[mods] kuertee's (RPG, QOL, UI): 18 Feb 2024: Kuda: many bug-fixes; UIX: New callbacks for new mods; ATD: Ironman mode

[Mycu]

New mod
Crime has consequences
https://www.nexusmods.com/x4foundations/mods/566

Looks quite complex. Very well!
Just in time for my today's playthrough

Hoping to experience sth similar to your testing story

Thanks for sharing and enriching X4.

[Mycu]

One question and a small little bug:
https://i.imgur.com/95BhPYq.png

Do we need fines with pirate factions?
And in message log, there is null on USO-753. It's a factory.

[kuertee]

One question and a small little bug:
https://i.imgur.com/95BhPYq.png

Do we need fines with pirate factions?
And in message log, there is null on USO-753. It's a factory.

oh! hahaha!, I'll need to find a way to exclude pirate factions.
Also, weird that it added attacks by station. I'll re-check my filters.

It's good, that you keep finding these bugs. Thanks, mycu!

[kuertee]

Hmmm ... there's no clear way to determine pirate factions. E.g. checking if their headquarters is a pirate base (i.e. in code: faction.buccaneers.headquarters.ispiratebase) isn't good enough because, in my game, Duke's Buccaneers doesn't have a headquarters. And I don't know enough of the lore to manually identify pirate factions.

Reading the Wiki (https://www.egosoft.com:8444/confluence ... Buccaneers), it looks like Duke's Buccaneers can be an ally. And if I remove them from factions that charge crimes, the player will be able to continually commit crimes against them with no penalty when they eventually become allies.

This goes the same with any faction the player can ally with. Hence, I'm unsure of whether I should actually remove pirate factions from the list.

It may be best to simply disable enemies from charging you with crimes in the Extensions Options. With this disabled, enemy factions will never charge the player with crimes and will never impound the player's ships. Also, when those factions do become neutral, friendly, or allied, the player will again have consequences to crimes against them.

What do you think?

[Mycu]

It may be best to simply disable enemies from charging you with crimes in the Extensions Options. With this disabled, enemy factions will never charge the player with crimes and will never impound the player's ships. Also, when those factions do become neutral, friendly, or allied, the player will again have consequences to crimes against them.

Sounds fair and should be enough.
I don't see much reason for my enemy to allow me to buyout my ships, because I could use them against him. So yeah, it would also be logical in this way.

Or maybe those "enemies" should be just factions that player has strongly bad relations? Ex. -10 and lower?
So impounded ships would be confiscated when player relations with that faction go below that level.

[kuertee]

...I don't see much reason for my enemy to allow me to buyout my ships, because I could use them against him. So yeah, it would also be logical in this way. Or maybe those "enemies" should be just factions that player has strongly bad relations? Ex. -10 and lower? So impounded ships would be confiscated when player relations with that faction go below that level.

Yeah, agreed. They should seize then use those ships as soon as your relations with them turn red - like how sea-faring nations did in the early 1800s. I'll add it in a future version. Thanks, again, mycu!





For now, I've released minor bug-fixes to the bugs you found:

Crime has consequences
https://www.nexusmods.com/x4foundations/mods/566
v1.0.1, 7 Nov 2020:
-Bug fix: Forfeiture of ship default to 0 hours - which is no forfeiture. This version changes your setting and sets the default to 14 hours. Re-set this to your liking.
-Bug-fix: Your stations were getting charged with attack and kill crimes.
-Bug-fix: Illegal cargo crimes on players were converting to attack crimes.

[kmunoz]

I don't see much reason for my enemy to allow me to buyout my ships, because I could use them against him. So yeah, it would also be logical in this way.

This would make warfare more like 18th century warfare, where captured enemies were paroled, exchanged and ransomed constantly. I don't see anything intrinsically wrong with it, as long as the "lore" of the mechanism is consistent.

