Switeck's Shipping v0.5 OXP - Ai, Economy, and Ship changes

[Switeck]

Maybe even add extra arriving pirates or traders based on the TL, economy type, and government type for the system? (Or is that better suited for a system "stocker" OXP?)

Have you made some test on how many new arrivals there actually are? My guess is that there are not so many. Basically only one for each trader that launches and jumps out from the main station. Except you have added a mechanism that lets more traders jump in. Oh, and I don't think that there are any jumping in pirates currently.

Yes, I have sat at the witchpoint with the game running at 16x speed for roughly an hour gametime to determine how often new ships arrive. And currently no pirates arrive without OXPs installed, which is why the longer you stay in a system the fewer pirates there will be, barring their addition by OXPs. Also, I have not yet added a new ship populator...I was only proposing it in a question of both feasibility and if that seemed an excessive measure to take for a "fix" of something that wasn't really broken.

exactly what traders are doing right now and have always done. They defend themselves if attacked by a pirate, but get out of the fight as soon as someone else (like the player) enters in.

A noteworthy exception to this... Dredgers OXP salvage missiles! I'd jump on a pirate that was harassing a trader, get it to bail, then pop it with a salvage missile...only to have the trader destroy the derelict pirate ship. I'd tried setting the derelict to 0 bounty, but that apparently does nothing to clear the current attacking state of traders, bounty hunters, or police. I'll probably need to add something like the code used in pirateCoveRock.js from Pirate Coves OXP to get attackers to cease firing...it's got to be brief (maybe the moment the salvage missile hits) and conditional (only affecting non-pirates) also, as I don't want pirates to ignore the juicy derelict. But that at least does not directly concern this OXP mod...so it's off-topic.

I think scavengerAI makes no sense, because it doesn't do what you think it does.

scavengerAI works well enough if you want to add an NPC ship that flees to nearest station and only initially at its starting location bothers to look for stray cargo canisters. If it has a full cargo bay or no cargo bay, it skips that step and just heads to nearest station. That's best I can tell from reading this:
"DOCK_WITH_STATION" =
{
ENTER = (setTargetToNearestStation, "setDesiredRangeTo: 5000.0", performIntercept);
...
"GO_TO_STATION" =
{
ENTER = (setTargetToNearestStation, "setDesiredRangeTo: 5000.0", setDestinationToTarget, checkCourseToDestination);

...and doing a little testing. The area around the witchpoint beacon may eventually end up free of cargo canisters, but traders using scavengerAI won't touch any left elsewhere. And this scavengerAI's flee-if-anything-bad-happens covers the "7.coward mode -- flee all fights?" and "4.dock with nearest station, not only the main station" well enough.

After all, they do ask for help and I'm typically nice enough to blast the pirates for them, but why should I be the only nice guy in my ooniverse?

Which stands to reason that they wouldn't bother to ask for help if there wasn't at least a slim chance of getting help...from somewhere/someone. And I don't think they're looking for police...maybe they're hoping a bounty hunter is around?

[Commander McLane]

I think scavengerAI makes no sense, because it doesn't do what you think it does.

scavengerAI works well enough if you want to add an NPC ship that flees to nearest station and only initially at its starting location bothers to look for stray cargo canisters.

My point was that I thought this would be a silly behaviour. I wanted to encourage you to create an AI for a ship that cruises the corridor(s) looking for debris. A ship that doesn't actively search for fights, but opportunisticly goes for the profit generated by fights in form of escape pods and cargo. A true—scavenger, so to speak. (Now that I think about it, I find Oolite's generic "scavenger" role is a misnomer. It is much more of a station-bound garbage-collector.)

[Zireael]

I love the idea behind the mod, especially the injectors added. /I hope they won't go kamikaze/

Price rebalancing I like less. Is there much change?

Re: Ships arriving at the witchpoint.
I did a couple of those at 16x (fuel collecting ) and no ships arrived either.

[Switeck]

I discovered in testing that new traders arriving near the witchpoint beacon _NEVER_ scooped any cargo no matter what I tried (and I hacked a few AI.plist files in the hopes they would as well as left cargo canisters around for them to grab)...they seem to be "immediately" given the route1traderAI.plist on arrival. I discovered/confirmed this only after I did a pause + 0 key and read through the log file for what state the NPC ships were in. This means enteringTraderAI.plist is probably NOT used, at least not by those. Maybe trader ships launched from a station use it? I think I've only seen trader ships go to the sun from the station -- never from the witchpoint beacon to the sun.

