Tyrak Reworked

Bardan wrote:

Something went horribly wrong.  Zadok Hellbringer one-shot'd the Ghost of Garacaius...

$_ARTHAN wrote:

      ... 

HA! Figured out what it was. I had left Zadok a melee attack for about 14k damage, and deities only have 30k. Normally, however, deities have a damage modifier against other deities 'god = 0.001;' which I had on the 2nd AoE attack, but not on the first. This is why we play test, children!

KD-Sage wrote:

Do you have a download? I'd like to test it.

I do not, yet. I'm putting the hefty 3do modifications on hold due to school responsibilities, and for now am simply play-testing the AI I've constructed. Last night in a 4v4, Veruna won out against Tyrak is a fair (lengthy) one-sided affair, whereas Taros got spanked continuously and only held on through Aramon bolstering. I took the middle ground and held the bulk of the 4th Tyrak player's attention. Right now, AI vs AI, Tyrak seems weaker.

So in a re-test of the AI (which is doing better, I think), Veruna was getting as good as it gave (while I fortified up in the corner for observation purposes). I swoop on down to see a Tyrak Maceman and Hell Hound killing a Verunan Catapult and Lodestone, respectively. They died each at almost the same moment... and TA:K crashed. Verunan units dying. Crashed TA:K. Da'fuq?

Hmm, I'm not sure what I've altered, but I've had more crashes the last couple of days. Really, though, the only thing I've changed has been the AI and very minor balancing issues. Perhaps whatever the underlying issue is, it has been less-utilized than previously.

I've also noticed something about the Tyrak corpses. IF a unit has a corpse, it oftentimes becomes a feature which you can't mouse over for a description (like "Swordsman corpse"), and while most other corpses dissipate relatively quickly (10 seconds give or take), these bones stick around for a while. I don't think that's the issue with the crashes, necessarily, but I DO need to make sure all the units which require corpses actually HAVE corpses. Similarly, I've noticed many don't have stoned_corpses or frozen_corpses. This may make me sound stupid, but what's the easiest way to make the lot of those?

And finally, the Tyrak have somehow figured out how to build on the sides of mountains. Here, let me show you.

Bardan wrote:

Hmm, I'm not sure what I've altered, but I've had more crashes the last couple of days.  Really, though, the only thing I've changed has been the AI and very minor balancing issues.  Perhaps whatever the underlying issue is, it has been less-utilized than previously.

I've also noticed something about the Tyrak corpses.  IF a unit has a corpse, it oftentimes becomes a feature which you can't mouse over for a description (like "Swordsman corpse"), and while most other corpses dissipate relatively quickly (10 seconds give or take), these bones stick around for a while.  I don't think that's the issue with the crashes, necessarily, but I DO need to make sure all the units which require corpses actually HAVE corpses.  Similarly, I've noticed many don't have stoned_corpses or frozen_corpses.  This may make me sound stupid, but what's the easiest way to make the lot of those?

Hmm. You can edit every stats of a corpse in its .tdf file located in *\features\corpses. Let's take an example from the Aramon Archer: (// are comments, you can use it in your files.)

[araarch_dead] //
{
animatable = 1;
blocking = 0; //if it gonna block passage.
damage = 440; // I think it is the "health" of the corpse, you can notice if, you keep attacking a corpse, it is going to disappear.
decomposetime = 30; //Time in seconds to decompose (disappear).
description = Archer Corpse; // The description on mouse over.
footprintx = 2; // Size of the unit in X side.
footprintz = 2; // Size of the unit in Z side.
height = 0;
hitdensity = 100;
noshadow = 1; // if it has shadow.
object = araarch_dead; //the corpse 3do.
reclaimable = 1; //if you can clean it.
resurrectable = 1; //if you can ressurrect it.
world = All Worlds;
}

Modify these values for your own unit and you are ready.
Btw, you should define what's the filename of the corpse for your unit in its stats file. Example:

corpse = araarch_dead;

Bardan wrote:

And finally, the Tyrak have somehow figured out how to build on the sides of mountains.  Here, let me show you.

I don't remember what could be it, but I will try to guess. It might be buildangle or maxslope or maxwaterdepth in the unit stats... =S

So still having crashes, but I'm more and more satisfied with the race overall. I still need to finish all of the stone_corpses and frozen_corpses... if anyone wants to help me with that, I'd probably love you forever. I think that might be the crash-happy issue...

