Auto Toggle
Your ACU is not just the brain for routing adjacency bonuses over networks. it can also provide automatic handling of your economy. It will monitor your energy income and usage, and will switch other units on/off automatically depending on how much energy and mass you have left. Your ACU will switch off whatever it can automatically, to prevent your economy from completely stalling. This mod can really reduce a lot of micro, but if your ACU dies, you lose the ability and everything is back on manual.
What Does It Work on?
For Auto Toggle to be able to pause a unit feature, that unit feature must:
Consume energy (or mass) when switched on
AND must either
(a) normally can be paused on the unit's orders menu, i.e.
    1/ Mass production of Massfabs
    2/ Shields
    3/ Radar or jamming on intel units
    4/ Stealth or cloak on counter-intel units
    (In the code, these are all the ones in the alt-orders that are paused using 'ScriptBits')
(b) involve building something, i.e.
    1/ The construction done by engineers
    2/ The unit upgrades on units that have these.
    3/ The enhancements on units that have these.
    (In the code, these are all the ones that have ActiveConsumptionand are paused in the construction menu.)

When Will Each Thing Get Paused?
By default, the order that the ACU uses for switching off or pausing things is defined in the mod and based on sensible guesses about which things are less important and should be paused first. For example, radar and sonar are switched off before shield towers. But you can customise the order in which things are paused.
Ordering is done by first putting units into "C" (Class) groups. C=1 is for the least important things that should get paused first. C=6 is the highest, for things that get paused as a last resort. Your ACU will also switch all of these units back on when you have enough energy to run them, and the order it does this in reflects the same priority order that was used to switch them off, i.e. the first thing to get switched off is the last thing to get switched back on.
All units capable of being included in the ACU's auto-toggle list will also have a 'AT' button that allows them to opt in or out of the list. This is useful if you have a unit like a stealth tower that you don't want the ACU to ever shut off - i.e. you would rather your energy hit rock bottom and construction was effected rather than have it switched off.
You can customise the order in which things are switched off in-game by selecting an auto-toggle unit and pressing CTRL-NUMPADMINUS and CTRL-NUMPADPLUS (i.e. like how you would change the game speed but with CTRL also pressed). The order number on the units will change to reflect the new order. I've used the custom naming system to display these order numbers to the player. Press CTRL-NUMPADSTAR to toggle this display on/off.
Mass Fabricators are all immediately turned off if your mass storage is full. There is also a class of unit (priority level 2 that can be assigned to units) that are only switched on if you are producing an excess of energy (i.e. energy storage is already full but you are still producing more energy that is being wasted). For example, I have assigned the stealth ability on my Cybran mass extractors this priority, so they all stay switched off when I'm building my initial base (I want my energy storage as full as possible while I'm constructing the first base).
Do I have to use this?
No. Each unit can opt out by unchecking the "ON" button in the AT menu. The ACU also has an 'AT' button in its orders menu. Toggling this determines if the AT menu "ON" button starts in the checked/unchecked position for any new unit being built.

Enhancements
The way that enhancements are managed has been improved to make them easier to use, with less micro.
1/ You can apply an enhancement to multiple units at the same time.
2/ You can apply a 3-stage enhancement on a unit by clicking on just 1 button. All the prerequisite enhancements for it are ordered to be built first automatically.
3/ Buttons are disabled to prevent accidental downgrading to inferior stages of the same enhancement.
4/ If you select a unit and click a series of enhancement buttons, then those enhancements will be applied one after another in that order. No further intervention is needed. A stop order will cancel the whole series of enhancements that have not already been completed.
5/ A unit can have an upgrade that is made up of many enhancements. If the unit already has some enhancements done, it will cost the unit less if a full upgrade is ordered on it. For example, in my mod pack in the Military Upgrades 2 module, a T1 Mech marine can upgrade to a T2 Mech Marine by selecting the T2 Mech Marine icon in the build menu. Alternatively, the T1 Mech Marine also has 3 enhancement paths that can be used to give it some of the abilities that the T2 version has. If all 3 of these enhancement paths are completed, the Mech Marine becomes T2 automatically at no further cost or build time. If part of the enhancement paths are completed, the build costs will be reduced if the full upgrade is ordered by clicking in the T2 icon in the build menu. In this way, units can upgrade in stages, without wasting lots of resources.

