Hard Light Productions Forums
Modding, Mission Design, and Coding => FS2 Open Coding - The Source Code Project (SCP) => Topic started by: Rampage on April 29, 2002, 07:52:44 am
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FRED 2 Improvents Wishlist Below. Please post.
I'll give you a head start.
1.) Enable beams for wings of ships.
2.) Make ships' beams automatically enabled.
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keep beams the way they are now, V did it for a reason
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1) Yes, making an option to enable beam-free *turrets* or beam-free all in misc menu when ships/wings are selected.
2) NO! Should be disabled as default.
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increase number of ships.
enable curved routes through waypoints.
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If beams are enabled by default then we could perfect the devestating Sathanas Gun.
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curved routes, you already have 1000 waypoints, r we not a bit lazy here.
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For wings of ships, again; lazyness, copy and paste works in the event editor too.
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Originally posted by DTP
curved routes, you already have 1000 waypoints, r we not a bit lazy here.
considering the ship has to stop to turn, it looks a bit odd when you want a ship to turn around.
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I would like to see the alternate ship type limit increased and more importantly, the sexp limit increased. ;) Although I can see reasons to have beams not enabled by default, anti-fighter beams (type 3) should be enabled by default in my opinion, since they serve the same purpose as flak, turrets or any of the other weapons. ;) One thing that would be very useful is to allow for custom strength values for individual ships in the mission, similar to the special explosion thing. The last thing is that it might be nice to see is to have some of the bugs removed, but none of these really get in the way:
when the squadron logo image is changed, all of the other mission properties get reset
background editor has a few issues with the "pattern" and other FS1 relics
get rid of the mission errors "wing orders not matching starting wings" and "no player ships in Alpha wing"
fix or remove the "run freespace" thing (although this can be done
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Originally posted by heretic
considering the ship has to stop to turn, it looks a bit odd when you want a ship to turn around.
seperate waypoints & distance!!!!
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I'm telling you, it still looks like crap when in game.
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Originally posted by LtNarol
keep beams the way they are now, V did it for a reason
YES!!! It is a pain, but it is necessary. Shutting down beams would take as much work, so its pointless to change it.
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And the "Cannot have reinforcements with mixed wings, sucka" thingy. Damn :v: humour
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would be nice to have an inital status
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I think the option to have Beam-free-all on with one tick should be there. For those who dont want it for all ships dont tick the box or whatever.
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Another change:
Must be capable of letting a ship enter into a docking bay of a ship and later come out with the same name, stats, etc.
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As far as turning beams on, here's my suggestion:
Put a checkbox in the Mission Specs editor called "All Beams On" or something like that. And set it so that when a ship arrives it's beams are turned on. There are cases where you can't turn a ship's beams on with beams-free-all. Say you make a multi-wave wing of cruisers. (Yes that's probably an odd idea to some of you, but I have done it before.) You use Beams-Free-All on all the ships of the wing in FRED2. When the second wave arrives their beams are off. If and when we get fighter beams working this could be more of a problem. (Maybe adapt Beams-Free-All to work with wings too? :))
And fixing the Run Freespace bug is extremely simple. Just put the cursor in the right spot and hit 2. :) :V: forgot to rename FS.exe to FS2.exe in the source when making FRED2 from FRED.
Dang. I've really gotta find VC++ 6.0 so I can see if I can do any of this stuff myself. :D
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I'm not sure if this has been suggested already, and it's not entirely a FRED2 issue, but here goes:
Make the player ship allowable in *any* wing, and as *any* number in that wing.
Allow a choice, in FRED2, of which wings can have their ship/weapon configurations changed by the player.
Allow a choice, in FRED 2, of which wings will be displayed in the little graphical friendly ship health/departure display.
It would add so much, IMO, to have an option for the player to be, for example, Delta 2. I think it would be a fairly difficult coding change, unfortunately.
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Actually, there is a fairly easy workaround already in FS2 for changing the players designation. First, go into Mission Specs and check "Multi Player". Make wing Beta, with the player ship as Beta 1. Then remove the 'X' from the 'player ship' box and put it in Beta 2's. Then go into Mission Specs and switch it to 'Single Player' and you have Beta 2 as the player. You'll get an error in Fred 2, but it will work in-game.
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Probably not possible, but I'd like a "preview," mode...
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make it so that the player doesnt have to be alpha 1 in singleplayer
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Originally posted by LtNarol
make it so that the player doesnt have to be alpha 1 in singleplayer
Isn't that what I was just talking about? If you ignore the damn error, it works just fine!
