Nomination thread: New features and bugfixes for Yitzi's patch 3.6

[Nevill]

I'm not sure either, but if you can provide a savegame to reproduce the 100% penalty, that would be good.

Sure.
http://www.4shared.com/file/2I9dbG0Pce/Aki_Zeta-5_of_the_Consciousnes.html

Conditions: be at war with the faction, be in range of the enemy artillery, successfully bombard the enemy territory that is in range of enemy artillery.
Consequences: you will spend your turn, and will be counter-bombarded with a 100% success chance as your power will be reduced to 0 due to a -100% penalty.

Suggestion: the duel should trigger before the attacker's turn is spent and instead of tile bombardment.

Also, there is a separate bug, or rather, an inconsistency you might notice in the order of how things are done. You can order a unit to bombard a tile that belongs to another faction, and that does not prompt 'do you want to break the truce' message by itself. If you fail the bombardment roll, your unit loses the turn, and that's it. The message is prompted only if you succeed in bombarding the tile, and the explosion animation is played. If, however, you refuse to declare vendetta, the improvements in the tile are not destroyed, as if nothing has happened.

How it should work - whenever you try to bombard a tile that belongs to another faction, the prompt to pronounce vendetta should appear. If you decline, the attack doesn't happen and the unit doesn't lose the turn. If you accept, you declare the vendetta and make thebombardment roll, with the usual results. If you fail - the unit loses turn. If you win, the improvement in the tile is destroyed.

Also, could you please look at this save file?
http://www.4shared.com/file/VS2MHq9Xba/Combat_vs_air_units.html
Use the cruiser to attack the wounded foil under a needlejet. Once of your foils (the leftmost one) loses a turn. What could possibly be causing this?

[Yitzi]

I'm not sure either, but if you can provide a savegame to reproduce the 100% penalty, that would be good.

Sure.
http://www.4shared.com/file/2I9dbG0Pce/Aki_Zeta-5_of_the_Consciousnes.html

I can't seem to get the save file to download without involving any downloaded .exe files.  Maybe you can just attach your version in this thread?

Suggestion: the duel should trigger before the attacker's turn is spent and instead of tile bombardment.

Clearly that should be the result...

Also, there is a separate bug, or rather, an inconsistency you might notice in the order of how things are done. You can order a unit to bombard a tile that belongs to another faction, and that does not prompt 'do you want to break the truce' message by itself. If you fail the bombardment roll, your unit loses the turn, and that's it. The message is prompted only if you succeed in bombarding the tile, and the explosion animation is played. If, however, you refuse to declare vendetta, the improvements in the tile are not destroyed, as if nothing has happened.

How it should work - whenever you try to bombard a tile that belongs to another faction, the prompt to pronounce vendetta should appear. If you decline, the attack doesn't happen and the unit doesn't lose the turn. If you accept, you declare the vendetta and make thebombardment roll, with the usual results. If you fail - the unit loses turn. If you win, the improvement in the tile is destroyed.

Seems reasonable.  However, you're limited to two bugfix nominations, so decide what you want to nominate.

Also, could you please look at this save file?
http://www.4shared.com/file/VS2MHq9Xba/Combat_vs_air_units.html

Again, 4shared doesn't work well for me, just attach it to your post right here.

Use the cruiser to attack the wounded foil under a needlejet. Once of your foils (the leftmost one) loses a turn. What could possibly be causing this?

Sounds like a bug that I could investigate and fix.  So post the files in the thread (or their own threads if you prefer, but not 4shared), and decide which bugfixes you want to nominate.

[Nevill]

Again, 4shared doesn't work well for me, just attach it to your post right here.

Done:
Combat vs air units.SAV - for movement bug demonstration
Aki Zeta-5 of the Consciousness, 2102.SAV - for hasty bug demonstration.

Is there a bug tracker thread or something where I can dump bug reports if I encounter any without creating separate threads or nominating them? I glanced at the forum but I see that every bug has a dedicated topic. Maybe there is a wiki entry for this stuff?

Anyway, I nominate 'limited Infiltration' and 'sea vs land combat to the death' as features, and fixing Artillery 'hasty' duels (and maybe some other associated quirks if they are somewhere near that particular piece of code) as a bugfix.

Either way, having exact values for each PROBE setting might be a bit much; better to just set the "X points, and each turn subtracts Y points minus Z per point of PROBE" approach.

