C# Aurora v0.x Questions

[Steve Walmsley]

Is drag and drop required for assigning fire controls, ECCM, etc during combat? Is it possible to do so using buttons or was the old UI completely removed?

I'm mostly asking as drag and drop is a bit of an unusual UI, from a screen reading perspective. It's theoretically  possible to use, but might be a bit harder.

Yes, there are quite a few areas that are drag and drop now. I could add the additional UI later though for it to be button-driven.

[Caplin]

Is drag and drop required for assigning fire controls, ECCM, etc during combat? Is it possible to do so using buttons or was the old UI completely removed?

I'm mostly asking as drag and drop is a bit of an unusual UI, from a screen reading perspective. It's theoretically  possible to use, but might be a bit harder.

Yes, there are quite a few areas that are drag and drop now. I could add the additional UI later though for it to be button-driven.

Thanks, Steve. I guess I won't know if it's truly a problem until I have a chance to play with the GUI a bit. The changes on the whole sound great, and I look forward to seeing what comes of them.

[TMaekler]

Two general and one specific questions:

a) What IDE are you using to program C# Aurora?
b) The old problem of points and decimals when using Aurora, will it be gone with the C# version, or would we still need the launcher?
c) What resources would you suggest to learn C#?

[TMaekler]

And some more questions - officers, auto assign & auto promote:

First, how will the game handle the specific amount of needed officers? Through the new structures and rules, the demand for people of specific ranks can vary a lot by how you organize your nation. In VB6 the game auto promoted according to if certain amount of numbers (9 rank one meant 3 rank two, meant 1 rank three...). Will the game auto promote according to the nations needs?

Second, if it cannot auto assign, could we get warning messages, that there are open positions available, so one could potentially manual promote?

Third, what happens if a person is auto promoted to the next rank, but there are no free positions available? He then has to leave his actual post. Can this happen, or would the game wait with the promotion until a free position has come up?

Fourth, lets say the position of captain on the flagship becomes free. Would the auto assign then only look into free officers or would it also cross "promote" captains of other vessels?

[Rich.h]

And some more questions - officers, auto assign & auto promote:

First, how will the game handle the specific amount of needed officers? Through the new structures and rules, the demand for people of specific ranks can vary a lot by how you organize your nation. In VB6 the game auto promoted according to if certain amount of numbers (9 rank one meant 3 rank two, meant 1 rank three...). Will the game auto promote according to the nations needs?

Second, if it cannot auto assign, could we get warning messages, that there are open positions available, so one could potentially manual promote?

Third, what happens if a person is auto promoted to the next rank, but there are no free positions available? He then has to leave his actual post. Can this happen, or would the game wait with the promotion until a free position has come up?

Fourth, lets say the position of captain on the flagship becomes free. Would the auto assign then only look into free officers or would it also cross "promote" captains of other vessels?

In addition to this can we have a selection on the maximum allowed rank for a ship class. No more admiral fighter pilots.

[TMaekler]

According to the description from Steve, that is already implemented.

[Steve Walmsley]

Two general and one specific questions:

a) What IDE are you using to program C# Aurora?
b) The old problem of points and decimals when using Aurora, will it be gone with the C# version, or would we still need the launcher?
c) What resources would you suggest to learn C#?

a) Visual Studio 2015

b) I haven't even looked at this. Not sure if C# handles by default or I need to do something about it.

c) I learned from searching on Google   I suggest starting a project and then googling for how to accomplish each part. You will soon pick it up. Of course, I already understood object-oriented programming in general, so that helped. The hardest part was probably getting my head around using LINQ with lambda expressions, which is very useful and very powerful. Just research and read a lot from any source you can find. The alternative is a programming book, but I find those less helpful because they teach you theory, when you will learn a lot faster from practical experience.

[Steve Walmsley]

And some more questions - officers, auto assign & auto promote:

First, how will the game handle the specific amount of needed officers? Through the new structures and rules, the demand for people of specific ranks can vary a lot by how you organize your nation. In VB6 the game auto promoted according to if certain amount of numbers (9 rank one meant 3 rank two, meant 1 rank three...). Will the game auto promote according to the nations needs?

Second, if it cannot auto assign, could we get warning messages, that there are open positions available, so one could potentially manual promote?

Third, what happens if a person is auto promoted to the next rank, but there are no free positions available? He then has to leave his actual post. Can this happen, or would the game wait with the promotion until a free position has come up?

