idk how....but im bumping this cause its a good question that i agree with ^_^

Well, you can do this a few ways:
01. Modify the encounters, heres an example, taken from SDK:
Tradelane_trade_transport.ini
[EncounterFormation
ship_by_class = 1, 1, sc_transports
pilot_job = transport_job
ship_by_class = 0, 1, sc_fighters
pilot_job = escort_leader_job
ship_by_class = 0, 2, sc_fighters, -1<--Note after the escort leader shps are at -1 to the difficulty level, you could try playing around with the entries to see if it lets you have fighters of a higher level to the transport instead.
pilot_job = escort_job
formation_by_class = transports
behavior = trade
arrival = tradelane
allow_simultaneous_creation = yes
zone_creation_distance = 0
times_to_create = infinite
..

02. Another way (that i quite like the idea of), is to add a shipclass only used to escort other ships. You could just add "class_escort" to missions/shipclasses.ini and modify the faction_prop, npcships and encounters to match.
Its a bit involved so let me know if you want me to go through it.

I haven't tried modifying the last number on ship_by_class. I'll have to try that.
It would be something like:
ship_by_class = 0, 2, sc_fighters, 4 <- to add 4 levels???


I did try the new class idea, and that caused freelancer to crash every time I would try to launch into space.

I only modified the tradelane encounter files for now to keep it simple.
For the tradelane encounter files, changed sc_fighters to sc_escort.

ship_by_class = 0, 2, sc_escort


For shipclasses, I added the new class...

[ShipClass
nickname = sc_escort
member = class_escort


For the npcship file I copied a fighter section that was there and modified it to be the class_escort instead of the class_fighter. In theory this should make all the escorts for tradelane encounters a kusari police ship. Right???


[NPCShipArch <- This is the one I copied
nickname = ku_p_ku_fighter_d9-19
loadout = ku_p_ku_fighter_loadout01
level = d9
ship_archetype = ku_fighter
pilot = pilot_police_ace
state_graph = FIGHTER
npc_class = lawful, class_fighter, d9, d10, d11, d12, d13, d14, d15, d16, d17, d18, d19

[NPCShipArch <- This is the new one
nickname = ku_p_ku_fighter_d9-19
loadout = ku_p_ku_fighter_loadout01
level = d9
ship_archetype = ku_fighter
pilot = pilot_police_ace
state_graph = FIGHTER
npc_class = lawful, class_escort, d9, d10, d11, d12, d13, d14, d15, d16, d17, d18, d19



What did I do wrong?
Are there other files I need to modify?

Most of it looks ok, but you would need to add a custom entry in faction_props.ini that is linked to the new npcships entry. You can't have two entries in npcships.ini of the same nickname so it need to be unique.
Like this:
Faction_prop:
npc_ship = ku_p_ku_fighter_d1-7
npc_ship = ku_p_ku_fighter_d8
npc_ship = ku_p_ku_fighter_d9-19
npc_ship = ku_p_ku_fighter_escort_d9-19
npc_ship = ku_p_ge_armored_d1-19

.. and in npcships.ini:
[NPCShipArch
nickname = ku_p_ku_fighter_escort_d9-19
loadout = ku_p_ku_fighter_loadout01
level = d9
ship_archetype = ku_fighter
pilot = pilot_police_ace
state_graph = FIGHTER
npc_class = lawful, class_escort, d9, d10, d11, d12, d13, d14, d15, d16, d17, d18, d19
I'd make a custom loadout one once the ships spawn ok.

You have said that you modified an encounter to allow the sc_escort, Kusari Police only have armoured transports so i'm assuming you changed an armoured transport encounter, otherwise you will need to add entries in faction_prop and their formations to th faction's entries.
Let me know how you get on.

(edit)
Oh, an by the way, you might be better off creating new encounters instead of modifying the older ones. Unless you plan on adding custom entries for every faction at each of the difficulty levels, you would end up with some factions that don't have the right shipclasses for the encounters in their list.
Also, in order for random missions to work you need to have "class_fighter" ships as they are the only ones used for missions. So, you can add to the entries but, i wouldn't modify the originals.

Edited by - Mace_166 on 4/18/2007 4:42:17 PM

So now I'm lost.
I wanted to increase the difficulty of the escorts. Not just the difficulty level but the difficulty of the ships defending them.
I tried modifying the number after the "ship_by_class" entry in the tradelane_trade_transport.ini but that didn't do anything.

So now I'm adding a few new escort ships to the npcships.ini and to some of the faction groups in the "faction_prop.ini"
Like...

[FactionProps
affiliation = co_nws_grp
...
npc_ship = co_be_ge_fighter4_d11-19
npc_ship = co_be_ge_escort_d11-19 <- New entry copied from one above
...

And in the npcships.ini, I just copied the co_be_ge_fighter4_d11-19 entry and renamed it co_be_ge_escort_d11-19 and gave it the "class_escort" instead of the "class_fighter"

Once I'm done I was going to modify the encounters files:
tradelane_trade_transport.ini,
tradelane_trade_freighter.ini
tradelane_trade_armored.ini
tradelane_armored_prisoner.ini
by switching the "sc_fighters" to "sc_escorts"

Is that not going to work?

As you have added to the shipclasses file then you should be ok with what you have done. But, by changing the original encounters it will affect every faction that uses them.
So, you would need to go through every faction that uses trade encounters and give them class_escort ships at all of the difficulty regions of d1-d19. So, just copy all of their fighter entries and duplicate them for the escorts.

The real thing is the loadouts they have... they are pants.

They carry class 1 guns etc. Alter loadouts to carry higher classed guns (or make new ones just for them instead) and it's instantly harder. Give them shield killers, and it becomes hella fun

You can then modify the pilots ability in the encounter by fiddling with the npc_ships.ini entry for each patrol escort that you find in there (you can't just look, match up the ships etc as per the other files to find what's what!). Put in a harder pilot too, so they shoot for longer, more accurately etc.

Its great, you load them out with missiles, person buys freighter thinks lol im gonna own the people! *Foosh* and boom they rethink pirating.

In my mod i'm re balancing trading and pirating. Both will be much harder.