0.9.5 / Java client

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Implode
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0.9.5 / Java client

Post by Implode »

So I've been wanting to post a screenshot to show how the Java client is looking, so here's a link :)

The Delphi client was a Direct 3D app all in one window. While there's other windows that appear inside it (like the unit view, city view, magic screen and so on), that only worked because of the amount of effort I took writing Delphi components to control Direct 3D and be able to make areas of the screen look like windows. But you can't move them about, and from Windows' point of view its a one window application.

The Java client is a Swing app, so each window is a separate window to the operating system, and so you can move them all about independantly. You can also have multiple copies of windows open where it makes sense - like you can open up the city view for multiple cities at once, or have multiple unit info screens up - if you have an important hero you could e.g. leave their screen up all the time and see as their experience levels go up and health goes up and down. You can leave the city screen (or multiple city screens) up and watch the progress coins skip up every time you hit next turn. You can leave the magic screen up and watch the sliders go up as you research spells and your skill improves. None of that was possible with the old Delphi client because you couldn't move the other windows out of the way.

I'm planning at the moment to release what will be 0.9.5.0 as soon as its something workable and playable, meaning it'll be missing several features that were in 0.9.4 such as custom game settings, sound+music, simultaneous turns games and being able to join multiplayer games, which will all end up being 0.9.5.1, 0.9.5.2 and so on before I start doing something else big for 0.9.6. The reason being that I just want to get something out there and released sooner rather than waiting months and months for it. I want to get back to being able to do incremental releases again where I make a couple of improvements and release that as a new version every month or two, rather than everything always being a massive amount of changes and releases being years apart.

Right now I'm about as far as the screenshot shows. You can build everything in cities, but still have to do units moving, combat and spells. If I can get something finished and releasable by the end of the year I'll be happy with that :)
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Re: 0.9.5 / Java client

Post by Worsas »

Great news. Glad to hear that you are still progressing.
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Re: 0.9.5 / Java client

Post by Implode »

Almost there! Have some tidying up to do with casting unit enchantments, animations from unit enchantments, manual control of units in combat (right now you can only click Auto), and casting spells in combat, but still, getting real close to having something good enough to release.

I went back to check something in 0.9.4 (can't believe I'd not written in animations for overland unit enchantments??) and was surprised how dated the UI now feels now I'm used to the Java client. It feels so slow and clunky and I'm there trying to drag windows around and of course can't :)
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Re: 0.9.5 / Java client

Post by Implode »

Just uploaded 0.9.5.1 on Sourceforge : https://sourceforge.net/projects/momime
Please look at the readme file there, or when you extract the .zip, if you need some quick notes on how to get a game started.

Note there's several features that were in 0.9.4 that aren't in the 0.9.5.x Java client yet, most especially
  • The ability to join mulitplayer games;
  • Custom new game settings (e.g. land proportion);
  • Custom wizards;
  • Simultaneous turns games.
Also I'll note that the 3 language files other than English, while included, are now vastly out of date and missing dozens of items since nobody is actively maintaing these anymore, so the game is probably going to look really bad if you try selecting those.

I'll be working on these next in upcoming releases in the near future. The reasons I wanted to get something out there now, rather than wait until absolutely everything was written back in and completely finished were:
  • To get feedback on several things such as the new ZIP installation, the updated UI, the updated spell book, the updated rules re: scouting monsters in nodes/lairs/towers, and so on.
  • In the hope that people might find and let me know of any outstanding bugs;
  • In how much testing I've done on this in recent weeks and months, I found and fixed numerous bugs in the 0.9.4 Java server, to the point that I'm now rather embrassed to have released 0.9.4 in such a state and that they all went unnoticed;
  • Because I don't want to get into a sitaution again where there is several years between releases. Now I'm back to the point of having something complete and maintainable, I'd much rather get back to being able to add a couple of features, do another small release, add a few more features, do another small release and so on, rather than waiting 6-12 months and then doing one massive release.
So please let me know how you get on and what you think :)

Nigel.
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Re: 0.9.5 / Java client

Post by Worsas »

I hope these observations are of some use:

- Upon starting a new game, the view is not centered at the starting town, but somewhere offside. I tend to incidentally command my starting troop to the middle of this starting view. Afterwards, no matter how often I try to send the starting troop to another place, the preset course will not change. The only way I get rid of this preset course is by klicking on the units in the group several times. While doing this, they once turned up colored although their moves were actually exhausted (I have only been able to produce this particular behaviour once). I cannot send them anywhere though until the next turn.

- the city naming dialogue starts up in the background. I only noticed its existence by incident while hovering over the window tab.

- the spellbook in combat is identical to the overland spellbook. In the overland view, if I press on a spell to cast (like summon magic spirit), it will enqueue the spell for casting without really giving me much feedback beyond closing the window. It will enqueue the spell for casting each time, so that spell will automatically be started when the previous spell has been finished. I don't know, if it's a feature or a bug. I don't have a way to cancel those enqueued spells at least. It will also start a spell when right-clicking on it.

