Random Assassination Contracts

LittleBear · Post by **LittleBear** » Mon Jul 17, 2006 8:09 pm

Teaser:

Ramon's take on Victim2
(The Galatic Cup Winning Zero-G Hockey Team)

jonnycuba · Post by **jonnycuba** » Mon Jul 17, 2006 8:30 pm

Wow! If this is the standard then I can't wait...

aegidian · Post by **aegidian** » Mon Jul 17, 2006 9:26 pm

Nice.

Will this OXP be using the code to add particular characters as Pilots etc? (As for the constrictor mission)

LittleBear · Post by **LittleBear** » Mon Jul 17, 2006 9:50 pm

Afraid I've coded very simpley (works though)!

Each of the ten victims plus various escorts, mafia hit men, vengefull
relatives etc is a unique ship with a unique role.

When the conditions for a hit to be offered are met:-

1) A mission brief appears explaining the nature of the hit and where the mark can be found and gives a bit of background as to who your client is, what type of ship the mark has why the client wants him killed and the price to be paid. If you accept the hit then the mission stage is set to the next stage.

Each victim ship is given a unique role (eg: victim2) or whatever. He also has a unique name Eg: "Guild Target : Hockey Team - 5,000C", "Guild Target : The Fair Wind - 20,000C" etc.

The ship has a unique AI (eg :victim2AI) so he will make his way to the planet, be a pirate or whatever.

If you attack him he sends you appropriate comm hails pleading / threatening for his life as approprate. Each victim has his own hails, as each has his own AI.

Once a hit has been accepted, the script checks you are have accepted the hit and are at the right planet (in this case the planet where the hockey team are enjoying a victory tour).

If so upon exiting witchspace, the script checks for the a ship with the approparate role (in this case victim2). The game won't find any as all ships in this OXP have unique roles, so it returns a none.

When no ship with the role victim2 (or whatever the script is checking for) is found the script adds one ship with the role victim2 (or whatever) somewhere in the system.

As the victim has the name "Guild Target : Hockey Team - 5,000C" he will appear on your ID computer as such.

In play terms. You are offered a hit. You go to the system. And start hunting down your victim. IDing each ship you meet. The mark will be there somewhere with all the other ships the game automatically adds.

Your "Victim Identifcation System" ID's him as a Guild Target and you attack. He pleads for his life in ammusing ways. When he dies, his death actions advance the mission to the next stage.

The script checks that the mission is at the right stage and you are docked. If so a mission screen comes up and credits are awarded. The mission stage is advanced.

Further hits or other OXP events will now take place, once, in addition to mission stage, kill count, planet number and dice roles are also met.

This simple method works both for victims and for vengefull relatives of earlier victims.

Vengfull relatives or Hit men with contracts on you are done in the same way. In the case of a hit on you. The script checks that the mission stage is at the correct stage and roles the dice following a hyperspace jump.

If the chance hits the vengefull relative or Hit Man is added to the system ships. The Hit men / vengfull relatives use a custom AI ("kill player AI").

But each "hit ship" has his own version of this AI. Eg a fellow hit man will hail you along the lines of "It's nothing personal Brother. Just a matter of buisness.", but a vengefull relative will berate you with hails on a more personal level! This is why I have had to do 20 odd unique ships!

LittleBear · Post by **LittleBear** » Tue Jul 18, 2006 9:03 am

Hi,

Could Murgh or Giles help me with a scripting problem?

Originally, I was going to have all the briefings offering hits to be text only. I've written some (I hope) darkly humerous text to go with each
briefing, but my own ship models wern't anything to write home about, so
it didn't bother including a showshipmodel.

However, Ramon's are so good. I'd really like the player to get a proper look at them. (Remember they are all unique victims, so you will only see once in space during the game - ie when you go and kill them).

I don't really want to include them in demoships, as that would really spoil the OXP. I'd like the player to be surprised every time a new hit is offered by Ramon's artwork.

I looked at Giles's contrictior mission and Murgh's military and saw (I thought) how they had done it. I went back through my script and changed the first "paragraph" of the OXP (the one offering the first hit), so it now reads:-

{
"assassins" = (
{
conditions = ("galaxy_number equal 6");
do = (
{
conditions = ("dockedAtMainStation_bool equal YES");
do = (
{
conditions = ("mission_assassins undefined", "score_number greaterthan 199");
do = (
"setMissionMusic: none",
setGuiToMissionScreen,
"showShipModel: victim1",
"addMissionText: hitbrief_1",
"set: mission_assassins assassins_STAGE1",
"setMissionDescription: assassins_header1"
);
},
This worked an a model of victim1 now appears in the background.

So I then changed the script displaying the hit on victim2 to:-

{
conditions = ("mission_assassins equal assassins_STAGE2", "planet_number lessthan 107", "galaxy_number equal 6", "score_number greaterthan 499", "d100_number lessthan 27");
do = (
"setMissionMusic: none",
setGuiToMissionScreen,
"showShipModel: victim2",
"addMissionText: hitbrief_2",
"set: mission_assassins assassins_STAGE2a",
"setMissionDescription: assassins_header4"
);
},

However, whilst the missiontext comes up, there is no shipmodel in the background.

