Some suggestions/ideas and questions

[theharkonnen]

I was wondering:

Why do none of the faction missions show up in the missions tab? I thought it was me, then I remembered that nothing shows up for Cao, Liu, Sun, or Yuan either.

[Seether]

Because they are scripted, they show up by clicking the advisor, then clicking “show me how”.

[R.P. Gryphus]

Because you must follow the instruction given in the first or second turn of your campaign. You must click on the help button, and on the circle to pop up the windows on which is written the mission details.

[theharkonnen]

How stupid of me. Thanks!

Another question: Does acumen stack? For example, if I have two officers in a city with 5, does this become 10?

I had Zhuge Liang and Liu Bei in a city, then when I had Liu leave it, the population rapidly declined. I was surprised as I thought it was limited to Zhuge's 10.

[R.P. Gryphus]

No it doesn't stack lol. The acumen affecting the settlement is from the character that manage the settlement. His picture is visible when you open the window of the settlement. The reason it declines is probably because Liu Bei was managing the settlement and when he left it was Zhuge Liang.

[Seether]

Do either of you have a late-game save and can take a screen shot of the merchant with the income he gets (or lack thereof) from a resource and his traits?

[theharkonnen]

I just have one where it is starting to go down. This guy was trading at about 40.

[Seether]

I figured out the issue. Apparently it is a misconception the modding community has had about trade & resources since forever. I'll update later.

[R.P. Gryphus]

Quick question : I'm trying to make available all camp border for all faction, but I seem to be missing something since it doesn't work. I've played in descr_regions and gave the hidden resources needed to make the building available for all, but it doesn't work. It gives something like this :

C-0305-a-ChangShan
    C-0305-b-ChangShan
    russia
    PL03-jiz-A
    207 167 201
    City05A, swg, korea_liao, italy, AA01-Gov, AA11-Road-B, AB03-jiz, recruit-HB, ZYborder, XLborder, JDborder, JZborder, BSborder
    5
    1
    religions { catholic 0 orthodox 0 islam 0 pagan 95 heretic 0 daoism 0 revolution 5 }

And in export_descr_buildings you can see :

zy_retrain_1 requires factions { middle_eastern, } and hidden_resource AA01-Gov and hidden_resource ZYborder

And all settlements in descr_regions have the hidden resource.

[Seether]

Did you delete map.rwm?

[R.P. Gryphus]

No i didn't. Gonna do that and see. Thanks.

EDIT : It works, thanks. ^^

[R.P. Gryphus]

character_record J-0213-GuanPing , male, age 13, alive, never_a_leader

What is the use of this code before the name of the character? I thought it was referring to the character buqu, but it is not. I'm trying to make Guan Ping recruitable as an unaligned officer, since he joins approximately at the same time as Liao Hua and Zhou Cang.

EDIT : Oh okay, I think its just the code to feature the name in-game.

[R.P. Gryphus]

There's a lot of traits that make no sense, I can't even find them in export_vnvs, like ZhanDou1000 or "Trigger trigger_1dao-102_10" or "Trigger trigger_1dao-102_104". And there's also this that I don't get :

{Loyalty_Starter}hidden trait
{ZhangWei_general}hidden trait
{han_biography}hidden trait
{uso}hidden trait
{eulpaso}hidden trait
{YT_general}hidden trait
{GuoDa_general}hidden trait
{GaoLan_general}hidden trait
{GuanYu}hidden trait
{ZhangFei}hidden trait
{LiuBei}hidden trait
{LuoJun_general}hidden trait
{TianFeng_general}hidden trait
{LuJi_general}hidden trait
{HuanJie_general}hidden trait
{DongZhao_general}hidden trait
{ZhouYu_general}hidden trait
{ChengPu_general}hidden trait
{ZhouTai_general}hidden trait
{GanNing_general}hidden trait
{LuXun_general}hidden trait
{SunQuan_general}hidden trait
{SunCe_general}hidden trait
{CaoRen_general}hidden trait
{XiahouDun_general}hidden trait

Hidden trait, what does it stand for? I understood that in-game we can't see what they do, but in the files, I don't get why there's plenty of Hidden traits doing nothing compared to the hundred other traits below them?

[Seether]

They are for unique strat models.

