BattleZone

[Dalva]

oh. so maybe my pc is bit old ?

[Prophet]

OMG!

That was fun.

I have to say level 9 was the best.
CSCs, Deimos', Corp Cruisers...

I had HUGE lag after I hit a group of Deimos and the explosion of the first ship triggered a chain reaction. None with the actual ships flying, just the explosions.

There's an odd thing happening when a small ship hits the barriers at a slow speed I see a 'shield hit' and the ship disappears. They do look nice though.

I think there may be a glitch in the leveling after I started changing the spawn level I would still gain xp for killing ships but I would not rise to the next level.

I love the customization ability. nothing like taking on an armada of 700 ships at once. I'd post the screenshot, but am not sure how...

This is definitely a keeper. I think I'm gonna make some custom enemies for this (with smaller explosions) I think I actuall hit 0.1 fps...... it was scarry.


Keep up the great work alterecco!



[/img]

[Dalva]

I'd post the screenshot, but am not sure how...

upload a picture file to a file hosting like:
http://www.imageshack.us
or
http://www.getdropbox.com

then link it to this forum like this:
for example (not a real link)

Code: Select all

[img]http://www.blablabla.com/myimages/coolexplosion.jpg[/img]

[Prophet]

Thx, Dalva!



Note the radar... and the bottom msg...

I never did get to fight them all

[alterecco]

Wooooot. That is insane.

The shield hit you see when a ship comes too close to the barrier is on purpose. They get 'ported' out of the way to avoid them being stuck in the barrier. Without that you would have tons of ships flying around inside the barrier, since they can somehow, sometimes, find their way through.

OK, when it comes to the leveling, it's a bit tricky right now. The system has actually been built to punish godmodded ships, so you will still be gaining xp, the next level is just miles away. Basically the multiplier is just too high when the ship is godmodded.

As i was testing it i only played in the base ships to make sure it was actually playable in them. As a result i might have punished godmodded ships too much. I would like very much peoples feedback on some points:

1. What configuration settings work well as default. would be nice to have a base that works quite well for most types of play

2. Items. Are the items in the store balanced enough. Should there be more/less enhancements. Should there be negative enhancements. Are the quantities of the different types balanced enough. Are there some things completely missing? Should they be id'ed by default? Stuff like that.

3. Credits. Does the player start with enough money? Is it actually possible to play as a vanilla ship, and match the spawn at higher levels, by buying items for the credits you gain.

Those are some of the questions id really like some good insights on.

So, hope you all have fun...

.]

[Prophet]

I've had a go with all three vanilla ships with the Battlezone defaults and here's a run down of what happened...

Played with the EI 500. Started off good. The spawns were dropping good loot and I bought a +laser+particle Class III Shield, then a particle weapon mid way through lvl 2. Couldn't afford a reactor and my weapon kept overloading. Started encountering alot of Saphires and other ships that run away when shields drop. Took about an hour to get to lvl 4 when I finally ran out of creds and fuel.

Played as the Wolfen. Easier to catch fleeing ships. Spent my starting cash on a 25mW reactor so I could upgrade to a better weapon. Got a decent shield. Killed by a spawn of 12 ships in lvl 2.

Tried the saphire. Good speen and the default kinetic weapon helped. bought class III shields first, a Kinetic weapon upgrade, a fast-arbalest cannon. dropping everything fast. Made it to lvl 4 in ~20mins. I have 24k credits in the bank and the store items range from 18k-600k creds. Killed by a spawn of 15 ships.

Constantly chasing down that last enemy was frustrating in the EI500, at least half my creds were spent on fuel.
The variation of enemies makes it especially difficult with the freighter as you can only have 2 weapons and you'd better hope that an enemy isn't resistant to both!
I'd recommend reducing the markup in the store and give a bonus at each new level.
Money is too tight to buy 'unknowns' (roms/barrels) to try and get a specific item. Perhaps set them as known initially?
The random upgrades work nicely (couldn't afford most) I did see a monopole deflector +darkfire. lol

In ver 3 (If there is one) I would also suggest changing the layout to a 'capture the flag' style. Especially with the EI500, running around the arena to try and find where that 1 ship spawned from eats alot of fuel.
Some custom ship lists with modified AI (No standoff)


I hope this helps. I'm gonna go fiddle with some of the variables.
Again, Great job.


