I need to know: is there a conflict between going pirate and personal forts?

[Fluen]

I have reached that stage in Tales of a Sea Hawk, where I've become enemies with Silehart and thus England.

Earlier I have expressed my desire to conquer all of the Caribbean. When I because of the storyline became enemies with France and its ally Spain, I took the opportunity to conquer all of the French and Spanish towns save the ones on Martinique and Puerto Rico. I spared those to avoid potential conflicts with sidequests.

I intend to begin my conquest of the English towns. But I don't have a letter of marque any longer. So my actions will be deemed pirate actions. And as all greater nations in the Caribbean are allied in two groups, I have no way to get a letter of marque. My only resort is to ally with the pirates or become a rogue pirate.

How will this affect my personal forts? Will they consider me a pirate and shoot at me, when I enter the ports, they guard? Threads on these forums indicate so.

 

[Grey Roger]

Pirates are just another nation. Your forts follow normal nation relation rules. If they see you under a Pirate flag and you are hostile to Pirates, the forts will fire, just as they would if they saw you under a Spanish flag. If you always raise your Personal flag before approaching your islands, you should be safe.

If you join the Pirates then you're friendly to them, so are your forts, and you can approach your islands safely under a Pirate flag.

You can't conquer Puerto Rico or Martinique, or any other island used by the story, even if you want to. The story code prevents it. Once you have completed the storyline, the blocks are lifted and you should be able to complete your conquest.

 

[Pieter Boelen]

Yes.
I would call that a Personal Conflict.

 

[Fluen]

Thank you.

 

[Grey Roger]

Another thought:

As I recall, previous problems were that someone had taken a colony for himself while flying a Pirate flag and being hostile to Pirates, then the Personal soldiers in the tavern tried to arrest him for being a Pirate and couldn't because Personal soldiers aren't allowed to attack the player. The other people in the tavern became incommunicative and remained so. The first was fixed by preventing Personal soldiers from getting to the dialog about arresting you. As a failsafe, the second is fixed for the specific incident in "Tales of a Sea Hawk" in which you're required to take Bridgetown for yourself; shortly afterwards, the tavern keeper and waitress are set to their normal behaviour in case they've gone into the weird, incommunicative state.

But these are just patches for symptoms. The underlying problem is capturing a town for yourself while being under a flag hostile to yourself, so the town may regard you as your own enemy. Try downloading this and putting it into "PROGRAM\Towns". With this version, if you capture a town for yourself while under a hostile flag, you'll automatically raise your Personal flag. I've done a bit of testing using a late-story save from an "Ardent" campaign so I have a big warship with which to take a town:
1: Capture a French town while flying a Spanish flag. The story has set me friendly to Spain. End result: still under Spanish flag.
2: Capture a French town while flying a Dutch flag. Holland is still hostile to me. End result: switched to Personal flag.
3: Capture a French town while flying a Personal flag, the reason being that some of the code for checking relations looked as though it might do odd things if checking for relations with PERSONAL_NATION. It shouldn't be a problem otherwise anyone using a Personal flag routinely ought to have run into serious trouble by now, but it does no harm to try it anyway. End result: still under Personal flag, no problems evident.

Now it's your turn, @Fluen. Partly because your campaign to conquer lots of towns for yourself makes you the ideal person to test this, and partly because you're better at finding bugs than I am. Give it a try and see what happens...

 

[Fluen]

So you want me to disguise myself as an enemy of myself (currently English, Spanish and French) and attack a fort, then see, if I'll automatically raise my personal flag. Have I understood correctly?

As an eager player and builder of custom Tomb Raider levels, it's my experience, that players usually are better at finding the bugs/errors, because they don't think the way, the builder does, and do thing very differently.

Captain, it's your lucky day! You've got yourself an imperial class nitpicker. I haven't even made any comments on the small errors, I've found in the dialogues.

 

[Grey Roger]

So you want me to disguise myself as an enemy of myself (currently English, Spanish and French) and attack a fort, then see, if I'll automatically raise my personal flag. Have I understood correctly?

