Oolite Bulletins

Posted: **Mon Aug 14, 2023 3:45 am**

Small update to address the issue with targeting wormholes. Should be really fixed this time.

Posted: **Sat Aug 26, 2023 9:21 pm**

This OXP seems to be the main method of (1) communicating with NPCs and then (2) getting the NPCs to react to those communications.

I'd like to be able to help NPCs (ie: rescue them!) but this depends on them reacting appropriately. I find that they tend to flee from me which defeats my purpose (especially the Refugee Adders and the Mining Pods).

Possible additions to the list of communications:

i) Let me help! (for establishing the relationship for rescuing the NPC)
"Follow Me!"/"Just tag along behind me"/"Let's get out of here - follow me!"/"Let's scram! Follow me!"/"What-ho old chap! Let's scarper, shall we?"

ii) Come on! (for NPC's having second thoughts: eg. if they doubt that they can trust me/more McNasties turn up etc.)
"Keep on following! Don't stop now!"/"Come on, only a little further"/"You need to keep on following me if you want to reach safety!"

iii) Escape this system! (Variants for "follow me when through" & "you keep on going when through, I'll stay behind and delay them" - or maybe better to combine that with iv/v)
"I'm going to open a wormhole. Dive in after me and keep on following"/"Let's get out of this system! I'll open a wormhole - you follow. And when you are through, keep on going."

iv) Scram! (alternative strategy - does not tell them where to run to)
"You scarper while I delay them! Go on - run!/"Get clear of them! I'll keep them busy."/"I'll take care of this little lot! You get out of here!"

v) Scram and go somewhere! (too many OXPs offer too many alternatives so I'm just sticking with the station and the sun - for sunskimming for the player)
"Head for the station! I'll head them off"/"You head for the sun! I'll take care of them"
This presumes no planet-landing capability on the part of the rescuee, and no ability to find a Rock Hermit etc.

vi) I need to sunskim! (for fuel for jumping or for injectors. With Stranger's World you don't sunskim, just scoop solar flux)
"I need to sunskim! Wait here if you have no shielding. I'll be watching for problems"

NB: In each case I've presumed a number of attackers rather than a solitary menace.

This might allow rescuing
•Refugee Adders,
•Mining Pods from the AstroGulags,
•and when I was raiding G7 Veanso, one of my fellow feudal Onarmalians seemed to get stuck in a blue funk in the middle of it all. Everyone else had fled. I wanted to rescue him, but couldn't work out how.

I realise that:

(i) the addessee might not wish to follow me (has no reason to trust me, or might have very good reasons for staying on the current course (heading for waiting help) etc.)
(ii) in reality, the following - especially if to a station or other dockable, would in reality probably lead to the establishment of a personal relationship, and how does one handle that in Oolite...

But it would still be nice to be able to do it!!

Possibly relevant coding in other OXPS
Both Norby's "Fighters" and Ramirez's "Resistance Commander" contain old AI.plists for NPCs following/protecting the player.
Escort Contracts has js. code for a ship (mother) which the player follows/protects. Less helpful for hyperjumps, especially for Mining Pods!

"Rescue Stations" might have something in Javascript, but I don't know the OXP. Ditto for "GalCop Missions" ("GalCopBB_Defend"?). Ditto for the various Mission OXPs ("Cataclysm"/"Lovecats" etc).

Edited to add another strategy and to explain what it is all for.

Posted: **Sun Jul 06, 2025 1:00 am**

Feature request if this is still under development - the alien ships from the Aliens OXP currently respond to greetings the same way regular ships do. It'd be nicely immersive if they either ignored communications or responded with something incomprehensible (Thargoid-style word salad, unpronouncable alien syllables, random symbols, etc.)

Posted: **Sun Jul 06, 2025 2:57 am**

Bicorn wrote: ↑Sun Jul 06, 2025 1:00 am
It'd be nicely immersive if they either ignored communications or responded with something incomprehensible (Thargoid-style word salad, unpronouncable alien syllables, random symbols, etc.)

Added to the list!

