Anti-Trait+NoGoingBackLevel mechanic confirmed broken in Medieval 2 Kingdoms

[Withwnar]

This I expect: Ignorance = 1, RhetoricSkill = 0, StrategicSkill = 0

[Jurand of Cracow]

This I expect: Ignorance = 1, RhetoricSkill = 0, StrategicSkill = 0

Yep, I do as well. This makes a trait with many anti-traits a very powerful one (of course, it depends on the triggers: if there're few of them or rarely fire than it doesn't matter).

Anyway, the title of the thread is a bit misleading: it's not that Anti-trait mechanics is broken, but only Anti-Trait in conjunction with NoGoingBack.

Both mechanism still have their uses, only in a special case: when you want to have both (a Princess can be either ugly or nice, but once she's ugly she shouldn't change into a nice one) one should use another mechanism.

[Withwnar]

Anyway, the title of the thread is a bit misleading: it's not that Anti-trait mechanics is broken, but only Anti-Trait in conjunction with NoGoingBack.

I was thinking the same thing. Perhaps a moderator or OP author could change it, as it's a sticky and therefore highly visible. Anti-Trait+NoGoingBackLevel mechanic confirmed broken in Medieval 2 Kingdoms might be better.

[Gigantus]

Ask and ye shall receive, google and ye shall find, knock and ye shall hear jokes....

[elud]

Good evening! I've been trying to learn more about traits and triggers so I can fix existing (and make new) traits and triggers for a mod so that they work properly and am trying to find the best way to go about it.
I have been reading the guides here, and checking threads to try find what bugs are there and how to avoid them, downloading other mods just to look at the edct to see how they set up the traits and triggers so I could perhaps learn something from it. So if I understand correctly, is that antitrait doesnt work as it should and am not supposed to use it for any traits that have effects, to avoid using antitrait + nogoingbacklevel together, but what about only nogoingbacklevel? Does it work correctly on its own?
I manly found people either using the nogoingbacklevel 1 or the virtual level, if they used it at all in the mods that I checked. If I want to use say nogoingbacklevel 3 in a trait that has 4 levels would that work(the trait being part of a pair that emulates antitrait mechanic with the trigger setup)? Or would using nogoingbacklevel at that level there cause any problems?
I am no expert on the matter, but I want to learn so I can do a proper job. Or did I maybe oversee some thread where these things are explained more in detail, the dos and don'ts?

[Gigantus]

nogingbacklevel and anti-traits work individually as advertised, BUT when used together they don't.

[elud]

I see, thank you for the clarification Gigantus!

[Razor]

I've been reading this thread over and over, but my head is spinning and I can't seem to find definite answers... still...

nogingbacklevel and anti-traits work individually as advertised, BUT when used together they don't.

So you're saying that the two work as intended when used separately? However, V.T. Marvin is stating:

This bug is different from the "NoGoingBackLevel" one. The point is not that an antitrait removes all levels of the trait, but that while the levels appear fine, the associated attributes still linger and if the trait-antitrait pair is used often, it stacks.

That leaves me with a few questions:

Question 1) does one point of the antitrait still remove all points of the trait? (Of which V.T.Marvin said it wasn't THE point he was making, but is it still A point to consider?)
Question 2) do the effects of the trait indeed still linger on even if it appears that the antitrait has removed them?

Because if so: then the antitraits don't quite work as intended, right?


Also, this quote:

"Workaround for the bug when gaining an anti-trait would reset trait value to zero

This is one nasty bug. It does not happen often, but when it happens it's not pretty. For example, if your Assassin had 4 points in GoodAssassin (Superior Assassin), and after one failed kill got 1 point of BadAssassin, instead getting left with 3 points (Murderer), he'll lose all points in GoodAssassin. Careful inspection shows that this bug only happens with traits that have no "NoGoingBackLevel". Just giving virtual "NoGoingBackLevel" to all problematic traits will fix the bug. By virtual, I mean giving levels that are not possible to achieve, like 6th level for GoodAssassin (which has just 5 levels)."