Yes - and then go into the tavern to check that people behave properly and do not refuse to talk to you. You can also use a flag friendly to yourself, check that you do not automatically raise your personal flag, and also see what the tavern people do.

Captain, it's your lucky day! You've got yourself an imperial class nitpicker. I haven't even made any comments on the small errors, I've found in the dialogues.

Dialogs are something you might be able to fix yourself. The text is in "PROGRAM\DIALOGS\ENGLISH" (or, if you're still playing "Tales of a Sea Hawk", dialog for characters specific to the storyline will be in "PROGRAM\Storyline\standard\DIALOGS\ENGLISH"). It's plain text so you should be able to edit it with the text editing program of your choice. Find the mistake you spotted and correct it.

 

[Fluen]

Concerning the test of towntable.c: am I supposed to raise a different flag between the conquest of the town and my visit to the tavern?

Concerning the dialogues: I did that once, but with every update you people make, I'd just have to do it over again. From my point of view it's better that you correct them, so they stay corrected.

 

[DavyJack]

Concerning the dialogues: I did that once, but with every update you people make, I'd just have to do it over again. From my point of view it's better that you correct them, so they stay corrected.

Make those changes and attach your corrected files here or make another thread dedicated to your fixes so @Grey Roger can include them in the next update. Might even mention you and give you a badge for your contributions.

And something to think about; when you make your own modifications/fixes to certain files it is always a good idea to make a backup and put them in a separate folder outside the game especially when you've put quite a lot of effort into it for future references.

EDIT:
This is what mine looks like/how it's set up.

 

[Grey Roger]

Make those changes and attach your corrected files here or make another thread dedicated to your fixes so @Grey Roger can include them in the next update. Might even mention you and give you a badge for your contributions.

No "might" about it. Upload your corrected files and I'll give them a quick check - don't take it personally, everything which goes into an update gets at least a quick check, including my own stuff! Then the files go into the next update and your name goes into "fixes.txt" and "Build Info.txt". Unfortunately I have no badges to give out, so you can have some badgers instead.

And something to think about; when you make your own modifications/fixes to certain files it is always a good idea to make a backup and put them in a separate folder outside the game especially when you've put quite a lot of effort into it for future references.

Yes, I also have several entire different installations for this reason. If something goes horribly wrong, I can get the older versions of files back from one of the older installations.

 

[Fluen]

Fine, I'll do that. And yes, I'm a great fan of backups and lots of clearly defined folders. Checks are also fine, I'm not a native user of English, so of course I make errors too.

I repeat my question from post 8: concerning the test of towntable.c: am I supposed to raise a different flag between the conquest of the town and my visit to the tavern?

This leads me to a question about the new names of pirate ships. Are the new ones from historical pirate ships? I'm wondering, because I have difficulties believing, that very superstitious sailors (as they were in those days) would name a ship something like Deathwish.

 

[Grey Roger]

I repeat my question from post 8: concerning the test of towntable.c: am I supposed to raise a different flag between the conquest of the town and my visit to the tavern?

You can if you like, but it shouldn't be necessary. The usual problem is likely to be when someone does not do that - they conquer the town while flying a pirate flag, for example, but are themselves hostile to pirates. Then they don't change flag, go to the tavern while still telling the world that they're pirates, and a soldier in the tavern believes them.

On second thoughts, try it anyway. Conquer the town while flying a pirate flag. If you haven't made peace with the pirates then that's a flag hostile to yourself and the new "Towntable.c" should raise your Personal flag. Go to the ship and change back to a pirate flag, then go to the tavern and talk to any soldier you find there, repeatedly. He shouldn't try to arrest you because of a revised dialog file ("random_guards_group_dialog.c", if you're interested) which should block Personal soldiers from the arrest dialog. See if the other inhabitants start behaving oddly, e.g. refusing to talk at all.

This leads me to a question about the new names of pirate ships. Are the new ones from historical pirate ships? I'm wondering, because I have difficulties believing, that very superstitious sailors (as they were in those days) would name a ship something like Deathwish.