[Edit]

There's something buggy in the pricing at shopnstuff.
Default is set at 2, I changed it to 1 and items are reasonably priced. The shop will not buy ANYTHING. When the Margin Multiplier is set to 10 (max) the shop will buy for regular value and sell at ridiculous price.

The items update at lvl 4 and were overpriced (2x list price) at margin multiplier 1x.

enemies get much more difficult at lvl 4 as well. Particles weapons and lots of missiles with a higher spawn rate =omg.

[Edit no2]

The Decontaminate at shopnstuff does not work. and no barrels for sale.

[Final Edit]

Change default inflation to 25 and everything works great.
You can sell loot and you're not scrambling for creds to buy fuel.
Need more Reactors available in store.
Cargo hold upgrades should be available throughout.
Weapon, armour, shield selection is good, I like the random upgrades, too.

[Dalva]

one time when i use the GOD mod i spawn 10 CSC as an escort ship. at first it work well, but when the enemy spawn 3 or 4 CSC, thoose CSC then start firing each other in a VERY close range, maybe as small as 4CSC stacked together (can you imagine, area that small even 4 CSC will be stacked is occupied with 13 CSC?).

Then an explosion of CSC's heavy nami missiles are making my PC laggy, and when one CSC explode, all of the CSC except one (yes, one) is exploded in a crazy chain reaction that send flying debris everywhere, sadly i'm too surprised with the explosion of the CSC, so i never think of capturing a screenshot.

after that explosion my monitor is filled with CSC debris. it was really cool

[alterecco]

Thank you Prophet for that post!!

That's exactly the kind of data that's priceless.

I will go through it thoroughly and update BattleZone. Expect a 2.1 very soon, with more balance issues and bugs resolved.

To resolve such issues as the one you experienced with the EI500, my thought was to add a "teleport to nearest enemy" item to the player's inventory be default, but I'm not really sure it would resolve the issue, as the ships would just run away again. I'm not sure how this issue is balanced out best, since slow speed is an inherent part of the freighters.

Maybe I just need to keep the spawn really low against such ships. The problem with that, is that the spawn count is based off of the player ships combat power, and for some reason the EI500's default combat power is 7, compared to the Wolfen's 4. I guess it's that omni laser doing it. Maybe i just have analyse the ships and make an power estimate myself.

With the inflation set to 25, would you still recommend items are 'known' by default?

And if you would care to elaborate a bit on how you see a 'capture the flag' arena play

Again, thanks for this. Please keep the ideas/criticisms coming...

.]

[Prophet]

With the inflation set to 25, would you still recommend items are 'known' by default?

I've been playing with the Wolfen and made it to lvl 7 and the only change was the inflation. With that changed it's not necessary to set the items to known. There's a little hiccup at lvl 4 when the new stuff comes in and you have to save up for that shiny new 250mW reactor (180k creds!) but it's worth it.

To resolve such issues as the one you experienced with the EI500, my thought was to add a "teleport to nearest enemy" item to the player's inventory be default, but I'm not really sure it would resolve the issue, as the ships would just run away again. I'm not sure how this issue is balanced out best, since slow speed is an inherent part of the freighters.

As for the issue with the freighter, perhaps a simple edit of the enemy lists to eliminate some of the less fun, more frustrating enemies. Off the top, the saphire, the autons (dang they're fast!)
I would volunteer to make some 'custom' ships for the BZ list to fill it out a bit. I can't do graphics of AI coding but more like making variants of existing types. I'd love to make a ship with no weapon that was really fast and gets really close, waiting to die, and then when you hit em, BOOM!, Thermonucular detonation, Kamikaze style!

The vanilla ships have their own 'difficulty'
Easy = Wolfen
Medium = Saphire
Hard = EI500

Obviously there's no trade in Battlezone so why are you using it? cuz its hard!

And if you would care to elaborate a bit on how you see a 'capture the flag' arena play

Rather than be in the centre of the spawns, have the player area at the bottom and the spawn sites in an arc around the top



This would keep the action going rather than hunting for that last slow moving jerk when you're in the zone.

