15 replies to this topic

[maul52]

I was playing "Operation Shadow Hand" tonight as the New Republic and I captured Byss and killed the Emperor in the process (3rd time I killed him in the game), yet the game did not end! I even waited until I built ground and space structures on Byss to make sure that wasn't the issue. I've played several of the Galactic Conquest missions, and each time I've been unable to complete them because of an "exception" that prevented me from continuing. Why didn't the game end this time? What more do I have to do?! Or are there no "kill screens" in this mod?

[Phoenix Rising]

Good question; it should work, but admittedly, it's been a while since I've completed a campaign from start to finish, given how saves become useless once any changes are made - and changes are made constantly on my end.

A quick check of the files reveals the problem: the victory condition for the NR on OSH is Galactic_Conquer_Enemy_Homeworld_And_Leader. I had assumed the "homeworld" corresponded to the <Home_Location> listed on the campaign, but apparently it's the <Home_Planet> of the faction. I guess PG had some issues with this as well:

<!-- AJA 03/04/2005 - Uncomment this block if you want the Empire to be able to win
			  the campaign by defeating Mon Mothma and capturing Alderaan.
			<Home_Planet>Alderaan</Home_Planet>
		-->
		<Faction_Leader>Mon_Mothma</Faction_Leader>
		<Faction_Leader_Company>Mon_Mothma_Team</Faction_Leader_Company>

<!-- This enables the galactic victory condition: "Win by capturing Coruscant and eliminating Emperor Palpatine" -->
		<Home_Planet>Coruscant</Home_Planet>
		<Faction_Leader>Emperor_Palpatine</Faction_Leader>
		<Faction_Leader_Company>Emperor_Palpatine_Team</Faction_Leader_Company>

Instead of doing it by the campaign, they just decided to comment the faction home planet out, making that victory condition almost totally worthless. My guess would be that if you had captured Coruscant, you would've won. Since you're supposed to capture Byss though, I'll redo it with a different victory condition (the one in TO).

Thanks for the report.

[maul52]

Thanks for the reply PR! I'll go back and conquer Coruscant this weekend and see what happens. I'll let you know.

[maul52]

OK, so I conquered Coruscant and the game still didn't end. I was going to conquer all the planets (the empire only had 3 left under its control), but I got sick of the land battles. I know you haven't finished with the land part of the mod yet.

Here's another weird thing, I'll let you tell me if it is intentional or not. After I conquered the space above Coruscant, I had a large fleet in orbit including Home One and Rebel Dream. I set out to conquer the ground by raiding with 3 squads of airspeeders (I've found that raiding often works better in a ground attack because all 3 squads land at the start; if you do a regular ground attack you start out with only one squad landed, and each squad gets destroyed before they even get off the ground, same for tanks, etc.). Anyway, I lost the raid battle and not only did I lose the 3 squads of airspeeders, but I also lost Home One, Rebel Dream, and my fleet commander! The rest of the space fleet was OK. Is that supposed to happen?

[Phoenix Rising]

OK, so I conquered Coruscant and the game still didn't end.

The other half of that condition has probably become broken also, as a result of our hero upgrades... No matter, we just won't use it anymore; there are others that can approximate it well enough.

Anyway, I lost the raid battle and not only did I lose the 3 squads of airspeeders, but I also lost Home One, Rebel Dream, and my fleet commander!

I'm guessing you used auto-resolve somehow to determine the outcome. Otherwise, I really don't know.

[maul52]

I didn't use autoresolve, I just lost the old fashioned way. But Home One and Rebel Dream were in orbit and not a part of the ground battle in any way, they shouldn't have been lost :(

[Phoenix Rising]

I have one follow-up question then: can you rebuild Ackbar or Leia?

[maul52]

I have one follow-up question then: can you rebuild Ackbar or Leia?

No, I cannot.

[Phoenix Rising]

Hmm, that would indicate an auto-resolve death - or at least not a tactical death, since the scripting logic for heroes is flawed such that they're only rebuildable when lost in tactical. But if it wasn't auto-resolve, I don't know how else they could've possibly died ...

[Tropical Bob]

I've noticed that heroes in orbit are thrown into land battles no matter who you actually select and send in. Don't think I've ever noticed it with Raids though.

Edited by Tropical Bob, 14 July 2009 - 05:35 AM.

[Phoenix Rising]

I've noticed that heroes in prbit are thrown into land battles no matter who you actually select and send in.

How so? Most specifically are told to Stay_In_Transport_During_Ground_Battle.

[Tropical Bob]

My bad. I notice it with auto-resolve, since I don't actually play out the land battles. I kind of just assumed it would happen with normal battles.

[maul52]

My bad. I notice it with auto-resolve, since I don't actually play out the land battles. I kind of just assumed it would happen with normal battles.

The land battles are truly difficult to figure out at this point. Most units have extremely long fire ranges; the pirate planets that have heavy mercenaries are a true pain b/c they can fire their rockets from all the way across the map. Yet, my stormies (when using the rocket secondary option) or rebel plex soldiers do not seem to have nearly the same range for the player. In fact the rocket secondary attack and the thermal detonator attack for stormies don't seem to work at all. Furthermore, maybe its just a matter of positioning, but the AI can destroy heavy units (e.g. AT-AT's) almost immediately at the beginning of a ground conflict while the player units cannot do the same when being attacked.

[Phoenix Rising]

I notice it with auto-resolve, since I don't actually play out the land battles.

It's true, with units that can fight on the ground, they will enter into the auto-resolve equation. Ackbar and Leia shouldn't though - they have no "real" unit for land - which is why I'm stumped. For tactical combat that you play out yourself, only the units that you bring into the battle can be destroyed.

The land battles are truly difficult to figure out at this point.

Land units should really have their own section on the website, but since I figure they're going to change dramatically anyways, it's probably not worth the time. I'll try to explain it briefly.

When I did the ranges, I made them canonically verbatim, which was a mistake. The maps in EaW are way too small - something like a few klicks wide - for exact ranges, hence the firing across the map.

The "Rocket Attack" ability is not a rocket attack... that name is misleading (from the T4-B). It's actually a swap weapons. Most infantry have two distinct weapons, but can conventionally have as many as four (I believe only Fett has more). The primary weapon is usually a rifle or something otherwise substantial, like a HH-15. The secondary weapon (triggered by "Rocket Attack") is a backup weapon, commonly a pistol. If the unit has grenades, these can also be thrown while in secondary mode. Finally, the tertiary weapon is something that only triggers at close range, such as a vibroblade or simply fisticuffs.

The thermal detonator attack for Stormtroopers is a fixed charge that can only be planted on structures.

So, uh, yeah, my advice would just be to auto-resolve land combat until the next release. It's totally unpolished and I probably should've cut it, but that's a long story...

[Kitkun]

For tactical combat that you play out yourself, only the units that you bring into the battle can be destroyed.

Unfortunately, it doesn't seem to work this way for heroes. I see this once in a while. (Well, saw it before my system died.)

[Phoenix Rising]

I know there was a tag (or maybe it was part of a script) that had something to do with not killing heroes with auto-resolve, but now I can't seem to find it. I'm pretty sure I had it in effect, but perhaps it doesn't apply to minor heroes, which all of our heroes are since making them buildable. Anyways, if anyone stumbles upon it, let me know so I can verify.