Author Topic: Blueprint system for Aurora C#?  (Read 3442 times)

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Offline GeaXle (OP)

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Blueprint system for Aurora C#?
« on: September 20, 2017, 06:42:31 AM »
Hello!

I have trying to follow the development of Aurora C# but I am sure I have missed some things and I couldn't find the information I was looking for.

I remember reading this as a suggestion a long time ago and I was wondering if it would be implemented in C# Aurora.

Will there be the bossibility to have technology and ship blueprints? Basically, currently when I design a ship and the needed tech for it, some techs are dependant on the rest of the ship (mostly the size) which I am not sure yet how big it will get with the crew support system and armor added. So the idea would be to have "Tech blueprints" which is exactly the same as a normal tech but has 0 research time and cost. Using a mix of blueprints tech and normal tech, I can design a ship blueprint. This ship blueprint will give me all the info of a normal ship design, but I cannot build it. This way, if say my laser is just slighly too big for the tonnage I am aiming, or if I have a bit more room for a single bigger engine I could quickly iterrate, make a new tech blueprint and check if it works out in my ship design blueprint. Once I am finally happy, I can make the real corresponding research project and research then with normal time and cost constraints.
 
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Offline smoelf

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Re: Blueprint system for Aurora C#?
« Reply #1 on: September 20, 2017, 06:46:40 AM »
While it likely isn't an optimal solution, can't you do this exact thing with SM? Instant research all the tech you need until you find the configuration you want, delete all of them and then research the actual tech properly. Perhaps put "Blueprint" in front of their name when creating the tech to distinguish them from actual tech?
 

Offline Gyrfalcon

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Re: Blueprint system for Aurora C#?
« Reply #2 on: September 20, 2017, 08:19:25 AM »
I normally use a separate game to do this, but I agree, the ability to design a ship and its parts as blueprints and only create the actual technology once you know what you need would be amazing.
 

Offline GeaXle (OP)

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Re: Blueprint system for Aurora C#?
« Reply #3 on: September 20, 2017, 09:58:42 AM »
While it likely isn't an optimal solution, can't you do this exact thing with SM?

Definitely, and as suggested by Gyrfalcon it is even better to have a parallel game for this. But it is cumbersome and if directly implemented in game it would just make life much easier.

I also like the idea of blueprints as a RP thing. A bit like when you read an article about this insane building design made by an architect bureau but in the end it was nevermade for whatever reasons. You could consult all the options you once considered.
 

Offline BlckKnght

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Re: Blueprint system for Aurora C#?
« Reply #4 on: September 25, 2017, 06:57:59 PM »
I'd suggest that you should automatically get blueprint (or "mock up" or "dummy") versions of every race specific tech you design.  Ships can be designed with mocked up parts, but they can't be built until all of the dummy parts are replaced by fully developed ones.  Until that happens the whole ship design is flagged as a mock up, making it ineligible for construction.  When the RST is fully researched, the real version of the part would automatically replace the mocked up version in any ship designs you've made.  That replacement may make the ship design eligible for construction (if it doesn't have any other dummy parts).

Probably this can all be done with a simple boolean flag added to ship components in the database.  When the RST research project is created, it would create the component in the database immediately, with the "dummy" (or "blueprint" or whatever) flag set.  When the tech was fully researched, the flag would be unset, making the part valid for normal use.

Ship designs that include dummy parts in their design could also have a dummy flag in the database, which would be recalculated each time one of its dummy parts gets developed (or when you edit the design by adding or removing dummy components).  I suppose the ship design could just check the flags on all of its component parts any time it needs to know if it is eligible for construction, but I'd guess that caching the value would be more efficient.

There would probably need to be some minor UI tweaks for how dummy parts appear in ship designs (and perhaps also how mocked up ships designs appear distinct from fully developed ones).  I'd suggest just prefixing the name with something like "{MOCK UP}", but exactly what text is used doesn't really matter that much.

The only special case I can think of would be deleting RST research projects.  I'd suggest that the player not be able to delete a project if the associated dummy components are being used in any ship designs.  Alternatively, the game could remove the components automatically from all designs that include them, but I'd expect this to be more disruptive.  Or, I suppose you could allow "orphaned" dummy parts to live on in some way, but that just seems like a bad idea to me.

Another question might be whether or not the mockup system should be extended to non-RST components.  For instance, it might be nice to be able to mock up a fighter before you've researched all of the miniaturized fuel tank and engineering bay components, for instance.
 
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Offline Scandinavian

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Re: Blueprint system for Aurora C#?
« Reply #5 on: November 11, 2017, 03:36:14 PM »
Another question might be whether or not the mockup system should be extended to non-RST components.  For instance, it might be nice to be able to mock up a fighter before you've researched all of the miniaturized fuel tank and engineering bay components, for instance.
Probably just one tech out, though (so you can use mock-ups of techs you can research, but not of as-yet-speculative ones.