At first, only the Ship Parts were produced in the Civ Ships Parts Lot. (It fits; you see, "Ship Parts" inside "Civ Ship Parts Lot"; that's how I understand it.)Thufar wrote: ↑Tue, 23. Oct 18, 04:41So, as I began my quest of learning how to play TNF, Thufar asked "Self, why did they choose to make the two ship parts in Civ Ship Parts Lot?'" Answer, if I understand it correctly, it seems it was needed very early on to make the station work, as opposed producing absolutely nothing. That make sense except, vanilla Civ Ship Parts Lots work now. Conclusion, the two ship parts don't "have" to be made at the Civ Ship Parts Lot.
It was later when we decided to try Ship Parts (Weapons) (which is basically Weapon Parts), did we add in the Ship Parts (Weapons) into the production cycles. But yeah, we kind of added this as an early Alpha feature, so everything is as chaotic as they have ever been.
I'm not really in a position to comment on Ship Parts; that's too much history piled on top of it.Thufar wrote: ↑Tue, 23. Oct 18, 04:41Then Thufar asks himself "Self, why do they make Ship Parts, Ship Parts (Weapons) and then go through an assembly run? Answer (a huge and probably incorrect assumption made here) is probably that's they way the old program did it. Conclusion, that's not necessarily the way it has to be done now.
For the Ship Parts (Weapons), ...! Of course, we will want Ship Parts (Weapons) to be made similarly compared to Ship Parts. This is what I am trying to do. I want to submit a set of numbers that is fit for producing Ship Parts (Weapons). (I actually thought it might be possible to just override the Turret Forge modules to produce Ship Parts (Weapons) with the set of numbers I come up with.) But, there were some problems. And as we patched the code one by one, it resulted in the rather bizarre situation we are now in. (There were so many patches and methods I am not sure which one we are using...)
Too many variables and uncertainties; have to place-hold it...
(Urge to buy X4 intensifies)Thufar wrote: ↑Tue, 23. Oct 18, 04:41So, like the two people shaking hands - one hand fitting into the other, so goes ship parts and Civ Ship Parts Lot. It seems that the programmers have it cemented in their minds that Ship Parts must be produced in a Civ Ship Parts Lot. To the best of my understanding, that simply doesn't have to be the case. Why not use another station as a template that has unchanging production runs? Take a High Tech Fab for instance - it has two Bio-Optics Fac, two Chip Fabs and two ScannAr Facilities - period. Any one of those production runs in that factory only produce one thing - ever.
Can a programmer not duplicate what ever programming is required to make a High Tech Fab and change the name to Ship Parts Fab. Can a programmer change the two Bio-Optics Fac production runs to Ship Parts (Weapons) Fac. Can that programmer change the four other production runs to Ship Parts Fab.
Would you not then have a stable production facility?
X4 improved upon X Rebirth (and previous X-games) by giving us a GUI to plan stations. Under the hood, station blueprints in X Rebirth are hard-coded. One does not simply swap out modules and call it a day; one must also make sure that the new module fits well, and does not block space and pathways.
So... if you really want a "new station", as in, completely new, never-before-seen-in-vanilla, you gotta do a lot of coding. That's where the pain begins. Just looking at the quaternions is making my mind melt. Also consider the certain "architecture styles" employed by the Albionians, Canterans, Omicronians, Teladi, and yada yada.
However, I find that designing Omicron Lyrae stations is by far the easiest. Everything is so modular that you could make something symmetrical and really call it a day.
And also: a new object model would be required if you really want a new station component to produce Ship Parts. (I don't mean repurposing existing station components; like, completely new, never-before-seen new.) No one ever knows where to find such designers...
So yeah. To conclude: technical aspects (as in coding) is ok to change. But the visual aspects? They would require too much work to make it worthwhile. Would resort to repurposing existing components.