Engine Questions

1. Are straight ahead beams (like the particle beam from EV, for people doing conversions) possable?

2. If so, is it possable to lock dead ahead the Salrilian lightning bolt?

3. What is the maximum quantity of shields possible?

4. Can you make it so that ships you build stay in stasis until the one you are flying is destroyed? This would be a cool mp map, called "Duel".

5. What is the exact object limit?

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Commander-in-Chief of the Nijayias Interstellar Navy.

1. I'm not sure. I know that there were provisions for it but I don't know if it was implemented.

2. If 1 is true, then 2 is true.

3. Probably something in the range of 32767.

4. Off the top of my head, no I don't think that would be possible. It's easy to do special things with predetermined objects. It's hard to do special things with objects that get built arbitrarily.

5. I believe the maximum is currently 256. That includes ships, shots, asteroids, explosions, debris, etc. That number won't be increased, primarily because of the way the network code handles ship selection.

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For #4, couldn't you just create ships for the "neutral side" and have the neutral ships all sit around, do nothing, and fire at no one? Then, when someone died, the ship could be transferred from neutral control to your control, like the border drone in the mission where you rescue the Bazidanese Battleship, right?

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No, I'm not that cruel. I don't use the flamethrower on my
enemies. I save that for my
allies.
-caalaklael, the trigger
happy obiard

Those were predetermined objects, caalaklael.

Oh, about those shields - I'm pretty sure the cantharan gateship has over 150000 shields because it was still going after 500 mag pulses at 300 damage each. Include turret fire and the damage my drake gunship did to it (still didn't finish it) was probably much higher.

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Commander-in-Chief of the Nijayias Interstellar Navy.

Well, weapon damage is probably 1/10 of the shield value in that case. Many games (like EV) don't have them congruent.

Mike Lee (Firebird)

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EV did have them congruent. It was the shipyard units that were messed up. They were <actual shields>/10. Maybe the same thing is done in Ares for the damage. Donno.

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Commander-in-Chief of the Nijayias Interstellar Navy.

Magneto pulses do 50 points of damage per shot.

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Replicant
www.axis.n3.net

Oh. Thanks Rep, I must have accidentaly used the range to calculate. Thanx.
Šř**徘 dyslexia.....

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Commander-in-Chief of the Nijayias Interstellar Navy.

Actually, the damage/shield values must be congruent.

What (based on your experience) is most likely: that it takes 65, 6.5 (or rather 7), or .65 (or rather 1) fusion pulse(s) to destroy a gaitori cruiser?

A G. cruiser has 650 shields, an F. pulse does 100 damage. If the rate was 1:10, you would need 65 fusion pulses to destroy the cruiser. If 1:1, you would need 7. And if 10:1, you would need 1 pulse. Which do you think is the right ratio?

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"Only two things are infinite: the universe and human stupidity, and I'm not sure about the former."
- Albert Einstein

I thought I just said that. Maybe it is only obvious to me.

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Commander-in-Chief of the Nijayias Interstellar Navy.

Yeah the shot damage to shield ratio is 1:1.

Looking back at the code, it looks like the shield maximum is 2,147,483,647 (the maximum signed value represented by 4 bytes), although I suspect bumping up against that max could result in some bad mojo.

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Hellooo, chalenge. How much shields does the cantharan gateship have, anyway? I'm pretty sure it takes more than 200 shots from the onas pulse to die, which is 100,000.

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Commander-in-Chief of the Nijayias Interstellar Navy.

You mentioned that ships could interact by goto. Could you make a ship you build in sections, and have them goto one another to make a giant ship?

Or could you build liners to goto a station to make a gateship?

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Commander-in-Chief of the Nijayias Interstellar Navy.

I have a question: could you disable and capture an enemy ship (like the bunker stations)?

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Quote

Fleet Admiral Darkk wrote:
**You mentioned that ships could interact by goto. Could you make a ship you build in sections, and have them goto one another to make a giant ship?
**

Hmmm. You couldn't have them do that automatically, but I guess it would be possible if they were individually ordered to the correct "parts."

However, there's a low limit (maybe 16?) to the the number of uniquely interacting objects (like transports to planets, or assault transports to stations).

Quote

**Or could you build liners to goto a station to make a gateship?
**

For an individual scenario, yes.

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Quote

Bob wrote:
(B)I have a question: could you disable and capture an enemy ship (like the bunker stations)?
/B)

Mmmm yes I think that would be possible.

for stasis, why not use those thingies from ch 14 and flagpod? the tractor moors. just have your guys shoot em down. I had a similar mp idea.

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"Cap'n Hector Robbed The Bank!"

-Dash Riprock

-Starseeker Commlog

Someone said that Ares sprites have 26 picts (or something close 2 that), but the engine could handle more. I was wondering, how many can it handle?

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I think that the max is 36 bob, that's what I remember it as anyway.

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In the next world war,
In a jack-knifed Juggernaut,
I am born again.

Quote

Bob wrote:
**Someone said that Ares sprites have 26 picts (or something close 2 that), but the engine could handle more. I was wondering, how many can it handle?

**

Ares' sprites tend to have 24 frames of rotation. One or two have 36, I think.

I believe the real limit is 360, but that'd be overkill. The number of frames probably has to go into 360 evenly (i.e. 24 frames will work but 26 might not).