Dune 2 eXtended Project

[MrFlibble]

You can complain to the developers of Dune II if your aesthetic feelings are hurt :P

BTW, I have no idea what "WOR" actually means. Is it an acronym or what?

[Nyerguds]

Wicked Old Rabban? :P

[MrFlibble]

I would rather expect some feedback regarding the changes in tech tree, balance and campaigns ::)

[Nyerguds]

haha, sorry, after friday I might give it a spin, but for now, still exams.

[MrFlibble]

Good luck!

[Daelin]

Ok, at MrFlibble's request I am posting all my suggestions here. Therefore waiting for some public comments and feedback.

(Message originally sent to MrFlibble)

*******************

Okay, I like some of the modifications you have made to the techtree and I have decided to slightly adapt my previous suggestions. I have loads of observations to make, but before that please make sure you check the two attached files. The Excel contains information about the techtree, while the Word gives you some feedback about the plot I have in mind for the project (by now the plot is quite chaotic so I thought of some reasons for the three new factions getting involved into the conflict).

The plot in my mind is pretty simple: The three great houses have arrived on dune and fight each-other (like in the classical game). However, as all houses are evenly matched, no alliances are made at this point and the Emperor does not interfere, the war between them seems to come to no end. This raises problems for each of the new factions:

    a) Emperor Frederick feels that through this war he is losing control upon Arrakis. The Spice Production has decreased and therefore he cannot achieve his original goal. Therefore he decides to join the battlefield and put an end to this charade. He realizes that he cannot fight all three houses alone, so he decides to approach House Harkonnen as an ally. He gains their trust by laying waste an Atreides outpost (who are known to be the Harkonnens' arch-enemies) and signs the "Pact of Suppression" by which the two factions would clear dune of any other house or force.

   b) The Fremen tribes are tired of the endless war between the three houses (read the plot file). They observe however that the Atreides are different from the other two houses, and did not come to Dune with intentions of war. They succeed to befriend them by aiding them in a fight against the Ordos and sign the "Truce of Liberty" by which they promise to free Arrakis of all wars and restore peace.

   c) The Mercenaries have been sent on Dune by the Sisterhood of the Bene Gesserit who, due to the blood feud taking place, fear that the spice may no longer flow. The sisters have secretly come to an agreement with the Guild Navigators and have obtained full monopole upon the CHOAM to fully support their faction and no other (that explains why only Mercenaries can build a starport). The Mercenaries arrive on dune and befriend the Ordos Cartel, who, to their personal belief, are closest to their interests on dune: Wealth. The two forces sign the "Collusion of Stealth" in their thirst for power and money.

Based on this lots of turnovers can take place. The idea is that based on these alliances, we can actually implement the whole idea of "attacking with a different faction". This way also, the game allows the player to play with all six factions (2 for each selection of primary faction - Mercenary - Ordos, Sardaukar - Harkonnen, Fremen - Atreides) and increase the number of potential enemies (from 3 up to 5?).

I am interested if you like the idea of this plot (of course it's just a sketch right now) and if we should further develop in this direction.

Now for the techtree, you will observe that I have borrowed some things, yet made some modifications. For now if we left the structure of the game the same (each new level gives access to new technology) then the following differences come between the houses...

Mission disadvantages

  M3 - Mercenaries and Fremen have to rely only on trikes (they do not have access to Starport)

  M4 - Harkonnen have to rely only on smaller vehicles this mission (they do not have access to Cobra Tanks). About Sardaukars I'm not sure yet whether they should have access to CT or not. :)

  M5 - Ordos and Mercenaries have to rely only on short-ranged vehicles, but they are the only factions who get access to turrets (as player that is xD)

  M6 - Atreides and Fremen are this time disadvantaged, as they do not get access to Siege Tanks (I wonder if the Ordos exception can be removed here)

Other advantages and disadvantages are written in plot document. The only problem when it comes to implementation will be actually Heavy Factory upgrades :)

**************

-Daelin

Package.zip

[MrFlibble]

Thanks for posting this, Daelin, I think the plot is really nice, I've thought of something along those lines myself (you even invented nice campaign names - Blizzard style, eh? ;))

Mission disadvantages

  M3 - Mercenaries and Fremen have to rely only on trikes (they do not have access to Starport)

  M4 - Harkonnen have to rely only on smaller vehicles this mission (they do not have access to Cobra Tanks). About Sardaukars I'm not sure yet whether they should have access to CT or not. :)

  M5 - Ordos and Mercenaries have to rely only on short-ranged vehicles, but they are the only factions who get access to turrets (as player that is xD)

  M6 - Atreides and Fremen are this time disadvantaged, as they do not get access to Siege Tanks (I wonder if the Ordos exception can be removed here)

Actually most of this no longer applies in v1.22. The Fremen and the Mercenaries can produce both Trikes and Quads now, and the original Houses have only minor deviations from Dune II tech tree wise (the Ordos miss the Raiders, and there are no more Troopers). BTW, it's not Cobra Tanks, it's Combat Tanks ;)

As for the other suggestions:

I don't think there's much merit in disabling the Spice Silos for the Fremen. It's going to be an annoyance, as the players will either have to spend lost of credits on stuff they don't really need, or stop their harvesters from time to time to avoid losses of excess spice that can't be stored.

Removing walls from the Mercenaries and Fremen can be done, but I believe it won't have any real effect on balance or playing style.

As for the new infantry types you propose, there's a serious drawback in that there are only two infantry sprites, namely the light infantry and the troopers, and only four sidebar icons (not counting the squad icons). Wouldn't it be a bit boring to have different infantry with the same sprites? Another question here is balance. My attempts at redesigning the tech tree C&C-style in v1.21 showed that it ain't that easy at all to introduce new things and keep them balanced. Already in Dune II infantry is at a disadvantage, and that was remedied only in C&C by making armor-piercing weaponry less effective against foot soldiers. However, in Dune II you can't have the rock-paper-scissors balance.

Currently, the Sardaukar Troopers fulfill the niche of light vehicles that the Sardaukar lack, and Fremen Warriors make for absence of tanks because of their range (I'm thinking of giving the Fremen foot troops sonic immunity to make them more useful in tandem with Sonic Tanks). Light infantry has been made more useful, but it's still more for looks than anything else :)

I have pondered the idea of removing the MCV from one of the sides (you proposed the Sardaukar), I'm still not sure. MCVs are not just to replace your primary CY, sometimes you need to expand because there's no more room to build (unlike later non-Dune games, where buildable terrain is more plentiful). Therefore I think the MCV remains.

Same way, I'm not sure about giving the Starport to the Mercenaries only. Through the Starport, the Fremen can have limited access to tanks, and I don't think that removing the tanks entirely from the Fremen is a good idea.

[jordos]

Regarding infantry, I would propose reversing the original sight distances, infantry being able to see the most, while siege tanks&launchers (and house tanks?) see almost nothing. Trikes&Quads would remain the best scout units thanks to their speed.

It might make them slightly less useless.

[MrFlibble]

What you propose is a bit radical, but you're right that in Dune II, the more powerful the unit is, the more sight range it has. Playing around with this could be a nice ides. For example, in Starcraft, the Siege Tank in siege mode actually has a firing range greater than its field of view, creating a need to rely on scouting units to fully exploit its long-range cannon.

[Daelin]

Okay, if I may explain what I had in mind maybe you will understand all the changes I have planned.

