Thargoid Police?

[JazHaz]

It appears in 1.73.4. My OXP list is:

...
Diso.oxp
dodo_stations.oxp
Dragonfireflyst v1.1.oxp
Famous_Planets_v2.0.oxp
FP Liners 1.00.oxp
Freaky Thargoids 3.oxp
Galactic_Navy 5.2.2.oxp
globestations.oxp
griff_barrel_normalmapped.oxp
griff_shipset_dizzy's_all_in_1.oxp
hammer.oxp
kirin.oxp
...

Dodo_stations? Hammer? They are not on the wiki oxp page. Are they available elsewhere?

CaptKev gave a link in 2008 for the OXP. Unfortunately the link is now broken. However I have PM'd him to ask if he has it. If he does, then I will get it put up on the Wiki.

[Ffoeg]

It appears in 1.73.4. My OXP list is:

...
dodo_stations.oxp
...
hammer.oxp

...

Dodo_stations? Hammer? They are not on the wiki oxp page. Are they available elsewhere?

CaptKev gave a link in 2008 for the OXP. Unfortunately the link is now broken. However I have PM'd him to ask if he has it. If he does, then I will get it put up on the Wiki.

My thanks to you sir.

[snork]

Oh noes! The thargoids have Borg technology and are assimilating the universe!!!

I love this idea.

[Thargoid]

And just to add a little to the original question - the Barracuda is one of mine (from Aquatics) and does include a police version.

So I would go along similar lines to McLane's thinking - specifically if the carrier is designated as a station, what defense ships are defined for it? It might be that if those are not set up Oolite may be falling back to default police (or interceptor) roles, but as the carrier is alien scanClass they're inheriting it.

[ADCK]

Do you by any chance know with which role these ships were spawned?

Please, if you come across another one, check it out.

My guess is that they come into existence whenever the Thargoid Carrier tries to launch some generic ship (from the game's point of view it's an ordinary station, after all).

So, what your shipdata needs is the

Code: Select all

<key>has_npc_traffic</key>
</false>

treatment, in order to prevent the launch of any ship not explicitely called for by the carrier's AI.

(That was one of the first things I implemented into my overhaul of the Thargoid Carrier (WIP). By the way, over the weekend I had some ideas on how to circumvent some of the dead ends I hit in its scripting. So work on it may resume soon.)

Code: Select all

<key>has_npc_traffic</key>
</false>

is redundant, as has_npc_traffic is set to false by default.

However:

And just to add a little to the original question - the Barracuda is one of mine (from Aquatics) and does include a police version.

So I would go along similar lines to McLane's thinking - specifically if the carrier is designated as a station, what defense ships are defined for it? It might be that if those are not set up Oolite may be falling back to default police (or interceptor) roles, but as the carrier is alien scanClass they're inheriting it.

Is likely to be the problem...

defense_ship
Gives an oportunity to designate a particular ship by name that will defend a station/carrier. When launched from a carrier the scanclass becomes that of the carrier.

[JensAyton]

has_npc_traffic is set to false by default.

Is that your final answer? *dramatic music*

[ADCK]

has_npc_traffic is set to false by default.

Is that your final answer? *dramatic music*

Uh... yes?

I'm just going off what the wiki says, so if i'm wrong the wiki's to blame >.>

Or perhaps i should say it's set to "NO" by default, the end result is the same.

[JensAyton]

Ladies and gentlemen, he called a friend… but the friend was mistaken.

Code: Select all

hasNPCTraffic = [dict oo_fuzzyBooleanForKey:@"has_npc_traffic" defaultValue:YES];

Who puts all this made-up stuff in the wiki, then?

[ADCK]

humbug, damn humans and their "human errors"

It shouldn't matter anyway as the AI's should prioritise hostily over docking, right? So a Galcop would attack a thargoid carrier before attempting to dock?

[ADCK]

Updated the wiki entry from:

Determines if a carrier has trader traffic. Default is no, but when set to YES traders will launch now and then just like stations do. Introduced in version 1.70

To:

Determines if a carrier has NPC traffic. By default it is set to "YES", when set to YES carriers will be open to docking/undocking by NPC's. Introduced in version 1.70

[Commander McLane]

The guy who falsified the Wiki-entry should clearly be fired.

I am sure it used to be correct. And if you think about it, it is obvious that it has to default to YES. After all, as a default you want that a station does have activities around it. Think how boring main stations were if they never launched a trader.

EDIT: No, it was mixed up from the beginning. Anyway, I re-phrased the whole thing and hope it is clearer now.

Oh, and back on the topic: Eric's explanation is (as usual) better than mine. While it certainly cannot hurt to prevent the carrier from launching random traders, the culprit certainly is that no specific defense ship is defined, therefore one is randomly chosen.

I have forgotten, though, whether defense_ship_role is currently working as expected (it wasn't, and I'm not sure whether this has been fixed yet).

[Eric Walch]

Code: Select all

hasNPCTraffic = [dict oo_fuzzyBooleanForKey:@"has_npc_traffic" defaultValue:YES];

Who puts all this made-up stuff in the wiki, then?

Looked back in the wiki history. Key was added at 5 dec 2007 by... me
And it went unnoticed since then. But to my defence, the code also includes:

Code: Select all

	if ([self isRotatingStation] && [self hasNPCTraffic])
	{
		// deletions
	}
	else
	{
		docked_shuttles = 0;
		docked_traders = 0;   // 1..3;
	}

So this effectively sets the effect of the flag for trader lanches to NO for carriers and non-rotating stations. And back to the topic: Even with the flag at YES a thargoid carrier will not launch traders or shuttles.

[ADCK]

...the culprit certainly is that no specific defense ship is defined, therefore one is randomly chosen.

I have forgotten, though, whether defense_ship_role is currently working as expected (it wasn't, and I'm not sure whether this has been fixed yet).

GalCop, Defenders of the universe, will even defend the enemy if you attack their bases

Good to know, will update the carriers in my behemoths oxp at a later date, theres probably a few other stations/carriers in my oxp's that should have a defence ship set as well, to avoid oddities like this happening.

[FlammableFlower]

Ahhh, that weirded me out when I first saw a Barracuda (alien) when attacking a Thargoid Carrier.

[Bugbear]

"Yes, it looks like one of your oxps is making thargoid randomly kidnap NPC ships and assimilating them,"

that'd be a good mission/fiction plot. Viper goes missing. turns up later, docks unchallenged at a Coriolis, Thargoids swarm out...

That would be Independence Day, but in reverse. I wonder if the Viper Thargoid inhabitants have a trusty Apple Mac to hack the computers of the coriolis station?