Economy
There are two aims to the economy changes in my mod pack.
1/ Some units play a very small role in the game because it is too easy to tech up and build better ones that make them redundant. The mod pack makes changes to the way the economy develops (as well as to the units themselves) in order to address this. Teching up now takes longer or costs more. Units at lower tech levels are changed to be slightly less overpowered by units of higher tech levels.
2/ Reduce economy micromanagent.
3/ Make holding territory and the location of bases important.
Separation of the 4th Tech Level
Developed independently, my mod pack was one of the first mods to have a clearly distinct 4th tech level, where T3 engineers cannot build T4 units, and ACUs have an extra enhancement that must be activated before they can build T4 units. (Black Ops also has this and it seems to be becoming popular with other modders too).
Teching Up Costs More
A lot of people complain that the T1 and T2 combat units get underused because it is always a better strategy to tech up fast, sometimes skipping out on T1 combat units altogether on larger maps. To address this situation, I made the following changes: Building T1 Factories cost more (so like in TA, it does make a difference which factory you choose to build first). Upgrading factories costs a lot more and is more capable of stalling your economy. The ACU's build enhancements cost a lot more. The Military Upgrades 2 Module included in my mod pack adds lots of enhancements for Tech 1 units. Mobile arty can increase their range. Each faction's scout now has unique upgrade paths to make them useful as combat units. LABs also get enhancements to make them less overpowered by T2 units.
Exponential Mass Extractors and Hydrocarbon Power Plants
This has been in my mod pack since the early SC days when Pawz made the first version of exponential mass extractors for SC. Since then my reworkings of the concept have proved very popular. What is it? Mexes and HCPPs produce more output according to how long they have survived. My twist on this idea was to extend it to also give these units other bonuses based on their survival time, and to extend it to HCPPs. I'm still looking for ideas for a special ability to give to the Seraphim mexes and HCPP. I wrote this part of the mod before FA came out and I hadn't planned on the Seraphim! This feature makes it important to hold more territory, as players who hold more territory will get more benefit from being able to defend their mexes and HCPPs.

Unit Improvements
I have added slider controls so that units can be adjusted in various ways.
My Aeon Czar has a slider control that lets you adjust its personal shield strength.
Dome shields have a slider control that adjusts their radius. Energy costs will increase as the area of coverage increases.
Stealth fields and cloak fields can be adjusted in a similar way.
LABs and T1 PDs have a slider control that lets you adjust their weapon range. Their weapons will now fire faster at shorter ranges.
User Interface
1/ I have integrated UI code from Goom into my mod. I did a conversion of his old 'Area Commands' mod for SC and brought it into FA with new features. I have also included a patched copy of his popular GUI 6 collection, that works alongside all my other mod pack modules.
2/ I added 'Factory Toggles': you can choose how toggles are set on units as they roll out of the factory.

Improved Effects
1/ I took over the work of Covert Jaguar and completed the transparent cloak effect that shows you which of youir units are cloaked by making them appear semi-transparent. I updated it to work with cloak field units and increased the accuracy and reliability of it.
2/ I added a trimmed version of Duncane's 'Music Order' mod, to randomise the order that musical tracks are played.
3/ My mod pack is 100% compatible with 4th Dimension's Explosions graphical effects module. Make sure you download a copy of that from their website to play with my mod pack.
4/ Corrected misplacement of blinking lights on Mass Fabricators and updated these effects so they display correctly underwater (they can be built on the seabed in my mod).
5/ Effects for my UEF damage limitation system.
6/ The size of the exhaust fumes increases on HCPPs as their output increases over time.
6/ The animation speed of increases on Mexes as their output increases over time. Aeon animations modified to support packing into defensive position when AutoDefend enabled (AutoDefend is explained below).

Goodies that other Modders can use
My mod pack contains modules of re-usable code for doing all kinds of cool stuff. For example:
    Maintenance Consumption Breakdown code makes it easy to ensure that your unit is consuming the correct total amounts of energy and mass while doing several things at once, i.e. building, using a shield, radar, stealth, with each one having its own costs and each one can be stopped and started, allowing various combinations of total power consumption. The unit class in SC and FA did not handle such multitasking units. My code makes it easy.
    AutoDefend units - Structure units that inherit this behaviour will activate a defense when under attack. In my mod, some Aeon units will pack into a defensive position and will use a personal shield. UEF units have a damage stabilisation system that reduces HP loss.


These mods both have modular script code that make unit mods easier to program and maintain. The average player won't really notice the effect of these code modules, but other modders can take advantage of the code by using it to give improved features to units in their mods.



