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I think this game lacks :
1) Good MP capabilities;
2) Battleships, at least 1 model for each Power (Alliance, Hegemony and Zolons);
3) Farcasting between at least all neighbouring systems (exept for some exceptions, you can only farcast from sector to sector inside a given system);
4) The possibility to start a fighter mission from inside the carrier.

Thanks for reading!

=S=

1) Good MP capabilities;

Could you elaborate more? Do you mean more 'features' like more game modes or do you mean just better stability?

2) Battleships, at least 1 model for each Power (Alliance, Hegemony and Zolons);

I'm not sure if milo fit BB's into his order of battle in the SS universe. SS is based largly on modern aerial/naval combat (hence the lack of corvettes) and as I understand it, the US Navy doesnt have any active-duty battleships anymore. I was under the impression he added a 'battleship' class just for modders to fill up.

4) The possibility to start a fighter mission from inside the carrier.

You mean be sitting in a fighter on the launch deck at the beginning of a mission? That is possible, I've done it before. If you have a mission that you want to start on the deck, copy and paste the .def up somewhere and people can take a look at it. I've only ever done it via old-school deffing, though as I understand it, it's possible in the .def editor.

The U.S. Navy does have BBs: the Iowa Class is still in service today, they were put back in service in the 80s.
As a matter of fact, they are the only ones who have BBs in service despite thei obvious weaknesses: big non maneauverable and vulnerable to any kind of anti-ship-missle.

Besides I got a question: what is the difference between a Dreadnought and a Battleship in Starshatter?
By definition every main line military ship today is a Dreadnougth as this word describes the HMS Dreadnought and its design features like the placement of the guns which are still in use today (I do not mean the guns!) well whith one exception perhaps: those ships that do not employ guns any more like most FFGs and DDGs that only have guns as secondary armaments, but even they are placed on the hull in a Dreadnought-like manner.

1) Good MP capabilities :
I mean beeing able to host a game at all. Other than when a dedicated server is running (wich is extremly rare) I can't host a game (by clicking on the local server/add/public/no password, etc). Most of the community has that problem as well. I fly about 4 to 6 times a week and I have about 10 to 12 people with whom to fly with, generally in multiplayer missions up to 4 players (wich is the biggest MP game I have ever joined).
From all those 10-12 people, only 2 can host - wich is indeed very limiting.
In fact, other than the people that very occasionaly put up dedicated servers (like the Mc Cormack family), I only know 2 people in this comunity that can host a game - DamoclesX and the Legionaire (a.k.a. RafaleC_77th).
And yes, stability should be highly improved. I can have a 4 player MP game that runs well, without any CTDs or freezing, as I may have (like this morning) a 2 player game that kept constantly bugging, resulting even on a system crash (I had to cold boot my new computer on the plug) [:'(]
Multiplayer is definately something that has to be reviewed, as a game without easy (you press a button and there you go!) and stable MP is or will be a dead game. People don't buy non-MP games anymore - in fact, one of the reasons I bought this game was because it was announced as MP capable. I paid $ 58 USD for a backed up downlod wich is the price of a new copy of IL2 or Medal of Honour, and I expect a service to the standard of what I paid for, wich is not what is happening today, regarding MP.
Nevertheless, if you can get me hosting a game on my machine I will worship you [&o]...

2) Let's go over battleships now. Modern naval/air combat on 20th century earth has nothing to do with space combat, thousands of years from now. For instance, a cruiser can sink another cruiser with a single harpoon or he may need a few of them if ECM works. But current Naval combat is about spoting the other b4 he spots you and fire before he does.
I can see the paralel with SS's emcon levels, as on modern naval combat one "plays" with sensors and emissions in order to reduce "signature".
In what concerns this topic, SS is ok with it's emcon levels.
Now returning to BBs. As you have seen, the difference between 20th century naval combat and SS is that in SS we have shields. So you have to saturate your target's shield with missiles and energy weapons, so gradually part of your damage power gets on the other side of the shield and starts doing damage.
A good example of this is to put a Broadsword class Destroyer against a Devastator class Cruiser. The Devastator will eventually destroy the Broadsword, as it has more damaging energy weapons (the grasers), as both have nike or Athena missiles, wich offcourse are useless due to PDB guns.
In the end, the Volnaris will be destroyed while the Devastator will have lost between 15 to 30% of it's hull, maximum, on a "worst-case scenario".
In consequence, the "wining ship" in Capital ship engagements on a one to one basis will be the one that has "better shields" (wich requires more power, hence more space) and more energy wepons (necessary to saturate your enemy's shields).
More means bigger, and in that perspective, BBs seem indispensable and lacking in this game.
Note that in most "known" Sci-fi games (software or tabletop wargames) like Star trek, Star Wars, Renegade Legion, Battletech, Imperium, Freespace, etc. the BB exists and in quantity, having it's place generally as the flagship of a battlegroup.
I would definately like to see BB's - one per "power" would be great (the hegemony one would definately rock, judging by their usual better looking - japanese anime style ships [:D]).

