Skorocel

Hello guys, I know this has been posted here already for dozen times, but anyway, is there a solution to that stupid split screen bug WITHOUT having to switch to 8-bit graphics in the main menu? OS: Windows XP Professional SP 3 Graphic card: nVidia GeForce FX5200

Just saw your Tut 1 & want to ask you something about intervals. As far as I understood, the interval condition can be basically used either for the carryall reinforcements or starport deliveries (enemy or player’s), and this especially when you want to make it happen for a certain number of times (say, 4 or 5), right? In other words, if I want to give the enemy/player a CR or SD say, 20 seconds from the start of the level, and want to repeat this action, say, every 30 seconds AND 4 times in total, the values will be as follows: Interval: 1800 Start Delay: 1200 Run Count: 5 Which means that the enemy/player will receive the first CR or SD 20 seconds from the beginning of the level, and then receive another CR or SD after 30 seconds, then another CR or SD after 30 seconds, and so on until the Run Count parameter reaches the value of 5, when the CRs or SDs will finally stop, right? Please correct me if I’m wrong, OK?

@Moonlight AbaSSy: So you have problems with my remake of the O9v1 level? Well, it was intended to be tougher than the original ;-), but anyway, I’d say that this particular remake is easier to beat than the remaining two which I thus far did (i.e. H9v2 and O8v1). I can say that I did beat it on hard difficulty fairly easily… What you basically need to do is to build another 2 refineries right in the beginning + couple of additional harvesters (remember you have 3 carryalls right from the start, so the harvesters should be picked from the spice fields to refineries & vice versa rather quickly). Then build a pretty strong wall of rocket turrets on the left side of the base (somewhere in the place where the Mercenary gun turret is standing in the beginning), and then put a decent number of siege tanks behind it, so that they can repel the attacks of sardaukars & troopers (that’s why I gave you a heavy factory right in the beginning, btw). As for the right side of the Mercenary base (i.e. the place between the two rocket turrets), it’s the same story, but you don’t need to build as many rocket turrets as on the left there as you’ll be attacked mainly by the Smugglers from this side, who maybe receive lots of missile tanks per starport, but they often tend to ignore your turrets and head straight for the Mercenaries & thus are a rather easy target to hit. Also don’t forget to put a decent number of siege tanks near the infantry only area located below the Mercenary outpost, so that no enemy sardaukars or troopers can sneak through it. And, unless you don’t have enough money to build a good defense line of rocket turrets on the upper left side of your base, DON’T build any buildings here (or near this place), as it will be attacked by the Harkonnen. Last but not least, DON’T forget to watch your harvesters! In the beginning of the level, let them all harvest the spice on the right side of the map (just below your base), but be careful as they can be smashed very easily by the Smugglers (who as I mentioned above receive many missile tanks per starport), so when the level starts, scout the whole area on the right side of the map, so you can then later spot the incoming attack on the radar & move the harvesters back to your base just in time. Later in the level, when the spice will be much scarcer, try to send your harvesters in an area where they are LESS prone to be attacked by the enemy (like, for example, the lower left corner of the map, where there’s an infinite spice bloom). Now once you have a good enough defense to protect your base from ALL possible sides of incoming attack AND enough money, build a vast army of combat tanks + missile tanks + quads + troopers & destroy the Smugglers first. Once that’s done, your harvesters should have a pretty easy mining, so amass another xy of spice and destroy the upper Atreides base. After that, you can cut the main Atreides & also the Emperor base from the spice by destroying their harvesters (remember that these 2 bases, contrary to Harkonnen, DON’T receive an automatic harvester reinforcement!). Once that’s done, the level becomes pretty much a piece of cake. As for the Mercenary starport reinforcements, you can change it very easily. Open the Mission editor from the D2K toolkit & then open the O9v1.mis file located in the Dune2000missions folder. If you previously didn’t do any changes to this file, the Mercenary starport reinforcements should be located in the „events“ section, number 36 & 37 (the difference between these 2 events is that in 36, the Mercs will receive the reinforcements a bit sooner than in 37; check the timer to see the exact time, but remember that the time which you see in the editor is multiplied by 60, so if the 36 has a timer of 9000, the real time in seconds will be 9000/60). Now just select either 36 or 37 and, in the menu on the right, you can add or subtract any unit you want. Once you did the desired changes, click on the „Apply“ button & then save the file via the upper left menu.

