Hard Light Productions Forums
Modding, Mission Design, and Coding => FS2 Open Coding - The Source Code Project (SCP) => Topic started by: CptWhite on April 27, 2002, 05:03:09 am
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hey everyone
well first off i am reporting on avengers work, not mine
ok now everyone has figured out its easy to increase tbl limits and such but we're only at the beginning : heres a report on the changes implemented by avenger for the babylon project thus far, note some are for testing purposes we're still making sure these things actually work :)
WORK LIST THUS FAR - you will like some of the new stuff :D
Revisions to the source code by Martin "Avenger/Malard" Ellis
If you find any problems with the modifications i have made, please tell me, if you
have any improvements you would like to see also please tell me and i will see what
i can do for you.
Revisions for Date : 26/04/02
------New SEXP (Engine Only) "term-mission"------
This much the same as the red-alert counter part allows you to end a mission without
a warp out. Not yet tested, but i think it should work, i have spent over 3 hours
trying to implement it in FRED2, which absolutly sucks, its like nearly impossible
to use, once you have a degree in fred usage, trying to code in its like trying to
walk up mt everest butt nacked. So i given up on FRED2, can a mission designer please
test this flag out, ue a red-alert flag in FRED2 then replace that with term-mission
via notepad or the likes. If it works great,if not tell me what happens, this update
is still very much a W.I.P.
Files Affected:
\Parse\SEXP.cpp
\Parse\SEXP.h
-------------------------------------------------
-------Game Crashes on Multiplayer Options-------
Fixed Bug which stopped the multiplayer options menu from being correctly displayed.
This was likely due to the rip DaveB did, getting rid of PXO support, he did alright
in the main but prolly forgot about this bit, all i did was REM out the affecting
lines, this means that u can goto the multiplayer options screen but the text fields
that would be where Username/Password/Squad would be are not there, it might look it
but trust me they arnt there.
Files Affected:
\MenuUI\OptionsMenuMulti.cpp
------------------------------------------------
---Added Support For Pre-exising '$Ambient light level' Flag---
This is a wierd one, not only was most of the code there, it was also commented on
in both locations, i find it hard to believe that they spent the effort implementing
the flag in FRED2 and also in the Parser, yet they never finished it off, nor any
idication that they made any attempt to do so. The comment about saying this is
where it should go and such, but all it took was 5 minutes of my time to implement
it and it would have taken even less time for them to implement it. Very wierd
Files Affected:
\Lighting\Lighting.cpp
\Mission\MissionParse.cpp
---------------------------------------------------------------
-------Set Default Ambience Level to 0.00f-------
At Request of CptWhite_UK the ambience light is set as default to 0.00f so if the
flag is not found in a mission file it will use that as default before it was at
0.15f so there isn't really that much difference for most people but for TBP there
is a major difference.
Files Affected:
\Lighting\Lighting.cpp
-------------------------------------------------
-------Enabled Debugging Option Press 'L'--------
Thanks to DaveB's post on the VWBB that i found tucked under a heap of other ****
was a way to enable a secret, not really bug proof menu, this is pretty cool its
gonna save Beta testers and mission designers endless amounts of time. Simply press
'L' in the main hall while in single player mode to bring up a list of missions.
Pretty cool and should be a big time saver!
Files Affected:
\GlobalIncs\PsTypes.h
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I am also asked for avenger to be unbanned, from what he tells me he did nothing wrong really, but was hacking around - LIKE PROGRAMMERS DO !!!! ffs he's not a bad guy unlike some others i know ...... cheers
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Sounds like we're off to a good start. (-:
This source stuff is soo cool.
--TurboNed
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Wasn't Avernger working on a new 3D engine or something when he got banned?
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probably, he's been exiled for some time now, found the thread about it deep the hosted staff forum....waiting to hear the admins' opinions because from what i read he did some pretty bad stuff.
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Originally posted by LtNarol
probably, he's been exiled for some time now, found the thread about it deep the hosted staff forum....waiting to hear the admins' opinions because from what i read he did some pretty bad stuff.
he looked at privates forums. I would have cared if he had shown stuff etc, but he didn't do more, so for my part I don't give a damn if he hacked my staff forum or not. He's one of the best progs around, and I won't ask for him to get hold away just because of misplaced pride.
