I might know how to make MM6 Reanimate Spell useful

[Super Goober]

In MM7 and MM8, you could raise the dead to fight your enemies. Doing this in the Arena was a heckload of fun. But the untouched beauty of Reanimate lies in MM6.

Reanimate is quite possibly the least useful spell in the entire game. Well, I may have found a solution.

MM7 and 8 both had a file named "Hostile.txt" That file controlled which monsters would attack certain kinds. I was wondering if it was possible to create a very similar txt file that makes MM6 monsters attack each other, depending on the Hostility Scale.

Right now, every single monster in the game (apart from peasants) is set to 4 against the party and nothing else. If someone could make a MM6 version of Hostile.txt, he/she/they would succeed where the developers of MM6 have failed).

I've always wanted to enter the Superior Temple of Baa, into the big room, where all the Clerics, Druids, and Magicians are, kill some of them, then raise my own army, watching projectiles fly everywhere.

That would be bliss for many players who love the Reanimate Spell.

Unfortunately, I'm not savvy enough with scripting or anything more than simply changing numbers and letters.

Also, decreasing the cost of Reanimate (since it is a dark spell) would be lovely too.

EDIT: I can see a couple problems with carrying this out.

You may have to create a "blocker" script to nullify the effects of the "Hst" part of MONSTERS.txt. That is, if you're making an exact replica of MM7 + 8's Hostile.txt.

Also, I don't think simply inserting a Hostile.txt in MM6 is going to do anything. You may have to make a script that enables monsters to go hostile with each other (the bad creatures don't even attack villagers).

This is why I don't want to mess with the files to the extent I'm talking about.

[GreatEmerald]

There's one more problem: there are no attack animations for creatures when fighting enemies not directly in front of the player's camera.

[Super Goober]

I thought about that earlier but forgot to mention it. Thanks for the tip .

Maybe there's an artist art there who could help. My skill is limited with sprite art (I can hardly shade, let along do something as high-skill as this).

It might not be as hard as starting a brand new sprite set from scratch, but it's still too hard for me.

Any willing artists out there can study the frontal attack sprites as a reference.

But even if there were no custom attack sprites (like some spellcasters in MM7 + 8), it wouldn't kill the gameplay. It would just be a bit annoying. However, non-frontal attack sprites would greatly improve the gameplay.

The sprite animations are second to functionality in priority (a bit wordy, I know). There can be a testing version without the custom sprites. The final version hopefully will include custom sprites. It will take a heck of a long time and much effort to make these sprites, though.

EDIT: I just scanned through the sprite files and I also found that we need directional wincing animations too, but that can come later.

[default8p]

Probably wouldn't be as easy as to just add the sprites (even if someone does redo all the sprites to include those animations) - the engine would have to know how to use them also. But the bigger problem probably lies in the creatures attacking creatures thing, MM6 doesn't have any creatures that fight among each other does it? So it's probably not even possible unless you make heavy edits to the engine but just for this mod would be kind of pointless

[Super Goober]

Probably wouldn't be as easy as to just add the sprites (even if someone does redo all the sprites to include those animations) - the engine would have to know how to use them also. But the bigger problem probably lies in the creatures attacking creatures thing, MM6 doesn't have any creatures that fight among each other does it? So it's probably not even possible unless you make heavy edits to the engine but just for this mod would be kind of pointless

Actually, I don't think making monsters attack each other is that hard to do, especially with Greyface's MMExtention. Greyface added brand new features to the game, including mouselook in his latest version. That was never there in the original version in any way, shape, or form.

All the monsters (except for peasants) have a hostile rating against your party, so that's a start. Plus, with MMExtension, you can actually change the monsters' aggression towards you in specific places (like the archers in Frozen Highland, for example). All that needs to happen is something that makes the monsters think that other monsters are the player, and we have a great start. Then work can begin on a MM6 version of Hostile.txt. Once MM6 can recognize Hostile.txt, then we can start changing the way Reanimate works. If people can change the damage on spells, then what's stopping people from changing the effects too.

The creatures that are reanimated will have a player aggression of 0 and will target monsters that have anything other than 0 (which is always 4).

Then hopefully, the work on sprites can begin, once a testing version is released and de-bugged. Doesn't sound so pointless now, does it? Reanimate was a fun spell to use in MM7-8, so I think people would enjoy a Reanimate spell with a use in MM6.

Who can resist raising an army of Warlocks, Druids, and Clerics in the Superior Temple of Baa?

[vladimir-maestro]

BDJ wrote about it.
there is no action for monster friendly\hostility. even town guards not attack monsters when they are next to them.

so you cannot create this in easy way, only hardcoding

[motter28218]

I asked Grayface about this and he said it was pretty much impossible in MM6 and in my experience if Grayface, BDJ, or MikeK say it can't be done it most likely can't. (Obviously ofcourse there is no such thing as "can't", I mean anything can be done it's just some things would take a monumental amount of work to the point of redesigning the whole game, and I don't know if anyone wants to or can take on such a project by themself.)

[Gothehell]

I have try a lot to make an account just to tell you to use your brain...
I have not see in my life more stupid bot filter from this site!

The answer is YES the reanimate spell is the most useful spell on the game, you just need to put skill points on Dark Magic to skill 44-45 (enough level to reanimate gold dragon), then you can kill them again and again, so...you can reach super high level.
The Elrond's M&M 6 Editor can give you level 255, if you know how to use the game you can go better, just use some of your brain...

I have reach level 750+ with no cheat, the problem is the money, you need a lot and the game is not enough for this amount except if you play the first version with the untouched treasure, you know...the rock-chest on the dragon sand desert, you need to read the obelisks to open and each time you are open it is giving you 250.000 gold, the designer was knew why has make this and some smart asses have disable this as a bug.

The concept of M&M is equal to life, "If you have money and you are smart, you can do anything"!

[Thonkerton]

Since the thread was reanimated, might as well mention that the Merge already does what OP wants. I don't know how it was done but I can reanimate New Sorpigal goblins to fight each other just fine. Since there's obviously no new animations, the goblin just looks at the other goblin and the attack animation is same as if the goblin is attacking player (looking at the player that is). It looks a bit odd but hardly a world ending issue.