I don't really see the difference in the code, and why one works and the other doesn't. This isn't fatal to the OXP, but it would be cool to have a good look at Ramon's models.

It isn't a problem with the ship itself. They all appear in space fine and if I change the name in the first para. of script to showshipmodel: victim2 (or any other ship for that matter), it works fine.

If anybody wants to PM me their e-mail I send you over the whole script file (all the whole OXP if you like). This is cosmetic rather than essenital, but the quality of the models is so good, I'd really like players to be able to have a good look at them.

Arexack_Heretic · Post by **Arexack_Heretic** » Tue Jul 18, 2006 10:27 am

I'd love to see some of the ships appear more often than only once...could you script (not really unique ships, like the Constrictor) to appear at several non-mission locations?
Or have a 0.1% chance of being chosen as hunter, pirate, etc.

for example: a gang has this supermamba, you kill the ringleader and the gang scatters. From now on, there could be a small chance of encountering one of the ex-gang members in a supermamba in another pirate outfit. They may even hold a grudge against you for killing the boss... or thank you, then ask politely for you to dump your cargo.

Also:
added incentive to doing the missions: more variety in the Ooniverse!

LittleBear · Post by **LittleBear** » Tue Jul 18, 2006 11:17 am

Some ships do appear more than once (and in groups). The hit men who
take revenge or the Soin Sisters (in their Mega Mambas) can hit you serveral times (using a dice roll to check if they are in the system that you
are in).

However the victim ships are unique (they have to be really as this is a contract on an individual). Also if I allowed these ships just to pop up willy-nilly, the OXP wouldn't work. Eg you might be at Stage 8 of the OXP, but killing a randomly generated Ramon's "Team Bus" would by its death actions set the STAGE back to STAGE3.

As a result I really would like to get a rotating ship model of Ramon's victims comming up on the briefing screen which offers you the hit.

It doesn't matter so much for the "Soin Clan Sister : Mega Mamba MkI" or the "Mafia Hit Ship : Mega Cobra MKV" as you'll see these ships serveral times during the OXP.

Once you have finished all the missions, yes it would be easy to script a chance of Mega Mambas / Mega Cobra's etc appearing in the role of a pirate. Will do this!

Also as reward for completing the missions I could also like_ship to the vitims and have a chance of a Victim2 ship (but without the death_actions), appearing in the role of special. Eg in my shipdate have <key>Team Bus</key><likeship><victim2><role><special>. Once you have completed all the mission, have the last script bit of script would check for ships with the role <special> and have a small chance of adding a special ship to the system ships.

Still want Ramon's victims to come up as shipmodels though!

Any ideas on how I fix my code to get Ramon's Victim Ship models comming up on the respective briefing screen?

Arexack_Heretic · Post by **Arexack_Heretic** » Tue Jul 18, 2006 2:14 pm

are you using winOo 1.65b3?
If so, I got the same problem for shipinfo display in general gameplay.
And Constrictor mission.

LittleBear · Post by **LittleBear** » Tue Jul 18, 2006 4:09 pm

I am.

But what is odd, is that the game has no problem with displaying the ship model in the first paragraph of the script. But then refuses to do so in the next paragraph. Even though I have copied and pasted the same code. (or at least I thought I had)!

At first I though that perhaps you could only have 1 showshipmodel in the same script. But this cannot be the case as Murgh shows several shipmodels in his Military briefing.

Davemak · Post by **Davemak** » Tue Jul 18, 2006 6:56 pm

I never saw any of Murghs ships on the briefings?
Similarly, missed out on lots of the briefings in Deposed.

Wierd or what?!?

LittleBear · Post by **LittleBear** » Tue Jul 18, 2006 7:21 pm

Well, as I say. It won't ruin the OXP if you don't see the victims on the mission briefing screen. Just that Ramon's models are so good, I'd like the OXP to show them off, by having them roating in the background to the message offering you the hit!

Murgh · Post by **Murgh** » Tue Jul 18, 2006 8:09 pm

like you say, it's possible, but you need to segment each screen carefully.
can be frustrating

LittleBear · Post by **LittleBear** » Tue Jul 18, 2006 8:29 pm

Do you mean i'm missing a } or ); somewhere?

Will check!

LittleBear · Post by **LittleBear** » Tue Jul 18, 2006 9:18 pm

PS: anybody else out there willing to take a basic elite ship and texture it for a victim in this OXP?

You don't need to do any shipdata (i can do that), but I have no artistic skill and could never do such a good job as Ramon has done by taking a basic python and texturing it into a "team bus". I can't expect the guy to texture every victim in the OXP!!!

So if you fancy re-texturing a basic elite ship to appear as a victim (or as a revenge ship) in this OXP send me a PM and I'll send you back a brief!

It is "only" a case of retexturing Giles's basic elite ship. You don't need to do a new model or do any shipdata, just retexture a classic elite ship and send me the model!

lex_talionis · Post by **lex_talionis** » Tue Jul 18, 2006 9:27 pm

...twist Flying_Circus's arm.... if he's up for it! His stuff's amazing. I'm sure he's got lots of time