More than one round, but not until one is dead.  I'm not so sure that's a bug, so I'm not fixing it (except as a moddable feature) without a consensus.

The reason to nominate the latter as a feature is that even though I might be able to get a consensus about it on this forum, there might still be people who disagree (I've linked to a discussion on another forum - no consensus was reached there).

I also nominate wrong timing of truce-breakingprompt for another bugfix. One example is above. Another one could be reproduced thusly: have a neutral (truce/treaty) faction's base with an interceptor and a unit (say, former) in it's interception radius. Try to attack the former with your air unit (say, needlejet). The interceptor will move to intercept first, and then, when it is in position, you will be asked whether or not you want to break a truce/treaty. If you refuse, the interceptor does not return to base and can no longer intercept any other units. You can effectively lure planes out of bases without breaking your diplomatic status.To me it's clear that the game is supposed to ask you about breaking truce when you attack the former, and only if you do should the interceptor be dispatched.

[Yitzi]

Again, 4shared doesn't work well for me, just attach it to your post right here.

Done:
Combat vs air units.SAV - for movement bug demonstration

Yep, that's a bug.  And it'll probably be an easy one, so I'll see if I can handle it easily for 3.5 without a nomination.

Aki Zeta-5 of the Consciousness, 2102.SAV - for hasty bug demonstration.

That would probably be a bit trickier to fix, and would need a nomination and vote.

Is there a bug tracker thread or something where I can dump bug reports if I encounter any without creating separate threads or nominating them? I glanced at the forum but I see that every bug has a dedicated topic. Maybe there is a wiki entry for this stuff?

I wouldn't know.  Although if you dump a bug report without going through the nomination and voting process then it doesn't get on my priority list.

Anyway, I nominate 'limited Infiltration' and 'sea vs land combat to the death' as features, and fixing Artillery 'hasty' duels (and maybe some other associated quirks if they are somewhere near that particular piece of code) as a bugfix.

Ok, nominations accepted.

I also nominate wrong timing of truce-breakingprompt for another bugfix.

Nomination accepted.

[DrazharLn]

There's no proper bug tracker. Management is slightly opposed to implementing one (unnecessary for current developers' workflow, takes attention from the forum) and we don't have the spare technical capacity to maintain one anyway.

Bugs have been tracked on a one thread per bug basis both at CGN (originally) and latterly here. I don't know if all the bugs mentioned on CGN have been dealt with or brought up here. I also don't know whether Yitzi or anyone systematically goes through the bugs that are reported here. They are good for referencing from threads like this, though.

[Yitzi]

Well, I started investigating that movement bug, and it's due to the fact that artillery, unlike normal attacks, does not update the "current unit" value...so when it tries to set the current unit's movement to 0, it gets the wrong unit.

To fix it properly (i.e. without risking adding other bugs, and with fixing any other bugs that have the same cause) would require further investigating the artillery code, which is big enough that it'll need to go through the normal nomination-and-voting process.

[Dio]

I am fairly certain that I have figured out where the function for the COMMFREQ Bonus exists. The actual test for the faction Bonus COMMFREQ occurs at address 005B3D36. I am uncertain exactly what occurs at this location. The other feaure I would want nominated is to fix the Morale Bonuses from Children's Creches and Brood Pits while a faction has a negative morale score.

COMMFREQ has already been fixed for 3.5.  But your nomination of fixing the effect of creches has been accepted.  (It's not clear what's even supposed to happen for Brood Pits, AFAIK.)

Based upon my analysis of the procedure, the effects of brood pits on the morale of Native Life is identical to that of Children's Creches except they appear to provide an additional +1 Morale bonus (including the bugs). The procedure for the visuals controls of the morale bonus starts at 004B3FD0. The procedure for the actual bonuses to morale from these facilities starts at address 00501940. Additionally, it appears as though Children's Creches also give Native Life the same Morale Bonus. However, the bonus from the Children's Creche does not stack with the bonus from a Brood Pit if both exist at the same base.

Speaking of bugs: I believe that when negating negative morale modifiers for units in a base with a creche, the game does not use this function, but rather just uses the result from social engineering/faction.  Thus, if the unit has the penalty reduced (either because that would put it below 0 or because its home base has a creche), the creche will actually add more than enough to compensate for the negative modifiers.

Also, while not technically a bug, the fact that the penalty is halved rounding down means that once you have creches, -1 MORALE is irrelevant (and so is -2 if you don't have command centers etc.).