[kuertee]

This would make warfare more like 18th century warfare, where captured enemies were paroled, exchanged and ransomed constantly. I don't see anything intrinsically wrong with it, as long as the "lore" of the mechanism is consistent.

I really should start adopting the Aubrey-Maturin series into a narrative mod for a game (Endless Space 2, initially, but X4 could be better suited.) like I always planned.

[Mycu]

First of all - really like the new Crime has consequences mod.
It works seamlessly with X4's gameplay and you've managed to add another layer to the game again.
I'm still discovering it's mechanics in details but I'm delighted with what I experience and how it plays in total.

Found two few small issues:

• NPC Reactions/Taxi service: travel speeds are incorrect. 2700 km/s is being showed as 2.7km/s - https://i.imgur.com/5kAPa4O.png
• Crime has consequences: items in Fines and Forfeiture tab are constantly resorted (items within group and groups/factions also): https://streamable.com/n0zy2q

There is also a "problem" when releasing ship from an enemy faction.
Had a situation when one of my destroyers got impounded because of the border fight with enemy faction (ZYA).
So I took a taxi (it is a wonderful feeling having to fly somewhere with an NPC:) and flew to Family Zhin to pay the fine. After paying my destroyer was released.
But as soon as it has left the ZYA station (having -21 relations with them) - that station started to attack my ship as it changed ownership to me.
My ship responded with fire and was given a fine and impounded again, which by the way prevented it from being destroyed.

So the problem is that enemy station attacks player's property on releasing and released ship is not able to fly from that station.
Excluding enemy factions from impounding (as you mentioned before) would be the way to deal with it but... this way I won't get a chance to use Taxi service...
Because currently I don't see another reason (besides sightseeing of the galaxy) to use Taxi service.

So, I thought that maybe it could be possible to give a player options to decide which faction should be excluded from impounding (I would exclude SCA but leave ZYA then).
And on releasing a ship give it an order to fly to nearest player's sector and just change ownership on this player's sector gate/border?
This should increase the chances of the ship leaving enemy space.

Or maybe for enemy factions crimes from station/ship attacks/kills should just be disabled.
The only left would be boardings/bomb attacks/cargo/plot claims.

And one question regarding bombing. Currently fine is granted on EMP triggering. Do you think that it might be a good idea to give player some chance to avoid that fine with a timer?
To give player ex. 2 minutes from triggering EMP to gather all 4 signal sources and return to ship?
If player manages to make it on time, he won't be granted fine for this attack. And your Teleport from transporter room mod would greatly help to avoid abuses

Last one thing. What does "accumulate crimes on enemy factions" option do?

[kuertee]

...[*]NPC Reactions/Taxi service: travel speeds are incorrect. 2700 km/s is being showed as 2.7km/s - https://i.imgur.com/5kAPa4O.png ...

That's what I get for only checking that the notification fits on that monitor and not actually reading what the notification says.

... And on releasing a ship give it an order to fly to nearest player's sector and just change ownership on this player's sector gate/border? ...

I like this one, actually. The ship is flown out of enemy space before it's released.

... Last one thing. What does "accumulate crimes on enemy factions" option do?

With this off, enemy factions will not charge you with crimes, and so will not impound your ships.

And one question regarding bombing. Currently fine is granted on EMP triggering. Do you think that it might be a good idea to give player some chance to avoid that fine with a timer?
To give player ex. 2 minutes from triggering EMP to gather all 4 signal sources and return to ship?
If player manages to make it on time, he won't be granted fine for this attack. And your Teleport from transporter room mod would greatly help to avoid abuses

I thought of several ways of allowing the player to avoid crime.
For spacesuit crimes, I thought that the player could avoid the charges getting transferred to a ship (and therefore, removed) if the player enters the ship outside of the station's radar range. But decided against it. It's a very long spacewalk to get outside of the station's radar range.

But my preference is for Egosoft to enable the currently available, but unused by the player cover system. It looks like NPC smugglers use it. If Egosoft doesn't implement it, I was thought of allowing the player to buy a one-time-use fake transponders from the Black Marketeer.

