Squashing Bug #666 (Partial Fix)

[echo7]

At this point I should ask if it is possible to create a community patch mod with this and the other fixes that are possible to mod out… Unfortunately I can’t mod. However, I can, and am willing to, do repetitive jobs (provided that someone gives me the raw files and the instructions).

I helped in making a mod localizable, so if there is something similar that I can do, count me in

[shadowwinterknig (Trebic)]

I quite enjoy doing scripting for HW2 and would be happy to help, though I can’t be sure as to how much time I can put in as I am meant to be working on a mod for the game.

To show my lack of knowledge, what are the other issues?

If one of the issues is that defense fighter’s don’t shoot down ballistic weapons, that is due to HW2 not having that ability. Changing the ballistic weapons to missiles kinda helps, but there are issues surrounding that. One being that missiles don’t collide with asteroids. Also, while scripting can force a unit to target missiles, it can not distinguish between different types of missiles (fake ballistics, missiles, torpedoes). And if not forcing a unit that can only attack missiles (defense fighter), it will target a ship and not disengage.

If GBX does ever come back to this game, even if not to fix any bugs, I do hope they add 1 function that allows filling a sobgroup with the strikegroup of a selected unit. This is all that is needed for a basic scripting fix for bug 666. But that is just one function of a growing list of functions I wish GBX would add.

[echo7]

I was referring mainly to the thread “2.1 Patch Balance Issues”, but it seems it was removed (you can see a glimpse of it here: Announcement - Public Patch Preview). I don’t know if every issue that was written there is now fixed or not…

[CryCoh]

@echo7 and @shadowwinterknig, it is possible to rework some features through modding to ‘fix’ some of the primary issues with the game, but the biggest offender is the broken targeting behavior.

For the most part, each ship has to be looked at and re-balanced. Some need drastic changes, others need minute tweaks. I put up a post months ago trying to gather some people for a community fix of sorts, but was burnt out at that point and not many were on board. However, seeing as how I have a lot more free time in the coming weeks, I’d be willing to join up with some people mod away.

As far as other issues, I think multiplayer balance as a whole needs tweaking, but that’s hard to do without tackling the targeting issues (unless reworked). Some other problems involve random sound bugs and ship fire animations (gearbox didn’t do some weapon/subsystem .events files correctly), excessive changes of targeted ship based on distance, infiltrator/marine latching… and more. I still have copies of my old spreadsheets that are helpful too.

[CryCoh]

Yeah, I was actually just looking for that thread, but I noticed it wasn’t there either. Its a bummer, as cloaked put a LOT of effort and dedication for the game and community. At least a majority of the issues were implemented in the current patch preview, but the standard game still needs those fixes.

[shadowwinterknig (Trebic)]

Couldn’t help myself, I think I am getting obsessed with trying to figure out this error.

Doing things a different way. Still got a ways to go, but results are looking better.

1st target not all kushan interceptors are targeting the same unit. Once that target is destroyed at ~30sec, then they start targeting the same unit. A few times towards the end of the clip, I start quickly switching their stance between aggressive and evasive to see if there targeting the same unit.

There is also a hiigaran interceptor squad flying around that is in the same strike group as the kushan interceptors, but is able to target different targets even though their inital target was the same as the kushan interceptors. (Problem with the old way I was doing things)

[shadowwinterknig (Trebic)]

The player units are 5x Kushan Interceptors in a strike group, 5x Taiidan Interceptors not in a strike group and 2x Hiigaran Interceptor squadrons in a strike group.

To explain the ATI

<ShipType> <InStrikeGroup?>
  Max Targets ? Current ?

Current is how many units the group is currently targeting, 1 is what it should be.
Max Targets is the highest Current has been. Current needs to be higher then Max Targets for ~5 seconds before Max Targets is set. If Max Targets hasn’t changed for ~20 seconds, it is reset back to Current.
This is done due to how the script captures the strikegroup. If a ship moves too far away from the rest of the strike group, it momentarily thinks its in a different strike group. Longest I’ve noticed Current to be higher the 1 is for ~10 seconds.

