Anti-Tech Guide for Dummies

[OzzyKP]

Ok, I'm working on a scenario and I want different units for each civ. Beyond cool graphics and names, the units and tech should be the same. Example, the Sioux, Iroquios, Inca, Aztec, and Tupi will all have a 3-2-1 Archer equivilent, but they will have different pics and names.

Anyways, I'm trying to set this up with anti-tech, but the damn thing isn't working. The ornery thing keeps giving civs the wrong units, lots of them. Like if i give the Inca the Anti-Sioux tech, then they loose Aztec units. Most of it however doesn't seem to have any affect at all.

What could I be doing wrong?

[OzzyKP]

Oh yea, in rules.txt I was using X1, X2, X3, etc to label the anti-tech, and for whatever reason I thought that might be a problem so I changed them to labels more like the other tech, inc for Anti-Inca, azt for anti-Aztec, etc. And now I can't even open my saved files, the game crashes right away. How could those little changes mess up the entire thing?

Ugh....

[Heresson]

I hate making tech-tree... Does your second post mean your problems are over? Anyway, You must have made something wrong. Gave them wrong tech, or whatever. Are You using editor or do it all manually? It seems manually...
It'd be better for You to use the editor... But remember not to change many things at one time, change and save and reload, and so on, otherwise, at least when it comes to my civ, You may have problems.

[Boco]

If you're stuck, your best bet would be to post your @CIVILIZE & @UNITS sections.

[Mercator]

These abbreviations are hard-coded and should never be changed!

In the text files the semi-colon marks a comment only (up to the end of the line). So for the technologies, the final 3 letter abbreviation is NOT part of the actual technology code, it's just there to let you know what abbreviation refers to what line.

Perhaps you could post the relevant lines of one such set of equivalent units (all the units, plus all involved techs)...

What should work is this:
You give each of the Archers the same prerequisite (obviously). You then give each of them the obsolesence tech (e.g. the Aztec archer goes obsolete with the anti-Aztec tech). Now give everyone but the Aztecs the anti-Aztec tech etc.
But then, you probably knew this, you probably made some silly mistake or typo somewhere.


Let's see... This bit is taken from my Orbis Terrae scenario:

Weaponry,           4,-1,  Che, SE,  0, 0    ; Stl
Lost Knowledge,     1, 0,  no,  no,  3, 3    ; U3
Lost Knowledge,     1, 0,  no,  no,  3, 3    ; X1

Auxiliaries,      U3,  0,  1.,0,  4a,2d,  2h,2f,  3,0,  0, Stl, 000000000000000
V. Warriors,      X1,  0,  1.,0,  3a,3d,  2h,1f,  2,0,  1, Stl, 000010000000100

Both the Roman Auxiliaries and Viking Warrirors require Weaponry (Stl), but the Auxiliaries go obsolete with U3 (the non-Roman tech), the Warriors with X1 (the non-Viking tech).

[OzzyKP]

Ok, I fixed the abbreviations, and the game starts up like normal now. It still doesn't work properly, so here is the code:

Anti-Inca,          3, 0,  nil,  no,  0, 0    ; X1
Anti-Aztec,          3, 0,  nil,  no,  0, 0    ; X2
Anti-Sioux,          3, 0,  nil,  no,  0, 0    ; X3
Anti-Tupi,          3, 0,  nil,  no,  0, 0    ; X4
Anti-Iroquois,          3, 0,  nil,  no,  0, 0    ; X5
Anti-Eskimo,       3, 0,  nil,  no,  0, 0    ; X6

Braves,      X5, 0,  1.,0,  1a,2d,  1h,1f,  2,0,  1, Bro, 000000000000000
Archers,      X5, 0,  1.,0,  3a,2d,  1h,1f,  3,0,  1, War, 000000000000000
Scalper,       X5, 0,  1.,0,  4a,2d,  1h,1f,  4,0,  1, Iro, 000000000000000
Sioux Braves,      X3, 0,  1.,0,  1a,2d,  1h,1f,  2,0,  1, Bro, 000000000000000
Sioux Archers,      X3, 0,  1.,0,  3a,2d,  1h,1f,  3,0,  1, War, 000000000000000
Sioux Elite Warriors,       X3, 0,  1.,0,  4a,2d,  1h,1f,  4,0,  1, Iro, 000000000000000
Sioux Raiders,    X3, 0,  2.,0,  5a,1d,  1h,1f,  4,0,  0, MT,  000000000000000
Sioux Horsemen,      X3, 0,  2.,0,  4a,2d,  1h,1f,  4,0,  0, Chi, 000000000000000
Aztec Slingers,      X2, 0,  1.,0,  3a,2d,  1h,1f,  3,0,  1, War, 000000000000000
Aztec Defender,      X2, 0,  1.,0,  1a,2d,  1h,1f,  2,0,  1, Bro, 000000000000000
Jaguar Warrior,       X2, 0,  1.,0,  4a,2d,  1h,1f,  4,0,  1, Iro, 000000000000000
Inca Slingers,      X1, 0,  1.,0,  3a,2d,  1h,1f,  3,0,  1, War, 000000000000000
Inca Defender,      X1, 0,  1.,0,  1a,2d,  1h,1f,  2,0,  1, Bro, 000000000000000
Elite Inca Warrior ,       X1, 0,  1.,0,  4a,2d,  1h,1f,  4,0,  1, Iro, 000000000000000
Amazonian,      X4, 0,  1.,0,  1a,2d,  1h,1f,  2,0,  1, Bro, 000000000000000
Tupi Warrior,      X4, 0,  1.,0,  3a,2d,  1h,1f,  3,0,  1, War, 000000000000000
Elite Tupi Warrior ,      X4, 0,  1.,0,  4a,2d,  1h,1f,  4,0,  1, Iro, 000000000000000

