Test Arena

[Zoythrus]

hey, i have this idea. a great tool for modders would be an "arena" of sorts that is designed to allow you to test units as if they were ingame.

like the g3d viewer, but the unit acts as if it was in a real game.

a function that could work would be the ability to add another unit to the playing field as well. mostly for balance and stuff. or maybe a way to change the stats of the unit in this "arena," which would immediately reflect onto the unit's XML file.

this would be a tool that would get tons of use. what do you think?

[asdfghjkl80]

that sounds cool. it would help me once i start on my faction (if i can ever get started ), and to get to know how a unit works.

[Omega]

It would be very useful, especially for trying to line up the particle projectiles properly (such as to make sure the bullet comes out of the gun, not some guy's chest).

I DEFINATELY don't think it should update the XMLs though... Otherwise you'd ruin your mod simply by using this tool to play around with... Just have the tool so we can find the perfect settings, then we can manually update the XML ourselves.

[Zoythrus]

or, a way to '"save" the stats, in case you like them!

[Hagekura]

Such a tool will be really helpful!
Even without editing xml function,the tool will be useful enough,If the tool allows us test the unit's stats and balancing with another units quickly.not only useful,such an arena type tool would be very fun itself.I also really want the tool!
Sadly,I know nothing about programming,so I can't help to create such a tool,but I really hope someone would make the tool. which would be greatly appreciated by all modders!

[Zoythrus]

other ideas would be:
the ability to add upgrades to the unit in question, so you can test how upgrades effect it.
the ability to add more than one of the tested unit (as well as "enemy" units), this is so you can "play out" various battles.
as i said before, if you like the stats that you have tested with, the ability to "save" those to the XML.
and for fun, the ability to make textures for the arena, so it wont look so bland (imagine using a unit in a "carnival" or a "cave")

any other ideas?

[tiger]

What is the point to making this tool?
I don't think This tool will save very much time?
Why not just test ingame?

[Zoythrus]

What is the point to making this tool?
I don't think This tool will save very much time?
Why not just test ingame?

its so you can control the game the way you need it. it's so you dont have to go through the tech tree just to get to a unit. also, you dont have to fight an AI, so it's just the way you want.

[wciow]

Umm, just thought I'd mention that GAE has a "real time" LUA console. So just start a game on a blank map and play around with the LUA functions. You can add and remove units, start and stop the AI and do various other things to help you test gameplay.

[Zoythrus]

honestly, id rather use a dedicated program. it's easier for those who are new to modding...

[Omega]

I know Wciow, that's what I use, but when I was creating the labatory for Military, which has 8 particle effects at any given time (no worries, no noticed decrease in performance), it took over an hour to get those particles perfect, and that's with using MG's existing smoke and fire particles as a template. Lining those up perfectly to the smoke stacks is HARD, then there was getting the perfect colours and transparency, as well as the perfect number of particles...

EVERY change for that required me to open Glest,  start a new game, wait a while for it to load, type "createUnit('lab',0,startLocation(0))" in the console, look at it, judge the changes I had to do, end the game, apply said changes, and repeat to see them. Must have started over 50 new games... A tool to simply allow me to see the model and update its XMLs in real time would be immensively helpful.

As well, months back, I had lots of balancing to do with units attacks, particularly those with "fast and weak" attacks. The humvee was underpowered still until the current WIP release.

However, the particle effects could potentially be added to the G3D viewer. MG's viewer supports so, but not with the model too (the most important part) and crashes a lot (apparently that feature of the viewer is very "beta").

[John.d.h]

MG's viewer supports so, but not with the model too

Um... you sure about that?  Worked fine for me before my motherboard died.  You can even load multiple particle effects at once with your model.  I used this quite extensively for Solunar, in fact.

[Omega]

MG's viewer supports so, but not with the model too

Um... you sure about that?  Worked fine for me before my motherboard died.  You can even load multiple particle effects at once with your model.  I used this quite extensively for Solunar, in fact.

...It can do that now? really? ... Perhaps I should pay it a visit again...

[ultifd]

Yep. They seem to be the same, besides that the MG version can load particles and that the GAE has more options on colors...

I guess you missed my post that day when you replied...oh well.
I guess I could compile the latest version of the g3d viewer for you, or maybe you can wait for the upcoming beta that's coming real soon.

[titi]

@omega: MG g3dviewer can load and show models particle effects ( including attack particles ) and can refresh this stuff with ctrl-r

[Zoythrus]

im just thinking, what about engine differences? if we make some test arena (or modify the g3d view so that it becomes said arena), will it be based off of GAE or MG (preferably both).

[Omega]

im just thinking, what about engine differences? if we make some test arena (or modify the g3d view so that it becomes said arena), will it be based off of GAE or MG (preferably both).

To my knowledge, MG has no massive changes to units themselves. And since MG mods load in GAE, it would seem that as long as it supports GAE, it should support MG (barring a few exceptions such as JPG support (planned for 0.4) and perhaps a few others).

[Zoythrus]

sorry, to dredge up this old topic of mine, but i was thinking that this would be a nifty tool for Glest 4. imagine the possibilities....

[ultifd]

Well, it would probably be better to revive this after the merge. I don't think this would really be top priority though, as there are other features that are more important/other things to do.

[Zoythrus]

well, seeing that the Merge isnt happening, does that give me permission to bump this?