Long time ago we already had discussions
about a bridge addon (that you can pass
water using a bridge) and today I just
made a fast drawing, so see if it possible
(if both beaches have diffrent hights it
looks very ugly ;( ) and as you see, there
is a problem with the flags ;)

http://img585.imageshack.us/img585/9946/br
cke.png

well, thats everything so far :D just a
question if somebody thinks that I should
continue the graphics or not :D

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I never heard of that idea before, and I really quite like it.

As for the graphics, I think they're looking quite decent already. The flag problem is indeed something to address, but I think by just drawing the road (the gray trail) over the bridge, you might fix the graphical error as well as make it a bit easier on the programmers, who probably would have to do who knows what to make people walk where there's no road.
Well, or maybe not, but it should fix the flag problem anyways ^^ Of course wood would look better, but yeah...

What I don't get is the pole in the center of the bridge. It looks disturbing and out of place, and in case it's supposed to be a flag, I think the penalty of not having flags on a bridge is fair enough compared to the possibility to transport people over water.

Good stuff though!

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Ich find die Idee auch klasse, könnte glatt von mir sein, aber leider kann ich das Bild nich sehen.

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Well i was thinking about an other Road Texture for those but i dont like it. The Pole is just something to Show the Player
Color (its Blue like the water because its a Blue Player ;) that idea with drawing Roadster over the Bridges is Good i
think,could work but i cant Test it^^

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That's pretty cool! :D Loved the idea! :)

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Writer for http://addict3dtogames.blogspot.com Got a tip? e-mail us! Also a major Settlers 2 Fan!

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In my opinion bridges are useless. I think better solution is to add the ability to transport people
by boat. It should be much easier to implement.

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addons are addons, therefore I think somewhen both will be added ;)

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i like this idea as well!

but i think the pylon is useless, nomal way dont have teamcolour as well.
u got a picture with "water height change"/different height on other cost/edged briges?

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Well, normal Roads have the flags which
are teamcolored => every road is marked
with team colors. Well yes, I can paint
the pylon without the player colors, but I
think its needed because the bridge looked
crappy without it.

And no, I dont have such a picture but I
can make one. Need to do something today
again^^

http://picload.org/image/rcgwcrc/brueckenl
eer.png

as you can see, there is the problem i
described.

2 ways to solve that problem:

a) make bridges only availabe if both
hights only +/- 1
b) you need to flatten the area by a land
grader

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As for the bridge-vs-people-on-boats thing: It would be an interesting change of gameplay if you'd have to build a bridge from both sides, as that means you can build connecting roads between places you travelled to before, but can't make 'leaps' to areas you're not supposed to be on at all. For example, building bridges between the islands of the Campaign map 4 (first ship map) and immediately transport people there would eliminate the need for ships at all, while you'd still need to go there by ship to be able to build buildings there, however then can transport people from one place to another, meaning you don't have to go the pesky ship way.
Also, if you have to build it from both sides, you could do the flattening thing much easier.

Another thing to take into consideration, though: How do ships behave with those bridges? ^^'

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Well, I don't think, that there should be added only one of these 2 ideas, I like both because they are diffrent.

Can be passed fast:
Bridge: yes
Waterroad: no
Can be destroyed:
Bridge: yes
Waterroad: yes
Can be used by enemy soldiers:
Bridge: yes
Waterroad: no

I think this is a main diffrence between these two addons. Also they are not supposed to be used on maps where you should not be able to pass the water. Also it should never be used instead of seafaring.

And a bridge would behave like a boat - just let the ship pass ;) Could make big animations where the bridge opens etc but I dislike that Idea, also bridges are normally not supposed to be used with seafaring.

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lets add enemy roads can be tageted by catapults if told so (buton in Catapult "attack bridge yess/no")

and secondly limit the lenght of bridges to a speciffic vallue. Maybe to a max length of 2.

but my main question: HOW do you build a bridge?

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Bridges are already set to max length of 2 fields.

Catapult attacks - I dont support that idea.

Building: well, the building side is at the flag I think and then just the normal building animation, maybe some extra pics for that

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Catapults: i think this is a really important part in fighting off an enemy or blocking its way directly to you.

Building: how do you get from where to where the Bridge will reach? sry, but im not familiar with the engine interna of S2

Building cost: 2wood per field?

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Catapults: well but thats not the idea behind it.

you just start building at one side and then you can pass the bridge to acess road at the other side.

costs: there is no "per field" cause length is fixed and costs as well.

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As for the catapults, it really does seem to be an odd thing to destroy roads with it. This way, you could destroy an enemy's path to his buildings, but without making territory available again like upon destruction of a military building. It would make more sense to be able to bombard Farms and Mines, really (and for the record, I don't want that to happen either ^^ )

As for the length, I still like the idea of an infinitely long bridge as long as it's going perfectly straight and you can see both ends. Maybe it could even start out as a waterway, and be upgraded (similar to the roads) to a bridge from the menu (again, only if it's perfectly straight). The boat guy would leave the road, and all transport would be shut down until a builder completed the bridge. That would also limit the bridge length to waterway length.

Just an idea... ^^

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i dont like the bombardement of other buildings or things :D catapults are already very powerful ^^

it makes no sense to destroy a bridge, better is to destroy the military building :D

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>> My Youtube Channel <<

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No long time no see guys :)

I think I brought the idea up some years ago, I'm glad to see it visualized now, nice graphics!
I agree with the 2 (maybe 3) fields limit, after all it's a major shortcut at times and you want to keep seafaring necessary, right?
But how does the construction work, will the builder only work from one end? That was a question to me when I thought about it the first time already, I think it would look a little weird.
Bombarding with catapults would make for a cool interplay I think, but the point with the farm/mines is a good one ;)

I hope this will be discussed further!

