Knights and Merchants.net Forum

Since the new XML based mission format for TKE is far from finished (it isn't even supported by TKE itself now so lol) I thought it's a perfect moment to ask what You want to be able to do in a mission.
I can't guarantee it will be added but I will at least consider it.

So what's important to You?
I have thought about
* events. they will be added, but what kinds of events should exist? I have thought about things such as "when there is less than X of resource Y" (and when there is more than Y, or whatever), and "when a unit dies" (must be a unit that was added in the mission file, not a trained one), "when a unit of play X enters a rectangle Y on the map for the first time", and of course "when the time reaches X seconds". What should be added/changed/removed?
* replacing the tile set. Why would you do that, one might ask.. Well, there are very few lava and ice tiles, maybe you want to make a lava or ice mission and need more of those tiles? This could be added relatively easily.
* different music? Might be nice, I don't know (would make big mission files though)
* changing unit stats? I'd have to talk with JBSnorro to get it done, but it ought to be possible. You could make a "destroy the enemy with this 1 barbarian" mission that way.
* being able to draw things on the screen that are not normally there. Such as a timer to the next attack maybe, the number of enemies that you killed, could be nice for cooperative multiplayer missions (most kills wins, attacks come in waves that keep getting stronger, something like that)
* dynamic attacks - for example: create and send 5 units first time, 10 second time, 15 next time, etc. Changing the type of unit after the 10th wave, etc.
* custom buildings, for this I'd also have to talk with JBSnorro. But you could do things like: an upgrades building, cost 100 gold to add 1 attack to all your soldiers, 200 planks and 200 stones to add 200 HP to all your buildings, 150 gold to add 1 defense to all your units, etc. These upgrade options could possibly be added to an existing building (say, the barracks) to avoid needing to draw a new building.

Example of what you could make this way:
A cooperative multiplayer mission where you defend your base, the enemy attacks in waves - every minute a new wave. Each wave is 5 units bigger than the next wave, start with 10 militia, after the 5th wave axe fighters, after the 10th wave swordfighters, after the 20th wave there will be archers behind. The number of seconds before the next wave starts is in the top right corner, kill count in the just below it. For each kill you make you get 1 iron and 2 gold and 3 planks in wave 1 through 5, in wave 6 through 9 you get 2 iron 4 gold and 6 planks and after that you get 5 iron 10 gold and 10 planks per kill. Most kills at the end of the last wave wins the game, if your base is destroyed you lose. Your soldiers do not need food, and you have infinite stones (so build towers). For 200 gold you can buy 1 extra attack for your soldiers at the weapon smithy, and for 250 gold you can buy 2 extra defense for your soldiers at the armour smithy.

This is just 1 example, you could do completely different things of course.
small note: this mission does not exist, at least not yet. If you want to use this idea feel free to do so - it's not at all original anyway, many games have this kind of mission. Warcraft 3 has loads of custom multiplayer missions that work like this.

But the most important thing of all.. what do You want? Anything to add? Change? Remove even? Do you have an idea for a mission but you're not sure what to add/change to this to make it work? Tell me anyway, I might figure it out.

To Krom and Lewin (but also others who feel this applies to them)
You are of course free to use the XML format, and equally free to make something entirely different, or even to take the XML format and change it beyond recognition, or anything else. I am not a big bad company with closed file formats
But I ask you to be kind in return and let me use whatever format you come up with - the K&M community would not benefit from a format war at all, it would be best for all of us if all missions work on both remakes (and others, should they be made)

my opinion:
* events: no opinion so far, guess these will grow automatically
* replacing the tile set: yes
* different music: no
* changing unit stats? yes, u can create 'hero' missions this way. Like a simple version of DoTa (warcraft 3)
* being able to draw things on the screen that are not normally there: yes, the exemples you gave like total kills, next attack wave, etc... are perfect for this
* dynamic attacks: i would use a scripting function for this no?
* custom buildings: yes maybe but upgradable buildings would be more important in my opninion

and as i read further i saw u also mentioned warcraft 3 . That is a good thing cuz warcraft 3 is heavy modable. Taking those functions out of it and use it in your project would be a very good step!
But i also want to mention that all these things are misc. The most important is to create a working game ofcourse

