Re: Capship Mod
 

Ah... thank you. But, can you make a comp which produces res and intel? I've tried it once, for another (personal) mod, but it didn't work...

Re: Capship Mod
 

And... once, I made a long Ability descr, but then ALL THREE ability descrs, the other two of which were one line, were just TOTAL BLACKNESS BEHIND THE BULLET when I rightclicked the comp ingame... y?

edit: OK... so that didn't make much sense.

Re: Capship Mod
 

Is it true that "leaky armor" is simply an armored comp without the Armor ability? And how do you make leaky shields?

Re: Capship Mod
 

Leaky armor is just components with no armor ability, but very high hitpoints per kt size.
They push your ship's hitpoints way up, and by details of the way damage is applied, the high hitpoint components will tend to absorb more than their expected % of the damage.
Size of the component does not matter when picking which component to destroy, only hitpoint total.

The damage is applied via a "hitpoint lottery", where each component gets a ticket for each of its hitpoints, and one is picked randomly.
However, due to the process of absorbing damage, and then picking new targets for any leftover damage points, components with large hitpoint counts will absorb more than their fair share of damage.
five 10-hp crew quarters, for each 50-hp armor. There is an even chance that CQ or armor will be hit first, however, IF the armor is picked, it absorbs 5x more damage than the CQ would have. If a CQ is hit, it only absorbs 10 damage, and the rest gets another chance to be absorbed by the armor.

---

Leaky shields use the shields-from-damage ability, just like crystalline armor.
For normal damage weapons, the first hit will knock down the shields. The second hit will do hull damage, and recharge the shields. Third hit is blocked, fourth does damage, and so on.
On average, when your ship has more than enough generators, the shields block 50% of the damage.

If you are short on generators or they suffer damage, then you'll hit a point where the SFD ability total is less than the damage per hit. When this happens, they will only block that ability amount per shot, instead of the full 50%.

If the weapon deals different damage types, you will get different absorption %:
quarter to shields: 80%
half to shields: 67%
normal: 50%
double to shields: 33%
quad to shields: 20%
any-skipping, any-only, etc: 0%


-----

Ability descriptions only reserve enough space for one line.
You will need to shorten the description, or break it up over multiple ability descriptions.
You can use the "Star - Unstable" ability to make extra ability tags, since that ability has no actual in-game effect. Add it multiple times if you like.

Also beware that your component's description / name dosen't get to be taller than the component picture, or it will eat into your space as well.

There is leeway of about one line worth of text, depending on font size, for the whole window.

Re: Capship Mod
 

Yes, this happens all too often. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/frown.gif It also happens if the component description is long enough to go below the component image... http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/frown.gif

Re: Capship Mod
 

Not COMP descr, ABILITY descr. I've made long comp descrs before, and they all worked. It were the Ability descrs that caused me trouble.

Thnx for all the input, guys.

Re: Capship Mod
 

What I said is absolutely true... go test it. Having descriptions in either place that are too long causes the same problem...

Re: Capship Mod
 

OK, so I'll split it up.

Re: Capship Mod
 

Something to bear in mind about a leaky armor system, any armor skipping weapons get devalued because they have nothing to skip. However, on the other hand, armor skipping weapons can make a leaky shield system useless because they wind up skipping the shields.
Just a couple points you should know. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/wink.gif

Re: Capship Mod
 

Thnx. I'm not planning to add leaky shields, I'm just going to make projectile (i.e. non-energy) weapons skip all shields, to reflect real life - an incoming laser beam might be scattered by a strong EM field, but a bullet will go right through it. I'll also revise the entire armor system. With everything I've planned for 0.81, I think it'll be quite some time before it's in working order.

edit: Torps will skip normal shields. They're essentially projectiles, but they have strong energy warheads. The projectile will be able to travel through a normal shield, but a phased shield will suck all energy out of the warhead.

Among other things, I'm completely revamping ground combat. Fighter weapons can no longer be placed on troops, now you have infantry, mech infantry, armor detachments, artillery, air units etc.

(Note: Thanks to DEG for making some of the pics I'm using as infantry/officer units... also used two of these to use as new pics for the boarding marines/security forces comps.)

Re: Capship Mod
 

Erm... one more Q:

What are the Range effects of troop weapons?

You see, I'm planning to add artillery as the part of my revamping GC - but I wanted it to have a damage of for example:
0 0 0 10 10
but I do not know if it is possible. Do GC ranges count as SC ranges? In that a planet is 4x4 squares, and a damage of 5 5 would be able to target a troop two squares in front of it?

