Basic unit changes?

[Gluegun]

Could someone direct me to a thread (or just post) some suggestions for doing basic unit changes? what are popular ones? Making cruiser probe teams usable when one gets foil chassis? Getting rid of supply crawlers? Making custom Tank Transports happen earlier rather than later? could anyone direct me to the relevant info? Thanks!

[Impaler[WrG]]

Well their are several ways you can go about modifying the Alpha to achive thouse things

Modify the Chasies - Change the tec required or the Cost to make some unit apear earlier or later and cost more or less. Also you can change the movment rate of the Chasies, I like to play with all movments doubled in my SP games

Modify the Weapon/Armor - again change prereqisites or Cost, you can also change the options for what is alowable such as preventing Probe teams from having particular abilites. You can also completly disable some weapons like Suppy crawlers if you wished.

Modify the Predesigned Unit list - Rememder to add any new units you design to the bottom of the list or else you will majorly screw up the Native life forms. Also make shure you change the number at the top of the list when you add units. These Predesigned units will be used by the AI significantly improving its performance if you add units that its too dump to design (like Probe Foils). A human though can "steal" through the workshop any ability, weapon or armor you give to a pre-designed unit unless you completly Disable the ability/weapon/armor. Then only the Predesigned unit can use it. Also note that you can change a predesigned units Cost to any # of rows you desire and give them as many abilites as you like. And all Predesigned units can have only 1 tec Prerequiste and will never require Pro-typing. Also note that all predesigned units use Fission Reactors, their is no reactor paramiter to modify. If you were to modify the Faction profiles along with the Alpha you could create Factin specific units ala Civ 3.

As you can see their is almost no end to what you can do with Alpha Text modifying of the Unit lists.

[Darsnan]

Heah Gluegun,

The SMAC Academy has a section on editing your Alpha(x).txt file, to include changing parameters on units, or adding new units to the basic set. FYI.


D

[Gluegun]

I was more asking "what are the specific changes that are agreed-upon to be balancing?"

[Impaler[WrG]]

As far as I know the most common additon is that of Probe Foils and other Probe based units. With these units on the list the AI will start to use them heavily and will be a much greater threat.

Besides this simple addition almost everyone who has any interest in Alpha modifying seems to make their own personal Alpha often by experimentation or consultation with others and incorporating what ever they like. The Torture Mod thread you posted on is such an effort (though it focues on Tecs and Balance rather then Units).

Personaly I have been planing to make fully Predesigned units possibly Hundreds of them and Disabling all the Chassies, Armor, Weapons and Abilites. This would make the game like traditional Civ inwich all units are directly linked to a single tecnology and their is no workshop. I dont know if I will ever get around to it though.

[Maniac]

IIRC there are over 32000 unit possibilities. Even selecting the most frequently used out of them would take a lot of work.

[The Mad Monk]

Yeah, that seems a bit much...

[The Mad Monk]

I think the AI really needs to be introduced to armored trance formers. I really do.

[The Mad Monk]

Okay, I added an armored former to the list, and for an added bonus I made it a starting unit for all factions.

Nobody is getting it.

Questions:

I set the tech requirement to Ecological Engineering -- is this preventing anyone from getting it until that tech is researched, or shouldn't it make a difference?

If I set tech to Disable, would the AI be able to build it once the appropriate techs are researched (It's just a former with synthmetal armor)?

[Impaler[WrG]]

A predesigned unit can be built once the ONE pre-requiste tecnology is obtained. If your using CentEcology as the Pre-requite then thats why it is not buildible from the start of the game. To make it buidible from the start use None as the tec required.

For example the Colony Pod


Colony Pod, Infantry, Colony Pod, Scout, 8, 0, 0, None, -1, 00000000000000000000000000

Is avalibe right from the start because the tec required is none, you could do the same with any unit, chassies, weapon, armor or ability.

The 0 after the 8, is for alternative cost, 0 means that the game autocalculates the cost. If you change it to say 2 you would make the cost of a Colony Pod 2 rows of minerals. Its been reported that this will significantly incresse the AI's desire to expand and they will give you a run for your money.

[The Mad Monk]

Thanks, I understand it's not buildable, but I set it (in each faction's .txt) to automatically appear along with the colony pod(s) and the scout, at the start of the game. Do I need to set it to Disable to make this work?

Looking back, I see I made it less than clear. Sorry about that.

[The Mad Monk]

Nevermind, figured it out.

[Gluegun]

How do you do some of the changes like those in the Democracy game? Like tweak the pods not to produce AA's or techs? Googlie's probe crusier tweak? What *exactly* is that?

[Darsnan]

Originally posted by Gluegun
How do you do some of the changes like those in the Democracy game? Like tweak the pods not to produce AA's or techs? Googlie's probe crusier tweak? What *exactly* is that?

The tweaking of the pods is set by the CMN of a game, who can change various parameters (such as pod popping results) via the Scenario Editor.
"Googlie's Probe Tweak" is a line added to the Alphax.txt file which then makes available a Probe Cruiser upon the discovery of Doc:Init, and the AI will then build these Probe Cruisers!
Both the pod popping tweak and the Probe Cruiser tweak are discussed in different sections at The SMAC Academy (their actually the last two sections at the bottom of the page). FYI.


D