Topic: I'd like to make a scenario without knowing lua. is that realistic?

I have an idea for a scenario in the dolomites map brewing in my head. It would require only few basic features:

• making messages pop up when specific actions are taken (conquering of a certain spot, defeating a certain player, gaining sight of something).
• including pictures in those messages; i intend the scenario to be also a sort of tour, and it would need real images
• changing seasons: on a timer of something around one hour, the map should switch from summer to winter and viceversa, and the terrain should change by type: for example, summer mountain 1 would become winter mountain 1; mountain passes would become impassable snow, but they can certainly be set up with a mechanism similar to that used in the trident of fire scenario
• some trigger for difficulty level, linked to building a certain building in a certain place, which would cause the AI to gain benefits for free.

Today I looked into it. Unfortunately, the wiki on scripting scenarios is ... less than useful

This section is intentionally cut short. There are excellent tutorials in Luas Wiki and there is a complete book free online: Programming in Lua. You should definitively start there to learn Lua.

really? I look for advice on how to make a scenario and I find "go to those links and learn lua"? It's like I ask how to fix my bike and I am told to go read a book on mechanics that will teach me how to make a car or a plane. I don't have the mix of time, intention and commitment needed to learn lua. I was hoping that I could get away with figuring out a few rudiments needed only for making a scenario. After all, I don't need to learn a whole programming language. I only need a handful of triggers; if this terrain comes under control of blue player, then make a window with a message appear. After that much time passes, change all instances of a certain terrain with a certain other terrain. it looks relatively easy. of course, I am well aware that everything you don't know how to do looks easier than it really is.

And so comes the point of my question. is it realistic that I can only learn how to work those handful of triggers to make a working scenario? or I don't really have a chance of managing it unless I become at least passably competent at lua? Does it makes sense for me to try without the commitment of becoming a programmer?

If the answer is "no, you have no chance of managing to make a scenario unless you become good with lua", then this bit of information should be addded to the wiki page. As it is, it sounds dismissive to the point of rudeness, at least to me.

Also, can someone recommend me a good lua editor usable under windows? I wanted to see if I can figure something out by looking at the scripting of existing scenarios and campaigns; at the moment I just use notepad to open lua files, but notepad does mess the formatting, and it makes really difficult to figure out what was going on. I've been using it so far to read stuff like the preferred growth parameters of trees or the working time of buildings, but no more

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Programming has always two parts:

1. Some knowlegde of the programming language. But mostly all basics are even over all programming languages: Loops, Variables, If-statements, tables (arrays). They differ a bit by the syntax, but if you know about them, you could easily dive into Lua i believe.
2. Knowledge of some APIs. In this case all the stuff of the widelands Lua scripting API. This means you have to learn when and how to use e.g. a map-object or a game-object. Also which functions all the objects provide and what they are good for.

From my point of view the second point is the most difficult task. But especially related to this point you could always ask here in the Forum for help

The existing campaigns and scenarios are a good point to start with. E.g. the atlantean campaign has code to change terrain. You could copy the code and adjust it to your needs.

As Editor i use komodo-edit. I use it mostly for programming python, but it has the same features for programming Lua i think:

1. Code highlighting, e.g. all braces are colored blue, strings are red, numbers are orange, comments are green and so on
2. Code completion, e.g. automatic closing braces
3. Smart indenting of code
4. Managing different projects
5. Open recently used files (project) on startup

But i think each person has his own favorite editor

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