Posts by 0blivion

Check this by holding your mouse over the bar for a few seconds (it will only work if tool tips are enabled). This will show you the true volume of your cargo hold no matter what the infocard says. If you can't buy more stuff than the original hold size would allow and this shows your new hold size, then I don't know what is going wrong. Post the code you changed if that happens.

There have been many times where I've wished a specific data block (such as the [Munition] block in weapon_equip.ini) had an entry on it that it didn't have normally (like radius = X). I know there are hacks out there like MultiCruise that add such things, can someone tell me how that is done? Any help on this would be much appreciated.

Also, most entries are only recognized once in a data block, does anyone know how to change that so it's recognized more than once?

Have you downloaded the SDK?

Troubleshooting tip: your actual cargo space, regardless of what the ship's information card says, is shown when you hold your mouse over the slotted bar labeled "Cargo Space" on the bottom left of the inventory window. Provided you have tool tips enabled.

I have actually made this myself. The attached file is a working mod (using FLMM) that has a few options added into it.[attachment=0]<!-- ia0 -->Novastalker Mod.zip.flmod<!-- ia0 -->[/attachment]
The critical changes are simply thus:

[Munition]
...
seeker_fov_deg = 180
max_angular_velocity = 10.240000
...

Don't ask me where 10.24 came from, I really don't know. You can set that to whatever you want.
But the units for max_angular_velocity are rad/s or radians per second. If you don't know what radians are, they're identical to degrees except there's 2p (6.2831...) in a full circle instead of 360.

After running some tests on what exactly is the best seeker_fov_deg value, it appears as if the maximum effective value is exactly 180. Even when set higher the missile won't find anything more than 90º off its front.

Honestly, after reading through all the work that we've done, all that this would really take to create is hooking up an explosion - not the effect, but the actual damaging part of the explosion - to an energy weapon. And finding where the tractor beam effect is created and hooking that up to an energy weapon as well. Is it just me or is this simpler than it has become in our minds?

Quote from "sabreman"

Just do this: make a power plant w/ no recharge rate and give your engines a high energy consumption. If all goes well, after a bit of flight your ship won't move.

Slight problem, sabreman. We want this to be something that is only engaged when someone shoots a special weapon at a ship, we don't want to change regular flight at all. What you're suggesting here will cause someone to be able to fly for a certain amount of time after launch (equal to power_plant_capacity/engine_power_usage) and then stop, only able to use their thrusters to move. Unfortunately, that's not quite what Alfa had in mind when he created this thread.

Since I have no time nor really any interest in continuing this any more, I'll post what I have and call it good. It doesn't really work at all as far as I remember. Oh well, here it is anyway... the projectile has some semblance of an Ionic Current, but not much.

[attachment=0]<!-- ia0 -->ICED Prototype Mod.zip.flmod<!-- ia0 -->[/attachment]

Quote from "Perry Rhofan"

I've found that having more than one engine does not increase speed or maneuverability, but each mounted engine DOES consume power, thereby decreasing the amount of time you can use the <TAB> thrusters to maneuver.

Uh, engines don't use thruster fuel. You could have 10 engine exhausts and your thruster will drain just as fast as if you only had one exhaust. Sorry, but I'm not sure where you're coming from. Engines, when they are set to use power, use the same power your weapons do.

Or were you talking about what happens when you put two separate engines on one ship, as in two equip = <shipname>_engine01 entries in the loadout file? If so then I have no idea what things that would do, or if it would even do anything. Pretty sure it wouldn't affect thrusters, though.

Dangit, I had something else, but I can't remember what it was...

Quote from "triunihq"

EDITED:
Yet making the commodity a piece of equipment raises two problems:
1) It would need a proper HardPoint just for it (I guess).
2) It would be sold everywhere at the same price (again I'm not sure if it can be avoided) vanishing what this idea is all about.

As far as why no one has addressed this, I don't know... but making one base buy/sell a piece of equipment at a different price than what is defined in the good file is identical to changing the price a base buys/sells a commodity for. Just go into the market_misc.ini file and change the last number in the marketgood entry to .8 (80%), for example, instead of 1 (100%). For example, this change would make the Justice Mk I 250 credits instead of 500 on Manhattan:

Just change this
MarketGood = li_gun01_mark01, 0, -1, 10, 10, 0, 1
in market_misc.ini to this
MarketGood = li_gun01_mark01, 0, -1, 10, 10, 0, .5
and boom, there's a cheap 250 credit (500 credits x .5) Justice Mk I for you on Manhattan.

I have a mod where there's weapons specific to house (Liberty, Bretonia, etc.) that's less expensive in that specific house than it is elsewhere. Not hard in the least.

So, if you created a piece of equipment that can be assigned to a specific hardpoint, and only that hardpoint, and set it to a volume far above that which any ship can hold so no one can unmount it, then there's your special non-combinable commodity.

Oh, firekiss, I tried your idea with changing combinable to false, and it didn't work. You can still buy as many as you please with combinable set to false, guaranteed. Hehe, that rhymed

I actually wasn't 100% sure that the engines were replaced by repairing, but I just tested it with all my engines gone and I did indeed get my engines back when I repaired my ship. It actually wasn't hard to dock on a planet without engines and with only a thruster; just place your ship in between the two clamp things, hit dock and you're good. Didn't try docking on a station though, I'm sure that's more difficult.