It would be great, if it was possible to shift view by right clicking on a square or by pressing the arrowbuttons. I think it would also be better to start games at a closer zoomlevel and leave people zoom out by choice. Nice work on overhauling the old MoM-music. I didn't notice the different music in previous versions.
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Re: 0.9.5 / Java client

Post by Implode »

Everything's useful, thank you for leaving comments :)
  • I know about the map not recentering, that's on the to do list. I skipped it because it was buggy in the Delphi client (sometimes it'd really insistently drag you to centre on the current unit while you were using the mouse to try to scroll in the opposite direction) so didn't just want to copy it over as-is without fixing that. (Also if you pick a Myrran starting race, you have to actually hit the Plane button to find your city)
  • City name dialog appearing in the background, yeah I know, its a bit annoying but I've no clue how to fix that.
  • To cancel moves you're supposed to do it the way you are - right click on the map cell, then click a unit in the stack. But I've also noticed that's quite glitchy but haven't narrowed down exactly why and been able to fix it. But will sort it out at some point...
  • Cancelled queued overland spells I'll add back in on F3/Apprenctice, that's on the list to do.
  • As for the spell book itself, yeah I've got a lot of comments about the UI in general and this is a real good example, I want to make a thread about that but there's not much point unless there's enough people to discuss it. But for the minute its working exactly as its supposed to.
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Re: 0.9.5 / Java client

Post by Implode »

0.9.5.2 released on Sourceforge - major things added back in are custom new game options, custom wizards, and the ability to join multiplayer games.
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Re: 0.9.5 / Java client

Post by Implode »

FYI found bug in 0.9.5.2 where wizards' starting cities are the wrong size. Will fix in next version, so maybe I'll release 0.9.5.3 quite quickly to get that fix out there.
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Re: 0.9.5 / Java client

Post by Implode »

0.9.5.3 released on Sourceforge - major things added back in are that the Next Turn button is blocked if you have outstanding actions you have to take care of (picking a spell to research, targetting a spell, negative production), Apprentice and Wizard advisors. Also fixed wizard city size bug mentioned above.
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Re: 0.9.5 / Java client

Post by Implode »

0.9.5.4 released on Sourceforge, major additions are the Options screen and simultaneous turns games. However simultaneous turns games were always a bit of experimental concept back when I added it to the Delphi version, and haven't changed at all since. Now I've been doing a lot of testing on it, I'm now thinking the whole way I planned to do this (make a list of combats so that players can choose which order to play them in) is fundamentally flawed, so have started planning how to completely redo this into something that works well in a later version. So until this is done, I'd suggest sticking to one-player-at-a-time games.
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Re: 0.9.5 / Java client

Post by Implode »

0.9.5.5 release on Sourceforge, with all the last bits and pieces leftover that used to work in the Delphi client (like autocentreing of the map, and right clicking items to get help text). I did realise too late (while doing the final build) that I'd forgotten to make inline images in the help text work (for e.g. right clicking on unit attributes like Melee, Ranged, + to Hit) but since this isn't game breaking I'll leave it for now, and see if anyone finds and dire bugs that need a bug fix patch done, and if so I'll do it in there. Otherwise I'm plugging ahead starting on 0.9.6 and... am happy to say... the first brand new stuff I've been able to work on in years, since I started the port of this project over to Java :)

So please let me know if you find any serious issues with the current version.
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Re: 0.9.5 / Java client

Post by Andy III »

My brother found this game and let me know about it since we both really liked MoM. I've played the game a few times now and found some things I'd like to report.
  • power base sliders do not add up properly (seems to round down), especially visible when bonuses are applied
  • extra reasearch points left over after completing spell research should be converted to mana
  • producing trade goods does not appear to have any effect, should show more gold in city window and next turn panel
  • producing housing does not appear to have any effect, should show population growth increase in city window
  • can't build catapults, triremes, galleys, or warships - it gives an error about wrong race, but should be allowed
  • can cast enchantment spells (e.g., Flight) or the same unit more than once
  • overland enchantment spells seem to be dispelled after each combat with a city (?), also stored mana pool is not used to keep enchantments alive
  • players do not die, should be banished and need to add Spell of Return, which is auto-cast on banishment
  • a Guardian Spirit could not meld with a node in simultaneous turn mode, which prevented me from ending the turn
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Re: 0.9.5 / Java client

Post by Implode »

Andy,

Thanks very much for the feedback, some of these are just things that haven't been written yet (trade goods, housing, victory conditions). As for the others:

>> power base sliders do not add up properly (seems to round down), especially visible when bonuses are applied
Yes it does round down. It used to work out research + skill rounding down, then work out "mana = magic power - research generated - skill generated" but I changed it a while back, I think because it was possible to get some bizarre results sometimes. I don't have any concrete info on exactly how the original MoM worked these out either so just done what seemed appropriate.

