Call for volunteers: merging Allegiance into FS2

[MrChaos]

Matt and Count

First I know absolutely little of you Matt, you type the right things, come clean when presented with the "yeah butts" when making the sales pitch It generally makes my ruined by the $#@!ing Boy Scouts and the mafia personality feel good inside... but after a decade plus around these parts I still have a wait and see stance... trust me the jaded attitude is well and truly earned... nothing personal


Count. Of all the rebels in these parts my money is on you to make a viable offshoot fwiw to you... nothing against your arch rival on Team Anarchy... he just crosses a line that makes the great unwashed uncomfortable with him at times... where the hell was I...


oh yeah this next bit


This is more how can we save FS2 via Allegiance rather then the opposite imho. Fundamental game play is well fundamental... the fundamentals are different and it saddens me to say this.... FS2 is on a ventilator (if you ever had someone you love on one you get it) already. They need us way more then we need them... and yes yes I get we too get an irregular heart.


Many of the worst aspects of this game in retaining players are actually worse for FS2 and the strengths don't translate well imho.



What I'm taking away Matt and Count is this: There is a significant, and hearting pent of demand from the can-and-will-doers to "get jiggy with it". I'm just not sure what has been outlined to date, in this discussion, is a high percentage chance at a "get'er done" outcome


MrChaos <--- has a distrurbing tendency to talk in slang with non-native speakers

[juckto]

I suggest having a forum here where Alleg players can thrash out what gameplay elements should be put in the FS mod, and a forum on FS where developers can thrash out how they're going to do it.

That'll also act as bit of a filter so developers don't get side-tracked in ranting threads about "what Allegiance really means."

[KGJV]

QUOTE (juckto @ Aug 3 2011, 03:00 AM) I suggest having a forum here where Alleg players can thrash out what gameplay elements should be put in the FS mod, and a forum on FS where developers can thrash out how they're going to do it.

That'll also act as bit of a filter so developers don't get side-tracked in ranting threads about "what Allegiance really means."

We need a forum here to get things started and see if and how we can succeed.

Once/if we have enough progress made then we can open a 'dev' forum on FS side (that's HLP's policy concerning mods).

This is why we're here anyway. This thing is about Allegiance, which is mostly unknown and not understood from FS side (and rest of the world in general btw).

So seeing from FS side this project is just a new mod idea for now and even more a multiplayer mod, a game type not very developed in their community. We need to build "momentum" to get the FS community interested. To have stuff to show.

Also by working here, we will drag new people (mostly from FS) who might become new players of vanilla Allegiance.

so it's win-win by starting here. The cost is only a few forum load and we won't disrupt the main game.

Eventually make Matt (and other people who declared wanting to help) moderators so we can filter the "ranting threads" like you call them.

Tell us quickly if you agree (and when) so we can start asap. Otherwise we will have to find a neutral project hosting site.

[KGJV]

QUOTE (MrChaos @ Aug 3 2011, 02:22 AM) but after a decade plus around these parts I still have a wait and see stance...

too many people have this stance. actually it's more a 'talk & judge' stance.

I'd rather try & fail than wait & see... is that a big hint enough ?

[MatthTheGeek]

QUOTE (MrChaos @ Aug 3 2011, 02:22 AM) This is more how can we save FS2 via Allegiance rather then the opposite imho. Fundamental game play is well fundamental... the fundamentals are different and it saddens me to say this.... FS2 is on a ventilator (if you ever had someone you love on one you get it) already. They need us way more then we need them... and yes yes I get we too get an irregular heart.

Save ? If you talk about saving FS2 interest in general, it doesn't need that. The FS modding community is large, crazy active and will remain that way for years to come. I'm far to be worried on that point.

If you talk about saving FS2 multiplayer, let's be honest, there's nothing much to save. It's revival we're talking about here. Process already started with BP Multi, and that I hope to continue with that project.

[juckto]

QUOTE Tell us quickly if you agree (and when) so we can start asap.[/quote]
There's nothing holding it up yet, just need to wait for TE or TB to log on, see the request, and act on it.
Also I brought the project up in the ZL forum for discussion, and the six of us that have posted so far have a consensus of "Good luck! Oh, and remember that the Microsoft models are still their license."

*Takes off ZL hat*
In the meantime, I'd like to talk turkey. I feel that a clear vision of the end product is needed before you head too far down a one-way street.

I'm taking it as a given that:
it's going to be a team-based game with players controlling individual ships and working together to destroy enemy space stations. the team will be led by a single commander who controls the money. miners and constructors exist pretty much as they do in Allegiance.the map will be divided up into sectors joined by "jump points".when a player is killed, they are put in a lifepod and must float home.the techpaths remain similar to Allegiance.the physics of ship movement and combat remain similar to Allegiance.small ships will remain free to fly.players can customise the loadout of their ships before launching.tech costs will be balanced around limited resources being available.

