Some small WaterMOD issues were fixed. Download & specifications page have been updated.

• (any) subs can dive under any ship now. (no ZOC at all for sub class)
• ship class rebalanced. (some pricing, movement & combat values for frigate, destroyer, cruiser, battleship)

2 tables with units and terrains design updates:

• terrain hexfields have been redesigned to fit climate classes better when used by map generator
• units show new transports with different amounts of cargo displayed (blue boxes)
• mod-tags next to right border of each unit sprite
  

  new terrain table

  

  new units table

Some video examples of Bladum’s framework features that are currently being developed;

example of map editing, placement of terrain fields, units, ownership etc.:
- import from png file in mod graphics folder (terrains only)
- map generator module
- both editor and gameplay mechanics are working together on same screen -> for better custom effects

example of movement range display and enemy unit spotting in dynamically calculated fog of war:

example of dynamical transport system and handling of cargo
- multiply graphics per transport unit based on current unit cargo usage

All our downloads have been polished (bugfixes, map updates,  files purged, new info file in each MOD folder).  The links on the right now open first a specification overview for every MOD including the downloadlink.

original Weewar specs
WinterMOD specs
KajahMOD specs
CasaMOD specs
WaterMOD specs

For long time WinterMOD was up our sleeve, the graphics Weewar player Madmike had drawn long time ago were ready to be used, I just put them together with some XMLs, added and changed some terrains a bit to fit the theme better and also added a new unit, the skidoo. 3 maps are ready to be played.
In WinterMOD movement over most of the snowy hexes generally costs more mobility points than on Weewar’s normal looking hex-fields. Here comes the skidoo in play. It is very fast, even faster, if it goes over snow or deep snow than the hovercraft unit, but it is hardly stronger in combat than a normal trooper. Still the cost of more than double a trooper’s price is worth it, as we all know it is crucial to reach a neutral base faster than your opponent. And you will love its additional move ability that enables you to go one hex further after having moved or attacked already, same as aircraft units can do but even  including a possible capture! The other units kept their combat values but their mobility was rebalanced slightly to make the new terrains more difficult to pass.
The terrains stayed in the principles of Weewar, mountains, woods and swamps have the same combat modifiers, only the graphics changed to winter style, plain is called snow now.
Desert was replacd with Deep Snow, all land units getting stuck in there suffer a decrease of attack and defence of -1.

Completely new is the ice hex, imagine an ice layer that is not too thick, enabling some land and some sea units to enter the same tile which is quite unique. It has these effects on units:

• Heavy HARD units (with low mobility) cannot enter ice, because they could brake it and drown. Light & fast HARD units are okay.
• SOFT units can cross ice but suffer -2 defense as there is no cover on it.
• Light SPEEDBOATS can not enter and heavy BOATS need 1 turn to brake their way through 1 hex of ice (very high mobility cost). HOVERS are not affected and move like on water.
• SUBS cannot stop on ice but they can dive beneath it, if they can reach an open water hex behind the frozen water.

Also new is the blizzard hex. I had that idea as I’ve been playing an Antarctica map on Weewar with Rahl and Norami, where void tiles were placed to represent the hostile environment. I didn’t like the void which was
looking like holes in the map and came up with the blizzard idea instead. This hex does a lot to your units’s stats, it raises defense +10 and lowers attack -10, costs much mobility and air units may not stay on the hex but only go through it.

Basically the mod is not very different to the Weewar rules and feel, the only main changes are the lower mobility, the skidoo and ice. Feel free to expand it or modify it further if you’d like to, it will be  downloadable soon.

edit May 12th 2010 by Casaubon

Hi readers, due to the fact that Norami is very occupied at the moment Casaubon takes over his WaterMOD temporarily. I want to  expand Norami’s ruleset a little and bring it to playable state, with bigger difference from the other MODs. Land units were reduced to a few units, which merged from subclasses. For example I merged tank and heavy tank to just simply “tank” that will perform something like in the middle of the old two. Merged units got new sprites. Capturing is different, you won’t use hovercraft for captures separated by sea  in this MOD like you are used to in Weewar.

features:

• land units: trooper (captures), tank (2 range), anti aircraft, artillery (5 range)
• in air similar to weewar: helicopter (captures), jet, bomber
• in speedboat class: speedboat, torpedoboat (hunts subs), mine trawler (places seamines), jetski (captures)
• in ship class: frigate (fast anti sub & air), destroyer (a bit weaker than in weewar), cruiser (5 range), battleship
• in sub class: submarine, diver, scuba scooter, seamine
• 2 stationary land units (not buildable): coast gun, stationary anti aircraft
• additional sea & underwater terrains like deep water(+ subs, – speedboats), shallow water (no ships), reef (+ sub),underwaterbase (divers), ledge (blocks), shipyard (ship building)
• harbors can produce speedboats but also troopers and add to naval repairs like repairshops do for land units

what could be done in a future update:

• further balancing when there is some more gaming experience (are seamines too expensive? perform destroyers not differently enough from frigates, are cruisers too powerfull, do divers need an own class, etc.)
• maps maps maps maps maps :)
• implement the aircraft carrier and freighter unit to the ship class, if transports are implemented in weebot. also change seamine placement from a captured build (like an oilrig build in KajahMOD) to the mine trawler’s real cargo without making the trawler disappear after placement, which is also possible only with code enabling implementation of real transports.
• I also tried to draw a Harrier (aircraft) but failed, planes are the most difficult to draw in weewar style. Maybe anybody can achieve that later.

