I have an idea and I also have little knowledge of the physical implementation of this mod...
Would it be possible to make a Freelancer mod based on believable 'to scale' planets and solar systems?
I had the idea of making a very simple mod for Freelancer where I would make systems with very large planets and suns so far away they would appear to really be millions of kilometres away...
The planets could be approached to within a certain distance where some high atmospheric effects would trigger and you could then 'dock' with the planet and a simple 'landing cut-scene' would play.
There would be no need for a docking ring...
Cruise speed would be upped to compensate for distance between planets and Trade lanes, cruise disruption would become an entirely different scenario...
There would be more emphasis on players converging around planets and stations rather than being able to simple hop across a Trade lane to the next planet...
Players would be more inclined to form groups and convoys/fleets for safety as they travel to other planets or even systems...
The trade lanes would still have there main role of accelerating the time taken to travel between planets but they would be more like a 'slingshot system' (Crossfire mod in Sol system) so no more disrupting trade lanes...
The mod would bring about an entirely different strategy to system manoeuvring and multi-player interaction, There would be a lot of 'open space' to fly in between orbiting stations and from 'trade lane' exits to the 'planet surface'.
The mod would rely a lot on the systems being believably big rather than actually being beyond the limits of the game engine... I have seen it done in Crossfire Mod very well...
The range on weapons would be increased, the combat would rely a lot more on strategy and convoys/escorts in open space... nothing between you and the enemy, just like it would be... no place to hide...
Stations and orbiting intractable objects would be huge and in themselves safe havens for those seeking cover and refuge and also battlegrounds for converging factions...
A single planet could be home to many factions and each having there own orbiting stations and bases... the fighting would take place in the harsh open space between planets or above them...
Typically each 'system' would have 'Jump gates' leading to the nearest stars and there solar systems, or Nebula or gas clouds or even asteroid belts...
The scale would end up being more like this: each system would be like 5 or 6 systems within a house and each planet would become more like an individual system...
There wouldn't be much need for 50 odd systems to explore... not that it wouldn't be nice to explore a 'to scale' sigma 13 or Tau 41... but even with 30 players on-line at one time in one giant system, would make for half decent PvP/RP game-play...
A system could include anything from a few barren planetoids to a vast majestic system with gas giants and thriving planets...
See what I'm getting at here? Basically kicking everything up a notch without asking the game to perform some kind of seamless surface landing or become so vast as to be too boring to explore...
Possible, certainly. The distances are arbitrary, bounded only by the max size of an int (2^31 - 1 since Freelancer ints are signed) in "m". (Then again, you can also go out to -(2^31) since positions can be negative, so I guess you get the full 2^32 ~ 4 billion m range.)
There's a bunch of tutorials on system modding, this is fairly basic stuff (but still finicky because FL is finicky, of course). I'm not sure who else has the time to do it (I certainly don't) but if you can sell the concept- and it looks like you've a decently worked out plan- you might be able to find some others to help out.
The biggest problem with that would be meeting and actually seeing other players, let alone fight them.
In Order to move inside the solar system, you would have to be travelling at speeds that would make flybys of 2 ships next to each other a very short and difficult to achieve event, unless the ship is really really huge.
Even if you had large radar ranges, getting someone in visual range without losing him from view again within split seconds would require you to slow down to speeds where it would take like a minute of trying before you are at the desired position.
And dont even think about pvp at scales like that.
Not necisarrily true. Freeworlds puts cruise at 900m/s, and its comabt and movement system is just as good.
I wouldnt say on the nearly as large scale as proposed here, but a larger scale in general seems liek a good idea. The only issue is stress testing it with the server, each connection, and supporting up to 200 players at any one time.
Its a very good concept, lets see if we cant work it in.
I would hope just a handful of systems would be enough for this kind of mod... I quite like the idea of managing to target and talk to other vessels out of visual range before closing in to engage in PvP combat or to trade.
Another way I thought of doing this mod was to have a system for each planet, so you would really get a sense of flying thousands of miles above the surface, there would also be use of features like gas clouds and flying through the atmosphere would be emulated by a gas cloud layer over the surface of the huge planet, you could then approach lower/closer to engage a docking sequence...
The author of FLAK 88 tried to do this and unfortunately upon a certain size, systems become unstable. I think he said that it causes invisible barriers you might bump into and general instability of the game.
Theres also a maximum number to docking-abilities. Like stations, Jumpgates, Jumpholes and so on. I dont know if thats just hardcoded or would cause other problems, though.
Flak works with Cruise-speed of 850, too, by the way. Tradelanes have been exchanged with buoys - just as freeworlds, i can attest you a pretty well working Fighting/Waylaying-style to the game.
' Wrote:The author of FLAK 88 tried to do this and unfortunately upon a certain size, systems become unstable. I think he said that it causes invisible barriers you might bump into and general instability of the game.
Theres also a maximum number to docking-abilities. Like stations, Jumpgates, Jumpholes and so on. I dont know if thats just hardcoded or would cause other problems, though.
Flak works with Cruise-speed of 850, too, by the way. Tradelanes have been exchanged with buoys - just as freeworlds, i can attest you a pretty well working Fighting/Waylaying-style to the game.
Yea, last I checked, you can go about 300 or so k from the edge of the map before you explode.
in any case, I still say systems can be expanded, jsut not to the level asked of in this topic
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