thesamonthemoon

Over the past few days, the number of questions regarding .wepn files has increased significantly, to the point where I have decided to write this post detailing some specifics of the .wepn files properties (well, actually I mostly wrote this because Ragnarokx asked me to), especialy the less well known ones (penetration and accuracy). All examples are taken from a somwhat edited hgn_bomblauncher.wepn. Just a note: much of this info is probably already known to experienced modders. If it turns out that there is nothing at all new in this post, it is at least a gathering of all the availible data into one place.


Function one: StartWeaponConfig

(Note, I added the space between Normal Only", and the 1200 to make this page more readable.)

This first line describes most of the properties of the weapon. Info on this first line is readily availibe in the form of WeaponTuning.xls (from the RDN tools) or from this page of Karos Graveyard.


Function two: AddWeaponResult

Another easy one. The RDN tools give plenty of info on this, as does this page from Karos Graveyard.

Side note: Damage per second, as displayed in the in game GUI: The damage displayed in the game (at the bottom of the screen when the ship in question is selected) is calculated as follows:

damage/fireTime = Damage per second for weapon 1 =DPS 1

Damage per second total = DPS 1 + DPS 2+... DPS K

Where damage per second total is the number displayed in the game, and K is the number of weapons on the ship. This leads to some inaccuracy in the number at the bottom of the screen because the number does not take accuracy into acount (to the best of my knolege), and the number at the bottom of the screen displays the damage per second of all the ships weapons, including the not yet researched ones, and the obsolete ones. Note for weapons that use bursts, the damage per second is calculated differently:

(fireTime) / (burstFireTime) = shots fired

damage X shots fired / burstWaitTime = Damage per second for weapon 1 =DPS 1

[edit]Might actually be:

damage X shots fired / (burstWaitTime + burstFireTime) = Damage per second for weapon 1 =DPS 1

[/edit]

Damage per second total = DPS 1 + DPS 2+... DPS K


Function three: setPenetration

Penetration, as seen above, is given by armour type. There is quite a bit less info availible on weapon penetration. The first number, the 5, is the % chance to go through a defense field. The next number is the default penetration, which is always one (as far as I've seen). The next numbers are the exceptions to the default penetrations. They are given in percents, where 1.00= 100%. The numbers mean one of the following:

1. The percent chance of doing any damge.

2. The percent of the normal damage that is done.

Although I am not certain which of these it is, it makes little differance, because either way, the damage averages out the same after a few shots.


Function three: setAccuracy

Accuracy is another of the lesser known functions. The first number is the default chance for the bullet in question to home in on the target, automaticaly hitting. The rest of the section lists the exceptions, which are given by ship family, or more specificaly attackFamily. The members of attackFamily are listed in FamilyList.lua (data/scripts/FamilyList.lua). When a weapon fires on a ship whith an exception, a random nimber between 0 and 1 is generated. If the number is below the exception number, the bullet hits (so basicaly, the exception number is the percent chance to hit).

Weapons will not even fire at targets against which they have zero accuracy.

Missing: When a bullet fails its accuracy test (when the random number is greater than the accuracy number) the bullet 1. Does not home and 2. The angle at which it is fired is offset by a random number that is less than the weapons firing cone radius (the first number of function four). However, although offset, the weapon does not neccecarily miss. Evem when offset, especialy against larger ships, the weapon can still hit the targets mesh. In normal circumstances, if a weapon fails it's accuracy test, even if the weapon hits the targets mesh, no damage is done... Unless...

The Damage Flag: If the damage flag is turned on, then all shots that hit the targets mesh will do damage, even if the weapon fails it's accuracy test. The damage flag is seen in the above example: ( damage = 1,) after the SmallCapitalShip line.

Beams: When a beam passes the acuracy test, rather than homing, it simply automaticaly hits it's target. If the beam fails it's accuracy test, it is offset by a random angle (but as with bullets, it doesn't nececarily miss the target). The damage flag acts the same with beams as it does with bullets.

Missiles: I don't know too much about what accuracy does to missiles, because none of the missiles in the game have an accuracy other than "1". My guess is that for missiles, having a non one accuracy would do two things: 1. create a random offset on launch (when the missiles fails it's accuracy test) (Note that this is only important for short range missiles with low tracking) and 2. If the damage flag was off, then the missiles would only do damage a certain percent of the time (that percent being equal to the accuracy percentage). Using this it might be possilble to create duds.

