NPC-shields v 1.1 now available

[Smivs]

I'd be interested to compare my download statistics to other people's and see whether we can find some common trends, for instance a confirmation (or non-confirmation) of my guess that ship OXPs are more popular than other types. If you look at the release titles here on the Expansion Pack forum, they're certainly more popular among OXP makers.

Here are mine, if it helps, broken down into 'editions' where appropriate. Where there has been more than one 'main' version, only the figures for the current version are stated, although previous versions might get a mention.

Those marked with a star * were released within the last four weeks (and yes, I should 'get a life' )

Accessories v2 610 (v1 had over 1500)
Clippers* 64 (replaced Boa Clipper - 847)
Combat HUD* 13
Contractor 585
ExtraFuelTanks* 68
GalDrivePod 497
Jellybaby Dispenser 88
Smivs' Shipset v3 970 [Basic 136, Standard Def 365, High def 469]
Star Jelly 329
ToughGuys 2 479 [standard 202, For Griff's shipset 170, For Smivs' Shipset 104)] (v2 was 635 in total)
WonderWorm* 67
Xeptatl's Sword 177
YellOo Cabs 355

Looks like ships are very popular as you suspect, plus re-textures and eye-candy which is no big surprise.

Of course not all downloaded OXPs are actually used, and I sometimes wonder how many (perhaps the more complex/exotic ones) are downloaded so those interested can 'disect' them.

[Thargoid]

Here are mine, at least since I moved them to box.com (some of the earlier ones will have more downloads than listed). These are total download figures for all versions of the given OXP:

• Aquatics - 4346
• Armoury - 2744
• Bigships - 1539
• Bounty Status - 504
• Cargo Shepherd - 561
• Energy Equipment - 2526
• Flight Log - 1028
• Fuel Station - 4583
• Gates - 2007
• Hired Guns - 2548
• Hyper Cargo - 1311
• Iron Hide- 1987
• Lave Academy - 3089
• Military Fuel Injectors - 644
• Naval Grid - 831
• ooCheat - 1030
• Planetfall - 5308
• Planetfall (Russian version) - 345
• PF - Black Monks - 921
• PF - Hoopy Casino - 900
• PF - ooHaul - 1007
• Planetfall Taxi - 1023
• Pods - 1776
• Pods (UPS Add-on) - 1160
• Repair Bots - 2809
• Retro Rockets - 242
• Ring Racer - 1220
• Second Wave - 1178
• Stealth - 1029
• Stellar Serpents - 794
• Target Autolock Plus - 4324
• TCAT - 1224
• Traffic Control - 2801
• Vortex - 1128
• Welcome Mat - 2696

So a total download count of 63163. That also doesn't include any of the OXPs that got rolled up into Armoury:

• AMS - 1418
• Captured Thargons - 1285
• Drones - 1166
• Missile Rack - 903
• Probe - 918

So my conclusions (other than I've written too many damn OXPs) would be that people like ships, but also system modifications and handy items (PF, Fuel Station, TAP) with middle-usage on ship equipment.

But I'd also say the simple little OXPs that fill a gap (Bounty Status and Welcome Mat in my case, in parallel with McLane's Display Reputation) all seem to do well.[/color]

[Gimi]

Weird, I must be an atypical player than.
I have several installations. My main one which is "Griffified". Only additional ships are those which have a "Griffy" look which means some of Staer9 ships. Apart from that no additional ships unless I'm testing or it is included in some mission or flavour package. On a different laptop (less powerful) the Ooniverse is Smivsified. No additional ship-sets, but lots of enhancements and equipment like snoopers, illegal goods, NPC shields and so on. (as long as they fit within the boundaries of what I deem permissible). I like consistency, so I avoid single ship OXP's unless they fit in and fill a role I think should be there, but I really like the flavour OXP's, so I have as many as the computer will handle.
However I do have a tendency to download most OXP's just to have a peak at it, so I have downloaded way more than I use.

And lastly: Darkspace.oxp has 37 downloads which is way more than I expected given it's simplicity and that it just reduces graphics to improve performance (something that you can also do in-game in options)

[Fatleaf]

Well for my one single oxp

Victim 11 has only 61

But it is very specialised as you have to have completed Assassins Guild first. Maybe Assassins II might have better success!

[Cody]

Weird, I must be an atypical player than

You're not the only one, Gimi... my Ooniverse is Griff'ed and as consistent as I can make it.
This means I have only the core ships (plus the Torus stations), and some kit and eye-candy OXPs.

Not only does NPC Shields make life tougher for the player... it makes NPC v NPC dogfights more entertaining.

[Gimi]

Not only does NPC Shields make life tougher for the player... it makes NPC v NPC dogfights more entertaining.

I have NPC Shields installed by default together with a few other OXP's that make my life a little more difficult. However I have had some trouble when I end up in a "Cdr Gimi against everyone" situation. (Random hits come to mind). In these cases I have felt that the situation has been skewed to much in favour of the NPC/Mission/Game/AI. So I have taken it out together with a few other OXP's, both favourable and disadvantageous to the player, to balance things out. But the default configuration is, NPC Shields enabled.

