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Hello,

I have been experimenting with AAI Programmable Vechicles and made a new map using these mods. It offers an alternative gameplay compared to what you usually have. Enjoy!

github: https://github.com/Candy6132/TheDarkFortress

STORY

Remarkable advances in the machine learning have led to the great boom and development of humanity, but our civilization has gone too far this time. Machines have become disobedient and no longer serve man. For about 20 years, mankind has been at war with AI and this conflict has completely destroyed our species. It is not known exactly how many survivors scattered across the galaxy.

As one of the survivors, you've just found a planet that should have enough resources on its surface to create a new base. Unfortunately, some unknown force changed the trajectory of your ship and you eventually crashed on a surface of an unknown planet with no way to escape, at least not too soon. Just before the crash you saw a lot of local fauna. This place isn't as welcoming as it appeared before. There's someting else too - you saw a massive black structure on the surface just before the crash. The machines are here and they are on their way towards you already. You must act quickly an build some defence!

REQUIREMENTS

This map can be downloaded only by the host. The rest of the players doesn't have to download anything except the required mods:
Rampant Arsenal
AAI Programmable Vehicles
AAI Programmable Structures
AAI Signals
AAI Zones
AAI Vehicles: Miner
AAI Vehicles: Laser Tank
AAI Vehicles: Flame Tank
AAI Vehicles: Chaingunner

HOW IT WORKS

The Dark Fortress will send a few armored vehicles to the player location every 20 minutes. The more waves you survived, the more enemy tanks you will have to face. Enemy units also become more advanced over time and have better ammo. The base has no infinity chests, and it produces everything it needs on place, thus produces a massive ammount of pollution and attracts nearby biters. Expect rapid evolution.

The enemy base is heavily defended. You will need to prepare before attempting to attack it. You won't find any uranium ore anywhere except inside of the Fortress, so no atomic bombs for you. Artillery might not be effective too, as the base has it's own artillery with large range. Any structure built within that area will be destroyed within secconds. Look for remains of a nuclear bomb to see if you are within the range of the artillery. Spidertrons are the target of artilery too, so you should either be fast or die. If you damage the base, it's robots will try to fix it, though there are some fragile points, that can't be fixed once destroyed. You will have to find them.

The scenario doesn't have any scripts so far. All is done with AAI Programmable Structures and circut conditions.

KNOWN ISSURES


You should expect some UPS drops due to large base, frequent biter attacks and AAI's scanning structures.
The number of tanks attacking you tends to be quite random. There can be 3 tanks instead of 1.
Flame Tanks are not properly spawning at this point. I'm working on fixing it.
The Fortress doesn't send attack waves sometimes. It happens especially if you reset the fog of war for your player, or you don't use the AAI remote (Y button).
AAI Vehicles doesn't trigger land mines for the most of the time (as of 0.7.9 ver. of AAI Programmable Vehicles).

Looks cool!

This sounds like a fascinating concept. I'll see if I can give it a try soon. This is probably something that's even better if you go in blind, so I'll try to do that as well.

Edit: I do get a lot of removed entities (bottleneck stoplight, vehicle miner...), recipes and items when starting it up. Is this normal? Also, AAI Zones is a prerequisite mod too. I'll refrain from playing until I know whether this is working as intended. I triple-checked my mods but I don't know if something else too that isn't listed is still needed. If it is working as intended, maybe it would be worthwhile saving the scenario file with just those mods loaded too.

Thanks fore the responce. I forgot to remove other unnecessary mods before saving the scenario. I upated the archive and now it should require only the essential mods listed above.

The AAI Zones is also required as a dependency from AAI Programmable Structures. I have also updated it.

Enjoy!

Thanks for looking into it!

It still gives me some errors, but less. Items and techs related to miner vehicles prominently. I'll assume these aren't problematic anymore though. Also another thing, parts of the map start out explored: there's a long curving path, as if someone ran outward from the spawn.

Ok, first impressions of the gameplay itself:

I got attacked the first time at 20-30 minutes by a wave of 3 tanks, each with cannon shells, which is virtually undefendable this early (juking shots is possible but extremely difficult, you could plausibly exhaust their ammo) but even if I could, I would still not be able to take out their combined HP of 6000. Very difficult! Basically impossible. I couldn't find anything useful nearby so I'm pretty much stuck.

Edit: You are supposed to spawn with miners and a hauler, which means AAI Miner and AAI Hauler are required mods as well. AAI Warden and Tumbler also have some techs in the game (but no items by default I guess).

It still doesn't make the beginning possible, but it is a stronger start.

Hi there,

Thanks for responce. I've also been testing the map with friends and it turned out very challenging, just as you said. First of all there was a bug, that made the Fortress send 3 tanks with explosive cannon shells instead of only 1 AI car with yellow ammo, so that was a big difference. I fixed that and now after 20-30 min. you should expect only one enemy Car, as long as it manages to get to you and not get eaten by biters.

I also added a damaged Car near the base that has some mines in it, though AAI Vehicles seem to not trigger land mines too often due to some bug of that mod... so that didn't help too much. I also added an abondonned tank nearby, that has some additional equipment you can use, but you will have to find it.

If you have any other ideas of how to make the start a bit easier (if it still needs to be easier after fix), I'd happy to hear it. I plan to make some alternative version of the scenario with some basic startup base and defences - few hours later after the landing.

There are some parts alreay explored, as if your read through the intro you will see, that this part has been revealed just before the engineer crashed the ship into the surface. This part of land is eplored in order to make the Fortress running properly instead of doing nothing under the black unexplored mask.

Here's the changelog:
1. Fixed first wave - the attack starts after 20-30 minutes with 1 AI Car, instead of 3 tanks.
2. Added destroyed Car with military equipment nearby the starting location.
3. Added damaged tank near the starting location.
4. Starter resources are now richer.
5. AAI Miner is now required by the scenario, if you want to have them in the wrecked ship.

Good to see people picking this one up

Hey there. The new update is finished:

1. All tech for the Fortress is now researched and active
2. Fixed no steel smelting for the Fortress
3. Construction robots are now rebuiling destroyed structures (they're quite fast in it)
4. Added new rocket launchers and small artillery to cover some weak points in the deffence.

Candy6132 wrote: ↑Thu Jun 10, 2021 6:38 pm Hey there. The new update is finished:

1. All tech for the Fortress is now researched and active
2. Fixed no steel smelting for the Fortress
3. Construction robots are now rebuiling destroyed structures (they're quite fast in it)
4. Added new rocket launchers and small artillery to cover some weak points in the deffence.

did you maybe forgot to upload that update on the github? since the rar file say its 15 days old, and you reply is only 5 days old.

also maybe its just me, but after the rocket launch i havent seen any other fortress attacks. Maybe the "victory screen" somehow bugged the waves?