Hello,
because of the huge progress the WC-Saga-Mod has made within the last few month, we are now beginning to make the final approach for an official demo-release and hopefully the main-release at the fall of this year (maybe some months later, I personally see it a little less optimistic, there is still so much to do).
But in order to do so, we are in desperate need of some code-changes. I posted our wishes a few times now, but mostly the topics went to quickly another way, so this is why I start this topic here. I would really appreciate if nothing unrelated to this topic will be posted here (in other words, no SPAM please
)
If we want to bring this project to a good end, we had to know on which code-changes we can count, and which we must spare or try to simulate another way, so I hope you can give us some clear "Yes and No's".
Also I don't want to hire away members of the SCP-Team, but If
someone wants to join our team to take care of the development of our main.exe in conjunction with the official SCP-Exe, we would be happy to welcome him.Being a Team-Member gives you the advantage of getting full access to our database-server and of course the internal forum, so you can check out everything with the real Wing-Commander-Stuff (but of course everything must be kept within the internal, we don't want any more leaks on our stuff). If you have experience in coding the FS-Source-Code and are interested to join our course, pls contact ME or TOLWYN.
Here are our needs, in the order of what is needed most in the first place:
1) Autopilot, for proper use it has 4 vital things missing.
a) A sexpression, which can controll the time-compression, best way would be, that it slows down in one or two steps, and not jump von 64x to 1x (but even this would be enough)
b) A "Max-Radar-Range" which can be set as a flag in the launcher, so that the "infintive radar" is only the value you have set.
c) A new Key-Boundle, best would be ALT-A, which can be used a few time within the mission to activate the autopilot-Sexpression. Currently I'm using the numbers 1 to 4, but they are used in multi-player and can only be used once in a mission (but this is maybe just a error in my scripts) and I need
five navpoints.
d) Also a small problem, when you fly to the navpoint via autopilot (means your fighter is controlled by the AI), you cannot target anything (which is actually not bad), but you can't see the distance to the Nav-Point either. Maybe some Lead-Indicator or something could solve this problem). Showing of the decreasing distance would be good.
Asking for a single "autopilot"-sexpression, which will fly to the selected navpoint, activates and deactivates the time-warp and form your wingmen (or let the player form on the leader) would be to much to ask I guess
)
2) Weapons.tbl should get a "max.range"-value for missile weapons. Problems can be handled more or less with the live-time of the missile, but if it is not to difficult ....Problem is, that AI-Fighters fire their missile from a very far distance, depending on the lifetime of the missiles. Also a change of the missile-fire-behaviour of AI-ships would be wise.
3) Phreaks very cool stealth-modus he once developed, but should be possible to control over sexpression and of course for AI-Fighers as well (and for the player pressing a specific button).
4) Taunt enemy. Just for fun, but would be perfect, when a taunted fighter automatically drops his target and attack you (after you taunted him 2 or 3 times).
5) Death screams of enemies (not all, only a few of them, maybe activated in FRED). When fredding a death-scream in a mission, you have to set it to guardian, then when it's hull is 1% send the message, and then selfdestruct him, that's the best way IMO. But the problem is, while the death-message is sended, the enemy is fully functional and invulnerable.
When I say, send message "when destroyed", the message can only be sended by "command" or something, but not by the destroyed fighter, and I need these comm-brackets around the target to make it realistic. Some Fighters are exploding instantly, but others are rotating and braking apart, for these the death-scream would be perfect.
6) Every shockwave (except missiles perhaps) should effect the player with the EMP-Effect, the nearer you are, the harder the effect. Shouldn't be to difficult, because the shockwave from the emp-missile already has that effekt. Maybe it can be edited to the tbl, if a shockwave will have an emp-effect or not.
7) Every time a capship explodes (in the same moment when it brakes apart and the shockwave starts generating) there should be a bright flash apear on the screen (maybe like the sun-flare). Best would be, if the strongness of the effect depends on how your view-angle is. Extrem bright when facing the exploding ship, and rather weak when you turn away about 180 degree (I always liked that in the WC-Games:) )
8) A different way to add subobjekt to a modelfile, which are visible and destroyable,
but not targetable. This is needed for parked fighters inside a carriers hangarbay. If you build them as normal subobjects, you can target them, and even worse, you can still target them when they are destroyed and didn't exist anymore. (Maybe this could also be achived by mutliple docking-points, but I would prefer the other solution). Turrest are handeld a little different, they cannot be targeted after destruction, maybe it would be enough if you can target the parked fighters when still alive, but not anymore when destroyed, but not targetable would be better).
Maybe the turret-way can be adapted to subobjects.
Fred-Changes (Important).9) Most of our carriers have two fighterbays, foreward and back. Forward for launch, back for landing. We need a addon in FRED, which let you select the subsystem , from which a wing/fighter should launch or land. Earlier I thought, I can achive this using waypoints, but it isn't working every time. The AI makes what it wants to, same goes for launching, it is not always using the first path (just an Idea, but sometimes it seems, that the game didn't say "bay01" is now free again. Can it be, that there is somesort of "time-amount", how long a path is busy after usage ? )
10) We need a "fire missile-turret" sexpression. Same as the "fire beam", which works fine for primaries, but not for secondary weapons. Maybe "fire beam" can be upgraded.
11) FRED-Limits for SEXP-Operators must be bumped up again.
12) The "player-use-ai"-SEXP still allows the player to make moves. Is it possible to lock the controll of the fighter 100 % ?
Thanks for your time !
Best regards
Starman©
P.S. My Team-Mates may correct me, If I had forgotten something.
And sorry for this veeery long post