They aren't historical names. Someone decided about 3 years ago that pirate ships needed more varied names and added them to "PROGRAM\Ships\ships_name.c". The idea of names like Deathwish is perhaps to scare the superstitious sailors on enemy ships. If you have ideas for other pirate ship names, you could always add a few more...

 

[Fluen]

On second thoughts, try it anyway. Conquer the town while flying a pirate flag. If you haven't made peace with the pirates then that's a flag hostile to yourself and the new "Towntable.c" should raise your Personal flag. Go to the ship and change back to a pirate flag, then go to the tavern and talk to any soldier you find there, repeatedly. He shouldn't try to arrest you because of a revised dialog file ("random_guards_group_dialog.c", if you're interested) which should block Personal soldiers from the arrest dialog. See if the other inhabitants start behaving oddly, e.g. refusing to talk at all.

I will test with the French, Spanish and English flags. The pirate flag may last a while, because I've just made friends with them.

They aren't historical names. Someone decided about 3 years ago that pirate ships needed more varied names and added them to "PROGRAM\Ships\ships_name.c". The idea of names like Deathwish is perhaps to scare the superstitious sailors on enemy ships. If you have ideas for other pirate ship names, you could always add a few more...

I ask, because I some five years ago added the ships names from the books about Horatio Hornblower and offered the updated file to the modders here. Some were displeased, because that introduced ships names from the Napoleonic period into other periods. The current modders have clearly abandoned the idea of historical ships names, then.

 

[Grey Roger]

I will test with the French, Spanish and English flags. The pirate flag may last a while, because I've just made friends with them.

For a quick test, perhaps reload an old savegame from before you made friends with them. Otherwise, although the problem was originally observed by someone who had flown a pirate flag while conquering a town for himself, I'd imagine that it would also happen if you conquer a French town while flying a British flag after Silehard has turned Britain hostile to you. (Except that if the new "Towntable.c" forcibly hoists a Personal flag for you, the problem shouldn't happen unless you then go back to your ship deck and hoist a hostile flag again. If someone is that determined to get into trouble, they can have it. )

I ask, because I some five years ago added the ships names from the books about Horatio Hornblower and offered the updated file to the modders here. Some were displeased, because that introduced ships names from the Napoleonic period into other periods. The current modders have clearly abandoned the idea of historical ships names, then.

Please upload it again, then. For one thing, ship names were re-used on different ships throughout history. (There have been numerous British warships named Dreadnought in the past and there's probably going to be another one in the not too distant future.) For another, there are other ships whose names make no sense in certain periods. Among French ships, for example, Dauphin Royal probably doesn't make much sense in "Napoleonic" period, while Commerce de Bordeaux and Tricolore don't make much sense in any other. Several ship names are in honour of famous people and make no sense in periods before the people in question had lived, become famous and died.

So, lets have the new British names again - but check whether the "Hornblower" names are already in there. Caroline and Lydia are already included, and they're just the first two which I spotted and recognised, there may be more.

 

[Fluen]

For a quick test, perhaps reload an old savegame from before you made friends with them. Otherwise, although the problem was originally observed by someone who had flown a pirate flag while conquering a town for himself, I'd imagine that it would also happen if you conquer a French town while flying a British flag after Silehard has turned Britain hostile to you. (Except that if the new "Towntable.c" forcibly hoists a Personal flag for you, the problem shouldn't happen unless you then go back to your ship deck and hoist a hostile flag again. If someone is that determined to get into trouble, they can have it. )

Sorry, but I'm too lazy to go through all the trouble with defeating a fort just for a test. You'll just have to wait, until I turn on the pirate nation and attack Turks Island.

 

[Fluen]

Please upload it again, then. For one thing, ship names were re-used on different ships throughout history. (There have been numerous British warships named Dreadnought in the past and there's probably going to be another one in the not too distant future.) For another, there are other ships whose names make no sense in certain periods. Among French ships, for example, Dauphin Royal probably doesn't make much sense in "Napoleonic" period, while Commerce de Bordeaux and Tricolore don't make much sense in any other. Several ship names are in honour of famous people and make no sense in periods before the people in question had lived, become famous and died.

