[A17/B18] Orbital Hubs United - Dropships 1.2 (14.02.2018)

[Madman666]

Well, if you get to sounds eventually its more than good enough for me)) By the way, right now you can land your flyers right in the middle of allied settlments and pilfer all their stuff absolutely unobstructed. Is that intended? I just robbed the crap out of a tribal base and they didn't say a thing... And also didn't find how to make weapons for aircraft anywhere, are those included in your other, bigger mod? Thanks in advance for answers))

[SpaceDorf]

You just ninjad my own answer, in which I wanted to praise the grand Cpt.Ohu and his Skitarii who recocvered this great STC in the far reaches of space and I would be honored if something of mine could help your quest.

In my current game I also noticed the calculated hex you show for range, which is really good and has not failed me so far.
I think I did not notice it before, because I fueled the Dropship to 2.3k .. so the hex was apperently so big it went out of sight over the horizon.

The point of no return is normally defined as the point where you depleted exaclty half of your fuel and return to the exact starting point is no longer savely possible, with error always rounding on the side of caution.
So if the starting and landing procedure also requires fuel, lets assume the worst case scenario of crossing a complete 400x400 map while starting and landing.
To bad the waypoint tool does not tell us how many hexes are crossed, this would make things so much easier

So the question is : is fuel consumption influenced by carried mass or not ?

Landing Time is the Time between the Message "Your Ship has arrived" and the moment it touches ground ?

Which is about ten seconds to roughly the center of a 300x300 map which I use. ( so between 150-200 map tiles, is the same speed used on the local map ? )

What about hovering ? you have arrived, but don't touch down ?

Since I also use the set-up-camp mod I can always land and ressuply by droppod

So Imho the description, a short excerpt from the tech manual, should tell :

----

A completely fueled and well maintained Orbital Hubs United Dropship reaches a top speed of half a hex per second and has a save maximum reach of XXX Hexes.
Calculations and Tests in our lab have proven that maintaining this speed with 150kg cargo, the OhU Standardized Value for two crewmembers, uses YYY amount of OHU approved TrashMan Chemfuel.

The assisted Take-Off and Landing Process uses another ten to twenty seconds of fuel, depending on the terrain at your landing zone.

If the full cargo capacity of one metric ton is used, the OHU Dropship still uses only ZZZ of TrashMan Chemfuel per second.

----

Remember the OHU Group is a mass producer of small ground to orbit transporters, the game is deniability.
( and only if the fuel consumption chip is set to test center mode )




Finally let us pray in the Name of the Emperor and the Omnissiah,
For Terra and Mars, the two Heads of the Aquila.


Look to your battle gear and it will protect you.
We guard it witrh our lives.
Your armour is your soul, and your soul's dedication is its armour.
The soul of the warrior is the protector of humanity.
Honour the craft of death.
Only the Emperor is higher in our devotion.
Honour the battle gear of the dead. We ask only to serve.
( and arrive in one piece )

[SpaceDorf]

And also didn't find how to make weapons for aircraft anywhere, are those included in your other, bigger mod? Thanks in advance for answers))

There is a turret you can build at the smithy , the 40k Weapons .. well yeah .. belong obviously to the 40k mod.

Maybe someone could talk the rimsenal team into an OhU - Addon ..

Pinky, are you pondering what I am pondering ?

gee Brain, you would love to play Dinosaurs with Mr. Washburne ?

No, Pinky .. but with the Firefly Template, it should be possible to convert the 40k Ships into a Vanilla Friendly version,
or we could even try to steal graphics from such games as FasterThanLight ..

and with them, we take over the rimWorld !


=== EDIT ====

Something that crossed my mind, while watching my pawns load another ship ..
Is there a way, are you planning a way, to cancel the loading process ?

[AngleWyrm]

This calculation is a bit complicated to put into an estimate of fuel consumption on the screen, though I'll see what I can do. And what would the reference point for the proposed point of no return be? The current parking spot? The nearest player settlement? The current position of the ship?

