Targ Collective's Autotracking Turrets Pack - Release-Ready!

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Targ Collective's Autotracking Turrets Pack - Release-Ready!

Post by targ collective »

Changes to PU 1.1b6 - Turrets Pack Version 4

The LRfriendorfoe item has been fixed. It is now present in game as a light-capship-missile. All Draymen have total capacity for 16 of these missiles in two launch tubes. In addition the DraymanCVL weapon hardpoints have been reworked; thanks goes out to Chuck Starchaser, who has nailed his flag to our mast and decided to come on board as our modeller. Let's hear a round of applause for Mr Starchaser! The CVL variant of the Drayman now has a light-medium-heavy weapon hardpoint, mounted to the top of the hull, and a forward-facing tractor beam mounted to the bottom of the hull.

Draymen will spawn with a full loadout of lrfreindorfoe ammo. The milspec version of the Drayman is also available for sale with a full loadout. Pirates may want to consider a change of affiliation - while the missiles are slow to launch they won't just attempt to ram the target; they will also attempt to take out shielding beforehand with an array of turbolaser cannons in order to maximise impact. Please note that your drayman will need to be repurchased to come in line with these changes.

Cockpits have been reworked again. The navigational data displayed on load will now be confined to the left hand side of the screen, while target information - be it target or view - is confined to the right hand side.

The full-version fix in the last release fixed one bug and created a worse one, so V4 reverses those changes.

V5 will feature a rationalised turret system, and possibly an array of suicide drone ships of varying lethality. Deployable point-defense satellites are also under consideration.

Changes to PU 1.1b6 - Turrets Pack Version 3

Due to unexpected behaviour in the Vegastrike engine, autotracking turrets had infinite radar range. In the Changes version of the pack the turrets were also omnidirectional. This is obviously unbalanced, and has now been fixed.

Randrigor was missed in the orbital bases fix - Randrigor should now also be indestructible. As V1 of this pack fixed the turret loadout players are advised not to pick fights with Randrigor.

Full Version Only

Junk text about shield upgrades has been removed from upgrades which do not install shields. The empty Stats table has proved persistant - work on removing this is continuing. The Changes version contains (simple) instructions on how this can be replicated. As this problem was so pervasive in units.csv, it has changed almost every entry in the file (no difference is present in gameplay).

Changes to PU 1.1b6 - Turrets Pack Version 2

Autotracking turrets are now fixed and present in game. They cost ten times the non-autotracking variants. (So capship autotracking turrets are forty times the cost of your every day mediums - scrimp and save!) Note that, for some strange reason, ITTS, locking and autotracking seem to be disabled when the turrets are piloted manually. Weird, but there we are.

Changes to PU 1.1b6 - Turrets Pack Version 1 (Full Package Only)

Description truncation in master_parts_list.csv has been fixed. Full package only as I believe it easier for people who have made their own changes to this file to append them to my version than it would be for them to do things the other way round. DO NOT OPEN MASTER_PARTS_LIST.CSV IN EXCEL! This will only reproduce the truncation, even if you don't save it. If you need to append new things to this file use a text editor or dedicated CSV file editor instead.

Changes to PU 1.1b6 - Turrets Pack Version 1 (both packages)

Both packages contain a description for the Dralthi for a certain large asteroid. There are also four corrections to master_parts_list - mostly corrections to spelling and grammar in description text, although the LRFriendOrFoe item is disabled as it does not appear to work as intended. If it's any consolation I have a pretty good idea why and mean to try to fix this as soon as possible. As part of the fix I will change the missile type to Capship-Missile, which I am reasonably sure the engine supports (at least, Vegastrike uses that weapon mount) and will give the missiles and missile mounts to Draymen as per the intended usage.

New turret variants - now there are heavy turrets ingame which can be installed onto the DraymanCVL and Paradigm vessels, as well as any other ships which use the Heavy Tachyon turret. They are exactly the same as the ordinary turrets but for three factors: They are installed on heavy mountpoints; they look like heavy turrets; they use new capship-class weaponry with twice the range, damage and velocity as the Medium counterparts. The heavy turrets even have their own pic in the upgrades screen, which I spent several hours painstakingly pixel-editing from a screenshot. The new heavy turrets are unbalanced, if only because at present they are player-only items.

All orbital bases are now truly indestructible, with hulls that would take several years of continuous fire to damage and shields so powerful you'll never hit the hulls anyway.

The DraymanCVL and Randrigor turrets have been fixed - the Randrigor will now spawn with the full intended turret loadout for the DraymanCVL. Turret mounts will now stay put, although there is no fix short of a change to the engine that will do the same for the types of turrets on those mounts, EG a plasma-tachyon loadout will reverse to a tachyon-plasma loadout every other load. The heavy, medium and mediumrear turrets will 'remember' facings and positionings now. (In truth it's far more primitive - turret types and facings merely read the same forwards as backwards).

The turret placement fix will come into play the instant you purchase a new DraymanCVL.

In line with the above changes factionships.py has been updated so that the Militia faction will now produce capital vessels. You are now as likely to encounter a DraymanCVL as you are a Paradigm, although this can be made more or less likely on demand. For example they could as easily be present half as often as the merchants; I copied the Paradigm values as they seemed the most realistic.

