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I use .rar myself but... For some reasson packing binaries on Github in zip format has become somehow a "standard". I suppose that as Github compresses sources using it, most modders prefer to use the same format on all associated files (We don't have to... When uploading binaries you can select a lot of compressed formats, at least I tried .rar, .7z and they all are accepted) but I see the logic behind, and been new to this, I prefered to follow the "common etiquette" most mods published on Github show.

Does this mod make changes to what happens when a guy with a pistol meets a guy with a club?

Not specifically... When you are armed with a weapon that's not classified as a melee weapon Pawns melee with their unarmed melee stats (You can check them on their Descriptions) This is vanilla behaviour, I don't go as high in the code as to change anything related to that... I just work ONCE a Pawn decides to use a melee attack.

ATM a high skilled pawn in melee will be able to use Attack Modes with or without a melee weapon equiped... The only "drawback" they have is that they can't "shield" themselves on a parry completely by letting their melee weapon eat the damage, they always take some damage. Obviously most Pawns do less damage unarmed than armed (But with the repertory of Bionics some mods give... This may not hold true in all cases ).

AFAIK nothing prevents a ranged weapon to be ALSO labeled as a potential melee weapon... My code just checks for that flag to distinguish which ones can be used to parry.

I can investigate to see if ranged weapons used as makeshift melee weapons are somekind of tag I can detect from inside melee resolution so they can be used to parry... But ATM I can't force pawns to use a given weapon, that's decided by the AI modules.

Another user got a similar problem and we traced the issue to the unpacker tool he was using on his W10 machine... The .zip itself is a regular zip file made with Winrar 5.21. Can you check that the tool you are using to access it can deal with it? For example, you can try to download the source code .zip files on the repository to see if you have the same problems. Those are generated automatically by Github using specific widely known "standard" zip tools.

= NEW VERSION 1.4.0 =

Changes:

- AI will now use different Attack Modes based on individual pawn's goals & capabilities.
- Tweaked Attack Modes thresholds & chances.
- Reduced Parry counter penalty.


Some comments:

- All pawns with Humanlike intellect (Animals and other primitive entities still default to "Kill" mode) will take now in consideration their own skill and their current target state to select an appropiate Attack Mode with decent chances to trigger the associated special effect. Combined with the tweaks on Attack Modes you will see, generally speaking, that skilled AI fighters will try to minimize the damage an enemy does to them trying to stun, disarm or even trying to incapacitate their targets in a single hit. This means you have to keep an extra eye on mentally unstable Skilled Melee colonists... If they suffer a Major break that puts them into Berserk trance, they will be deadlier than before.

- The next focus will be on the different auditive & visual notifications the Mod uses to bring your attention to what happens on the game. This means it will take more time than the previous features, as I need to explore how the underlaying engine does them and then trying to make my poor artisthical skills to yield something that really comes as an improvement of the current state... So I'm not even sure I can make the whole situation better .


The mod is STILL savegame friendly. When/If I do something that leaves a trace on the savegame I will clearly announce it.

I assume Melee_Rebalance you were using was the last version (1.3.2), right?

I've tried restarting the game, getting rid of the pawn (But the error is that there is no pawn to reference, so that shouldn't have any effect anyway), turning Melee Re-balance off. The error remains and is slowing my game to a crawl.

Just to clarify... You got into the bugged state playing normally, you saved, turned Melee Rebalance Off, reload and you got the same error? Or the game just halted? (Can you try to do exactly that... But activating Dev Console on the Menu BEFORE loading?. Some errors aren't critical enought to show Dev Console BUT may be leaving your game into a "semifreezing" state). It would rock to have the Dev Console report of were Vanilla is failing even with my Mod off.


It would rock even more to have BOTH savegames, the original & the one with MR off still triggering the anomalous state... Can you upload the savegames somewhere (google drive for example) and send me a link so I can take a look at them?


In the meantime, I will try to reproduce the state... It may have to do with the Pawn loosing his weapon unexpectedly on a parry... Just by chance, do you remember seeing a forbidden melee weapon nearby?

UPDATE: After checking multiple scenarios I've isolated 2 possible causes of that error. Both seems to suggest that effectively, Vanilla, somehow "lost" target/attacker data and that's why MeleeRebalance fails and why that savegame keeps failing even WITHOUT the Mod on. But to keep investigating I REALLY need that you confirm me EXACTLY which version of the Mod you were using at the time of the error you posted. The chances that you have met a truly Vanilla bug is high... Because the 2 vulnerabilities on my mod are the same vulnerabilities Vanilla has on the situation you describe. OFC, the interesting part would be to know how your game reached that state in the 1st place... . But that part of the investigation comes later.

Thanks for the enthusiastic feedback, Pokk720

On a sidenote, I love this mod. It would be really cool to eventually see a ranged version of this that allows you to target certain body parts.

Sadly, there are already mods around that try to "spice up" ranged combat. I wouldn't like to force users to choose between mods. I try hard to control how much Vanilla features my mod uses/tweaks so more players can find a "spot" to use this mod without making others obsolete/less interesting...

...I'm trying to ADD content so players can have more options to tweak their game experience, that's all.

= NEW VERSION 1.3.2 =

Changes:

- Added overlays to Attack Mode button to describe effective chances of a special effect to happen.
- Compatibility with "Defensive Positions" mod.


