Draw Criteria

[conboy]

Ahoy,
Someone PM'd me and told me that a couple of my scenarios had ended in draws even though the player had achieved all the primary objectives. I can't find anything wrong with the objectives in question (they are very hard to troubleshoot however), and the logic evades me as to how a scenario can end in a draw if the Human meets all the primary objectives:

 Major Defeat: NOT all primary objectives met + NOT all secondary objectives
met + hostile alliance has achieved all primary objectives.
 Minor Defeat: NOT all primary objectives met + ALL secondary objectives met +
hostile alliance has achieved all primary objectives.
 Draw: turn limit reached + no one has met ALL primary objectives.
 Minor Victory: ALL primary objectives met + NOT all secondary objectives met.
 Major Victory: ALL primary objectives met + ALL secondary objectives met.

Might it be that somehow there is a primary objective that is assigned to the AI that doesn't have a reciprocal on the Human, and the AI achieves that objective? More simply put, is it a Draw if the AI achieves (only) one of several primary objectives and the Human achieves all? This would require a fault in the objective set-up, obviously, but would it result in a draw?

But that's not how the definition reads, as long as the Human achieves the all Primary Objectives he should get a at least a Minor Victory, correct?

Also, could this result from disabling some AI objectives? Sometimes you need to do that to keep objectives from being retaken later in the scenario and spoiling the victory.

thanks in advance!

conboy

[bru888]

My impression is that when one side achieves ALL of its primary objectives, the scenario ends. The first side to do so wins (major or minor victory for the player depending on whether all secondary objectives are completed).

Draw is supposed to happen only when the scenario ends on turns and neither side is done completing its primary objectives. Even if "there is a primary objective that is assigned to the AI that doesn't have a reciprocal on the Human, and the AI achieves that objective," that just means the AI will win if it completes its other objectives before the human player does with his.

So, yes, "as long as the Human achieves the all Primary Objectives he should get at least a Minor Victory" as long as he beats the AI in doing so.

Most likely, if there is a Draw problem in a couple of your scenarios, it's an issue with the triggers. Two pairs of eyes are better than one so if you would like to post a link to the scenarios involved, I will have a quick look if you would like.

Even though I am not an "egghead."

[GabeKnight]

I was curious and made some tests:

-Major Defeat: NOT ALL primary objectives met + NOT ALL secondary objectives met + hostile alliance has achieved ALL primary objectives.
-Minor Defeat: NOT ALL primary objectives met + ALL secondary objectives met + hostile alliance has achieved ALL primary objectives.
-Draw: turn limit reached + no one has met ALL primary objectives.
-Minor Victory: ALL primary objectives met + NOT ALL secondary objectives met.
-Major Victory: ALL primary objectives met + ALL secondary objectives met.

This statement is EXACTLY right.
And it also means that if there are multiple primary (or secondary) objectives, failing (or not completing) one is the same as completing none.

With some particulars:

- "open" objective = "failed" objective
- If the human alliance meets all prim. obj. it does NOT matter if the AI has ALSO met all prim. objectives. The human wins.
- If the AI team has more than one prim. objective, ALL these objectives must be "complete" for the human to lose. Otherwise it's "draw" at worst!


Conboy, that's why I said that I see no point in giving the AI team more than one prim. obj. (and of course no secondaries!). It makes no sense and just messes things up and you have more work with some triggers.

[bru888]

Conboy, that's why I said that I see no point in giving the AI team more than one prim. obj. (and of course no secondaries!). It makes no sense and just messes things up and you have more work with some triggers.

I'm not so sure about this, myself. I prefer to have matching, offsetting human and AI objectives so that it is clearly determined who wins and who loses, and fairly. Else, how does the AI win? Only if the human fails to achieve everything at the end of a scenario? That does not seem fair.

With matching objectives, a Draw will occur when there is a "split decision" at the end of the scenario. This system requires more work, perhaps, but is more finite in my opinion.

