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OpenTS Manual

Allies

Changed in 0.2.0

The houses a scenario's house counts as friendly.

Specification
Applies to
House (per-scenario)
File
map file
Section
[<House ID>]
Value
list of HouseTypes
When omitted
(empty)An empty list, which leaves the house allied to nobody but itself.
Parse behavior

read from a house record in a campaign and, outside a campaign, from the spawn house section of the house holding that start position; both feed the same alliance state

The value is a comma-separated list of houses that this house treats as friends. An allied object is rejected by an automatic target scan, is passed over instead of crushed, and does not provoke retaliation. A house is always its own ally, whether or not it names itself.

Where the list is read

Section titled “Where the list is read”

A campaign mission reads Allies from each house record. Each name matches a country by its section name or its Name=, ignoring letter case, and allies the house with that country’s house. Write the names with no space after the commas: in a house record, a name with a leading space matches nothing.

scenario map file
[Special] ; a house record in the scenario's own house list
Allies=GDI,Nod

A skirmish or multiplayer game reads Allies from the spawn house sections [Spawn1] through [Spawn8] instead. Each section applies to the house that starts at that position, and a section for a position nobody holds is ignored. Each name can be one of these:

  • A spawn house, such as Spawn2, allies with the one house that starts at that position.
  • A country allies with every house playing that country.

An observer is never allied.

multiplayer map file
[Spawn1] ; whoever starts at waypoint 0
Allies=Spawn2,Nod

Alliances from the launch file are made first and kept, and the map’s alliances are added to them.

When a house is defeated in a skirmish or multiplayer game, or by the Destroy all of… action, the match ends if every house left is allied with every other in both directions.

What a map alliance does not do

Section titled “What a map alliance does not do”

Alliances from the map take effect without the alliance announcement. They also skip two things that happen when an alliance forms during play: the house’s units drop targets that are now friendly, and, with AllyReveal on, a house that allies with the local player reveals the terrain around all its objects at once.

With Paranoid on, every computer house breaks its alliances with every human house, including those the map or the launch file declared, when either of these happens:

  • A human house forms an alliance during play.
  • A computer house whose IQ equals MaxIQLevels is defeated. Every computer player in a skirmish or multiplayer game has that IQ.

Paranoid=no in [AI] is the only setting that keeps a cooperative map’s alliances between human and computer houses intact. Leaving AlliesAllowed at no in the launch file’s [Settings] stops only the alliances players form during play.

See also — Owner, AllyReveal, Edge

History

  1. Changed0.2.0In development

    Read alliances from the spawn house sections outside campaign