[Mycu]

Or maybe for enemy factions crimes from station/ship attacks/kills should just be disabled.

With this off, enemy factions will not charge you with crimes, and so will not impound your ships.

Apparently, I was missing that information

[Mycu]

I had some performance problem after latest updates.
It took me a while to narrow it down because few days ago I was also updating my OS and Nvidia drivers so firstly suspected other factors.

It turned out that Alternatives to Death mod is a culprit and lowers my frame rate.
Made a series of tests and got:

• 122-126 FPS when AoD is disabled
• 94-98 FPS when AoD is enabled

Strange thing is that downgrading AtD mod to v1.0 didn't helped (and I haven't noticed performance problems prior to 1.2).
As soon as I enable this mod - my FPS drops.

[kuertee]

I had some performance problem after latest updates.
It took me a while to narrow it down because few days ago I was also updating my OS and Nvidia drivers so firstly suspected other factors.

It turned out that Alternatives to Death mod is a culprit and lowers my frame rate.
Made a series of tests and got:

• 122-126 FPS when AoD is disabled
• 94-98 FPS when AoD is enabled

Strange thing is that downgrading AtD mod to v1.0 didn't helped (and I haven't noticed performance problems prior to 1.2).
As soon as I enable this mod - my FPS drops.

Oh! Thanks for the report. I'll look into it.
It's weird that it would be Alternatives to death (ATD). I expected Crime has consequences (CHC) to be more of a hog, because CHC has events that trigger for all your ships - even those below the "visible" attention level. ATD only runs on the ship you're in (i.e. above the "visible" attention level).

I'll look into ATD's code. Thanks, mycu!

[Mycu]

It's weird that it would be Alternatives to death (ATD). I expected Crime has consequences (CHC) to be more of a hog, because CHC has events that trigger for all your ships - even those below the "visible" attention level. ATD only runs on the ship you're in (i.e. above the "visible" attention level).

I was surprised too - similar to yours, my first bets were Crime has consequences and Wear and Tear - because of it's nature to loop through owned ships. But no, only AtD seems to affect my FPS.
Maybe it's something related only to my current save file? Before installing v1.2 I had problems caused by AtD with indestructible ship and instant death on teleportation. Honestly I'm not sure if indestructible ship problem is gone now.
Also:

Strange thing is that downgrading AtD mod to v1.0 didn't helped (and I haven't noticed performance problems prior to 1.2).

So thought that maybe some old data from my save file could make somehow AtD to clog.

[kuertee]

So thought that maybe some old data from my save file could make somehow AtD to clog.

A clean-save will remove old data.

I tested clean-saving a few weeks ago.

In a separate folder, to keep the integrity of the zipped file intact, I unzipped my save-file so that I can view the data kept by my mods.
Then deleted my mods folder, loaded a game, re-saved to a new file.
I unzipped this new file to view its content.
My mods' data were gone.

The results were the same when simply deactivating the mods.

I'll have a look at ATD later tonight after work.

[kuertee]

New mod
Waypoint fields for deployments
https://www.nexusmods.com/x4foundations/mods/585
Creates waypoints that you and your wingmen can follow to deploy equipment and weapons.

Mission activation
When a mission to deploy equipment (satellites, resource probes, navigation beacons) or weapons (laser towers, mine) is activated from the base game's gm_achievecoverage or gm_deployinplace missions, a new (secondary) mission is created.

This secondary mission will guide you and your wingmen who have the necessary equipment/weapons to each point in the field. Your wingmen will deploy the necessary equipment/weapon at each point. The density of the waypoints and the size of the field are automatically set according to the equipment's (or the weapon's) functional range and according to the requirements of the mission.

When the primary mission is ccompleted, because the required coverage is filled, for example, this secondary mission will also end. Your wingmen will retrieve any deployments that were not taken over by the primary mission.

