modders and shipset creators - please read

[Andrés]

SJ I just realized what you mean. It’s more a question on how troops are launched than if smaller troops should be drop pods or the troopers themselves.
I believe you’re saying that troops are launched by the transport in space and have to land on the planet by their own means. So then it would be impossible for a single trooper unless it’s equipped with an extremely advanced space suit to land. A drop pod sounds better. What I don’t like is seeing pods in the ground combat window. Another question is how do troops are transferred again to the transport. Can they “jump” from the planet by themselves?
However it’s possible that troops aren’t literally “dropped” but reach the planet by other means. For example the transport can land on the planet and open the door to let troops walk away, some startrek-like beam, or invisible drop pods or shuttles. The same mean is probably also used for all other cargo transfers.
Then there would be no problem with infantry. Of course that 1 kt (1,000,000 kg) is completely out of scale for a single trooper, but the game just doesn’t allow to make a vehiclesize of 0.0001 kt or less. Imagine that each infantry represents a complete division + equipment.


On another note I like the idea of using more “neutral” names for new sizes. Do we agree to use LargeBaseShip, HeavyBaseShip, MassiveBaseShip as bitmap names for larger than baseship sizes? If so I’ll rename them (at least file names but not the name shown to players) next time I update my mod.
Oh and I believe that maximum allowed tonnage is 65535, more than 43 times larger than a baseship, so maybe we should consider the possibility of having more than 3 larger-than-baseship sizes.

Oh and the sizes I remembered from the email group (it used to be egroup but now it’s yahoogroup) were early drafts of Dave's Mod. Most of them are also in Devnullmod, but not all of them for example this smaller-than-escort Scout, so I though you’d like to take a look anyway.

quote:

---

Tonnage
Scout 100*
Corvette 250*
Escort 150
Frigate 200
Destroyer 300
Light Cruiser 400
Cruiser 500
Battle Cruiser 600
Heavy Cruiser 750*
Battleship 800
Sub-Dreadnought 900*
Dreadnought 1000
Super-Dreadnought 1300*
Titan I don't really like the name for any of these three...Any better
ideas?
Mega-Titan also any better ideas for sizes? I don't like going above the
baseship size
Colossus for these
Baseship 1500
---
Courier (transport) 200*
Small Transport 300
Medium Transport 600
Large Transport 900
Mega Transport 1000
---
Escort Carrier 500*
Light Carrier 800
Medium Carrier 1000
Heavy Carrier 1200
Mega Carrier 1500*
---
Light Colony Ship Any special reason to have different sized colony ships?
Colony Ship
Heavy Colony Ship
Mega Colony Ship
---
Space Station 500
Battlestation 1500
Starbase 2500
Star Fortress 2000*
Doom Star 3000*
Ultra Station 4000* This should take FOREVER to build

---
Small Fighter 15
Medium Fighter 20
Heavy Fighter 25

Light Bomber 30*
Medium Bomber 40*
Heavy Bomber 50*

For the bombers, I would probably do decreasing number of maximum engines,
so that the heavy bomber is SLOW

---
Light Troop 10
Medium Troop 15
Heavy Troop 20
Hover Tank 35*
Heavy Tank 50*


Anything followed by an * is my ideas; otherwise, its official game stuff
from SE4

For graphics for new ships, I am terrible at bitmaps, so I doubt I could do
other graphics, especcially for new things like bombers and tanks, where it
would really be good, but I can easily do the data files, and will do so in
the next couple of days.

If anyone has any suggestions, send them my way

Dave

---

[Baron Munchausen]

There's an unused ability in the abilities.txt file called 'drop troops'. Apparently there was supposed to be a special bay like for launching fighters, but for dropping troops. The sheer numbers of troops you have to drop to take a large or huge planet apparently made that impractical.

Personally, I'm still requesting a 'Robotech-style' combination troop/fighter vehicle. Imagine how cool to have a carrier that launches hundreds of dual-purpose vehicles. They attack the defending fleet and THEN take the planet without having to haul a bunch of troops in a seperate ship! This could be very powerful, of course. It ought to be a racial tech that costs some points. But it would be so much fun to have!

[out_law]

!I don't if you know this but you can give ship certain bulit advantaces, not just 40% change of hitting kind of thing - but other things like bulit in bridge, this could open the door to things like organic star ships and probe. Why dose'nt the drone work? I tried to added it but it would have any of it!

