[REL] Real Time Battle Light

[SuperChango]

Currently All Ported Ships Combined Mod is about 3 1/2 hours from finished
next up: All Ships Combined Addon Part 1 and i'm good to go...

 

[Luke159]

Hopefully you will get to play with these new ships and the RTBL mod after you install it all.

 

[SuperChango]

Luke... i've just remembered... have you tweaked the "collision" damage... i mean when you ram another ship... i remember shooting the rig off small ships and just ramming them with mow's and not much damage is done... exept qhen you get the "koinoor" bug, in which case both ships sink...

 

[Luke159]

Luke... i've just remembered... have you tweaked the "collision" damage... i mean when you ram another ship... i remember shooting the rig off small ships and just ramming them with mow's and not much damage is done... exept qhen you get the "koinoor" bug, in which case both ships sink...

Nope i didn't even know about the collision damage, does it need tweaking?

 

[Hrv123]

Hmmm, guys hows is your game stability with 1.4 installed?
Im getting frequent game crashes after instolment of it when encountering ships on world map (Spanish & Pirates groups)

 

[Luke159]

Hmmm, guys hows is your game stability with 1.4 installed?
Im getting frequent game crashes after instolment of it when encountering ships on world map (Spanish & Pirates groups)

Yes i've found the reason and will upload it, a texture for the ships interface isn't there i, not sure how that happened but i will upload the texture as a quick fix which i will add a readme to explain where it goes and you shoul have no more crashing on entering battles with anyone i hope. As for the stability side my game play's fine with next to no problems.

Ok testing this out requires some heavy duty ships so i bourght myself a Light Man-O-War and 4 Man-O-War's, thats a large enough force i think. I ktted each ship with the highest calibure gun they could mount all cannons so less loading times and set out in search of a fort to attack. My first target was a small fort with 76 cannons.

Battle starts at 11:52am.

We get into position all the enemy ships sail away as fast as they can, they was a Gunboat, Bermuda Sloop and a Pink. I think they made the right disission there. :

13:00pm


Its not looking too good with 9 cannons already taken out, the 48 pounder cannons look to be in some need increased hp value's. The fort its self shouldn't be easily damaged since its hp value is 54,000 or there abouts. As for all the ships well, we have all lost some crew more some than other's but damage wise we are not seeing huge damage at the moment but i'm sure that will change. The Wind Chaser has recieved the heaviest damage with a hull value of 9634 now down to 8984, and some 45 crew killed.

14:00pm


It seems to be settling down a little now not sure if thats because the other ships are moving around or if its the calm before the storm, with a further 4 cannons knocked out and the fort showing some signs of damage it does look like this part of RTBL needs fixing. As for damage to us, well nothing big, mostly its the crew that have been killed on my ships and the other ships seem to have had much less damage this time around but then they are near my position which would explain it.

15:00pm


With 8 more cannons down the battle looks to be more easier than it should be and has suprised me. The 48 and 92 pounders have already had there hp value's increased for the next test and the forts hp value will be increased from 54,000 to 80,000 some 26,000hp increase. I want the battle to last a good several hours and i have made it so all forts will start with the 92 pounders if that happens it will be ver interesting since those cannons have a hit multiplyer of 10.0 some 4.0 higher than the 48 pounders. So much higher damage and crew loses, but thats after this test has finished. Shouldn't be long now.

 

[Luke159]

16:00pm


A total of 24 cannons down and the pace seems to have slown down a little again, i'm currently trying to move to a new position but i am still firing as soon as the guns are loaded, damage for me has been a little but crew is the higher area of damage for me. I want to relocate so i'm not the prime target while all my companions hide behind me as they have been doing and i want to do it in case any of my masts full, it slow but at 0.5 knots i'm getting there.

Between 16:00 and 17:00

The fort was captured and taken as was the town, the battle was over and i am not a happy person i didn't loose a single cannon neither did any of my companions, my ship didn't recieve the kind of damage we should have done had the battle lasted for the length of time i expected it too. Now to test the new value's and hope the forts are kitted oput with 92 pounders.

Update:

I have now made a few edits to get the forts to use the 92 pounder's as they was ment to which is why i added them in the first place, here's a picture of a fort with 92Ibs.


