[MOD] Variety and Rebalance Overhaul (VRO) 4.x

[Shuulo]

Just chiming in to say "Darn Great Mod!" Hopefully it will continue to be worked on as Split DLC goes live etc. This is my current "Goto" mod.

Thanks for kind words!
It will 100% require an extensive update as 3.0 + split dlc will bring a lot of assets changes, but I'll try to update it as fast as I can.

[Chrizzeay]

I feel like CWIS is not as effective as it should be against missiles. It is especially noticeable if the ship is moving. Is it still limited by vanilla turret calculations being bad or can it be buffed in some way? I have noticed that it tends to shoot slightly behind the missiles as they approach closer and at long range they seem ineffective as well even though it is firing at the missiles almost head on, could be due to reduced accuracy at long range. I feel like it should not struggle as much as it is currently against only one missile but rather get overwhelmed when there are many. They also get worse the closer you are to the launch, probably due to target acquisition time.

I have done some playing around in the mod files with varying results, but it is hard to know what balance you have set up around the weapons and then keep it. The better they are against missiles the better they are against small craft as well. I did some limited testing with the laser turrets as well, although it is hard to tell I fell like they could be a little bit better as well. Oh and are swarm missiles impossible to defend against? Can that be modded to work?

Other than that I really like the mod thus far, and combat feels much better than it did before. I had some fun playing around in the files as well, reduced the velocity of the CWIS bullets to a realistic amount and increased the lifetime and fire rate. Looks really really cool but is probably horrible for performance and was horribly inefficient att killing anything.

[Shuulo]

snip

Yep, turrets still have this bug with targeting, so can't do anything about it unfortunately. It's not so evident as in vanilla due to overall faster projectiles.
Ciws was meant as anti-fighter weapon for now, as there is no possibility to create anti-missile weapon with current turret bug. I suggest just ignore missile defense command.
As for swarm missiles, yep, it's impossible to defend against them. If you think they can be re-balanced in some way let me know

[Angsaar]

Could a subset of beams with "instant" focusing but low power compensate enough? Similar to an MWO LAMS

[Corporeal]

Trying to test out weapons more methodically raised a bigger problem: some of the weapon effects are freezing my game. The "plasma incinerator" (M Plasma II) reliably reproduced the problem whenever it hit anything within hit-effect rendering distance. Tagging a P at the limit of its range was okay, but as soon as I got close enough to see the projectile hit, it'd freeze and thrash the cpu. Stuck in an infinite loop maybe?

Running Steam version on Linux with a decent Nvidia card, if there's any kind of diagnostic I can spit out to help track the problem.

[ETA] Playing with graphics settings seems to have fixed the problem. FXAA -> MSAA

For me changing the ricochet chance to 0.01 solved this. My money's on a difference in how DBZ errors are handled. Seems having maxhits over 1 causes an automatic ricochet evaluation. If those are tied into graphics distance, 3d sound, etc it would also explain why graphics fixed it. Betting on DBZ though.

bullet_gen_m_plasma_01_mk2_macro.xml
<bullet speed="2500" lifetime="2" amount="3" barrelamount="1" icon="weapon_plasma_mk2" timediff="0.004" angle="0.9" maxhits="3" ricochet="0.01" scale="0" attach="0" selfdestruct="1" />

[Rastuasi]

I get the same freeze since early on, caused me to stop using this mod.

[Shuulo]

Trying to test out weapons more methodically raised a bigger problem: some of the weapon effects are freezing my game. The "plasma incinerator" (M Plasma II) reliably reproduced the problem whenever it hit anything within hit-effect rendering distance. Tagging a P at the limit of its range was okay, but as soon as I got close enough to see the projectile hit, it'd freeze and thrash the cpu. Stuck in an infinite loop maybe?

Running Steam version on Linux with a decent Nvidia card, if there's any kind of diagnostic I can spit out to help track the problem.

[ETA] Playing with graphics settings seems to have fixed the problem. FXAA -> MSAA

For me changing the ricochet chance to 0.01 solved this. My money's on a difference in how DBZ errors are handled. Seems having maxhits over 1 causes an automatic ricochet evaluation. If those are tied into graphics distance, 3d sound, etc it would also explain why graphics fixed it. Betting on DBZ though.

bullet_gen_m_plasma_01_mk2_macro.xml
<bullet speed="2500" lifetime="2" amount="3" barrelamount="1" icon="weapon_plasma_mk2" timediff="0.004" angle="0.9" maxhits="3" ricochet="0.01" scale="0" attach="0" selfdestruct="1" />

Hmm, thanks for the feedback, I'll look into it

[Shuulo]

I get the same freeze since early on, caused me to stop using this mod.

This is now resolved, will be in next version.

[VeeQ]

Bording is a bit harder with this, yes, but L ships are more powerful in VRO, so you may need to work harder, use more ships for boarding or make them deplete all the ammunition.

How can I capture ship, if for that need destroy turrets when board start?

[Shuulo]

Bording is a bit harder with this, yes, but L ships are more powerful in VRO, so you may need to work harder, use more ships for boarding or make them deplete all the ammunition.

How can I capture ship, if for that need destroy turrets when board start?

