HOMM3 Babies Mini-Expansion Beta now Available for Download!

[MattCaspermeyer]

Originally Posted by Sir Whiskers

Interesting - I always assumed that GOG version 1.7 and Gamers Gate version 1.7 were the same. Well, if the worst issue I run into with your mod is this minor bug, I'm not worried.

Thanks for all your hard work.

Same here - I actually emailed GoG about their build number, but have not received a response yet. Maybe after Christmas someone will reply.

I never paid attention to the build number before, just the version number, until I saw this issue with my mod. Now I know that the build number is just as important as the version number.

I'm actually really happy with getting all the damage hints working on the spirit abilities in the latest version of the mod I've been working on (Evil Shoal, Ice Thorns, Ice Ball, and Poison Cloud), but it is too bad that build 35,234 does not support the features that I'm using. There is an "always_hint" flag that you can set to 1 on a spirit ability and it will then always execute the hint functions in COMBAT_LOG.LUA, but this is not implemented in that build for whatever reason and so the spirit abilities will not execute the damage hint code that I added.

There's also the bug with the hero_lu_item function in the Logic library I mentioned above, but hopefully there are no other issues with build 35,234. I basically am playing two TL games right now - Warrior on 234 and Paladin on 396 and so I get to now see what is different between the two builds and my mod. It is easy to pass the save game back and forth between them and double check if something not working on 234 works on 396, which has been the case so far with the issues I've mentioned.

/C\/C\

[MattCaspermeyer]

New version beta 2014-01-01 is now available!

There are some bug fixes, new hints for Spirit Abilities that didn't have them before, and some new features.

Here is the change list:

Version Beta 2014-01-01

• *.ATOM
  • CANNONER.ATOM
    • Triple shot: Added Fatt_Shade's idea for damage to surrounding troops, although I added friendly damage.
    • Normal shot: now does 50% damage to surrounding troops (friendly fire)
    • All shots have no range limit and no penalty
    • Added camera shake to both attacks!
  • Spirit ATOMS: (DEATH, LINA, SLIME, THEROCK) - simplified upgrade criteria
    • DEATH.ATOM - removed 1 rest reduction level from time back and black hole and replaced with 1 rage reduction level
    • LINA.ATOM
      • Removed 1 rest reduction level from gizmo and replaced with 1 rage reduction level
      • Orb:
        • Now causes damage when cast upon landing via a quake similar to the Giant ability and the damage reduction per hex away from the landing point decreases with increasing attack level
        • Attack and Defense upgrades now only increase attack and defense capability (before there was a slight increase to the opposite statistic)
        • Roll damage per hex now increases with increasing attack level
        • Knocks the target back 1 cell if possible
      • Added always hint flag for orb and devatron to show the damage hint
    • SLIME.ATOM
      • Dramatically improved Poison Cloud:
        • Does immediate damage to the targets plus the damage by the cloud later
        • Has the specified chance to poison the targets (note that higher levels can "super" poison the targets due to its high and repetitive damage)
      • Evil Shoal:
        • Now has a chance to cause fear in the target (normal fear immunities apply)
        • Now shows the damage hint!
      • Swamp Poison now has the duration specified
    • THEROCK.ATOM - lump, rockfall, and quake now all have their duration specified
  • DEVATRON_THROW.ATOM - improved the damage animation
  • DRUID.ATOM - new ability: Revive Beast (2 charges) - resurrects beasts (i.e. bears, wolves, etc.)
  • ENT & ENT2.ATOM - added movetype custom parameter to moveattack to include movement type = -2 (Ghosts and Cursed Ghosts)
  • GIANT.ATOM - quake now does 200% damage to structures (obstacles, barriers, and towers)
  • KINGTHORN.ATOM - included movement type = -2 (Ghosts and Cursed Ghosts) in the movetype entangle custom parameter
  • ORB.ATOM - added ground shake particles for shaking the ground when the Ice Ball lands per the changes to Ice Ball above
  • SLIMEFOG.ATOM - the fog damage is no longer affected by the attack of the cloud / defense of the target
• *.LNG
  • EN(G)_BATTLE.LNG
    • Added new log for showing the recharge enemy attacks message.
    • Added "fightened" log for when Evil Shoal causes fear and the unit already has it, it will add +1 to the duration of current
  • EN(G)_ITEMS.LNG - fixed Carl Leonar -> Carl Leonard
  • EN(G)_SPIRITS.LNG
    • Added changes to descriptions and level ups based on all the atom and other features added
  • EN(G)_UNITS_SPECIALS.LNG
    • Updated Cannoneer Salvo to include half damage to surrounding troops, friend or foe.
    • Update Giant Quake to include 200% damage to structures
    • Added new druid Beast Revive name, header, and hint
    • Added warning_revive for new Druid ability
  • EN(G)_UNITS_FEATURES.LNG
    • Added separate Siege Gun header / hint for Cannoners per their update
    • Added Knockback header / hint
  • EN(G)_WINDOWS.LNG
    • Updated version number
    • Added many new screen tips to show new features of the mod
  • TEMPLATES.LNG
    • Updated spirit templates to accommodate changes in ATOMs
    • Fixed Feanora template Werewolves -> Graywolves
• *.LUA
  • ARENA.LUA
    • Fixed issue with improperly using the wrong spell level if the enemy hero's spells happened to be higher than I thought
    • Set min_score to 0 so that all spells have a chance to cast. I originally put this in to prevent spells with very low probabilities from being cast, but it seems like there could be quite a few lower level enemy heroes with really low scores and so they'd end up skipping turns not casting spells.
    • Critical Hit difficulty level bonus is now additive since a lot of unit's Critical Hit is really low. So now enemies will "krit" a lot more often on harder difficulty levels...
  • COMBAT_LOG.LUA
    • Added damage hint for Rage Skills:
      • Poison Cloud
      • Ice Ball (see above)
      • Evil Shoal
      • Ice Thorns
  • ITEMS_HINT.LUA - fixed issue with text description for wives having their first child
  • SPECIAL_ATTACKS - added change to Giant's Quake damage to structures as identified above
  • SPELL_COMMON.LUA
    • Calccells for Royal Thorn's Entangle now checks for a comma-delimited list of movement types (this is to include Ghosts / Cursed Ghosts) - Thanks to jorko80 for pointing this out!
    • Function common_cell_apply_damage can now return the dead from act_damage
  • SPIRIT_LINA.LUA
    • Ice Thorns now:
      • Uses common_freeze_attack to be consistent with Geyser and Ice Serpent - Thanks to jork80 for pointing this out!
      • Uses its duration (was using a constant of 3, but had created variable duration in the past)
      • Affects the Undead (not sure why I had it this way before)
      • Improved the damage animation
    • Ice Ball now:
      • Damages enemies like the Giant's quake upon casting
      • Has variable roll damage increase
      • Knocks targets back 1 cell if possible
  • SPIRIT_SLIME.LUA
    • Implemented changes as specified in the ATOM changes above
    • Implemented changes to show the damage of Evil Shoal
  • SPIRIT_THEROCK.LUA - implemented changes as specified in the ATOM changes above
  • TEXTGEN.LUA - added new function for generating the Ice Ball's roll damage for its feature hint
  • UNIT_FEATURES.LUA
    • features_entangle (Entangle) now also checks for a comma-delimited list of movement types (this is to include Ghosts / Cursed Ghosts) - Thanks to jorko80 for pointing this out!
    • Re-ordered features_entangle boolean logic checks to optimize logic for speed / efficiency
    • Fixed error with special_priest where the holy effect was being shown when moving the cursor over enemies
• *.TXT
  • & LOGIC.TXT - added new parameter, rndrecharge, for determining when enemy attacks are automatically recharged based on difficulty level.
  • & SPELLS.TXT - Ice Snake is now an Order spell

