SDMPNet - Satellite Deployment/Monitoring/Patrol

blackspell · Post by **blackspell** » Sat, 3. Apr 04, 11:09

<new version - v0.999>
new things:
- you now have to pay maintenance costs for your patrol ships (for every killed enemy)
- deployment ship will now install sats in all sectors without one first, upgrading nav.sats to adv.sats (if possible) is done afterwards
- changed satellite placement rules: normally not in enemy sectors, only when there is a player station in it (for those of you who like building fabs in Unkown Sectors - including me ;)
- patrol ships stay in current sector after securing it instead of returning to home sector. I consider this useful since Khaak invade the same few sectors most of the time. This way you already have a patrol ship in them and they not always need to jump through the whole universe to get there.
- patrol ships now attack enemies based on the all enemies/khaak only option. This means they hunt down those innocent pirates only if you have Pirates set to foe.
</new version>

SDMPNet Satellite Deployment, Monitoring and Patrol Network
Available via www.xscripting.com or via my homepage http://blackspell.gmxhome.de

With this kit you can assign a ship to deploy satellites in all your sectors. The satellites will then monitor their sector for enemy intrusion. If they detect enemies, they will call in one of your patrol ships, if available (see readme for details how it works).
Per M6 on SDMPNet patrol you can defend about 20 sectors.
The script is based on a virtual headquarters which needs to be a satellite production factory (Nav.Sat/Adv.Sat)

Let me know what you think of it.

blackspell · Post by **blackspell** » Sat, 3. Apr 04, 15:36

released this morning, and i already found a bug in it - aarghh! (deployment ship does not use jumpdrive for returntohome)

plz do not download until i resubmitted the file (currently trying to reach SteelRush, webmaster of xscripting.com)
but it is easy to fix it on your own, if you don't want to wait:
in script: cmd.plugin.sdmpnet.deploysats line 37 there is a wrong script call.
replace this line with "=[THIS]->call script plugin.sdmpnet.movefasttosector : sector = $homesector"

[edit]
i finally managed to resubmit the file. now it works as expected.

dPM_HeMan · Post by **dPM_HeMan** » Sat, 3. Apr 04, 19:43

blackspell wrote:The satellites will then monitor their sector for enemy intrusion.

this idea is quiet useful, i'll check back here later

blackspell · Post by **blackspell** » Thu, 8. Apr 04, 20:05

www.xscripting.com download section seems to be online again.
i just uploaded the new version of my script SDMPNet, v0.99. hopefully, the download works ;)

changes:
- fixed some minor bugs
- added cmd to control satellite behaviour (all enemies / khaak only)
- added cmd to turn log messages on or off

blackspell · Post by **blackspell** » Thu, 29. Apr 04, 22:48

added a reply to push it up - otherwise no one would notice the new version

JustHere4Coffee · Post by **JustHere4Coffee** » Thu, 29. Apr 04, 23:15

you're charging the player for using his own ships? isn't that a little over-the-top?

nice ideas otherwise, though

blackspell · Post by **blackspell** » Fri, 30. Apr 04, 06:10

you're charging the player for using his own ships? isn't that a little over-the-top?

you may be right, but i'm hoping to get this script signed, and since payment is a requirement for every automatic thing...
although i'm not sure if egosoft will ever sign any script - mkess and burnit don't seem to have much time for this ;)

Charlie Whiskey · Post by **Charlie Whiskey** » Sat, 1. May 04, 16:18

Just a quick question: Your readme says that you are using a cheat to move ecells, how does that work?

blackspell · Post by **blackspell** » Sat, 1. May 04, 17:22

since we can not access docked ships oss, it tries to simulate sending out a ship to buy ecell.

- calculate distance to nearest spp
- wait the amount of time it would take a harrier to travel there and back again
- insert ecell by using 'install y units of ware'
- bill player/homebase for ecells

if you would like to know more details just take a look into the script plugin.sdmpnet.movefasttosector

Charlie Whiskey · Post by **Charlie Whiskey** » Sat, 1. May 04, 21:54

$30000 per cluster??

That's really expensive considering how frequent Khaak spawns, and that a Manta costs barely 4 times that! Even for my 130+ fabs empire this is a major expenditure! Don't forget I've also got to pay the fuel bill too!

By the way, if I need a brand new satellite factory, I might as well build a loop since it is a pain to find a stable and constant supply of all the resources. If I do that then I'll have spare capacity at the SPP, so it is probably a better idea to move the ships back to the designated SPP for refueling instead of having them idle on the spot.

blackspell · Post by **blackspell** » Sun, 2. May 04, 07:18

it's not always 30000, on average its between 10 and 20 thousand creds since most khaak cluster are only mid-size.
in my game i use a double-looped adv.sat factory in paranid prime for it. although it runs like hell it makes almost no money due to the constant patrol ship billing.
hm, ok, this probably a bit too expensive. I will think about lowering it (maybe to the half or so) for the next release.

as for the ecell supply: at the moment the ships buy ecell directly before jumping (this was the easiest way to implement it ;) although not very realistic, it has the advantage that jumping takes longer - at least, I think, that's an advantage.
resupplying after returning from mission has two logical problems: we don't know how much ecells will be needed for the next jump and it may happen that we are called to another sector while waiting for our resupply ships to return to us.
not sure, yet, how this it done best

Charlie Whiskey · Post by **Charlie Whiskey** » Sun, 2. May 04, 08:41

blackspell wrote:resupplying after returning from mission has two logical problems: we don't know how much ecells will be needed for the next jump and it may happen that we are called to another sector while waiting for our resupply ships to return to us.
not sure, yet, how this it done best

Why not just top up the tank? That's what I'm doing manually already. And if the ship is needed during refueling, just order the M5 to come home which doesn't take too long. You are simulating the M5 anyway right? Just recalculate the time delay then I suppose.

blackspell · Post by **blackspell** » Mon, 3. May 04, 18:11

yes, that would work. but only difference would be the point in time when the ships resupply with ecell.
resupplying directly before jumping increases the time a ships needs to reach the target sector - i personally like this, since it prevents the script/the ships from getting to strong/fast.

Charlie Whiskey · Post by **Charlie Whiskey** » Mon, 3. May 04, 20:30

But on the other hand if it doesn't perform as well as I do it manually then I might as well do it myself. I mean the only reason that I'm using a script is because I'm getting sick of doing it manually and would rather spend more time enjoy what else is in the game, not trying to gain advantage through the script.

blackspell · Post by **blackspell** » Mon, 3. May 04, 20:42

this depends on your point of view, of course.
i'm using the script cause i am sick of doing it myself, too, but for me it's enough having the task done 'some way', the script does not have to be better than doing it manually.

btw, that is true for most things in x2. killing ships manually is far more effective than the 'attack.all' script. manually supplying your fabs with resources would be more effective than the 'buy.ware.best' script, too

imho, that is basically a balancing issue: having some task done automatically by script, or doing it yourself to do it as effective as possible
but you don't have to agree with that, of course

egosoft.com

egosoft.com

SDMPNet - Satellite Deployment/Monitoring/Patrol

SDMPNet - Satellite Deployment/Monitoring/Patrol

Re: new: SDMPNet (Satellite Deployment/Monitoring/Patrol)

new version: 0.99