The Stars Beyond

[Wolfy]

It's all so tempting to work on!
I decided to jump ahead and begin working on the imperial fighter, meticulously copying the engine from george's dreadnought. I got close enough at about 80-90% similarity (there was a minor difference I didn't notice until too late, but it's barely noticeable)
I'm working on the ship's body, though I may rebuild the body since it's not coming out exactly how I wanted it...

[evilbob]

ooh, can I see, can I see?! *jumps around*

[Wolfy]

hehe, I'm not done yet!

I just started redoing the body...

Then I'll either do the gunship or the dreadnought...

[Wolfy]

ranx fighter
(kinda hard to see stationary on black background but it looks awesome in flight)




40 facings btw

[edit]

Can't wait to start on the imperial dreadnought or dragon- they look so awesome!
I'll probably start on one next weekend...
Making 120 to 180 facings for a 256-384 (yes, it could be as big as 384x384) ship will NOT be fun by any stretch of imagination however...

[Wolfy]

I'll be sticking up a forum in a few hours for my mods...
Posting here is getting impossible

[Ttech]

Ever try http://xelerus.de??

[Wolfy]

Ever try http://xelerus.de??

Notice it has a 5MB upload limit? zipped my mod is ~10MB

and it's not done either yet

[Wolfy]

I made the imperial fighter a bit more visible, and the warlord scoutship is based off of the old centauri raider graphic- it's now a dark, steely blue-tinged grey

[Wolfy]

Yay! I finished the Imperial gunship...


Now for a rundown on the performance of the ships:

1) Warlord Patrol ship- Instigator: basically a small fighter, these tiny ships, while very weak individually, will often be seen in large groups of 6-12 ships. Nothing more than flying Hardened Plasteel Armor with an Akan30 tacked on

2) Imperial Fighter- Dagger: a small, high end fighter. They are fast, accurate and quite deadly. They are expensive to build by comparison to the warlords' counterpart, and thus it's common to see at most flights of 2-3 fighters.

3) Imperial Gunship- Broadsword: on the largish end of gunships, only ships such as the luminous drone or the centurion match it in size. They too are fast and deadly, but cost enough to the point that to see more than two on combat or patrol duty together is very rare. Generally, the only place where more than one ship will be seen is at a Ranx Empire fortress or settlement.

And here is a picture of some of the ships:


20 facing Instigator- from the Centauri Raider of 98 and before


Dagger (2nd edition)





Broadsword






[edit]--
Now a ranx station complete with turrets!

[Wolfy]

Some more info on the ranx...

Todo list:
finish armor items, finish all weapon items
rebalance the cruiser
change the color balance on the imperial stations and cruiser so they look a bit more like the new ships.
add:
-playable ranx ships (ranx adventure extension maybe?)
-civilian freighters (9 variants in length and weapons and armor: bridge-cargo-engines layout. Cargo pods number from 0 to 9 segments)
-military freighters (also has variant, but fewer)
-dreadnought
-imperial dragon*
-EMP ship*
-warlord dreadnought
-warlord destroyer
-warlord defense turret
new systems for ranx and sung

*special ships- usually do not appear in normal gameplay

civilian freighter- it ranges from a short, tiny little craft that speeds along like a gunship to a long, thin craft moving along at .09c. This is possible because the ranx civilian freighters have a modular construction that allows cargo pods to be added or removed. they can support up to 8 pods
for every pod- -.02c from speed
for every two pods- +1x ranx repeller gun
for every 5 pods- +1s ranx anti-missile gun, +1 shield level

The basic ship (0) has:
type A shield
.25c speed
4x light blast-dmg cannons

Then...

The 8 segment ship has:
type B shield
.09c speed
4x light blast-dmg cannons
4x ranx repeller guns
1x anti missile gun

The EMP ship is a long thin ship that looks like a fighter with a really long tail attached to it. The tail end has 4 angular "nodes" on it.
This ship is designed entirely to attack sung slave camps and is rarely seen in normal circumstances

it has:
type xB shield (optimised to be almost immune to particle damage- weak to almost all other damage types)
.18c speed
2x ranx gauss cannons
8x ranx EMP cannons

The Imperial dragon's stats arn't totally finalized yet, but it will have approximatly:
type H shield (just a very strong well-rounded shield- slightly weaker vs. energy weapons)
.04-.06c speed
1x ranx antimatter artilliary
2x ranx howitzers
1x heavy FPG
2x FPG's
4x light FPG's
4x gauss cannons
8x ranx repellers

The military transports will come in 2 variants- a small and a large varient
they look similar, just that the large one has more modules. they are fixed modules however.

small:
type B shields
8x light cannons

large:
type C shields
8x light cannons
4x ranx repellers

Ranx scout auton
Not too different than the fighter stats-wise, these small ships are shieldless however.
1x dual ranx gauss cannon

umm... i'll add more later when i remember it...


