FTL Captain's Edition 1.308/Inf 1.301b/EL 1.308

[slowriderxcorps]

Zoltan controlled or Zoltan homeworld?

I think it could have been a Homeworld sector, I did stumble upon the Zoltan Cruiser quest, though I'm not sure if I saw that in that sector or the one before. I'm reviewing and rendering the footage anyway, as it has info on something I was experimenting with.

EDIT: Come across it now. I keep on pre-emptively guessing what it is as I watch this footage. T'was a Zoltan sector, Border Zone 'Friendship'.

[English Narwhal]

While I won't deny that it's possible to run into no-win situations in Vanilla, CaptRevo's example suggests you're taking things to an extreme that should probably be avoided. Knocking out weapons, drones and O2 in a single event?

There seems to be some misconception about what this event does.

First of all: This is not a fight, it is a radiation event where you basically have to endure an amount of time during which your life support situation worsens. The derelict enemy ship/station sits ther and none of you can take shots (visible on the screen shot, placeholder enemy with no offensive capabilities). Most of the time this hazards are very manageable. Weapons and drones being disabled has no impact on the event. System limitations and and the harmless enemy dummy station only exist to keep oxygen disabled, because exiting combat resets system modifiers on that.

Second: The player might be helpless in this particular situation, but he wasn't before. Fuel is available at every shop. Life support lvl 3 can negate this hazard and is also available everywhere. Nebula in Industrial sectors could to some extend be avoided, at last till you found a shop for fuel, which are always located outside of the clouds. Of course the player might not know this. Just as he can/she might not know how to deal with suns when beginning to play FTL. It's a new learning process for CE.

Also: This whole scenario is pretty rare. Which, I admit, does not make it obvious to the player that the radiation event can be so deadly. But the player can definitely gather that running out of fuel is lethal during other situations in CE. This particular scenario is just as rare as the stalemate-out-of-fuel scenario I'd say. I can't remove neither of these in an elegant way. In the end I'd rather keep the Radiation events in the mod, instead of removing them because of the remote possibility that this dead-end situation happens. Lowering the life support requirement for negating radiation to lvl 2 would be possible, but does not matter for the overall discussion if this situation should exist, cause it still could exist if the player does not upgrade.

@ CaptRevos: I'm sorry if this scenario ruined your fun with the mod here. I'm sure you will never again venture into Industrial Clouds when on low fuel, should you continue to play CE.

Though I wholly agree with your argument, Sleeper, I honestly think you have overdone certain types of events. In vanilla FTL, system reduction and other 'added challenge' events are rare, but in Captain's Edition... I honestly find myself facing them pretty much as often as normal battles.

[ikeelyou300]

Also: This whole scenario is pretty rare. Which, I admit, does not make it obvious to the player that the radiation event can be so deadly. But the player can definitely gather that running out of fuel is lethal during other situations in CE. This particular scenario is just as rare as the stalemate-out-of-fuel scenario I'd say. I can't remove neither of these in an elegant way. In the end I'd rather keep the Radiation events in the mod, instead of removing them because of the remote possibility that this dead-end situation happens. Lowering the life support requirement for negating radiation to lvl 2 would be possible, but does not matter for the overall discussion if this situation should exist, cause it still could exist if the player does not upgrade.

I understand what happened here and I think the only reason CaptRevos mentioned it was because of the strangeness of it, not because he wasn't having any fun. It is definitely situations like this that make FTL frustrating... But, In a fun way.

I don't think any changes are necessary here. But I can think of one change that might be made to another similar situation... I'm not sure exactly how the level 3 Life Support works in this situation, but it should probably give you a blue option that turns the enemy "ship" neutral again. That way you can select the "wait" option to get more fuel. And it could be implied that while you waited you drifted out of the radiation zone. Otherwise even if you had a level 3 life support you would be forced to open the air locks yourself to end the game. That is unless Sleeper was already smart as usual and did this, I'm not sure if there is actually a blue option for LS in this particular event. Either way, this situation will likely never happen again, but you never know...

EDIT: I feel justified about my complaints earlier about unfortunate things happening in the 1st sector. Everyone wanted to burn me at the stake, but now I see others complaining about things more trivial than I was talking about.

I am in favor of bad to horrible things happening to the player sometimes and an equal amount of good to "Holy crap a weapon is just floating in space" things happening to the player sometimes. Instead of reducing the difficulty, maybe you should just add in a few more positive events, but you have added good things like the federation fleet events.

[Mr. Mister]

Sleepy, before you post the version changes: was 1.097 only an internal release or what?

