buoys

[XB7]

What is the difference between buoy and buoy-witchpoint? Are they used interchangeably? I noticed in the Deepspace ship mod, one was textured with flashers while the other was using the vanilla settings.

[Smivs]

That's right. The witchpoint buoy has flashers whereas the station navigation buoy doesn't. I think Rock-Hermit buoys also have flashers.
Deepspace has two different buoy textures as well IIRC, whereas in vanilla Oolite the same one is used everywhere.

Edit:-

The flashers are technically sub-entities of the model and are specified in the shipdata.plist. They are nothing to do with the textures, and feature on the buoys irrespective of OXP (unless the OXP author has removed them).

[Commander McLane]

What is the difference between buoy and buoy-witchpoint? Are they used interchangeably?

"buoy" is the station beacon, located 10,000 meters in front of the docking bay of each main station.

"buoy-witchpoint" is the witchpoint beacon (d'oh!), located at the witchpoint. It has flashers because they make it more visible from the distance, which is helpful if you're flying towards the witchpoint. (The station beacon doesn't need that, because it sits right next to a big station.)

So they are not used interchangeably.

[Smivs]

Just in case we are talking at cross-purposes, the witchpoint buoy and the station buoy (navigation beacon) are coded individually and as Commander Mclane says, are not interchangeable. However the textures used are the same for all the buoys, so although they are different, they look the same in terms of their texture. The witchpoint buoy also has flashers, but these are coded in the shipdata.plist and are nothing to do with the textures.
To complicate things further, Deepspace uses two textures, one for the navigation beacon, and a different one for the witchpoint buoy, and I beleive he also used a seperate model for one of them as well, although it's just a copy of the same model the other one uses. This is because Deepspace Ships was released before it was possible to specify multiple textures all using the same model. Before, if you wanted multiple versions of one object, each version needed its own model. This is no longer the case.

[Ramirez]

Actually, I was going to ask: how do you apply different textures without having to do separate models? I've got to do a load of ad-boards and it would be a pain to keep creating copies of dat files. I did try something with materials but it didn't work. Can you point me towards an example?

[Smivs]

Can you point me towards an example?

Hi Ramirez,
Take a look at v3.0 of my shipset, where you will find several examples, the first being the Adder where the standard and scavenger versions both use the same model. A better example still would be the Python, with three different textures all using the same model. v3.0 also has the models so you can see the whole picture.
If it's still not clear, PM me and I'll see if I can help further.
Cheers,
Smivs.

[Thargoid]

Or at TCAT, where there are various Raptor skins for the same model. You can even do it "on the fly" by scripting, to have the ships texture react to events or circumstances.

That is for true retexturing, as opposed to colour variants which are also possible (see Butterflies OXP for that one).

[XB7]

Well, I'm fairly new to the scene and still use the buoy for docking a station. The pink vanilla buoy in oolite is really hard to see.

After installing Deepspace's mod, the pink buoy would still intermittently show up in front of the station. I'm not sure if that had anything to do with the YAD mod?

In any case, I carried the following line from the witchpoint-buoy to the buoy and I haven't seen another pink buoy since.

materials = { "target_metal.png" = { diffuse_map = "NavBuoy_DS.png"; };
};

I noticed that the orange buoy seems to be applied to the witchpoint location somewhere other than shipdata.

Witchpoint is an interesting word. What's the story behind it?

[Smivs]

Well, I'm fairly new to the scene and still use the buoy for docking a station. The pink vanilla buoy in oolite is really hard to see.

Have you tried my Accessories OXP? There's no way you can miss the buoys...they glow a very bright red and have yellow lights!

After installing Deepspace's mod, the pink buoy would still intermittently show up in front of the station. I'm not sure if that had anything to do with the YAD mod?

YAH adds billboards which replace the buoy at higher systems, both at the witchpoint and station. You've probably seen the buoy where no billboard was used.

In any case, I carried the following line from the witchpoint-buoy to the buoy and I haven't seen another pink buoy since.

materials = { "target_metal.png" = { diffuse_map = "NavBuoy_DS.png"; };
};

I noticed that the orange buoy seems to be applied to the witchpoint location somewhere other than shipdata.

I think you've given the station buoy the same texture as the witchpoint buoy. That's OK.

Witchpoint is an interesting word. What's the story behind it?

In Oolite, Hyperspace is refered to as Witchspace, hence the point where you exit hyperspace/witchspace is the witchpoint.

[Cody]

Witchpoint is an interesting word. What's the story behind it?

In Oolite, Hyperspace is refered to as Witchspace, hence the point where you exit hyperspace/witchspace is the witchpoint.

One of the ‘lore-masters’ will know more than me, but I believe that the concept of ‘witchspace’ comes from The Dark Wheel (by Robert Holdstock), the novella that was included with the original Elite game.

[XB7]

Thanks, Smivs. I'll check out your accessories. I'm at around 110+ mods now.