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well, it seems my forums are getting members now so I guess I might let everyone know about my sig...

[Wolfy]

the special ranx EMP ship. This ship is rarely seen, but is used in the ranx final battle.

[Wolfy]

while I try to re-finalize the ranx dreadnought and imperial dragon designs, I decided to start work sometime this week or next weekend on one of the following:

Canis industries ships (heavy gunship, cruiser, battleship)
Heliotrope solar harvesters (2 med, 1 small)
Luminous ships (large pod deployer, pod, luminous cruiser)
Container ships (1 med, 1 small, maybe 1 large)

The CI ships are advanced ships relying on mainly plasma and antimatter/positron weapons, each with a downgraded playable version.

The Heliotrope harvesters are simply ships that the player can attack and loot for fuel cells, but they are often guarded. Med #1 is cylindrical and has a set of turbos and blinders. Med #2 has a flare cannon- both medium ones come with a few escorting ships. the Small one is unarmed, but they travel in large escorted groups.

The pod deployer is a very large ship that creates a luminous pod set to wander around the system every 20-30 seconds. It is armed with a heavy ion blaster and fires forward. The pod is armed with a light ion blaster and fires backwards. they pose a minimal threat and are more of a nuisance. The cruiser looks like and is essentially a pod deployer without the pods and thus moves/turns faster.

The container ships are used by refugees, impoverished CW citizens, and the pitiful gangs that appear near container habitats and slums. Refugees of the ares-CW war often equip their large and medium ships with weak shielding and have some relatively cheap weapons. small ships get only a light recoiless cannon and maybe cheap shielding. Gangs often use only medium and small ships equipped with light recoiless cannons and/or lasers. Impoverished citizens are almost always unarmed and unshielded.

[Ttech]

I'm probably missing something. But I can't find a place to download

[Wolfy]

I'm probably missing something. But I can't find a place to download

you arn't missing anything. I don't have a dl avaliable yet... It's still got lots of superfluous files and bugs to work out. The topology is just an experimental setup... D:

[Wolfy]

Long needed update:

Therrius:
This is a group of nomadic peoples. They have no stations- just CSC like ships.
They boast very durable shields but have only passable armor.

Ships:

Cargo drone- a moderately armored, lightly armed auton. There is a version the player can use, it behaves similarly to the mule, but with a self-defense bolter. They always travel in large groups and have several well-armed escorts

Defense drone- small blocky pods, these turreted ships are fast, well armed escorts, but are infrequently encountered. They are armed with a relatively powerful plasma weapon, the plasma bolter (like a weakened plasma cannon that fires a longer range due to higher velocity of shots).

Therriusian Class-S freighter- a small craft, more like a fighter, but it does not have powerful weapons, trading them for a relatively large cargo bay. They often travel in groups and have one or two defense drones with them. Armed with a pair of lightning blasters (light ion weapon)

Therriusian Class-V freighter- similar in size to a medium gunship, this craft has double the cargo space of the class-S at the cost of reduced speed. It sports 4 lightning blasters

Therriusian Class-C freighter- bigger and slower than most Therriusian freighters, this ship has an imposing shape, and if converted, it can make a passable warship. Despite this, most C's are in the freighter configuration with 4 turreted light vulcan cannons (a good thermo weapon for it's cost/power). The warship version has 2 light vulcan cannons, 2 vulcan cannons, (both turreted), and a Therra seeker cannon (small homing plasma projectiles)

Therriusian Class-A freighter- a big superfreighter, the Therriusians also use them as dreadnoughts. The superfreighter variant has massive cargo space, 4 light vulcan cannons, and 2 vulcan cannons. The dreadnought version has a pair of heavy vulcan cannons, 1 plasma bolter, 1 Therra meta-seeker generator (fires very slowly, but the shot is quite powerful with an area damage and it homes as well), 4 Therra seeker cannons- don't get this ship mad at you- it's on more or less equal footing with the phobos.

Therriusian Worldship- Behemoths that rival the ranx imperial dragon in size, these beasts house the people of Therrius. These great ships are well protected and can be docked with- the Therriusians will provide a great array of useful services from repair of devices to providing unique upgrades as well as the usual fuel and shipyard functions. These ships are not only heavily armed with 4 seeker cannons, 4 vulcan cannons, and a meta-seeker cannon, but they are also heavily guarded (this includes the escorts of the trade convoys).

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Therriusians live in a very hostile area, an area occupied by the CW, luminous, Ares, Solarians, Danthorians and others. Their primary enemies are the teraton raiders and the house of charon whom prey on their freighters (HoC doesn't have wimpy lasers in this stage FYI- they are a feared menace that actually dominates some systems, not some downtrodden pirates stealing from poorly armed korolov ships)

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new weapons mostly have new sounds too

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I'm working on the ships, I'll try to post a picture of the cargo drone tomm. or maybe some of the new weapons effects?

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