Posted: **Sun Jul 06, 2025 8:40 am**

phkb wrote: ↑Sun Jul 06, 2025 2:57 am

Bicorn wrote: ↑Sun Jul 06, 2025 1:00 am
It'd be nicely immersive if they either ignored communications or responded with something incomprehensible (Thargoid-style word salad, unpronouncable alien syllables, random symbols, etc.)
Added to the list!

I do hope I'm not increasing your workload too much with all these ideas and bug reports. It seems most OXPs I develop an interest in are yours.

Posted: **Mon Jul 07, 2025 6:55 am**

Bicorn wrote: ↑Sun Jul 06, 2025 8:40 am
I do hope I'm not increasing your workload too much with all these ideas and bug reports.

If it ever becomes "work", I'll let you know!

Otherwise, keep the suggestions coming.

Posted: **Mon Jul 07, 2025 8:56 am**

Would the script be able to identify which of the alien ships it's dealing with? Of the three in the Aliens OXP, the Odonoteans strike me as the most "mysterious" so they should probably get the strangest comms responses. Scorpex remind me of the Yautja of the Predator franchise, so something similar to their dialogue in the movies (vaguely-apropos sentence fragments and/or angry snarls) might feel fitting.
Is the OXP's creator still active on the forums? They probably should get the last word on how/if the aliens communicate.

Posted: **Mon Jul 07, 2025 11:49 am**

Bicorn wrote: ↑Mon Jul 07, 2025 8:56 am
Would the script be able to identify which of the alien ships it's dealing with? Of the three in the Aliens OXP, the Odonoteans strike me as the most "mysterious" so they should probably get the strangest comms responses. Scorpex remind me of the Yautja of the Predator franchise, so something similar to their dialogue in the movies (vaguely-apropos sentence fragments and/or angry snarls) might feel fitting.
Is the OXP's creator still active on the forums? They probably should get the last word on how/if the aliens communicate.

1) Smivs last visited in July 2020. He is an exceptionally nice chap, by all accounts. Apparently into selling tropical stick insects! Perhaps you could contact him through this. If you do, do ask him if his work on Capital player ship with detachable docking module is publishable!

2) I understand that the Broadcast Comms allows you to write an override of it for another OXP - so you could add something yourself.

And this is probably a better way to go. I'm quite scared of these OXPs which require constant updating each time a new OXP comes out (eg. these three: Loadout by Category, Wireframe Ship Images, The Galactic Almanac). What happens when the author gets fed up? Much better to institutionalise compatibility inside the new OXP itself. I'm unaware of a single example of how to do this for any of the three aforementioned.

There are extensive Dark Side details under "External access" on the

Broadcast Comms MFD wiki page. I believe that the

GalCop Missions oxp already does this. So too does the most recent version of

Refugee Adder. There is also a developer's oxp (Broadcast Comms Testbed) which is found here. The more examples of this sort of thing, the better. It makes it much easier for dumb pilots like myself to add things into the game.

3) Another option, if you are willing to dispense with dialogue, is to follow the much easier example of Murgh's "personality ship" OXPs. See

Hotrods OXP,

Boyracer or

Missionaries OXP. These early 2006 oxps should be easy to emulate. There are more recent examples here:

Iron Ass OXP

Reference: Hiran's oolite-expansion-catalog for GalCop Missions (details all javascript files for each "Expansions Manager OXZ")

Posted: **Mon Jul 07, 2025 9:34 pm**

Cholmondely wrote: ↑Mon Jul 07, 2025 11:49 am
And this is probably a better way to go.

Indeed. However, I'm still going to need to update BCC to allow for overriding all of the responses, otherwise you'd end up getting two responses: one of BCC, and then one from any additional mod. Having an override option is better in the long run anyway, but it will mean an update to this one.