Is it possible to have this particular feature nominated as a bugfix instead of as a feature because of your comment quoted above? I am also curious as to whether or not it is possible to have the Probe Team base morale limits nominated as a bugfix because I have made it function correctly. In addition, I have evidence that another individual thought it was a suspicious as well. The relevalent section of the quote from this individual's comment is below this sentence.

The first being how Probe teams can never be "Very Green" or "Green".  Rest of code relating to Probe team morale seems ok.

[Dio]

If the above request receives an affirmative from Yitzi, than I want to nominate targetted probe team tech steal as an option. The basic task of making it function requires an individual to change the jump condition at address 005A0123 from JNZ to JE. After this receives a change, it becomes necessary to realize that the second option of the #Decipher script does not allow an individual to steal world maps. In addition, I think the script #Stolenothing does not operate as expected. The second feature I want to nominate, if the previous request receives an affirmative, is the ability to have the scripts #AdvEnergy and #AdvEnergy1 fixed so that they work. My best guess at the moment as to why they do not operate involves the fact that the flag that controls this particular interlock never becomes used at another location. An example of the manner in which these flags are implemented appears at address 005A33C2. This particular address and flag corresponds with the network interlock for stealing technology.

[Yitzi]

I am fairly certain that I have figured out where the function for the COMMFREQ Bonus exists. The actual test for the faction Bonus COMMFREQ occurs at address 005B3D36. I am uncertain exactly what occurs at this location. The other feaure I would want nominated is to fix the Morale Bonuses from Children's Creches and Brood Pits while a faction has a negative morale score.

COMMFREQ has already been fixed for 3.5.  But your nomination of fixing the effect of creches has been accepted.  (It's not clear what's even supposed to happen for Brood Pits, AFAIK.)

Based upon my analysis of the procedure, the effects of brood pits on the morale of Native Life is identical to that of Children's Creches except they appear to provide an additional +1 Morale bonus (including the bugs). The procedure for the visuals controls of the morale bonus starts at 004B3FD0. The procedure for the actual bonuses to morale from these facilities starts at address 00501940. Additionally, it appears as though Children's Creches also give Native Life the same Morale Bonus. However, the bonus from the Children's Creche does not stack with the bonus from a Brood Pit if both exist at the same base.

Speaking of bugs: I believe that when negating negative morale modifiers for units in a base with a creche, the game does not use this function, but rather just uses the result from social engineering/faction.  Thus, if the unit has the penalty reduced (either because that would put it below 0 or because its home base has a creche), the creche will actually add more than enough to compensate for the negative modifiers.

Also, while not technically a bug, the fact that the penalty is halved rounding down means that once you have creches, -1 MORALE is irrelevant (and so is -2 if you don't have command centers etc.).

Is it possible to have this particular feature nominated as a bugfix instead of as a feature because of your comment quoted above? I am also curious as to whether or not it is possible to have the Probe Team base morale limits nominated as a bugfix because I have made it function correctly. In addition, I have evidence that another individual thought it was a suspicious as well. The relevalent section of the quote from this individual's comment is below this sentence.

The first being how Probe teams can never be "Very Green" or "Green".  Rest of code relating to Probe team morale seems ok.

The overcompensation could definitely be nominated as a bugfix, but the "making -1 MORALE irrelevant", while poor design, is not a bug and therefore a fix would need to be nominated as a feature.  The minimum of Disciplined is clearly intended by the designers...so whether you think it's a good idea or not, it's not a bug.

If the above request receives an affirmative from Yitzi

Better clarify whether what I just said counts as an affirmative here.

than I want to nominate targetted probe team tech steal as an option. The basic task of making it function requires an individual to change the jump condition at address 005A0123 from JNZ to JE. After this receives a change, it becomes necessary to realize that the second option of the #Decipher script does not allow an individual to steal world maps.

Should it?

In addition, I think the script #Stolenothing does not operate as expected.

How so?

The second feature I want to nominate, if the previous request receives an affirmative, is the ability to have the scripts #AdvEnergy and #AdvEnergy1 fixed so that they work. My best guess at the moment as to why they do not operate involves the fact that the flag that controls this particular interlock never becomes used at another location. An example of the manner in which these flags are implemented appears at address 005A33C2. This particular address and flag corresponds with the network interlock for stealing technology.

