Fixed Correcting "Early Explorers" Period

[Grey Roger]

Does that 'Preprocessor_Add' line need to go just before every questbook entry, or is one somewhere in "quests_side.c" sufficient to cover all cases? There are several references to names in the "Help the Church" questbook entries - Father Bernard, Father Jerald and Simon Hanpool are all hard-coded.

 

[Pieter Boelen]

Does that 'Preprocessor_Add' line need to go just before every questbook entry, or is one somewhere in "quests_side.c" sufficient to cover all cases? There are several references to names in the "Help the Church" questbook entries - Father Bernard, Father Jerald and Simon Hanpool are all hard-coded.

As far as I've been able to tell from my use of it in dialogs, it does indeed need to be added just before every questbook entry that needs it.
I figured that theoretically it shouldn't, but when I try it only once at the beginning of a dialog file, it doesn't work the second time.

 

[Grey Roger]

Meanwhile, here's "SideQuest.c" with the 'ch.questchar = true;' lines commented out for the women with missing children. I started a new game of "Francis Drake" (using a new profile so as not to lose my existing game), went straight to Palo Brasil, and the women did indeed have Spanish names.

 

[Grey Roger]

Next problem: I'm going to need to find a new place for the new sword to be buried at the end of the "Angelique Moulin" side quest. With Antigua disabled, it seems to be impossible to land at the beach. Maps of disabled islands are still available for sale (though for some reason, Antigua's map is labelled "Antigua Map", while Aruba's and Curacao's maps are just labelled "Map"). Even with the map, I can't Sail-To the beach (or St. John's), and I can't find the beach by sailing near the area where it's supposed to be.

How do you find out which location you're standing in, e.g. "Antigua_Jungle_01"? Visible Locators show the names of the actual locator points but not the general area.

And then I'm going to need to do things to the "Elizabeth Shaw" quest because that involves the port admiral of Antigua, which won't work too well if Antigua doesn't have an admiral, or for that matter a port... (It also wouldn't make much sense even if Antigua is re-enabled because Cayman is Spanish in "Early Explorers" and it's unlikely a Spanish governor would have a ship carrying his daughter dock at an English naval base. )

 

[Pieter Boelen]

Meanwhile, here's "SideQuest.c" with the 'ch.questchar = true;' lines commented out for the women with missing children. I started a new game of "Francis Drake" (using a new profile so as not to lose my existing game), went straight to Palo Brasil, and the women did indeed have Spanish names.

Thanks!

Next problem: I'm going to need to find a new place for the new sword to be buried at the end of the "Angelique Moulin" side quest. With Antigua disabled, it seems to be impossible to land at the beach. Maps of disabled islands are still available for sale (though for some reason, Antigua's map is labelled "Antigua Map", while Aruba's and Curacao's maps are just labelled "Map"). Even with the map, I can't Sail-To the beach (or St. John's), and I can't find the beach by sailing near the area where it's supposed to be.

The maps are still sold? That's not fair! They are specifically disabled in Periods.c; search for "map" in that file.
If I recall, I added the Antigua map item there as well.

For disabled islands, you can very simply not get ashore in any way. Fast travel doesn't work and reloads don't work.
The only thing you CAN do is to sail past them and enjoy the scenery....

How do you find out which location you're standing in, e.g. "Antigua_Jungle_01"? Visible Locators show the names of the actual locator points but not the general area.

One of the console cases can do that. I think it's case 2 or 3.

And then I'm going to need to do things to the "Elizabeth Shaw" quest because that involves the port admiral of Antigua, which won't work too well if Antigua doesn't have an admiral, or for that matter a port... (It also wouldn't make much sense even if Antigua is re-enabled because Cayman is Spanish in "Early Explorers" and it's unlikely a Spanish governor would have a ship carrying his daughter dock at an English naval base. )

Simplest solution might be to disable that sidequest in Early Explorers.

 

[Pieter Boelen]

I'd really like to thank @Grey Roger for paying an Early Explorers game properly!
This is the most different time period of them all and as not many people play it, any issues could have easily slipped under the radar for a long time.
Now at least we're finding out!

So what still needs doing for Early Explorers? Here's what I remember:
- Edit Robert Fletcher_dialog.c so that the Tortuga dialog makes sense when you're not actually hostile to France.
- Ensure that maps of disabled islands do NOT show up during the game
- Disable the "First Contact" sidequest (maybe?)
- Adjust the Moulin sidequest so that the reward sword can be found somewhere that isn't on a disabled island
- Use variable character names for Father Bernard, Father Jerald and Simon Hanpool in the questbook entries (maybe others too)

Am I forgetting anything?