[AJC]

How about Monitor, Super Monitor

quote:

---

Originally posted by Andrés Lescano:

Super-Dreadnought 1300*
Titan I don't really like the name for any of these three...Any better
ideas?
Mega-Titan

---

[/b][/quote]

[ZeroAdunn]

Hey baron, I wanted troops/fighters to. I made em, just a troop with the ability to be luanced. They would work if it wasn't for the fact that you can only launch fighters mines and sats. Stupid code.

[dogscoff]

Thanks for all that info Andres. It will be useful when negotiating new filenames.

I've come to some conclusions:

I think I will also be using some mod-specific terminology. I see your point S_J but I have several reasons for this:

1> the naming conventions in SE4 aren't particularly logical anyway (ie carrierlight but lightcruiser)

2>I imagine the majority of additional ship sizes will be mod-specific. Shared images won't be all that common, except for fighters and infantry, which everyone wants.

3>Making the table compatible with mods rather than forcing mods to be compatible with the table means less work and restrictions for modders.

4>Imposing arbitrary guidelines may give modders the impression that I am trying to control their creativity.

5>Giving modders the opportunity to make their filename the "official" one adds incentive and character to the table.


Also I'm splitting up the battlemoons and the giant baseships because they are very different in appearance (one is big, round and planet-like and the other would probably be more spaceship shaped.) Death Stars and battlemoons could share images, since they would look quite similar (big, round),

I believe the standard, devnull, P&N and SW sizes will form a good foundation for my table - other mods are unlikely to include much that isn't included in the above, and if they do then I have left room to accomodate them.

I therefore suggest the following set of filenames:

all standard filenames (obviously)

transportcourier

carrierescort

colonyark
miningship (resource ship, remote miner)
miningstation (resource station, mining station)
barge (Stellar manipulation barge. I considered putting this under small death star, but one is a warstation and the other a contruction ship, so I decided they were too different.)

3 larger fighter sizes, not sure about the filenames yet. (These will cover all the heavy fighters, fighter bombers and TIE fighters)

troopinfantry (SW infantry and P&N drop pod)

corvette
heavydestroyer
heavycruiser
superdreadnought
supermonitor
battlemoonsmall (small death star)
battlemoon (medium deathstar, P&N battlemoon)
battlemoonlarge (large death star)

Andres - note I have used battlemoon rather than Death Star. Malfador/ Shrapnel are unable to include Star Wars/ Trek etc mods for copyright reasons. I thought it would be a good idea if I followed the same rules.

Once these filenames have been agreed on (after debate and adjustment if necessary) I will update the website and start to integrate some other mods.

------------------
"Pinky, are you pondering what I'm pondering?"
"I think so Brain but, if you replace the P with an O, my name would be Oinky, wouldn't it?"

[Suicide Junkie]

quote:

---

Andres - note I have used battlemoon rather than Death Star. Malfador/ Shrapnel are unable to include Star Wars/ Trek etc mods for copyright reasons. I thought it would be a good idea if I followed the same rules.

---

Just so you know, BattleMoons are from ShadowRaiders the TV show. I've also already converted my mod to the Massive_baseship filename.

1> the naming conventions:
They may not be logical, but you've got to start somewhere.
You are creating a standard... if it takes off, it may even be adopted by MM/Aaron/Classic SE4.

2>I imagine the majority of additional ship sizes will be mod-specific. Shared images won't be all that common, except for fighters and infantry, which everyone wants.
If a mod comes out with a cool new shipsize that needs a separate picture, I can pretty much guarantee that there will be many more mods incorporating it shortly after.

3>Making the table compatible with mods rather than forcing mods to be compatible with the table means less work and restrictions for modders.
True, but it also means a mishmash of picture files and a lot more work for the people who create the shipsets.

4>Imposing arbitrary guidelines may give modders the impression that I am trying to control their creativity.
I would not think so... You are only providing a guideline for the filenames, the names of the shipsizes in the game is independent of the filename, so what the player sees will be what the modder wants them to see. Your filename guideline will just ensure that their mod is compatible with the shipsets.

5>Giving modders the opportunity to make their filename the "official" one adds incentive and character to the table.
Just be sure there is a balance between 'character' and total chaos. Remember that the filenames have absolutely no affect on the game, from the player's point of view.

IMO, it is easier for modders to update their mods to reflect your shipset standards (one line in the vehiclesize.txt), rather than the shipset creators updating shipsets.

------------------
The latest info onPirates & Nomads (forum thread).
-<Download V2.0>-
-<Download V1.6>-
-<Download compatible EMPs for P&N v1.6>-
-<SJs latest AI Patcher>-
Visit My Homepage


[This message has been edited by suicide_junkie (edited 23 July 2001).]