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Topic: Aftermath (Read 98895 times)
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thatsteveguy
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Posts: 52
Everything addict.
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Finally got a chance to play for a good bit. Many things are so much better. I like the camera switching between ships, it's much smoother. The cargo pods are a great addition, (minus the bug of course). The icon based UI is a huge step in the right direction, though it still needs to be tweaked, (I also noticed you changed how the mouse responds, thank you!) Also the ships that warp in and attack you makes just mining a whole lot more interesting. As you mentioned, adding ships, weapons and devices is A LOT easier too. Bravo!
I ran across a bug that's probably simple enough to repair for .653. If you buy an upgrade to your engine, or even change it as far as I can tell, the bar (System space I assume) will go red. Even if I go back to the engine I had before, it remains red and I have to sell the ship before I am able to launch. I tried it with the weapons and it seems to work with them. Just not engines.
Along the same lines, there really needs to be an option to have nothing in a weapon, scanner or shield slot. I could almost fake it by creating a weapon, scanner and shield named Empty with all the stats zeroed out. It doesn't work with the weapon though because it still produces sounds, (Even if one isn't defined).I haven't tried it with the scanner and shield yet though I suspect similar problems will show up.
Finally, some suggestions:
Put a credit display on the market screen. It's hard to tell what you can buy without one.
The credit display when you're in explore mode isn't needed as the game stands now. All it's doing is taking up screen real estate that could be used for something else.
I really like the spread option for weapons, but I'd like to be able to set NumberOfShots to greater than 6. (I'm thinking of the Kohr-Ah's F.R.I.E.D. weapon, I already have done the model)
Well that's probably enough from me, heh. 
-TSG
Edit: I guess it's not enough for me... I thought of one other thing. While I was playing this game, I noticed what's refered to as "screen tear". I've seen it in other games and the thing that always fixed it was setting Vsync on in the game. I have a suspicion that it's not an easy thing to add for you, but I thought you might like to know.
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« Last Edit: August 04, 2004, 01:49:26 am by thatsteveguy »
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Madgap
Frungy champion
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Posts: 88
We come in peace.
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thetallman13: That a side effect of my not having balanced all the systems yet. If you want to make a manual adjustment look in the Systems directory for the .Hull file corresponding to the ship you want to upgrade. Open that file in a text editor and increase the number after SystemSpace:
thatsteveguy: Interesting problem...I'll look into it. As for the tearing that's actually really easy to fix. Usually people like to leave vsync off because it can give you a slight boost in framerate. When I add an options screen I'll put in a vsync checkbox or something so you can turn it off.
EDIT: I've changed the code to allow for an unlimited number of shots (instead of 6 max). I don't remember why I put that 6 max limitation in...hmm...
I also found the engine load problem...it's not in the code, it's a device definition file problem. The two small ships use a special engine (the Micro engine). But it is listed as Team: Ur-Quan so it isn't available for purchase.
In Capaign/Devices/MainDevices.dat change:
Begin Item
Name: Micro
Type: Drive
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Team: Ur-Quan
End
to
Begin Item
Name: Micro
Type: Drive
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Team: Federation
End
-Madgap
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« Last Edit: August 04, 2004, 03:40:53 am by Madgap »
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Madgap
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Nice, I didn't even think about FRIED.
Ok, guys, here's the plan: we need to balance all of these systems out (price, mass, damage, health, etc...). I need feedback from you guys in order to get the balance just right. Here are some of my thoughts:
- More enemies per encounter, but make them weaker.
- Prices for systems remain fairly constant (low tech vs. high tech), but the strategic resource requirements go up.
- Smaller ships are faster, but don't have the space for larger systems.
- Limit player's fleet size to around 10-15 ships max.
Any weapon or system requests? Any comments about the fun factor during combat? What do you like most, and what do you like least?
EDIT: Oh, and I put the new executable up.
-Madgap
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« Last Edit: August 04, 2004, 06:17:19 am by Madgap »
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thatsteveguy
Frungy champion
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Posts: 52
Everything addict.