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It's not so much the actual specification of what he did than the fact he did it. I for one do not like hackers - especially when it happens around here, I don't care how good someone may be at whatever they can do - if they don't play by the rules then they get treated the same as anyone else who breakes those rules - that's not unreasonable is it?
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an0n's post analysisizer 3000
It's not so much the actual specification of what he did than the fact he did it. =True= I for one do not like hackers =must......not.....comment.....=- especially when it happens around here, I don't care how good someone may be at whatever they can do - if they don't play by the rules then they get treated the same as anyone else who breakes those rules - that's not unreasonable is it? Yes.
*runs, spraying flak behind him as the HOJ powers up*
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Perhaps I should rephrase - I don't like hackers with no tact, openly hack, cause trouble or boast of their hacking, warez or other exploits. All the above causes only one thing - problems.
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I'll be frank, I don't know the first thing about programming in C++. The most I can do is HTML and Javascript, and even those abilities are poor.
Animated Textures/Backgrounds:
Could be cool, more so for the background aspect, and I've always wanted to have a ship textured with the thruster flame...I dunno why, just think it'd look cool.
Player ships with BEAMS!!! :
I'm not talking about the turret thing. I want a player ship with real beams, not that targeting laser crap.
Planet-side missions:
Maybe this is stretching it, but I think it'd be awesome to be cruising around in orbit for one portion of a mission, only to have to finish the rest planet-side with some atmospheric battle along the way. ^_^;;
Better AI:
'Nuff Said.
Geomodable ships:
Once again, probably outside the limitations of the engine, but would still be cool.
Increase sub-object limit:
Let's face it, with 30 km ships lumbering around nowadays, 80 subobjects isn't cutting it. On that note, removing the message displays for when subsystems are damaged would be good, and would allow players to fly capships without having the game crash. Perhaps subsystem damage could be viewed on a seperate screen?
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one thing I want is for you to be able to see your own ship! This is very fun when you can see the forward facing wings of your ship in front of you, or the gun points over your head. Also would be benifical to TBP so they can have their starfury cockpit look right. :D
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This is a wierd one, not only was most of the code there, it was also commented on
in both locations, i find it hard to believe that they spent the effort implementing
the flag in FRED2 and also in the Parser, yet they never finished it off, nor any
idication that they made any attempt to do so. The comment about saying this is
where it should go and such, but all it took was 5 minutes of my time to implement
it and it would have taken even less time for them to implement it. Very wierd
This thing is already in the mission files actually; just open one up through notepad and you will see an "ambient light level" setting in the background section. ;) I guess they just never got around to putting it into FRED2 itself.
One thing that I'm sure many people would appreciate would be to increase the shield icon limit in hud.tbl; I have never had problems with this but I have heard many others complaining about it.
The main other thing that I would like to see is the sexp operator limit increased. I have had lots of trouble with this in the past and have had to tone down some of my missions a bit to get around it, so it would be really good to increase this.
Also, fix the debriefing music bugs if possible. (i.e. allow the mission designer to specify which music should be played) I found a way to get around this, but it doesn't work perfectly.
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I so don't have enough time to get me head around all this stuff... come the summer, I'm gonna sit in front of me pc and I'm gonna damn well do cool stuff with FS2
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well... let's see...
#define MAX_OP_MENUS 30
.... maybe this one :P
and later on...
//#define MAX_SEXP_TREE_SIZE 500
#define MAX_SEXP_TREE_SIZE 1050
Files:
Sexp_tree.cpp
Sexp_tree.h
and what the heck is thaat?!?!?!?!?
(http://mypage.bluewin.ch/p98/fsc1.jpg)
programming is fun! :D (yea... sure...)
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hey thunder, don't you think you should atleast consider giving him a second chance? asking him to behave and telling him that if he doesnt he'll be banned permanently?
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Was that guy the same Avenger who pissed off everyone in the Squadwar forum? (really annoying guy and probably one of Vertigo's alternate aliases) Or was it The Avenger? (another guy who, as far as I know, did nothing wrong)
and what the heck is thaat?!?!?!?!?
