Author Topic: Contraband  (Read 62922 times)

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Offline Rheyah

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  • Will release something one day. Promise.
So the screenshots are a little late and for good reason.  My PhD kicked into overdrive this week so I had a lot of stuff to be getting on with.  However it's weekend now so I finally have a little free time.  I'll post some WIP stuff tonight so people can see a little bit of what I'm seeing and writing.

 

Offline Rheyah

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  • Will release something one day. Promise.


This is Orkney Station - a former manufacturing, processing and mining outpost.

 
Looking very nice!
"Wouldn't it be so wonderful if everything were meaningless?
But everything is so meaningful, and most everything turns to ****.
Rejoice."
-David Bazan

 

Offline Rheyah

  • 28
  • Will release something one day. Promise.
So the question of what it is I am doing arises periodically.  I ask it myself.  So here is the update:

I will have a series of screenshots of a completed mission very soon.  I scrapped a lot of the work I had done and put some of it back to later campaigns because it didn't fit, felt too early or I didn't feel the story was fleshed out enough.  As such, the story is now in its final form and won't be altering other than minor alterations.

Loads of new weapons with weapon effects are in the game.  This slowed me down A LOT.  There is also much more coherant styling for ships of various factions.  I may be doing a bit of reskinning but not until Act 1 is out.  I don't plan to change much in the tbls from now on, which is thankful because it was driving me slowly mad.

Finally, I have also substantially changed the mission structure.  The story of "Shetland" will be split into 4 acts of ~8-10 missions each.  I have plans beyond this, but I would like to complete Act 1 first and show what my story is going to be about.  I had originally planned on a campaign of 25 missions split into two, but decided that this was telling the story too quickly and

At present, Mission 3 is almost complete.  Mission 1 is going to be the hardest to write and FRED so I will be doing that last.  I am finally happy with everything and am making good progress on that.

Previous missions I have mentioned are being put in a cupboard for now for later acts.  If you are wondering whether this mod is just treading water, it isn't.  I've done tons of work on it and it's getting much quicker to build missions now.  Very pleased with the way things are going :)
« Last Edit: January 02, 2014, 06:03:32 pm by Rheyah »

 
 

Offline Lorric

  • 212
Good luck from me too. It seems unusual to finish the first mission last and for the first mission to be the most complex. That's intriguing.

I hope to resume work on my own campaign at some point, and I might just give your style of updating a try in my own campaign thread if I can get going, I quite like it. It is something that would be nice to look back on if and when the project is completed.

 

Offline Rheyah

  • 28
  • Will release something one day. Promise.
Update.

FREDing is bloody hard work!

 

Offline Lorric

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Offline Rheyah

  • 28
  • Will release something one day. Promise.
Update nine million and one.

I spent the last few days completely debugging my tbms and getting certain weapons working.  Now I am just working on missions and mission design.  This is the hard part - balancing and so on is actually fairly difficult.  Got some interesting ideas though.  At present I'm working on mission 4 which is one of the simpler missions to FRED.

 

Offline Rheyah

  • 28
  • Will release something one day. Promise.
Minuscule update.  I've been working on the narrative structure of the campaign the last few days in order to make it fit my own prejudices a bit more, particularly the world building aspect.  There were some elements of the campaign I felt were out of order and inhibited narrative progression.

As such, very little visible progress has been made other than tweaking and so on.  Which is annoying since I hoped to have a ton to show by now but nothing I make is satisfying to me.  Ah well.  I should have something to show for all my effort soon enough.  It's been a long road, learning everything from scratch as I have done.

 

Offline Rheyah

  • 28
  • Will release something one day. Promise.
Etos Industries Celebrates Bumper New Year But Experts Warn of Malingering

Etos Industries released its 2387 first quarter results to considerable fanfare after years of lackluster performance.  Net sales have increased to GCD 1.3 trillion (+17.2% on Q1 2386) with profits increasing by 8.4% to GCD 97 billion.  This is a recent up turn for Etos Industries, which for the last thirteen quarters has been a consistently average prospect for investors and potential business partners alike.

A little history is required for those of you more rooted in Core Zone prospects.  Etos Industries was founded in 2371 as a merger between two Altair-based mining magnates.  As with most corporations founded during that time, little state funding was available due to the pressures of the recession and the Disillusionment.  To paraphrase local business news, they grew "parasitically but organically", taking over weaker rivals and growing larger without any significant industrial oversight.  They were named the Treasury 2374 "Prospect To Watch" and this trend continued year on year until 2378 - the year the GTVA formalized the Petrarch Doctrine.