Re: Capship Mod
 

How about giving projectile weapons 4x damage to shields instead of making them skip all shielding? It would have a similar effect, but it wouldn't render the shields 100% useless... Surely those energy barriers would do something to slow down or deflect projectiles?

How are you planning to balance shield piercing projectiles with energy weapons?

Troop combat is really primitive. All weapons do damage listed at range 1 every round. Range and rate of fire are irrelevant. There is no distance. Both sides just line up and fire at each other until one side is dead. Make sure to balance all troop weapons with this in mind.

Re: Capship Mod
 

Make projectiles skip shields, torps skip normal shields and energy weaps (beams, plasma missiles, and such) skip none unless specified. Projectiles are pretty strong in the early game, but are still important later as you get access to ridiculously poweful weapons in comparison to DUCs. Energy weaps will be very strong and smaller than projectile, but will as said not skip unless specified. Torps are in between; skip noraml, do medium damage at medium size. Torps will be moderately effective later, with phased shields because they're smaller than projectile and stronger than energy.

Thnx for the info. Damn...

Re: Capship Mod
 

One quick way to maintain balance would be to make projectile weapons use a lot more supplies than energy weapons and make thier ROF slower. That actually seems to be fairly realistic.

Re: Capship Mod
 

Having a mix of good, supply sapping weapons, and not-so-good, supply-saving weapons can come in handy.

You can then have customized defense ships, slinging thousands of supplies per turn into the combat while sitting in orbit of a resupply depot.

On the other hand, your attack ships will have to use the supply-saving weapons in order to fight more than one or two big combats.
You could also have some attack ships clear a path to the enemy lines, and bring in the powerful defense ships to back them up for a single major warppoint or homeworld battle.

Re: Capship Mod
 

Problem with that is: I've added Large-Scale Gatling Cannons and Heavy Vulcan Autocannons that fire really fast... will do the supply thing tho, but remember: projectiles are relatively weak in comparison to energy weaps (especially anti-capship weaponry... 1K consistent damage on a range of approx. seven. OMFG) and you still have torps to take up the middle.
So the basic weapon usage layout would be:
-Early game: Projectile, perhaps early Torps, perhaps early Beams
-Middle game: Projectile, Torps, stronger Beams
-Late game: advanced Projectile, minor usage of Torps and large-scale Beam weapon deployment

Still a [censored] pity of the GC... http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/frown.gif http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/mad.gif http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/frown.gif realy wanted to add that Artillery. Oh well. Back to the drawing board then. Will have to make the Artillery space-based long-range heavy weaponry...
Damage(approx):
0 0 0 1K25 1K 1K 750 750 500 500 250 250 250
and:
0 0 0 0 0 1K5 1K5 1K25 1K25 1K25 1K 1K 1K 1K 1K
and:
0 0 0 250 250 0 0 0 0 0 2K 1K75 1K5 1K25 1K

Re: Capship Mod
 

Check out GritEcon mod.

http://imagemodserver.mine.nu/other/...Mods/GritEcon/

It has infantry, tanks, and artillery. Infantry do piddly damage, but have tons of hit points. Artillery do must more damage, but have piddly hit points. Tanks do less damage than artillery and have fewer hit points than infantry. You need infantry to soak up damage, but you need heavy vehicles to do any real damage.

Re: Capship Mod
 

Plus, build costs go up rapidly with increasing size.

You can easily throw 10,000 infantry around in multiple major planetary assaults, and throw a few thousand light tanks in to back them up, but you have to carefully hoard your couple hundred heavy tanks and save them for the important battles.

Re: Capship Mod
 

Thnx. Will look into it. I'll change the range of troops to 1, and do something about the costs/damage/hps.

Re: Capship Mod
 

Is there a downloadable version of this mod yet? At least in a beta?

Re: Capship Mod
 

Look back a couple pages... latest edition is 0.80 tho, 0.81 (in the works) will be different.

Re: Capship Mod
 

Eventually, if what I'm planning now can be implemented, the entire game play will be different, and almost nothing will be the same.

Leaky armor, armor tech trees, light weapons for anti-fighter/small ship fire-support and large, heavy weaponry for anti-capship support, modified Boarding combat components, etc.

Re: Capship Mod
 

ai?

Re: Capship Mod
 

He really can't do an AI until he gets the components and such finalized.

