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[xenoargh]

Hey everybody; I had a cool idea for a new project this weekend, and I'd like to know if there's any interest in doing this collectively, in terms of content.

Basically, the concept is to introduce a new ship type into SS- the SingleShip.

What's a SingleShip?

1.  SingleShips are engineered for pure combat; they have one pilot and no cargo / fuel storage.  They are wholly dependent on support craft to stay viable in the campaign.

2.  SingleShips, art-wise, are classic Space Mecha (think Macross,  Gundam et al).  They have a body, arms, etc.  I'm going to be using some cool tricks to make them seem to function as you'd expect.

3.  Gameplay-wise, they are small, fast ships that can dodge very well (extremely high acceleration, ignores asteroids and other ships like fighters do).  They'll have heavy weapons for their size, but will be very fragile; they're classic glass-cannons / hero-ships, or disposable moogs, depending on who's flying them and what type they are.  They will not be able to mount many Hull Mods, Vents, etc., but their weapons will be built in and they'll have a unique shield mechanic that will make them feel really different.  I will probably write some custom AI support for them into my AI Overhaul.

4.  SingleShips are meant to offer a fun experience that's distinctly different from the existing ship types, feels moderately lore-friendly, and gives combat hero builds another avenue.  I may even add some custom stuff to the Skills to support them if that seems like a good idea later.

I have most of the code written to make these things interesting, and I think they'll be fun.

The reason why I'm proposing this as a collective project is that, given their small size, the sprites are accessible to a lot of artists, and I thought it'd be fun to do thematic stuff with this, so that at launch we have stuff for each Vanilla faction, at least.  I'll have examples of the art requirements up here later today to give everybody an idea of how to do these, and I'll be responsible for assembly, etc.

Anyhow, thanks for giving this consideration and I hope people will consider helping and that this will be a fun addition to the game

[Nicke535]

Interesting idea, and can probably be turned into something really interesting.

Can't really contribute myself, though. I'm not really a spriter.

[xenoargh]

Well, I thought this would be fun for people just learning how to make sprites, as well as the experts, because it's all so small-scale.

OK, here are the art specs:

1.  Bodies should be small; no more than 32 pixels wide, and preferably less deep than they are wide.

2.  Arms should be reasonably proportionate.

3.  Weapons can extend the length a bit but should be kept reasonable.

Each part needs to be its own layer or separate sprite.  I'll talk more specifically about the needs of the arms / weapons here in a minute, but this is a typical layout:

Each arm and each weapon needs to get fitted specifically to use the arm's natural pivot-point as its sprite center, to keep the illusion that the arms are moving the weapons, etc.  For most of these mechs, that means just one Weapon per each side, plus any additional invisible Weapons built into the body, or a turret-for-a-head, if that seems cool.  The idea, though, is that we're building very small sprites, and people can just build bodies but not arms, or arms but not bodies, etc., so we can mix-and-match parts and have a decent variety of mechs pretty easily.

[cjuicy]

Now I have to point one thing out...

Where do I sign up? I can provide a lot of mecha knowledge, descriptions and unique ideas for further growth. I'll also provide weapon sprites and projectiles once I can get my new desktop up and running. I'll need a month or so for that one.

[Mr. Nobody]

I'll be able to play as a maximum edgelord in a food shortage chasing simulator. WHAT A TIME TO BE ALIVE!

Spoiler

[close]

[MesoTroniK]

So these things are going to be frigates, with a hullmod that forces fighter collision class I assume?

A problem with that line of thought, is that it will wreak havoc with ship AI, autofire AI, custom missile AI, custom autofire AI, weapons with the strike hint, PD weapons etc etc. While I would not go as far to call is game breaking, it will be suboptimal and result in a lot of subtle to sometimes moderate issues.

The things will move like a fighter I think? While being the size of one. This is giving me a huge headache thinking about having to add in logic to all my missile and autofire AIs to understand these things correctly. And even then, fixing things like strike weapon hints, and PD weapons that don't use a custom AI is impossible

[xenoargh]

Actually, IIRC, the Vanilla AI can handle ships with FIGHTER collision classes, so far as I know.  Anyhow, we'll cross that bridge later; if nothing else, I'm quite sure that my AI handles that stuff correctly.

