Oolite Bulletins

Before I start running amok with the ships, I want to make sure I'm clear on certain variables.

1) Thrust. What exactly does this do? Is it acceleration/deceleration?

2) Fuel. The wiki only has a short blurb, but the value for all ships is 70, which I assume refers to the 7.0ly maximum jump that any ship can take. I'm debating whether to tweak this. Part of this consideration has to do with the distance between planets. I'm not sure how to ask this question, but I'm trying to figure out the maximum distance between two adjacent planets. In other words, would a ship be able to access all planets (even if it had to take a long way around) if it could only jump 6ly? What about 5ly? How low can you go and still be able to access everything?

3) Energy and recharge. Does this apply to fore/aft shields as well? Regardless of the value, every ship has a certain number of full bars of energy. Is there a value that's used as a break point to start a new bar? If so, is the amount of energy in each bar split between them? So if the breakpoint is 101. would a ship with 100 energy would have one bar of 100, which a ship with energy 150 would have two bars of 75? Also, is the recharge rate the amount of energy the regenerates per second?

4) Cargo. Correct me if I'm wrong. A ship that doesn't have an extra_cargo entry cannot upgrade their cargo hold. If they do have it, then it can be upgraded, and by an amount specified by an integer value.

I think that's all I got for now. Thanks.

With regards to (2) - there are several planets and indeed systems of planets that cannot be accessed (short of Gal. Hyper jumping in) because there is MORE than 7ly between them and another system....

Good places to set OXPs though - or indeed as Drew did - set your fiction!

punkbohemian wrote:

2) Fuel. The wiki only has a short blurb, but the value for all ships is 70, which I assume refers to the 7.0ly maximum jump that any ship can take. I'm debating whether to tweak this. Part of this consideration has to do with the distance between planets. I'm not sure how to ask this question, but I'm trying to figure out the maximum distance between two adjacent planets. In other words, would a ship be able to access all planets (even if it had to take a long way around) if it could only jump 6ly? What about 5ly? How low can you go and still be able to access everything?

I'll leave the other questions to smarter people but I don't think there's any good way of knowing the answer to your question. The galaxies were generated from random seeds, and there are in fact some systems and groups of systems which can't be reached (without some clever inter-galactic navigation) because they lie more than 7 light-years away from the rest of the group. Take a look at e.g. Galaxy 6:

punkbohemian wrote:

1) Thrust. What exactly does this do? Is it acceleration/deceleration?

Yes. The lower the thrust, the longer it takes to gain full speed or stop from it. With low thrust, the ship also requires a much longer distance to fall out of torus drive speed, with the possibility to crash into objects.

punkbohemian wrote:

3) Energy and recharge. Does this apply to fore/aft shields as well? Regardless of the value, every ship has a certain number of full bars of energy. Is there a value that's used as a break point to start a new bar? If so, is the amount of energy in each bar split between them? So if the breakpoint is 101. would a ship with 100 energy would have one bar of 100, which a ship with energy 150 would have two bars of 75? Also, is the recharge rate the amount of energy the regenerates per second?

The recharge rate is basically causing the recharge per second, however, for the exact formula you would have to look into the code.

The amount of energy also sets the amount of energy banks. I'm not sure how much energy one bank stands for, but I think it's something like 75. More banks are pretty much useless except surviving missile hits, as that energy does not cause the shields to be stronger.

The recharge rate of energy also appears not to enhance the shield build up, although the energy recharge does slow down (or stop) if the shields need to be charged. I think there's a cap for shield recharge, thus you won't see much effect there.

I personally would very much like to have energy banks being drained for faster shield regeneration...but that would require a code change.

punkbohemian wrote:

4) Cargo. Correct me if I'm wrong. A ship that doesn't have an extra_cargo entry cannot upgrade their cargo hold. If they do have it, then it can be upgraded, and by an amount specified by an integer value.

Yes.

Screet

Regarding the fuel question, it has to do with the fuel capacity of a ship, which at the moment is hardcoded to 7.0LY. You cannot have ships that can jump 5.0 or 6.0LY for now, although changing this in the code seems to be relatively easy (famous last words). But I think that such a gameplay related change should be considered only after 1.73 goes public.

there are in fact some systems and groups of systems which can't be reached (without some clever inter-galactic navigation).

I have yet to do any intergalactic navigation. Maybe I should before I start oxp designing Based on what you said, I get the impression that when you make an intergalactic hop, you're in the same place (on the map), but in a different galaxy. So if a place in galaxy 1 is inaccessible, you could hop to galaxy 2, make your way to the approximate location of your destination and then hop back. Is this correct?

More banks are pretty much useless except surviving missile hits, as that energy does not cause the shields to be stronger.

I'm not sure I understand what you're saying. My impression from gameplay is that you have fore/aft shields and then x number of energy banks. If attacks get through the shields, then energy banks start to take a hit. Additionally, the sole function of shields is to measure how much of a beating a ship can take. With that in mind, doesn't more banks equate to more energy, which equates to a good thing?

