============== Empyrion Alpha 10.6 EXPERIMENTAL has gone live! Please use the threads in our EXP forum for GAMEPLAY feedback ( about values, balancing,..): https://empyriononline.com/forums/experimental-features-discussion.35/ Please proceed in the thread below for general discussion about the feature itself! Thanks a lot for your contribution! ============== Alongside with CPU and the new Flight Model, we will also add a new way to release your Capital Vessels from the need to always land on a planet: HV-SV Docking How does it work? Same as with docking a SV or HV to a CV or BA you can move your HV onto a SV and simply dock it. The same rules apply as for all other docking methods: You are not allowed to stay seated in the docked vessel when the carrier moves Turrets and Shields of the docked HV need to be off A non-docked HV inside a SV leads to a movement-block for the SV There are a few limitations, though: You cannot dock to a CV or BA as long as you have a HV docked to the SV. Currently there is also no possiblity to change this, as this is a technical limitation. To work around this limitation when you are in space, the HV can now move in ALL directions, but only with a limited speed of 3m/s but also WITHOUT requiring any thrusters! This means, as of A10.6, you can load and unload a HV in space without any restrictions, even when the HV is floating in space in non-gravity environment. Notes/Knowledge: With Alpha 10.6 the weight and mass of a docked vessel will also contribute to the carrier mass! Shields on the carrier do NOT protect the docked vessel ( The Hull Polarization is only active for the vessel with the shield device) Tip: What you can also do is to dock a HV below a SV. For this to work, your HV needs a docking pad on top of the HV, as the SV-docking and landing-gears will not dock to the HV. You then need to "press" the HV against the SV floor to make it dock.
Like docking to a CV, only the HV's shields needs to be off, correct? The SV's shields can remain on and protect the SV? If the SV's shields can remain on does it also protect the HV if the HV is inside the SV?
Yes, basically all the rules are identical .. if something is not identical, it is a bug/not intentional No, the shields only protect the carrier. (Same as with CV and BA) > Added to the 1st post. Thx (nearly forgot that)
=| i would favor if gravity or a minimum of 1 thruster is required. waited long to load unload HV in Space That's fair i guess Sidenote 10.6 is going tobe huuuuuuuuuuuuuuugge, trust me, i know this.
We had it that way in the 1st interation, but causes some issues AND would not work if you have a HV with the green "ground repulsor engines" as for those you would not need any thruster. (and, this way it will not cost you extra CPU just to be able to move your HV from the CV parking space onto your SV)
Is this a thing that will change in the future? I think docked ships need the protection of shields. I realize that forcing the shields off of the child ship is to stop a potential exploit.
By the name alone "Hull polarized shield" the Shield of the SV cannot protect what is not a Part of it as the Shield does not form a Star Trek like Bubble around the Vessel.
What is when my dedicated carriervessel has a platform where i can drive my HV onto that platform to dock it with docking plates on the HVs bottom to the SVs floor?
This is a really nice QoL feature and much appreciated. I'd also like to request that SVs be able to dock to HVs. It's pretty clear that, intended or not, HVs will be the default 'Haulers' now. Unless/until Capital Hover Vessels become possible. This leads to a bit of a Catch-22. An HV that can haul a few hundred tons will almost certainly be too heavy for most early-mid game SVs to lift. And I don't imagine that a "Fighter SV" will have the lift to haul a Support HV around when doing POI assaults. But say the "Fighter SV" could haul that HV and drop it nearby. It couldn't haul the HV back to base once it's filled w hundred/s plus tons of loot. Yet if the FOB/Support HV could haul the Fighter SV around on it's deck, then that would fit much better into the M&V/CPU Meta.
