Notes after running EE at a Convention

We ran EE this past weekend at ShadowCon. This was my 6th year running BridgeSims there. All the previous years we've run Artemis SBS. This was the first time I ran EE for the length of a Convention. You can see a couple pictures here: http://bridgesim.net/discussion/153/event-shadowcon-jan-8-9-2016-west-memphis-ar. We had good response from players, most had played Artemis at the con in the past.

Here's a couple of things I ran across during running of the games.

1. Have a Dedicated (non-headless) server screen - Be able to spawn new ships without having to select another console screen, or have a screen just for server for starting & pausing/un-pausing games. I ran a main screen on a separate PC and the server didn't have the proper OpenGL capabilities to run another mainscreen. I ended up using Power Management which isn't the best solution. Maybe have a timer telling how long the game has been running for the "server" screen.
Since the Basic mission didn't spawn a ship, I could not run a headless server without modifying the script. Maybe be able to enter commands on the headless server to run basic things like spawning a ship.

2. Launching a new game (or restarting) without closing the server - When running the same scenario over and over, it can be a pain to have to exit the server and restart it to run the same scenario. Then have to manually reconnect the clients.
I did have the clients configured to auto-connect, but ran into a problem with a couple of clients not wanting to auto-connect.
Maybe just clear all the LUA actions from memory and relaunch the same script. This could be also done in the script if the Victory command could load & start the same script or another script.

3. VS mode - I tried to create a "Single Pilot VS Mode" to let single pilots have a 2v2 battle but wasn't able to spawn some of the ships as another race.

4. Disable the Main Screen section in Single Pilot using option.ini - Allow the game to run in a window in separate windows with a main screen and Single Pilot.

5. auto-connect to a 2nd (or Nth) ship - Have an setting in option.ini to connect to a ship that is not the first one spawned. For multi player ship games.

6. Save presets for the server - Be able to keep Science Scanning, Sensors, & warp/jump config, etc settings across server restarts. Maybe store these in option.ini.

Comments

  • 1. Yes. I usually setup my laptop as server. It has a very good CPU, lots of memory. But a crappy GPU. So works great as server and GM screen. Adding the option to have clients function as GM screen is complex (as right now the GM screen uses a lot of info that is only available on the server)

    2. I should really look into this. I've made some progress for it in the past, but forgot about it.

    3. Should be possible. You can always change the faction of any item in the GM screen with the top left faction selector.

    4. You mean, have like the single pilot view without the 3D view? Guess that's just a different screen type then. Does give a lot more screen space to use :-)

    5. Should be easy. https://github.com/daid/EmptyEpsilon/commit/b86fd963f06dbfb6c4a256e03cbc32ab8c37891c

    6. I'll have a look. Shouldn't be too hard.
  • 3. I was trying to do this via a script, but, it didn't seem to create any ships.

    4. Yes, just removing the 3d view from Single Pilot. On a 5:4 screen it only gives just a small strip for the 3D view. It's very hard to see anything. I guess I can work on that :smile:. on a 16:9 widescreen it looks much better.

    5. Cool. Will check out tonight.
  • 3. Odd. No reason why this shouldn't work.
    This worked for me:
    PlayerSpaceship():setFaction("Human Navy"):setTemplate("Player Cruiser"):setRotation(200):setPosition(0, 0) PlayerSpaceship():setFaction("Human Navy"):setTemplate("Player Cruiser"):setRotation(200):setPosition(100, 0) PlayerSpaceship():setFaction("Kraylor"):setTemplate("Player Cruiser"):setRotation(200):setPosition(200, 0) PlayerSpaceship():setFaction("Kraylor"):setTemplate("Player Cruiser"):setRotation(200):setPosition(300, 0)

    4. I'll see what I can do, maybe I should collapse the 3D view when it is too small.
  • daid said:

    3. Odd. No reason why this shouldn't work.
    This worked for me:
    PlayerSpaceship():setFaction("Human Navy"):setTemplate("Player Cruiser"):setRotation(200):setPosition(0, 0) PlayerSpaceship():setFaction("Human Navy"):setTemplate("Player Cruiser"):setRotation(200):setPosition(100, 0) PlayerSpaceship():setFaction("Kraylor"):setTemplate("Player Cruiser"):setRotation(200):setPosition(200, 0) PlayerSpaceship():setFaction("Kraylor"):setTemplate("Player Cruiser"):setRotation(200):setPosition(300, 0)

    I tried something similar. It could have just been a typo or something, but, I didn't get a LUA error.

  • I didn't get much of a chance to test that either as I was working on it at the Convention.
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