H4 Remove health

[RobB]

Can anyone think of a way to temporarily "injure" a player? The game doesn't have pits and traps, etc., but I'd like to simulate something like that with place events. I don't want to kill the hero, but I'd like to leave him/her sufficiently injured that he/she is likely to think twice about attacking for a turn or so.

Anyone ever wonder why they left the sleep/wake option in H4? It seems totally irrelevant. I've certainly never used it.

[Humakt]

Can anyone think of a way to temporarily "injure" a player? The game doesn't have pits and traps, etc., but I'd like to simulate something like that with place events. I don't want to kill the hero, but I'd like to leave him/her sufficiently injured that he/she is likely to think twice about attacking for a turn or so.

Changing the hero neutral and then making it battle creatures of succifient strength to damage (but not kill) the hero could do the trick. Afterwards you just change hero back to proper color.

I'm not sure if it's possible to change hero from colour to neutral, at least it hasn't been possible in earlier versions. Also you have to make sure player owns another stack or town and if they don't, you'll just give them one for the moment the event runs. Of course, if the hero is not alone and has other heroes with him/her, you won't be able to use the trick above.

With hero having creatures you can do the trick, but you have to do a lot of scripting to first take away creatures prior to battle and then returning them after the battle. That's a lot asked for simple wounding effect. At least you can use take and give creatures in other events if you've scripted it properly.

To put it bluntly it is easiest to do if the hero in question is alone.

[RobB]

It sounds fiendishly complicated, especially since I have never been able to find the "change colour" command - I think someone mentioned it was only available in towns; either way, I can't find it, and even if I did, your reply is not very encouraging.

Pity. I would like to spring a few surprises. I think I know how to remove spells, but this is a might-only hero map (I've disabled every possible spell/magic producing building). It wouldn't be so bad if I could do "ambush", but I think that's an H3 thing - the only way I know, it to put large numbers of bandits, but even then, Scouting beats this.

Back to the drawing board.

[Muszka]

It wouldn't be so bad if I could do "ambush", but I think that's an H3 thing - the only way I know, it to put large numbers of bandits, but even then, Scouting beats this.

I think I've seen ambushes in H4, but I can't recall where, and how.

[Humakt]

It sounds fiendishly complicated, especially since I have never been able to find the "change colour" command - I think someone mentioned it was only available in towns; either way, I can't find it, and even if I did, your reply is not very encouraging.

Pity. I would like to spring a few surprises. I think I know how to remove spells, but this is a might-only hero map (I've disabled every possible spell/magic producing building). It wouldn't be so bad if I could do "ambush", but I think that's an H3 thing - the only way I know, it to put large numbers of bandits, but even then, Scouting beats this.

Back to the drawing board.

It is complicated, but that's what the workarounds generally are. It's pity it's not available as a simple command. Also it is not easy to determine what is the sufficient army to damage hero properly, especially if that hero is able to gain different amount of levels prior to battle. And you may just outright kill hero if he's damaged already.

You're looking at wrong command. The real one is change owner and it is available at every flaggable structure and army. You need to explore a bit those script commands.

Doing ambushes is easy in Heroes 4, just make placed event and display message in it and then put combat part on it.

[RobB]

It is complicated, but that's what the workarounds generally are. It's pity it's not available as a simple command. Also it is not easy to determine what is the sufficient army to damage hero properly, especially if that hero is able to gain different amount of levels prior to battle. And you may just outright kill hero if he's damaged already.

You're looking at wrong command. The real one is change owner and it is available at every flaggable structure and army. You need to explore a bit those script commands.

Doing ambushes is easy in Heroes 4, just make placed event and display message in it and then put combat part on it.

OK, I will explore change owner. I've been afraid of using combat as the list of script commands I downloaded from CH says it doesn't alway work properly, but I think it might be time to drag out my test map again.

[Robenhagen]

OK, I will explore change owner. I've been afraid of using combat as the list of script commands I downloaded from CH says it doesn't alway work properly, but I think it might be time to drag out my test map again.

The part that doesn't work in the Combat script is the branching part (if Victorious/if Defeated) - I can't remember what the bug is, but you can't rely on these events to occour. It's not a problem when making adventures featuring only 1 army; if you have a 'lose scenario script' if main character dies, because if he is defeated in the combat, then the game is over - if he survives, then the next part of your script is run, so you can put a reward or some story after the combat script.

[RobB]

The part that doesn't work in the Combat script is the branching part (if Victorious/if Defeated) - I can't remember what the bug is, but you can't rely on these events to occour. It's not a problem when making adventures featuring only 1 army; if you have a 'lose scenario script' if main character dies, because if he is defeated in the combat, then the game is over - if he survives, then the next part of your script is run, so you can put a reward or some story after the combat script.

Thanks for the warning and explanation. I need to experiment a bit on a test map before I try any of these ideas in a real map.