@mvi: Why there are X & Y coordinates next to a starport delivery? Does it have any bearing or is it completely irrelevant if I put, say X = 29 & Y = 45 or X = 0 & Y = 0? One would think that these X & Y values would point to the exact location of the given starport, but that's not the case. If you open, say, the H6v2 level, you'll see that the the X & Y values for the Ordos starport delivery are 5 & 45, but the actual starport lies somewhere else...

Well, that’s exactly what I did :) Too bad it came to my mind only after I wrote that previous post of mine :) It’s the easiest way, and it works 100 %!

Yes, but as I’ve already said, the problem is, these „finite“ ones aren’t visible on the map at all (I mean when you open a map in the klofkac’s editor, you don’t see them). There’s just spice on the map, but no spice bloom at all. Well, actually, you can see a small “hole” in the spice which seems to be the exact location of these “finite” ones, but even this is not always the case. For example, in the O9v2 level, you have one particular spice field which is located just between your & the Mercenary base, and this spice field has a spice bloom which reappears for some 20 or so times, and then it finally vanishes for good. When you open the map in the klofkac’s editor, you don’t see any “hole” in this spice field at all, but what’s interesting is that all the other spice fields in this level which have these “finite” blooms do have this “hole” (which, as I’ve already said, seems to be in the exact place where these “finite” blooms appear). In the 2 pictures below (taken from the O9v2 level, using the klofkac’s editor), you can see the aforementioned spice field between your & the Mercenary base, and then a spice field located just underneath the Mercenary base, near the left edge of the map. Both of these spice fields have this “finite” bloom, but as you can see, the former doesn’t have any “hole” in it, whilst the latter has.

When playing Dune 2000, you may’ve noticed that some of these „spice blooms“ will continue to reappear forever, whilst some will reappear, say, 15 or 20 times, and then disappear for good. But when you try to use the klofkac’s editor, there are only the „infinite“ ones visible (i.e. the ones which continue to reappear forever), whilst the later aren’t visible on the map at all. Is there a chance to put these on the map?

Plz help someone! I’d like to increase the casualty threshold for Mercenaries in O9v2. What should I do? For the “Mercenary leader: We’re losing too many men!” message: Casualty Threshold = 10 unknown C1 = 224 unknown C2 = 63 For the “Mercenary leader: We’ve lost too many men! We must withdraw our support!” message: Casualty Threshold = 15 unknown C1 = 32 unknown C2 = 64 Do I need to change only the Casualty threshold parameter or also the C1 & C2? What do these C1 & C2 parameters represent? Thanks in advance!

@sandworm & aKaFedaYkin: Stupid me, I take it back! Was too lazy to check the .mis files, you know 8) You’re both right about the Mercs. They indeed ally with the other houses when the casualties grow, so if the Harkonnen or Atreides decide to destroy their base, it’s actually good for the player, as it draws their attention away for a minute or two… Re: the stealth fremen & saboteurs, they of course get spotted by the infantry, but what I meant is that they also get “visible” when walking near an LI / trooper / sardaukar who belong to a house which is ALLIED to them. That’s what I found weird on it… If they’re allied with these units, why should they reveal themselves, isn’t it?