Before the new cannons was added the ispyglass.C file located in Age of Pirates 2\Program\battle_interface would course the game to crash when adding the new cannon types, that has now been fixed and all new cannons/culverines and there calibures have been added, this means a new version of RTBL will be released with some added features not just a fix to the fort battles which i have now started test 2. In test 2 the forts not only have 92Ibs but they also have better cannon hp value's and the forts them selves have had there hp value's increased from 65+ to 500 which will increase fort battles. I will update you as to how the fort battle goes with game hour updates as normal.

 

[Luke159]

Test 2

Before the test could begin some files had to be edited so that the forts would mount 92 pounders as you will see in the picture bellow that is now done and the spy glass needed updating to show 92 pounders which while i was there i added all the other calibures too since they wasn't there.


So what is my plan is this test, well i have edited the forts so there hp value should be 500+ the cannons have had there hp value's increased to a much higher level and since the 92 pounder is a mean cannon and was added to COAS for the forts its going to make this test far more interesting. But first i need to get some officer's cheat and get some MOW's and stock them up with ammo, powder and mount the best guns they can carry.

6am (Battle starts)

Ships
Jenny (Soleil Royal)
112, 32Ibs cannons
1188 crew
11,728hp

Royalist (Man-O-War)
102, 42Ibs cannons
1026 crew
11,062hp

Wind Chaser (Man-O-War)
102, 42Ibs cannons
1119 crew
9,868hp

Royal Sovereign (Man-O-War)
102, 42Ibs cannons
1095 crew
10,821hp

Sullfolk (Man-O-War)
102, 42Ibs cannons
1086 crew
9,502hp

Enemy fort
128, 92Ibs
1962 crew

7am


1 hour has passed and in the previous test the fort cannons was already been destroyed. In this test with new value's etc that hasn't happened, but for the ships things are much more different, those 92Ibs are nasty. Every 2 hours i will report casualties and hull damage, but in this first hour alot of damage has been taken which means that this will be a tough battle and ships should be sunk as you would expect from battling forts.

8am


Well 2 hours later and still nothing happening to the fort, i'm watching as my ship takes on heavy casualties and looses 1 gun which makes me retreat further away but still within range of the bombs.
Ships
Jenny (Soleil Royal)
111, 32Ibs cannons (was 112)
988 crew (was 1188)
10,772hp (was 11,728hp)

Royalist (Man-O-War)
102, 42Ibs cannons (was 102)
901 crew (was 1026)
9,993hp (was 11,062hp)

Wind Chaser (Man-O-War)
102, 42Ibs cannons (was 102)
1118 crew (was 1119)
9,860hp (was 9,868hp)

Royal Sovereign (Man-O-War)
102, 42Ibs cannons (was 102)
1095 crew (was 1095)
10,820hp (was 10,821hp)

Sullfolk (Man-O-War)
102, 42Ibs cannons (was 102)
1086 crew (was 1086)
9,496hp (was 9,502hp)

Enemy fort
128, 92Ibs (was 128)
1962 crew (was 1962)

So as you can see it was my ship that was been targeted the most, after moving further away the companions have started moving further away aswell so the is this a sign of the AI been more intellegant or are they trying to keep a distance them selves?

9am



After loosing a mast i figured i need to be further out and closer to my companions so at the moment thats my aim, to get close to my companions and aviod been the main target as it seems thats how it is right now. Hull damage isn't much different to the previous report while crew is as you can see taken a large hit. The companions don't seem to be targeted or are not recieving critical hits like i am and if i'm to see this battle out i need to stop been the main target and bring the companions into this battle. More so now that after 2 hours none of the forts cannons have been destroyed.

10am



Almost no change as the companions remain out of range, i will have them reload with round shot, i'm now close enough to the other ships and hopefully not in as much danager now however i'm now on the boarder of the round shot and can't go any further out to sea. The Fort has not had any cannons destroyed but that could be down to the other ships not firing at it, we shall see in the next 2 hours if that was indeed the case.

Ships
Jenny (Soleil Royal)
110, 32Ibs cannons (was 112)
901 crew (was 1188)
10,372hp (was 11,728hp)

Royalist (Man-O-War)
102, 42Ibs cannons (was 102)
901 crew (was 1026)
9,993hp (was 11,062hp)

Wind Chaser (Man-O-War)
102, 42Ibs cannons (was 102)
1118 crew (was 1119)
9,860hp (was 9,868hp)

Royal Sovereign (Man-O-War)
102, 42Ibs cannons (was 102)
1095 crew (was 1095)
10,820hp (was 10,821hp)

Sullfolk (Man-O-War)
102, 42Ibs cannons (was 102)
1086 crew (was 1086)
9,496hp (was 9,502hp)

Enemy fort
128, 92Ibs (was 128)
1962 crew (was 1962)

As you can see, what i was saying about been the main target turned out i was the only target after not one single companion ship has any differnece between there previous stats report and this one. We shall see how that changes now, i'm thinking the 92Ibs need there hp value's lowering to 100 and the 48Ibs reseting to there original value's since the forts will most likely not use them now.