Oh, Chazz, please do post a screenshot of this "box," it will definitely help those of us who are not entirely sure what exactly you are referring to.

Quote from "Chazz"

I have proof that there is a devicein every ship. In the Discovery mod (and every other possible mod) the bigger ships you can only see the inside of in the buy menu. There is a small square box thats just floats in the exact center of the ship. I took away a chunk of a mesh, and fired a few shots onto this box(pretty good aiming), and that took out his engines, shields, and weapons. Not thrusters though. If that is not what your talking about, I do not know what is. I have a few screenshots of the box if anyone would like it.

Hmm... That sounds exactly like what we're looking for. Just one question though: did shooting it permanently take out his engines, shield and weapons, or was it only for how long you were shooting it?

Also, if we're going to use this feature, how will we make it so this ionic current weapon is the only one that hits it?

Quote from "Rankor"

I've noticed the engines especially, rather than being simply "fixed", HpEngine01, HpEngine02, etc, it was annotated as DpEngine01.

Quite true, there are DpEngine0X hardpoints on stock models, however if you look a bit further there are also HpEngine0X hardpoints. I have made a ship that has destructible engines, however you replace them by repairing your ship and not buying new engines, if that's what you were getting at. Same principle, anyway, it costs money to fix. And, when some of the engines are destroyed, you don't lose max speed but you do accelerate slower. Not sure about maneuverability, whether you lose some of that or not, but considering that information is all in the same spot you probably do. And, if you do lose all your engines, you have no thrust and therefore stop, but you can still use engine kill and drift. If you don't kill your engine, then you stop as if you decreased your throttle to 0. You can still turn, but nothing else.

EDIT: Check that: just did a test, losing one engine when you have two or more does not affect speed, acceleration or maneuverability at all.

Nah. Thanks though. All I have time for at the moment is to check the forums and reply. I'm getting a few hours less sleep than I should anyway. I might have some time tomorrow, though, who knows. We'll have to see. Best not to count on it though.

That's about what I figured. Not easy, but possible.

I would be working on this but I'm dead tired and I have a lot of things to do... two math classes and two computer science classes, despite being introductory, are most likely going to be a large workload. I probably won't have too much time to work on any of this, if any. I'll be checking this forum and posting, but might not be able to actually run some tests to their full extent. Soz, but that's how things go.

Not quite true. You can still use your thrusters, but you'll have to be in the exact spot to dock when you select dock. Well, even then, I'm not sure, but maybe. I wouldn't recommend removing thruster regeneration if you do make engines destructible, though, make sure the player is able to do at least something.

Oh, and I have a mod with a ship with destructible engines, I can give that to you if you want. I stopped working on the mod because I got bored of it, but the ship works fine, as far as mechanics go.

Hehe, sometimes a question you first think is simple doesn't turn out to be that way...

As far as making engines "equippable" so you could destroy them, quite possible. I understand what you're saying about making the destructible the engine exhaust itself, and it doesn't sound like a bad idea. Make the game more believable. I think all you would have to do is make a .cmp file that has Hp_mount and Hp_engine I think is the right hardpoint for an engine? Something like that, the hardpoint name that creates where the exhaust is... Anyways, make a file like that, assign it a certain hardpoint in engine_equip.ini, give it a good file, standard things like that, and it might just work. You'd have to create a .sur for it, I think, so that it would actually be hittable, but yeah I think it would work. Can't try it as I'm way too busy right now, but it just might work.

@ Alfa,

Do you mean to tell me that knocking off a person's engines is something that would work for how this weapon works? You have got to be kidding me... I've known that would work for this entire time, but thought you wanted the ships to come online again so I didn't say anything...grr...

Ah. So what you're saying is, if this is possible, why hasn't it been done before? Well, every invention has an inventor. Someone has to do it first. It could be someone else has managed it, it could be that we're the first, but as far as I know, no one else has managed it, so we're the first.

Quote from "JONG"

I mean that, FL doesn't recognize a second shield_link line, so if you want to add the second shield_link line, it's will not work.

Hmm. I could have sworn I got a second shield_link line to work at some point in time. Not sure, though, that was when I was working on differentiating shield capacitors and regenerators. Wish I could test this...

Quote from "JONG"

Think about that, if FL can let us to make engine slow down or stop it, why haven't any mod can do that ?

Do you mean when you use the increase and decrease throttle commands to manually slow down and speed up your ship? In order for a mod to do that, it would have to manually override the player's control of the ship to stop it, essentially take over those specific commands, and I highly doubt that would be possible. Good thought, though.

@ Killerboy,

"With hook?" Do explain, but just to be sure we're on the same page, we do want the target to become active again after being shot with the ICED. Unless I'm badly mistaken of course.

@ JONG,

Just so you know, a cruise disruptor will eliminate a ship's ability to engage cruise for 5 seconds and it will also take them out of engine kill. The only way I know of to make someone lose control of basic thrust is to either remove their engines entirely or take away their ability to supply their engines with needed power. As far as a thruster goes, I have no idea how to temporarily disable that, unless you can make it require power, as well, then it would be the same basic principle as removing basic thrust. Again, I don't have any .ini files, but I think you might be able to edit a thruster's code to require power, it might have the line power_usage = 0 in it or something like that, not sure. Dang this is debilitating not having any files to look off of... on a family member's computer so I can't download the .ini backup files.