and their lack of loyalty

For my latest plug-in I am trying to make a fighter which will never die. Well, it will die, but not stay dead. Its escape ship is itself (thanks to Emmit Gandlodder for how to fly escape ships). The idea is to have an enemy fighter which will not die, but instead is knocked out of battle for a few seconds as it reloads, giving you a chance to move against the ship it is escorting.
When testing the fighter with my own ship I ran into a problem (duh, that's why I'm here). The fighter would explode, launch its clone escape ship, the new ship would promptly act as if it has nothing to do with me.
Is there a way to preserve the loyalty of my fighters' escape ships?

Also, my ship has a bay for these fighters and my ship also uses the fighters as an escape ship. When my fighters are launched and my ship is destroyed, I escape in a fighter, but my fighters stop recognizing me. I know that when I have had launched my fighters, then sold my ship, they remained as normal escorts.
Is there a way to preserve the loyalty of my own fighters when I die?

Thank you.

(preserve the loyalty is a fun phrase to use, very authoritative :laugh:)

Klepsacovic, on Mar 13 2005, 06:28 AM, said:

Preserve the loyalty is a fun phrase to use, very authoritative :laugh:
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"Gone Feral" is another interesting phrase to use. It usually applies to fighters of fighters, or fighters of escorts, once the carrying ship (your fighter / your escort) is destroyed. Basically, these sub-fighters turn their guns against you.

I'm not aware of a solution to either problem.

Wouldn't ionizing weapons be a better way of doing this?

Regulus, on Mar 13 2005, 10:24 AM, said:

Wouldn't ionizing weapons be a better way of doing this?
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Um... read what he posted... :mellow:

Quote

When testing the fighter with my own ship I ran into a problem (duh, that's why I'm here). The fighter would explode, launch its clone escape ship, the new ship would promptly act as if it has nothing to do with me.

Maybe you could set the fighter to a government that either likes you or hates you depending on the situation.

general11, on Mar 13 2005, 03:44 PM, said:

Um... read what he posted... :mellow:

Maybe you could set the fighter to a government that either likes you or hates you depending on the situation.
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That would work well in missions. I suppose I could apply this to normal flight. Create a new rank and government so that the fighters will always assist when I request help. The only problem is that I would still lose the fighters, though I guess I could just disable and recapture them. And I wouldn't have the ability to call them off if I want to just disable a ship.
Still the most important thing is to not lose the fighters. Since they never die, they are really expensive (many times the cost of a Raven). I don't think players would be happy about their expensive, immortal fighters just abandoning them (especially in the middle of a battle).
Maybe I'll just not let players use them, if they maintained loyalty they would definitely be a cheat. Even flying one yourself is basically cheating. The mother ship is really strong, and the fighters are well armed and very fast.

I've had an idea But you'll have to test it. And you won't get it as a fighter, but as a mďsn-based escort

Set the fighter (ID yyy) AI to "Wimpy Trader", then create a düde (ID zzz) of the fighter with "Interceptor" AI (or "Warship" if you prefer ).
I would also try giving the fighter "fast jumping" (for what will happen further along).

Upon buying the outfit of the fighter, the outfit itself is blank but it starts mission xxx. This mission uses düde zzz and has the dude follow the player and enter by hyperspace jump.

Upon abortion or failure of mission xxx (which is an invisible mission offered in a përs resource ship), mission xxx starts again.

Upon destruction, the first fighter gives way to the second fighter (still ID yyy). This second fighter, having the AI of a wimpy trader (because it's the inherent value, not a düde resource), will hopefully leave the system. And, hopefully, the fighter of the newly started mission xxx will arrive after the second fighter has left the system.

See what I mean?

general11, on Mar 13 2005, 10:44 AM, said:

Um... read what he posted... :mellow:
View Post

I did. Temporarily knocking ships out of comission is exactly what ionizing weapons are designed to do.

-reg

But... hes not making a weapon to knock ships out of comission. Hes making a ship that gets knocked out of comission by normal weapons...

I really have no idea. I was thinking of that govt flag 'never attack players' that turns everything of that govt into an escort, but that doesnt really work.

The main idea of the ship is that it will not stay dead. For the player it is a powerful cheat. But when used by the computer it creates an interesting challeng.
I am considering making higher ranked variants escape ships. Imagine if instead of dying, AI ships just got more powerful. It would be like an EVN version of the Hulk. The only obstacle I see is running out of weapons. Outfits won't be a problem, I just won't make any outfits for the weapons. That will leave them open for non-weapon outfits and prevent players from abusing the stronger rebirth.
Example:
Pirate Valkyrie is destroyed. It escapes in a slightly weakened but more dangerous Pirate Valkyrie II. That escapes, this time in a class III. Once that is down you must take on a deadly Pirate Valkyrie Class IV. I like the idea, that way just by taking on one Pirate you can get four times the kills, legal benefit, and possibly money (does money reappear with the escape ship?).
I shudder to think of the effects of attacking a full warship. How many variants are there of the Auroran Carrier, 10? Oh nice, 15 Abominations. Just on Aurorans alone I will run out of weapons. Maybe I'll have to restrict my ambitions. Or I could make a different plug-in for each general ship group. If you think will fight lots of Feds, you add the plug-in that makes the Fed ships grow stronger, Pirates: the Pirate plug-in, and so on and so forth. Now that sounds authoritative.
max weapons 256 (minus those that Nova already uses)
ships used by Nova 286

