Devnull Mod Gold: updates and discussion

[Rollo]

Thanks Binford,
well done on the first draft. Comments are in the mail.
DNM home page is a great idea . Go for it.

Still no ETA on 1.70. We had a big family party that had me ..uuhmm.. 'occupied' for a couple of days.

Rollo

[ August 18, 2002, 21:06: Message edited by: Rollo ]

[Binford]

Thanks all. I have updated the Description again with Rollo's changes and re-posted it:

http://www.jeffleggett.com/DevNullMod.htm

This week I will work on getting up a DNM Home Page, with links to all the files and this update and whatever else I can think of.

Binford

[Rollo]

Binford, two minor nitpicks.

1) Geo has updated the Amonkrie and Fazrah, not the Vikings
2) The United Flora have no updated AI in 1.63, but they will have a new AI in 1.70. So, might as well leave that in .

[PerpetualNewbie]

Sorry if this is the wrong place to post this:

I noticed that the Devnull Mod removes the abilities of the system shield to stop warp point manipulations in the system (actually I found this out the hard way, by researching like crazy to get the system shield and then not getting the ability...didn't believe it until I checked the facilities.txt file).

Was there a balance reason why this was removed? To me it seems like the only thing that allows a decent defense later on in the game.

Another newby question: I re-inserted the warp point abilities in the devnull facilities file...is this going to affect (or possibly crash) the game I've in progress?

[Fyron]

Re-adding the ability won't adversely affect current games you are running (it will add the ability, but it won't crash anything).

[Rollo]

PerpetualNewbie, thanks for the catch. This is absolutely the right place to post this.

I don't think that the abilities to stop warp point manipulations were taken away from the facilities. It is rather that they weren't added to them like in the standard game. IIRC these abilties were added in SE4 1.49. The DNM facility.txt is based on an older Version.
Anyway, I am rambling... I'll add the abilities to the system shield in the next Version. In the meantime you can just edit the facilities file yourself. As Fyron already said, that shouldn't cause any problems.

Rollo

[Devin D.Bass]

Does the current Version of devnull (ver1.63)take advantage of the new patch?
If so, can or how does the AI take advatage of the new mounts?

[Toryin]

The current Version of Devnull 1.63 doesn't take into account the new mounts from the latest patch. So no need to worry about the AI right now.

Rollo is however making a new Version that will take advantage of the new patch. Its just taking him a little while cause he has to edit all those pesky AI files.

If you want to play a game using the Devnull mod, go ahead however, as 1.63 is compatible enough to play .

Cheers

[Rollo]

I am considering using shield mounts that will make shields more effective on smaller hulls and less effective on big hulls. Kind of a QNP-system for shield generators. Not sure, yet, if that will be part of the next Version or not (or used at all ). Any opinions whether that is a good idea or not?

Rollo

[Spoo]

I am considering using shield mounts that will make shields more effective on smaller hulls and less effective on big hulls

I don't know if that makes much sense. Bigger ships should be able to take a beating. The advantage of big ships is they Last longer. Little ships should be able swarm in large numbers, but they should go "poof" when they get hit by the bigger ships. Perhaps shields should be cheaper on smaller ships. This would compliment the strategy of building large numbers of small, expendable ships.

It would seem odd to me to have smaller ships that are better shielded than their larger counterparts.