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Member
Join Date: Jan 2006
Location: Iowa City, IA
Posts: 78
February 18th, 2006, 04:00 PM
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Yeah OK, best programming problem description ever...:P.
In my read throughs of the docs I've failed to grasp several aspects of AB, and its pretty clear at the moment that may be causing me some extra heart ache. In trying to fix this, I need some general idea of what the overrides, exclusions, prelink, postlink, member, childlin, etc buttons are for. The existing data files I've been ripping off....er...inspired by don't seem to use them, so I'm light in the shorts on examples of what they do, and I'm having zero luck finding it in the docs. Could someone please point me to the sections on what those buttons do? I'm also trying to figure out how live tagexpr work, but can't find a refrence to them either. Basically, I'm digging into this in the hopes that I can cut some extra stuff out; I have units that appear in several races, and I can't figure out how to get them to show up in all the lists short of putting duplicates (and duplicates of all the options they may have) in all the races they appear in, and when I do that I need to modify the name slightly so I don't get compile errors. If you've got units that do the same, I sure would like to see an example of it in your data file....for inspiration, of course  .
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#1
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Senior Member
Volunteer Data File Author
Join Date: Mar 2005
Posts: 345
February 18th, 2006, 10:49 PM
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if you have several dat files with differing races in them then use an ext file to extend the unit into the other race roster
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#2
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Senior Member
Lone Wolf Staff
Join Date: May 2005
Posts: 8,232
February 20th, 2006, 01:04 PM
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At 05:00 PM 2/18/2006, you wrote:
Quote:
Overrides --------- This button brings up a form where you can specify "overrides" for a given entity. Overrides allow you to use the exact same entity in multiple places, with only slight differences based on context. For example, let's assume you have a unit named "Warriors" for a race that has a set of equipment and a cost of 10 points. If you have the same basic "Warriors" unit for a different race, except the cost is 9 points, you could use an override to specify the alternate cost when the unit is chosen for the second race. In the "Data Files" docs, look at the "Entities" section, where you'll find all the technical details on overrides. Within the "Tips & Tricks" chapter, there is a topic entitled "Entity Overrides". They are also referred to in other places (see the links from the topics), but those are the core places. Exclusions ---------- This button brings up a form where you can specify all of the exclusion references for a given entity. At this point, I'm assuming you've got an understanding of using exclusion groups and exclusion references with options and links. Entities can also count as exclusion references, and this is how you would assign them. In the "Tips & Tricks" chapter, there is a short topic entitled "Putting Exclusion Groups to Work". There are a few links from this topic that detail how exclusions can be used with entities. Image URLs ---------- This button lets you define URLs to image files corresponding to the entity. AB will allow the user to download and view those images. Prelink ------- This button lets you define/edit the "PreLinks" script associated with the entity. In the discussion of "Entities" within the "Data Files" chapter, there is an overview of each of the various scripts and tag expressions that can be defined. Within each overview is a link to the full details of the corresponding script/tagexpr, explaining what it does, how it works, and what's special about it. Postlink -------- Same as Prelink but for the "PostLinks" script. Childcst -------- Same as Prelink but for the "ChildCost" script. Member ------ Same as Prelink but for the "Member" tag expression. Childvis -------- Same as Prelink but for the "ChildVis" tag expression. Follow ------ Same as Prelink but for the "Follow" tag expression. In addition, this tagexpr only applies to unit, so it is documented with "Units" instead of "Entities" (since entities apply to both unit and items). Please ask if you have additional questions on any of these topics after reviewing the docs. Hope this helps, Rob |
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#3
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Senior Member
Lone Wolf Staff
Join Date: May 2005
Posts: 8,232
February 20th, 2006, 01:12 PM
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At 05:00 PM 2/18/2006, you wrote:
Quote:
You can easily re-use the same unit in multiple races via use of "race" tags. Just assign the unit separate "race" tags corresponding to each race in which the unit should appear. That's all you need to do. If you need to enforce more specific control (e.g. a unit is only available in a roster of 2000 points or more), then you need to also use the "Member" tag expression. There is a detailed example of this in the topic entitled "Managing Allies". -Rob |
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#4
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Member
Join Date: Jan 2006
Location: Iowa City, IA
Posts: 78
February 20th, 2006, 01:22 PM
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AH!
And uh oh....I think I created a ton of work I didn't need to *sigh*. Thanks! |
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#5
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Linear Mode
