C# Aurora Changes List v1.00

[Steve Walmsley (OP)]

Commander Name Themes

C# Aurora allows a Race to have an unlimited number of Commander Name Themes. This is handled on the Race window.

When a Race is created, a single theme is selected as part of the creation process. Unless the player makes changes, 100% of commanders will use this initial theme. The player can choose additional themes, assigning each one a weight. When a new commander is generated, the name will be randomly assigned a theme based on the weight of each theme.

The first screenshot shows a race with a single commander name theme. The second shows the same race with multiple additional themes. The top left section of the Race window shows the main theme (the greatest weight) plus the number of additional themes.

[Steve Walmsley (OP)]

Missile Engines Integrated into Missile Design

In VB6, you research missile engines first and then use that engine within a missile design. This can be tedious, especially if you are not sure exactly what engine size you need. Therefore, for C# the missile engine design has been removed from the Create Research Project window and integrated directly into the Missile Design window.

The best engine and fuel efficiency tech will automatically be used, so the player decides on the engine size and power boost. The engine design takes place behind the scenes and is confirmed when you design the missile. This means you can play around with the engine design and missile design at the same time. See first screenshot below.

If no engine is required, just tick the No Engine option. See second screenshot.

[Steve Walmsley (OP)]

Potential Colony Locations

VB6 Aurora has a window entitled Available Colony Analysis, which is used to search for new colony sites.

In C# Aurora, this function has been built into the System View window. If you click the 'All System View' button, the Stars section is replaced with search filters. Several areas that are not required in this mode, such as the jump point list, are hidden from view. The All System View button changes to the Normal View button, which will return you to the standard single system view.

While in the All System Mode, you can narrow the search for potential colony sites across all systems while retaining all the functionality of the system view window.

For example, here the Jovian Federation is looking for worlds with a colony cost of 4 or less that have minerals present. The results are sorted by Colony Cost and then Hydro Extent descending. The Federation has yet to develop jump tech so all the bodies are from the Sol system.



The second screen shot is from my previous campaign and shows a search for worlds with acceptable gravity, oxygen present, not in an alien-controlled system, below a colony cost of 4, with a pop capacity of at least one million and that have minerals present. This is sorted by colony cost and size of mineral deposits.

[Steve Walmsley (OP)]

Race Comparison Window

C# has a comparison window that allows you to see a high level comparison between different Races. It is simple and read-only, but useful for a high-level overview.

The window expands to the number of player races in the game. I may also add some additional comparison information over time.

[Steve Walmsley (OP)]

New Spoiler Race

C# introduces a new optional spoiler race - the Rakhas.

The Rakhas are the remnants of an ancient civilisation that once had colonies across the galaxy. Their populations were virtually wiped out and the tiny number of survivors have regressed to a primitive, tribal lifestyle, although they retain some elements of Trans-Newtonian technology. The Rakhas have no ships and are confined to planetary surfaces, with each remnant colony effectively a different race with potentially different levels of technology. These populations consist only of ground forces with no 'civilian' population and due to the ancient history of alien invasion the Rakhas will resist any invader. The Rakhas are large, heavily-muscled humanoids with skin colouration ranging from green to grey.

Their surviving technology is sufficient for Trans-Newtonian infantry and mechanised forces. Some Rakhas tribes will also retain STO weapons. The ancient Rakhas experimented with genetic modification during their final wars, so some tribes will retain genetic advantages for combat and all tribes will be familiar with warfare in the dominant terrain of their home world (desert fighting, jungle fighting, etc).

The Rakhas have wider environmental tolerances than humans and their colonies were generally created on worlds with large quantities of accessible TN mineral deposits. Therefore, the remnant tribes will usually be encountered on worlds with oxygen atmospheres that posses multiple accessible mineral deposits. There is a small chance that a tribe may have survived on a hostile world.

Orbital bombardment is an option to wipe out the Rakhas, although as the planets that Rakhas tribes inhabit will generally be valuable in terms of habitability and resources, any attacker may wish to avoid catastrophic damage to the environment.