But I do think that the concept should be included in a future release of Oolite, but balance needs to be looked at.
Oh, and yes, it does make life more entertaining when NPC's struggle to kill each other. Can take a long time, especially if the NPC runs away when they are low on energy and come back. The AI's would probably need adjusting as well if NPC shields becomes a core feature.

[Cmdr. Maegil]

In these cases I have felt that the situation has been skewed to much in favour of the NPC/Mission/Game/AI.

I think it's the other way around: to make it a game and not a noob killer it was necessary to skew the odds in favour to the player; what the OXP does is to eliminate this handicap. That such situations were "easily" winnable was a distortion in itself, but now you have to be really, really good to tackle such top-notch assignments.

I disagree on adding it to the core simply because it'd make a game already very hard on beginners become almost impossible, putting yet more people off Oolite regardless of how good it may be.

Oh, and yes, it does make life more entertaining when NPC's struggle to kill each other. Can take a long time, especially if the NPC runs away when they are low on energy and come back. The AI's would probably need adjusting as well if NPC shields becomes a core feature.

Indeed dogfighting became much more tactical, or at least for the player.
I had to adjust my techniques, since most ships can't be destroyed by a single full burst of military lasers anymore; fighting the bugs also became more interesting - now you have to show even the thargons some respect... however, I think the AIs are "good enough" as they are and don't need any tweaking - lest we end up with a 30-page thread on AI space combat manoeuvring tactics (and good luck with implementing them ).

[Switeck]

Where the AIs need the most help isn't in trying to kill a particular target...it's for everything else.
Very slow docking computers and NPCs docking (and crashing) comes to mind.

[Gimi]

In these cases I have felt that the situation has been skewed to much in favour of the NPC/Mission/Game/AI.

I think it's the other way around: to make it a game and not a noob killer it was necessary to skew the odds in favour to the player; what the OXP does is to eliminate this handicap. That such situations were "easily" winnable was a distortion in itself, but now you have to be really, really good to tackle such top-notch assignments.

I disagree of course. Some of the furballs I get into with Random Hits and other OXP's are close to impossible unless you use quite powerful OXP weapons in my view. I generally only use lasers, avoiding powerful OXP weapons. The one thing that tilts these encounters in the players favour is the cloaking device, but if that goes or if you haven't got one, it's unbalanced in my view. (My current commender doesn't have one yet.). Generally I reckon I can hold my own in Oolite, and for most (90%) situations, NPC-shields makes the game more interesting, but everything takes longer. With all that in mind, I agree with you when you say that NPC-shields in the core game would make the game to hard for a beginner. This is why I think that, if it was to be included, the game balance would need to be revised. But I still think the concept would be a very nice addition to the core game.

(When I read through what I have written, our opinions are not that far apart ).

[Kaks]

One thing to bear in mind is that - more likely than not - quite a few of the more challenging combat situations were tested without NPC shields, and/or other stuff...

Game balance is always pretty tricky to get right. Hopefully some of those really challenging situations will be redesigned so that the level of challenge isn't so high if NPC shields are installed, or increased if the player has a bit too many turrets, repair bots, escorts, and/or assorted superweapons...

Hmm, there seems to be a stream of new stuff out there pulling in all different directions all at once: things kind of go horribly unbalanced for a while, then something comes up that kind of restores balance - again, for a while, until the same cycle starts all over again...
OXPs: a curse, and a gift!

You know, the more I think about it, the happier I am that we can all customise our gaming environments!

[Fatleaf]

(Even Cataclysm 1.1 has a slow-but-steady flow of downloads, notwithstanding the fact that it's broken for a long time now, totaling 1347 downloads since January 2009.)

Now that you mention it, is there any chance of motivating you to look at it again? This mission was always one of my favourites

[Cmdr. Maegil]

One thing to bear in mind is that - more likely than not - quite a few of the more challenging combat situations were tested without NPC shields, and/or other stuff (...) things kind of go horribly unbalanced for a while, then something comes up that kind of restores balance - again, for a while, until the same cycle starts all over again...

OXPs: a curse, and a gift!

You know, the more I think about it, the happier I am that we can all customise our gaming environments!

To be absolutely frank, the NPC shields do turn hard missions into nigh-impossible ones if you're flying a normal ship (the Cobbie being the vanilla lanes' average Joe).

However, in RL one does not pick a fight with a street gang and expect to leave standing; I see no reason for my Ooniverse to be any different in this aspect... The differential is that here I can also outfit myself: even if I may be easily pulped in a fistfight against two, or a dozen, I might be able to wipe them all out if I had access to some heavy hardware (even though the enemies can still win if I'm not careful).

[m4r35n357]

Given the choice, I would rather have more aggressive enemies that indestructible ones . . . why not just make Tough Guys Anarchy part of the game?

[DaddyHoggy]

Given the choice, I would rather have more aggressive enemies that indestructible ones . . . why not just make Tough Guys Anarchy part of the game?

Because it's not - because it's easily addable as an OXP and the whole point of Oolite...

[m4r35n357]

Because it's not - because it's easily addable as an OXP and the whole point of Oolite...

Precisely