[GabeKnight]

Maybe I'm missing some logic here, but there are only five possible endings. Nothing in between. And it's not about being "fair", but computer coding...
And they are coded like this:

- For each human min./maj. "win" it does NOT matter how the AI does; if it has one or ten objectives or if they have been failed or completed. Once the human team has all prim. obj. checked as complete, it's a Victory.
- For each AI min./maj. "win" (=human Defeat) the AI team has to have ALL prim. obj. complete. All. It also doesn't matter how many the human player has completed if at least one prim.obj. is open.
- And for the draw: at least one open prim. obj. for the human and one open prim. obj. for the AI team. What difference would it make if the AI had two completed and one open? It's still a draw.

Maybe you're right and I'm some "egghead" , but I really see no point (or rather: a difference in the result) having multiple AI objectives.

The most difficult part has to be to figure out the conditions that will determine how a win, draw or defeat are defined within the scen. And once they are, the programming of the (objective) triggers has to be as simple as possible IMO.

I'm not saying there might not be some special cases, but usually it's capture this (until turn x) or hold there or kill x units. And either you can do it or ... not.

[conboy]

Bru,
Here is one of the accused offenders.
I can't see why this would end in a draw if all the Human objectives were achieved.

http://www.mediafire.com/file/fqqpmwetd ... t.zip/file

thanks for the offer,

conboy

[conboy]

Gabe,

but I really see no point (or rather: a difference in the result) having multiple AI objectives.

Slowly, I am grasping your point. I think I'll try from now on to have one AI objective, that being to deny the Human any primary objective, and pursue it that way. It seems so much simpler than each Human objective having a reciprocal AI objective. When the Human attains all the objectives, the game is over. (Unless it's a defensive scenario, hold these objectives till the end...)

I am losing this in the fog, but I think you are on to something here.

conboy

[Mascarenhas]

How someone knows which are AI´s objectives?

[GabeKnight]

And, I mean, we're still talking singleplayer, right?

I guess with multiplayer maps - and human vs. human - the prim. obj. are more "interesting" there...

[bru888]

Bru,
Here is one of the accused offenders.
I can't see why this would end in a draw if all the Human objectives were achieved.

http://www.mediafire.com/file/fqqpmwetd ... t.zip/file

thanks for the offer,

conboy

I've got three weak theories.

1) You have a secondary objective for the AI, which is at best superfluous. At worst, it could be affecting the evaluation of scenario results. Who knows with this game? I would get rid of it.

Screenshot 1.jpg (217.21 KiB) Viewed 2305 times

2) These secondary objectives are marked as Primary in their effects. Again, who knows whether this would cause a problem?

Screenshot 5.jpg (280.14 KiB) Viewed 2305 times

Screenshot 6.jpg (260.9 KiB) Viewed 2305 times

3) By my count, you have 14 primary objective victory points. It is easy for the player to overlook one or more of them. Or, one of the primary objectives is to take the first six VPs before Turn 12. The player doesn't do that, but does so later, then expects a victory while forgetting that he needed to do this objective before Turn 12. Or, he completes this objective early but is foiled by this trigger, which will fail the the previously achieved objective on Turn 12 if the AI has taken back any of those six VPs.

Screenshot 7.jpg (279.25 KiB) Viewed 2305 times

If any of these theories holds credence, I would say it's #3. For, I cannot find anything obviously wrong with 6 Volt.

[bru888]

Oh, wait a minute. (Heh, I was just signing off of this project when a thought occurred . . . ) Here is a much stronger theory.

This triggers says to take those Phase I Objectives before Turn 13. The objective requires "Secure Phase I Objectives <Turn 12." So this is an error in itself:

Screenshot 1.jpg (276.26 KiB) Viewed 2300 times

So the player is being allowed to finish this objective during his Turn 12 if he has not done so already. However, in Turn 12, as soon as he moves any unit, this trigger will fire and fail the objective:

Screenshot 2.jpg (274.86 KiB) Viewed 2300 times

I'm still not sure whether this could be the cause of an unexpected Draw result, but it is something that needs to be fixed.

[conboy]

Thank you, Bru.
I think the lesson that should be conveyed from the 3d ID Campaign is, keep it simple! No matter how many times I reviewed it, there are still errors like the one you pointed out.

Hope you didn't spend too much time on that, but I really appreciate it.

conboy

p.s. what grafix editor do you use when you create these pictures? I've been meaning to ask for some time...

