grit-tech

[Baal]

OK, mine's in we are ready to go.

[geoschmo]

Baal withdrew from the game for some reason. Its very early though in the game if someone wants to step in. I don't want to turn it over to the AI.

Geoschmo

[geoschmo]

If anyone is interested, we have a five player Grit tech game going on at PBW. We are up to turn 79 and the second place player just dropped out of the game for personal reasons. Looking for a replacment.

So far there have been some small scale skirmishes, but no huge wars yet. Probably getting close though. It's been quite an interesting game so far IMHO.

Anyone interested in taking over, drop by PBW and look for "Grit Tech".

Geocshmo

[Puke]

Ever since Geo's Grit-Tech game (referenced below) on PBW brought an old forum post of mine (foundation of this thread) to life over a year ago, I have been working on a full blown GritTech Mod. Granted, most of the time has been spent doing nothing, and the mod has been reborn a couple times. I expect an alpha or beta release to be ready for the next patch (GOLD-3), as there is a rather significant mount bug that I would prefer not to have to work around.

I would like to present a rough feature list here, and solicit some assistance and input, as I have some spare time now to work on the project:

the weapons list consists of the following:

conventional cannons
gauss weapons / rail guns
lasers
missiles
torpedos

an evolution of missiles and torpedos will include Honor Harrington style laser warheads. I am considering including short range plasma weapons as an evolution of laser weapons.

I would appreciate input on other weapons ideas, other types of missiles or rockets, or whatever. Please keep consistant with a low-tech setting (aliens 2)

I would also like to include genre specific race sets with the mod. specifically, humans. At some point, I will probably scrounge around fan sites for ship sets, but if anyone could provide links to human looking ship sets, or human race portraits (or flag/insignia images) that can be pasted onto existing shipsets, i would be quite grateful. if anyone would like to provide their own (non-humorous) human shipset, i would be happy to include it in the mod. computer AI for empires wont be able to exist until after the first release, as the tech tree and component list is not finished. this will start as a multiplayer only mod, and any AI will have to be written by others, as i have been avoiding learning how to mod AI since I first purchased the game several years ago. I expect existing AI to be completely useless with this mod.

back to the projected feature list, i am trying to keep the initial feature list slim, and the projected feature list do-able to avoid the unobtainable goals that i had set for the old PCMod. expect the following in the initial release:

-porportions style facilities, and porportions inspired cargo and colonization systems. colony components will be huge. 100KT cargo components will mass 100KT.
-QNP movement, facilitated by engine mounts
-armor mounts that scale armor cost and mass to ship size
-no shields, many armor types
-reaction systems based on 'low' technology. chemical, fission, fusion...
-upgrades in nuclear reactiors influence available engine and weapon technology
-ship sizes broken into three categories, small craft, capital ships, and ships of the line. each Category varies vastly in size from the others.
-more of a tech tree, with different research categories for specific technology types.
-larger focus on remote mining
-special non-combattant technologies, hulls, and components.
-3 cloaking types and sensor types, independant of each other. optical, electronic, and a special mine sensor and cloaking system.

features slated to be added after the first release:
-organics consumption by facilities, use of organics as a kind of currency.
-ruins technologies left over from an older human empire (story line elements, different races are human factions left over from older wars) such as nanotech, artificial inteligence, neural interfaces, and genetic engineering. each will require research.
-optional factional racial technologies (similar to P&N) such as spaceborne (has access to advanced ship construction and hulls), colonial (can colonize), technologist (better research capabilities), industrial (better resource and manufacturing capabilities).

Somewhere down the road, I would like to do a graphics makeover for it. I would like to include some customized weapons icons to help with the mood and setting, and I would like to eventually re-do the se4 window border graphics in green or grey, and replace the font with an old terminal type font to give it that old circa 1980 green-screen terminal feel. this is more of a pie-in-the sky plan, that probably wont happen unless someone else tackles it.

I welcome any feedback, requests, or offers for assistance.

[geoschmo]

You may run into problems with the interface change you mentioned at the end. There are certain elements of the screen that simply can't be changed. The result would likely end up a garish mixture of green and grey with some default SE4 bright blue lines and such. However the text and stuff would be doable. Check out the B5 mod. They pretty much change everything you can change. A lot is different in that.

Geoschmo

[Puke]

really? i was looking through the pictures directory and found all the borders and buttons done in blue. i was thinking at the least i could filter those same 2 or 3 tone blue images into 2 or 3 tone green or grey, and keep the rest the same.

[geoschmo]

Yeah, you would think that from looking at the images, but apparently there is some of the screen elements that are hardcoded and don't pull from the images for some reason. I don't recall all the details. I remember Hadrian mentioning it once.

Geoschmo

[Puke]

oh well. considering that was a pie-in-the-sky item at the bottom of the feature list, im not going to lose any sleep over not having it.

Did Krsqk ever get anything done with the basic tech mod that he was working on a while back?

[Will]

Way back in Classic beta, I tried making a red and a green interface instead of the blue. IIRC, blue text, except for a few buttons, remained blue. Internal borders (single pixel, blue) stayed the same. There were a few other things too, but it was a long time ago, so I don't really remember. The red one clashed a lot, the green one less. I could probably have made a blending of blue and green, but I didn't really take it much farther after discovering the parts that couldn't be changed. They were small, but significant if you wanted any color changes.

It would be nice if a later Version of SE4 and/or SE5 could be completely skinned, like WinAmp or Trillian. Could break it out of the current 800x600 and 1024x768 resolutions it's fixed at now. Also could make for some interesting interface interpretations by some of the more creative members of the modding community.

[dogscoff]

Wow, this is an old thread, kind of like seeing an old friend again.

if anyone would like to provide their own (non-humorous) human shipset

I guess that rules out my human shipsets then Seriously though, an all-humans mod would be cool, with everyone fighting over rock/oxy. Maybe you could mod in one alien AI with its own killer tech-tree (a la devnullmod space monsters).

I'm getting back into the shipset game now, so maybe I'll make a "sensible" human one for you, all gritty and dirty looking