Oolite Bulletins

In another game I have there are a few hollow asteroids (hollow because they have been mined out) and you can fly inside these asteroids via a small opening that leads into a tunnel and then into the center of the asteroid itself.

Could this be done for Oolite?

I am not taking about an asteroid that can be docked with but a hollow one that you just fly into.
These would make good hiding places for when you are being attacked. Maybe you could stay there for a while whilst your sheilds and energy replenish then fly back out to continue the fight.

The 'hull' of the asteroid would have to be rather strong in case the ships chasing you decide to attack it, with you inside.
It would have to be big too to allow even some of the bigger ships to enter it, turn around and fly back out again.

elite wrote:

It would have to be big too to allow even some of the bigger ships to enter it, turn around and fly back out again.

Surely, any attacking ship would simply follow you in....

Captain Hesperus

Should be easy, there is already something very similar, in Anarchies.oxp. Salvage gang I think. That is dockable, but it should be pretty easy to make something similar but without the docking port, and a truckload of energy.

Captain Hesperus wrote:

Surely, any attacking ship would simply follow you in....

Yes but only if the ship is scripted to do so?

In 'normal' flight wouldn't an attacking ship stay clear of the asteroid due to the collision detection?

I attempted a similar thing for Assasins.OXP, but I got bogged down in the implementation phase of it's scripted destruction.

At the time it was required to use subentities to prevent bounding-box collisions.
But maybe the collision system was upgraded in the meantime.

Please note that not only the Salvage Gang, but also the Hacker Outpost is hollowed out and has a cavity inside. (Again thanks to Killer Wolf for this gorgeous idea and its implementation! )

And you can indeed enter one of these asteroids and hide a little bit. Or, once you're inside, get a parking position at the edge of the internal cavern and watch another ship following you in the tunnel and dock (I've done that!).

But! Very unfortunately both big asteroids have a flaw, which is not their, but Oolite's fault. And it's exactly the point A_H is pointing at:

Oolite's collision detection handling is less reliable than it would be desirable in an ideal Ooniverse. To say the least. Or in plain English: It sucks!

Try to attack anybody close to a Salvage Gang or Hacker Outpost and then go hiding inside the asteroid, to see what I mean. Your opponents laser fire will hit you even if you're in the middle of the structure. It goes right through the asteroid. Sometimes even a NPC-ship will fly right through the structure. I can only apologize for that and hope that a situation like this doesn't spoil anybody's having fun with the game. But at this point there is nothing we can do about it.

By the way, it is exactly this problem of sloppy and unreliable collision detection once you are in a structure that derailed the construction of the death-burger in Assassins.

The bottom line is: Oolite's collision detection needs major overhaul. Anybody up to it?

collision detection is hard. It's even harder with funny shaped complex ships.

OTOH everything is mostly spread out enough that their ought to be some heuristics that will greatly cut down the amount of work necessary...

Hoopy wrote:

collision detection is hard. It's even harder with funny shaped complex ships.

OTOH everything is mostly spread out enough that their ought to be some heuristics that will greatly cut down the amount of work necessary...

Quick rejection (cutting down on the amount of work, for instance by dividing space into sections in a clever way) and close-up collision detection (working out whether two ships are touching/intersecting, and if so where) are two different problems. Oolite needs a complete rewrite of both. Any volunteers?

i don't have enough time to play it, never mind code anything

I'd like to though...

Commander McLane wrote:

Try to attack anybody close to a Salvage Gang or Hacker Outpost and then go hiding inside the asteroid, to see what I mean. Your opponents laser fire will hit you even if you're in the middle of the structure. It goes right through the asteroid.

I finally got around to trying it.

I attacked a Police ship then entered the salvage yard asteroid.

The Police ship didn't even attempt to attack me and I had time to recharge my shields.

I tried this with other ships too and got the same result.

I'm running 1.68.

Love the salvage and hacker asteroids by the way

Those outposts should have offender status or similar, so that police will attack it when they find it.
Naturally a few vipers will likely not have enough firepower to destroy one.

Arexack_Heretic wrote:

Those outposts should have offender status or similar, so that police will attack it when they find it.
Naturally a few vipers will likely not have enough firepower to destroy one.

I agree for the Hacker Outposts, will try it out.

But I don't agree for the Salvage Gangs (at least not outside Anarchy systems). They do nothing plainly illegal, so why should they be Offenders?

Anyway, I have no idea yet how a station with Offender-Status will behave, so I will have to test it before I implement it.

And second thought on the Hackers: Isn't it reasonable to assume that they would use their abilities to hack themselves clean again, whenever GalCop tries to stick an Offender-label to them? So they also would appear clean at least most of the time.

I would assume they would yes, but more probably they rely on invisibility, deleting records of their presence and activities.

GalCoop probably has 'federal' cases on most hacker-rings, finding an uncharted outpost is bound to be followed by closer investigation (not in anarchies obviously).
When discovered, the hackers won't allow them in and dissapear before reinforcements arive.
Not complying with galcop interceptors constitutes an offence punishable by destruction.
thus the cops who found the outpost must dissapear as well.

This would neccesitate an allegiance between the hackers and salvagers, in order to tow away the hackers to a safe location.
(Or altitude thrusters on the outpost itself)

Arexack_Heretic wrote:

finding an uncharted outpost is bound to be followed by closer investigation (not in anarchies obviously).

Hmm, yes, but Hacker Outposts exist only in Anarchies. That's a difference to the slightly more legal Salvage Gangs who can be found in non-Anarchy systems as well.

And as far as towing is concerned: You will never find both Salvagers and Hackers in the same system.

It's possible that Hacker Outposts can adequately cover their presence by bribery and corruption: you'd have to assume that GalCop postings to Anarchy systems would be generally unpopular, and that most cops bsed there wouldn't object to a little (untraceable) garnish being added to their salaries for turning a blind eye.

In my experience pretty much the only thing that cops do in Anarchy systems is patrol inside the aegis. There aren't enough of them, and they're probably insufficiently motivated, to go out looking for trouble! The only thing the hackers would have to worry about is the occasional incorruptible -- and then they could always plant evidence of malfeasance and get him or her cashiered in disgrace.

If GalCop wanted to, they could probably send a big wing in with a Behemoth to sweep out the hackers -- but that's a lot of trouble and expense to go to in a system that nobody really cares about anyway. The hackers just have to be careful not to stick their necks out too far.