An ambitious idea...is it possible!?

[PsiCorps]

Hi all, whilst I haven't uploaded a new version of the B5 mod for a while now I am still working on it.

One of the ideas I've had is for a slight change in how the asteroid tiles work. Here goes:-

Currently when a ship enters an asteroid tile it stops moving, unless it has more than 2 movement points.

What I would like to see when a ship enters an asteroid tile is for a check to be triggered that determines if the unit has run into or been struck by an asteroid.

The chance of hitting/being hit is as follows.

• Colony Ship* - 95%
• Battleship - 95%
• Carrier - 85%
• Cruiser - 75%
• Destroyer - 65%
• Invasion Ship - 55%
• Frigate - 45%
• Scout - 35%
• Squadron** - 25%

* If the colony ship is escorted by another vessel then the escort vessel is checked whilst the colony ship has a 1% chance of being hit. This reflects the military sacrificing their safety for the civilians.
** Squadrons only carry out a check if they are conducting a mission into or out of an asteroid tile this also includes combat space patrol and rebasing.

The base chance shown above would then be mitigated by promotions as follows.

1. Maneuvering in asteroids -10%
2. Asteroid Combat I -5%
3. Asteroid Combat II -5%
4. Interceptor Batteries I -15%
5. Interceptor Batteries II -10%
6. Interceptor Batteries III -5%
7. Interceptor Batteries IV -5%

If/when a unit is hit then the damage is randomly generated and could be up to 100% meaning the ship is destroyed. This check is made every time the unit moves into a new asteroid tile. If a unit stops to repair then a new check is carried out each turn the unit doesn't move but at a reduced chance of being hit again.

Regardless of promotions all units have a minimum 1% chance of being hit, you're never truly safe in space.

This would require a change to how the colony ships take damage, currently any military vessel attacking them automatically kills them. Maybe they could have an asteroid survival chance instead or just ban colony ships from entering asteroid tiles, thus negating the need for a damage status.

Is this possible to do or should I consign it to the bin?

 

[Imperator Knoedel]

That's not how asteroid fields work in real life. This isn't Star Wars, you know. Any ship would see an asteroid coming from (hundreds of thousands of) miles away and have ample time to evade.

 

[PsiCorps]

That's not how asteroid fields work in real life. This isn't Star Wars, you know. Any ship would see an asteroid coming from (hundreds of thousands of) miles away and have ample time to evade.

I'm aware of the asteroid chase sequence in SW:TESB but my reasoning isn't based only on that. When speaking of single asteroids, avoiding them is easy. The asteroid tiles in FF represent fields of asteroids of all sizes. Ships moving into them will be moving quite quickly and the smaller rocks won't be avoidable. Armour on the ships will protect them to an extent but strikes on the hull still do damage.

Have you ever seen the results of a bird strike on an aircraft? The bird may be soft and squidgy but it will still leave a hole in an aircraft. Bird strikes have caused the loss of aircraft on many occasions. (I have a little first hand experience of this)

All I'm trying to do is add a little bit of realism to the feature. If you use the radiation tiles as an example of tiles damaging units, then the concept in FF is wrong. In reality prolonged exposure will simply kill the crew and leave the ship intact but irradiated. But the FF tile damages the unit to the extent that more than 3 turns spent moving through a large radiation field destroys the unit.

The Star Trek mod wouldn't need the feature I am proposing as the ships in that game all have deflector dishes and shielding to protect them but the FF units don't.

 

[Imperator Knoedel]

I think we have very different ideas about realism.

 

[PsiCorps]

I think we have very different ideas about realism.

That's as maybe but my question still stands, is what I would like to do possible?

 

[Imperator Knoedel]

That's as maybe but my question still stands, is what I would like to do possible?

Theoretically yes, practically it seems like a lot of coding work. Maybe you could just add it as a random event with very high probability?

 

[PsiCorps]

Thanks Imp. Knoedel

 

[TC01]

This probably wouldn't be that difficult to implement. The harder thing would be the conditions for what happens when strike craft are involved and the "colony ships escorted by another vessel" thing. Which is to say, I'd have to think about how you'd handle that, but simply hooking the on unit move code and rolling randomly would be easy.

I would suggest adding a tag to Features that's something like "iRandomHitOnEntry", that gives the default percentage of random damage happening when a unit enters. And then to Units/Promotions other tags that influence the default percentage could be added too.

 

[PsiCorps]

This probably wouldn't be that difficult to implement. The harder thing would be the conditions for what happens when strike craft are involved and the "colony ships escorted by another vessel" thing. Which is to say, I'd have to think about how you'd handle that, but simply hooking the on unit move code and rolling randomly would be easy.

I would suggest adding a tag to Features that's something like "iRandomHitOnEntry", that gives the default percentage of random damage happening when a unit enters. And then to Units/Promotions other tags that influence the default percentage could be added too.

Thanks TC01, your response has given me some hope that it could be done.

 

[Blake00]

That's not how asteroid fields work in real life. This isn't Star Wars, you know. Any ship would see an asteroid coming from (hundreds of thousands of) miles away and have ample time to evade.

And by "this" you're referring to a scifi fantasy tv show mod for a computer game with scifi fantasy elements lol. On no by all means lets tell PsiCorps off for not being realistic enough in this Civ4 FF mod brought to you by Nasa lol. In fact he better cancel the whole mod as Babylon 5 isn't real either lol. Centauri? No can't have them.. Minbari? Nope in the bin thanks. Not real!!!!