1) First and most important, why do I want the original sides modified? It's very simple, because the new "campaigns" I have in mind are team-oriented. This means that per campaign you can gain access to two factions (Mercenaries and Ordos, Fremen and Atreides, Sardaukar and Harkonnen). Don't get me wrong, you don't get to play with both on the same map (I understand that's impossible), but I still wish we could exploit the idea of being able to choose with which side you play with during a mission (except missions 1, 9 and possibly 8), based on the territory selected. And in order to do that, we'd have to manipulate the original techtree too.

2) Ok, to explain now the new modifications to the techtree. The original game definitely has a problem when it comes to the gameplay: lack of difference in style between houses! The idea is the same: you have the same pattern when building the base, you build the same (or almost the same) units, and you develop the same strategy against the enemy (again, with some exceptions - the Ordos were a bit better made here and the last missions are indeed different because of the special tanks/palace - Ordos here almost useless if you ignore deviator bug).

For DuneX, bringing 3 new sides should allow 3 different gameplay styles thorough the game, especially in the latest missions. There are 2 elements which can be exploited (training units and constructing buildings) and 2 phases of a level (building base and attacking enemy). Modifying these actually make the gameplay different, and therefore, playing with a new house, it's a new game, something different, not just the same thing with new colors. AND NOTICE that I did not suggest the same disadvantage for more than one faction (you mentioned disabling Walls for both Mercenaries and Fremen - they are not the same thing!!! different gameplay - different advantages and disadvantages - very important!).

SK/HK

  - Not being able to repair units makes army upkeep quite high (it's more expensive to buy new units than to repair already existant ones). This means that a very good management of resources has to be made, and if you want a permanently healthy army, you'll have to destroy highly damaged vehicles before you can build more (due to unit limit).

  - Not being able to build an MCV requires that the player keeps the Construction Yard well protected. Once it is destroyed, it's bye-bye rebuilding it ever.  Not being able to expand requires that the player has a very good management of the rock, and not erect the base too loose (economy of space).

      Note: I personally never used the MCV when playing the game. I always found the original land sufficient for my base and did not see the necessity of expanding. But maybe that's just me!

      Another note: notice that only the Death Hand owners do not get to rebuild their CY. Elsewhere this would make the game impossible unless you cheat (save-reload trick).

FR/AT

  - Not being able to build spice silos is indeed quite annoying. You have to make sure that you manage your resources very well or else you're into a spice overflow problem. You either invest the money into "pre-building" units/buildings, or you just control the way your harvesters mine the spice. It's a matter of resource management here. Not to mention that you can build more refineries, but here comes the greater need of space for supplementary refineries (and therefore the possible need for expansion). :) Or of course, you can always try to steal an enemy silo but this is pointless.

  - Not being to build walls can be quite annoying in some situations. Maybe you don't really use walls when playing dune, but there are numerous situations where I use walls. Normally when enemy units go for a highly-attractive building (Repair Facility/Heavy Factory) they tend to go in straight line, and if that building is actually behind the base, they stop right where the base begins. Now if that unit is a devastator and you have no walls, there go your windtraps. Not to mention that I use the walls to fill gaps between the rocket turrets I build in front of the base. Elsewhere enemy units can enter the gaps and possibly cause some damage (or again, if it is a devastator, there go your turrets again). I find Walls extremely useful, and probably not being able to build any would be quite annoying.

ME/OR

   - Cannot build palace in the latest missions. No free-bonuses for them (though the Saboteurs are pretty pointless anyway - and they still get to buy them - as many as they want might I mention - Barracks).

   - Being the sole owners of a starport, the Mercenaries gain a totally different gameplay from the other factions. They get access to all the regular tanks, but they get NOTHING SPECIAL (I will talk about special weapons in the following paragraph). It would be a shame to give this advantage to Fremen too. Fremen get access to Combat Tanks anyway (if you check the table), but just like the Atreides lack Siege Tanks. This is unique gameplay, being capable of only ordering units. Why? You can't keep a unit athand, ready to deploy, you have to wait the preplaced 10 seconds, you don't get to build multiple units at the same time (you have to wait those 10 seconds). Yet after 10 seconds you can virtually get multiple tanks at the same time, which can prove advantageous in certain situations. As I said, this is too unique to spoil it, and give it to other factions. This is a Mercenary thingy, don't ruin it!

3) Let's talk about special weapons and weapons restrictions. You'll notice that I have restricted for each team a tank, based on the mission.

    SK/HK - mission 4, no combat tanks => no heavy factory. God how annoying must it be to battle the enemies combat tanks with quads and trikes. Also in mission 5 you have to support your rocket launchers with wheeled vehicles. Difficult!

    ME/OD - mission 5, no rocket launchers (not even via starport for ME at this mission - activate it via starport later - maybe only in mission 7 while allowing siege tanks in mission 6? :P bitchy) => we already know how annoying this is.

    FR/AT - mission 6, no siege tanks. Again, we already know that from our friends Ordos in the original.

Now this was for the basic missions. Now let's move to special weapons in mission 7:

   ME - absolutely nothing special. Just the ordinary tanks, all available via starport. A bit frustrating, fighting sonic tanks and devastators with masses of siege tanks and missile turrets.

   OD - the classical deviators. They do the job well thanks to the bug. :)

   SK - sardaukars do not get devastators. They get however their sardaukar troopers. I see two troopers together should be able to do about more damage than a devastator, but also cost almost much (350/troop?) and more vulnerable (combined they still get less health than a devastator). You'd have to build more sardaukar troopers than devastators to actually make it the same thing. Troopers besides are quite annoying that they can be squashed, but they also explode in the process so it's a win-win situation (almost like a devastator too, huh?).

   HK - let's stick to devastators. strongest tank on dune.

   FR - now fremen get their soldier version of their allies special tank, and more specifically the Fedaykin. Now Fedaykins look like a group of troopers but instead of bullets fire sonic attacks (and have therefore sonic immunity). Unlike sonic tanks, Fedaykin fire twice, but do not do as much damage. Fedaykins can be squashed, and if damaged to yellow turn into a single Fremen Warrior that fires explosive bullets (just like normal troopers) but obviously at higher damage than the original trooper (and are still immune to sonic damage).

   AT - stick to sonic tanks, they're really cool anyway and go well in tandem with Fedaykins.

As for the sprite problem, I say we replace the troopers with normal infantry GFX (but still fire same type of minirockets and move just as fast as the troopers) and just drop the normal infantry (they are useless anyway). As for sardaukars vs fremen..... Sardaukars are purple, fedaykins are orange. What more difference is there to make? :) They are not special units for nothing.

4) I'm aware of the "Cobra Tanks" stuff, I just mentioned it because it sounded cooler than "Combat Tank". I had something else in mind when I switched the name but then I dropped the idea so there we go, Cobra Tanks. Forget about that if you find the change pointless and wish to stick to the original. :D

5) For the plot, the names were actually the names of the alliances. The campaign titles would be as follows:

  SK - Rebirth of Corrino

  FR - Eternal sands of freedom

  ME - The spice must flow

6) Unfortunately there is no way you can make the infantry actually useless, because there is no way we can make different types of missiles affect differently infantry and tanks. That's why I suggested dropping them and keeping only the troopers. Replace infantry with the Fremen special units, and make buildings spawn troopers instead of infantry (all houses get access to troopers by means of barracks). Remove either WOR or Barracks and leave all units to be built at one of them. I like the sight idea but maybe it can be adapted to the infantry to be left (troopers). And YES, in my techtree I replaced the troopers name (I hated that name) to Elite Infantry, and singular trooper to Soldier!

