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Author Topic: Starsector 0.95a (Released) Patch Notes  (Read 596129 times)

Caymon Joestar

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Re: Starsector 0.95a (In Development) Patch Notes
« Reply #570 on: November 05, 2020, 05:37:29 PM »

Ah, sorry, that's not really possible... at least, not super easily! The idea here is literally the opposite - to make the weapon type less restrictive, not more.

(I'm also not really sold that having this as a restriction makes a ton of sense, since generally speaking those types of slots are pretty rare, so weapons requiring them severely limits where they can be used.)

Ah I see rip. The idea behind it that you could have a weapon that while not able to used by every ship, could be potentially more potent (I.e More powerful) for ships that can take advantage of it. And I figured by using a tag, it would be possible to keep the way you’re doing it while letting those who may not want a say specific hybrid weapon they add to be as accessible to be more restricted. If that makes sense.

Tho personally, letting hybrid and etc into primary slots feels weird since while I’m not really into like the lore or logistics of ships, if I put like say as an example a hybrid light assault gun that instead of physical bullets, it shoots lasers like those from a small pulse turret. Wouldn’t it thematically make sense for it require a hybrid slot as it uses both ballistic and energy “supplies/components” as composed to one or the other?  Might just be me on this one tho.

But if it’s not something you can do super easily, then it’s fine, not gonna force you. Already interested in seeing how the new exotic weapons and ships function in the next update
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Alex

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Re: Starsector 0.95a (In Development) Patch Notes
« Reply #571 on: November 05, 2020, 05:58:49 PM »

Do Wasps and Mining Pods have the "auto_fighter" tag?

They do!

How do "auto_rec" and "auto_fighter" tags interact - when putting the fighter game checks for presence of "auto_rec" on ship and then check the wing for "auto_fighter"?

They don't interact at all, actually. auto_fighter is based on he presence of the "automated" hullmod on the ship, not the auto_rec tag. The auto_rec tag is purely for whether it's recoverable.

Question related to mods:
Can I make a hullmod that will nullifies the "auto_fighter" tag requirement (makes all fighters require 0 crew but gives debuffs to fighters)?
Say I have a ship with 0 crew capacity and want it to accept only drone fighters, I assume I'd have to reference auto_fighter tag in hullmod code to make it accept only drone wings?

The answer is no, I think. Firstly because I don't think there is a way for hullmods to make the ship's fighters require no crew (?), but also because this is handled via tags on the fighter wing/whether the "automated" hullmod is there. I suppose if you worked out a way to add the "automated" hullmod to the ship, perhaps?

For the second part, the thing to do would be make sure the ship has the "automated" hullmod. But iirc that'd also make it not-transfer-command-to-able...

Ah I see rip. The idea behind it that you could have a weapon that while not able to used by every ship, could be potentially more potent (I.e More powerful) for ships that can take advantage of it. And I figured by using a tag, it would be possible to keep the way you’re doing it while letting those who may not want a say specific hybrid weapon they add to be as accessible to be more restricted. If that makes sense.

Hmm, yeah. I'm not sure that's actually a great way to balance it, though, since ships with composite etc slots are not designed with that in mind, you know? The existence of weapons like that is basically a buff to composite (or whatever) slot ships, in terms of balance, then.

Tho personally, letting hybrid and etc into primary slots feels weird since while I’m not really into like the lore or logistics of ships, if I put like say as an example a hybrid light assault gun that instead of physical bullets, it shoots lasers like those from a small pulse turret. Wouldn’t it thematically make sense for it require a hybrid slot as it uses both ballistic and energy “supplies/components” as composed to one or the other?  Might just be me on this one tho.