Side note: What else determines accuracy -- There are two other things that can sometimes factor into accuracy:
1. The targets speed: Bullets only go a certain speed, and if the target moves out of the bullets range before the bullet catches the target, the bullet doesn't do any damage.
2. For beams (with moderately long lifetimes) only: The traking speed of the turret/ship v.s. the speed of the target ship: If the target can outrun the traking speed of the beam weapon, it might only do part of it's normal damage.


Function four: setAngles

Info on this is readily availible in WeaponTuning.xls, but I'll post it here anyway.
Number 1: The radius of the weapons firing cone. The angle (degrees) from straight forward at which the weapon can shoot.

Note: For gimble and turrets, this represents the angle at which the bullet will fly. For fixed and missile weapons this represents the angle at which the weapon will launch, however the weapon will not launch toward the enemy: it will launch straight.

Number 2: The Maximum angle a turret can rotate to the left (I think. I might have left and right mixed up). Always negative to the best of my knowlege.
Number 3: The Maximum angle a turret can rotate to the right. Always positive to the best of my knowlege.
Number 4: The Maximum angle a turret can rotate to the down. Always negative to the best of my knowlege.
Number 5:The Maximum angle a turret can rotate to the up. Always positive to the best of my knowlege.
numbers 2-5 apply only to turrets.


Function five: setMiscValues

Value one is the recoil distance, value two is the delay between the weapon firing and it's slave firing. The total time it takes to fire the weapon and all of it's slaves must be less than the weapons firing time (a.k.a. it's loading time).

Side note: Slave weapons -- Definition: Slave weapons are essentialy weapons that are exactly the same as another weapon on the ship, except with a slight position offset. Slave weapons are defined in the .HOD file, and can be seen with pipakins .HOD viewer (with GUI).




Some of this was writen pretty late. If I made lots of spellling (or other) mistakes, that would be why. I'll get around to fixing them soon.

thesamonthemoon

Ragnarokx

great dude, i appreciate your work, thanks again.
Now, if someone could go a bit deeper into missiles, i would be grateful. Do missiles always home ? what if i want to make a Missile that only flies straight, without turning or homing in any way... ?

komninosm

Ragnarokx I don't think it can be done unless you make a new missile type that has 0 turning ability. Should be easy enough.
Or you could theoretically make a bullet that resembles a missile in graphic form.
If you try to put "Gimble","Bullet" instead of "Missile" it may crash the game or I don't know.

Ranger

YOu can give the missile a lauchtime of the missile's lifetime, and you'll get *almost* the effect you want. However, sometimes the missile will launch at an angle and look funny as it flies.

thesamonthemoon

Yes it's possible (In fact, I made sonthing similair to this for the underwater mod), but it doesn't work too well. Here is why: if the weapon has zero tracking, then it has to be launched directly at the target in order to hit. Which means you have to change the set angles line to somthing like this:

setAngles(NewWeaponType,1,0,0,0,0)

When the weapon has such a tiny firing arc, the weapon very rarely gets to fire. And even with a 1 degree firing arc, a long range missile can still miss.
However, you can still make the missile look like it doesn't home by giving it maybe 4 degrees of traking and a fire cone of 2 degrees. It still might miss a lot (especialy if its a short range missile) but it will look like it's going straight, even if it's going at a slight angle.

komninosm

thesamonthemoon:

Some corrections and stuff:

What's the difference between gimble and fixed if both are set to the same firing cone?
Weapon speed for missiles is the velocity they are launched at, then accelerating to their normal (missilename.miss file) stats.
I think it also means the distance from the weaponpoint at which they appear because when set high I see them start leaving trails away from it. Maybe it's just that the engine anim/event/effects start a bit after launch and it is simply the distance traveled without trail that makes it look that way, because missiles are pretty hard to see with out their trail.

(rounded down) [(fireTime) / (burstFireTime)] = shots fired
damage X shots fired / (burstWaitTime + burstfiretime) = Damage per second
I think you are right about the problem with ships like torpedo frigate that have many guns but only use one at a given time. Their firepower is misleading. I think it calculates all the available weapons. So in its case the first weapon is normal only but the next two are special (only). So it probably adds them up. If a ship had normal (not only) and a special weapon it would probably add them up after the upgrade. It's Relic's fault but also minor.

