[skrux]

Hello everyone!

I've had a idea for a mod for some time now, convert the capital ships to be player usable.  I was able to figure out how to set a cap ship as player flyable, but I could not figure out how to make a beam weapon that could be set as a primary.  Ideally, I would like to set up some kind of general player control over non forward armament (such as firing broadsides), but I understand the limitations of the engine.  Still, if I could get working beam weapons on something like a Leviathan or a Deimos, that would be good for a start.

So for now, any tips on making working beam weapons to be set as primaries will do  

Thanks for any info!

[Starwing]

You can use beam weapons just like other primaries, although only as forward firing weapons and only one per weapon system. You can't control turrets directly, the only way would be a trick in mission scripting, to create a "fire_beam" event that is linked to a key pressed.

[delta_7890]

 

Originally posted by Starwing:
You can use beam weapons just like other primaries, although only as forward firing weapons and only one per weapon system. You can't control turrets directly, the only way would be a trick in mission scripting, to create a "fire_beam" event that is linked to a key pressed.

Of course, the ods of the beam hitting its mark are slim, since you wouldn't be able to aim the turret itself.  And even if you could, you'd only be controlling one turret at a time.  I shudder at the thought of aiming, firing, switching to another turret, aim, fire, ect.  It would be rather laborous, and you wouldn't get the kill anyways.  (You never get kills for using beams.)  Piloting capships would still be fun, even without being able to fire beams youself.

[Pera]

 

Originally posted by delta_7890:
Of course, the ods of the beam hitting its mark are slim, since you wouldn't be able to aim the turret itself.  And even if you could, you'd only be controlling one turret at a time.  I shudder at the thought of aiming, firing, switching to another turret, aim, fire, ect.  It would be rather laborous, and you wouldn't get the kill anyways.  (You never get kills for using beams.)  Piloting capships would still be fun, even without being able to fire beams youself.

I've been experimenting quite a lot with player flyable capships, and here's what I've found out:

1. Yes, it's possible to make those ships player flyable, and It's possible to make the beams work. This is done by giving the ship "bomber"-flag.

2. It's also possible to aim the beam. The game seems to have a hardcoded feature, that every single turret in your ship aims at your locked target.

Now the drawbacks:

1. It's not possible to make a button press "fire-beam" event in FRED2, it's a problem with repeating the action.

2. The ship can't have too many turrets, or it will crash. This is because the subsystem damage display list becomes too long.

3. FS2 engine simply isn't made for flying capships. Just look at the FS2 capship battles, they just sit there, and pound each other until the other one is dead. Not very interesting.

So the bottom line: Forget about it.

Edit: About putting beams at primary slots. It's not possible with "real" beams, but ypu can always make a primary laser that looks like a beam. You can make a real basic one in 10 minutes. Though it may not look like an FS2 beam, it'll look like some kind of beam  



[This message has been edited by Pera (edited 01-14-2002).]

[Starwing]

What do you think what the targeting laser is? It's a real beam put as a primary weapon. Several people, including myself have already played around with making beam primaries.  

[vadar_1]

type-2 beams can be primaries, but they look stupid when firing, considering how they "clip" through everything and never inpact

[vadar_1]

 

Originally posted by Pera:
1. It's not possible to make a button press "fire-beam" event in FRED2, it's a problem with repeating the action.

sorry i had to make another post, but its easier to use quote, anyways, im not sure about this, but wouldn't it be possible just to loop the even like 999 times with 1 second delay? then when the player does press the button, the even becomes true for that loop only and fires the beam. then again im not exactly sure if the condition has to be true every loop...

[LAW ENFORCER]

This is usefull as I have some larger (super fighters) that are basicly cap ships...

