Repulsor Tweak

incidenta5 · Post by **incidenta5** » 15 Mar 2006, 00:48

New Stuff:
Shield strength indicator:

The shield works on any unit with the 'repulsor1' weapon attached. The on/off button ceases to work; however, friendly fire will pass right through the shield to avoid the shield being drained via FF on purpose.

Requirements:

Spring 0.70bX
Absolute Annihilation 1.44

Notes:
- v1 was tested with spring 0.70b1

Download Links

Shield Mod v1
-This includes the new spring.exe, and the modifications I made to AA1.44S as well as a partial VSS report that includes most of the code changes i've made. (On/Off button works; Fire mode selector changes from off,bounce,collision.)

Patch .diff for PlasmaRepulsor.cpp
-Patch for 0.70b1

Original Post:

I recently started modding a few aspects of the Plasma Repulsor that are hard coded into the spring engine.

I made two changes to the way that projectiles interact with the field. First, projectiles no longer bounce and are slowed down significantly to approximately less than 1% of their velocity almost instantly upon entering the field. Second, the projectiles explode once their speed drops below 1.0.

Also, I changed the graphics a bit and made a visible 'shield' impact that changes color based on the ammout of energy in your reserves. Its based on (energy / max_energy) and the color ranges from green to red, where green is 100% and red is less than 10%, it becomes yellow around 50% and looks pretty good.

Do these changes fundamentally alter the balance of the game in any sigificant way, and would it possibly be more fun to play a war of attrition where your 'shield' and energy reserves matter just as much as your army of units? Essentially, the "defense field" mimics the "shield" from Stargate Atlantis if anyone has seen the first episode of the second season.

[Edit]
Screenshots:

Highpower

Lowpower

[NEW]
Bounce Mode:

Collision Mode:

Shield Strength:

Das Bruce · Post by **Das Bruce** » 15 Mar 2006, 02:45

So you're making these FBI based?

Soulless1 · Post by **Soulless1** » 15 Mar 2006, 02:54

awesome stuff - though why does it need the beam? I reckon it'd do a great shield effect if it looked the same but without the beam.

Also, is it possible to turn it off yet? Cos that would be useful. :)

Argh · Post by **Argh** » 15 Mar 2006, 03:03

I guess my short answer to this would be:

1. Anything that makes it mandatory that the Repulsor use Energy in the first place is counter-productive. Not every mod is going to use Energy, or will want to use both the Repulsor and use Energy in another way. Tying them together reduces the possible options.

2. I think it'd be cooler, in general, if Repulsors could be affected/immune to a larger number of things, much like the way that the Armor tag system works. This could lead to terrific innovations in mods- we could have entire game designs built around weapons that can pass through some Shields, do super-heavy damage to others, and are worthless against a third option, for example.

3. The bounce makes perfect sense for some situations. I've played with the bounce, and if handled really carefully, you can get some jaw-dropping results with it.

I guess what I'm saying is that I really like the special-effect, and I really like how you're extending the game code to give us a better feature, but what we need, in general, out've any new features... is the same flexibility that exists in most of the TA code that Spring emulates so well. OTA was a great game design in large part because it has so much flex, and so many possible combinations of options. When you start putting things in too tight of a pigeon-hole, like the idea you've proposed, though... then it's probably not something that modders like me, who want to build new game designs for Spring, are likely to use.

incidenta5 · Post by **incidenta5** » 15 Mar 2006, 03:11

The beam part is about 5 lines of code so it would be pretty easy to comment out. My latest build attempts to block both MERL Missiles and Rockets. So far I can get it to target them, but it has difficulty in slowing them down due to the speed being reset when the missile updates its own position.

The funny thing is that I can get the missiles to blow up early, and I can get the shield effect to draw; just not both at the same time, yet.

Also, is it possible to turn it off yet? Cos that would be useful. :)

I'll look into getting it to turn off, I hadn't noticed that bit before you mentioned it.

When you start putting things in too tight of a pigeon-hole, like the idea you've proposed, though... then it's probably not something that modders like me, who want to build new game designs for Spring, are likely to use.

I was thinking about branching the PlasmaRepulsor weapon into two or three different types. That way, for the time being, you could have the old style bounce, or the shield effect.

In fact, I was thinking about using the fireState toggle to allow you to switch between the regular 'bounce' mode and the 'collison' mode. The problem there would be the lack of a means to change the power requirements between the two modes.

[Edit]
I fixed the PlasmaRepulsor weapon so that it automatically checks the fireState of the the unit/building its attached to. Works perfectly. Now you can turn it off :)

No more 'beam' effect:

Argh · Post by **Argh** » 15 Mar 2006, 04:40

Hmm... it really should support the "onoffable=1;" tag from unit TDFs, I think. That's where people are going to expect to be able to use this- turn the Shield on, turn it off... or change states, with differing effects.

In addition, it needs to call a different bitmap, preferably a bitmap called in the FBI (say, like a line that says "impactbitmap=MyBitMapName;" ). Calling the explosion bitmap really limits us in a lot've ways, just as how the current explosions are severely limited in looks/variety because we cannot name new bitmaps for the various named particles, which go to hardcoded locations instead of flexible ones. It's pretty clear, from the last release, that we're heading away from this, which is great- set the bar higher, and give use the ability to have different Shields that look different, simply by using a different bitmap projected across the sphere or whatever.