[bru888]

p.s. what grafix editor do you use when you create these pictures? I've been meaning to ask for some time...

I use FastStone Image Viewer (free) for organizing and simple editing like cropping (I love the ability to save preset cropping sizes such as 512 x 415 pixels). I did shell out $19.95 for FastStone Screen Capture for its versatility in creating screen prints and its somewhat more robust Draw Board functions. For the occasional photo touchups (Magic Wand, Clone Brush, etc.), I use paint.net.

I just used the latter to turn this raw material - scratched, watermarked, and poorly sized:

large_000000.jpg (55.65 KiB) Viewed 2278 times

into this game-ready beauty!

HMS_La_Malouine.png (134.44 KiB) Viewed 2278 times

[Note: IWM says "You can embed media or download low resolution images free of charge for private and non-commercial use under the IWM Non-Commercial Licence." I am keeping such things in mind even though I have yet to earn a dime from any of this work that I am doing. ]

[bru888]

For example, before some wag could say "You missed a spot," I used FastStone Capture to make a zoomed-in screen capture of the area in question, then I drew an oval around it with FastStone Image Viewer:

Image0330.jpg (44.38 KiB) Viewed 2273 times

I did that just to post the image here. Then I went back to paint.net and clone brushed that eyesore away!

HMS_La_Malouine.png (133.13 KiB) Viewed 2273 times

[Of course, you could get nutty . . . there's another spot or two that could be touched up . . . but maybe I will make this a test case. "Must. Resist. Urge. To. Fiddle."]

[bru888]

. . . maybe I will make this a test case. "Must. Resist. Urge. To. Fiddle."]

Oh, who am I kidding? But I am NOT looking at this image any more. Nope, nope, nope!

HMS_La_Malouine.png (133.13 KiB) Viewed 2271 times

[conboy]

Cool!
I just started using Paint.net for editing pictures.
I use the Snip app for screen grabs. Very handy. I have been using it to do screen grabs of old news reels.
And the app I think is best for resizing pictures is the paint3d that comes with windows.

So that probably shows how limited my bitmap editing repertoire is. I miss photoshop!

I'll check out the FastStone app on your recommendation.

thanks,
conboy

ps stop fooling around with that bitmap!

[bru888]

ps stop fooling around with that bitmap!

Okay.

By the way, I am taking this course at udemy.com:

Image0331.jpg (43.26 KiB) Viewed 2256 times

I got it at the price shown but I doubt that it's ever as expensive as the "pre-sale" price shown. Well worth it, IMO.

I've been all over the place with photo editing programs: GIMP, IrfanView (both free at least) and Paintshop Pro (a waste of money; WAY too much to wade through). Paint.net is the best alternative for guys like us; again IMO.

[bru888]

Going back to our discussion of matching/offsetting human and AI primary objectives, which I still adhere to, I have been finding that this arrangement works out well:

Screenshot 1.jpg (279.21 KiB) Viewed 2228 times

Screenshot 2.jpg (245.45 KiB) Viewed 2228 times

Screenshot 3.jpg (257.91 KiB) Viewed 2228 times

The first screenshot shows the usual complicated trigger conditions; take four points and reduce enemy units. No way around that unless you really want to go with very simple targets like "Take Point X. You win!" And the offsetting fail trigger is the usual trigger for evaluation of the objective at the end of the scenario.

But, instead of needing to account for each condition not being met such as each of the four victory points, only one of which being in enemy hands at scenario end fails the objective, what I have been doing is shown in the second and third screenshots.

That is, merely test to see if the objective is still open. If so, fail the objective and award the AI its corresponding objective. A single trigger instead of four individual ones for each of the VPs. Seems to be working; no complaints so far.

[conboy]

Bru,
I concur. This is a far simpler method than having a reciprocal for each objective.

This way, when all Human objectives are achieved, the Human wins.

If all are not achieved (any objective still open) the Human loses. You can set up one trigger on the AI side to check all Human objectives and be done with it that way.

I'm going to sign up for the udemy course today -- thanks for the tip!

conboy

[conboy]

Bru,

Thanks for the tip. The course is back up to 89.99 now!

conboy