About penetration % to go through field I never see that working especially with missiles even after changing it from 5 to 95. Maybe it's my fault any ideas?
Default penetration is 0.5 in cluster torpedo to signify it's uselessness against capships. Maybe a few other weapons too.
As far as I can see penetration is the percent of the normal damage that is done. It does make a difference because if a weapon that does 500 damage hits a 30 hitpoint fighter with penetration 0.1 it would kill it in one shot (50 damage) but if it was the other way you'd have to hit fighters with 10 shots to average one overpowered kill (500). Add to that the accuracy of usually about 0.1 and you get a 1% chance to kill a fighter instead of 10%.
My question is if exceptions are multiplied with the default penetration or simply override it (I think its override but we need a dev here).

The angle at which it is fired is offset by a random number that is less than the weapons firing cone radius ? No I think it depends on the target randomness of the target ship (and whether the weapon/ship uses interpolation or not) which is in the ship file. I'm pretty sure it is the target ship and not the ship that fires, which determines how to spread misses. Look it up. Strikecraft don't have it because their hull is so small there is no point to make shots spread over it like a beam that slides across a frigate hull . Weapons miss against strikecraft (when the accuracy test is failed) because most don't interpolate and even if they did the SC [can] change direction [and usually do] really fast.
Missiles always home in as best as their engines allow. Accuracy less than 1 will simply make them inflict no damage when (if) they connect. Note that the (non heavy) concussion missile has addweaponresult (a small sphere burst) for both miss and hit events though it has accuracy 1. I imagine that Relic intended when a missile gets close to target it should explode but I'm not sure if it's working.
If a shot doesn't miss but another ship get's in the way to absorb the damage you still don't do damage to intended target; so a miss is a miss but a hit needs to connect or it does damage to the first hull it hits. A miss though that hits a diferent hull than intended target will do no damage unless there is a flag damage=1 for that ship's family. I don't think it depends on the intended/original target having damage=1 but on the unlucky ship that gets in the middle. Only Relic knows...
Side note: I think bullets disappear after maxrange and beams seem to thin out (I wonder if that means they do less damage at long range - that would be great) but missiles can exceed the range after being launched. They have a time limited existance though.

About animated turrets I wonder if setting the firing cone to greater than 0 maybe it would improve turet performance. It would allow it to target a ship that is a few degrees off the current line of sight of the turret, without moving the turret. I could be wrong though...
I think the turret values don't have to be positive/negative. Imagine a turret that can move only from 10 degrees over the horizontal plane to 60 degrees over. Both values are positive and the same goes with left and right. Usually though you are correct and it seems stupid to make a turret that can't face the direction of it's forward axis, simply change its forward axis when creating the mesh (may help in obscure cases of replacing existing turrets when you don't want to mess with meshes and stuff). Maybe it can't even be done and crashes the game.
Too bad you can't put missiles on animated turrets (or so I heard) that would've been way cool!

The function setMiscValues(NewWeaponType,a,b) could be a good indication that the weapon has slaves that you don't see in the ship file (why not Relic? we can't even have slaves different from master can we?). Even if b=0 it could be that simply the slave fires at the same time as the master. But if a=0 meaning no recoil it is usually prudent to consider the exisitance of a slave, otherwise why include the function in the first place in a weapon with no recoil and no slave? Remember if you mod this stuff you also have to mod the event files, which I found out the hard way. My modded Destroyer has Ion beam turrets but in order for the charge event/fx of the ion beams I had to use the firetime/lifetime/anticipationtime values of the Ion Frigate weapon otherwise it doesn't look good. Also even if you time it all perfectly you still might get timing errors with the slave guns fx. I think that's because sometimes the event starts but the slave weapon doesn't fire because target is destroyed or lost. Then it stays ready to fire so if there is a new target before the event ends the slave fires and then slave master timing is screwed up. This is because there is no anim for the slave gun but only an event that happens a bit after the event of the master gun anim, which has animtime 0 usually. You can sometimes see this with the Destroyer Torpedoes, which have a puff of smoke effect when they launch and in the heat of battle it can sometimes lose its proper timing.

I hope my contributions to the modding community are answered with some help in my problem threads
Have a nice day!

PS: When using wordpad turn off wordwrap before copy-pasting.

komninosm

Have you tried what you are talking about for mssiles? You mean that after firing the angle still plays a role? I thought it was all up to the missiles turning ability acceleration and stuff after launch.

