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Modding, Mission Design, and Coding => The Modding Workshop => Topic started by: Kusanagi on September 06, 2010, 05:33:02 pm

Title: Making missiles fire perpendicular to the target [solved!]
Post by: Kusanagi on September 06, 2010, 05:33:02 pm
Yet another fun weapons question for Journey To Hiigara!

One thing that you see a lot in sci-fi/anime when missiles launch from a ship is that the missiles launch from tubes mounted in the ships hull, causing them to be fired out perpendicular to the ship's surface. The missiles then curve around to chase the target.

I've been playing with subsystem flags and missiles themselves trying to get this effect. The ship in question is the Taiidan missile destroyer. When she launches missiles, they fire straight out from the hull and will track a target, or they can curve to the front to attack a larger ship.

My problem has to do with the field of view. Each turret has a 180 degree field of view and missiles fire from them fine but launch straight to the target (which is normal)

When adding either the "fire down normals" or "fixed firingpoints" flags, the effect works but the turret only seems to have a FOV of around 50 degrees.

Has anyone ever figured out how to work this effect?
Title: Re: Making missiles fire perpendicular to the target
Post by: General Battuta on September 06, 2010, 05:35:22 pm
War in Heaven has VLS launchers on most of its UEF ships. I am not a model or table dude, but open those up and you'll have your answer, since they behave exactly like you'll want the missile destroyer to.
Title: Re: Making missiles fire perpendicular to the target
Post by: Droid803 on September 06, 2010, 05:37:12 pm
http://www.hard-light.net/wiki/index.php/Weapons.tbl#.24Free_Flight_Time: (http://www.hard-light.net/wiki/index.php/Weapons.tbl#.24Free_Flight_Time:)
Title: Re: Making missiles fire perpendicular to the target
Post by: The E on September 06, 2010, 05:50:43 pm
I would also suggest upping the FOV to 270, for full VLSy goodness.

You may ask, why not 360 degrees, well, the answer is that unless you have a rather high turn time, you'll get missiles impacting on the firing ship's hull. For an example, take this (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6iLfJ36-qno&feature=PlayList&p=319DA3374E2CBE03&index=4) video and skip to about 8:16
Title: Re: Making missiles fire perpendicular to the target
Post by: Kusanagi on September 06, 2010, 06:56:41 pm
http://www.hard-light.net/wiki/index.php/Weapons.tbl#.24Free_Flight_Time: (http://www.hard-light.net/wiki/index.php/Weapons.tbl#.24Free_Flight_Time:)

I have tried this but the missile will still launch directly towards the target if Fire Down Normals isn't flagged, then we end up with the 50 degree FOV. :(

I will try the suggested fixes and let you know!
Title: Re: Making missiles fire perpendicular to the target
Post by: FUBAR-BDHR on September 06, 2010, 07:14:50 pm
Try setting the weapon to corkscrew.  I was never able to get fire down normals to work on regular seekers. 
Title: Re: Making missiles fire perpendicular to the target
Post by: Droid803 on September 06, 2010, 07:22:15 pm
That, or swarm. (depending how you want the torpedoes to track?)
Title: Re: Making missiles fire perpendicular to the target
Post by: Kusanagi on September 06, 2010, 07:37:31 pm
I thought the swarm command broke single part turrets?  :confused:
Title: Re: Making missiles fire perpendicular to the target
Post by: General Battuta on September 06, 2010, 07:51:47 pm
I thought the swarm command broke single part turrets?  :confused:

I know I am like the least helpful person here on this point, but...just open up the War in Heaven tables and models for torrent.pof, solaris.pof or tethis.pof. They have working VLS exactly like you want, and on singleparts.
Title: Re: Making missiles fire perpendicular to the target
Post by: Droid803 on September 06, 2010, 08:48:06 pm
I thought the swarm command broke single part turrets?  :confused:

No, it makes them fire down normals.
Which kinda breaks singlepart laser turrets as they can only fire straight forward, but that's about it. :)
Think about it, the Moloch spams you with swarm missiles just fine, (albiet not very effectively) and they always fire straight out from the firepoint before homing.

The Apocalypse torpedoes on the Karuna, Narayana (and Solaris?) all have Swarm, as do the Warhammers on the Sanctus. :P

Swarm definitely does not break singleparts if what they're firing has any sort of homing.
(don't do it with dumbfire missiles or primaries though or it'll look silly)
Title: Re: Making missiles fire perpendicular to the target
Post by: Kusanagi on September 07, 2010, 01:27:39 am
I thought the swarm command broke single part turrets?  :confused:

I know I am like the least helpful person here on this point, but...just open up the War in Heaven tables and models for torrent.pof, solaris.pof or tethis.pof. They have working VLS exactly like you want, and on singleparts.

Sorry, I was going off what it said in the wiki :P

I'll open them and take a look. I never downloaded WIH because I can't play it  :(
Title: Re: Making missiles fire perpendicular to the target
Post by: Kusanagi on September 07, 2010, 11:04:52 pm
Got it working! Thanks guys!  :yes:

(http://img230.imageshack.us/img230/426/screen0035z.jpg)
Title: Re: Making missiles fire perpendicular to the target
Post by: Rodo on September 07, 2010, 11:50:59 pm
Didn't the Skaal Fa fired missiles from the front and straight to the target?
Title: Re: Making missiles fire perpendicular to the target
Post by: Kusanagi on September 08, 2010, 12:16:07 am
Nope, that was the Kushan missile destroyer.
Title: Re: Making missiles fire perpendicular to the target
Post by: Colonol Dekker on September 08, 2010, 03:21:43 am
I lost so many strike craft the first time I did the capture mission for that destroyer. . . . . It made me sad.
Title: Re: Making missiles fire perpendicular to the target
Post by: Kusanagi on September 14, 2010, 01:08:51 am
Ok, another question...is it possible to do this for Fighters and secondary banks?