Li'l help needed with testing...

Final Edit: Attached plug-in removed from this post. Thanks to Dr. Trowel for his input, and helping to make my plug-in better. Otherwise... open beta experiment a failure. Clearly my own fault, but disappointing nonetheless.

Hey folks! For the past several weeks I have been diligently working on a ship hangar/garage type of plug-in for the official EV(Classic) for EVN(the port). After much tinkering (and hair pulling), I think I've finally got it right. But, of course, I need some help testing it.

Anyone interested in lending a hand can download the plug-in from the attachment at the bottom of this post. The enclosed Read Me should have all of the info you need to get you started. Please post any comments, questions, suggestions, or bugs in this topic. All I really ask is that you play the game and make use of the hangar, and of course, let me know how it goes.

If all goes as well as I think it will, I'll be looking to do the same for the EVO port in the near future. I'm also going to attempt to put together coherent documentation for how I accomplished the task, so any developers wishing to use the method will be able to. I'm sure there are also developers out there who can find ways to make it more efficient, (possibly using less resources), and I'd love to hear from them also.

Thanks!

And... no, this isn't possible for the EVN scenario. Not with my method, anyway. Nova is just way too big.

This post has been edited by slouch : 25 September 2004 - 10:52 AM

Initial indications are that this works fine! So far I've stored and retrieved a shuttle and a scoutship, each with an array of custom outfits. This is on a Mac running OS X.3.

You might want to add a note that the ship that you turn in upon retrieving a stored ship will be lost forever, with no credit to your account for either the ship or it's outfits. If you want to retrieve a stored ship and don't want to store your current vessel, it therefore is best to trade down to a shuttle at Blackthorne before proceeding to Ship Hanger Station.

So far, so good then. Thanks Dr. Trowel!

I never even thought of the ship trade in value being lost. I'll definitely add some type of warning about that, most likely in the Read Me. I'm not sure that the tiny landing description area in EVC can accomodate much more. I'll give it a shot though, I see a mistake that needs changing anyway.

For some reason, I thought the ship name being lost/transferred would be more of an issue. It isn't one for me, but who knows.

Thanks!

BTW: any noticable lag in the game when landing/taking off from the station or storing/retrieving ships? I've got a ton of crons iterating there.

This post has been edited by slouch : 13 September 2004 - 06:05 PM

Haven't had a chance to check for lags, but I didn't notice any the first 3 times I used the storage feature.

You could avoid the no-credit-for-exchanged-ships issue if you could figure out how to have the ship retrieval process include a shipyard purchase of a 0 credit "dummy" ship that sets bits to dump the player into the right ship, or to activate the mission that does the ship switch.

Version 1.2 now available via the attachment from the first post.

Changes:

- Ship retrieval now takes place in the shipyard on Ship Hangar Station. (Player will receive full trade-in value for their current ship).

- Player is no longer absquatulated from the station after storing a ship.

- Descriptions updated, and other internal changes. (Unnecessary operations removed).

I've gotta say, I like this way much better. It would be perfect if both ship storage and retrieval could be done in the shipyard. Unfortunately, that would lead to a big time money cheat, so it's not going to happen.

Pros:

1. Ship trade in value is not lost when retrieving a ship.
2. Opportunity to rename your ship when retrieving it from storage.
3. Just feels more like a game feature than a game hack.

Cons:

1. Shipyard info will not accurately display the weapons being stored with the ship.

Important! If you have been using version 1.0, and your last save point was Ship Hangar Station, you must first land on any other planet/station before removing version 1.0! This will ensure that all of the old missions have the chance to properly auto-abort. Afterwards, you may remove 1.0, and replace it with 1.2.

There is no version 1.1, it was an ill-fated experiment that died a quick death.

This post has been edited by slouch : 15 September 2004 - 01:18 PM

slouch, on Sep 15 2004, 01:52 PM, said:

It would be perfect if both ship storage and retrieval could be done in the shipyard.View Post

How about a mission offer text that pops up when you enter the station's shipyard (ala the Sigma Shipping missions), asking you if you want to store your ship?

Haven't tried 1.2 yet.... But I will. I also haven't peeked under the hood of this baby. I'm looking forward to seeing how you managed to keep track of the hundreds of Javelin rockets on my stored Scoutship!

This post has been edited by Dr. Trowel : 15 September 2004 - 06:37 PM

Excellent idea! I just gave it a quick test, and there are a couple of obstacles:

1. There must be ships available for purchase in the shipyard for missions to be offered there. Currently, I don't have any normal ships sold there to cut down on some potential headaches with the counting system. It can be done though, I'll look into this.

2. NCBs set on accept/refuse in missions offered from the shipyard don't have an immediate impact on the ships which are available. So, after storing a ship the player would need to return to the main spaceport, then go back to the shipyard to see their stored ship. I don't think there is any way around this.

I'll play around with it a bit more and see if I can make it work. Thanks for the suggestion, though!

This post has been edited by slouch : 15 September 2004 - 09:45 PM

First major problem encountered:

Do not land on Ship Hangar Station with launched fighters. This will create 9999 cron iterations which will take in the neighborhood of 20-30 seconds. Big big lag. This is only a problem if they are launched, carried on board does not have any problems. If you are looking to exploit this, and can deal with a huge lag, storing a ship with fighters launched, then retrieving the ship will give you 9999 fighters.

I have several options to explore to get around this, but it may take some time.

Edit:

Options, so far as I can tell:

1. Not keep count of the players carried ships at all. The player will lose any carried ships when they put their ship in storage.

2. Not keep count of the players carried ships at all. Automatically refill fighter bays when ship is retrieved.

3. Do nothing. Put a warning in the Read Me which explains the problem.

Obviously, all of these have some serious flaws.

1. Flaw - The player will lose the value of some expensive outfits when storing. This will force them to buy them back, or capture if possible.

2. Flaw - Basically makes a built-in cheat. The player could always just store and immediately retrieve their ship to refill their bays. Also makes a big time money cheat if they sell fighters, store/retrieve ship, rinse, repeat.

3. Flaw - Someone will either miss the warning in the Read Me, or accidentally land on the station with fighters launched. Leads to a big time cheat: if the player stores that ship, on retrieval they will be given 9999 of the fighter type that was launched. The huge lag is also a problem. Depending on the state of the hangars, they may have to endure 20,000 cron iterations. I'm sure to get some angry emails, or thanks for the big cheat. Either way, not what I'm looking for.

Frankly, if I were just making this for myself, I would take option #3. But since I would like to post this for download, I don't think that's the best course of action. I'm leaning towards option #2, but I'll try to come up with something else before making any changes.

This post has been edited by slouch : 17 September 2004 - 07:37 AM