If turning is set to 0 or very low then the missile would fly straight wouldn't it? And no need for low angles that restrict launching.

Ranger

Penetration: It's an override.

Fixed: Weapon fires straight, based on the orientation of the hardpoint. The angle determines when it can fire, but does not affect the aim. Thus, if you have an angle of 90, the weapon will fire whenever the target is within a 180-degree arc in front of the hardpoint, but the weapon will always fire straight (at the equivalent of 0 degrees).

Gimble: Weapon tracks target within the angle, as though by an invisible turret.

Missiles: You still need the low angle, else the missile will launch once the target is within the specified angle, but it won't launch *at* the target. Missiles launch just like a fixed weapon. See above.

thesamonthemoon

Yes. Here is a clarification: Missiles always launch straight, the firing cone just dictates what angle the target needs to be at before the missile will launch. I'll edit this into my post at the top of the page.

lol, simultaneous post with ranger.

Ill respond to your long post in just a minute.

Demon_Eyes

Missile file strait from their starting point, however they can be made to launch forward or slide up or to the right and then launch foward (see vagr missile corvette)

also:

http://hw2.tproc.org/wiki/KarosGraveyard

thesamonthemoon

"I think it also means the distance from the weaponpoint at which they appear because when set high I see them start leaving trails away from it. Maybe it's just that the engine anim/event/effects start a bit after launch and it is simply the distance traveled without trail that makes it look that way, because missiles are pretty hard to see with out their trail."

Not so sure about this, but you're right about fire speed being the launch speed.

"damage X shots fired / (burstWaitTime + burstfiretime) = Damage per second"

I'm not sure if this is right either. I think that burstfiretime starts counting as soon as the burst begins firing. I'll have to test this though.

"If a ship had normal (not only) and a special weapon it would probably add them up after the upgrade"

This is incorect. Check out the higaran bomber. It's base weapons do about 135 damge per second, but the game always displays a much higher number (even if you haven't researched impoved bombs yet).

"About penetration % to go through field I never see that working especially with missiles even after changing it from 5 to 95."

I've never tried this either, for that bit I was just paraphrasing WeaponTuning.xls.

"My question is if exceptions are multiplied with the default penetration or simply override it (I think its override but we need a dev here)."

The penetration exceptions are just like the accuracy exceptions (essentialy they are percents).







"Missiles always home in as best as their engines allow. Accuracy less than 1 will simply make them inflict no damage when (if) they connect. Note that the (non heavy) concussion missile has addweaponresult (a small sphere burst) for both miss and hit events though it has accuracy 1. I imagine that Relic intended when a missile gets close to target it should explode but I'm not sure if it's working."

Thats what I said! (with the adition of the random firing offset)

"Side note: I think bullets disappear after maxrange and beams seem to thin out (I wonder if that means they do less damage at long range - that would be great) but missiles can exceed the range after being launched. They have a time limited existance though."

1.Yep, 2. Yep, but they always do the same damage. 3. Yes, bullet lifetime is in the .miss file.

"About animated turrets I wonder if setting the firing cone to greater than 0 maybe it would improve turet performance. It would allow it to target a ship that is a few degrees off the current line of sight of the turret, without moving the turret. I could be wrong though...
I think the turret values don't have to be positive/negative. Imagine a turret that can move only from 10 degrees over the horizontal plane to 60 degrees over. Both values are positive and the same goes with left and right. Usually though you are correct and it seems stupid to make a turret that can't face the direction of it's forward axis, simply change its forward axis when creating the mesh (may help in obscure cases of replacing existing turrets when you don't want to mess with meshes and stuff). Maybe it can't even be done and crashes the game."

1. Some animated turrets do have a firing cone. (see hgn_ioncannonturret.wepn)
2. Sure, why not I never said they couldn't be negative/positive (opposite of thier normal), I just said that they always had the same sign in all of the turrets that were included in the game.

"Too bad you can't put missiles on animated turrets (or so I heard) that would've been way cool!"

Why not?

"The function setMiscValues(NewWeaponType,a,b) could be a good indication that the weapon has slaves that you don't see in the ship file [etc...]"

Yes, but not always. For example if two ships use the same weapon and one of the ship has slaves of that weapon, the weapon will have the setMiscValues line, even though one of the ships doesn't have slaves.



You had some valid stuff to add, but some of what you said is just a paraphrase of what I said, and some of your corrections are off.