 

[SuperChango]

Maybe you could leave the 48 for smaller forts, and the 92 for big cities, like Habana, i suppose the latter where quite expen... also, another use for the 48 pounders could be the small towers near towns...
So far looks good !
Oh, and about ram damage, there should be ! i suppose, on the extreme side... a mow should easily sink a tartane, or heavily damage a frigate... MK ? :?

 

[modernknight1]

Mates, I would also like to see better ship to ship damage from contact. Obviously swiping damage should be negligible, but head on damage could be bad for both ships. As Superchango eluded, I think size is the key entry arguement. Totally agree that a MOW going over a Tartane outcome is obvious. A graduated matrix is the way to go.

Once again if we could ever get period specific combat in play there could be tactical advantages enjoyed by certain factions or ship types. The English throughout their illustrious naval history have always prefered stand off tactics with superior gunnery. The Spanish liked to close and board. This was influenced largely by Spain's geography. Spain isn't only an Atlantic country but Mediteranean as well. The Catalonians heavily infulenced Spain's naval evolution with Army commander's in charge of naval affairs/navies and Galley tactics in vogue even until the late 17th century. The Galley was all about using man power not wind to achieve tactical advantage. Closing quickly, ramming, and boarding was how a Spaniard thought in those times. The Dutch while having a monopoly on the arms trade were not as good with gunnery as the English and also prefered to use closing and boarding tactics until signals and line ahead tactics became in vogue during the second Anglo-Dutch War (1660's).

It's interesting to note that you see this failure to give up the old (even ancient) mentality of ramming and boarding even in large oarless Atlantic ships during that period of evolution. Here are a couple of examples of Atlantic vessels with rams prevalent(a Flemish or Spanish Merchantman and Warship from the 1550-1560 era) from Wheatley's Historic Sail (ISBN 1-85367-399-4) to make my point. Indeed your own Libertad would not have been out of place with a ram.

MK

 

[Luke159]

When POTC is finished i'm hopping we will see the period mod been ported over, new islands and some effects mods like the smoke from the cannons firing but the period mod i think is a must because it would add so much more realism to the game and if the ships are effected by the period mod that would make the game so much more injoyable.

 

[Luke159]

Well i have tried to make the forts range further but it looks like its range is predetermined by by cannon type, that is annoying since i can't find anything code for the range of each shot under different calibure of guns. So to bring everyone up to speed, the problem was the forts range was so poor i could sit just inside my own range and fire round shots without the fort firing a single shot back, yes it would have taken a very long time to destroy the cannons but for patient people this would have been a back door so to speak and very unrealistic since anyone shooting at you would resault in you shooting back and when you consider i was using 32 pounders compared to the forts 92 pounders which should have a range of 1450.0 but because forts are limited to only 1 shot type and that alway's been bombs i have changed it to round shots, because they can now fire at a range of over 900.0 that will mean its much harder to find as you might call it the sweat spot where you can fire but it can't fire back, however that still needs more testing and if a sweat spot is found then i wil have to try to increase the range of the 92 pounder's to make sure the sweat spots are almost impossile to find hence making the battles as they should. Here's a screenshot of the fort with 92 pounder round shots and the distance at which i started to see them firing at me.

[attachment=4062aint 1.JPG]

 

[carmenara]

This looks like incredible work! Keep it up!

 

[Luke159]

Thanks Snow White Sorrow.

Its getting there, just trying to fix small issues now that wqasn't previously tested fully or was over looked, one such thing is the ball multiplyer.

rCannon.SizeMultiply = 1.0;

If i'm to understand this correctly that determines size of damage the shot will inflict on any given surface. All shot types are set to 1.0 apart from the mortars which are set to 5.0. Since we have 4, 8, 12, 16, 18, 24, 32, 36, 42 and 48 pounder cannons i was thinking perhaps lowering these value's for the calibures bellow 32Ibs to.
4Ibs = 0.2
8Ibs = 0.4
12Ibs = 0.6
16Ibs = 0.8
18Ibs = 1.0
24Ibs = 1.2
32Ibs = 1.4
36Ibs = 1.6
42Ibs = 1.8
48Ibs = 2.0
92Ibs = 5.0

These value's will be tested out, this will also mean the larger calibures will do more damage than in previous battles, so i will counter that in another way so that the battles last just as long or slightly longer. But lets get the fort testing out of the way.