The questions I want to pose are:
How will you do "fog of war"? Will you retain Allegiance's scan and signature system?How will you minimise bandwidth, i.e. will players only receive updates from their current sector?Will you explore the idea of jump gates being buildable/destroyable?Will you prevent manual travel between sectors? i.e. if the enemy are camping in one sector, should you be able to just drive to their area of the map after 5, 10, 15 very boring minutes to avoid the camp? Will asteroids still be locked in one position, drift through a sector, or orbit around a sector?If asteroids are not locked, then what happens to a station when it is built? It could be interesting if stations retain the orbit of the asteroid they were built on.Will you overhaul the shipyard techpath?Will you overhaul the damage and armour class system?Will you add more "equipment slots" to craft?Will you overhaul the missile lock/countermeasures system? Especially since it doesn't work for large ships (CM spawns behind ship)Will you overhaul the turret system? I think that would be a good step towards letting capships scale with game size?Will players be able to transfer stations instantly? Or should there be a spawn delay based on how far apart the stations are?Will players be able to spawn from mobile units (i.e. carriers)?Should stations/carriers have a spawn/minute limit? Instead of the old "ships ripcording to a carrier reduce its energy" mechanic.How many factions will you aim to get in the alpha, how many in the beta, how many in first stable build?Will you still be able to steal tech from enemy teams?Will there be a command view?Placeholder

[SP4WN]

If neutral ground or a more personal approach is needed at any point, i would be more than happy to host.

Great points juckto

[KGJV]

QUOTE (juckto @ Aug 3 2011, 02:24 PM) There's nothing holding it up yet, just need to wait for TE or TB to log on, see the request, and act on it.
Also I brought the project up in the ZL forum for discussion, and the six of us that have posted so far have a consensus of "Good luck! Oh, and remember that the Microsoft models are still their license."

I'm not worried about MS models license because of their global Game Content Usage Rules (although Allegiance isn't explicitly named here, last time I checked for another project it was covered).
But I'm pretty sure we won't reuse a lot of Allegiance artwork anyway. May be some icons at start.

QUOTE (juckto @ Aug 3 2011, 02:24 PM) *Takes off ZL hat*
In the meantime, I'd like to talk turkey. I feel that a clear vision of the end product is needed before you head too far down a one-way street.

I'm taking it as a given that:
it's going to be a team-based game with players controlling individual ships and working together to destroy enemy space stations. the team will be led by a single commander who controls the money. miners and constructors exist pretty much as they do in Allegiance.the map will be divided up into sectors joined by "jump points".when a player is killed, they are put in a lifepod and must float home.the techpaths remain similar to Allegiance.the physics of ship movement and combat remain similar to Allegiance.small ships will remain free to fly.players can customise the loadout of their ships before launching.tech costs will be balanced around limited resources being available.

<tons of questions>

It's way too soon to cover all these things. Matt can probably answer more precisely.
Remember also that we're not trying to build an 100% exact Allegiance clone.

Your points & questions clearly show that you think in an Allegiance way where everything is either fixed in the code or values in a core.

But in the FreeSpace way of thinking, it's all about the mission script(s). When you set up a game with other people you chose a mod and then a mission script. It's the mission that determines most of what will happen and what can be done. One can design a mission which mimics a typical Allegiance 'conquest' game with miners, cons, commanders, etc. But you can design missions that only have some of these elements and other different elements. you can have the money coming from different ways, you can have full AI controlled sides, you can have dynamic 'big' events happening any time during the game, a lot of things can be scripted.

The point at which we are now is determining what can be done with current FS code and mission editor (it's called FRED). Then we will know what are the required code changes (high level LUA scripting or lower level engine C++ code) to do other the things that can't currently be done.

[Raveen]

For my money, if you're aiming for Allegesque gameplay then you really need these as essentials:


it's going to be a team-based game with players controlling individual ships and working together to destroy enemy space stations.
the team will be led by a single commander who controls the money.
miners and constructors exist pretty much as they do in Allegiance - in other words a drone based economy and expansion mechanic.

If you lose those then you're into more Quake in Space territory (not necessarily a bad thing, but not Allegiance IMO).

Of course things like developing techs, Alleg physics (as an option at least for the die hards here), pods and sectors (however they work) would be nice too.

[Makida]

I think scan range and signature are pretty essential and fundamental to Alleg too. Using stealth and making sure you can see the enemy are pretty fundamental to the strategy. I think this is something FS2 can do though -- weren't there a couple of missions in the original un-modded game where you had to fly in this pretty nebula and deal with limited sensors and with having to get close to a target before you could spot it? Maybe it could just be a wider application of that?.. Maybe with less nebula. If anything it could probably be done even more awesome-ly than Alleg does it, like, say, with you being able to detect that there's *something* on your sensors at a particular range, and then being able to see more and more details about what this something actually is as you get closer.

Escape pods -- when I first read about Allegiance somewhere long, long ago I remember they were presented as one of the ways Allegiance takes a regular multiplayer game element (re-spawning after death) and actually turns it into an interesting and unique part of gameplay. I think they're just great gameplay, and if they can be replicated, they should be, methinks.

Developing techs also seems pretty essential to me, since that's where a lot of the strategy element of Alleg comes from. There's plenty else for the commander to do, sure, but come now -- it would be very different from Alleg if there wasn't a tech tree with different tech paths.

And I have to say, a 100% exact Allegiance clone sounds really good to me. Being able to change all the rules by using different "mission scripts" would be great for special events and zone games and the like.

On the other hand, I feel kind of bad making a bunch of requests. I have to say I disagree with MrC quite completely here -- this looks more like someone from another, bigger community that actually has active coders descending from the heavens and saving us all. So really, even if it ends up something that only shares some elements with Alleg, I guess ya can't really complain too much -- if nothing else, maybe it'd get more people to discover the original.