Laser Tower / Complex Construction suggestion

[Cursed Ghost]

hi all

Since I been having issues with trying to defend my assets with fighters due to the non-existence fleet control ability in X2 I've been playing about with the idea of using laser towers as a way to safe guard my assets when I'm not around.

However as I have just discovered it's basically impossible to accurately deploy laser towers, for some reason the game just wont cooperate, every time I try to drop a laser tower for some reason it ends up being Kms away from where I want it deployed, which frankly is extremely irritating and I wish the system would pack it in and deploy them where I drop them and not where it feels like putting them.

Anyway the though occurs that it would in fact be more sensible to add turret to stations rather then having objects that you can crash into cluttering the space around your stations. The way I see this working is kinda similar to the way the complex construction kit do, the player goes to a shipyard buys a turret construction kit and then fly it back to the station, the turret kit is then deployed and the player gets a hologram, just like when placing a station allowing them to decide where on the exterior of there station they would like to build the laser tower turret, the player then confirms there choice and the turret is constructed at that location, the player then opens the command console for the station and select equip laser tower option, then you select the ship that is carrying the laser tower and confirm the choice, the laser tower then vanishes from the ships cargo hold and is mounted in the turret.

Each turret mount would be able to house only 1 laser tower, and as each laser tower is mounted on the outside of the station it would not be protected by the stations shield, however each turret mount would come with it's own shield generator providing additional protection to the laser tower that is mounted inside it, however each turret would still remain individually targetable and destroyable just like a free floating laser tower, the only different is that a turreted laser tower would be more difficult to destroy due being more heavily shielded.

Now I don't know if such a thing is programmeably possible, however I think it would make laser towers more useful and easier to work with especially when trying to use them protect large complexes.

While I'm on the subject of complexes as we all know the complex construction kits while a good idea in theory didn't really work out so well in practice, for various reasons like poor implementation and bugs, and without additional scripts it's impossible to create tidy efficient and orderly complexes, even with additional scripts it's still difficult, this is the reason I hate complexes and steadfastly refuse to use them, which is a real shame because complex construction is a good idea, it's just so badly implemented that it's unusable by any average player like me.

To that end I proposed that the complex construction kits be scraped, and that you allow players to equip a transporter device to stations.

Basically the way I see this working is that the player goes and buys a transporter device and then installs it on each station that is to be connected to the complex, and as long as each station is placed within 5km of another station goods will be transferred automatically back and forth in the same way as with complex construction kits, the command and control console on the station for controlling this would remain the same as when using complex construction kits, the only different is that now there would be no need to have a load of messy and badly implemented pipe work connecting factories.

In addition, each station that is equipped with a transporter device would act like a relay station, so I could make crystals on a station at one end the sector and have them relayed to a power plant at the opposite end of the sector, so long as there is an unbroken chain of stations placed within 5km of each other between the crystal fab and the power station, and so long as each station in the chain is equipped with a transporter device, doing this makes it possible to create infinitely expandable complexs minus all the messy, unuser friendly, fiddly and badly implemented complex construction kits.

if you didn't want to go down the road of equipping stations with transporter devices then an alternative method could be to crate transporter relay stations instead.

basically you go to the ship yard by a transporter relay station kit you deploy it and then you place all the station that are to be connected to the complex within 5km of the relay station once done all the set up is done in the usual way vie the standard interface

why ego didn't just go this root in the first place I don't know because its much cleaner and simpler and ultimately less work for them as it just utilizes pre existing code all they would have needed to add was the extra commands to the stations control panel but they had to add then anyway for the station complex kits

anyway what ya think ?

[JackKiller2266]

i think this post that you did would work better in the S&M forums

[Snafu_X3]

AFAICS most of your core points are addressed in the upcoming rewrite of the game

[Coreblimey]

I don't know about X2 but in the X3 series all npc complexes are single stations.

[BlueSwede]

If I remember correctly, there where no construction kits in X2, so a "complex" in x2 needed a ship that traveled between stations in the "complex". I remember I used to use some scripts to help with that, it made the task a lot easier than setting up a "complex" without using any additional scripts ...

[devilsad]

There is already a tubeless complex mod which (not surprisingly) removes the physical tubes from the complex, mostly to make it look nice and speed up the game in that sector. You still need to rotate and arrange all the stations yourself by hand though, which is a major pain to do properly. Personally I would have preferred complexes to be built in the same way that they'll be done in the upcoming game - basically you would build your station already attached to a previous one, and that would determine the position and orientation for you.

Also I believe the laser tower 'jumping' problem is due to you trying to deploy them very close to the station, and the game 'helpfully' moves them further away so your laser tower doesn't smack into the structure and explode. If you deploy them further away then they should stay where you put them.

