Qustion about abilities

[Justtryer]

I am a newbye here. And I'm thinking about RTS game. But there are some questions about the engine.

1. I would like to create 5 resourses. Is it possible?
2. I would like to create 10 teams (races). Same question.
3. Each team will build special own units and buildings. Same question again.
4. I would like to create units that can't attack or move without resourses.
5. I would like to create resourse transport to deliver resourses from base or commander to units.

Well. Is it possible to do it? Or maybe it's better to find another engine? Or it is possible but difficult?

[smoth]

yes. some will be a lot of work, some won't.

[Justtryer]

yes. some will be a lot of work, some won't.

Thanks.
And can you tell a little bit more? What is hard to do? What isn't?
I'm guessing that resourse transportation must be the hardest thing. Am I right?

[FLOZi]

All are doable.

Spring only supports 2 resources 'out of the box' but with lua you can add as many as you wish. Resource transports needn't be that tricky, CnC harvester-type resource system has been done before.

Creating all the art content for, and moreover balancing, 10 races is more of a problem than any technical issues.

Here's jmo;

1. I would like to create 5 resourses. Is it possible?

Possible. Reasonable effort required but has been done before.

2. I would like to create 10 teams (races). Same question.

No technical limitation on number of races.

3. Each team will build special own units and buildings. Same question again.

Teams build options are entirely up to you down to each individual's units build menus.

4. I would like to create units that can't attack or move without resourses.

Possible. Would tie in to the resources code so would require some effort (though I think perhaps the previous code may have done something similar anyway - ask Smoth, he wrote it)

5. I would like to create resourse transport to deliver resourses from base or commander to units.

Possible. Shouldn't really be too hard, either.

Well. Is it possible to do it? Or maybe it's better to find another engine? Or it is possible but difficult?

1. All possible
2. I doubt there are any engines better suited than Spring (generally, for almost all RTS game designs)
3. Difficulty subjectively depends on your time, effort and coding ability.

[Justtryer]

Thanks a lot.

[smoth]

Possible. Would tie in to the resources code so would require some effort (though I think perhaps the previous code may have done something similar anyway - ask Smoth, he wrote it)

would be remiss if I didn't clarify, kdr wrote the base, I have just been bug fixing and augmenting it. I should perhaps consider doing something to make it more readily support more than 3 resource. It would not be hard at all and maybe make it a bit cleaner.

[SpliFF]

Spring1944 also has an example of custom resources (based on territory occupied - similiar to Company of Heroes).

The Spring engine will manage 2 resources (essentially metal/energy like TA) but you can bypass the engine and manage your own resources in Lua code. Then when a harvester pulls in to your depots you simply increment your internal resource counters based on the amount/type of resource carried and when you later build something you check the counters and abort/pause/disable the build if your required resources aren't there. You have control of all necessary aspects via your code so your limitations in all the cases you raised are entirely dependent on your ability to program the behaviour.

In short, the engine won't stop you but nor will it help you. You're basically "taking over" a built-in feature and there is certainly no harm in that provided you weren't expecting it all to happen "automagically" with minimal effort.

You could ask for a more flexible resource system as an engine feature request but I wouldn't expect too much. The general trend is towards removing gameplay-specific features from the engine, not adding new ones since Spring has evolved beyond TA and now addresses a wider range of gameplay styles through more flexible Lua interfaces rather than hardcoded features.

For most of us here that's a good thing.

[FLOZi]

Spring1944 also has an example of custom resources (based on territory occupied - similiar to Company of Heroes).

S44 has different methods for collection - Flags for metal which are essentially capturable mexes with a custom written capturing code (units within radius rather than unit actively attacking / capturing flag) and 'max out your storage on a timer' for energy - but at it's heart it still uses the OTA / Spring default resources for production and consumption.

N.B. So does MCL (metal generated by damaging/killing enemy units and on standard amount per tick, energy is used totally differently to represent total weight of mechs in use)- I'm too lazy to write my own custom resources gadget unless I really have to.

It's a fair point though that even if you choose to use M&E to simplify the process you aren't really locked into the traditional OTA methods for production.

[zwzsg]

Kernel Panic's buffer could be considered a custom resource, and is fairly simple.