Etos Industries underwent a shift in strategy during those years.  As old investments grew under the new GTVA climate, Etos was one of the first adopters of the notion of Red Dipping - GTVA registered corporations investing in infrastructure beyond the Green Zones.  The Red Zones experienced large scale migration in both directions during those years and Etos was able to confirm its presence in a number of systems.  This strategy paid dividends until recent years saw a downturn in those markets.  Market analysts believe this is due to the manner in which native Red Zone organizations have begun to organize - often forming co-operatives and alliances of their own which are able to compete for and control local resources.

So why the sudden change in profitability?

There are a few reasons that present themselves.  First is Etos' own proclamations.  Their recently appointed CEO, Ms Lynda Barker states "Our financial results are the result of a long underway and extensive re-branding and slimming strategy, focusing chiefly on our core competencies and extending our reach to new markets.  We are proud to be at the fore front of industry beyond the Petrarch Nodes and are committed to our long term strategy of developing undeveloped systems."

Etos amongst a number of Red Dippers have become more aggressive in the way they deal with privateers.  Red Zone founded corporations are not afforded full GTVA business protection clauses and are invariably unfavoured compared to Core or Green Zone organizations.  This strategy is commonly known as Dip Padding, which means upping your profit margins through squeezing independent contractors and aggressively pursuing debt.

More concerning to potential investors is the rumours concerning possible Red Zone connections with the Wayward Sons of Capella, a well known and established paramilitary syndicate.  Etos denies these rumours in the strongest possible terms, stating that their official company policy "is to rigorously investigate all connections with Blacklisted organizations and report them to the central regulator".  This has done little to reassure sentient rights campaign groups who claim to have evidence of active collusion with criminal elements in at least three systems.

The recent acquisition of a number of smaller competitors in a variety of markets joins the complete change of staff in the boardroom.  Recent CEO Ausar Bastbadru was ousted after overseeing the final years of poor financial results.  While he could not be reached for comment, the Vasudan CEO was pivotal to a softening of a number of Etos policies relating to social inclusion and was popular in those communities within which Etos operated.  Perhaps it is indicative of the more aggresive approach they intend to take with their business strategy that they oust a well loved CEO in favour of a younger and if rumours are to be trusted, far more fiery CEO.

Watch this space.
« Last Edit: May 25, 2014, 07:06:36 pm by Rheyah »

 

Offline General Battuta

  • Poe's Law In Action
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What's your Petrarch Doctrine, pilot?

 

Offline Black Wolf

  • Twisted Infinities
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  • Hey! You! Get off-a my cloud!
    • Visit the TI homepage!
Might want to fix a couple of those dates. :P
TWISTED INFINITIES · SECTORGAME· FRONTLINES
Rarely Updated P3D.
Burn the heretic who killed F2S! Burn him, burn him!!- GalEmp

 

Offline Luis Dias

  • 211
2697 first quarter results? Wow wasn't aware this mod was so far out in the future! :D

 

Offline Rheyah

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  • Will release something one day. Promise.
Hah.  Good point.  Why did I even write 26?  What was I thinking?

Fixed now :)

 

Offline General Battuta

  • Poe's Law In Action
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For the love of God, I'd have posted it if I thought it was useful advice rather than pointless low-level nitpicking.

 

Offline Luis Dias

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For the love of God, I'd have posted it if I thought it was useful advice rather than pointless low-level nitpicking.

No idea what you are talking about. NO IDEA.

 

Offline Rheyah

  • 28
  • Will release something one day. Promise.
For the love of God, I'd have posted it if I thought it was useful advice rather than pointless low-level nitpicking.

I genuinely missed it and I'm a stickler for details :)  It would have annoyed me and I would have gone back to fix it anyway.

With that said, the next update I do is going to have some actual FREDing.  I keep using this as a dump for thoughts and little stories from the setting but I would like to prove I've actually made progress :)

 

Offline General Battuta

  • Poe's Law In Action
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  • i wonder when my postcount will exceed my iq
Well now Luis has gone and deleted it so I look a bit mad.

 

Offline Rheyah

  • 28
  • Will release something one day. Promise.
Was there something else?