Chilibird

*applause* Way to go Clay! Now THAT is a shining example of humanity! That's one of those "gives you a smile" stories.

Awww, battle creek didn't make it in. heh, prolly too late for the cut, even if it was being considered Anyways, I'm updating now. I think I'll hop on for some good ol DT carnage for a bit. See if I can get my mic to work well in-game.

lol, that would do it Those new intel mac pros are out.. starting @ $1700 USD I think?

Aye, that'd be it. The only graphic setting I have at max is view distance. No anti-aliasing or any of that.

Really? That's interesting. I didn't notice any performance difference on my computer, and I know I'm using one of the lower-end ones here. When you say poorly, you mean FPS wise, I guess? Anyone else tried this?

Generally, when that happens, you're just missing the 'vital organs'. Chances are you killed or seriously damaged quite a few of the internal systems, but never took out the battery or motor, which would have resulted in a kill.

1.67 Ghz Powerbook G4, 512 MB RAM, and it runs fine with foliage for me. Generally, though, I shut down any background apps when running DropTeam. iTunes, Adium, and Virus Barrier are the 3 I normally have running, and they are all shut down.

I like the sound of this. I've been looking for more of a long range piece, not to mention something a little more.. artillery-ish. I like the Thors, but if you have a well coordinated team, there is very little you can do. (And I can't tell you the number of times I've blasted my own dropship out of the sky with one) I think that these won't be as uneven as orginally figured. If they are slow, which is what i'm gathering, they are almost like SCUD launchers. On hilly maps, where getting a LOS shot will be difficult, they aren't that uneven. Same goes for the fact that once they DO fire, any Thor Heavy Artillery on the map will know where it is relative to them, and probably proceed to unload on it. I know I will. And besides, this gives me reason to get my butt into gear and try this stuff

One thing that I find works well for me is to use Terragen. If you set the coordinate data to the same size as is defined in your scenario file, including vertex spacing, you can use the camera position to find coordinates. (Just drag the green dot around, and the row of numbers will change to reflect the coordinate) It's a good way to find all your coordinates without complex work. That's how I did it for Battle Creek. Basically, it's like this. step 1- Open Terragen, and import your RAW file. In this example, I'm using my RAW file for my map, Battle Creek, which was made in Terragen. step 2- go to landscape -> size/radius. In this panel, the dropdown menu should already be the same as your RAW file, otherwise it wouldn't import. Change point spacing to whatever you have it set to in your scenario file so things match up. step 3- being sure your units are still set on "meters", use the green dot to find your coordinates. In this example, the coordinates I'd put in my scenario file would be 1620,1500,0. The z axis is always 0, drop team will automatically place things at the appropriate height. Note- The position of the red dot does not make a difference in the coordinate data for the green dot. [ August 25, 2006, 08:26 PM: Message edited by: IcemanUSA ]

So, who all has tried this? Any opinions? Any feedback is appreciated -Ice

It was SP, and yes, fully updated. My guess was just that random bug, which would explain why I couldn't do it again.

There is one odd bug I may have run into, though I can't seem to duplicate it, making me think it was just a brain fart on my computers part. When I tried to drop a vehicle during the deployment phase, it started flying around like crazy. I can't get it to do it again, but if anyone can, let me know.

Howdy all, I've finally finished work on my Battle Creek scenario. Thanks go out to everyone who helped me out. Anywho, the scenario itself is set on one of the few land bridges leading across the Hopewell River. Obviously, since it cannot be destroyed as easilly a as a normal bridge, this makes it a vital strategic control point. However, due to Battle Creek's proximity to the Ocean, morning fog is a regular occurance, and will be in this battle. Also, in addition to vision restrictions, I've created a new gametype. King of the Hill. Like many other versions of this type, control is won by holding the center hill of the bridge. However, at the same time that you can hold it, so can your enemy, so you want to be sure to set up an effective perimiter around the base, so they aren't gaining points, either. Every 60 seconds, your team will gain 1 point for holding the hill. Obviously, at the end of the time limit, the team with the most points wins. Both teams are able to place units during the Deployment Phase, no niether team will have the advantage in attempting to control the hill. Obviously, the new dropships will play greatly into this, because point drops aren't as easy anymore. You need to have a force that is coordinated enough to maintain its battle lines to control the hill, while at the same time protecting those helping to fortify it. Communication will be vital, since fog will obscure your vision. Be sure it's an enemy you're firing at, and that you can actually hit them! Enjoy guys, and let me know what you think! http://www.megaupload.com/?d=WH0Q2MTW

I personally use my mousewheel to manually set my range. It's not too hard for me to use E to bring up the gunsight.

Sounds kinda like an in game clan system to me. None the less, I like it. I don't know how easilly the game can have you on the same team as your buds, for balance reasons, but at least knowing that your friends are online would be good. And as the game grows, more than one server may come online, so you can tell which server they are on.

