Witchspace, possible to exit?

[ClymAngus]

In my experience with original Elite (for the PC) being yanked out of Hyperspace by Thargoids always left the Commander with enough fuel left to re-enter Hyperspace and travel to a nearby system or the system a Commander intended to jump to in the first place.

Yeah, an actual choice would be nice that didn't end in spacebar.

Sure, you've got just enough fuel to get you to a planet. of course if you actually try and save it, the Thargons will be handing you your ass on a platter in 9 seconds flat. What was that? But But it takes 14 seconds to jump you say? Shame.... What about plan B Play the hero so you kill a few, excellent OH dear..... because you actually had to AVOID some of those death dealing bast**ds by fuel injecting your fuel level just went red. You know what that means happy pilot boy? Its a slow lingering death of you! That will teach you to try and be brave.

So what we are saying here is when you miss jump, Immediate Chicken-sh** tactics of heading in the other direction, brown trail mixing with your exhaust gasses , clutching your pink whinny the poo blankee for comfort, hoping the nasty nasty saucers don't get you as you before you can jump back into the nice safe cornflower blue world of trading. = WIN!

Hardly character building really now is it? I say it's not a feature it's a bug and the sooner someone oxp's this incompetent 80's throwback late night programming, blistering brain wrong screw up into the dustbin of gaming history the better.

[Cmdr James]

Er... what behaviour do you want to see? some free fuel?


I dont see a problem with the way it currently is. If you dont feel tough enough, then keep your ship in good condition, and hope you dont misjump. Only ever happened to me once or twice.

[Thargoid]

Hardly character building really now is it? I say it's not a feature it's a bug and the sooner someone oxp's this incompetent 80's throwback late night programming, blistering brain wrong screw up into the dustbin of gaming history the better.

You mean like someone writing a Fuel Tank OXP or a Fuel Collector OXP or an Interstellar Help OXP?

Or just an OXP that places big dockable ships in interstellar space, say like a Behemoth having a spacewar or something?

[ClymAngus]

Cmdr James, I'm glad your a fan of death traps. That must make life very interesting for you. If a little fuitless. I however am not.

You mean like someone writing a Fuel Tank OXP or a Fuel Collector OXP or an Interstellar Help OXP?

Or just an OXP that places big dockable ships in interstellar space, say like a Behemoth having a spacewar or something?

Well this is what I thought after taking 8 of those saucers out but....
1) Flying around for a bit, (try half an hour) Fuel collector didn't suck up so much as a drop of juice. I could have coped with zipping through nothingness for an hour or two, if I knew that ever so slowing I would be getting out of this impossible situation. Apparently not.
2)Interstellar Help Doesn't that only work the one way? Sure it would be nice to have someone to cry with as we both slowly freeze to death but still, it's a bit melodramatic for a game.
3) Fuel tank, yeah blew that dodging the 6 warships, and 2 battleships. Remember the Thargons have a serious turn of speed so maxing out engines doesn't cut it they'll just cut you to pieces.
4) A ship repair at this point would mean the loss of several contracts as the repairs themselves take time to complete.
5) Behamoth, yes lost track of them as all the saucers forgot about the fleet action and went after me.

What I'm trying to say here is (non-rant), because mis-jumps are rare events they don't give as much opportunity for programmers to properly test their oxps. If I had known that Fuel collector oxp was non-functional in deep space then it would have changed my disision to stay and fight.

Of course I did design something to fix this, but as I'm playing this game "properly" and I can't afford my hand built bug squasher yet. But you are right ranting about it does no good. I'll just pop the hood on Fuel collector and fix it myself.

[Thargoid]

I think the fuel collector does work in interstellar space, or at least it's supposed to. From a quick look in the v6 scripting we find

Code: Select all

			player.consoleMessage("Interstellar space:Fly at max speed to extract fuel",3)

so Frame already is on the case with that one.

And interstellar help (at least the later versions) was iirc designed to get players out of this very situation, as McLane was of the same view as you (and it's one I'm sympathetic to as well - I'm not a fan of no-win Kobayashi Maru's, but then I'd just Kirk-it via the debug console). I think you were supposed to be able to be the one in distress, and follow the saviour ship out via its wormhole.

[ClymAngus]

Looks like I need to go on a latest Version road trip.

Still I feel better for the rant. I worked blood hard taking out those ships, with nothing to show for it. Felt like a slap in the face.

[Disembodied]

You're right, though, ClymAngus, the original Elite witchdrive malfunction is a duff piece of game-design. In it's raw state it always results in a Game Over if the player has, by chance, been interrupted in the middle of a long jump -- even if you manage to heroically kill off the enemy ships.

