Shapeshifter alliances

[PajdomanMokri]

I am trying to make a shapeshifter hero on one of my maps.
However, it is a bit problematic because, when he takes the shape of an enemy, his alliance would need to change so that he looks friendly to enemies, but remain friendly to his allies. Also, simply changing diplomacy wouldn't work because only the single unit should appear friendly, not all.

I have absolutely no idea how to make something like this and I'd be really thankful if you gave me some ideas.

 

[cleavinghammer]

The Rexxar campaign simply makes the "neutral" unit (a transport ship) invulnerable, maybe you can do that and remove the invulnerability as soon as the unit does something to blow his cover (uses an ability, goes into a forbidden area, gets too close to an enemy).

Or maybe you can add another player who owns the unit and give shared ownership, changing its diplomacy as needed.

 

[Gottfried]

You may simply use a trigger, when this unit used this ability activation, the enemy became ally and when the ability was deactivated, the ally turned to enemy.

 

[PajdomanMokri]

The Rexxar campaign simply makes the "neutral" unit (a transport ship) invulnerable, maybe you can do that and remove the invulnerability as soon as the unit does something to blow his cover (uses an ability, goes into a forbidden area, gets too close to an enemy).

Or maybe you can add another player who owns the unit and give shared ownership, changing its diplomacy as needed.

Invulnerability wouldn't work, because the enemy player would know he is being infiltrated and could prepare for it.
The shapeshifter should be an assassin and spy, and should specialize in assassinating warlords or other powerful units before battle.
Invisibility was an option before, but it is countered by true sight.

About the player, it might work, but since the map is split into 9 regions (with 9 players), there would be needed a total of 18 players (1 playing and 1 for diplomacy)... And it would be a problem.

Map is for playing against players, so the unit should be attackable and player who is spied on shouldn't be able to know it except by seeing the unit acts suspicious.

You may simply use a trigger, when this unit used this ability activation, the enemy became ally and when the ability was deactivated, the ally turned to enemy.

I explained in main post why that isn't an option.

 

[Gottfried]

Oh sorry... then you should add the enemy unit to neutral passive with retain color. Then when he deactivate that, then the enemy becomes enemy again.

 

[cleavinghammer]

Maybe you can make the shapeshifter's owner the same for everyone, if they're not supposed to attack each other.

 

[PajdomanMokri]

Maybe you can make the shapeshifter's owner the same for everyone, if they're not supposed to attack each other.

Shapeshifters shouldn't have the same owner, because one might be friendly to one player and enemy to other.
Let's say we have 6 players in teams of 2.
1st team has shapeshifter shapeshifted into 2nd team unit. He should seem friendly to 2nd team unit, but enemy to 3rd team unit (because they will see him as 2nd team). And now we make 3rd team shapeshift into 1st team and we have 2 shapeshifters that are enemies in normal alliances and their fake alliences.

Oh sorry... then you should add the enemy unit to neutral passive with retain color. Then when he deactivate that, then the enemy becomes enemy again.

The map is played by players on all slots, so by making all units neutral passive, it would make a player unable to control his units, which would ruin the game.

 

[Gottfried]

The map is played by players on all slots

Then... if you not use all player slots, a create new '"user player" and make that to ally to your enemy. When ability deactivated, the unit becomes enemy again for enemies.

If you use all of the 12 slot, then your problem seems unsolveable for me. :/ Sorry!

 

[SAUS]

I've never even checked or anything, but there are mechanical sheep or something lol. Maybe there's an ability that summons a unit like this? May as well check if that exists since it might be the easiest way to get started.

Otherwise, maybe you could make the hero turn invisible and spawn a neutral unit that follows it or something like that (or you could give it order to move the same as the hero and update the speed to match the hero). Might be a bunch of work to handle all the edge cases, though.

 

[PajdomanMokri]

I've never even checked or anything, but there are mechanical sheep or something lol. Maybe there's an ability that summons a unit like this? May as well check if that exists since it might be the easiest way to get started.

Otherwise, maybe you could make the hero turn invisible and spawn a neutral unit that follows it or something like that (or you could give it order to move the same as the hero and update the speed to match the hero). Might be a bunch of work to handle all the edge cases, though.

Invisibility is countered by true sight. And I want players to try to see unit behaving weird and then draw conclusions instead of seeing invisible unit that walks around their base followed by another unit.

Can you elaborate mechanical sheep idea? I never used mechanical sheep, so I'm not aware what it does.

 

[SAUS]

Invisibility is countered by true sight. And I want players to try to see unit behaving weird and then draw conclusions instead of seeing invisible unit that walks around their base followed by another unit.

Can you elaborate mechanical sheep idea? I never used mechanical sheep, so I'm not aware what it does.

I am not aware of what it does, either. I just remember seeing it when I was making stuff, so maybe there is an ability for it. If I had to guess, it gives you a sheep that looks like it's neutral, but actually gives you vision. I figure it's worth investigating before going with a complex strategy to make it work, but I have never looked into it at all. I could investigate a bit myself, but it'll have to wait. Gonna be super busy this weekend.