Gammon Forum

Quote:
I am picking up where I left off when i started coding this 20 years ago

Fiendish said:

I guess you'll want to modify any other things that have levels too, like equipment or any level-based events. Are you changing stat ranges too or just doubling the max level?

Quote:
does the game automatically adjust things like having an appropriate HP and mana per level, as well as does the game automatically adjust skill/training points (to learn and improve skills)?

Fiendish said:


If you link to a download of the codebase, I can help figure that out.

Fiendish said:

Here are a couple of things I've seen so far...

The raw number 101 (your previous max level) is used at the end of your do_modskill function in class.c instead of the MAX_LEVEL constant.

It looks like your level gains happen in the advance_level function in update.c. I don't know what the original version looked like, but the gains do not appear to take MAX_LEVEL into account. If you haven't already modified that, then you'll either want to (right before you use the values on line 193) divide all of the add_hp/add_mana/etc gains by 2.0 (and then rounding) or do e.g. `add_hp = number_range(0, add_hp)` which does the same thing on average but allows for bigger variation, and then also replace `ch->train += 1;` with `ch->train += number_range(0, 1);` or only add 1 every other level. This will make each level effectively give half as much stuff so that it stretches out evenly across twice as many levels. Instead of directly dividing by 2, you could also define ORIGINAL_LEVEL_HERO as 101 and then use (1.0*LEVEL_HERO/ORIGINAL_LEVEL_HERO) to make it completely based on whatever your hero level is set to.

There's also a function called advance_level_quiet which appears to do literally exactly the same thing as the above except without the print statements. That's a terrible newbie programmer mistake. Extensive logic should only be done in one place. You should do one of:

option 1: make it so that advance_level_quiet returns its modifications and then make advance_level call advance_level_quiet to do the changes and then print the returned modifications.

option 2: get rid of advance_level_quiet and add a boolean argument to advance_level that governs whether the sprintf and send_to_char happen or not.

Quote:
Where would the variable be passed from to determine whether we are advancing and notifying, vs just advancing

Fiendish said:



After changing the advance_level function to take true/false-type argument, you'd then find every current invocation of advance_level and and every invocation of advance_level_quiet and set one one way and the other the other way.

Quote:
/*
* Lower level:
* Reset to level 1.
* Then raise again.
* Currently, an imp can lower another imp.
* -- Swiftest
*/
if ( level <= victim->level )
{
int temp_prac;

send_to_char( "Lowering a player's level!\n\r", ch );
send_to_char( "{R******** {GOOOOHHHHHHHHHH NNNNOOOO {R*******{x\n\r", victim );
sprintf(buf, "{R**** {WYou've been demoted to level %d {R****{x\n\r", level );
send_to_char(buf, victim);
if ((victim->level > HERO) || (level > HERO))
{
update_wizlist(victim, level);
}
temp_prac = victim->practice;
victim->level = 1;
victim->exp = exp_per_level(victim,victim->pcdata->points);
victim->max_hit = 100;
victim->max_mana = 100;
victim->max_move = 100;
victim->practice = 0;
victim->hit = victim->max_hit;
victim->mana = victim->max_mana;
victim->move = victim->max_move;
advance_level_quiet( victim );
victim->practice = temp_prac;
}

Quote:
else
{
send_to_char( "Raising a player's level!\n\r", ch );
send_to_char( "{B******* {GOOOOHHHHHHHHHH YYYYEEEESSS {B******{x\n\r", victim );
sprintf(buf, "{B**** {WYou've been advanced to level %d {B****{x\n\r", level );
send_to_char(buf, victim);
if ((victim->level > HERO) || (level > HERO))
{
update_wizlist(victim, level);
}
}

Quote:
for ( iLevel = victim->level ; iLevel < level; iLevel++ )
{
victim->level += 1;
advance_level_quiet( victim );
}
victim->exp = exp_per_level(victim,victim->pcdata->points)
* UMAX( 1, victim->level );
victim->trust = 0;
save_char_obj(victim);
return;

Quote:
if ( ( !IS_NPC( ch ) && !IS_NPC( victim ) )
&& ( !IS_IMMORTAL( ch ) )
&& ( !IS_IMMORTAL( victim ) )
&& ( ch != victim )
&& ( !strcmp(ch->pcdata->socket, victim->pcdata->socket ) ) )
{
send_to_char("They are unable to join your group.\n\r",ch);
return;
}

Quote:
this disallowed players to follow/group each other

( ch != victim )

!strcmp(ch->pcdata->socket, victim->pcdata->socket )

( !IS_IMMORTAL( ch ) ) && ( !IS_IMMORTAL( victim ) )

Fiendish said:


No, it disallows two...

different people

on the same socket

to follow each other if neither of them is an immortal


"They are unable to join your group." is a horribly uninformative error message, though.