Edit: By mistake in the submitted techtree not all factions have access to the basic elite infantry & soldiers (more specifically Sardaukars and Fremen). The two factions are meant to be able to train those too :)

That's all for now. Feel free to reply to all this, I'll gladly explain more thoroughly what I have in mind. I've been playing this game for over 15 years now and I still can't get enough of it :X

-Daelin

[MrFlibble]

One thing about the plot:

The Mercenaries have been sent on Dune by the Sisterhood of the Bene Gesserit who, due to the blood feud taking place, fear that the spice may no longer flow. The sisters have secretly come to an agreement with the Guild Navigators and have obtained full monopole upon the CHOAM to fully support their faction and no other (that explains why only Mercenaries can build a starport). The Mercenaries arrive on dune and befriend the Ordos Cartel, who, to their personal belief, are closest to their interests on dune: Wealth. The two forces sign the "Collusion of Stealth" in their thirst for power and money.

IMHO the Bene Gesserit don't fit very well into this. Not that the plot details really matter (since the original game already deviated from the universe established in the books), but wouldn't it just do that the Mercenaries are simply hired by House Ordos to support their dwindling numbers (or something like that)? I'm saying this because CHOAM supporting only the mercenaries who are hired by the Sisterhood is very far off from the Dune universe point-of-view.

AND NOTICE that I did not suggest the same disadvantage for more than one faction (you mentioned disabling Walls for both Mercenaries and Fremen - they are not the same thing!!! different gameplay - different advantages and disadvantages - very important!).

That's my bad, somehow I got the impression you suggested no walls for both these factions.

  - Not being able to build an MCV requires that the player keeps the Construction Yard well protected. Once it is destroyed, it's bye-bye rebuilding it ever.  Not being able to expand requires that the player has a very good management of the rock, and not erect the base too loose (economy of space).

      Note: I personally never used the MCV when playing the game. I always found the original land sufficient for my base and did not see the necessity of expanding. But maybe that's just me!

The only thing I could say is that some people might find this annoying. I have used MCVs for expanding in Dune II, e.g. if you want to harvest a lot of spice (the amount of spice you harvested is the primary factor in score calculation), you'll need to place all those silos somewhere.

      Another note: notice that only the Death Hand owners do not get to rebuild their CY. Elsewhere this would make the game impossible unless you cheat (save-reload trick).

The missile isn't the only way to lose your CY. In fact, the CY in Dune II is pretty low on hit points compared to other Westwood RTS games. For example:

Dune 2 stats:

Windtrap: 200

Barracks: 300

Refinery: 450

Construction Yard: 400

Red Alert stats:

Power Plant: 400

Barracks: 800

Refinery: 900

Construction Yard: 1000

The refinery's got more HP than the CY in Dune 2.

FR/AT

  - Not being able to build spice silos is indeed quite annoying. You have to make sure that you manage your resources very well or else you're into a spice overflow problem. You either invest the money into "pre-building" units/buildings, or you just control the way your harvesters mine the spice. It's a matter of resource management here. Not to mention that you can build more refineries, but here comes the greater need of space for supplementary refineries (and therefore the possible need for expansion). :) Or of course, you can always try to steal an enemy silo but this is pointless.

I'm still not convinced the silos should be disabled. You say refineries can make up for the absence of the silos, but don't forget that every refinery comes with a harvester, which is not too good when units under your control are limited. Also, what should a player do if he wants to harvest a lot of spice for the high scores? Spend what he has harvested on needless buildings or units?

Besides, this change will make the Fremen spice harvesting "faulty", and that with the Fremen being the most adapted to life on Dune. Goes against the lore, I'd say. If it were possible, I'd entirely remove the need to store spice in silos exclusively for the Fremen (maybe they'd store huge amounts in the refinery or something like that, but I think it is not doable).

  - Not being to build walls can be quite annoying in some situations. Maybe you don't really use walls when playing dune, but there are numerous situations where I use walls. Normally when enemy units go for a highly-attractive building (Repair Facility/Heavy Factory) they tend to go in straight line, and if that building is actually behind the base, they stop right where the base begins. Now if that unit is a devastator and you have no walls, there go your windtraps. Not to mention that I use the walls to fill gaps between the rocket turrets I build in front of the base. Elsewhere enemy units can enter the gaps and possibly cause some damage (or again, if it is a devastator, there go your turrets again). I find Walls extremely useful, and probably not being able to build any would be quite annoying.

What counter do you propose to this? Coupled with sonic turrets (should these ever be implemented at all), it could be really devastating for the player if enemy units mess around the base. Even the missile turrets sometimes hit your own structures instead of enemy units that got inside your perimeter.

So the Fremen need to have some other way to stop enemy advancement (except building a "wall" of trikes and quads, that is ;)). Deviators would do nice, I think, but deviators shouldn't be available to the Fremen anyway.

ME/OR

    - Cannot build palace in the latest missions. No free-bonuses for them (though the Saboteurs are pretty pointless anyway - and they still get to buy them - as many as they want might I mention - Barracks).

The saboteurs aren't that pointless. They have increased hit points in DuneX, and you can build as many as you want. Given that the AI now has lots of starting credits, it might be a good idea to use a Saboteur to blow a structure up instead of struggling with the auto-repair using regular units.

    - Being the sole owners of a starport, the Mercenaries gain a totally different gameplay from the other factions. They get access to all the regular tanks, but they get NOTHING SPECIAL (I will talk about special weapons in the following paragraph). It would be a shame to give this advantage to Fremen too. Fremen get access to Combat Tanks anyway (if you check the table), but just like the Atreides lack Siege Tanks. This is unique gameplay, being capable of only ordering units. Why? You can't keep a unit athand, ready to deploy, you have to wait the preplaced 10 seconds, you don't get to build multiple units at the same time (you have to wait those 10 seconds). Yet after 10 seconds you can virtually get multiple tanks at the same time, which can prove advantageous in certain situations. As I said, this is too unique to spoil it, and give it to other factions. This is a Mercenary thingy, don't ruin it!

I thought you didn't like the idea of Mercenaries having only the Starport...

The starport brings a lot of limits, such as the "out of stock", fluctuating prices and the long delay between frigate arrivals. It would be extremely tough to balance the game if you wanted to give the Mercenaries only Starport... plus I do not know how you could make the Mercenary AI work in a feasible manner anymore, as the computer never uses the starport.

3) Let's talk about special weapons and weapons restrictions. You'll notice that I have restricted for each team a tank, based on the mission.

I've noticed that you seem to refer to the tech levels based on the original Dune 2, whereas in DuneX almost everything goes one level "down". E.g. the Heavy Factory is available on mission 3 instead of mission 4. The missions are changed accordingly: mission3 is former mission 4, etc. etc. until mission 6 (<-7). The actual mission 7 is altered in that one of the AI players has a palace, thus making it like the original mission 8.

    SK/HK - mission 4, no combat tanks => no heavy factory. God how annoying must it be to battle the enemies combat tanks with quads and trikes. Also in mission 5 you have to support your rocket launchers with wheeled vehicles.

