Subset Games Forum

Chrono Vortex wrote:When I make a weapon what I usually do is grab something like the burst laser or pike beam (depending on the weapon I want to make), copy and paste bits of other weapons on and do some fine tuning until the bits look like they belong on the weapon. Is that any help?

Yeah, I guess the best way to imagine something is to take what you already know and screw around with it until you get something new.

I pick a weapon from a different franchise or inspiration source and get that weapon(s) and put it in FTL form...

For eg the PPC : particle projection cannon, inspired from Battletechs version. It is a energy projectile weapon (which for BT is odd as there is no other projectiles for the whole energy class) and it has a minor EMP effect. I will go with a damage + ion combo for htese with nice good velocity. here is a picture of it in the original 1990's tro.

This is an encased version fired from the legendary Timberwolf (IS reporting name: mad cat) from battletech. another old work


Mechwarrior Onlines Catapult CPLT-k2 with duel PPC's.





THIS is my final version of the PPC's inspired from these sources
Light PPC

(normal) PPC

Heavy PPC


and the Snub nose PPC (short barrel, shorter range)


I will also have blue events for these and my gauss rifles to have the ability to fire at enemies from range and stuff.


I can show you some other weapons I have and the sources and inspiration.

You could take another beam weapon and change the colours... then add the Glaive Beam's focusing lens to it.

I downloaded a ship a while back before AE called "The Nexus" and it had things like a Cryo Beam or a Thoron Blaster which were essentially recoloured beams or ion guns. So there's always that - a spectrum of weapon colours. Green/Blue/Orange/Purple Glaive Beams.
Sounds like something Endless Loot would have though.

Has anyone done a green beam yet?

R4V3-0N wrote:I pick a weapon from a different franchise or inspiration source and get that weapon(s) and put it in FTL form...

THIS is my final version of the PPC's inspired from these sources
Light PPC

(normal) PPC

Heavy PPC


and the Snub nose PPC (short barrel, shorter range)


I will also have blue events for these and my gauss rifles to have the ability to fire at enemies from range and stuff.


I can show you some other weapons I have and the sources and inspiration.

Wow that's amazing work there. Your sprites are so much more detailed than mine. I'll take a look at a few weapons and see what can I make in the FTL style. Though as a side note, and a fairly important one as it's one of the main things interfering with my modding. Your work is also a bit disheartening. Your barrage lasers and gauss rifles fill in the same niche as my photocasters and railguns. And frankly, I wonder to myself if I should even bother working on those two anymore when a far more capable modder is executing similar ideas. Sure, I have other weapons, but that's one of the bugbears that have been jabbing at me ever since I came back to FTL. I feel like I joined the modding scene way too late. Since the modding scene is so saturated here, in order to bring something new to the table, you really have to push the boundaries-like that ship selector button guy, having a clever concept just doesn't cut anymore as everything's been explored. I feel like as a rookie modder, I feel can't make anything worthwhile or something that hasn't been done already.

WhiteWeasel wrote: I feel like I joined the modding scene way too late. Since the modding scene is so saturated here, in order to bring something new to the table, you really have to push the boundaries-like that ship selector button guy, having a clever concept just doesn't cut anymore as everything's been explored. I feel like as a rookie modder, I feel can't make anything worthwhile or something that hasn't been done already.

If it makes you feel any better, I felt the same way when I joined the forums. And this was shortly after AE had come out and ruined everyone's mods.
The best mods do a lot more than just add new and cool-looking ships though. And honestly, I don't like weapons mods that much. Last thing I need is more clutter between me and the Bust Laser Mk.II and the Flak I and please, no more bloody Drones that do the same thing a Combat I drone does except it's a different shell being lobbed or the speed's changed.

I think the best mods are things that radically alter the game, like for example Captain's Edition or anything made by Gencool. Or A Strange New Galaxy, Descent Into Darkness...