4) Start a fighter inside a carrier :
Well, other than on stock missions and campaigns, no one has ever built a custom mission that worked where you actually found yourself seeing a white line across the horizon. You can hear the music but the ESC menu doesn't work at all. Here is what you get when you put the player fighter inside a carrier, even if you select Alert :


I know lot's of people that have encountered this problem and there are several posts on the support forum regarding this.
Now, if you have succeeded in building a CUSTOM mission where you can actually launch from a carrier or one where the farcasters actually work, please e-mail it to me, so I can detect the settings you chose on the mission editor.
Now if you manualy have to edit the mission file to get that working, it is not a reliable solution for a $ 58 USD solution. That is for freeware, not for a commercial product that you can find on the shelves.

5) Conclusion :

People who buy a $ 58 USD game are exactly the same that buy a new car - all needs to be working fast and good, reliable and very intuitive. They shouldn't have to open the engine and fuse up things for it to work.

Otherwhise SS is an excellent game - wich I play online almost daily and I am confident all these and other minor topics will be dealt with.

=S=

Basically...

A Dreadnought is a sort of pocket battleship, powerfull weapons, more manoeuverable and quicker than a BB, but with less armour.

A BB has powerfull armour, powerfull weapons but it is generally less manoeuverable and slower than most capital ships.

A Juggernaut Is something so big that cannot be classified as a BB. A good example would be Battlestar Galactica, Cylon base star, Vorlon planet killer, the Death Star, basically any starship or station that can move by itself and display AWESOME firepower, armour, etc.

For those of you that don't have an idea of fleet to fleet engagements I sugest you try this mission I wrote called "return of the king".
In this mission you would appreciate having a Battleship as it's firepower would have served you well. You can download this mission at the Starshatter Central downloads page by clicking here.

If you flew this mission, you will appreciate and understand the importance of the in modern space combat.

=S=

The only 3 similarities between 21st century earth naval combat and SS space combat is the way we name the ship's classes (Corvette's, Cruise's, etc.), the ranks (Captain, Commodore, Admiral, etc.) and the impact of fighters on naval/space battles.

The similarities end there because :

1) You are fighting on space not on water and atmosphere;

2) Missiles won't work between SS capital ship engagements as they work for 21st century earth naval engagements as in naval engagements he who fires first normally kills first and one shot is often synonim of one kill (judging by top naval warfare simulators like Harpoon - wich seems to be a game worshiped by naval warfare sim fanatics [:D]).
On SS and while PDB guns are working and shields up, no missile will ever get close to your hull, unless you are flanked by 4-5 ships (wich will saturate your PDBs) or unless your enemy is firing exactly from below you, as Milo's ships drastically lack PDB guns below (PDB = point defense guns).

3) The only missiles that work effectively against Capital ships are fighter-launched missiles, as they are too small to be intercepted by the Capital ship's shileds and PDBs.
A flight of 4 to 6 fighter/attack space fighters, armed with anti-ship missiles are generally enough to take down an SS cruiser, but insufficient to take down a starbase, for instance.
Fighters remain nevertheless, the best way to destroy a capital ship in SS.

4) Contrary to 21st century Naval combat, guns remain the best way to destroy your opponent(s) in capital SHIP TO SHIP combat (no fighters involved), as in SS missiles are inefficient if PDBs are working and the best way to pound an enemy is to keep sending waves of energy beams - from wich some energy will pass through the shielld and progressively deplete the hull's armour.
SS combat is more like WWII naval combat or even Rennaissance ship combat (he who has the most guns or manoeuvers faster wins) - wich is obviously more fun than firing a single missile before your opponent and it's over...

=S=

Orbital Bombardment and terrain following radar (wich is an old technology!)[:D]

Last I heard milo had everthing he needed for the next master, I wouldnt want us to add more onto that cause it would never get out

adding new ships is easy for me, or other modders, but not milo, because he has to balance it carfully against his other ships, factor it into the story, write missions and campaigns that can use them, create storys.

Yes, you can definately create alert fighter packages (and working farcasters) through the in-game mission editor by following the instructions that I wrote for the game manual. It's hard for me to guess what problem you are having in your missions, but if I have to guess I will guess that you are assigning the player to the squadron instead of the alert element. To make this work, you need to create three elements in the mission:

1. The carrier. Choose any carrier class and call it whatever you like. This could also be one of the space stations or a groundside starbase.

2. The squadron. This is a set of twenty or so fighters that are stored in the hangar of the carrier or station. Make sure that the squadron element has the carrier parameter set to the name you chose for the carrier in in step 1, and that the squadron is NOT listed as the player.

3. The alert element. This is a flight of from one to four fighters that will actually launch from the carrier or starbase. Make sure that this element has the squadron parameter set to the name you chose for the squadron in step 2. Do not use the same name for the alert element as you did for either the carrier or the squadron (e.g. You could correctly use Archon / Stallions / Alpha for the carrier, squadron, and alert elements respectively). Make sure that the IFF, Class, and Design are the same in both the squadron and the alert element. Set the Player, Playable, and Alert flags for this element ONLY.