Ok...I'd have to investigate and see what's going on there.

[Dio]

than I want to nominate targetted probe team tech steal as an option. The basic task of making it function requires an individual to change the jump condition at address 005A0123 from JNZ to JE. After this receives a change, it becomes necessary to realize that the second option of the #Decipher script does not allow an individual to steal world maps.

Should it?
Yes it should because every other script in this particular procedure has a jump if equal command in that particular section. That particular command difference is the reason that the script does not appear while you attempt to steal technology.

In addition, I think the script #Stolenothing does not operate as expected.

How so?

Ok...I'd have to investigate and see what's going on there.

The second option for the #Decipher script always results in the loss of the probe team if the targetted Faction does not have any Technology to steal. This occurs regardless of whether or not you have stolen the world map. I believe the #stolenothing script does not function because it is jumped over if the faction AI does not specific conditions activated before it even checks if the faction is human or AI controlled.

[Dio]

I am fairly certain that I have figured out where the function for the COMMFREQ Bonus exists. The actual test for the faction Bonus COMMFREQ occurs at address 005B3D36. I am uncertain exactly what occurs at this location. The other feaure I would want nominated is to fix the Morale Bonuses from Children's Creches and Brood Pits while a faction has a negative morale score.

COMMFREQ has already been fixed for 3.5.  But your nomination of fixing the effect of creches has been accepted.  (It's not clear what's even supposed to happen for Brood Pits, AFAIK.)

Based upon my analysis of the procedure, the effects of brood pits on the morale of Native Life is identical to that of Children's Creches except they appear to provide an additional +1 Morale bonus (including the bugs). The procedure for the visuals controls of the morale bonus starts at 004B3FD0. The procedure for the actual bonuses to morale from these facilities starts at address 00501940. Additionally, it appears as though Children's Creches also give Native Life the same Morale Bonus. However, the bonus from the Children's Creche does not stack with the bonus from a Brood Pit if both exist at the same base.

Speaking of bugs: I believe that when negating negative morale modifiers for units in a base with a creche, the game does not use this function, but rather just uses the result from social engineering/faction.  Thus, if the unit has the penalty reduced (either because that would put it below 0 or because its home base has a creche), the creche will actually add more than enough to compensate for the negative modifiers.

Also, while not technically a bug, the fact that the penalty is halved rounding down means that once you have creches, -1 MORALE is irrelevant (and so is -2 if you don't have command centers etc.).

Is it possible to have this particular feature nominated as a bugfix instead of as a feature because of your comment quoted above? I am also curious as to whether or not it is possible to have the Probe Team base morale limits nominated as a bugfix because I have made it function correctly. In addition, I have evidence that another individual thought it was a suspicious as well. The relevalent section of the quote from this individual's comment is below this sentence.

The first being how Probe teams can never be "Very Green" or "Green".  Rest of code relating to Probe team morale seems ok.

The overcompensation could definitely be nominated as a bugfix, but the "making -1 MORALE irrelevant", while poor design, is not a bug and therefore a fix would need to be nominated as a feature.  The minimum of Disciplined is clearly intended by the designers...so whether you think it's a good idea or not, it's not a bug.

If the above request receives an affirmative from Yitzi

Better clarify whether what I just said counts as an affirmative here.

than I want to nominate targetted probe team tech steal as an option. The basic task of making it function requires an individual to change the jump condition at address 005A0123 from JNZ to JE. After this receives a change, it becomes necessary to realize that the second option of the #Decipher script does not allow an individual to steal world maps.

Should it?

In addition, I think the script #Stolenothing does not operate as expected.

How so?

The second feature I want to nominate, if the previous request receives an affirmative, is the ability to have the scripts #AdvEnergy and #AdvEnergy1 fixed so that they work. My best guess at the moment as to why they do not operate involves the fact that the flag that controls this particular interlock never becomes used at another location. An example of the manner in which these flags are implemented appears at address 005A33C2. This particular address and flag corresponds with the network interlock for stealing technology.

Ok...I'd have to investigate and see what's going on there.

I will then have the children's creche nominated as a bugfix with the expection of the -1 Morale feature. I also want to nominate as a bugfix the factenergy script. The two features I want nominated include the fixing of the AdvEnergy and AdvEnergy1 scripts, and a second option I will announce later.

[Dio]

Would it be feasible to include the additional bonuses for the Citizens as described in the #CitizenHeck section of the help file? This might become my second nomination if it remains a viable option.

