Sneaky Tricks of the EV Bastardizer

You know you have those little tricks that help make your universe that much (read: this much: ---) better. But that counts.

Like:
Not setting an explosion type on your ships. Now, your ships won't explode when they die, and they'll just sit there. You won't be able to select them, though. This is useful if you want a big battle and/or you're not feeling particularly violent. You would have to be careful if you want a mix of exploding and non-exploding ships, though.

So, what are your favorite tricks for EVN?

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And there's more where that came from!

Once upon a time, one could creatively exploit the fact that if you specified a link in system A to system B but not a link to system A in system B, the player could go from A > B...but not back. This made for creepy settings of things like "all those who have entered have never returned...". Unfortunately, this isn't possible in Nova.

Anyhow: set the AI of something to 5 or 6. I forget the effect.

EDIT: Palendromal (sp?) post count!

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The programmer's code of entomology: there's always another bug.
Windows users: stop asking for plugins. (url="http://"http://www.aznt.com/EVN/EVNEW/")Make one yourself.(/url)
(url="http://"http://www.cwssoftware.com")Sephil Saga Website(/url)

(This message has been edited by orcaloverbri9 (edited 01-11-2004).)

Make something without an asteroid scoop "collect asteroids". Makes them fly between planets in the system. Done in stock scenario for the economy at work ships.
-Az

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It is here. EVNEW Public Beta (url="http://"http://www.aznt.com/EVN/EVNEW")www.aznt.com/EVN/EVNEW(/url)
Stuffit is a piece of .sit.

Give ships a PD weapon as their main weapon. Give then a weapon with does no damage (energy damage 1, mass 0, passes through shields) but still pisses people off, so that they can almost control it.

Other option, make normal unguided weapon that immediately subs into a PD weapon and goes straight.

Both are useful for simulating giant robots with handheld weapons, I've found.

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~Charlie
Sephil Saga Homepage: (url="http://"http://www.cwssoftware.com")www.cwssoftware.com(/url)

Quote

Originally posted by Mantaray:
**Not setting an explosion type on your ships. Now, your ships won't explode when they die, and they'll just sit there. You won't be able to select them, though. This is useful if you want a big battle and/or you're not feeling particularly violent. You would have to be careful if you want a mix of exploding and non-exploding ships, though.

**

That is a good idea, and fits into one of my other ideas I have been working on... iSteal. If you must know, I am making custom asteroid types to be ship debris, having the larger asteroids be actual pieces of ships, and then, as you destroy them, they break into smaller components. It is incredibly useful for a mission I have in mind for my Gundam plugin, in the Sea of Solomon... Actually one of my potential starting missions. You start with a Spacesuit instead of a ship, with little accelleration, little turning, and little speed. They will be given several different missions to board special ships, which will be rendered as pieces of crap, but less so than the debris floating about in the system. Some of these will be duds, where boarding them only gives an error message of sorts. Others will actually work, allowing the player to effectively choose a starting suit or ship (OnShipDone, change ship to whatever suit/ship was chosen). It will be pretty much crap, but still work, until you get the ship to a friendly spaceport, where the mission will be completed. This will allow the player to repair the ship, for a cost, most likely by working for the shipyard, or for the government, as you will start with very little money.

There will, in the starting mission, also be an actual ship that flies into the system after a few dud ships were boarded, using a counter, who the player can hail to get into a different string... Ah, the possibilities...

Masamune, that short range PD weapon idea would be a good way to finally get the AI to use Beam Sabers... However, I've found that handheld weapons like that are that look really terrible, unfortunately... Ah, but to have weapon animations... Or, at the least, have that flag in the weapons resource to trigger the ship's unfolding animation, instead of it always used for every weapon... sighs

Okay, I'm going to find a really good way to simulate weapon animations...

Anyways, my primary goal in plugins isn't perfect realism, a la Sephil Saga, but rather, appropriate atmosphere, and realism in relation to the setting. This isn't hard with Gundam, because the Minovsky physics which allow the majority of stretches taken in Gundam are quite clearly documented.

~ SpacePirate

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Eat blazing electric death!

(This message has been edited by SpacePirate (edited 01-11-2004).)