Raider mechanics need to be changed to allow the user to achieve technological superiority

[SanzSeraph]

One serious flaw I see in the game, which should be easy to change, is that no matter how fast the player advances, they can never achieve technological superiority. Raider settings are tied to the current era, so as soon as you advance to, say, the Bronze age, Raiders immediately come at you with bronze weapons.

The problem is that this can't even be changed in a custom scenario. I wanted to create a "Vikings in North America" scenario, where the player starts out in the iron age, and has to survive onslaughts from hordes of Native Americans who are still using Neolithic technology. But as far as I can tell, that is not achievable using the current modification capabilities. If you supply a SetRaider action with an era of Neolithic, raiders never come because the player is in the iron age. But if you have a SetRaider action with an era of IronAge, then the raiders have iron age technology.

[ᴇɪɴᴀᴜɢᴀ]

I have the same issue, having multiple scenarios at the ready but missing the nuance to make it plausible. I'd like to decide myself what weapons raiders are carrying.

[threethreethree]

Originally posted by ᴇɪɴᴀᴜɢᴀ:

I have the same issue, having multiple scenarios at the ready but missing the nuance to make it plausible. I'd like to decide myself what weapons raiders are carrying.

I can't really tell if my code for predators attacking works. set raider for hyenas, wolves, and lions. it seems they will hunt you because they're hungry and near enough, but not because i coded it, or because I put so many on the map. Am also still wondering if something like period 0.1 variance 0.05 does anything, or does it need to be whole quarter years. Is this something you know anything about?

[ᴇɪɴᴀᴜɢᴀ]

Originally posted by threethreethree:

I can't really tell if my code for predators attacking works. set raider for hyenas, wolves, and lions. it seems they will hunt you because they're hungry and near enough, but not because i coded it, or because I put so many on the map.

I peeked into your scenario as I was playing I noticed some off things. I think there's a flaw in the SetRaider settings where you have duplicate lines for each era, which might be interfering with timing of other events like trader spawning. The first line (animals) per era is not properly executed as the second line (human) overrules it, which isn't causing a crash but isn't accepted as proper code apparently.

It's not that noticible as the higher ratio of predators in your scenario cause more frequent attacks anyway, but I've had villagers going off to collect some pristine weapon laying far out a few times, that any defeated raider or villager would have recently dropped their weapon is not possible. The weapon probably appears because of the 'blocked' execution of the first line.

I've had a similar experience myself in testing code TriggerRaiderAttack amount=1 with mint weapons appearing instead of a raider spawning but it didn't interfere with time.
Your TriggerRaiderAttacks are fine, so it could be the flaw is in SetRaider. Just the one line per era forces you to compromise between random human/animal combined or either human or animal raiders only for a specific era.

Also several small raids (TriggerRaiderAttack) happening around the same moment as regular raids (SetRaider), causes them wanting to join up with eachother, to then arrive exhausted and scattered in groups being easy pickings.

[ᴇɪɴᴀᴜɢᴀ]

Originally posted by threethreethree:

Am also still wondering if something like period 0.1 variance 0.05 does anything, or does it need to be whole quarter years. Is this something you know anything about?

If variance is short or absent the event generally happens at the start of the given period.
Larger variance makes the occurrence less predectable but it can't exceed the period logically. variance=0.05y on period=0.1y will work but I doubt it's noticable?
If the number is a decimal you can decimal away all you like, no quarters or anything.

[threethreethree]

thanks for the reponses

Originally posted by ᴇɪɴᴀᴜɢᴀ:

Also several small raids (TriggerRaiderAttack) happening around the same moment as regular raids (SetRaider), causes them wanting to join up with eachother, to then arrive exhausted and scattered in groups being easy pickings.

yea this happens, (and referring to the split trigger raider groups too) but it actually results in things that I wanted, so it's acceptable.

Originally posted by ᴇɪɴᴀᴜɢᴀ:

I've had villagers going off to collect some pristine weapon laying far out a few times, that any defeated raider or villager would have recently dropped their weapon is not possible

I've had a similar experience myself in testing code TriggerRaiderAttack amount=1 with mint weapons appearing instead of a raider

with me, this seems to happen only where raiders have left the map. i've also noticed (rarely) someone going to butcher something that wasn't ours but predators took down, and it seems to be predators getting a trader's animal, versus just another wild one. Don't think i've seen that in vanilla but not sure, and others say it happens in all mods potentially.

Originally posted by ᴇɪɴᴀᴜɢᴀ:

If variance is short or absent the event generally happens at the start of the given period.
Larger variance makes the occurrence less predectable but it can't exceed the period logically. variance=0.05y on period=0.1y will work but I doubt it's noticable?
If the number is a decimal you can decimal away all you like, no quarters or anything.

awesome. thanks.


...but, now to the main thing - I have separate lines for human raiders and for predator attacks aka raids. And you say that works against the way that the code wants to work. Any suggestions? You can see what I'm wanting and trying to get, but this implies that I won't get it...can't imagine another way. I can't combine the predators and raiders because they are 2 completely different dynamics and should be completely different events executed differently from each other.

I'm thinking of resorting to not having human raiders in some eras, so that I can use it for predator attacks, and use a more thought-out trigger raider approach to getting those in that age/era. But I'd rather be able to use the regular schedule.

as far as i understand, i can't really do a trigger raider for animals, because no matter how much i've looked and tested, i can't influence WHERE the animal spawns, and i wouldn't want to spawn it in the village anyway. if doing that way, does the game just pick some preexisting animals and send them your way to stalk? (you can see my first group of animal spawns, but those are useless unless a player starts where the game puts them at first, and i was never sure i wanted it like that anyway.)