For a more detailed Html information table see the

new WaterMOD Unit & Terrain Specification

WaterMOD land units in action:

WaterMOD navy in action:

Hi guys,

I wanted to show you all, what I wanted to make for the SpaceMOD and what should be implemented for it.
Overall:

• Several spaceships
• Many different terrains
• Plus many more features

In detail, there will be:

• Captureable units
• Units that produce units
• Units with temporary effects (like changing the ZoC)
• Units that change the terrain
• Units that transport units
• Terrains that changes units-health
• Different races

Basics of map generator:

There are major issues regarding map generator. All maps are made by 3 level of Perlin noise:

• height
• humidity
• temperature

There are also effects of:

• evaporation (temperature on humidity)
• erosion (humidity on height)
• Coriolis effect for wind (height on humidity)

Here are some example maps, any feedback is welcome. Basically all parameters can be changed if needed, currently I test range for each one. Hope until the end of week it will be finished.

I would like to know Your feedback about it (answer in brackets).

1. Minimum and maximum size of generated maps (number) -> major impact on game length and units speed
2. Generator as a option of map editor (yes / no)
3. Generator as a standalone application (yes / no)
4. Generator as a option in new game (yes / no)
5. Customize editor option like curves for height / humidity / temperature levels on planets in XML files (yes / no)
6. Customize flat terrains requirement for humidity / temperature in XML file as a 2D matrix (yes / no)

Some more things that I can implement, but it depends how complex this generator must be:

1. Standard earth like maps or any custom maps, with wide range of parameters (standard / custom)
2. Predefined pack of settings for special custom maps like ice-age, barren world or water-world   (yes / no)
3. Number of settings to control map final result (many small detailed / few major)
4. Additional general function to process map like flat world or don-ought world (yes / no)
5. Plants natural evolution like grow of the forest or move of the deserts (yes / no)
6. Special random events like floods, forest fires, mountain chains or volcanoes (yes / no)

Those things could be run a an option from editor, I will do proper function in my lib for future usage. Remember that map generator is working on 3 sets of 2D layers and final output is exported at the end. So adding a “fire forest” is done not on WeeBot map but on map generator pre-map.

Flat terrain requirements:

This issue MUST be heavy tested, because it has huge impact on map quality.

Additional terrains:

Second issue to discuss are things which are not normal in natural environment:

1. Bases, shipyards and airports (do we need ?)
2. Roads, bridges and rivers (do we need ?)
3. Other non-standard, human made type of terrain like concrete or walls (do we need ?)

Do we really need those things and why not ? :) I think this can be done by making proper places for colonization (height, humidity and temperature) and then add some in more random places. Roads could be used to connect those good colonization places using A* algorithm. Bridges can be used to connect random land tiles, if only there is single water tile between them.

Map generator and fog of war:

Random map could be great if used with full fog of war. This need to implement two layer fog of war in WeeBot. First layer is to cover terrain (unexplored) and second is to cover units (explored but not visible). Need discussion how can this feature can be connected with random map generator.

Fallowing 2D matrix define flat terrain requirement based on local humidity and temperature. This can be change to get rid of middle terrains like plains or tundra if needed.

Hi folks,

it seems that currently Weebot is more about modding and editing than playing, so I had the idea to announce a certain time to host a single game by internet. Remember, we don’t want to compete with Weewar.com so there will be only single games provided every now and then. To start it off slow I will be hosting a simple game in one of the finished MODs and the participants will choose what MOD and map will be played. For a later day of play we can have a poll, but for the first time we can do the deciding by mail or comments to this post. It would be cool, if people who actually want to play in this coming up game event could make a comment here and tell us their:

1. WeeWar Name
   (sorry if someone is completely new. He/She definitely should play a bunch of weewar matches first to learn what this is all about. Explaining to a newbie during that game itself would take too much time)
2. Time Zone
   (we need to find a common time we could play together where everyone could do at least some turns, the game can be saved and continued sometime later, though. there is this nice browser applet that we could use to enter the player’s time zones and find a time window that is good for all)
3. contact
   (real time messenger contact like skype would be helpful, or weewar nickname for opening a simultaneous chat there, in worst case just an email address should work too. The host needs to tell you how to configure the clientconfig.xml and serverconfig.xml or send these 2 files already setup over to you in order to connect the clients to the server.)

Also planning to record the game by the WeeBot HQ app and display the video here with the results :)

edit (4/25/2010 player time zones added):
Australia (East): Kajah
USA (East): Norami
Austria: Yourtime, Casaubon
Poland: Bladum
feel free to join the list! :)

edit (4/28/2010 map suggestion added):
we could play this 5 player map where the 6th purple player could be played by the AI

My second post for WildWestMOd is regarding
the graphical style for terrains; I left the Weewar design principles in some points:

1. bases that can be captured do not change their color as a whole but the change of ownership adds only distinctive  attributes. those are side specific colors at the  hex-borders (as you have seen already in the factions post)  and a flag or any other side- specific symbol
2. items that can be manipulated (like units or capturable terrain) have a black border to display more contrast to background
3. the playing field consists of terrain hexes that look less symbolic than in weewar and are more naturalistic. I’m working on 3 naturalistic terrain sets : grassy (green set), barren (red set), and prairie (yellow set).
4. combination of naturalistic terrain and more comic style units (and buildings) should help the player to distinguish between the map and things he actually could manipulate
5. terrain of the same kind may show just 1 or more than 1 slightly different graphics to increase diversity of the whole map appearance
6. hex size is 10 px larger