Didn’t know where to post this, but anyway, here are 2 "new things" which somehow got my attention when playing the D2K recently: 1. Why do the enemy stealth fremen appear “visible” when walking near the infantry units from the other enemy clans? Seems weird, isn’t it? 2. Also, in the levels where the Ordos play together with the Mercs, why, once you get that message: „We’ve lost too many men! We must withdraw our support!”, do the Mercs let their base to be destroyed by the other clans, which are supposed to be “neutral” to the Mercs? As far as I understand, the Mercs become “neutral” to all houses whilst all houses become “neutral” to Mercs as well WHEN this message appears, but what’s pretty common is that, by the time of this message, the Mercs are fighting against this or that house’s unit (or some house’s unit is about to attack their base or unit), but what’s strange is that they, once being attacked, don’t respond to the enemy fire at all (i.e. they still consider the attackers as “neutral”, whilst the attackers certainly don’t consider the Mercs to be “neutral”). They simply won’t do anything and will let their base to be destroyed without firing one single shot at the attackers… I mean it’s OK when they, once they become “neutral” to you and all the other houses, stop receiving those Starport deliveries (which is perfectly understandable as it would be of no use to them when they aren’t fighting with anyone anymore), but this is strange… If they become “neutral” to you and you, by an accident, attack them, they’ll automatically become your enemies (which is logical), but when they’re attacked by the other clans, they’ll ignore their fire…

@Vota dc: I don’t think A combat tank is bad at all. It has better armor than OCT & is quicker than HCT both in movement & rate of fire. In other words, it’s somewhere in the middle between OCT & HCT. I personally like it a lot more than the OCT, which is pretty much good for running over the infantry & revealing the map, rather than for fighting. @aKaFedaYkin: I still think the Deviator sux (at least in campaign play). It’s totally useless against buildings & infantry, expensive, slow to move & fire, pretty easy to destroy, and, what’s perhaps the worst: it often MISFIRES (i.e. it has to fire more than once in order to successfully change the target’s allegiance).

Man, didn't notice that at all! After playing Dune 2000 for some 13 years, that really sucks, huh? :) Always thought the Ordos combat tanks are just quicker in terms of movement, not in terms of rate of fire. Btw, does it also have the same gun & damage as has H & A combat tank? I'm too lazy to check that up in TibEd, you know ;)

@mvi: Does the TibEd also allow you to change what units can the given house BUILD? For example, it’d be good to give the Ordos a chance to build missile tanks (since they can only order them per starport). Instead, they can only build deviators, which are more or less suitable for one & only thing: stealing the enemy harvesters. Not to mention the fact that the Ordos also have the weakest combat tanks of all 3 houses... With such poor armor, one can only guess if the Westwood intended to use them more as an exploring unit rather than a fighting unit :D Which version of TibEd did you use to change that harvester’s properties? Also, which game files will the change affect? I mean, did you back up some files prior to making that change, and if so, which ones were it? The authors of TibEd themselves say that the game may sometimes render unstable if you try to edit it, so I’m just asking this in case something goes wrong... I’m interested in extending the firing range of the sonic tank, just to see how it is to be attacked by a 10 m long sonic wave, LOL :)

The Mercs can bring up a strong army even without light factory / barracks / additional starport units - it's just that they (in most of the cases) spend their units rather quickly, without thinking too much about protecting their base. Would be cool if you could give them a some sort of order which would make them attack the enemy bases only if they had, say, at least 50 units, AND with, say, a maximum of 20 units (i.e. 20 units would go outside for hunt, whilst the remaining 30 would protect the base). Speaking about the AI, btw, I've noticed that sometimes the enemy can make pretty strange things. For example their harvesters: normally, the enemy would have 2 harvesters per refinery (i.e. if he has, say, 2 refineries, he will have no more than 4 harvesters at any time, and if you destroy him one, he will quickly rebuild it, if you destroy him 2, he will rebuild 2, etc.) But sometimes, he'd, for some unknown reason, simply order 5 harvesters per starport, even if he has just 2 refineries (and therefore 4 harvesters to go with it).

