AE R&D - What is new? What can we do now?

[kartoFlane]

Just a quick quirk i noticed, Engis don't have any layers for some reason.

I think it's because they're robotic. They're supposed to all look alike.

I don't think that's a problem -- layers can be added at will, if I understand the system correctly.

@Rockman
That's actually pretty clever way to make that work, though yeah, using up one system slot is definitely a big downside.

[Sleeper Service]

A commonly requested example: A Rock Ram weapon/system. The ram itself is a dummy weapon, however it can be made so that away the beginning of any fight an option to use the ram is given. Using the new ae event options it could damage a random system or a system of your choosing from the start. This is similar to the way the Captain's Edition uses special augments to give faction specific choices, except it uses a system rather than an augment. Only downside obviously is that there is one less system slot.

Did you test if you can make the artillery weapon a working requirements in events? It might only be possible to make any artillery an requirement, not the weapon itself. I'm somewhat doubt that event requirements can check which weapon your artillery is using. Needs testing.

[RAD-82]

Did you test if you can make the artillery weapon a working requirements in events?

Advanced Edition added ARTILLERY_FED to the WEAPONS_BEAM_DAMAGE list, and it works. I know that the artillery weapon didn't use to be checked by events, but it does now.

Side topic*: Unfortunately, drones still aren't checked by name for events. They are still checked by type.
More side topic*: I do see that lists work for <weapon name="{...}"/> and <drone name="{...}"/> tags now, and probably augments too. I never tested them before, but I was under the impression that didn't work before.
More side topic*: I see the <removeCrew class="{...}"> tag can target a specific race. Can it also target multiple crew like the old method of removing crew? Presumably with an amount="#" attribute?

*Okay, it isn't really off-topic, but it isn't what was currently being discussed, which is why I used side instead of off.

[Tweevle]

So I've done some testing with the crew colour system and it looks like you can have as many layers as you like with as many colour sets as you like - I'm currently trying five layers with 20 colour sets. The alpha value defined in each colour set can make a layer completely invisible, so you can potentially have multiple layers with different stuff overlapping (e.g. multiple hairstyles). The weird thing is, while the colour sets are in order, each layer's colour sets are offset randomly for each crew member.

It's difficult to explain, but say you have two layers for a human with three colour sets each, like so:

Layer 1 - Skin Colour:

1. Light
2. Medium
3. Dark

Layer 2 - Hair Colour:

1. Blonde
2. Brown
3. Black

Each human in the hangar will have three colour combinations you can choose from (with a male and female variant of each, so six in total), but the combinations will be specific to each human. E.g. one has these:

1. Light Skin / Blonde Hair
2. Medium Skin / Brown Hair
3. Dark Skin / Black Hair

But for another has these :

1. Light Skin / Black Hair
2. Medium Skin / Blonde Hair
3. Dark Skin / Brown Hair

The order of the colour sets in each layer appears to be the same as that which you put in the blueprints file, but the combinations are offset differently for each person. I hope that makes sense.

Anyway, this is a bit of a pain if you want to have certain colour sets go with other ones (e.g. if you wanted to have certain skin colours go with certain hair colours, or have different layers that don't overlap with each other). Since the combinations are random, they're all going to get mixed up regardless of how you organize them.

[Sleeper Service]

Yeah I observed that as well. I think the game actually offers all possible combinations of layers, but the hanger interface might not be able to showcase them all? Just the adjacent 5 variant combinations or something like that? Cause even more possible combinations get left in the hangar showcase when you add more colors to each layer.

[Russian Rockman]

Yeah I observed that as well. I think the game actually offers all possible combinations of layers, but the hanger interface might not be able to showcase them all? Just the adjacent 5 variant combinations or something like that? Cause even more possible combinations get left in the hangar showcase when you add more colors to each layer.