Well... for the vanilla weapons that use this, the reasoning is rather that they can be adapted into either of the slot types! Though I see what you're saying, for sure. But also, something like the Mjolnir - ballistic type, but firing energy bolts. Basically, it's as flexible as it needs to be, lore-wise :)
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Caymon Joestar

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Re: Starsector 0.95a (In Development) Patch Notes
« Reply #572 on: November 05, 2020, 07:14:27 PM »


Ah I see rip. The idea behind it that you could have a weapon that while not able to used by every ship, could be potentially more potent (I.e More powerful) for ships that can take advantage of it. And I figured by using a tag, it would be possible to keep the way you’re doing it while letting those who may not want a say specific hybrid weapon they add to be as accessible to be more restricted. If that makes sense.

Hmm, yeah. I'm not sure that's actually a great way to balance it, though, since ships with composite etc slots are not designed with that in mind, you know? The existence of weapons like that is basically a buff to composite (or whatever) slot ships, in terms of balance, then.

Tho personally, letting hybrid and etc into primary slots feels weird since while I’m not really into like the lore or logistics of ships, if I put like say as an example a hybrid light assault gun that instead of physical bullets, it shoots lasers like those from a small pulse turret. Wouldn’t it thematically make sense for it require a hybrid slot as it uses both ballistic and energy “supplies/components” as composed to one or the other?  Might just be me on this one tho.

Well... for the vanilla weapons that use this, the reasoning is rather that they can be adapted into either of the slot types! Though I see what you're saying, for sure. But also, something like the Mjolnir - ballistic type, but firing energy bolts. Basically, it's as flexible as it needs to be, lore-wise :)

1. Well obviously the slot type shouldn’t be the only factor in balancing of secondary weapon types (Prob easier to call them this than composite and etc) but it wouldn’t (and shouldn’t ) be like 100% better than an a primary type weapon either. If say you or a modder wanted to add an dual light machine gun that in addition to say dealing slightly more dmg (like 5% more) it could periodically release swarmer srms (Like the fighter’s not the normal one) in exchange for costing 10% more flux and a OP increase of 1, it could make for an potential side grade option to a normal dual light machine gun for a ship that can use it. Prob not the best example on my part to prove my point.!

Tho you are right in that any current ships with the secondary weapons slots would be getting a indirect buff but in vanilla case, I don’t think it would have too much of an impact on the balance unless the weapon itself is broken as hell.

2. Makes sense.
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Alex

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Re: Starsector 0.95a (In Development) Patch Notes
« Reply #573 on: November 05, 2020, 07:21:50 PM »

Yeah - I guess the way I'm seeing it, it feels like adding cool new weapons! But then they're really restricted so you can't use them except on a very few specific ships. It's just, composite (etc) slots are not common enough, I don't think, to successfully use as a restriction like this. I could see this working better as part of a faction whose ships were focused on composite (etc) slots, though, hmm.

(But, yeah, these are kind of idle thoughts anyway; can't really too easily pull this off. Plus it'd be confusing for the player if the behavior between different "composite" weapons differed so drastically, so there'd be presentation issues to resolve as well.)
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Retry

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Re: Starsector 0.95a (In Development) Patch Notes
« Reply #574 on: November 05, 2020, 07:32:15 PM »

Quote
The answer is no, I think. Firstly because I don't think there is a way for hullmods to make the ship's fighters require no crew (?), but also because this is handled via tags on the fighter wing/whether the "automated" hullmod is there. I suppose if you worked out a way to add the "automated" hullmod to the ship, perhaps?

For the second part, the thing to do would be make sure the ship has the "automated" hullmod. But iirc that'd also make it not-transfer-command-to-able...
Tangentially related follow-up, mostly for modding

For the auto_fighter tag and automated hullmod, is it the "Automated" hullmod specifically that has the code or whatever that's handling the "Uses Drones Only" part?  If so, would it be possible to, say, copy part of that "Automated" hullmod that does the "Uses Drones Only" part (but not the other stuff associated the "Automated" hullmod), and have that as its own separate hullmod?

The use-case would be as a built-in for making modular non-Remnant "Drone Carriers," with some flexibility in terms of wing loadout over built-in wings (Shepherd's Borers, Tempest's Terminators), but not as much flexibility as a "full" carrier (which can have manned fighters like Broadswords).  For example, a "Drone Battlecarrier" frigate around 9-6 DP, with fairly solid capabilities with its main gun in addition to having a modular built-in drone bay.  Kinda like a beefed-up mid-tech or high-tech Shepherd?

