HowTo:Make Weapons

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HowTos

Add Upgrades

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Adding weapons to the weapon list

Weapon descriptons are stored in the weapon_list.xml in the data directory.

Weapons are classified as FIXME DIFFERENCES BETWEEN CATEGORIES

• Beam
• Bolt
• Ball
• Missile

Weapon XML Schema

FIXME ADD DESCRIPTIONS TO SCHEMA

Beam

<beam ... >

• • name
  • mountsize
• <Energy ... />
  • rate - Energy requirement/second, in units of 100s of MJ
  • stability - Maximum continuous firing duration
  • refire - Rest time, in seconds, between firing
  • locktime - N/A for beams
• <Damage ... />
  • rate - Damage output/second, in units of 5.4 MJ
  • phasedamage - Damage/second, in units of 5.4 MJ that ignores shields
  • longrange - Fraction of damage applied at max range
• <Distance ... />
  • speed - Speed at which beam travels linearly through space, in meters/second (usually rather fast)
  • radialspeed - Speed at which beam reaches full radius, and full damage, in meters/second
  • radius - Beam radius, in meters
  • length - N/A for beams
  • pulsespeed - Controls visual wave effect in beam
  • range - Max damaging range, in meters
  • detonationrange - N/A for beams
  • volume - N/A for beams
• <Appearance ... />
  • file
  • soundwav
  • r
  • g
  • b
  • a

Example 1: Beam Weapon

<Beam name="LR_PminusBeamMKIV" mountsize="capship-massive">
  <Energy rate="1500" stability="8" refire="2" /> 
  <Damage rate="15000" longrange=".8" /> 
  <Distance speed="300000" radialspeed="60" radius="60" length="8" pulsespeed="36" range="150000" /> 
  <Appearance file="weapons/heavylaserbeam.png" soundwav="beam1.wav" r=".6" g=".1" b=".8" a=".6" /> 
</Beam>

Example 2: Spinning Weapon

You can make it spin as well by making it an accessory of the missle/weapon:

• You make it a subunit (turret) at the center, which has the word accessory in its name (e.g call it torpedo_accessory)
• Set the max_yaw, max_pitch, and max_roll to whatever you want it to spin at.
• Make an invisible (or e.g torpedo casing) main body.

Creating a weapon upgrade

prestidigitator documented his steps to create new weapons in a forum post. Here it is:

You will need to create an upgrade file for this weapon that appears in master_parts_list.csv as well as units.csv.

Here is what I have done:

1. weapon_list.xml: Copied the entire <Beam name="LaserBeam' ...> node to the end of the file (just before the </WEAPONS> end tag), changed the name from "LaserBeam" to "MyLaserBeam", and modified the values to be what I wanted (I left the "mountsize" attribute as "light").
2. master_part_list.csv: Copied the line starting with "laser_beam" to the end of the file and changed "laser_beam" to "my_laser_beam".
3. units/units.csv: Copied the line starting with "laser_beam__upgrades" to the end of the file, changed "laser_beam__upgrades" to "my_laser_beam__upgrades", changed "./factions/upgrades/laser_beam" to "./factions/upgrades/my_laser_beam", changed the second "laser_beam" to "my_laser_beam", and finally changed the "LaserBeam" to "MyLaserBeam".
4. units/factions/upgrades/: Copied the "laser_beam/laser_beam" file to "my_laser_beam/my_laser_beam" and changed the "weapon" attribute of the <mount> node from "LaserBeam" to "MyLaserBeam".

There's an ordering problem. I moved all the additions to immediately after those entries for the laser beam, and it worked.

So, I guess if you are trying to do this, consider my steps above to be a mini-HowTo, with the caveat that you should be careful about WHERE in the files you add things.

See also

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MOD

HowTos

Add Upgrades