In fact one avenue that hasn't been explored much (in my opinion) is enemy ships. Captain's Edition and A Strange New Galaxy are the only mods out there I've seen that adds new enemies to fight. So instead of more guns to clutter the list or more ships to clutter the list, how about more skulls to bash? (and maybe a skull-ship to bash)

WhiteWeasel wrote: Wow that's amazing work there. Your sprites are so much more detailed than mine. I'll take a look at a few weapons and see what can I make in the FTL style. Though as a side note, and a fairly important one as it's one of the main things interfering with my modding. Your work is also a bit disheartening. Your barrage lasers and gauss rifles fill in the same niche as my photocasters and railguns. And frankly, I wonder to myself if I should even bother working on those two anymore when a far more capable modder is executing similar ideas. Sure, I have other weapons, but that's one of the bugbears that have been jabbing at me ever since I came back to FTL. I feel like I joined the modding scene way too late. Since the modding scene is so saturated here, in order to bring something new to the table, you really have to push the boundaries-like that ship selector button guy, having a clever concept just doesn't cut anymore as everything's been explored. I feel like as a rookie modder, I feel can't make anything worthwhile or something that hasn't been done already.

Personally? I had the same thoughts with me and I've been here for I think 3 years now (or 2) way back before AE. I looked at mods like Foundation of the Federation (no longer being worked on), the early phases of Captains edition (such as the additional weapons mod and stuff), drone+, and so on and on I looked around and feared not much can be done. Then you got people like dry eagle doing an extreme into a new concept such as O2'less crewed ships (increase engi med bots heal rate, no O2 room, crystal crew, etc), or explore the use of disconnected rooms (scarab), and so on and on and on...

However the thing that mainly got me into modding is a project I'l working on that is in a way Foundation of the federation but more specific, or a more mellow version of captains edition.

Instead of expanding the game (CE) or pulling the timeline back a few hundred years (FotF) I will look at FotF and CE' (fed) faction components and will make a overhaul called FTL: Engi Brigade . You play as the Engi brigade instead of a human part of the federation. I wanted to add a bunch of new player ships to go with it (mainly engi), but I also needed new weapons and so I got in this very awkward loop of continuously building weapons around ships and making more weapons for just a full series or what have you. THen what happens if I want to change my idea for a weapon? welp, time to make a completely new rushed weapon for an update... So instead I went with inspiration of FotF and CE- early on they made different 'packages' of the content before merging it (which FotF never did), this way if your project dies there is still some fruit to bare and you will never 'fail' the project as something good still has come from it. On top of that it allows you to get a better working scheme, hence my weapons pack, after I go through all the basics in my mind for a weapon pack of each weapon type- I will add blue events later for each mod and increase the pool a bit more. (ie for go ballistic I'm planning on a machine gun array, more light autocannons, anti personnel gauss rifles, more drones, rail gun, Hyper assault gaussrifle. etc) and then after the 2nd huge pass I will go for a mega weapon pack that refines the whole lot and maybe add a few extra bits and pieces. thus this last mod for weapons. I will move on to the ships (ish), and then events and enemies...

One thing I aimmed for with the events is simular to CE, give common cheap obsolete versions of weapons, give very powerful late end rare weapons, normal weapons, weapons that do more roles, etc. However I will try to fit these weapons more with certain factions, for eg Federation will mainly go into ballistics, slugs will mainly use plasma weapons (rather it be regular plasma, ionised plasma, etc), tesla weapons go to engi and slugs, basic beams go to engi, asteroid launcher (not finished name, kind of like a heavy laser that fires asteroids as a gimicy rock weapon) for rocks, any crystal weapon obviously for crystal. Zoltans get versions of weapons that are reduced power. So on and on and on. I will also check with the coding on methods of like making sector specific store rarity. I know it's there but I'll need to practice with my coding. I want to make things like rebel sectors get rebel and fed weapons more often then others, while other sectors get things like .

But my plans out of the way and life-mod story. Stylesrj does make a few points. however his hate for things getting in his way between him and his burst laser II and his distrust in drones and missiles does put a perspective to it- even though you may have made a weapon that's like a vulcan burst laser iI or a burst laser III that is the same reload and power as a burst laser II with minor changes but other hits...

It is true enemy ships isn't explored much. I will eventually do enemy ship modding. However weapon pacts are quite scarce as well as drone packs and stuff. So those are still valid areas of modding. (ships on the other hand... so many...)

Personally when I first made GO BALLISTIC I receive a mountain of responses such as "I always wanted a weapon pack like this!" and so on. Not only for the fact I covered the niche for it as ballistics and featured mainly out dated fun but also the fact there isn't much weapon packs out there.


