Oolite Bulletins

spud42 wrote:

is it permissible to tweak an oxp?

Absolutely - tweak to your heart's content. Just remember which OXPs you have tweaked, in case of error reporting.

spud42 wrote:

is it permissible to tweak an oxp? i mean like change the tech level it is available from and chance of appearing? i dont want to step on toes but as much as i really like this ship it is becoming too prevalent.

Yes.. lots of us do it to our own personal copies, to make things a better fit in our Ooniverse. Many of the tweaks then end up posted in the Tinkerer's Workshop thread.. and if the original OXP author likes the changes, they've even been known to be adopted in the next update.

Diziet Sma wrote:

spud42 wrote:

is it permissible to tweak an oxp?

Certainly. The whole OXP 'thing' has been designed to allow you to modify your game, and making changes to individual OXPs is fine, and often to be encouraged.
The only proviso I would add is that if you are thinking of releasing one that you have tweaked for yourself, it is both sensible and polite to consult the original author, but if it is purely for personal use just do it .

thanks all for the replies . i didnt want to upset the OXP author . i really like the Tiger Ray as a ship and i do want to keep it but i think personally tech lvl 3 worlds is a bit low for a nice bit of kit like this.... and maybe reduce the chance a bit to make it not so prevalent. right now its almost 1 to 1 with vipers.....

spud42 wrote:

thanks all for the replies . i didnt want to upset the OXP author . i really like the Tiger Ray as a ship and i do want to keep it but i think personally tech lvl 3 worlds is a bit low for a nice bit of kit like this.... and maybe reduce the chance a bit to make it not so prevalent. right now its almost 1 to 1 with vipers.....

Sorry for not getting back to this thread more quickly - I've been travelling a fair bit in the last couple of weeks and have only just had time to check the forum. Feel free to tweak the OXP as you want - you certainly will not upset me (in fact I take someone trying to improve things as a compliment that there is something actually worth improving).

Smivs wrote:

Just a mention, but lots of OXP ships do seem to appear far too frequently - natural I suppose as the 'author' likes to see their handiwork - but it does rather upset things a bit in some ways. The less often they appear, the more they are appreciated I think, as rarity value plays a part.

Guilty as charged However in my defence I would claim that it was to allow me to do easy testing. Not a very strong defence I admit!

spud42 wrote:

tech lvl 3 worlds is a bit low for a nice bit of kit like this.

Level 3 is probably a bit low, but I do see the Tiger Ray as a lower end fighter - the Viper is for the high tech systems, capable of taking on almost anything while the Tiger Ray is a good alternative, but ultimately not as good (something which comes out in the testing I have done so far). However, that's my take on it and anyone modding the OXP can have whatever spin they want on it ... in fact if a modded OXP drifts far enough away from the one I'm still tweaking then I would be happy to share a slightly different version of the model (different engines, different weapons, etc ... which are already in the basic model, and eventually even a different paint job ... which will require some work) to allow the two versions to coexist more easily.

thanks Jona . i see where you are coming from with where you aimed the Tiger Ray. It may be just my impression but i feel that even in higher tech worlds 12 and above it is almost 50/50 Vipers and Tiger Rays.

Is it possible to give a TL range in which a ship would spawn? ie between TL3 and TL9??? or can you only set the minimum TL a ship will spawn at?

i have only set tech level to 6 and chance to 0.1.. and i still get a few which i like but not so many as they outnumber the vipers...lol

seen quite a few flown by pirates,damn near got one too but he bugged out after 2 hits..... just as well my laser was overheating and shields almost gone...lol fun fight.

After a bit of a long break (thank you a nice and long bout of the flu!) I've updated the OXZ file for the Tiger Ray based on the feedback given by everyone. Above all the ship should be less common in each role. The link is the same as before ... here.

In addition I've started working on a few new ships. The first up, still in progress, is tentatively called the Hammerhead (until someone points out that this name has already been taken!) and looks like this for the moment ...



As you can see creation of the model is accelerated as I can recycle components (the weapons, engines, scanners and life support systems) from ship to ship (in line with what I'm doing in my own game). Beyond this I am undecided on which design to complete and would welcome feedback (even if the models are a bit rough and ready for the moment). The first design has the engines bolted onto the sides of the ship and wings above the central fuselage while in the second design the engines are housed under 'wings' added to the side of the fuselage while the wings are currently underneath the ship's belly - gives a slightly wider profile. The concept behind the design is a more bulky, less maneuverable ship than the Tiger Ray, less sophisticated, but packing a bigger punch with two forward weapon hardpoints (for Oolite this will be one laser and one missile launcher).

The other ship (the Mite ... yes need to change the name!) is much smaller, basically a glorified short range shuttle. It's more or less finished as shown below.



Unfortunately it's not working at all in Oolite for the moment due to the lack of model transparencies ... the cockpit with opaque glass looks really bad ... for the moment I'll concentrate on the Hammerhead and see if I get any inspiration on the Mite as I go along.

Jona wrote:

...tentatively called the Hammerhead (until someone points out that this name has already been taken!)...

Guess what
Hehe, it's really hard to find original, un-used names these days, but a quick search around the Board or the Wiki will often help.
I don't think there is a Mite, but I have to ask, have you seen the discussions on scale? That Mite looks tiny if the pilot is anything to go by. It's probably a tenth as big as a cargo container I'd guess, and would therefore be all but un-seeable in-game.
I'm glad you are over the flu now. Mrs_Smivs was laid up with it just before New Year, and she'd had a jab, too!

Smivs wrote:

Mrs_Smivs was laid up with it just before New Year, and she'd had a jab, too!

Take it from someone whose stepmother was a GP.. getting the 'flu jab almost guarantees that you'll catch it. Which was why she always advised her patients to avoid it, unless absolutely necessary.

Smivs wrote:

I don't think there is a Mite, but I have to ask, have you seen the discussions on scale? That Mite looks tiny if the pilot is anything to go by. It's probably a tenth as big as a cargo container I'd guess, and would therefore be all but un-seeable in-game.

I certainly have seen the discussions on scale - the problem I have is that I'm making these models for my own personal attempt at an Elite style game (think Star Citizen with a budget roughly $66 million less ) where the sizes of ships are a lot smaller ... probably because my own 'vision' of Vipers and Cobras from years back had these Elite ships being smaller. For many of the models I'm creating (the Tiger Ray being an example) this is not too serious as changing the scale doesn't cause too many issues. For the Mite the whole design is based on 'small' and the model really isn't working in Oolite at the moment - the only approach here would be to completely rework the cockpit (get rid of the large window to overcome the issues with no transparency and then change the design to for instance half the size of the crew space and add more vents and engineering elements perhaps. As mentioned last time I will be working first on the Hammerhead as the design is more immediately reworkable.

Jona wrote:

...I'm making these models for my own personal attempt at an Elite style game (think Star Citizen with a budget roughly $66 million less ) where the sizes of ships are a lot smaller ...

Ah, I see

Smivs wrote:

Jona wrote:

...I'm making these models for my own personal attempt at an Elite style game (think Star Citizen with a budget roughly $66 million less ) where the sizes of ships are a lot smaller ...

Ah, I see

To help you see even better I've just created the following video ...



Shows the completed ship models and hangar running in my own game engine. Even includes another ship model, although unfortunately again this one would need a far amount of work around the cockpit to get it looking okay in Oolite.

Nice

very promising

nice video. i mite see a problem with the mite......

thrust line is not on centre of mass line so unless the engine is more mass than the rest of the ship or its made out of ultra dense handvavium, that sucker is just gonna spin... lol