New mod gives OTA a slew of new features

[carbon]

A new mod for the original Total Annihilation uses many interesting features that have been devoid in TA game play since its inception. This new mod, Devolution, makes it possible to seemingly modify unit stats based on certain events, i.e. closeness of one unit to another (see the Galactic Gate/Commander system), unit bonuses (armour/rate of fire bonuses) due to proximity, unit upgrades (increased stats new/more powerful weapons) as units gain levels, hero-type units (called Captains).

All of these features seem like they would be great additions to the Spring engine. And if the OTA engine can do it then I am sure the Spring engine can. I have no idea how this was done, but I am guessing it is just some clever BOS scripting. If that is the case then I am betting all of these features can be ported to Spring without any modification to the engine.

This seems like one amazing mod which hopefully can be ported to the Spring engine. The features I mentioned above are touted as the "new" features. This makes me wonder what other ingenious features have been prevalent in the mod for some time.

Somebody interested in converting this mod to be playable in Spring!?! I wonder how hard it would be. Anyway, the mod sounds like it could be fun... gonna dust off my copy of TA and try it out.

See the front page of tauniverse for the post, or see this link (tauniverse.com/forum/showthread.php?t=36801) to download the mod.

Here is an excerpt from Boogie's post on TAU about the new features of the mod:

New Features:
Galactic Gate/Commander System: Instead of your Commander, you start the game with a Deployment Scout. This unit builds your Galactic Gate (for free), and the Gate then builds your Commander (for free). If your Galactic Gate dies, you lose the game, but when your Commander is nearby, it has a shield which makes it invincible, except to a D-Gun hit. The Commander is also much more powerful, as it is faster and has better armor. When the Commander leaves the area, its D-Gun begins to take longer and longer to reload. If they Commander leaves or is destroyed, the Gate├â┬ó├óÔÇÜ┬¼├óÔÇ×┬ós shield also goes down, making it vulnerable to attack.

This concept allows for players to rely heavily on the Commander as a defense against rushes as well as making it easier to defend your base, while at the same time making it very difficult to abuse the improved Commander for offensive purposes.

Captains: Each side gets a choice of 3 Captains, which players may build one of at a time, available at Tech Level 3. Captains provide bonuses to nearby friendly units, making them extremely valuable for leading your units into combat. Each Captain is totally unique, and has 3 different levels it gains as it gets kills. At Level 3 Captains obtain a unique ability, making them even more important on the battlefield.

Bonuses range from unit to unit, but each unit├â┬ó├óÔÇÜ┬¼├óÔÇ×┬ós bonus makes it roughly 2 times as powerful. This is done through armor bonuses, rate of fire bonuses, and new weapons.

Any time you guys want to play, you can find me on MSN, SN is Boogalizer@hotmail.com.
I hope to be releasing regular updates to Version 4, which is something I haven├â┬ó├óÔÇÜ┬¼├óÔÇ×┬ót done in the past, but to do that I require some playing!

[Peet]

Several mods have various combinations of these features, actually (CvC and s1944 to name a couple).

[carbon]

What mods have units that give armour and rate of fire bonuses to nearby friendly/allied units? I have seen the hero/captain system before, but not like this. I know Gundam uses hero units, but those are just simply very powerful units that are limited to 1 on the map at a time. Also, what mods have units that get upgraded stats and new weapons as they increase in level (besides the increase in hp based on experience that has been in Spring for a long time)?

Also, I thought it was just cool how the commander became less powerful as he moved away fromt the galactic gate. That seems like a unique idea I can't imagine that any mod would come up with.

[smoth]

WOO HOO SOMEONE KNOWS GUNDAM EXISTS!

[Zydox]

what mods have units that get upgraded stats and new weapons as they increase in level (besides the increase in hp based on experience that has been in Spring for a long time)?

War Evolution 1.7

[KDR_11k]

Try Star Wars, Zwzsg is their scripter so you can expect LOTS of such nastiness.

We can do all of that, it's pretty much all the same code. Only problem is it's VERY demanding on the CPU. Also most mods just don't want to use it because it doesn't fit their game design.

[zwzsg]

Oh, no, not exactly. I was one of their scripter for SWTA pack 6, which never got released. There I made droids that stopped moving and firing when control center was taken, I made jedi give bonus to adjacent infantry*, I made the orbital strike, I fixed the transport, I made a Multi Unit Air Transport, I made a mass auto load auto unload for the AT-AT, etc...

But:
- It was for TA, not for Spring.
- It was never released.

The current StarWar spring scripter is Argh, I think. Oh and Gnome did lots of scripting, both for SWTA pack 6 and SWS. *For instance I just made the template for the jedi giving bonus, and it's him who wrote the final script.


For a TA mod using lots of cool new script tricks, I recommend Talon, by TheRegisteredOne. It has thing such as buildable commander upgrades, mind control tower, rolling cathedral leaving trail of fire, Stargates, ...

[KDR_11k]

I thought Argh was working on some kind of realism mod?

[FLOZi]

Heh, you must be just about the only person unaware of Arghs 'secret' project.

[j5mello]

apparently KDR didn't get the memo

[Neddie]

I got the memo.

