Question About Carriers

posted on June 25th, 2014, 4:45 am

Is it possible to have have the fighters spawn from a hardpoint on the carrier's model rather than simply appearing in space? I want them to file out of a hangar on the model I'm using.

posted on June 25th, 2014, 5:33 am

The fighters spawn from the replaceweapon's hardpoint as far as I recall, so if your weapon's hardpoint is at the distinct hardpoint you wish, that would work.

posted on June 25th, 2014, 6:47 am

Doesn't seem to be working. The fighters are spawning from the root in the direction of the nearest enemy rather than straight from the defined hardpoint. They always point to the enemy even if they are on the opposite side of the map and I can't see them. It is also a non-special weapon variant, which now that I think about it may be part of the problem.

Edit: I thought it was toward the enemy, turns out it's just any angle between about 10 and 50 degrees clockwise or counter clockwise. Restricting the fire arc doesn't fix it. Still spawning from root even though the odf references an existing hp.

Edit2: It looks like the line I want is replacementXClassXPosition to make it spawn from the hangar, but they're still turning when they leave. Perhaps if the weapon spawns a dummy fighter that can't turn and gets replaced with the real one once it's clear?

Edit3: The idea from edit2 almost worked. The dummy fighters spawn in the hangar, clear the ship, then are replaced with the real fighters. The problem is that the carrier's fighter launch replaceweapon loses track of the fighters after they're replaced and just keeps making more. I've tried replacementregisterasnew = 0, transferstats = 1, replacementmaintainorders = 1, replacementkeepname = 1, and preservestatus = 1 for the dummy-fighter-to-real-fighter replaceweapon and originalclass = "dummyfighter" for the real fighter.

posted on June 25th, 2014, 4:32 pm

Ah yes, they can't be made to spawn facing a certain direction - they are craft, so they will try to attack what enemies they see on a dime (due to the physics). Yes, replacing the replacee will cause the carrier to forget its 'child crafts'

posted on June 25th, 2014, 6:56 pm

Oh well. If replacing the fighter worked, I could have given them collision, too. I'll mess with their turn radius to see if I can at least keep them from exiting the hangar through the hull.

Edit: Reducing turnomega from 0.145 to 0.11 seems to have worked. The fighters aren't quite as nimble but they're still turning tighter than the capital ships I'm using. Also, is there a way to make the fighters pick up targets from further away than about 600 units? I'd like to allow the carrier to stay behind the lines a bit and send its fighters out to the battle rather than needing to get in the thick of it before the fighters start picking targets.