[Steve Walmsley (OP)]

Automated Medal Awards

In terms of basic concept, Medals in C# have a similar function to VB6. You can create a medal with a name and description, associate a medal image and assign a promotion score boost (or penalty). You can assign that medal as desired to different officers for role-playing reasons. A minor addition for C# is that you can flag a medal as allowing only a single award, or allowing multiple awards.

The major change for C# is that medals can now be assigned automatically. A lengthy default list of conditions for medal awards will be available and, within the constraints of the available measurement types, additional conditions can be added. Medals can be associated with one or more conditions and the medal will be awarded if a commander meets one of those conditions (unless it is a single-award only and the commander already has it).

This first screenshot shows the Medal Window, with the first medal on the list selected. At the bottom of the window are options for changing text or image, setting promotion score and the multiple award flag and adding/removing conditions for the medal.



The second screenshot shows a list of available conditions. This is only an initial list to show examples of what is possible. All these conditions are already working. I will also add to this window the ability to create new conditions. They will have to use one of the existing measurement types, but you can choose different measurement amounts. This thread is open for suggestions of different measurement types: http://aurora2.pentarch.org/index.php?topic=10435.0



The third screenshot shows the commander window with medals awarded. A major side-benefit of the medals code is that each commander will now display a list of every measurement type where he has activity (panel in top middle-left). This screenshot is using random data, so it doesn't match the medal assignments on the previous screenshots.

The medal images are from VB6 so I think I need some updated ones, preferably in PNG format with transparent backgrounds.

[Steve Walmsley (OP)]

Human NPRs

C# has a new option for NPR generation called Human NPRs. If this option is selected, when a NPR is generated (except for Starting NPRs) there is a one-third chance that a check is made to see if the NPR is 'human'. 'Human' in this context is the species of the oldest population of the oldest player race. This is because you may want to play as a non-human race, or modified human race, and still retain the option of your species appearing as an NPR.

If the check is made and the system body is capable of supporting humans, then the species of the new NPR will be human. Human NPRs will generally be smaller (on average about half the size) of normal NPRs. You also gain +20 to communication checks when two races have the same primary species.

This option is to allow a campaign taking place in the aftermath of the collapse of a large human Empire. As the Empire, or one of its major populations, expands once again, human remnant populations may still be found in distant systems.

[Steve Walmsley (OP)]

Manual Medal Awards

The previous post on medals covered automated medal assignment. This covers manual awards, for which there are two options:

1) An award to an individual commander on the Commanders window using the Award Medal button (as per VB6).
2) Mass Awards to large numbers of commanders at once, primarily for the purposes of 'Campaign Medals'.

On the Fleet window, you can select a Ship, a Sub-Fleet, a Fleet or a Naval Admin Command and click Award Medal. The following window pops up:



You choose the medal and the type of command positions to which the medal will be awarded. Every commander with a command included in the selected types that is on a ship included in the selected organisation will be awarded the selected medal. This would include commanders of any ground formations present on the ships if that command type is selected. If a fleet is selected, all ships in the fleet are included, including any in sub-fleets. If an Admin Command is selected, every ship in the complete hierarchy of that Admin Command will be selected. Mass Awards use a confirmation popup after you close the Medal Award window, as a mistaken mass award would require some sorting out

On the Naval Forces window of the Galactic Map there is an Award Medal button. This will pop up the same Award Medal window. The selected medal will be awarded to every commander with one of the selected command types in the system currently selected on the Galactic map, including commanders of ground formations at populations in the system if that command type is selected.

On the Ground Forces window in the Order of Battle tab are two new buttons; Formation Medal and Hierarchy Medal. Formation Medal functions in a similar way to the Award Medal on the Commander window. The medal is awarded to the single commander of the currently selected formation. Hierarchy Medal is a Mass Award option with two functions, depending on whether a formation or a population is selected. When a formation is selected, the mass award is to all commanders in the downward hierarchy of the currently selected formation, included the commander of the selected formation. When a population is selected the mass award is to the commanders of all formations at that population.

