[Guide] How I made my charters young again. Immortal trait.

[mellester1]

LATE EDIT: I changed my approach, see below. I recommend currently adding the dna_modifier to gfx\portraits\portrait_modifiers\AB_Imortal.txt not a trait

So i managed to make a trait that will remove 50 years of someone live and make them look young again.
It works like this.
Every character has genes that determine How it looks. The most important ones are defined in "common\genes\00_genes.txt"
In it there is a special age gene. whos strength will determine how the person looks in old age.
A few things to note

• There are 5 different sub age genes. old_1 to old_5. one will be picked at random
• By default the MAX_AGE is 100. a 101 year old will look the same as a 100 year old
• every sub_age gene is split up in again male,boy,female,girl. whe can ignore the boy and girl parts.
• Most statements and conditions like if = {}. I have not gotten to work in _genes.txt. so we need a difrent trick
  
• Instead we can use "required_tags = not(unaging)" to disable certain looks we don't like for our immortal charter. However this is limited to morph sub-gene decals, settings, and texture_overrides. will be important.

So we cant use condition like one would want to do

if = {
     limit = {
      NOT = { has_trait = imortal}
     age < 50
               }
      }
#aging code here
}

 

[mellester1]

But we have a way around it.
Take a look a the blind trait already in the game

blind = {
    type = health
    finesse = -3
    dna_modifiers = {
        accessory = {
            mode = replace     #overwrite this gene in the dna with the specified template and value
    
            gene = eye_accessory
            template = blindfold_1
            value = 1
        }
    }
}

It is a trait that modifies the dna of a person.
This works nicely if say you wanna change the skin color of a charter to blue and have a blue man group trait in you game.
However when you try and do

    dna_modifiers = {
        morph = {
            mode = replace
            gene = age
                        template = old_1
                       value = 0.5
}}

to turn your pop into a 50 year old. It will print out a error in the log that you are not allowed to modifiers this special gene.
so we need a work around.
Basically we need to make a new gene that disables or reverses the effects of aging.
And then we add that to the character.
There is a nice example already in the genes.txt. namely

special_genes = {
morph_genes={
      gene_tags = {
            no_hair = { index = 0 set_tags = "no_hair" }
}}

this gene is found at the bottom of _genes.txt. All it does is set a "tag" which will turn of or enable those other genes that required_tags = "no_hair".
This way you can very easily make a shame trait. so that you can shave all those people that failed the nation.
So we can make our own.

        gene_tags = {
            no_hair = { index = 0 set_tags = "no_hair" }
            unaging ={   index = 1  set_tags = "unaging"}

This look like a simple solution but there is a problem.
When we go and add the required_tags = "not(unaging)" we run in to a problem.
Every sub_gene and every person type has 4 effects for aging.

• setting = { animation_curve = { ... } }
• a skin decal
• a hair hsv shift (grey hair)
• a skin hsv shift

We can only use required_tags = "not(unaging)" for the setting block and the Decal.
The hair_hsv_shift_curve function is not used anywhere else but the age gene and cant be affected by tags or wrapped in a settings block. So as far as I know you can only tweak the numbers and outright disable aging for everyone in the world. But not for specific people and groups.

So a another work around needs to be found.
because hair_hsv_shift_curve cant be on a disabled. We can do the next best thing.
And add another hair_hsv_shift_curve but with the negative values. this will Undo the effects of aging for only the characters with that new gene we add by trait.

        gene_tags = {
            no_hair = { index = 0 set_tags = "no_hair" }
            # full_hair = { index = 1 set_tags = "full_hair" }
            unaging ={
            index = 1
            set_tags = "unaging"
            #set_tags = "test1,test3"
            male = {
                    hair_hsv_shift_curve = {
                        #age    {hsv change} 
                        { 0.35    { 0.0 0.0 0.0 } }
                        { 0.6   { 0.0 0.5 -0.3 } }
                    }
                    skin_hsv_shift_curve = {
                    #age    {hsv change} 
                    { 0.55    { 0.0 0.0 0.0 } }
                    { 0.8   { 0.0 0.1 -0.02 } }
                }
            }               
        }

So now we make a trait that adds this gene.

unaging = {
    type = health
    dna_modifiers = {
        morph = {
            mode = add    #add this gene in the dna with the specified template and value
            gene = gene_tags
            template = unaging
            value = 0.5 #removes 50 years of aging. Max age is 100 so a 150 year will look like a 50 year old too
        } 
    }
}

I have omitted the parts needed for females. I leave that as a exercise to the reader

 

[Blood Royal]

Wow, this is HUGE!

I didn't think it was possible, and not for lack of trying

Awesome work, now I can really differentiate aging for elves, dwarves, etc. and still have humans age as normal. Up to now in my LOTR mod I've had to disable all aging for everyone at age 30.