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sorry, just noticed the posts about it above
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Actually, there is a fairly easy workaround already in FS2 for changing the players designation. First, go into Mission Specs and check "Multi Player". Make wing Beta, with the player ship as Beta 1. Then remove the 'X' from the 'player ship' box and put it in Beta 2's. Then go into Mission Specs and switch it to 'Single Player' and you have Beta 2 as the player. You'll get an error in Fred 2, but it will work in-game.
Yeah, I have done this thing in several of my missions (works for any ships in Alpha, Beta or Gamma) and it works quite well. :) It probably wouldn't take too much work to remove some of the error messages though; one of my missions work fine ingame but loads up four or five errors related to this when opened in FRED2. :p
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Originally posted by Grey Wolf 2009
Actually, there is a fairly easy workaround already in FS2 for changing the players designation. First, go into Mission Specs and check "Multi Player". Make wing Beta, with the player ship as Beta 1. Then remove the 'X' from the 'player ship' box and put it in Beta 2's. Then go into Mission Specs and switch it to 'Single Player' and you have Beta 2 as the player. You'll get an error in Fred 2, but it will work in-game.
Still, that's a fairly complicated workaround for something that really should be easy. Anyway, it still wouldn't allow Delta 2. I was thinking that new missions could maybe even take place at about the same time and place as the main campaign, just after or before Alpha 1 comes in.
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Originally posted by NotDefault
Still, that's a fairly complicated workaround for something that really should be easy. Anyway, it still wouldn't allow Delta 2. I was thinking that new missions could maybe even take place at about the same time and place as the main campaign, just after or before Alpha 1 comes in.
?
I've flown as Delta 2 in one of DiamondGeezers' missions. :)
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I think you can fly as other wings as well, but then it doesn't let you select your ship and loadout. :p
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Originally posted by Rampage
Another change:
Must be capable of letting a ship enter into a docking bay of a ship and later come out with the same name, stats, etc.
A useful trick invented by ZylonBane: Name one ship Delta 1, and another Delta¤1. In FS2, both names will look like Delta 1.
How does it work? ¤ is a high ASCII character, and the FS2 font doesn't support most of the high ASCII characters, but instead shows a blank in their place. There are quite a number of such unsupported characters (17 that I have bothered to find), so one can have plenty of ships with the "same" name. High ASCII characters are accessed by holding down the Alt key while typing in any four digit number between 0000 and 0255. ¤ is Alt+0164, for example, and other options include 0240-0255 inclusive except for 0252 (which makes the arrow used to indicate a selected weapon on the HUD, IIRC).
Have the ship enter the fighterbay, and then have ship¤ emerge afterwards. To keep the original ship's stats, record them in variables prior to departure, and then use set-subsystem-strength to put ship¤'s subsystems to the values in the variables once it enters the mission.
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ses is a genious! Someone give that man a cookie!
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It wasn't me, it was ZylonBane. But I'll still take the cookie. One of the cream sandwich kind with the dollop of jam in the middle preferred. :D
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Originally posted by Sesquipedalian
It wasn't me, it was ZylonBane. But I'll still take the cookie. One of the cream sandwich kind with the dollop of jam in the middle preferred. :D
a 'dollop' :wtf:
ooookay...if you insist...
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dol-lop (dol'uhp) n., v. <-loped, -lop-ing>
n.
1. a lump or blob of some substance.
2. a small amount: a dollop of whipped cream.
v.t.
3. to dispense in dollops.
[1565-75; cf. Icel dolpur fat man, Norw (dial.)
dolp lump]
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Originally posted by Sesquipedalian
dol-lop (dol'uhp) n., v. <-loped, -lop-ing>
n.
1. a lump or blob of some substance.
2. a small amount: a dollop of whipped cream.
v.t.
3. to dispense in dollops.
[1565-75; cf. Icel dolpur fat man, Norw (dial.)
dolp lump]
:lol: is that what you do with your time ses? read the dictionary? :p
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Originally posted by CP5670
I think you can fly as other wings as well, but then it doesn't let you select your ship and loadout. :p
My point exactly :). I wasn't sure if having the player ship as any number in any wing was possible, but I guess it is... still, it would be nice to have that functionality programmed into FRED2 instead of having to work around what's already there.
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It's possible allright. Did that in a single-mission, and it worked fine.
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Originally posted by Stunaep
It's possible allright. Did that in a single-mission, and it worked fine.
So when you get shot down, it will say "Beta 2 collided with his own missile, etc.", not Alpha 1, etc. Right?
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Originally posted by LtNarol
:lol: is that what you do with your time ses? read the dictionary? :p
Click my signature. Forsooth, 'tis not without justification that my handle is Sesquipedalian. Were I not studying theology, I'd like as not be in lingustics.
