Hi guys,
I'm not sure if you have thought of these ideas yet but I had some thoughts for the game (My laptop is on the frizz and I'm saving for a new one, so I don't want to download anything right now).

-One thing that bugged me abut the original BotF was that certain items that were built in a system that should be in space were not part of a battle scene if a fleet was attacking a planet/system. Items such as orbital batteries and shipyards should be targets for attacking fleets the same as if they were targeting other ships/starbases.

-Add a diplomatic feature that allows a player to suggest to a (NPC whom is allied or affiliated to the player) the NPC's next target. For example, say I'm playing as the Federation and I'm allied with the Klingons and we're both at war with the Cardassians. I could send a diplomatic message asking the Klingons to attack a specific Cardassian system next. They either reply in the positive and focus on attacking that system (and don't make other moves until they capture that system) or in the negative and fight the battles they choose to. NPCs should be able to send the same requests to a player. This would help allies coordinate campaigns.

-Have 2 options for maps when you start a new game.
1. A random generated map, similar to how the original BotF starts
2. A standard Alpha quadrant map with wormhole near Bajor leading to a partial standard Gamma quadrant map. All races/stellar phenomena (badlands, wormhole, famous nebulae, etc) will be set in place based on their locations in Star Trek/TNG/DS9. I can probably provide some accurate input for a stellar map if you need help (Keep in mind that I'm by no means a programmer, only a star trek geek with some free time).

to realize the idea of combined attacks one could also implement a follow order and give the AI certain preferences to just "attach" one of their fleets to a fleet of yours at a given rendez-vous point. This rendez-vous point would always be a common reachable starbase in the borderline of both territories. if both allies aren't connected then I guess it won't make much sense to tell them to attack a specific system cause you won't have much intel about that other borderline anyway and it'd be best to let the AI decide which system to attack according to their better intel.

In Supremacy orbital batteries, science stations and ship yards will be showing up in 3D combat. We have the models online ready for use in the 3D engine that is being refined.

Hi Matress_of_evil and everyone

Ok so I thought of something to help with the problem determining if wormholes are stable or not. As was posted before, a player wouldn't want to send a ship through. Why not use probes? They could have the sensor range of the weakest level outpost, have the shortest range/speed and only take one turn to build (that way they're no big loss).


One other idea regarding diplomacy. A previous post noted that diplomacy now featured the ability to trade certain items (dilithium, etc). Why not have items specific to the major races that could be traded for either another race's special item or dilitium/credits, etc.

Federation: Genesis Device (makes one barren / gas giant into a class M Planet)
Klingons: Portable Cloaking device (can equip to one ship and once that ship is destroyed, it's lost)
Romulans: Portable Cloaking device (can equip to one ship and once that ship is destroyed, it's lost)
Cardassians: Long Range Unmanned Missle (as was seen in ST Voyager) (This can be used to attack planetary system defenses or star bases prior to a fleet attacking to soften defenses).
Dominion: Tachyon grid to attach to a ship that prevents cloaked ships from getting first strike (can equip to one ship and once that ship is destroyed, it's lost).

I see there's some juicy talk going on here...I'll add some input, if that's okay.

Edo, the sensor scanning and launching probes into wormholes was already discussed elsewhere. Basically, the idea was that only science vessels would be able to detect wormholes (why else did the Cardies not detect the Celestial Temple for so long and Barzaan their own unstable wormhole?) Also, launching probes is a neat idea, but we'll just have to see what the programmers say about it. If it's too much of a hassle to do, I wouldn't bother. After all, as LaForge put it, the only way to know for sure whether the wormhole is stable is to fly in it (that's why the Ferengi flew into the Barzaan wormhole together with the Enterprise shuttle). So that time trying to figure out that part of programming may be better spent elsewhere.

I like all the above ideas, they're really great. About Edo's suggestion to have those special items for empire to be traded: the problem arises as far as the legality of such items. What I mean by that is that the Klingons never gave away their cloaking technology through official channels. In the game, if you play Klingon, you could never have that option, at least not sanctioned by the Council. As far as the Romulans, the only reason why they gave it to the Feds was as a counter-offer for Fed intelligence on the Dominion, but I guess that's okay. So, the bottom line is that one such offer could be countered by a counter-offer that is empire-specific. It would just suck that both Roms and Klings would offer the same thing. Consider Romulan Ale. As far as the Genesis project, it never ended up actually producing a stable planet, but I guess for the purposes of the game it would be okay.