Those are all the anti-techs and the civ specific units.

[Mercator]

Let me see...

First a few nitpicks: I think you should get rid of the space after the names of the two elite warrior units.
Otherwise you might end up getting trouble using them in your events file. The space would also have to appear in there, and a space is easy to miss at the end of a line.

Unless posting it here messed the formatting up, you'd better align each line too, just for readability. You can use extra spaces right after the commas to line up the values.

Now onto the problem...
You basically have 3 types, defenders, warriors and slingers. These 3 all have pretty much the same stats, except the attack value increases.

Due to this problem, that would mean the slingers make the defenders obsolete, and the warriors make the slingers obsolete.
If that's not your intention, change the unit roles or statistics.

Secondly, I'm not sure about the nil, no combination. I don't think that works.
Instead, make them nil, nil first, give them to whichever civ needs them (i.e. everyone but it's "anti-civ"), and then change the rules to no, no.

Other than that, the prerequisite and obsolesence techs are correct so that can't be the problem.

... That's all I can think of right now.

[OzzyKP]

Originally posted by Mercator
Secondly, I'm not sure about the nil, no combination. I don't think that works.
Instead, make them nil, nil first, give them to whichever civ needs them (i.e. everyone but it's "anti-civ"), and then change the rules to no, no.

Thanks much, this was the problem. I changed them to no, no and it works fine. Hooray!

As for the obscelence problem you mentioned, I'm not clear on that. The link you provided mentioned problems with the Musketeer slot. I haven't used that spot, nor are the civs allowed to get to that point. I haven't had any problems with obscelence yet (though of course I haven't done any playtesting yet).

The tech tree will be exactly like the standard civ2 tree but with The Wheel (and maybe magnitism) removed. The defender is just a phalanx, the slinger is just an archer, and the elite warrior is just a legion. All the unit values will be identical, but the graphics are just customized for each civ. So they shouldn't affect each other, and since gunpowder will never be invented, they shouldn't go obsolete. Am I mistaken?

[OzzyKP]

oops, double post. i'll make the best of it...

On the topic of obsolescence, since I want the units to behave totally normal, how do I make civ specific units that expire at a normal time? Like if everyone has a unique phalanx equivilent I'd want it to expire at feudalism like normal. Since they all expire with the anti-tech, could I have two techs that cause the tech to expire?

If not, thats fine too, I was thinking I make all the units that expire in my tech tree standard across all the civs. And just the ones that won't expire will I make unique.

[Exile]

Here's an idea;

When the appropriate tech that allows the creation of a more powerful unit, create an event that gives the anti-tech to the civ in question.

You will probably want to include a "just once" trigger too.

[Mercator]

As for the obscelence problem you mentioned, I'm not clear on that.

Nevermind, it seems the problem I had in mind only happens for units with a movement larger than 1.

When the appropriate tech that allows the creation of a more powerful unit, create an event that gives the anti-tech to the civ in question.

That doesn't really work. Because then ALL of its unique units would become obsolete... Unless each unit has a separate set of anti-techs.

[Exile]

It can work, Merc.

If you give a tech to each civ that is its own. The typical example is to give a German civ a no,no tech called "German tech," and use that tech as the preq for some or all of the German specific units. Specified units could then have, given the necessities of the scenario, differing times of obsolesence and arrival. Not every civ-specific unit has to have the corresponding anti-tech as its obsoleting tech . . . if the unit's preq is the civ-specific tech. That way no other civ can build it, and that tech can also be given at any point in the game, and the initial units that you want to go obsolete will do so.

The drawback is that this method requires the dedication of a good number of available tech slots to make it work.

Take a look at either Age of War or Imperialism 1870 to see how I solved similar problems [out-and-out self-promotion].