EDIT: Actually, that Drone Battlecarrier concept could be pretty interesting in Vanilla Starsector.  Think I'll open a new topic in Suggestions too.
« Last Edit: November 05, 2020, 07:59:47 PM by Retry »
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Alex

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Re: Starsector 0.95a (In Development) Patch Notes
« Reply #575 on: November 05, 2020, 08:10:38 PM »

Ah - it's currently just checking for the presence of the "automated" hullmod, so, pretty much hardcoded.
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Avanitia

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Re: Starsector 0.95a (In Development) Patch Notes
« Reply #576 on: November 05, 2020, 08:45:00 PM »

They don't interact at all, actually. auto_fighter is based on the presence of the "automated" hullmod on the ship, not the auto_rec tag. The auto_rec tag is purely for whether it's recoverable.

Got it, makes sense.

The answer is no, I think. Firstly because I don't think there is a way for hullmods to make the ship's fighters require no crew (?), but also because this is handled via tags on the fighter wing/whether the "automated" hullmod is there. I suppose if you worked out a way to add the "automated" hullmod to the ship, perhaps?

For the second part, the thing to do would be make sure the ship has the "automated" hullmod. But iirc that'd also make it not-transfer-command-to-able...

First thing was more of "is this even doable", just an idle thought really.
As for second part, that's unfortunate - I guess only way to make it controllable by player and reject crewed wings would be a hacky hullmod that checks required crew per fighter.
Oh well. Thanks for answering my questions.
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You haven't played Starsector unless your storage has one thousand Vulcans in it.

Alex

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Re: Starsector 0.95a (In Development) Patch Notes
« Reply #577 on: November 05, 2020, 09:03:16 PM »

Ah, you know what, with the new stuff, it could actually be not-hacky! You could have a hullmod add a FighterOPCostModifier (new thing) to the ship's MutableShipStatsAPI and have it up the OP cost of crewed fighters to something very high. But then the high-OP fighters would be listed first, so that's kind of bad.

... but that's an easy fix! Just made it so that fighters costing 1000 OP or more show up last in the list, have no text for the OP cost, and instead of the gray "ordnance points" label, show a red "not installable" label. I think this really covers it pretty well, along with any other what-kind-of-fighter-can-be-installed-on-what cases.

(Edit: let me make it 10000, just to be on the safe side. I don't *think* there'd be any fighters costing that much, or ships that could afford it, but juuuust in case.)
« Last Edit: November 05, 2020, 09:07:35 PM by Alex »
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SonnaBanana

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Re: Starsector 0.95a (In Development) Patch Notes
« Reply #578 on: November 05, 2020, 09:24:40 PM »

I don't see an issue with automated carriers launching manned fighters.
Hi - this actually isn't a bug and can happen in a few cases. What it means is a militarized Prometheus Mk.II requires some auxiliary support (for additional crew capacity) to function. In terms of an in-fiction explanation, crews have to rotate off the ship during off-duty hours, life support systems are strained, etc - it's a bit of a mess in there :)

Question: can some type of sufficiently important factional contacts broker ceasefires between players and factions? After said factions are exhausted enough, that is  :P
« Last Edit: November 06, 2020, 03:30:47 AM by SonnaBanana »
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SCC

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Re: Starsector 0.95a (In Development) Patch Notes
« Reply #579 on: November 06, 2020, 12:34:01 AM »

Alex, can you make that non-installable thing work for weapons, too? I also find it amusing that you think there might be 1000+ OP fighters in the modiverse.

Super flexible weapons, I think, aren't going to be much fun, since weapons are defined by contrasting qualities. Both synergy and composite weapons would have to have qualities that aren't desirable to low tech or high tech ships. Hybrid weapons would probably be useful for low tech ships only as SO guns. The idea in general sounds like a pain in the neck to keep both interesting and balanced.