That's a shame. I noticed also when cycling through your CE slug variants that I had a series of 5 slugs with the exact same color scheme. Perhaps this was a bug in AE's randomization? Or maybe the hangar is only meant to show a few variants. I also think I can across a slug ship with 6 of the same colored slugs once. Maybe the enemy skins are handled differently?

Since you can make transparent layers does that mean it is technically possible to have a ton of different alien species now? If someone wanted to take the time to do that.


*Hey Sleeper, since you can remove types of crew now does that mean you can actually make AI Avatars immine to disease now?

**It would be nice if we could identify specific ships by giving them unique systems, but the loss of a system slot is not worth it. I'd rather sacrifice one augment slot than a system slot for sure. Too bad, I thought they would add a way to identify ships in the AE, but they have done a lot of other pleasant things that I didn't think about.

[Russian Rockman]

i have done some tests and i think the maximum power you can have without a crash is about 50 - 60 i would need to do more tests for the exact numbers *ion storms not included just starting game*

Thanks for doing that much legwork. I plan on taking it when I edit the Potential. 80 (or whatever I set it to) was overkill anyway. 50 should be fine

Just a quick quirk i noticed, Engis don't have any layers for some reason.

I think it's because they're robotic. They're supposed to all look alike.

I have my own testrel which I gave about 35 power I think and it crashed the game when I went into a nebula which I assume was an ion storm so you may have to bring the Potential's power down to 25-30. I have however tested increasing the max power of the Backup Battery system and it seems limitless. You could give the potential the Augment that reduces the Battery's cool down time and increase the Battery's max power to 8. Which is the equivalent of 16 power. That should be fine.

Another possibility that may be interesting is to give the potential access to every system from the beginning for a total of over 8 systems. Of course that would probably mess up the UI beyond fixing... Perhaps less systems then! Like it doesn't even have to start with a shield system. It could be really customizeable that way.

[Sleeper Service]

That's a shame. I noticed also when cycling through your CE slug variants that I had a series of 5 slugs with the exact same color scheme. Perhaps this was a bug in AE's randomization? Or maybe the hangar is only meant to show a few variants. I also think I can across a slug ship with 6 of the same colored slugs once. Maybe the enemy skins are handled differently?

Since you can make transparent layers does that mean it is technically possible to have a ton of different alien species now? If someone wanted to take the time to do that.

The system has it's limits. Mainly that you can not control which layer variants are mixed with which, so you can not really make various aliens to the full degrees. Also no few people fully modded a completely new crew sheet anyway.

*Hey Sleeper, since you can remove types of crew now does that mean you can actually make AI Avatars immine to disease now?

I don't really see how. The problem is that you can not check if your ship has nothing but AIs aboard to call the different event. You also still can't tell the event to kill anyone but the AE.

[Vhati]

Stock FTL doesn't include Type-C layouts for Lanius and Crystal.

Is that hardcoded, or can mods add "PLAYER_SHIP_ANAEROBIC_3" and "PLAYER_SHIP_CRYSTAL_3" to show up in the hangar?

[Russian Rockman]

The system has it's limits. Mainly that you can not control which layer variants are mixed with which, so you can not really make various aliens to the full degrees. Also no few people fully modded a completely new crew sheet anyway.

I don't really see how. The problem is that you can not check if your ship has nothing but AIs aboard to call the different event. You also still can't tell the event to kill anyone but the AE.

I thought as much, but it was worth getting a second opinion...

Stock FTL doesn't include Type-C layouts for Lanius and Crystal.

Is that hardcoded, or can mods add "PLAYER_SHIP_ANAEROBIC_3" and "PLAYER_SHIP_CRYSTAL_3" to show up in the hangar?

I would imagine not, but it is probably worth testing. I was pleasantly surprised when I found out you could add artillery to the final boss in pre-AE FTL.


Also, here is one more interesting thought about artillery. Since it is possible to make new artillery weapons now it may actually be possible to let all ships buy an artillery system if they want to. The non Fed cruiser ones could be weaker versions of some other weapon. it could be interesting to mix things up.