My biggest concern in the game is the battle itself. It is without a doubt to become the most prominent and most important part of the game. By no means do I intend to scoff at Cmdr. Wolfe's great work, but there's much that needs to be done, beginning with the star field and through the graphics of starships and ending with the intelligence of the ships. The bottom line is that there is so much work involved that it may well be impossible for Cmdr. Wolfe to accomplish this, no matter how much of a Trek fan he is. Right now, here's what needs improvement:
-the star field,
-the planet(s) and immediate surroundings,
-orbital batteries and other space constructions, as mentioned above by all of you,
-starship texture improved, the nacelles do not glow,
-if possible (VERY important from the esthetic point of view), the phaser beam coming together on the array arc before it fires, much like in Bridge Commander (if Bridge Commander could somehow get fused with this game, that would be something!!!!!!!),
-info on screen showing order status, speed, ship condition, morale, (possibly remaining torpedo count?), etc.
-the explosions truly need improvement, hopefully leaving debris.

The bottom line: to implement all of that above is without a doubt a lot of work, which can be demoralizing, but the way I see it I'd strive either for near-perfection or not at all. Given such large Star Trek audience and enthusiasts among the programming community, it should be possible to do the above by collaborating with others with high programming qualifications. But then I'm sure you guys already have that as part of your approach. I would be sure that anyone who saw the current status of the game would be enthusiastic enough about it to lend a hand (and this is one of those moments where I deeply regret that I have no clue how to do any of this stuff, so hat off to all of you guys, especially to Cmdr. Wolfe for his hard work!).

And then we have the A.I. Other than the space battle, that is the most time-consuming and most complicated piece of work. All above suggestions are great, let's hope to see them implemented.

One possible additional way (additional with regards to cdrwolfe's work) for all of those things are going to end up in botf2 is by merging with a then finished ST:Excalibur engine. The things you search for will be attempted to be realized there but I think only for small-scale BC-type battles, i.e. not the Dominion wars type of large-scale battles that should be possible to perform in botf2. That means of course cutting down eye-candyness a little since all eye-candyness means more CPU power to be used and multiplying this usage with the amount of ships in battle you might get a feeling for what could cause problems in large-scale battles.
For smaller battles of course one could add those things. It would make sense btw. since in large scale battles you have so much interaction just by the sheer mass of ships that you won't look at details like phaser beam convergence or correct nacelle lighting (btw. nacelles should have constant lighting when not using warp engine, i.e. only at retreat command, the nacelles should change their glow) on each ship on the battlefield. It simply escapes the eye. One could of course calculate these things for zoomed-in camera areas because only there you need to show eye-candyness.

Btw. near-perfectionness is a good thing but not at all costs. Even if you get to near-perfection stages, it wouldn't make the game 0%-100% playable, i.e. near-perfection or not at all is no option for a fan-based game. The credo here reads more like the Olympic credo: near-perfection but having fun while doing it is the greatest part of it, no matter the outcome. Nevertheless your suggestions are really good. You should add them to the corresponding 3D engine main thread so that cdrwolfe can "digest" them . Things like phaser beams coming together or debris might be easier than we think but also, they might not be. As cdrwolfe said, he has learned 3D programming in Irrlicht "by doing", i.e. unlike company programmers, he did not and to a certain degree still doesn't know what's possibly easy-to-do and what requires tons of work. Just look at the shield implementation. He expected it to take months to capture the math behind it while it was just a matter of seconds to be exact. There you can see that it's all about knowledge and if someone comes up with an easy idea or implementation of debris mesh creation (which Irrlicht should be able to perform theoretically since it allows for run-time mesh creation) and phaser beam convergence (in theory just a light ball moving across the texture along given/calculated points of the mesh) then you might get to near-perfection in the end. It's all about someone actually doing the work. Sadly, I think you overestimate the size of hardcore trek fans. From what I know, both ST:Excalibur and Supremacy weren't really flooded by helping hands programming-wise. It's all up to us I believe to get the job done on our own..

I don't think they know the needed details of the engine to actually copy that behaviour. The SoaSE engine provides tools to tweak it but how everything's done is surely not open to the public or else some other competing company could just imitate it and bring out a similar engine in a similar game for cheap.

I think the debris works as I mentioned, by simply run-time creating random meshes and applying some black, burned standard texture and some plasma waves around it to simulate outflowing plasma. That way, they'd be persistant in Irrlicht too.

We've *always* had concerns and ideas about the implementation of the cloaking devices, Edo; it's not going to be a last-minute tacked on feature like it was in BOTF. We plan to give Cloaking devices distinct disadvantages when they are used, such as the loss of shields and weapons, periods of vulnerability between the lowering of the cloak and the raising of shields, and time limitations on usage. (Eg. time limits before cloak failure or timed recharge requirements after it has been lowered)

These are just plans though, and obviously could change in the future as the game, combat system, and gameplay ideas evolve. Cloaking devices are something that has definitely been given some serious thought.