I would really like to know what that button was supposed to do... :D
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Originally posted by CP5670
Was that guy the same Avenger who pissed off everyone in the Squadwar forum? (really annoying guy and probably one of Vertigo's alternate aliases) Or was it The Avenger? (another guy who, as far as I know, did nothing wrong)
it's The Avenger.
For my part, I want him to get allowed back, not because he never bragged about his hacks or anything ( as I said I don't give a **** about that), but because when i want to know ask/ some thing related, I like to do it on HLP. call me lazy :p
edit: oh yeah, there's also the fact he's a nice guy -as proved when kazan was throwing all the crap he could at avenger, and this one always stayed as cool as one could be in such circumstances -.
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Originally posted by venom2506
it's The Avenger.
For my part, I want him to get allowed back, not because he never bragged about his hacks or anything ( as I said I don't give a **** about that), but because when i want to know ask/ some thing related, I like to do it on HLP. call me lazy :p
edit: oh yeah, there's also the fact he's a nice guy -as proved when kazan was throwing all the crap he could at avenger, and this one always stayed as cool as one could be in such circumstances -.
[nevermind]
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Seems to me that this place isn't a democracy - it's an, uh, oligarchy? Or whatever it is when it's run by a few "elite" aristocrats. Not that I in any way have a problem with that - with a community this small, a governing system of this type is the most effective, efficient, and practical way to do things.
I recommend against polling, if the people in charge want him back, he'll be unbanned. If not, then they have their reasons.
--TurboNed
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Actually every democracy is an oligarchy. You have a figurehead at the top with the visible "power" and then 10 others who have all the money who tell him what to do. Infact, thats true of Communism, Despotism, and any other political organization you can think of. The only difference with Democracy is the average person gets to vote which figurehead gets supported or shunned by those 10 people with money :)
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No. Avenger did more than just hack the boards, he also hacked the CP and attempted to crash the boards when I told him he was going to get banned for hacking. So for that, he's staying out. I don't care if he's a nice guy most of the time, if you can't control yourself and if you go back on your promise not to do something (The time in hosted support was the SECOND time btw, after he had said he wouldn't do it again), you can take a hike.
Oh, and Venom? Let's see you be so sanguine about it when it happens to you.
Discussion closed.
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If he has some programming skills on the FS2 source code, he has just to demonstrate them on the VWBB forum...
(with all that I don't remember what I wanted to post)
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Avenger, Avenger, let me seeeee.....
Hmmmm...Oh, waitm now I remember him! That little sh*t-head! Don't let him back!!!:(
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Originally posted by Shrike
Oh, and Venom? Let's see you be so sanguine about it when it happens to you.
Discussion closed.
Ok for the discussion closed, I don't care, but about that happening to me... believe me, I've got much worse in real life than a hacked forum. much worse.
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Originally posted by venom2506
Ok for the discussion closed, I don't care, but about that happening to me... believe me, I've got much worse in real life than a hacked forum. much worse.
Et na ! :p
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Originally posted by IceFire
Actually every democracy is an oligarchy. You have a figurehead at the top with the visible "power" and then 10 others who have all the money who tell him what to do. Infact, thats true of Communism, Despotism, and any other political organization you can think of. The only difference with Democracy is the average person gets to vote which figurehead gets supported or shunned by those 10 people with money :)
*cough*Republic*cough*
This is exactly why I like anarchy better than any uniform method of governing.
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Raaaaah! anyway, this went awfully OT, so:
what's the next release will include?
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Originally posted by CptWhite
------New SEXP (Engine Only) "term-mission"------
This much the same as the red-alert counter part allows you to end a mission without
a warp out. Not yet tested, but i think it should work, i have spent over 3 hours
trying to implement it in FRED2, which absolutly sucks, its like nearly impossible
to use, once you have a degree in fred usage, trying to code in its like trying to
walk up mt everest butt nacked. So i given up on FRED2, can a mission designer please
test this flag out, ue a red-alert flag in FRED2 then replace that with term-mission
via notepad or the likes. If it works great,if not tell me what happens, this update
is still very much a W.I.P.