Bardan wrote:

So still having crashes...

Could you tell us the EXACTLY time that the game crashes? So it would be easier to discover what's the problem...

DK-Manolo wrote:

Bardan wrote:

So still having crashes...

Could you tell us the EXACTLY time that the game crashes? So it would be easier to discover what's the problem...

It seems to differ situation to situation, and I can't pinpoint it. Several times it seems to just be me moving rapidly across the map by clicking the minimap. Before I can even see what I've moved to, it crashes.

KD-Sage wrote:

KD-Sage wrote:

Do you have a download? I'd like to test it.

Bardan wrote:

KD-Sage wrote:

Do you have a download? I'd like to test it.

I do not, yet.  I'm putting the hefty 3do modifications on hold due to school responsibilities, and for now am simply play-testing the AI I've constructed.  Last night in a 4v4, Veruna won out against Tyrak is a fair (lengthy) one-sided affair, whereas Taros got spanked continuously and only held on through Aramon bolstering.  I took the middle ground and held the bulk of the 4th Tyrak player's attention.  Right now, AI vs AI, Tyrak seems weaker.

Bardan wrote:

DK-Manolo wrote:

Bardan wrote:

So still having crashes...

Could you tell us the EXACTLY time that the game crashes? So it would be easier to discover what's the problem...

It seems to differ situation to situation, and I can't pinpoint it. Several times it seems to just be me moving rapidly across the map by clicking the minimap.  Before I can even see what I've moved to, it crashes.

It could be one unit that is crashing the game, the game won't crash if you don't see the bugged unit. Try making ALL the units in one screen, and see which is gonna crash.

I've made all of them myself many times, and killed with each, and had all die. Hence my intrigue on this elusive issue.

Note to self. Felguard. That is all.

Hmm, so I don't know that I've changed anything at all, other than balancing the Undead Giant (he was breaking 2 and 3 guard towers in 2-3 hits).  But now, I'm getting an error of "anims/LtngBall_3a_4444.taf"

Um. What?!

EDIT: Combed through the units, found a LtngBall_3a under one of the WEAPON sections. It's never blown up before, but I changed it to LtngBall_2a and it loaded fine. Odd.

Netherfire Tower. I like it. Probably need to nerf it a tad...


Here are my Hunter ranks being incinerated in Netherfire!


All from one tower. Hell, Xorn showed up and died faster than that blasted tower.

Really cool, Bardan. This mod is going to be awesome!!

Still noticing some bugs.

For one, the Death Knight is just awful.  Because his emit damage (3do) was on his flail, they all swing wide and miss their target.  I've attempted to fix this by moving the emit to his chest, hoping it would make it more direct.  This didn't work exactly, so I tried to change the spells themselves to remote effect (fbi).  Now he's just taking 4 years to cast a spell, and it's still off-target.  Plus, I think he might cause crashes.  Not sure.  I see his corpses, I'm certain, but I'm not completely sure I've ever seen them die in the act.

Just now, I unleashed a large wave against an Aramon base, a mix of just about everything.  Most seemed to work fine, except the Rift Demon.  He *might fire at his target when it comes into range, but then he walks right up to melee range and *might attack again, might not.  I gave him a custom projectile, which I pulled from... I'm not sure.  Somewhere else.  I think this guy might cause crashes too.  But if so, it must be when they're on-screen, as I see them walking around other times and no crash occurs... but when attacking or under attack?  Mystery.

Finally, the Reaper *might be an issue.  I'm not sure, he seems to work just fine, but he seems to be the Priest of Lihr script with a heavily modified 3do, including a cape/cloak.  It makes him look a little funny while walking, but not a big deal - unless it causes crashes somehow.  Or maybe his custom projectile (a scythe), but I highly doubt that's it.  I've seen it used too often.

I know all of Tier1 works fine.  I know several units of Tier2 work fine.  I know Tier3 works fine.  So it has to be one of those three Tier2 units which is causing the headaches.

Otherwise, I just need to tweak the corpses and _stone/_frozen 3dos.  Does anyone have any tips how to proceed with this?

