Designing a Modding tool

[Darkspire]

ORIGINAL: ASHBERY76

Looks nice.The race polices have 6 tech focus and not 2 like shown.

That is the race.txt not the policy.txt and there are only two tech focus entries in the race.txt (check the tabs on the image), the policy screen editor(?) image shown on here does not have any tech focus listed on it at all.

Darkspire

[yummie]

ORIGINAL: Darkspire

ORIGINAL: ASHBERY76

Looks nice.The race polices have 6 tech focus and not 2 like shown.

yes according to page 18 of the Mod manual that is correct only 2 tech focus, as for polices I have not gotten that far into it, SO you my want to check your manual. But thanks for trying to point out a mistake. Also check darkspire comment he is correct.

[ASHBERY76]

The race.txt tech focus along with the ResearchDesignOverallFocus is overwritten by the policy files so it's actually redundant having it included.

[yummie]

Agreed but if they dont do policies section it actually isnt. They can pick and choose what they want to do, other than they have to choose modd name so it really isnt redundant

[yummie]

Update:
Loads races already created when you fill in the Modd name to the races box Also, Now loads previous races data that you have saved also when you click on the picture of the race you want to load. This is a huge step, One for celebrating. We are that much closer to clearing out the race.txt mod and will move on to biases because policies is very cumbersome, Policies will be done over the weekend and We will work on biases as out next goal. But a huge High five and slap on the booty is needed for this break through as It was a hard endeavor to get to work. Pictures will be add to this post Later to night Before We go to bed. Just want to Let you knwo It is being worked on and huge progress is being made on the tool.
***edit
Here is the pictures of the differnt info being loaded Now to this this 113 more times for each one blah... But we got it to laid each type easly and constantly even loads the pictures for each race with the name. rest is copy paste change name copy past change name to each moddible drop down. WHich also make it easy to do same with policies and other apps we add on. So success!!!!!!!!!!! circled changes so easy to find and I figured out 2 of them and nick figured out the other 2 So slap on ass goes to me high five for nick woohoo

[yummiesslave]

ORIGINAL: tjhkkr

Do you have a real time code interpreter... or do you have to compile to check if your syntax is clean?
Or is the struggle with testing the completed screens/logic flow?

If you're speaking of our backend code, yes it tells us if our syntax is clean while coding. The struggle so far is a lot of grunt work and some bug tracking.

If you're speaking of testing in game, we've done some testing and found no problems yet. Hopefully our luck will hold.

[yummie]

Okay work went well today, I got most of the set up to finish the loading script, So race section is almost ready for a nice beta test run. There are a few bugs to work out But them seem minor, Will try and conqure those and move on to biases.

Edit****
Okay So Here is where we stand With Stuff that is finished.
The About info creation is done....
The Basic layout of the Races Bin is Done....
Race text and photo is done....
Loading of Mods even if not made by this mod nearing completion....
Loading Mod complete Complete ***Edit...
Race images that are click able Done so you can load race data....
Able to delete Race Not complete....
Validations of drop down menu data not complete....
Pirates selection not Done....
Hoover overs modd manual info not done but nearing completion i believe only 10 left to do....
Validation of about not done....
Validation of Races not done....


As you can see these are the steps that are left and have been done so far.... It is a lot that has been done and still some things that need to been done. Nick will be taking the weekend off from programing as he got into elder scrolls Weekend beta So it will just me Me programming again, But Does not mean that the project will stall. As He hasn't been working on much since last Saturday. Mostly Just been me doing a lot of it alone as He has been working a lot of, hours lately, To get Bills paid. He has been waiting on The release of elder Scrolls for awhile. Ill try to get as Much Done over the weekend So We keep on schedule. If you see me Slacking Slap my booty and Tell me to get to work. Still a lot to do before Beta release. Which is coming Very Very soon.

[CyclopsSlayer]

You all are machines! Just a few days in and the tool is looking clean, easy and too useful for words!

[yummie]

Yeah its called over 100 hours programming to get it to this point. That's on my end add about 30 for nick side and this is what you get. 130 hours worth of work.

Edit****
Here is the load from one to the other so you can see the changes, Still errors when loading non tool mod As not all values are there, Will have to write validations for that.... Hour break then Starting on biases as this is Just about done

[yummie]

Okay i decided who every wrote the policies section needs to suck a big one, They need to at least be constant on naming things, To many random ones You realize how big of a pain it is for flow when they do that. Freakin want to smack them. First it was the names where entirely way to long, now its they are to long and completely random. I now hate Policies more than anything in this game just looking at it in manual makes me want to smack someone. Sorry had to get that out, Hate sloppy work and that is all policies is. half the mods in it are just there so they can say that the game is very moddable. Kinda of dumb if you ask me. But hey what I know. Ill keep working on it slowly, But after I go Punch something. hey nick come here[:@][:@][:@][:@]

[DeadlyShoe]

lol. I think they have admitted the game isn't very moddable. The stuff that's moddable is stuff that's easier to have in data files anyway imo...

and it's grown in an unholy amalgamation from expansion to expansion so you have redundancies and nonsense