Zireael,
Thanks for the testing...I see new ships arriving very slowly at the witchpoint beacon, maybe only 1 group (mother + escorts) every ~5 minutes gametime even at a rich industrial TL 14 Confederacy system (Xexedi in Galaxy 1).

As for NPCs with injectors ramming you...I found the slower ships tended to dodge better, so long as you're not trying to to ram them as well. The time a Python rammed me was because we both turned into each other on the pass. Had I slowed or remained straight...I'd be missed.
Do note that the NPC ships can have a LOT more than injectors. It's possible to face a pirate Boa 2 Cruiser with the NPC equivalent of military shields+shield boosters, injectors, a couple ECM-resistant missiles mixed in the 5 total missiles onboard, and have its usual 4 escorts. (Sidewinders and/or Mambas)

You could put the original game and my mod's commodities lists side-by-side and spot all the changes I made quickly.

Most of them are virtually invisible to the average player -- as Rock Hermits are NOT everywhere and it's unusual to go to a Rock Hermit to sell anything besides Liquors&Wines. I just made food slightly profitable to sell there relative the main station: +0.4 cr/ton extra to base amount and +0.8 cr/ton greater variability for +1.6 cr/ton absolute maximum price increase over main station...which pales in comparison to the food price differences between Poor Agri. (at ~2cr/ton) and Rich Ind. (at ~8cr/ton) systems.

Amount of Minerals for sale flipped over at Rock Hermits and ended up being rather low, despite being the place you'd expect them to be flooded with them...so I fixed that as best as I could. Luxuries prices also flipped over and back to near-zero, so I modified that as well so those are very close to the same price as the main station (sometimes ~3 credits less, other times maybe 0.8 credits more) -- the Hermits would want some of that for themselves as well and could easily resell any excess to the main station.

At the main stations, gold amounts were flipping over...because they were set too high. So I reduced their amounts from 66 for sale to only 3. You would probably need to make >100 jumps and check those amounts to even statistically prove there was a very minor change.

As for Alien Items being increased in price (in industrial systems only!) to 50-59 cr/ton, that was to make scooping Thargons WORTHWHILE instead of just shooting them for 50 credits and 1 kill towards Elite status. Shooting them saves cargo space as well, so my change there is certainly not imbalancing.

[Cody]

As for Alien Items being increased in price (in industrial systems only!) to 50-59 cr/ton, that was to make scooping Thargons WORTHWHILE instead of just shooting them for 50 credits and 1 kill towards Elite status. Shooting them saves cargo space as well, so my change there is certainly not imbalancing.

I always shoot the Thargons, never scoop them… but I reckon you should only got the kill and credits if they are ‘live’… once they become white blips, they should just be ‘alien items’ to be scooped, if you wish.

[Switeck]

Thargoid invasion meets Energy Bomb = player makes enough money from all the bounties to possibly pay for the e-bomb. At least in the Commodore-64 version of Elite, initially undamaged Thargoids survived an E-Bomb. I can't reduce the Energy Bomb damage (the fixed weapon on player ship, not the q-bomb deployable mine)...or I would. The Q-bomb at least requires you to flee the area quick or suffer the same fate as everything else: destruction!
C-64 Elite Thargoids were also far slower. Oolite's Thargoids are stupid-fast...they even outrun their own "missiles", the Thargons!

[Commander McLane]

C-64 Elite Thargoids were also far slower.

But they were faster than the player's CobraIII (Thargoids and Asps were the only ships which could outrun the player). I know for sure, because my regular tactic was to pull a Monthy Python on groups of pirates. This way I could keep them at a distance behind me and take out one by one. But I had to kill the Thargoids and Asps first, because they were still closing in.

[Commander McLane]

I discovered in testing that new traders arriving near the witchpoint beacon _NEVER_ scooped any cargo no matter what I tried (and I hacked a few AI.plist files in the hopes they would as well as left cargo canisters around for them to grab)...they seem to be "immediately" given the route1traderAI.plist on arrival. I discovered/confirmed this only after I did a pause + 0 key and read through the log file for what state the NPC ships were in. This means enteringTraderAI.plist is probably NOT used, at least not by those. Maybe trader ships launched from a station use it? I think I've only seen trader ships go to the sun from the station -- never from the witchpoint beacon to the sun.