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Originally posted by Sesquipedalian
Click my signature. Forsooth, 'tis not without justification that my handle is Sesquipedalian. Were I not studying theology, I'd like as not be in lingustics.
ok, point taken
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Originally posted by Rampage
So when you get shot down, it will say "Beta 2 collided with his own missile, etc.", not Alpha 1, etc. Right?
Have you played FS2 lately? :) It doesn't mention your wing in the death screen. Period. That's what call signs are for. :D
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However, if you die a certain way, you'll get "[callsign] died in a collision with [designation]."
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Originally posted by Grey Wolf 2009
However, if you die a certain way, you'll get "[callsign] died in a collision with [designation]."
I knew that. But unless you find some way to collide with yourself it won't say your ship's name. And that's what he was asking about. :)
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Originally posted by EdrickV
I knew that. But unless you find some way to collide with yourself it won't say your ship's name. And that's what he was asking about. :)
I think it may be when you leave the damn 60 KM cube...
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Originally posted by Grey Wolf 2009
I think it may be when you leave the damn 60 KM cube...
Not sure where to find that message, (it looks like it's a built-in static message) but all the messages I've seen used the callsign.
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Originally posted by Grey Wolf 2009
I think it may be when you leave the damn 60 KM cube...
Somehow, I don't remember how, I collided with myself... It wasn't as much fun as being killed by my own laser, but whatcha gonna do?
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- Fred2 is the omega of all giant unwieldy pieces of code. Its big, its horrifying,
and it just doesn't care. View it at your own risk.
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Originally posted by aldo_14
I've flown as Delta 2 in one of DiamondGeezers' missions. :)
:nod:
Originally posted by CP5670
I think you can fly as other wings as well, but then it doesn't let you select your ship and loadout. :p
Meh... whadda ya gonna do?
Originally posted by Rampage
So when you get shot down, it will say "Beta 2 collided with his own missile, etc.", not Alpha 1, etc. Right?
I had a better one: "Diamond Geezer was killed by Alpha Two exploding"
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I like "Alpha 1 was killed by friendly fire from ARMD 10." myself. Killed by my home ship.
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Hey I got an idea. Is it possible to make the player have another designation other than Alpha 1.
I just think it would make things a little different since the GTVA are bound to have more than one Alpha 1 you know plus I don't think it would be too hard since the multiplayer mode already allows players to be in whatever wing they want.
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That's what this thread is about. It's possible without source code modifications.
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Yeah, but it's one pain in the ass to keep doing it. I was just wondering if someone found an easier way?
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FRED2 event request:
An event that overrides current speed on selected capital ship(s).
Very similar to cap-waypoint-speed event.
But instead this new event could be used for ramming speed and capital ship afterburners or similar engine boosts.
For example, many FS2 ships has max. speed of 30. With this event it could be forced to 50, 60, 100 or whatever you like. Second value is acceleration speed, how fast you want the ship to accelerate to forced speed. This event ignores max. speed and acceleration values set in ships.tbl. Of course you would need second event to disable forced speed too.
There are moments where I really could use something like this, when I need to move certain capital ship over fair distance, with "engine boost" cap ship could make it much faster.
This would be especially handy for TBP where cap ships are not just sitting and waiting for hostiles coming for them but are maneuvering and using engines.
And yes I have noticed that many of my requests are most useful for TBP, I can't help it much because I am TBP mission designer. ;)
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Originally posted by Mr. Fury
FRED2 event request:
An event that overrides current speed on selected capital ship(s).
Very similar to cap-waypoint-speed event.
But instead this new event could be used for ramming speed and capital ship afterburners or similar engine boosts.
For example, many FS2 ships has max. speed of 30. With this event it could be forced to 50, 60, 100 or whatever you like. Second value is acceleration speed, how fast you want the ship to accelerate to forced speed. This event ignores max. speed and acceleration values set in ships.tbl. Of course you would need second event to disable forced speed too.
There are moments where I really could use something like this, when I need to move certain capital ship over fair distance, with "engine boost" cap ship could make it much faster.
This would be especially handy for TBP where cap ships are not just waiting for hostiles coming for them but are maneuvering and using engines.
I'm drooling already... :thepimp:
There would be many occasions where this could be useful.
Please Source Code programmers, you are our only hope. :)
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Take out the 60km cube limit, and make it endless, or at least extremely big.
Then have the whole fleet, including the player, face one direction. Make them lose control, and the ai flys them, and the rest of the fleet at 10,000m/s. Warpspeed. Could really make an interesting plot if the player could warp to different battles happening at different places in the same mission.
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Originally posted by Wildfire
Yeah, but it's one pain in the ass to keep doing it. I was just wondering if someone found an easier way?
:wtf: You can't be bothered to go through a 30 second process, so you want some poor, busy coder to spend a whole lot of time and effort to reinvent the wheel for you?