Update:

Thats annoying, it seems you can't lower the other cannon calibures size multiplier bellow 1.0, otherwise you will end up with weird partical effects like these.

[attachment=4065aint 1.JPG][attachment=4066aint 1.JPG]

Lets see if this still happens if i increase the value's from 1.0 up.

 

[modernknight1]

Luke, Send me your values and I will load them on one of my machines and help you test as well. I wish this were more like pure simulation on the pairing. For objects like heavy wood beams/planking and stone. We're not talking simple probability of hit and kill. We are talking about cumulative attritive damage over time. So hardness factor should be the key. You should not have to change the nice performance/damage effects balances you've achieved with the munitions. We should look for numbers dealing with the hardness of wood and stone if there are any(there has to be!). I'm looking hard - no pun intended.

MK

 

[Luke159]

I've decided to start from scratch, i'm not sure what went wrong but those particals wouldn't go away even after reverting back to the back up files of everything i have changed since last nights testing. If you want you can help test the fort battle out?, requires using the cheats and you can either go on your own or with max companions, since thats how most player's would do it, so thats how i've been testing it all out.

 

[modernknight1]

OK Luke,

I will mess with it too.

The particular value I'm looking for has nothing to do with hit points. I'm looking for an entry value string. In other words, if I'm trying to pair 4 or 8 pounders against heavy stone breastworks, 0.00 is the value and no hp damage occurs at all no matter how many times you shoot. However the value against wood is different, allowing a hp damage to occur, but using the value derived from the ammo at that point to determine damage.

BTW: It appears as if they were trying to do more with the seiges but not at the detail level we are looking for:

void SiegeResult(string tmp)
{
int ifortPower = sti(colonies[FindColony(aData.colony)].FortValue);
int fortDamage = CheckFortInjuri();
int SquadronDamage = CheckSquadronInjuri();
Log_TestInfo("fortDamage: "+ fortDamage);
Log_TestInfo("SquadronDamage: "+ SquadronDamage);


I'm really enjoying this current game (more so than any previous!!!) Thanks once again Luke! I am seeing the "convoy phenomena" a little more often. It was funny because I encountered a large British Military squadron on the map and when we went to sailing mode they were a bunch of wimpy little Shnyavas. Even though there were six of them I easily outmatched them with only my three ships. I was thinking about it and am wondering if this is an old defect left over from AOP-CT. I remember when I'd get higher in level, I'd run into convoys of the same ships every time. The bug would get worse over time and eventually every ship for sale in the ports would be the same and if you didn't go back to an earlier save eventually every ship in the whole game would be that same ship type. I remember that was extremely annoying and hope this isn't the same bug as I get higher level. That would suck.

MK

 

[Luke159]

That will be interesting, have you found some code that defines the hit points for the wood/brick? i'm guessing the cannons stats will determine how much damage is done since i haven't see anything that actually seperates brick, wood, between all the different cannon/culverine calibures.

 

[SuperChango]

Guys... you are the coders... but

All shot types are set to 1.0 apart from the mortars which are set to 5.0

Maybe this is the effect radius of the shot ? call it damage ratio on impact, just to make clear i'm not talking about "FX"...

BTW... last night i had an amizing battle, i found a battle in map mode, dutch vs pirates, the dutch where 4 and the pirates 2, dont remember all the ships, but there where schooners, a schooner-xebec and a corvette... i let the dutch have fun with the corvetteSL while i sunk the xebec... then no more cheese-heads... just me (schooner) and the corvetteSL...

 

[Luke159]

Guys... you are the coders... but

All shot types are set to 1.0 apart from the mortars which are set to 5.0

Maybe this is the effect radius of the shot ? call it damage ratio on impact, just to make clear i'm not talking about "FX"...

Yes i was thinking the same the amount of surface the shot damages, an example round shot from a 4 pounder could have a surface damage of say 3" X 3" while from a 92 pounder that is 5X that size = a big f**king hole. :