[Cobra]

Gorn Battlecruiser?

ship design knowledge is a little rusty...

[Getter Robo G]

heh , notice I said non-Trek. If no one gets it by Friday I wil spill it.

[Cobra]

****, i didn't see the word not.

[Getter Robo G]

Above pic was Federation Destroyer from Gundam series...


Anyway after a short talk with karajorma I went back to square one for my cloaking idea. I couldn't figure out why the basic green255 map with white border wouldn't work so I said F-it and randomly looked for a nameplat to test my theory... It works!

I fredded a dark BOP to be in game cloaked, then in 30 seconds uncloak.  this is how it appears in game while "cloaked" not exactly see-through BUT at least it has a ghostly white look and not pure white.. Close enough I say! (this is from Trashman's Archangel, mind if I adopt this for all ships Trashman?).

Needs more testing but I think I am well on the way to nailing down Trek style cloaking and decloaking...

[Gregster2k]

meh, you wont REALLY have that until we get the kinds of shaders necessary to make explosions that seem to warp space itself around them...once we're capable of that, we'll be capable of making "perfect Klingon" cloaking

[Getter Robo G]

yeah I know, but if I waited for things to "happen" I'd be stuck where I was 3 years ago...

[Getter Robo G]

speaking of three years ago remember this?

Romulan Nightwind Armed Shuttle. (By Kt'Hyla)



I finally got it working again. This was one of the dozens of conversions I did for RETAIL FS2, but in 3.6 due to the texture limit many of them are no longer useable (ie like 49 textures average).. I was lucky this one had only 19 so I trimmed 3 off without losing much visual quality.

So now you know why much of my progress got backpedled, what was worked on llong ago now needs to be re-worded and needs skills (like baking textures) that I do not curently have... One giant step backward, but I persevere regardless....

[Getter Robo G]

Just a small update since I recovered from my last eye operation and got net access restored after a big move.


Fed Odysseus makes it's WIP debut. )I totally lost the original file so I will have to scramble to find the author)




Skinman does it again! Klingon battlecruiser of the future, the "Kvort'cha" (Dark)




Lastly, Inter Stellar Concordium fighter#2 (turned a cruiser into a fighter with a slight retexture. I still need to tweak the cockpit).



Had 3 Star Blazer WIPs in cob format with shape placeholders for texture (blow up tests) but the pics must have gotten overwritten (ops)

Also added bow and rear dorsal turrets to Hammer Head fighter (SAAB) BUT now fighter crashes on death. Good thing I saved the unturreted .cob and .pof.

That's about all for now.

[Cobra]

[Ace]

Maybe those earlier models of "The Race" could be given updated skins and made into Kzinti craft?

Then the main campaign deals with a Kzin invasion after the Dominion War? (i.e. blitzkreig the weakened Klingons and Romulans to seize systems, Federation is pulled in when a science vessel is attacked)

[Getter Robo G]

Hmmmm that could work...

I was doing a sort of homage to old Trek and Wing commander with the idea of teh Mirak and Lyrans being "convinved" to put aside their differences (in other words browbeaten) and forge a new empire based on common heratige The Kizinti Empire. (based on the Kilrathi Empire).

Basicly they go through this transformation due to events against eh ISC Invasion and then after they help fight them off they basicly tell everyone "stay out of our borders" and go into mostly total isolation mode trade wise (they send ships out but none are allowed in). Very suspicious huh? that's how STA1 ends.

Now I was going to end it like that but I'll definately think about the Kizinti forces in the post Dominion era STA3(just before) or STA4 (after Nemisis).. I don't think they should be the main protagonists though, maybe secondary or even tritary.  (for the simple fact that although they boost their numbers a bit they still would be out numbered and out tech'ed by most everyone.) 

I might have them become the Nemesis era pirates (as you fight the Orions in STA1). Hmmmm how about an alliance between teh New Kizinti Empire and the Syndicate?  The Orions are pretty pissed about the beatdown they got in STA1.   (They have a Pirate version of the defiant concept, not hull, in game already).

[Getter Robo G]

OK table question time...

Don't yell cause I am using 3.6...

Why does this not work for ANImated torpedo?

Is i simply that 3.6 won;t support it or did I get something wrong?