Your rail gun may be simular to my gauss or coil gun. However there is ALWAYS ways to make it different- hell I am also planing a rail gun and stuff. My biggest problem isn't the function of it but it was also partly the art, which your work here


actually inspired me on ways how to make my one- funny how the world goes round isn't it? Simply changing a weapons velocity, charge time, power requirement, ammo or not ,and extras ie system damage, hull, etc. can change a lot for a weapon to be unique and I seriously think you can make your weapon ideas worth while and who knows, your rendition of it rather in art or basic coding could be better then mine- just because I attempted it doesn't mean you shouldn't.
It may be better, maybe for some people- maybe for most people. That slight faster cooldown and different damage could probably make yours better or much more fitting for some people then mine.

Rail gun isn't a new thing in FTL modding- it has been done I think about 5 times including you and i- at least in mass popularity and not minor variations. DryEagle did it on his scarab (5 shield piercing 1 damage fast reload), GingerDragon (Forgot the stats...) I will do it (2-3 shield piercing for 1 projectile), you may have it as a straight up 2 shield pen weapon with high velocity

I don't know- I could be just babling along. I'm not the best at English or formatting proper long pieces of writing even though I love wall of text production.

Thanks for the big reply, I'll continue my work after all. I guess I'm experiencing what I call "the noob paradox". You don't want to do something because your are not good at it, but how can you get good if you don't attempt it?

R4V3-0N wrote:But my plans out of the way and life-mod story. Stylesrj does make a few points. however his hate for things getting in his way between him and his burst laser II and his distrust in drones and missiles does put a perspective to it- even though you may have made a weapon that's like a vulcan burst laser iI or a burst laser III that is the same reload and power as a burst laser II with minor changes but other hits...

I guess that's a fault of the random drop system, everything is drawn from the same pool, meaning every weapon you add will lower the chance of getting X by a tiny bit. Sure you can change the specific load outs of certain enemies, but you can't as far as I know make weapons sector specific. Such as the slugs should have higher likely hood bombs appearing in their stores/weapon drops to reflect their nature to take ships intact for example.

R4V3-0N wrote:Your rail gun may be simular to my gauss or coil gun. However there is ALWAYS ways to make it different- hell I am also planing a rail gun and stuff. My biggest problem isn't the function of it but it was also partly the art, which your work here


actually inspired me on ways how to make my one- funny how the world goes round isn't it? Simply changing a weapons velocity, charge time, power requirement, ammo or not ,and extras ie system damage, hull, etc. can change a lot for a weapon to be unique and I seriously think you can make your weapon ideas worth while and who knows, your rendition of it rather in art or basic coding could be better then mine- just because I attempted it doesn't mean you shouldn't.
It may be better, maybe for some people- maybe for most people. That slight faster cooldown and different damage could probably make yours better or much more fitting for some people then mine.

Rail gun isn't a new thing in FTL modding- it has been done I think about 5 times including you and i- at least in mass popularity and not minor variations. DryEagle did it on his scarab (5 shield piercing 1 damage fast reload), GingerDragon (Forgot the stats...) I will do it (2-3 shield piercing for 1 projectile), you may have it as a straight up 2 shield pen weapon with high velocity

I don't know- I could be just babling along. I'm not the best at English or formatting proper long pieces of writing even though I love wall of text production.

My railguns are indeed high velocity, long cooldown, and depending on the model, have two shield pen. (The small and charge have only one SP, while the medium and large have two). Also note that weapons with singular high damage projectiles (like my railguns) are quite vulnerable to enemies with high evasion.

from what I can recall you can make weapons sector specific: for eg you never encountered the lockdown bomb, anti bio beam, or the crystal burst II in sector 2 have you? =P or any non slug/ crystal sector.

Line of code from the sector_data.xml Not sure if it is correct as it was canceled out with "<---'s" but I know it is there somewhere and hear as you can see basicly makes all rarity of all times to 0 besides crystal weapons.



And if it makes you feel better I do not think you are a 'noob' ^^ your weapons are quite nice looking and you show lots of promise.

R4V3-0N wrote:from what I can recall you can make weapons sector specific: for eg you never encountered the lockdown bomb, anti bio beam, or the crystal burst II in sector 2 have you? =P or any non slug/ crystal sector.