There needs to be some sort of escape hatch, even if it's bloody difficult to reach. The fuel collector is one option but it does alter other aspects of gameplay, so not everyone might have one fitted: ideally this one situation should have one individual solution. Something like, maybe, a "Thargoid Nexus" which can generate a wormhole to a nearby system. Once you've defeated the attendant Thargoid squadron, of course. And maybe done something else, to activate it – carrying a certain number of Tharglets in the hold, maybe, to "mask your signature".

[Eric Walch]

What I'm trying to say here is (non-rant), because mis-jumps are rare events they don't give as much opportunity for programmers to properly test their oxps.

It can easy be tested but programmers often forget to test because they don't realise things could behave different in witchspace. From the code:

Code: Select all

BOOL misjump = ((flightPitch == max_flight_pitch) || (malfunc && (randf() > 0.75)));

Misjumps because of bad maintenance are rare (second condition). And even than only 25% of the malfunctions leads to a misjump the other 75% gives other failures. I do not bother to do maintenance and accept an occasional misjump. (Maintenance costs me 8000 cr each time). The first condition is easy to fulfil by a tester, so testing in witchspace should not be to difficult.

I always thought it was not using up the full fuel on a misjump, but in the code I saw it is first reducing your fuel level and only than looking if a misjump is made. So it always cost you fuel for the full distance. Better do only long jumps in a well maintained craft.

UPS does occasionally put fuel ships in witchspace after you got the change to give fuel to some ships in distress in normal space. I also never tested it if it worked as I didn't know how to force the jump at that time. An when I tested it I noticed that the advanced space compass is not working in witchspace. The tankers are added and transmit a T but a player will never receive the signal. So finding the fuelship will ups will be just luck.

[KZ9999]

It may seem like a death trap but there was logic behind it:

1) To remind players that they are not a action movie hero's, unlike most games of the era, and bad stuff can happen for no reason. Cruel but realistic.
2) More importantly, to encourage commanders to keep their jumps short as possible, to have fuel spare. It forces the player to have to spend more time fighting and trading. This builds up more involvement in the game.

My opinion on the other bit's discussed.
* Leave the fuel cost as it is. It's how the original acorn game worked.
* The confusion about the hyperspace/witchspace comes from the original acorn version manual and novella. B&B used hyperspace as their term of choice. Robert Holdstock used witchspace by habit, it's found in many of his other SF novels, if my memory serves me correctly. Subsequent version of the game in-game text and documents have mixed both. It's now reached the point that Mr Braben's later versions of the game mixes both terms pretty randomly.
* There's no reason why there can't be low cost FTL coms. Sub-atomic wormholes are believed occur naturally in the space-time fabric. Ship's would only have to tune in to one linking near the station to where they are. Coms would be compressed pulses to survive their unbelievably short lifespan. Because the natural wormholes don't cover trans-galactic distances, there's no com's between GCW charts, hence the reset of your legal status when you G-jump. The GCW wouldn't waste valuable com time on the hideously expensive artificial wormhole trans-galactic com's transmitting changes of commanders legal status
* A possible solution to the lost in space problem is to set the battles on the distant outer fringes of star systems, instead of inter-galactic space. (The sun a distant dot on the horizon, but the space compass still works) Make so that you can head back to the system and safety, but it's tens of minuets of hyperspeed to do it. The player now has the choice to walk back, or load a saved game.

[Diziet Sma]

<snip>
There needs to be some sort of escape hatch, even if it's bloody difficult to reach.
</snip>

I vaguely recall one time getting trapped in witchspace in the C64 version, and using my escape capsule to get out... don't know if this works in Oolite, I've only been playing a week. Since I'm deliberately letting maintenance slide ATM, I may get the chance to find out soon.

Since this is my first post here, I'd also like to say how blown away I am by what Oolite has become, it's like everything that was only in my imagination 20+ years ago is now on the screen! Serious kudos to all involved!

[Thargoid]

Firstly an alien welcome, oh cultured one

And if you want a quicker way to test these things, try doing a certain type of acrobatics whilst your jump finishes its countdown

Yes I am being deliberately obscure to save spoilers.

[another_commander]

I vaguely recall one time getting trapped in witchspace in the C64 version, and using my escape capsule to get out... don't know if this works in Oolite, I've only been playing a week. Since I'm deliberately letting maintenance slide ATM, I may get the chance to find out soon.

Welcome to the boards Diziet Sma. You will find that the escape pod does not work in witchspace, since normally there is no station nearby. However, you don't really need to wait for a misjump to occur as a result of lack of maintenance to test it. Up up and away at the end of hyperspace cowntdown can take you places...

[Diziet Sma]

Firstly an alien welcome, oh cultured one

Thank you.. oh dear... does this mean my SC cover is blown?

Yeah, I guess I could trigger a misjump, but to be honest, I'm not that keen on tangling with Thargoids until I get a new joystick, some things are best not done with just a keyboard.