SLIC reference material

[Dale]

Okay guys, now that all the whining and moaning about Activision's pulling out on us is out of our systems, it's time to get down and really pull out some "Super-mods".

What I've noticed in my own scripting attempts is that I've come up with a list of "do's & don'ts" when it comes to scripting diplomacy, and found out how to use a lot of commands that Locutus was unable to provide info for. As I'm sure every one of you have found yourself. There's a lot of SLIC material floating around between all of us, including Apolyton's, Locutus', and numerous other documents. I feel that we need to centralise all our information into one source. I put in all the diplomacy SLIC info I have, BlueO puts in all the SLIC info on the frenzy AI and Amazon commands he used, Wes's team puts in all the info they've found out, and so on. This will provide a great database of information for all SLIC scripters out there whether they be beginners or experts like us.

Just another way I feel we can tap into the potential of CTP2 and make it the game all us civers hoped it to be. Comments?

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Author of Diplomod. The mod to fix diplomacy.

Rommell to a sub-commander outside Tobruk: "Those Australians are in there somewhere. But where? Let's advance and wait till they shoot, then shoot back."

[kormer]

Dale, I just want to say thanks in advance. I've got some cool ideas that I want to do with my scenario that I know can be done in the alexander scenario, I just can't get them working in my own. I've read every slic document 5 times over. If you can create something for slic newbies so we can make better scenarios, then please do so.

[Locutus]

Well, great idea but I'm miles ahead of you already
I've been working on extensive SLIC documentation ever since I got the first alpha build of CtP2. The problem is that at first (before release of the game) SLIC kept changing so I had to adapt the docs all the time and later I got too busy with helping out Wes and Harlan (and answering all the SLIC related questions in the forums), so now I hardly have time to work on it (but since so many people seem to be interested in it I'm gonna try to give it some more priority if I can).

I can assure you that once my documentation is ready (you can hardly call that stuff on my website documentation), it will include every bit of information on SLIC that has been mentioned in the forums and my email archive or that I found out myself. If anyone has any info on SLIC that isn't mentioned anywhere where I can find it, please post your info here or elsewhere in the (creation) forum or email me so I can include it in my guide. I would be very grateful for even the tiniest bit of info anyone can give me since there's way too much to know about SLIC for one person to find out...

Once my docs are complete I think I'll try and set up a website or whatever to keep that information up to date, 'cause I know we'll keep finding out new things all the time (this is how it went with CtP1, so I assume this is how it'll go with CtP2). But that's something for the distant future I fear...

[Peter Triggs]

Wouter, I thought you'd given up on that project so a few days back I started working on an "Absolute Beginner's Guide to SLIC and CTP2 Modification". And who else has had this idea? Maybe we should get organized, involve everyone who's interested, and have people work on specific topics they're interested in. From the sound of things, your stuff is going to be pretty encyclopedic whereas I was planning on something much more elementary. So, is there anybody out there who might be interested in something like this? Possibly, even .... (Are you reading this, Joe? You've created something that's got a life of it's own. And in or out of Activision, be prepared to be pestered about it.)

[BTW, for those of you who haven't heard, Joe Rumsey, who created Slic, has left Activision.]

[Locutus]

Hi Peter, good to see you're still around, long time no see

Actually, my documentation is a two-parter: one part explains all the basics of SLIC programming (what's a variable? how does an for-loop work? how to display a message, etc) and the second part consists of lots of practical advise on programming SLIC (with a bunch of standard algorithms, tips on how to go from idea to code, pitfalls, etc) and a bunch of appendices with elaborate explanations of all functions/variables/events in the game and anything else that might be interesting.

The first part will still be too extensive to call it a quick guide (currently about 5-6 pages per chapter (lots of examples) and eventually it will have a total of 8 or 9 chapters) but it won't contain everything one could possibly know about SLIC, far from it. The set-up is about the same as those 'Programming for beginners' books.

Just last night I decided to split things up and release the first part of the documentation ASAP and write the second part later, so people would at least have something to work with. Esp. for non-programmers this should be useful since the current docs are fairly useless if you don't have at least some elementary programming knowledge. Particularly documenting all functions and events and stuff could turn out to be a very time-consuming job and I don't want to wait too long anymore before releasing something.

[Dale]

Good to see there's something coming. I know It'll be usefull for me. I'm still just getting into the swing of SLIC.

And yeah, with what's floating around you do need to know some form of programming. Lucky I did Cobol and C++ at uni eh?

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Author of Diplomod. The mod to fix diplomacy.

Rommell to a sub-commander outside Tobruk: "Those Australians are in there somewhere. But where? Let's advance and wait till they shoot, then shoot back."

[Peter Triggs]

Looks good, Wouter. Your 'first part'sounds like the sort of thing I had in mind; but since you're way ahead of me, I guess I'll leave it up to you. I think I'll have a look at personalities/strategies/goals. Although the documentation this time is a quantum leap above what it was for CTP1, it might still be worthwhile to expand on it.

Peter