**Tutorial** - Making Beam Weapons

    Turst me, beam weapons will be deadly simply by the fact that they are "continous fire" meaning that even a level 1 laser with 16 damage will destroy a titan in a few second if you have the beam pointed at it for the duration. That´s the whole point of beam weapons, they are the most devastating weapon in any arsenal. Not sure if any of you played Freespace 2, cuz you would know what i mean. Here with these modifications you can experience beam weapons in Freelancer, but if you dont want them to be Uber Powerfull just reduce their hull damage to like 5 or something cuz with a refire rate of virtually zero, even a gun with 5 damage is gonna tear it up.

    Beam weapons are okay i suppose, but i prefer a turret with the liberty cruiser main gun effect. Naturally this has to be on cap ships only cause it would look wierd otherwise. Here´s what i did in the weapon_equip.ini to get the effect: ;Find the gun you want to change and change its munition heading to the following. Note, the munition setting here is for the liberty battleship main guns [Munition nickname = li_battleship_turret01_ammo hp_type = hp_gun requires_ammo = false hit_pts = 2 hull_damage = 10000.500000 energy_damage = 0 one_shot_sound = fire_capship_forward_gun munition_hit_effect = li_capgun_01_impact const_effect = li_cruiser_maingun lifetime = 3.500000 force_gun_ori = false mass = 1 volume = 0.000100 Change the remaining damage and refire rates as you like. It looks cool though.

    Has anyone else messed around with the beam_effects.ini file yet? Ive been messing around with trails and projectile sizes on the Justice lasers (so i can test them quikly) and ive come up with some really neat effects. I tried to apply the "rail gun" effect by making the trail about 5x longer, then i changed the color to a deep blue, and turned down the fire rate and up the damage. I also messed with the core_width and head_width and the product is a really sweet looking weapon. All i need to do is make the core and head width larger and I bet it´d make the perfect Cap Ship weapon... and because the trail length is so long, it looks a lot like a true beam weapon (just not a constant beam, like in Homeworld).

    Hey Warzer--- You are looking for the Justice? in the file weapon_equip.ini, the name for the Justice is "li_gun01_mark01". In the file beam_effects.ini, its "Li_laser_01_beam". Im not sure about any other files it may appear in, but Im assuming its nearly the same.

    what gun names is some laser one.. like mamagna hammer Admin For Macross Saga Server.

    <img src=http://home.cogeco.ca/~meng21/ve1d[_]small.jpg> Admin For Macross Saga Server.

    Hey guys! Great news/info! I know how to make a beam weapon! You need to realize that I have been working with the Jusitce Mk. 1 (which isnt a true laser like the Drail) just because they are easy and cheap to aqquire (you start with two of them!). I was messing around in beam_effects.ini and I changed the Justice to *look* like a true laser. Then I made the core_width and head_width smaller to make it a bit thinner, then changed the tip_length to something like 3000. what this does is make the actual projectile of the Justice LOOK like a beam! NEAT! In beam_effects.ini located in DataFX, find Li_laser_01_beam and change the following to what is shown here: [BeamSpear nickname = Li_laser_01_beam tip_length = 3000 tail_length = 0 head_width = 1 core_width = 1 tip_color = 0, 0, 0 core_color = 50, 50, 255 outter_color = 200, 200, 255 tail_color = 55, 55, 155 head_brightness = 1 trail_brightness = 1 head_texture = ball trail_texture = thin flash_size = 2 Anyway, this is where my problems started to occur. First, when it looks like this and you fire, you see a LONG A$$ beam fire into the distance, but it still travels at the speed of a regular projectile (750 m/s for the Justice), so it doesnt look like it stays &quot;connected&quot; to the ship. So i tried changing the projectile speed to 0 in weapon_equip.ini, but the result was a laser that didnt fire (or at least it appeared not to fire). So I got the idea to change it to 1. The result was interesting: A beam that looked like it was connected to the ship but because of certain factors (projectile speed determins how far it will travel before &quot;meeting&quot; ) , the lasers all crossed paths RIGHT in front of the ship and so the beams took off in all directions. I have a theory as to how to get it to work. It would involve editing the animation sequence of the laser so that there is a begining, but no end - so that it looks as if it stays connected to the ship during the duration of the animation, but then ends when the beam disappears after the &quot;distance&quot; of the actual projectile has been reached (like is does by default). I dont know if this is possible, but its how we can get a true beam to work on player ships. If anyone finds an easier way to do this, please email me. Also, you must realize that, although this procedure may make the weapon look like a beam weapon, it will not &quot;act&quot; like a beam weapon. What I mean is that there is still only ONE projectile, so there is sill only ONE hit effect. A true beam is constatly damaging its target for the duration of the contact. I dont know if this is possible with what we can do now. Also, changing the refire rate makes this look really stupid, so dont suggest that as an idea to make it &quot;seem&quot; like there is a constant damage effect. It seems like everyday now I learn something new, lol. Edited by - SuPaFrEaK on 11-03-2003 04:49:53