Range in world hexes is the variable of interest to players. The others are sub-components to it, and if it's difficult for the dev to figure out how far a ship can go, it's nearly impossible for a player to make that calculation.

The point of no return, or operational radius of an aircraft is the maximum radius drawn from it's liftoff point out to a range where it can still return to it's liftoff point. 

Fuel consumption is currently defined as fuel per second of flight, and a speed factor of 1 (normal dropship) means roughly 2 seconds of flight per world tile [plus complications].

speed (world tiles/second) x fuel (seconds) = distance (world tiles)
2 seconds/worldTile = 1/2 worldTile/second

[SpaceDorf]

This calculation is a bit complicated to put into an estimate of fuel consumption on the screen, though I'll see what I can do. And what would the reference point for the proposed point of no return be? The current parking spot? The nearest player settlement? The current position of the ship?

Range in world hexes is the variable of interest to players. The others are sub-components to it, and if it's difficult for the dev to figure out how far a ship can go, it's nearly impossible for a player to make that calculation.

The point of no return, or operational radius of an aircraft is the maximum radius drawn from it's liftoff point out to a range where it can still return to it's liftoff point. 

Fuel consumption is currently defined as fuel per second of flight, and a speed factor of 1 (normal dropship) means roughly 2 seconds of flight per world tile + the respective time it takes for the ship to drop on / leave a map. This calculation is a bit complicated to put into an estimate of fuel consumption on the screen, though I'll see what I can do.

speed (world tiles/second) x fuel (seconds) = distance (world tiles)
2 seconds/worldTile = 1/2 worldTile/second

fixed :
speed (world tiles/second) x ( fuel (seconds) - 2 x localmap_offset (seconds) )= distance (world tiles)

2 seconds/worldTile = 1/2 worldTile/second
localmap_offset = either the average value or maximal value of travel on a local map during take off and landing.

[AngleWyrm]

So localmap_offset is the seconds of fuel burned during take-off and landing; great that clears up the complications.

[SpaceDorf]

yeah. since 2 seconds on the local map are allready a complete hex, this is quite important.

And the fact that the range of the return flight is actually shorter due to this extra fuel consumption is really grinding on my nerves. And how to predict and show this ..
On the other hand, this is so true to real life, that I love the immersion it creates.

[AngleWyrm]

speed (world tiles/second) x fuel (seconds) = distance (world tiles)
2 seconds/worldTile = 1/2 worldTile/second

fixed :
speed (world tiles/second) x ( fuel (seconds) - 2 x localmap_offset (seconds) )= distance (world tiles)
2 seconds/worldTile = 1/2 worldTile/second
localmap_offset = either the average value or maximal value of travel on a local map during take off and landing.

further refinement:
speed (world tiles/second) x ( fuel (seconds) - 4 x localmap_offset (seconds) )= distance (world tiles)

Two take-offs and two landings for a complete round trip, with the remaining seconds of fuel defining the radius of maximum distance after reaching altitude. Half of that would be the radius that a ship can cover and still return home on the fuel it's got.

For a generic value of localmap_offset, maybe something representing how long it would take to cross a given map size from the edge to edge of that map size. Then the actual distance available would always be at least what is predicted, and maybe a little bit more depending on where in the map the ship parked and which way it's headed. So I like the "maximal value of travel on a local map" version.

If that generalization seems ok, then the localmap_offset could be the same value as fuel consumption per world tile crossed, the time spent in a world tile. 1/speed = seconds/worldTile

[Cpt.Ohu]

so when is this going to be released in steam??
also any known mod conflicts??
and requires new saves or current save compatible??

A steam release will still take some time since there are a few kinks in the mod that would make support on the steam workshop a nightmare.
The mod shouldn't conflict with anything, but of course I don't know for sure. One incompability may be CE, but only if you want to use the ship turret.

Also, the mod should be savegame compatible, but that depends on whether the generation of a special world object succeeds on your savegame or not.

