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News: Celebrating 30 years of Star Control 2 - The Ur-Quan Masters

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Author Topic: Scale  (Read 36354 times)
Arne
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Re: Scale
« Reply #135 on: May 05, 2005, 04:21:51 pm »

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I wouldn't equate "correct" with "fits our observations". Our observations may be incomplete, and what we observe isn't necessarilly what is


And I didn't, did I?
I just said we treat things (such as gravity pull) as 'correct' (note the ' I used), because it's the best we can do. It might later prove to be false, because the multidimensional pink squibb-squabbs that tug on things goes on a strike in the year 2380. Until then, I dare to trust in the theory enough to call it... corr... ... .. the most accurate? Sufficient? Preferable?

Edit: New page, better quote properly.


Edit. Made sloppy clay figures of the Scout and Dreadnought, sized as in the melee. The masses are pretty close to what's in the code. Scout is 1, and the Deadnought is 8. It's 10 in the code. If they're made of the same material, it means the Scout is built of a material  7150 times as heavy as what's used in the Dreadnought, or that the Dreadnought is just a thin skin of some lightweight and not very durable metal.
« Last Edit: May 05, 2005, 07:13:28 pm by Arne » Logged
Bobucles
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Re: Scale
« Reply #136 on: May 05, 2005, 07:13:01 pm »

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Seems unlikely that you'd need a tool intended to blow holes in things at long range for ordinary ship maintenance. If the Vindicator is an all-purpose vessel there's no reason it couldn't have been given the ability to at least defend itself in combat by the Precursors.
I was trying to point out that technology that appears to be one thing could actually be another. Precursor tech is so advanced, that the ion gun seems unnaturally weak. There's no way that the ion cannon would be considered decent during the precursor times. It seems unlikely that the ion gun was intended to be a precursor weapon, and I think it was probably a high powered tool that, if you use it wrong, can be used in combat. After all, if a precursor warship is pretty much impervious to modern tech, and is enormous compared to the Vindie, how big and strong a tool will you need to perform maintenance on it? I think it fits with the "workhorse vehicle" design of the flagship.

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This is like having a 7.5mm gun on a small WW1 patrol boat, and a single 50mm cannon in the front of a 250m WW2 battleship. Not only that, but the battleship is so poorly built it can just take 40 hits from the tiny patrol boat gun.
I think you're reading too much into it. I think it's designed that way for gameplay's sake. Would you enjoy putting hundreds or thousands of shots into a dreadnought that can one-shot you? Probably not, but killing one with a Shofixi ship is still a feat. Ur-Quan doesn't give a huge range of endurance for vessels. In Ur-Quan, there is no such thing as injured crew, they're either alive or dead, so you can't take a "fraction" of a hit point. There's no such thing as armor factor either, so every ship loses the same amount of crew from a shot. The melee health meter only goes up to 40, and the developers must've decided that is a good amount. The dreadnought fills up the bar completely, and you won't be shooting at the ship wondering why it's not losing any health. I'm sure that you could try adding in things like an armor factor and injured-but-savable crew, and that would give you a much wider range of endurance that ships can have. But if you had a Shofixi ship that couldn't scratch a dreadnought at all, and the flagship was indeed invincible, would you enjoy that?
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Arne
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Re: Scale
« Reply #137 on: May 05, 2005, 07:23:38 pm »

Haha, Yes, I know it's just a game!

I just prefer to say that the melee gameplay is the game, and not the surrounding pictures.

I dunno, maybe I'm getting too offended by the other pics. It's like seeing the Alien movie, and then noticing a factoid somewhere that states that the Aliens are made of chocolate, and actually only 1 inch tall.
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Deus Siddis
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Fun 'n Funny.
« Reply #138 on: May 05, 2005, 11:01:41 pm »

No one would buy that for Alien, but that movie was meant to feel real. Starcontrol might be more of a comedy.

Either way, your artwork is still kick ass. I can't wait to see what you create next.  Smiley
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Arne
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Re: Scale
« Reply #139 on: May 06, 2005, 12:33:15 am »

Thanks! I'm doing a Slylandro ark next. It's basically a big glass bubble that's has a pressurized atmosphere inside. Not sure how big I should make it though Wink
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