Other than that... well, I guess asking for you to make it read a value in a TDF and then check vs. a SHIELD database for various states on impact (say, "ignore", "shieldvalue=0-1.0" to raise/lower the default effectiveness, and "maxdamage", "autoheal" and "timedown") would be too much for one go, eh? Gimme all that, and we can totally do Trek, Star Wars, and other awesome sci-fi mishmash mods with complete believabilty and authenticity

Warlord Zsinj · Post by **Warlord Zsinj** » 15 Mar 2006, 06:08

Any chance of getting lasers reflecting so that we can get some lightsabers happening?

Das Bruce · Post by **Das Bruce** » 15 Mar 2006, 07:14

It would be cool if we could have it texture based some how, but that would require perpolygon detection.

Post by SJ » 15 Mar 2006, 08:49

Why add a seccond beam effect to it? There already is one although with low alpha value, better just to rise the alpha of that if one want a beam.

As for only being able to target some projectiles, add a bitfielt to the repulsor/projectiles working in the same way as the targetable/interceptor fields do for nuke/antinukes.

incidenta5 · Post by **incidenta5** » 15 Mar 2006, 12:42

SJ wrote:Why add a seccond beam effect to it? There already is one although with low alpha value, better just to rise the alpha of that if one want a beam.

As for only being able to target some projectiles, add a bitfielt to the repulsor/projectiles working in the same way as the targetable/interceptor fields do for nuke/antinukes.

I've just started exploring the way Spring is setup behind the scenes, so when I get a chance I'll explore this.

[Edit]

I recoded a bit of the PlasmaRepulsor code and it now uses the on/off button that I added to the Defense Field Emitter building.

This is a mod on top of AA1.44S that adds the on/off button and toggle.

AF · Post by AF » 15 Mar 2006, 20:32

Can we have control over the colour? for example the droideka in starwars will have blue shields always regardless of energy, and the same for startrek, although in ST:Armada they used a system similair to that with green->red....

SinbadEV · Post by **SinbadEV** » 15 Mar 2006, 20:53

I like the new effect and I like the old effect, I like the beam/missile command effect for some things too... I think it should be something that either fbi, weapons deffinition, or script handles... 3 options for repultion, the "bounce" effect we currently have, this "explodes on impact" option, and a simple "replection" option... I can't think of any other types of shield can be simulated with those 3 options.

incidenta5 · Post by **incidenta5** » 15 Mar 2006, 22:13

SinbadEV wrote:I like the new effect and I like the old effect, I like the beam/missile command effect for some things too... I think it should be something that either fbi, weapons deffinition, or script handles... 3 options for repultion, the "bounce" effect we currently have, this "explodes on impact" option, and a simple "replection" option... I can't think of any other types of shield can be simulated with those 3 options.

I'm working on adding more configuration options to the FBI file for the DF Emitter itself.

So far I was thinking about the following additions to the UnitDef structure:
Shield Strength
Shield Max
Shield Recharge Rate
Shield Type (which weapons it will block)
Shield Beam Size
Shield Size
Shield Beam RGB
Shield RGB

I already have the behavior of the emitter linked to the fire state:
Hold Fire - (same as the off button)
Return Fire - bounce mode
Fire at will - detonate upon impact

On/Off switch - works now.

NOTE: I added a download link to a working version on my first post.

(whats FBI? I haven't heard of that acronym before.)

SinbadEV · Post by **SinbadEV** » 15 Mar 2006, 22:30

... fbi is the extention for unit deffinitions... http://taspring.clan-sy.com/wiki/Units:FBI ... please tell me you was joking... right?

Argh · Post by **Argh** » 15 Mar 2006, 22:32

FBI files are text files, starting with a named object, say like [LASER (the other bracket is missing cus of PHPBB, not because it's missing IRL) then bracketed with "{" and closed with "}" Inside of every Weapon file is a [DAMAGE declaration, that is also bracketed/closed in like fashion. Other than the brackets, these files do not obey any particular order- whatever is between the opening/closing brackets is read into memory, associated with that weapon.

These files are the control definitions for weapons in the TA engine, and are used in the same capacity in Spring. Open up the Weapons folder in AA to see FBI files, but they're all basically the same.

Basically, we need that part working in order to make much use of the additional parameters. If you can get that working, though, then it should be a snap, given where you're already at. Very cool stuff

FLOZi · Post by **FLOZi** » 15 Mar 2006, 22:46

Sorry to burst your bubble, but you are meaning .tdf there, Argh.

FBI are text files that control unit statistics/data

incidenta5 · Post by **incidenta5** » 15 Mar 2006, 22:46

SinbadEV wrote:... fbi is the extention for unit deffinitions... http://taspring.clan-sy.com/wiki/Units:FBI ... please tell me you was joking... right?

Lol

Argh · Post by **Argh** » 16 Mar 2006, 02:26

Oops, duh. Sorry, it's been a very long day at work, here.

Warlord Zsinj · Post by **Warlord Zsinj** » 16 Mar 2006, 09:15

Again, no droideka shields until we can reflect lasers.

SinbadEV · Post by **SinbadEV** » 16 Mar 2006, 17:27

heh... I alsways thought the Jedi were saying "Destroyers" and the fish-heads were saying "Droidy Cars"... heh...

Spring RTS Engine

Repulsor Tweak

Repulsor Tweak