VWBB - Annoying FRED/Freespace Behaviour

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-- Annoying FRED/Freespace Behaviour (http://volitionwatch.papageorgefamily/vwbb/showthread.php?threadid=9130)

Posted by Corentor on 06-18-2003 04:44 AM:

Annoying FRED/Freespace Behaviour

I am wondering if anyone has come across this problem.

I have an event set up to tell a Terran crusier to "ai chase" a shivan crusier when it jumps in.

The problem is the Terran cruiser will stop attacking and resume its Initial orders IF I order ANY fighters to "disable" the target.

Does anyone have a work around for this? I can't have my warships stop doing what they are told simply because the player ordered a wing of fighters to disable the target.

Posted by karajorma on 06-18-2003 02:05 PM:

1) Never use AI-chase with capships. I know it's the easiest way of doing things but it seldom works well. Capship AI makes them circle, bob up and down or other such rubbish when they use the chase orders.
Instead you should script the battle by having both ships following a waypoint path (or heading to a single waypoint far away enough that they won't reach it in the time the mission will last)

2) Orders given to fighters in game have a habit of occasionally propagating up to the capship level. This is a common problem with the ignore order. I've never heard of it happening with capships when a disable order is given before though.
Scripting the battle as above should solve the problem but if it doesn't you may be able to fix it by using a repeating event containing a fire-beam SEXP for each turret that can hit the enemy ship.

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Posted by Corentor on 06-18-2003 02:46 PM:

Ya I noticed that dumb behaviour of AI chase as well for Cap ships. I'll use the waypoint method for coreographing cap ship combat as you suggested. The only thing that bugs me is that sometimes a clever player or a player who knows whats going to happen might screw things up by diabling a cap ship too early so the cap ships are too far apart to fight.

Thats how I came across this in the first place...

Posted by karajorma on 06-18-2003 04:29 PM:

quote:
Originally posted by Corentor
The only thing that bugs me is that sometimes a clever player or a player who knows whats going to happen might screw things up by diabling a cap ship too early so the cap ships are too far apart to fight.

Ah, the problems of good mission design!

One solution to that problem is design the mission so that other wings enemy wings come in only if the enemy capship is disabled. Or you can have the enemy ship jump out if the player attempts to disable it (if you're feeling really evil you can have it cause problems in a later mission depending on if it was destroyed or not!). Or you could keep the player away from the enemy capship at the start of the mission by having other goals he has to achieve/ships he has to protect from attack.
You may also depending on your mission be able to tell the Terran cruiser to stop a certain distance from the enemy cruiser if it is disabled (use the distance SEXP for that).

Stuff like this is a constant worry when designing missions. You always have to worry that the player may decide to do something stupid or unexpected (Another good one is what if the player decides to disable and disarm a capship that you were counting on him to destroy!)

Posted by Corentor on 06-18-2003 06:09 PM:

Thanks for all the help and suggestions.

Posted by karajorma on 06-18-2003 10:27 PM:

No Problem. If you haven't already check the FRED section of my FAQ for lots more hints and tips

Posted by Corentor on 06-20-2003 08:39 PM:

More questions

How do I prevent the player from being able to edit another wing's load out and ship selection?

Posted by Hippo on 06-20-2003 08:44 PM:

seleheships, press Shift-S and click the 'Locked' checkbox in the Misc. or Initial status windows.

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Posted by karajorma on 06-20-2003 09:14 PM:

What Hippo said or simply put them in wings delta or epsilon (which appear at the top of the hud but which can't be edited).

Posted by Corentor on 06-21-2003 12:04 AM:

Cool, thanks for both suggestions.

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