@mvi: Thank you very much for these links, but I'm afraid I won't become any hex editor ace anytime soon, firstly because (as you may've noticed from my previous post to sandworm) I'm just too lazy to do any research, and secondly because I've ALWAYS sucked at maths or anything of that kind :(

Cool range these Devastators have :) With that kind of deadly & invisible army, defeating the enemy would be a piece of cake – provided he wouldn’t use these same units against you, that is ;) These Harvesters look really funny (and weird!) with that gun, btw. Judging from the writing, it was (probably?) done by some Russians, using the TibEd...

@sandworm: I've checked that file which you provided, and even though I roughly understand what to do (change some numbers, then save the file, and run the level to check how it all plays out), I'm not familiar with the hex editor at all (never worked with it), so I'll leave that task for you :P But I'm gonna try to assign an enemy AI to me as a player, just to see how it works. Very interesting idea, btw. Haven't tried it yet... As for the topic of enemy AI, as I've already said, I'd especially love to somehow determine what units & how many of them should the enemy build & train before the attack. I'd like to see more levels like H9v1, where the enemy will amass a deadly force and ONLY THEN attack. I've noticed that, for example in the O8v1 level (I guess this applies for the other levels as well), there's a certain limit for some types of units which the enemy uses. Tried, for example, to add 10 sonic tanks to the Atreides using the mvi's editor (via the unit spawn event, of course) with the Deploy action parameter set to 2 (which meant these 10 sonic tanks would patrol around the base, but NEVER attack yours), and what happened was that the Atreides didn't build a single new sonic tank, which meant they didn't attack my base with sonic tanks at all. They had the means to do so, as they had both the Heavy Factory & Ix Research Center (as well as enough money & tech level), but, since I gave them 10 sonic tanks in the beginning (and therefore probably breached some limit, like, say, no more than 4 sonic tanks at any time) + ordered all of them to stay home and not attack me, the enemy wouldn't build any additional units of this kind at all. I guess I may sound a bit confusing, but I hope you understand what I mean. Btw, speaking of the AI, it'd be interesting to somehow alter the behavior of the Mercenaries (which act as your ally, of course). What I mean is that, even though they receive lots of units per Starport, they, in vast majority of the cases, spend them rather quickly by simply attacking whatever is on sight, INSTEAD of sending, say, just 5-6 units to attack & leaving the REST guarding the base. What I want to say is that I'd love to make them use their units more wisely, giving a higher priority to PROTECTING THEIR BASE instead of blindly attacking whatever enemy unit that is closest to them... Things like rebuilding buildings, I don't know. As far as I know, the enemy, whether with the original AI or with an imported AI (via mvi's editor, of course), will always rebuild a building if you destroy it, provided it has the means to do so. I've noticed that sometimes, it may take a bit longer, like if you destroy, say, 2 rocket turrets & 1 gun turret, the enemy will first rebuild, say, the gun turret, and then, after, say, 5 minutes, will rebuild the rocket turrets as well. Btw, yesterday I played the original O9v2 level, and when the enemy destroyed the Mercenary silos (they have 6 silos), the Mercenaries only rebuild 5 of them, so I'm not quite sure whether the AI will rebuild everything which you destroy, even if you give him enough time to do so...

What do you mean by saying „turn the AI on“? Do you mean importing an AI from, let’s say, Harkonnen in A9v1, or do you mean simply putting a Harkonnen base in the level and assign them as your enemies, WITHOUT giving them any specific AI? As far as I know, if you do the latter, the enemy AI won’t build any units (or maybe one or two), and they won’t repair their buildings as well. That’s at least what I remember from remaking the O8v1 level – when I added Fremen & Smugglers to it, they won’t attacked me at all & didn’t repair their buildings when I attacked them. But once I gave them a specific AI (from Atreides O9v1 level, to be precise), they acted as “usual” enemy would do…

That may be true. However, when I redid the O8v1 level (you can download it here or on mvi’s site & try it, if you want), I assigned a Barracks & a Starport to Smugglers & gave them lots of cash + an AI from Atreides O9v1 level, and I can tell you they’d have no problems to train & attack you with well over 50 troopers/light infantry at any time… Btw, what do you mean by “AI without coding”? I mean, where I can find such AI? As far as I understand, every single AI in this or that particular level (as you already mentioned) is “coded”, right? That happens to be, for example, in the O9v1 level with Mercenaries. When you try to attack, say, the Harkonnen base together with the Mercenary units, they’ll sometimes attack walls, even when there are still some Harkonnen buildings to destroy. So does that mean that the Mercenary AI from this particular level is NOT coded? I suppose it is, or?

