EDF Design Document by Koralt, 2003 (c) the Earth's Defence Force Project, 2003 www.edf-project.org The EDF team reserves the copyright on this document. You may change the format in which it is presented provided that the contents are not modified. Please contact us if you wish to use these ideas for some purpose other than EDF, wish to translate it, or wish to help the project. TECHNICAL GLOSSARY this is not meant to be a substitute for a careful reading of the actual design document, but rather to clarify points that are made in it. don't think you'll get the whole game just by reading this section. active orders- orders which results in a modification of physical environment or behaviour, such as movement, firing, and standing orders. see: inactive orders, orders, standing orders actor- any active element of the game world, capable of deliberately affecting other actors. items, vehicles and units are all examples of these, although only units can take player orders. the distinction between types of actors are essentially arbitrary. see: player, orders, unit, vehicle AI hierarchy- applied node- auxiliary AI- the AI, also called unit AI, that decides what a unit wants to do and how it will interpret orders given it by players. see: AI hierarchy, command AI, player, orders, unit command AI- dynamical system- in mathematics, a system of variables which is modified, usually over time. a game like EDF is an example of a particularly complicated dynamical system. some dynamical systems are linear, others are chaotic. EDF is a chaotic dynamical system, in which small changes in conditions have massive effects on the final results. see: EDF- the Earth's Defence Force. this refers both to the game and to the project that is developing it. EDFpedia- the collection of all knowledge known to EDF, in a form presentable to a human player. see: research web empirical node- see: observational node, research node, research web game interface- see: interface inactive orders- orders which merely request information, such as unit location, knowledge, or condition. see: active orders, orders interface- something which gives orders to units, either active or inactive. an interface may interpret a human player's commands in order to give orders to units, and it may interpret information obtained from the units in order to present a graphical or auditory representation to a human player. see: orders, player, unit item- an actor that has no auxiliary AI and cannot be given orders by a player, but which can be manipulated by units. see: actor, orders, player, unit modularity- the theory that the game should broken up into a set of modules, each entirely encapsulated, that communicate with one another and can be separately improved. see: module module- node- see: research node observational node- orders- commands given by an interface to a unit instructing it in what the interface would like it to do. these commands are then interpreted by the unit's auxiliary AI, which then responds to them appropriately. the unit can decide, at its own will, whether to obey an order given to it by any interface; usually, a unit will obey only one interface. EDF operatives, for instance, will only obey commands given by the interface representing the EDF player. many orders may be given to each unit each turn, and will be rejected or executed immediately. if a unit refuses an order, that order simply has no bearing on the game; no time units are wasted, no morale is changed. see: auxiliary AI, interface, player, standing orders, unit pedia- see: EDFpedia player- any game interface that attempts to give active orders to units. a player can be a human, an AI internal to the game, or another player (again, either human or AI) connected over a network. see: interface, orders, unit project- see: research project, EDF research node- research project- research web- standing orders- an order given which modifies the state of a unit, changing the way in which that unit interprets other orders. standing orders usually mean to ignore commands to the contrary, but can also change the internal state of a unit. the order not to fire during an enemy's turn is one example of a standing order. see: auxiliary AI, orders, turn strategy- tactics- TAK- an evil alien creature with a myriad great ideas for the development of EDF. ;) time units- the primary unit of movement in EDF, as in X-COM. technically, a measure of velocity. In X-COM's system of measurement, 4 TUs indicate the ability to move 1 meter in one turn (3 seconds), by which system TU=v*12, with v in m/s. However, if time units are used for some purpose other than movement, then maxTU=v*12, where v is the maximum speed, and actionTU=(actionTime/3s)*maxTU. see: turn theoretical node- TU- see: time units turn- in turn based play, a turn is the time during which one side of a conflict is allowed to move. the standing order not to do anything until further order is automatically given, if a player controls the side; any units whose auxiliary AIs tell them to ignore this command will immediately act, mirroring the behaviour of "panic" and "beserk" in X-COM. see: auxiliary AIs, orders, player, standing orders unit- a type of actor, the fundamental object of player interaction with the EDF world. units can be given orders by and can report information to interfaces. see: actor, interface, orders, auxiliary AI unit AI- see: auxiliary AI vehicle- an actor that may or may not have auxiliary AI but which cannot take orders from a player and cannot make decisions based on desire as units may. see: actor, orders, player, unit web- see: research web