Charmed allied summons

[Demivrgvs]

You're right it works!

 

I thought it didn't because apparently it takes few seconds before the script triggers, but if you wait a little the creature becomes selectable again!

 

Now I've to add this piece of code to every summoned creature...though for some of them I may have to add a custom Override script because most creatures just use a default script like wtasight.bcs (or dvmelee.bcs in case of SR's creatures).

 

Thanks for helping...isn't strange that nobody ever worked on this before?

[aVENGER_(RR)]

Thanks for helping...isn't strange that nobody ever worked on this before?

 

Glad it worked out for you. I think no one else bothered with this because the vanilla summons are fairly expendable and not really worth the effort.

 

Now I've to add this piece of code to every summoned creature...though for some of them I may have to add a custom Override script because most creatures just use a default script like wtasight.bcs (or dvmelee.bcs in case of SR's creatures).:

 

A word of advice, make sure to only add the script to the vanilla game's summons as many mods add their own summoned creatures with unique AI (i.e. RR's Shamblers) which is also placed in the override script slot.

[Demivrgvs]

Glad it worked out for you. I think no one else bothered with this because the vanilla summons are fairly expendable and not really worth the effort.

Good point, indedd except Mordenkainen's Sword and Fire Elementals vanilla's summons where pretty useless...

 

A word of advice, make sure to only add the script to the vanilla game's summons as many mods add their own summoned creatures with unique AI (i.e. RR's Shamblers) which is also placed in the override script slot.

Don't worry about that, I'll do it for SR's summons only (which are all vanilla's ones plus some custom ones).

[Icendoan]

You saying Planetars are useless Demi?

 

 

I think you forgot them.

 

Icen

[aVENGER_(RR)]

Planetars are gated, not summoned.

[Demivrgvs]

Yeah, Planetars are quite special. They are gated, and they are not even granted by normal spells but from HLAs. If you want to count them, I think Elemental Princes too were quite good. But then again, they really are few exceptions to the general rule: "vanilla summons are fairly expendable and not really worth the effort".

[Miloch]

You could also just extend the top of summonee scripts rather than overwriting them with new ones. The only thing you'd want to look out for is if the scripts were used for other CREs too and if the block you're adding would have unreliable behaviour if added to those scripts (though a gender check could prevent that also). There's an example of that type of code in P5Tweaks (really, it excludes summonees from what it does, though it'd be quite easy to reverse the code to include them instead). It also fixes a few genders for summonees that weren't properly set (not even with the Fixpack which fixes some but not all).

[Demivrgvs]

You could also just extend the top of summonee scripts rather than overwriting them with new ones.

I don't overwrite anything, all SR's creatures now use custom scripts.

[Miloch]

I don't overwrite anything, all SR's creatures now use custom scripts.

If they are your own creatures, obviously overwriting is not an issue. However, if they are also vanilla creatures you've modded, and you're technically assigning a new script in the override slot where there was one previously, technically that's overwriting too. The best method is to EXTEND the existing script, so you don't reverse any changes other modders have made. And for that matter, if your modded spells are now using new CREs, well the best method for that too is to patch the existing CREs and extend their scripts rather than putting in brand new CREs, unless they truly are brand new - I mean completely different CREs other than anything existing.

 

[P.S.: Happy birthday, btw .]

[Demivrgvs]

And for that matter, if your modded spells are now using new CREs, well the best method for that too is to patch the existing CREs and extend their scripts rather than putting in brand new CREs, unless they truly are brand new - I mean completely different CREs other than anything existing.

Well, SR's creatures are brand-new, or completely redone versions of existing ones (e.g. different characteristics, resistences, abilities, ...), and very few of them use vanilla's .cre files.

 

[P.S.: Happy birthday, btw .]

It was yesterday.

[Miloch]

(e.g. different characteristics, resistences, abilities, ...)

