Proportions question re: abilities

[DavidG]

I noticed while testing my program that the Proportions mod txt files seem to have some strange abilites for some facilities. Like 'Boarding Attack' for a Research Center or Multiplex Tracking for an Intelignce centre. Do these abilities do anything or are they place holders or something?

[Ed Kolis]

They are tags used by the AI so it will build the proper facilities; PvK could explain it better since he made the mod!

[PvK]

Yes, they are abilities that have no effect on the type of item they are included on, but that allows the AI to select them for construction, where without those abilities, they would do something less effective in Proportions.

There are some explanations of these (perhaps not entirely complete and updated, but you can ask me if some explanation seems peculiar) in the abilities.txt, and at least some of the AI facilities construction files (*_AI_Construction_Facilities.txt). E.g.:

Proportions bogus ability coding system:
Palace means Shipyard
Emergency Resupply means Supply Generation
Emergency Energy means Spaceport
Movement Bonus means Resource Generation - Minerals
Quantum Reactor means Resource Generation - Organics
Drop Troops means Resource Generation - Radioactives
Boarding Attack means Point Generation - Research
Boarding Defense means System Point Generation Modifier - Research
Multiplex Tracking means Point Generation - Intelligence
Ship Bridge means Change Population Happiness - System
Ship Life Support means Cargo Storage
Ship Auxiliary Control means Resource Storage - Mineral
Ship Crew Quarters means Resource Storage - Organics
Self-Destruct means Resource Storage - Radioactives
Component Repair means Cultural Center

Edit: P.S.: The main reason for all of the facilities ones is that the AI tends to choose the Cultural Center as the best facility to build, for almost everything. Cultural Centers are generally too expensive to actually build even one of during a game, so in order to keep the AI from wasting its planetary build queues, this had to be done. It's not noticable when playing the game (except sometimes a planet may have a "use facility" option which does nothing).

PvK

[ November 26, 2002, 05:08: Message edited by: PvK ]

[DavidG]

Neat trick, Thanks for the reply.