unwitnessed kilrathi capships:

Discuss the Wing Commander Series and find the latest information on the Wing Commander Universe privateer mod as well as the standalone mod Wasteland Incident project.
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starlord
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unwitnessed kilrathi capships:

Post by starlord »

hello to all, I have an idea to propose, should you accept, that is:


I always wanted to play a sort of "wing commander prequel"battle : a space campaign starting from the iason incident up all the way to the mcaulliffe battle and the cluster carnival. Knowing the fact that this would be quite impossible, why not instead try to create that kind of campaign in WCU? Naturally, this would mean adding new ships, such as a pre WC1 true carrier (name unknown) , and perhaps other things such as WC movie sivars, movie snakeir super dreadnaughts (standard and command 4km long versions) and perhaps a corvette precursor to the kamekh named spikeri (design in SWC ship section on the cic site).

And who knows, if the story could continue up to the Wc2 era, perhaps we could recreate the academy storyline and add ships such as the agon ra sivar class dreadnaught...

Naturally, those remain suppositions, but it would be good to test oneself against those ships in space combat: universe would be the only mod proposing the few WC ships one never flew against in any WC game and therefore would become a truly unmissable project to witness.

I would like to have your point of view on this.

regards.

starlord.
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Post by chuck_starchaser »

Sounds like a good idea to me; I'm in. Could you please make a list of ships you need and gather as many references as possible on them. I find that to be the hardest part of modeling, really. Every picture, drawing, painting, in-game screen shot, movie clip, or textual description of even the most seemingly insignificant detail... helps. All new ships in WCU will have fully modeled interiors, and there's not always references on those; but sometimes there are mentions in a book about someone getting into a kat ship, say, and ranting about the odd locations of some of the controls... Every piece of info is important. Not the least of which: colors and materials.
E.g.: What's durasteel supposed to look like? More like aluminium, or stainless, or titanium, or...?
(I'd never heard of a pre-WC1 carrier, but then again I'm no WC erudite.)
A 4km ship will require a 2k texture. This will make MKruer really happy, but we'll need like 20 people to paint all those texels before our generation passes on...
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Post by starlord »

GREAT: thanks man:

All right: here goes:

If you have the WC movie, you'll see what was the biggest kilrathi battleship before the WC3 dreadnaught: The snakeir super dreadnaught:
http://www.wcnews.com/newshots/full/bw-snake.jpg

(there are standard 915m versions and a long 4km version, details can be found in the ships database).

then comes the sivar dreadnaught (movie) 825m, no photos for the moment but I'll continue the search.

then comes the thrakhra spy ship (com control, can be used for jamming), no photos for the moment.

plus we have the agon ra sivar from academy: http://www.wcnews.com/news/update/5817

from academy, we also have a kilrathi tug: http://wcnews.com/cgi-bin/searchnews.cg ... ted+Series
can be interesting to use as well as a shuttle.

we have also a pre WC1 corvette named spikeri (precursor to the kamehk) here: http://www.wcnews.com/newershots/full/fralthi.jpg
Though it never appeared in any game, if we give it about 100 m, we have a nice corvette/gunboat which can prove very effective in swarms.

Eventually the last thing would be to design a sort of preWC1 kilrathi carrier for campaigns such as the mcauliffe battle (name, shape and specks unknown).


Should you be interested, you can also have access to "new" confed ships:
such as the concordia super cruiser: http://www.wcnews.com/cgi-bin/searchnews.cgi

and the black lance carrier: http://wcnews.com/newshots/full/blcarrier.jpg

I hope I've benn of some help to you!

kind regards, and good luck!

starlord.
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Post by starlord »

It might seem as an old version of the kilrathi spy ship stands here:

http://www.wcnews.com/newestshots/full/ ... ncept3.jpg
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Post by chuck_starchaser »

Alright, I'm starting a folder for the project; got the pics. Thanks. More is better tho. I don't have the movie, could you save any relevant frames and gmail them to me; I'll send you a pm with my gmail address.

