Battle in I-War

[Belter_john]

One thing I miss in I-War 2 is the lack of being able to jump into Engineering, specify priority for thrusters and a missile launcher (or some other strategy), and thereby survive a long battle vs superior numbers. Most of the time in I-War 2, if you jump off targeting, you die within seconds. Ships do not become disabled and drift for 30-60 seconds like in I-War, original. This really hurts I-War 2 dogfighting options.

So perhaps just adding armor to the main ring would restore some of this tactical gameplay to I-War 2? Is it that simple?

Anyway (IMHO) the ships are much too fragile in I-War 2. There is no system failure senario other than shields and armor and instant destruction. I miss the tactic of say, Ripple-fire missiles at 6 incoming Patcoms, then, if able, finish off 2 or 3 and jump into LDS for repairs to combat systems. Then go after the remaining ships. That was one of original I-War's unique elements. The battles had great depth of playing options.

-Belter

[Stephen Robertson]

AFAIK there is a mod for I-War 2 that restores some of the system damage functionality you're after.

The reasoning behind the damage system in I-War 2 was that drifting in space with no control and being shot at for 2 minutes without being able to do anything about it wasn't fun.

However in retrospect it added a lot of tension to the game, and occasionally you could get your ship repaired enough to run away, which made for an exciting experience.

[Cougaris]

Must have missed that Mod. Location?

Hanging around for a minute would be pretty boring alright. If you could bring it down to 10-15 seconds though...:)

[Dreadnaught]

Originally posted by Stephen Robertson
However in retrospect it added a lot of tension to the game, and occasionally you could get your ship repaired enough to run away, which made for an exciting experience.

Indeed, that was always a LOT of fun!!:up:

[MichaelShane]

Must have missed that Mod. Location? It was created by Flamineo about a year ago for use in the Epic Mod. And, I have to say, it's pure brilliance. :D Combat becomes quite grueling, and when a system is destroyed it's removed from the ship and inventory... forever. :eek:

Coupled with higher ship hit points, combat can take some time. Usually resulting in a ship having to withdraw to repair.

However, IIRC, it had some Epic dependencies; it required mods to change the autorepair rates, hit points, and armor ratings to be fully effective. Also, the flux entry concerning system damage had to be modified.

As far as I can see, it's not available for download on the Epic site or in Soup's download page, but maybe GrandpaTrout could find a link to it somewhere (I think I saw it in the last Epic release)?

Found it. Here's the thread:

http://i-war2.com/forum/topic.asp?TOPIC_ID=691

The links still work. :)

[jessica00]

its a wonder no one ever made a mod to make the game exactly like the original

[MichaelShane]

Once or twice there was talk at Soup's about modding EoC to become I-War. Actually duplicating the missions and flight dynamics to recreate the I-War game with Flux.

But panning the player's POV to another workstation doesn't appear do-able.

That kinda breaks the whole project.

[arrrse]

^
|
I wannit

[Dreadnaught]

Originally posted by MichaelShane
But panning the player's POV to another workstation doesn't appear do-able.

That kinda breaks the whole project.

I thought it was the insane amount of work that would be required to transfer models and scripts into an I-War I-esque game :confused: :p

[MichaelShane]

I don't want to give the wrong impression; I would not attemp such a feat. :D I'm just saying it was mentioned (and promptly shot down by those acquainted with modding EoC).

It would be a nightmare task just pulling the information from the old game (x station is this far from x planet/station/etc., so-and-so mission had to start at x location at x time).

Legacy systems and glide wrappers are much simpler! :)

[dmfp321]

Is epic still being developed or has it been abandoned?

[GrandpaTrout]

Epic floundered pretty badly last fall. It has resumed development. I now think of it as the rather pleasing paradox of "tiny EPIC".

It is much simpler overall. For instance, at one time I had planned for the player to be able to assassinate faction leaders. And you could do that by learning the travel plans of a leader, and laying in wait, and striking when they passed. Hours were spent figuring out where leaders would go, when, how, using what guards.

All Gone. You can still bump off faction leaders. But now you just attack the faction HQ and wipe out the command section module. No tracking, no travel, no stealth.

Not so great, but feasible to code.

There are a lot of changes like that. Non player Stations earn money, but with a very simple economy. There are missions, but they are simpler. There is still automated faction wars (rebels, corporations, governments, pirates), but no chess board of always present fleets. (essentially IFleet style).

No promises as to when it will be done. But the date is closer than "Never" which is where it was heading.

