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[EnigmaniteZ]

BGECarapace.kt function advanceInCombat contains:
ship.captain?.setPersonality("reckless")
permanently changes officers assigned to the ship.

example fix:

    override fun advanceInCombat(ship: ShipAPI, amount: Float) {
        modifyPowerLevel(ship)
        hideControlCollarIfNotPlayer(ship)
        val cap=ship.captain
        if (cap != null) {
            val isDef=cap.isDefault
            if (isDef) {
                ship.captain?.setPersonality("reckless")
            }
        }
        erraticPropulsion.advanceInCombat(ship, amount)
    }

[Reshy]

The Toxocyst ship seems to play with an AI in a weird way, ships don't maintain proper distance or will refuse to disengage when damaged.  Additionally it's weapon seems to bypass shields, which the AI is also kinda not sure how to deal with.  As the AI is coded it'll remain in the fight so long as it's shield isn't pressured even if it's armor is completely stripped.  Might be worth looking at bug fixing those issues.

[EnigmaniteZ]

SVC have reckless AI. (and this gets applied to any human officers that pilot them permanently). the weapons are basically designed to get around shields, too, and i'm pretty certain that's intentional at this point. but as for bug fixing...well, I doubt that'll happen. heh.

[Reshy]

SVC have reckless AI. (and this gets applied to any human officers that pilot them permanently). the weapons are basically designed to get around shields, too, and i'm pretty certain that's intentional at this point. but as for bug fixing...well, I doubt that'll happen. heh.

Usually a mark of poor design when it confuses the singleplayer AI, considering that's a major part of the campaign.


Will mention it does sorta feel like the creatures are designed assuming you're full boating exclusively HE weaponry, it could probably be worth tuning it down so they're not so much of an active drain on resources even when you overpower them.  Them getting around shields just makes them... for lack of better words, unfun, since they're ignoring a crucial part of the gameplay and the player can't be expected to pilot their entire fleet simultaneously.

[EnigmaniteZ]

well, if you open up tips.json in the mod's data/strings folder it kinda tells you what's expected;
Voidlings are melee and heavily armored, you're either very mobile or have superior firepower.
Plus, you can choose most of the time whether to engage them.
As for the AI and shields... that teleporting minelayer system comes to mind.
But also, there is this system for measuring the threat level of ships in the game, and maybe that ship doesn't have those values set properly. I haven't gone so far as to look at that.

[Reshy]

well, if you open up tips.json in the mod's data/strings folder it kinda tells you what's expected;
Voidlings are melee and heavily armored, you're either very mobile or have superior firepower.
Plus, you can choose most of the time whether to engage them.
As for the AI and shields... that teleporting minelayer system comes to mind.
But also, there is this system for measuring the threat level of ships in the game, and maybe that ship doesn't have those values set properly. I haven't gone so far as to look at that.

I've been using fairly agile ships but I've noticed that even with that they seem to not properly disengage from the void creatures when able to.  For example a Medusa won't phase shift away from a shield-piercing attack because it's shields are still up even if it's hull and armor is critical. 

[EnigmaniteZ]

just checked fleet points and those seem set properly.
as for the movement...I guess it depends on which enemy. problem with medusa not phase shifting is it's a "in the direction it is traveling" ability...if it even uses it, would it even go anywhere? the void creatures have grapplers which pull ships to them, which could be interfering
other than that, idk? I know vanilla AI is...prohibitively stupid sometimes...

[mllhild]

I tried to do a themed run as Monster Hunter. (Modlists: Nex, SiC, QoL)
It failed terribly due to economics. So from that POV I will list the Problems I had and the suggestions.

Problem: It can be really hard to find the Void creatures reliably, compared to Probes.
Suggestion: Visits to Bars giving info on in which systems they have been seen.

Problem: They feel rare, not like spreading pests as described in the bounty.
Suggestion 1: Add "Initial Count of Infested Systems" "Infestation Degree" option via LunaLib, so that the amount of their presence can be set.
Suggestion 2: Add "Reproduction Rate" option, so that if you dont kill all of them in a system, they start multiplying until a limit is reached.
Suggestion 3: Add "Infestation Spread Speed" option, so that they can spread to neighboring star systems.

Problem: Not easy to distinguish types.
Suggestion: The Phase capable ones get some distinct purple glowing organs. The EMP ones get a blue glowing organ.

Problem: Ship AI seems to fail hard on the Phase type since its skill appears to be instant after dephasing.
Suggestion: Add a bit of fire delay to their ranged weapons and skills.

Problem: Ship AI does not seem to disengage properly.
Suggestion: No idea. I dont get why my ships just suicide when fighting.

Problem: Too much all around armor on the small ones. (A 14 FP Swarmhost has more armor than an Onslaught, even the smallest one has armor of cruiser, that is without considering the evolutions that push it into capital level armor)
Suggestion: Instead of normal armor stats, use directional ablative armor plates. (ex: UAF) That way flanking them actually means something and Kinetics dont just tickle them.

