Radagast.

Did anyone try the 3dsMax -> FBX --> Ultimate3D -> MS3D --> Milkshape -> SMD --> Blender route? http://forum.unity3d.com/threads/122986-Small-Tut-From-3D-Max-to-FBX-To-Milkskape-to-Blender-to-Unity-Steps!! Else is there a chance we can fix the incorrect rotation, scale and facing(object-normal) issues with a python script? Can anyone give feedback on what exactly fails currently with the newest COLLADA importer and what of the above mentioned broken imported properties need to be fixed in order to save the old animations from wreckage? e.g. Is the facing object still a problem? I think it's mentioned somewhere that this is fixed for the newer COLLADA importer (> 2.66 < 2.69) ? The rotation we should be able to fix with a script (blender offers Quaternion|Matrice.inverted() method). The scale is difficult as it defines the influence on the vetices, does it? Historic_bruno said the .dae-Format is human readable, so there is a chance we could figure the correct values and try to find a pattern which values and axis are swapped. Once we have the pattern we could correct those problems with a python script/extension. For the scale in special this means we had parse the .dae XML to extract the correct scale values (if anyone knows where these correct values are stored). Then we could insert those correct scale values for each bone via python. The bone names or at least IDs are kept up, i.e. are the same for .dae and blender-bones, are they?

Can you elaborate more what you have in mind about the treasure guards? Sound interesting .. Are you thinking of having pirates around (like Mythos already wished in a thread) that simply defend their treasures? Sometimes they cross the countrysides to enrichen themselves, while most of the time they float on the seven seas (until they meet a Roman Galley .. you know Goscinny et Uderzo ). Ah now I get it. You mean digging with creeping? So a mining system .. or dynamic entrenchments? hmm. .. perhaps with Philips new pathfinder with 1x1 resolution this is possible by dynamic changes to the heightmap? For the playable civs the transformation from mini-civ to real civ and the other way round would be non-existent if there are still buildings available that allow reproduction and expansion of the civ that split away from a rebellion. Or because this is all that is left after the rebellion was crushed - a rebellion is not even required to have taken place at all: Imagine you conquer foreign territories but decide to leave the remaining few buildings and civilians alive. As long as there is some territory left we would have a mini-civ then. Maybe they have to repair their buildings permanently if there is no territory left. My little brother Findus and me we once had 40 females left .. but no more territory keeping building after even the blacksmith was crushed. (but still had a market, two houses and a mercenary camp left that allowed to continue production as we had heaps of resources left). So if I hadn't made a terrible tactical mistake then we perhaps still had had the chance to turn the tide. Actually only moments before that hopeless situation we had almost all of our previously occupied territory re-conquered that we lost to Aegis's assaults in the meantime for the at least the forth time. But I sent the 30 females from our rear-areas (in the meantime already conquered by Aegis) too close nearby enemy units and drew the attention on our last hope: the market which made it still possible to build new (store)houses. Also the decline of the buildings seemed to accelerate by time .. perhaps this was by the enemy units gaining in stregth but we didn't realise this attack until all was lost. Okay, I think to have mini-civs repair their remaining buildings steadily is out of the question , so we have to stop or at least reduce the decline for those mini-civs. Or anyone knows how it's currently done with the Thracians? Probably without at least one territory-gaining building we should really convert the declining civ/faction to be converted in a real mini-civ (without colors or however this works currently - have not looked at how it's done currently because I have to finish the hybrid AI first.). Exactly. In the Hybrid AI we forge for the Roman Republic Mod, there is no direct need to think about this. The general will request reinforcements from the senate/mayor. This will then be decided upon in the next council meeting, depending on how urgent it is. This 'leadership'/council then might call for reinforcements from allies themselves. So no need to worry about that. Of course you can use ALT+D and activate to have full control finally relaying all such decisions to you alone (as requested e.g. by Romulus .. the cheated 'Emperor Mode' .. there is a more legal way to achieve the same result by getting elected consul or even dictator in wartimes but this is Roman Republic specific. We can think about how to generalise this later.). If you yourself (the unit you currently focus on) have a military command then it's up to you to call for reinforcements of course. You may react on reinforcement calls of your subordinates ... or simply overrule those decisions (making their sympathy towards you sink of course, especially if your decision turns the subordinates and their soldiers into a fiasco). Here I would still opt for dividing twofold:Mercenary camp (training mercenaries that have been recruited). Note: 0A.D. uses training for recruitment, I mean training in terms of strenghtening their stats, researching technology. Also I wish to only make the mercenaries available to the player once they have reached a mercenary camp. So no mercenary camp => no mercenaries can be recruited. There could be techs with the mercenary camps that allow for recruitment of different rank units. Or first only light-infantry, then need a tech to make it possible to recruit heavy infantry, another tech for cavallery... finally if it is researched how to recruit all basic unit mercenaries then elite mercenaries may be called upon. The good thing is that the enemy may pay mercenaries from the same mini-civ at a time, just depending on how bad the condition of the mini-civ is. That is if they need a lot of resources or not.Recruitment of mercenaries itself from mini-civilisations, neutral factions, pirates (also mini-civ essentially? difference is only that they are nomadic .. just like nomads) ...