[Cougaris]

The problem with doing ambitious mods like Epic are that all the hard work you and others have put into it will be squandered should the project fall apart (as was nearly the case, by your own admission).

Frankly, I'm foaming at the mouth for the system damage functionality mentioned above. Likewise, I have seen tonnes of cool little modifications the Epic team have made. But it gets tiring waiting for some massive super release., which I may or may not enjoy (I keep thinking that making your own systems and such is just making things harder on yourselves - work with the EoC universe as it is).

Surely you can see the benefits of releasing bits and pieces piecemeal, allowing your work to be appreciated (and allowing the user to customize their game to include this and that) and preventing the loss of the good work should the project flounder yet again.

Pretty please? :)

[GrandpaTrout]

Ah, 20/20 hindsight. Yes, I think the planning would be different the second time around.

But it is hard to section. Many pieces are dependent. And breaking those up can be difficult.

Damage mod is not very dependent on Epic. It would work just as well with Elite. The real trick is the ships need enough hit points to survive long enough that you notice the subsystem damage. But lots of people know how to edit INI files.

One change that would make damage mod really great is giving the player some way to purchase and replenish Repair Units. Just a little piece of code that deducts any used Repair Units from the player inventory when the player docks back at base.

And then give the player a blue print for making more. That pirated inventory will not last long. Anyone feel like doing some modding?

[dmfp321]

EDIT: sry, posted in wrong thread

[MichaelShane]

Originally posted by Cougaris
Frankly, I'm foaming at the mouth for the system damage functionality mentioned above. How much interest is there in this?

I could create a mod which would run in tandem with Flamineo's and would set the default EoC ship's hits and autorepair rates to the correct hit point levels. Given a week (maybe 10 days tops), I could probably get the I-War levels of acceleration in place (since I'm experimenting with just that very thing on a mod I'm currently working on).

The acceleration values are tricky. Get 'em too low and freighters can't stop fast enough to avoid ramming stations. Big damn mess... cargo everywhere. :D

Like I said, it'd be a week or so before I could get it all put together, and it'd just use the standard EoC missions. It'd mean playing through the game again or just running in free-form mode; no new missions.

Is there enough interest in that for the work involved? How many people here even have EoC installed?

Oh, and others would have to test it. ;) (That's the part that takes up so much time.) See if the changes make the "Trouble With Gunstars" or the Oman missions or others impossible, and if they do, report them back to me and I'd make adjustments.

If others are willing, I'd give it a go.

[Zamboni]

... A fully loaded corvette is virtually indestructable... ie. combat LDA w/ sync and booster. I can take down dozens of destroyers without even losing more than 50% shield...

The tug is really the ONLY thing in the game that dies quickly... The interceptor and patcom are both too small to be hit by energy weapons at medium range and can easilly dodge missiles.

[Cougaris]

I don't know about tinkering with the acceleration - seems kinda dicey if it will work out alright.

But I agree with Zamboni. I'd rather fly a real ship, rather then an avatar with a percentage-life attached. I have EoC installed at the moment, so I'd be pretty happy to give the mod a crack. It sounds like a really cool mod, IMO.

[Greb]

I too would be very interested in such a mod. Flying a ship in EoC feels rather like flying a big, heavy fighter, not a million tonne starship.

I'd like different command stations too, but It appears this is impossible. :(

Greb

[GrandpaTrout]

Hmmm. It would be nice if Flamineo's work reached a wider audience. Cougaris has a valid point about piecemeal releases vs lost work.
Shane, if your going to change the INI files, I will pull together the Damage mod bits and add Repair Units to the player inventory. And account for any epic dependencies.

I should be able to finish it by Monday (since it really works just fine).

[Cougaris]

Small, incremental mods are much better then one giga-mod. For a starters, you get feedback on how well it functions and can get bug reports on that particular mod, as opposed to having to track down the bug through heaps of code.

There are a few other mods I'd like to see made available piecemeal:

- That economy mod thingie that Epic is going to make use of.
- Gunstar defences (that function) for correct type of stations.
- More traffic scripts around stations.
- Basically, little things that help improve the atmosphere of the game without compromising it totally (i.e. by forcing the player to adopt another persons (modders) play style). Example: there was a mod released a good while back that forced the player to make use of a cargo ship (had a skull on the front). It was nicely done, but didn't fit into the EoC universe I play in.

After all, making mods smaller and releaseing them piecemeal, is kinda good programming practice (nice OO deisgn :D)

[MichaelShane]

Okay. I'll get started changing the ini values tonight.

