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Observations about the latest Director War

The Merciful
Buda 5
Posts: 758
Registered: Dec 1999
posted 06-09-2003 08:16 PM
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OK, I downloaded the latest Ship and ini packs as well Director War and Ship Galery. This is what I hastly noticed when playing the Director War (director mode) superficially.
- The jump points were non-translucent, far too luminous and thus looked pretty silly. I have some screens from 1st of september 2002 which have far better - and quite authentic - looking point which is also translucent. I have the same machine and settings now as then, including my graphics gard (Voodoo5). What happened?
- Vorlon cruisers shoot beams from EVERYWHERE including their arse! Doesn't look right, not at all.
- When the ISA Excalibur cruisers fire their big guns (which they did often), there wasn't beams from the pylons visible like in Crusade.
- The jumpgates really need to be upscaled. Its a bit humiliating when that big bad Drakh cruiser collides with the gate when jumping in and explodes.
- Shadow battlecrabs should have IMO have wider beams. The current ones aren't spetacular nor - more importanly - menacing enough.

+ Whitestar was correctly lit on my system now.

I'm such an old whiner.

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- Utterly Bastard Groovy -
- Buda5 -

[This message has been edited by The Merciful (edited 06-09-2003).]

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LogicSequence
Member
Posts: 464
Registered: Feb 2002
posted 06-10-2003 06:14 AM
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YES... YOU ARE......
Logic


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When the long night comes, return to the end of the beginning.

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LogicSequence
Member
Posts: 464
Registered: Feb 2002
posted 06-10-2003 06:23 AM
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quote:
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Originally posted by The Merciful:
- Vorlon cruisers shoot beams from EVERYWHERE including their arse! Doesn't look right, not at all.
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WELL VORLON CRUISERS HAVE LIGHTENING GUN TURRETS. SINCE THERE ARE NO OBVIOUS PORTS FOR THEM TO FIRE FROM, IF YOU WOULD LIKE TO TELL ME WHERE THEY FIRE FROM I'LL BE HAPPY TO FIX THEM.




quote:
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Originally posted by The Merciful:
- When the ISA Excalibur cruisers fire their big guns (which they did often), there wasn't beams from the pylons visible like in Crusade.
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YOU HAVE TO USE ALL OF THE BEAMS AT ONCE TO GET THE PYLON AFFECT. I.E. WEAPONS LINK. I JUST UPDATED THE EXCALIBUR AND IT WORKS IF YOU USE IT CORRECTLY. IF IT DOESN'T WORK IN THE NEWE SKIRMISH THEN THAT'S A DIFFERENT PROBLEM.




quote:
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Originally posted by The Merciful:
- Shadow battlecrabs should have IMO have wider beams. The current ones aren't spetacular nor more importanly - menacing enough.
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THE BATTLECRAB IS AN ALPHA VERSION FOR SCRIPTORS ONLY... TO BE HONEST I WAS SURPRISED TO FIND IT IN THE SHIP PACK AS IT'S NOT READY FOR THE PUBLIC. BEAMS GET SMALLER THE FURTHER AWAY YOU GET FROM THEM. AND THERE ARE LIMITATIONS TO WHAT YOU CAN DO IN IWAR2 AS FAR AS EFFECTS GO. U CAN'T HAVE BEAMS SLIZING THRU SHIPS AND CUTTING THEM IN HALF.




quote:
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Originally posted by The Merciful:+ Whitestar was correctly lit on my system now.
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AND IT ALWAYS WOULD HAVE BEEN IF U HAD A BETTER VID CARD

P.S.
ships don't have arses...

Logic


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When the long night comes, return to the end of the beginning.

[This message has been edited by LogicSequence (edited 06-10-2003).]

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The Claw
Member
Posts: 263
Registered: Nov 2001
posted 06-10-2003 08:31 PM
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Actually... Considering that Vorlon ships are living creatures, it's quite plausible they do . Hey, maybe that's why B5 scanners couldn't detect the propulsion methods they used
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"I love the British for three reasons. One, we always beat you at rugby. Two, your wives are always welcoming and hospitable. Three, you fought like devils to save us" Old french bloke in my uncles pub.
"I do be the pirate of this here bus! Arrrrrrr!" An overactive me. Just before me and the other guys doing aircraft maintenance began singing "I'm dreaming of a white christmas"

Comments

  • The MercifulThe Merciful Earthforce Officer
    Well, the only weapon of any Vorlon ship I remember seeing in the show was the one beam between the frontal tentacles. Anything else just isn't in resonance with the show.

    How do you plan to improve the Shadow cruiser? Seemed fine to me. The beams are as they are, but that's teh same with all ships having them.
  • LogicSequenceLogicSequence Elite Ranger
    :rolleyes:

    actually if you watch into the fire again u'll see vorlon dreadnaughts with more than one beam firing. and i've also done alot of research and everywhere i go says the vorlon dreadnaught has more than just ONE beam. and that makes LOGICAL sense too. Plus vorlon fighers (which you DO see) have a completely different TYPE of weapon then other vorlon ships. while still a beam it can only fire for a brief second, like a lightening strike (hence the name lightening gun), while the others fire longer.

