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Creating Team Melee Mod (Team Shares a Base)

Posted: Fri Mar 08, 2019 10:03 pm
by Phabbits
Hello All!

I have been playing OpenRA for a while now, and have recently got into modding it. I have been coding for several years now, albeit in different languages, but am hoping this mod idea is not too far out of my abilities.

Okay, so here is the reason I would like to make this mod. Just this year, my friends and I have been able to get a large group together to play online, and OpenRA seems to be the game of choice. The problem is when so many people are playing the game, many new to it and on old computers, the games tend to be unfair and laggy. My idea is to implement a shared base, team melee mode, where two or more player could work together to reduce the total amount of units in the game, and allow for more relaxed play.

A little more information on team melee can be found on the Starcraft forums, https://starcraft.fandom.com/wiki/Team_Melee, where I initially ran into the concept.

So far I have created a basic rule changing mod, but think that in order to allow the ability to join bases, I will need to make it a stand-alone mod. I have been reading the provided guides online, and think that I can achieve it by altering the PlayerActor and WorldActor. I have made a checkbox for it in the lobby using the player.yaml file, but do not know how to further implement it.

Final description of the idea is that you check box the option in the lobby to allow for team melee. Players can then choose the same spawn as another player, thus signifying a shared base. When the game starts, any players on a shared spawn will be able to control each other units and share resources.

Any help or ideas would be greatly appreciated!

Re: Creating Team Melee Mod (Team Shares a Base)

Posted: Sat Mar 09, 2019 9:46 pm
by Phabbits
Okay, I have an update.

So I have been looking around on the resource center for custom maps that have some sort of shared base element, and found this type of map called SwitchShare.

Basically, the SwitchShare maps use LUA coding to allow for players to switch bases within their team on a few minute intervals. Also it implemented a shared resource feature for the team.

I think this is getting a lot closer to what I actually want. I could create a map with shared resources rules, and have team spawns right next to each other. The only thing I need now is a way to control your ally's units and buildngs.

Maybe I could use the Actor's Owner setting to set to multiple players?

Any thoughts would be appreciated.

Re: Creating Team Melee Mod (Team Shares a Base)

Posted: Wed Mar 13, 2019 1:59 pm
by camundahl
interesting idea

Re: Creating Team Melee Mod (Team Shares a Base)

Posted: Wed Mar 13, 2019 11:10 pm
by Phabbits
Thanks!

I actually got into the OpenRA discord, and got some help on starting it up. I now have a somewhat working version where the mod itself allows for allies to control each other troops, and when using it with the specially marked melee maps, teams spawn close together and share resources.

Had to create my own copy of the OpenRA engine to do this, and change a few C# files.

Re: Creating Team Melee Mod (Team Shares a Base)

Posted: Thu Mar 14, 2019 5:24 pm
by SirCake
Awesome:)

Re: Creating Team Melee Mod (Team Shares a Base)

Posted: Thu Mar 14, 2019 6:07 pm
by camundahl
Is it playable as a "mod map", or do we need to download a separate executable?

Re: Creating Team Melee Mod (Team Shares a Base)

Posted: Thu Mar 14, 2019 9:25 pm
by Phabbits
Unfortunately it required me making changes to the OpenRA engine itself, so it will require an executable, which I am currently working on.

Re: Creating Team Melee Mod (Team Shares a Base)

Posted: Thu Mar 14, 2019 10:18 pm
by lawANDorder
You can use the SDK to package your own mod executables very easy for linux, macOS and Windows. https://github.com/OpenRA/OpenRAModSDK

Re: Creating Team Melee Mod (Team Shares a Base)

Posted: Fri Mar 15, 2019 3:16 am
by Phabbits
lawANDorder wrote:
Thu Mar 14, 2019 10:18 pm
You can use the SDK to package your own mod executables very easy for linux, macOS and Windows. https://github.com/OpenRA/OpenRAModSDK
Hey lawANDorder! That's actually what I did. Had a little trouble getting it up and going, but with some help from the modding channel on the discord got it working just fine!

Currently I have:
  • Some unique factions just for fun
    Rule changes for garrisoning and terrain speeds
And then on the Melee Side
  • Shared unit control between allies
    Control groups able to be made with ally's troops, working on number display
    Shared resources on select MELEE maps with close spawns
Hoping on adding:
  • Limitations for everything from allies to just people sharing a base
    Shared prerequisite completion for building
    Shared radar view
Shout out to my brother for doing most the rule changes!

Here is the GitHub if you would like to check the progress so far:
https://github.com/Phabbits/Geoff-Red-Alert

Re: Creating Team Melee Mod (Team Shares a Base)

Posted: Fri Mar 15, 2019 1:12 pm
by lawANDorder
Here is the GitHub if you would like to check the progress so far:
https://github.com/Phabbits/Geoff-Red-Alert
Thanks for developing it in the open. Good luck with the project!

Re: Creating Team Melee Mod (Team Shares a Base)

Posted: Sat Apr 06, 2019 1:42 pm
by eskimo
Really fun idea. Love to see this kind of thing integrated into the base game. But even if not will be really fun to play i'd imagen.

Re: Creating Team Melee Mod (Team Shares a Base)

Posted: Wed Apr 10, 2019 5:24 am
by Phabbits
Thanks for the encouragement guys! Unfortunately, the project will have to be put on hold for a month while I finish up a real intense semester, but then I will hopefully get back at it!

I think I may have discovered a better way to implement the team melee rather than what I was doing, by using world actors. So I will look into that too.