Races and Construct

[Tethys]

After deliberating which forum to post this, I figured it's more related to scripting rather than general technical support.

I am having trouble with the LiBorgStarBase and Construct mod (latest KM version). I have set up a construction ship for the Borg so that they may construct bases, however when the construction ship builds the base, it shows up as a Neutral base. I can add the base manually to Friendly and Enemy sides (which is a problem) since it does cause conflicts in certain game modes (such as Fed vs Non Fed Deathmatch), an enemy LiBorgStarBase WILL spawn friendly Borg ships that WILL attack the parent base. I have checked the Racesd Borg.py and the LiBorgStarBase IS listed in the script. I have checked the Custom script for the LiBorgStarBase and it is labeled App.SPECIES_BORG. The ShipIcons.py has LiBorgStarBase with corresponding entry in SpeciesToShip entry.

Does anyone know what I have missed here? If my memory serves me, all other bases work and construct properly. Thanks for any help, its appreciated.

-Tethys

[Defiant]

IIRC all ships are neutral while under construction. When finished they are moved to a group. The ship is then added to the same group is the constructing ship.

[Tethys]

I can verify (at least in my dev) that ships/stations under construction will usually side with the item that is building it, but not always. Everywhere I looked thus far tells me that this is some scripting issue. I do recall creating some scripts/Custom/ships scripts for the Cardassian stations, and they ended up turning into enemies when under construction, and when I deleted them they reverted back to being Friendly while being constructed. I checked SpeciesToShip and ShipIcons py files for clues but came up with nothing (other than maybe how BC handles stock ships and their races, but I have no idea what to do to make them work without potentially breaking the game). I have a Breen Shipyard also that will side with Federation/Klingon when built. I'm sure I can solve the problem with A LOT of tedious work, (such as taking scripts from "working" stations and overwriting the "broken" ones and then manually re-editing them with their old values) but I am curious to know, what the real solution would be? Furthermore, I can verify that when the Borg Starbase builds ships, they are assigned as if they are on my team rather than on the Starbase's team. Below are some screenshots of the issue.

[Defiant]

Please remove both calls to addShipToGroup() in LibConstruct.py, should be line 427 and 436 and see what happens.

[Tethys]

It had no effect, I am sorry to say. Sometime this week I will test a replacement set of scripts and see if I can inadvertently fix it. If not I will dig into the SpeciesToShip py and see if I can change stuff in there to an effect. Say, how many races were in stock BC? 6? How many were added in KM? My theory is that some races are based on Ferengi (neutral) while others are based on enemies of Federation/Klingon, but Romulan would have its own race side and so would the Cardassian/Kessok yes? So stock BC should have 3 sides and 1 neutral. I don't know much about stock BC I jumped in when modding was in full swing and never actually got into the stock model. 

[Defiant]

Why are you sorry? Thats a good thing: We now know that it is not from construct. Since this comes from a 3rd party script you can  revert the changes from my last post.  Did you add any other scripts? Is GalaxyCharts or something similar active?

[Tethys]

Yes, some parts of Galaxy Charts I was able to get working in MP (such as gravity and the system/astrometrics map), you think that might have something to do with it? I believe it has something to do with how the models are scripted by the original authors. If you have anything else you want me to check I am open to suggestions

Furthermore, I just checked and all mutators are active EXCEPT for Galaxy Charts.

[Defiant]

Is this Multiplayer??? What is the Server players race?

[Tethys]

I test everything on LAN. The game mode is UFP vs Non UFP Deathmatch (have not tested much on TKY mode). Player race should be Borg, but the construction ship will not build a friendly station.

The reason I test so much in UFP vs Non is because of the diversity of teams. This game mode appears to utilize more than 2 teams as well as a Neutral team. Time for bed, brain hurtss lol.

[Defiant]

Can you reproduce this in QB?

[Tethys]

Affirmative.

[Defiant]

As I said while under construction the ships will stay neutral. And the starbases look far from finished.

[Tethys]

I added one Card Freighter to each side, enemy, and friendly. This is what happens, and is what I would prefer to happen when stations are under construction (UFP vs Non-UFP Deathmatch mode).

[Defiant]

Problem is that while under construction with only a few 100 HP they get shot down to easily/early.

[Tethys]

Yes, this is why I added iProtectionShieldPowerPerSecond to the construction ships and gave it a value, 2 or 3 seems to be a little low, I am still playing with the values. 4 or 5 should allow the shields to protect the station while constructing, enough firepower should take them down however. But destroying the construction ship is also very easy. This is a screenshot from Quick Battle mode (updated screenshot)




Furthermore I have noticed the lack of icon on the Vakor. May be related, but I'm just about out of free time today, gotta get to work on a car.

[Tethys]

I am pleased to report that I have found a workaround for this persistent issue. 

In the Borg Racesd, adding the LiBorgStarBase to the lDefaultShips = [] list forces the base into the proper group. However, as a side effect, the starbases will now have names like a starship. I have not found a workaround yet for the ship names. 

[King Class Scout]

'persistant' is an understatement.  I think I've been hearing this construction complaint since this addon was first created.  Tiq and I were having similar p[roblems with the old Galaxy Charts; we were trying to set up TOS ships as a seperate race for the warp flashes and effects.  at least I'd got baz's JJ ships and their effects working.

[Tethys]

It's not a perfect fix though, after I added the bases to the ships list I tested it and the starbases were building starbases, so I had to go into the construct and add removals for all bases/stations for each race. So far so good though, only problems with the names now.

I may be thinking too far into things, but I did notice that only starships have a ship name list in the corresponding Racesd file.. I wonder if maybe a new name group should be created for starbase names, with a single entry (ex. "ControllingRace Starbase" or "ControllingRace Station"), that perhaps this might fix the issue of this persistent construct bug? For now I am happy with this workaround, so I will likely not involve myself further in this particular issue unless a game breaking issue arises from this workaround.

Additionally, on a separate note (as a note to myself), perhaps forcing shields to 100 and boosting the recharge rate for stations under construction could allow them to survive until construction is complete, whereupon recharge rates are restored to default.

[Morgan]

Yes, this is why I added iProtectionShieldPowerPerSecond to the construction ships and gave it a value, 2 or 3 seems to be a little low, I am still playing with the values. 4 or 5 should allow the shields to protect the station while constructing, enough firepower should take them down however. But destroying the construction ship is also very easy. This is a screenshot from Quick Battle mode (updated screenshot)




Furthermore I have noticed the lack of icon on the Vakor. May be related, but I'm just about out of free time today, gotta get to work on a car.

Hey Tethy's, unrelated note.  May I ask where you found that Cardassian Starbase in the pic?  I've been wanting that one for a while.

[Tethys]

SFSY_Vakor

I do not remember where I obtained the model, but I think I had to build a hardpoint for it if I'm not mistaken.