The Ascension Campaign R&D Thread

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NewAgeOfPower
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The Ascension Campaign R&D Thread

Postby NewAgeOfPower » Mon Sep 30, 2013 8:31 am

Announcing the Ascension mods- consisting of 3 arcs, explaining and expanding upon FTL's bare-bones storyline.

It will consist of quite a few individual Ship Mods, a Core Mod Data file (that will be required to make any ship mod run) and individual campaign mods, should a player wish to play the Ascension storyline (of course you do, right?).

The first arc, Requiem, will explore ships that are significantly stronger than vanilla ships, but are designed to not be disgustingly overpowered, and serve as a prelude.

The second arc, Vindication, will explore the ramifications of the storyline introduced in Requiem, and introduce difficult-to-play but unbalanced ships(artillery-only ship, no weapons/drones, but stealth, for example, or a pure tele ship, or a 99% defense ship), setting up the final arc.

The final arc, Transcendence, will introduce ships that are designed for play with Brothershogo's ridiculous difficulty mod- or another mod with equivalent difficulty, and conclude the final clash between the Concordiat of Man and the Khadarin Confederacy.
Last edited by NewAgeOfPower on Wed Oct 23, 2013 1:12 am, edited 4 times in total.
Requiem. The first in the Ascension trilogy. Current version: 0.6 BETA.

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NewAgeOfPower
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Re: [WIP][MOD] The Ascension Campaign

Postby NewAgeOfPower » Sat Oct 05, 2013 6:31 pm

@Ultramantis

What did you think of the PM? Do you approve/disapprove of the way I've integrated the Marauders into the storyline? I've already done the preliminary work on the Shard Cannon, and I'd like to know if you approve before I animate something as monstrous as the Shrike Cannon and then get the no-go.

So, do I have full creative control or freedom, within the concept I've laid out? Do you want to serve as, like, an editor for the mod? I can send you internal design documentation if you wish.

@Everyone Else

For those who weren't part of the 0.1 Requiem Alpha, here are some Concordiat missile systems that were put into the teaser.

Capital Torpedo Launcher

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With a movespeed of 10, these anti-capital grade torpedoes are trivial to shoot down for any unit with active defenses. However, these torpedoes allow light units to threaten heavy or even capital units- and once defenses have been beaten down, any target is in for a world of pain.

From tooltip:
Fires 2 slow torpedoes, each dealing 5 levels of damage. Consumes three units of explosives. Will cause breaches.

Assailant Missile Launcher

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A quadruple cell light missile launcher built for skirmishers, these allow one light unit to quickly swamp another's missile defenses at minimal logistics burden. However, each missile is equipped with a minimalist warhead dealing minimal damage- and to make things worse, the light weight of each missile reduces it's shield penetrating ability.

From tooltip:
Fires 4 missiles, each dealing 1 level of damage. Penetrates 3 shields. Consumes one unit of explosives.

Anyways, once I get the green light from Ultramantis, I'll finish up and release the 0.5 Beta this time, with even more weapons, ships, and drones : ]
Last edited by NewAgeOfPower on Sun Oct 06, 2013 12:01 am, edited 4 times in total.
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UltraMantis
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Re: [WIP][MOD] The Ascension Campaign

Postby UltraMantis » Sat Oct 05, 2013 11:41 pm

I've received the PM, just havent had the time to properly read it. You have full creative sir, i don't belive in selfishly hogging creations made for the community. You should expand on the idea as you see fit and not be restrained.
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NewAgeOfPower
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Re: The Ascension Campaign Development Thread

Postby NewAgeOfPower » Thu Oct 10, 2013 12:16 am

Okay, general mod design and campaign storyline design have been done. I'll be able to get real work in this weekend.

The mod is going to be highly articulated; there will be an Ascension Core Weapons/Augs/Drones ftl, then the individual ship FTLs & events FTLs.

Each arc of the story will have 2 different campaigns, i.e. Arc 1 will tell the story from both the Concordiat [Integreteriat] view point, and the Khadarin [Marauder] viewpoint.

For example, in the beginning of the Requiem/Marauder campaign, the player's first sector would generate a quest point, giving him/her instructions to proceed to the next sector, and capture a Concordiat scout.

Anyways, after 6 or so other quests in the chain, culimating with the assassination of [REDACTED] and your daring escape, you'll get the victory screen, and the instructions to boot up the Requiem/Integreteriat campaign ftl, and unload the Khadarin ftl.

In the mission (sectors) on the Concordiat side, you'll be doing a different chain of missions (since your respective stellar nations have different objectives), but you'll be told to be careful- multiple Khadarin Marauders were spotted in this subsector, and several other Concordiat scouts were lost, referencing the Khadarin viewpoint, implying a sort of in-sync universe...

Both storylines will run parallel to each other, with hints of what the player has or will do in the other viewpoint of the campaign storyline. Shouldn't be too hard, given the linear nature of this mod.