    thats the result of my ten minutes of contribution nickname = Li_laser_01_beam tip_length = 9000 tail_length = 9000 head_width = 1 core_width = 0.3 tip_color = 172, 34, 172 core_color = 185, 34, 185 outter_color = 152, 35, 184 tail_color = 111, 37, 184 head_brightness = 0 trail_brightness = 2 head_texture = star trail_texture = wide flash_size = 4 you also have to make the changes to weapon_equip.ini that revenant posted [Munition nickname = li_gun01_mark01_ammo hp_type = hp_gun requires_ammo = false hit_pts = 2 hull_damage = 20.0 energy_damage = 10 weapon_type = W_Laser01 one_shot_sound = fire_laser1 munition_hit_effect = li_laser_01_impact const_effect = li_laser_01_proj lifetime = 5.000000 force_gun_ori = false mass = 1 volume = 0.000010 [Gun nickname = li_gun01_mark01 ids_name = 263357 ids_info = 264357 DA_archetype = equipmentmodelsweaponsli_heavy_ion_blaster.cmp material_library = equipmentmodelsli_equip.mat HP_child = HPConnect hit_pts = 400 explosion_resistance = 1.000000 debris_type = debris_normal parent_impulse = 20 child_impulse = 80 volume = 0.000000 mass = 10 hp_gun_type = hp_gun_special_1 damage_per_fire = 0 power_usage = 5.090000 refire_delay = 0.0010000 muzzle_velocity = 10000 use_animation = Sc_fire toughness = 1.300000 flash_particle_name = li_laser_01_flash flash_radius = 15 light_anim = l_gun01_flash projectile_archetype = li_gun01_mark01_ammo separation_explosion = sever_debris auto_turret = false turn_rate = 90 lootable = true LODranges = 0, 20, 40, 80, 100 well ok its not perfect and has some of the symptoms decribed by supafreak but its a start and it does look and behave like a beam weapon(like in homeworld). I borrowed the color code from the nomad blasters but if anyone can get me the red code, it´d be way cooler Edited by - kongfuchicken on 11-03-2003 06:44:36

    just abit of an idea. for beam weapons you should really crank up the amount of power they use. cus anything longer than a 3-5 second burst is just way too long for a beam weapon. those things have GOT to eat up power.

    Wonder how something like that would look for the Wyrm type guns. Might be a little off topic, but a erradic lightning type gun could also be interesting, exspecially if it could be changed to drain ships weapon/thruster/shield energy.

    This is so cool. I was trying to balance out the Britonian Captial ships in relation to the Liberty cap ship. This is the ideal choice, it allows the britonian cap to inflict damage gradually on the liberty ship. The Liberty ship can use it´s big gun and it´s guns are pretty good as it is. I´m tweaking power usage now. Btw, it looks like for different colors, you change those RGB values there. Just use mspaint´s color matcher to get the color you want.

    I changed those anyway because they are too powerfull. They should waste energy like ricky martin´s girlfriend. they are mainly good against shields and not that good for hull damage because its really too easy to kill anything in the game. Oh by the way, auto-turret just makes your cursor go on target when it is active, it does not have any AI.

    so do we have a TRUE functioning beam weapon? The infinite reaches of space are my home. And you´r trespassing.

    No Honey, the green dots are the good guys, try not to shoot them again.

    Anyone really have a beam weapon like the ones used in freepsace 2? those were too cool. i´d also like to know if you could get sound effects that sound like the ones in fs2...mmmmmm &lt;drool&gt;

    there is also damage per fire maby if you change it to a higer number you can get damage from your own fire im am cheking it now i am only atacking the people who want to kill me....

    the best diplomat i ever saw was a fully charged phaser bank

    Hey, I noticed you can get even &quot;beamier&quot; looking weapons by changing the entries you want in beam_effects.ini from [beamspear to [beambolt. Be sure to add in the missing values, as well. (Refer to default_beam_bolt at the top for all values) Why make your own mistakes when someone else has already made them for you? -Learn from the skeletons floating in the piranha pool: NO SWIMMING[!

    -------------------------------- Why make your own mistakes when someone else has already made them for you? -Learn from the skeletons floating in the piranha pool: NO SWIMMING! [img=http://groups.msn.com/_Secure/0YQDhAr4g6o056VzOKxpOEGGZXjnV*

    nope the damage per fire has nothing to do with damage to your ship i am only atacking the people who want to kill me....

    the best diplomat i ever saw was a fully charged phaser bank

    ok is there something wrong with my game? cuz nothing in my weapon_equip.ini file has settings with numbers..... i want to make nomad cannons and silver fires into beam weapons. what should i look for to edit? i thinnk the silverfire would look so freakin kick ass as a beam weapons...with its weird circle thingies for its trail....ooooh and the nomad cannon would look like a purple streamer...sweet Edited by - Siddious on 06-04-2003 21:45:52

    [_][_][_][_][_][_][_][_][_][_][_][_][_][_][_][_][_][_][_][_][_][_][_][_][_][_][_][_][_][_][_][_][_][_][_][_][_][_][_][_][_][_][_][_][_][_][_][_][_] Yep. I`m obsessed with the Star Wars mod.