Caduceus Omega and Aquatics' Guardian Defense System

[ilNibbio]

Hi guys.
I'd like to open a new thread cause I got an issue with the Guardian Drones system from Aquatics.
I bought the piece of hardware twice: at first, the drones launched and got destroyed instantly.
At second, they launched normally, but after a dogfight, dunno what happened, they start shooting at me, then after a while I found another target and I've lost track of them.
Have I got targeted myself? I immediately put missiles on safety, trying to unlock the target (my own vessel), but no way.
Now in my equipment list I have two hardwares named "Guardian defense system" but both are orange, N/A.
Is there a way to repair it? The DNC of my Caduceus doesn't apply this system. Or to restore the drones? Or sell it?
Any clue?

Oolite 1.76.1, Caduceus Omega, clean, deadly, docked at Veinmaa (G3).

[Thargoid]

The guardians shouldn't lock onto you, or if they do then they should unlock themselves.

But the Caduceus is a ship armed with turrets, and it may be that they hit a drone by mistake and destroyed it.

At the end of combat (when your status indicator ceases to be red) the system will de-activate and the drones will vanish (and conceptually will return to your ship, although that's too tricky to actually do in practice).

You should be able to get the system restocked and repaired if you go back to the Aquarian HQ in Aqualina. One of them should also be fixable at higher tech system main stations. You shouldn't actually be able to have both versions installed at once - I need to look into that.

[ilNibbio]

Thx Thargoid for the help.
But I ensure you that they fired at me, I wasn't doped.
I'll get back to Aqualina, sooner or later.

[Thargoid]

I don't disbelieve you - it just means that something went wrong as I thought I'd coded against that. I'll look into that too.

[Commander McLane]

At the end of combat (when your status indicator ceases to be red) the system will de-activate and the drones will vanish (and conceptually will return to your ship, although that's too tricky to actually do in practice).

However, if something went wrong (friendly fire from the Caddy's turrets seems indeed the most likely explanation) and the drones turned hostile on the player, there won't be an end of combat, of course, and the system may not de-activate as planned.

[DaveG]

Sorry about bringing up an old thread, but it seemed better than starting a new one...

I have exactly the same problem - so much so that I'm wondering whether to forget the 'GDS' completely!

I fly a Falcon S, and although it has turrets, my problem is mostly inadvertantly shooting my own drones! Essentially, in a god fight, I will often switch to rear laser. However, the GDS activates and deactivates so frequently (when the situation briefly switches to yellow alert) that when they respawn, it is right in front of my rear laser, which I will often be using!

They also nearly always collide with my ship, especially after coming out of witchspace jump or torus drive! This means they usually only last about 3 -4 space jumps before they need fixing! Somewhat costly!

cheers for any help!

dave

[JazHaz]

Maybe the drones' spawn position needs to be changed, perhaps above or below your ship? Or maybe to the side.

[DaveG]

Maybe the drones' spawn position needs to be changed, perhaps above or below your ship? Or maybe to the side.

possibly - unfortunately my knowledge at editing the shiplist are minimal! I'm happy to do this with help, but I wondered if it was also possible for the GDS to never attack the mother ship? I can't think of any reason why I would want to be beaten up by my own drones! (of course, some pilots may like that sort of thing..!)

[Thargoid]

The drones should already have a friendly fire check in them - I'll review it and see if there's a gap in it somewhere which is allowing them to fire at the player.

As for launching, they deploy at the same position as cargo dumping will occur from. That depends entirely on the definition information of the ship you're flying, and is of course beyond the OXP control.

[DaveG]

cheers thargoid - i understand about the launching position, and I'll look into that elsewhere!

If it helps, it seems (although I may be imagining it) that a single hit or two from my laser doesn't set them off, but if they launch in front of a mil laser on continuous burst, they get more than a single 'friendly fire' shot! From the drone point of view, it could look like a deliberate attack on them!

[Thargoid]

The shipdata.plist entry aft_eject_position is what you want - it's probably either not configured or is configured directly behind your ship (and in front of the aft laser).

Anyway i think I've found the friendly fire glitch - if you've targetted the drone and shoot it then it sees it as friendly fire, but if you just shoot it without target-locking it then it won't. I'll adjust it for the next release of the OXP anyway. But if you want to test it yourself, change line 63 of aquatics_guardianPlayer.js to

Code: Select all

	if(this.ship.target && (this.ship.target.hasRole("aquatics_guardianPlayer") || this.ship.target.isPlayer))

and it should check correctly (remembering to hold down shift when restarting after the mod so the cache is cleared.[/color]

[DaveG]

Just to update, I made both changes, and everything works, however as I moved the aft eject position to below my Falcon a bit, I haven't shot the drones any more, so I don't know if that bit is fine! WOuld you like my to shoot them and find out?!

[Thargoid]

Yes please, both with and without targeting them first.