[yummie]

ORIGINAL: DeadlyShoe

lol. I think they have admitted the game isn't very moddable. The stuff that's moddable is stuff that's easier to have in data files anyway imo...

and it's grown in an unholy amalgamation from expansion to expansion so you have redundancies and nonsense

I am noticing that, sloppy work actually, Hopefully they clean it up with the next release, But for as much as this game is I think i have had more fun writing a tool for it than actually playing it lets compare...
time playing the game....2 hours
time spent making tool...104 hours Hmm which you think I like doing more hahaha

I am Making a mod for a tool I have barely played. Mostly tried some of the mods and got mad because they were all over the place and most of them dont work right.. Plus one i really wanted to Try didn't work, so something had to be done. oh and nick has played the game for 10 minutes I know we are totally nuts right. Go ahead say we are nuts. Totally looney Off our rocker, Me more than nick But still.

Edit****
Okay all need sleep so I am done for today, Got the basic look of the bias tab done, Will be worked on more later. Has trouble loading 50 races but that can be fixed. but not tonight. Tomorrow will start on dialog and get that knocked out that should be fast as that is a text based menu so no lists, See you all tomorrow. Enjoy the images of the completed images section so glad that is done. Not sure if i will go mess with that for a little while as it is completely functional. other than writing exceptions for mods not written but this tool, for missing data.

[yummie]

Okay So race dialog is now done. Kicked that out this morning Might go in and change design later on today. Works great, Next I start working on design templates I think, This is the point where we are straying away from The mod manual and Diving in and making tabs based off items that are moddable but not in manual. So this will be interesting process As I have to go through each text file and figure Out exactly what is happening. This one will fun to work out And get a working tool for that Text file. For full conversions We will make sure it backs up originals some where else so you can easily revert back. My even make that part of the tool not sure. We shall See Work should pick up for a day or 2 and should be able to get a lot done. in between naps and what not. But will also be boring as nick will not be available at all as he is going to be to busy playing elder scrolls. So now all errors will be my fault. So lets see if i can rap most of this up before Monday when beta ends.

[DeadlyShoe]

Skyrim ruins everything.

wishlist for template editor:

*approximate ship size estimator
*change out every weapon type for that race
*sanity checker to make sure a race AI is set to research its template weapons

[yummie]

Edits and response aft the stars

ORIGINAL: DeadlyShoe

Skyrim ruins everything.

wishlist for template editor:

*approximate ship size estimator*** could happen I'll look into it this weekend
*change out every weapon type for that race*** actually was planing on that any ways lol
*sanity checker to make sure a race AI is set to research its template weapons***no clue what your talking about here,

I think This tool will be quiet thrall and do not only what you think is neccessary but will go beyond what you think is possible. Atleast that is what I think.

[Bingeling]

I'd guess that what he wants is:

The race uses a couple of specific weapon types.
Those weapon types should be tech focuses to make sure they are researched.

Otherwise you could have designs with maxos blasters (basic), while the most powerful rail gun is researched.

[Igard]

OFFTOPIC: Is Nick playing Elder Scroll Online? What's he make of it?

ONTOPIC: There are 2 "TechFocus" fields in the races txt as well as 3 "DisallowedResearchArea" fields that must not conflict. So you don't want to focus on area weapons and disallow them at the same time.

There are also 6 "ResearchDesignTechFocus" fields in the policy txt file. You want 2 of these to correlate with the 2 techFocus fields in the races txt file.

Then you have something called DesignTemplates which allows you to enter the number of components for each ship design. Again, you don't want to add components from technology branches that you've disallowed and you want to use the same components as those focused in the race file and the policy file.

Sloppy is putting it mildly. A bloody nightmare of jumbled randomness is also putting it mildly.

Edit1: just note that no one is using design templates as they haven't really worked properly. You can ignore these completely.

Edit2: Ignore that apparently people do use them!

[Bingeling]

What is wrong with design templates? They seems to work OK as far as I have seen (but I have not looked hard). Default races has different templates, and seem to use weapons according to them. And some have troop compartments on destroyers+, others not.

[Igard]

Maybe I was doing something wrong then. I never realised people actually used them. It never gave me the weapon choices that I wanted. Although I was putting different combinations of weapon types perhaps that was screwing it up. Just didn't seem to do what I wanted it.

For adding other components it seemed fine though. So I guess it might have its uses. It just seems like alot of work for something that you have to correlate with the race and policy files and it still doesn't give what I want. It's also a source of frustration for me because really, there should be a button the design screen in the game for saving the template file.

However, if it's something that gets used still, then yummie and Nick should add it to the tool. I don't think it's worth checking if each value correlates with the tech focuses though. That would be impressive it did!

Perhaps it might be a good idea to automatically write the same value from the race files techFocus fields 1&2 to the policy files 1st & 2nd fields for the ResearchDesignTechFocus. They use the same values so it would keep consistency there.

[CyclopsSlayer]

From what I have seen, the design templates cannot adapt to new technologies. Upgrades already in the template? All is good. Something completely new and they haven't a clue.