Actually that's not entirerly true, if he wants to keep his sanity he'll not try to do an AI until he get the other stuff done. Having to constantly redo an AI sucks. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/frown.gif

Re: Capship Mod
 

And I don't think I'll be able to do it. I've looked at AI files sometimes, but i couldn't make heads or tails out of it (at least the Research file, Speech is easier than enything and Construction is also comprehensible... somewhat. But Research will require the most major tweaks. I'll probably let someone else handle that... any volunteers? it's gonna be a tough job, though.)

Btw, happy birthday, Nodachi.

Re: Capship Mod
 

Thank you, StrategiaInUltima.

My advice is to concentrate on getting everything working the way you want and then worry about the AI. I'm not an expert but I know my way around the files well enough to give you a hand with the AI.

Re: Capship Mod
 

I know, and I think that about half of the AI files shouldn't pose that much of a problem... I mean, the Design Creation works approximately the same as the Quadrant Types and Happiness (in my eyes). It's just that Research will be a pain in the frickin butt to mod...

Re: Capship Mod
 

About the best way to do the research files for a mod is to play as the race you're working on a few times keeping track of what you research and go with whatever way works out the best. It's a PIA but it's about the only way to go.

Re: Capship Mod
 

Problem is... I'm not that patient to go sit 'round a singleplayer game checking minor AI tweaks if the entire AI eventually needs to be completely torn asunder and reconstituted... the research file at least.

Re: Capship Mod
 

I think I'll wait until teh finalized (or nearlly so) version is out. I do sympathize with you over the AI file writting though... http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/happy.gif http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/happy.gif

Re: Capship Mod
 

Thank you, Kerensky... and as for the full version, I think that 1.00 will be human player ONLY. Maybe it won't be, but I doubt it. In the end, I hope to have a totally different gameplay experience, with very little stock comps left.

Re: Capship Mod
 

Here's Capship 0.801. It isn't 0.81 since this version is just 0.80 with the revamped GC and a few minor bug fixes.

Test it and tell me what you think about the GC.

Re: Capship Mod
 

Just happened to glance through the components and found this:

<font class="small">Code:</font><hr /><pre>
Ability 1 Type := Palace
Ability 1 Descr := The robots do not respond well to unknown situations - so they're experiencing 20% less accuracy.
Ability 1 Val 1 := 0
Ability 1 Val 2 := 0
Ability 2 Type := Armor
Ability 2 Descr := Robotic Troopers are placed at the very front lines, to protect the more effective infantry behind them.
Ability 2 Val 1 := 0
Ability 2 Val 2 := 0
</pre><hr />
The first ability will have no effect because it's a Palace and has a zero ability amount anyway, and the second will have no effect because troops don't take partial damage.

Re: Capship Mod
 

The first is just a description placeholder; the actual effect is elsewhere.

Re: Capship Mod
 

The first ability is a very good modding practice. It gives explicit reference to a bonus/penalty to hit for that component. At least, I assume so based on the description.

Troops that die first are those that are loaded onto the transport first. First in, first out. Abilities, size, hit points, etc. have nothing to do with it.

Re: Capship Mod
 

Oh. Well... I'll just leave it in place anyway. Can't do harm. And the Palace ability is a description and a notification of the -20 combat modifier (similar to P&amp;N Computer Pilot/Master Computer deficits).

And does anyone else notice that the side of the screen is smaller? Happened in another thread too...

Re: Capship Mod
 

This is caused by Ed Kolis' earlier post where he used the "code" tags. UBB interprets this as an instruction to post the tagged text without doing any sort of formatting or word wrapping. This can cause the right hand column to be bigger than normal, which is the case here, which will mean there's less room for the left hand column. Once his post if off the first page of this thread it will revert to the normal column sizes.

The same thing can also be caused by large images being posted to a thread.

Geoschmo

Re: Capship Mod
 

Ah, thank you.

Re: Capship Mod
 

Yes it does. The description will lead people to think that that troop will be destroyed first, when really it won't be just because of the ability. You might want to remove it now to save yourself many headaches later.

Re: Capship Mod
 

And it is ABSOLUTELY CERTAIN troops do NOT take partial damage, even if you're bringing a 250kT Army?

Re: Capship Mod
 

Units never take partial damage: either they are fully destroyed, or they are fully operational. So, if a unit with 500 hitpoints take 495 damage points, it will be fine... until it takes 5 more damage that is.

The first unit of a stack is the first to be destroyed, so until the first unit is gone, all the others are safe. Then the second unit will be targatted, and so on.