Fourth, lets say the position of captain on the flagship becomes free. Would the auto assign then only look into free officers or would it also cross "promote" captains of other vessels?

In addition to this can we have a selection on the maximum allowed rank for a ship class. No more admiral fighter pilots.

All ships only have a single rank for each office position.

http://aurora2.pentarch.org/index.php?topic=8495.msg101818#msg101818

[Steve Walmsley]

And some more questions - officers, auto assign & auto promote:

First, how will the game handle the specific amount of needed officers? Through the new structures and rules, the demand for people of specific ranks can vary a lot by how you organize your nation. In VB6 the game auto promoted according to if certain amount of numbers (9 rank one meant 3 rank two, meant 1 rank three...). Will the game auto promote according to the nations needs?

Second, if it cannot auto assign, could we get warning messages, that there are open positions available, so one could potentially manual promote?

Third, what happens if a person is auto promoted to the next rank, but there are no free positions available? He then has to leave his actual post. Can this happen, or would the game wait with the promotion until a free position has come up?

Fourth, lets say the position of captain on the flagship becomes free. Would the auto assign then only look into free officers or would it also cross "promote" captains of other vessels?

Currently naval ranks are half the number of previous rank (compared to one third for VB6), while ground ranks are one third (compared to one quarter for VB6). I might change this based on play test.

I could add warning for no auto-assign, although I think that would get tedious with multiple similar messages over time. You can check the commanders window to see any vacancies.

If someone is promoted, they are removed from their current assignments (as all assignments have a specific rank requirement) and made available for a new role.

Unassigned officers and junior officers (not a ship commander) are available for any new position (so the exec of a larger warship could move to command of a smaller warship). Ship commanders are not available for cross-promotion, although if they gain a rank they will become available for larger vessels.

[chrislocke2000]

On missile interception mechanics I've never been sure if the occasional failure for slower AMMs to actually intercept incoming missiles was a bug or a feature. I'm hopping the former and something addressed in C#? 

[TMaekler]

Currently naval ranks are half the number of previous rank (compared to one third for VB6), while ground ranks are one third (compared to one quarter for VB6). I might change this based on play test.

I think it would be nice if the promotions are made roughly upon the need of the navy. Quickly calculated together US personell numbers from Navy + Air Force and have come up with these numbers (when applying some kind of Aurora logic to the ranking system without the new module system):
Lieutenants: 2222
Lt. Commanders: 2480
Commanders: 223
Captains: 192

These would man roughly 4000 air planes and 1.250 ships.
And if I would add the new modules for XO, CIC etc. to these ships, the lower numbers might climb even higher... .


Don't know about the promotions, but an eager captain of a destroyer might be very interested in commanding an aircraft carrier, if a spot becomes available. And if he has prooven himself whilst performing his duty, he probably would be chosen in real life, rather then someone from the free roster, I guess.

[Steve Walmsley]

On missile interception mechanics I've never been sure if the occasional failure for slower AMMs to actually intercept incoming missiles was a bug or a feature. I'm hopping the former and something addressed in C#?

It is because of the movement mechanics. Sometimes the faster missile will move so far past the approaching slower missile that the latter cannot catch up. It isn't a bug though. It seems reasonable that a faster missile will sometimes avoid even the chance of interception from a slower AMM.

[Steve Walmsley]

Don't know about the promotions, but an eager captain of a destroyer might be very interested in commanding an aircraft carrier, if a spot becomes available. And if he has prooven himself whilst performing his duty, he probably would be chosen in real life, rather then someone from the free roster, I guess.

In real life, a destroyer is usually commanded by a lower rank (Commander) than an aircraft carrier (Captain). So in Aurora terms, a high quality destroyer CO would get promoted and become eligible to command the carrier. It would not be normal in real life for a destroyer commander to move to a carrier without a promotion.

[Triato]

Right now, when a ship is scraped, the crew automatically disapears with all the training they have. Is any mechanism to prevent that planed?

I dont post this in sugestions because I dont have a good solution. Maybe they could add some training to existing or future ships?

[JacenHan]

Right now, when a ship is scraped, the crew automatically disapears with all the training they have. Is any mechanism to prevent that planed?

I dont post this in sugestions because I dont have a good solution. Maybe they could add some training to existing or future ships?

I'm pretty sure that their training currently gets added back into the crew pool in the form of extra crew. IE: 500 crewman with twice as many points as a fresh crew would become 1000 sailors in the pool.