    P.S.
    "Like I said, it's an imperfect universe" - John Sheridan

    need i say more? not everything can be copied exactly as it is from the show. the show itself is imperfect, as the mod is imperfect. sometimes you have to add or take away to make things work or make sense.

    P.P.S.
    If you don't beleive the show is imperfect or doesn't have contradictions, i'll be happy to provide a list (a very long list) of contradictions, inaccuracies, and misnomers in the show :)
  • LogicSequenceLogicSequence Elite Ranger
    ok i may sound like a broken record, but what IS the deal with the weapons link problem? some scenarios it works, others, not... and i don't mean like firing all of the same weapon at once, i mean just plain having all the weapons of the same type on the HUD and chain firing. what exactly IS the problem? cause it's really dragging gameplay in our missions... i mean it gets to a point where they're not fun cause it won't work.

    Also, what's involved with the Jumppoint/Jumpgate problem? how is it all setup? is it all scripting or are there setup scenese and what not involved, something a modeler could look at and try to fix?
  • IndieIndie Moderator
    Weapons link problem = having all the weapons of the same type on the HUD. Nobody knows the exact cause. I think multiple beam weapons are one, but it wasn't the cause in whitestar. I think I got that one working, but it needs more testing.
  • LogicSequenceLogicSequence Elite Ranger
    so we don't have a "this is what causes it to happen"? just a thought, could it be the order in which you are scripting, i.e. loading presets, etc... if i recall in freespace 2 there was a special command called freebeams that you had to include at the correct time to get beams to work, perhaps its something of that nature???

    P.S.
    could we email particle systems? has it been done be4? can they help legally?
  • The MercifulThe Merciful Earthforce Officer
    A shot in the dark...

    Does it matter where the ship's ini-file is called from? For example, there seems to be two inis for the White Star, one in directory sims/ships/isa and another in sims/ships/player. The one in 'player' has some more sytems including imaging module, so I think I can tell which ini is used in missions and I have noted that I can't zoom in Escort mission so it must be using the ini in 'isa' folder. Since I can't see any significant differences in either inis, it seems logical to me that the game treats the inis differently depending from which folder they are from. After all, I don't remeber AI ships caring much for such things as chain or salvo fire - they seem to have all ship's weapons always available (I could be wrong). So, Indie, try calling inis from 'player' directory and see if it helps.


    Logic, for obivious reasons Argonaut Seffield (ex PS) won't officially have anything to do with Babylon 5 mods, but they can answer genral modding question which is enough. Of course it entirely different matter if they have time...
  • LogicSequenceLogicSequence Elite Ranger
    I beleive the one in the player folder would be the ini file i made when i released the origional mod. the one in ISA folder is probably one made by Indie???? specifically for the ship pack? i always include the imaging thingy cause i think it's stupid not to be able to zoom. i think all the ships we release should have it cause lets face it, would ships in B5 have a zoom in some shape or form? yes. anyways, try linking to the other ini, maybe it'll work... :: crosses fingers ::
  • IndieIndie Moderator
    No no, the ini files in the player folder are ships meant for player use. These are the ones I always use as player ships. They have things AI ships don't need, such as heat sinks, cpu, powerplant. AI doesn't use those and some of them may even cause problems so there is no reason to include them. They can't be used very well by player, which you can try in the gallery scenario. If you remote control some ship and fire weapons, chances are they won't recharge or fire at all.

    The imaging module (zoom) is another problem entirely: I've tried including it in player ships, but usually it doesn't work. Sometimes it even works at first, but then stops working later although this might also be because of CPU damage. In normal ini files the imaging module is never included in the file, but its rather somehow added to be part of the CPU.
    :confused:

    The order of things may very well have some effect. I'm going to experiment with it.
  • LogicSequenceLogicSequence Elite Ranger
    the imaging module must be turned on from the weapon ini file... in EOC only specific weapons were t ohave zoom capability, so it was triggered in the specific weapon ini file. All weapons i've done have it, but others i don't know.. chances are if it doesn't work it's b/c the selected weapon doesn't have it enabled. i beleive the tag is sniper_zoom=1 (NOT in the bolt ini file of course). it could also be it has to be enabled by scrpit as well?
  • IndieIndie Moderator
    No, that can't be it. Regular EOC weapons don't have the sniper_zoom tag enabled, yet the zoom works with them. Of course it could be possible that the tag means the weapon has a built-in zoom that works independently of imaging module. However, the zoom on the whitestar doesn't work (in a scenario). I haven't found any pog command that has to do with zooming.
  • LogicSequenceLogicSequence Elite Ranger
    Hmmmmm that's interesting, then if they're independant, what's the use of the other? i mean if all can be done by imaging module, why sniper zoom? if individual ones can be done by sniper zoom, why imaging module? hmmmm... all i know is in the REGULAR EOC campaign, every weapon i've ever put sniper zoom on has had zoom capability....
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