AI War 2:Custom Text Messages To The Player

Hey!

Do you really mean " Journal Entries", in the sense of those things that are defined in xml and new in version 2.040 of the game and further? If so, click that link. Those are what you should be using for long-term, detailed journal entries. And as a bonus, they don't require any custom code from you.

What is presented below is an older form of "journal entry," which is just embedded in the chat log. It can be useful to do that sort of thing at various points as well, but those are... less robust. The journal entries that we're referring to at the above link is instead like uncovering little wiki entries, almost, that show up in a dedicated tab in your sidebar as you play.

Revised Q&A

Q: Do you have sample code for how to emit different journal entries? For example, I'd like a permanent journal entry at game start when you have allied marauders that basically explain how marauders work, and that they can build Raiders if they have their own planets.

A: This has changed a LOT!

Where Do Do That Sort Of Permanent Logging

Now you will find the new instructions for that in the Q&A On How To Log Journal Entries From Custom Code.

Why We'd Use This Instead

So we've established at this point that nothing we do here is actually permanent, correct?

Okay. So, our purpose here is just to write to the chat log. This means a little popup on the right side of the screen for 10 seconds, and then it's visible in the chat window until 50 more messages are logged. Only the last 50 chat log messages are kept, whereas all journal entries are kept forever.

The goal of using something like this is probably to tell people about something that is happening right now ("hey, marauders are back for the 80th time, just thought you should know") in a conversational way that really makes them notice it, but without logging it forever (seriously, a journal full of 80 marauder attacks would be so overstuffed as to be incomprehensible.

One thing you should NOT do is use this AND a journal entry call for permanent logging. Why? Journal entries have chat_text built right in as a field on them, and they will already send a message to the chat log when they arrive, if the journal entry author feels that is warranted. Trust the journal entry author. If you do both, probably players will get double messages.

So here are some use cases for this sort of thing:

1. First off, to have something show up in the sidebar log for a second and then NOT go to the chat log -- and while we're at it, only go to the local player:

            World_AIW2.Instance.QueueChatMessageOrCommand( "Not enough energy to place " + typeToPlace.DisplayName, ChatType.ShowLocallyOnly, "CannotDoThatThing", context );

There are several overloads, but it's the new ChatType.ShowLocallyOnly that matters.

2. Taking a step up from that, let's tell everyone and dump that in the general chat log:

            World_AIW2.Instance.QueueChatMessageOrCommand( "Human Resistance Fighters arriving to reinforce " + targetPlanet.Name, ChatType.LogToCentralChat, "HumanResistanceFightersWarpInNeutralPlanet", Context );