You can disable combat tanks for these sides, but not the heavy factory itself.

    ME/OD - mission 5, no rocket launchers (not even via starport for ME at this mission - activate it via starport later - maybe only in mission 7 while allowing siege tanks in mission 6? :P bitchy) => we already know how annoying this is.

Once again, make corrections for what I said above about mission tech levels in DuneX.

    FR/AT - mission 6, no siege tanks. Again, we already know that from our friends Ordos in the original.

Note that this change will result in a permanent useless third heavy factory upgrade for these sides. It's not a huge problem, but it's sort of sloppy (I know the current release of DuneX features similar issues).

Now this was for the basic missions. Now let's move to special weapons in mission 7:

    ME - absolutely nothing special. Just the ordinary tanks, all available via starport. A bit frustrating, fighting sonic tanks and devastators with masses of siege tanks and missile turrets.

    OD - the classical deviators. They do the job well thanks to the bug. :)

I don't think the absence of special tanks is "frustrating". It's a tad more difficult compared to having sonic tanks or devastators. And what's the "deviator bug"? I think I'm missing something here...

    SK - sardaukars do not get devastators. They get however their sardaukar troopers. I see two troopers together should be able to do about more damage than a devastator, but also cost almost much (350/troop?) and more vulnerable (combined they still get less health than a devastator). You'd have to build more sardaukar troopers than devastators to actually make it the same thing. Troopers besides are quite annoying that they can be squashed, but they also explode in the process so it's a win-win situation (almost like a devastator too, huh?).

You didn't provide exact stats for the Sardaukar troopers in your documents, but I guess they're supposed to be more powerful than they are now, right?

    FR - now fremen get their soldier version of their allies special tank, and more specifically the Fedaykin. Now Fedaykins look like a group of troopers but instead of bullets fire sonic attacks (and have therefore sonic immunity). Unlike sonic tanks, Fedaykin fire twice, but do not do as much damage. Fedaykins can be squashed, and if damaged to yellow turn into a single Fremen Warrior that fires explosive bullets (just like normal troopers) but obviously at higher damage than the original trooper (and are still immune to sonic damage).

What will be the real difference between Fedaykin and Sonic tanks save for the looks? Do you already have ideas for exact values of their hit points, attack damage, movement speed and such?

Edit: By mistake in the submitted techtree not all factions have access to the basic elite infantry & soldiers (more specifically Sardaukars and Fremen). The two factions are meant to be able to train those too :)

Won't the Sardaukar have two different units sharing the same sprite that way (contrary to what you stated above about the sprite usage)?

[Daelin]

One thing about the plot:IMHO the Bene Gesserit don't fit very well into this. Not that the plot details really matter (since the original game already deviated from the universe established in the books), but wouldn't it just do that the Mercenaries are simply hired by House Ordos to support their dwindling numbers (or something like that)? I'm saying this because CHOAM supporting only the mercenaries who are hired by the Sisterhood is very far off from the Dune universe point-of-view.

Well, from what I've read about the dune universe (not that much, my bad), the Guild Navigators and the Bene Gesserit are primarily interested in the production of SPICE! Though they cooperate with the Emperor, their need of spice is crucial (as its lack would cause their DEATH) - here I admit I don't really get the relationship between the Navigators, Bene Gesserit and Emperor. The thing is that the Emperor's plan to have the Three Houses to fight for dune is not really dune-universe, is it? But the main problem is that when you three sides fighting for control, they tend to disregard the main purpose: harvest spice! This would be the reason for the reduced spice production, which both the Bene Gesserit and the Navigators fear. Though by the Great Convention (or something like that) a direct intervention is not allowed, they hire the Mercenaries to "fix the problem" and "restore the original production". That's why the title of the campaign: "The spice must flow". Not every idea of what I mentioned is coherent to the original plot, but I hope you actually get the idea behind the whole Bene Gesserit thingy.

That's my bad, somehow I got the impression you suggested no walls for both these factions.

Nope. That would ruin the whole purpose of removing the walls at all then. :)

The only thing I could say is that some people might find this annoying. I have used MCVs for expanding in Dune II, e.g. if you want to harvest a lot of spice (the amount of spice you harvested is the primary factor in score calculation), you'll need to place all those silos somewhere.

Uhm, keep in mind that new factions come with a different style of playing the game. While in the original there were not many differences between the original houses, for a greater replay-of-the-game I think more differences in the whole play style should be evident in the expansion. It is possible to finish each and every mission without harvesting the whole spice at the same time, meaning that for the Sardaukars an expansion would not be vital. SURE, it is maybe easier to do so, but what's a game without any challenges and restrictions. If I've learnt a thing about techtree, it's that different factions should come with different advantages and disadvantages, making the style of playing each of them different (with several variation). This is crucial to take into consideration if it is for any of my ideas to actually matter.

The missile isn't the only way to lose your CY. In fact, the CY in Dune II is pretty low on hit points compared to other Westwood RTS games.

I am perfectly aware of that, but then again, what's a game without a challenge? I never lost my CY in the original game except to the Death Hand. It has a far too small aggressivity level to be directly assaulted by enemies after you start building your base nicely :)

I'm still not convinced the silos should be disabled. You say refineries can make up for the absence of the silos, but don't forget that every refinery comes with a harvester, which is not too good when units under your control are limited. Also, what should a player do if he wants to harvest a lot of spice for the high scores? Spend what he has harvested on needless buildings or units?

Actually I was not aware of the fact that highscores are actually the relevant point here. Harvesting for highscores is in my opinion lame and boring. That's not what makes the game interesting now, is it? I mean.... is it more satisfactory to get 800 points in mission 5 just because you harvested loads of spice, or 800 points in mission 6 because you crushed the hell out of your enemies and did not waste another 3 hours to just harvest some spice which is anyway useless? :) Spice management should not be about highscore, but about its purpose: purchasing units and constructing buildings.

Besides, this change will make the Fremen spice harvesting "faulty", and that with the Fremen being the most adapted to life on Dune. Goes against the lore, I'd say. If it were possible, I'd entirely remove the need to store spice in silos exclusively for the Fremen (maybe they'd store huge amounts in the refinery or something like that, but I think it is not doable).

Well, exactly! Fremen are in their natural habitat, but did they originally need to "harvest" the spice? I mean, why would they need to do it?! Spice is everywhere on Arrakis, and their purpose is not to harvest it. Sure, in the books it's the "working for this or that house", but in Dune 2 you get contact with the Fremen only later, as House Atreides befriends them. They are not miners in the game, they are soldiers! In my opinions they are interested in storing water (that is their primary concern on Arrakis), not spice (which as mentioned before, is everywhere). That's actually one of the reasons I found that they should not possess spice silos :)

What counter do you propose to this? Coupled with sonic turrets (should these ever be implemented at all), it could be really devastating for the player if enemy units mess around the base. Even the missile turrets sometimes hit your own structures instead of enemy units that got inside your perimeter.

An intelligent placement of the turrets I guess. Sonic turrets would indeed be very powerful, but if not placed carefully, they could prove devastating for the base itself. You can actually control the trajectory of the enemy units by observing the bases' positions and placing high aggresivity buildings at certain points on the map, to ensure that mostly the enemies try to attack there, and therefore contrl their trajectory in some way. That's how I would do for example.