Umm, excellent work with all the changes to the source code. But...but...I'm sure that if you just set a red-alert sexp to a goal or time, the mission ends without a warpout anyway. The only reason that missions end with a red-alert warpout is that they're sexped as:
when > has departed delay (or is-key-pressed Alt-J) > Alpha 1 > 0 > red-alert.
So really you don't need this.
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Originally posted by Kellan
Umm, excellent work with all the changes to the source code. But...but...I'm sure that if you just set a red-alert sexp to a goal or time, the mission ends without a warpout anyway. The only reason that missions end with a red-alert warpout is that they're sexped as:
when > has departed delay (or is-key-pressed Alt-J) > Alpha 1 > 0 > red-alert.
So really you don't need this.
the idea is to get out of the mission w/o the jump, but still get a debriefing :)
getting to the hangar rather than jumping away.
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Originally posted by venom2506
the idea is to get out of the mission w/o the jump, but still get a debriefing :)
getting to the hangar rather than jumping away.
Yes, that's good (if can be applied)
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Nice work... :)
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Originally posted by venom2506
the idea is to get out of the mission w/o the jump, but still get a debriefing :)
getting to the hangar rather than jumping away.
THAT I want. Something similar to X-wing vs. TIE fighter, where if you are a certain distance from your command ship's fighterbay, you can hit Alt-J and the AI will take over your ship and fly you into the hangar. Command ship status could be conferred to any ship with a fighterbay in FRED with a checkbox.
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Originally posted by an0n
This is exactly why I like anarchy better than any uniform method of governing.
LOL! you're kidding, right? you think anarchy would ever work?
"you can do whatever you want, but we'll trust you to do the right thing."
:rolleyes: if that were true, we wouldn't need a government.
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anarchy would equate to a standstill in terms of scientific progression, which is never good. ;)
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Originally posted by venom2506
edit: oh yeah, there's also the fact he's a nice guy
Dude... he hacked us just to break our system... nice guy? :(
As much as I want to let him back - I've been just about the only admin who really, really wanted to - it just doesn't make any sense. He hacked us; we banned him; then we let him back in. Then he hacked us again; so when we told him we were going to ban him, he broke into the admin control panel and tried to de-admin us. (Continually.) So then we locked him out. It's like a pattern...
To most people, letting him in isn't "another chance" (it wouldn't be a second chance anyway, it'd be more like a third or fourth); it'd be "stupidity". I'm sorry, we did try. :(
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he's a second offense criminal.
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I've heard some of the internal stuff regarding the things he did,
he ain't gett'n back in :wink:
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he also did some other stuff that we didn't ban him for.
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Originally posted by GalacticEmperor
THAT I want. Something similar to X-wing vs. TIE fighter, where if you are a certain distance from your command ship's fighterbay, you can hit Alt-J and the AI will take over your ship and fly you into the hangar. Command ship status could be conferred to any ship with a fighterbay in FRED with a checkbox.
Okay, now that does sound cool. I agree that it's stupid to have to jump out when your Command ship is in the area.
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Originally posted by Bobboau
I've heard some of the internal stuff regarding the things he did
Thats just the problem I think, most people don't hear the full story - only what we say has happened or what he said has happened to him. Why should the entire series of events be broadcast to everyone making more trouble? It's much better to keep things quiet between those concerned - unfortunately this kind of thing we have now crops up if that happens. People not knowing the full story make the wrong assumption about one or more parties and it causes yet more problems.
Still, there's one lesson for everyone now that the info is on display - the rules we have can be bent in places but there are limits to how much we can afford to tolorate.
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Originally posted by CmdKewin
and what the heck is thaat?!?!?!?!?
It's a place holder for the new ship type drop down combo box. :) The combo box replaces it so all it does is tell Windows/MFC where to put the combo box.
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you know, doing the hangar thing isnt very hard, all we need is an additional SEXP to the effect of "playerai-add-command" that allows the fredder to give the player's ship orders that take control of the ship and use the regular orders of ais.
Then all you would have to do is use the order dock (or enter hangar, dont remember which it is but you get the idea). The is-key-pressed sexp can be used to start the sequence, and there ya go.
