Changing to a melee attack briefly

Alright, I'm trying to make this ability called "swoop" where a flying hero that normally has a range of 600 will swoop down to a target and do a melee attack. After that, I want him to come back up, and have a ranged attack again. I have everything working fine, except that I can NOT make it so that he gets a melee attack for only one attack, and then gets the ranged attack again. I tried giving him an attack 2 that has melee range and can only target suicidal, and then used a trigger that gave the target unit "A sapper" classification, but that didn't work at all. I then tried using the archer upgrade "improved bows" and made it give -500 range which works, but you can't unlearn researches for some stupid reason. I really need help, this is starting to get to me.

Oh, and please don't tell me to get a modified world editor.

Perhaps you want to use a damage action instead of actually making the hero attack? This would also allow you to set exactly how much damage is dealt. The damage actions are at the very end of the Unit category in the action list.

maybe a low ranged storm bolt, and changehis flying height?

Rumor has it that some sort of orb of fire or something similar can actually change what attack you use (attack 1 vs 2), so you can try that out.

I can't use the Damage Trigger, nor can I use a storm bolt. I'll try the orb ability.. would it be the "enabled attack index" field?

yes, it is. you have to add the orb ability to the unit when the spell is cast, and remove it when he attacked

Well, I tried, but it didn't work. Any other ideas? If you want, I can post what I have in excrutiating detail.

What's wrong with triggering the situation?

make a unit with 1000 damage and the locust ability, and then create an if/then/else, where if the unit health is higher than the damage delat, you set the unit health = unit health - damage, and if it is lower than create the unit above and order it to attack the unit that is being attacked

I can't trigger the damage for a few reasons:
1. It is a flying unit with range, and I want it to swoop down on top of a unit and attack it with a melee attack.
2. I want the spell to deal the heroe's damage plus a bonus, which is done by adding a corruption orb ability before he attacks.
3. I want the unit's armor to break, which is also done by the corruption orb.
4. most of the triggers rely on launching when he attacks the unit.

mogmiester, I don't understand what this would do.

Also: I keep thinking that a multi-level version of Improved Bows, where one level adds 0 to range, and one adds -500, would work because you can change research levels. I tried many variations to get the upgrade to do this... but it's very confusing with the Effect 1 Base and Effect 1 Increment fields.. can anyone please tell me if this can be accomplished and how. I'd really like this spell to get done.

well you could trigger it to use a targetable, castable damage reduction ability,

as if you a using an orb of corruption base, it could clash with the orb of fire ability (if u are using them both seperately)

You could let the unit keep it's ranged attack but trigger it so that the unit get's in melee range when it uses swoop, thus making it appear like it did a melee attack. Don't bother with upgrades, because they cannot be unlearned, so it's a one way trip with them.

try replacing units maybe?

I am only using one orb ability, the orb of corruption. Does it HAVE to be orb of fire?

Replacing may be the only solution, but id have to do a lot of work in the trigger... setting experience, hero stats, items, etc., plus this would probably screw up control groups, wouldn't it? Or does replace keep control groups?

Umm... is this an ability? You know that you could pretend to have the hero fly right to the unit and order a dummy unit to attack the unit once the hero is close enough. And the attack would unfortunately have fixed damage but that's the best alternative I have.

~Daelin