So the Fremen need to have some other way to stop enemy advancement (except building a "wall" of trikes and quads, that is ;)). Deviators would do nice, I think, but deviators shouldn't be available to the Fremen anyway.

No deviators for the fremen.... either a wall of turrets (you complained about having too much resources for the fremen, huh? well time to build some turrets with those money) or just structuring your base in such a way that walls are not needed :)

The saboteurs aren't that pointless. They have increased hit points in DuneX, and you can build as many as you want. Given that the AI now has lots of starting credits, it might be a good idea to use a Saboteur to blow a structure up instead of struggling with the auto-repair using regular units.

That is true, but I wonder if the Saboteurs now do not have too many hitpoints. :) Haven't tested this yet. In the original Dune 2 I actually succeeded to infiltrate a Saboteur so well, that I was capable of destroying the Harkonnen CY (mission 8, Atreides Palace map). After this, I could just devastate the HK base using the deviator bug.

I thought you didn't like the idea of Mercenaries having only the Starport...

Well, after studying the techtree better, I came to realize that the idea is actually really cool. :) Getting involved with the project helped me realize some things too. ^^

I've noticed that you seem to refer to the tech levels based on the original Dune 2, whereas in DuneX almost everything goes one level "down". E.g. the Heavy Factory is available on mission 3 instead of mission 4. The missions are changed accordingly: mission3 is former mission 4, etc. etc. until mission 6 (<-7). The actual mission 7 is altered in that one of the AI players has a palace, thus making it like the original mission 8.

You do realize that the original maps will most likely modify if we make an entire plot around the idea of alliances between factions 2 by 2. This will also modify the territory distribution too, though it is a matter of "changing factions on the playable map" and nothing much. :)

You can disable combat tanks for these sides, but not the heavy factory itself.

I wonder if there's a way to add more exceptions to techtrees (just as the WOR for Ordos, the number of upgrades and so on).

Note that this change will result in a permanent useless third heavy factory upgrade for these sides. It's not a huge problem, but it's sort of sloppy (I know the current release of DuneX features similar issues).

Of course I understand that, but we should search for a solution for THIS problem maybe. :)

I don't think the absence of special tanks is "frustrating". It's a tad more difficult compared to having sonic tanks or devastators. And what's the "deviator bug"? I think I'm missing something here...

The deviator bug is when using enemy units to force them to attack their own base. You deviate an enemy unit (let's say a devastator), select its attack option, wait until it reverts back to harkkonen, you are still capable to select what it should attack, and you order it to attack an enemy building. The devastator keeps attacking the building until it destroys it, then it can get new orders. Moreover, while it attacks the building, no enemy unit or turret reacts, and lets the devastator "do its thing".

You didn't provide exact stats for the Sardaukar troopers in your documents, but I guess they're supposed to be more powerful than they are now, right?

Definitely. Read below to get what I mean by these "troopers".

What will be the real difference between Fedaykin and Sonic tanks save for the looks? Do you already have ideas for exact values of their hit points, attack damage, movement speed and such?

Ok, to further develop the idea of special troopers... Normally houses have special TANKS: Sonic Tank, Devastator, Deviator. The "new" factions (Mercenaries, Sardaukars and Fremen) in my opinion should get special SOLDIERS: Saboteur for Mercenary, Fedaykin for Fremen and Sardaukar for... well Sardaukars. For the last two factions, the soldiers have similar traits to the allied factions' special tanks: Sardaukars focus on damage, Fedaykin have sonic damage. There are however some differences:

    Soldiers can walk on rock. Soldiers come usually in larger numbers, but are cheaper. Soldiers can capture enemy buildings. When on red/yellow, a single soldier does not "smoke" (move slower, attack slower), but multiple soldiers to indeed turn into a single one, which usually disables "fire twice".

    Tanks cannot be crushed (though sardaukars explode upon crushing). Tanks are stronger but smaller in numbers (much easier to maneuver in Dune 2 where you can't select multiple units). Tanks tend to move a bit faster (though I'd personally recommend Sardaukars to be faster than devastators but this is a problem of balance). Tanks are more expensive.

Because of the unit limit, you can't have as many soldiers as special tanks. Moreover they are harder to maneuver. However, an army of soldiers is mainly cheaper and can rival special tanks. Also regarding unit limit, maybe thanks to Segra's discovery, we could limit soldiers differently from tanks.

Won't the Sardaukar have two different units sharing the same sprite that way (contrary to what you stated above about the sprite usage)?

Uhm, I didn't get this. If regular troopers are replaced with normal infantry GFX, then this problem is solved, right?

-Daelin

[Nyerguds]

If it were possible, I'd entirely remove the need to store spice in silos exclusively for the Fremen (maybe they'd store huge amounts in the refinery or something like that, but I think it is not doable).

You could give all of their building spice storage... though I'm not sure if you lose spice if a silo is destroyed, or if it just gets transferred to other silo space (like it is in C&C - except if it gets captured, that is).

[Daelin]

You can give a building spice storage, that is correct, but you cannot selectively decide which race gets this trait. Building properties are global afterall.

-Daelin

[MrFlibble]

Well, from what I've read about the dune universe (not that much, my bad), the Guild Navigators and the Bene Gesserit are primarily interested in the production of SPICE! Though they cooperate with the Emperor, their need of spice is crucial (as its lack would cause their DEATH) - here I admit I don't really get the relationship between the Navigators, Bene Gesserit and Emperor. The thing is that the Emperor's plan to have the Three Houses to fight for dune is not really dune-universe, is it? But the main problem is that when you three sides fighting for control, they tend to disregard the main purpose: harvest spice! This would be the reason for the reduced spice production, which both the Bene Gesserit and the Navigators fear. Though by the Great Convention (or something like that) a direct intervention is not allowed, they hire the Mercenaries to "fix the problem" and "restore the original production". That's why the title of the campaign: "The spice must flow". Not every idea of what I mentioned is coherent to the original plot, but I hope you actually get the idea behind the whole Bene Gesserit thingy.

You're right that the plot of Dune II itself is not very Dune-ish (universe-wise), yet my idea was to partially remedy that in the mod.

As for the Bene Gesserit involvement and motives, according to the book, at the time of House Corrino's rule the BGs actually did not use the spice in their practice before Jessica was subjected to "spice agony", which was initially a Fremen ritual.

I find it also very out of character for the Bene Gesserit to rely on mercenary forces (they had their own army at the time of Heretics/Chapterhouse, but that was long after Leto II's reign), or, for that matter, to ally with House Ordos. The Ordos don't seem to be the good guys anyway (I've always pictured them as a kind of crossover between the Tleilaxu and the Brotherhood of Nod).

BTW, the BGs never cooperated with the Emperor or anyone else for that matter. They had an agenda of their own, which included breeding the Kwisatz Haderach and ensuring Humanity's survival among other things.

It is possible to finish each and every mission without harvesting the whole spice at the same time, meaning that for the Sardaukars an expansion would not be vital. SURE, it is maybe easier to do so, but what's a game without any challenges and restrictions.

I wasn't saying it's easier to harvest more spice, rather that one might want to do so if one is aiming at high scores. As I said above, the more spice you harvest, the higher the scores, it's the primary factor (unlike C&C or RA) in score calculation. The paramount importance of harvested spice for the score is a specific trait of Dune II coming from the plot: initially, the competition between the Great Houses is about harvesting more spice.