All cockpits that use more than one screen now have one side dedicated to the Nav, View and Target functions and the other dedicated to the remainder of the functions. This should be the right-hand side on all vessels.

There are two versions of this package, the TurretPack and the Changes pack. The TurretPack is for those of you who have not made changes of your own (new ships, new items) to Privateer Universe. The Changes pack will place new files in the Privateer directories - unit_changes.csv and master_part_list_changes.csv. Note that in both versions factionships.py, most cockpit.cpt files and weapon_list.xml will be overwritten, including your changes. If this proves to be a problem let me know and I'll single out what I've changed in keeping with the other files. As far as the cockpits are concerned they, at least, should not be too much of a problem either way.

Installation is the same in both versions as it is for Privateer Universe - simply unRar straight into the data directory for Privateer Universe (usually Privateer).

Those of you who need to use the Changes version - append the master_parts_list.csv file with notepad, or better yet notepad++ which understands the return characters. Curt instructions for installation are included inside the _changes files.

Finally, remember you must have an account and log in to download these files.

Mods, as this is in part a bugfix pack, could this be stickied?
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Last edited by targ collective on Thu May 17, 2007 11:29 am, edited 6 times in total.
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Post by chuck_starchaser »

Many thanks, and congrats.
I haven't got PU installed, my most recent install is PR1.2; what are all the steps I need to take to get to try the pack? Also, I just released a temporary "Cutter class" ship, --see neighboring thread--; how do I put heavy turrets on it?
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Post by targ collective »

You can obtain PU from CanonHUD downloads; see Dilloh's sig. If there's demand for heavy turrets in Privateer Remake let me know - I converted to Universe a long time ago and advise all others to do the same. Adds cool new stuff; takes nothing away. (Rather like my little contribution in that respect).

Actually for PR, you could just download the heavy turret pic, the relevant cockpit files and the turrets from the Changes pack. (I try to accomodate modders - I am one, after all.) Open the _changes files in your non-Excel CSV viewer of choice (although you can open units_changes.csv with Excel if you wish), then copy over the turrets section.

For adding the heavy turrets you just need heavy_blank mountpoints on your ship.

One small favour - I couldn't fix the mountpoints for the weapons on the Drayman - could you, as a socially responsible model-literate wrapping guru, take another look at the Drayman model and crunch the figures for us? I've mentioned this to Dilloh, and he's said he'll have a look at it too and see if he can get someone else on it, but I'd rather get as many people on fixing this as possible to be sure it does get fixed. (No slur on Dilloh there, I'm just anxious to perfect this pack as soon as possible).

Oddly enough I've noticed a slight degrading in performance now I've disable the autotrackers. Maybe it was only ever psychological that I thought they were working (and I'm seeing an expected and fictional degrade in performance by the same coin), maybe the extra radar values helped the turrets, maybe they did autotrack - just, weirdly, when unpiloted. I'm going to give them 360 degree autotrack as a definitive test - if they can't shoot down their own barrels, they can't autotrack.

Once again, enjoy the fruits of my labours. Bear in mind I just lost my whole Sunday getting things release-ready - it's not as easy as you'd think doing this, especially with no prior experience.

Ah well. Download+1!
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Post by chuck_starchaser »

I can't even figure out how to install DSE; --says to "make sure this file is in your /privateer directory", but I don't have one. I assumed it referred to the main installation folder of PR1.2, but when I run setup.bat there it keeps coming up with "path not found" errors.
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Post by targ collective »

The installation instructions are restated here.

Do a clean install of Privateer Remake. (I'm assuming you got that far).

UnRar the PU contents (as opposed to CanonHUDsFixed, now obsolete) into the data directory of Privateer (the directory directly above Bin, Textures, Modules etc). On a clean install this will be Privateer if you did not rename it.

Finally, run setup.bat. If everything is where it should be, that will finalise the installation.

If all of that does not work, contact Dilloh - I'm not the expert on this. You may need some taken-for-granted runtime to get it working, in which case he'll steer you right with pleasure I'm sure.

[plug] Finally, install the optional but highly reccommended Heavy Turrets Pack. As well as adding heavy turrets to the game this pack will also fix many of the more irritating bugs in PU (dancing turrets of the DraymanCVL; cockpit multifunctialism; destructible bases...) [/plug]
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Post by Dilloh »

Yeah, congrats too, I virtually saw any member contributing that fast!

One thing in advance, does autotracking now work or not? I had a brief look at your turrets, I saw you gave it the values of a B&S Omni, but not the scanner itself - maybe if you gave it the scanner, you could make a step forward.

@chuck
setup.bat is looking for vega.ico to ensure that you are in the correct dir, and /privateer relates to the folder where PR is installed. It should work like targ said.
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Post by targ collective »

What do you mean by scanner? Are you talking about radar range? If you give that values which are too high the turrets will 'lock' onto the same enemy even when it is far out of range - meaning the user will have to keep pressing ctrl-W to retarget the turrets. Nasty. They do need a slight buff in range, but I'm going to balance that out later - one thing at a time.

