What can be done with cyber defense?

[Periculi]

I am just full of questions- the more I dig into the XML the more mysteries I find.

So... anyone know how the cyberDefenseLevel works- and what can be done with it?

[e_____e]

I'm not quite sure, but I think it relates to the chance of a CyberDeck Device working.

[Periculi]

I found cyber deck devices in the Sung Slavers xml- the items have their own unique new tag type called CyberDeckDevice. This tag has an option for program="". The two types of programs I saw were 'disarm' and 'shieldsdown'. Do you know if there are more programs? Disabling or destroying targeting would be interesting, for one. Or 'DumpFuel' which dropped your fuel reserve to 5%, even.

Some ships have a cyber defense level, some ships don't. The playerships don't seem to have any cyber defense level.. so can they get cyber defense devices and use them? I have never run across any item that gave me a cyberdefense device yet.

[e_____e]

I don't think there are any others, and as far as I know, you can't make your own, sadly.

The devices are virtual, so the only way to get them is to mod a ship with them.

[Periculi]

What? You can't install a virtual device at a dock station or through another function? That just can't be the case.

[e_____e]

Virtual devices are literally unobtainable: you just can't get them. However, you could overwrite the devices with an extension and remove the virtual= "true" tag to make them obtainable.

[Lord Trogg]

I think that the quantum computer should give you a bonus to cyber defense because it would be harder for cyberattacks to deal with the more complex machine. What would be also interesting would be if you can find roms that would increase your ships cyber defense when used for a permanent effect.

[george moromisato]

Virtual devices are literally unobtainable: you just can't get them. However, you could overwrite the devices with an extension and remove the virtual= "true" tag to make them obtainable.

Or, better yet, create a new device (with its own UNID) that has the same properties as the virtual device.

The only reason for creating a virtual device is to create a device that does not appear as an item. Other than that, there is nothing special about virtual devices.

[Periculi]

Then I should be able to create a playership with several virtual devices installed that took up weapon, device, and cargo space invisibly- which could later be removed mid to late game as a 'ship upgrade' to allow access to the extra slots/space, yes? That would be kinda cool- in place of upgrading the player ship to a new ship, for now.

[e_____e]

Then I should be able to create a playership with several virtual devices installed that took up weapon, device, and cargo space invisibly- which could later be removed mid to late game as a 'ship upgrade' to allow access to the extra slots/space, yes? That would be kinda cool- in place of upgrading the player ship to a new ship, for now.

That makes sense. In fact, I think almost everything we need is there, in the form of virtual devices. We just need a way to change the image and the fuel capacity: everything else could probably be done using virtual devices + coding.

[Periculi]

umm.. it isn't working well for weapons. For one- I haven't found a way to declare that a device is taking up more than 1 slot. for two- the 'virtual' weapon device is showing up as a weapon. bleah. There just doesn't seem to be a way to invisibly reserve device slots.

How much of the player ship data can be altered in the game? It seems to be mostly static data- only changeable from the xml outside the game.

edit- I suppose that generic device slots could be reserved with the virtual item I created, and definitely Mass can be added invisibly- so it could work for some features. I took the sapphire and bumped up the devices to 30 and the cargo to 200, then created a virtual device with mass of 100. I had 29 slots and 100 available tons in cargo- HOWEVER- the added mass was NO GOOD. So for each slot we would need a massless virtual device to reserve the slot- I don't really know about the mass issue. Maybe cargo hold expansion devicess can be set up differently. (+10% instead of +100% of available max?)

edit 2- here:
<CargoHoldDevice
cargoSpace= "100"
/>
the generic cargo hold.

here:
<CargoHoldDevice
cargoSpace= "50"
/>
The smugglers hold.

So is that giving a % of the maximum? Thusly various levels of upgrades could be added with cargoSpace="10" or "25" or "33" perhaps.. I will go try it.

edit 3= Very interesting. The cargoSpace="x" totally ignored the max cargo setting for the sapphire when I set it to 200. lol. That's perfect for stepped upgrade paths.

edit 4= Ok, so back to the virtual device. I set the sapphire up with 20 slots, and then set the device as a:
<MiscellaneousDevice
deviceSlots="10"
>
And it worked like a charm to gobble up 10 device slots and do nothing at all and not even show up at all. The only way to know that a virtual device was installed was to look in the xml for the sapphire. Now, I am hoping that the device can be removed at some time in the future at a special station-that-upgrades-ship-by-removing-virtual-device station.

Of course this won't change max weapons. Any ideas?

edit 5= hey, i'm off topic. I still don't get what uses cyber defense has in game.

[Kamikaze]

That makes sense. In fact, I think almost everything we need is there, in the form of virtual devices. We just need a way to change the image and the fuel capacity: everything else could probably be done using virtual devices + coding.

Fuel capacity: Reactor change.