To ease the strain on the player, would it be possible to convert manufacturing points into Repair units via a special blueprint? Or would that be 'technically' silly?

[GrandpaTrout]

Yeah, that is exactly what I had in mind. Create a Repair Unit cargo type that can be "built" using a blueprint. Just like gattling ammo, each pod would be worth 100 (or some number) of Repair Units loaded on the player ship.

When you launch your ship, the mod would "fill up" your ships repair units with as many units as you had in inventory. (up to max ship capacity). If you have less in stock, you get what you have.

When you return to base, any unused units are returned to stock.

By letting the player manufacture the units, we don't need to mess with FutureTrader or anything.

Adding the cargo item for repair units is simple.

And I worked out an inventory system like this for the hacking mod. So I have a pattern in mind that should work. The only part I don't know how to do right off is set the repair units properly in Flamenio's code. But I can read that code!

To handle the blueprint, I think I just need to set a boolean flag that tells the game the player can manufacture that kind of cargo.

If I cannot create a blueprint, then I will add a trade. Say, let the player convert ship parts into repair units.

[MajorTom]

You can use the int value of the cargo enum to make a really simple Repair Unit value per pod type, that makes some sense.

Wste has values between 1 and 7

food is between 8 and 26

organic stuff (animals and bacteria) go up to 100

avionics stuff goes up to around 250

Raw materials and minerals are around 400 (Gold finally gets a value at 430)

Weapons are in the 500s range

Ship systems like shields are around 600.

To top it off a Cargo "advanced hull material refit" has 611

Course, you could put a ceiling or bottom value on that too but at least you have some order of value, already given, that you could use.

[Belter_john]

Originally posted by Stephen Robertson
AFAIK there is a mod for I-War 2 that restores some of the system damage functionality you're after.

The reasoning behind the damage system in I-War 2 was that drifting in space with no control and being shot at for 2 minutes without being able to do anything about it wasn't fun.

However in retrospect it added a lot of tension to the game, and occasionally you could get your ship repaired enough to run away, which made for an exciting experience.

I will try the mod, could be fun. I remember in I-War 1, I would usually manage to finish off several of a larger force and damage some others by using ripple-fire. Then I would use LDS to evade, even if I could not control speed or direction, to get some protection while I was in engineering fixing nav and weapons systems to where I could resume the battle. Many times I left my opponents drifting also so only one or two ships could actually pursue. I could usually win the battle if I got this far and this was how I won the Gunstar mission the first time.

All in all, I used LDS drive to manuever into manageable dogfights in most I-War 1 battles. In I-War 2 opponents seem to carry an endless supply of long range LDSI missiles which stops this option. It's okay, but leaves you always at the mercy of Newtonian Physics in dogfights. LDS Drive offers retreat and attack options at low speeds, even if you can't fire.

The other thing I would really like to see in...... I-War 3? :) Is Padlock View of the target from your cockpit. Even if it was limited it would greatly enhance awareness of the battles for players. I-War certainly has the best realism and viewable-depth of any space-sim already. Padlock View would just add to what is already there.

In any event, the I-War Series is the most realistic and entertaining space-action sim to date and I hope to see more to come.


-Belter

[Red_Hex]

a few years ago i recall someone - hogfoot? - attempting to mod ripple fire into eoc. did anyone ever succeed?

[MichaelShane]

If memory serves, Mehrune's iFleet contains a Ripple-fire mode.

[GrandpaTrout]

You can use the int value of the cargo enum to make a really simple Repair Unit value per pod type, that makes some sense.

Good idea. If I cannot make the manufacturing work, I will give this a spin.

[Belter_john]

Here is a thought. Is there any way to greatly increase sensor range? Or keep a lock on previously targeted ships and/or cargo. 400-500 kilometers, maybe? This would allow some interesting tactics, like hit and fade, to develope. Not sure if it would hurt game balance tho. Does the engine support this range? It does for Distress and other nav markers, but what does it do with ships after contact is lost?

-Belter

[EricMan64]

Generally, other ships only exist within a 400km radius sphere around the ship. If a ship leaves that range, it is deleted (or as us EoC scripters say 'culled'). This means that 400km is the reasonable limit to sensors.

[chichi77]

Originally posted by Belter_john

In any event, the I-War Series is the most realistic and entertaining space-action sim to date and I hope to see more to come.


You could say that again. :)
Yeah ! :up: