March 07, 2005

My thoughts on the galaxy generation in Moo2

Recently, I have been taking a little time to re-examine the effects of the /nobh on galaxy generation. I am not entirely happy with its effects on the galaxy. It seems to be throwing off the balance of thing.

The game forms the entire star field first. Black holes are handled as a type of star (type 6). After the star field is formed, the planets are added to the systems based on the type of star in each system.

As some of you may know, currently the /nobh switch converts black holes into red stars as the stars are formed. My reasoning for implementing such a simple transformation was because the game manual states red stars 'rarely have planets with abundant mineral resources or easily habitable environments' however the game manual seems incorrect.

I have noticed in many cases that there is very little difference between the grades of the planets in systems with one type of star versus another. The manual specifically states many things that seem completely wrong if taken literally.

For example, in the case of brown stars the manual says brown stars have 'no planets orbiting these extremely rare stars, but they`re more likely than other systems to have a system special'. It is true that these stars are rare but they often have planets. Also, the manual states that yellow stars 'almost always have planets with moderate mineral resources and environments tolerant of, if not friendly to, life' when in fact these systems rarely have nice worlds.

Overall, I don`t see very much difference in the quality of systems with one type of star versus the other. It seems almost random. I do notice this however. There are more red stars in the galaxy than any other type when the /nobh switch is used.

I believe a change is still needed to reduce the number of red stars . As such, I will make a change in the next release of the patch. The type of star the black hole is converted to will be randomized.

8 comments:

siron said...

Hi LB!

@ brown stars: I have a completely different impression. They are almost always empty but I have not verified the higher probability of system specials.

Just made a small test:
5 huge org rich galaxies:
6 brown stars, 5 empties and 1 gas giant. And imho thats a normal result.

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"There are more red stars in the galaxy than any other type when the /nowh switch is used."

guess typo. u mean /nobh?

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I'll write later more.

Anonymous said...

Siron is right. Brown stars are ALWAYS worst systems in galaxy. Ugly!

If u increased number of red stars this may be the answer for my question : why i find so many riches or generally more planets then year b4.

PK

StepNRazor said...

Perhaps add a switch option as well so the star type can be set if a type is found that produces a balanced map.

StepNRazor said...

Perhaps also adding switch to set the star type might be nice to beter zero in on a balanced map.

siron said...

WB Step!

LB told me he already altered the map generator. I think the change was not really necessary...the replacement of bhs is already randomized....because the replacement happens DURING map generation. So maps with bh and nobh (everything else is the same) are almost completely different. Just in the corners the places of the systems is almost identical but even here the colour of stars differs.

I think other changes are more important:

1. splinter singletons: I often had completely XXXXXX up starts with a gold-singleton near hw (ex-splinter). I think a gem or arti might be fairer.

2. planets=4 or 5 switch increases the probability of Urich ng or huge rich/ur hg. tol is even stronger. I guess we need at least a "no ur ng" switch. LB told me he works on something similar.

siron said...

Ummm. Yes. We can.

You should try to use the dos-version. Whats your problem?

Have you tried a MP game with your win-version? Then you know why almost no MP-player uses it.

A win-version patch would slow down his project.

siron said...

So you have 2k? (dos-version doesnt work there)

Otherwise you should try to install the dos-version. LB wrote nice instructions. (setup)

(Win-version is simply too slow in MP-Games)

Anonymous said...

I've seen what techman95 reported though I only get it after creating a multi-player game. It launches the game and allows people to join in and set up their race. Then, when the host actually starts the game, the screen goes black and it remains so. Oddly enough, we can hear the music playing in the background, but there is nothing on either monitor screen. MOO2 works fine when playing single player and after correcting the issue with IPX/SPX not being installed, my friend and I had thought we had the problem fixed. Any thoughts as I am completely stumped on this?

Thanks for any help offered and for making these much needed improvements to an otherwise wonderful game.

My email addy is balrogofmoria70@hotmail.com

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