On other fronts, do you have a plot in mind? Don't reveal anything about it here, publically, just say yes or no or maybe. If not, we can work at it together. What we'd need to come up with, first, is background info, and a detailed chronology of existing canon for the period.

Also maps. Presumably, systems like Gemini and Landreich would already exist, but not be fully explored, for example? As sideplots, we could have exploration of uncharted systems, perhaps, that are mentioned in later games and books?

Characters: Who's around in the period, where, and what age are they?

What WC1 ships are already around, if any?

Etceteras.

EDIT:
Also, any loose ends needing tying up? I mean, say, for instance, something the terrans may seem to have known about the kats that helped them during WC1, but which the canon leaves unexplained, could be explained via a secret espionage mission into Kilrah in a prequel. I see new plots as opportunities to patch holes and make bridges in the existing canon.

Finally, do you know, or does anybody know, of any current fan projects targeting this period? We wouldn't want our stories to end up clashing with theirs.
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Post by Dilloh »

I once read about a mod or stand-alone game similar to Privateer, but playing in the past, at the time of WC1 or before. I don't know if the ship models are fantasy or canon, and how far they are advanced, but one could look it up and maybe port models from there (with the authors permission of course).

Unfortunately I can't remember the project's name, but I'm quite sure I followed some links on one of the admin's pages... Maybe ace, mkruer, jacks?
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Post by starlord »

I think pionnier is the mod you've been thinking about, but I don't know much on this mod.

As for the plot, I have a rough idea but no doubt it will need to be inproved. But the goal is indeed to "tie up those loose ends" while being able to engage ANY ship in the WC universe.

I'll give the full details when needed!

regards.
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Post by chuck_starchaser »

Hmmm... I wasn't aware that Pioneer was set in this timeframe. I think the right thing to do, then, would be to play through Pioneer and/or synchronize with Howard by email, and make sure there are no conflicts with their plot line and background details.
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Post by BradMick »

wow...yeah, don't use that piece of shit 1997 render of my sivar as an example of the wc movie ships....thats back in the true space, crappy days.

as far as pioneer goes, all the ships (except the obvious ones) were either concepted out by me, and modeled by howard and I. in so far as the plot line goes, nothing will be of major import to the overall wc story. its a 'non interference' plot i guess you could say, and we're still not even 100% on where we're going to go with it anyway. To many other things to worry about and focus on over the plot right now. As for the time, its set in 2650, in the landreich. and its actually not a mod, but a from the ground up game.

in so far as the models go, they are not available to the public, nor will they be for the forseeable future.
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Post by chuck_starchaser »

Thanks. Okay, I guess we can just stay away from Landreich, then, to be really sure of no conflicts. ;-)
Is that okay, starlord?
I wasn't just worrying about possible storyline conflicts, but about background facts, stats, art, whatever.
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Post by starlord »

no problem: My "plot" doesn't have anything to do with the landreich normally.
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Post by chuck_starchaser »

Soon as you have those movie shots and stuff, email them to me.
If you want to discuss the plot, email it to me too.
Let's do the ships in order of appearance; like if you tell me which is the first ship (or station) you need for the start of the plot, I'll start modelling that one.
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Post by mkruer »

Sorry about not getting to you sooner Starlord, I saw your e-mail, but it went into my spam account. Anyway I don’t foresee any major problems providing that you do not break continuity between the games. Brad and Chuck can provide you a lot of insight, better then I can. As for WCU integration, I don’t foresee any integration issues.
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Post by mkruer »

I added a new section to WCU:Wiki called Wing Commander Zero

Other Projects can be found here WCU:Projects
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Post by chuck_starchaser »

Hahaha, good name :D

I'm excited about this project. Our most recent plan was to start with a WC1 remake; but that was rather partly for lack of better propositions, except for the Wasteland Incident; but also partly to proceed chronologically. But with a new plot that precedes WC1, I think we got the best of both worlds; and a modest, achievable goal that might put WCU on the map. So far, if I understand correctly, first things we need to model are:

1) Alexandria station
2) Scimtar
3) Exeter
4) ...

