Posts from NTBF – New buildings for the towns in Tribes of the East 3.1.

then only the second function

Plan:
Inferno:
- Sacrificial Pit - in addition to its function, every Monday it increases the experience of the hero sitting in the castle by 666 units.
Necropolis:
- Abode of Souls - an upgrade that improves the stats of upgraded ghosts. All captured mines produce ghosts in a certain quantity.
Dungeon:
- Sacrificial Pit - in addition to its function, it immediately restores the mana of all heroes visiting the city.
I have an idea for an artifact that would allow creatures from the city to move to the hero on the map for free.

denis-cam
There’s a mod available at this link; it improves mines.

Is development still in progress?

I have an idea on how to add a building to a town that has an alternative creature.

I've wanted this for a long time, and I'm probably not the only one, to add an additional building to a town for hiring new creatures.
It seems that it's impossible to create a full-fledged additional building, but there are a couple of ideas on how to create an alternative one.



I'm warning you in advance and apologizing, there's a lot of text.
But in short, unfortunately, I couldn't explain the whole scheme.



First, I'll briefly describe what I found out.
1. A creature appears in the hiring window based on the ID of the building to which it is attached (i.e., if there is a level 7 creature in a building with the ID dwelling_1, it will still appear on the first line in the hiring window).
2. It is not possible to assign new IDs, i.e., you cannot simply enter dwelling_8 or special_8 for a building; in my case, the game crashes.
3. Unimproved, upgraded, and alt-upgraded creatures appear in the first, second, and third slots in the hiring window, respectively. This, in turn, is already tied to the creature (i.e., if you assign an improved creature to a level 1 building without an original one, this creature will still appear in the second slot, not the first).
4. You can assign no more than two creatures to a building per level.
5. All buildings can theoretically be built up to level 5. The building plan and the interdependence of buildings can be changed as you like, but I think everyone already knows this.
6. If you assign levels 3 and 4 (with a new original and two upgrades) to a building with creatures built up to level 2 (original and two upgrades), they will replace the primary creatures in the hiring window. This will happen as follows (according to the points written above): first, the old, unimproved unit will be replaced with a new one, while leaving the upgrades from the old creature; then, the upgrades will be replaced with new ones.

I understand that this is not exactly an alternative building, but rather a building "on top." And the third level of such a building looks terribly awkward (a new, unimproved unit and its old upgrades).

But this situation can probably be fixed with scripts.
(I'm not very good at scripts, but as far as I know, what I'm describing is actually possible).
We will need a script to destroy the building, a script to build it, and a script to assign a new valid level, but let's go through everything in order.

First, let's create five levels of the building so that all possible combinations are available at different stages of construction.

1. We assign the original, unimproved unit.
2. We assign a new, unimproved unit.
3. We assign a new upgrade and an alt-upgrade.
4. We assign the original, unimproved unit.
5. We assign the original upgrade and the alt-upgrade.

We get the combinations themselves.

Level 1 ---- only the original unit in the hiring window.
Level 5 ---- the original unit with two upgrades in the hiring window.

Level 2 ---- only the new unit in the hiring window.
Level 3 ---- the new unit with two upgrades in the hiring window.

Now, using scripts, we need to assign town id build dwelling_1 level 2 or something like that.
(As I said, I'm not very good at scripts, but I'm sure that such commands should exist).

Of course, these scripts need a trigger.
It will be inconvenient and ugly to do it through dialog boxes.
I have an idea to do it through the same buildings. For this, you can use buildings with special IDs or even use taverns and forges. Any building that has a resource to build up to level 5 will do.


Let's take an example with the Elven town and try to make it as clear as possible.

We take the dwelling_1 building (the building of fairies), special_4 (the building that increases the growth of fairies), and the blacksmith (forge). Let's try to add an alternative building with knights to them. The scheme will be as follows.

dwelling_1
upg1
(fairies are assigned)
upg2
(knights are assigned)
upg3
(knight upgrades are assigned)
upg4
(fairies are assigned)
upg5
(fairy upgrades are assigned)

special_4
upg1
(nothing is assigned, the building is empty, but the icon and description are designed as a building with fairy upgrades)
upg2
(the influence on the growth of fairies is assigned)

blacksmith
upg1
(the forge is assigned)
upg2
(nothing is assigned, the building is empty, but the icon and description are designed as a building with an unimproved knight)

Next,

there are two options:
blacksmith upg2 (looking like a building for hiring knights)
and
dwelling upg1 (looking like and being a building for hiring fairies)

Let's assume we build blacksmith upg2. Then, using a script, we need to assign that if the blacksmith upg2 building is built, then dwelling_1 upg2 will be built automatically, and it will be forbidden to build it higher than level 3. Also, it will be forbidden to build the special_4 upg1 building. As you understand, in this case, no fairies will be available.

In the alternative option, we build dwelling_1 upg1. We assign a script that if this building is built, it will be forbidden to build dwelling_1 upg1 further and it will be forbidden to build blacksmith upg2. The special_4 upg1 building appears. Before that, it was hidden because it required dwelling_1 upg1 to be built. We build special_4 upg1. Using a script, we assign that if special_4 upg1 is built, then dwelling_1 upg5 will be built automatically. That's it. Now, fairies are built, and knights are unavailable.

As you understand, by skillfully arranging the icons and adjusting the description, you can create the impression for the player that it is not about three different buildings, but about only one with different development options.



The main problem for me is the script. I am almost one hundred percent sure that this is possible, but, unfortunately, I will not be able to write it myself.

And there is another nuance here. This idea involves detaching various original special properties from certain buildings and attaching them to other buildings, but I haven't figured out how this is done and where these properties are written yet.



Well, in general, the idea should work. In this way, you can double the variety of creatures that can be hired in a castle.

If someone can help with scripts, I can create a couple of such mods for an alternative building.

2. It's not possible to assign new IDs; that is, you can't simply enter dwelling_8 or special_8 for a building. In my case, the game crashes.

It's quite intricate. I understand the idea, but how are you planning to modify the game scripts to implement this concept?

Has it been tested with a value of zero?!