CoverdInBees

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Re: Starsector 0.95a (In Development) Patch Notes
« Reply #580 on: November 06, 2020, 04:12:15 AM »

I don't see an issue with automated carriers launching manned fighters.
Hi - this actually isn't a bug and can happen in a few cases. What it means is a militarized Prometheus Mk.II requires some auxiliary support (for additional crew capacity) to function. In terms of an in-fiction explanation, crews have to rotate off the ship during off-duty hours, life support systems are strained, etc - it's a bit of a mess in there :)


Some ships + hullmods getting strained beyond sustainably supporting their crew without support doesn't seem like a good reason to handwave away restrictions for ships that aren't supposed to have any provisions for crew at all.
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Dri

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Re: Starsector 0.95a (In Development) Patch Notes
« Reply #581 on: November 06, 2020, 10:14:11 AM »

What video card do you have now Alex?
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Alex

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Re: Starsector 0.95a (In Development) Patch Notes
« Reply #582 on: November 06, 2020, 12:34:04 PM »

Question: can some type of sufficiently important factional contacts broker ceasefires between players and factions? After said factions are exhausted enough, that is  :P

Not at the moment, no.

Alex, can you make that non-installable thing work for weapons, too? I also find it amusing that you think there might be 1000+ OP fighters in the modiverse.

Ah, good call - did that!

(You mean there aren't? I'm disappointed.)

Super flexible weapons, I think, aren't going to be much fun, since weapons are defined by contrasting qualities. Both synergy and composite weapons would have to have qualities that aren't desirable to low tech or high tech ships. Hybrid weapons would probably be useful for low tech ships only as SO guns. The idea in general sounds like a pain in the neck to keep both interesting and balanced.

It's trickier, for sure, but I don't think the specifics are quite as you say. E.G. a hypothetical "hybrid" type weapon might be very useful in an energy slot if it did kinetic damage, or useful in a ballistic slot if it did EMP damage, and so on. It just depends on which way they lean compared to what's usually available for those slots. They'll probably lean one way or another in terms of net usefulness, though, but if they offer some degree of flexibility or utility they could be worthwhile on different types of ships.

What video card do you have now Alex?

GeForce RTX 2080 (as of a couple of years ago, I forget what I had before that point, but also NVIDIA); why do you ask?
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Wyvern

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Re: Starsector 0.95a (In Development) Patch Notes
« Reply #583 on: November 06, 2020, 01:12:03 PM »

Super flexible weapons, I think, aren't going to be much fun, since weapons are defined by contrasting qualities. Both synergy and composite weapons would have to have qualities that aren't desirable to low tech or high tech ships. Hybrid weapons would probably be useful for low tech ships only as SO guns. The idea in general sounds like a pain in the neck to keep both interesting and balanced.

It's trickier, for sure, but I don't think the specifics are quite as you say. E.G. a hypothetical "hybrid" type weapon might be very useful in an energy slot if it did kinetic damage, or useful in a ballistic slot if it did EMP damage, and so on. It just depends on which way they lean compared to what's usually available for those slots. They'll probably lean one way or another in terms of net usefulness, though, but if they offer some degree of flexibility or utility they could be worthwhile on different types of ships.
Yup! Can verify - while I don't think I'd ever use a (vanilla) medium energy weapon in a hybrid or universal slot, the antimatter blaster, ion cannon, and tachyon lance are all weapons that I have used in such slots; ballistic weaponry simply doesn't have anything that fits the same niches.
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AsterPiano

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Re: Starsector 0.95a (In Development) Patch Notes
« Reply #584 on: November 06, 2020, 03:59:15 PM »

Alex, can you make that non-installable thing work for weapons, too? I also find it amusing that you think there might be 1000+ OP fighters in the modiverse.

Ah, good call - did that!

(You mean there aren't? I'm disappointed.)
There are at least mod ships (though only cheat level ships afaik) with 1000+ OP in the modiverse
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