This post has been edited by Klepsacovic : 14 March 2005 - 09:04 PM

Acutally, that would make a good thing for lots of weak "organic" ships (i.e. when they die, their child is relesed) if it's possible. the problem with Pace (haldora)'s idea is that if you launched them from a bay you could not get them back. you would have to buy the special outfit and hire them as an escort (at least I think so)

Valkries containing valkries is just wierd... I could understand biological/magical/whatever non mechanical ships undergoing such a transformation, but the only reason i could see for a mechanical ship doing this is if a standard balanced ship, once cornered and critically damaged, were to shed its outer shell to reveal an offensive, suicidally destructive kamikaze ship. maybe a -999 ammotype (or... unless AI never fire those).

Im still at a loss for how to achieve this. Maybe if the death delay is really long on the mother ship, the baby wont go feral so long as the mother still exists. This is kinda messy, as you have noted. (Full circle) but if the ships are only to go a few iterations, this wont fill the system up. This obviously isnt an infinate fix, but its a start. I think you would have to use alt frames to show the ship, then hide them when disabled so it becomes invisible. As for the radar ghost... this isnt a real enough of a solution to worry about that.

NebuchadnezzaR, on Mar 15 2005, 03:11 AM, said:

Valkries containing valkries is just wierd...
Im still at a loss for how to achieve this. Maybe if the death delay is really long on the mother ship, the baby wont go feral so long as the mother still exists.View Post

The transformation is not supposed to make sense in any real way. It is just a way to increase the challenge of fighting with the AI. It's similar to variants somehow having more free mass than each other. It's a game, it doesn't have to make sense.
The mother ship must die. The reason is that the escape ship is a fighter, really fast but also really easily destroyed by any concentration of fire. Also, the AI launches lots of missiles, too many in fact. I have noticed that they will track the escape ship. So in a span of two seconds I have lost three ships. If they don't go away, I could fill the system in less than a minute.
The undead mother ship would not work anyway. Escorts (including fighters) lose loyalty the instant a ship reaches zero armor.
I am afraid that I will have to remove the ability to have these as escorts. They would be too expensive to hire (to buy one costs 25 million), too much of a cheat, and don't even work as escorts

Okay, I've come up with a solution to having yourself a reincarnating escort ( so to make it an enemy ship of the same capabilities, you will just have to change the mďsn resource included ). It's not perfect because if you're in a system with a planet or two, the "born from the ashes" ship will usually go visit a planet before it hypers out, giving the chance for the new escort that will hyper in the chance to get there before the first ship gets out.

To try it out, buy the Striker Bay (I've used a Striker, and the prices and mass are almost nil to enable easier testing), then buy a Striker, and use it in such a way that it gets destroyed. Then you will see another Striker be born form its ashes, and it will have a Wimpy Trader AI, making it only visit a planet then hyper out. It will not ever fight an enemy that doesn't provoque it because the inherent government has the "maximum odds" field set to 1

To explain what I have done in more detail, here goes

1. Preliminary information

Oütf 490, the Striker Bay, enables you to buy oütf 489, the Striker. The Striker Bay is weapon 247, the Striker is not its ammo (otherwise your mission would never work). Both have a maximum number of 1. On the other hand, buying the Striker starts mission 1123 which makes a Striker escort you. Basically, they are but cover outfits and a cover weapon.

2. Making the ship be born again

Shďp 439 (the Striker that is your escort) receives weapon 248, which uses shďp 440 as ammo and isn't usable by the AI. Corresponding oütf resources are Striker Bay 492 and Striker 491. Shďp 439 also gets 1 ammo count of the weapon, and KeyCarried is shďp 440.
Because of this, the Striker will not be able to send out a Striker escort, but will, when destroyed, give way to another Striker. Unfortunately, this doesn't always seem to happen. Though it does happen most of the time.
This Striker, ID 440, has a Wimpy Trader AI as explained above, and this makes it leave the system after visiting a planet. So sometimes you get two Strikers in the same system. Unfortunately, it's the best option I had (apart from changing the Escape Pod shän, which I didn't want to do).

3. Making the escort return

Mission 1123, which controls the escort's behaviour, is a mission without a set destination, but more importantly, it is a visible mission. (this is mandatory, otherwise it doesn't fail)
The OnFail field starts mission 1123 again, and thus the cycle restarts.

This is all very approximate. If you can improve this in any way, please do so and indicate the changes.

Attached File(s)

• Fighter.zip (990bytes)
  Number of downloads: 44

This post has been edited by Pace (haldora) : 29 March 2005 - 03:52 AM