The Hornet and Bengal are both at pretty advanced work stages.
Talon, Raptor, Rapier... Probably need to be redone.

What's the political and social situation at this time? How long ago was the Pilgrim War? What's happening in Border Worlds, Landreich, etceteras?
Has Gemini been explored/conquered yet? I guess not...
I'd like to get a bird's eye view on the whole situation.
Maybe we should take LOAF's map and cross out every system that we know is not known at this time.

EDIT:
Oh yeah...
WCrevival's timeline wrote:2639
The central metropolis of New Detroit begins to spread over the entire planet. Over the next 30 years the entire planet

will become one huge city.
Privateer Manual
Which means that at the beginning of our time period New Det ought to have been established, already.


EDIT2:
Also from WCrevival, after the loss of the Tiger's Claw:
2657.016
"Treacherous Hero" is released.
KS Calendar

2658
The Particle Cannon enters service.
KS Manual
The last great confict between Confederation and Kilrathi forces in Gemini Sector takes place.
Privateer Manual

2664
Mordecai Jones joins the Church of Men.
Righteous Fire
Finally, by late 2664, only a handful of troops remain on either side on Repleetah. The sole surviving Terran officer, Lieutenant Miles D'Arby, leads his men in a last-ditch effort to overrun the Kilrathi position. No one lives through this last action. The Battle of Repleetah has finally come to an end.
KS Manual
Wish I still had the Privateer Manual...
Hmmm... Big, 6-year gap between 2658 and 2664...

Anyways, perhaps we could add a set of missions in Gemini.
One might suppose that those systems north-east of Perry, the ones with Kilrathi names, were taken from the Kilrathi, militarily, around this period?
I'd like to build as many bridges as possible between Privateer and WC.
I'm thinking, if Mordecai Jones joins the Church of Man in 2664, probably the Church of Man already existed before WC1, and we could learn something about its origins. Perhaps it was some small group of 'spiritual luddite' lunatics that got coopted by mandarins.
What I was really hoping was to make them a distorted fork of a more philosophical, less fanatical movement of Steltek believers, who aim to limit destructive technologies --rather than the erradication of all technology.
Unfortunately, there's nothing about Steltek before 2667, when...
2667
The Anti-Matter Gun enters service.
KS Manual
Dr. Lemuel A. Monkhouse discovers relics, dated at 2.4 billion years of age, of the ancient Steltek race on his Mars site. This find shakes the scientific community and calles into question previous estimates of the age of the universe.
Although...
This is also the first evidence found which supports the "Steltek Hypothesis", the postulation that an advanced, galaxy-spanning civilisation existed before the so-called "Dawn of Intelligence". That evidence is confiscated by the Confederation.
Privateer
...which implies that the "Steltek Hypothesis" predates Mars Sita... So, not all hope is lost.

