[Idea][Questions] Making raiding Xenon sectors more rewarding.

[RoverTX]

In order to make the raiding of Xenon sectors have more of an effect on the game I redid the Xenon Jobs.

First thing I did was to remove all the existing Xenon jobs, and cull them down to the basic types.

M5
M4/M3
M6/M7
M1
M2
M2+

I then created two versions of each of these. "Stay in sector" and "aggressive leave sector". With the first running "fight.rthr.attackallenemies" and the second group running "patrol.long".

All these jobs were "-1,-1", in other words they had no specific sector, though I set the flags for "owner's sector" and "has shipyard".

I then added a Xenon Shipyard to every Xenon sector in game.

The end result being that there are about the same number of Xenon running around, I put a reasonable cap on jobs per sector so they should be distributed about the same. BUT if a player raids a Xenon sector and kills a the Xenon Shipyard the sector shall be relatively free of hostilities until God Re-spawns the Shipyard.

This gives players a reason to raid Xenon sectors, while at the same time maintaining vanilla balance. While only modifying two files, Jobs.txt, and x3_universe.xml, in addition at the same time reducing complexity of the Jobs file.

I was wondering if anyone had any thoughts or ideas related to the above method, or if anyone else has tried something like this before and what their results were.

[Igor.tverd]

Good idea, can you do it without changing the map file? This will make it current game compatible.

[dillpickle]

Good idea, can you do it without changing the map file? This will make it current game compatible.

It should be possible to do with a separate map file for the Xenon sectors that need shipyards adding, eg for Xenon 534:

Code: Select all

<o t="1" x="17" y="0" r="6" size="27000000" m="0" p="-1" qtrade="100" qfight="100" qbuild="100" qthink="100">
   <o t="6" s="SS_FAC_X_SHIP" x="-2812500" y="0" z="4312500" r="6" a="-10240" b="0" g="0"/>
</o>

Then using the MD:

Code: Select all

<load_map file="map file name"/>

[Brokkoli]

When I read the topic, I was thinking about improved loot for destroyed Xenon ships. Then I was thinking microchips. Now that would be a mod idea!

Sadly, I do not know how to change loot drops. Can someone tell me how to make Xenon ships/stations drop microchips when killed? Now that would be rewarding when doing the hub plot... raid a Xenon sector for microchips

[RoverTX]

Add a secondary signal for Xenon Ships, for the Destroyed Signal. When its triggered have some chance that a crate with some microchips will spawn nearby, the amount depending on the type of ship destroyed.

I didn't go this route because at higher combat ranks Xenon ships are already dropping a lot of weapons and missiles, and all that having them drop microchips would do it just speed the already fast passed early game. Unless your playing X3:TC and just need the microchips for the hub plot... there is that.

[RoverTX]

Was revisiting this today. I changed the Xenon jobs from the above, owner sector and shipyard, to owner station's and shipyard.

The reason I did this was so that I could add a mission director that will create a Xenon shipyard in a random border sector. When this happened a mission would be added to the player's mission list. If the player destroys the shipyard they get a large reward. Otherwise I assume RRF will take care of the Xenon Shipyard in due time.

Does that seem like it will work, or will RRF attack the Xenon spawning ships, but ignore the Xenon Shipyard?