@SpaceDorf & AngleWyrm: If you're really interested, I can attach the excel-sheet with actual calculations at some point. The last rendition you put together is quite close already.

I'll probably just draw a second radius indicating the maximum distance to travel if you want to return to your current location. Just have to figure out how to display this info on the world map while targeting as well.

Also: Currently cargo load isn't factored into fuel consumption. The easiest way would be to add another scaling factor as a percentage. E.G. a 0.1% increase in consumption for every 1% of cargo, resulting in a maximum increase of fuel consumption of 10% for a fully loaded ship.

[AngleWyrm]

Currently cargo load isn't factored into fuel consumption. The easiest way would be to add another scaling factor as a percentage. E.G. a 0.1% increase in consumption for every 1% of cargo, resulting in a maximum increase of fuel consumption of 10% for a fully loaded ship.

What happens if the on-board fuel weight is consumed while in transit? Here's a page on optimizing fuel consumption that illustrates the type of solutions and observations that arise from this question.

An interesting assertion is "if you drive a car at constant speed, then the number of miles per gallon will first increase and then decrease"

[SpaceDorf]

Yeah .. Stupid Me. My Internet Provider sucked yesterday so today I give you :

The way landing and starting works we actually know the max localmap_offset :
its the mapsize of the colony.

every landing and launching crosses the complete map once.

so for launching you allready know ( localmap.size - localmap.x ) as flightpath -> length/speed = times
while landing gives you localmap.x which remains as the only unknown value and should therefore default to max mapsize.
And I would love to see the excel file

===== EDIT =====

I have been messing with DropPods for the first time, and there are some things left
I would like to see for the dropships :

Setting Fuellevel allready displayes the Max Range .. if you remove the flight time for mapsize.max you can predict the save range there.

When Selecting a Pod it displays a message .. Not Ready for Launch, Loading in Progress.
Can't you use the same workgiver for your dropships ? And would it not be better to restrict the pawns assigned to the ship from loading instead of them forming a caravan ?

Something New : Could you give the Ship a fourth tab which displays the remaining orders ? Similiar to the cargo bay you can see there what is assigned to be loaded into the ship .. as addition you could abort the order from there similiar to unloading.

[SpaceDorf]

Last for now, I hope :

What I learned from a Siege today :

Park your Dropship in a Neighboring Hex.
Use a Droppod to send a Scout into the enemy territory
Land your dropship wherever you like.

[Duftmand]

I'm playing with Hardcore SK, is this compatible? and if it isn't is there some way i can change the resources required to build the dropships so that they fit with what SK uses?

[SpaceDorf]

I am reliefed HardcoreSK guy posted ..

So I will grace you with an answer first :
Honestly I don't know, and I don't care    ( sorry being tired and cheeky )
My guess is, that the Dropships should work, because as far as I know ( and care ) HardcoreSK and CE ( just to be complete)
don't mess with the stuff required for the dropships .. if the droppods work, so should the dropships ..
I would be careful about the turret though.

-----------------------------------------------------
Now I have another thing to write about ...

aimless wandering of loading pawns. Could have two reasons now .. I gave the order to load and enter my second dropship
to support my attack on an pirate outpost ( the pirates ran single file into my firing squad, and a grenade took out the power of the single turret, but damn those giant spiders ... )
anyhow .. I gave the load orders, saved and closed my game.

After reloading the two assigned pawns stumbled around like someone removed their thinkdefs again.
I have to admit I am not sure if it was the restart, or that I forgot to set pawns needed to load above zero ..
after they entered and left the ship, I gave the orders again and now they are hauling away.

Sadly the Debug Log only writes about lazy minions and unhappy babys ..

[Rocket_Raccoon]

Got a game breaking error when a big group of pirates attacked my colony with ships.
Not set to an instand of an object, that sort. I´ll look if i can find a screenshot/error log, bc i was not able to save after the errors popped in.
€: found some.

So it basically startet with the following error message:
At first my colonists and turrets could still hit the pirates, but after a few moments not anymore.