Xenon Cap ships look like Paranid designs.

birdtable · Post by **birdtable** » Wed, 23. Mar 16, 15:34

Well I would have thought the perfect shape for a Top Of The Line Destroyer would be a mirrored Orb encircled with lasers to hit incoming hard targets and rotating plasma (or whatever) weapons that could freely rotate around the surface to bring complete fire power to which ever target was chosen.
The old Xenon destroyers while offering a slim profile in one dimension offered a great big slab of target from above or below ...
Nature evolves the best shapes for survival, I have yet to see a flagstone on legs anywhere recorded in biological history.
The most menacing ship I have come across in the history of the X Series is the present Xenon I ... a definite WTF moment when first encountered.

Requiemfang · Post by **Requiemfang** » Wed, 23. Mar 16, 15:46

linolafett wrote:
That more, beacuse there are no decent 3d export/import tools for modding avaliable.

Well that is really ES fault for not at least providing some basic tools for such a thing. For all of ES's openness to modding you guys could of at least given us some export import tools for 3d programs. If anything with XR you guys made it harder for us to add custom ships compared to the last 3 games.

Killjaeden · Post by **Killjaeden** » Wed, 23. Mar 16, 20:52

linolafett wrote:That more, beacuse there are no decent 3d export/import tools for modding avaliable.

It is possible, that's what really matters. Creating a new ship is considerably more time consuming then exporting it, even without decent exporter, unless we talk about 15min kitbash jobs...
If people would find XR compelling enough, they would have a go at it. I know i would, but its not compelling for me at all (for the already stated reasons). And all the X3 modellers i knew felt the same.

Can't speak for all of those who left, but if you would go back to the X3 faction designs in new titles i would consider "coming back". But as it stands... the X-series and i have to part ways, which is very sad. So please, at least consider it for your future designs...

Post by **Nanook** » Thu, 24. Mar 16, 00:04

birdtable wrote:Well I would have thought the perfect shape for a Top Of The Line Destroyer would be a mirrored Orb encircled with lasers to hit incoming hard targets and rotating plasma (or whatever) weapons that could freely rotate around the surface to bring complete fire power to which ever target was chosen.
The old Xenon destroyers while offering a slim profile in one dimension offered a great big slab of target from above or below ...

And yet, a big old mirror ball would be the worst shape ever. It would give missiles a huge target. And a mirrored surface is only good against a limited wavelength of radiation - usually visible light. Infrared, gamma ray and x-ray lasers, for example, wouldn't have a problem. And neither would projectiles. The Xenon capital ships from TC and AP had great designs, IMO. They were flat and could rapidly change attitude to face a target with a very small profile. And they were rather full of holes so a lot of shots would pass right through without hitting anything.

Nature evolves the best shapes for survival, I have yet to see a flagstone on legs anywhere recorded in biological history...

Umm, that's silly. Of course they didn't. There was nothing shooting projectiles at them until humans came along.

Nikola515 · Post by **Nikola515** » Thu, 24. Mar 16, 01:18

I agree with Nanook here. Xenon ships had better design in X3 than in XR......Especially with weapons loadouts (it is so easy to disable/destroy Xenon K now.... I never understood why they didn't reuse some of old designs on first place

I hope they bring them back some day in new game....

Nikola515 · Post by **Nikola515** » Thu, 24. Mar 16, 01:42

Privata wrote:
Nikola515 wrote:I think Xenon ships might have little inspiration from Mass Effect Ripers in XR....
I think they look more like the geth dropship rather than the actual reapers.

Geth ships wore actually inspired by Reapers... They wore controlled by Reapers and they thought they wore mechanical gods to Geth .... But anyway im talking about insects design and black red lighting on them. For example when Reapers are shooting that red eye laser it makes it extra ominous and intimidating

Lander1979 · Post by **Lander1979** » Thu, 24. Mar 16, 02:45

What made Xenon scary and intimidating for me in past X titles was not the look of any individual ship, but the sheer numbers of them. When you stumbled into a Xenon sector you knew about it, there was a literal sea of Red, ships of all sizes being mass produced, a von neumann machine out of control.

This isn't the case in Rebirth as there just isn't that many of them. Focus for the fear factor has been shifted from sheer mass of numbers to the look of the individual, and once you've seen them a few times that initial "shock factor" is lost, same as it would be if you watch a "jump-scare" video over and over. After that, they become a nuisance to deal with rather than a force to be reckoned with.