You don't need to destroy turrets for boarding to start.
Just use few M ships to do that, not just one as in vanilla.
It's more risky, yes, but it's too easy in vanilla imo

[Shuulo]

Version 1.95

New:
- Argon and Teladi bombers now get new weapon slot.
- Plasma Bomb weapon for bombers that deals pure hull damage through shields

Changes:
- updates to Teladi buzzard(+1 shield), Stork (+1 shield) and Condor (moved turret) (thanks to RoverTX!!) Please upgrade your ships in shipyard/warf
- missile sounds updated

Balance:
- rebalance of L and XL combat and resupply ships hull and speed values
- rebalance of L and XL thrusters to make them more variable
- rebalance to M shields - they are a bit more robust
- small rebalance to S fighters
- rebalance of few small weapons

[Rastuasi]

Downloading now, will try fresh game and see if I get any crashes with your fix, thanks for all your effort on this mod!

[Shuulo]

Downloading now, will try fresh game and see if I get any crashes with your fix, thanks for all your effort on this mod!

So how did it went?

[Rastuasi]

Downloading now, will try fresh game and see if I get any crashes with your fix, thanks for all your effort on this mod!

So how did it went?

I didn't get much time, loaded the new game, got the fighter bolt weapons and shot at a xenon n. The fight didn't last long, but I didn't get a freeze. It wasn't consistent before either, I think it depended on how close I was, so I'll have to test more tonight, where I can find more targets.

[Kyle Baxter]

Hi,

I've been using this Mod alongside Faction War/Economy Enhancer for some days now, started my Universe fresh with 2.6 and it seems like my Kha'ak faction is broken. There is a system with a Kha'ak station in it that spawns raiding fleets, but they don't move and i can't attack them. It looks like only the raiding fleet with small S ships called Raiding Party Forage are affected, M and above looks ok. When i try to shoot it with my main weapon the volleys go through. It seems like my weapon is unable to track the ship. Also my turrets or my other ships won't attack them. So, in the main thread it is mentioned that VRO overwrites changes, because is is lower in the mod load order. So my thought is that maybe VRO is causing this. I tried disabling all extensions for testing purpose, but the ships are still broken. I've got now a system full with those small ships that i can't attack. What could cause this? Maybe it is a conflict with the War Module of Faction Enhancer? Did something change in 2.6 with the Kha'ak?

[Shuulo]

Hi,

I've been using this Mod alongside Faction War/Economy Enhancer for some days now, started my Universe fresh with 2.6 and it seems like my Kha'ak faction is broken. There is a system with a Kha'ak station in it that spawns raiding fleets, but they don't move and i can't attack them. It looks like only the raiding fleet with small S ships called Raiding Party Forage are affected, M and above looks ok. When i try to shoot it with my main weapon the volleys go through. It seems like my weapon is unable to track the ship. Also my turrets or my other ships won't attack them. So, in the main thread it is mentioned that VRO overwrites changes, because is is lower in the mod load order. So my thought is that maybe VRO is causing this. I tried disabling all extensions for testing purpose, but the ships are still broken. I've got now a system full with those small ships that i can't attack. What could cause this? Maybe it is a conflict with the War Module of Faction Enhancer? Did something change in 2.6 with the Kha'ak?

Hi, I have the same issue with raiding parties but i dont think VRO causing this. VRO only changes macro file, basically HP and speed and thats it. No components or anything else was changed to cause projectiles go through. I believe this is the vanilla (bad collision) or faction fix issue (if it changes their behavior).

[Kyle Baxter]

My thought was that maybe VRO caused this, because VRO does change weapons, engines, shields and also hull. Maybe this raider type uses a engine part that VRO changes and the Forage ship type spawns because of that without a engine and does not move. But this was just a guess. I could only think about this two Mods that change things on a larger scale. I mean i use TaterTrader and stuff like that. But i highly doubt that a script like that messes with the Kha'ak.

[Shuulo]

My thought was that maybe VRO caused this, because VRO does change weapons, engines, shields and also hull. Maybe this raider type uses a engine part that VRO changes and the Forage ship type spawns because of that without a engine and does not move. But this was just a guess. I could only think about this two Mods that change things on a larger scale. I mean i use TaterTrader and stuff like that. But i highly doubt that a script like that messes with the Kha'ak.

VRO does not change Khaak engines at all. From my perspective Khaak implementation is kind of a placeholder so decided to not change much for them, just basic staff like mass of hull so speed is higher to match the speed of other ships in game for them not to look stupid.
Though ill re-check today evening just in case.

[Shuulo]

My thought was that maybe VRO caused this, because VRO does change weapons, engines, shields and also hull. Maybe this raider type uses a engine part that VRO changes and the Forage ship type spawns because of that without a engine and does not move. But this was just a guess. I could only think about this two Mods that change things on a larger scale. I mean i use TaterTrader and stuff like that. But i highly doubt that a script like that messes with the Kha'ak.

Hi, I actually found the culprit for this, it was really VRO, somehow, connection in Forager ship for cockpit was commented out, maybe in my numerous testings of different things.
Ill release an update asap, it inflicted on Forager ship.

[Kyle Baxter]

Great! I've been really enjoying your mod so far, thanks btw. Will the update fix the Foragers that are already there?