Posted: **Tue Jul 08, 2025 6:31 am**

Hmm, actually I've apparently already done the work! Here's what you'd need to do to override any of the messages from BCC:
1. Create a shipdata-overrides.plist file, with the following:

Code: Select all

{
    "kephalan" = {
        script_info = {
            bcc_custom_defaults = { 
                "1" = { // wormhole request
                    reply_confirm = "[kephalan_type1_confirm]";
                    reply_decline = "[kephalan_type1_decline]";
                };
                "3" = { // greeting
                    reply = "[kephalan_type3_reply]";
                };
                "4" = { // taunt
                    reply = "[kephalan_type4_reply]";
                };
                "5" = { // threat
                    reply_normal = "[kephalan_type5_normal]";
                    reply_fleeing = "[kephalan_type5_fleeing]";
                };
                "6" = { // bribe
                    reply_decline = "[kephalan_type6_decline]"; // decline bribe
                    reply_accept = "[kephalan_type6_accept]"; // accept bribe
                };
                "7" = { // demand cargo
                    reply_refuse = "[kephalan_type7_refuse]";
                };
                "8" = { // surrender
                    reply_impatient = "[kephalan_type8_impatient]";
                };
                "9" = { // escape pod offer to rescue
                    reply_friendly = "[kephalan_type9_friendly]";
                    reply_unfriendly = "[kephalan_type9_unfriendly]";
                };
                "11" = { // keep away from target
                    reply = "[kephalan_type11_reply]";
                };
            };
        };
    };
    "odonatean" = {
        script_info = {
            bcc_custom_defaults = { 
                "1" = { // wormhole request
                    reply_confirm = "[odonatean_type1_confirm]";
                    reply_decline = "[odonatean_type1_decline]";
                };
                "3" = { // greeting
                    reply = "[odonatean_type3_reply]";
                };
                "4" = { // taunt
                    reply = "[odonatean_type4_reply]";
                };
                "5" = { // threat
                    reply_normal = "[odonatean_type5_normal]";
                    reply_fleeing = "[odonatean_type5_fleeing]";
                };
                "6" = { // bribe
                    reply_decline = "[odonatean_type6_decline]"; // decline bribe
                    reply_accept = "[odonatean_type6_accept]"; // accept bribe
                };
                "7" = { // demand cargo
                    reply_refuse = "[odonatean_type7_refuse]";
                };
                "8" = { // surrender
                    reply_impatient = "[odonatean_type8_impatient]";
                };
                "9" = { // escape pod offer to rescue
                    reply_friendly = "[odonatean_type9_friendly]";
                    reply_unfriendly = "[odonatean_type9_unfriendly]";
                };
                "11" = { // keep away from target
                    reply = "[odonatean_type11_reply]";
                };
            };
        };
    };
    "scorpax" = {
        script_info = {
            bcc_custom_defaults = { 
                "1" = { // wormhole request
                    reply_confirm = "[scorpax_type1_confirm]";
                    reply_decline = "[scorpax_type1_decline]";
                };
                "3" = { // greeting
                    reply = "[scorpax_type3_reply]";
                };
                "4" = { // taunt
                    reply = "[scorpax_type4_reply]";
                };
                "5" = { // threat
                    reply_normal = "[scorpax_type5_normal]";
                    reply_fleeing = "[scorpax_type5_fleeing]";
                };
                "6" = { // bribe
                    reply_decline = "[scorpax_type6_decline]"; // decline bribe
                    reply_accept = "[scorpax_type6_accept]"; // accept bribe
                };
                "7" = { // demand cargo
                    reply_refuse = "[scorpax_type7_refuse]";
                };
                "8" = { // surrender
                    reply_impatient = "[scorpax_type8_impatient]";
                };
                "9" = { // escape pod offer to rescue
                    reply_friendly = "[scorpax_type9_friendly]";
                    reply_unfriendly = "[scorpax_type9_unfriendly]";
                };
                "11" = { // keep away from target
                    reply = "[scorpax_type11_reply]";
                };
            };
        };
    };
}

2. Create a "descriptions.plist" file with the following:

Code: Select all

{
    "kephalan_type1_confirm" = ("");
    "kephalan_type1_decline" = ("");
    "kephalan_type3_reply" = ("");
    "kephalan_type4_reply" = ("");
    "kephalan_type5_normal" = ("");
    "kephalan_type5_fleeing" = ("");
    "kephalan_type6_decline" = ("");
    "kephalan_type6_accept" = ("");
    "kephalan_type7_refuse" = ("");
    "kephalan_type8_impatient" = ("");
    "kephalan_type9_friendly" = ("");
    "kephalan_type9_unfriendly" = ("");
    "kephalan_type11_reply" = ("");