Dilloh, if you just downloaded the files, check your PMs - your dev version has autotracking turrets enabled for testing.

If not, and it was another who downloaded, remember you only need ONE version. And it's good manners to post and lavish me with praise... I mean say thanks for developing this. If I don't know my userbase that will hurt development.

EDIT: You read the PM but didn't download? And then downloaded the public version?!?!

I need your help in testing Dilloh; you know your way around the .csv files! D/L the developer version immediately!!!

EDIT: Oh, you mean add the scanner in Upgrades? Fine, I can do that, so long as I can add a turret_range_downgrade to them as well to solve the above-mentioned range issues.
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Post by Dilloh »

What do you mean by scanner? Are you talking about radar range? If you give that values which are too high the turrets will 'lock' onto the same enemy even when it is far out of range - meaning the user will have to keep pressing ctrl-W to retarget the turrets. Nasty. They do need a slight buff in range, but I'm going to balance that out later - one thing at a time.
You surely know that autotracking requires locking ability in first case. I checked your turret entries and they have locking capability - but if you still have problems, I'd suggest to put any radar-related capabilities and ranges to zero and simply add a milspec scanner with the potential to lock - that would be what a human player has and you wouldn't have to play around with entries. The AI can be considered smart enough to not lock stupidously targets out of fire range - at least I have seen enough battles where stock DraymanCVLs always sweep to another target when the first one is out of fire range.
Dilloh, if you just downloaded the files, check your PMs - your dev version has autotracking turrets enabled for testing.
Got them, thanks. Another thing in advance: If the autotracking works manually (that means while sitting in your turret), you've done all you can so far - the AI should be able to lock for itself then.

Still, I have grapped my marvellous trick-the-engine-capabilities (sorry again chuck :lol: ) and can come up with two concepts of how to ensure autotracking:
1.) This one's a bit blurry, but I've looked up some AI scripts and I found in turntowardsitts.xml the following:

Code: Select all

<FaceTarget terminate="0" itts="1" /> 
For that, I believe that there is also a possibility that there's a lock-flag which would force AI attackers, to which turrets also are coutned, to attack their targets with AI and lock, still terminate="0" would ensure that they are not chasing you through the whole quadrant. A theory, but a possibility.
2.) It is obvious that the AI can fire missilies, and therefor need to do a lock. We could take advantage of this factum in giving the turrets their own gun typos: by creating e.g. a fusion_gun_for_turrets and giving them missile-capabilities: requires a locking time (setting this time to zero would still ensure a lock), but still reactor-power dependant.

Just in case ATs don't work yet - I'm enthusiastic to be able to check the dev version tonight.
EDIT: You read the PM but didn't download? And then downloaded the public version?!?!

I need your help in testing Dilloh; you know your way around the .csv files! D/L the developer version immediately!!!
:oops: I'm sorry, I thought I had downloaded the correct files... If I sent you a screenshot of my desktop you'd understand why I often mix things. I have the files now and will start off right now --
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Post by targ collective »

As you no doubt have realised by now, it is fixed! Fixed!!! Finally over... I can rest.

Blast - the turret system (turret/light medium heavy/autotracking and turret/capship/light medium heavy/autotracking) still needs rationalising. The LR friendorfoe missile still needs fixing. The heavy turrets still need balancing. (Give them to enemies? Cut range and increase damage?) The DraymanCVL weapon mountpoints still need fixing. I haven't even looked at turret placement on any other ships. Damage modelling for capships still needs rationalising. (Needs new capship upgrades - better ask Zool about the hard-limiter system).

Okay, Dilloh, you know your way around the .csv files. For now rationalise the turrets into the above listed categories, and get the right places to stock the right classes of turrets. (If a place doesn't sell weapons/heavy, that place should not sell plasma turrets). Only let Perry stock the Heavies, and maybe Speke and Randrigor. (New Detroit too maybe? Probably not New Constantinople). Perry, Speke, maybe Randrigor and New Detroit but probably not New Constantinople for the autotracking variants, too, autotrack is high-tech/milspec. (Trivial - rename Hiemdall to Randrigor properly as a unit type - contract to rndrgr where needed to meet 8-char limitations).

Chuck, I want you to figure out those weapon mountpoints for the Drayman. Top big button=Tractor; Two forward mounted LRFF launchers to the prow of the ship; Bottom big button = main weapon(s). They'll be capship weapons like the turrets. Just get me those figures! That needs fixing.

I'm not going to balance a figure without your go-ahead, Dilloh. I know this embarrasses you but PU is your creation, it's your right to have the final say.

Zool, tell me about the hard-limiter system. Disabling it is not the answer; however using upgrade space as a balancing aid has merit. I look forward to hearing from you.

For now (until we form a devteam for this little refinement) I'm taking a looong holiday from it all to enjoy my work. It'll be nice to play without having to hack my file for testing - takes all the fun out of it!
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Post by Dilloh »

As you no doubt have realised by now, it is fixed! Fixed!!! Finally over... I can rest.
I am sorry to disturb you right now, but autotracking still doesn't work. I've tried several things and, from what I can say you did everything correct for AT only refers to the mounts used. Strange though, the tractor beam on the turret can autotrack w/o any lock or itts. I dunno why this happens to be, I tried to find an answer in units.csv, but I didn't.

