Slitherine

Great news Robotron I think it would be interesting to make an event to join Spain with Entente if Italy joins CP. I also think, Spain should have any navy... while Sweden has two fleets Spain has none Comparing dreadnoughts and cruisers (the most powerful ships), Sweden had none dreadnoughts but 12 coastal dreadnoughts (minidreadnoughts) and 7 cruisers. On the other side, Spain had two dreadnoughts and 11 cruisers. Historically, the Entente pact with Spain was in order to join the spanish and the french navy to have a chance to defeat the combined italian and austria-hungarian navy.

http://www.naval-encyclopedia.com/ww1/swedish-navy
http://www.naval-encyclopedia.com/ww1/spanish-navy-ww1

Hi again Robotron,

First let me congratulate you again for this mod. Really seems a DLC. Still didn’t play all the campaigns for both sides, I am still a bit confused with the immense influence and changed in the Events.

For now I really liked the introduction of the Battlecruisers, more generals, more cities/fortress, huge Russian army that in 1914 can attack Prussia and Galicia…

A doubt about the mod and a question:

Doubt: I played the first months of 1914 with both sides, it seems that the number of units don’t match, I found that the AI had more units that when I was in the other side? Is this correct?

Question:

Brilliant idea to have the coordinates seen on screen!!!! As I want to work on a small mod (for now just for fun) what is(are) the file(s) that I need to change so the coordinates can be seen on screen, and what I need to introduce? For modding this is a very practical tool.

@Kossatx: What about Spain having 1 Armoured Cruiser and 1 pre-dreadnought? I'd hate to give her a full dreadnought though, maybe one at 30% hp.

@:Tulius: the amount of units available to the AI is depending on the events that were played but also the AI enjoys a greater amount of production in general. This is to enable the AI to build a cohesive front line which is not easily outflanked by the player. Sadly such "dirty" tricks are necessary because there's not much else that can be done to improve the rather lacking AI code which is a complete hell to decipher to begin with.

About how to add the coordinates display please refer to my post here:
viewtopic.php?f=218&t=72163

Be sure to backup any scripts you want to change beforehand just in case anything goes wrong.

Robotron wrote: ↑Sat Aug 25, 2018 2:24 pm @Kossatx: What about Spain having 1 Armoured Cruiser and 1 pre-dreadnought? I'd hate to give her a full dreadnought though, maybe one at 30% hp.

@:Tulius: the amount of units available to the AI is depending on the events that were played but also the AI enjoys a greater amount of production in general. This is to enable the AI to build a cohesive front line which is not easily outflanked by the player. Sadly such "dirty" tricks are necessary because there's not much else that can be done to improve the rather lacking AI code which is a complete hell to decipher to begin with.

About how to add the coordinates display please refer to my post here:
viewtopic.php?f=218&t=72163

Be sure to backup any scripts you want to change beforehand just in case anything goes wrong.

Thanks, much appreciated for the link, didn’t saw the thread, I will try it now!!!

Got it about the AI, but did you improved this on the mod? Or that part is still plain Vanilla?

By the way, agree with Kossatx, Spain should have a navy. Even after the 1898 fiasco Spain had considerable naval traditions and a “reasonable” navy. But probably in game terms a dreadnaught would be too much. Still didn’t saw it in your mod, but so should Portugal. In my “mini-mod”, I already deleted a Portuguese Infantry (Portugal had an huge army in the original game) and added an Armoured Cruiser in Lisbon (already renamed to Lisboa). Portugal without a navy? What an heresy!!!

PS: This has nothing to do with the fact that I am Portuguese… I think!

And thanks for the backup advice. I generally do back ups… generally… that means that sometimes I forget… than in such occasions the mistake happens!!!

@Tulius: I did my best to improve the AI wherever I could make sense of the scripts, you will notice it the most when playing Entente in singleplayer where vanilla AI was barely making an attempt to invade France. In Potzblitz it's quite a bit more of a challenge to stop the Germans although most of it is scripted (as in: IF the player moves here THEN do that etc.). I know that's kind of cheap but it works better than in vanilla where the AI behavior was designed with no strategical goals in mind other than to attack there where the player has the least units.

Robotron wrote: ↑Sat Aug 25, 2018 3:17 pm @Tulius: I did my best to improve the AI wherever I could make sense of the scripts, you will notice it the most when playing Entente in singleplayer where vanilla AI was barely making an attempt to invade France. In Potzblitz it's quite a bit more of a challenge to stop the Germans although most of it is scripted (as in: IF the player moves here THEN do that etc.). I know that's kind of cheap but it works better than in vanilla where the AI behavior was designed with no strategical goals in mind other than to attack there where the player has the least units.