When awarded medals manually, a popup box will appear after the medal is chosen, allowing you to enter an optional medal citation. This citation will appear if you mouse-over the medal in the commander view.

This new Mass Award option should result in a much more visual history of different commanders with the display of their various campaign medals.

[Steve Walmsley (OP)]

Mining Company Names

This is only a 'miner' cosmetic change

When civilian mining companies are created, they will be given a company name which will become the population name. This is similar to shipyard naming using a family name from the racial naming theme plus a 'company name' such as Smith Minerals & Ores or Jones Resources Group. This is purely cosmetic and has no game play impact, but serves to differentiate the civilian mining outposts.

Note that this doesn't rename the system body. Population and system body names are separate in C# Aurora, so you can still create your own population with a different name on the same system body. The Economics window already has an option to show both system body name and pop name if they are different so you can still see the locations if desired.

[Steve Walmsley (OP)]

System OOB

Another cosmetic change. A new tab on the Fleet window lists your forces by system in text format. This is intended partially as a quick reference but mainly to allow easy posting of current deployments into an AAR. Any military ships over 1000 tons have their names listed. I'll probably create some options in the future for more flexibility on what is displayed.

[Steve Walmsley (OP)]

Adding Your Own Naming Themes

Adding your own naming themes is very simple in C# Aurora.

1) Create a text file with one name per line.
2) Click the button shown below
3) Enter the theme name in an input field that pops up
4) Select the file using a standard windows file dialog box.

The name theme is added to the database for the current game and all future games.

[Steve Walmsley (OP)]

Survey Site List

Given the number of potential ground survey sites, it could be difficult to keep track. Therefore I have added a new tab to the tactical map that contains a list of current known sites.

[Steve Walmsley (OP)]

Logistics Reports

A new Logistics Report tab on the Fleet window lists all relevant ships for each of five categories. Fuel, Maintenance Supply Point, Ordnance, Deployment Time (for crew) and Time Since Overhaul. A dropdown is used to select each category and the ships are sorted by those most affected in the selected category. Screenshots below show examples for four of those categories. MSP is very similar to fuel.

[Steve Walmsley (OP)]

Ship Ordnance Templates

In VB6, you can set an ordnance template for each class. When a ship loads ordnance it will load ordnance based on that parent class template.

For C#, you can create optional ship ordnance templates. If a template is created at the individual ship level, it will override the parent class template when the ship loads ordnance. If there is no template at the ship level, the parent class template will be used.

A new tab on the Ship section of the Naval Organization window shows the class and ship ordnance templates for each ship, plus the current actual loadout for the ship. This tab can be used to change the ship ordnance template in a similar way to setting the class ordnance template on the Class window. You can copy the existing class ordnance template into the ship template if you only want to make minor changes. You can rename and obsolete missiles from this tab.

The first screenshot shows a ship with a class template, but no ship template. The second screenshot shows a recon-focused ship ordnance template.

[Steve Walmsley (OP)]

Tracking Time Bonus vs Missiles

Energy weapons and beam fire controls engaging missiles can gain a bonus to their tracking speed based on how long the missile has been on active sensors. Similar functionality was added to VB6 but is not working. The benefit of this has been toned down a little from the planned functionality in VB6 as fuel considerations in C# will reduce the max boost used for anti-ship missiles and avoid the late game missile speed vs tracking speed disparity.

The gain in tracking speed is equal to one percent for every five seconds a missile is continually tracked by active sensors. This is subject to a maximum time based on the associated tracking time tech. The starting tech costs 1000 RP and adds tracking bonus for the first 30 seconds. The tech name format is: Max Tracking Time for Bonus vs Missiles: 30 Seconds (6%)

This time increases with subsequent tech to 45, 60, 80, 120, 160, 200, 250, 320 and 400. Each tech is approximately double the cost of the previous one.

Note this is a bonus to tracking speed, not the base to-hit chance. If the tracking speed is already higher than the missile speed, this bonus will not improve the chance to hit.

I considered adding this to all energy-weapon fire for consistency, but decided it was reasonable to keep it to missiles only, given their more predictable courses.