[RobB]

I've just been re-reading Thelonious' list of script commands. I see there is a "Give Skill". Is there a "Take Skill" too? How, with either of these, do you check to see a) whether the hero has a slot left to receive the skill or b) if the "Take" command exists, whether the hero has a skill to remove? Also Thelonious doesn't make it clear where "Skill Mastery" is - is it on the hero?

[wimfrits]

OK, I will explore change owner.

Don't.
Change owner is an army script. If the player double clicks an army (in this case a hero) and drags all members of the army to the bottom slots, the original army ceases to exist. And so does the change owner script.
Change owner only works on neutral armies and AI armies that have nowhere to move (like Proetho in the Haven campaign)

With all scripts that need to be run on a specific hero, make sure the script is on the hero and not on the army the hero is in!!

Skill mastery is a condition in a conditional (If) script; which can be scripted on a hero. Note that it has a peculiar way of counting. I thought no skill = -1 and basic level = 0.
I don't think there is an option to take a skill.

[Humakt]

Change owner only works on neutral armies and AI armies that have nowhere to move (like Proetho in the Haven campaign)

It works also on every flaggable object. But it is true that army scripts get lost pretty easily unless armies are somehow controlled/restricted by map (like in Trapped Inside the Beast, provided player doesn't purposefully exploit it by dragging army, but luckily very few players knows that exploit), pity the script isn't available for heroes.

[wimfrits]

A change owner script on a hero would open up a lot more possibilities. But that's probably not available as it could result in the awkward situation where multiple heroes are in 1 army and 1 of them changes color.

[RobB]

It's beginning to look as if some of the ideas I had for a new map will have to be rethought. Pity. I wanted a campaign where the Life hero started out as strictly no-magic (all cathedrals, seminaries and the like disabled) and then later in the campaign, he acquires magic. The acquisiton bit is easy, but I wanted checks every now and then to stop him getting magic skills if they had been offered when he went up levels. Looks as if I can't do that.

At least, I've managed to get ambushes working on my test map using Combat. As was suggested, they didn't quite work as I expected, but now I think I know how to use them.

[wimfrits]

You could still disable all magic skills up to a point. There are 5 skillslots and only 4 non-magic skills, so the concept of acquiring magic at a later time can still work.

[Muszka]

Why don't you disable magic skills from Map Tools -> Campaign Properties?

[RobB]

Why don't you disable magic skills from Map Tools -> Campaign Properties?

I didn't know that was possible. I shall investigate.

[RobB]

Now I have investigated and I'm afraid I don't see how, in H4, I can affect magic using from Map Properties.

[Muszka]

I think I don't understand you.
I you don't want that your hero to get a specific skill, you can disable it for a specific map. E.g. Spirituality. If you disable it you still can learn Life Magic even at Advanced lvl and Healing too, at Advanced lvl as well, but you can't learn Expert Life Magic, since Spirituality is a requirment for it, or you can disable Life Magic totally. And when time is right teach your hero Life Magic (or Spirituality) with scripting (I'm not 100% sure, but I think this is possible). Maybe you should ask someone who knows H4 scripting. Humakt perhaps or GoW. Or just simply enable it in the campaign's next map.
If you only want to restrict your hero from casting spells than you can always take all of his spell points with placed events, and you can give him back when you want it.

[RobB]

I think I don't understand you.
I you don't want that your hero to get a specific skill, you can disable it for a specific map. E.g. Spirituality. If you disable it you still can learn Life Magic even at Advanced lvl and Healing too, at Advanced lvl as well, but you can't learn Expert Life Magic, since Spirituality is a requirment for it, or you can disable Life Magic totally. And when time is right teach your hero Life Magic (or Spirituality) with scripting (I'm not 100% sure, but I think this is possible). Maybe you should ask someone who knows H4 scripting. Humakt perhaps or GoW. Or just simply enable it in the campaign's next map.
If you only want to restrict your hero from casting spells than you can always take all of his spell points with placed events, and you can give him back when you want it.

Sorry, but I don't see anywhere in Map Properties that disables a specifiic skill - I've only got H4 standard: are you sure the Editor you're using is the same? Giving skills is definitely possible with an event. However, you idea of removing spell points (and I think you can remove total possible SPs) is a possibility that could work.

[Muszka]

Sorry, but I don't see anywhere in Map Properties that disables a specifiic skill - I've only got H4 standard: are you sure the Editor you're using is the same? Giving skills is definitely possible with an event. However, you idea of removing spell points (and I think you can remove total possible SPs) is a possibility that could work.

That could be the problem. I have WoW + Equilibris. You can download the H4utility and make your map with that, than convert it back to Stnd H4 map. You can learn the procedure from the "H4 map for testing" thread I think it's in the 5th page, the last comment by ByteBandit.
As for spellpoints, just take about 500 before every battle and you're there. I don't think they could go in minus. But there are lot nicer solutions for this.