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Docking in a hanger to end a mission? Where's Zeronet? :D
Seriously though, that would be awesome. Might need to do some tweaking with some models then though. Somebody DO IT! ;)
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like i says, many of the things we are asking for can already be done, ie: someone asked to allow ending a mission without warping out but still at the player's discresion, well, its simple: is-key-pressed (whatever key you want to use), redalert.
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IMHO the best way to have the player's ship leave by a fighter bay is to put a check in the Alt+J code to see if the player's wing is set to leave via a ship's fighter bay instead of hyperspace. If so, have the normal AI fly the ship into the bay when they press Alt+J. If the ship is still around. SEXPs to override a wing/ship's departure (and maybe entry) point could be useful too. If you just want to keep the player's ship from doing the warp out animation you can disable that without any source code editing.
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i still say a sexp that give control of the player's fighter to an ai, that way the same sexp can be used for a number of other things as well, instead of altering so much code just for one thing. This sort of autopilot function can come in really handy for fredders when used with or without the is-key-pressed sexp.
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About the Avenger thing: That wasn't, technically speaking, a hack. I talked to him afterward, and he'd more or less guessed an admin's password. That was it.
And BTW, considering how he hasn't, say, made another shot at it, I'd say give him another chance, since if he really DID have hacking skills he could very well have used them if he wanted to after being banned. If he decided not to, so much the better for you admins- perhaps, if you care so much, you shouldn't have guessable passwords. Of course, I wouldn't lay high odds on his returning even if he could, it's entirely likely now that he's found a better place to go...
On a completely other note, I do see the prob with letting him back. Still, if he can get in by guessing passwords, I or anyone else could, given a while. There's obviously a security problem there...
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Originally posted by LtNarol
you know, doing the hangar thing isnt very hard, all we need is an additional SEXP to the effect of "playerai-add-command" that allows the fredder to give the player's ship orders that take control of the ship and use the regular orders of ais.
Then all you would have to do is use the order dock (or enter hangar, dont remember which it is but you get the idea). The is-key-pressed sexp can be used to start the sequence, and there ya go.
Oh, you could have so much evil fun with that one for things other than docking. A s-exp that's very broad like that would be good. I mean I could, for example use it to simulate the player losing control, going onto autopilot, ship being damaged, etc. ;7
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Originally posted by LtNarol
i still say a sexp that give control of the player's fighter to an ai, that way the same sexp can be used for a number of other things as well, instead of altering so much code just for one thing. This sort of autopilot function can come in really handy for fredders when used with or without the is-key-pressed sexp.
I find this to be useful occasionally (from my old X-Wing vs. TIE Fighter days) when I'm viewing the map (which doesn't exist in FS/2) - but IF it's implemented (no good reason to implement it that I can think of, except if there's a map-type-thing created) - why make it a SEXP? Just make a new control to map and if for some strange reason you want it to be enable-able/disable-able, make a checkbox in the Mission Options thing from FRED2 - making a SEXP for this sort of thing is worse than making a SEXP for beam-free-all - if the feature exists, we just want it enabled/accessible by default. (-:
--TurboNed
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Originally posted by Stryke 9
About the Avenger thing: That wasn't, technically speaking, a hack. I talked to him afterward, and he'd more or less guessed an admin's password. That was it.
And BTW, considering how he hasn't, say, made another shot at it, I'd say give him another chance, since if he really DID have hacking skills he could very well have used them if he wanted to after being banned. If he decided not to, so much the better for you admins- perhaps, if you care so much, you shouldn't have guessable passwords. Of course, I wouldn't lay high odds on his returning even if he could, it's entirely likely now that he's found a better place to go...
On a completely other note, I do see the prob with letting him back. Still, if he can get in by guessing passwords, I or anyone else could, given a while. There's obviously a security problem there...
IF that's how it happened, then the problem is not that there are passwords to be guessed, it's that there's someone who tried to guess them for the purposes of cracking (hacking is what we're doing to the FS2 source code - cracking is what it seems Avenger did from what I've read in this thread). And I'm pretty sure that we've decided that the admins (who know exactly what happened, as they were kinda there - and on top of that, they have the power, authority, and right to ban someone simply because said someone's IP resembles an ex-girlfriend's phone number) will ban or unban Avenger as they see fit. Can we stop talking about him now? The rest of this thread is interesting.