I'm still following RTTR and I'm happy about the progress made through the years!

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Well, welcome back soong ;)

Well - I had the idea that it should be
maybe possible to change the direction of
the building site. Normal buildings are
built from bottom to top but for bridges
we should use a left to right or right to
left animation. Yeah I know thats NOT
settlers 2 like but a way to solve that
problem. Otherwise we would need an other
way.

Well your post spurred me to make
something! :)

Therefore I got some Icons for possible
bridge positions.

http://picload.org/image/dgaoaic/bridgeico
ns2.png

I like the third one.

And ingame:
http://picload.org/image/dgaoawc/brcke.png

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sehr gute Idee.
Ein Vorschlag von mir wäre, dass man vor dem Start eines Spieles in den Voreinstellungen einstellen kann, ob Brücken bei Angriffen abgerissen werden dürfen oder nicht oder ob sie in der Nähe von Grenzen abgerissen werden dürfen - Also genau die selben Einstellungen, die man auch für Militärgebäude einstellen kann. Denn theoretisch könnte eine ansonsten vollständig von Wasser umgebene Insel nur über eine Brücke erreichbar sein, über die dann auch gegnerische Soldaten marschieren können. Man hätte also den Vorteil, dass man die Insel durch eine Brücke besser an sein Wirtschaftssystem anschließen kann, als das oft mit Häfen der Fall ist, muss aber dann in Kauf nehmen, dass auch der Gegner leichter auf die Insel gelangen kann. Alternativ könnte man natürlich auch vor dem Spiel einstellen, dass man immer Brücken abreißen darf, egal ob der Gegner angreift. Somit würde jedem Spieler selbst die Wahl gelassen werden, was er einstellen will, genau wie es ja auch bei den Militärbebäuden der Fall ist.

Edit:
Und natürlich könnte man auch eine Einstellung vor dem Spiel machen, in der man je nach Geschmack festlegen kann, ob Gegnerische Soldaten überhaupt über die Brücken gehen dürfen, oder nicht.

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Siedlersüchtig seit 1999 ^^

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i like the second one

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>> My Youtube Channel <<

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I love this idea. Is it still in development?

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It's not abandoned :p

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Will we get it in the next patch?
I think it is a great idea.

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No, we neither have all the graphics nor we have a programmer for that addon at the moment - but I will see what we can do ;)

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I'll get your hopes up for nothing: I might later on start working on RttR's code. It just isn't in the nearest future and I'll probably prioritise performance optimization as that is something I like to do (faster loading times would be nice). I also want to improve stuff like previously unused texture support to better imitate the original game so there would be more interest on maps with extra unused textures in use (that would still work with both S2 and RttR).

"When" is still an open question. I have other stuff on my list I want to get done first, but RttR is certainly on my list of interest.


As for bridges, I think the best visual result comes with a "road" texture that first rises up to required height (if need be) and then have a nice solid graphic slapped on top. Also, I think building a bridge needs to involve a cost, so maybe some minor raw material consumption & builder required, maybe even the planer to make sure the site is suitable.

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Settlers II.net admin

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Yeah sure it should - but the way of
displaying I don't understand :D

tried to use the road system...
http://picload.org/image/ddclgwc/versuch.p
ng

Well, strange how it works, doesnt seem to
be useful..

http://picload.org/image/ddclrdc/versuch2.
png

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It would require a modified render, you could think of it like having an invisible node that is above the water level so the road would be drawn upwards if water level is equal to ground. Maybe instead of solid bridge graphic there would be a need for a bridge texture that is drawn to fill the gap between road and water level.


Edit!
After some more thinking I figured a way that involves bridge graphics, up to some 5 x 3 = 15 graphics would be required for various height differences. I'll try doing some visualizations later on today.

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Settlers II.net admin

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Yes, that would work but I was not sure if it would be to much coding if you are using more graphics?

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Coding wise the changes would be like this:

If node has a bridge, then node's height +2 when dealing with settlers.

Drawing the bridge would be in two phases: one for the left side of water node, the other for right side (mirror image). So three directions of bridge images, three times for various height differences (+2 height over water to equal with water). Atm I can't remember what I thought for requiring two more... maybe an error in my thought.

Biggest issue: how to mark bridge is on node and how to let settlers pass through. Also: what about ships? Bridges would be on water spots that technically are ships area. Should bridge block it or should bridges be disallowed from water that can have ships roaming through...

I already know how you can calculate if one can build a bridge to a spot.

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Settlers II.net admin

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First of all, colors:

• Red = node height indicator
• Light blue = road/bridge edge indicator
• Blue = side wall/bridge base
• Light green = visible part of walking area

The first row: flat terrain, water midpoint is set two points up from base height (this is the height to settlers will walk like they would be walking on a road), the second image shows how mirroring can be used to lessen amount of images to draw.

Second row: the left node is two points higher than water, so the bridge appears in a straight line.

Third row: what happens when left node is two points higher while right node is on same level as water.


These samples are missing the diagonal orientation, but I hope you have enough imagination for that :) Oh and I'm really really tired so I'm not going to try anything artistic or using actual game sizes and backgrounds...

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Settlers II.net admin

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Well, but maybe I will ;)

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What is the current development status with the bridges? Is there any progress going on so that we all can walk over water soon?

And actually, I like the Idea that the bridges look like a normal road and not that big and wide, but seems not to work, huh?

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Yeah, bridges for the win ^^

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No, at the moment there is no progress with bridges because there are no active devs ;)

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Zitat von Spike:

Really? Damn.. That is sad news. :(

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yup it's sad :c

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If you find some, I would continue my work :p

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Edited my posts, most images are still up
but the img-tag won't work anymore. Sadly
I can't remove them in merries posts.

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