Question about tweaking Mazz V plugin

[warpwizard]

A friend and I like playing Mazz V together. We can beat it on Timid and Simple, but those difficulties are getting boring. We tried it on Normal, but I think we're going to need a boost to be able to do it and have it be "fun", as there are so many harassers.

I've already tweaked the plugin to change our unit selection, but I'd like to be able to give us more artifacts and whatnot at the start. My question is: is there any way to tweak the plugin to provide more of the various Mazz powerups, magic bows etc etc at the start?

There are a very few powerups listed in the "projectiles" section in Fear when I'm editing the plugin, but I don't know how to get at the myriad of others. Can it be done?

[warpwizard]

Ok, I figured out how to add projectiles to the palette. Energon Cube, very funny.

Now to find out the names of the mana triangle and for some reason, the Storm and Fire bows...

[ChrisP]

Look in Projectile Group tags in anything with the word "pieces" in it. Here you will be able to increase the probabilities of specific artifacts being dropped. Be warned though, Fear can not display all the projectile tags in Mazz V at once and you can damage a tag that's trying to connect to an undisplayed projectile tag if you open it and then hit "Okay". To access some of the artifact projectiles you may need to temporarily remove clusters of projectile tags from the local folder, but make sure you only remove ones you know for certain you won't be trying to access.

[warpwizard]

Thanks for the info. Just today I figured out on my own about the "removing extra tags to make space" trick and got access to the missing artifacts.

I think bows of justice will solve the problem my friend and I are having. As 2 people playing an 8 player map, we find the massive numbers of harassers detract from our enjoyment. This is in no way the plugin's fault, but it's still a problem for our particular situation.

Care to give me a hint on how to interact with the "map actions" programming? I'd like to tweak some starting inventories and I can see a line that says "give paladin artifict". Seems promising but it's like a shell game, none of the ways I try to get at the information actually give me anything specific! Where is the actual list of artifacts being given?

[ChrisP]

As 2 people playing an 8 player map, we find the massive numbers of harassers detract from our enjoyment.

Yes, of course. I'm amazed/glad you guys can enjoy it at all considering it's really meant for only large groups of players.

Care to give me a hint on how to interact with the "map actions" programming? I'd like to tweak some starting inventories and I can see a line that says "give paladin artifict". Seems promising but it's like a shell game, none of the ways I try to get at the information actually give me anything specific! Where is the actual list of artifacts being given?

Honestly, of all the ways to make the map less hectic for only two players, messing with the artifact scripting is the last I would recommend. Unless you're using Loathing on a Mac, you won't even be able to see the projectiles being fed to units via scripting. At a certain point, PC Loathing just stops displaying projectiles when there's tons being used on a map. Even if you're on a Mac, the amount of scripting on the mesh is pretty much at the limit and adding anything additional will cause random map actions to randomly stop working every random number of games. Trust me on that one.

Instead, just place the artifact projectile at the units feet so it can be picked up manually at the start of the game. But again, you'll need a Mac to do this.

Alternately, just increase the odds of certain artifacts appearing in the monster death projectile groups. Or, you can just go in monster tags to increase ammo carried (to give Mazz extra dispersals or Heron's extra roots, for example) or in the artifact tags to add additional charges, like giving the Paladin two dozen regenerations on a sword instead of just 7.

Or just ignore me and have fun learning to do it your own way.

[warpwizard]

Enjoy: We play ROTD the same way. I just think of it as playing with an army as opposed to a squad. You have to be a good multitasker and make great use of the Alt-group function. I wish there were another 10 groups possible so that I could pick out individual archers etc. We also play this way because most random players have all the teamwork ability of an ornery mule.

Scripting: Ah right. Makes sense.

I can add artifacts with my PC Loathing and they're visible. Mostly. For instance, the Mazz crystal for "Blade Torrent" doesn't show up in Loathing, but all the others do. It's odd.

Thanks for the info, it's been a great help. *goes off to fiddle with the plugin*