[MesoTroniK]

Maybe, the issues should be thought over, *before* something is made?

[SafariJohn]

I don't think there is a middle ground where ships like this would be both fun to pilot and not overpowered. 2D really limits what little ships can do.

Not to mention the numerous issues MesoTroniK has pointed out.

[Az the Squishy]

Actually, IIRC, the Vanilla AI can handle ships with FIGHTER collision classes, so far as I know.  Anyhow, we'll cross that bridge later; if nothing else, I'm quite sure that my AI handles that stuff correctly.

I think that's a little pretentious. But, who knows. I personally am all for the experimentation of it all. At the very least it might be an interesting work on the mechanicis even if it may not be the greatest thing to impliment and may have many issues.


I'll say this Xeno.  You chur out mods like someone who has WAY too many cups of coffee and a streak with tinkering after realizing that the sugar wasn't what it seemed and going on trip to do all sorts of things with your new-found energy!
It's interesting, fun, and great to see what you think of. Sometimes it seems painful to watch as well but, I will not take away the fact that you think of a LOT and do a lot of things as well.


So have fun, go nuts, and experiment with the willing test monkeys swinging around.

[MesoTroniK]

Xeno, I was thinking about a way to do your idea in a way that would *just work*. While working 100% right for vanilla, and *all* mods while creating no workload for anyone else, but would create more work for you.

Make them actually fighters in combat. So in the campaign layer it would be a frigate, in combat, it is deployed, the frigate is removed, replaced with the fighter and control is switched to it. If the fighter survives combat, it is spawned as the frigate again, if it does not then it is is not. Is a complex solution, but it would work to create "playable fighters" that will never interfere with anything else.

I admit, your idea is super cool. But the current plan for it, breaks a good modding rule to follow which is:
Don't create work for other modders unless there is a very good reason for it, and if you do... Make it an opt in system to support, not an opt out system to support.

[Alex]

(Went ahead and added ShipAPI.setHullSize() method. Not sure why it wasn't in the interface in the first place, tbh.)

[xenoargh]

@Alex:  Thanks!

@Meso:  We'll cross those bridges when we get there.  I'm not too worried about these issues until it's working as designed.  I'll probably have an early version out later this week

[Machine]

I had to deal with fighters ignoring a ship's bounds when making my mod's weapon spawned fighters, since non carrier bound fighters seem to ignore any kind of bound, and happily sit inside their target's bounds, more often than not right on top the ship's center. I dealt with that by changing their AI, so they no longer work like fighters. So this kinda complicates Meso's idea, not by much though.

However it also exposed a big issue, honestly sitting on top the center was not that bad, but it also made them completely broken since most ships PD can't touch them anymore, and it also meant they were immune to allied PD, since they would be inside their allies bounds.

So far not too bad, as I said before, it can be fixed (thankfully, I was close to scrap the idea). But for your proposal there's a HUGE problem, the player can't be AI fixed, so unless you make it impossible for the player to use weapons inside a ship's bounds, or alter every vanilla (and modded ship) to include internal PD coverage, I don't see the idea of collision-less player controlled ships working.

[HELMUT]

I remember that very old mod that basically did that. It worked, kinda.

http://fractalsoftworks.com/forum/index.php?topic=4252.0

From what i'm understanding, your idea is more or less Starsector Arcade, but for the campaign, with mechs? I can definitely get behind that. However i'm not convinced why those things should be fighters. Why not frigates? This would make things simpler and avoid the potential AI issues.

Another thing, the current size of the mechs are way too small. This'll cause two issues, first it'll be hard to keep sight of them in battle (especially if they can go "over" ships). Second, sprites that small are very hard to get right. Here's a comparison with a DA wanzer and your mech :



The wanzer, despite being a fighter, feels huge. It also features more details and looks noticeably better. I tried quite a few times to sprite a space mech, and it is much harder than doing a simple fighter. Tartiflette managed to do it because... Well, he's a professional artist. A frigate sized mech would not only look better, but also be much easier to sprite. And it's still possible to keep a smaller hitbox if needed (shmup style).

I would like to participate to such a project, i like the idea. Unfortunately i'm really not convinced by the execution.