I never lost my CY in the original game except to the Death Hand. It has a far too small aggressivity level to be directly assaulted by enemies after you start building your base nicely :)

There may be occasional things like once I lost a Starport because a Devastator was dropped via reinforcement script, and when it blew up upon destruction (the missile turrets did their job well), it took the nearby Starport with it. And again, what if the player runs out of buildable land? There may be enough for minimal base deployment, but not so much for extra silos or whatever else one may need (e.g. in mission 9 of original Dune II, I used to expand to the rock patch just to the north-east of the starting position to deploy additional defenses and an extra palace).

Actually I was not aware of the fact that highscores are actually the relevant point here. Harvesting for highscores is in my opinion lame and boring. That's not what makes the game interesting now, is it? I mean.... is it more satisfactory to get 800 points in mission 5 just because you harvested loads of spice, or 800 points in mission 6 because you crushed the hell out of your enemies and did not waste another 3 hours to just harvest some spice which is anyway useless? :) Spice management should not be about highscore, but about its purpose: purchasing units and constructing buildings.

Although I tend to agree with you on this, there are people who think otherwise. Besides, one might need to expand for other purposes as well. How about building more palaces with cluster missiles? The ability to launch more missiles at a time would compensate for their inaccuracy.

Fremen are in their natural habitat, but did they originally need to "harvest" the spice? I mean, why would they need to do it?! Spice is everywhere on Arrakis, and their purpose is not to harvest it. Sure, in the books it's the "working for this or that house", but in Dune 2 you get contact with the Fremen only later, as House Atreides befriends them. They are not miners in the game, they are soldiers! In my opinions they are interested in storing water (that is their primary concern on Arrakis), not spice (which as mentioned before, is everywhere). That's actually one of the reasons I found that they should not possess spice silos :)

Well, in the book, the Fremen did harvest the spice to bribe the Guild and buy stuff from the smugglers. After all, spice isn't like raw fruit hanging from a tree to be plucked, is it? It has to be harvested and processed. I don't remember if it is mentioned in the book that the Fremen hoarded spice though. But since they're using all the standard technologies in the game, why not build silos?

No deviators for the fremen.... either a wall of turrets (you complained about having too much resources for the fremen, huh? well time to build some turrets with those money) or just structuring your base in such a way that walls are not needed :)

Okay, I will consider removing the walls (I believe I had some similar idea, since the Fremen "mentat" says something negative about walls in the corresponding reference article).

You do realize that the original maps will most likely modify if we make an entire plot around the idea of alliances between factions 2 by 2. This will also modify the territory distribution too, though it is a matter of "changing factions on the playable map" and nothing much. :)

I certainly do, but that seems to me not a matter of immediate priority. It's a lot of work to be dome if the campaign choices are to be properly implemented, and honestly, I don't have much free time ATM. Besides, having more early access to the tech tree advancements seems a good idea anyway. After all, mission 1 in Dune II was nothing more than a tutorial.

I wonder if there's a way to add more exceptions to techtrees (just as the WOR for Ordos, the number of upgrades and so on).

I believe it's only possible to use the current exceptions for other factions, but someone more competent might prove me wrong :)

The deviator bug is when using enemy units to force them to attack their own base. You deviate an enemy unit (let's say a devastator), select its attack option, wait until it reverts back to harkkonen, you are still capable to select what it should attack, and you order it to attack an enemy building. The devastator keeps attacking the building until it destroys it, then it can get new orders. Moreover, while it attacks the building, no enemy unit or turret reacts, and lets the devastator "do its thing".

Ah, that old cheat. Never used it. I thought it was some kind of bug in deviator's behavior that you were referring to.

For the last two factions, the soldiers have similar traits to the allied factions' special tanks: Sardaukars focus on damage, Fedaykin have sonic damage. There are however some differences:

    Soldiers can walk on rock.

You mean "mountains". And those are few on the maps, so it gives no real advantage overall.

Soldiers can capture enemy buildings.

Would you waste a Fedaykin - a Sonic Tank equivalent - to capture a building?

When on red/yellow, a single soldier does not "smoke" (move slower, attack slower), but multiple soldiers to indeed turn into a single one, which usually disables "fire twice".

Yeah, when beaten down to half strength, a Fedaykin with a sonic weapon will turn into a much more useless Fremen Trooper. Does a Sonic Tank morph into a Quad when damaged sufficiently? Unless the Fremen Trooper also has the same sonic weapon, this is a huge disadvantage.

    Tanks cannot be crushed (though sardaukars explode upon crushing). Tanks are stronger but smaller in numbers (much easier to maneuver in Dune 2 where you can't select multiple units). Tanks tend to move a bit faster (though I'd personally recommend Sardaukars to be faster than devastators but this is a problem of balance). Tanks are more expensive.

And, much more importantly, tanks can be repaired (save for the Sardaukar, that is, but they are going to be like Orcs/Protoss, more powerful units but no repair/heal ability). Basically, a Fedaykin as you propose it will be effectively "destroyed" only when it's lost half it's normal HP, and the player will be able to do nothing to prevent it, 'cause there's no way to repair/heal it (even if you turn on the option for the carryalls to pick it up, it's useless because it only works with units damaged into yellow).

BTW, do you intend the Fedaykin's weapon to have the same range as that of a Sonic Tank?

As for the unit limit, even if we break it, the game's going to slow down drastically when there are too many units. I've read in some Dune II trainer's readme that the guy who made it actually hacked into the unit limit code - not the MaxUnit stuff in the scenarios, but the global unit limit per map - and the game would lag a lot when there were lots of units present on the map.

[Nyerguds]

You can give a building spice storage, that is correct, but you cannot selectively decide which race gets this trait. Building properties are global afterall.

Ahh true :P

[Daelin]

You're right that the plot of Dune II itself is not very Dune-ish (universe-wise), yet my idea was to partially remedy that in the mod.

True. What I mostly had in mind by my plot was making practically an "expansion" of Dune 2, because the plot continues that of Dune 2, with the sole exception that there is actually no dominant house out of the war, and the war itself keeps rolling.

As for the Bene Gesserit involvement and motives, according to the book, at the time of House Corrino's rule the BGs actually did not use the spice in their practice before Jessica was subjected to "spice agony", which was initially a Fremen ritual.

Oh yes, I know about the spice agony but I was not aware that the Bene Gesserit were not consuming the spice before. As far as I can remember from the Dune movie (Miniseries 2000), the Reverend Mother kept babbling about "The spice must flow". Maybe the Guild Navigators may hire the mercenaries then? :D I feel that all new factions should come exterior to the war, and each join the house they find closest to their style (Sardaukars do not like Ordos for they easily betray, and Atreides because they are just too 'fair'.... Fremen do not like Harkonnen for their cruelness and Ordos for their deceptive personality.... and Mercenaries, well they are just like the Ordos, money is power! :) ).

I find it also very out of character for the Bene Gesserit to rely on mercenary forces (they had their own army at the time of Heretics/Chapterhouse, but that was long after Leto II's reign), or, for that matter, to ally with House Ordos. The Ordos don't seem to be the good guys anyway (I've always pictured them as a kind of crossover between the Tleilaxu and the Brotherhood of Nod).

Exactly, these Mercenaries are not the personal troops of the Bene Gesserit. They are merely hired by them to ensure that the "Spice will Flow". They do not intend to keep an alliance with the ordos, but it's impossible to enter such a feud and enter in war with all the houses. You need an ally to "enter" the war, which can of course later be betrayed.