[shadowwinterknig (Trebic)]

Made a few tweaks to the code. Also made changes to the ATI display (Removed the Max Targets reset after ~20sec and added a timer to see how long the strike group has 1 target)

Next I will need to check band box selection and also mixed ship type strike groups and different formations.

A few issues I’ve noticed with this is that the targeting line may flash before changing targets (this only occurs after the strike groups primary target is destroyed)
Due to how I gather units for a strike group, there are moments when 2 strike groups are in close proximity and one strike group destroys there target, either the entire strike will start targeting the other strike groups targets or members will think there in a different strike group ( for the second case, this is only temporary until the strike groups move apart)

[CryCoh]

Have you looked at the ‘attack behavior visualizations’ link in the initial post? It might help direct you a bit with the target flickering as to what the problem could be.

[shadowwinterknig (Trebic)]

Thinking about the issue, I believe it’s with my script where it’s trying to force the strikegroup to attack a unit that’s in it’s death phase, something the game doesn’t like.

The excessive switching of targets is, to the best of my knowledge, is caused by the attack styles. ((My script doesn’t allow the attack styles to switch target))
The attack styles are basically a set of possible actions the unit can do using a weighted random system. One of these possible actions is ‘PickNewTarget’. The issue (At least what you have noticed in the vanilla game) is that the unit is selecting this action too often, either from there being too many ‘PickNewTarget’ actions in the attack style, or a ‘PickNewTarget’ has a too heavy weight.
Removing these doesn’t fix Bug #666, but is what is causing both the constant switching of targets, as well as the random (temporary) fixing of Bug #666.

[shadowwinterknig (Trebic)]

StrikeGroup.zip

This might be the best I can do on this issue. The biggest problem is trying to find units that are in the same strikegroup.

No need to read the following as I’m just rambling on about a better fix if gearbox was to add a few new functions.

Ramblings

If gearbox was to continue with Homeworld, and for some reason chose not to fix this bug, then (at least for me) 3 new functions and changes to 2 other functions would make this bug easily fixed with lua.

For the new functions, the most important is something to get the strikegroup of a unit.

SobGroup_FillStrikeGroup(<SobGroup-Out>,<SobGroup>)

Returns the current strikegroup group stance of the first ship in SobGroup.
Possible return values are “None”, “Batch”, “Shape” and "Subs"
If the first ship in SobGroup is not in a strikegroup, the returned value is nil

Next, due to how strikegroups work, it would be best to know the group stance (“None”, “Batch”, “Shape” and “Subs”)

SobGroup_GetStanceGrouping(<SobGroup>)

Returns the current strikegroup group stance of the first ship in SobGroup
Possible return values are “None”, “Batch”, “Shape” and "Subs"
If the first ship in SobGroup is not in a strikegroup, the returned value is nil

With group stancing, sub formations are determined by there attack family and combat family. Currently, there is no way I know of determining a units combat family other then loading the units ship file. As such, adding a new filter tag “combatFamily” would be of use.

SobGroup_FilterInclude(<SobGroup-Out>,<SobGroup>,"combatFamily",<sAttackFamily>)

Add’s filter tag “combatFamily”

While the above determines what units are in a strikegroup as well as there current stance grouping, deciding who to attack with lua will replace any back-end code that does a much better job. To correct this, first it would be best to know what unit a ship is attacking.