I'm wondering if I should hold the next "expansion's" ships and mission .ftl until a player sends me a password/screenshot that would be included in the final screens once they beat my 'missions', i.e. beating the Khadarin viewpoint of the Requiem arc would give you the Khadarin/Requiem half of the password, and so on and so forth.

Anyways, an overall (Ascension) progress report:

Storyline update:

6k words out of (estimated requirements) 20k complete.

Art update:

4/13 ship designs complete.
Half of weapons complete.
Half of drones complete.

XML update:

3/13 ships integrated.
All completed weapons (excepting one) integrated.
All completed drones integrated. One (1) drone requires fixing.

Next objective:

I need someone to show me the ropes around events/sectors, sometime around this coming weekend. All the arcs are shaping up to be 7 missions longs each, meaning I'll have to write 42 sectors worth of events total- even considering using bulk filler, I'll need complex multi-stage events for at least 3-4 beacons per sector.
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NewAgeOfPower
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Re: The Ascension Campaign Development Thread

Postby NewAgeOfPower » Sat Oct 12, 2013 8:10 pm

Side note: I couldn't get a beam defense drone to work, nor a bomb defense drone.

Query: does a defense projectile sprite size determine chance to hit (when intercepting an incoming shot)? Or is missile/projectile evasion hardcoded?
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dalolorn
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Re: The Ascension Campaign Development Thread

Postby dalolorn » Sat Oct 12, 2013 8:18 pm

NewAgeOfPower wrote:Side note: I couldn't get a beam defense drone to work, nor a bomb defense drone.

Query: does a defense projectile sprite size determine chance to hit (when intercepting an incoming shot)? Or is missile/projectile evasion hardcoded?


I do not believe defense weapons can miss, they can merely be fired too late to hit the target. However, I do not believe bombs or beams are viable weapons for defense drones.
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NewAgeOfPower
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Re: The Ascension Campaign Development Thread

Postby NewAgeOfPower » Sat Oct 12, 2013 9:00 pm

dalolorn wrote:
NewAgeOfPower wrote:Side note: I couldn't get a beam defense drone to work, nor a bomb defense drone.

Query: does a defense projectile sprite size determine chance to hit (when intercepting an incoming shot)? Or is missile/projectile evasion hardcoded?


I do not believe defense weapons can miss, they can merely be fired too late to hit the target. However, I do not believe bombs or beams are viable weapons for defense drones.


The beam drone simply fails to fire, although it's turret will track the target.

I attempted to circumvent the bomb drone's slow explosive mechanism ala UltraMantis's Magma Cannon, by setting the explosion image timers to near-zero values.

The drones fire, and the bomb appears over the missile, but the bombs fail to detonate. I'm uncertain why.
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dalolorn
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Re: The Ascension Campaign Development Thread

Postby dalolorn » Sun Oct 13, 2013 8:31 am

NewAgeOfPower wrote:
dalolorn wrote:
NewAgeOfPower wrote:Side note: I couldn't get a beam defense drone to work, nor a bomb defense drone.

Query: does a defense projectile sprite size determine chance to hit (when intercepting an incoming shot)? Or is missile/projectile evasion hardcoded?


I do not believe defense weapons can miss, they can merely be fired too late to hit the target. However, I do not believe bombs or beams are viable weapons for defense drones.


The beam drone simply fails to fire, although it's turret will track the target.

I attempted to circumvent the bomb drone's slow explosive mechanism ala UltraMantis's Magma Cannon, by setting the explosion image timers to near-zero values.

The drones fire, and the bomb appears over the missile, but the bombs fail to detonate. I'm uncertain why.


Yes, the system was coded for the lasers on the defense drones you see in the vanilla game, and is therefore only compatible with other lasers or missiles. Basically, you need a projectile that can collide with other projectiles. Clearly, bombs and beams never had collision code because they instantly impacted the target, removing the need for collision checks.
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Re: The Ascension Campaign R&D Thread

Postby R4V3-0N » Sun Oct 13, 2013 9:04 am

Defence weapons can miss. I've seen it a few times in games (eg firing at 1 of the flagships boarding drone, after 3 shot down, the 4th one was a miss and got to my ship before my drone fired again)

And also I really want a Beam defence drone to be in this mod (also would be cool to fit with Captains edition Drone extensions just saying)
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dalolorn
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Re: The Ascension Campaign R&D Thread

Postby dalolorn » Sun Oct 13, 2013 9:15 am

R4V3-0N wrote:Defence weapons can miss. I've seen it a few times in games (eg firing at 1 of the flagships boarding drone, after 3 shot down, the 4th one was a miss and got to my ship before my drone fired again)

And also I really want a Beam defence drone to be in this mod (also would be cool to fit with Captains edition Drone extensions just saying)


As far as I know, defense weapons don't fire twice at one target. I have yet to see them miss, though.

Beam defense drones, as explained in the 2 posts above yours, can't fire.