--TurboNed
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Guys, if you can't decide on which version of hangar-based mission endings is best, just plan on implementing both. There's no harm in putting several ways of doing one thing in; the current SEXPs already show that.
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about the hangar thing, you DO realize it's already done, as said in the first post? :p
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Originally posted by Corsair
Docking in a hanger to end a mission? Where's Zeronet? :D
Seriously though, that would be awesome. Might need to do some tweaking with some models then though. Somebody DO IT! ;)
Here :D. One of the things you could do is a Autopilot launch from a hanger, sorta like WCP or being dropped out B5 style.
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1. its not already done, the player's ship is always under the player's control except when warping out, there is no way to force the player's ship to do something without the player's consent at this time. Thats what im looking for.
2. the sexp is better than a check box because using it as a sexp allows for variables (gasp). Why are there sexps in the first place instead of just a bunch of check boxes that say: "bombing mission", "lots of enemy fighters", "capitalship vs capitalship"? So we can customize. With the sexp, we can determine when something happens and if something happens.
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Originally posted by LtNarol
2. the sexp is better than a check box because using it as a sexp allows for variables (gasp). Why are there sexps in the first place instead of just a bunch of check boxes that say: "bombing mission", "lots of enemy fighters", "capitalship vs capitalship"? So we can customize. With the sexp, we can determine when something happens and if something happens.
And under what conditions. :D
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ok, say you want to make a mission where you're patroling an asteriod field, boring milkrun of a mission where all you do for the first 5 minutes is fly paterns through the field following a wingman. Wouldnt it be nice if you gave the player the option of hitting a key (say "a" for example) and the player ship automatically follows your wingman until the player hits the key again? If it was a checkbox, the player would not be able to enable/disable this.
If you wanted the fighter to dock with a station, you hit a key and the ai takes over, pilot the ship to the thing and docks it. Check boxes dont work so well for that. like i said earlier, there are reasons why we have SEXPs in the first place.
While we're on this topic, it would be very nice if we can have a new ai command SEXP: follow ship.
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Originally posted by LtNarol
While we're on this topic, it would be very nice if we can have a new ai command SEXP: follow ship.
Guard ship does about the same thing follow ship would, unless you're in combat or want a ship to follow a ship on a different team. As far as autopilots, I think other then for warping out/landing they're just for the lazy but that's just my opinion. Someone could just turn on autopilot and watch the AI try and control their ship through the whole mission. FS2 isn't a Microsoft flight simulator. And, right now at least, the AI often is not very smart when fighters are "following" another ship. There is also a "stay near ship" AI-goal" available to support ships.
If anything, I think some sort of AI piloting system for the player's ship would be most useful for in game cinema scenes. (Incidently, in some missions Alpha Wing's initial orders are to guard Alpha 1. If you tried using a "follow Alpha 2" thing in them you'd be following a ship trying to follow you. Hmm. Now I'm going to have to make a mission just to see what something like that would look like.)
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It should be possible to assign the stay-near-ship and keep-safe-distance operators to fighters; these can be quite useful every now and then, but it is currently only possible to give them to support ships.
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Originally posted by CP5670
It should be possible to assign the stay-near-ship and keep-safe-distance operators to fighters; these can be quite useful every now and then, but it is currently only possible to give them to support ships.
Actually, you might be able to trick FRED2 into giving that order to any ship. I've tricked it into giving an "ignore ship" order to a cap ship. Will test it out right now. :>
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Well, it worked. It looked a little odd having this big old ARMD cruiser following me around though. :) As long as the SEXP doesn't have any ship type checking within the code itself you can assign just about any orders to any ship.
How I got an ARMD cruiser to follow me around like a lost puppy:
Startup FRED2.
Put in the ship you want to follow you. Can be any type.
Put in a support ship.
Name the follower whatever you want to call it and make the player ship Alpha wing.
Go into the event editor.
Create a new event.
Change Do-nothing to have the support ship stay near Alpha 1.
Right click the support ship's name and choose "Edit Data"
Type in the name of the ship you want to follow Alpha 1 and press return/enter.