[Sleeper Service]

Thanks for pointing to that crash. For once, It was easy to fix. Sorry about that, I thought I eliminated that problem last time already. Please also note that the player ship addon is now integrated into main CE. A new addon now lets your revert the ships to their vanilla loadouts. This way, I don't have to release a new version of the addon each time I make changes to player ship loadouts.

1.098
- Does not contain the Testrel this time, I checked
- UI impact prompts added to many more weapons
- DE: Two drones added
- Enemy Ion Defence Drones should be as ineffective as player ones now
- Enabled breaking truce for (all?) enemies with custom surrenders
- Zoltan AI ship minimal sector removed, resolves Zoltan sector crashes
- Sensor resets from Slug surrenders removed
- Crystal crew now lets you locate the ancient device when arriving in the Rock Homeworld
- Industrial Sector nebula mass reduced
- Industrial Sector counts as a Nebula sector again
- Bio Focus Beam now requires four power
- Player ship addon is now integrated into the CE coremod
- Released a new addon that let's you revert player ships to vanilla loadouts

Though I wholly agree with your argument, Sleeper, I honestly think you have overdone certain types of events. In vanilla FTL, system reduction and other 'added challenge' events are rare, but in Captain's Edition... I honestly find myself facing them pretty much as often as normal battles.

*shrug* Does not feel like that to me, but this could be readjusted of course.

While CE might increase the amount of system reduction events, it also gives you the tools to apply these restrictions to almost every enemy you meet. IMO most events that involve hostiles with combat augs, apart from the one featuring the weapon jammer, pose little threat in the end.

The new Hazards are mostly characterized by system reductions, they live from that and apply them to enemies as well. The new Hazards are also fairly avoidable, cause they are clearly marked on the map. If you look at the lists than you'd see that system reductions events not even make up ten percent of everything that can happen. Maybe you can elaborate what amount of system disruption would not "overdo" it and why?

I don't think any changes are necessary here. But I can think of one change that might be made to another similar situation... I'm not sure exactly how the level 3 Life Support works in this situation, but it should probably give you a blue option that turns the enemy "ship" neutral again. That way you can select the "wait" option to get more fuel. And it could be implied that while you waited you drifted out of the radiation zone.

That's exactly how it works already. Lvl 3 life support lets you filter the radiation out of your ships atmosphere, which ends combat, restores you life support system to full and lets you wait despite the radiation.

I am in favor of bad to horrible things happening to the player sometimes and an equal amount of good to "Holy crap a weapon is just floating in space" things happening to the player sometimes. Instead of reducing the difficulty, maybe you should just add in a few more positive events, but you have added good things like the federation fleet events.

Yep, that's kind of how it is handled. Hazzard clouds for example have way above average free stuff floating within them. Its up to you if you consider it worth the risk to go look for it.

Sleepy, before you post the version changes: was 1.097 only an internal release or what?

Nah, I kind of put numbers there that feel right. 1.097 looked wrong and I usually make bigger jumps in numbers when more content was added or more time past. The numbering is pretty random in the end.

[Mr. Mister]

I haven't checked yet (stupid acid clouds), but did you give a scout drone to the 1st flagship phase?

I'm thinking you could give scout drones to (and only to) all PDS-targeting ships. Not only will it be cool and more obvious what's going on, but the new player that goes to confront the flagship will make the connection and realise that he's gonna get bombarded if he doesn't hurry, even if he skipped the text.

[The Captain]

So it seems the versions keep jumping ahead. I'm going to post in case these haven't been fixed. (Oh, as far as vanilla, I don't remember what is or isn't; I just post what I think could be corrected.)

The biggest thing was in Tuco's Proving Grounds: there was a store with triangle shown by Long Range Scanners. I went to it, and the dialog box said a pirate was going to intercept me before I got to the store. So I thought I was going into a fight and chose an appropriate option. Then the store menu popped up. After I closed it, I won the fight. I think I had a dialog box about being able to go to the store, but the menu didn't pop up (though the store button at top was there).

"(Production Augment) Produce something on-board*." - on board.

"The* ship maintenance should give the team something to do. Waiting is not good for crew moral**." - 1) remove "The," start sentence with "Ship"; 2) morale.

"1. (Improved Internal AI) Try to draw up some more schematics for on-board* drones." - onboard.

Next: "You sit down with your crew* and the matter is quickly decided.
4. Change your mind. You** rather rely on your sentient crew." - 1) add comma after "crew"; 2) You'd.

'The outpost hails you after the store was* destroyed,** "Thanks for the help. We've been harassed non-stop*** by these scouts...." ' - 1) is; 2) replace comma with period or colon; 3) nonstop.

'The Rockman wants you to have a look at the scrap materials you collected. "... makeshift guiding devices,* these other components are instable** enough...." ' - 1) replace comma with semicolon; 2) unstable.