If you want, send me the mission you are having trouble with and I will fix it and send it back.

Good luck,

Dear Milo,

Thanks for answering.

I have figured out carrier launch procedures and all is clear to me and works fine now.

As for farcasters I can now get them to work well within the sectors of a given system but not between two different start systems. Here is a mission if you want to check it out :
http://perso.numericable.fr/~pazmario/starshatter/downloads/carrierops1.zip
Please check it out and tell me what I have done wrong. Thanks in advance.

Regarding your next version of Starshatter, is it possible to have Battleships? I think they are cruely missing in Starshatter as all Sci-fi games/TV series have them.
Please think about it... [&o][&o][&o]

Thanks for getting your hands in the "mud" for my mission editing problems.

a big salute to you John,

=S=

I can agree with Diabolico about BB's, they could be effective, here and there. These and other classes of capital ships are able to be modded in from what I understand....

Let me add to this list the possiblility of at very least being able to go to a dock and repair a ship during a mission. That could at least make a custom "campaign" work. Campaigns released would be a nice second, but I won't push it...

Bbs would be good, but they woul dneed such an awsome point defense system that you couldn never fighter attack the, otherwise they would just be swarmed with torpedos and missiles from the faster ships that could duck and dodge out of the bbs firing arcs

Even then, the distance that a fighter can lock and launch a missile from is great enough to prevent PD lasers from working, and PD missiles tend to ignore fighters if another capship firing torpedoes is in the area.

::disengage lurker field::

Normally I'm not one to post outloud, but the topic got me thinking... If I could ask for one thing to be added it would be animated beam graphics. Right now, we can easily simulate photon torpedoes and the like with the animation loop in the weapon's specs...I'd love to see the same thing for beam weapons.... I realize that its most likely to late to add things like that in, but I just had to say it out loud...

Nec.

::engage lurker field::

it could be possible.. if you use a very long torpedo texture... and change the length and witdth to make it act like a beam.. then.. hmmm.. take away any speed or turning / tracking it may have

dunno but it might work

I'll tack on a few of my own ideas;

1. Offensive Docking - i.e. the ability to have a friendly ship dock with an enemy or neutral ship. I have notice the dock command, but it seems to only be for friendly units. This is needed for everything from starship captures, to pirates raiding freighters.
2. More Events - It would be nice to be able damage a specific system on a ship with an event, and trigger events when a system is damaged. Allow triggering events based on docking would be handy with the above.
3. Armor - Not hull integrity, but armor that can bounce a round. Shields might be able to be modified to do this, but I haven't played enough with it to know. Shields are nice and all, but since they only reduce damage by a percentage, a pea shooter can still sink a BB. It's kind of like saying a .22 pistol can blow up a M1A1, if given enough ammo... This is doubly need to replicate settings that don't have "shield" technology.
4. Variable Jumps - Why are all jumps created equal? If I have a larger jump drive I should have a much larger selection of jump destinations. I'm thinking in a Traveler-style game for the old RPGers out there.

That's it for now, I'll say the pie-in-the-sky ideas for another day.

Dedicated Server:
A server wich doesn't require to download the whole game! It can be really annoying to upload 400MB to the server, on a normal cable connection.

Bug Fixing:
Some fighters are landing backwards on Starstations or carriers. (In Multiplayer Matches)

Element of TIE Fighters are spread around several kilometers. Not good! Make it possible to adjust size of the formation.

More than 8 engine ports for ship P L E A S E !

Ships start mission with full shield and energy weapons do maximum damage at maximum distance. Those as parameters for .DEF files, like shield_full: true and max_damage: true

ORIGINAL: Diabolico

2) Missiles won't work between SS capital ship engagements as they work for 21st century earth naval engagements as in naval engagements he who fires first normally kills first and one shot is often synonim of one kill (judging by top naval warfare simulators like Harpoon

What? No interceptor missiles? No computer tracked machine guns? No chaff? No flare?

Just to let everyone know...

You do have flares that will sidetrack not only inbound fighter missiles, but capital ship missiles as well. All you have to do is add the fighter decoy section to your cap ships and voila, effective missile decoys. A cautionary note here. Use max muzzles and be sure to "aim" the decoys out and away from your vessel. As the AI is pretty linear in its attack patterns, if the flares come out dead astern, the missiles will still hit you.

Sorry, Milo. I probably shouldn't tell folks that.

Check out the bright dot down by the port fin on my BB. That is a fighter flare that works like a charm on any inbound missile. Although, they are individually more effective if you are moving first.

I have all of the files (Thanks again Dragonlead) but wouldlike some help converting it into the .dat format.
I have succeeded making a .dat but the mod enabler doesn't enable it, although the "Yamato.dat" does show on the mods list.
Can anybody help me out with this please?
Thanks in advance,

=S=