[TC][OXCE][WIP] The Great War of the Worlds | v1.0 Mk. V Attrition

[efrenespartano]

Greetings, fellow Trench Raiders! To coincide with the historical Christmas Truce in 1914, we have launcher a major update! With the help of the newest dev of the team, Kiro Xei, we have finished enough changes to release this as version 1.0!  Work continues, of course. But now we can consider it different to vanilla and stable enough.

A new update is ready.

The Great War of the Worlds v1.0 Mk. V Attrition is alive now!

What's new in this update?

Code: [Select]

25-December-2023: 1.0 "Attrition"
Changes made:
* Updated to latest OXCE v7.10.
* Added most of the missing codes. By Kiro Xei.
* Added most of the missing War Codex content (Ufopedia). By Kiro Xei.
* Added missing research requirements. By Kiro Xei.
* Fixing Strings from language yml file. By Kiro Xei.
* Rebalance Heat-Ray (Laser) weapon requirements by changing to all difficults. It requires Heat Ray Weapon analysis and Improved metalurgic techniques. By efrenespartano.
* Added new facilities: Guard Tower; Tower Fortress; Trench line N-S + W- E; Concrete Fortification; Machine Gun Nest. By efrenespartano.
* Changed facility name for the following: General Stores > Supply Depot, Living Quarters > Barracks. By efrenespartano.
* Introducing base defense terrain, players can allow to move troops to unbuilt terrain as it please. By efrenespartano.
* Barracks can now train up to 10 soldiers including all soldier types. Soldiers training cap is added.
* Fixed Berdan II ufopedia by recorrecting the appropiate research info.
* Phlogiston weapon events reorgnazied. By efrenespartano.
* All items, inventorys, and weapons are reduced to realistic scaled divided by 10. Which helps to fill more items in few supply depots.
* Changed Overlords living weapon to false, due to missing image issue. Now they can wield weapons.
* Revised starting conditions by adding missing armor: Italian Gasmask, Russian Gasmask, L'inmortale Heavy Armor, and Totemkopf Mechanized Armor for the Red Weed environment.
* Adding Energy shield script from The World of Terrifying Silence Mod to Totemkopf Mechanized Armor for field testing. Adding visibilityatday to 30; visibilityatdark to 18 to Totemkopf Mechanized Armor.
* Adding Maxviewdistance to 40. No soldiers can go blind shooting. This applies to units, allies, and enemies.
* Fixing Russian Tier 2 equipment selection.
* Fixing Hague Convention weapons and ammo by recorrecting the requirements.
* Replacing missing alien race snakes man to Martians elite platoon.
* Laboratory spaces reduces to 30; while Advance Laboratory was added to 60 to match the description.
* Changed HWP Tank requirements.
* General Bugfixing. By Kiro Xei.

[GumChewer]

I got a three problem with version 1.1.

The female sprites in Resources/SoldiersSprites/00-Body use a palette index != 0 for the background. The latest OXCE has a problem with that, for me at least, it disregards the alpha channel thus there is no transparency at all.

The following files also use a wrong index for the background, or a wrong palette, or at least most of them, I forgot:
SoldiersSprites/Battlescape/German/GermanCoat.png
SoldiersSprites/Battlescape/German/Stahlhelm.png
SoldiersSprites/01-Uniform/GermanCoat.png
SoldiersSprites/01-Uniform/GermanUniform.png
HeatRay/black_smoke_explosion.png
HeatRay/green_gas_explosion.png
(SoldiersSprites/NPCs/ ... Inventories)

Both can be fixed automatically, but I suppose a pull request will not be seen.

A zero bytes file:
SoldiersSprites/Battlescape/American/Inventory/MAN23_F1.png

[GumChewer]

Version 0.8 uses stationary ufos to represent Martian Outpost, e.g. STR_MARTIAN_CAMP, with point defense weapons. Or so I assume.
An interception window opens if approached by an craft, something not possible with alien bases.

The problem with this is that all of them spawn at the same few locations within a region. This seems unrealistic and kills my fun every time.

Is that a bug? Something that should change? A feature?

