[MOD] Explore and Salvage v1.0 (4.0 Update)

[XexrelFenix]

Update: In the Big Empty ( Only atm ), site spawn are out of control. They spawn and despawn alternating every second you move in the area ( stops when sitting still ) with different location and site. Every spawn will cause a FPS lag spike.

[iforgotmysocks]

Update: In the Big Empty ( Only atm ), site spawn are out of control. They spawn and despawn alternating every second you move in the area ( stops when sitting still ) with different location and site. Every spawn will cause a FPS lag spike.

Hm, thats just a difficult location. There are some zones overlapping pretty close. I'm using a counter to keep track when the player goes though a change of zones but there the player scratches so many zones and non-zone space, that those spawned sites disappear again very fast an new ones spawn.

I've been thinking about alot ways to keep wrecks in place even if the player leaves the zone and enters it later again, but also still be able to remove them correctly, so there wouldn't be stuff left behind slowing down the game.

Until i come up with an idea how to handle this, the player can just avoid this by trying not to pass that the mess of zoneboarders in the big empty over and over again at that critical point.
A simply passing through may cause some short lags, but nothing serious, and as you mentioned, i didn't find any other location where it happend like this yet.

[wwdragon]

I'm looking forward to being able to use this mod.

For a spawn based system, just spawn them randomly on a timer.
Pick three random systems anywhere in the universe and have them spawn there.
Maybe send the player a log notification.

Once you figure out how to do it via destroyed ships, you can have them spawn around battlefields based on the number of ships in the zone destroyed.
Maybe each additional ship adds to the salvage field?

To make it so that people don't have to manually uninstall, you could just put a save-game variable in, which tells the version last installed.
That way your mod just reads it and, when update is needed, it performs it automatically.

[XexrelFenix]

Yer, im avoiding the border as usual. Just something I encountered accidentally.

[bm01]

Would be fun to add some mines occasionally, like in Fell Affliction.

What happens if a cap ship boost through a mine field?

Nothing I think.
I noticed some weird thing with mines, they only get active around the player (but after that they seems to be able to target anything)... Or I should say around the camera.
Let me explain. I saw a Titurel in the mine field once, getting no damage at all. But as soon as I pressed F3 a dozen of mines flew toward it.
I repeated this many times, I couldn't believe camera position is what makes mines active.

[wwdragon]

I noticed some weird thing with mines, they only get active around the player (but after that they seems to be able to target anything)... Or I should say around the camera.

Now that you mention it, I have noticed a lot of things only happen to the player ship.
Superhighway slowdown things don't affect npcs.

[iforgotmysocks]

To make it so that people don't have to manually uninstall, you could just put a save-game variable in, which tells the version last installed.
That way your mod just reads it and, when update is needed, it performs it automatically.

Thats pretty much how i'm updating my mods since day 1 which was almost a year ago. Sadly those sweet ~3000 Lines of code are a little bit more complex, so i decided to skip the failing update routine on this one until the critical parts are in, then i can worrie about that as a whole and write a working update routine that actually works. Its called "early alpha" for a reason.

[JESS 246]

Hi iforgotmysocks

I've just had a go again at this games 3.0v using your mod though the game sucks and worse than before 2.20v, your mod is grate.

But sort of stops working after main campaign plot as i fire on a wreck i only get one lot of salvage and then the collecting stops no matter how long i keep firing no more items and no destroying the wreckage and nothing if i go to another wreck.

And if i save and reload again one shot one lot of items and no more unlike before you kept firing and collecting till wreck was destroyed.

I don't know if any other players are having the same issue if so needs looking into.

[docwho83]

Hey Iforgotmysocks. Love the mod. Have been playing with it since 3.0 came out.

I seen one little bug. I tend to board the capital ships that are in the area.

After I have clear the field and leave the my news ships get removed from game. I am not sure why but it like the code to clear the field is also clearing any ship that was created by it even if it has changed owners.

