Oolite Bulletins

Norby wrote:

Gimi wrote:

Intergalactic Space (Normal):

• 80% chance of 2 light patrols fighting 4+ thargoid ships.
• 70% chance of 2 heavy patrols fighting 6+ thargoid ships.
• 60% chance of 1 cruiser & escorts fighting 8+ thargoid ships.

In cim's [wiki]Galactic_Misjump_OXP[/wiki] never happen any misjump unless the player pull up the controls at the moment of jump to force a misjump. If you want high chance to see some battle within galactic jumps then must increase this chance first, then your previous odds will happen within this. For example if you set the galactic misjump chance to 50% then all of the mentioned odds are halved from the viewpoint of a single galactic jump.

Another question about the three different case above is that two of them can happen at once? If not then you should stay within 100% with the sum of odds, else you break the current law of mathematics.

My intention would be that two of them would never happen at once. As I said, I'm not quite up to speed on how probabilities work in Oolite.
So it would be:

Intergalactic Space (Normal):

• 80% chance of 2 light patrols fighting 4+ thargoid ships. OR
• 70% chance of 2 heavy patrols fighting 6+ thargoid ships. OR
• 60% chance of 1 cruiser & escorts fighting 8+ thargoid ships.

This would probably need to fine tuned for the different cases.

As for Galactic misjump. I would suggest that a version is built into HIMSN, and I would probably leave it at "intentional misjump" only, otherwise it would be a bit unfair on new players, and for the veterans it doesn't make much difference.

Norby wrote:

If you want high chance to see some battle within galactic jumps then must increase this chance first...)

I wonder if you are missing the point here Norby. As I understand it the chance of coming across a battle in intergalactic space is extremely rare. These battle in themselves would be rare events, and the chance of you just coming across one where you happen to be and when you happen to be there are virtually zero.
Maybe once in a lifetime, if you are lucky (or unlucky!) unless you are purposefully there - in other words the Navy has an engagement under way and is desperate for help so calls for re-inforcements from the local systems. Which is one of the things I expect this OXP will do on rare occassions.
It's the old 'Space is BIG!' thing. The chances of being anywhere near one of these battles is extremely low, and the chance of participating much lower still. It's this level of realism that will set the two Navy OXPs apart, and although this clearly limits the players' chances of experiencing something like this, when you do it will seem much more plausible, and the rarity value will make it a much more valuable experience.

Then I misundersanded Gimi's previous post about increased odds. Galactic misjumps will stay in forced mode - ok, I have no problem with this.

Gimi wrote:

how probabilities work

Imagine 100 forced galactic misjumps:
- How many will not contain any HIMSN ships?
- How many will contain light patrols?
- How many will contain heavy patrols?
- How many will contain a cruiser?

The sum of numbers in your answers must be equal with 100 if two of these would never happen at once. My guess: 10, 35, 30, 25.

I've now done pretty much as Gimi has said - the percentages are exactly what Gimi has stated in previous post, and the patrols and stations in system only appear on witchpoint-sun route. There is the chance (as stated in Gimi's post) that an extra patrol may spawn on one of the other routes (only in station systems). Also, when a patrol is finished, they will either jump to another system or sun-skim.

The only thing I haven't incorporated (yet) are Galactic Misjumps. This is only because the OXP cim wrote does not contain a world-script and therefore I would not be able to call it from this OXZ. Also, as the Galactic Interstellar Space cim has designed is already heavily populated with his own naval ships fighting thargoids (and a rogue planet!) the only way of doing as Gimi has suggested is to script a new Galactic Misjump function and have it jump to a different Galactic Interstellar Space. Although possible, I firstly don't want to pinch/borrow cim's code without permission, and also by doing this it could cause issues with the current Galactic Misjump OXP.

Download Test OXZ

Gimi wrote:

On another note. Anyone here capable of making textures and logos for HIMSN.
When the discussions took a break I was looking at "Imperial White".
Something like this:


Not sure how that would look "non shaded" though.

I like this, I played around with a Sidewinder and had similar results! Do you still have the images you are using as symbols/insignia on that Cobra Mk. 3, Gimi?

Gimi wrote:

Something like this:


Not sure how that would look "non shaded" though.

It would not look much different just using 'materials'. Diffuse, emission, normal and specular maps are all handled by simple shaders, so a modest computer (one without full shaders) will give this look, and because there is no dependence on shaders, the ships would also look pretty good on completely non-shadery computers - they would just lose the 'depth' given by the normal map and the 'shininess' of the specular map.
If I get time, I'll try to knock out a quick Asp or something as a demo/proof of concept, but with the Smivslets on half-term and me halfway through a major computer overhaul it may be a day or two before I have anything to show.

Smivs wrote:

It would not look much different just using 'materials'. Diffuse, emission, normal and specular maps are all handled by simple shaders, so a modest computer (one without full shaders) will give this look, and because there is no dependence on shaders, the ships would also look pretty good on completely non-shadery computers - they would just lose the 'depth' given by the normal map and the 'shininess' of the specular map.
If I get time, I'll try to knock out a quick Asp or something as a demo/proof of concept, but with the Smivslets on half-term and me halfway through a major computer overhaul it may be a day or two before I have anything to show.

That sounds good, as I said before I was just messing around with the shaders before to replicate this, but if it could be done without this then it would make it more compatible for more people.

Pleb wrote:

I've now done pretty much as Gimi has said

Nice work and you are very fast.

I was curious how you implemeted the percentages and I found some difference, which is currently small due to the low values but will be high with the high odds in the galactic case.