Ranger

He's referring to the fact that turrets do not move if you do this. So, technically, you can put missile weapons in a turret, but it doesn't work as desired.

komninosm

So missiles are always "fixed" even if you put a "gimble"? Maybe that's why they can't be put on animated turrets like I read somewhere (but never tried). Maybe one could make an animated subsystem turret that has fixed missiles or... maybe not
I know about the ejection of them with weaponFireAxis...
And from excel:
Relic User:
fire every "fireTime" seconds for "burstFireTime" seconds then wait "burstWaitTime" seconds before firing again.
So I guess I am right or you could try it using 0.5 firetime, 2.5 bursttime and 3 burstwait. If you see constant firing every 0.5 seconds then you are right but if it stops for 3 second intervals then I am.

Hmm I guess you are right about special weapons (hey I said maybe in the first place). I guess it simply add all the weapons it finds. Does it take into account default penetration? I think it does if you do the math for torpedo frigates. But that's about all it counts...
About shield penetration please someone do some tests.
I read (I think at Karos) that there is some speculation that in the addability(defensefieldSHIELD)(0,1200,0,0) the 1200 is not range (that is established in the defensefield ability) but how much it absorbs. It could be wrong but check it out. Maybe that's why the DFF has both lines though I think it is for nebula shielding and stuff.

<The penetration exceptions are just like the accuracy exceptions (essentialy they are percents).> this doesn't answer my question read it again please. Unless you mean override and I'm too thick.

Also what mecha says doesn't disagree with anything I say in your quotes. I am just expanding it more and for good reason. There are secrets there young skywalker (I guess I'm Chui)
Look at the ship excel and I think you'll agree the random offset max/min values are there.

<Thats what I said! (with the adition of the random firing offset)>
Yes but I said it so much better Besides I added some more info and ideas to speculate on.

<1.Yep, 2. Yep, but they always do the same damage. 3. Yes, bullet lifetime is in the .miss file.>
I wasn't asking, I was being polite. Except for the beam idea which I would love to see modded in the game especially with my long range artilery ion frigates :P

So the animated turret with the firecone gets more coverage or does it simply shoot fixed straight in the direction of the turret at the moment an enemy passes through the cone and then tries to home in while firing. I think it's the first way.

<2. Sure, why not I never said they couldn't be negative/positive (opposite of thier normal), I just said that they always had the same sign in all of the turrets that were included in the game.>

I didn't say you did I just added to your findings. And also asked a question. Will it cause problems to the game.
Hmm can we make a turret that is true 360 or does it get stuck (like in Cataclysm) and has to make a full rotation the other way around?

<Why not?> Because :P

About setMiscValues I was giving ideas on how to spot it not certainties. After that it's up to the modder to make further inquiries but it's good to know when he has to, just to be sure.

<You had some valid stuff to add, but some of what you said is just a paraphrase of what I said, and some of your corrections are off.>
No it isn't (monty python)
Why the sad face though?
I think most would agree I added a lot of stuff, not just paraphrase you. Also only the GUI firepower idea was off but it was only an idea had while writing not something tested thoroughly. I was only suggesting a possibility but it turns out thing are even simpler than that.
And I added to the GUI firepower stuff with the burst correction :P
I also asked some serious questions here and there that had to be asked, and maybe answered. Good ground for speculation and testing and results.
I am not trying to steal your thread only to contribute to it like few others. I hope I'm doing a good job :P

Have a nice day!

mecha

I can see no reason beyond messing up the data why an animated turret can't fire missiles.

Also, the random offset for inaccurate shots is not data driven.

komninosm

What if we make a turret with normal missiles like so
setAngles(NewWeaponType,5,-180,180,-10,60)
Wouldn't that make the turret turn to 'see' the enemy before it fires a missile?

komninosm

TargetRandom useTargetRandom
targetRandomPointXMin
targetRandomPointXMax
targetRandomPointYMin
targetRandomPointYMax
targetRandomPointZMin
targetRandomPointZMax

I thought it was based on the above mecha isn't it? Is the above only for hits and not misses? That's good to know.

thesamonthemoon

The sad face was because I thought you were trying to steal my kill... er... thread...er...