For playtesting, I used multiple ships - Kamekh, Paradgim and a Galaxy. I first judged the new mounts for not being able to support autotracking (note that weaponslist.xml asks for a light mount), but that wouldn't explain why special mounts worked. Even in a galaxy turret where you just added the AT flag, I coudn't even manage to AT while sitting in the turret.
Blast - the turret system (turret/light medium heavy/autotracking and turret/capship/light medium heavy/autotracking) still needs rationalising. The LR friendorfoe missile still needs fixing. The heavy turrets still need balancing. (Give them to enemies? Cut range and increase damage?) The DraymanCVL weapon mountpoints still need fixing. I haven't even looked at turret placement on any other ships. Damage modelling for capships still needs rationalising. (Needs new capship upgrades - better ask Zool about the hard-limiter system).
As you said, one step after the other. Balancing issues are most likely related to user opinions since we can get an average cut here. Plus, I give e.g. the DraymanCVLs turretmounts lower priority than other projects currently running.
Okay, Dilloh, you know your way around the .csv files. For now rationalise the turrets into the above listed categories, and get the right places to stock the right classes of turrets. (If a place doesn't sell weapons/heavy, that place should not sell plasma turrets). Only let Perry stock the Heavies, and maybe Speke and Randrigor. (New Detroit too maybe? Probably not New Constantinople). Perry, Speke, maybe Randrigor and New Detroit but probably not New Constantinople for the autotracking variants, too, autotrack is high-tech/milspec. (Trivial - rename Hiemdall to Randrigor properly as a unit type - contract to rndrgr where needed to meet 8-char limitations).
I'd like to - still we need to have AT online!
I'm not going to balance a figure without your go-ahead, Dilloh. I know this embarrasses you but PU is your creation, it's your right to have the final say.
To clarify: it is not my creation, I'm just doing some stuff while z30 is gone. I'm trying to keep up the democratic element in PU - I'll ask for Zool's and Melonhead's opinions as well as for user opinions. Still, whenever the ATts will work, there might be additional interested projects which might benefit from that.
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Post by Dilloh »

Okay, I researched that strange tractor beam AT issue more deeply.

Therefor, I replaced a stock turret's tractor beam with one of my HK1303, designated to be compatible with the special mount. The outcome was: no AT any more!

I'd now say, we have reached an engine limitation, and auto tracking is restricted so that sub-units like turrets just cannot use it.

But why, why the :evil: :evil: :evil: does this tractor beam can autotrack?

I'm sorry I cannot help more right now, but at least this is one point you can hook up with your research: find out why turret tractors can AT, but guns not. Maybe chuck nows, or spirit, or ace, I don't know...
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Post by targ collective »

I gave the turrets 360 degree tracking as an arbitrary test, way overpowered, and it worked. Therefore it must work with more limited values too; just when unpiloted. Reread the first post. And for fun, try the 360. :twisted:

Getting them to work when unpiloted is probably down to the engine, I agree, but what we have is good enough for now. I'd rather we shift piloted autotracking to low priority, as that will see hardly any use, and sort out what will have a more immediate affect on rationalising/bugfixing gameplay i.e the above.

Let's at least start on the balancing - z30, Zool and Melonhead will no doubt be pleased that work is continuing while they're out of the loop, and they can have the final says afterwards, no?
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Post by chuck_starchaser »

Finally got your heavy autotracking laser turrets to work on the Cutter.
I'm not sure how to verify it objectively, but they must be autotracking allright, bacause they pulverize any attackers in like no time :D

I tried to convert the draymanCVL bfxm back to obj but mesher crashes on me. Anybody has the mesh file in any standard format?
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Post by targ collective »

Yes, that's a bug (already fixed, uploading new version in a bit). EDIT: Uploaded. They're not supposed to be that unbalanced.

You used the Changes version, right? I didn't give the turrets null values for the radar, I removed data from those cells entirely, and apparently the engine treats no data as maximum values for radar. (Range is not overwritten by upgrades, either - and I forgot to add the new radar to the Changes units.csv). You'll have found they have infinite targeting range, too.

I'm going to upload the new files as soon as I have removed the empty stats table from things that do not affect stats. Junk text "Installs shield with following upgrades" has already been removed. As the problem is so pervasive this feature is not going to be present in the Changes version; I will, however, include instructions (textual) for implementing the fix. EDIT: No luck removing the stats table; ready to ship. Uploaded when the post is edited.

Sorry for the inconvenience; this will all be ready soon. I'm afraid there'll probably be frequent updates, meaning a lot of appends will be needed for members of the modding community such as yourself.

