[FEEDBACK THREAD] Full Power to Fore Deflectors! - A Shield Rework

[Sparky_hotdog]

"She cannae take much more, Cap'n!" - John Himeo, Chief Engineer

A Shield Rework

(PR here)

The Problem:

For a while now, I have felt shields have been a little boring as a mechanic. This is largely due to the way in which strength and charge rate are handled, whereby a saturation point exists based on:

• The capacitor power (A constant)
• The perimeter of the Horizon (Generally a constant)
• The dissipation rate of shields (Again, a constant)

Due to this, the Horizon's shields generally saturate at about 5.5 Renwicks, and while this value changes slightly with map changes that affect the outer hull, this value has largely remained constant over the last year and a half.

Aims:

So here are the goals I set for myself with this project:

1. Make shield settings a balancing act. Meaning fast charging shields come at the expense of overall strength, and vice versa.
2. Port shield modes from Bay. These add more options to how shields behave.
3. Add directional shielding, at least for the Horizon. This allows more power to be put into shields at the fore of the ship at the expense of the starboard, port and/or aft.

 

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Part I - The Balancing Act

Most people will probably be familiar with the shield generator machine as the main device you interact with when setting shields; Well no longer. The shield generator is now the collective name for all the component machines: Capacitor, Matrix and Projector(s). The best way to explain how this all works is to walk through the steps from power in the grid to a physics defying field of force.

The Capacitor:

Spoiler

Anyone familiar with how shields operate at the moment will know that the Shield Capacitor is where the journey starts now, and that isn't changing. In fact, very little has changed about this stage: It still draws power from the grid, and stores it awaiting its use by the rest of the shield generator. There might be some values to tweak in regards to the maximum input power the Horizon's capacitor has, but otherwise this works as before. It does have a fancy new tgui though.

 

The Matrix:

Spoiler

With the shield generator now multiple machines, a new machine is required to act as the main control point. Enter the Shield Matrix, the beating heart of the generator. There is quite a lot to walk through, so a visual aid of the UI should help.

The Shield Matrix Controls are the simplest part of the console, serving the same function as these do in the current UI. A button to toggle activation, information on the connected capacitor, field radius selection and multi-z-level toggle all work as before.

Shield Power Control is the main part of the balancing act goal. When the matrix draws Renwicks from the capacitor, it then divides them up based on this ratio between shield strength, charge rate and modulation. The triangular diagram represents the balance of these.

Shield Modulator Control is where you select the shield modes mentioned as one of the other goals. The more of these that are active, the more cool things your shields do; However, they all cost Renwicks to upkeep, and become less effective the more you add.

Projector Power Control is where you can change the strength of each of the generator's projectors, as per the last of the goals.

The Projector(s):

Spoiler

The final stage in the pathway to making a force field is the Shield Projector, being the machine to actually produce the shield. The Horizon will be equipped with 4 directional ones (One for each of the directions seen above), while there remains an all-direction "Bubble" generator in the code, buildable if needed or usable by third-party ships.

 

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Part II - Modulators

As was shown in Part I, in porting the shield modes from Bay, modifications were made both to their name and their functionality. All shield modes have a set upkeep cost in Renwicks, taken from the modulation power pool. Some of these modes can use excess Renwicks to improve their performance, so the more specialised your shield is, the stronger it is. The matrix comes equipped with the shield modes shown before as standard, with additional ones being something R&D can produce boards for to add to the matrix.

The current modulators are:

• Hyperkinetic Projectiles - Blocks brute attacks such as bullets, as well as explosions. Excess Renwicks increase the armour the shield has against these attacks. Available by default.
• Photonic Dispersion - Blocks burn attacks such as lasers or fire. Excess Renwicks increase the armour the shield has against these attacks. Also turns the shield opaque, due to it blocking light. Available by default.
• Humanoid Lifeforms - Slows organic humanoids (i.e. Non-IPC player characters) moving through the shield. Excess Renwicks increase the slow down. Available by default.
• Silicon Lifeforms - Slows inorganic mobs (i.e. IPCs, Borgs, etc) moving through the shield. Excess Renwicks increase the slow down. Available by default.
• Unknown Lifeforms - Slows mobs that don't fall into the above categories (i.e. Carp) moving through the shield. Excess Renwicks increase the slow down. Available by default.
• Hull Shielding - Causes the shield to form around the ship's hull, rather than in a bubble around it. Does not use excess Renwicks. Available by default.
• Atmospheric Containment - Prevents atmospheric movement across the shield. Does not use excess Renwicks. Available with Engineering Tech Level 5.
• Field Overcharge - Causes damage to any mob that comes into contact with the shield (Requires the mob type to be slowed), damaging the shield in the process. Excess Renwicks increase damage. Available with Engineering Tech Level 5.
• Adaptive Field Harmonics - Blocks both brute and burn attacks, with armour adjusting to react to damage as it is taken. Excess Renwicks increase the speed of adjustment. Available with Engineering Tech Level 8

 

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Part III & IV - Directional Shielding & Sprites

Both of these parts are fairly short so I'm going to condense them into one page.

Directional shielding has largely already been covered in Part I. There isn't much more to it that there being multiple projectors which only produce shields in one direction, and being able to prioritise power to one area over the others.

However, a fourth part of this project began to emerge as I delved into it; Both modulator boards and the shield matrix were going to need sprites, as was the directional shield generator. Thus, I decided to simply resprite all the component parts of the shield generator.

Spoiler

I am far more of a codemonkey than I am a spriter, so I would appreciate feedback on these as well as any of the actual rework. I also would not be offended if someone who knows what they're doing with pixel art were to make improvements in the future.

[GeneralCamo]

Re sprites: It would be better to split the shield "ring" effect from the machine rotation animation. This way we can move it to a seperate layer. Perhaps even make it greyscale and we can use one of the color filters.