If you have no modding experience with Gladius it is probably not the best idea to start with but on the other hand with no point on the horizon there is no need to get started anyway.

What you should do first is to remove the clear tile xml. Then implement your own version with your own icons sounds and last but not least some effects.

Bonus is you can do more. Get resources from trees, blow up rocks, etc.

I've looked through the files and can't find any "clear tile" xml, where would I find that?

I didn't realize bedrock could be cleared. This is something I'd want to include in a mod I'm working on, so I'll take a look at it.

After a quick look through I'm pretty sure this shouldn't be too difficult. It'll be a day or two before I can test it though.

If I get it working I'll publish this bit separately.

You're a legend

Good news is proof of concept more or less works.

I can set the clear tile ability so it can't target tiles with bedrock. This does leave edge cases where ruins with bedrock can't have the ruins cleared by clear tile. Personally, I'm ok with this. I see it being an extreme edge case that you'd care to clear the ruins if it's not going to clear the bedrock too.

Bad news is it looks like the game engine doesn't like the clear tile ability being modified by xml.ext only full xml files. I've triple checked everything, but still possible it's a formatting issue on my side and not a limitation of the engine.

I'll take another look at it this weekend and let you know how it goes.

Actually, on further testing I'm finding that clear tile ability on the Malanthrope, Techpriest Enginseer and Cybernetic Datasmith doesn't clear bedrock, without any modding.

Patch notes for the march update lists adding cluster mines to the features affected by clear tile. Maybe clear tile and bedrock has changed since you originally posted.

Originally posted by Kurziel:

Actually, on further testing I'm finding that clear tile ability on Techpriest Enginseer and Cybernetic Datasmith doesn't clear bedrock, without any modding.

How did you test that, because that's not what I get.

Ahhh.... looks like some of the clear tile functionality is tied to the faction, not the unit.

I was spawning in techpriest and datasmith as a tyranid player. So, in my tests the techpriest and datasmith were using the tyranid's clear tile ability, which doesn't clear bedrock.

Using an ad mech player with an extra malanthrope I'm reproducing clear tile clearing bedrock with unmodded abilities.

Good news is my original concept still appears to restrict clear tile's ability to target bedrock.

Here you go: https://steamhost.cn/steamcommunity_com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2802600978

Let me know if I missed any units with a Clear Tile ability or if you have any problems with it.

You're a legend