[Raven2001]

I was browsing through the tech database and noticed that the tech description of the Mara says that all the info about it is classified level "whatever"

I thought: well, I can understand why they say that about the Sath (Nova weapon...) and the Comm node, but the Mara??

Any thought about this??

[pyro-manic]

Not sure what you're referring to here. The SF Mara, or the Terran version of it?

[Blaise Russel]

Laziness?

[Raven2001]

Originally posted by pyro-manic
Not sure what you're referring to here. The SF Mara, or the Terran version of it?

the SF Mara of course

[Nuclear1]

Because, when the tech entry was made, details for the Rakshasa and Mara would have been classified, as the Shivans had just returned?

[Raven2001]

Well, that would be a bit lazy, like Blaise Russel pointed out... also, the Rakshasa doesn't have any of that stuff, but a well done description

[phatosealpha]

I figured it was just command being command, ie, not telling us anything.  It's not exactly like they've got a freedom of information policy, and half the time I'm amazed when they tell me anything about the ships I'm actually flying.

[aldo_14]

They probably classify anything which the GTI is still investigating.

[Charismatic]

And thus the never ending investigation..

[Nuclear1]

Originally posted by aldo_14
They probably classify anything which the GTI is still investigating.

Like reverse-engineering Maras?

Yes...

[Mefustae]

Well what exactly do you want the Tech-Entry to give you? A mail-order form where you can send away for a 'Make your own Mara, E-Z!' Kit?

...Woah, that'd be pretty sweet come to think of it...

[Mav]

Well, I'd say they don't want to give away that they captured some...  (is of course pointless once you've flown them)

[NGTM-1R]

It's just stupid. They know that the pilots they send in are going to be fighting these things, but they won't tell the pilots anything about them.

[WMCoolmon]

Maybe because they thought if pilots knew the true capabilities of the Mara, they'd freak out? Or it could be that clearance may be granted on a per-mission basis, but isn't given out freely to keep things under wraps, and prevent civillians from freaking out.

Alternatively, it might just be technical specs and the like that are classified.

[willy_principal]

yeah..man........it's ****ing clasdsdiedesd

[Akalabeth Angel]

Logically all fighters/ships from the enemy should have a "we don't know much about it, but it seems kickass" entry and a later "well, it can do this, and this, and this. Beware!" entry, but since each ship only gets one entry that's not possible. (unless you did two entries for each ship, and add one to the techbase, and delete the other when the time came (assuming the latter is possible)).

The Mara simply represents one of those "we don't know much about it yet" stages . . .

[NGTM-1R]

Originally posted by WMCoolmon
Maybe because they thought if pilots knew the true capabilities of the Mara, they'd freak out? Or it could be that clearance may be granted on a per-mission basis, but isn't given out freely to keep things under wraps, and prevent civillians from freaking out.

Alternatively, it might just be technical specs and the like that are classified.

Frankly, I'd freak more about the Astaroth, and they were willing to let me know about that...

[Mav]

Originally posted by WMCoolmon
Maybe because they thought if pilots knew the true capabilities of the Mara, they'd freak out? Or it could be that clearance may be granted on a per-mission basis, but isn't given out freely to keep things under wraps, and prevent civillians from freaking out.

Alternatively, it might just be technical specs and the like that are classified.

On this point, it would be nice if we could get different clearance levels implemented. So each ship/weapon/whatnot could have different descriptions assigned in the .tbl-file like

$Description 1: "blabla"
$DescriptionClearance 1: Leutnant
...


If you want to control it with SEXPs, just assign every description a rank the player cannot reach in your campaign.

[TopAce]

Redundant waste of time.

On-topic: Only this line came to the mind of the man who wrote the descriptions. I don't see what could be classified on the Mara or the Rakshasa.

[Akalabeth Angel]

The problem with adding new SEXps, is how often do the players look at the techroom? Having multiple descriptions would be cool . . . heck for my campaign I updated all the descriptions for the current time frame, but how many people are actually going to notice multiple descriptions let alone new ones for older units?

Only those who perhaps have a real appreciation of detail might do that. But if most people want to check out the ship they'd probably start up ModelView