Really those proposals are massive improvements. I thought the same but then realised that there were simply much more plants in the lower right part of the image. Or was it an optical illusion? Thanks for the improvements, there are more things taking shape than I expected. Also I like the wagons. Could we make the fields even more unregular too, e.g. by using larger and randomly placed transparent textures? Thought this was discussed somewhere somewhen ... but forgot in which thread. I'm not sure brushes or trees around the fields would make it look artificial once there are too many in a row of them? (just because LordGood mentioned it)

You fixed it? Finally the old 50+ animations saved?

Thanks Lion. Good idea with Lion's logo in the sig of thamlett too. I wonder how it would turn out. That's how I understood it. And it would be the ultimate goal for me. At least interally. For the downloads we could still write script for bundlng it automatically. Furthermore I would like to convince people to download all mods (except GUI change mods) because: it's not that much to download.it makes our live easier.quality is high anyway andwe could reduce redundancy (thus saving us nightmares .. I think of my AI being spread out everywhere in dozens of versions ...).

Edit for above post: A potential problem with fexor's proposal is that it could destroy the helmet-like look? Have to test it. Isn't it possible to import the whole Aristeia repository? Also the public repo (access if github-account) I mentioned before I meant to allow people to easily send in their improvements. I think such an easy procedure (because automatic write-/commit-access if has a github account) would make a whole lot more people consider contributing. (and would fit well our non-hierarchy structure) The good thing with this is that we then can easily integrate those up-stream-improvements into the main repos. Edit: Is it possible to set different access rights for branches? That would be an elegant solution then. Also we need a common repository if that's possible. I mean somehow to not have to copy things over and over. Anyone knows a good procedure for how to avoid redundancy spread over several repos?

Wow, happy turnarount here. @Lion: Wow! There is really a lot to discover. The cool thing with the first one is that really looks like a helmet. The second one like a shield at first sight, also not bad - if one imagine that the black center of the wrench is the backplate of the helmet as seen from inside, then it also turns into a helmet (even better than the first then .. perhaps give this another colour tone than the rest?). The C is the base, no? Or the magician's tower-like wrench top is the C ? Interesting .. well done! @Romulus & Niek: Glad, the repos are taking shape too. The recruitment text is well-chosen! Or take the big bottom part as the C and give this base a continuous rim (many helmets have rims at the bottom, haven't they?) But let's Lion decide .. he will know.

We shouldn't be angry with Michael, he's our master at least and very active with the artwork in the SVN currently .. and perhaps even only doesn't want us to be disappointed if all our ideas fail (what many people might think). :/ True for me too .. I always write too much too. And edit over and over - could be seen as trolling too. I read about it and it's why I think it would integrate quite nicely. And no complication too. Just add those mini-tribes and we have our mercenaries in a realistic way (we then might have nomadic mini-civs and you one-hut + a few fields tribes too - two problems solved with one solution: mini-cultures). Still we could add mercenary training camps just like army entrenchment camp for the Romans is like, no? Placeable everywhere (like roman entrenchment camp & intelligence towers are already). There we could place the technologies to research and some extra candies. And it would be an interesting target for being captured for enemies. .. "oh I'm bankrupt. Why? Can't my tribe accept I'm a military leader only. Why do they complain they starve?" No no.. I get your point. It's a good point actually. This way, we could even add to send some camouflaged "mercenaries" that offer being hired .. but in reality are spies (that we sent to them). Just the real thing. Good we've written it down for later to remember ..

