New tech tree?

[TRIX Rabbit]

I was wondering, could we program op2, so when you started off, you wold only have:
Command Center,
Structure facturey,
common ore smelter,
totamac,
and basic lab?
At the basic lab, you would reserch the five data bases, and when you reaserched 'boptronics' you would get the agridome, and 'social sciences' would get you residences. and after you reaserched all five, you could reserch 'Advanced expirimentation' and get the standard lab. :op2:  

[PlayingOutpost0-24]

i dont know if it is possible (ask hacker or anyone), but it would be good to improve the tech tree of OP2...

[Leviathan]

placing buildings is harder than other things such as edting mines.
Also it is easyer to make a mission dll from scratch than editing another so maybe once we know everything we can do it.

Would you like a tech tree where you have very little researsh done and no buildings in your SF. Im sure we could do more. Firstly i was thinking i could add the basic lab researsh's to the Std Lab and have them needed to be done b4 more researsh.  

[PlayingOutpost0-24]

hmmm... if we know everything then comes hell... every 1.5th person has checksum error because of modding. well solution: seperate OP2s.

[BlackBox]

it's because they run incompatible versions. If everyone ran the correct version there would be no problems.

yea, to do what you want you can write a new techtree.

Btw: may I ask that you scale down your image in your sig? it's a little large, we may have to remove it if you don't scale it down.

[TRIX Rabbit]

OK, i was wondering because it would be fun if their was a multi playergame where you would start off like you just landed on new terra.

BTW: Would it be possible to change sprites pics? it would be funny to have a scout look like a hummer or beetle

[Betaray]

you can change the sounds around, wich is really fun, making everything cry lol

[Hooman]

Well, I havent' tried this stuff myself but for those who are interested in trying, I've noticed this about the tech files.

If you look at multitek.txt, edentek.txt or ply_tek.txt you'll see setting the COST to 0 seems to make that already researched. A setting of -1 seems to make the technology unavailable. You can also set EDEN_COST and PLYMOUTH_COST individually. Now the Basic Lab is found at the end of multitek.txt where there are 3 unavailable technologies. If you read the comments at the end, one of them is the Basic Lab. I'm guessing to activate it, you change the COST from -1 to 0. You can always check the campaign tech files, edentek.txt and ply_tek.txt.

It's interesting to note that the EDEN_COST for microwave is 0, but then microwave weapons can be given to eden and they will work fine. It seems to be common practive to "give" and unavailable technology to the player that can't research it. This simplifies the tech tree in that two of the same thing don't need to be created for each race because they depend on race specific technology. Instead, the game makes that item depend on both technologies and "gives" the player the technology they can't research. Of course the player never knows this and can't do anything with it. Take a look at Mobile Weapons Platforms for an example.

There is also a LAB tag that controls where things are researched from. Use 1 for Basic Lab, 2 for Standard Lab, and 3 for Advanced Lab.
 

[Leviathan]

the tek files r fun 2 play around with and easy 2 do, im having some good results

[PlayingOutpost0-24]

n00b tree

i started working on alltechtree. i will copy my map and make an alltech as soon as its finished and i get the DLL.

[Arklon]

Perhaps with editing the sheets. Not sure, though...

[Eddy-B]

i've been looking into the techtrees, and i believe it IS possible to do what TRIX rabbit is suggesting. I will look into it further, as i'm planning to add this to my new campaign missions somewhere.
If it works out, i'll post whatever code you need, to make it work in multiplayer mode !

[Eddy-B]

Okay..
today i've looked into this request, and i did it !  

i've got a standard dll now, along with a modified tektree. I will need someone to give me a GOOD map to combine it with. I'll do my best in designing an AI to go with it (or maybe someone has one already ?).

For now, i'm testing to see if all works out well without any exceptions in op2.exe unsing a 64x64 map (no ai, just me and a couple of beacons).

I was wondering, could we program op2, so when you started off, you wold only have:
Command Center,
Structure facturey,
common ore smelter,
totamac,
and basic lab?
At the basic lab, you would reserch the five data bases, and when you reaserched 'boptronics' you would get the agridome, and 'social sciences' would get you residences. and after you reaserched all five, you could reserch 'Advanced expirimentation' and get the standard lab.

Well, my version does this:
You start off with a tok,sf & cc + 1 storage; 1 cargo truck + 1 convec is enough (might be more in easy mode)
You have 5000 ore (max) and 2000 food.
You can ONLY build these:
Tokamak, Light Tower, Command Center, Structure Factory, Common Storage and a Basic Lab.
As you notice: NO residence, agridome OR smelter (you'll need to construct an agridome asap to keep your food supply from dropping, and a residence to keep mortality rate down + moral up)

You can only research boptronics & social sciences.
When you read the teasers, you will see why: everything on New Terra is build around the boptronics research. Of course social sciences doesn't need any boptronics. After researching boptronics you will get to build the standard lab (and basic lab is removed from the SF's construction list). From there you can move on:
For a smelter you'll need both chemistry and planetary sciences.

The rest is unchanged (so far). I'm open to input for more changes in the tektree.

PS: this will ONLY affect new missions using this new tech-tree, not the 'old' missions (campaign, colony or multi)

[Leviathan]

sounds like a good custom mission

[TH300]

nice.

But make Basic Lab removed not before all research topics there are done. Otherwise the player would be stuck if it accidently is destroyed.