It looks to me like a lot of the design for the new Xenon has been inspired by "The Matrix" trilogy, which is a fairly well known showcase of the "robotic insectoid" style.

Nikola515 · Post by **Nikola515** » Thu, 24. Mar 16, 04:11

Actually when you look in dark and just see bright red it is scary. A lots of horror games do that.... I agree Xenon should be swarm of ships (strength in numbers). But i don't think AI can't handle all of this. Im having problems having one cap ship tell what to do let alone swarm(they fly in circles and there is no grup formation). Also im not even going to bother with escort AI or battle script (Balor). Other races should ships should be powerful but there shouldn't be many of them....

Lander1979 · Post by **Lander1979** » Thu, 24. Mar 16, 04:52

True, the first couple of times a K sneaks up behind you it can make you jump with all the blackness and glowy red bits, but what never gets old is when you go through the wrong jump gate and your hud and radar suddenly turns red with hundreds upon hundreds of hostile contacts...

There are 2 different types of fears that the Xenon are playing on here. The one they play on in XR is a cheap form of horror which plays on initial instinctive reaction like a jump-scare video. Once the player becomes accustomed to this the entire effect is lost. Eventually a ship that sneaks up behind you and goes "BOO!" is going to get old...

In previous X the fear was a much deeper and long lasting one, it was an ever present atmosphere of danger created by the pure knowledge that something is there... Something vast with a sinister intent and unthinkable might to impose it's will. Even near the end game it had the most steely eyed of commanders sweating and counting their Armada, questioning themselves, "is it enough? will it ever be enough? and what if it's not..."

Nikola515 · Post by **Nikola515** » Thu, 24. Mar 16, 07:12

Im not sure if you ever played X3 games ???? But you should try x3 litcube's universe mod.... There is new Xenon race that are even more powerful than Terran ATF ships. Also they can take over sector by sector and given time even whole universe. You cant fight them with one ship because you will die in seconds. So you need to build your own armada to defeat them. Also there is features where you can tell your fleet/armada to jump to your location in formations. Or you can tell it what missile to use and how.... Also AI is not stupid as in vanilla.... Having your first fleet battle Xenon is just epic and perhaps EGO could learn things or two. Anyway no matter how much I play It never gets old and it always entertaining

He also did pretty good job on optimization so you can have up 100 ships and game wont lag (unlike vanilla 5 capitals and it is slowing down). I actually had around 250 ships and game started to slow down little

birdtable · Post by **birdtable** » Thu, 24. Mar 16, 07:27

As Lander1979 stated " it was an ever present atmosphere of danger " , this is missing in Rebirth. The Galaxy is quite benevolent, never feel threatened although this may have changed slightly with the introduction of the khaak. The Xenon in a soft cuddly environment will never achieve the fear factor they deserve.

Nikola515 · Post by **Nikola515** » Thu, 24. Mar 16, 08:58

That's becuse stations can't be destroyed (gets fixed for free and fast). Also ships respawn out of thin air as well. Player is only one that follows rules and everything else is cheating. If there was consequence for everyone it would be much different. For example you would fight and take Xenon/Pirates much more serious if they could destroy NPC station that is only sorce ammo or shipyard that builds ships that you need.

Lander1979 · Post by **Lander1979** » Thu, 24. Mar 16, 23:22

I have made a Mod to test the Idea of using the Xenon I as a Paranid Zeus.

http://forum.egosoft.com/viewtopic.php?t=388638

spankahontis · Post by **spankahontis** » Fri, 25. Mar 16, 00:39

Snafu_X3 wrote:Don't forget there are other reasons for ships to have more 'organic' rounded looks, eg defence

Look at the evolution of castles from square towers to round ones, for instance. Round towers provide better defence (survivability) despite being more difficult to build, as shots tend to bounce off curved surfaces unless they hit at precisely the right angle (pun not intended). Tanks, to be more up-to-date, went through a similar process in the 1940s & later; surface warships similarly, although slightly earlier (& was prolly more of an offshoot from streamlining efficiency to gain more speed & burn less fuel anyway). Modern-day combat aircraft don't do this mainly to save on weight/mass, but if you look closely at the designs there may be some similarities turning up..

Although that's not intended to provide the designers with an excuse as to why the K has that huuuuge blind spot on its back..

It's the same principle with something as simple as a raw egg, the top parts, the small curved parts are the strongest part of the egg, harder to shatter.

birdtable wrote:As Lander1979 stated " it was an ever present atmosphere of danger " , this is missing in Rebirth. The Galaxy is quite benevolent, never feel threatened although this may have changed slightly with the introduction of the khaak. The Xenon in a soft cuddly environment will never achieve the fear factor they deserve.