Press OK to close the event editor. Delete the support ship, save, and have fun. :) It will move to stay about 300 meters away. (If it can't move it will turn to face you. If it can.)
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Could anyone figure a sexp string like...
IF
- distance from
---Alpha 1
---GTD Orion 1
--is lesser than or equal to
---200
AND
-is key pressed
--alt-j
THEN
-end mission
Just how is the question:
--orion hangar animation
Something akin to the death animation? (Where the camera is on the outside of the ship and it simply flies into the hangar while things happen around it...) But not like the generic cutscene (Which would end mission and needlessly go to a anim)
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Originally posted by LtNarol
ok, say you want to make a mission where you're patroling an asteriod field, boring milkrun of a mission where all you do for the first 5 minutes is fly paterns through the field following a wingman. Wouldnt it be nice if you gave the player the option of hitting a key (say "a" for example) and the player ship automatically follows your wingman until the player hits the key again? If it was a checkbox, the player would not be able to enable/disable this.
If you wanted the fighter to dock with a station, you hit a key and the ai takes over, pilot the ship to the thing and docks it. Check boxes dont work so well for that. like i said earlier, there are reasons why we have SEXPs in the first place.
While we're on this topic, it would be very nice if we can have a new ai command SEXP: follow ship.
You misunderstood what I meant by having a checkbox. My checkbox was to allow/disallow the player to do that. You'd have something in the control configuration of "AI Enable Button" where the player maps a button to that (requires source/engine modifications). Then, assuming the player mapped "a" to that function, he could hit "a" to enable his fighter to be taken over by the AI (perhaps allowing his own ship to appear in the command box so he can issue commands such as "form up" to his own fighter). The checkbox could be used to disallow that function to exist in a mission.
I guess I misunderstood what you were saying too. I assumed you meant having a SEXP which would take over a players' ship (when Colossus is-destroyed, AI take-over Alpha 1). That particular case (and others similar to it) seems totally useless.....but then again - we'll always find some situation where we wish we had it. (-; Anyway, I see now that what you meant wasn't like that situation there, having SEXP support for something like that would be useful as well.
It could be done kinda like the Invulnerable ship checkbox - it can be checked - but later disabled through SEXPs. But instead of enabling/disabling the AI control of a players' ship, we'd be enabling/disabling the player's CHOICE to allow AI control of his ship.
Also, when I think of Wing Commander/X-Wing series games, they don't have the AI take over the ship when you get near the mothership (errr....capship). You hit "Space" or request clearance or whatever, and then the screen goes blank. In XWA, you watch the fighter dock in the bay - but that's a scripted sequence that's actually happening in a model that's totally different and unrelated to the model you saw when you hit the spacebar. You'll notice in XWA that the fighterbay you see after you dock is MUCH larger than the fighterbay you see before you start docking. (-:
Having an AI landing procedure seems kinda overrated and possibly bug-prone though. (imagine initiating AI landing procedures while there's some capship protrusion between your ship and the landing bay - WHAMMO....kinda looks stupid) But if it were done right, it could be kinda cool. I really don't see anything wrong with simply allowing the player to fly near the capship, hit Alt+J, and have SEXP events control whether the warp animation is displayed, or if the screen simply goes blank and the player is treated to a debriefing (indicating that he docked, similar to XvT/TIE Fighter/X-Wing/Wing Commander style).
Sorry if that rambled a bit more than I intended originally. (-:
--TurboNed
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the advantage to a sexp is that its flexible, you can have the autopilot come into play when a ship is destroyed, a subsystem is destroyed, when something's hull is below or above a certain point, or just whenever the player presses a specific key. i still dont see what you're trying to say with the check box, i still dont see its purpose.
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Originally posted by LtNarol
the advantage to a sexp is that its flexible, you can have the autopilot come into play when a ship is destroyed, a subsystem is destroyed, when something's hull is below or above a certain point, or just whenever the player presses a specific key. i still dont see what you're trying to say with the check box, i still dont see its purpose.
This is precisely why I suggest ripping out the current SEXP system, hacking in an internal scripting engine (like Python), and reimplementing the SEXPs in python. SEXPs are more flexible than simple boolean checkboxes, but being able to code new SEXPs on a mission by mission basis would be even more flexible.