EDIT: Sorry, should have said from the off - thanks for your efforts with the Drayman model. Wish we had a dozen more like you. Shame it didn't work out...
Last edited by targ collective on Tue May 15, 2007 11:08 am, edited 2 times in total.
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Post by Dilloh »

targ collective wrote:I gave the turrets 360 degree tracking as an arbitrary test, way overpowered, and it worked. Therefore it must work with more limited values too; just when unpiloted. Reread the first post. And for fun, try the 360.
Okay then, this explains alot. If you agree, I'd look out for a way to merge that with PU - I cannot say if this will happen within the next release or the next-next, I'll have to contact the others first. Would you agree if I changed minor issues (like prices, ranges) and / or took only parts of your mod into PU?
Getting them to work when unpiloted is probably down to the engine, I agree, but what we have is good enough for now. I'd rather we shift piloted autotracking to low priority, as that will see hardly any use, and sort out what will have a more immediate affect on rationalising/bugfixing gameplay i.e the above
Agreed.
Let's at least start on the balancing - z30, Zool and Melonhead will no doubt be pleased that work is continuing while they're out of the loop, and they can have the final says afterwards, no?
I'm currently waiting for their release of units.csv. To give a short overview: Melonhead will hack my stock units.csv for the sake of a new mass system, will give it to Zool then, Zool will put in his rebalance stuff, will give it to me then, and I'll put in some minor campaign-related changes. Afterwards, you/we/I can put in your turret changes into the dev-units.csv. For so long, you're somewhat working on an obsolete units.csv for PU - but as long you track what you add or change, I see no major problem in putting the stuff afterwards.
I'm afraid there'll probably be frequent updates, meaning a lot of appends will be needed for members of the modding community such as yourself.
Talking for myself, I doubt that I can hold my promise of a release for this month - so further balancing updates are okay for me. I'll inform you as soon as a new release of canonHUDs comes into reasonable range.
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Post by targ collective »

Dilloh, this pack was never intended as a mod but an addon pack for you to integrate into PU. You can do what you like with it. It is my gift to the PU community, see?

I can see no problem with you fiddling around with my ideas, so long as you give me credit for the original concept. I haven't even tried to balance the prices or ranges - please do fiddle with them!

Hmm. Well, look to the Changes package for information on merging. I imagine the mass values for the turrets will be easy enough to throw in there, and thus throw into the full TurretPack package.

Dilloh, are you going to rationalise that turret system? If not, let me know as soon as possible and I'll include it in the next update in a couple of day's time.
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Post by Dilloh »

Dilloh, this pack was never intended as a mod but an addon pack for you to integrate into PU. You can do what you like with it. It is my gift to the PU community, see?
I'm glad you think like that... that's what open source is all about! It is important that I can alter some stuff to make it fit the PU user's needs - still I'm always trying to keep the spirit of contributions at what their authors meant to achieve with them.
I can see no problem with you fiddling around with my ideas, so long as you give me credit for the original concept. I haven't even tried to balance the prices or ranges - please do fiddle with them!
We've already talked about credits - be sure you'll have your personal credits in the official credit list, plus maybe some day I'll think of a campaign where your turrets are locked - a secret mistery around Targ Collective Industries Inc.

I will delegate any fiddling to Zool - he is currently creating a new mass and price system. In average, Zool is looking out for a more realistic mass delegation, as well as higher prices to keep the gameplay more interesting. If you have any suggestion, primarily let him know.
Hmm. Well, look to the Changes package for information on merging. I imagine the mass values for the turrets will be easy enough to throw in there, and thus throw into the full TurretPack package.
Alright - if there'll be updates, I'd be happy to see further "changes only"-versions - makes life easier!
Dilloh, are you going to rationalise that turret system? If not, let me know as soon as possible and I'll include it in the next update in a couple of day's time.
I don't know what you mean with "rationalise", I'll do some intense gameplay to find out more about the advantages of large turret mounts. Of course I'll put in reasonable categories, as well as possibly rebalance the capguns. I assume you got those values from WCU, still I think capship guns should fly and recharge slower, as well as their turning rate should be. Therefor, they can be deadly.

I'm not sure yet what the outcome will be, but overall, I'd like to see a change that new and different that it is worth trying - worth running a new game and trying out the new concept. That's why we have so many PU users, even for PR now exists for quite a long time.

Regards
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Post by targ collective »

Don't get too big-headed about the Changes package - that was built with modders like me in mind, not developers. Developers seldom produce 'changes' packages of their own; I'm merely trying to make life easier for the little people.

To clarify: not credit in the official PU credits (though that would be great!). I was specifically requesting credit for the original concept and implementation of autotracking turrets. That's very important, and while I'd never withdraw the changes from PU general access, or disallow developers from integrating them fully into PU, I'd get annoyed if specific credit were not given. And then you might find the changes, bugfixes and refinements coming more slowly because I'd be less motivated to produce them.

By 'rationalise the turret system', I meant implement the turret categories in the tree stated above. And make sure only the right places stock them, of course. Shouldn't be too complicated.

I'm not going to look at balancing until I know more about the hard-limiter system, and have a better idea of how mass is going to be implemented. In time I will produce capship-specific armour, shields and hull values like wot Vegastrike has, but I'll need to know how mass works beforehand. And how to stop, say, Talons from flying around with 90,000 regen/sec shielding. (I know that capship shielding is unbalanced; that's just an example.)