Problem: Too high maneuverability. (You capital class has turnrates higher than some frigates) (They have turn rates that keep up with safety override frigates with maneuvering trousters.)
Suggestion: Decrease their turn rates a bit (-20%/-25%/-30%/-35%). That way flanking them becomes possible with fast ships.

Problem: Too steep of a combat curve. Their fleet spawns go from single frigate to two frigates and a cruiser.
Suggestion: Upgrade the current frigates a bit in size(but not stats) and set them to destroyer class. Introduce a few youngling types that each have a degraded version of the adults ability and stats as frigates. That way the player can get used to them and you can increase the number of enemies, so they feel more like pests that grow into nightmares. (tldr: danger in number, but individually weak.)


In total they have potential, but their overreliance on high tech ship systems(phase, emp, entropy) doesnt quite fit the theme of void monsters that are trying to eat you. (Dashes and slowing projectiles would fit a bit better)
Also Hull tanks would fit living creatures better than being Armor tanks.

[Reshy]

I tried to do a themed run as Monster Hunter. (Modlists: Nex, SiC, QoL)
It failed terribly due to economics. So from that POV I will list the Problems I had and the suggestions.

Problem: It can be really hard to find the Void creatures reliably, compared to Probes.
Suggestion: Visits to Bars giving info on in which systems they have been seen.

Problem: They feel rare, not like spreading pests as described in the bounty.
Suggestion 1: Add "Initial Count of Infested Systems" "Infestation Degree" option via LunaLib, so that the amount of their presence can be set.
Suggestion 2: Add "Reproduction Rate" option, so that if you dont kill all of them in a system, they start multiplying until a limit is reached.
Suggestion 3: Add "Infestation Spread Speed" option, so that they can spread to neighboring star systems.

Problem: Not easy to distinguish types.
Suggestion: The Phase capable ones get some distinct purple glowing organs. The EMP ones get a blue glowing organ.

Problem: Ship AI seems to fail hard on the Phase type since its skill appears to be instant after dephasing.
Suggestion: Add a bit of fire delay to their ranged weapons and skills.

Problem: Ship AI does not seem to disengage properly.
Suggestion: No idea. I dont get why my ships just suicide when fighting.

Problem: Too much all around armor on the small ones. (A 14 FP Swarmhost has more armor than an Onslaught, even the smallest one has armor of cruiser, that is without considering the evolutions that push it into capital level armor)
Suggestion: Instead of normal armor stats, use directional ablative armor plates. (ex: UAF) That way flanking them actually means something and Kinetics dont just tickle them.

Problem: Too high maneuverability. (You capital class has turnrates higher than some frigates) (They have turn rates that keep up with safety override frigates with maneuvering trousters.)
Suggestion: Decrease their turn rates a bit (-20%/-25%/-30%/-35%). That way flanking them becomes possible with fast ships.

Problem: Too steep of a combat curve. Their fleet spawns go from single frigate to two frigates and a cruiser.
Suggestion: Upgrade the current frigates a bit in size(but not stats) and set them to destroyer class. Introduce a few youngling types that each have a degraded version of the adults ability and stats as frigates. That way the player can get used to them and you can increase the number of enemies, so they feel more like pests that grow into nightmares. (tldr: danger in number, but individually weak.)


In total they have potential, but their overreliance on high tech ship systems(phase, emp, entropy) doesnt quite fit the theme of void monsters that are trying to eat you. (Dashes and slowing projectiles would fit a bit better)
Also Hull tanks would fit living creatures better than being Armor tanks.

This has been largely my experience as well.  They're interesting, but a bit overtuned.  I'd say they're as dangerous as remnant fleets if not more so due to how the standard ship AI handles them. 



Edit:  Playing around with the creatures themselves, I noticed that you can only have one "Alpha" in your fleet, BUT the fleets that enemies spawn can have several alphas which should render their combat rating 0 but it doesn't appear to. 




I'd either remove the limitation from the player, or to add a hard limit to the amount of alpha creatures to 1 in any given fleet to keep things consistent.  If the penalty is maintained I'd recommend at the bare minimum making the penalty only apply to active alpha bugs rather than mothballed ones.



EDIT:  Additionally, I noticed that if a Stjarwhal derelicts from a bug attacks salvaging it does not produce any of the Stjarwhal oil and you also cannot recover it and heal it.

[Reshy]

Another bug, but the "detected bugs" event references your own fleet rather than the enemy fleet:




EDIT:  Another bug, but if a Void Creature fleet ends up in real space or they have a derelict you only get standard metals in salvage rather than void chitin.

[Tecrys]

I tried to do a themed run as Monster Hunter. (Modlists: Nex, SiC, QoL)
It failed terribly due to economics. So from that POV I will list the Problems I had and the suggestions.

Unfortunately a themed run isn't really supported at the moment. We might be able to support that in a future update.

Problem: It can be really hard to find the Void creatures reliably, compared to Probes.
Suggestion: Visits to Bars giving info on in which systems they have been seen.