Some comments:

- Now each time a Drafted pawn attempts a melee attack, his/her Attack Mode button will change based on how likely the Special Effect was to be applied to his current target. Some Examples:

	No Chance This Pawn didn't have a chance to Disarm his target on the last attack attempted.
	Low Chances This pawn had low chances to Stun his target on the last melee attack attempted.
	Decent Chances This Pawn had decent chances to Capture his target on the last attack.

This Overlays will change dynamically over a fight... So pay attention to them to know when a given Attack Mode has a decent chance to trigger the effect you look for. While paused, you can scroll over the different modes to know what would have happened if the Pawn would have been using another Mode. I hope this helps at figuring out what happens "behind the scenes", take the best decission while in-fight, and understand better the role each Mode can play on a given situation.

- After some intense headbanging, now I developed a strategy to deal with Detour Collisions from Mods that do not use Harmony. The 1st benefit is that now you all can enjoy full features of this mod while having "Defensive Positions" active.


The mod is STILL savegame friendly. When/If I do something that leaves a trace on the savegame I will clearly announce it.

Ah k... That's the next thing I was going to try, to send you a .rar instead. Glad you found the issue and reported back... I was about to enter into "Real Exotic Issues" mode . Hope you enjoy the mod.

Mmmm... Browser (Chrome, Firefox, Internet Explorer, etc) and OS (And their versions if possible)? Happens with this mod only? Crazy ideas:

- Your Antivirus is detecting an unsigned dll and deleting the zip file.

Check the attachment on this reply... It's a bandaid, but may help you spot the issue. It's the zip file of the current release.

[attachment deleted by admin due to age]

That's weird... Maybe it's the browser. If you have problems with yours, try to use this link (it's the repository itself) and there you will find all the zip files. Latest version is 1.3.1.

EDIT: All links use HTTPS... Check that your browser/firewall/setup is allowing you to use them.

But regarding your suggested documentation change: no offense but I consider that part basic knowledge of handling MethodInfo. If you patch manually, I expect you to handle fetching MethodInfos the correct way.

None taken ... It's your documentation and you decide which kind of users it's aimed for.

An update, pardeike. I found the issue, after some headbanging sessions checking the code flow differences between automatic patching and manual patching... Certainly the original method could be null as deep as to the GetValueSafe call...

...I forgot to overload with the appropiate BindingFlags for the method in question so, on the code above if I replace:

Code Select Expand


var original = typeof(Verb_MeleeAttack).GetMethod("TryCastShot");


with:

Code Select Expand


var original = typeof(Verb_MeleeAttack).GetMethod("TryCastShot", BindingFlags.Static | BindingFlags.Public);


Original method is now non-null and detouring works like a charm. So now I can start checking if I can make conditional patching working.


It would be nice if you warned specifically about this pitfall on the Wiki's example... Because amateur moders like me, just have the habit of "copy'n paste" examples without really understanding the innards of what we are doing . I think it would save some headaches to both the user and to yourself by not having to loose time in reports like the above.

= NEW VERSION 1.3.1 =

Changes:

- Using Shortcut "M" (Misc 7) as default.
- RTS behaviour on Attack Mode button when multiple pawns are selected.


Some comments:

- Attack Mode button now leaves ALL selected pawns in the same state, instead of the previous behaviour were EACH selected pawn used the next attack mode. This behaviour is more intuitive as it matches the generalized behaviour of how most RTS games approach multicasting orders to groups of units. Thanks to Wishmaster for pointing BOTH problems solved into this release.


The mod is STILL savegame friendly. When/If I do something that leaves a trace on the savegame I will clearly announce it.

Oh never mind... actually it is not working only when at first, selected pawns don't have the same mode. Still something to be fixed maybe.

I already internally fixed the shortcut problem to use the Default M (Misc 7), which I find mnemotechnically easier to remember ("M"elee is a term that's used over different languages, even ) while preventing the "hijacking" from happening.

As the error is not crippling I will hold releasing a new version until any of the following happens:

a) Find a solution to your multiselection suggestion. Certainly, players used to RTS controls EXPECT that the result of an order applied to a group of units leaves ALL units on the same state.

b) Solve the incompatibility with "Defensive Possitions". I depend on a report I made to Harmony creator to even start with a solution... So.

Any (Or been optimist BOTH) of the above points really qualify for a subversion release. I don't want to spam users with a version per minute approach .

Thanks for the feedback, Wishmaster.

That would be great to have a specific key binding to cycle modes instead of override the key to use weapon.

Certainly, not only great... Is a must have. I will check why the injected button is "hijacking" the Weapon use key... I probably did something wrong.

That would be great too to to able to set the combat mode of multiple selected pawns.

Isn't it working for you? That's the whole point of selecting exactly that Detour... To take advantage of Vanilla multicast when multiple pawns are selected. One caveat, activating the button brodcasts "Use NEXT mode" to all pawns... Which is not equal to "Put ALL pawns" into this mode, as the resulting pawns will not have THE SAME attack mode, unless they all were in the SAME mode before selecting them. Do you think it's more intuitive as a "reset" button? Because I can try to mimic what vanilla does on binary controls when, on multi selection, you get a button per unique state of any member on the selection... The problem with a multistate button is that you can potentially fill the UI while showing all available options.