    "odonatean_type1_confirm" = ("");
    "odonatean_type1_decline" = ("");
    "odonatean_type3_reply" = ("");
    "odonatean_type4_reply" = ("");
    "odonatean_type5_normal" = ("");
    "odonatean_type5_fleeing" = ("");
    "odonatean_type6_decline" = ("");
    "odonatean_type6_accept" = ("");
    "odonatean_type7_refuse" = ("");
    "odonatean_type8_impatient" = ("");
    "odonatean_type9_friendly" = ("");
    "odonatean_type9_unfriendly" = ("");
    "odonatean_type11_reply" = ("");

    "scorpax_type1_confirm" = ("");
    "scorpax_type1_decline" = ("");
    "scorpax_type3_reply" = ("");
    "scorpax_type4_reply" = ("");
    "scorpax_type5_normal" = ("");
    "scorpax_type5_fleeing" = ("");
    "scorpax_type6_decline" = ("");
    "scorpax_type6_accept" = ("");
    "scorpax_type7_refuse" = ("");
    "scorpax_type8_impatient" = ("");
    "scorpax_type9_friendly" = ("");
    "scorpax_type9_unfriendly" = ("");
    "scorpax_type11_reply" = ("");
}

You would then add responses into each of the double-quotes. You can add multiple variations of each, just separate each entry with a comma
eg ("variation1", "variation2", "variation3"). Oolite will pick a random one from the options whenever it's used.

And that's it. Now the three different types of alien ships can have their own responses. Let me know if something doesn't make sense.

Posted: **Tue Jul 08, 2025 9:13 pm**

phkb wrote: ↑Tue Jul 08, 2025 6:31 am
And that's it. Now the three different types of alien ships can have their own responses. Let me know if something doesn't make sense.

I'll give it a try. Might take a while to be able to properly test it, because the alien ships are so rare.

Posted: **Tue Jul 08, 2025 9:53 pm**

Bicorn wrote: ↑Tue Jul 08, 2025 9:13 pm

phkb wrote: ↑Tue Jul 08, 2025 6:31 am
And that's it. Now the three different types of alien ships can have their own responses. Let me know if something doesn't make sense.
I'll give it a try. Might take a while to be able to properly test it, because the alien ships are so rare.

You can tweak the populator (

System Populator &

Oolite System Populator) to make them more common - or if you are using the Developer's Release version (or v.1.91) you can use the

Debug OXP and summon one on the spot!

And when you've finished it, you can repackage it as an OXZ (don't forget to update the ReadMe and the Manifest.plist) and ask Hiran, Timer, a_c or Phkb to update the Expansions Manager with your new version. We can then garnish the wiki page with the details of your enhancement!

Posted: **Wed Jul 09, 2025 1:05 am**

phkb wrote: ↑Mon Jul 07, 2025 9:34 pm

Cholmondely wrote: ↑Mon Jul 07, 2025 11:49 am
And this is probably a better way to go.
Indeed. However, I'm still going to need to update BCC to allow for overriding all of the responses, otherwise you'd end up getting two responses: one of BCC, and then one from any additional mod. Having an override option is better in the long run anyway, but it will mean an update to this one.

To re-check, do the override files go to the AddOns\Config\ folder or somewhere else?

Posted: **Wed Jul 09, 2025 3:46 am**

Bicorn wrote: ↑Wed Jul 09, 2025 1:05 am
To re-check, do the override files go to the AddOns\Config\ folder or somewhere else?

Both files (shipdata-overrides.plist and descriptions.plist) go into the Config folder.

Posted: **Wed Jul 09, 2025 4:07 am**

phkb wrote: ↑Wed Jul 09, 2025 3:46 am

Bicorn wrote: ↑Wed Jul 09, 2025 1:05 am
To re-check, do the override files go to the AddOns\Config\ folder or somewhere else?
Both files (shipdata-overrides.plist and descriptions.plist) go into the Config folder.

I think I'm still doing something wrong - no matter what I do I can't get the new lines to show up. They always just respond with the generic default lines.

Oolite Bulletins

BroadcastComms MFD [Release]

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