Also, at around this time, we might suppose there's some system somewhere around Gemini where Menesch is becoming governor...
Monte wrote:The man is a menace. Years ago, Menesch was governor of a base in a more populated system. As his influence grew, so did his lust for money. He had used his connections to sell Confederation ships, mostly Talons, to outlaw groups such as the pirates and the Retros. It’s been years since his administration collapsed, and now, he’s come out of hiding to do business in Gemini. It seems more than coincidence that your gun should disappear with Menesch around. I wouldn’t put anything past him. If he can stoop to becoming the Retros main supplier, I wouldn’t be surprised if he had connections with the Kilrathi.
Let's see: He will eventually get kicked out of office for corruption. But for now, if his thing is selling Talons to pirates and retros, it means he has contacts deep within Confed Decomissionings. Or, could it be that he had military rank before he went into politics?
Where are the retros at this time? We know that, before the start of Privateer, Burrows gets attacked by retros at Sheol station in Callisto System, Avalon Sector. That's a couple of jumps West of Fariss quadrant. And Menesch was governor somewhere near, but not in, Gemini; so probably Avalon. The Scarab's run was from Baroda.
I'm googling around to find out if there are any references in WC lore as to where Decomissionings is based. If nothing comes up, we could have Decomissionings being moved to Avalon. There might be a small retro base in Avalon somewhere, as well. Maybe several. Come to think of it, the Retros, at this time, are divided, if we consider what Monte says:
"Let me try to pacify you. I know that the Retros have recently been united. ... [by Jones]". That implies they used to be divided.
"Years ago, Menesch was governor of a base in a more populated system.."
Probably means "more populated sector". Governor of a base... Could be a base in a system in Avalon which is home to Confed Decomissionings...
Decomissionings ought to be connected to a shipyard, as much of the material recovered from scuttled ships would be recycled. Do we know of any shipyards in Avalon?
And when Menesch gets deposed and goes into hiding, he then gains contact with the Kilrathi. Where is that?
Allow me to suppose that could be in the Grovsner Colonies
Not sure who (probably the CIC Encyclopaedia) wrote:The Grovsner Colonies did not participate in negotiations between the Kilrathi and the Confederation that lead to the False Peace. Nothing else is known about the Grovsner Colonies.
But we do know where they are; right between Gemini and Kilrathi space.
And how on Earth do the Grovsner Colonies manage to exist right next to Kilrathi space? I'd say because their government allows people like Menesch and the Mandarins a hiding safe-haven, and so the kats leave them alone.

Not that I'd have missions that go into Avalon, or the Grovsner Colonies; I'm just thinking for the purposes of forming a big picture about what's going on everywhere. Perhaps some facts, such as Menesch getting elected governor could come up as a news item or bartender rumor.

Sorry if I'm bugging too much with Privateer stuff. I grew up in a farm on Helen ;-)
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Post by Shissui »

chuck_starchaser wrote:Sorry if I'm bugging too much with Privateer stuff. I grew up in a farm on Helen ;-)
Do carry on -- a full and rich history is not wasted. It adds flavour even where it does not directly touch the plot line.
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Post by chuck_starchaser »

Exactly. ;-)

Once I posted a poll here to know if people would like to see magazines you can buy in-game, and I think it was like 20 yes votes and 1 no vote.
I love games in which there's stuff to read, --provided it's thoughtful, of course; or where anyhow there's plenty of tantalizing information, however it's delivered.
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Post by chuck_starchaser »

I'd like to also propose a set of missions to the Grovsner Colonies. Nothing firm, yet; just that they are well situated, right on the kilrathi border; and nothing is known about them except that they didn't participate in the signing of the armistice in 2668.
I think we could have them be founded by pirates and renegades that make deals with the kats in exchange for being left alone. Perhaps the mandarins society is founded there.

Question: Do we meet the Ark Royal in the plot? Seems to me, anyhow we look at it, we're going to need to make a Concordia class. 16 of them are made in the period up to Cluster's Carnival. If I remember correctly, the Concordia we have has like 50 polygons and 25 textures... That'd make Brad happy, but not me ... :D

EDIT:
There's actually two pre-war carriers. Standard size, like the TCS Antilles and the TCS Soryu; and the Heavy pre-war class, like the TCS Coral Sea.
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Post by Shissui »

chuck_starchaser wrote:There's actually two pre-war carriers. Standard size, like the TCS Antilles and the TCS Soryu; and the Heavy pre-war class, like the TCS Coral Sea.
If we are to include one, then from a pragmatic point of view, I suggest the heavy model -- light carriers are too easy for a single fighter to kill by sniping the turrets & torpedoe when done.

BUT, carriers in general should not have this problem. A passive carrier should always (except possibly while jumping) have deployed several escort ships or, if not available, some of its own fighters as a screen; and, if attacked, should immediately spawn [!! !! !!] additional fighters for serious protection. It becomes much harder to snipe the turrets off even a light carrier if you have a swarm of ### chasing you.