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Originally posted by EdrickV
If anything, I think some sort of AI piloting system for the player's ship would be most useful for in game cinema scenes.
For in-game cinema scenes, the last thing one would usually want is AI control of anything. It's way too unpredictable what's going to happen. in-game cinema scenes need to be fully scripted by the mission designer with the engine explicitly following those guidelines, even if they contradict other phyiscs things. (For example, if a mission designer scripts two ships to fly through each other, but doesn't script a collision/explosion - then they should clip right through each other). Such a system would give excellent flexibility to the cinematic designer, but would also require incredible discipline and attention to detail.
Furthermore - some people (myself included) have objections to having missions where you fight for a little while and then are whisked out of your cockpit to view other things happening for story-exposition purposes. However, that doesn't mean that scripted sequences are necessarily bad. They could be used to provide between-mission cutscenes....basically having a completely non-interactive "mission" whose sole-purpose is providing exposition in-engine. This is something I'm not opposed to (and have wished I could do while FREDding).
--TurboNed
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Originally posted by LtNarol
the advantage to a sexp is that its flexible, you can have the autopilot come into play when a ship is destroyed, a subsystem is destroyed, when something's hull is below or above a certain point, or just whenever the player presses a specific key. i still dont see what you're trying to say with the check box, i still dont see its purpose.
The same reason we have a "has-shields" checkbox in FRED. There could be an "AI-Takeover-allowed" checkbox. If it's checked, then the player is allowed to hit the button to have the AI take over his ship. If not, then he can't. Just for the FREDder's convenience. The same thing could be accomplished with an event and SEXP - but sometimes it's easier to uncheck a box than to create an event saying
-when
--time=0
--disallow-ai-takeover
---alpha 1
It's kinda like some people are asking for a checkbox on capships that does the beam-free-all thing without requiring an event.
--TurboNed
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but a check box will limit the abilities of this function such as when it comes into play, what if you dont want the player to decide to hand over to autopilot? what if you want it to kick in automatically? If you keep the sexp and the checkbox, then you have to go in and check the box if you want to use the sexp. Its just more work for the programmer AND more work for the fredder. it just seems kinda pointless to me to have checkboxes, sexps are so much better.
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check boxes work basicly like sExps that triger when the ship enters the level, having both shouldn't be a problem
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well, just set it up so that you dont have to go find that check box to make the SEXP work, that would just be annoying. The whole point of having such a box though would really only apply if all you intended to do with it was for landings and takeoffs, but thats not the purpose of such a sexp, so really, i still insist that such a box would only complicate things. As for custom SEXPs, i agree with that, but i dont agree with ripping out the current system. We do want nonprogrammers to be able to make missions too.
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If one checks the box for a ship to be invulnerable, then uses the SEXP to make the ship not be invulnerable, you can destroy the ship, right? I feel the same functionality would be used here.
(If that SEXP doesn't work as I've described it, then I think it SHOULD. [grin]) Believe me, I'm not against flexibility, usefulness, or efficiency. If it turns out that the way I've described is less in any of those ways, there's no reason for it to be there.
--TurboNed
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I really don't see anything wrong with simply allowing the player to fly near the capship, hit Alt+J, and have SEXP events control whether the warp animation is displayed, or if the screen simply goes blank and the player is treated to a debriefing (indicating that he docked, similar to XvT/TIE Fighter/X-Wing/Wing Commander style).
Something like that is possible already. You can't change it in the mission, but you can disable the warp in/out out animation for the player's wing. (or any other wing/ship) A SEXP probably could be made to change those flags within a mission. The Robotech MOD has a landing system where you can't leave until you target your mothership's fighter bay, face the ship, and close to 200 meters. Then it lets you warpout. (And if the warp effect is disabled it'll start warming up the engine for warp out and just end.)
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Actually, you might be able to trick FRED2 into giving that order to any ship. I've tricked it into giving an "ignore ship" order to a cap ship. Will test it out right now. :>
I tried kind of "forcing" the order on some ships once, but they didn't really do it correctly. That was only with one of the other orders though; need to try doing what you said. ;)