Various suggestions

[KDR_11k]

Yes, descriptive title, I know.

Damage limit targeting or force spread targeting: I've got an anti-swarm unit that mounts eight laser guns. Now of course it doesn't need all eight of them to destroy those swarmers. It would be nice if I could tell it to have each weapon try to seek a different target. Optimally units would know how much damage their target can still take and will pick a new target once a lethal dosis has been launched (granted, the projectiles could miss) like they do in Perimeter. That would also work better with snipers, currently if you have a number of sniper units in a place and a single unit enters your LOS all snipers will fire at it at once even though one of them could easily destroy it. Then they have to reload while the rest of the troop enters your LOS.

"Unit done" script call for factories: Pretty simple, a function that gets called (if present) when a factory finishes one unit so we could add an animation to that.

Burst fire script call: During a burst fire the FireWeapon* function is called only once (was the same in OTA IIRC), if you want the projectiles to emerge from different gunpoints you have to use QueryWeapon* but that gets called when the unit is aiming as well, causing it to skip some gunpoints.

Virtual unit for targets leaving detection: I've mentioned that in another thread: When there is an attack order on a unit and that unit leaves your detection (both radar and LOS), instead of keeping the order a virtual unit is created, which is simply a tag that's moving at a constant velocity (last known velocity of the unit), serves as a target for the attacking units (maybe with a spread depending on the age of the VU) and has a timeout and associated unit type. If it times out, it disappears and the attack order is cancelled. If something enters detection nearby, it gets targeted if it's either a radar blip or the same unit type. This would prevent artillery from shelling a target long after it has left detection and magically knowing when that target has been destroyed.

Mod-defined ressources: Instead of forcing everyone to have metal and energy and extract metal from those patches in the ground it would be great if mods could define their own ressource system (just a list of ressource names probably) and have all ressources treated equal (so I could have an energy extractor or something).

Ressource bounties: As a weapon property, allow a weapon to generate ressources if it hits an enemy, possibly multiplied by the damage done. Just giving a negative cost would allow firing it at the ground and getting ressources.

Shield damage values: You can define damage for every unit type but you can't tell a weapon to e.g. do triple damage against shields.

Numeric shield values in the unit stats: So we could have invisible shields while still telling the user when it's depleted.

Use reclaim as automatic attack: I was thinking about having attack units that attack by reclaiming enemies but that'd require massive microing. If I could tell the unit to automatically attempt to reclaim enemies nearby that would be great.

Don't fire at blips: Firing a sniper weapon at a radar blip is futile anyway so it should be possible to tell a unit not to bother with that and wait until LOS is established.

Start transports loaded?: May be useful for some mods, define what units are loaded when the transport is built. A step further would be to allow transports to produce units that are automatically put into its storage (obviously halting production when no more spots are free). This would also allow mounting upgrade weapons on a unit.

EDIT: This could be extended by allowing a transport to be set up so its transported units will automatically deploy and attack when the transporter receives an attack order and optionally the units could be forced to return to the transporter afterwards (not allowing player intervention), this could be used to implement the aircrafts returning to their airbase or to do something like the Carriers from Starcraft.

Force return to airbase: I'm sure many mods are already asking for this: Having planes return to their airbase after use.

Global variables for unit scripts: Of course global only to a player. Might be useful for handling upgrades and research.

I apologize if this is the wrong forum for that and for any and all of the above features that are already implemented or in the process of being so.

[Felix the Cat]

Yes.

Noize is going to tell you to make a patch.

Too bad we have very few coders active in Spring.

[Gnomre]

There's a get UNIT_BUILD_PERCENT_LEFT script operator which factories can use to detect if a unit is done. See the changelog for details on that, I believe.

About the virtual unit: Like the ghost buildings, but for mobiles? I don't know about that one... but then again, if it's not forced on us all, I wouldn't care.

I think someone mentioned you can add shields to armor.txt by adding the shield's weapon name. I've not tried it though.

Agree on the shield HP report. Needs displayed for all shields.

I've been asking for "Don't fire at blips without a targetting facility" since day one. Spring's over a year old now.

