The large cruisers

Since the functions of the cruisers are a little different from the other ships I thought there might be some questions about them. Here's a place to ask them.

MajorTom: Do you have a prefence as to the whether the cruiser weapons are based on the fixed-mount guns or turrets? They mount different ways, so I just want to make sure of what you want before I set up the final setup scenes. (Both the fixed-mount guns and turrets can either have visible avatars or be invisible, whatever you prefer.)

Personally, I like the turrets because they can be made to track at any speed, allowing more variety and control. I've tried out some setups with some big powerful long-range turrets that track slowly and small shorter-range anti-fighter turrets that track reasonably quickly. They looked pretty good because the big guns couldn't track the fighters, so they didn't really shoot at them. But when they locked on to a large slow-moving ship they would fire. And the shorter range on the anti-fighter turrets prevented them from shooting at anything but the fighters. It seemed to work out well, so I thought I'd put it on the table. (btw - The big guns don't have to actually do any damage. I figure they're just for show anyway, because it looks cool having the big ships shooting at each other over extremely long range. I know that all the actual damage should be left to the players.)

That's my two cents on the guns. What would you like?

mailto:second_chance@cox.net
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I like your ideas and the concept.
Go for the turret versions with visible avatars first and we'll see what happens.

A word of caution:
We had 2 turrets each on the bastille destroyers in multiplayer (What_rocksV2) and noticed that sometimes both and sometimes only one would track. The fire arc of both was as if they were tracking, but one turret just remained immobile. That looks kinda funny when a bolt comes out of a turret at 45 degrees to the muzzle position.

we never found what caused the tracking to be intermittant. It may have been the tracking speed. So, if you can make them real slow tracking that might help.
You might want to try out a cruiser with 2 and then 4 turrets first to make sure all is going well. Don't worry about preformance hit in this case, because the tracking (visual movement) is done on each client separately.

Where we can expect a preformance hit is in reference to the number of bolts flying around. Each bolt represents a projectile that the server has to track for collision.
What I'm saying here is that we may have to reduce the refire_rate considerably to keep the game going smoothly when the two cruisers are fireing at each other (even if the bolts don't really do any damage).
So don't go and get yer hopes up too much about having some spectacular fireworks

Iwar2 Multiplayer Fan Site

Ok, cool. I think I actually talked to Steve about the turret animation problem once. If I remember correctly, he said it was just one of those things that don't always work. So there's nothing that can be done about it. Sometimes they work, sometimes they don't. But the functionality is unaffected, it's just an animation thing. So, we'll do what we can, and see what works.

Refire rate is no problem for me. I think at least the big guns should fire very slowly. But you can figure out what works for you during balancing, and I can always tweak the tracking speed if need be.

*edit*
Oh yeah, about the number of bolts flying around; I'm glad you brought that up. The "real" Star Destroyer has something like 200+ guns. That's obviously far too much for this game on one ship. Do you have any kind of a rough idea of how many guns, and of what power, you want on the cruisers? Since the players only get fighters, I think a few (like 4, maybe) big long-range "show off" canons and a bunch of shorter range anti-fighter guns (maybe 6-12) should do it. Is that too much? Too little?

I figure the player and anti-fighter gun range should max out at about 5km or so. This way, it's possible to fly away from the cruisers and try to regroup without a non-stop barrage. But I'm sure you'll get all that stuff sorted out in testing.

Now that the holidays are over I'll try to start dedicating more time to finishing the work.

mailto:second_chance@cox.net
The Ultimate Guide To Modding: I-War 2 - Edge Of Chaos
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Originally posted by Second Chance


*edit*
Oh yeah, about the number of bolts flying around; I'm glad you brought that up. The "real" Star Destroyer has something like 200+ guns. That's obviously far too much for this game on one ship. Do you have any kind of a rough idea of how many guns, and of what power, you want on the cruisers? Since the players only get fighters, I think a few (like 4, maybe) big long-range "show off" canons and a bunch of shorter range anti-fighter guns (maybe 6-12) should do it. Is that too much? Too little?

I dunno, really. six might be ok but 12 anti-fighter guns will be way too many.
1)A fighter would never get past them and
2) it would load the client a lot to render all the bolt avatars. At an average refire rate and bolt speed you'll have 3 to 4 bolt pairs constantly rendered for each gun pair before they disappear in the distance.

Iwar2 Multiplayer Fan Site

Okey dokey. I'll start things off with six mounts and we'll see where that takes us.

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The Ultimate Guide To Modding: I-War 2 - Edge Of Chaos
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