Re: Capship Mod
 

Oh. Well, thanks. I'll remove it rightaway.

Re: Capship Mod
 

Am currently working to update Capship for Imagemod in the latest version (Components 24b) and it's a major PITA. I seem to have overwritten one Capship pic, and am trying to find its counterpart (it was modified from the Proportions energy rifle) and recreate it. Also need to scale down all images *AGAIN* to fit them into Components... then need to give a fair portion of the comps a new pic (as I worked with a slightly modified Proportions comp set until now, so I need to find *ALL* comps with Proportions/custom images... and find their new counterparts...

As I said, real PITA.

I'm considering sending in some/all of my new custom pics as comp additions for Imagemod. Also wish to thank DEG for making such excellent pics... I took some pics from the old Avatar Emporium (none used, to my knowledge) and used them as infantry pics. Also thanks to DeadZone for pointing me to a page full of info about the M109 - the artillery unit in his avatar - where I found excellent tank/artillery/mech infantry pics.

No new versions anytime soon, as I've just started re-adding armor - in a major fashion. Already have several types of armor, and that's just low-tech. Planning to add an entire Armor tech TREE - and a Xeno-Science/Xeno-Technology tech tree, which gives access to exotic technologies that are expensive but powerful.

This is beginning to sound like a blog entry.

Re: Capship Mod
 

Why not just submit these new images to the Image Mod and save yourself the trouble of redoing them for future image mod updates?

Re: Capship Mod
 

Just a question but how large is the largest ship in your mod???

Re: Capship Mod
 

Fyron: I'm just ready with indeed putting my pics in Imagemod, and I'm about to send it to SJ. Secondly, the Imagemod had several MUCH better pics for things I already assigned another pic to... (that's its purpose) so it took me roughly two or three hours to track down all "old" images and redo them for Imagemod. And doing the small pics is also a pretty darn PITA. There are over twenty images, and I had already done them before... but forgot to back up the old Components file, so had to redo them myself. Major PITA, as my version seems to miss a few large comp pics so I'd just renamed the images... then had to rename them again... and also two pics didn't look good as miniaturized pics, so I'd touched them up a little. PITA.

Kerensky: As of yet 25MT (was 30MT on 0.70) but perhaps I'll ad larger ships - perhaps by 1.00 or perhaps in a later update.

Btw, as soon as Capship reaches 1.00, I'll post it in another thread, since this one is mainly a discussion over the undergoing construction of the mod and is pretty cluttered up by now for a full version release.

Re: Capship Mod
 

Am also planning to redo fighter combat as well.

Gee. I'm planning to edit just about everything except the source code, it seems.

Re: Capship Mod
 

Forgot about redoing fighter combat, I remember now that I have checked this thread again and I remember what I wanted to do, but it's low on my priorities list.

However, I am working on a mod called the "Realism Mod" in which you start off with SLVs and RLVs that aren't warp-capable and cannot move beyond orbit, but later you get solar sail ships, generation ships, sleeper ships and such. I am trying to make it as realistic as possible.

This means that Capship will be delayed. Just so that you know. I'll probably get a renewed bout of Capship enthusiasm in a week or two, after which I hope to have 0.81 ready, perhaps even 0.90. I think that 1.00 will be some time away, and I think that some of the changes I have in mind (the reworked fighters, for instance) will only appear in post-1.00 versions.

(And btw, the idea for the revamped fighters I got from reading the "Carrier Battles Mod" thread - thank you SJ for inspiring me. I won't copycat you, I will still design my own comps, but you gave me the inspiration. Also thanks to the person responsible for the "Ground Combat Mod", that's where I got the idea for the revamped GC in Capship.)

(Just so you know, I didn't do exactly the same as the GC Mod, I had only read the post and got the idea from that. I only looked into the actual mod itself later.)

(Wheehee! 951 thread views!)

Re: Capship Mod
 

And don't expect any AI for Realism - at least, not anytime soon. Not before artificially intelligent PC's can team up and do the work for me.

The reason for my using a new post here is that I'm trying to get Ed's code post down to the second page so that the screen appears normal again.

No offence, Ed.

(Second page? Yes, I've got the settings set up for showing 25 posts per page, in descending order, newest post first - so that the SEV Wishlist would immediately open on the newest suggestions immediately, to avoid having to select "..." all the time until I reached the last page, or pressing Show all.)

Re: Capship Mod
 

Just a queation... how can you make drones move? I've tried, but nothing will work... The drone shows that it has movement, but it will not move and will die in the next turn.