 

[Levis]

About the location for the sword. I'd say pick one of the more unused islands or carthenga

 

[Pieter Boelen]

I don't think Cartagena has any jungle locations? Perhaps use the one smuggling shore that @Pillat added there?

 

[Levis]

Or the new jungle location @Jack Rackham was working on for Turks?

 

[Jack Rackham]

Or the new jungle location @@Jack Rackham was working on for Turks?

I have only added an inside location to the Fort + added the new Town gates to an existing jungle location.

 

[Levis]

Oh must have misread then.

 

[Grey Roger]

I'd really like to thank @Grey Roger for paying an Early Explorers game properly!
This is the most different time period of them all and as not many people play it, any issues could have easily slipped under the radar for a long time.
Now at least we're finding out!

So what still needs doing for Early Explorers? Here's what I remember:
- Edit Robert Fletcher_dialog.c so that the Tortuga dialog makes sense when you're not actually hostile to France.

Ah. I forgot - already done that.

 

[Pieter Boelen]

Ah. I forgot - already done that.

Cheers!
Do the starting questbook and Ship's Log entries make sense or do those also need tweaking?

Also, can you confirm if my list is complete? If it is, then I'll add it to the opening post as To-Do List.

 

[Grey Roger]

I don't think there's anything in the starting questbook which refers specifically to France. There's the one about life as a privateer which is fairly generic, and the one about "Turbulent Times" which just tells you that relations are varied. Which Ship's Log entries should I be looking for?

Looking through the list of side quests on the Wiki page:
. Girl won in a card game - shouldn't be a problem, random gambling followed by action on Martinique, which hasn't changed
. Artois Voysey - done, no problems encountered
. Baldewyn Coffier - done, everything happens on Martinique
. Cargo for Thomas O'Reilly - won't be for Thomas O'Reilly because his name will be different in Villa de Vega. Questbook will need to be made variable.
. Edgar Attwood - is this even possible unless you're playing Standard storyline?
. Elizabeth Shaw - needs to be disabled or seriously reworked because Antigua and Guadeloupe are disabled
. Vigila Mendes - done, no problems encountered, and you can give yourself a pat on the back for that one.
. Angelique Moulin's Father - as well as sorting out the reward, this would be better if Antoine Chamfort were altered. He's the only Frenchman in a Spanish fort.
. Missing Son of Spanish Admiral - done, no problems encountered
. Hard Labours of an Assassin - in progress, no problems expected, except English banker Geoffrey Bampfylde is maybe out of place in Portuguese Santa Ines
. Help the Boatswain - done, he hasn't changed and neither has Martinique
. Help the Church - already on your list
. Help the Lady - done, no problems encountered, action is on Nevis and Puerto Rico, names have changed but dialogs use variable names
. Help Turks Island Settlement - shouldn't be a problem, Turks is still pirate and Santo Domingo is still Spanish. (Was this moved somewhere else because Santo Domingo is not Spanish in later periods?)
. Rys Bloom - shouldn't be a problem, apart from an unemployed English sailor in what is now a Spanish port
. Nigel Blythe - never done this one so no idea what are the implications of "Early Explorers"
. Patric and the Idols - done, everything happens on Martinique
. Rescue Peter Blood's Crew - Cayman is now Spanish Las Tortugas so English Peter Blood may seem out of place, but he's a pirate anyway. Action is on Cuba, which has different island and town names. Should be OK if variable are used instead of hard-coded names
. Sabine Matton - Arnaud Matton's dialog needs a bit of work as it still refers to war with England and the French capture of <insert Speightstown name>.
. Saving Toff's daughter - done, no problem due to change of ownership of Kralendijk / Palo Brasil
. Search for Peter Blood's Ship - needs to be disabled or seriously reworked as it happens on Guadeloupe which is disabled
. Sink the pirate corvette - should be OK now that period-correct ships are used
. Sinking the Vogelstruijs - should be disabled as it makes no sense when Port Royale and Port au Prince are now Spanish Villa de la Vega and Santa Maria del Puerto
. Smuggling for Thomas O'Reilly - probably needs some work as it's not Thomas O'Reilly, someone else will need to try due to pre-requisite smuggling now
. Strange Things Going On in the Caribbean - Mefisto needs to be replaced with an appropriate ship type
. French Pirate in the Tavern - dialog needs work, you're not raiding English gold when Las Barbados is Portuguese
. Saga of the Blacque family - done, no problems caused by Jamaica now being Spanish, everything else happens on Martinique
. Silver Train - done, no problems if blank companions problem is fixed
. Thierry Bosquet - done, everything happens on Martinique
. Woman Who Lost Husband and Son - done, everything happens on Martinique
. Zaid Murro's Problems - done, everything happens on Puerto Rico