Keep on programming! :p

Good
We will not lose sight of the actual game, I hope, but some features might require a different design than normal - it would be a pain to change them later, so best do it now we have a chance to do it right at once

For the dynamic attacks, well, I don't think you can use the old scripting ways for this - I mean adding 100 attacks by hand is painful, right? Especially if the attacks all follow a pattern that could easily be calculated by the computer

Would there be anything else that you'd like to see added?

Yea.
Corpses instead of ghosts who dissapear xD
and maybe some blood ^^

Sounds interesting, but KAM does not have graphics of corpses..

I quite like the "ghosts that disappear". They make the game seem more quaint. If there was blood and dead men everywhere then it just wouldn't be KaM any more.
But that's just my opinion. If you do implement corpses/blood then I suggest you make it an optional setting, and have it turned off by default.

I think everything else you suggested is a good idea. Krom and I will be using the original .DAT format but with extra commands added. That way the original missions will still work without conversions, and people who make missions by hand with script won't have to learn a new language. We will probably add the things you suggested too, but for the moment we are working towards a fully functional village system. (troops will be later)

We have no intention of starting a format war. In fact, we might go open source at some point. (don't quote me on this though, Krom's opinion may be different and he is the project leader )
Lewin.

Well I've added a couple of things to the normal parser, such as CLEAR_ALL and a CLEAR x y width height for rectangles, but I can't add everything without terrible hacks..
I'm working on a DAT -> XML converter by the way, and I could try to make it work the other way round as well - although I'm afraid it wouldn't be too accurate..

What are you adding?

Oh and TKE is already "open" source, the open source guys wouldn't agree I know. But since it's .NET it can be decompiled. And modified and then compiled again. So it's pretty open - and in fact we're required to make at least some parts more open since at some point a piece of MIT-licensed code will be used. It's not in use yet.. but it will be (for text input)

In KaM the command for !CLEAR_ALL is !CLEAR_UP 255. That reveals the entire map.

We haven't decided on what we are adding yet. We will be deciding on that later. But I think we can implement all of the commands you suggested above into the current script format.
Lewin.

As for my opinion - everything is ok, but first we need to reach TSK level. Then we'll decide on new features and formats etc.. So far it's KaM clone and I can't bet my money that it will reach fully functional release.

New commands you mentioned are nice. Of course it will be no problem to add them once game is done. I'm not familiar with XML format though, I'd go for simplier format, but thats your remake and you drive it as you like.

There's a possibility KaM Remake will be open-source, thats not decided yet. Harold, open-source is open-source, it's not "you can decompile my exe"

Well Krom, it is in the .NET case. For C++ and Delphi etc it's different, decompiling that sucks. But .NET can be nearly perfectly decompiled - except for comments and local variable names. Everything else (function names, class names, class layouts) it preserved. Really, give it a try, get the free Red Gate .NET Reflector and decompile the KaM.dll found in TKE - you might be surprised.

OffTopic: Comments and local variable names are important part of any source code. With complex programs like KaM for example, comments are almost the size of code itself Anyway, whats the problem with uploading a zip with your project folder if you claim it to be open-source already?

Back to topic: Would be a nice feature to have some sort of record/playback in missions. To make scripted sequences.

Everything can be decompiled if you are skilled enough

Somehow we all end-up rewriting KaM from scratch instead of re-compiling it

Don't count on it.
z80 example:

Ok, after some debate (well, really just 3 minutes of agreeing with eachother, but that doesn't sound nice), we decided that along with "normal" scripted missions, we're going to allow fully programmed missions. They should come in DLL form, and they have to be .NET (but they can be any .NET language).
They won't have full access to the entire game of course, just to the features we want to expose. But they will be able to do "a lot".