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Stupid Question

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ryanchealth:
How do I make a Convoy move to a Jumpoint.  I have created my first mission and working on the 2nd that deals with a convoy escort.  I created the Jump Node and created Waypoint but the ship stand still.  Do I need to do this in the Events editor or is there a simpler way?

Shivan Hunter:
Typically, you give your ships an order to follow the waypoint (ship dialog -> "Initial orders" -> "Waypoints"; note that FRED will hide the "Waypoints" goal unless there is an actual waypoint in the mission).

The best/most robust way to do this is to create a waypoint for each ship in the convoy, tell each ship to go to its own waypoint "Waypoints" or "Waypoints Once", doesn't matter) and set each ship's departure cue to check for when it's within a certain distance of its waypoint.

If you use a single waypoint for an entire convoy, the ships' paths will converge on that point and they'll start bumping into each other. Worse, they may never actually reach the waypoint, if two ships are colliding with each other trying to occupy the same space. This is another good reason to use a departure cue that checks for a distance, rather than a "Warp" order with lower priority than a "Waypoints once" order (which is the simple way to do it).

Note that ships in a wing will get into a formation automatically, and will all depart at once (you can only set a departure cue for the wing, not for individual ships that are in a wing).

Good luck! Glad to see more people making missions :D

Colonol Dekker:
Freespace comes with a comprehensive Fred tutorial, we also have one in detail in the modding wiki if memory serves.  Finish both to learn most of the features you'll need to make an entire campaign :)

0rph3u5:

--- Quote from: Shivan Hunter on April 18, 2023, 05:43:08 pm --- "Waypoints" or "Waypoints Once", doesn't matter

--- End quote ---

There is a difference that does matter between these two AI goals
- "Waypoints" means that a ship will loop on the waypoint path, meaning when it reaches the final waypoint it will head back to the first and start again. As a result the ship will not deccelerate when approaching a waypoint. "Waypoints" will never be true if checked with "are-waypoints-done-delay"
- "Waypoints Once" means that the ship will stop on the final waypoint, as logic dicatates it will reduce speed on approach to the final waypoint. "Waypoints Once" can be checked with "are-waypoints-done-delay".


--- Quote from: Shivan Hunter on April 18, 2023, 05:43:08 pm ---set each ship's departure cue to check for when it's within a certain distance of its waypoint.

--- End quote ---

While this is roibust and avoids a bug where an impromperly configured ship has problems "hitting" a waypoint, it also means that waypoint clock visible on a targeted friendly ship will be off. Considering this waypoint clock is dynamic (i.e. it responds to the ship's speed), it is the most accurate representation for the player when trying to check for a time estimate on task completion.

Shivan Hunter:

--- Quote from: 0rph3u5 on April 20, 2023, 08:57:52 pm ---There is a difference that does matter between these two AI goals
- "Waypoints" means that a ship will loop on the waypoint path, meaning when it reaches the final waypoint it will head back to the first and start again. As a result the ship will not deccelerate when approaching a waypoint. "Waypoints" will never be true if checked with "are-waypoints-done-delay"
- "Waypoints Once" means that the ship will stop on the final waypoint, as logic dicatates it will reduce speed on approach to the final waypoint. "Waypoints Once" can be checked with "are-waypoints-done-delay".

--- End quote ---

True 'nuff! I was hasty in my explanation there, but I meant that in my case - where the ships get close and are told to depart via departure cue - it doesn't matter which is used, since the goal should get "interrupted" by the departure cue anyway. (Departure cues override all goals and other AI behavior as far as I'm aware)

You can see the effect of a "Waypoints" (looping) goal, used on a waypoint path with only one waypoint, in some [V] missions - the one that comes to mind is the one with the Parracombe and Jooyun and the asteroid field. The ships reach their waypoints and start senselessly dancing around that one spot, since they're effectively being told to "patrol" a "path" consisting of a single point. So yeah, 0rph3u5 is right, don't do that :P


--- Quote from: 0rph3u5 on April 20, 2023, 08:57:52 pm ---While this is roibust and avoids a bug where an impromperly configured ship has problems "hitting" a waypoint, it also means that waypoint clock visible on a targeted friendly ship will be off. Considering this waypoint clock is dynamic (i.e. it responds to the ship's speed), it is the most accurate representation for the player when trying to check for a time estimate on task completion.

--- End quote ---

Also true. But the distance check doesn't have to be large - checking if the ship is within ~100 meters or so would make the discrepancy only a few seconds, and IIRC would still avoid most problems (depending on the mission, of course. It won't help if two Collosi are trying to occupy the same space!)

Although there may be new best-practices for waypoints that FREDders have come up with in the last decade, in which case ignore me :nervous:

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