SobGroup_GetPrimaryTargetIndex(<SobGroup>)

Returns the current primary attack target index of the first ship in SobGroup
If SobGroup does not have any attack targets, will return nil
Return values start from 0

Lastly, there would need to be a way to set the primary target from a list of potential targets, this could be done using

SobGroup_Attack(<Player>, <SobGroup>, <SobGroup-ToAttack>, <PrimaryTargetIndex>)

Add’s an optional 4th argument "PrimaryTargetIndex"
If set, and valid (Between 0 and SobGroup_Count(SobGroup-ToAttack)- 1), will set the current primary attack target index

If these function were added, the lua code to fix this bug would be

function FixTarget_Init()
  if (Rule_Exists("FixTarget_Rule")~= 1) then
    Rule_AddInterval("FixTarget_Rule", 0.25)
  end
end

function FixTarget_Rule()
  if (attackFamily == nil) then
    dofilepath("Data:Scripts\\FamilyList.lua")
    attackCount = getn(attackFamily)
  end

  SobGroup_CreateIfNotExist("Squadron")
  SobGroup_CreateIfNotExist("StrikeGroup")
  SobGroup_CreateIfNotExist("StrikeFamily")
  SobGroup_CreateIfNotExist("Player_Ships")

  for player = 0, Universe_PlayerCount()- 1 do
    SobGroup_Copy("Player_Ships", "Player_Ships"..player)

    while (SobGroup_Empty("Player_Ships")~= 1) do
      SobGroup_FillShipsByIndexRange("Squadron", "Player_Ships", 0, 1)
      SobGroup_FillSubstract("Player_Ships", "Player_Ships", "Squadron")

      if (SobGroup_InStrikeGroup("Squadron")== 1) then
        local groupStance = SobGroup_GetStanceGrouping("Squadron")

        SobGroup_FillStrikeGroup("StrikeGroup", "Squadron")
        SobGroup_FillSubstract("Player_Ships", "Player_Ships", "StrikeGroup")

        if (groupStance == "None") then
          -- fix everyone
          FixTarget_Primary("StrikeGroup")
        end

        if (groupStance == "Shape") then
          for int = 1, attackCount do
            SobGroup_FilterInclude("StrikeFamily", "StrikeGroup", "combatFamily", attackFamily[int])
            SobGroup_FillSubstract("StrikeGroup", "StrikeGroup", "StrikeFamily")

            if (SobGroup_Count("StrikeFamily") > 0) then
              FixTarget_Primary("StrikeFamily")
            end
          end

          for int = 1, attackCount do
            SobGroup_FilterInclude("StrikeFamily", "StrikeGroup", "attackFamily", attackFamily[int])
            SobGroup_FillSubstract("StrikeGroup", "StrikeGroup", "StrikeFamily")

            if (SobGroup_Count("StrikeFamily") > 0) then
              FixTarget_SetPrimary("StrikeFamily")
            end
          end
        end

        if (groupStance == "Batch" or groupStance == "Subs") then
          -- only fix squadrons
          while (SobGroup_Empty("StrikeGroup")~= 1) do
            SobGroup_FillShipsByIndexRange("StrikeFamily", "StrikeGroup", 0, 1)
            SobGroup_FillSubstract("StrikeGroup", "StrikeGroup", "StrikeFamily")

            if (SobGroup_Count("StrikeFamily") > 1) then
              FixTarget_Primary("StrikeFamily")
            end
          end
        end

      end
    end

  end
end

function FixTarget_SetPrimary(player, sobGroup)
  local player,primaryIndex = SobGroup_OwnedBy(sobGroup), SobGroup_GetPrimaryTargetIndex(sobGroup)

  SobGroup_CreateIfNotExist("FixTarget_SetPrimary")
  SobGroup_GetCommandTargets("FixTarget_SetPrimary", sobGroup, COMMAND_Attack)
  SobGroup_Attack(player, sobGroup, "FixTarget_SetPrimary", primaryIndex)
end

[shadowwinterknig (Trebic)]

Made a slight change to my attempt at a fix so it is multiplayer safe

Dropbox - Link not found

Also tried a slightly different way at capturing strikegroups

Dropbox - Link not found

v2 seems to be better at capturing strikegroups, but there is the added risk on incorrectly capturing units from another strikegroup (Though only when they are too close, should fix itself when the move apart)

[Dom2 (Taiidan Republic Mod)]

I don’t really understand the details of what you are doing but I’d like to say that I’m very pleased someone is making progress in this area

[shadowwinterknig (Trebic)]

Dropbox - Link not found

[CryCoh]

I updated the main post quite a bit, and included your fix!

