Add Loyal Allies to launcher

[Euenus]

I've recently come along this change in rules:

http://www.twcenter.net/forums/showt...37#post5875037

Do you want two factions that are Allied to honor the Alliance?
To make the AI not send a vessel to a port and blockade, ruining the alliance!
To stop the AI roaming armies turn on their allies' undefended region instead of reinforce it like a ally would!
To send an Emissary (Diplomat) to tell their ally they want to break the alliance?

Then this is the perfect mod!

This file will disable any army or navy units attempting to attack an ally Army, Settlement, Navy, or Port.
Yes that is right - the AI will not break alliances by simply following their silly coded invasions!

Which makes it so allies cannot attack you. Alliances can only be broken by spies or assassins being caught by them, diplomatic end of alliance, or allies declaring war on your allies. This really helps the random behavior of the AI and the pointlessness of alliances in the game.

As far as I can tell it does not conflict with Roma Surrectum.

[High Fist]

This sounds amazing and I question why this hasn't been introduced before.

[tungri_centurio]

i looks like its not working correct on the rtw engine.if it worked it was a nice extra.

[Euenus]

It works fine for me?

[century x]

So basically this mod disables naval movement of allies to attack you?

[Euenus]

Disables the ability to attack allies but does nothing to stop you or the AI from breaking it off through diplomacy, spies or assassins being caught, or allies' declaration of war.

[High Fist]

So the two files in question are: descr_cursor_actions.txt and cursor_action_tooltips.txt

Once dvk says modifying these files is "safe" for the script, I'll download it. Nice find.

[Greymane]

This is one hell of a find! Thanks Euenus!
Really the only thing putting me off with Roma Surrectum is that you will eventually end up fighting everyone.
If this fixes that and it is safe...

Fingers crossed for dvk's answer.

[onmy6]

Great idea after some research i discovered that they didnt worked the bugs out, the mod died off back in 2009 and didnt play nice with some RTW mods, the concept works well on M2TW and apparently works ok on RTW VH/VH settings however with a legend like DVK maybe he can figure i out

[dvk901]

This is, unfortunately, one big advantage that M2TW has over RTW....the ability to better control the AI. That's the reason this idea works well in M2TW, but not so much in RTW...or with varying results.

I've been thinking for a very long time how to make the AI 'feel better' about alliances, but the only thing that is really available in RTW is to punish the AI for breaking them. For example, it would be possible to script a situation where, if faction 'a' is allied with faction 'b', it would benefit both by giving the FL a trait, that is then replicated in all characters, and gives them a trade, or tax or law bonus or something. Then if they broke the alliance, the trait would be taken away from the FL, and subsequently all other characters.

The problem is, I don't know if the RTW AI is smart enough to associate an action of this type with a 'benefit' or a 'penalty'. I DO know that if a faction gets into trouble with, say , rebellious cities or is being attacked by other factions, or has run out of money....they will ask for a ceasefire long enough to recover. An interesting dynamic I see a lot, so it leads one to assume that the AI is smart enough to know that it will get money the next turn.

The thing to do, perhaps, could be to associate the 'give money' part of the script...or the income supplement that RS2 uses, with NOT being at war with anyone. If the faction\AI senses that 'being at war' means 'no money'...it might be smart enough to figure that out. I don't know...it would need a lot of testing so you didn't cripple the AI in the process.

[Euenus]

But again, this doesn't compete with the fact that this works for me. It prevents attacking while you're in an alliance.

[dvk901]

But again, this doesn't compete with the fact that this works for me. It prevents attacking while you're in an alliance.

I understand, however, I an wary of this for several reasons. The main file atered here is:

descr_cursor_actions.txt

This file 'assumes' that something is 'clicked on'. The AI does not 'click' on anything, nor does it use a cursor like the player does.
I know from experience with my attempts to prevent 'cloned characters' that I could prevent the PLAYER from cloning a non-family character by giving that character a trait called 'Not_Adoptable', and putting that trait in the section of 'export_descr_advice.txt' as a condition like so:

and not trait not_adoptable

in this case, the adoption request or window would never pop up for the player, and no more cloned characters were even possible.
BUT, the AI just ignored this. So it makes no sense that the AI would have to pay any attention at all to the cursor actions file. From what I read in the thread about this mod, that was exactly the problem people were having.

But hey, I could be wrong. Keep testing it and we'll see what happens.

[Alavaria]

I understand, however, I an wary of this for several reasons. The main file atered here is:

descr_cursor_actions.txt

This file 'assumes' that something is 'clicked on'. The AI does not 'click' on anything, nor does it use a cursor like the player does.

I remember hearing about this mod and even using it in M2TW.

It doesn't work in RTW and the related (BI/Alex) exes for this reason, but it does work in M2TW because the AI there has to "click" something to attack (instead of just attacking) due to the way they have it interact with the game.

[Euenus]

What I have noticed: I played Sparta, turned on the script, went along my business. Next turn, it again asked me if I wanted to turn on my script.

[High Fist]

That sounds scary. I'm gonna make a back up and try it in a new campaign some time today.

[High Fist]

Right, started a new campaign, only a few turns in but looking good. Playing one turn as the GCS, I can't attack any of my allies and it doesn't seem to be affecting the script. Euenus, didn't you say you had that problem before you used this mod?

[Euenus]

Yeah.

[High Fist]

Yep, don't work.

This file assumes that the AI is clicking on something. How does the AI attack with its armies then? If we know that then there might be a way to tell the AI not to attack allies? Maybe?

This has probably been covered a hundred times before but.

[Alavaria]

I think in RTW it's hardcoded into the exe, the AI just attacks and you can't change it. You have to click to tell the engine "I am attacking", the AI just tells the engine straight up "I'm attacking".

Apparently when writing the AI for the M2TW engine, they had it "clicking" rather than the method RTW used, so the trick of "you can't click that" works on the AI there.

Meanwhile in RTW it certainly works on the player, but you usually just end up fighting everyone anyway, heh...

[High Fist]

Hmm. A shame. Let's hope dvk finds a way to bribe the out of them. /