Yes I mean override (not to say you're too thick or anything ). It doesnt make a differance anyway though, because the default penetration is always one, so if the exceptions were things that were multiplyed by the default, they would still be the same.

komninosm

As I said before the clustertorpedo is 0.5 :P
Also the Destroyer torpedo is 0.5. I guess they forgot to change it after taking out the improved torpedo research affecting DDs. Look in the bugs forum for more on that and other stuff in a thread called What Relic 'forgot' to do

But I guess you Ranger and I all agree that it is override. Would be nice if mecha agreed too

Ranger

As far as I can tell, they are overrides.

As for missiles in turrets, it could be that I haven't tested it thoroughly enough, but my experience is that the turret will always face forward without ever rotating. The game seems to use the missile's tracking over the turret's tracking. In other words, it relies on the missile to track the target on its own instead of relying on the turret to point to the target before firing.

komninosm

have you tried my example in the previous page?

What if we make a turret with normal missiles like so
setAngles(NewWeaponType,5,-180,180,-10,60)
Wouldn't that make the turret turn to 'see' the enemy before it fires a missile?

Ranger

I haven't tried that specifically, no. Give it a whirl and see what happens.

shadow51689

I was looking thru some old threads, but I think docking this would help some people...


oh.. I misread the date, damn I need sleep..

komninosm

what date?

komninosm

Is it actually a firing cone or more of a pyramid with a square base?

thesamonthemoon

A cone acording to the RDN tools (maxAngleFromNorm).

shadow51689

I have a question about weapons... How do you edit the range of the weapons?

shadow51689

I got it, nm.

komninosm

Yes sammon I know that but for animated turrets that have 0 angle and then azimuths like:
setAngles(NewWeaponType,0,-30,30,-30,30)
the firing ability is a pyramid if you really think about it.
I was speculating maybe Relic did the smae for angle and didn't really think about it. You get my meaning or should I explain it further?

thesamonthemoon

No... I see what your saying.

setAngles(NewWeaponType,5,-30,30,-30,30)

The -30,30,-30,30 shows how far animated turrets can rotate, which also hapens to a box, as well as thier firing angle. Not so for the first number. The first number is a cone... Or at least some approximation thereof. It might just be a many sided pyramid (in which case it would act similair to a cone).

komninosm

You cheat! I had no 5 in there :P

If you project the animated turret's line of fire edges to the weapons range you get a sort of pyramid (with a spherical base though, a square cut out of a sphere, sorry don't know how to say this in proper English, I can barely say it in Greek)

So how the first angle being a cone means that an angle 10 weapon can fire on a target 30 degrees up or 30 to the left but not 30 up and 30 left. It can only fire approximately 26 up and 26 left or values inbetween based on a circle.
Have you tested this or know it from a reliable source other than excel.
I'm probably (certainly) wrong but can you imagine a way of testing this? I mean without pausing the game and using rulers and degreemeters on my screen (though that would work too I guess).

PS: talk about exercise in futility

komninosm

I tried the following animated missile turret and it didn't work. Turret was immobile and didn't fire.

StartWeaponConfig(NewWeaponType,"AnimatedTurret","Missile","Vgr_SmallMissile","Normal",40,3000,0,0,0,0,1,0,0,3.5,0,0,1,1,0,0,0.1,"Normal",0,0,0)
AddWeaponResult(NewWeaponType,"Hit","SpawnWeaponFire","Target",0,0,"Vgr_SmallMissileBurst")
AddWeaponResult(NewWeaponType,"Miss","SpawnWeaponFire","Target",0,0,"Vgr_SmallMissileBurst")
setPenetration(NewWeaponType,5,1,{
PlanetKillerArmour = 0,
})
setAccuracy(NewWeaponType,1)
setAngles(NewWeaponType,5,-135,135,-2.5,60)
setMiscValues(NewWeaponType,0,1)
addAnimTurretSound(NewWeaponType,"Data:Sound/SFX/ETG/SPECIAL/SPECIAL_ABILITIES_TURRET_ON")

I tried setAngles(NewWeaponType,0,-135,135,-2.5,60)
but it didn't work either.
Tested with Destroyer top turret.

pipakin

I think the unanimous decision is probably

Animated Turret + Missiles = no workie.

komninosm

mecha said:
I can see no reason beyond messing up the data why an animated turret can't fire missiles.

