Oolite Bulletins

phkb wrote:

Thanks for the heads up. New version on the way shortly

Excellent - thanks buddy.

Still in illegal_goods_missions.js, at least some of your emails are broken, don' know why...

https://bb.oolite.space/viewtopic.php?f= ... 43#p233843

Yep, got that one too. A case of making changes to working code and not thinking I'd broken anything. New version on the way.

OK, version 2.0.1 is up, available via the download manager or via this link: https://app.box.com/s/mlzwh83ailp23ah4v8m48wo795ck5sce

In this version: Code improvements as suggested by wildeblood. Updated markSystem and unmarkSystem to use objects rather than system ID's only. Fixed bug with link to email system.

phkb wrote:

..... I love what this OXP does for the game.

Same here!!! Thanks again for fixing the conflict so quickly

So, I've got a bit of a feature request for this OXP: it would be great if, given a mission to rescue slaves 'on the far side of the sun', there would be an X marker on the ASC. 'On the far side of the sun' is pretty vague to begin with, and to top it off it's supposed to be a Rock Hermit were the slave market is, so it's not even large enough to get mass-locked if you get close (never mind that a Rock Hermit also looks like a space potato on the scanner ). I've tried these missions several occasions and never once been successful :/

I think this has been requested before! However, this is supposed to be a hard mission, and wouldn't the slavers' have disabled any transmitting device that would allow the ASC to locate them?

There are a couple of options if you still find it too hard: My method for finding the base is to use the Sun as a backdrop. First, fly around to the other side of the sun. Then, position yourself so that your ship, the sun, and the planet form a line. Once you do that, you should be able to pick up black spots against the sun, which should be the base. A glare filter might come in handy.

But if you really are finding the mission too hard, you can convert the OXZ to an OXP by renaming the file to have a ".ZIP" extension and then extracting the contents to "C:\Oolite\Addons\IllegalGoodsTweak.OXP". Then, edit the "shipdata.plist" file in the "config folder, and add the following lines of code after the "allegiance" line and before "bounty":That will put the Slaverbase on the ASC.

Now that we can set beacon codes and labels on existing ships from JS... and I'm not suggesting this for this OXP which I don't think should be made easier... but this has brought it to mind... things like the slaver base could be given an intermittent beacon. Use timers to add the beacon, say once a minute, and remove it again 10 or 15 seconds later.

Wildeblood wrote:

Now that we can set beacon codes and labels on existing ships from JS... and I'm not suggesting this for this OXP which I don't think should be made easier... but this has brought it to mind... things like the slaver base could be given an intermittent beacon. Use timers to add the beacon, say once a minute, and remove it again 10 or 15 seconds later.

I like that idea - Phkb made a good point about the base not likely broadcasting a signal. Although I suppose it doesn't seem like too much of stretch that the folks from the intelligence team could have marked the base remotely. Something to think about - thanks Phkb

CommRLock78 wrote:

It doesn't seem like too much of stretch that the folks from the intelligence team could have marked the base remotely.

How do waypoints work, they're another thing we didn't have back in my day? Giving the player a "last known position", more or less anywhere the correct distance, but wrong direction, from the star, so they don't go flying off forever into the distance, might be an idea.

Version 2.2.0 is now available via the download manager. The two changes in this release are:

1. Made illegal goods check occur at any GalCop-aligned station, rather than just the main station.

2. Better integration with Smugglers OXP (v0.5.0) - the screen when docking with slaves now looks like an Amnesty Intergalactic screen, rather than a GalCop Customs screen. If the player doesn't want to hand over the slaves to AI, they can chose to work with GalCop directly, at which point the Smugglers OXP will deal with the importation of illegal goods (slaves), and the player can attempt to bribe the docking officials if they choose.

If you don't have Smugglers installed everything should be the same as before, only now, with the GalCop aligned check you'll get asked about Illegal Goods in more locations.

Bug in case there is more than one "grateful ex-slave" in the queue: It took a long time until I happened to come through the first system, had the meal, then it told me about the message I have in my inbox which should tell me about the credits I got in addition to the meal. But it instead was the message from the next ex-slave asking for the meeting.