I am wondering if it wouldn't be easier to have the autodock feature removed and be replaced with a manual dock feature that turns off all things notvallowed on docked vessels automatically. I think it is easier and more obvious to see a docked/undocked message in the UI, than going through multiple menus and go from cockpit to cockpit just to check what is not working and prevents moving and what people forget to turn off. It is less a quality of life improvement than a way of implementing a feature every player, especially new player can do intuitively instead of the other way around, which is pretty much busy work. Example: You are on board of a CV with a Dropship SV and a HV in the Hangar. Obviously the CV needs to be stopped completely. So in order to dock the HV to the SV you need to lift of the SV so it is undocked, lift of the HV and slowly bring it in position to dock it to the SV, disable all devices that are not allowed to be on in order to fly, and go to the SV cockpit to take off. I'll asume that you have thought of everything and not make multiple trips. Now with the way i propose, you leave the SV where it is standing on Deck. You undock it without changing its position and hight above ground. Then you get into your HV and bring it in position to dock it and press the key for docking. Everything not allowed by the system will be off and the HV is securly docked, now change back to the SV cockpit and fly off. That all might change with walking on moving ships obviously. I think that will be hard to do anyways because as soon as you can walk on a moving ship and get into a cockpit to undock you slam into the backwall of CV or glitch out. So the whole inside of the mother entity CV should be treated as a playfield itself so you can move within it without the movement of the ME CV in mind. Without that moving on moving ships makes notvreally sense. But if you could pull it off it would be awesome. Imagine a mothership slowly approaching a planet while players get on board a dropship CV, load up recon SV, miner HVs and Tank HVs and the dropship CV undocks while the mothership is in movement. On the planets sureface the Recon SV starts of the fyling dropship CV while the Tank HVs jump out of the back to secure the landing area for the dropship CV to set up a base.... Oh well.... one can only dream. ;-)
So, for this to work we need to leave the SV floating mid air, exit and enter the HV so we can dock it hoping we left the SV at the right place, if not rinse, repeat.... Why can't the SV just dock the HV and take it away?
I'm guessing it's another limitation in the current docking code. I believe the player has to be in the child vessel to dock to a parent. In this case the child is the HV and the parent is the SV. If it is a limitation as I think then it couldn't be changed without a rework of the entire code.
I expect that the thing that will get the most 'yells' will be difficulty getting back into the SV cockpit (who has underside access to their SVs?), and whatever happens to the player when the SV is right above the HV Cockpit and the player exits the HV cockpit. It's pretty easy to get hard stuck exiting cockpits as it is, heh. --- @martian101 , to your question, I think @krazzykid2006 is right about the code & Child docks to Mother part. As to how to handle an actual docking, my guess is the following would be a decent way to handle an 'SV over the top of an HV' docking; 1) Lower HV to less than a meter above ground, if not fully grounded. Have roof mounted landing pads. 2) Bring in SV, use 'Alt' to freelook while in 3rd person mode, center SV side to side, then adjust forward/aft so that the HVs cockpit isn't right up against the SVs belly; since you'll have to exit the HV after docking. 2a) Lower the SV until it touches the top of the HV, then, watching the "Distance to Orbit" in lower right of the HUD, raise SV a meter. 3) Exit SV carefully, so you don't break a leg. 4) Enter HV, raise HV until docked with SV. 5) Power down HV. 6) Exit HV. 7) Enter SV cockpit. May need to modify either HV or SV to support this.
The The "rules" do not have a lot to do with the docking itself, but are mainly because of non-intentional use (like HV as a shielded-docked-turret) and they are already implemented and not "new" for 10.6 .. just applied to the new docking. Agree... I would also prefer a manual docking mode, but this is not on the horizon atm.
We plan to do a few refinements, but it will ALWAYS be the way that a HV is docking TO the SV. Technically. What we aim to possibly chance is that you currently cannot "dock" a vessel by pressing the carrier onto a docking pad of the to-be-docked vessel (it will simply not do anyhting)
Question, If my HV has docking pads on the side, can I just bump against the side of a SV to dock? I assume yes if the rules are the same as current docking.