;-------------------------------------

;Micro Photon
;
$Name: Micro Photon
+Title: XSTR("GU-13", 3317)
+Description:
XSTR(
"Special Issue
Fast-fire rate
Ballistic", 3318)
$end_multi_text
+Tech Title: XSTR("GU-13", 3319)
+Tech Anim: Tech_GTW-66_Maxim
+Tech Description:
XSTR("Federation photonic torpedo for fighters/shuttles.", 3320)
$end_multi_text
$Model File: none
@Laser Bitmap:                           microtorp
@Laser Glow:                           microtorp
@Laser Color:                           0, 0, 0
@Laser Color2:                           0, 0, 0
@Laser Length:                           1.
@Laser Head Radius:                     2.5
@Laser Tail Radius:                     2.5
$Mass:                                 0.10
$Velocity:                             400.0                           ;; speed of the weapon (initially) -- may or may not change
$Fire Wait:                            10.0                             ;; in seconds
$Damage:                               500
$Armor Factor:                        1.0
$Shield Factor:                        0.6
$Subsystem Factor:                     1.0
$Lifetime:                             25.0
$Energy Consumed:                        0.5                              ;; Energy used when fired
$Cargo Size:                           0.100                              ;; Amount of space taken up in weapon cargo
$Rearm Rate:                    100.0 
$Homing:                               NO
$LaunchSnd:                            81                               ;; The sound it makes when fired
$ImpactSnd:                            85                               ;; The sound it makes when it hits something
$Flags:                                ( "player allowed" "shudder" "stream" "ballistic" )
$Icon:                                 iconNewton
$Anim:                                 Newton
$Impact Explosion:      ExpMissileHit1
$Impact Explosion Radius:  10.0
$Pspew:
+Count: 1
+Time: 17
+Vel: 0.31 ;0.9
+Radius: 2.25
+Life: 0.8
+Scale: 0.0
+Bitmap: microfedp
;-------------------------


Everything after [ $Anim:  Newton ] line copied from vp weapons pack and added to my old torp table, and yes in this mod fighter torps are micro versions that are primaries and ballistic (and they work)...

Aw crap as I write this I just realised I forgot to add "particle spew" to flags....sigh.. one more time hope this works... I got the microfedp animation in the effects folder.

BRB...


[a few minutes later]  EDIT!


Ok you all can laugh at me now...




kinda cool, but not what I want for players.... Any helpful suggestions?
Keep in mind I now just enough to mess myself up, even after all this time I barely know what I am doing

[Wanderer]

Check the lenght of pspew (+Life:) and also the lenght (or FPS) of the animation used (if eff) and edit those.

[Getter Robo G]

Animation was made out of 24 frames, 12 red and 12 white for alternating pulses. Looks fine when you run ani alone out of game @ rate of 20fps.  15 was a bit slow and 30 was too fast. Life is .8

Thought it was exactly like beam info... I might have misinterprited it... I will try.1?  I want to make sure it flahes from firing to impact max range 2000 meters (for fighter version caps will have 4-6km range and be slower).

[Wanderer]

So do you want it to play the anim on the effect for 0.8 s and then start over? Like displaying only single particle instead of 'trail of particle blobs'?

[Getter Robo G]

You saw the Starfox trailer right?

Aside from the diff animation that's how it's suppose to be, just like the photons from trek. I used the images from Trek games to make all the torps I have but decided to go back and do them right this time and instead of static blobs (which look fine as is) see if I can get them to pulsate as the images show them rotating.

They are 8 bit pcx's... (remember I am modding about 2 years behind you guys until I finish them and then someone else can make the mods work with whatever current version SCP is by then)

This is what they look like static:

Fighter  (these came out awesome)



Caps (they look better than this now, older pic)



All images of other race's torps are basicly done, just wanna go back and make them all animated since they can be it seems, and I have all the images I need to make them.

[Wanderer]

Well as it happens i'm part of the Starfox team... So yes, i have seen those effects .

If you are planning to use them as primary (=non-homing) weapons then animation is rather simple.. Just set the animation as weapon bitmap graphic, either ani or (preferably) eff, and it should solve the issue given that the fps is properly set. Dont use such animations in particle spew as they will form trails.

However if you are planning to make animated secondaries (=more or less homing) thats a bit trickier. Problem is quite simply that with secondaries we can not use weapon bitmap effects, not atleast in any proper way. So there is a real challenge. But it is possible and already done

[Getter Robo G]

Woot!

    That did the trick... I also slowed then down a little and made them bigger to see better but not so big they dwarf the fighter firing them. I'll just call it an optical trick if people think they are big.

   The problem with secondaries is that Static maps work (will try ani later) but they are HUGE!!! And currently not lookign good for fighters, just caps.

Anyway here is final result!!!

   

Thanks a bunch!

[Wanderer]

Hmmm.. What are those beam like things?

[Colonol Dekker]

Rough guess- beam cannon made to look like phasers?