[GumChewer]

According to the screenshots of version 1.0 the ground of the buildings does not adjust to the terrain selected by the base position on the globe.
It is always dirt/mud.

This could be fixed by using the decoration type of the vertical-levels feature, instead of using a mapname for the base facilities.
The facility maps should then have no ground outside the buildings and the terrain from the globe should supply it.

Is there interest in having this?
I could do this, but I probably wont find time for this in the near future. Maybe I could do a sample such that somebody else could adapt it for the other facilities and terrains.

[GumChewer]

Anyway, I love the new content added! Thanks!

[efrenespartano]

Greetings! Thanks for playing and specially for the continued feedback. Sorry if i may take a bit longer than expected to reply here, i peak

I got a three problem with version 1.1.

The female sprites in Resources/SoldiersSprites/00-Body use a palette index != 0 for the background. The latest OXCE has a problem with that, for me at least, it disregards the alpha channel thus there is no transparency at all.

The following files also use a wrong index for the background, or a wrong palette, or at least most of them, I forgot:
SoldiersSprites/Battlescape/German/GermanCoat.png
SoldiersSprites/Battlescape/German/Stahlhelm.png
SoldiersSprites/01-Uniform/GermanCoat.png
SoldiersSprites/01-Uniform/GermanUniform.png
HeatRay/black_smoke_explosion.png
HeatRay/green_gas_explosion.png
(SoldiersSprites/NPCs/ ... Inventories)

Both can be fixed automatically, but I suppose a pull request will not be seen.

A zero bytes file:
SoldiersSprites/Battlescape/American/Inventory/MAN23_F1.png

I appreciate the warnings! I'll fix those issues, i most likely didn't noticed them.

Version 0.8 uses stationary ufos to represent Martian Outpost, e.g. STR_MARTIAN_CAMP, with point defense weapons. Or so I assume.
An interception window opens if approached by an craft, something not possible with alien bases.

The problem with this is that all of them spawn at the same few locations within a region. This seems unrealistic and kills my fun every time.

Is that a bug? Something that should change? A feature?

Not exactly a bug, it's just the vanilla regionZones. I'll consider adding more spots.

And yes, those static UFOs are indeed meant to be attacked and bombed. So far, you cannot attack a real alien base, so the only way i could add bombers (and give them a reason to be) was by making them stand still, unmoved.

According to the screenshots of version 1.0 the ground of the buildings does not adjust to the terrain selected by the base position on the globe.
It is always dirt/mud.

This could be fixed by using the decoration type of the vertical-levels feature, instead of using a mapname for the base facilities.
The facility maps should then have no ground outside the buildings and the terrain from the globe should supply it.

Is there interest in having this?
I could do this, but I probably wont find time for this in the near future. Maybe I could do a sample such that somebody else could adapt it for the other facilities and terrains.

If you want, go ahead. Personally i'm not totally interested in tweaking the base terrain (it was a pain to rework it on the surface to begin with hahaha).

Anyway, I love the new content added! Thanks!

Hope you are having a good time! If you want to, I usually dwell the IDT Discord server. Here's an invitation link! I reply back in some hours at most, as opposed to some days here haha

[GumChewer]

Howdy,

Sorry and Thanks, I have not managed to look into discord yet. But I will not complain about response time so long!

But meanwhile, I made new pull request to fix the images and some (most? all?) yaml syntax errors.

Have a good day/weekend!

[GumChewer]

If you want, go ahead. Personally i'm not totally interested in tweaking the base terrain (it was a pain to rework it on the surface to begin with hahaha).

That is undoubtedly true and the reason I never considered to make a surface base myself.
Luckily, someone else did all the work 

[LuigiWhatif]

I've been enjoying your mod, but I also have a few bugs to report.  The first is on a mission to a small enemy "base."  I included a picture of the crash message and a save file right before starting the mission.  I was able to enter the mission by waiting a day for the seed to re-roll.  The other bugs are:

2.)I have researched Alien Grenades and can use them in battle, but there doesn't seem to be a codex entry for them.
3.)I have the entry for the Martian Metal Sabre despite not doing that research yet.  Also, the entry and detailed info show it having the same stats as the normal sabre.
4.)When my soldiers in Sappenpanzer armor go into a red weed area they change into the default gas mask armor instead of the Sappenpanzer gas mask.