Is it possible to create a "weapon" -- carrier catapult -- that co-locates with a docking square, draws ammo from cargo & kicks out a cargo/starship every 5 seconds ? This "weapon" would make ALL carriers much scarier; especially as large carriers would have several of these.

If we can get that on the "to-do" list, then I withdraw my recommendation for a heavy carrier pending other plot considerations.
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Post by chuck_starchaser »

Well, I don't think we'd really want to invent anything new; specially in a prequel game. New, more powerful technologies are very dangerous things for a game. The way origin finished Privateer, with the player in possession of a superior weapon (Steltek gun), there was no way to write a sequel to that story except to have your gun stolen (beginning of RF).
When they invented Flashpack, soon after had to have all carriers officially upgraded to have flashpack-proof armor, to save the game imbalance situation it created.

These pre-war carriers are supposed to be bad. Otherwise why would they have designed and built the new Concordia class?

Haven't found any references on prewar carriers, much less pics or concept drawings. If I end up coming up with my own concept, they will be ugly, inefficient, impractical, weak, looking like cattle transport trucks but for fighters, held together with bootlaces but without much luck, slow, featureless; --and then have a few problems.
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Post by mkruer »

I tend to see it a different way. Historically how many invincible, super ships/armor/technology in general, developed during peace time, ended up being cannon fodder in the first real battle they engaged in? For me this would make the game more interesting and intense to know that your carrier could be sunk by a simple direct hit. There were are a few WC mission like this in every game, and those are the missions that most people enjoy struggling with. I would rather have fewer and more deadly threats then mass quantity of enemies. [sic WCP]
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Post by chuck_starchaser »

Well, these pre-war carriers are not "enemies"; they are Confed.
But if you mean that there should be a particular strategy the kats need to use to get at the carrier, and that as defender, the player would have to keep this strategy in mind, to try to prevent them from using it, rather than just target the first kat ship that comes up, I'm with you.

Starlord, this is your campaign; what's your take?
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Post by Shissui »

chuck_starchaser wrote:These pre-war carriers are supposed to be bad. Otherwise why would they have designed and built the new Concordia class?
Really, I think my comment was in the wrong forum -- it belongs in *feature requests*. My apologies. This was, however, where raising the issue occurred to me.

I have no problem with some carriers being ineffective.

In WW2, Japan had a converted freighter. This carrier had a fair number of planes (for a light carrier). However, the lift to get them up from below was part of the deck at the business end of the catapult. So it could not launch/land planes fast enough to be in any way useful in combat. It rounded this out with bad armour & very little anti-aircraft, but a middling to slow speed -- definitely the worst carrier of that era. [@mkruer -- another pre-war masterpiece. It was Japan's first effort at a domestic carrier]

BUT, returning to my main point, even THIS carrier could manage to keep a patrol in the air & more on deck to launch if threatened.

My fundamental issue is that the principal weapon of ANY carrier (not just WCU) is its cargo. Yet, the VS engine does not currently permit a carrier to use this resource. Any player with a moderate freighter has a better carrier than a Concordia, because the Concordia will never launch. Why do we even have carriers at all if they never launch or resupply fighters in combat ??

[Yes, I do accept "the story line demands it", but I am hoping for better.]

***
I must go now, but later I will copy elements of this thread over to "Feature Requests", where it can be debated in the more general context. For now, feel free to critique the proposal from the perspective of WC0.
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Post by chuck_starchaser »

Well, Spiritplumber did implement carriers launching fighters. They were doing so in the last semi-working version of WCU. I don't know why her hacks weren't committed to the VS main trunk. That's a question for the devs. I guess they've been too busy with arcade features like network play, and trying to raise the maximum number of ships on the screen from an awfully big bunch to a gazillion...

For this pre-war carrier I'm thinking of a string of boxes or sardine cans with doors that open up and harnesses that push fighters out. No launch tubes; no landing platforms. Just grappling hooks and mattress springs.
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