forward_weapon_type in shipyard/shippdata.plist

[montana05]

Could somebody please explain to me what the forward_weapon_type or lasers in general in shipyard.plist are doing ? As discussed and tested here viewtopic.php?p=283537#p283537 shipdata.plist always overwrites the settings of shipyard.plist. Any laser in shipyard.plist is ignored as long as there is no entry in shipdata.plist so at a first look this field(s) seems pretty useless.

[Old Murgh]

Could somebody please explain to me what the forward_weapon_type or lasers in general in shipyard.plist are doing ? As discussed and tested here viewtopic.php?p=283537#p283537 shipdata.plist always overwrites the settings of shipyard.plist. Any laser in shipyard.plist is ignored as long as there is no entry in shipdata.plist so at a first look this field(s) seems pretty useless.

I'm assuming you are applying it to a player-only ship, in which case it is useless, but in an NPC entry it is useful. It's like what's the point of view position coords on an NPCship?

But the moment a playership or NPCship is a tiny brief entry drawing its bulk info from an is_template ship, it doesn't hurt to have all the parameters..

[montana05]

Could somebody please explain to me what the forward_weapon_type or lasers in general in shipyard.plist are doing ? As discussed and tested here viewtopic.php?p=283537#p283537 shipdata.plist always overwrites the settings of shipyard.plist. Any laser in shipyard.plist is ignored as long as there is no entry in shipdata.plist so at a first look this field(s) seems pretty useless.

I'm assuming you are applying it to a player-only ship, in which case it is useless, but in an NPC entry it is useful. It's like what's the point of view position coords on an NPCship?

But the moment a playership or NPCship is a tiny brief entry drawing its bulk info from an is_template ship, it doesn't hurt to have all the parameters..

I might be wrong but shipyard.plist is for player-ships only, it doesn't affect any NPC as much as I know. While I usually even set default values (just to be sure) it is kind of confusing to have a seemingless useless parameter. While testing the individual shipyard, I saw several ships getting their lasers reduced because their authors believed, same like me in the past, that shipyard.plist will overwrite shipdata.plist.

[Old Murgh]

I might be wrong but shipyard.plist is for player-ships only, it doesn't affect any NPC as much as I know. While I usually even set default values (just to be sure) it is kind of confusing to have a seemingless useless parameter. While testing the individual shipyard, I saw several ships getting their lasers reduced because their authors believed, same like me in the past, that shipyard.plist will overwrite shipdata.plist.

Sorry, my brain dyslexed your word order. Yes you're right, that' shouldn't be the case. I'll test when I get a chance.

[Nite Owl]

Pure speculation on my part but...

If the shipdata.plist designates a specific laser, lets say a Military Laser for the sake of discussion, and the shipyard.plist designates no laser at all. Does it then follow that any Shipyard could offer that ship with a less powerful laser, say a Pulse or Beam Laser, instead of the desired Military Laser from the shipdata.plist. Does that make sense of it? Basically the entry in the shipyard.plist is there only to ensure that the desired type of laser is the minimum that could be offered at a Shipyard for that specific ship. It then follows that the two entries from each .plist should match to get the desired result or that no entry should be entered in either .plist to allow any laser to be fitted at a Shipyard.

Have not even gone into the Standard Equipment versus Optional Equipment aspects of the shipyard.plist. Just trying to make sense of the entries that are under discussion here.

[Old Murgh]

My first tests are like Montana says.
The shipdata overrides the standard shipyard designation. Then weirdly, when writing military laser in the shipyard and a pulse in the shipdata, the ship is sold with no laser (though ML was present in the optional list). To me it seems like something resembling a bug, but a more systematic tester might see the explanation..

[montana05]

Pure speculation on my part but...
Basically the entry in the shipyard.plist is there only to ensure that the desired type of laser is the minimum that could be offered at a Shipyard for that specific ship.

Good thought, but while in my test-runs I had a rear laser who wasn't defined in the shipdata.plist but in the shipyard.plist as military. The result when I bought the ship was no rear laser at all.

[Slartibartfast]

Hello

Basically the entry in the shipyard.plist is there only to ensure that the desired type of laser is the minimum that could be offered at a Shipyard for that specific ship.

hmm
maybe ... but my eyes, that would make no sense to set a "minimum"
-- why should a "big ship" not be able to carry small lasers?

i think, only the other way round makes sense
define "max-laser_(power)" in shipdata

- shipdata (technical part) should define the ability of the "hull" to carry equipment

- shipyard should define, how a new ship is equipped and what you can buy
( regarding to the maximum, which is set in shipdata)

matthias

[Slartibartfast]

hi
O.K. then we need a "2nd part" for equipment in "shipdata"
-EQ , that is set fo npc-ships, (only npc! ), because you have no shipyard
( which should also fit to the "hull-data" )
---------
or ..... a "virtual" shipyard - that equips npc-ships randomly
( regarding to the hull-data " set in shipdata )
....
oh .. i see that would cause a lot of work
matthias

[montana05]

Sorry, I missed this originally. I'll check out what the source is doing and report back.

Ahem, Ahem, any news regarding this ?

[phkb]

OK, I've had a look at what's going on, and can confirm this is a bug. The weapon info is is picked up from the shipyard data, but never actually applied into the final ship object. I have a fix, which I'll try and publish in the next few days.

If you want to compile and play yourself, add these two lines to "Universe.m" at line 8630 (if should be just below this statement: OOWeaponType aftWeapon = OOWeaponTypeFromEquipmentIdentifierSloppy(aftWeaponString);)

Code: Select all

			if (fwdWeapon && fwdWeaponString) [shipDict setObject:fwdWeaponString forKey:KEY_EQUIPMENT_FORWARD_WEAPON];
			if (aftWeapon && aftWeaponString) [shipDict setObject:aftWeaponString forKey:KEY_EQUIPMENT_AFT_WEAPON];

[montana05]

OK, I've had a look at what's going on, and can confirm this is a bug. The weapon info is is picked up from the shipyard data, but never actually applied into the final ship object. I have a fix, which I'll try and publish in the next few days.

If you want to compile and play yourself, add these two lines to "Universe.m" at line 8630 (if should be just below this statement: OOWeaponType aftWeapon = OOWeaponTypeFromEquipmentIdentifierSloppy(aftWeaponString);)

Code: Select all

			if (fwdWeapon && fwdWeaponString) [shipDict setObject:fwdWeaponString forKey:KEY_EQUIPMENT_FORWARD_WEAPON];
			if (aftWeapon && aftWeaponString) [shipDict setObject:aftWeaponString forKey:KEY_EQUIPMENT_AFT_WEAPON];

Thank you for your effort, phkb, I did suspect that much after my tests. Slartibartfast was right.

Since you already checked the source here, another one, longtime reported but never solved:

scan_description in the shipdata.plist seems to crash the game, no hints in the log to find. When used in a script, there are no obvious problems. It could be a matter of numbers, back then I tried to create a complete new category, "navy ship", and therefore quite some ships had this description assigned when I left the station.

[phkb]

Looks like another_commander has just checked in a fix for the scan_description bug!

[montana05]

Looks like another_commander has just checked in a fix for the scan_description bug!

Hurray , the last time I mentioned this bug was 2018, and I am sure I reported it the first time ways before.