[Dio]

The minimum of Disciplined is clearly intended by the designers...so whether you think it's a good idea or not, it's not a bug.

I believe it is reasonable to allow this option for individuals that want to play with both Probe Teams that start at the Green Morale Level and the associated features that come with this change. As a result, I believe it might become necessary for me to release a minor update that enables these features if you decide that you do not agree with Probe Teams starting at a Green morale level.

[Yitzi]

than I want to nominate targetted probe team tech steal as an option. The basic task of making it function requires an individual to change the jump condition at address 005A0123 from JNZ to JE. After this receives a change, it becomes necessary to realize that the second option of the #Decipher script does not allow an individual to steal world maps.

Should it?
Yes it should because every other script in this particular procedure has a jump if equal command in that particular section. That particular command difference is the reason that the script does not appear while you attempt to steal technology.

In addition, I think the script #Stolenothing does not operate as expected.

How so?

Ok...I'd have to investigate and see what's going on there.

The second option for the #Decipher script always results in the loss of the probe team if the targetted Faction does not have any Technology to steal. This occurs regardless of whether or not you have stolen the world map.

Ah, thank you.  That sounds like a bug.

I believe the #stolenothing script does not function because it is jumped over if the faction AI does not specific conditions activated before it even checks if the faction is human or AI controlled.

Ok, thank you.

I will then have the children's creche nominated as a bugfix with the expection of the -1 Morale feature. I also want to nominate as a bugfix the factenergy script. The two features I want nominated include the fixing of the AdvEnergy and AdvEnergy1 scripts, and a second option I will announce later.

Ok, accepted.  The creche bug will probably get a high vote modifier, since it's a fairly easy fix.  (It would be even easier if not for the need to distinguish between a unit "defending with its weapon" and one attacking from the base...but so things are.)

Would it be feasible to include the additional bonuses for the Citizens as described in the #CitizenHeck section of the help file? This might become my second nomination if it remains a viable option.

It would be fairly major, though doable at the cost of limiting bonuses to a maximum of 127 and minimum of -128.  (I don't think that will be an issue.)  We'd have to figure out what each of those bonuses means, though.

The minimum of Disciplined is clearly intended by the designers...so whether you think it's a good idea or not, it's not a bug.

I believe it is reasonable to allow this option for individuals that want to play with both Probe Teams that start at the Green Morale Level and the associated features that come with this change. As a result, I believe it might become necessary for me to release a minor update that enables these features if you decide that you do not agree with Probe Teams starting at a Green morale level.

The problem is that we first need to accommodate those who want to play starting with Disciplined...so in order to make it ok for both, we need to make it user-moddable, and that means it needs to be done as a feature rather than a bugfix.  I'm all for the change, but I don't think we can do it in a way that affects everybody.

[Dio]

Would it be feasible to include the additional bonuses for the Citizens as described in the #CitizenHeck section of the help file? This might become my second nomination if it remains a viable option.

It would be fairly major, though doable at the cost of limiting bonuses to a maximum of 127 and minimum of -128.  (I don't think that will be an issue.)  We'd have to figure out what each of those bonuses means, though.

I think it best that we stick with tackling the probe team issues at the moment because that way the workload remains manageable, and we can tackle issues that already exist within the game before adding anymore features that might create additional issues. I am able to help with the probe teams because I have become fairly familiar with that section of the code. I think I will stick with the nominations for the probe teams except for the fact that so many of them have a classification as "features." I had an idea this morning. This idea went something along the lines of the fact that the game already checks a maximum and a minimum morale level for probe teams. Would it become possible to add a variable in alphax that corresponds to the location in this procedure that checks the the probe team morale level before it returns from the procedure?  This would allow an individual to set the maximum and minimum morale levels that the game uses while determining probe team morale.
Most of the citizens bonuses appear fairly clear except for one.
The efficiency bonus could operate in a similar manner to a children's creches.
The morale bonus could operate in a similar manner to either the children's crèche or command center depending upon what people want.
The Psi Defense bonus could increase the basic base bonus during psi combat.
The commerce bonus appears fairly clear because I have a fairly good Idea where the game calculates the commerce income at each base. I imagine it might operate as a commerce tech for the purpose of that base.
The aliens bonus could operate in a similar manner to biology labs.
The production bonus remains the only questionable bonus because it could mean many different features depending upon the context.