Capship turrets currently charge at twice the rate of ordinary turrets to maintain parity with the medium turrets. They also have double capacitance. In terms of the plasma turrets they have barely enough recharge to fire both weapons - I think you're looking more at a siege weaponry analogue than an infantry-tank analogue. Not that there is no room for both - look at the FranklinLR concept in the Vegastrike forums.

For weapons that break orbital bases and shatter capships, how about something really nasty - when firing shields are lowered? That may already be possible, I'll have to ask.

EDIT: Zool's rebalance will be included with the next version? Removing the hard limiter system is not, not, not the answer! Stop that man! Stop him!! *Throws Dilloh a catchpole*
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Post by Dilloh »

Don't get too big-headed about the Changes package - that was built with modders like me in mind, not developers. Developers seldom produce 'changes' packages of their own; I'm merely trying to make life easier for the little people
Sounds good to me... just count me to the little people.
To clarify: not credit in the official PU credits (though that would be great!). I was specifically requesting credit for the original concept and implementation of autotracking turrets. That's very important, and while I'd never withdraw the changes from PU general access, or disallow developers from integrating them fully into PU, I'd get annoyed if specific credit were not given. And then you might find the changes, bugfixes and refinements coming more slowly because I'd be less motivated to produce them.
I need to clarify, too:
1.) You will be credited, with a link to this thread, and within PU in any form.
2.) Crediting people and therefor motivating them is a vital part of OpenSource, Web2.0, whatever you like to call it. This principle is most important to me. I too wouldn't do all this if there wouldn't be some guys saying "well done" from time to time - though the download counter often gives me a similar feeling :D
3.) PR's devs are not PU's devs. Actually, the current core of PU consists of Melonhead, Zool and me - at least we show the greatest interests in this project. PU is meant to be fully available for any means. Everybody contributing to PU must live with the possibility of someone coming around and re-modding the whole stuff, and if he/she just paints all ships purple.
By 'rationalise the turret system', I meant implement the turret categories in the tree stated above. And make sure only the right places stock them, of course. Shouldn't be too complicated.
Of course - I'd propose the capship turrets for ND, NC and P, medium ATs for refinieries, and capship ATs for Oxford (as a centre of research) - agreed?
In time I will produce capship-specific armour, shields and hull values
That's content for the far future IMHO - this would either limit places where you can equip your capships or add new items causing additional confusion. We'll need to launch a poll in the PR forum about that.
I think you're looking more at a siege weaponry analogue than an infantry-tank analogue. Not that there is no room for both
Well, I rather think about the purposes about a destroyer - from what I heard Paradigms and Kamekhs are meant to attack other caps. I'm trying to keep a good chance for fighters to destroy a cap for the sake of balance. We shall see how your new turrets will contribute to that, or not. I just thought if we're already on it, I'd propose another concept: Capship turrets are not assorted by the guns on the open market, but rather by purpose: FlakCannon, CapshipDodger, and something in between. That'd limit the choice to three guns, but I see this as an advantage - Owning a capship, you need to do many expensive decisions and just want to make sure that you bought what you wanted.
For weapons that break orbital bases and shatter capships, how about something really nasty - when firing shields are lowered? That may already be possible, I'll have to ask.
I don't like that concept, I often had bounties against several Kamekhs... if they all accumulate near a refinery, the base soon is dust in the wind. I'm rather thinking of a repulsor turret. I never saw a really good repulsor action, I only heard from ships twisting like crazy. A turret with a fast and stable repulsor could help a capship repel fighters with a new concept.
EDIT: Zool's rebalance will be included with the next version? Removing the hard limiter system is not, not, not the answer! Stop that man! Stop him!! *Throws Dilloh a catchpole*
I also had and still have strong objections about the concept. Still, I realized that 90% of the canonHUDs users used it, so I'll give it a chance, and I think it'll stand this chance. If there'll be strong complaints in the feedbacks, I still can remove it. But the point is: Zool spent a lot of time into this, and since it is popular, I won't stop it just because I think I could not like it (talking about motivations again...). I also have objections concerning the large turret placement (I think the medium turret concept is good enough), still I see the time you invested here and I see that you had good reasons for it - so I'll also give it a try. If I'd do what I liked, I'd first kick out all CVL variants, but this is not the way I support PU. Also, remember that Zools Rebalance always offers the possibilites to recreate the old customizations. So the limits are not harder, they are indeed smoother.

Overall, just wait for the final release and see if it is annoying or not. Personally, I'm really excited. We never had that much new and experimental stuff (actually, the latest updates were 90% about bugfixing). I think the next canonHUDs will be the best one ever! And a major piece of that cake was baken by contributors like you (I hope you all understood the cake-saying...)
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Post by chuck_starchaser »

Dilloh wrote:Well, I rather think about the purposes about a destroyer - from what I heard Paradigms and Kamekhs are meant to attack other caps.
The Paradigm is a destroyer; the Khamek is a corvette.
The term "destroyer" is a short of the original term "torpedo boat destroyer". Their role is NEVER to attack capships or large targets, but precisely the opposite: torpedo boats in RL; corvettes and bombers in WC. Destroyers are big, but relatively light and nimble (for their size) guys who take on smaller guys that may pose a threat to a carrier. They are not designed to operate alone; they are meant to operate as carrier escorts only. Thus, it is right to see Khameks attacking a carrier or a base; but it would be inconsistent to see Paradigms doing so.