Nice they are shrunk. Unfortunately if only one of us uses a non-shrunk version and is on the same page then the shrunk AND normal size version have to be loaded. So it's the contrary of saving bandwidth. As I think the smaller one are still big enough to read the Established date, we should go for those. One more question. How does the recruiting phase work? Rather, where do you plan to recruit, master Romulus? On Mod DB? Or in communities like blender's or Open Game Art? Aren't all modders of this forum member automatically? May we also put up a public write permission sub-repository (if that's possible)? @github: faerietree - my twigs and the fruits they might bear at your service.

Nice writeup Lion. Thanks for clarifying. Then couldn't we do this with 'mini cultures'? They have only a small economy and many warriors. If you are manage to hire them, they stay loyal until they lose trust in your success and defect. You are right! I must have tomatoes on my eyes!

Yes story line is the main usage ... Just didn't think of how it could be useful for us. But your words clarified. Thanks a lot. Edit: Did I call it "artificial physics"?

The capturing can be just like the other capturing .. if the health/condition of the building is low enough and it is overpowered by enemey units (also calculated via their health). Then the building changes the owner. This way you even might have some time to relieve the siege. Interesting. Happy I read this. Isn't a mercenary camp for the training? And those well might have an owner. So if you decide to have more training capabilities for mercenaries then you have more mercenary camps. What you talk about are the mercenaries itself and those of course go where they were drawn to for whatever reasons. Or if there is a foreign tribe (eyecandy or what you call it) then you might go to their chief's hut and ask for troops. Well, you might be forced out or even lose you envy if the tribe isn't please with your bid (and you brought no presents or wanted to exploit them (paid badly? wanted to draw/recruit too many units?) ... Those then of course are neutral. But in general I doubt that a mercenary camp is neutral, standing around in the countryside, waiting until a leader comes and asks for help ... (if it were like that why then train units? why not get the recruits immediately .. they had time enough to be trained already ...) I also think it should not be captured, even though I think it could be captured ... you should be able to build it. Then it could be captured by other units if they overpower you. That's easiest to integrate I think. That's why I wish to introduce the decentralised AI ... it can assist you if you wish. What do you think of simply having mercenaries like it is and the mercenary camp just like a usual building for training those recruited mercenaries. Because though I've heard of mercenaries carrying around their baggage and women I've not heard of them carrying around complete houses. Interesting will be to hire troops from Gaia or neutral "eye-candy" tribes.

Thought the random maps were random ... so how do you plan to influence the random? Supply will work.. I have a decision tree somewhere for this functionality .. so the general staff will manage the logistics.

Can't the kind (dev/artist,..) be put as text .. just like your (currently screwed ) Senātus Populusque Rōmānus. I wonder if there will be enough characters left to include the CoM logo into your sig... isn't there a limit? Would be a pity, you signature with the Roman bust and its roman surrounding is quite interesting.

Why need triggers? Aren't triggers artificial version of physics? I know they are used in RPG for developing a story line. May be used for traps too, but that can be done via physics, so once we had basic physics we'd not need triggers or the other way round (which would be less dynamic and automatic as we had to define triggers for each physic action, i.e. falling in a hole in the ground, jumping off a cliff or ship ...).

Brilliant maps!

Like this image here most: I like the details .. it's really a nice countryside.

Interesting! Another useful list. So did I, basically just a collection of ideas thrown into our thinkfarm . Finally we will make it happen jointly. As a single one it does not make sense any way as we stated before, because if there is noone to show your work or ideas to... well then it's all useless. So thanks for sharing! (currently I'm thinking about if it's useful to make enemy attacks being coordinated from an right-angle as seen from the frontiers to the attack target or if the units should try to reach their targets straight through enemy territory... probably yet another decision the general should make and learn from it.) Thanks for the suplply work, too! Have to get into the query language next month when I start my AI tests 'in the fields'. Edit: of if --> or if, Unother --> Another, on the field --> in the fields?

