Helper Macros
 

Not sure if they really are macros, but can anyone explain the Helper stuff? I am working on a new file for the new High Elf Warhammer Book and having issues creating the High Elf version of barding.

Currently, Barding is an Option defined in the genericstuff.dat file. I was able to add a "HE style barding" but I was not able to get it to show up under the mount like normal barding does. I did everything just like normal barding, minus the Helper stuff, which I assume is what does this. However, when I looked in the warhammer.def file, I found the Helper "Group", and see the Barding and BardingOK "Helper Groups" but they don't have anything to them. I don't see anything that would suggest that it would cause the behavior we normally see with barding.

So, I guess my question is the barding something special or does it have to do with this Helper stuff? I guess I could just add the HE style barding where it is seen all the time and just make it non selectable unless a horse is selected. But, I would like to keep with the standard barding way of doing things.

Any help would be great. Thanks.

The 'helper' groups are tags, Helper is just a title given to distinguish them, it can be anything. Tags are used to identify units, and can either be global or just affect a single unit. There will be rules setup that affect units that have certain tags attached to them. Using your example, 'BardingOK' is used to show a unit can be given barding. That is a very simplistic explanation, it's 1 in the morning, and my brain is shutting down!

As an aside, I have completed the High Elf file, and it will be included in the June release.

Yeah, June is too far away lol.

And yeah, I figured the Helpers were tags. That is what they looked like. I did this for something else in the HE file, so that is what I thought it was. However, I just don't know what is causing the barding to be invisible until you click the steed, and then what makes if visible, other than the fact that it is barding. Is the that functionality something built into army builder?

Really all I want to do is have barding with a different name.

From the explanation from UltraPrime the AB mechanism would be a live tag possibly with either script in the pre or post link to add it as needed or inherant in the unit. Have a look at the list of options in AB and see it if says live next to it, when you click on the option click on the live button to see if the live tag is in there and mirror that?

Is there We could get a copy of your finished file?

I tried, and botched it several times.

Thanks,

Gabe

I already tried this. Like I said, I have already done all of this type of stuff. I have created the whole new HE file, but this was the only thing I couldn't figure out. In the Live Tag it just says Helper.BardingOK, which he said just tells it that this unit can have barding. And that is why I was thinking that barding is something built into Army builder. The only thing I see are these "Helper" things, but they are only tags. So, that seems to mean that it just tells Army Builder to add bard.

I created a "Ithilmar barding" which is a copy of the barding. If I leave the "Helper.BardingOK" in the Live tag, it cause it to look exactly like barding and uses the name Barding, even though that is not what I named it. Anyways, I gave up and just left it called barding and changed the cost and took out the stuff in the post link that made it take off 1 movement.

Say unit A has barding listed in it's options. The barding option has Helper.BardingOK as a Live expression. This means it will be invisible until unit A is assigned the Helper.BardingOK tag. With most units, this will be preassigned as they would have barding as standard. But if you look at a Lord/Hero, you will see this tag gets assigned when he chooses a horse, making the barding suddenly appear on the list.

For what you are attempting, there are two ways about this. You could make a carbon copy of the barding options from the genericstuff.dat file, renaming it. Or you could use the Link Name option in the units barding option to just rename it.