Year 13 - Day 241

I'm still working on the combat routine.  It was taking way too long for an armed ship to destroy the smallest unarmed, unarmored ship, so I adjusted the hit chances and damage up for Beam Lasers.  I'm afraid if it takes too long for combat to finish it will stress out the server too much if I ever manage to go live with the game.  It's going to require a lot of balancing regardless.  I may have to end up raising the damage and hit chances considerably or limiting the number of rounds that combat will run.

The latest code I've been working on is to create a page that will instantly create armed ships for testing purposes.  I've thought about rigging up an entire combat simulator, and I still may, but for now that would require a lot of extra work that I'd rather spend on just getting the combat routine completely fleshed out.

I'll end today's post with a recent screenshot of a ship that was destroyed in combat.  This is what you would see if you clicked on the name of a ship in your Dead Ship List.

More Combat Results

The following combat report is the first one that stops when it needs to, procedurally, rather than going for a set number of rounds.  The report is still messy and lacks any real formatting, but this means that 1 vs 1 ship combat with beam lasers is essentially finished other than debugging and making it look prettier.

I'll likely need to adjust the damage amounts on weapons upwards a bit.  This combat only took four rounds, but it had gone for 21 rounds just before this.  I'm not taking everything into account like the Weaponry or Tactics skills yet, but I don't want a very small unarmed ship to take 25 rounds of combat to be blown up.

Actually, that's not even correct either.  In this situation the unarmed ship should offer to surrender pretty quickly.  Whether the attacker is willing to accept surrenders will be up to the player, but this exact combat should result in a surrender after a few rounds after I've added all the options in.

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While orbiting the planet Oak in the Marvin system, the unarmed IND John C. Butler (42) was attacked by the IND Golden Rule (2).

The IND Goate Bucket (33) is unarmed and remains neutral.
The IND Mobile Bay (37) is unarmed and remains neutral.
The IND Reuben James (39) is unarmed and remains neutral.
The IND Szent István (44) is unarmed and remains neutral.
The IND Hatchass (57) is unarmed and remains neutral.

Order of Battle

Aggressor IND Golden Rule (2)

Defender IND John C. Butler (42)

Initial Targeting

Aggressors

The IND Golden Rule (2) targets the IND John C. Butler (42)

Defenders

The IND John C. Butler (42) targets the IND Golden Rule (2)

Begin Combat

**** Round 1 ****

Golden Rule (2) - IV: 3.4 Speed: 1.5   Damage (C: 0/500 M: 5/1000 E: 0/500)  Armor (ZOR 600/600/600)
The Golden Rule manuevers away from the John C. Butler at Speed 1 to a distance of 5.
 Turret #1 (2 x Beam Laser I) fires at the John C. Butler and misses.
 Turret #2 (2 x Beam Laser I) fires at the John C. Butler and hits the Engine Section for 93 damage.

• Slipdrive I (98) takes 93 points of damage.

John C. Butler (42) - IV: 0 Speed: 0   Damage (C: 179/500 M: 204/500 E: 477/500)
The John C. Butler retreats at speed 0 to a distance of 5.

**** Round 2 ****

Golden Rule (2) - IV: 3.4 Speed: 1.5   Damage (C: 0/500 M: 5/1000 E: 0/500)  Armor (ZOR 600/600/600)
The Golden Rule maintains a distance of 5.
 Turret #1 (2 x Beam Laser I) fires at the John C. Butler and misses.
 Turret #2 (2 x Beam Laser I) fires at the John C. Butler and hits the Command Section for 55 damage.

• Command Module (96) takes 55 points of damage.

John C. Butler (42) - IV: 0 Speed: 0   Damage (C: 234/500 M: 204/500 E: 477/500)
The John C. Butler retreats at speed 0 to a distance of 5.

**** Round 3 ****

Golden Rule (2) - IV: 3.4 Speed: 1.5   Damage (C: 0/500 M: 5/1000 E: 0/500)  Armor (ZOR 600/600/600)
The Golden Rule maintains a distance of 5.
 Turret #1 (2 x Beam Laser I) fires at the John C. Butler and misses.
 Turret #2 (2 x Beam Laser I) fires at the John C. Butler and misses.

John C. Butler (42) - IV: 0 Speed: 0   Damage (C: 234/500 M: 204/500 E: 477/500)
The John C. Butler retreats at speed 0 to a distance of 5.

**** Round 4 ****

Golden Rule (2) - IV: 3.4 Speed: 1.5   Damage (C: 0/500 M: 5/1000 E: 0/500)  Armor (ZOR 600/600/600)
The Golden Rule maintains a distance of 5.
 Turret #1 (2 x Beam Laser I) fires at the John C. Butler and misses.
 Turret #2 (2 x Beam Laser I) fires at the John C. Butler and hits the Engine Section for 25 damage.

• Slipdrive I (98) takes 23 points of damage and is destroyed.
• Ship is Destroyed!

Combat Ends

AssetID: 42 was destroyed.

Year 13 - Day 231

Game development reached an important milestone yesterday evening when the first ship was blown up in the game by the combat routine.  The IND Mobile Bay had the honors of being the first ship lost to enemy fire in the history of Project Libertine.

Even though the ship was blown up, the combat routine still tried to continue, so work continues on making the combat end properly when there are no enemy ships left.  In addition the game doesn't currently show destroyed ships properly, so a lot of work on the interface remains before my first pass at ship combat can be considered complete.