That's a cool suggestion. Will look into it.

Problem: They feel rare, not like spreading pests as described in the bounty.
Suggestion 1: Add "Initial Count of Infested Systems" "Infestation Degree" option via LunaLib, so that the amount of their presence can be set.
Suggestion 2: Add "Reproduction Rate" option, so that if you dont kill all of them in a system, they start multiplying until a limit is reached.
Suggestion 3: Add "Infestation Spread Speed" option, so that they can spread to neighboring star systems.

Spawn rates increase over time and the farther you are away from core worlds.
Also in dev mode spawn rates are massively increased for testing purposes.
Adding options to lunalib to change spawning settings is a nice idea.

Problem: Not easy to distinguish types.
Suggestion: The Phase capable ones get some distinct purple glowing organs. The EMP ones get a blue glowing organ.

There's only one Voidling capable of phasing. No Voidling or weapon has any notable amount of EMP damage.

Problem: Ship AI does not seem to disengage properly.
Suggestion: No idea. I dont get why my ships just suicide when fighting.

The way they behave is fine for enemies but I agree that their AI needs to be more predictable and tweakable when in player fleets. I'll look into it when I get back into modding.

[...]
permanently changes officers assigned to the ship.
[...]

This is an oversight. Thanks for reporting the issue.

Edit:  Playing around with the creatures themselves, I noticed that you can only have one "Alpha" in your fleet, BUT the fleets that enemies spawn can have several alphas which should render their combat rating 0 but it doesn't appear to. 

This is intended and explained in the Alpha Voidling hullmod. There might be ways in the future to bypass this limitation through story content or quests

The Toxocyst ship seems to play with an AI in a weird way, ships don't maintain proper distance or will refuse to disengage when damaged.  Additionally it's weapon seems to bypass shields, which the AI is also kinda not sure how to deal with.

Are you using Advanced Gunnery Control? All Voidlings should behave much better when that mod is installed, though I admit that the Toxocyst is an edge case because it's the only phaseship. Increasing its phase cooldown might be a bandaid fix.
The ship is not able to bypass or penetrate shields but it uses the same ship system as the harbinger which momentarily overloads an enemy in range. That might make it seem like it ignores shields.

[Killer of Fate]

hi, i was playing your mod a long time ago and had my ass kicked, cause i was using vanilla ships
but generally i think it looks really cool...
I'm going to play it a bit more soon. And if you ever need sound effects or maybe some descriptions, just message me

I wish you all the best

edit: Also, i think this should be put into mods instead of modding, considering how much effort you clearly put it into it
try messaging Alex about it, if you feel comfortable being on the front page

[Tecrys]

hi, i was playing your mod a long time ago and had my ass kicked, cause i was using vanilla ships
but generally i think it looks really cool...
I'm going to play it a bit more soon. And if you ever need sound effects or maybe some descriptions, just message me

I wish you all the best

edit: Also, i think this should be put into mods instead of modding, considering how much effort you clearly put it into it
try messaging Alex about it, if you feel comfortable being on the front page

Hi!
I could actually use a few better sound effects here and there. In addition to descriptions, would you also be able to write dialogue?

Since the indev patch notes for the next big Starsector update are out Jannes and I are planning on getting back into working on SVC so we can offer some more content when the big update hits Starsector. We had some big things already half finished.

[Killer of Fate]

hi, i was playing your mod a long time ago and had my ass kicked, cause i was using vanilla ships
but generally i think it looks really cool...
I'm going to play it a bit more soon. And if you ever need sound effects or maybe some descriptions, just message me

I wish you all the best

edit: Also, i think this should be put into mods instead of modding, considering how much effort you clearly put it into it
try messaging Alex about it, if you feel comfortable being on the front page

Hi!
I could actually use a few better sound effects here and there. In addition to descriptions, would you also be able to write dialogue?

Since the indev patch notes for the next big Starsector update are out Jannes and I are planning on getting back into working on SVC so we can offer some more content when the big update hits Starsector. We had some big things already half finished.

Oh, uhhhhhhh... Yes. I'll see what I can do. You can contact me on Discord if you want to. Message me personally through the forums for details

this post has been edited, because I didn't want to appear like I'm self-advertising too much

[momom2]

I found a system where the void creatures had taken control of a nav buoy. I think it's a bug, they're not supposed to control infrastructure at all?
Suggestion: don't have them fight alongside regular ships in station attack due to More Military Missions; if they get picked, let them be the only faction of the attack.

I met Stjarwhals in the Abyss, and didn't have any idea what I was facing, so I picked attack to see them up close - after I exterminated the pack, it told me I failed to protect them from hungry voidlings.
So there's a bug to fix there, but also I think it'd be nice to have a bit of dialogue to explain that the creatures are peaceful, and you can just enjoy burning next to them, that they need protection (if applicable), and that you can get rare ressources from killing them. I hope there's a way to make up to them, their dying hululations were so painful...