Dear Jesus; why will 3do not shrink the Rift Demon despite Scaling Down repeatedly?

While combing through some of the old 3rd party units, I've decided to add a few to Tyrak. Partly for balance, partly for character, and partly because it might just save me a step or two.

I had wanted to (and still might) add 2 flying creatures, a sea creature, and some sort of transportation device. These are still on the 'To-Do' list. But I will be adding the following:

-Gremlin (renamed Imp, built by Crypt or Dedicated)
-Demon Artillery (to be renamed, built by Forsaken)
//To be continued.

well do to some races usen some of the same units (solarons and tyrak have 2 of the same units)
so if you had anthor race on there but dude some of the races really need the rebalncing like demons and fairys tyrak has only a few problems its not broken as all hell like matthews race. undead needs major rebalance i think Fairy and Demons was made by the same person because they where kind of made to fight each other because only Demons can take on Fairys T5 and up and Fairys can attack super early to stop Demons early advance (mostly to Ladybugs if you ever played Fairys)

Bardan wrote:

Still noticing some bugs.

For one, the Death Knight is just awful.  Because his emit damage (3do) was on his flail, they all swing wide and miss their target.  I've attempted to fix this by moving the emit to his chest, hoping it would make it more direct.  This didn't work exactly, so I tried to change the spells themselves to remote effect (fbi).  Now he's just taking 4 years to cast a spell, and it's still off-target.  Plus, I think he might cause crashes.  Not sure.  I see his corpses, I'm certain, but I'm not completely sure I've ever seen them die in the act.

Just now, I unleashed a large wave against an Aramon base, a mix of just about everything.  Most seemed to work fine, except the Rift Demon.  He *might fire at his target when it comes into range, but then he walks right up to melee range and *might attack again, might not.  I gave him a custom projectile, which I pulled from... I'm not sure.  Somewhere else.  I think this guy might cause crashes too.  But if so, it must be when they're on-screen, as I see them walking around other times and no crash occurs... but when attacking or under attack?  Mystery.

Otherwise, I just need to tweak the corpses and _stone/_frozen 3dos.  Does anyone have any tips how to proceed with this?

The missing target issue, I think you can fix by editing the fbi file of the unit. I had this issue happened in a few units, so I changed the "aimtolerance" to 1024.

If some units are taking forever to attack, I would add the command: fireatwillrandom =1; in the UNITINFO section, and firestarter =1; under weapon #... Fireatwillrandom should do the trick by itself tho. After that, you need to check the "reloadtime = #" The lower this # is, the less time it will take for the weapon to launch.

Bardan wrote:

Dear Jesus; why will 3do not shrink the Rift Demon despite Scaling Down repeatedly?

To scale down a unit completely, go to Special/ scale all objects.
You'll see that the default value is 1, which means that is at its 100%.
- If you want it to be 10% smaller, then type in .9.
- If you want the unit to be 10% bigger, type in 1.1.

Every time you go to Special/ scale all objects, you will see the value 1. This value does not tell you what the size of the unit is, but how big or how small you want the unit to be.

After you are done scaling your unit, make sure you have the liflogo/ nothingatall purple texture on faces like emitjim, emitblood, wake, etc.. You'll see that the faces are blank. If you do not add this texture, your unit will make the game drop.

Lord chris wrote:

well do to some races usen some of the same units (solarons and tyrak have 2 of the same units)
so if you had anthor race on there but dude some of the races really need the rebalncing like demons and fairys tyrak has only a few problems its not broken as all hell like matthews race. undead needs major rebalance i think Fairy and Demons was made by the same person because they where kind of made to fight each other because only Demons can take on Fairys T5 and up and Fairys can attack super early to stop Demons early advance  (mostly to Ladybugs if you ever played Fairys)

Again, please use more punctuation. I have nothing against you, but for someone like me, it's hard to understand easily without. I have not played many of those races. Matthews race was a joke, never meant to be a real race. It's all the monarchs and dragons and such for 10 mana each, IIRC. Tyrak was just... poor quality, which is why it is my first project. The other races - that I deem worthy - will follow.

Sage wrote:

The missing target issue, I think you can fix by editing the fbi file of the unit. I had this issue happened in a few units, so I changed the "aimtolerance" to 1024.