Humm… ok. I really have to try better your mod. After all I have the game for less than a week!

The problem is that the AI code has been edited quite a few times during development and there are bits and pieces flying around which are obviously "hacks" or improvements that ended up nullifying older parts completely. Thus it is very hard to discern what parts are deprecated and what is going on anyway.

Kossatx brought up such an example lately when he asked for the meaning of the strengthValue parameter which is found in units.lua and whose relevance is hazy to say the least. From what I've seen in the scripts that's a general value for defining the combat-value of any given unit, so the AI knows how many of such units are necessary to allocate to the battlefronts.

Also at times it is barely noticeable if the AI reacts at all to changes you have made, so you have to reload the game dozens of times from a given savegame to spot patterns in unit behaviour...if there are any at all.

It's all very laborious but then again, that's what you asked for if you want to mod such a game. ^^

Robotron wrote: ↑Sat Aug 25, 2018 3:17 pm @Tulius: I did my best to improve the AI wherever I could make sense of the scripts, you will notice it the most when playing Entente in singleplayer where vanilla AI was barely making an attempt to invade France. In Potzblitz it's quite a bit more of a challenge to stop the Germans although most of it is scripted (as in: IF the player moves here THEN do that etc.). I know that's kind of cheap but it works better than in vanilla where the AI behavior was designed with no strategical goals in mind other than to attack there where the player has the least units.

im not sure if ive learned how to stop germans or u made it less aggressive in later versions, but they barely steps on any french hex

if i remember it right, from my last three games, once it was at least able to kick out belgians, once i held antwerp, once even brussels (in that i caugth that repositioning of french defense before invasion)

when u were experimenting with that more aggressive ai, for the first time they were allready surrounding paris, but failed later

its opening was like unstopable, boom, boom, boom, no units to fill all holes

now i dont even need new units and cp suddenly stops

cant be ai somehow mixed? for example first 10 turns headless aggressive, at least for germans? armies+generals vs corps should be like storm (in some version it was, but now is ai doing less attacks)

difficulty levels differs in that, handicaped ai is doing the less, balanced some more, privileged the most attacks

Robotron wrote: ↑Sat Aug 25, 2018 2:24 pm @Kossatx: What about Spain having 1 Armoured Cruiser and 1 pre-dreadnought? I'd hate to give her a full dreadnought though, maybe one at 30% hp.

I agree with you, 1 armoured cruiser and 1 pre-dreadnought is a good choice

Robotron wrote: ↑Sat Aug 25, 2018 4:10 pm The problem is that the AI code has been edited quite a few times during development and there are bits and pieces flying around which are obviously "hacks" or improvements that ended up nullifying older parts completely. Thus it is very hard to discern what parts are deprecated and what is going on anyway.

Kossatx brought up such an example lately when he asked for the meaning of the strengthValue parameter which is found in units.lua and whose relevance is hazy to say the least. From what I've seen in the scripts that's a general value for defining the combat-value of any given unit, so the AI knows how many of such units are necessary to allocate to the battlefronts.

Also at times it is barely noticeable if the AI reacts at all to changes you have made, so you have to reload the game dozens of times from a given savegame to spot patterns in unit behaviour...if there are any at all.

It's all very laborious but then again, that's what you asked for if you want to mod such a game. ^^

I understand you partially. I mean I understand that these codes changed several times and updated can make a mess. I think I have just messed my “bright” new mod, since the Germans now, even if I made them overall stronger, can’t even invade Belgium properly and conquer Brussels.

Furthermore I have my first crash to desktop. I know where is the error, since I usually go by steps, but still didn’t understood why!

Anyway, thanks for your answers, and sorry for my annoying newbie questions, but since I am beginning with this, I am still full of fuel!!!

Kossatx wrote: ↑Sat Aug 25, 2018 5:59 pm I agree with you, 1 armoured cruiser and 1 pre-dreadnought is a good choice

I agree with you. Seems a fair choice in game terms. A dreadnaught or a cruiser would be too modern.

In the vanilla version the Germans were as good as never be able to take Brussels, it's a deficiency brought about the very defensive AI stance.

If the game keeps crashing please provide the last savegame (autosave.endturn) before the crash or the ctgw.log (usually to be found in your Documents folder, so look in "My Documents\My Games\Commander The Great War".
Put the ctgw.log and/or autosave.endturn files into a .zip or .rar archive and attach them to your post using the forum's "upload attachment" feature in the bottom left corner of the FULL EDITOR version of the reply box.
NOTE: This log is overwritten every time you start the game. Please make a copy of the log after any crash/bug you want to report BEFORE reloading the game.