Regarding the fuel question, it has to do with the fuel capacity of a ship, which at the moment is hardcoded to 7.0LY.

Does that mean changing the fuel value does nothing? If so, why is it in the plist? Can/does it serve another function?

punkbohemian wrote:

So if a place in galaxy 1 is inaccessible, you could hop to galaxy 2, make your way to the approximate location of your destination and then hop back. Is this correct?

No. You go all the way to galaxy 8, then make your way to the approximate location, and then hop back to galaxy 1. It's the scenic route to inaccessible systems in a galaxy.

punkbohemian wrote:

I'm not sure I understand what you're saying. My impression from gameplay is that you have fore/aft shields and then x number of energy banks. If attacks get through the shields, then energy banks start to take a hit. Additionally, the sole function of shields is to measure how much of a beating a ship can take. With that in mind, doesn't more banks equate to more energy, which equates to a good thing?

If the shields are shot through, the shots directly hit your energy banks. More banks = longer survival, true, but it's worth nothing as a single hit which goes through the shields can damage your equipment. Thus you probably survive in a state where you want to reload anyway.

With missile hits it's different, as they do a massive amount of energy damage when coming through the shields. More energy = better survival chance against the first hit.

Screet

punkbohemian wrote:

Regarding the fuel question, it has to do with the fuel capacity of a ship, which at the moment is hardcoded to 7.0LY.

Does that mean changing the fuel value does nothing? If so, why is it in the plist? Can/does it serve another function?

Changing the fuel value will change the fuel the ship has available, but I think it works for NPCs only. It does not change the fuel capacity of a ship. It's in the plist for NPCs and for possible player future use.

another_commander wrote:

Changing the fuel value will change the fuel the ship has available, but I think it works for NPCs only. It does not change the fuel capacity of a ship. It's in the plist for NPCs and for possible player future use.

Yep, giving player ships a higher fuel value than 7.0 LYs has no effect. It also doesn't make NPCs jump farther than that limit.

The only use going beyond that limit is giving NPC ships lots of fuel to burn for their injectors, thereby making them massively faster and more on the same speed level as you as a player, a strategy I am using extensively for my meta-oxp.

Not sure if having a lower LYs distance for player ships would be so game-enhancing. It would, for example, mean that with a 5 LYs only player ship, you would have a new galactic map with new inaccessible islands - perhaps even landing you in uncharted ones you can't leave because any Galactic Hyperdrive you could buy would be more than those 5 LYs away. So you would have to buy a new ship to leave the island etc. ...

My 0.2 Cr

L

I'm sure I remember playing about with the fuel variable. My aging memory seems to tell me that if you change it to, say, 100 (ie 10 light years), you can still jump only seven, but you end up with 3 LYsworth in your tank - and it does work on a player ship.

I always thought it might be a worthwhile OXP subject - a fuel tank upgrade - although you can already get extra fuel pods which take up missile space.

Mike

MKG wrote:

I always thought it might be a worthwhile OXP subject - a fuel tank upgrade - although you can already get extra fuel pods which take up missile space.

But who wants to use up pylon space? Thus improved fuel tanks, which then come with higher capacity, are surely interesting, even if they cost a lot of money...and that from me who often hesitates to pay 70Cr for the little bit of fuel in a pylon mounted tank or the price of a Rock Hermit

Screet

MKG wrote:

I always thought it might be a worthwhile OXP subject - a fuel tank upgrade - although you can already get extra fuel pods which take up missile space.

Already done.

The OSE WiP oxp you can have a look at over there in the Testing forum has a new equipment item "Hyperdrive Class 2" that enables you to buy new, special fuel tanks which have 7 LYs of fuel in them.

Don't know if an even higher upgrade still makes sense gamebalance-wise. If there was a "Hyperdrive Class 3+" that awarded you even more fuel or endless fuel why not let any ship jump anywhere at once and get rid of the waiting time for the next jump completely?

Food for thoughts, though

L

Lestradae wrote:

Don't know if an even higher upgrade still makes sense gamebalance-wise. If there was a "Hyperdrive Class 3+" that awarded you even more fuel or endless fuel why not let any ship jump anywhere at once and get rid of the waiting time for the next jump completely?

Hehe, I was thinking about that few hours ago: Something like a galactic hyperdrive, but only working on the same map...the player selects the target planet anywhere on the map...but even if it would be more costly than a galactic hyperdrive, it probably would destroy most of the fun and break missions where a player has to travel to a distant planet with constant attacks on the way there.

Screet

Concerning energy banks, one bank is 64 in the shipdata.

How did I figure that out, you ask? Let's crunch some numbers.

The startup Cobby has four banks. In it's entry in shipdata, energy = 256

256 divided by 4 = 64

So, knowing that, you can give a ship as many banks as you like accurately.
Want 7 banks? Easy. 64 times 7 = 448

See how that works?