Original Post
I've been screwing around seeing if its possible to mod back in the Wormhole drive of years past, based on the methodology I came up with here:
A really stupid idea for remaking wormhole stations... must be a reason why someone's not tried this already?
Been slowly scoping-in an ideal range for wormholes. below is an euclid of 65
range = 50
range =65
And here we see the ship will travel to its destination, then back to Deneb, then out to destination 2, repeat. This is basically just a repainted L cluster.
I handle wormhole construction with decisions rather than constructors 1) for UI reasons (I hate touching UI elements) 2) AIs can use decisions well [well, as well as you can script them to] and 3) Constructors have the intelligence of a concussed rodent.
Where things get interesting is when you start getting into multiple bypass networks (via macro) - in the thread I linked earlier I demonstrate how you can construct enumerated/repeating script-blocks in excel using simple macros and the row() function. This allows me to build 2 thousand (or as many as I like really) Wormhole networks for the game to use.
Essentially every time a WH network station is placed, a new network is added to the game - like a new L-Gate network. This forces ships to move between multiple intermediate systems to get from point A to B, "slinging" between wormhole stations as they go. This is more or less exactly how the game worked on the old FTL system.
Here we see the star ship transitioning between gate networks 1 and 2
The problem is - graphically - it looks like shit.
I can hide the megastructure icons (i think) for the wormhole end-points I think and just keep the stations on the map, but despite all my tests I've not found a way to project a yellow dashed ring like the game used to use. Only the jump drive still seems to do this in 2.8.1. and it appears to be a hardcoded function.
If anyone knows a way to add that dashed ring back - or if anyone at PDX feels charitable enough to add an effect to megastructures to render a sensor ring - even if it doesnt actually do anything. (the Spy orb does not seem to do this anymore, only jumpdrive ships??) I'd be the happiest pancake in all the universe.
From here you'd need to disable the hyperdrive for empires with this civic (the gates themselves are already locked off to anyone that lacks the wormhole_empire_civic) ... and that's about it from the player's perspective
A fair amount of AI logic is probably needed to tell it when to use decisions - basically whenever it has a system with a wormhole that is X distances away from an existing station / on the leading edge of its network.
And each gate network needs to be generated in script - quick to do with simple substitution in excel (Network_1 Network_2 {="Network_"&row()}
And then a very very very long IF check needs to be created [again via a macro - probably VBA if it's got an irregular structure] to
Treat this as a proof of concept, that at least 1 of the 2 (the other being Warp) old FTL types can indeed be brought back in to the modern game fairly similarly to how used to play.
Bonus:
and noticed that the game will actually render 2 different gateway icons - presumably it can render even more than that. Something to keep in mind for future projects.
What it looks like when you screw up your distance limiter and spawn wormhole connections everywhere in the galaxy:
A really stupid idea for remaking wormhole stations... must be a reason why someone's not tried this already?
Been slowly scoping-in an ideal range for wormholes. below is an euclid of 65
And here we see the ship will travel to its destination, then back to Deneb, then out to destination 2, repeat. This is basically just a repainted L cluster.
I handle wormhole construction with decisions rather than constructors 1) for UI reasons (I hate touching UI elements) 2) AIs can use decisions well [well, as well as you can script them to] and 3) Constructors have the intelligence of a concussed rodent.
Where things get interesting is when you start getting into multiple bypass networks (via macro) - in the thread I linked earlier I demonstrate how you can construct enumerated/repeating script-blocks in excel using simple macros and the row() function. This allows me to build 2 thousand (or as many as I like really) Wormhole networks for the game to use.
Essentially every time a WH network station is placed, a new network is added to the game - like a new L-Gate network. This forces ships to move between multiple intermediate systems to get from point A to B, "slinging" between wormhole stations as they go. This is more or less exactly how the game worked on the old FTL system.
Here we see the star ship transitioning between gate networks 1 and 2
The problem is - graphically - it looks like shit.
I can hide the megastructure icons (i think) for the wormhole end-points I think and just keep the stations on the map, but despite all my tests I've not found a way to project a yellow dashed ring like the game used to use. Only the jump drive still seems to do this in 2.8.1. and it appears to be a hardcoded function.
Specifically I want to find a way to make the wormhole stations project this yellow ring, to show you which stars will be within range, without having to resort to Icons or guesswork.
If anyone knows a way to add that dashed ring back - or if anyone at PDX feels charitable enough to add an effect to megastructures to render a sensor ring - even if it doesnt actually do anything. (the Spy orb does not seem to do this anymore, only jumpdrive ships??) I'd be the happiest pancake in all the universe.
From here you'd need to disable the hyperdrive for empires with this civic (the gates themselves are already locked off to anyone that lacks the wormhole_empire_civic) ... and that's about it from the player's perspective
A fair amount of AI logic is probably needed to tell it when to use decisions - basically whenever it has a system with a wormhole that is X distances away from an existing station / on the leading edge of its network.
And each gate network needs to be generated in script - quick to do with simple substitution in excel (Network_1 Network_2 {="Network_"&row()}
And then a very very very long IF check needs to be created [again via a macro - probably VBA if it's got an irregular structure] to
1 analyse the galaxy flags and say which of the next galaxy flags is free (starting at 1 counting to 2000 till it finds a free one)
2 select the bypass/gateway of the corresponding unique number
3 tell the game to spawn that specific network (as above you see it spawn gate networks 1 and 2)
Treat this as a proof of concept, that at least 1 of the 2 (the other being Warp) old FTL types can indeed be brought back in to the modern game fairly similarly to how used to play.
Bonus:
and noticed that the game will actually render 2 different gateway icons - presumably it can render even more than that. Something to keep in mind for future projects.
What it looks like when you screw up your distance limiter and spawn wormhole connections everywhere in the galaxy:
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