Military Energy Unit

RVSJimbo · Post by **RVSJimbo** » Thu Jan 26, 2006 10:27 am

When I was playing Elite on the beeb, many moons ago, my friend got deadly (I think) and was sent on a mission, which he completed. As payment for the mission he was given a military energy unit. Has this been implemented already, and if not, will it be? Are there missions already implemented?

In another thread someone mentioned a multiplayer option. Is this actually happening? Sounds like great fun if it is.

Thanks for a great game,

Paul
~~~~

(still at Mostly Harmless!)

Rxke · Post by **Rxke** » Thu Jan 26, 2006 11:55 am

Yes, see mission requirements: https://bb.oolite.space/viewtopic.php?t=1091

it's the thargoid plans that give you the upgrade.

Arexack_Heretic · Post by **Arexack_Heretic** » Thu Jan 26, 2006 6:53 pm

I'd like to see one of those real Thargoid motherships that INRA is supposedly fighting in Intergalactic Space....

CheshireNoir · Post by **CheshireNoir** » Fri Jan 27, 2006 6:42 am

I actually have an early version of an OXP that implements Thargoid Motherships.

My brother made it. I'll tell him to get it finished, and point him at this thread.

kaypy · Post by **kaypy** » Fri Jan 27, 2006 12:33 pm

Ive got what I think is a reasonable model for it

But am having trouble with
a) getting the behaviour right
and
b) my attention span

It seems to me that if I set its role to thargoid its going to start turning up in random encounters, but if I dont set it, then it gets stot up by its minions

It isnt really a mothership per-se, more about equivalent of the behemoth (I suppose I could scale it up a bit* and have it carry thargoids instead of drones...)

Kris

* "OK, just bring your ship over to this tyre pump, we'll have you upsized in no time"

JensAyton · Post by **JensAyton** » Fri Jan 27, 2006 1:59 pm

Thargoid Dreadnaught?

Oh, I seem to recall you can set probabilities with roles. If so, set it to thargoid(0.05) or something, and there’ll only be a small chance of it showing up in random encounters (which’ll spice it up a bit).

neilplus · Post by **neilplus** » Fri Jan 27, 2006 7:45 pm

kaypy wrote:
Ive got what I think is a reasonable model for it

[big eyes]

A Thargoid Behemoth. Ye Gods. That is well cool.

Rxke · Post by **Rxke** » Fri Jan 27, 2006 7:51 pm

Fitted with pink plasma cannons.

The human race is doomed!

(Not to mention the slimy frogs, edible poets, etc...)

Murgh · Post by **Murgh** » Fri Jan 27, 2006 8:47 pm

it looks very good.

how isn't it behaving right? (or do you just mean that which is solved by making it more rare by role(0.05)..?)

jonnycuba · Post by **jonnycuba** » Fri Jan 27, 2006 9:41 pm

Run for the Hills!

kaypy · Post by **kaypy** » Sat Jan 28, 2006 2:25 am

how isn't it behaving right?

Several areas of concern at the moment.

The main one used to be it tended to attack its minons, but that may have been fixed by the role(number) trick. Digging through the source code, it looks like I dont actually need to mark it 'thargoid' to prevent that, anything beginning with 'tharg' will do.

however...

1) At present, launching tharglets requires that the launcher have a role that is exactly "thargoid".

Code: Select all

if ([roles isEqual:@"thargoid"])
		return [self fireTharglet];

It also seems that launching a ship as a carrier rejigs the launched ship's role

Code: Select all

		if (defense_ship_role_key)
		{
			defense_ship = [universe getShipWithRole:defense_ship_role_key];
//			NSLog(@"DEBUG launchDefenseShip Got ship with defense_ship_role '%@' : %@", defense_ship_role_key, defense_ship);
			[defense_ship setRoles:@"defense_ship"];
		}

Hmm I wonder if this replaces the other roles... If it does then Im still going to have my original problem, too...

Anyhow, the net result is that I keep having thargoids launch regular missiles.

2) Im trying to get things to launch out of that bay at the bottom of the ship, without much luck yet.

3) While less important, I think having this think armed with a bunch of thargoid lasers rather than the plasma turrets would probably be more thematically correct. (Although I would also need to reduce the fire rate so that the ship as a whole doesnt dish out that much more damage than a regular thargoid)

4) I need to go figure out how escorts work, so I can give this thing some pre-generated flunkies

kaypy · Post by **kaypy** » Sat Jan 28, 2006 2:28 am

Had a nasty surprise while playing with this...

I had originally set the defense_ship_role to 'thargoid', so when I gave the carrier itself a thargoid role, it started creating more of itself...

"Augh! Trumbles! Trumbles with GUNS!"

kaypy · Post by **kaypy** » Sat Jan 28, 2006 2:47 am

oh, I almost forgot

5) get the textures down to a reasonable size. Theres enough repetition there that it ought be be reusing about 6 panels over and over, but I havent the faintest idea how to organise it...

Ive put up what I have here in case anyone wants to have a fiddle... Its kinda big (700k) because of the aforementioned texture inefficiency...

kris

Murgh · Post by **Murgh** » Sat Jan 28, 2006 9:00 am

thanks for the fiddle.
it's a fun, horrific experience.

but your problems, from initial peeking:
you must include a ballturret.dat with turretskin.png

(or was this included in previous Oolites until yesterday?)

the regular missiles keep coming, because the AI tells it to do so in a few cases.

the texture (how come in a fat .bmp?) as you say should be refitted in wings to make much better economy of a smaller space with the repeat panels, and will loook much crisper. you write 'not the faintest..', but it's pretty easy.. I'll elaborate if you want.

making them spawn defense_ship thargoid (but not itself) would be avoided by making the it a highly unlikely thargoid(0.01) (maybe thargoid(0.0001) would work?) or.. customizing the thargoids you include to have, say, thargDread_defender as a role, corresponding with the defense_ship entry..

if you include setUpEscorts (and do the necessary escortstuff in the shipdata) in the GLOBAL in your AI, the dreadnaught will have a posse ready instantly.

I quite like the pink plasmaballs.

kaypy · Post by **kaypy** » Sat Jan 28, 2006 11:18 am

you must include a ballturret.dat with turretskin.png Wink (or was this included in previous Oolites until yesterday?)

Oops. Have had behemoth.oxp installed for so long Id forgotten it isnt always there...

the regular missiles keep coming, because the AI tells it to do so in a few cases.

My problem isnt with it launching missiles too fast (although that needs tweaking too) its that regular thargoids launch tharglets with the same command, but its hardwired for role="thargoid" (and defense ships dont seem to stay just "thargoid" even if they are summonded with that role.

I may be able to work around things by turning the targoid defenders into carriers in their own right... That would probably fix most of my immediate problems, its just a pain in the neck..

the texture (how come in a fat .bmp?) as you say should be refitted in wings to make much better economy of a smaller space with the repeat panels, and will loook much crisper. you write 'not the faintest..', but it's pretty easy.. I'll elaborate if you want.

Mostly I havent tried to figure it out yet. Is the relevent information in the wiki? If not maybe elaborate some there...

customizing the thargoids you include to have, say, thargDread_defender as a role, corresponding with the defense_ship entry

I had already got that far (after my initial surprise), but had set them back again while playing with the "missile" stuff...

if you include setUpEscorts (and do the necessary escortstuff in the shipdata) in the GLOBAL in your AI, the dreadnaught will have a posse ready instantly.

Cool. Ill give it a try. Im guessing Ill probably need to carrierise the escorts too...

I quite like the pink plasmaballs.

I like them in general, they just dont seem appropriate for thargoids...