IRT Bjarmson- Well, that's just when the pilots get bored. Life gets dull on those liveships, ya know I've seen the stuck dropship a lot, and I still seem to encounter a fair amount of "Server Not Responding" messages. For the dropship one, I'd at least throw something in that allows you to still kill yourself if you get stuck.

My guess is that it is mearly lag. I'll occasionally get it when the server is really full.

Well, you are right, but here is the way I look at it. I drive a '99 Toyota 4runner. Automatic Transmission, power steering/braking. Now then.. recently, the Transmission, or something related, has been acting up, causing the engine to randomly stall. When the engine goes, obviously, so does the various power components of the car. Recently, the car actually stalled while moving (~20 MPH) so I had to brake to a stop before I could restart the car. It was a LOT harder without the hydraulics/power braking there. And that is a 2 ton car.. imagine a 20 ton tank. They are definately hydraulic/power breaking, and without the engine running, because it stopped, or was blown out, you don't have that, and even if the brakes did work, the effect of the driver slamming on the brake pedals would be miniscule.

I'd personally like to give it a shot, as well. Some of the discussion here gave me an idea... Guess I'll have to go see if that Blender download will actually finish today...

The one thing I really like with this new update is following the Dropship's decent into the atmosphere. The one thing that can be a pain is on extract, if the dropship backs away from danger, and hits a building, it'll get stuck. And then you can't kill the dropship, nor can you do anything else but hope someone comes and blasts your dropship away.

Sweet, updating now. Having dropships fly evasivly should make things a lot better for preventing bots constantly blowing them out of the sky.

It's generally later in the night. 9 or 10 my time (Eastern.. GMT-6 I think?), there's usually at least 5 or 6 people on, and that's on weekdays. It's not uncommon for the server to be full on weekend nights, especially friday. FYI- Herin, I'm using this map as a reference. http://tbgsoftware.com/TheRimSector.htm I think a cool idea would be to create 2 'factions' here on the forums. The players could either be randomly devided, or choose their factions. Each is fighting for control of the rim planets. Every week.. say friday night, another 'battle' is declared for a given planet. Given that some planets have multiple battlefields (Like Hopewell), they could be chosen at random. Each match is played at say.. 9 PM EST friday night. Whichever faction is victorious, wins control of that system, or prevents loosing it to the enemy. Now then, as you notice by looking at the map, there are a LOT of planets on there. (335 to be exact). So what we want to do is just use a given solar system (The big green circles = 1 system).. in this case, the Rim. This whole scenario could go in 2 ways. 1 way is that all of the rim sectors that are being used are devided equally between the factions. Every week, one planet bordering one controled by another faction may come under attack. (use the lines to see the 'borders') This could switch week to week, so each faction has a chance to gain/loose ground. This method would allow the war to continue indefinately until one victor is declared. The second method is to kind of reenact the Mu Arae wars. One faction gets all of the planets, and the other gets to attack one planet every week. The defending faction must hold on for a given time period (say 3 months), and if they still hold at least say.. 3.. systems at the end of this time, they are considered victorious. Now then, i'm sure you are all thinking 2 things right now. 1, that's a lot of thought for the admins to have to coordinate all this, and 2- I have a life, I don't want to dedicate playing a given night. Well, to the first question- this can go multiple ways, but the way I was thinking is that a map is kept showing what faction controls what planets, and when it comes time to battle, one planet is selected at random to be the battleground. The admins then set the server to keep repeating that map for the night. and 2- Of course. I do too. I can't guarentee that I'll be able to play on a friday night. So we have a fog of war. You don't know where, when, or even if your enemy will attack. So basically, if there is at least 1 human per team, (even if it's 7 on 1) the match continues on to a finish. If one, or both, teams fail to have a human player join before 9, the battle is considered to have a lack of defenders, or the attackers screwed up. If 1 side had humans, and the other didn't, then that side wins, and gains (or retains) control of that system. If neither side showed up, the battle never took place, and there is no change of control. There are no set players for that night. If you can show up, then show up. If you can't, or forget, then oh well, it's a game. I personally like the first of the 2 options I presented. Not only will it generate some friendly rivalry here on the forums, it might attract new players seeing how we have a 'war' for the rim for them to participate in, and it isn't just random gaming. I'm perfectly willing to try and explain this better if anyone is intersted. Hopefully someone decided to read, and understand, all that

Did I pick up on a Marathon/Halo reference there? FYI- The player, in Marathon, and Master Chief, in Halo, both wear a 'Mjolnir Mark IV' battle suit in the games.

Sent, clay. Hopefully you can make something out of it

A bit of a note for mac users- What I find easier than going to "show package contents" and tracking down the data folder every time, is that I do this. 1. Right click on DropTeam, go to Show Package Contents 2. Browse through to the Data folder like normal, but do not open the Data folder. 3. Right click on the Data folder, and select "Make Alias" 4. Move the resulting alias file to the same folder as Drop Team. Voila, you no longer have to track through all of the files/folders every time you want to change something in your scenario. Simply double clicking will open the "Data" folder inside drop team, or you can just drag the files to be installed on top of the alias, and it will move them to the folder itself.