Thanks for the bug report. I'll look into it.

I have found that the tweak oxp has missed on some occasions that rescued / captured escape pods are just that and has instead regarded them as slaves, skipping the option to voluntarily hand them over.
The only option given is to accept the penalty or attempt to bribe.

Taken from my Latest.log:

14:59:15.113 [LogEvents]: docking clearance granted
14:59:33.042 [StationDockControl]: Current ship count: 266
14:59:46.618 [LogEvents]: VIEW_CUSTOM
14:59:52.835 [LogEvents]: will dock to Coriolis Station 24622
14:59:53.134 [StationDockControl]: Current ship count: 266
14:59:53.135 [LogEvents]: alert condition changed from 2 to 1
14:59:53.135 [LogEvents]: ship lost EQ_XENONHUD_DOCKING
14:59:53.136 [LogEvents]: ship got EQ_XENONHUD_CENTRE
14:59:53.137 [LogEvents]: ship got EQ_XENONHUD_TEMP_LOW
14:59:55.400 [LogEvents]: rescued escape pod with a slave occuped by Esan Atilse undefined
14:59:55.401 [LogEvents]: rescued escape pod for 90.8 credits insurance occuped by Beza Ouxe undefined
14:59:55.404 [LogEvents]: rescued escape pod for 464.6 credits insurance occuped by Le Stit undefined
14:59:55.563 [LogEvents]: ship lost EQ_TARGETSELECTOR_MODECHANGER
14:59:55.564 [LogEvents]: docked to Coriolis Station 24622
14:59:55.581 [LogEvents]: ship lost EQ_XENONHUD_CLOCK_3
14:59:55.583 [LogEvents]: gui screen will change from GUI_SCREEN_MAIN to GUI_SCREEN_STATUS
14:59:55.602 [LogEvents]: gui screen changed from GUI_SCREEN_MAIN to GUI_SCREEN_STATUS
14:59:56.306 [LogEvents]: gui screen changed from GUI_SCREEN_STATUS to GUI_SCREEN_REPORT
14:59:56.408 [LogEvents]: alert condition changed from 1 to 0
15:00:02.549 [LogEvents]: gui screen will change from GUI_SCREEN_REPORT to GUI_SCREEN_STATUS
15:00:02.571 [LogEvents]: gui screen changed from GUI_SCREEN_REPORT to GUI_SCREEN_STATUS
15:00:02.590 [LogEvents]: report screen ended
15:00:02.595 [LogEvents]: bounty is changed by 1 to 1 due to illegal imports

As you can see I had 3 rescued / captured escape pods. I was awarded a fee for 2 of them but the third (Esan Atilse) appears to have fallen through the net and been assigned as Illegal cargo.

Thanks for the report, Damocles Edge. The log is quite interesting. The key piece of information is this:

Damocles Edge wrote:

14:59:55.400 [LogEvents]: rescued escape pod with a slave occuped by Esan Atilse undefined

That tells me that the occupant of this escape pod did not have any insurance or bounty applied to them when they entered their escape pod. I can't tell what the source of this escape pod was, but after some testing I can confirm that if a crew is set for an escape pod with zero insurance and bounty, the occupant will not be picked up by standard escape pod processing when you dock -- that is, with no insurance there is no payout for the player, and with no bounty there is no reward either. As both these scenarios fail to kick in, the "slave" you scooped (which is how an escape pod occupant is viewed in your hold) remains a slave after you dock.

There are two questions that come out of this: (1) how did the escape pod get created with no insurance or bounty, and (2) is it possible to prevent this scenario from happening? I can't answer the first one, as there are a lot of ways escape pods can be created (although by far the most common one will be a ship being destroyed and the pilot bailing out). As for the second one, there might be a way of preventing the scenario, but it might be difficult to prevent the solution from interfering with other OXP's, mission OXP's in particular. I'll have a bit of a play and see if I can come up with something reliable.