[iforgotmysocks]

Hey guys, sorry that i dropped all my mods back then, i didn't have time to maintain them with all the frequent updates which didn't make things any better at the time. ^^
However, i had some time on my hands so i updated EaS for 4.0

New in v0.07:
- Salvagable NPC wrecks!
- Exploration (Spawning of wrecks and enemies) is modular now and can be disabled in the config file
- Drone loot is logged via logbook entries if enabled in the ingame menu
- Fixed loottables (the new items ruined the old loottabels - sorry about that )
- All loottables are now configurable in the config file
- Boarded ships won't be removed by cleanup routines anymore
- Improved cleanup
- General code adjustments (last version was released over 2 years ago)

[iforgotmysocks]

New in v0.08:
- Debrisfields no longer despawn while the player is close to them (happend before if the player was crossing over zone boarders frequently)
- Adjusted loottables a little more
- Fixed an oversight hiding in the weapon removal script when removing the mod. (Back then mk2 was topnotch and to avoid problems the mod simply removed all weapons and added a set of mk2 weapons, now the player gets to keep his weapons)

Sorry about the weapon overseight, if somebody lost weapons on a save he doesn't want to give up, let me know and i'll send you a script that adds the weapons again.

[iforgotmysocks]

Checked up on new ship spawn libs and updated values accordingly plus a couple fixes/improvements.

New in v0.09:
- Another issue causing the disappearance of ships spawned by EaS after boarding fixed
- Updated enemy spawn libraries and overhauled enemy spawns
- Improved cleanup on mod-removal, now all EaS wrecks get removed, even those who's cleanup routines were disrupted (happens rarely)
- Fixed an issue that caused weapon modifications to disappear

[iforgotmysocks]

These are the latest changes and i think the mod is in a good place right now. It's sad that i had to stop modding X-R over two years ago and couldn't make more significant progress on this project, but at least i was able to polish it and bring it up to date for now.


New in v1.0:
- Fixed enemy Capship's turrets not firing in some situations
- Fixed Salvagers not working if Exploration was disabled
- Enemies are more aggressive now

[ezra-r]

Hello,

Can you please consider making a Linux compatible version in the future? Pretty please? thanks

I'm going to try myself with a litlle scripting but I may mess up.

--

There is even a space in a file:
units_size_drone_salvager_COLLECTOR BACKUP.xml

is this correct? ^^^

[iforgotmysocks]

Oh... i didn't even know that compability issues on other platforms exist. xD Thought it's all the same. I'll have to look into it.

[ezra-r]

Oh... i didn't even know that compability issues on other platforms exist. xD Thought it's all the same. I'll have to look into it.

Thank you.

To save you the search there is a guide in this thread:

http://forum.egosoft.com/viewtopic.php?t=380912

basically for what I get:

• * No uppercase anywhere
  * No spaces in names or weird windows name thingies

[iforgotmysocks]

Thanks, that helps quite alot.

[jocan2003]

You need to install SideBarExtender by Philipp Offensand for the menu options to work.

Link Nexus: http://www.nexusmods.com/xrebirth/mods/416/?

(Some pretty stuff to look at)
https://www.dropbox.com/sh/y1i9md23old7abs/8jj3RRY21j

Explore and Salvage


Important! If you want to update a save that runs an older version of EaS you have to perform following steps!
Before removing the old version open the config file (Extensions\ExploreAndSalvage\md\ES_Config.xml)
and set the value "global.$ES_InitUpdate" to exact="true" and save the file before closing.
Load your save now so the old mod content is going to be removed. Save your game!

Now just add the latest version and keep playing.


New in v1.0:
- Fixed Enemy Capship turrets not firing in some situations
- Fixed Salvagers not working if Exploration was disabled
- Enemies are more aggressive now

New in v0.09:
- Another issue causing the disappearance of ships spawned by EaS after boarding fixed
- Updated enemy spawn libraries and overhauled enemy spawns
- Improved cleanup on mod-removal, now all EaS wrecks get removed, even those who's cleanup routines were disrupted (happens rarely)
- Fixed an issue that caused weapon modifications to disappear

New in v0.08:
- Debrisfields no longer despawn while the player is close to them (happend before if the player was crossing over zone boarders frequently)
- Adjusted loottables a little more
- Fixed an oversight hiding in the weapon removal script when removing the mod. (Back then mk2 was topnotch and to avoid problems the mod simply removed all weapons and added a set of mk2 weapons, now the player gets to keep his weapons)

New in v0.07:
- Salvagable NPC wrecks!
- Exploration (Spawning of wrecks and enemies) is modular now and can be disabled in the config file
- Drone loot is logged via logbook entries if enabled in the ingame menu
- Fixed loottables (the new items ruined the old loottabels - sorry about that )
- All loottables are now configurable in the config file
- Boarded ships won't be removed by cleanup routines anymore
- Improved cleanup
- General code adjustments (last version was released over 2 years ago)

New in v0.06:
- Different enemies now, not just your daily xenon ;x
- Slightly improved enemy ai (i didnt have much time, this is just a quick solution until i can focus on that)
- Removed salvage items and created a loottable which contains items that actually make sense.

