Oolite Bulletins

Smivs wrote:

We'll have the bloody Green Knights signing up next at this rate! (if they ever return from their pub-crawl)

<sniggers> Notius Ed is doing his best... but those guys are... well, you know!

El Viejo wrote:

Can the Free Mexican Airforce join too, jefe?

Same conditions as mentioned above.....
First get something out there, then we can talk about missions and add-ons.
Requirement is that graphics and style follows the OXP.

You won't see them in an OXP, jefe... the Free Mexican Airforce is Oofictional!

Gimi wrote:

Just one note: One thing that has been one of the main reasons for starting on something like HIMSN, was the big presence GLANAV had in the game. That means that I/we intend to make an encounter with a navy ship from HIMSN a rare event. From that follows that an encounter with a 249er unit would be even rarer if it is to be a part of HIMSN.

Ah, but the Reserve is just that: reserve. Not all reserve units are called to active duty. I can understand why truly Active units would be; I would probably trim down their Galcop presence to just flying wingman to Galcop's Vipers. The Active units would get an equivalent boost in their Ironass rating.

Taking the basic backstory I've written for it, perhaps the 249th would be an ally of Her Imperial Majesty's Space Navy.

Just catching up! What is the state of this WIP? Would love to see this in my Ooniverse.

Fatleaf wrote:

Just catching up! What is the state of this WIP? Would love to see this in my Ooniverse.

Very much on hold I'm afraid.
First problem is RL. I don't have the time required.
Second problem is of course Elite: Dangerous pulling my attention elsewhere.
Biggest problem is that I just don't have the know how to pull this off by myself. Even in the very scaled back version 1 that I have in mind it's going to be a fairly complex OXP, especially on the AI front.
I have had a lot of offers for help, but somebody with programming knowledge has to pull it together. I just don't have the know how to tune and merge the different inputs. I have done quite a bit of research on the Wiki, but my conclusion is that if I were to try to acquire the skill, HIMSN is not the right project to do it with.
Another hurdle is my ambition for HIMSN to have a consistent look and feel and to fit in with Griff ships and SMIVS ships. That is a fairly ambitious goal, as you can only ask so much of people, and it's kind of hard when I'm not sure what I want myself.

Not sure when or even if I pick this up again. I have a lot of ideas and notes, but they are still fairly unstructured and of course there is all the programming, modelling and graphics work required to transform those ideas into something useful.

Edit: In essence, in HIMSN I have probably bitten over more than I can chew.

Been thinking about this since yesterday, and it probably deserves a better answer.
When discussions started around HIMSN I was sort of named project lead on this. My position at the time was that I was more suited to be a "consultant" as I had some clear views on how HIMSN should work and especially on how navy ships in Oolite should behave, but I lacked the skills needed to actually make it happen. However, I ran with my ideas for a while, and I'll give a very short synopsis on where I am with this.

Anyway, since the discussion stated almost a year ago, I have jotted down ideas, seen the scope of the oxp expand into something bigger that GALNAV.oxp, and then scaled it back only to see it balloon again and so on. So we are not short on ideas.

Right now I have a loose framework for a three stage development (Slightly revised since I last posted about this stuff).

Stage one (Eye candy only)
- Navy ships based on core ships using models form Griff and Smivs ships.
- 2 Types of stations (1 x Navy HQ) (8 x Navy regional HQ's, one for each galaxy).
- Would feature a set of Navy ships based on Griff and /Smivs ships with Navy colours and markings. (3 models, 5 different types. Asp, Sidewinder, Anaconda missile corvette, Anaconda logistics ship, and an Asp Courier type.).
- Ship behaviour would be adapted to give a distinct military behaviour (I have some ideas on rules for this, and it would probably require the new AI features in 1.77 if at all possible)

Stage 2 (More eye candy, capital ships and battles, prepare for missions in stage 3)
- Few more stations (2 x Navy ship yard type station, 8 x Intelligence HQ stations in hidden systems)
- Stage two would see the introduction of two (or maybe just one) classes of carriers.
- I would like to introduce some extremely rare intelligence/Special Operations type ships including the production model of the Constrictor in preparation for missions in stage three.
- Introduction of HIMSN Fleet day.
- Rare battles with the Thargoids in Intergalactic space.
- Further AI development would be needed to cater for these shy intelligence guys.

Stage 3 (Missions)
Missions. Details are a lot more sketchy here.
Ideas include courier and delivery missions to some very odd places, sting operations where you are asked to pilot a constrictor.

Some main design thoughts are:

The Navy are not Police and will not behave like Police. This means that they will not attack criminals and in general they will not intervene in a fight, but they will report criminal acts (piracy). I know that historically in RL counter piracy has been a Navy task, but I find that this fits better in Oolite.
The navy tries to stay out of your way, and normally you won't see them unless you try to find them. They don't like to show off, except for that one day a year that is.
Ships are generally few and far between, but better than their civilian counterparts, and always fully equipped with an "Iron Ass". Quality over quantity principle.
The military in general have no concept of fighting fair. They will follow the rules given to them, but will come back at you with all they have if you provoke them. Concentration of fire and overkill are two thoughts here. They never operate alone is another (Except the intel/specops guys that is).

Basic outline given, but I don't have the skills to turn it into something useful.

I like a lot of what you have here. I could do most of what you have so far, code wise (apart of modelling the ships and stations) but unfortunately I can't run 1.77 because of my graphics card (it's pants). So I couldn't test anything I wrote.

If I manage to get a better machine anytime soon I would be happy to give it a shot but as it stands I can't really help.

*BUMP* Is anyone still working on this? I like the idea of a military presence in the game, but the Galactic Navy OXP makes the ooniverse too militarised! Something more subtle like what's been suggested here would be perfect...

Pleb wrote:

*BUMP* Is anyone still working on this?

Gimi is/was the jefe, but this project is definitely on the back-burner (unfortunately) - I doubt it'll get revived any time soon.

Is a shame, the Galactic Navy OXP just doesn't look right with my griffed ooniverse and it takes over every other star system! I like the idea of a military, and I like the odd big battle. But I don't want to be chased by bloody great big frigates every time I put one toe out of line...I can take on Gal Cop, but I can't take on a frigate or a behemoth!

Agreed! Fancy taking-on a new project, Pleb? I'd wager Gimi would gladly hand you all his notes/ideas, and you'd get plenty of help.

I'd love to, but I'd be worried I wouldn't be able to do it justice. The coding would probably be okay, but I have no idea when it comes to textures and graphics! I've never been that artistic (my B grade GCSE in art notwithstanding)...

Ha! I'm sure we could soon find an artist for the textures etc. I'd even come out of retirement as a test pilot for this one.