BTW, the BGs never cooperated with the Emperor or anyone else for that matter. They had an agenda of their own, which included breeding the Kwisatz Haderach and ensuring Humanity's survival among other things.

obviously, that's why I did not even intend an alliance with the Sardaukars. For that matter the Mercenaries will actually get to battle the Sardaukars.

I wasn't saying it's easier to harvest more spice, rather that one might want to do so if one is aiming at high scores. As I said above, the more spice you harvest, the higher the scores, it's the primary factor (unlike C&C or RA) in score calculation. The paramount importance of harvested spice for the score is a specific trait of Dune II coming from the plot: initially, the competition between the Great Houses is about harvesting more spice.

Due to the plot suggested, this wouldn't be a problem. Because right now the spice production would have indeed decreased, but in order to set things right, something must be done.

There may be occasional things like once I lost a Starport because a Devastator was dropped via reinforcement script, and when it blew up upon destruction (the missile turrets did their job well), it took the nearby Starport with it. And again, what if the player runs out of buildable land? There may be enough for minimal base deployment, but not so much for extra silos or whatever else one may need (e.g. in mission 9 of original Dune II, I used to expand to the rock patch just to the north-east of the starting position to deploy additional defenses and an extra palace).

It's curious, I never needed that space. It's all about the way you structure your base. The Sardaukars will probably have to adopt a more "crowded" style, or why not, capture an enemy building so that they can expand there. You finally start to see the usefulness of capturing buildings with Sardaukars? :) (if this can actually be accomplished). Depending on the way the enemy bases are placed, it would be possible and actually matter if you can capture an enemy building and expand there. This remains to be discussed of course.

Although I tend to agree with you on this, there are people who think otherwise. Besides, one might need to expand for other purposes as well. How about building more palaces with cluster missiles? The ability to launch more missiles at a time would compensate for their inaccuracy.

Though it was originally intended that you could build only one Palace. Here again, you have to decide what's your priority: "build palace, or add useless structures such as a High-Tech Factory" (which can actually be destroyed if you want supplementary space :grin:). oh, and also, the Sardaukars do not get to build a Repair Facility. That's a perfect place for another refinery. :)

Well, in the book, the Fremen did harvest the spice to bribe the Guild and buy stuff from the smugglers. After all, spice isn't like raw fruit hanging from a tree to be plucked, is it? It has to be harvested and processed. I don't remember if it is mentioned in the book that the Fremen hoarded spice though. But since they're using all the standard technologies in the game, why not build silos?

Hehe, and how did the Fremen spice it? Did they actually have Harvesters? The Fremen in this expansion are interested in liberating their planet, not mining spice. Due to this belief they would not see a reason to actually construct Spice Siloses. The need of bribe ends when they join forces with the Atreides. This conflict gets much more complex than the books mention, and many lore elements are most likely to be left out. Dunno, I found dropping Spice Silos a cool idea in the gameplay of the Fremen, but if you don't like it, we can drop it. :)

I certainly do, but that seems to me not a matter of immediate priority. It's a lot of work to be dome if the campaign choices are to be properly implemented, and honestly, I don't have much free time ATM. Besides, having more early access to the tech tree advancements seems a good idea anyway. After all, mission 1 in Dune II was nothing more than a tutorial.

This is true! In DuneX if the idea of the plot above remains, you would actually get to set alliances and "enter the plot".

I believe it's only possible to use the current exceptions for other factions, but someone more competent might prove me wrong :)

What if we revert the Light Factory and the Heavy Factory? That way the Harkonnen get the first upgrade already, which is pointless since they can't build Tanks. Therefore the heavy Factory would be useful only for buying Harvesters.

And talking about harvesters and unit limit, wouldn't it be an idea to set a different limit for the harvesters (separated to the other tanks)? Something like.... a ceiling of 4 or 5 harvesters/house? :)

Ah, that old cheat. Never used it. I thought it was some kind of bug in deviator's behavior that you were referring to.

I use that a lot when playing the Ordos.

You mean "mountains". And those are few on the maps, so it gives no real advantage overall.

Thism ay change if we modify the maps accordingly, though this was only a minor advantage :)

Would you waste a Fedaykin - a Sonic Tank equivalent - to capture a building?

You actually got me wrong. A Fedayking is half as strong as a Sonic Tank. Two Fedaykins should more or less equivalate a Sonic Tank.

Yeah, when beaten down to half strength, a Fedaykin with a sonic weapon will turn into a much more useless Fremen Trooper. Does a Sonic Tank morph into a Quad when damaged sufficiently? Unless the Fremen Trooper also has the same sonic weapon, this is a huge disadvantage.And, much more importantly, tanks can be repaired (save for the Sardaukar, that is, but they are going to be like Orcs/Protoss, more powerful units but no repair/heal ability). Basically, a Fedaykin as you propose it will be effectively "destroyed" only when it's lost half it's normal HP, and the player will be able to do nothing to prevent it, 'cause there's no way to repair/heal it (even if you turn on the option for the carryalls to pick it up, it's useless because it only works with units damaged into yellow).

Awsome point here. I guess you are right :) Though the trooper would've still had substantial damage yes, maybe it should still keep sonic attack. This is again balance issue. But I'm glad you're taking this idea into consideration. It would be cool for the Atreides Palace to also spawn Fedaykins, if we decide to keep it.

BTW, do you intend the Fedaykin's weapon to have the same range as that of a Sonic Tank?

Good question again. I did not think about this. It's again a matter of balance. I'll think about it.

As for the unit limit, even if we break it, the game's going to slow down drastically when there are too many units. I've read in some Dune II trainer's readme that the guy who made it actually hacked into the unit limit code - not the MaxUnit stuff in the scenarios, but the global unit limit per map - and the game would lag a lot when there were lots of units present on the map.

I know, that's why we should find some balance between soldiers and tanks. Keep things balance somehow :)

[MrFlibble]

I feel that all new factions should come exterior to the war, and each join the house they find closest to their style (Sardaukars do not like Ordos for they easily betray, and Atreides because they are just too 'fair'.... Fremen do not like Harkonnen for their cruelness and Ordos for their deceptive personality.... and Mercenaries, well they are just like the Ordos, money is power! :) ).

Actually, in the book, the Sardaukar hate and despise the Harkonnens. However, the Emperor has struck a bargain with House Harkonnen, giving them support in return for some dirty work the Baron does for the Emperor. The Sardaukar despise pretty much everyone else, anyway.

Exactly, these Mercenaries are not the personal troops of the Bene Gesserit.

Once again, it's not very consistent with what's in the books.

Though it was originally intended that you could build only one Palace.

AFAIK there are no PC versions where such a limitation was actually implemented.

Dunno, I found dropping Spice Silos a cool idea in the gameplay of the Fremen, but if you don't like it, we can drop it. :)

This has to be very thoroughly tested, as drawbacks might outweigh advantages of differentiating gameplay for each side.

What if we revert the Light Factory and the Heavy Factory? That way the Harkonnen get the first upgrade already, which is pointless since they can't build Tanks. Therefore the heavy Factory would be useful only for buying Harvesters.