Paradigms should really not even have forward guns; only turrets; and the turrets should be medium sized, not heavy. Or maybe have just two heavies and the rest medium.

In fact, you could think of corvettes as being a sort of "mini-cruisers".

There'd be two rightful places for heavy turrets in WC, IMO: Cruisers, which are the archetype of the "big ship that operates alone" (though they make excellent carrier companions, and the kats use them so), and which need heavy turrets to take on enemy corvettes, since they can't turn at any speed at all (they are bigger than carriers); and stations, which can't turn at all to aim a gun, but may need big guns to defend from corvettes or cruisers.

(Note: I put heavy turrets in the Cutter, but just to try Targ's new turrets; they should really be medium turrets.)

Origin's developers may or may not have been aware of the differences between destroyers, corvettes and cruisers, in terms of roles and stats; but IMO it would be a good idea, if we're going to be making rebalancing adjustments, to take such subtleties into consideration. I think it would enrich the game experience.

EDIT: I would add that turrets should rarely be though of as offensive weapons, except in the case of destroyers.
And in terms of stats, fixed guns should always be more powerful than similarly sized turrets. So, a medium sized fixed gun should be in the same stats league as a heavy turret of similar type.
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Post by targ collective »

Dilloh wrote:I need to clarify, too:
1.) You will be credited, with a link to this thread, and within PU in any form.
2.) Crediting people and therefor motivating them is a vital part of OpenSource, Web2.0, whatever you like to call it. This principle is most important to me. I too wouldn't do all this if there wouldn't be some guys saying "well done" from time to time - though the download counter often gives me a similar feeling :D
3.) PR's devs are not PU's devs. Actually, the current core of PU consists of Melonhead, Zool and me - at least we show the greatest interests in this project. PU is meant to be fully available for any means. Everybody contributing to PU must live with the possibility of someone coming around and re-modding the whole stuff, and if he/she just paints all ships purple.
All I wanted to know and more!
Dilloh wrote:Of course - I'd propose the capship turrets for ND, NC and P, medium ATs for refinieries, and capship ATs for Oxford (as a centre of research) - agreed?
Not entirely. Heavy Autotrackers in Oxford, as research is complete on Light and Medium models (else there would be no heavy variants). Perry should stock Lights and Mediums, and only sometimes Heavies. Within capship autotrackers, I mean. And the 'special' items I mentioned in your PM - the ones we don't know if they'll be included yet - in Oxford only, of course.
Dilloh wrote:That's content for the far future IMHO - this would either limit places where you can equip your capships or add new items causing additional confusion. We'll need to launch a poll in the PR forum about that.
If you think a poll is needed, but capships having upgrades of their own seems a logical extension to me.
Dilloh wrote:Well, I rather think about the purposes about a destroyer - from what I heard Paradigms and Kamekhs are meant to attack other caps. I'm trying to keep a good chance for fighters to destroy a cap for the sake of balance. We shall see how your new turrets will contribute to that, or not. I just thought if we're already on it, I'd propose another concept: Capship turrets are not assorted by the guns on the open market, but rather by purpose: FlakCannon, CapshipDodger, and something in between. That'd limit the choice to three guns, but I see this as an advantage - Owning a capship, you need to do many expensive decisions and just want to make sure that you bought what you wanted.
The above post covers ship classes comprehensively, so I have nothing to say on this. Agreed in principle, but in practice more difficult. Flak setups would need clusters of turrets with no tracking firing in a suppression pattern, but the engine seems to support that now. Just give them short range, medium-high velocity with only mediocre damage for that. One turret 'base', either as part of a ship model or (preferably) as a turret base with five 'guns' arranged in a star pattern - I'd ask Chuck to look at this but he has enough on his plate already with capship guns, his new and very cool Cutter ship and finding out a way to sort out those Drayman weapon mounts. No problems in theory implementing this. Point-defense, if that's what you meant by CapshipDodger, simply uses high-velocity medium-long range rounds with tracking. In-between the two is just like it sounds.
Dilloh wrote:I don't like that concept, I often had bounties against several Kamekhs... if they all accumulate near a refinery, the base soon is dust in the wind. I'm rather thinking of a repulsor turret. I never saw a really good repulsor action, I only heard from ships twisting like crazy. A turret with a fast and stable repulsor could help a capship repel fighters with a new concept.
Repulsors are implemented in Vegastrike. Telling the AI to use them is another matter, but hacking them in-game is the work of a moment.
Dilloh wrote:I also had and still have strong objections about the concept. Still, I realized that 90% of the canonHUDs users used it, so I'll give it a chance, and I think it'll stand this chance. If there'll be strong complaints in the feedbacks, I still can remove it. But the point is: Zool spent a lot of time into this, and since it is popular, I won't stop it just because I think I could not like it (talking about motivations again...). I also have objections concerning the large turret placement (I think the medium turret concept is good enough), still I see the time you invested here and I see that you had good reasons for it - so I'll also give it a try. If I'd do what I liked, I'd first kick out all CVL variants, but this is not the way I support PU. Also, remember that Zools Rebalance always offers the possibilites to recreate the old customizations. So the limits are not harder, they are indeed smoother.
For my part, the users just see the balance as they use it, so of course it's popular with them. That doesn't mean that it's popular with people developing PU like you and me as we have to try and resolve conflicts like my original illustration. Once again, I fully support the use of upgrade space as a balancing aid. I just believe that should be combined with the existing hard-limiter system, as opposed to acting as a replacement.

