Messages

1

User modifications / Re: New Reaction Fire system and other game tweaks (.diff file)

« on: April 25, 2010, 09:06:38 pm »

Hello MCR, and ... sorry : I did stop the development of this patch.

I have to admit strict coding guidelines did chill me somewhat. I did want to help the project, but my motive was also to have fun in doing so. Correcting bugs, warnings and such make sense obviously, a code has to be clean. However, I just felt that some constraints cost too much extra work and re-checks when they did not actually made the code better (that camelcase thing for instance).

The UFO:AI project is not a company with paid employees, so in my opinion the working environment should be made more flexible and firendly in order to attract and keep participants (well, at least for the coding part). Its a non-professional free game project, and you can still go do work without being professionaly strict, and it might also make the project grow faster.

Once again, theres no bad in constraints - as long as their effect justify their cost.

So basically, yes, I was somehwat put off by the 'little' constaints - not big the structural ones, but thats not all : Im currently opening an online shop and thats a lot of work, so I dont have as much time as before, and I rather spend my free time on things that feels more fun than checking where the capitals letters are in a variable name.

That said, iirc, the patch files are quite complete - altough old - and excepts for some minors errors and guidelines deviances, it worked back then. And since its open source code, anyone can continue it

Sorry to disappoint you.

2

Coding / Re: [SUGGESTION] Reaction fire automatic weapons behavior

« on: March 27, 2010, 03:27:03 pm »

Here are the updated patch. Pretty straightforward :

- file "...AND_other_tweaks" still includes the other gameplay tweaks from the original patch

- file "...MINUS_other_tweaks" has the following *removed* : actor starts round with half TU after being dazed, critical hit system, actors stunned by high damage, stunned actors HP set to very low when mission ends, sniper accuracy tweak.

- for both files : used no brackets "if", removed commented code, removed broadcast debug messages, removed typo corrections, used _("Blah blah.") for messages, tried to follow coding guidelines, corrected the vec2_t bug.

Note that :
The new TU spending system is required for the new RF system. It would not make much points not to include the survey point (aimAt) since the goal is to have a new RF patch. All this requires new struct elements, new functions, definitions, network messages on both moving, combat, and reaction firing domains, also required edition of ufo weapon def files. Hence : lots of files are still impacted with the 'MINUS' patch.

IMPORTANT :
I hand-modified the .patch files, and im not 100% sure i did it right. Use with caution.

3

Feature Requests / Re: Proposal for 2.4 TODOs (Unofficial For Now)

« on: March 27, 2010, 01:38:45 am »

I dont think theres any copyright or patent for "put butons side to side with an icon on it", or "use color for graphical representations".
Well, if there is, someone is about to sue the world.

4

Feature Requests / Re: Research and Story/Gameplay progression

« on: March 27, 2010, 01:37:14 am »

That would triple bad :
- the player can lock the game progression by stopping researchs.
- the pressure of the technology race is lost - even more, if you do research, you end up helping the enemy.
- you get a linear research tree as one thing unlocks the next, no choices.

Sorry, bad idea.

5

Coding / Re: [SUGGESTION] Reaction fire automatic weapons behavior

« on: March 27, 2010, 01:31:16 am »

put some more stuff into the scripts

What do you have in mind ?

Ill check for that crash, and coding guidelines, and try to release a clean -or at least more stable- version.

6

Windows / Re: lame soldiers in v2.2.1

« on: March 26, 2010, 01:07:27 pm »

3-round burst from an assault rifle(if it hits) is guaranteed to kill an alien even if he wears medium alien armour...

I ... dont think so. Unless you're playing on easy - i didnt try it.
The only aliens I manage to kill with 3 hits from rifle are the unarmored taaman.

7

Coding / Re: [SUGGESTION] Reaction fire automatic weapons behavior

« on: March 26, 2010, 01:04:45 pm »

The point survey system is built on the new reaction fire system. Since ive mostly rewritten the whole thing, im not sure how to include point survey on the regular RF structure. However i suppose it would be rather easy to do, you just have to register the point at the time you make a soldier face, and then give a bonus for reaction fire when enemies are close to that point.