[R.P. Gryphus]

I just don't get how the term "hidden trait" can be connected to a strat model. It gets confusing really quickly when playing in those files. -_-

And what about ZhanDou1000 or "Trigger trigger_1dao-102_102" or "Trigger trigger_1dao-102_104"?

[Seether]

Hidden trait, with accompanying entry in export_descr_character_traits.txt, is so that the trait isn’t displayed in the character’s info screen.

For strat models you have to compare the trait level in export_descr_character_traits.txt to the model level & faction in descr_characters.txt .

Strat models are assigned via traits. The mod workshop has tutorials on such.

[R.P. Gryphus]

Ok thanks for the info, and what about [B]ZhanDou1000 or "Trigger trigger_[B]1dao-102_102" or "Trigger trigger_1dao-102_104"?

And another quick question. Let's say I want to make Zuo Ci available, but his loyalty is way to high to bribe. How do I decrease this? Because even the trait list isn't clear compared to other mod or vanilla :

traits ZuoCi_general 1 , JbAAAA0100 1 , Lz-3001-0 1 , Jn1000 2 , Jn2001 2 , Jn3001 2 , Jn4001 2 , Jn5001 2 , JnA1000 4 , JnA2000 4 , JnA3000 4 , JnA4000 4 , JnA5000 4 , JnA6000 4 , JnA7000 9 , JnA8000 9 , JnA9000 1 , Jnxg6000 2 , A1050JnJM-A 3 , A1070JnFS-A 3 , B2150JnJY-A 3 , B2160JnDC-A 3

Jn2001 is for acumen and the value for Zuo Ci is 2, but in-game it's 10!

Is there not a way, like via chat on steam, I can become an apprentice of yours or Gig' just so I can start to understand a little bit better how this mod works? ^^' I really wish I can mod it, like I did for SS6.3, but there's so many thing that I can't pass through.

[theharkonnen]

Why don't you try PMs on these forums?

[theharkonnen]

I figured out the issue. Apparently it is a misconception the modding community has had about trade & resources since forever. I'll update later.

Any news on this front? The late-game economy is my biggest peeve right now.

[Seether]

So this is a copy of my original post. The discussion is between myself and Gigantus, in regard to the disappearance of Merchant income from trade resources starting at mid-game. I believed it was due to the -1 trade income penalty (found in stone_wall and above) stacking and having a global effect, where it penalized not only trade income but also the value of trade resources. It was believed, previously, that those trade income penalties/bonuses only directly affected trade income - they were not to supposed to affect Merchant income from trade resources at all. So, essentially, the more city-level-and-greater size settlements you, the more -1 trade income penalties you have. Those -1 penalties stack together, which results in not only the killing of trade income, but also the disappearance of all trade resource values. Interestingly, unlike trade income penalties, trade income bonuses are not global and only affect the local settlement. So I ran a series of tests (with my new economic files) and the results pretty much speak for themselves. The most telling are tests #10 & #11, as they show an 11 settlement faction at game start and at early mid-game (in regard to number of trade income penalties), with a huge disparity in the value of the same trade resource.

Spoiler Alert, click show to read: 

I can definitely say it's not negative traits for the Merchant(s). This guy modified his game (descr_strat) to make his settlements start at a larger size and got hit by this in the early game; as you can see, no negative traits and 0 income. This always happens in late game and has for many versions of this mod. By late game essentially every settlement you own is at least of city-level, meaning you could have every single one of your 30-50 settlements giving you the "trade_base_income_bonus bonus -1 requires factions { all, }" . It is in such a situation that you see the total disappearance of all income that is in any way related to commerce. Trade income drops to 0, every one of your merchants, on any resource type, will yield 0 gold.

Here it is reported back in 2015 - the guy tries to link treasury size to diminishing merchant income. As his treasury will naturally increase the larger his kingdom gets, the larger his settlements become and more trade-related buildings he constructs (plus economy was a bit out of whack 4 years ago), I believe it is actually the number of settlements that give the trade_base_income penalty (as his kingdom got larger), that caused his issue. And here is a 3.5 campaign, 62 turns in, when his rather large empire is starting to have quite a few city-level size and above settlements.


EDIT: So I just did a series of tests. First is using the Wudoumi Sect (mongols). At campaign start they possess one City-level (stone_wall) settlement and one castle (wooden_castle). Then I use Ba-Shu, with one test at game start and a second test with all core-buildings having -1 trade_income_bonus, to represent a mid-game faction with numerous larger cities where this penalty would take hold.