'You receive a hail from a small station,* "In accordance to** general system law*** we identify ourselves as Rebel occupied**** ..." ' - 1) replace comma with colon or period; 2) with; 3) add comma after "law"; 4) Rebel-occupied.

Drone Uplink Jammer description: "Attempts to scrambles* the** enemy drone communication..." - 1) scramble; 2) remove "the."

Shuttle event, next box: 'After waiting several minutes... you finally receive a hail,* "Are you with the Federation. ..." ' - replace comma with period or colon.

'A disabled Federation craft drifts at* this beacon. "We've been attacked by Rebels,** I'm the only one left. May I come aboard*** Captain?" ' - 1) near; 2) replace comma with period; 3) add comma after "aboard."

"You arrive at a quarantine checkpoint set up around this beacon. The Zoltan security officers do the talking,* ...." -
replace comma with period.

The Rockman is seriously wondering how it feels to be burned. ... "What do you mean by "pain",* Captain?"

- single quotes around 'pain'; move comma right after 'pain' inside last quote.

'The Rockman is nowhere to be found. ... "Tactical planning, Captain,* is it urgent?" ' - replace comma with period, capitalize "Is"; or perhaps: "Is this urgent? I am studying tactical planning, Captain."

'You receive a wide-band* automated message,** "Welcome to our humble trade depot...." ' - 1) wideband; 2) replace comma with period or colon.

'You receive * hail from an FTL core powered stations,** "Welcome to your own private hostile encounter,*** you are our thirty-sixth ...." ' - 1) add "a" after "receive"; 2) "FTL-core-powered station" and replace comma with period or colon; 3) replace comma with period, capitalize "You."

Next: 'You receive a hail from a pirate, his voice sounding dark and hollow,* "If I go down** I'll be taking you with me!".*** ' - 1) replace comma with period or colon; 2) add comma after "down"; 3) remove period after quote.

Anecdote about hostile nebula: I entered an AI sector once (once!). Nanobot clouds eat away at your hull, right? Well, the whole first half of the sector was nebula! I don't remember how much hull I had entering, but I barely had enough to survive the clouds and run away from the AI ships I encountered to get to clear space. Maybe that kind of sector layout doesn't happen too often (and so far I haven't been in a situation where the only jump is to an AI sector), but I can certainly imagine starting the sector with less hull and never being able to get out of the nebula.

[Sovereighn2280]

Can't wait to see what's going to be done for AE... Especially the new Aliens...

[Sleeper Service]

I haven't checked yet (stupid acid clouds), but did you give a scout drone to the 1st flagship phase?

I'm thinking you could give scout drones to (and only to) all PDS-targeting ships. Not only will it be cool and more obvious what's going on, but the new player that goes to confront the flagship will make the connection and realise that he's gonna get bombarded if he doesn't hurry, even if he skipped the text.

Well usually there are giant obvious warnings in the background. Also this drones are supposed to be spy drones, the ship or crew does the artillery spotting.

The biggest thing was in Tuco's Proving Grounds: there was a store with triangle shown by Long Range Scanners. I went to it, and the dialog box said a pirate was going to intercept me before I got to the store. So I thought I was going into a fight and chose an appropriate option. Then the store menu popped up. After I closed it, I won the fight. I think I had a dialog box about being able to go to the store, but the menu didn't pop up (though the store button at top was there).

That's an odd one. Was this event spawning a fight without the shop window for some people? Else this whole event might not work at all as intended...

Anecdote about hostile nebula: I entered an AI sector once (once!). Nanobot clouds eat away at your hull, right? Well, the whole first half of the sector was nebula! I don't remember how much hull I had entering, but I barely had enough to survive the clouds and run away from the AI ships I encountered to get to clear space. Maybe that kind of sector layout doesn't happen too often (and so far I haven't been in a situation where the only jump is to an AI sector), but I can certainly imagine starting the sector with less hull and never being able to get out of the nebula.

Alright, nebula mass reduction is scheduled.

[Mr. Mister]

Can confirm the shopping just as the fight starts, though I thought it was just hardcoding striking again. Basically, it's "We're not gonna let you shop and will kill you instead!" -> store window automatically opens with game paused -> you close the store window when you feel like it after doing whatever -> Now you're fighting and obviosuly can't manage the ship nor the store windows -> you win -> store window becomes avaliable again

I'm pretty sure on-board is correct.


Also, regarding that Rockman conversation: Rockmen feel pain, so maybe you should replace ""pain"" with ""ardent"" or so.

EDIT: Nanocloud has been find whenever I've visited. You simply do NOT jump into AI Overrun unless you're prepared for it.