>> extra reasearch points left over after completing spell research should be converted to mana
The original doesn't either, just tested it - had research slider on full generating 12 RP per turn, had 8 RP left on current spell, when it completed researching my MP still said 0. You have any info that suggests it shouldn't work like this?

>> can't build catapults, triremes, galleys, or warships - it gives an error about wrong race, but should be allowed
Oops you're right, fixed that now, thanks for spotting this. (Note you can't load units in ships yet).

>> can cast enchantment spells (e.g., Flight) or the same unit more than once
Are you sure on this, this has always worked ok before, you get a message like "This unit already has Bless cast on it". I just tested it both casting overland and in combat and I couldn't get it to let me cast an enchantment multiple times?

>> overland enchantment spells seem to be dispelled after each combat with a city (?)
Ugh! That was down to some missing brackets in one of the checks, to do with sorting out existing city enchantments (e.g. Altar of Battle) or city curses (e.g. Cursed Lands) when you capture a city, very well spotted.

>> also stored mana pool is not used to keep enchantments alive
How do you mean? I just tried this out, started a game, cast Just Cause (costs 3 MP per turn to maintain), had 9 MP - then moved the magic sliders so I was putting almost everything into research and MP was at -2 per turn. I was able to "End Turn" 4 times until I was down to 1 MP at which point it blocks you from ending turn rather than lose the enchantment. I can't see anything wrong here?

>> a Guardian Spirit could not meld with a node in simultaneous turn mode, which prevented me from ending the turn
Ah that's a case of something I hadn't spotted that hadn't been written yet and hadn't ran into it when testing it. To be honest after adding simultaneous turns back into one of the 0.9.5.x releases and starting to test it, I realised how badly broken simultaneous turns combat resolution was and so gave up doing any serious amount of testing on it, knowing I was planning on completely rewriting it in 0.9.6, which I've now done. But it still crashes when you try to give special orders (meld node/build city, since build road/purify aren't implemented yet). I'll get this fixed, again thanks very much for spotting this.

Now with having found these issues its making me tempted to do a build and release what I've done on 0.9.6 so far, and finish the rest as 0.9.6.1. I don't mind minor issues but the special orders in simultaneous games issue actually crashes it out completely so you can't continue playing. I'm in the middle of adding in and being able to save and reload single player games, so once that's finished in a week or two I'll probably put a new version out to fix the things you spotted.

Thanks again for spotting these and letting me know about it :)
Nigel.
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Re: 0.9.5 / Java client

Post by Andy III »

Thanks for looking into these right away! Here are my responses to the "open" issues:
Implode wrote: >> power base sliders do not add up properly (seems to round down), especially visible when bonuses are applied
Yes it does round down. It used to work out research + skill rounding down, then work out "mana = magic power - research generated - skill generated" but I changed it a while back, I think because it was possible to get some bizarre results sometimes. I don't have any concrete info on exactly how the original MoM worked these out either so just done what seemed appropriate.
Don't copy what the original had, it was actually broken sometimes, too. I think mana + research + skill (before bonuses) should add up to power base at all times. I thought of an algorithm that would make this work.
  1. Take the highest allocated bar and figure out the percent of power base to assign
  2. Remove the (integer) amount from the power base, and apply bonuses to it before showing to the user
  3. Take the next highest allocated bar and repeat with the remaining power base until all bars are handled
This is a slightly longer way to handle it, but it guarantees that you will assign exactly all of your power base in the (rough) proportion you specify without losing power. It also means that if you have a single pixel in a bar, you will assign at least one power to it.
Implode wrote: >> extra reasearch points left over after completing spell research should be converted to mana
The original doesn't either, just tested it - had research slider on full generating 12 RP per turn, had 8 RP left on current spell, when it completed researching my MP still said 0. You have any info that suggests it shouldn't work like this?
I'm working with old memories, too. It seemed like when I was pumping massive research (as I almost always did) I would never lack for mana because I didn't often cast anything. I could be mis-remembering.
Andy III wrote: >> can cast enchantment spells (e.g., Flight) or the same unit more than once
>> overland enchantment spells seem to be dispelled after each combat with a city (?)
>> also stored mana pool is not used to keep enchantments alive
Sorry, it looks like all three of these were based on the same cause, which you likely fixed. I cast Flight on the "same" unit after it had been dispelled. It was taking me three turns to cast it, and in those three turns, the spell was dispelled. Each time I saw it, I thought of a different explanation as I learned more about it.
Implode wrote: Now with having found these issues its making me tempted to do a build and release what I've done on 0.9.6 so far, and finish the rest as 0.9.6.1. I don't mind minor issues but the special orders in simultaneous games issue actually crashes it out completely so you can't continue playing. I'm in the middle of adding in and being able to save and reload single player games, so once that's finished in a week or two I'll probably put a new version out to fix the things you spotted.
Save and load would be a tremendous addition, not to mention that we'd be able to include save files in bug reports!

BTW, I am a Java developer who is familiar with Maven and really enjoyed the original MoM. Can I help somehow?
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