Now all Spirits have at least 2 damage abilities to help them keep up with Spirits that level faster. This is especially true for Lina as she now can be maintained at levels near the others whereas before she always fell behind. With Sleem, Poison Cloud was hard to use because it didn't give experience based on damage and units could move away from it. Now it does immediate damage and then will do additional damage based on its life. This makes this ability a lot more useful.

All the Spirit abilities show damage hints now, but you have to have Build 35,396 to see them - if you have build 35,234 then you still won't see them. This is also true for Maria to show you the number of Dragonfly Wings you have. I have no idea why older builds are being sold, but I guess that's the way it is for now.

Druids can now resurrect your animals (twice) so there is a new troop selection synergy with using them now.

I haven't made any changes since the beginning of the year and so that's why it is V2014-01-01, but everything seems to be working great.

See the last post to get the latest version...

/C\/C\

[MattCaspermeyer]

Here's a bug fix update to fix a few bugs I found a day or so ago.

Here's the list of changes:

Version Beta 2014-01-28

• *.LNG
  • EN(G)_WINDOWS.LNG
    • Corrected a few errors in the original tips
    • Removed duplicate hint #44
• *.LUA
  • Fixed issues with not converting act_spell_param outputs to numbers:
    • BOSS.LUA - dmg_min and dmg_max for effect_spider_poison_attack may have been strings instead of numbers, although since this was in the original game it may not have been a problem
    • SPELLS.LUA - level for post_spell_plague may have been a string, although not sure if this was a problem
    • UNIT_FEATURES.LUA - this one was a problem and was causing Mana Spring cast from Enchanted Hero to give your hero mana instead of the enemy hero - belligerent check from spell parameter needed to be converted to a number
  • LOGIC.LUA - the new mod hints I added were not being used because it seems like the hint counting did not work so I manually set it to the maximum number of hints that are in EN(G)_WINDOWS.LNG so that it would show my new hints

With the act_spell_param bug fixes, the only one I found a problem with was the one in UNIT_FEATURES.LUA. The others were potential issues that I figured I'd change just in case there could be a problem.

