Babylon 5 Mod

[Timstone]

Thanks AGoetz for the settings.txt.

[grumbler]

Sorry, Tim I couldn't find the original settings.txt and couldn't remember which changes I made two weeks ago (my notes are around here somewhere) but I should have let you know.

Still working on a an upgrade to the engines system and just started to pick through the Minbari weapons options. I am starting with Minbari since they seem to work pretty well right now but need the advanced stuff if they are to keep up.

BTW, I'm on turn 200 of a game (playing Minbari) with the corrected spaceports AI files and am in 7th place! I don't think I have ever stayed down so far for so long.

[ June 26, 2003, 17:12: Message edited by: grumbler ]

[Timstone]

It's alright. Hope that new system of yours works out (starting buildings and so on), coz the buildings the AI in the beginning gets were rightout strange. Ah well, if it works fine, I'll implement it in the 2.0 Version.

[Timstone]

Joehoe, anybody home?! Please opload the settings.txt, it's only a small file, won't take much time and would make me very very happy. Come on guys upload it for me.
*Almost breaks in tears*

[grumbler]

I have kinda reached a dead end with the engine mods, barring the possibility that people will accept a single massive (like 2000kt massive! ) engine module for the Planet Killers that gives something like a 10-speed bonus.

The problem, as we all know by now, is the 255 limit to engines. Now, without bonus speeds, the planet killers can only move at speed 3, even if they devote 100% of their space to engines!

Unfortunately, as we know from "A Call to Arms" fleets were not limited by the speed of their planet-killers.

Now, since the speed of planet-killers will be determined almost exclusively by the bonus movement assigned by their engines, it seems that the only way to make them work is with a huge bonus, with a correspondingly huge component that provides the bonus (else other ships will use the component and get the bonus "unfairly.")

The system I will propose will take care of ships through 1250k tons very nicely, and through 2000kt with a slight loss of top speed. But the 5000kt ships simply throw all the rules out the window.

So, can people live with such a component? PF, can we get the AI to use it?

[Fyron]

Why not just lower the engines per move of planet killers?

[grumbler]

Originally posted by Imperator Fyron:
Why not just lower the engines per move of planet killers?

Hmm Then we get into the whole issue of whether or not we are trying to maintain consistency.

In order for 5000kt ships to move at anything like normal speeds, they would have to massively violate the pseudo-Newtonian principals of the game.

Even better would be to have the engines per move of ALL ships be 1 per 100kt, rather than 1 per 50kt.

However, that would be a massive rewrite of the system that exists, and I already think I am stepping on toes with what i propose.

That is why I suggest that v2.0 use the 100kt per ton (eliminating the x50 ton vehicle sizes, unfortunately, but also allowing more variation at the top end in exchange)), but that does not solve the problem with v1.0 (or whatever Version we are on right now! ) which can only be solved through some workarounds.

There are a lot of reasons why more variation should occur at the low end of the ship spectrum, and that is where the x50kt ships are concentrated. For one thing, the costs to build up ship size tech are proportional, right now, to the progression of research points. If v2.0 goes with the x100 model, this will be a tough issue to deal with.

So, bottom line, we need to account for the 5000kt ships in a way that is considtent with the rest of the ships, or else they become disproportionately effective. The only way I see of to deal with this is through some "gawdawful" component that gives a huge movement bounus.

[grumbler]

And before I get too far into my weapons system analysis, I want to get a feel for how many people really want the EA to be "uniquely interesting" by having so many weapons choices.

Right now, I guess about half of the unique weapons are EA-specific. Since the canon revolves around the EA, I guess this is natural as a starting point.

However, I personally find the choices bewildering and the optimal mix hard to calculate. If we are not to end up with unmanageable file sizes, I think we need to rethink having such things as anti-missile-missiles and anti-fighter missiles that do much the same job (let alone all the array of PD weapons) so we can free slots for things like advanced Minbari weapons ('cause right now about half the Minbari weapons research programs are dead ends).

Thoughts?

[Fyron]

So, bottom line, we need to account for the 5000kt ships in a way that is considtent with the rest of the ships, or else they become disproportionately effective. The only way I see of to deal with this is through some "gawdawful" component that gives a huge movement bounus.

Lowering the big ship's engines per move has the same effect, and eliminates the need for a special component (which violates the QNP principles equally to the lowering of engines per move anyways).

[pathfinder]

Lost my cookies yesterday and it appears I have lost my @hotmail e-mail address. SOOOooooo, looks like my PBW need to go to harryb1@comcast.net instead.