Manalink TODO list

[Gargaroz]

@Xenias : Null Rod is already done, but needs the recoding of the old mana-artifacts in order to work. When we'll have a correct decompilation of Black Lotus, we'll do that.

[Korath]

Second one.
DWORD AVAILABLE_MANA[2][8] 0x4EF3C0
AVAILABLE_MANA[player][color_t]
[...]

Code: Select all

    if(event == EVENT_CAN_COUNTER){
        if(AVAILABLE_MANA[player][COLOR_BLUE]>=2){
            ai_modifier += 24;
        }
    }


It says,
"Wow, 2 blue mana remains. Pay attention!! Counterspell Sucks!"
or
"I keep 2 blue mana, time for counter! Just do it!!"

It's actually only available mana that's been declared through declare_mana_available(). declare_mana_available_hex() instead stores its values starting at 0x4ef21c (it can deal with up to 50 declarations for each player); has_mana() and related functions check both, as well as mana_pool[]. This bit of Counterspell will affect the ai if two Islands or Mox Sapphires are untapped, but not if two Underground Seas are, or if you're floating in your mana pool.

An interesting side note here, perhaps of use implementing Celestial Dawn and similar effects (are there similar effects?) - dword_60A4B4[11*player] can store up to ten separate "You may spend [from_color] as if it were [to_color]" effects per player. sunglasses_of_urza_effect() at 0x49d380 is a handy front end:

Code: Select all

void sunglasses_of_urza_effect(int player, color_t from_color, color_t to_color)
{
  int i;

  if (from_color > 0 && to_color > 0)
    for (i = 0; i < 10; ++i)
      if (dword_60A4B4[11 * player + i] == -1)
        {
          dword_60A4B4[11 * player + i] = (unsigned __int16)from_color | (unsigned int)(to_color << 16);
          dword_60A4B4[11 * player + i + 1] = -1;
          break;
        }
}

The only place that writes to this array is Sunglasses of Urza, which doesn't do anything except call sunglasses_of_urza_effect(player, COLOR_WHITE, COLOR_RED) in its EVENT_COUNT_MANA handler.

No help in building a proper EVENT_COUNT_MANA handler for Graven Cairns or Shadowblood Ridge, though. Maybe experiment some with calling all three of declare_mana_available(player, COLOR_BLACK, 1), declare_mana_available(player, COLOR_RED, 1), and declare_mana_available(player, COLOR_COLORLESS, -1); but I suspect that the current data won't be able to handle color filtering no matter what, and we'll have to rewrite has_mana() eventually. I just hope there aren't too many other places that inspect the raw data directly instead of going through has_mana() like they should.

[Gargaroz]

Korath, given the things you already know, do you think a proper implementation of Cavern of Souls or Food Chain is possible ?

[Korath]

Not yet. charge_mana() is very complex, and I haven't yet investigated how the AI decides which spells or abilities it attempts to cast or activate.

A first approximation would be making them activateable only while paying for a mana cost (which I can do currently, with the injection I've made for Mana Flare) and only when trying to cast or activate a spell or permanent of the appropriate type (which I don't yet know how to get at). That would be almost enough for player (non-AI) use, except

1. you'd have to be able to pay for the spell or ability without using restricted mana to even be able to get into charge_mana() (we could work around this by having EVENT_COUNT_MANA always consider them activateable, no matter what the spell is); and
2. if you cancelled, the mana would just go back into your mana pool.

Probably the only feasible way to get them fully working is to copy the machinery that makes COLOR_ARTIFACT work. Which, among many other things, will mean tracking down and changing all the direct accesses to mana_pool[], AVAILABLE_MANA[], the version of that for declare_mana_available_hex(), etc., which'll be no fun at all.

[Xenias]

Thanks Gargaroz, and thanks Korath.

I greatly appreciate your interesting information. Mycosynth Lattice is a similar to Celestial Dawn.(I think one of the hardest card to code.)
A routine for producing mana are so complicated. But you almost make it clear. Awesome!!

By the way, do you think code hooking is not a smart solution? (is a bad coding?)
I think that's a good solution for 'can't be activated' or 'split second'.

[Korath]

I prefer to edit the exe directly, instead of writing to it at runtime like you've done, for two reasons:

• Analyzing the exe becomes impossible if the code in the file isn't what's actually being run, and
• we don't currently have a function that's guaranteed to be run before any gameplay - pregame() gets run multiple times when starting a new game, and not at all if you load a game instead of starting one (which is why you can't use the debug commands after loading)

I also prefer to edit call_cards_function() (what I'd labelled 0x4018C0, the function you're hooking) directly instead of tracking down all the calls to it. More reliable, less effort, and less error-prone. It's also not the only place cards' functions are called from (though most calls do go through that).

[Gargaroz]

Well, here's a preliminar version of Celestial Dawn.
I foresee A LOT of problems with Hybrid card, cards with Phyrexian mana and so on.

Code: Select all

int card_celestial_dawn(int player, int card, event_t event){

    card_instance_t *instance = get_card_instance( player, card );

    if( event == EVENT_RESOLVE_SPELL ){
      instance->targets[1].card = get_internal_card_id_from_csv_id(CARD_ID_PLAINS);
    }
   
   if( event == EVENT_CHANGE_TYPE && instance->targets[1].card > -1 ){
      if( affected_card_controller == player && is_what(affected_card_controller, affected_card, TYPE_LAND) ){
         event_result = instance->targets[1].card;
      }
    }
   
   if( event == EVENT_MODIFY_COST_GLOBAL && affected_card_controller == player ){
      card_ptr_t* c = cards_ptr[ get_id(affected_card_controller, affected_card)  ];
      int amount = 0;
      if( c->req_black < 16 ){
         amount+=c->req_black;
         COST_BLACK-=c->req_black;
      }
      if( c->req_blue < 16 ){
         amount+=c->req_blue;
         COST_BLUE-=c->req_blue;
      }
      if( c->req_green < 16 ){
         amount+=c->req_green;
         COST_GREEN-=c->req_green;
      }
      if( c->req_red < 16 ){
         amount+=c->req_red;
         COST_RED-=c->req_red;
      }
      COST_WHITE+=amount;
   }
   
   if( event == EVENT_SET_COLOR && affected_card_controller == player ){
      event_result = COLOR_TEST_WHITE;
   }

    return global_enchantment(player, card, event);
}


[Korath]

3) How exactly works the function that "attach" an enchantment / effect to another card ? Cards like Aura Graft are doable ?

Looks like card_instance_t::damage_target_player and damage_target_card are really the player/card this card is enchanting, and its use for damage cards is a special case.

There's no way in general, though, to find out if an aura could legally enchant an arbitrary card, for much the same reason Deflection can't be coded: target validation is handled as part of EVENT_CAST_SPELL or EVENT_ACTIVATE, rather than something a card can be asked to do separately.