29 replies to this topic

[Phoenix Rising]

We've long had buildable heroes in place of respawning heroes, but it's always been tempered by an option to rebuild. The scripting that accomplishes this is not flawless at catching every death event and I doubt it ever will be. Allowing heroes one life per game would simplify the scripting and likely allow for consistency; however, that alone isn't a good enough reason to implement hero permadeath. I could live with it either way (bad pun), so what does the community think? This is sort of a straw poll to get a conversation started, so please explain your choice!

Edited by Phoenix Rising, 13 October 2012 - 07:39 PM.

[P.O._210877]

You know, I always viewed the occasional slip in the code to represent the Will of the Force. By their nature heroes (and villains) are larger than life and survive their apparent demise to return again and again. But once in a while some of them fall for good, in a narrative account this keeps us guessing and wondering if this or that character has finally kicked the bucket for good this time around. The occasional "real" death in PR emulates this phenomena and although it was not intentional it does keep us guessing and wondering about how we should use our heroes; do I commit a hero to a major battle knowing it'll be dangerous and death is a real possibility? There's an actual choice here, while an endlessly rebuildable hero is just a bookkeeping concern, a hero that might really die is much more than only credits.

[johnchm.10]

you make a good point regarding the drama and gameplay issues with permadeath, and with some heroes it is canon and fitting. i know i personally would have loved to see Thrawn go down fighting, having made one gamble too many, or if faced with odds that even his tactical skill couldnt win against, etc, and not from a bodyguard turned assassin.
on the other hand when a battle 'ends' i find it not unreasonable for search and rescue teams and ships to scour the battlespace looking for survivors., and even during a battle, there have been known to be shuttles darting through picking up pilots that have gone EV, or who's ships have been disabled. it happened in the books some times. and something like the former is how Luke met his future wife, lol.

[Madurai]

I already have hero permadeath; I don't rebuild them.

[Phoenix Rising]

That's an interesting way of looking at it, P.O., but it's not the case where it is completely random: there are specific death/despawn events that story scripting just isn't capable of catching for generic (buildable) heroes.

The reason there are no named smugglers or bounty hunters passed the first variant is because it can't catch those mission deployments - the first one becomes rebuildable thanks only to built limit XML tags. Similarly, even though I want to, I can't force a story-scripted respawn for smuggler or bounty hunters.

That is an option for players, Madurai, but not the AI.

[evilbobthebob]

Well in terms of the AI, it doesn't really use heroes at all in my experience. I have certainly never been attacked by one and I've never seen the AI recruit more heroes, that I can recall.

[Phoenix Rising]

I was just attacked by Page and Chewbacca, so it's probably just that the threshold for attachment is too high (function of rank).

[Darth Stalin]

What do you mean as "the threshold for attachment"??

And as I previously found in PR 1.0 that AI is rarely to use heroes (and even build them), when I'm now "modding" the GFFA campaign with "all available planets" I gave the Rebels (as the AI) all available heroes... and most (if not all) of them upgraded to the highest level. Thus the AI will be more challenging... yet not too challenging for a little experienced player I presume.

[Phoenix Rising]

In the game object scripts, all hero plans reference HeroPlanAttach, which is supposed to attach them to things like attack plans. This is how vanilla EaW did it, but I haven't played that in so long and never while specifically looking for it, so I don't know how well it worked originally. The brute force approach would be to include the hero categories in plan taskforces, which would certainly work, although the AI may overvalue their worth and not bring enough regular forces.

[P.O._210877]

Is it part of the .MEG file in data?

That's where it's at, there is no folder per say but the files are clearly identifiable as xmls.

[sargeantsandwich]

Heroes cost so much that spamming them early game is impossible... and by late game I just want them back.
Han and Chewie also don't seem to return from smuggling, and they weren't even killed

[Darth Stalin]

Besides, especially in case of heroes with their own "custom" ships the "death" event may occur either in space combat or (as with "land" or "double environmental" heroes) during land combat. This may well be explained as "ship's destruction/failure" or "being severely wounded during combat".
To avoid searching too much: look at Anakin Skywalker; he was even called "dead" by his former master yet he survived. He also replaced his command ships many times during his time as Emperor's servant. Similar case was with a female Imperial Knight (don't remember her name) from SW: Legacy comics series (the one saved by Cade Skywalker and "encased in Vader's way" by Bantha Rawk). She survived and even got new armour, yet it required time.
Similar case: see Johny Rico in "Starship Troopers", when he was presumed (and officially declared...) dead after failed "Ivasion on Klendathu", yet he survived in medical tank (resembling very much the bacta tank... ).
Oh, forget about the Emperor himself, resurrecting in his clone body at least twice before his permanent death... or Thrawn's clone... etc.
Besides, the cost of "resurrecting a hero" is sometimes astonishingly high - hero must be "built" anew and then upgraded with all his previous "levels" (see the cost of Thrawn - construction (some 10K credits?), then construction of Admonitor...(another ~30K credits) and finally the Razor's Kiss - IIRC 729K cedits! - total about 800K credits for one hero!).
That reminds me about the need to conquer more "mining" planets in my ongoing Empire campaign... to have a weekly income of some 100K per week at least - doable but requires careful planning.

[johnchm.10]

and there are examples of heroes being rebuilt or resurrected in other media. the 6 Million Dollar Man (we can rebuild him..... ), Bionic Woman, Sheppard in Mass Effect 2, Starkiller being cloned in TFU2 (only notable because they cloned a force user that didnt end up being completely insane like Cabouth (forgive the spelling error. cant get to wookie.)

[Zeta1127]

C'baoth, Jorus C'baoth, with Joruus C'baoth being the clone.

[johnchm.10]

lol. thanks. one thing that i believe we can all agree on is that some of them names are not easy

[Zeta1127]

Indeed.

[Henry X]

I am in favor or absurdly long respawn times for heroes.

[Sûlherokhh]

Now Han returns from his smuggling operations. Haven't tried death variants yet.

 

    <HeroCompany Name="Han_Solo_Team">
       ...
        <!-- <Company_Units>Han_Solo, Chewbacca</Company_Units> -->
        <Company_Units>Han_Solo</Company_Units>
       ...
    </HeroCompany>
 

Of Course we may now need a seperate Chewbacca Team. Or maybe make Han spawn Chewie like a starship spawns it's complement.

 

I guess Leia & C-3PO / Luke & R2D2 may have the same source of rebuilding troubles. The HeroUnit dies/deploys, yet the HeroCompany still exists somewhere, with the companion being the other valid member of the team.

Edited by Sûlherokhh, 20 April 2013 - 11:47 AM.

[a.fake.name]

Havent read the thread, but here's my two cents:

Permadeath should be possible, but rare.

 

Also, if it could be coded the odds should go up when your hero is on the attacking force, so if you risked the hero you also risk greater odds of loosing the hero.

 

Past that, the more out numbered you are, the higher the odds of a permadeath should be.

 

However, if possible, it would be cool to add land and space 'rescue' missions for the hero, IE: you go get an escape pod, then escape.

 

Past that, it should depend on the hero and that hero's place within star wars, which would actually make some minor characters MORE survivable than major heroes.

 

A key example would be Wedge Antillies and R2D2.

R2 survives EVERY movie like a champ, so should be incapable of a permadeath. Perhaps if possible, double the respawn time each time, or add a few minutes to the timer each time.

As for Wedge, he survived three movies, Darth Vader, and two Death Stars..... if he's in a fighter cockpit, he should pretty much not be perma killable.