[echo7]

Wow, thanks a lot for your work! I have a few questions though:

1. Is v2.1.2 MP safe too or just for SP and skirmishes?
2. If it is not, do I have to manually remove a version before using the other? Or, how do I swap from the MP safe version to the SP one and vice versa?
3. Where do I unzip the files? (Sorry if the answer seems obvious to you guys, but I am not a modder )
4. Can a Steam version be made (for ease of installation) to make it visible to a larger audience?
5. In multiplayer, do all players need to have the fix or it is sufficient that only the host has it (like it is for Cloaked’s Ace Maps from ModDB)?

Thank you again

[Cloaked]

Trebic created a new thread for the 666 fix here:

Bug 666 partial fix + multi-mod compatability

New fix discovered by @Cloaked. Check out their post further down. Also, check out Homeworld Remastered 2.3 Players Patch

Old Version

<a href="https://www.dropbox.com/s/l1803pye7qi3nt1/StrikeGroup_v2.1.4.zip?dl=0" rel="nofollow noopener">https://www.dropbox.com/s/l1803pye7qi3nt1/StrikeGroup_v2.1.4.zip?dl=0</a> I have tried my hand at both creating a partial fix for bug 666 as well as a mod that allows multiple mods to work together. If you are unsure what Bug 6…

I did some testing with the latest version of the fix, and its SP and MP safe. However you can only use this in SP or LAN, until a formal Steam Workshop mod is created. For multiplayer, all players will need to have the mod.

I’m now planning to release a Patch on the Steam Workshop soon. It would include the 666 Fix, the balance fixes included in the Patch Preview, and balance fixes for the few remaining minor open issues.

Edit: Here’s some additional technical details from messages I exchanged with Trebic:

Click to view technical details

On another topic

It might be best first to give a bit of an explanation of what my attempt at a fix does.

When a ship starts attacking, it creates a target list of all nearby ships that it can attack. (This is back-end code, not my script)

My script then grabs this list and picks a target at random (I could try selecting the best target, but this would have a much larger hit on performance).

Next my script scans for nearby ships and treats them as being in the same strikegroup as the first unit.

Once it scans all nearby ships, it will then force them all to attack that single unit selected earlier on.

There are 3 issues with this.

-Firstly I haven’t added a way to choose the best potential target (Reason stated above).

-Secondly, since there is no good way of finding unit’s in the same strikegroup, there is a high chance of units being missed or incorrectly chosen (wrong strikegroup), (Hw2 squadrons are treated differently in lua where you can not select only 1 unit in the squadron, it’s all or none. Though a strikegroup with more then 1 squadron still has the same risk of not being captured like the hw1 units).

-Third issue is due to unit’s being forced to attack only 1 unit. This first means there is no auto switching targets (This issue in vanilla homeworld is actually how attack styles work, not an issue with strikegroups). Secondly with the third issue, ships that can attack secondary targets, don’t have any secondary targets to attack. The included weapons folder changes weapons that are meant to attack secondaries and forces them to scan for there own secondaries (Sadly, info I found on this states there could be a performance issue)

The fix currently won’t work in multiplayer. This is as I have used the random function which is not multiplayer safe. I will upload a newer version which corrects this.

Also, in scripts/scar/strikegroups.lua, there is a variable l_StrikeGroup__Proximity. (I think that’s what I called it). The current value should be 100 (or 90). Setting this to a higher value increases the potential other units in the strikegroup will be found. But, the higher the value, the higher the chance of ‘capturing’ unit’s that are in a different strikegroup.

This fix should limit the affect of bug 666, but due to there being no good way of knowing what units are in the same strikegroup, then there will not be a proper fix for the issue.

