1.

Possible, but complicated. Thier is no known way to just "make the ship disapear" but you can kill it, which will cause an explosion. But you can just say that the explosion is explosive bolts or the like.

It is possible for the resultent cap to have a level similar to the original cap by manipulating the ressurection ability.

This is VERY complicated, and I would be willing to help.

At risking sounding like a complete Ass, I am probably the only person in sins who could make such an ability to combine exactly four (or more/less) ships back into one. 

2. I am a codder, so my knowaledge of modeling ext... is limited, but I do believe that you could make a ship that is dieffernt parts, not as one whole. However, this wouldn't solve your problem, becouse they would still act, and technicly be, one ship.

3. Would be awsome, and simple, but I know of know way (and it is generaly conisedered impossilbe in sins currently) to create an undetectable ship.

Hmm....Your right about the construction vessels, I havn't thought about that.

*looking at them now*

Okay, thier is no line to just make the frigates go away. It is built into the starbase constuction line.

So, what I sugest, is that we USE the starbase constuction line, we just leave the type of starbase to be constructed blank.

You'll have to test that idea, to make sure it doesn't crash the game.

I have also thought of a problem, when joining the frigates back together, we have to spawn a capitol ship. And as far as I know, the only known way to spawn a capitol ship, is to use something similar to the Vassari fleet beacon. Meaning that the capship jumps in. (VS just appearing).

I think someone MAY have gotten around this, I'll reaserch that.

Sure you don't want this to be a cruiser or a frigate? (would make this a WHOLE lot easier)

Also, for now, you can begin work on the ability that seperates the ship. SHould be fairly simple, just have the ability apply a buff to itself, that buff then removes the original ship, and spawns your new ships. (look at the Sova Missile pod thing for an idea if you don't know)

Okay, I've got to be honest.  I've found that adding in new ships, messing with entity, mesh, and texture files is all fairly easy and straight-forward, but I'm not too sure about some of these ability/buff lines here.  I suppose I just don't know what lines affect what part of the game.  Anyway, I've put together the Ability and Buff for Separation HERE, but I do still have a few questions.

1)  Is there a way to have the three frigates act as a squadron or perhaps as a locked fleet (coordinated attacks, navigation, etc.)?  Each frigate must have a different model to represent a different portion of the ship, but I'm not sure how three separate models can translate into a group that acts as a squadron or fleet.

2)  Here's another thought.  Initially, I wanted to make this an untimed ability, which required that the frigates have an ability that would reform the capital ship when activated.  Would it be easier to make it a timed ability that just reverses the process at its elapse?

3)  In the buff, I used the Create Starbase line, but I also came across a Make Dead instant action.  I'm not sure to what unit it belongs, but I assume this would cause the explosion you were referring to earlier, right? 

Like I said, I'm not sure if what I'm doing is correct, but I figured you could point me in the right direction if something is wrong.

the 'MakeDead' instant action will kill the object using the ability. This line is used on the Argonev's Last Resort ability, and NOT IN SB CREATION ABILITIES.

Oops!  I changed a few things last minute that created a few of those inconsistencies.  I've fixed them up just now.

As to the issue with spawning a capital ship, I'm not totally married to the idea.  Could this work if the ship were a cruiser?

Edit:  Okay, so I have the spawning part completely worked out.  The Prometheus can spawn any number of whatever frigates I like that act independently just as any other frigate would.  For the moment, I have them set to a timer as I don't know how to go about creating the "redocking" ability. 

I tried the CreateStarbase line to get rid of the Prometheus as it spawns the frigates, and, while it didn't create any minidump issues, it didn't have any other kind of effect either.  I'm wondering if the construction frigate's disappearance is linked to something else.  Just for grins I also added in the Phase Out Hull buff to take the Prometheus out of the battle while its separate parts fight.  If I could figure out some way to make the ship invisible, or even mostly translucent, this might be a possible solution.

So, I have a question or two about making this work in the cruiser format?  I know how the Prometheus would respawn in cruiser form thanks to your help, but how could we get all three frigates to disappear under the effect of a single ability or buff?

Here are the new files, btw.

Ha! Success! Well with the ship being a frigate\cruiser at least. Though it's not perfect it's atleast a start

Essentially what i've got is an ability on ship A that spawns Ships B,C, and D and destroys ship A which is the simple part obviously

Then on ship B, there is an ability which will destroy ships B,C, and D and recreate Ship A, said ability will only work if Ships B, C and D are All within range otherwise it does nothing.

The main flaws are that

it is unable to distinguish between ships, by which i mean if you have multiples of Ship A you would be able to mix and match ships B,C and D to recreate the ships, (though you would always require one of each).

due to some of the buffs i used being an area effect, if you have multiple ships it CAN start a chain reaction (cool to watch though), but aslong as the range is very short it shouldn't be an issue

 It requires a passive ability on ships B,C and D, in addition to the Active abilities on A and B, so limits the other abilities able to placed on the ships (particularly ship B )

For the record I was not at all working on it because Tesla threw down the gauntlet 

lol Terraziel @ last line

Mystic Angel-  So does our idea of the create Starbase line work for our purposes or not?