Line of code from the sector_data.xml

Code: Select all

<sectorDescription name="CRYSTAL_HOME" minSector="0" unique="true">   
	<nameList>
		<name>Hidden Crystal Worlds</name>
	</nameList>
	<trackList>
		<track>debris</track>
		<track>wasteland</track>
		<track>deepspace</track>
	</trackList>
	<rarityList>
		<blueprint name="engi" rarity="0"/>
		<blueprint name="mantis" rarity="0"/>
		<blueprint name="energy" rarity="0"/>
		<blueprint name="slug" rarity="0"/>
		<blueprint name="rock" rarity="0"/>
		<blueprint name="human" rarity="0"/>
		<blueprint name="crystal" rarity="1"/>
		<blueprint name="LASER_BURST_1" rarity="0"/>
		<blueprint name="LASER_BURST_2" rarity="0"/>
		<blueprint name="LASER_BURST_2_A" rarity="0"/>
		<blueprint name="LASER_BURST_3" rarity="0"/>
		<blueprint name="LASER_BURST_5" rarity="0"/>
		<blueprint name="LASER_HEAVY_1" rarity="0"/>
		<blueprint name="LASER_HEAVY_2" rarity="0"/>
		<blueprint name="MISSILES_1" rarity="0"/>
		<blueprint name="MISSILES_2" rarity="0"/>
		<blueprint name="MISSILES_2_PLAYER" rarity="0"/>
		<blueprint name="MISSILES_3" rarity="0"/>
		<blueprint name="MISSILES_BURST" rarity="0"/>
		<blueprint name="MISSILES_BREACH" rarity="0"/>
		<blueprint name="BEAM_1" rarity="0"/>
		<blueprint name="BEAM_2" rarity="0"/>
		<blueprint name="BEAM_3" rarity="0"/>
		<blueprint name="BEAM_LONG" rarity="0"/>
		<blueprint name="BEAM_FIRE" rarity="0"/>
		<blueprint name="BOMB_BREACH_1" rarity="0"/>
		<blueprint name="BOMB_BREACH_2" rarity="0"/>
		<blueprint name="ION_1" rarity="0"/>
		<blueprint name="ION_2" rarity="0"/>
		<blueprint name="ION_4" rarity="0"/>
		<blueprint name="BOMB_1" rarity="0"/>
		<blueprint name="BOMB_FIRE" rarity="0"/>
		<blueprint name="BOMB_ION" rarity="0"/>
		<blueprint name="BOMB_HEAL" rarity="0"/>
		<blueprint name="LASER_HULL_1" rarity="0"/>
		<blueprint name="LASER_HULL_2" rarity="0"/>
		<blueprint name="BEAM_HULL" rarity="0"/>
		<blueprint name="MISSILES_HULL" rarity="0"/>
		<blueprint name="BOMB_LOCK" rarity="3"/>
		<blueprint name="CRYSTAL_BURST_1" rarity="1"/>
		<blueprint name="CRYSTAL_BURST_2" rarity="4"/>
		<blueprint name="CRYSTAL_HEAVY_1" rarity="2"/>
		<blueprint name="CRYSTAL_HEAVY_2" rarity="5"/>
	</rarityList>
	<startEvent>START_BEACON_CRYSTAL</startEvent>
	<event name="STORE_CRYSTAL" min="2" max="3"/>
	<event name="ITEMS_CRYSTAL" min="2" max="2"/>
	<event name="NOTHING_CRYSTAL" min="2" max="2"/>
	<event name="HOSTILE_CRYSTAL" min="6" max="10"/>
	<event name="BOARDERS_CRYSTAL" min="1" max="2"/>
	<event name="NEUTRAL_CRYSTAL" min="12" max="12"/>
	
	
</sectorDescrption>

Not sure if it is correct as it was canceled out with "<---'s" but I know it is there somewhere and hear as you can see basicly makes all rarity of all times to 0 besides crystal weapons.



And if it makes you feel better I do not think you are a 'noob' ^^ your weapons are quite nice looking and you show lots of promise.

I really appreciate the motivation, I think my drive to mod FTL is back and in the first hour and a half of work time I made the first sprites of my (from ring runner) light repeating photocasters marks I & II.



Since photocasters are weak little spammer weapons having the dinky little pew sound going -pew--pew--pew- would not sound right. So what I did was make the light photocaster projectile sprite look like two smaller projectiles and added an extra loop to the shooting animation. So it fires three/four projectiles for three/four damage, but giving the illusion of six/eight so I can achieve that pewpewpewpewpewpew effect.

Looks quite neat! I do not think it would be that similar to my barrage laser as it seems we're going for different trade ofs for firing more.