Instructions:
color conventions: "Shouts"   "Dialog nodes."   Scripts

Get Genji's Art of War (referred to as GAOW from here down) , and drag it from your inventory to your quickbar. (You will use this almost every round; you will want it on the quick bar since activating it is the default click on the quick bar ).

Click GAOW, and then click yourself.
 --  Your Field Marshal ports in and talks to you. There can be up to four Field Marshal's at any given time. Each one will be designated with a different color flag, and each one will only listen to his general. In conversation, He only offers secondary orders and assign new units at first since you don't have any units yet. Choose "Assign New Unit."
 --  There are some options on what kind of unit to pick, so pick one, say "Create unit by Racial Type." Then, after the marshal says to pick a soldier to start the unit, click GAOW (or hit the hotkey associated with it, since you placed it in your quickslot didn't you?) and then click a solider, let's say an orc.
 --  The marshal will come back to you and ask how many you want in a unit, say 6, and then you have a new unit named Alpha with 6 orcs in it, picked from other creatures (that are orcs) as close to the first soldier as possible, and are part of the first soldier's faction ( unless the general is a DM ). You can have up to ten units. The current max per unit is twenty soldiers. If you want a unit bigger than that you might want to rethink your tactics. 20 will be very hard to handle (pathfinding...)

You have a unit now, so your orders are fully opened to you.
 --  To run to a location, select "Run to Location.", pick a unit from the list presented in conversation, and after the "Choose location for unit Alpha to move to." node, click GAOW and then click a location.
 --  To form up a unit, select "Set Unit Formation.", choose "Form up Unit in 2 columns.", select the unit, and the marshal will say "Choose soldier from Unit Alpha to form on.". you can either 2) tell him to form Alpha up on itself, in which case Alpha will select one soldier as the front left man and form a 2 person column to the rear of that soldier. If you pick 1), the conversation ends and you click GAOW and click a soldier of that unit (the unit will momentarily glow green underfoot to see who is in the unit). The soldier clicked becomes the front left man (the unit leader) and Alpha will form up on him.

[ I have seen a few formation scripts in my time here, and mine is by far the best. The members of whatever unit you are forming up can be almost anywhere and they will get as close to a formation as they can. I sometimes have to tell them to form up twice, but I have never had to tell them three times ( not that that is a challenge, I'm sure it's doable...). There is a lot of logic that goes into how they form up; it is not as simple as it looks. And this is with the piss poor path finding that the game currently has, if that gets better ( I pray it will ) this way of forming up will be bullet proof.

UPDATED 8.18.02 - the formation algorithm now includes the ability for a soldier that is blocked by another soldier in his unit to "bump" that soldier to the location he was running to and take that blocking soldier's place, and logic to go around other blockers. That, combined with the fact that you can shout to form up, twice in a row, makes forming up almost fool-proof. ]

 --  The rest of the actions revolve around these two concepts, any time you are asked to pick a soldier, location, or object. you have to click GAOW and then click ( with an activation cursor ) the location or soldier, or object.
 --  E.g. in "Set Unit Facing." you are prompted with 4 directions which when selected will cause the group to turn that direction, or a "I'll pick it" choice which allows you to click on GAOW and then click a location anywhere and they will turn that direction.

A brief description of each current order in Dialog:
[-] Assign New Unit. - choose a way of grouping a unit and then click the first soldier. e.g. you want an axe brigade, choose "By Armament.", and then click an orc with an axe. The entire unit will be made up of soldiers with an axe of some sort equipped or carried.
[-] Run to Location. - unit runs to location and form up into a 3 column formation.
[-] Set Unit Formation.
      [-] Form on Location - select location and unit will form there in a 3x column formation.
      [-] form a 2x, 3x and 4x formation. formation will occur in place on unit leader ( top left soldier)
      [-] Set Line. - unit will run to the location you select and set up a line that is perpendicular to the last facing of the closest soldier. If you use "Set Unit Facing", point them all south, and then set a line in front of them. the whole unit will line up on that line and face south.
      [-] Form on Object (escort). - form a four man formation around a creature or object ( escort )
      [-] Set Unit Facing. - change the entire unit to face the 4 directions or one of your choosing. ( nice for alignment of formations afterward )
      [-] Unit Follow. - unit will follow you, your Field Marshal, or whoever you click based on choices in the conversation. This is not permanent following like a henchman, it will be cleared on combat and any other clearAllActions() call.
      [-] Form Perimeter. - unit will form a circular perimeter around a location, you, or whoever you click based on choices in the conversation. Once in place unit will turn outwards facing in all directions.
[-] Secondary Orders.
      [-] Make Camp. - All the soldiers in your army stand-down, mill about, some sit, and some of them make campfires and the like. After Break Camp below, those fires are removed if that soldier is still alive to do it. If you have an army slaughtered, you can have an army camp left behind as evidence.
      [-] Break Camp. - Campfires and the like are removed. Only available if you are camping.
      [-] Set Rally Point. - set a flag that is your rally point.
      [-] Highlight Unit. - unit selected will have a green disk glow beneath their feet for 6 seconds so you can see where they are, and what they are composed of.
      [-] Disband Unit. - unit will be removed and those soldiers can be reassigned. If a unit is all dead, the next time you call an order on them, like report in, the Field Marshal will tell you they're all dead, and disband it automatically. That unit name will then become available again.
      [-] Dismiss Field Marshall. - send the Field Marshal away. To get him back, or to have him come to you instead of you having to run to him: click GAOW and then click yourself. *Bamf* and he's there. This does not destroy him, it uses a swap space that I am fond of called wardrobe and saves him ( and all his local variables ). Field Marshal is plot now, as there are way too many variables saved on him so swap out with another creature. If you wish to change where I use my waypoint to "hide" him, edit the script gen_aow_custom.
      [-] Set Field Marshall Following. - Set whether the Field Marshal follows you or not. Default is to follow, however you can change that in the script gen_aow_custom.

 --  You can give every order with the exception of assigning & disbanding new units, and dismissing the Field Marshal, and following with a shout.
You can pause the game and shout while it is paused, and these orders will be carried out during the pause, or if they involve actions, they will get carried out as soon as the pause is over. which is awesome.
Please refer to the Shout List for a comprehensive listing of all shouts.

Additional Notes

There is an include with a couple of customizable variables that should make it easier to modify some of what i have released. If there is something that you would like to see customizable, let me know. You can currently change:
 --  Where the Field Marshal get's hidden when dismissed ( e.g. my swap space i call wardrobe...).
 --  The default delay between catapult firings for a catapult team.
 --  Whether the Field Marshal defaults to following you or not.
 --  Whether you need to be a DM to call privileged orders.
 --  Whether the Field Marshal will say anything at all, and if silent also not display any special effects. Use this option if you want to use an Invisible FM.
 --  Whether you want unit hiliting to default to be on when the FM is summoned the first time.
 --  Whether you want the army of a pc to be under his/her control after they die, regardless of spawning.
 --  All the faction representatives in your module need to be represented in the function in this include. This will become mute when we get a GetFaction(object oCreature) function, but until then this is a workaround.
Just edit the include: gen_aow_custom and build the module again ( and go get a sandwich, or watch a movie, or both, compiling this thing takes forever....)

Genji.

If you have any problems, here is the site for versions and my email. GAOW Site