Swapping the Light Factory with the Heavy Factory and vice versa is an unnecessary complication. Besides, it's useless anyway, the first HF upgrade gives you the MCV, not the Combat Tank. Combat Tanks require no upgrades whatsoever.

And talking about harvesters and unit limit, wouldn't it be an idea to set a different limit for the harvesters (separated to the other tanks)? Something like.... a ceiling of 4 or 5 harvesters/house? :)

I think the Harvesters share their limit with other treaded vehicles. And I was talking about global limits, they don't count which side owns which unit.

You actually got me wrong. A Fedayking is half as strong as a Sonic Tank. Two Fedaykins should more or less equivalate a Sonic Tank.

By saying "equivalent", I did not mean it has the same hit points and other stats. What I meant was that a Fedaykin as proposed is a hi-level "special weapon" type unit. I was also referring to your idea that the Fedaykins fill the same niche as Sonic Tanks for the Atreides.

Awsome point here. I guess you are right :) Though the trooper would've still had substantial damage yes, maybe it should still keep sonic attack. This is again balance issue. But I'm glad you're taking this idea into consideration. It would be cool for the Atreides Palace to also spawn Fedaykins, if we decide to keep it.

The only thing I don't like about this is that the Fremen will also have to produce regular infantry as low-level units.

[MrFlibble]

This update is mostly about modifying AI behavior. Recent updates of Nyerguds' Dune II Editor, based on Daelin's research, and the subsequent investigation of AI attack priorities have opened the possibility to significantly increase AI efficiency in Dune II. The Demo features a new AI attack priority system, which supposedly will make the game more challenging.

Another development, also made possible with Nyerguds' Editor, is that the Demo now consists of less PAK files, and its size is also reduced. This was done by "rewiring" the PAK file contents (previously I had to replace certain files within the PAK archives), so all the duplicate files that were not changed compared to Dune II are read from the original archives. Because of this, it is highly recommended that you uninstall any previous version of the Demo you might have before installing the current one.

Also, the Mercenary campaign is now complete with new briefings. The story isn't exactly breathtaking, but this is better than just placeholder Ordos briefings from Dune II :) Most mercenary missions have new briefing images that are more or less appropriate to what's going to happen in the mission itself.

Here are some action-packed screenshots:

[Daelin]

Flibble, keep in mind that any modifications you make to the threat levels will also affect YOUR ornithopters, meaning that instead of prioritizing useful buildings, they will now also go for turrets (which are impossible to destroy this way) => Ornis become quite useless.

Also, it would be nice to check units' threat level too (if you haven't already done that, because i know you mentioned something in the investigation thread about the buildings but nothing about the units). For instance, I remember that in Dune 2000 Harvesters were quite a prioritary target for the opponent. Maybe you should put harvesters at the same threat level with refineries. That way the opponent would go for your spice production very "efficiently", so to speak.

[Nyerguds]

Actually, using thopters to soften the defenses before an attack doesn't seem too useless. They rebuild buildings anyway, so this way they'll be useful when attacking.

[MrFlibble]

Flibble, keep in mind that any modifications you make to the threat levels will also affect YOUR ornithopters, meaning that instead of prioritizing useful buildings, they will now also go for turrets (which are impossible to destroy this way) => Ornis become quite useless.

'Thopters were already pretty useless if the AI still had AA defenses. They're only good to pick up the remains when the defenses are down. As Nyerguds pointed out, any attempts to destroy the enemy base with 'thopters is futile in v1.07 as the AI rebuilds lost structures, and the Construction Yard is not on the top of the priority list anyway.

Also, it would be nice to check units' threat level too (if you haven't already done that, because i know you mentioned something in the investigation thread about the buildings but nothing about the units). For instance, I remember that in Dune 2000 Harvesters were quite a prioritary target for the opponent. Maybe you should put harvesters at the same threat level with refineries. That way the opponent would go for your spice production very "efficiently", so to speak.

I haven't tried modifying unit threat levels yet, because I wanted to learn how well the AI would behave with the ability to counter the player's defenses. Making the Harvesters have the same priority level as the Refineries seems like a good idea.

Oh, and it's MrFlibble, by the way.

[Daelin]

'Thopters were already pretty useless if the AI still had AA defenses. They're only good to pick up the remains when the defenses are down. As Nyerguds pointed out, any attempts to destroy the enemy base with 'thopters is futile in v1.07 as the AI rebuilds lost structures, and the Construction Yard is not on the top of the priority list anyway.

Hmm.... well then how about keeping both turrets and CY in mind as top priorities for the AI? That way if the AI would have to choose which one to go for, they would randomly pick either the turrets or the CY. Or maybe make the CY only slightly more threatful than the turrets and see how the computer behaves (a difference of lets say 10 points?). The computer seems to somehow choose them pseudo-randomly, but yet keeping distance to the objective somehow in mind as well. The best way to test this is with your own 'thopters. I used to have a modified "Ordos Mission 8 on Harkonnen region" map, where I swapped the harkonnen base with the ordos, made sure they atreides can't build any ornis, and reduced their cost and build time to 1. And voila, you're up for some heavy testing. I don't really have time to do this. The Assembly course is killing me and I don't understand anything from that gibberish. :)

Oh and btw, don't be so sure that ornis are useless when attacking your opponent. They are useful when it comes to making a Saboteur attack. In mission 8 I destroyed the Atreides CY with a Saboteur by first sending an Orni and then quickly sending my Saboteur for the construction yard. It's quite a fun strategy, actually!

I haven't tried modifying unit threat levels yet, because I wanted to learn how well the AI would behave with the ability to counter the player's defenses. Making the Harvesters have the same priority level as the Refineries seems like a good idea.

There is a problem though with units threat levels, as units can be moved across the map and could be useful to attract enemy units as well into a trap. Though keeping in mind that you actually need to keep the spice production up, you'd need to have atleast one harvester out mining. :)

Oh, and it's MrFlibble, by the way.

Oh, sorry about that. Felt "Flibble" was a bit more familiar, but if you don't like it, I'll tell you MrFlibble from now on. :)

-Daelin

[MrFlibble]

Hmm.... well then how about keeping both turrets and CY in mind as top priorities for the AI? That way if the AI would have to choose which one to go for, they would randomly pick either the turrets or the CY. Or maybe make the CY only slightly more threatful than the turrets and see how the computer behaves (a difference of lets say 10 points?). The computer seems to somehow choose them pseudo-randomly, but yet keeping distance to the objective somehow in mind as well.

I'm not sure, but the way the AI picks its targets seems to depend in part on their position on the map, like in Command & Conquer does.

Oh and btw, don't be so sure that ornis are useless when attacking your opponent. They are useful when it comes to making a Saboteur attack. In mission 8 I destroyed the Atreides CY with a Saboteur by first sending an Orni and then quickly sending my Saboteur for the construction yard. It's quite a fun strategy, actually!

I did not try to underemphasize the value of 'thopters. They're good for scouting and making distractions, but as attackers on their own, they are largely ineffective against AA defenses.

Oh, sorry about that. Felt "Flibble" was a bit more familiar, but if you don't like it, I'll tell you MrFlibble from now on. :)

No need to apologize, it's just that Mr is a part of the name rather than a title :)

Nobody knows his first name. (Although it could be 'Mr.')

[MrFlibble]

Guys, I've moved segra's explanation of the AI team scripts to the DUNE2.EXE Editing/Programming Thread, so that other people can find relevant data more easily :)