But there might be a problem : if i got it right, on the normal RF, when an enemy actor moves, and one of your soldier can see him and has RF on, he will get that enemy as his RF target (does not mean he'll fire), and wont change until next turn. Which means if another enemy moves, even on the survey point, he will be ignored as a target is already acquired.

To check for this search for something like ent->reactionTarget or such.

btw, anyone tried the patch ?

8

Feature Requests / Re: MultiStory Bases

« on: March 26, 2010, 01:25:12 am »

You might want to read this : http://ufoai.ninex.info/forum/index.php?topic=4533.0

9

Design / Re: why no nuclear stuff?

« on: March 26, 2010, 01:21:49 am »

Hertzila, what i am talking about is nuclear weapon. Nuclear does not means "nuclear bomb". For instance, there are "nuclear plants", and afaik their goal is not to be exploding, but to provide energy.

Its obviously dumb to think about using a nuclear bomb on the field in a tactical squad game. It could be implemented in some way in the geoscape, but to be honest im not sure what purpose it could serve - aliens goal isnt to kill everyone, and there no alien target big enough for phallanx to justify using a nuke - bases being underground.

So what i was talking about is nuclear powered weapons, or as in the modern weaponry and as mfos mentionned, U-238 ammo.

And for the high tech, i didnt mean Sci-Fi high tech, i played the game you know, its hard not to noticed those theres alot of sci-fi high tech already. Other than uranium weaponry, theres javelin missiles (rising in the sky to attack the target from above), claymore mines, a large palette of unmanned drones and reconnaissance devices, extremely quick automatic turrets, and so on ...

I dont say we need to put every existing weapon in the game, but that being limited to old and very conventionnal weapons (machinegun, rifle, shotgun ...) is odd.

10

Windows / Re: lame soldiers in v2.2.1

« on: March 26, 2010, 12:45:52 am »

There are games where you pay to hire soldiers or staff, and the better they are, the most it costs. I do prefer the "trading card game" effect tough.

11

Design / Engineers and Scientists hiring

« on: March 25, 2010, 08:01:43 pm »

Why is it necessary to select every single scientist and engineer when you are hiring ? Afaik they dont have any unique stats.
I suppose it would make it easier if scientists and engineers were bought as 'items'. Or is something planed with their stats who would justificate to pick one more than another ?

12

Windows / Re: lame soldiers in v2.2.1

« on: March 25, 2010, 07:54:05 pm »

tbh, it has always bothered me too, that most 'elite' soldiers you recruit seem to have never held a weapon before, and more importantly never thrown a ball in their whole life (maybe dad was away when it was time to teach baseball to the son ?) ... look at how they throw grenades -_-; ...

Id rather have a game system with soldier having their random stats fixed - until implants are applied - and getting experimented at killing aliens, giving them chances to score critical hits on the alien types they know well.

One thing I liked in UFO:EU is that you 'bought' soldiers. It was quite like a trading card game : you buy a pack of cards, if you have luck you get good ones, and you can continue spending money to try to get a very good team..

But i suppose that would be too different from the actual game design / the old ufo game.

13

Design / Re: why no nuclear stuff?

« on: March 25, 2010, 07:39:51 pm »

Nuclear handheld weapons are very 'old style SF', and is an efficient cliché. Id like to have some, but just because its 'sounds cool'. Also, its true modern high tech weaponry has quite some fancy suff and is not limited to m16 & machineguns.

14

Feature Requests / Re: Better Interface for the Transfer Screen

« on: March 25, 2010, 11:56:27 am »

As a player I would think that managing transport vehicles is too much micromanagement.

15

Feature Requests / Re: Better Interface for the Transfer Screen

« on: March 24, 2010, 12:11:42 pm »

I dont know ho xcom apoc works, but if its the same as the table system I suggest, does it work ?