changing unit stats

[redworf]

I changed the marine unit to appear after advanced naval tactics. (marines have been hitting the beaches during this period), besides there is such a long lull between machine gun troops to the appearance of other troops, well armor too. My question is : 1. How do I change the Library to reflect this, and 2, Can I change the name of a unit ie Paratrooper to "shock troops" lets say and give them the ability to attack cities from air and sea?, and finally 3. how can I open the existing sprite graphics to make some subtle changes on them? I have paint shop pro. The mod help files really didn't answer my questions. I know a bit of programming and understand that unit names are tagged etc.
thanks....:hmmm

[Martin Gühmann]

1. Open the Great_Library.txt in your ..\ctp2_data\english\gamedata\ folder. here is the entry for the marine:

[UNIT_MARINE_PREREQ]
Requires:
Adv. Infantry Tactics

Abilities:
Amphibious Assault
[END]

[UNIT_MARINE_STATISTICS]
Attack: {UnitDB(UnitRecord[0]).Attack / 100}
Ranged: {UnitDB(UnitRecord[0]).ZBRangeAttack}
Defense: {UnitDB(UnitRecord[0]).Defense / 100}
Armor: {UnitDB(UnitRecord[0]).Armor / 100}
Damage: {UnitDB(UnitRecord[0]).Firepower}
Vision: {UnitDB(UnitRecord[0]).VisionRange}
Movement: {UnitDB(UnitRecord[0]).MaxMovePoints / 10000}
Max HP: {UnitDB(UnitRecord[0]).MaxHP}

Costs: {UnitDB(UnitRecord[0]).ShieldCost}
Upkeep: {UnitDB(UnitRecord[0]).ShieldHunger} Shields
Food Hunger: {UnitDB(UnitRecord[0]).FoodHunger}
[END]

[UNIT_MARINE_SUMMARY]
Can attack immediately after unloading from naval transport vessels
[END]

[UNIT_MARINE_GAMEPLAY]
What sets the Marine apart from the Machine Gunner is its ability to move and attack immediately after unloading from a Naval Transport vessel.  Whereas other infantry units must first land before beginning their assault, the Marine hits the ground running, striking targets with alacrity.
[END]

[UNIT_MARINE_HISTORICAL]
A stalwart and fierce component of modern combat operations, the marine traced its roots back to the 5th century BC.  In their writings, Greek historians Herodotus and Thucydides referred to epibatai, heavily armed sea soldiers in the Greek fleets.  In the 3rd-2nd century BC, the Greek statesman Polybius described a type of Roman soldier, called milites classiarii ("soldiers of the fleet"), who were trained and armed especially for service aboard Roman warships.  In the Middle Ages, standard soldiers often sailed aboard ships to bolster attack and boarding capabilities.  In the 17th century naval wars, the British and Dutch each raised the first distinct and organized corps of modern marines:  the Royal Marine (1664) and the Koninklijke Nederlandse Corps Mariniers (1665), respectively.  Although other countries maintained marine corps, by far the most famous organization of this kind was the United States Marine Corps. 

Founded in 1775 as a separate military service within the U.S. Department of the Navy, the USMC was primarily charged with seizure and defense of advanced bases and with land and air operations related to naval campaigns.  It was also responsible for service aboard certain naval vessels, as well as providing security for shore installations and U.S. diplomatic missions in foreign countries.  Above any other duty, however, the marines specialized in amphibious attacks, such as those undertaken against Japanese-held islands in the Pacific during World War II.  The USMC participated in every war of the United States, often being the first, or among the first, to fight, executed more than 300 landings on foreign shores and served in every major U.S. naval action since 1775.
[END]

Don't copy and paste from here some of the above code is not displayed or converted to smilies. I didn't disabled smilies and I can't disable html code.

If you changed the values for attack, defence or armor no problem it depends directly on the *.txt files via slic.

If you changed the enabling advance you have to edit the prereq field.

2. To change the name of a unit search for a file called gl_str.txt in your ..\ctp2_data\english\gamedata\ folder. It contains the names that are used in the game for the units.

For the second part of that question open the unit.txt in the ..\ctp2_data\default\gamedata\ folder.

Here are some lines from the unit.txt concerning the aircraft carrier:

   CanAttack: Sea
   CanAttack: ShallowWater
   CanCarry: MedAir
   CanCarry: SmallAir
   CanSee: Standard
   Defend: Air
   MovementType: Sea
   MovementType: ShallowWater
   Size: Large
   VisionClass: Standard

I think this is enough to get the direction. Of course if I am to brief please ask.

3. There is no tool avilable that can extract the graphics from a sprite, yet. You could ask Martin the Dane, but that would requre some time. We have only the sprite make tool.

-Martin

[Immortal Wombat]

Originally posted by Martin Gühmann

3. There is no tool avilable that can extract the graphics from a sprite, yet. You could ask Martin the Dane, but that would requre some time. We have only the sprite make tool.

-Martin

Meaning extensive screenshots, and remaking the entire sprite Probably not worth it unless it really matters.

[Martin Gühmann]

Originally posted by Immortal Wombat
Meaning extensive screenshots, and remaking the entire sprite Probably not worth it unless it really matters.

And you can't get all the animation frames, but you can make a all in one colour tile to seperate it better from the terrain, but also you have a non animated sprite with unsharp borders you wouldn't be able to recreate the original sprite.

-Martin