Alpha.txt oddities

[T-hawk]

I read somewhere that the AI won't create some types of units, like naval probe teams, but can use them fairly well if the unit is added to the default-units list in alpha.txt . So I did so, adding a cruiser probe team entry after the default probe team.

Whoops! Didn't realize that the unit functions were hardcoded to particular spots in the table -- so everything after those entries behaved really weird. Lal showed up on about turn 10 of the game with a Locust of Chiron! (Should have been a Unity Rover.)

And fungus, instead of spawning mind worms, spawned Alien Artifacts! This could be a very very interesting mod...


Another unrelated oddity -- Does setting Retool Strictness to 3 actually work? Both me and the AI can change freely from one SP to another with no mineral penalty. I don't want it that way.

[Nadexander]

I did the same thing the first time i tried adding a unit. Got attacked by locusts that looked like gravships. quite odd. anyways, dding the new units at the end of the list instead of in the middle helps. And make sure to increment the "number of unique units" variable.

-Nadexander

[Basil]

I've tried setting retool strictness to 3 as well, and found it didn't work.

[Avenoct]

This thread really belongs in the creation forums, but anyways...

Didn't know that Retool option 3 was broken..good to know. The retool exemption (usually set to 10) does work, as does the faction ability:

HURRY = Percentage change in costs of "Hurry"
; button on construction (e.g. 125 means
; 125% of normal cost, so 100 costs 125).

50, ; Retool percent penalty for production change
2, ; Retool strictness (0 = Always Free, 1 = Free in Category, 2 = Free if Project, 3 = Never Free)
10, ; Retool exemption (first X minerals not affected by penalty)

The penalty and exemption lines are quite powerful. Since the AI doesn't rushbuild well, increasing the penalty and decreasing the exemption help the AI.

As to #UNITS, I think you guys have it now.

#UNITS
14
Colony Pod, Infantry, Colony Pod, Scout, 8, 0, 0, None,
etc..etc..

Change that 14 to reflect how many units are in the list. Add new units to the end of the list.

-Smack

[T-hawk]

Re: Alpha.txt oddities

Oh, also, I tried removing Monsoon Jungle from the landmarks list in alpha.txt. I HATE HATE HATE that jungle. Didn't work, and threw everything after that into the same off-by-one situation: I found a flat land area with little yellow sparkles giving +1 energy per square, called New Sargasso.

Anybody got a fix for the Retool Strictness problem? It's a shame that it doesn't work. Neither me nor the AIs should be able to change freely between SPs -- although, except for starting an SP intending to switch to another when the tech is available (which I don't do), free SP retool probably helps the AIs more than me.

[Fitz]

Originally posted by Avenoct
The penalty and exemption lines are quite powerful. Since the AI doesn't rushbuild well, increasing the penalty and decreasing the exemption help the AI.

Given that the AI doesn't seem to pay ANY penalty for changing production, as far as I can tell, they can't be that powerful.

IIRC, the AI can change production without loosing excess minerals. Note this is quite different from paying a penalty for changing, so I may have extrapolated incorrectly that they pay no penalty for changing production.

If you want to see this in action, choose an AI base with a large number of minerals. Count minerals collected so far. Erradicate all the defenders so that it changes to a garrison. Note that their is an extreme amount of excess (red) minerals. Next turn, note that it is back to the original production minus the cost of a garrison. The AI doesn't lose the excess minerals! A human player does if they try this.

However, I have never counted the minerals before the change to a garrison to see if it lost half when it changed to that garrison.

[Avenoct]

Given that the AI doesn't seem to pay ANY penalty for changing production, as far as I can tell, they can't be that powerful.

Yes, yes, so changing these things penalizes the player, hence helping the AI.

Er, maybe I should be more clear. The AI rushbuild-switch-for-free you describe is one case... and as far as I know, the AI only does this when it loses a garrison, though I might be wrong. What I was addressing is that the AI doesn't often half-build, half-buy things the way a player can do. I've seen the AI rushbuild an SP a couple of times though. So hurting rush-building hurts the player.

-S-

[Flubber]

So if I understand this right, if i add a unit early in the list I could find advanced units available at the outset ?? That could lead to a very wild SP experience . Imagine building locusts in the first 20 years of the game

[Googlie]

When you add the unit to the list you also have to add the prerequisite (in which case you would see no change to your current timetable of acquisition, e.g. the supply crawler which has Ind Auto as a prereq), or set it to disable, in which case it's available from the beginning of the game (like the colony pod)

And the AI does make a decent job of using skimship probes when they are added to the preset list (but remember to change the number below the #UNITS line from 23 to 24 or whatever)

G.