[Cursed Ghost]

I think this post that you did would work better in the S&M forums

Don't know about X2 but in the X3 series all npc complexes are single stations.

If I remember correctly, there where no construction kits in X2, so a "complex" in x2 needed a ship that traveled between stations in the "complex". I remember I used to use some scripts to help with that, it made the task a lot easier than setting up a "complex" without using any additional scripts ...

not really a suggestion for a mod or script I was more thinking for enhancements to be added to AP and rebirth and then possibly back ported to X3TC and X3R because these are deficiencies in the game that need fixing as there rendering parts of the game unworkable.

Laser towers are useless in pretty much all the x games because there to slow and don't have enough protection to make them a threat to anything even in large quantities if they ever manage to get a lock on you then yeah they will cook your ship pretty quick the issue is they will never get a lock on you rendering then harmless

maybe if they had about twice the range they do now then the slowness and weak shielding would be less of an issue because the towers would have more time to lock onto and unload on a target before it gets into range to fire back which would give them higher survivability and might actually make them dangerous but as its stands a laser tower isn't even a match for a single khaak m3 in x2

maybe if it was able to be equipped with 3x125mw shields then that might be enough to even up the odds a bit and actually make them semi useful although you would still have to deploy at least a dozen or more towers at a time to ensure they don't get completely wiped out when your not in the system due to the way oos combat is handled

don't know how laser towers are in later games I'd have to test them but some how I don't see them being any better

as for complexes even in TC complex construction is a swine because the implementation hasn't been fixed, even if some of the bugs have it’s still the same poorly implemented badly clunky and broken system as when it was first introduced my idea would immediately solve that just equip stations with transporters devices and drop with in 5km of each other no more lining up or awkward fiddling about no more Spaghetti junction pipe work just drop open the command console configure things there supply some resources to get the whole thing running and your good to go much simpler and cleaner no need for modding or scripts just to try and fix a system that was basically broken from the out set a system that ego should have fixed them selves

AFAICS most of your core points are addressed in the upcoming rewrite of the game

I hope so because I'd like to use these things but right now there’s no point because there useless

There is already a tubeless complex mod which (not surprisingly) removes the physical tubes from the complex, mostly to make it look nice and speed up the game in that sector. You still need to rotate and arrange all the stations yourself by hand though, which is a major pain to do properly. Personally I would have preferred complexes to be built in the same way that they'll be done in the upcoming game - basically you would build your station already attached to a previous one, and that would determine the position and orientation for you.

well if that system works any better then the one they have now then grate I'll reserve judgement on that till I can try it out for my self but that don't really help in the mean time so in the mean time ego should just patch the game to remove the current system and allow complexes to be done vie the transporter device either that or just add a signed script to the bonus pack to allow for complexes to be done view the transporter

its the fastest easiest way to deal with this problem and its the one method that will require the least amount of work by ego to fix because all there doing to just using pre existing code

I know there are mods and such out there but as a general rule I don't like running third party mods/scripts because they have the tenancy to fiddle with other parts of the game when all I'm looking for is a simple fix to a specific issue then there is the whole cross compatibility issue and mod/scripts conflicting with each other and all the rest of it and its just a pain and like I said before I shouldn't have to use a third party mod or script to fix something that ego should have fixed them selves

to be fair the BHP smart freighter was a brilliant addition to the bonus pack in X2 and addressed that particular issue perfectly with out interfering with other parts of the game and is one of very few scripts that I actually use I wonder why ego never made the BHP smart freighter the de-facto standard for all trade ships ?? it's unfortunate that it was never ported to X3R and X3TC because it's invaluable when running stations with ships.

Also I believe the laser tower 'jumping' problem is due to you trying to deploy them very close to the station, and the game 'helpfully' moves them further away so your laser tower doesn't smack into the structure and explode. If you deploy them further away then they should stay where you put them.

I did wonder what’s the closest distance you can drop a tower to a station with out it jumping ? because with the towers only having a 4km range really I need to drop them right on top of the station to ensure they can adequately cover the entire station because even a relativity small station like a mine is bigger than 4km across

personally id like to just be able to deploy my defensive batteries from within the station just as if I was equipping a gun to a ship because that's much simpler and less messing about but can't see that happening not for an old game like x2

[Snafu_X3]

If yio're not happy with X: series 'laser' (ie 'gun') workings take a loook at Vegastrike: http://sourceforge.net/projects/vegastr ... ike/0.5.1/

Once you've played it & survived you may appreciate why X: series 'lasers' are toned down a bit..