Withwnar is drawing the conclusion from it that "NoGoingBackLevel is the cause", while the quote says that using NoGoingBackLevel is actually fixing the bug of the antitrait resetting the trait value?



After reading all of this I still don't know what the issues are exactly and what works and what doesn't.

[Withwnar]

this bug only happens with traits that have no "NoGoingBackLevel".

the quote says that using NoGoingBackLevel is actually fixing the bug of the antitrait resetting the trait value?

Oops. Looks like I missed the "no" in that sentence. I have removed my comment that NoGoingBackLevel is the cause.

It's describing a second issue with Anti-traits and yes it is saying that NoGoingBackLevel fixes it but only when used in a special way: present but not doing anything because its level will never be reached. So it's there but effectively isn't there, hence "virtual".

Question 1) does one point of the antitrait still remove all points of the trait? (Of which V.T.Marvin said it wasn't THE point he was making, but is it still A point to consider?)
Question 2) do the effects of the trait indeed still linger on even if it appears that the antitrait has removed them?

Because if so: then the antitraits don't quite work as intended, right?

From what others are saying...

1) Yes, unless a virtual NoGoingBackLevel is also used.

2) Yes, although maybe not always? My test in post 4 seemed to work correctly (without NoGoingBackLevel).

So yes, avoiding Anti-traits altogether would be wise. It's possible to code Anti-trait-like behaviour instead of using the Anti-traits mechanism, but could quickly get complicated.

Changing the thread's title to "Anti-Trait+NoGoingBackLevel" was the wrong call, sorry Gigantus. It's true that that combination is broken but Anti-traits are also broken in a different way regardless of NoGoingBackLevel.

[Razor]

Oops. Looks like I missed the "no" in that sentence. I have removed my comment that NoGoingBackLevel is the cause.

It's describing a second issue with Anti-traits and yes it is saying that NoGoingBackLevel fixes it but only when used in a special way: present but not doing anything because its level will never be reached. So it's there but effectively isn't there, hence "virtual".



From what others are saying...

1) Yes, unless a virtual NoGoingBackLevel is also used.

2) Yes, although maybe not always? My test in post 4 seemed to work correctly (without NoGoingBackLevel).

So yes, avoiding Anti-traits altogether would be wise. It's possible to code Anti-trait-like behaviour instead of using the Anti-traits mechanism, but could quickly get complicated.

Changing the thread's title to "Anti-Trait+NoGoingBackLevel" was the wrong call, sorry Gigantus. It's true that that combination is broken but Anti-traits are also broken in a different way regardless of NoGoingBackLevel.

Oof, not the answer I was hoping for, but at least an answer that makes sense. It would require a rework of all the traits and triggers to circumvent this nasty bug.

[bitterhowl]

BYG's supply system built on Anti-trait mechanism, all local characters are involved every turn - and trait effects (movement points, command points) correctly change according to traits.

[Jurand of Cracow]

iirc, Byg's used the the anti-trait by simultaniously subtracting a point in one trait and adding it to it's "antitrait". I'm not sure he used the "antitrait" feature from the engine.

[Gigantus]

How about a 'one trait to bind them all' method - have a multiple level trait that starts with the middle (neutral) level and triggers then add or subtract levels.

Better
Good
Neutral
Bad
Worse

Edit: would work only with one 'anti' trait, unfortunately.

[Jurand of Cracow]

Guys, these are my ways (implemented in the SSHIP) of dealing the the AT/AT-NGB bug:

Delete both AT and NGB and:

1. Fusion: two traits into one
   
   1. if there’re just two anti-traits and you accept that the trait will be on every character for the whole game (eg. Intelligent-Ignorant) or the trait is hidden to the player
   2. you fuse two traits into one, add technical levels at both ends (eg. technical_bad, very bad, bad, neutral, good, very good, technical_good - remember 9 levels is maximum!); add a “starter” (middle value) at the beginning of his life (has in mind all situations: CoA, OfA, OfM, MotH, script); add safety triggers at the end (if below technical then +, if at technical_max then -) - just in case you've made a mistake somewhere.
   3. In this method you need to be very careful with triggers, and it’s easy to make errors mixing up points and levels.
   