Start transports loaded would be cool too. We eventually want to do the large droid rack from Episode 1 for SWTA, and ideally it'd start out with a full array of battle droids instead of needing to load them all manually.

[Erom]

I really don't like the virtual unit idea. Far too complicated. The transport stuff would of course be awesome though.

[Min3mat]

Damage limit targeting or force spread targeting: I've got an anti-swarm unit that mounts eight laser guns. Now of course it doesn't need all eight of them to destroy those swarmers. It would be nice if I could tell it to have each weapon try to seek a different target. Optimally units would know how much damage their target can still take and will pick a new target once a lethal dosis has been launched (granted, the projectiles could miss) like they do in Perimeter. That would also work better with snipers, currently if you have a number of sniper units in a place and a single unit enters your LOS all snipers will fire at it at once even though one of them could easily destroy it. Then they have to reload while the rest of the troop enters your LOS.

this is the wondaas of teh micro. also units target teh unit with the least HP within their range so a long line should spread fire a fair bit against identical foes

Virtual unit for targets leaving detection: I've mentioned that in another thread: When there is an attack order on a unit and that unit leaves your detection (both radar and LOS), instead of keeping the order a virtual unit is created, which is simply a tag that's moving at a constant velocity (last known velocity of the unit), serves as a target for the attacking units (maybe with a spread depending on the age of the VU) and has a timeout and associated unit type. If it times out, it disappears and the attack order is cancelled. If something enters detection nearby, it gets targeted if it's either a radar blip or the same unit type. This would prevent artillery from shelling a target long after it has left detection and magically knowing when that target has been destroyed.

yeah...that would be so great. gameplay would be so much better...i think its a wonderful idea...yeah brilliant fantastic...inspired. (GO TO HELL)

Ressource bounties: As a weapon property, allow a weapon to generate ressources if it hits an enemy, possibly multiplied by the damage done. Just giving a negative cost would allow firing it at the ground and getting ressources.

interesting and allowing further moddability of the engine. i like.

Shield damage values: You can define damage for every unit type but you can't tell a weapon to e.g. do triple damage against shields.

triple the damage, make it do 1/3 damage to all unit ty

pes


Numeric shield values in the unit stats: So we could have invisible shields while still telling the user when it's depleted.

new GUI ;.;

Use reclaim as automatic attack: I was thinking about having attack units that attack by reclaiming enemies but that'd require massive microing. If I could tell the unit to automatically attempt to reclaim enemies nearby that would be great.

moronic...

Don't fire at blips: Firing a sniper weapon at a radar blip is futile anyway so it should be possible to tell a unit not to bother with that and wait until LOS is established.

ghosted buildings, groups of units, luck?

Start transports loaded?: May be useful for some mods, define what units are loaded when the transport is built. A step further would be to allow transports to produce units that are automatically put into its storage (obviously halting production when no more spots are free). This would also allow mounting upgrade weapons on a unit.

EDIT: This could be extended by allowing a transport to be set up so its transported units will automatically deploy and attack when the transporter receives an attack order and optionally the units could be forced to return to the transporter afterwards (not allowing player intervention), this could be used to implement the aircrafts returning to their airbase or to do something like the Carriers from Starcraft.

Force return to airbase: I'm sure many mods are already asking for this: Having planes return to their airbase after use.

both good, diversify the engine!

[esteroth12]

Don't fire at blips: Firing a sniper weapon at a radar blip is futile anyway so it should be possible to tell a unit not to bother with that and wait until LOS is established.

ghosted buildings, groups of units, luck?

you could just tell the sniper to hold fire and check the line every now and then...

[Erom]

Dude, the autoreclaim isn't moronic at all, min! We should be able to set units to default to other orders other than 'attack' when they see enemy units. For example, a biological unit that gets resources for it's team by "eating" enemy troops would default to reclaim. A 'hacker' unit that defaults to Capture? Lots of possibilities.

[esteroth12]

yeah, the Commando (it may return to AA soon) was a cloaked stealth unit that stunned and then captured targets... it would be nice to have it default to capture... although this would reduce micro, which is why Mat is probably against it