I'm not sure why the tip counting is not working and so I just manually set the maximum tip number in LOGIC.LUA so that it will now show the extra tips that I added for my mod.

That's it!

Thanks for trying out my mod.

/C\/C\

Please see the last post in this thread for the latest version...

[Sir Whiskers]

A couple bugs I've found recently:

1) The tip for shamans has no text. I'm referring to the normal load screen that has tips, such as "Orcs and Veteran orcs have a new ability...". The load screen comes up normally, it says "Shamans", but nothing else.

2) I'm in Haas' Labyrinth, at the Temple of Delights. Whenever I click the right arrow to cycle through the available troops, the game crashes to desktop.

I'm very impressed with this mod. The tips, the info screens for spells and troops, all show the updated mod info. I absolutely love the new Phoenix spell. The troops have new abilities that make them more interesting to use, and more challenging to fight. The game allows my hero to become much more powerful than the base game, but that's necessary, as the battles become increasingly more difficult. Definitely a fun challenge.

SW

[MattCaspermeyer]

Thanks for pointing these out!

Originally Posted by Sir Whiskers

A couple bugs I've found recently:

1) The tip for shamans has no text. I'm referring to the normal load screen that has tips, such as "Orcs and Veteran orcs have a new ability...". The load screen comes up normally, it says "Shamans", but nothing else.

This one I've fixed, but it's in my latest release that I'm working on. I hope to release this update soon...

Originally Posted by Sir Whiskers

2) I'm in Haas' Labyrinth, at the Temple of Delights. Whenever I click the right arrow to cycle through the available troops, the game crashes to desktop.

Okay, I've found it - attached is a fix for this issue (essentially I misspelled cerberus (cereberus) in the LOC file). The fix is just a copy of CERBERUS.ATOM as CEREBERUS.ATOM. Similar to the problem I had with Neoka's castle and "Druids". The next update will have this issue fixed, although it will only affect new games. Don't buy the Cerberus' with this fix by the way, their picture might be blank, but it shouldn't crash any more - let me know...

Originally Posted by Sir Whiskers

I'm very impressed with this mod. The tips, the info screens for spells and troops, all show the updated mod info. I absolutely love the new Phoenix spell. The troops have new abilities that make them more interesting to use, and more challenging to fight. The game allows my hero to become much more powerful than the base game, but that's necessary, as the battles become increasingly more difficult. Definitely a fun challenge.

SW

Thanks!

I've got quite a few more changes coming in the next update, the largest being that difficulty level / map bonus now also affects the talent abilities of enemy units, improvements to bears, unicorns, daylight penalties to undead, and more!

/C\/C\

Here's the fix for the Temple of Delights crash in the Labryrinth (just put this in the same folder as the mod):

[Sir Whiskers]

Originally Posted by MattCaspermeyer

Okay, I've found it - attached is a fix for this issue (essentially I misspelled cerberus (cereberus) in the LOC file). The fix is just a copy of CERBERUS.ATOM as CEREBERUS.ATOM. Similar to the problem I had with Neoka's castle and "Druids". The next update will have this issue fixed, although it will only affect new games. Don't buy the Cerberus' with this fix by the way, their picture might be blank, but it shouldn't crash any more - let me know...

Yep, problem fixed in my current game. The Cerberus has no pic, as you mentioned, but I can now buy any of the other troops there.

I hope you still find time to work on your mod for AP/CW. I enjoy Legend, and will gladly grab your next update, but I feel the devs got the balance better in AP/CW, reducing the number of battles and increasing the hero levels.

Thanks.

[MattCaspermeyer]

Originally Posted by Sir Whiskers

Yep, problem fixed in my current game. The Cerberus has no pic, as you mentioned, but I can now buy any of the other troops there.

Okay, great!

Originally Posted by Sir Whiskers

I hope you still find time to work on your mod for AP/CW. I enjoy Legend, and will gladly grab your next update, but I feel the devs got the balance better in AP/CW, reducing the number of battles and increasing the hero levels.

Thanks.

I promise it's coming one of these millennia - there's only so much time in the day...

I've actually taken a step back from the tomes part because of the issues I had with the number of items in the game, although the changes may roll back into my H3B mod because I think I like how I did the bonuses better. I have some ideas of how to combine a lot of the items into a single item and so am thinking about how to implement them - this would greatly reduce the total number of items and still allow me for the most part to implement all the HOMM3 heroes.

We'll see how it goes...

/C\/C\