Alternatively you can just post the "error" message at the end of the ctgw.log, usually this holds enough information to fix a bug but in some cases the last savegame is required for me to get the "bigger picture".

Robotron wrote: ↑Sat Aug 25, 2018 11:01 pm In the vanilla version the Germans were as good as never be able to take Brussels, it's a deficiency brought about the very defensive AI stance.

If the game keeps crashing please provide the last savegame (autosave.endturn) before the crash or the ctgw.log (usually to be found in your Documents folder, so look in "My Documents\My Games\Commander The Great War".
Put the ctgw.log and/or autosave.endturn files into a .zip or .rar archive and attach them to your post using the forum's "upload attachment" feature in the bottom left corner of the FULL EDITOR version of the reply box.
NOTE: This log is overwritten every time you start the game. Please make a copy of the log after any crash/bug you want to report BEFORE reloading the game.

Alternatively you can just post the "error" message at the end of the ctgw.log, usually this holds enough information to fix a bug but in some cases the last savegame is required for me to get the "bigger picture".

Your support here has been a jewel in the crown!!!

The game doesn’t even start now with the error, so no savegame report. I just added a two cities in Belgium (basically copy/pasted from your mod) in the constructions.lua file. So the error is there. I deleted one city than the other, with no luck. Still crashes. I deleted both the game works.

The ctgw.log is a good help. It confirmed my suspicions:

[23:56:15][1304]Lua Error:[C]:-1(global dofile) std::exception: 'Lua Error:constructions.lua:1277: '}' expected (to close '{' at line 1252) near '{''

The file constructions.lua, beginning in line 1251:

*******************
belgium =
{
{
type = "capital",
name = "BRUSSELS",
hex = {86, 26},
PP = 10, -- initial 11
},
{
type = "fortress",
name = "ANTWERP",
hex = {85, 24},
PP = 4, -- initial 7
},
{
type = "harbor",
name = "PORT",
hex = {85, 23},
},
{
type = "fortress",
name = "LIEGE",
hex = {88, 26},
PP = 2,
}
--new Belgian cities, by Tulius, thanks to Robotron!
{
type = "city",
name = "YPRES",
hex = {84, 26},
PP = 2,
},
{
type = "fortress",
name = "NAMUR",
hex = {87, 27},
PP = 2,
},
},
**********

If I remove the parts with Ypres and Namur the game works. The problem must be evident, but escapes me for now. where do I need a "}"?

Got it, I missed a coma after Liege!!!! sorry!

If you are not already using notepad++ for editing you should definitely do so.

Robotron wrote: ↑Sat Aug 25, 2018 11:41 pm If you are not already using notepad++ for editing you should definitely do so.

You got me. I am not used to notepad++, I just use it to see the line numbers. Got to get used to it for this. It had a red part near the error.

One more thing:

Please be aware that the more you are modding in, the less I'll be able to help you since I don't have your modified scripts and to be frankly, I just don't have the time to go looking through the changes you made.
This is not meant to sound unfriendly, but after a certain amount of changes, it's just too time-consuming for me.
Of course I'll try to help anytime I can when the error is caused by things like typos or other "general" stuff.

Robotron wrote: ↑Sat Aug 25, 2018 11:49 pm One more thing:

Please be aware that the more you are modding in, the less I'll be able to help you since I don't have your modified scripts and to be frankly, I just don't have the time to go looking through the changes you made.
This is not meant to sound unfriendly, but after a certain amount of changes, it's just too time-consuming for me.
Of course I'll try to help anytime I can when the error is caused by things like typos or other "general" stuff.

“sound unfriendly”?

You are the most friendly person that knew in a forum for… much time… ages…

I understand you perfectly on that. You have been the patience of a saint and/or of a real fan of the game. I tough to mod your mod, but I decided to begin to mod the vanilla introducing some of the features of your mod. Sometimes when I buy a game I spent more time modding than playing. Nobody is perfect!

More stuff added into V6:

Russian offensives of Lake Naroch, Brussilov and Kerenski added as choice events that burn lots of manpower and add collapse points to spawn extra units

Gallipoli Landing added as choice event.

The city of Pristina moved back into Albania.

Naval forces to both Portugal and Spain: 1 Armoured Cruiser for Portugal, 2 Armoured Cruisers and a Pre-Dread for Spain.

Slightly more randomized starting alignment for minor neutrals.

Great Robotron!

Robotron wrote: ↑Sun Aug 26, 2018 7:44 pm More stuff added into V6:

maybe it was quickly covered by dust, but i would suggest that germans should be more aggressive in the west

they dont usually attack from metz to the east, it can be hold by 5/10 garrison or arty

from metz to west, they do some damage, but by far, not as much as they could