Your code contain an else-based processing: if the first chance is not filled then generate a new random number and check it against the next. This mean for example if you have cookies and you give some to your first friend, then give a part of the remain to the next, but this is less than the same part of all cookies. So a criuser will not appear in 10 of 100 cases but in less than 8 only - not a big difference, but not exactly the same.

If you will do this with galactic jumps also and use the mentioned 80, 70, 60 percents in the same code then the result in 100 case:
- 80 light patrols,
- 14 heavy patrols (70% of the remaining 20),
- only 3.6 cruiser (60% of the remaining 6),
- 2.4 left out.

In this way HIMSN has 80 / 3.6 = 22 times more light patrols than cruisers. I think it is too large difference but Gimi will say the last word.

I suggest to use one random number only and compare it with the odds determined by spreading the 100 case.

I don't think the HIMSN should have many cruisers - in the core Oolite game you never see any big ships. Even with other OXP/OXZ's that add larger ships, they are not a particularly common sight (with the exception of Galactic Navy and maybe hOoPy casinos). Cruisers should be exceptionally rare, and carriers (when implemented) should be a 1 in a billion. You should only really see these ships in missions, and even then hardly at all.

Yep, rare as a rare thing.
There should be times during a players' life when they can say "i saw a full Navy battle group once. Couple of years ago it was, out in interstellar space between here and there. Doubt I'll ever see a sight like that again!"

Smivs wrote:

Yep, rare as a rare thing.
There should be times during a players' life when they can say "i saw a full Navy battle group once. Couple of years ago it was, out in interstellar space between here and there. Doubt I'll ever see a sight like that again!"

That's how the percentages are working out at the moment, when eventually a carrier is developed I intend to set it to the same kind of chances of seeing a constrictor are at the moment. As I've said before I like the idea of having a one off special mission involving a massive fight, but outside of missions this shouldn't really be happening, just rare small skirmishes and even rarer medium skirmishes.

cim has given permission for me to use the concept and coding for the Galactic Misjumps, so I will implement this in my next upload. Though as it's Valentine’s Day the wife and I are going out tonight, and this will be the first night our son has stayed away (he's only 15 months) so there won't be an upload tonight...

Pleb wrote:

Though as it's Valentine’s Day the wife and I are going out tonight, and this will be the first night our son has stayed away (he's only 15 months) so there won't be an upload tonight...

<grins> Enjoy!

Pleb wrote:

I've now done pretty much as Gimi has said - the percentages are exactly what Gimi has stated in previous post, and the patrols and stations in system only appear on witchpoint-sun route. There is the chance (as stated in Gimi's post) that an extra patrol may spawn on one of the other routes (only in station systems). Also, when a patrol is finished, they will either jump to another system or sun-skim.

One way to handle it - a fair bit more complicated than just using percentage chances, but potentially giving much better results: don't add any random patrols at all. Instead, set the AI up to plan multi-system journeys from the base out to its destination (and potentially return) - have a look at the courier AI for one which gets multisystem trips, and the bounty hunter leader AI for "out, do mission, return" priorities.

Then, set up particular missions for the launched groups to carry out: launch from their base, jump across several systems to their destination, do the job, go home. You can work out from their route (and some rough guesses about in-system times) what their arrival and departure times in each system will be, and use that to work out when the player arrives in a system if there's a HIMSN group there or not. If there is, you add it; if it will be arriving soon, the repopulator function can have them jump in appropriately.

Now, it's not just a randomly-generated patrol that flies around a bit and then jumps out, it's the HIMSN 31st Squadron, on it's way from Xeer to Teraed, where they'll meet up with a freighter group carrying vital supplies for the war effort against the Thargoids and escort them back to Xeer. And, if you're patient enough - and stay far enough back that they don't get suspicious - you as the player can watch them do all of this. Or maybe you leave them alone, but see them jumping back into Xeer later with several ships missing and only two surviving freighters. Depending on how many such missions you simulate at once, that then gives a greater or lesser chance of their appearance, and also a much increased chance of seeing one near their base compared with at the other side of the map.

As far as where they go to fight Thargoids: in 1.79 the Thargoids have changed tactics slightly - they can appear on any spacelane (when entering a system, they use their superior witchspace technology to appear well clear of the potentially patrolled witchpoint) and in other places too - and are much more likely to appear in "bottleneck" systems, especially those poorly defended by the local forces, than other systems. I'm not sure that there is in general much tactical benefit to jumping to interstellar space to shoot Thargoids - though it might be a pastime of the more heavily-armed bounty hunters - but it might be worth it if a hard-to-defend target was about to make a jump between two systems: jump a military force into interstellar space ahead of it, have them distract the Thargoids for 15-30 minutes until the more critical target is past, then leave.

Pleb wrote:

This is only because the OXP cim wrote does not contain a world-script

It does - in Config/script.js - but I think you'd be better reimplementing rather than trying to integrate it, since it was just a proof of concept. Take any bits you need, though.

What cim said! That sounds brilliant, and shadowing a Navy taskforce would be a great way to spend an evening or two

Pleb wrote:

I like this, I played around with a Sidewinder and had similar results! Do you still have the images you are using as symbols/insignia on that Cobra Mk. 3, Gimi?

Possible misunderstanding here. The crest on that cobra is actually my family crest. The signal flags just spell G I M I. So not very suitable for HIMSN.
I was hoping someone with a drawing talent could make a flag, take Smivs logo and increase the detail on it, make HIMSN command pennants and so on.