All of that can (and should) be done by patching the existing CREs (eventually anyway). I have, for example, a mini-mod patch that fixes the Call Woodland Beings summoned nymph so that she has PnP-suitable spells, stats, even colours which were off, and it patches her script with the proper spells as well. It's a good 50 to 100 lines of code or more just for the nymph alone, and yes, it would've been easier to remake her entirely with a new CRE, but not as compatible. And if some mod comes along and assigns a new (but essentially similar) CRE to the same vanilla spell, it wipes all that in one sweep, as well as enhancements from other mods (I think there's a component of the old Baldurdash Fixpack and/or Big Picture that changes her too). Indeed, they may all be doing similar things, but there's no reason they couldn't be technically compatible unless they're swapping and shuffling CREs and scripts and the like, which isn't really necessary unless you want to mod the spell such that, say, it summons only unicorns and not nymphs.

[Demivrgvs]

I have, for example, a mini-mod patch that fixes the Call Woodland Beings summoned nymph so that she has PnP-suitable spells, stats, even colours which were off, and it patches her script with the proper spells as well. It's a good 50 to 100 lines of code or more just for the nymph alone, and yes, it would've been easier to remake her entirely with a new CRE, but not as compatible.

We already had this conversation. If you had to write more than 100 lines of code for just one creature try imagine how many lines I should have to write for all SR's changes, it would have taken me an eternity. Instead I prefer to have a playable version (and very compatible in spite of everything), and then slowly make it patching if possible.

 

That being said, SR uses custom creatures and scripts for most summons exactly to make them more compatible. For example if you change a creature's spellbook patching the original cre, mods like gMinion and SCS will assign to them wrong scripts, or other mods may wipe out all your work (assigning new spells again, changing characteristics, resistances, type of attack, ...).

[DavidW]

If you had to write more than 100 lines of code for just one creature try imagine how many lines I should have to write for all SR's changes, it would have taken me an eternity.

Actually (and I don't particularly want to say that you ought to do it), it would be a lot simpler than that: that's the beauty of macros. You can probably write something that does what you want for one creature or spell type, and then reuse it.

[Miloch]

If you had to write more than 100 lines of code for just one creature try imagine how many lines I should have to write for all SR's changes, it would have taken me an eternity.

Actually (and I don't particularly want to say that you ought to do it), it would be a lot simpler than that: that's the beauty of macros. You can probably write something that does what you want for one creature or spell type, and then reuse it.

Actually, this particular code is specific to the creature, and took maybe a few minutes to write. It would've taken just as long if not longer to go through the creature with an editor and change everything that needed changing, or to create one from scratch. But templates (and possibly macros in some cases) could speed that up even further.

other mods may wipe out all your work (assigning new spells again, changing characteristics, resistances, type of attack, ...).

And this is precisely the problem with overwriting - it wipes out the work of other mods. It doesn't make things more compatible, nor does it guarantee some other mod won't change your work. In this particular case, it doesn't matter whether my mod is installed before or after yours. It won't have an effect either way, since it doesn't overwrite (or even change, I believe) the generic Call Woodland Beings spell - it only patches the summoned creature. But I can see I'm going to have to patch things more aggressively dynamically - i.e., search for all summoned "nymphs" and make sure they are patched accordingly with all (and only) the changes that are relevant. I just didn't envision getting in a sort of "mod war" since I thought modding was swinging the other direction (toward greater compatibility rather than away from it). And if someone made an improvement such as the one discussed above, I think I would want to preserve that rather than wipe it out to try to maintain only *my* changes.

We already had this conversation.

Yes, and I'm sure we'll keep doing so until you see the Light of Reason .

[Demivrgvs]

Yes, and I'm sure we'll keep doing so until you see the Light of Reason .

We'll keep doing so until I have the time to learn how to code all the things my mods do, and when I have the time to redo everything from the start. Which may be not so far (if I manage to finish IR V1), but working as I'm doing allow me to mod much faster at the moment.