So I guess he's wrong :P
You tell him that, I don't want any part in this

mecha

You guys give up so easily...

replace the weapon config in Hgn_KineticBurstCannonDestroyer with this:



works fine for me, all 3 top side guns rotate to face the target then they shoot one torpedo for each barrel.

pipakin

ah, well, I hadn't tried it myself, just saw that everyone was getting the "It won't turn" result.

Not trying to offend the Great Mecha.

-Philip "Pip" Kin

komninosm

Hmm I seem to have made some noob mistakes like 0 tracking speeds, etc.
OK OK I was tired so I made a few mistakes so shoot me!
What's everybody else's excuse

komninosm

I finally did some tests and it worked ok. I wonder why people said it wouldn't work. Maybe they made the same mistakes as me initially and then abandoned it. OK missile turrets work! Now we need some good models for them like a SAM or MRLS.

thesamonthemoon

First of all, in space there are no SAM's (except me ). Second, its MLRS, not MRLS. And of course it worked; if mecha says it works, it works. You may see something like a MLRS in the Underwater Mod.

Thanks for bumping the thread by the way.

Turgidson

(sorry for bumping the thread)

> Also, the random offset for inaccurate shots is not data driven.

Means that even if the cone angle is set to 0, there is still a random offset, right ?

Does anyone have the (hardcoded) equation that determines this random offset ? Just for info, it can be useful.

thesamonthemoon

Buahahahahaha!! My thread has been bumped.... err... and their will be fewer newb weapon questions.. Bwahaha?

Turgidson, thats an interesting question. I think you got it correctly, but I'll go test it in a few minutes.

Turgidson

And what was the result ?

Also, does anyone have the equation of the random offset angle that is generated ?

Fang

Quick Clarification: If I set the accuracy for a bullet weapon to say .00001 for all ship classes, with the dmg flag on then theoretically it should almost never home in on the target, However I noticed this also made the weapons very inaccurate. So this inaccuracy is caused by a random offset from the firing cone, if I were to reduce the firing cone to a very small number would this reduce the offset and thus increase the accuracy/reduce scattering, or would the offset still be random. And if that doesnt work then is there any other way to reduce the offset, cause I would like to make the capital ship guns more accurate without having them home, just reduce the scattering effect that is caused by them failing their accuracy tests.

mecha

You can't set the cone, just the accuracy. If you don't like the look of the homing how about making the bullets faster? The homing is not really noticeable on anything but the slowest bullets like those fired by the destroyer, and then only if you're really looking for it. I guess if you're a realism nut then any homing is bad but remember that without homing the game becomes very random and hard to balance. With homing ships will pretty much always perform how you expect as long as they spend roughly the same amount of time facing the target.

It's not really a cone either, we just mess with the heading a bit in each axis by at least 0.01 and at most 0.02.

Fang

So there is no way to really alter the cone or reduce the amount of the random offset when I weapon "misses", that was really all I wanted to know. I have no problem witht he original game im just experimenting around to see what makes it more fun or cooler looking, so perhaps im mistaken but you sounded slightly offended with my request, if that is the case I hope you understand I have no problems with the origninal game which is quite brilliant if you ask me, im just fiddiling around which I thought was incouraged? Im just interesed if I can have the weapons have accuracy based more on whether the shot hit the actual target rather than passed a test and homed in, However this does not mean I think poorly of any of the developers of the oringinal code for doing it this way, and it doesnt mean I have a problem with the homing nor am I a realism nut, just want to see if it can be done.

mecha

Not at all, of course you can fiddle around as much as you want, unfortunately a lot of things can't be fiddled with, homing is one of those things. There's a bunch of things you can do with it though, inaccurate shots with damage are good visually vs large targets as the shots spread out a lot. Inaccurate shots with a miss event are used in for the flak frigate.

Ghent

suggest this as a good candidate for a sticky ? Great detailed info & discussion on the .wepn files

Turgidson

Thanks for the answer, Mecha. I do understand why you used this accuracy test, since it makes balancing much easier, especially for small targets. I just find it a bit sad that the option ain't "uncheckable" for us modders, but once again I can understand the reasons. IMHO, the limitations of this automated check merely come when some targets within a class have very different sizes, or when the shape of a single unit varies a lot depending on the targeting angle (example : big flat ship, hard to hit frontally but easy to hit from top/bottom).

BTW :

> "It's not really a cone either, we just mess with the heading a bit in each axis by at least 0.01 and at most 0.02."

Is that in degrees, or in radians ?

zebadee

how do you change the range that a weapon has?