Sure, medium turrets are good enough. For medium ships. I'd like to see more capships in game, and more capship armanent - turrets, weapons, armours and shields. You're being a little conservative here, Dilloh - if there are subcategories Fighter, Frigate, Destroyer, Corvette in the upgrades screens and the upgrades for the classes the player isn't flying are all in red, where's the room for confusion?

The CVLs were a misbegotten concept from the word go - civilan ships should be less battleworthy than military ships; the confusion came about because in WC it means 'light carrier' and the Drayman was both CVL and tougher than the stock. The builds of ships I have no problems with, but they do not fit well with logic or canon and should be renamed.
Dilloh wrote:Overall, just wait for the final release and see if it is annoying or not. Personally, I'm really excited. We never had that much new and experimental stuff (actually, the latest updates were 90% about bugfixing). I think the next canonHUDs will be the best one ever! And a major piece of that cake was baken by contributors like you (I hope you all understood the cake-saying...)
Understood. Forgive me for not getting too enthusiastic yet - I have not yet seen fixes to those weapon mounts on the Drayman and a few other things I've been pushing have yet to be implemented too. I'll develop quietly in my corner; I'm relying on everyone else to keep plugging away in theirs. Then when the release is out I will decide how exciting it is for myself.

Sorry if that came across a little cold, but I haven't seen what is in it yet, so that's all I can really say.
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Post by targ collective »

*jumps up and down with excitement*

Thank you thank you thank you thank you!

I'll get this ingame right away. One query, are facings embedded in that data or just the raw XYZ values?

What am I saying? I'll find out for myself! That's great, that's such a huge weight off my mind!

I've got the LRFF fixed now but the junk shield data has proved very persistent (no sooner do I post than it's back and twice as ugly). I'll revert those changes.

The LRFF seems more of a high-velocity ballistic missile than a full drone ship. I've taken a look at Vegastrike's Hellspawn for inspiration on creating a true armed drone-bomb; the Hellspawn uses turrets as its armanent. It may not be able to fire in a conventional manner.

Release after next will hopefully contain an array of drone-ships, using the light-capship-missile mountpoints. I'll bind those launchers to the docking bays.

So all I'm really waiting on for the next update is that rationalised turret system
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Post by Dilloh »

The Paradigm is a destroyer; the Khamek is a corvette.
I'm sorry, I often mix that up.
Origin's developers may or may not have been aware of the differences between destroyers, corvettes and cruisers, in terms of roles and stats; but IMO it would be a good idea, if we're going to be making rebalancing adjustments, to take such subtleties into consideration. I think it would enrich the game experience.
I believe something like, "oops, Privateer is ready, but we still have no capships", happened to Origin. Capships without turrets, as they were in the original game, are just dumb! Kick the front guns!
I would add that turrets should rarely be though of as offensive weapons, except in the case of destroyers.
And in terms of stats, fixed guns should always be more powerful than similarly sized turrets. So, a medium sized fixed gun should be in the same stats league as a heavy turret of similar type.
Yes!
You're being a little conservative here, Dilloh - if there are subcategories Fighter, Frigate, Destroyer, Corvette in the upgrades screens and the upgrades for the classes the player isn't flying are all in red, where's the room for confusion?
Okay, that was quite convincing.
The CVLs were a misbegotten concept from the word go - civilan ships should be less battleworthy than military ships; the confusion came about because in WC it means 'light carrier' and the Drayman was both CVL and tougher than the stock. The builds of ships I have no problems with, but they do not fit well with logic or canon and should be renamed.
I agree more and more.
Understood. Forgive me for not getting too enthusiastic yet - I have not yet seen fixes to those weapon mounts on the Drayman and a few other things I've been pushing have yet to be implemented too. I'll develop quietly in my corner; I'm relying on everyone else to keep plugging away in theirs. Then when the release is out I will decide how exciting it is for myself.

Sorry if that came across a little cold, but I haven't seen what is in it yet, so that's all I can really say.
I didn't mean "wait for the release, than I'll implement your stuff" - it just believe we'll have to take a look at what comes out of the mixture of all the new stuff.
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Post by targ collective »

Weaker armanent on the turrets? I can hack that in today, and get it uploaded tomorrow if you give me the figures. What exactly do you have in mind? Shall we say 75% damage of fixed guns on the turrets? (Bear in mind turrets are double-barreled; even so I think a 50% nerf would be too much).
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