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My plan was to go through and balance the whole thing and then post it here.... I realized I bit off more than I could chew in a day though. The problem I ran into was there wasn't anyplace to start from. So here's what I came up with after some thinking. No ship is a ship without a drive. So start with the drive. I put together 9 drives: 3 for small ships 3 for medium ships and 3 for large ships.
| -Drive- | -fuel use- | -weight- | -cost- | -total thrust- | -turning thrust- | -batt regen- | -batt storage- | -mine requirements- |
| Micro Plasma | 0.3 | 4 | 300 | 15000 | 1500 | 2 | 10 | |
| Micro Impulse | 0.2 | 5 | 600 | 17500 | 1750 | 3.5 | 15 | 1A 1T |
| Micro AM | 0.15 | 6 | 900 | 20000 | 2000 | 5 | 20 | 1A 1C |
| Plasma Thrower | 0.3 | 10 | 600 | 21000 | 2100 | 2 | 15 | 1H |
| Ion Engine | 0.2 | 15 | 900 | 23500 | 2350 | 4 | 25 | 1H 2T |
| AntiMatter Engine | 0.15 | 20 | 1200 | 26000 | 2600 | 6 | 35 | C2 H T2 |
| Plasma Impeller | 0.4 | 30 | 1000 | 30000 | 3000 | 4 | 30 | 1A 1C 1H 1T |
| Fusion Drive | 0.3 | 40 | 1500 | 35000 | 3500 | 7 | 45 | 2A 2C 2H 1T |
| AM Collider | 0.2 | 50 | 2000 | 40000 | 4000 | 10 | 60 | 2A 2C 3H 2T |
I already put the files together so if anyone wants to experiment with them you can get them here: http://www.thatsteveguy.net/drives.zip
I haven't put in the requirements yet for them so they can be got at without setting up mines.
-TSG
Edit: Madgap, I tried the NO_INERTIA tag with the Arilou but it didn't work, have you not finished that yet? Or am I missing something? (I put it in the Skiff.hull file like: Special: NO_INERTIA)
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« Last Edit: August 05, 2004, 05:17:38 am by thatsteveguy »
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thatsteveguy
Frungy champion
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Posts: 52
Everything addict.
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You know, I realized that I didn't respond to your post directly in any way at all... heh. So without futher ado.
Ok, guys, here's the plan: we need to balance all of these systems out (price, mass, damage, health, etc...). I need feedback from you guys in order to get the balance just right. Here are some of my thoughts:
- More enemies per encounter, but make them weaker.
- Prices for systems remain fairly constant (low tech vs. high tech), but the strategic resource requirements go up.
- Smaller ships are faster, but don't have the space for larger systems.
- Limit player's fleet size to around 10-15 ships max.
Any weapon or system requests? Any comments about the fun factor during combat? What do you like most, and what do you like least?
-At this point I think that the number of enemies per encounter is about right. They just need to be made more difficult. The Ur-Quan are just a little too easy now.
-Prices should go up for higher technology and they should have resource requirements. My reasoning? Once you move up the tech tree it gets easier and easier to kill cargo ships. So you have more money. What are you going to do with it?
-I fully agree with you on ship size, speed and system space.
-15 ships I think would be a fine point to limit the players fleet at.
-system requests? Teleport, (for skiff), cloak (for ilwrath), change ship, (for x-form and guardian), recoil, (for druuge and thraddash). I know it's a hard list for you to implement, but I figure if you don't like it you can always just ignore me. 
I'm redoing the drives I did earlier too. The thrust for all the drives is WAY too high. I'm experimenting to find the right balance.
-TSG
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« Last Edit: August 05, 2004, 10:00:18 am by thatsteveguy »
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Cronos
*Many bubbles*
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Posts: 170
Shofixti Scoutmaster
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Something thats been annoying me extremely, the arrow keys seem to be tied into zoom, so when I acellarate it zooms way out and I have to press the down arrow key to zoom back in.
Is there any way to untie arrow keys to zooming? Please?