Excellent Compatibility

All modules in my mod pack were designed with compatibility with other mods in mind. Considering the vast amount of code my mod adds, there are amazingly not that many conflicts with other mods, and a lot of mods that can be run alongside my mod pack.|||Let me take this opportunity to let you know that you kick ***, Gil.



I'd been wondering if anybody was going to tackle polishing up this concept - I'd given up hope. It sounds like you've done a seriously good deed here.



Here's a question - what about modded-in bonuses? Like say I gave shields a strength bonus, or intel a range bonus, with adjacency? Would those break this system, work with it, or work only as normal?



And what other mod stuff that nobody's done are you considering?



I'm definitely grabbing this - lots of goodies here. :)|||Gilbot, your mods have always found a welcome home on my drive, and this pack will definitely be taking up residence there at the soonest possible moment (in fact, I'm putting RTSC on auto-refresh :)).



Will be modding the cap out, though. Currently, I have the adjacency limit set high enough to get 758 out of one L3 mex. Being able to use just one metal storage farm for all my mexes would be awesome though, since right now my metal income buildings use up over half my unitcap by late game :lol:|||work w/ FA?|||Lurkily|||The Mod Pack can be downloaded from RTSC (see link in my signature).



Please let me know about any bugs, and reply to this thread with any suggestions on changes you think I should make or features you would like added. I do not promise to add every feature suggested, just the good ideas!



If you can send me error logs, please PM them to me (do not post error logs on this thread).|||You've outdone yourself mate! I'll DL this and report back as soon as I've beat the mod to death with a few rather intense rounds of 8 way play.



BTW: My mech is done, just have to texture it now and redo the walking animation. P.M me if you want a preview.|||Gilbot-X|||8)|||Edit: Bugs above were for an old SC version of the mod pack. Please ignore.|||Ok I'll try the mod within it's Zip file.... I'm assuming i have to place it within the mod folder?|||Edit: The installation instructions for the mod pack are now inside the mod's zip file, in a HTML file called "Installation Instructions.mht".|||Ok... I'll see it tomorrow and DL it for home testing.|||New version uploaded.|||Haven't done extensive testing with it yet, but for me the Cybran ex. pipeline shows as T3, and the tooltip for the buildable pylon indicates it's a standard T3 pipeline that will be built. Might be another mod I have on somehow conflicting, or I might just be stupid. Or both at the same time!



Anyway, LOVE all these mods since they all greatly improve gameplay experience for me.|||Impressive, its nice to see my Cloak mod being used.|||comlink|||Gilbot-X|||I'm not quite sure how to use the pipelines, Gil. I'm not getting adjacency connections, even when I build T3 piplines within range of each other. I Do get pipelines between directly adjacent structures, and oddly, I'd getting adjacency connections between structures directly diagonal to one another. (T1 fabs, I noticed this on.)



But I don't seem to be getting any visual indication of which nodes are connected to anything.|||Lurkily|||Is the version up on RTSC the newest? I can't seem to find this exp. Aeon shield enhancer, and the T4 pipeline still says "T3 pipeline".|||No, I've made those fixes but haven't uploaded a version to RTSC that has those changes. The reason is that I'm making other changes to the resource networks code that will improve efficiency, so when that is working I will upload a version with the fix in it. It should be ready soon, just got a couple bugs to iron out!|||Ah, ok. Thought it might have been an upload bug. Returning to WaitPatiently() :D|||Gilbot-X|||With no other mods loaded, I've noticed some serious bugs with the networks so far. Mostly to do with them being able to re-link after massive damage has been done.



For example, last night a monkeylord came ashore and shot my commander. All my mass and energy storage went up with him, and when I recovered I noticed that all of my remaining adjacency links were broken, and "all the kings men" couldn't make them work again. I blew up all remaining pipelines, hoping that would reset the system, but alas, it did not. In that particular game, 2 powergens can be butted up against each other and neither will share with the factory directly adjacent.



As a more regular occurring bug, say I have 4 Mexes in a roughly "cross" shape as is the case on a lot of maps. They get networked with T1 pipes during the start of the game, then later on I want to upgrade to a single T3 with a T1 next to each mex as a receiver. Usually I can get maybe 2-3 to connect, sometimes with a visual connection but with no bonus being shown on the mex or my econ readout.



Knowing this is close to useless as a report, I'm going to try running in debug (hopefully) tonight, and see what sort of output I get in the two above scenarios. I wish I had a log for example 1 above when it happened, but alas, it was not to be.

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