Organic Infestation ?

[TheGunslinger]

Whats the use of a System with a Organic Infestation ? Or of a System with a big star telling you "A star is is its progress to be created" (or howevers its called)

I was really scared when i noticed a Infestation next to my Homeworld, but then i noticed it did nothing, even after a few douzen turns...oh well that must have been my first game though
so anyone knows about that ?

[ 25 March 2002: Message edited by: TheGunslinger ]

[TerranC]

It's just an Eye candy.
The only close thing to an Organic infestation to your planets are plagues.

But you gotta admit, it's pretty horrifying.

[Andrés]

Not only organic infestations, all new Systems in Gold are a great disappointment.
I was expecting something new, something that modders wouldn't have been able to add, with new abilities that would really add something new to the game.
Instead most of them are just new pictures in empty systems with some descriptions and names that just don't make sense.
I get the impression that many of the pictures and descriptions were made by someone that is not familiar with SE4 structure.
Some mods such as Hadrian Aventine's Ultimate Mod added more and more interesting new system types.

Here's a list of all new systems and some opinions and ideas about them.

Black Hole 2
It's a copy of the old black hole with a new pic and new description. The same way there are many pics for nebulaes, it makes sense that not all black holes look the same (the fact that they should be invisible is part of another story).

Description says it draws all matter from nearby systems, but abilities are the same as the old one.

Comets
Nice pics in empty systems.
It's completely out of scale. A comet should be smaller than a planet (it's even described as a planetary fragment) but these ones look larger than stars.
Solution:
Erase these system types, they just doesn't make any sense. Crop the pic and resize it to 128x128 and 36x36 and add it as a sector type object. Perhaps ice planets (since they are outnumbered by other planet types), or perhaps non-colonizable like asteroids.

Stellar Core Fragment
Another nice pic in an empty system.
Again if it is a fragment of a star's core, why is it larger than a star???

Green Giant
Yet another nice pic in an empty system.
What a hell is a Green Giant?
This reminds me of a long discussion in the yahoo group about the existence of green and purple stars.

New Nebulaes
Nice pics. Lower sight obscuration and shield disruption are interesting variations.
There is this bug someone posted: their System Physical Type is Normal instead of Nebulae, so they cannot be destroyed by nebulae destroying components.

Nova
Description says that the star gone nova is distant. Then that is that thing in the center of the system? and where is that distant nova? In another system?

It would be interesting that for example every time a star is destroyed (either naturally or artificially) the system turns into a nova system for some time before becoming a destroyed star system.

Anyway, a shield disruption system without sight obscuring or pull to center abilities should be and interesting ground to stage battles.

Organic Infestations
Yet other nice pics in empty systems.

It may be interesting if they were minable (with high organic value)
Or if infestations would break out as events (or by using some stellar manipulation weapon) forcing the player to "kill" it some special new techs or to evacuate the system before it consumes the planets.

Red Giants
Yet other nice pics in empty systems.
IIRC there were already some standard stars described as red giants.
But it's ok, they are supposed to be way bigger than normal stars.
Maybe add them some ability to make them more interesting. Sector damage or Shield Disruption

Spatial Ruptures
Nice. They use the Random Movement ability that was so far unused in the standard game + a shield disruption.

Burnt Out Star
Yet another nice pic in an empty system.

It resembles how destroyed stars looked SE3. I'd just crop the center and use it as an alternative destroyed star sector type with the same size of normal sector types.

Star Forming
Yet other nice pics in empty systems.
This is the only case where IMHO the pics are good enough to justify new systems just to display them.

They would be more interesting if in time they would become a newly formed system with empty colonizable planets.
What about if they were spontaneously formed in a nebulae system or in empty space outside any system. (adding new systems during the game!)
A whole new system being created from nothing.

[Wizarc]

One way to make some of these new pictures usable is to put lots of asteroid belts in them (of course the ones that make sense. I dont believe anything would live in a nova.) Then when you get the technology you could create planets that would survive in say an Organic Infestation system.

[oleg]

Is it possible to assign a negative value to the stellar ability "pull to the center of system" ?
If yes, the Nova system can be made pushing ships away, thus emulating the strong solar wind of blowing star

[GhostBear]

I have to concur with the general consensus that these new "systems" are pretty worthless.

Make them do something or give a way to turn them off.

GB

[Arak Koba]

I did a revision of these new system graphics because I thought most of them looked too large for the space they occupied. You can get them at the link in my sig or at PBW.

I think that idea about the repulsion for Nova systems is a good idea. Or at least, taking damage for being in such a volatile sector of space.

-edit-

I am going to make a modified SystemTypes file to include special abilities for these new systems.

Wish me luck!

[ 26 March 2002: Message edited by: Arak Koba ]

[TerranC]

quote:

---

Originally posted by GhostBear:
I have to concur with the general consensus that these new "systems" are pretty worthless.

Make them do something or give a way to turn them off.

---

Well sir, aren't you arrogant.

Even though they are worthless to the strategic part of gameplay, In the original, it was pretty boring to see either solar systems, or asteroid belts, or just nebulaes... and it had only around 5 colours.

They still look nice, and add a bit of fun in the beginning.

[Gryphin]

The way I "see" the new systems is for now they are eye candy as someone has said.
Personaly, I like the variety. I also suspect that making them "do" something would have cost more time and money. I also suspect that they will indeed have a function in the future. I'd say suggest some ideas on how to use them.
The idea about "pushing" ships was very interesting.

Edit: I wish I could type

[ 26 March 2002: Message edited by: Gryphin ]

[Arak Koba]

Ok, I have added all kinds of abilities to these systems, mostly along the lines of scanner interference, shield interference, and random movement for systems like the Infestation, etc.

I need to go test it out, especially to see if movement repulsion will work for the Nova system.

Once I test it out, I will upload it and link it.