Edit:
Two more.  There doesn't seem to be a research project for the Martian Scientist corpses I'm collecting, and the large enemy turrets are giving me an item with a default name and no value or weight.  I added a picture.

[LuigiWhatif]

I just finished what I assume is the pyrrhic victory route.  I had fun with the weapons and combat, and the WWI aesthetic really stood out from other mods.  The short ranges/slow speed of vehicles also forced me away from the usual strategy of specialized bases, which was interesting.  However, I don't think I'll be continuing for a better ending. 

Looking at the research tree it looks like I would have to capture multiple overlords. I only saw two (and only caught the second) and repeating the wait between them over and over just sounded tiring.  I already felt endgame and hadn't been seeing anything new, so it looks like it would have just been shooting down ships and waiting.  I do remember reading a comment mentioning a Verdun mission but I never got that or any other missions, just ships, bases, and one capsule when China was temporarily lost.

I also had an issue with capturing.  I mentioned that I killed my first overlord.  That was because I brought no tranquilizers to that mission.  I never felt a need for them before that.  Surrendering aliens filled my prison.  I might have taken them for officers, since punching and trench maces seem over-tuned and would regularly kill even armored aliens.  However up until the mission where I captured the overlord I had assumed officers would be visually different.  It was only on that mission that I noticed the royal guard officer's name because I middle clicked to check their weapon.  I noticed there were tesla weapons in the tech tree and maybe those would be better stunners, but since I hadn't been searching for officers contacting Tesla was the last research I did before ending the game.  I had finished all the other researches with regular labs.

I did enjoy the mod, and I would like to play again to see the other country's equipment and actually build an advanced lab.  I'll leave off with a bug.  The last page of the ending narration was cut off for me.  I cut off the top to avoid spoilers but you can see how the bottom got cut.  Thank you for your work.

Edit:  Added my last save file so you can see if the text bug replicates on your end.

[ThatThomasGuy]

The José avatar and Commonwealth service dress armor combination doesn't mix quite well, it causes this funky yellowout. Changing the avatar or the armor resolves the glitch. My OXCE version is 7.12.

[GumChewer]

The José avatar and Commonwealth service dress armor combination doesn't mix quite well, it causes this funky yellowout. Changing the avatar or the armor resolves the glitch. My OXCE version is 7.12.

I already submitted a fix for the images with wrong palettes/image. See quote below.
Either the IDT is busy with real life or they have not really noticed it.
Please contact them on Discord if you have an account there.

I have no format which is instantly applicable anymore. But you can grab the images from my github repository, or just the whole mod. If you cannot do this, I might take the additional work to make a submod or drop-in zip or similiar.
Feedback to the fix would help anyway.

But meanwhile, I made new pull request to fix the images and some (most? all?) yaml syntax errors.

[GumChewer]

I made myself a program to automatize the conversion from full-color images to custom palette images, for use in the cutscenes and Ufopaedia.
It can also replace text-only Ufopaedia articles with text+images articles with the proper (custom palette) background.
Resizing the images, if necessary, is included.
Cropping is done semi-automatically because there is the one time need for defining how to crop the individual images (top vs. bottom, etc).
It can also output a submod, which overrides the ruleset.

Because the bad color representation of many images kill my fun/immersion each time, I'd like to ask if you would share the full color versions of the images used in TGWotW (and Unexcom?).

The only drawback is, that I'm still busy. It might take some time.

[GumChewer]

I made myself a program to automatize the conversion from full-color images to custom palette images, for use in the cutscenes and Ufopaedia.
It can also replace text-only Ufopaedia articles with text+images articles with the proper (custom palette) background.
Resizing the images, if necessary, is included.
Cropping is done semi-automatically because there is the one time need for defining how to crop the individual images (top vs. bottom, etc).
It can also output a submod, which overrides the ruleset.

Because the bad color representation of many images kill my fun/immersion each time, I'd like to ask if you would share the full color versions of the images used in TGWotW (and Unexcom?).

The only drawback is, that I'm still busy. It might take some time.

An example of a cutscene image that was full-color in the mod at some time.