So, some dialogs need to be corrected, but the critical ones are "Elizabeth Shaw's Disappearance", "Angelique Moulin's Father", "Search for Peter Blood's Ship", "Sinking the Vogelstruijs" and "Strange Things Going On". Those are the ones which have more serious problems than slightly incongruous dialog. Alright, "Sinking the Vogelstruijs" is really only a dialog problem as well, but it's a big one. The change of ownership of various towns means that Spanish Santa Maria del Puerto is worried that Spain will attack Spanish Villa de la Vega, to which purpose a ship will smuggle explosives from Spanish Palo Brasil to Spanish Santo Domingo.

 

[Pieter Boelen]

@Grey Roger: This in SideQuest.c might help:

// Antoine Chamfort - FIND ANGELIQUE MOULIN'S FATHER (Missing Man quest)
   ch.old.name = "Antoine";
   ch.old.lastname = "Chamfort";
   ch.name = TranslateString("","Antoine");
   ch.lastname = TranslateString("","Chamfort");
   ch.id     = "Antoine Chamfort";
   ch.model   = Nations[GetTownNation("Port au Prince")].fantomModel.m0; // PB

Even better would be this, because I want to get rid of the nation.m0 type code for soldiers:

ch.model   = GetRandomModelForTypeExSubCheck(true, "Soldiers", "man", GetTownNation("Port au Prince")); // PB

Not sure if that works, but it's worth a try. If not, similar code should go into Periods.c instead to ensure it is executed AFTER the town nation has been updated.

 

[Grey Roger]

And some sort of preprocessor code similar to what is needed for "Help the Church" will also be needed for both the questbook and Francois Moulin's dialog, otherwise Antoine Chamfort is still going to be the only Frenchman in a Spanish fort, he'll just be in disguise. How do you use the preprocessor to get just part of someone's name? At the moment, Francois Moulin's dialog refers to "Antoin" several times. It would work if the surname were used instead of the first name, but would look a little clumsy if the entire name were used every time.

 

[Pieter Boelen]

This is the syntax for that preprocessor function:

Preprocessor_Add(string label, string text)

You can use whatever label (referred to as, for example, "#senemy#" in a dialog file) and whatever text (for example "GetNationDescByType(iNation)") in a code file.
For a character's firstname, try GetMyName(CharacterFromID("Francois Moulin"))
There is also GetMyLastName, GetMyFirstNames (with "nickname"), GetMySimpleName, GetMyFullName (with rank, e.g. "Lieutenant"), GetMyRespectfullyName (with title, e.g. "Sir").
I hope that helps.

 

[Talisman]

. Edgar Attwood - is this even possible unless you're playing Standard storyline?

Just checked in Assassin & Devlin Opera

Edgar Attwood appears to be playable - went to Port Royale prison - Edgar ( has different name ( Spanish) in Devlin Opera) was walking around and when you talk to him you can hire him ( need 1,5oo gold ).

You don't need the Leadership Skill qualification (4) that you need in the Standard Story.

It appears that the bit with the governor is removed ( relates to Standard Story anyway ) - and you start as if you have gone back later to hire Edgar.

 

[Pieter Boelen]

Just checked in Assassin & Devlin Opera

Edgar Attwood appears to be playable - went to Port Royale prison - Edgar ( has different name ( Spanish) in Devlin Opera) was walking around and when you talk to him you can hire him ( need 1,5oo gold ).

You don't need the Leadership Skill qualification (4) that you need in the Standard Story.

It appears that the bit with the governor is removed ( relates to Standard Story anyway ) - and you start as if you have gone back later to hire Edgar.

Correct on all accounts. I set that up not too long ago, because I figured it is much nicer if he is available in other storylines too.
So to answer the question: Yes, he should most definitely work in other storylines now too.

 

[Pieter Boelen]

Thread title renamed as this no longer is about only "Privateering" but about the "Early Explorers" period in general.