Oolite Bulletins

With regard to the size of the ship I am thinking of basing this around the front section of the ship actually being the escape pod (See the first screenshot of what I have modelled on the previous page). With this in mind are their any limits to the size of an escape pod ?

I know that escape pods are generally in the region of 5-6m long and at present the front section of this ship is 7.5m long which in turn makes of overall ship approximately 46m long which seems a little small.

I could of course scale the whole model up but this would have the effect of increasing the size of the escape pod.

One solution that I am considering would be to scale the complete ship up to a suitable size but have the escape pod version of the front section of the ship based on a smaller model. Any thoughts ?

I think there is no solution that could please everyone... you could just make the Fireball XL5 a rather smallish fighter, in Oolite measures, or you could go to make it a more formidable ship, like in the series, but then the front as escape capsule would be ... strange, with your solution of doing a smaller model as escape pod. Because someone killing it would be seeing transforming it in size, at least if he is near to it...
Maybe just script spawn the pod when it is blown up with some distance from the player?

Or you could wait to see how the detachable thing from Smivs works we all wait exitedly for...

cim wrote:

Shipbuilder wrote:

Does anyone know if it is possible to script exausts so that they only become active when a ship is travelling at maximum speed ?

The only control you get over exhausts is the position, nothing else. They might be made more scriptable eventually.

There is a way to make exhaust only seeable at higher speeds: Place the exhaust inside the ship, so that only when it reaches a certain length it can be seen from outside. You need propably some space in front of the exhaust to place it and it is only seen as rather short even at higher speed, though.

There's no size limit on escape pods, but if you're going to make them much larger than the current one you probably want to give it a different scan class so that it isn't scoopable.

Rorschachhamster wrote:

There is a way to make exhaust only seeable at higher speeds: Place the exhaust inside the ship, so that only when it reaches a certain length it can be seen from outside. You need propably some space in front of the exhaust to place it and it is only seen as rather short even at higher speed, though.

This will not work so well if the ship is not travelling in a straight line, however.

cim wrote:

Rorschachhamster wrote:

There is a way to make exhaust only seeable at higher speeds: Place the exhaust inside the ship, so that only when it reaches a certain length it can be seen from outside. You need propably some space in front of the exhaust to place it and it is only seen as rather short even at higher speed, though.

This will not work so well if the ship is not travelling in a straight line, however.

You're right.
Could work with an exhaust that is only seeable at speeds above very low... but then, the effect would be not very impressive, propably.

As escape pod, you can define any size custom pod. So you should be able to define an escape pod that is the copy of your front section. And when eject location is in the front, the escape pod will eject from the front. But, than also cargo will eject at the front.

With a ship script, you should be able to fix it. Just define the eject location at the ships back. Than the the pitot ejects, the pod is created at the back and that the event handler is called. In this, you can relocate the position to the front, give the pod the same orientation as the ship and give it a new velocity, matching your ship. The player and collision detection would not notice any of this because it all happens between two drawings. That should look like the pod being released from the front.

cim wrote:

There's no size limit on escape pods, but if you're going to make them much larger than the current one you probably want to give it a different scan class so that it isn't scoopable.

Yes, but tharglets also have a size that looks a bit to big to scoop. Though I agree, now we can change scanclass in 1.77, you could make it a un-scoopable ship. (And maybe with a regular small escape pod in it)

Lookin' good, Shipbuilder! And so fast, too!

Man, what I wouldn't give to spend an afternoon watching over your shoulder as you work..

Diziet Sma wrote:

Lookin' good, Shipbuilder! And so fast, too!

Man, what I wouldn't give to spend an afternoon watching over your shoulder as you work..

You would be very welcome but I suspect the distance would be a bit of a problem

Shipbuilder wrote:

Thanks for letting me know cim (Maybe one for the future).

Anyway latest update shot with the model 90% completed.

Nicely done, Shipbuilder. It's a beauty.

Thanks Mandoman.

I have now completed the model, (See below), I'll put the shipdata.plists etc together then have a look at the texturing.........I hate texturing

Shipbuilder wrote:

Thanks Mandoman.

I have now completed the model, (See below), I'll put the shipdata.plists etc together then have a look at the texturing.........I hate texturing

Wow, what a cool ship!! I want that in my Ooniverse, too!

OK below is a early in game screenshot based on a basic texture and no emission map (In the Ritila system).

I still have plenty of work to do but things are starting to come together.

That is looking absolutely fantastic, Shipbuilder!

A couple of minor criticisms, if I may..
The fins on the nosecone really need to have a sharp edge, like the tailfin has.
The fore-aft dimension of the nosecone fins is spot on, but the height of the fins is roughly double what it should be. In pictures it can be seen that their height is just a little more than the radius of the fuselage cylinder, but yours are closer to matching the diameter, instead. Reducing the height would give them the swept-back look of the pics.

As I said, minor points, but it makes the nose feel somehow wrong..

Good spot Diziet - Having cross referenced the pictures you originally posted you are indeed correct. Looks like I somehow got the fin height twice what it should have been.

I'll remodel these tomorrow and attend to the sharpening up of the fin edges while I am at it.

With regard to the actual specs listed on my first post do you have any particular thoughts ?

Regarding the escape pod issue i.e. ship front section of the ship I have been giving it some consideration and think that once a decision has been made on a overall length of the ship the suggestions earlier in this thread regarding a larger non scoopable pod seem a good idea.

Here's where the comet stands. I gotta quit working on it for a while, as I'm going bug eyed. Unwrapping the whole thing at once, and texturing it is turning into a bit of a job. It will be a lot easier when I break it into subentities. pics.

mandoman wrote:

pics.

WAAAUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuu!!!!!!
Yay! *dance* *dance* Yay!