If not, we'll have to use a special version of "MakeDead"

(though, not that line specificly, becoues it causes minidumps)

Yes, it can be a cruiser. For all Modding purposes, frigates and cruisers are the same thing.

I just looked at it, and again, I do not like your level source type. IF this is put on a capitol ship, someone could upgrade it to lvl 2, or 3, and not have to use any antimatter.

It SHOULD work if put on a cruiser/frigate. But it would be nicer if you would use "ReaserchWithoutBase"

As for the finish condition on the buff, that timer does absolutly nothing. I again sugest that you replace it with "AllOnDelayInstantActionsFinished" or however that line is.

As for Expiry time, I HEAVILY sugest that you put it on "-1" instead of 200.

All that means, is that after 200 seconds, all your nice new ships die. Which is problomatic if you want to join them back together.

Terriezial- Would you mind posting the re-combination buff?

I know how to improve it so that it can distinguish between ships.

(by the sounds of it, you may already know how, you just didn't do it)

I'd like to use it for this re-combining ability if you don't mind.

No problem, I've done the same thing with my files.  *hurries off to go compare*

EvilTesla-

I've had some stuff to take care of this morning, but I'm about to test out the starbase line now.  I actually got the "MakeDead" buff to work just fine.  Of course, the ship disappears in a huge, screen rattling explosion no matter how much I change the explosion/debris lines in the unit entity files.

I also figred out the frigate/cruiser thing.  I just hadn't been paying much attention to the cruiser entity files when I'd been in them, so I didn't realize they functioned as frigates as well.

I forget now why I was still using the "Intrinsic" source; it was really late last night, so maybe I just wasn't getting something with the ResearchWithoutBase stuff.  I'll change it around, but it did work fine on my cruiser last night.

Like I said, I was using a timer on the frigates just to have them disappear ( my version of an alpha).  The finish condition was there because I copied it over from the "IllusionSelfCopy" buff.  I originally had it as finishing after all On Delays, but didn't change it back after the copy/paste.  My intention is for the frigates to hang around indefinitely (until they're recombined, that is) in the end, so no worries there.

I'm off to go test out our theories.

Okay, after some frustrations working with Terraziel's files (due to minidumps I couldn't track down) I took a short break and a few steps backward and got the spawning files working in entrenchment. 

I also experimented some with the "CreateStarBase" line.  To be honest, I'm not really sure what's going on, but I do have a few ideas.  I've added the line in exactly as it's found in the starbase construction frigate file (both without and without a placement radius).  Basically, the ships were spawned, and the original frigate just stayed there with no sign of a starbase.  My initial thought is that I've put the action into a buff that's being applied to the unit itself (ApplyBuffToSelf), and the original creation ability does no such thing.  It's simply a "CreateStarBase" buff with no mention of target, self, or anything else.  So, maybe if I can create a second buff in the chain that accomplishes this without being applied to the original frigate...?  I don't really know but wanted to see what you guys thought.

Incidently, the MakeDead buff does create an unavoidable (for the moment), screen-shaking explosion.  So if it comes to it, then we could use that and somehow screw around with the explosions so that the ability creates a nonexistent explosion with no debris while being destroyed in battle creates the normal effects.

Latest files.

Yes, it probably doesn't work becouse it doesn't have a target.

I just looked at the Deploy Starbase files, and I see no way to give our "CreateStarbase" line a target.

We'll probably just have to use MakeDead.

Though, when using MakeDead, keep an eye on it, becouse again, I have had it crash the game.

(maby they fixed it in Entrenchment?)

I guess then it is time to begin work on the recombination ability.

In this recombination ability, I will sugest a PRODIGIOUS use of my invention, the "And Gate Buff"

I have it diagramed here, with a "Boomerang Buff"

An "And Gate Buff" is simply a set of buffs that makes sure that a certain buff only works if it is on the right ship. And a "Boomerang Buff" is a set of buffs that are targeted from a certain ship, onto a target, then "boomerang" back to the original.

Here is an ability diagram of a Boomenang Buff with an And Gate Buff

I will make the Ability Diagram of the recombination buff tommarow. It will have at least three Boomerang Buffs, and six and gates.

So yea, this will be a complex ability.

I like your theory, but keep in mind that this would take up more ability slots.

Your going to have to define what you mean by linking abilities.

Here is the Recombination Ability

Complex, confusing, and hard to understand,

But it SHOULD be bullit proof

Note: You'll probably want to change the names of the Buffs and Abilities and such

I'd rather you do it.

I have alot on my hands, and it is YOUR mod.

Don't worry about the names. They are just that, names.

Your idea would work, but here is somthing better.

Why don't you just have a buff that applies an explosion effect OnOwnerDeath??

what do you mean by you can't get the buff to take effect?

The buff wont apply?

The effect wont Apply?