[Grey Wolf]

 

Originally posted by vadar_1:
type-2 beams can be primaries, but they look stupid when firing, considering how they "clip" through everything and never inpact

Incorrect. The Thor in SHaS (see GTD Wolf, link in avatar) is a type 2 beam, and it hits al the ships pretty well  

[Pera]

 

Originally posted by vadar_1:

sorry i had to make another post, but its easier to use quote, anyways, im not sure about this, but wouldn't it be possible just to loop the even like 999 times with 1 second delay? then when the player does press the button, the even becomes true for that loop only and fires the beam. then again im not exactly sure if the condition has to be true every loop...

Actually I'v been trying the "beam-free-all"-event.

No, it wouldn't work, because you have to define a target for the "fire-beam"-event, and so the player couldn't aim the beam.

And about the targeting laser, there are many reasons why it sucks. It doesn't have a sound, it doesn't drain energy, you can only fíre one at a time, and most of all it has infinite range.

[untouchable]

By the way welcome to HLP  

[Ulala]

 

Originally posted by vadar_1:

sorry i had to make another post, but its easier to use quote, anyways, im not sure about this, but wouldn't it be possible just to loop the even like 999 times with 1 second delay? then when the player does press the button, the even becomes true for that loop only and fires the beam. then again im not exactly sure if the condition has to be true every loop...

Nope, tried that already. When you make it repeat 1000000 times and have the interval for 1 second or 5 seconds or whatever, it causes the turret thats firing to fire EVERY 1 second or EVERY 5 seconds 1000000 times!     Usually you get so many beams dumped off in a few seconds that the game crashes.

[This message has been edited by Ulala (edited 01-16-2002).]

[skrux]

Wow, didn't expect you guys to be that helpful    Flyable cap ships have been an obsession with me since... since... ISDs in TIE Fighter  

I shall not give up so soon though.  The next step is figuring out how to add primary/secondary weapon points to a model.  There some editor out there, or is it good ol' hex?  For that matter, (and forgive me if this is a dumb question) is it possible to cluster turrets?  That is, control say 4 turrets with one subsystem?

Thanks again!

[Pera]

 

Originally posted by skrux:
Wow, didn't expect you guys to be that helpful      Flyable cap ships have been an obsession with me since... since... ISDs in TIE Fighter    

I shall not give up so soon though.  The next step is figuring out how to add primary/secondary weapon points to a model.  There some editor out there, or is it good ol' hex?  For that matter, (and forgive me if this is a dumb question) is it possible to cluster turrets?  That is, control say 4 turrets with one subsystem?

Thanks again!

The modelview32. Extremely easy to use.
I think you can get it from www.descent-freespace.com  .

And if you mean that a single turret would fire its weapon from multiple points, then yes, it's possible. Only they don't fire at the same time, but in turns. So if you have four firing points in a turret, it first fires from point 1, then waits the recharge time, fires from point 2, and so on.



[This message has been edited by Pera (edited 01-17-2002).]

[Darkage]

Why use modelview use PCS much better it only is abit more dificult to understand if you are new to it

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[LAW ENFORCER]

even better use PCS fo every thing MV32 can't do ... now why didn't YOU think of that  

MV32 is better at fire points (you can see them) but eye points don't stay, subojbect editing is 'strange' and paths, docks and thrusters carn't be set... its obious what to do (just make sure you reopen the model in PCS before editing (cos you save over your upgrades DOH!)

[KARMA]

 

(cos you save over your upgrades DOH!)

ehehheeh happened dozens of times to me    

[This message has been edited by KARMA (edited 01-17-2002).]

[Pera]

 

Originally posted by LAW ENFORCER:
even better use PCS fo every thing MV32 can't do ... now why didn't YOU think of that  

MV32 is better at fire points (you can see them) but eye points don't stay, subojbect editing is 'strange' and paths, docks and thrusters carn't be set... its obious what to do (just make sure you reopen the model in PCS before editing (cos you save over your upgrades DOH!)

Yeah, that's what I do too. It just is that he wanted to put firing points and primary slots in those ships, and as you said, Modview is better in that.