[alterecco]

Umm, once again, yeehaaw, thanks for the feedback...

At the moment i have made the 'known' state of items depend on a config variable, but I think I will leave it set to off by default. I have also added a Item BlackList, so some of the useless items can be avoided. It comes with a config switch as well (Im not sure it's really useful, but in the spirit of configuration options, what the heck!). The item pricing is now completely controlled by a function, so it should be possible to make a "smoother" rise in prices, but i will have to experiment a bit with that.

On the adding of ships, I think its an excellent idea. When it comes to images, I see no reason why we don't use some of the vanilla images again. Then we would have variants of the same ship, and never know what we are facing. As for removing ships, I only think that is a good idea if they are a problem under all circumstances. Rather, I would override the ships so they don't display the problematic traits. Please feel free to send me ships in any form, and i will fit them into BZ if necessary. Easiest would probably be to throw pasties at me on IRC, or private messages. Or something .

I like your arena idea. I will add it as an optional layout that can be chosen in game.

OK, Rock'n'roll. At the rate things are going we'll have a new updated version out in no time

.]

[Cygnus.X1]

Basically the multiplier is just too high when the ship is godmodded.

That explains SO much, you sneaky bi-yatch

Looks like Prophet beat me to the playtesting punch, but I can confirm the irritation with the 'lost sheep' ship syndrome.

[alterecco]

That explains SO much, you sneaky bi-yatch

You didn't think I would make it easy on you, now would you? 8)

[alterecco]

Wohoo, On the fly changeable arenas, turned out to be easy to implement:

To wit:



Works like a charm - If anyone can come up with some other interesting configurations, feel free to suggest.

.]

[Prophet]

Glad I could help!

Wohoo, On the fly changeable arenas, turned out to be easy to implement:

That's terrific, I can't wait to try out the new configs!

In the spirit of playtesting, can I get an option to override the shiplist to a specific unid for playtesting? I'm gonna start working on those ships right away. I will try using the random device to spice it up even further.

One question, is the enemy combat power set AFTER it is generated? If I make a ship that randomly has either a laser cannon or a OmniDualTeV9 going to be calculated as the same combat power regardless of the final equipment load or does it eval after?
Lastly, what is taken into the combat power equation? For example, a ship with LightTitanium and a laser blaster with spd 50 and maneuver 4 that goes thermonuclear onDestroy would have a low combat power and probably spawn at lvl 1 (Very bad!) If I set the score attribute higher would it spawn later, say lvl5? Or do I pile it with better weapons and set the fireRateAdj to 0 or 1? I can't seem to find the code in the BattleZone.xml.
Thx

[alterecco]

In the spirit of playtesting, can I get an option to override the shiplist to a specific unid for playtesting? I'm gonna start working on those ships right away. I will try using the random device to spice it up even further.

what exactly is it you need. If you just need to spawn a specific ship as an enemy i suggest you use the god mod. If it is something more built in, let me know more specifics.
As for the random device, i suppose you mean you want to randomize ships starting equipment. Since we have complete control over the ships when they spawn, it is something that would make more sense to build into battlezone, rather then have it configured on each ship.

One question, is the enemy combat power set AFTER it is generated?

The combat power of a ship is calculated on the fly. There is a built in function (objGetCombatPower) that i use, which returns this number. If you install a bigger gun, the number changes on the fly. However, I'm not really happy with the results of it. Atm i am tinkering with a homegrown version which will provide more fine grained results.

Lastly, what is taken into the combat power equation?

As for the built in version, I'm not sure. As for the one I'm trying to build, everything i can get at (including maneuver and maxspeed)

All that being said, the way enemy ships are partitioned right now is purely by level, which is an arcane number, pulled from i don't know where, by the function (objGetLevel). I might suppose it's calculated from a ships score value. I am definitely looking for a more controlled way to partition ships.
Atm you can find the func that build the ship list as (buildShipList).


I'll let you know more details when i find out if i can get some good values from the game for a ships combat strength. You can have a look at a very rough draft of the function here, which basically just contains comments on the data we can get at, and which make sense: http://transcendence.pastebin.com/m1adca307

.]