Not at all! Haven’t you played the H9v1 level yet? I bet you must’ve ;-) As I’ve already said, it doesn’t happen all the time (I mean that massive & simultaneous attack), but when it does, it usually happens to be THE VERY FIRST ATTACK from these 2 main bases of Atreides & Emperor. That means, these 2 bases won’t attack you immediately (like say, after 5 minutes from the start of the level), but they’ll hold on for a while (you’ll easily notice it, as there won’t be any enemy units coming and it’ll look like a „silence before the storm“), amass a deadly army, and then commence the attack together. If this happens, you can do virtually nothing as you won’t have the time & enough cash to build a good enough defense. However, sometimes, this massive & coordinated attack may happen LATER in the level (say, after 30 minutes). If this happens, you can usually repel it, as you’ll have more time to harvest enough spice & build a good defense, of course. Btw, sometimes, you can be attacked in such a way also by the remaining 2 Atreides & 1 Emperor subbases. But this usually happens to be in the very beginning of the level, as the 1 Atreides subbase with the Barracks & Outpost (located in the upper left corner of the map, between the 2 main bases of Atreides & Emperor) only has a very small amount of cash (i.e. it can produce only 3 or 4 attack waves of troopers/ligh infantry before running out of cash). Anyway, when this attack occurs, it’s also difficult (if not impossible) to repel, as you’ll have to fight lots of combat / siege tanks, quads and trikes from the Atreides subbase to the left + 15-20 troopers/light infantry from the aforementioned 2nd Atreides subbase + another wave of combat /siege tanks, quads and trikes from the Emperor subbase from above. Re: these subbases in this particular H9v1 level, it’s actually the Atreides subbase on the left that can often make such a sudden & ferocious attack, and it can happen virtually at any time. They’ll send, say, 7 quads & 7 trikes as an „appetizer“, then quickly followed by another 7-8 combat tanks & another 7-8 siege tanks (these numbers are just an example, of course). However, this attack is quite easy to repel (if you have enough rocket turrets, that is), as the quads & trikes are very easy to kill + the combat & siege tanks aren’t best suited to destroy turrets. But as I’ve already said, when you’re attacked by the 2 main bases of Atreides & Emperor, it’s, of course, a totally different story, as they have missile tanks & sonic tanks, which can be a real pain in the ass for your turrets (especially when these are occupied with firing at light infantry or some other units like trikes or quads). Btw, I sometimes encountered this kind of attack also from the main Atreides base in the H9v2 level. It usually happens later in the level, and it is somehow easier to repel as the attack in the H9v1 level, firstly because the Atreides usually won’t do this attack together with the Emperor, and secondly because there’s a set of stones just before your base, which can be only accessed by the infantry & which forces the mechanized units to bypass it & thus prevents them from attacking you in a large simultaneous wave (i.e. they just come in 2 or 3 at a time, while the others are stuck behind those stones).