Have to disagree, the burning red eyes of their front ships make them look menacing, plus their models resemble certain bacteria/insects, the I looks like a giant Cockroach.

Post by **Nanook** » Fri, 25. Mar 16, 01:19

spankahontis wrote:
Snafu_X3 wrote:Don't forget there are other reasons for ships to have more 'organic' rounded looks, eg defence

Look at the evolution of castles from square towers to round ones, for instance. Round towers provide better defence (survivability) despite being more difficult to build, as shots tend to bounce off curved surfaces unless they hit at precisely the right angle (pun not intended). Tanks, to be more up-to-date, went through a similar process in the 1940s & later; surface warships similarly, although slightly earlier (& was prolly more of an offshoot from streamlining efficiency to gain more speed & burn less fuel anyway). Modern-day combat aircraft don't do this mainly to save on weight/mass, but if you look closely at the designs there may be some similarities turning up..

Although that's not intended to provide the designers with an excuse as to why the K has that huuuuge blind spot on its back..

It's the same principle with something as simple as a raw egg, the top parts, the small curved parts are the strongest part of the egg, harder to shatter.

And just how is that relevant to a spaceship containing AI that don't, to the best of our knowledge, require any sort of atmosphere? Oh, and eggs are designed to be cracked open, you know. Otherwise, the critter inside won't be able to escape.

birdtable wrote:As Lander1979 stated " it was an ever present atmosphere of danger " , this is missing in Rebirth. The Galaxy is quite benevolent, never feel threatened although this may have changed slightly with the introduction of the khaak. The Xenon in a soft cuddly environment will never achieve the fear factor they deserve.

Have to disagree, the burning red eyes of their front ships make them look menacing, plus their models resemble certain bacteria/insects, the I looks like a giant Cockroach.

And who's afraid of the big bad cockroach? Seems to me if they knew human** psychology so well, they'd find a more menacing shape to use.

(**Which is very likely totally different from that of the other races.)

However, in a space battle, I highly doubt the shape of the ship is going to have any sort of psychological effect on anybody involved. The real fear comes with the knowledge that they're trying to kill you.

Or maybe they could try putting us off our guard by making their ships in the shape of cute, cuddly puppies. Probably about as effective as a cockroach.

Snafu_X3 · Post by **Snafu_X3** » Fri, 25. Mar 16, 01:37

Nanook wrote: Oh, and eggs are designed to be cracked open, you know. Otherwise, the critter inside won't be able to escape.

An egg is designed to be opened /from the inside!/ It's designed to be tough from /exterior/ damage (your point is not lost though..)

however, in a space battle, I highly doubt the shape of the ship is going to have any sort of psychological effect on anybody involved.

In a space battle limited to lightspeed comms/detection nobody's likely to see the hostile ship before it's launched all weapons. If there is FTL comms/detection around, then in the X universe it appears to have been applied sloppily by civilians & not at all by the military - the direct opposite of what would seem to be SOP for any government with an organized force (army/navy/WHY)

.. so the point is moot

Lander1979 · Post by **Lander1979** » Fri, 25. Mar 16, 05:24

Lander1979 wrote:I have made a Mod to test the Idea of using the Xenon I as a Paranid Zeus.

http://forum.egosoft.com/viewtopic.php?t=388638

Looking for Test Pilots and Feedback Please.

(Mod related feedback should be posted on the thread in the Scripts and Modding forum linked above)

birdtable · Post by **birdtable** » Fri, 25. Mar 16, 06:51

So no volunteering from me for any future space wars, no bright flashy lights, same old slabs with holes, ...
Unlike Batty I would not be able to remember C beams glittering, attack ships on fire .... My memories would be " It was dark man just so dark and so sixties"

Requiemfang · Post by **Requiemfang** » Fri, 25. Mar 16, 16:03

I think the curved armor thing applies still seeing has 97% of the weapons that are used by the ships in game are matter projector throwers. The only true energy weapons in the game are from the mean purple menace

Killjaeden · Post by **Killjaeden** » Fri, 25. Mar 16, 16:16

X3's xenon capital design totally wasn't menacing ... no not at all *sarcasm*

In a space battle limited to lightspeed comms/detection nobody's likely to see the hostile ship before it's launched all weapons.

I can clearly see the enemy ships in X way before they are in firing range, so not sure what you are trying to say.