Test #1: No changes. Using my recently modified files (removed all trade_income bonuses and penalties from core buildings and increased resource value x3 in descr_sm_resources)
Result: 99 wuzhu

Spoiler Alert, click show to read: 

Test #2: added "trade_base_income_bonus bonus 5 requires factions { all, }" to stone_wall core building
Result: 137 wuzhu

Spoiler Alert, click show to read: 

Test #3: added "trade_base_income_bonus bonus 5 requires factions { all, }" to stone_wall core building & removed all buildings from Hanzhong except stone_wall core building
Result: 129 wuzhu

Spoiler Alert, click show to read: 

Test #4: added "trade_base_income_bonus bonus 5 requires factions { all, }" to stone_wall and wooden_castle core buildings & removed all buildings from Hanzhong except stone_wall core building
Result: 129 wuzhu

Spoiler Alert, click show to read: 

Test #5: Same as Test #1, except added "trade_base_income_bonus bonus -1 requires factions { all, }" to stone_wall
Result: 91 wuzhu

Spoiler Alert, click show to read: 

Test #6: Same as Test #1, except added "trade_base_income_bonus bonus -1 requires factions { all, }" to stone_wall and wooden_castle
Result: 84 wuzhu

Spoiler Alert, click show to read: 

Test #7: Same as Test #1, except added "trade_base_income_bonus bonus -1 requires factions { all, }" to stone_wall and wooden_castle & removed all buildings from Hanzhong except stone_wall core building
Result: 76 wuzhu

Spoiler Alert, click show to read: 

Test #8: Same as Test #1, except added "trade_base_income_bonus bonus -5 requires factions { all, }" to stone_wall
Result: 84 wuzhu

Spoiler Alert, click show to read: 

Test #9: added "trade_base_income_bonus bonus -5 requires factions { all, }" to stone_wall and wooden_castle
Result: 23 wuzhu

Spoiler Alert, click show to read: 

Test #10: Used Ba-Shu (11 settlements = 1 stone_wall, 5 wooden_wall, 3 wooden_pallisade, 3 wooden_castle) with same files as Test #1
Result: 106 wuzhu

Spoiler Alert, click show to read: 

Test #11: Same as Test #10, added "trade_base_income_bonus bonus -1 requires factions { all, }" to all above-mentioned core_buildings.
Result: 15 wuzhu

Spoiler Alert, click show to read: 

Conclusion: As an FYI, when I refer to "bonus" I am referring to a positive bonus, while "penalty" is a negative bonus. There are several things that I got from this series of tests. First is that trade income and resource value are intertwined more than the modding community had come to believe. We all know that trade buildings (roads, markets, ports, etc.) increase a settlement's trade income, a merchant's skills affects how much money they get from a resource, and the value of a resource in descr_sm_resources affects both the trade income of a settlement and how much money a merchant gains from the resource. It is also known that the trade_base_income_bonus capability can be set as both negative and positive, but exactly how those worked was misunderstood by modders.

First, a bonus only affects the local settlement, meaning it does not stack or globally affect the faction (tests #3 & #4). Second, a penalty not only affects the local settlement, but also stacks with other trade_base_income penalties in other settlements and affects the faction globally. Third, both bonuses and penalties affect the value of resources (money merchants make from a resource). Fourth, while trade income is known to be derived, at least partially, from the type and amount of resources in that setlement's region, trade income and resource values are apparently directly connected, with penalties/bonuses to the former having a direct effect on the value of the latter. So if a trade_income penalty is applied to a specific building, and multiple settlements construct that building, both trade income and the amount of money merchants get from a resource will drop dramatically - even to 0. With just 11 settlements (in Tests #10 & #11) giving a -1 penalty, the value of the Dye resource dropped 86% - from 106 to only 15! Similarly, with the Wudoumi Sect, when comparing 1 settlement to 2 settlements (Test #8 & #9) with a -5 penalty in each, the value of the Dye resource dropped 73% - from 84 (1 settlement with penalty) to only 23 (2 settlements with penalty)! So, to finalize, attempting to control a faction's income by lowering its trade income via penalties has had the unforeseen consequence of lowering global trade resource values and making merchants utterly useless.