   
2. Subtraction: take points from both traits simultaneously
   
   1. there’re just two anti-traits and you need an interaction between various triggers during the process of awarding points in one turn, and the final outcome depends on what's going in the meantime (eg. Coming of Age for the Princesses in the StainlessSteel)
   2. two triggers: take away one point of one trait (if it’s positive) or add a point to the other trait (if it’s 0)
   3. In this method you need to create many triggers, especially if there’re more conditions in the triggers (what I usually want to do…). There're also errors possible so a safety valve as described above is useful.
   
   
3. Clearing house: take points from both (or more) traits at the end
   
   1. there’re just two anti-traits and you can accept temporary (ie during the event firing, what is invisible to the player) divergencies, and also some marginal overall impreciseness in probabilities
   2. make triggers as usual for both traits, then (perhaps at the end of the EDCT file) make a "clearing house" taking away points in both traits until only one of them is positive (eg. Battle Dread/Chivalry)
   3. this is a very time-efficient solution and is less prone to errors (they’re levelled up at the end, after all).
   
   
4. NoGoingBack threshold
   
   1. introduce at the required level an additional trigger giving many points (say +10) with 100% probability; adjust the thresholds accordingly; add additional highest technical level so that it doesn't explode (character is getting those +10 every turn).
   2. if the NGB is somewhere in the middle (eg. lvl2 when there're 3 levels), to additional triggers are needed (for each of the levels to be NGB).
   
   
5. More complicated traits and triggers
   
   1. Use mixture of the methods above.
   2. One should be very, very careful with triggers and probabilities, and know the gameplay very well.

Example of getting rid of No Going Back:

;------------------------------------------Trait Insane
 Characters family


 Level Dysfunctional
   Description Dysfunctional_desc
   EffectsDescription Dysfunctional_effects_desc
   GainMessage Dysfunctional_gain_desc
   Threshold 1 

   Effect Authority -1 
   
 Level Quite_Mad_NGB
   Description Quite_Mad_desc
   EffectsDescription Quite_Mad_effects_desc
   GainMessage Quite_Mad_gain_desc
   Threshold 2 

   Effect Authority -2

 Level Quite_Mad
   Description Quite_Mad_desc
   EffectsDescription Quite_Mad_effects_desc
   Threshold 12 

   Effect Authority -2
   
 Level Utterly_Insane_NGB
   Description Utterly_Insane_desc
   EffectsDescription Utterly_Insane_effects_desc
   GainMessage Utterly_Insane_gain_desc
   Threshold 13 

   Effect Authority -3
   
 Level Utterly_Insane
   Description Utterly_Insane_desc
   EffectsDescription Utterly_Insane_effects_desc
   Epithet Utterly_Insane_epithet_desc
   Threshold 23

   Effect Authority -3
  
........................

;------------------------------------------
Trigger Insane_NoGoingBack_2
 WhenToTest CharacterTurnEnd


 Condition Trait Insane > 1
       and Trait Insane < 3
       
 Affects Insane 10 Chance 100


;------------------------------------------
Trigger Insane_NoGoingBack_3
 WhenToTest CharacterTurnEnd


 Condition Trait Insane > 2
       and Trait Insane < 4
       
 Affects Insane 10 Chance 100

[Jadli]

Has anyone had any experience with trait that have anti traits to possibly cause crashes in campaign? I had to remove a few triggers including such traits to avoid such crashes- sitting_around_camp_vnv_trigger, harsh_lifestyle2 and selfperpetuating 5,17,34,41. Possibly will have to remove more of them or find whats suddenly causing the issue with them...

Only thing I can think of as an explanation is that perhaps I accidentaly gave oppossing traits to some of my characters, and hence when the triggers come true, it could cause a crash.... anybody got an experience with what could crashes with these triggers? (they ussually caused crashes around turn 50, now the game runs smooth)

[Jadli]

Ehm, nothing?