If some units are taking forever to attack, I would add the command: fireatwillrandom =1; in the UNITINFO section, and firestarter =1; under weapon #... Fireatwillrandom should do the trick by itself tho. After that, you need to check the "reloadtime = #" The lower this # is, the less time it will take for the weapon to launch.

Quick check reveals the aimtolerance is at 1024 for all attacks. Would the 'fireatwillrandom = 1' go in the main unit info section, or for each particular weapon? I'm assuming the former. 'Firestarter' is used when the attacks are fire-based (for example, not lightning). Reloadtimes and emittimes are all low as well. So... yeah, baffled. Builduptime is also low.

Now, 'weaponart' - is that the actual fireball itself? 'Explosionclass' is the impact animation (such as flamestrike or cannonball impact), yes? Now... decaytime - what is that, exactly? I assume how long an attack like a wave exists in action.

Sage wrote:

To scale down a unit completely, go to Special/ scale all objects.
You'll see that the default value is 1, which means that is at its 100%.
- If you want it to be 10% smaller, then type in .9.
- If you want the unit to be 10% bigger, type in 1.1.

Every time you go to Special/ scale all objects, you will see the value 1. This value does not tell you what the size of the unit is, but how big or how small you want the unit to be.

After you are done scaling your unit, make sure you have the liflogo/ nothingatall purple texture on faces like emitjim, emitblood, wake, etc.. You'll see that the faces are blank. If you do not add this texture, your unit will make the game drop.

The Special/Scale All Objects is the way I've been doing it, and yeah, I understand default 1.0 is what it is. I then save the 3do and move it to the Tyrak 3do folder and HPIpack it into the TAK races folder. When I build the critter in-game, he's still the same old size as before.

I've not altered the emits... but I'll have a look to make sure what you've said is included properly with those units I suspect of causing crashes. Thanks!

hmmm i see your point, but Demons isnt really broken it just needs 2 units moved and it will be fine.
Fairys just needs its T5-6 needs fixed and lady bugs needs to either be removed or more build time and cost.
But my thing stills stands i would fix them myself but im scared im going to \"****\' some shit up.
Tyrak wasnt really bad like i said it just needed Divine loadstones and its T2 building gives 30 mana regardless of where you put it at those where really its only problems the pyro tower didnt really have all that much range it was better for hitting air units sometimes

Truthfully, I got started just for the Divine Lodestone, but I'm obsessive and a bit of an overachiever. Much of what I'm doing is kind of simple hack work, but I hope it will make the race both viable and fun to play. I'd say it should be ready in a couple of weeks. Got school stuff to take care of first.

I might have spoken too soon on which unit is causing the crash. I'll be running a series of games using only one combat unit at throughout to isolate the issue.

Meanwhile, I've robbed a small unit pack of a T3 Mage, a properDivine Lodestone (that isn't a direct Taros rip), and the aforementioned Gremlin. Likewise, I stole a unit for Taros called "Shire" for some reason. Looks like some sort of altar. It is now the dimensional portal doomaflitchy which can transport large numbers of troops across entire maps. See, there are benefits from being Otherworldly!

Bardan wrote:

I might have spoken too soon on which unit is causing the crash. I'll be running a series of games using only one combat unit at throughout to isolate the issue.

HA!  I don't know about the others yet, but the Undead Maceman (Tier 1 melee) caused the game to crash three times in a row after - get this - destroying a Verunan Bastion.  I sent 50 into the enemy camp, tore through the front ranks of warriors, mer warriors, catapults, mortars, and then... a single Bastion.  With six macemen standing at the Bastion when it was destroyed, the game crashed.  (Actually, the third time wasn't the Bastion, but appeared to be the Mortar, though it didn't crash instantly.  In fact, it was 1-2 seconds giving a Dirigible time to drop a bomb on them.  One macemen had walked over and hit the Bastion, though...) And again when a catapult was destroyed. The common factor seems to be something to do with the puff of dust when a siege/building dies...

Any one have any ideas?

Skeletal maceman? appears to not have a corpse line with a corresponding entry in the features/corpses folder. Checking the script, the script calls for a corpse on any damage that is not an explosion.

In regards to aimtolerance, the smaller the number the more accurate and more time the unit takes to fire.