[KDR_11k]

Dunno, he seemed to assume I know about it but never made more than vague allusions that it involves infantry and of course his goal of having perfectly realistic animations (by the time he's done with that we can deliver him to the sanatorium).

[tombom]

Heh, you must be just about the only person unaware of Arghs 'secret' project.

I'm unaware.

Goddamnit

[smoth]

heh, good luck with "realistic" animation. He will have a fun time with units runing in place when turning. The spring movement system is not best suited for walking units.

[TheRegisteredOne]

I'd like to say that Devolution is not the first mod to do this, the first unit to actually get affected by other units is Genghis Khan's missile truck thing (way back in 2000ish), which needs to be in close proximity to its originating factory to reload its missiles. Also, upgradable units are already available before hand, such as spybots that can disable fusions when they are in close proximity, and buildable upgrades for your commander, these features are included in Talon as zwzsg has mentioned. In creating TA:D, Boogie actually use my code and consulted me on how to make the captains work, so TA:D might seem very revolutionary, but that is because of your gross ignorance of the happenings in TA modding.

Also check out crazy stuff made by zwzsg like stargates, and air transports that can transport more than 1 unit.

[Zoombie]

Yeah Zwzg is good, mmmkay.

And I also did not get the memo.

Did Argh put the new cover on his TPS reports?

[Warlord Zsinj]

Eek, Argh's been outed >_>

I'd really like to release pack6 actually. It got to a reasonably stable set with the Jedi (I'd probably leave the ATAT out). I just haven't touched it in so long, I barely have any idea how to deal with it anymore...

[carbon]

Yes, none of these features may be new to the TA or Spring engine and one or two of them may have existed in older mods in the past. However, TA:D seems to incorporate all of them rather nicely into a mod that uses them in a way that can introduce new strategies/tactics into TA's traditional game play model. Sure, a single missile truck may have existed that could only reload near its factory, but that is hardly an innovation as noteworthy as the kind of game play that TA:D brings to the table. These "innovations" I speak of are hardly features that I saw and thought "OMGZORZ! sum guy maed this ova tha weekend!!!!1". I am aware of several of these small leaps and unique features added to the TA engine. I recall back in the late 90's when I used to check TAU every day for several years and try out new mods for OTA all the time. The first interesting feature I remember seeing was a tank (the Greyhound I believe) made by TADD that had random textures assigned to it (by hiding and showing different faces) to make it seem like each tank had a unique number painted on the side of it. I have also seen zwzsg's scripting wonders in other mods such as SWTA (the transports are awesome). However, I feel that TA:D really presents a "whole package" that incorporates several of these features into a single mod which greatly changes game play, whereas other mods have only used them for aesthetics or have just changed the strategies relating to a handful of units. TA:D has units that affect several of TA's key LVL1 and LVL2 units by giving them armour/ROF/damage increases. This gives players incentive to strategically plan out what units to group with their captains and take into consideration the kind of bonuses they receive, which will allow players to use them to take advantage of their enemy's weaknesses. Also, the use of the Commander has changed drastically. Players must value him even more and carefully plan out how and where they will use him. THIS is what makes TA:D seem so revolutionary. I used to make units for OTA so I can imagine how much work it takes to make a mod that has these features and game play changes. Perhaps the "gross ignorance" TheRegisteredOne speaks of is due to the fact that no other mod has presented itself as well and has incorporated all of these "new" features as TA:D seems to have done. Or perhaps it├â┬ó├óÔÇÜ┬¼├óÔÇ×┬ós due to the fact that the version of TA:D that has these features is new and it got a spot on the TAU front page. I remember hearing of Talon for a while, but it never caught my interest as it just seemed like another Mynn type race when it first came out. But if it is really as great as I am hearing I kind of wonder why it has been such a well kept secret. It should be promoted! The Talon mod is OTA only, right? I have never seen a Talon game hosted in the lobby, so I am only guessing. I have kind of lost interest in the OTA community in recent years (I converted to Spring the day it came out), so if anybody had bothered to promote it then that is probably why I didn├â┬ó├óÔÇÜ┬¼├óÔÇ×┬ót know Talon used some of these features.

P.S. Argh is working on "realistic animations" in Spring? He is really light years ahead of his time. Shouldn't he wait until the skeletal animation system is added to Spring? That is IF it ever gets added. I wonder if any devs have made any progress on that...

[Peet]

I was unaware until I was bored one day and saw that Argh's server has directory listing enabled..
>_>
<_<

[TheRegisteredOne]

yes, it is ota only.

as for why captains are not found in other mods. Firstly, there are several inconvenient issues with the captain idea:
1. it lags when units have to constantly cycle through 5000 unit ids and checks the height of the unit to detect the presence of captains, it lags even more when you have 200 of such units on the map.
2. it makes little sense for the units near the captain's presense to magically gain bonuses or for captains to magically gain upgrades through killing enemy units. It would make more sense for player to build upgrades instead
3. convoluted starting build pattern: Not only does it make very little sense for the magical stuff that happens to your starting units (instabuild command center absorbes the recon scout, builds commander etc), it is also makes it hard for the ai to perform, and when push comes to shove, mods are more likely to be singleplayer than multiplayer.