And so finally - does triggering an animal attack actually work? without it being hungry, for example, because that's how i imagine it if it's not been what i see with predators when they get hungry and are close. Also, i seen it implied elsewhere that you can do this for aurochs or bear, not just predators.

(btw the period and variance for predator raid schedule was just me trying to increase the chances of making it happen. making it very frequent but also 'shaking it up' instead of it being very consistent and ending up in time-spots that didn't work somehow, because it seemed to me that it was just influencing the close predators when they got hungry)

[ᴇɪɴᴀᴜɢᴀ]

Yeah you probably need to compromise raiders into just one line per era or just keep them separate. TriggerRaiderAttack with animals doesn't work so if you want separate animal and human raids but simultaneously occurring, I'd suggest sticking to animals in SetRaider and human attacks by TriggerRaiderAttack. You can also blend humans and predators in SetRaider and let AI randomly choose the raider type

entity_types="primitive_human wolf bear" mins="2 2 2" maxes="3 3 3"

Like you said, human and animal raiders don't join up if spawned by different events at the same time, or at all really.

To my experience animal raiders spawn just for the event and move from the edge of the map just like humans do. They can be spotted by being in "moving" mode in a straight line for a long time or already having targeted a person without being hungry.

A way to simulate animal raids is to have a pack of predators (leader/followers) spawn near a person or amidst a village, edging parental predators to instantly retaliate and cause an attack, but that's rather a weak option and unfair to the player if you ask me.

That's basically all you can work with, but yes you can also have mammoth raiders - anything that has red or orange PrimalVision color are retaliation animals when attacked and can be utilized as raider. Can't remember to have tried if non-agressive animals work too but my guess is no.

[threethreethree]

Originally posted by ᴇɪɴᴀᴜɢᴀ:

snip

So animal setraider DOES work, just to confirm? They do start at edge of map and begin towards village? I'm going to do another round of testing for this. THANKS.

Isn't it good enough to just setraider for hyena without specifying adult and male etc?

btw I DON'T want animals and raiders joining up, and I'm pretty sure they wouldn't anyway. I just don't want to make animal attacks and raider schedules on the same rhythm by putting them on the same line. Also, I once tested spawning an adult female bear as leader, and cubs as follower, in the middle of village (start location) and had villagers attack cub. 'Momma' didn't care and just ran. I wouldn't want to do that anyway, if spawning like that I'd rather them be outside the village some distance first, but i could never make anything but start location work. Also, how/why would setraider affect the trader??

[threethreethree]

Doing tests I probably already tried almost a year ago.

<action type="SetRaider" era="Paleolithic" entity_types="cave_hyena" age="Adult" gender="Male" min="30" max="35" period="0.1y" variance="0.05y"/>

With no other line for paleolithic. No other raids coded in paleolithic.

New game. Number of hyenas so it'd be unmistakable. Ran from beginning of spring to mid autumn, just in case there is a default grace period. Nothing. No desired results. I checked every inch of the map in primal.

[pdoan8]

You might need a couple years for the first "raider" to be triggered. I'm pretty sure that there won't be any in the first year.

[threethreethree]

Originally posted by pdoan8:

You might need a couple years for the first "raider" to be triggered. I'm pretty sure that there won't be any in the first year.

well darn. any other kind of raiding I've coded in happened early, delayed only when i have a grace period. but if you guys are saying that predator attacks actually do work, per how i've coded it, then i'll keep working on it to have it in my mod. what i'd really like is to be able to spawn things in places other than right in the village then they raid/attack. but assigning location markers or coordinates or a structure for it either just doesn't work or wouldn't be a good method because, in the case of general coordinates, i'll never know where each player settles...even though i suppose i can make it the general center of map and they'd travel to the village if they're programmed to attack?

[ᴇɪɴᴀᴜɢᴀ]

In ActionSetRaider period, variance and grace_period all take default values when left out in the code line, 1.5y, 1y and 0.5y respectively. So if you leave out grace_period, you'll have to wait at least 0.5y for anything to happen. Leave out variance and it could randomly happen late in the 1y.

If you want a raid to occur closest to the start of any period, the shortest value for variance and grace_period="1" (of 4800) and it will happen practically instantly, there's no built-in grace period to wait out first not for any era.

The species of animals you want as raider need to be present on the map, not in numbers necessarily though. Animal raiders will be randomly picked from any pack that roams around and if more are needed than available, they just multiply from the ones that are already en-route.

[threethreethree]

Originally posted by ᴇɪɴᴀᴜɢᴀ:

In ActionSetRaider period, variance and grace_period all take default values when left out in the code line, 1.5y, 1y and 0.5y respectively. So if you leave out grace_period, you'll have to wait at least 0.5y for anything to happen. Leave out variance and it could randomly happen late in the 1y.

If you want a raid to occur closest to the start of any period, the shortest value for variance and grace_period="1" (of 4800) and it will happen practically instantly, there's no built-in grace period to wait out first not for any era.

The species of animals you want as raider need to be present on the map, not in numbers necessarily though. Animal raiders will be randomly picked from any pack that roams around and if more are needed than available, they just multiply from the ones that are already en-route.

i assumed that grace period applied only in beginning of game, the first age, and that when you advance to the next era, the counter for things keeps going continuously, as opposed to starting over for certain things and using either a coded grace or default grace. this is wrong?

and no, animal raids never happen for me. no matter how i code it or how long i wait.