SMACX Thinker Mod

[MisterPachanga]

I am using the thinker mod v2.0 with PRACX v1.11 and can't automate the base governors.
Once a building is completed, they want to keep building the same thing.

What am I doing wrong?

[Induktio]

Alrighty, I decided to get back with this development. There's a couple of things that could be added in or fixed from the previous release.

> I think there is a bug with free formers. Progenitors and Planet Cult don't get them.

This is probably caused by the fact they spawn a couple of turns late. Free units only get assigned on turn 1 in this implementation.

> Got a feature request idea while poking around the morale function: Any chance you can expose these turn thresholds for native lifecycle increases in thinker.ini?

> my group noticed that transports and isles of the deep have a very high chance of fishing alien artifacts out of sea pods. Irritating little bug.

Do you know if anything has been implemented about these on WTP?

I'm also considering if there's any bugfixes to import from WTP mod. I probably won't import any large game mechanics changes as usual to keep the scope of this project smaller. But smaller bugfix style improvements are certainly welcome. What would be the most important ones here?

> I am using the thinker mod v2.0 with PRACX v1.11 and can't automate the base governors.

Don't remember any bug reports about these. Are there any differences to the vanilla binary here?

[Alpha Centauri Bear]

Alrighty, I decided to get back with this development. There's a couple of things that could be added in or fixed from the previous release.

> I think there is a bug with free formers. Progenitors and Planet Cult don't get them.

This is probably caused by the fact they spawn a couple of turns late. Free units only get assigned on turn 1 in this implementation.

If interested I've hooked this on setup_faction function instead of relying on turn count. This solved it for later appearing factions.

> Got a feature request idea while poking around the morale function: Any chance you can expose these turn thresholds for native lifecycle increases in thinker.ini?

> my group noticed that transports and isles of the deep have a very high chance of fishing alien artifacts out of sea pods. Irritating little bug.

Do you know if anything has been implemented about these on WTP?

Nope.

[MisterPachanga]

> I am using the thinker mod v2.0 with PRACX v1.11 and can't automate the base governors.

Don't remember any bug reports about these. Are there any differences to the vanilla binary here?

I am playing with the GOG Planetary Pack.
No changes to any file. Only when I am playing with the terranx_mod is when I see this behavior. The base governor works fine on unmodded SMAC and SMACX.

Sure I am doing something wrong, I just don't know what it is

[Alpha Centauri Bear]

Can anyone build up a reproducible test case with the save?
Induktio is back in business (as he mentioned on Riot) so he may look into it.

[Induktio]

Well, obviously I'm reading this thread too.

> No changes to any file. Only when I am playing with the terranx_mod is when I see this behavior. The base governor works fine on unmodded SMAC and SMACX.

It could be possible it's related to some fix in Scient's patch. Generally Thinker should just skip player-owned bases and not affect their behaviour. You could just try using build queues as a workaround in the meantime.

[Marty651]

It could be possible it's related to some fix in Scient's patch. Generally Thinker should just skip player-owned bases and not affect their behaviour. You could just try using build queues as a workaround in the meantime.

Hi Induktio,
I can confirm this issue. You mean a reason could be a fix you added to Scient's patch? Because this doesn't happen with Scient V2.1.

[Induktio]

This mod just imports Scient's patch with no modifications.

Based on some testing it appears one of Thinker's functions interferes with governors on player-owned bases. Looks like this one is pretty simple to fix unless I missed something. Almost nobody seems to use governors since this wasn't reported before.

[Induktio]

Good news, v2.1 is now available from project website.

One of the most long awaited features is some kind of balance in combat between different reactors. I implemented a new patch called ignore_reactor_power for this purpose. It's still considered experimental but I encourage players to enable it. Many other minor fixes were also included in this release. Here's the rest of the changelog:

(click to show/hide)

## Version 2.1 (2020-11-08)
* New option: ignore_reactor_power (disabled by default). This makes the combat calculation ignore reactor power and treat every unit as having a fission reactor. Combat odds are also properly displayed in the confirmation dialog. More advanced reactors still provide their usual cost discounts. Planet busters are unaffected by this feature.
* New option: territory_border_fix will make the oldest bases claim tiles that are equidistant between two bases of different factions. Coastal bases also expand territory into the ocean for each of the 20 workable tiles in the base radius.
* Addition to eco_damage_fix: clean minerals cap will now increase every time Tree Farm, Hybrid Forest, Centauri Preserve or Temple of Planet is built even if no fungal pop has been encountered yet. It is not necessary anymore to delay building these facilities to alleviate eco damage.
* Faction placement is improved on custom maps where some starting locations were not previously picked.
* AI production planner tries to avoid building certain secret projects if they yield only marginal benefits.
* Include also TALENT and ROBUST modifiers in social_ai calculation.
* Fix issue where alien factions didn't gain the bonuses provided by free_colony_pods or free_formers.
* Fix issue where governors didn't sometimes work in player-owned bases.
* Fix AI vehicle home base reassignment bug where an apparent oversight made the game engine to reassign vehicles to bases with mineral_surplus < 2. Credits: Will To Power mod.

[Induktio]

Due to an apparent oversight, it looks like revised_tech_cost is not working in v2.1. It just defaults to the vanilla cost mechanics. This will be fixed in the next release. Other than that, haven't seen any big issues with the latest version though.

[EmpathCrawler]

Hell yeah, going to have to play again.

[Marty651]

Hell yeah, going to have to play again.

Definitely! Especially since Induktio released V2.2 three days ago!

[Induktio]

Hell yeah, going to have to play again.

Sure, tell us how the game went also.

And another note... there were some features (like diplomacy changes) that I considered for this update, but those ultimately didn't make the final cut. I'm not sure if those would make a sufficient impact to be necessary for inclusion in the game.

[EmpathCrawler]

Speaking of diplomacy changes: I wonder if, and I haven't though this out at all, it would help the AIs if non-aquatic factions that lost all of their land bases would become heavily inclined to submit to their enemies. It would be much better for the victorious AI to not have to follow up a decisive victory on land with sea base whack a mole that can last a century. They could instead benefit from the commerce income and get to move on to their next enemy.


I'm actually not even sure if AIs sign submission pacts with each other.

[Induktio]

Well, I don't remember AIs ever signing pacts of surrender amongst themselves.

Anyway, I found a simple way to implement the cpu usage fix (config option cpu_idle_fix) on the mod. It should now significantly reduce cpu cycles while the game is idling. It's available for preview in develop build 20201122.

Another small change in the build: factions with negative SE RESEARCH value will now start to accumulate labs from the first turn.