You are free to deactivate this secondary mission. But it will re-activate when the primary mission is activated.

Manual creation
You can create waypoint fields manually:
1. Create a Guidance Mission on the map (with the right-mouse click) on either an object, for example, a station or in empty space.
2. Go to the Guidance Mission menu, and click on Create Waypoint Field.
3. Configure the field in the Waypoint Field mission menu. Choose the equipment/weapon to deploy, and the shape of the field (cube or sphere).
4. A preview of the field can be created.
5. You can also order your wingmen to stop or continue with their deployments.

[kuertee]

Waypoint fields for deployments
https://www.nexusmods.com/x4foundations/mods/585

Videos:
Achieve coverage mission: https://youtu.be/9xmunLKRgOM
Find resources mission: https://youtu.be/1dzAFZIJgE0

Update:
v1.1.0, 22 Nov 2020:
-New feature: Create a Waypoint Field directly with a right-mouse click on the map.
-New feature: The Waypoint Field panel now lists its attached mission. "Show original mission" and "Show Waypoint Field mission" toggles between the two mission panels.
-New feature: The Waypoint Field mission (e.g. mission target, progress, etc.) is now attached to your last controlled ship. Previously, it would only work if you were in direct control of the ship. In this version, you're allowed to exit the ship to do other things.
-Tweak: Wingmen defaults to deploying Fried-Foe mines when performing mining missions. Manually order them to deploy other mines. Their AI is not very good at avoiding mines they deploy.
-Tweak: Better distribution of retrieved deployments. Previously, the first wingman would retrieve as much as they can, while the others would retrieve what remaining few.
-Tweak: Missions created from the base game's rml_achievecoverage.xml, rml_deployinplace.xml and rml_find_resources.xml files now create Waypoint Field missions. These underlying files are the base missions for the gm_* files previously used.
-Tweak: Increased horizontal interval of resource probe waypoints.
-Bug-fix: Completion of a waypoint previously failed for deployments that do not set their ownership immediately after deployment - causing wingmen to deploy multiple times on the one waypoint. E.g. laser towers.
-Bug-fix: For manually created Waypoint Fields that are attached to missions, wingmen deployment would stop after the first if the sector they are deploying is different from the sector of the mission.
-Bug-fix: Re-assignment of waypoint ignored by the player.
-Bug-fix: Previously fails when the target coverage from the missions was too small for the waypoint interval set in my mod. In this version, the area determines the intervals.

[kmunoz]

Having an odd issue with Extensions Options, specifically Reset Mouse but it seems to be affecting everything, not sure how to track down the cause. It seems like the Extensions Options aren't holding settings, and sometimes not letting me change settings at all. So if I switch the reset mouse option from center to top-left, it doesn't actually "take." And then eventually it does, usually after I quit and restart.

The only Extension Options mods I'm using are yours (teleport, NPC reactions, reset mouse, signal leak hunter), Better Target Monitor and Named Pipes API.

I can't seem to change any of the settings on the top level menu, and the settings I change inside the kuertee options don't stay set after I exit the menu.

[kmunoz]

Having an odd issue with Extensions Options, specifically Reset Mouse but it seems to be affecting everything, not sure how to track down the cause. It seems like the Extensions Options aren't holding settings, and sometimes not letting me change settings at all. So if I switch the reset mouse option from center to top-left, it doesn't actually "take." And then eventually it does, usually after I quit and restart.

The Extension Options mods I'm using are yours (teleport, NPC reactions, reset mouse, signal leak hunter), Better Target Monitor and Named Pipes API.

I can't seem to change any of the settings on the top level menu, and the settings I change inside the kuertee options don't stay set after I exit the menu.

[Mycu]

Quick info after short testing of Waypoint fields for deployments.
Game hangs when I deploy advanced satelite through quick action menu. Tried two times, same result.
It doesn't hang when placing satelite with mission inactive.

Also noticed no difference in waypoint placement when swithing between std/adv satelites.