After researching boptronics you will get to build the standard lab (and basic lab is removed from the SF's construction list)

[Eddy-B]

you've got a point. I've tried to have basic & standard lab together on the list, but OP2 just refuses this: as soon as std.lab is available, basic automaticly dissappears.

Anyway: for the record, it's a good suggestion (and i WILL change it right away) - but i still think "(chrono)logicly" it's wrong.. but okay.

I'll also try to find out if you can add the 'Advanced expirimentation' mentioned by trix - that would serve both the game flow (as you've said) and the game logic (what i just mentioned).

[BlackBox]

I think the basic and standard lab share the same tech id. Hence the basic lab disappearing.

The only way around this is to change one of the tech id's in buildings.txt. (Please note, that if you do this you will be incompatible with every one else out there. We ARE working on a way to make sheets changes more possible)

[Eddy-B]

Thanx for that.. that's good news !

I've added 1 more tech: Advanced Experimentation 02706
Requires 02701 ~ 05 (all 5 basic lab reseaches). Then the std lab requires 02706 to build.

As for your remark: basic lab = 02106, while std = 03101
The first 2 digits is nothing more than the mission# in wich the tech becomes available (when playing the default game), and you might remember that in mission 2 you have to do those 5 things @ basic, and mission 3 you can build the std lab

Now, i've tested what i suggested earlier: it DOES work fine, but it takes a hell of a long time to complete everything (starting with 20 workers & 10 scientists - no children)
around mark 40 my basic lab is completed
around mark 80 i have an agridome
around mark 110 a residence
at mark 145 im done with the basic lab (but not enough ore to build the std lab) The good news is that morale is starting to go up, wich will improve production
Then around mark 180 i can finally start my ore route !
With a 1-bar mine at only 3 tiles distance from my smelter, it takes me until mark 260 to have my std lab start on "Offspring enhancements"


Food doesn't go down below 1000 (starting @ 2000) and by the time my nursery & university are done, im down to just 13 workers and 7 scientists (+1 newly born child before the uni was done).

I'm not sure this'll be an exciting level..
anyway: MIDAS is out of the question  :lol:

[LoneWolf]

Well, shouldn't Advancement Sciences be nearly instantaneously researched? Because all it is moving from Basic Lab to Standard Lab. And maybe, there would be a way to have the Basic Lab be either replaced with a function Standard Lab, or have it be deconstructed and resources added to your stock to aid in building a new lab. I'm not much of a coder, but I know the code would look something similar to this.


if(Advacement Sciences = true then do change Basic Lab to Deconstruct)(Set timer1 = 600milliseconds)
if(Deconstruct = true and timer1 = expired then change Deconstruct to Rubble-Basic Lab and add xxx Common Ore and 0 Rare Ore)
if(Rubble-Basic Lab = true then remove Basic Lab from Build List and add Standard Lab to Build List)


Or maybe this...?


if(Advancment Sciences = true then change Basic Lab to Standard Lab)
if(Standard Lab = true then remove Basic Lab from Build List and add Standard Lab to Build List)


And maybe for the really advanced players add research for building the RoboSurveyor and RoboMiner?

[BlackBox]

Well it's not that easy to change a basic lab into a standard lab. (There is no script command for demolition, the best you can do is the "death" command which makes it blow up like it got destroyed).
You also need to remember that the two labs have slightly different boundaries so it might not fit where the old lab was. (In addition it would look kind of weird to suddenly call CreateUnit and have the standard lab sitting there)

I think you might want to get rid of the "Advancement Sciences" (just make all the basic lab topics REQUIRES lines for the Standard Lab research topic, and set COST 0 so it becomes available as soon as all the base topics are completed).

Also, maybe make the mine a 2 bar (or 1 bar variant 3. I think you set the variant parameter to 0 to do that. The default -1 (or 0xFFFFFFFFF) selects a random variant, and works the same way if you put that in for the bar yield).

[Eddy-B]

There is no script command for demolition, the best you can do is the "death" command which makes it blow up like it got destroyed

.. you'd still need a gorf for this (wich u still need to research, kind of the chicken and the egg)

I think you might want to get rid of the "Advancement Sciences" (just make all the basic lab topics REQUIRES lines for the Standard Lab research topic, and set COST 0 so it becomes available as soon as all the base topics are completed

.. i just coded was was requested.. lol
I'm not going to use it myself, but i can create a basic DLL (&tektree) to go with mutliplayer games.

Also, maybe make the mine a 2 bar (or 1 bar variant 3. I think you set the variant parameter to 0 to do that. The default -1 (or 0xFFFFFFFFF) selects a random variant, and works the same way if you put that in for the bar yield).

The example above, was just THAT: an example... I just wanted to show it takes a long time to research everything, before your smelter would be ready, sufice to say, with a 'better' mine, after that initial research/construction time, everything will speed up !


If ppl really want this idea worked out further, let us know !
As i said: i can release the code, it's short !

[nesfreak1]

I would like the code developed futher, i don't know anything about coding but the map does sound fun to play, so if someone would take the idea and run with it, that would be great. (thumbsup)  

[Eddy-B]

I HAVE the code (or at least some snippets) that works... all it needs is a map... and maybe some AI to try and destroy you..  I've tested the code (see earlier posting) on the demo.map

It could be done as a simple COLONY type game. Make a pretty simple objective - it can be anything from completing a certain research to having a certain amount of people, or units or whatever you want.

Give me some ideas that i can work with (AND a map)!