Generic weapon odf files

posted on May 10th, 2013, 9:31 am

Right now there are alot of individual weapon odfs. Would it not be simpler to have a small amount of generic files for each weapon type (fedW_phaser/pulse/torpedo, romW_phaser/pulse/torpedo, kliW_phaser/pulse/torpedo) especially for mods that span all races. As I recall stock Armada2 had some generic files like fed_phaser.odf. They used the '#include_nameodf' command. But certain lines like range or damage were overwritten. In fleetops could the same be done? and specifically could i put a 'validtargets' line in the generic files so they span all faction weapons?

posted on May 10th, 2013, 10:16 am

that's of course possible to do, however you lose some game mechanics, like passives that increase the yield of a weapon. If all vessels share the same weapon files, you can't have a defiant's pulses deal more damage and be more precise, for example. That you require a lot of ODFs to do that is a problem with the way Armada expresses its game mechanics. That mechanism wasn't designed for such complex stuff. It's not a problem in regards to performance, just a problem in managing those files.

Internally in FO development we created tools to do that. We still have plans to polish these tools and make them available to the public, but as that would take quite a bit of extra time, don't expect that before the next major releases.

You could, however, write a small tool yourself. especially if you do a total conversion and don't need the increased complexity, you would also be fine with just doing a single quantum torpedo for all ships.

posted on May 11th, 2013, 3:47 pm

I do something similer for my mod. I have a base weapon file which spans all ships. However, I have it set up so each ship has its own weapon file, which changes specific values for that ship specifically, such as refire rate, and accuracy.

All you need is the #include command, and the base files you need.