The Battle for Wesnoth as a teaching tool

1. Kaido Kikkas Institute of Informatics Tallinn University The Battle for Wesnothas a teaching tool

2. The Battle for Wesnoth • A turn-based, fantasy-themed strategy game • Founded by David White in 2003, now at v1.4.3 • Influences: Master of Monsters, Warsong • Fully free and open-source software under GNU General Public License • Cross-platform (Linux, MS Windows, MacOS X)‏ • Both single- and multiplayer • Available in 41 languages (the scope varies)‏ • Extensive and active community at wesnoth.org

3. Basics • Played on a hex map with several dozens of terrain types (influence movement and defense)‏ • Hundreds of units in various (6 in default era) factions, each with distinct strengths and weaknesses, 2-5 levels (mostly 3), movement... • Day and night cycle vs the unit alignment • Economy based on gold, generated by villages • In campaign mode, surviving units from previous scenarios can be recalled • Missions may vary greatly (even if destroying enemies is the most common one)‏

4. OK, but what does it have to do with teaching & learning? • Homo ludens :-)‏ • Similar to teaching web design – should give three kinds of skills: • Technology: coding (programming)‏ • Design: artwork, maps, overall aesthetics • Content: scenarios and campaigns • Compared to web design: • Technology is more prominent – includes event-driven programming in addition to markup • Content is more affected by the other two (or vv)‏

5. Two cases up to now • Autumn 2007 – TLU IMKE Master students, mostly with no or very basic programming skills; 6 persons (two teams of 3) participated • Spring 2008 – TLU third-year computer science students with adequate to expert propgramming skills; more than 20 people (5 teams of 3-5) completed the course • Two rather different sets of people - yet the course worked in both cases • The point of the courses was not Wesnoth, but the open-source way of development

6. The ideas behind Open Source • Roots in the hacker culture of the 60s • Richard M. Stallman, the Father of Free Software • Linus Torvalds and Linux • Eric S. Raymond, The Cathedral and the Bazaar(Note: he is also an active contributor to Wesnoth)‏ • The avalanche grows: LAMP, GNOME/KDE, OpenOffice.org, Moodle ... • Not freeware: the zero price is not the point • The point is in collaboration, community, peer review and flexibility

7. What can be taught with Wesnoth? • Storytelling and expression, overall creativity • Graphical design • Animation • Markup (a possible step before moving to XHTML, XML, AJAX etc)‏ • Event-driven programming • NB! Easier to 'sell' to non-technical students! • The good thing is that these can be mixed and balanced according to the audience, allowing a good range of accommodation

8. Campaign building • Write the storyline, design major events and divide them into scenarios • Choose/build units for main characters • For each scenario • Design (objectives, events)‏ • Draw the map (considering terrain and starting points)‏ • Choose units and recruitment scheme • Code the scenario • Code the campaign summary • Test and balance

9. Storyline • Wesnoth has its own fictional history (http://www.wesnoth.org/wiki/History_of_Wesnoth) as well as geography: http://www.wesnoth.org/wiki/Geography_of_Wesnoth • On the other hand, several interesting attempts have been made to base totally different storylines on the Wesnoth engine • Eric S. Raymond has written the Wesnoth campaign design How-To:http://www.catb.org/~esr/wesnoth/campaign-design-howto.html

10. Wesnoth map editor

11. Wercator map converter • By Brennan Sellner • Converts Wesnoth maps to fancy graphical maps • A plugin for GIMP • Available online at http://www.sellner. org/wercator/

12. Units • Several hundreds are available, distributed under different eras (historic sets)‏ • At first, choosing among ready-made ones is more than enough. The unit list for v1.4 is at http://www.wesnoth.org/units/1.4/C/mainline.html • To create new units, tutorials are available at http://www.wesnoth.org/wiki/Art_Tutorials • In the newer versions of Wesnoth, multi-frame animations, shadows, different view angles etc are used, making unit design quite complex

13. Wesnoth Markup Language • Rather similar to XML • Tags written in the form of [tag] • A typical scenarion consists of • Various metadata in the beginning • Storytelling part explaining the situation • Map data (can be included, but is typically linked)‏ • Day/night cycle and difficulty specifications • Prestart part (definitions of sides, objectives etc)‏ • Event-based buildup for the scenario

14. WML... • Can be very simple, but allows for really complex operations (changing units and terrain on the fly – e.g. a character can be magically turned into a monster or a cave wall may open under a spell or password; events may also depend on if a character from a previous scenario is alive etc etc)‏ • Teaches good structure (opening and closing tags, correct use of parameters) as well as 'the big picture' (campaign level)‏

15. Examples • A demo campaign I started to develop in spring • A crazy story which involves a lot of famous characters from various tales and also some celebrity-based people (including a Finn...). • Will gradually feature more complicated techniques, the 2 existing scenarios are quite simple

16. Final words • Wesnoth is a versatile tool for teaching a number of things • Fully open in nature => may be used to develop new things without messing with the 'IP' stuff • Sometimes people learn better from playing :)‏

17. Thanks!