 

[mellester1]

dna_modifiers = { value = #scripted_valuehere?}

dna modifier only accepts Literal values so so you cant use scripted values. So they have the gene be stronger or weaker depending on the age of the charter some other tricks need to bo used

 

[mellester1]

update this what I ended up with to gradually fix the aging problem

#\gfx\portraits\portrait_modifiers\AB_Imortal.txt
Unaging_group1 = {
    Unaging1 = {
        dna_modifiers = {
            morph = {
                mode = add   #add a new gene in the dna with the specified template and value
                gene = gene_tags
                template = unaging
                # a value of 0.5 would remove 50 years of age from a char.
                #Max age for portraits is 100 so a 400 year old char will look like 50 too
                value = 0.2
            }  
        }
        weight = {
            base = 0
            modifier = {
                add = 1
                AND = {
                    char_is_unaging_trigger = yes
                    age >= 50
                }
            }
        }
    }
}

Unaging_group2 = {
    Unaging2 = {
        dna_modifiers = {
            morph = {
                mode = add    #add a new gene in the dna with the specified template and value
                gene = gene_tags
                template = unaging
                # a value of 0.5 would remove 50 years of age from a char.
                #Max age for portraits is 100 so a 400 year old char will look like 50 too
                value = 0.4
            }  
        }
        weight = {
            base = 0
            modifier = {
                add = 1
                AND = {
                char_is_unaging_trigger = yes
                age >= 70
                }
            }
        }
    }
}
Unaging_group3 = {
    Unaging3 = {
        dna_modifiers = {
            morph = {
                mode = add    #add a new gene in the dna with the specified template and value
                gene = gene_tags
                template = unaging
                # a value of 0.5 would remove 50 years of age from a char.
                #Max age for portraits is 100 so a 400 year old char will look like 50 too
                value = 0.6
            }  
        }
        weight = {
            base = 0
            modifier = {
                add = 1
                AND = {
                char_is_unaging_trigger = yes
                age >= 90
                }
            }
        }
    }
}

 

[suplanter]

update this what I ended up with to gradually fix the aging problem

How did you use the char_is_unaging_trigger?

 

[mellester1]

How did you use the char_is_unaging_trigger?

#common\scripted_triggers\01_trait_groups.txt
char_is_vampire_trigger = {
    OR = {
has_trait = vampire
has_trait = brujah
#more traits here        
}
}


# determine if age should not affect a char
char_is_unaging_trigger = {
    OR = {
char_is_vampire_trigger = yes
#more traits here
}
}

Triggers are are checks to see if the a person has a certain trait

 

[Shalassan]

Hello,

So basically you use \gfx\portraits\portrait_modifiers\ to add/change the new gene "unaging" if i understand all correctly?
So i have a few questions with this.
First the Unaging gene is definied this way

                  hair_hsv_shift_curve = {
                        #age    {hsv change}
                        { 0.35    { 0.0 0.0 0.0 } }
                        { 0.6   { 0.0 0.5 -0.3 } }
                    }
                    skin_hsv_shift_curve = {
                        #age    {hsv change}
                        { 0.55    { 0.0 0.0 0.0 } }
                        { 0.8    { 0.0 0.1 -0.02 } }

Not absolutely sure what it means but to my understanding with a gene strength of 0.35 or less the color won't be changed and at 0.6 saturation will go up by 50% and light reduced by 30.
The normal aging is

                        #age    {hsv change}
                        { 0.45  { 0.0 0.0 0.0 } }
                        { 0.65   { 0.0 -1 0.3 } }
                    }
                    skin_hsv_shift_curve = {
                        #age    {hsv change}
                        { 0.55  { 0.0 0.0 0.0 } }
                        { 0.8   { 0.0 -0.1 0.02 } }

So that means hairs will still loose 50% of saturation right? (-1+0.5) and it might not be noticeable on blond or black hairs but what with red or fancy colors? Shouldn't the unaging code be the exact opposite of the aging code?

The second question is more about LoTR mod as it's using this trick i wanted to see how it was done actually in game to understand perfectly how it works. And i've seen a bit of code not in this thread. The aging genes have been modified this way :

                    setting = {
                                            required_tags = "not(unaging)" #added code in LOTR
                                            attribute = "bs_old5"    value = { min = 0.0 max = 1.0 }
                        animation_curve = {
                            {0.0 0.0}
                            { 0.3 0 }
                            { 0.8 1.0 }
                        }
                    }
                    decal = {
                        required_tags = "not(unaging)" #added code in LOTR
                        type = skin
                        atlas_pos = { 3 1 }
                        alpha_curve = {
                            { 0.32  0.0 }
                            { 0.75   1.0 }
                        }
                    }

So i was wondering what those required_tags = "not(unaging)" were doing, are they working at all? If they are effectively preventing the aging mechanic then the scripted portrait is useless, and if the portrait is required, then this part do not really seem useful right? So i wanted to know if there was some sort of reason i don't understand yet before starting to mess too much with something i don't completely understand so far.