I don't think that's completely true. I don't know whether all entering traders get enteringTraderAI. It may be that only those whose wormhole you follow get this AI.

But entering traders get definitely randomly route1traderAI or route2sunskimAI. Here's the proof: I waited at the witchpoint and paused the game immediately when I saw an entering ship. Of course my reaction took a second, so I didn't capture them in enteringTraderAI, even if they used it. So I have no conclusive evidence that they get it or don't get it.

But, as it happens, there were two traders entering within just a couple of seconds. The first had route1traderAI, and the second had route2sunskimAI. Here's the console entry (I simply queried for the AI of the closest ship, which was the one that had just jumped in):

Code: Select all

> S.shipsWithPrimaryRole("trader", player.ship)[0].AI
route1traderAI.plist
> S.shipsWithPrimaryRole("trader", player.ship)[0].AI
route2sunskimAI.plist

So, entering traders do go sunskimming (and they always have, and I have killed many of them when I flew between witchpoint and sun).

EDIT: And here is visual proof, if you prefer this:

You see the first ship in the distance, going towards the planet (relatively small at ten-o-clock from the planet), and the second ship right before me, clearly going towards the sun (in the direction the planet is lighted from).

[DaddyHoggy]

C-64 Elite Thargoids were also far slower.

But they were faster than the player's CobraIII (Thargoids and Asps were the only ships which could outrun the player). I know for sure, because my regular tactic was to pull a Monthy Python on groups of pirates. This way I could keep them at a distance behind me and take out one by one. But I had to kill the Thargoids and Asps first, because they were still closing in.

Vipers were definitely faster than a Cobby3 - nothing more nervous for a Jameson trying to slip in to a station dock weaving away from the laser fire of the ever closing vipers - which given the C64s update rate made for very exciting times! (Mambas were faster too - given that on the C64 the Cobby3 only did 0.30LM and a Mamba could do 0.32 I think)

[Commander McLane]

Vipers were definitely faster than a Cobby3

True. To my defense, I was only thinking of pirate ships.

(Mambas were faster too - given that on the C64 the Cobby3 only did 0.30LM and a Mamba could do 0.32 I think)

Perhaps I am mixing up Asps with Mambas. But I seem to remember that there was only one type of pirate ship faster than the player (and Thargoids).

[Cody]

Seeing as I’ve had Elite Plus running tonight, these speeds are from the EP manual:

Asp Mk II 0.4
Cobra Mk III 0.3
FDL 0.3
Gecko 0.3
Krait 0.3
Mamba 0.32
Sidewinder 0.37
Thargoid 0.2
Viper 0.32

[DaddyHoggy]

Numbers confirmed on Ian Bell's site: http://www.iancgbell.clara.net/elite/manual.htm#A47

I really don't remember sidewinders being so quick (possibly because on the C64 you learned to blow them up at the point where they went from being a long way away but only one pixel wide to being even further away but 2x2 pixels wide...)

[Cody]

I like the description of the Sidewinder:

Mainly used for atmosphere and planetary surface scouting, but extensively too for city-strafing, reconnaissance and infantry air support (and by pirates who favor speed and elusiveness, its primary advantage).

[DaddyHoggy]

Pretty much all made up by Rob H too...

[Switeck]

I don't think that's completely true. I don't know whether all entering traders get enteringTraderAI. It may be that only those whose wormhole you follow get this AI.
....
So, entering traders do go sunskimming (and they always have, and I have killed many of them when I flew between witchpoint and sun).

I just haven't watched arriving traders enough to see the ones that head towards the sun.

Eric Walch told me:
"enteringTraderAI.plist is only called by exitingTraderAI.plist. That is the AI used by ships entering wormholes.
...
When a trader jumps in at the witchspace entry point in the current system, it always had a 10 percent chance of going to the sun. In trunk that now has changed a little. ...
In the past, any ship could become a sunskimmer. Now only ships that also contain the sunskim-trader role. The code "makeSunSkimmer" ensures that the heat-shielding is sufficient and it uses the right AI."