New in v0.05:
- Added menuoption to en/disable drone autolaunch
- Added menuoption to en/disable drone ware selection (legal/illegal)
- Nerfed collectingspeed of drones
- Fixed the drone animation (they actually only pull out their arms if they are working now)
- Fixed a bug which caused errors in legal ware collections
- Fixed the drone's name
- Requires SideBarExtender now (if you don't want to use the SideBarExtender,
you can also set the drone launch and ware type options in the config file.

New in v0.04:
- Update to the update/deinstallroutine, 0.02 can be updated without issues if done as described
(Sorry if you installed 0.03 already, hopefully you still have a save with 0.02, otherwise your
weaponlayout will be messed up if you had salvagers installed. If you didn't have salvagers, you are fine.)


Salvage Drones:
Pics: https://www.dropbox.com/sh/i7141o7jh8sz ... 5tdAa?dl=0

Salvage Drones can be bought at your friendly neighbourhood Equipment Vendor. They are't entirely cheap, but they are worth it.
I created them as inventory items, so they wouldn't stop the player from taking combat drones.
They work completly on their own, and don't need any playerattention. (Except protection)
The player can activate/deactivate autolaunch and collection of illegal wares under "Crew" in the Main menu.
If the playership finds wrecks in range (default 20km), up to (default 20) drones are launched which start salvaging the wrecks in range.
If the player moves too far away (default >30km), they will take it as a recall and return, unload their cargo and dock.
A drone will also return to the player if its cargo is full (200 items), but will continue salvaging after dropping of the salvageloot.
If a player enters a highway, drones will "jump to the playership and dock automaticly".
Drones can also leave illegal wares behind. (This will prevent being killed by stations while afk salvaging ^^)

The config file can be found here: (Extensions\ExploreAndSalvage\md\ES_Config.xml)

Known Bugs:
- Sometimes site spawns end up being "ghost sites", the player will pass through spawned content, and can't attack it. Enemies aren't able to harm anybody either. Drones can salvage wrecks as usual. This only happens rarly and i'm working on it. Simply leave the site aside until it despawns.

Planned:
- More realistic salvage animation


This mod brings exploration, hunting down spezial items, practicly a reason to leave the spacecities and highways once in a while.
Discovering long forgotten shipgraveyards, finding missing relicts...

Archived:
- Salvageable NPC Wrecks
- Spawning random groups/clusters of debris/wrecks with the chance for enemies to hide in and loot to find. (currently spawning/despawning by entering/leaving a zone)
- Creating large remaining fields of spacetrash which might hide enemies and treasures... or probably just trash. (Just 1 each sector in albion yet)
- Salvagers which can be bought or found to salvage wrecks.

In work:
- Collecting information about the game performace while running the mod
- Collecting some ideas how to bring more depht in the whole process of exploring
- Creating more remaining trashfields and shipgraveyards
- Creating local events which might leed to more wrecks (some on paper, some for real)
- Writing logbooktexts which tell a fitting story about some larger trashfields or ship graveyards
- Better enemyvariations and control

Planned:
- More variations of debris and stuff like stations etc.
- Creating missions forcing the player to go out there
- Salvage ships and drones which can salvage large amounts and collect goods used in the economy. (This will take time!)
- Dynamical and depletable space trash fields forming where battles take place

If you guys like the project, stick around, drop off some ideas and enjoy a much needed game experiance, soon.


Install:
Download the mod, extract the data and copy it into your Extentions Directory.

Update/Uninstall:
Before removing the old version open the config file (Extensions\ExploreAndSalvage\md\ES_Config.xml)
and set the value "global.$ES_InitUpdate" to exact="true" and save the file before closing.
Load your save now so the old mod content is going to be removed. Save your game!

Now just add the latest version and keep playing.

Oh wow, makes me think of the one i made for X3 reunion back in the days!!, thank you for this mod

[Warnoise]

I absolutely love the idea behind this mode! I have been wanting a slavaging mechanism for a long time.

This adds a new interesting way to get materials.

I just want to confirm one thing:

For example when a ship is destroyed, can you salvage its wreck? Or do the ship wrecks randomly spawn accross the universe?

it would be amazing if i can send my salvagers into a warzone and let them do their job, then sell/use the loot.

[ADMNtek]

yes you can salvage wrecks from freshly destroyed ships even all the fighters you kill. but you can also salvage what i think random deposits.