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Madgap
Frungy champion
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Posts: 88
We come in peace.
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I've unbound the arrow keys from the screen zoom, fixed the strange slowdown in Asar, added some new hull attributes (include NO_INERTIA but it isn't working perfectly yet), and changed a few other things. Oh, and I did a full recompile and ran it overnight on automatic. However, old savegames won't work since I added a couple of new things. For those that don't want to start completely over again just open Campaign/Scenario1.dat in a text editor and increase your wealth. However, if you get too greedy the space police will bust you!
-Madgap
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« Last Edit: August 05, 2004, 07:58:46 pm by Madgap »
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thatsteveguy
Frungy champion
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Posts: 52
Everything addict.
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I've come across something that reoccurs but I don't know what it is exactly that is causing. Every once in a while right while I'm in the middle of playing aftermath freezes and I'm unable to do anything though the music continues. Alt-Tab won't get me back to the desktop or any application, so I have to shut aftermath down using the task manager. The last time it happened an error alert box popped up saying "Failed to initialize 3d environment." This has happened 2-3 times now, but I can't tell what exactly causes it. Now, I have been playing around with the ship and device files a bit so there may be something I've done that is causing it so I'll play with a clean install and see if it happens there. Specs for my system if you're interested:
1.4Ghz Pentium 4
GeForce 4 4200Ti
256MB ram
If you want anymore let me know.
-TSG
Edit: It did occur with the default files. (Though I didn't get the error alert box). Just a total freeze with the music still running. When I pulled up task manager with ctrl-alt-del, it did say that aftermath was not responding. I've got the most recent video drivers for my video card, (upgraded a week ago), and DirectX 9.x (I think it's 9.1 but I'm not totally sure.) This was with the most current version of the executable 0.654. Hope it helps.
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« Last Edit: August 06, 2004, 07:55:42 am by thatsteveguy »
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Madgap
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I just fixed that one tonight in version 0.655. It was the new pirate spawn code...it was possible to get in an infinite loop. I've also squashed yet another cargo bay problem, but I'll save that one for 0.656.
-Madgap
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thatsteveguy
Frungy champion
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Posts: 52
Everything addict.
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Ran into a small issue. The CARGO_SHIP tag can be defeated if you buy a cargo ship, make sure it's in the first slot, (by selling any ships above it), leaving and then returning to the base. You can then upgrade any part of that cargo ship that you want.
I also noticed that the CARGO_SHIP tag prevents you from upgrading anything at all. Splitting it up into NO_WEAPONS NO_SHIELD and ONE_WEAPON, (as in one weapon only), would give a lot more options for unique hulls.
Just late night thoughts,
-TSG
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« Last Edit: August 06, 2004, 02:03:23 pm by thatsteveguy »
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Cronos
*Many bubbles*
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Posts: 170
Shofixti Scoutmaster
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Note to people mucking about with ship/race files in the future: Do _NOT_ set the pirate ships to cargo vessels. The resultant crate spamming can be deadly to the system.
Also, as a result of said crate spam, I noticed something. The FPS indicator doesn't go below 20, just a heads up.
Also, you may wish to do one of two things. Either make a kind of scavenger craft that goes about picking up crates and drops it into the players cargo pool, make all allied ships able to pick up crates and put it in the cargo pool, or, make the crates dissapear after a time.
Also, as a stop gap solution to the arilou, could you perhaps add some special code that evaluates when the thrust button has ceased being pressed and applies a negative accelaration over a second to neutralise the speed thus simulating an inertialess drive?
So, for example.
Thrust key stops being pressed.
Player craft at Velocity Z Vector {X,Y}
Apply acceleration -Z Vector {-X,-Y}
Acceleration Duration: 0.1 seconds
After that you may only need to add a tag that allows arilou craft to be immune to gravity and you've essentially simulated an inertialess drive.
Also, I've said Also a lot, just thought I'd point that out in case anyone didn't notice.
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Bah. You probably had a better reason. Thanks for the tweak, Kohr-Ah here I come. And also Pkunk. And improved BSS. Whee!