On another topic

I will add, bug 666, at least to what I can understand is this:

Firstly a ship will generate a list of the nearby targets it can attack.
Next it will select the best potential target from that list.
If there is more then 1 best potential target, then it will randomly select a primary target from them.

All of the above works as intended, the problem is that this is done on a per-ship bases. Think of each ship in a hiigaran interceptor squadron doing this. 30 nearby targets, 30 best potential targets, each interceptor then randomly selects it’s own primary target.

The second issue is the constant switching of targets. This is not an issue with strike groups, but instead attack styles. With attack styles, there is a list of potential actions based on stance that a ship can chose from. The actual choosing of an action is done by a weighted random system. One of the potential actions is PickNewTarget (It actually appears multiple times in the attack styles), this action is being chosen too often, possible because of having a too high weight to it.

Due to how my fix works, this action is ignored, but if gearbox was to fix bug 666, or a better way of fixing the bug is found, then this constant switching of targets may sprout up again.

On another topic

Thanks for the summary and updating the fix for multiplayer, I’ll test it out later tonight. EDIT: I tested multiplayer for 1 hour with hiigaran and kushan interceptors, the v2 fix works great!!!

I’ve updated the original 666 Bug thread, give it a good read.

Your fix appears to apply to all ships. However the 666 bug only negatively impacts formations/squadrons of fighters. Its often OK, or even beneficial for a formation of turreted corvettes, frigates, capital ships, etc. to pick their own separate targets. This was actually intended by design to allow for example; a wall formation of corvettes to fire on many different targets.

Is it possible to improve your fix so it only applies to the fighters listed under the “Ships Affected” section of the original 666 Bug thread?

Regarding the weapons folder, I see you changed many weapons from “Shoot at Secondaries = 1, Shoot at Surroundings = 0” to “Shoot at Secondaries = 1, Shoot at Surroundings = 1”. It also contains many files unchanged from the 2.1 Patch including: hw1_scout, vgr_flechettecannon, etc. So some cleanup is in order.

A few reasons to possibly delete the weapons folder:

It doesn’t change any of the weapons/ships negatively affected by the 666 bug
‘Shoot at Surroundings’ sucks performance. In Homeworld 2 classic, Relic only used it for Battle Cruisers and Destroyers - period. Expanding this to even more ships than gearbox (possibly naively) did, is probably not good.
Deleting the weapons folder would allow this fix to be used whether your playing on the 2.1 Patch, the 2.205 Patch Preview, or even other mods. The Patch Preview contains balance fixes/updates to many weapon files, so I’m only using your scripts folder.

On another topic

https://www.dropbox.com/s/78ycc2bzejzxnv4/StrikeGroup_v2.1.zip?dl=0

(Haven’t posted this link on the forum yet, will do after I clean up the script)

Made changes so the script only affects the following ships

Hiigaran: Scouts, Interceptors, Bombers

Vaygr: Scouts, Assault Craft, Bombers, Lance, Laser Corvettes

Kushan/Taiidan: Scouts, Interceptors, Bombers, Cloaked Fighters

The initial reasoning for the changers in the weapons folder was all ships would be affected by the script. And since the script sets an affected ship to only target 1 enemy, secondaries wouldn’t shoot at there surroundings. Meaning that the only way they could, was if the Shoot at surroudings was set to 1. With the new changes were the script only affects a certain list of ships, the weapons folder can now be (and has been) deleted.

I will still need to go through the script and clean it up, may also need to re-arrange a few things.

The affected ships are in there own folder (Scripts\SCaR\TargetFix), doing this allows mix mod compatability (If 2 mods that both have this are loaded together, there extra ships will work without error)

[b8factor]

Is there an official mod being made of this?

[Cloaked]

Working on it.

Edit: Its done! Check out the HWR News section.

[maelrizzo (El Rizzo)]

That is super awesome to hear!