[WIP] Capital Ships Only

from Sins Forums

I personally believe that capital ships don't get enough glory. In the cinematic intro to Rebellion, almost all the ships are CS. But in-game, it's wasteful to use more than 6. So what I've done is remove the combat and support frigates and replace them with a frigate version of their respective CS.

TEC only for now:

Light(change?) to CSTransport

Heavy to CSBattleShip

Carrier to CSCarrier

LongRange to CSSiege

Utility0 to CSColony

Utility1 to CSSupport

I use a frigate type CS because the AI will build these in large numbers. It works beautifully. To the game its just a frigate, but it has all the stats of a CS.

Tech for removed frigates also removed.

Todo: 

Cost balancing. (Cut price in half, credits metal and crystal, but it seems too cheap)

Apply to other races

Abilities balancing (Right now all their abilities are usable as soon as they are made)

Find a use for legit CS (Flagships maybe?)

Speed up combat (battles take to damn long)

Maybe add research requirement to some CS?

Balance remaining frigates/defences (they are so useless)

modding
7,609 views 10 replies
Reply #1 from Sins Forums Top

You might be able to get the AI to use more capital ships by reducing their cost and increasing the cap thresholds for each 

To alter cost, mod the CAPITALSHIP files. e.g. CAPITALSHIP_PHASEBATTLESHIP.entity 

basePrice

              credits 3000.000000

              metal 400.000000

              crystal 250.000000

You might also want to alter the support cost within this file

slotCount 50.000000

You need to do this for each capital ship

 

To alter the cap number of capital ships copy and edit the following files:

RESEARCH SUBJECT_MAXCAPITALSHIPSPHASE0.entity

Files 0-7 for the vassari

 

RESEARCH SUBJECT_MAXCAPITALSHIPSPSI0.entity

Files 0-7 for the Advent

 

RESEARCH SUBJECT_MAXCAPITALSHIPSTECH0.entity

Files 0-7 for the Tech

If you'd rather run a mod that does these things I think the E4X mod does

Reply #2 from Sins Forums Top

Quoting ZanyPilot, reply 1
You might be able to get the AI to use more capital ships by reducing their cost and increasing the cap thresholds for each 

To alter cost, mod the CAPITALSHIP files. e.g. CAPITALSHIP_PHASEBATTLESHIP.entity 

basePrice

              credits 3000.000000

              metal 400.000000

              crystal 250.000000

You might also want to alter the support cost within this file

slotCount 50.000000

You need to do this for each capital ship

 

To alter the cap number of capital ships copy and edit the following files:

RESEARCH SUBJECT_MAXCAPITALSHIPSPHASE0.entity

Files 0-7 for the vassari

 

RESEARCH SUBJECT_MAXCAPITALSHIPSPSI0.entity

Files 0-7 for the Advent

 

RESEARCH SUBJECT_MAXCAPITALSHIPSTECH0.entity

Files 0-7 for the Tech

If you'd rather run a mod that does these things I think the E4X mod does
End of ZanyPilot's quote

 

I tried and tried and tried to, but the AI would flat out refuse to build them. At one point I made them totally free. For instance as a frigate entity, about 10 minutes into a game the AI had about 15 CS. As a CS entity by that time they had 3. Also the AI never builds any CS factories, save for one on their home planet. Even if they are free.

I think it had something to do with "frigateRoleType" throwing off the AI's build queue if there were missing ones like "Support" or "Heavy". But adding those lines to CS entities is invalid to the game.

 

If the AI wasn't hard coded they would have stayed CS entities.

Sins of a Solar Empire II
Reply #3 from Sins Forums Top

You could always put abilities on the factories that simply spawn capital ships...whether those abilities use AM or credits/resources is up to you...I'd point out though that the AI is much better at using abilities costing only credits instead of ones costing resources and credits...probably would want the autocast to be set to AnyTime...

Reply #4 from Sins Forums Top

Quoting Seleuceia, reply 3
You could always put abilities on the factories that simply spawn capital ships...whether those abilities use AM or credits/resources is up to you...I'd point out though that the AI is much better at using abilities costing only credits instead of ones costing resources and credits...probably would want the autocast to be set to AnyTime...
End of Seleuceia's quote

 

Now that I have the AI building them as frigate entities I don't really need to do that. If I wanted to make them CS entities with leveling yes, but I think frigate entities without leveling works well enough.

Plus, the AI still won't build CS factories.

Reply #5 from Sins Forums Top

Then put the ability on frigate factories...

Of course if you really don't want leveling at all (which is kind of the point of capital ships) then I suppose it doesn't matter...

Reply #6 from Sins Forums Top

Quoting Seleuceia, reply 6
Then put the ability on frigate factories...

Of course if you really don't want leveling at all (which is kind of the point of capital ships) then I suppose it doesn't matter...
End of Seleuceia's quote

 

Could I place an ability on the frigate entity CS that could:

Destroy it as soon as it's made and,

Spawn the CS entity, for leveling?

 

That would keep the AI's build queue consistent on what it wants, appropriate cost, and leveled CS

Reply #7 from Sins Forums Top

Yes I believe you could...

Reply #8 from Sins Forums Top

Quoting Seleuceia, reply 8
Yes I believe you could...
End of Seleuceia's quote

 

It works to an extent. I have the game building frigate entity CS that despawn and call a CS entity via Dark Fleet. The only problem is that there is about 1 failed ship spawn (the ship despawned before it called a CS) for every 60 ships built.

I'm not very good with abilities so could I make the despawn only happen after a CS is called?

And is there a way to remove ship explosions totally? I tried to leave the field blank, but whenever the ship is destroyed it just floats away and never disappears.

Reply #9 from Sins Forums Top

Ask in the "Modder's Get an Answer" thread (or something like that...more people check that...

Reply #10 from Sins Forums Top

It works perfectly now. No failures with +80 ships.

I have the placeholder ship phased out while it spawns a CS entity now too, to prevent it from combat.

Now I need to see how the AI behave with it in greater detail. Once I apply this to other races I will release it here.