Plug Problems/Questions

First, it has been quite awhile shice I visited this board, (under a different handle) so I appoligise if anything I saw has been covered before.

Anyway, I'm designing a pulg to completely replace EVO. Working title: Late Arrival. Actualy has several meanings, one of which refers to the fact that this plug is so late after the release of EVO.

So far it is huge. 6 different civilizations (2 human) (not including pirates and other space hazards). All new techs, weapons, ships, etc. So far I have wonderfull new graphics for 47 different ships, weapons. Each races' technology (ships, weapons) have a distincly different look and design than the others. Much of the universe is created, and much of the story is planned, but not yet coded. A story that can be played from a number of different perspectives, with different endings.

So here are some current problems:

1. When ships launched from fighter bays have their OWN ships to launch. This works fine except there is some unusual behavior.

Visualize if you will: Ship C has fighter bays containing ship B. While ship B has fighter bays containing ship A.

The tiny A fighters of ship B don't come back before ship B returns to ship C, and they are left flying around. Not TOO much of a problem, except that I think ship B gets all of it's A fighters back when it returns to ship C. This behavior can be abused.

More of a problem is when the player is playing ship C. It seems that ship B will have difficulty launching the A fighters: they keep popping in and out (but they sometimes manage to get out and stay out) This problem doesn't seem to occur when the computer plays ship C.

Even worse is the scenario of a ship D that launches ship C. Works if the player plays ship D (with the exception that the B ships will pop in and out again.) However, if the computer plays ship D, for some reason it won't launch ships C.

I hope that all made sence!
BTW: such behavior with multiple fighter leves is very appropiate for one particular insect-like race that inhabits a distant part of my galaxy... The effect is QUITE nice. Going to attack that lone bug-like ship? Whoops! Seconds latrer there are 15 smaller bug-like enemies swooping around!

2. Can't seem to get different weapons to use the same ammo. For instance, you have a gun that shoots metal slugs, but perhaps you could also choose a heavier version of the weapon that shoots them at a faster speed (longer range, more damage) or a turreted version, that all draw from the same ammo. The EVO Bible says this is possible, you can set the AmmoType to a different weapon, but it doesn't seem to work.

3. I would like to use some short 10-15 second music clips for some select worlds. However, I'm sure this is, technicaly, a copyright violation. Has anyone had any problems from music companies for doing this? (I've seen it done is some plugs) I'm not charging any money for my plug, and I would be more that happy to give appropiate credit.

4. Strange AI behavior for a ship with 1 rocket. When the ship has 1 unguided rocket it rarely fires it. When I give it 2, it fires 3.

Well that's about it for now. Can anyone offer soultions?

Desprez
P.S. Perhaps someone knows where I might be able to post some of my graphics? As a sort of teaser? Even if this project falls by the wayside, I'm sure someone could find an use for them.

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Your a-b-c idea is certainly nothing new. I can recall several people who tried it. However, if you noticed, no one has EVER done a serious plug doing that. I think its because EV/O just wasn't designed to do that.

There is no way to fix it really. The only thing that COULD work is to make it impossible for B to get back into C. Unfortuantly, I don't recall anyway to do that.

I seriously suggests you don't do an a-b-c thing unless you can solve that problem. Bugs like that really make a plug look bad, very unrealistic.

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I hope that you'll be able to finish this plug-in, it sounds interesting. Two levels of nested ships wouldn't bother me (the a-b-c relationship) even if some or all of the third level didn't make it back to the mother ship . Of course, players couldn't be allowed to take over these ships or everything would go haywire. But that doesn't bother me either. You could have missions done from every other perspective, I suppose

You could also make the last level of nested ships a slow moving weapon with ship graphics. Some sort of kamakaze (sp?) drone.

As for your other questions, I don't think that the dual ammo technique works, though I think that Martin Turner somehow did manage to make a weapon like that in FH. Take a look at the plug and see if you can figure it out. It involved the IMP missiles and normal rockets, I think.

I never heard of anyone but Ambrosia being concerned with copyright violations in EV/O plugs. As long as you don't advertise the fact that you use someone else's material, I think you're ok.

I've never heard of that single rocket problem, don't know what to do about it.

Good luck

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Bubbles

(This message has been edited by Bubbles (edited 01-30-2000).)

Just on the music problem; copyright will be a problem only if someone reports it.

While you may be able to get away with that if the plug is free, you might still have problems with 'public broadcast' restrictions.

If it makes any nevermind, Nova was going to have music for planets, but it turns out that the sounds run into each other. About 4-5 secs is all you get, sometimes, because the pitch and the timing of the sound change randomly (it's an ambient sound, see?)

best,

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(pipeline)

The ABC ship idea runs into problems when the b ships come back, then the c ships will fire on you if you fire any weapons, as they have no owners. And if the b ships relaunch, then you quickly run out of places for ships.

If you made AI ships that launched say 2 fighters and all those 2 fighters can launch 2 more fighters it would work, and it would give the swarming effect you might want for the insects.

As for using the same ammo for different weapons it is "theoretically possible" but that theory has been disproven by everyone who's tried. so no you can't.

The reason the AI has different numbers of rockets than you specify is because the number you give is the average, but it usually increases by like ą 20% that number probably is wrong but you get the idea.

Chamrin

Am I a "veteran" yet?

Actually the A ships that get left behind are not much of a problem with the AI. As it turns out, it is very easy to explain that behavior within the storyline.

The Itkl are an insect like race whose ships are grown out of living tissue. One of the features of this race is their ability to swarm an enemy - quickly. Also, because their ships are a very efficient biological construct, they have one of the smallest interceptors. An expendable unpiloted drone (A ship). Quite deadly and hard to hit because of their small size and speed, they cary a one shot very close range explosive charge. However, once this charge is expended, they have little bite left with their remaing single gun-like weapon, and become more of a distraction. Sometimes the Itkl just leave them behind. And on rare occasions they seem to be able to grow new ones.

Though it sounds like a rationalization after the fact, all but the last sentance was decided before I had even tried the ABC thing. Funny how it almost makes it more alien and convincing WITH the problem.

I think I will have to restrict player access to the large Mothership (C ship) though. Again, not too much of a problem. The Mothership is a rare sight. A huge monstrosity of a bug. Slow and ponderous, but able to launch two of the feared Warship bugs (B ship) each of which cary 4-6 drones, depending on the type of warship. (The Itkl are continusly trying new and different genetic alterations to their ships)

I still have Frozen Heart on my HD so I'll take a peek. It's a real bummer if the ammo thing can't work.

As far as music is concerned, the 8 bit mono required sound clips sound horrid. But I still wan to use SOME kind of background sounds on some worlds. Anyone know where I might be able to pick some up? What inexpensive software are people using to edit sound clips?

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Desprez

(This message has been edited by Desprez (edited 01-31-2000).)