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Still, that's a fairly complicated workaround for something that really should be easy. Anyway, it still wouldn't allow Delta 2. I was thinking that new missions could maybe even take place at about the same time and place as the main campaign, just after or before Alpha 1 comes in.
This is exactly what I could use. Yeah, if this could become not such a pain to do, that would be awesome.
That or somehow make there able to be two of same wing smaybe (different squadrons)
maybe thats a bad idea
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Someone said what the battlefield limit is... 60KM cube!!! Thank y ou!!!
Now how can this be changed or eliminated??? It's not fair to be chasing down the enemy and have command kill you for "not returning to the battle" when that is exactly what you are doing!
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you've ran down an enemy for over 30km?
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I asked the same question and the only reply I got was (what are you doing that far away..) :mad:
Yeah something weird happens when the atlantis station blows up. It seems to float away taking the 3 borg cubes with it (cause they still attack it in it's death throes thinking it's a valid target. they float like 40KM away by the time I finish off the hostiles in the original start point. By this time the fleet has split in half. The SDF-1, Galactica, Minbari, and Warlock head towards the Borg entry point to secure the jump node from more intrusions and opposite is the dying Atlantis station, TDX Apocolypse (unarmed cause it wasn't turrented? Turned into 1 million colonist ship), and borg attckers, 5 0other FS2 terran ships and the 3 surviving fighter wings head the other way... I have a choice stay put or head away to either battle and die. Of course I can move the entry node close BUT I cannot do anything to change the second battle. I will be out of it cause it floats away fom the 60km limit in minutes!!!! I even reduce the borg speed by 1/3rd but more changes would suck cause they really are supposed to be able to outrun everyone... See what I mean?? ANY SOLUTIONS???
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60km limit needs to be taken out.
I tried having warp drives in a mission once. There were two batles going on so far away you couldn't see anything from the other one except a destroyer. The two friendly destroyers were escort ships. So you could target them and know which way to "warp". It was a special ship, and when you pressed the afternurners, you went extremely fast, and hopefully to the other battle.
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Originally posted by Sesquipedalian
:wtf: You can't be bothered to go through a 30 second process, so you want some poor, busy coder to spend a whole lot of time and effort to reinvent the wheel for you?
It just gets frustrating when you keep hering the same error message noise time and time again. Besides I never said anything about a coder solving the problem. I wanted to know if there was a way to do it without that bloody error message appearing every time I save the changes to the mission.
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BUT! One possibility is that you could have different wing names and loadout screens. Example, for the SW mod we'd like the player to be able to choose loadouts and keep an eye on Red, Blue, Gold, Green, and Gray wings instead of Alpha, Beta, Gamma, Delta, and Epsilon wings. This would need editing of the ANIs somehow, or it would have to be re-coded so it used the font to represent the wing names on the HUD.
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The Alpha/Beta/Delta/Gamma/Epsilon/Zeta wings are hardcoded in the game in many places for various things. Changing them would be a major task and screw up backwards compatability. (They are especially used in the multi-player code, and it's hard to track down where each is used since there are often unrelated variables with the same name as a wing.) Zeta is only found in 16 files of the original source code, but Alpha is in 185 files.
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A minor but useful FRED2 suggestion: Enable the grant medal/promotion/etc. SEXPs that exist but are currently not listed in the menu for release builds of FRED2. Doesn't look very hard. Here is the code in question from FRED2/Sexp_tree.cpp:
#ifdef NDEBUG
switch (Operators[i].value) {
case OP_WAS_PROMOTION_GRANTED:
case OP_WAS_MEDAL_GRANTED:
case OP_GRANT_PROMOTION:
case OP_GRANT_MEDAL:
case OP_TECH_ADD_SHIP:
case OP_TECH_ADD_WEAPON:
j = Num_op_menus; // don't allow these operators in final release
}
#endif
Just comment out the #ifdef and #endif.
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The FRED2 code is, I agree, one ugly chunk of code. What I suggest, to be easier on MODders, is to integrate PCS and MODELVIEW32 into FRED2 as separate entities. FRED2 would have an option to edit a selected ship's model and then open it in PCS.
Also on another note, in several missions I have used Alpha 2 as main player and I received NO ERROR MESSAGES!
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Originally posted by Rampage
The FRED2 code is, I agree, one ugly chunk of code. What I suggest, to be easier on MODders, is to integrate PCS and MODELVIEW32 into FRED2 as separate entities. FRED2 would have an option to edit a selected ship's model and then open it in PCS.
Modelview maybe, but I wouldn't let PCS touch Fred with a ten foot pole unless and until someone actually makes it stable. Putting something as buggy and crash-prone as PCS into Fred is just asking for trouble.