Wow, this looks like another stellar work from mvi! Would be fascinating, for example, to find out, how exactly the enemy AI works when attacking you. I mean, in some levels (I'd say in vast majority of them), the enemy will just build its usual share of units & then attack you without causing too much trouble. But when you look at, say, the H9v1 level (which is my all-time favourite, mainly because it's the most difficult one from all the levels in the original Dune 2000 campaign), the enemy, particularly from the main Atreides & Emperor base, will often make a MASSIVE & COORDINATED ATTACK, which, unless you don't have a sufficient defense, will almost invariably smash you to pieces. What I like on it is the fact that it is massive & coordinated as well, i.e. both Atreides & Emperor build & train & order a lot of units of all kinds (i.e. combat tanks, missile tanks, quads, sonic tanks, Sardaukars, etc.) and attack you simultaneously, as if they somehow "knew" that doing the attack together will defeat you. Don't know if it happens purely by an "accident" or whether the enemy AI is indeed programmed to do it that way, but what I do know is that it doesn't happen all the time when you play this level :(, but when it does, it's one helluva experience! 8) Would be fantastic if you could somehow apply such AI to the enemy... Btw, a quite opposite enemy behavior you can come upon is, for example, in the O9v2 level. In the Harkonnen base, there's a small "sub-base" of Emperor, containing some turrets, the palace, wind traps and barracks (of course, this base works independently from the main Emperor base, as it originally "belongs" to Fremen but shares the same index allocation number with Emperor). Since it has also a refinery with 2 harvesters & a carryal, it has more than enough money to train vast armies of light infantry, sardaukars or troopers (which would certainly make your life harder!), but what's strange is that this base won't train any new units, unless you come too close to it. That means: no attack on your base at all...

Interesting idea to play as one of the subhouses. It's just pity that they aren't more differentiated from the other, "regular" houses. The Mercs & Smugglers look exactly like the Ordos (the only difference being the color & the inability to build Deviators for Mercs), Fremen look exactly like the Atreides (again, the only difference being the color & the ability to train Sardaukars instead of Fremen), and the Emperor are a carbon copy of Harkonnen (just violet instead of red, with Saboteurs instead of DHM & unable to build Devastators)...

No problem. Would be glad if you can do that. Thanks!

Here are some remakes of the original Dune 2000 levels which I made using mvi’s & klofkac’s editors. The terrain & spice is the same (didn’t quite have the mood & courage to change it, LOL), but you’ll have to face some new enemies like Fremen or Smugglers, and in general, these levels are much harder to beat – especially if you play them on HARD difficulty setting. Just copy the .mis & .map files in the mission folder (don’t forget to make a backup of the original ones, of course) & enjoy! Once again, a BIG thanks goes to mvi & klofkac, who made it all possible! Dune 2000 remake O8v1_O9v1_H9v2.zip

Do you mean a scenario in which an AI with maximum tech level and, say, 20 000 solaris of spice, has, say, a Construction Yard, 2 Wind Traps & Refinery in the beginning? If that’s the case, then I guess it won’t build any new buildings, unless you add some via the klofkac’s editor, of course. As far as I know, the only case when an AI builds a building (in single player, that is) is when you destroy one of its existing buildings. In other words, the enemy AI in single player won’t build any new buildings (even if it has the means to do so), it will only rebuild the ones which were destroyed. Speaking of weird enemy behavior, if you try to edit some of the earlier levels (say, A1V1) and add a Starport to the enemy, it won’t order any units per it, even if you overwrite it’s AI with an enemy AI from some of the later levels. The only way to make the enemy use the Starport in these earlier levels is to make a Starport delivery event via your mission editor (with a corresponding Building exists = Harkonnen / Atreides / Ordos / Smuggler Starport Condition, of course). I guess it's that "Building exists" condition which makes the AI to somehow "recognize" it has a Starport to use... Also, in the levels where the enemy receives an automatic Starport delivery (as far as I know, it’s only the Emperor whom the authors of this game granted this “privilege”), this particular enemy won’t order any new units per the “usual” way (i.e. by buying it), just like a “regular” enemy owning a Starport would do. However, if you rewrite its AI with some other AI from these later levels, it will receive these automatic deliveries & order new units as well (which can be pretty brutal). For example, in the O8V1 level, I added Smugglers & Fremen as my enemies & gave them both a Starport & a nice 200 000 chunk of spice (so that they can spend that spice a bit, LOL). Also rewrote the Emperor AI, so that they could receive the deliveries & order new units as well, and well, what followed was one helluva mayhem!