So, lets have the new British names again - but check whether the "Hornblower" names are already in there. Caroline and Lydia are already included, and they're just the first two which I spotted and recognised, there may be more.

I'm sorry, but it appears, that I wrote the names directly into my own version of the file with the ships names. Back then I also tidied it up and put all entries in alphabetic order for each nation and deleted double (and some triple) entries per nation. So while I have that file, I no longer know, which of the names, I found in the Hornblower books.

Back then I faithfully added all found names under the nation, they appeared in in the Hornblower books. So English ships taken and repurposed by the French like Witch of Endor were put under French ships, and similarly for French ships taken by the English.

At the same time I read books about ships of the line in the Napoleonic period to understand the Hornblower books, and I added the names found there as well. Because it at the time was custom by the English to name a new ship of the line after a taken French ship, several of those names were French.

I took a look at the current file with ships names and can see, that the lists are changed. Firstly, the alphabetic order has gone. And secondly, names like Witch of Endor and Christian VII and Danmark (Danish ships Hornblower met, when he aided Russia) and Medjidieh (Turkish ship) have been deleted.

I can only assume, that people deleted the names, they found strange, and kept the rest.

 

[Grey Roger]

Another thing about Hornblower's ships is that, if you start a FreePlay as Hornblower - especially if you start right at the bottom as Midshipman Hornblower - you should recognise the ships which you'll receive when you start and when you're promoted. (This also means that if you want a quick reminder of Hornblower's ships, look at "PROGRAM\NK.c", function 'GivePromotionReward', and see what Hornblower receives at each rank.)

I don't know where Hornblower gets the Witch of Endor in the books. In the old film "Captain Horatio Hornblower RN", he gets it from the Dutch, although it's in a French port. In any case, with a name like that, it's presumably an ex-British ship captured by the Dutch (or French), and the film shows some British sailors as prisoners on board. All of which means that the name would be better for British ships than French or Dutch.

Danish and Turkish names might be useful if the "Hornblower" storyline ever gets to the point where those ships are needed, but someone may have decided that they're not very appropriate for general British ships.

 

[Fluen]

I didn't just write the names of Hornblower's ships into the file. I wrote down any ship name, I came across. I think, Hornblower saw Witch of Endor in a French harbour, but I don't remember, if he tried to flee, or if the town was occupied by the English. Medjidieh was a ship guarding an area, that contained a wreck with money, Hornblower had order to get. I put all names of ships of nations not in the Caribbean into the Pirates nation.

About correcting dialogues: do you want whole files or just the lines, I have corrected?

 

[Grey Roger]

In the film, Hornblower and an officer are taken prisoner, have to travel by coach to another town, and overpower their guards on the way. In the French town they see the Witch of Endor manned by Dutch officers and British prisoners as crew. They follow a couple of Dutch officers down an alley and mug them for their uniforms, then go aboard, reveal who they are to the prisoners and incite them to riot. Then they set sail for Britain, where a lookout recognises the ship. So the Witch of Endor was presumably British, captured by the Dutch, and retaken by Hornblower, which is why Hornblower gets a cutter named Witch of Endor in FreePlay if he either starts as Lieutenant or is promoted from Midshipman. (And generic FreePlay British midshipmen get the same ship right away.)

Dialogs: the whole files are easier for me as I will use WinMerge to see what has changed. And probably easier for you too, since you don't need to pick out all the changes and copy them into a different file.

 

[Fluen]

An update to the test of conquering enemy towns flying a flag hostile to myself. I have also taken Governor's Harbour (English) flying a French flag. Again your modification worked, and I automatically flew my personal flag, when I left the townhall. And the innkeeper acted normally, when I visited him.

But I later re-entered the tavern with my crewmembers into a tavernbrawl - except nobody was brawling. The danger music played, but everyboy just stood around. Both the brawlers, my crewmembers and my personal soldiers. I was afraid of a bug, which could ruin my chances of future conquest, so I immediately reloaded. I'll try to keep a log of, what happens if I encounter a tavernbrawl in my personal towns.