Couldn't we use UnQLite (from the same devs like SQLite) instead? It's self-contained in one (1) C-file - without dependency. Has a C API and is object, JSON storage. (key => value pairs). Thanks for the expansion on grain picker example. Gives some interesting insights. Is your AI called Hannibal? So perhaps soon we have Aegis, Hannibal, TauCet & Fides and the one of Teiresias ... (essentially myself is working on two variants hence Fides & TauCeti as one is quite specific for the Roman Republic Mod in a hybrid-human-AI mode and with splitting and joining capabilities.) I didn't want to discredit anyone. Surely Teiresias must have spakred the splitting and joining idea. You brought in the self-learning comment and agentx the state machine. My humble self only forged both into the hybrid version of state machine and the variant weighted decision making tree. See we need your AI ... okay, I also recall: So decide yourself, it doesn't matter. If you think our efforts are enough already (though we have not yet a working alternate AI) you don't have to start your own - but are always allowed to!

Hey, well done!! Interesting ... a bug in an IDE compiler? oh gracious, I don't wish to debug that ... This means the SpiderMonkey is history? No more mess with it? Oh, and the JavaDebugger will work now again (if we really need it) or am I just mixing it all up again?

Well done and thanks for sharing. It's really hard currently to follow all these actions around. So I'm haven't seen this until now- You will probably get angry because of my question: Does this match all infantry hero units that are filtered by > costs.metal? Or is it really SORTing instead of filtering. Then I think all would be CONTAINed in the result, no? The parser/query language will surely have benefits other than look if compared to writing MACROs or functions for that directly, e.g. get('infantry,hero', filter_callback)? Where filter callback would be just like SORT ... ah I get it, the ultimate benefit is the chaining as you stated in the excellent nodes call description! Is your AI called Hannibal? Your work is motivating me a lot. One I have time I will dive deeply into the AI to finally get my AI (TauCeti) to work ... hopefully we then can include all your improvements into the common_api.

Now that I thought about this more, I wonder if dereferencing will make any difference at all as it's in O(1), i.e. needs only constant time. Currently I wonder if it's not even relativated by the extra function that's required only to create those shortcuts. It's a bit confusing as objects can suddenly be accessed in many different ways - bringing the logical order in disarray? Will calling the function create as much overhead as time saved by the fewer O(1) dereferences? I know readability is the reason, unfortunately in my opinion the program gets less readable if we reassign attributes at arbitrary levels in the prototype hierarchy. No offense, I'm completely okay with it - it's just a question of what you're used to. As I often use search and replace functionality, I don't really create shortcuts that much. If we followed the current heavy shortcut and less typing path consequently shouldn't we then change our random numbers 0, 1, ... to constants too, e.g. instead of parameter[3] use parameter[RESOURCE_FOOD] or comparable? Also no offense, I only want to extend my horizon as I try to get familiar with the system and as usual it's tempting to change all and everything that one is not used to. (Luckily so far I could resist it.. so that the AI is purely additive for now.) Thanks for the hint agentx and all those explanations sander.

Interesting to see this more closely. I'm afraid my knowledge of Assembly is limited too. My guess is that the optimizations have also stripped the segfault version of the push to stack command of the JS::Value because the optimizer realized there was no longer a need for it. So if the compiler gets the order wrong the code changes drastically if optimization is turned on .. Your comments are helpful. Especially as assembly differs a lot inbetween hardware types.

Good you put in alternatives. Nice books! Let's keep up our momentum. Council implies table and if we call it Council of Modders and have an image with a round table this says it all. Artus Table also did call themselves Artusround, so Modderround or Table of Modders or why not Council of Modders as we had it? Thank you for your efforts to improve my skills, Lion. I hope you have success with that someday. I think, I'm not really an artistic giant so please excuse my humble efforts ... Which goals? Difficult to depict that we want to join efforts though I think the round table tells it all if we only could get 0 A.D. and Modding in there somehow. That's why I wanted to add helmets of all different mods we currently work on. Each chair another helmet or something like that. I have to deal with that somehow ... no idea if I can make this happen. Still hope for Lions help once he has more time.

Definitely there must be more implicitely to be initialized static templates. One alone will make it easy for the compiler to get it in the correct order (as there is only one). Even though there are more than one still the compiler could be lucky and initialize all references using the correct order. Agreed. To exactly understand the problem in the context of JS::Value would be helpful. Unfortunately for bigger programs to find the real issue could turn out more complicated than simply explicitely declaring used static template functions and attributes (in the correct order). If you do further research, please let us know how your ventures turn out. And take your time - SpiderMonkey by itself is dangerous enough as it's highly optimized probably at all and every corner. (so I would not use it for spaceflight, as there could be crazy odds one never thinks of until the spacecraft crashes)