**Tutorial** - System Building from scratch.

Fri May 02, 2003 2:08 am by giskard

I have been little disappointed at the lack of a really good system building tutorial lately and seeing people pointing noobs at the old one then telling them not to spam when they ask about stuff that was not in that tutorial just started to get to me. I own a lot to that tutorial my self but people seem to believe its complete when its not. I hope to correct that here.

So after biting keiths head off earlier (sorry mate) I decided the only way to settle it was to right a new one.

What follows is a huge tutorial all about system building, covering everything from jumpgates, to mbases, to encounters, to bar work and much more. I do not cover infocards at all, instead I point at zens ship tutorial because he explains it nicely there. The areas I am not sure about I have owned up to in the hope others can fill in those blanks for me, feel free to send any corrections to me. The links are on my site and all roads lead back to me so to speak.

Making your own system Parts 1 & 2 (big tutorial)

http://www.respawn.co.uk/

(Can an admin fix this so they appear as links, everything i tried didnt work, thanks. BTW i have the complete single doc html version of this guide if anybody wants it.)

Any questions, post below and I'll try and answer them. I do have limits though and whilst my knowledge of system building is pretty good, its not 100 complete yet.

I wish i could name all the people who posted juicy bits of info that helped me piece all this together but i cannot. However the trail started at Dawns system posts and I followed links to hundreds of different threads from there. Each incomplete, but each with little bit more info that helped me organise it enough in my own head to be able to write it down for others.

So im sending a universe wide thanks to all those who posted solutions to system problems. I read most of them so if you posted, this thanks is for you and this guide contains your tips too.

Next on my list is new factions, I believe i know enough to get them working now so I going to try that in my Hostile Universe mod V3. After V2 is released.

Giskard

Edited by - bakedpotato on 06-11-2003 00:56:19

Edited by - Stinger on 2/14/2004 7:42:14 AM

Edited by - Chips on 10/31/2004 7:57:34 AM

Edited by - Chips on 10/31/2004 7:57:59 AM

Fri May 02, 2003 2:27 am by bakedpotato

Excellent rating = *****

See that wasnt so hard.
The gladiator said theres so much unemployment around here I would like to use some of them for practice. Now we can go back to work with a smile.

Edited by - bakedpotato on 06-11-2003 00:57:47

Fri May 02, 2003 2:51 am by giskard

ROTFL

I was going mental before with all the pointers to that old tutorial for stuff it simply didnt have it. Reminded me of some sort of robot making automatic posts out of habbit. Atleast now when somebody says its covered in a tutorial, it probably is.

Though i still need to figure out the following items.

Patrols as opposed to arena scripts.
How to Solar objects such as nebulars showing up on the mini map.
And how to fix a weird bug that seems to make the jobs case say im unfriendly even though the same faction in the bar will offer me work any time.

Other than that, I dont have any new questions or answers for systems. I think I just about nailed this one. Just got to figure out how ships work now. My new pet hate

Keith...come back, im joking

Giskard

Fri May 02, 2003 3:16 am by bakedpotato

arena as in gladiator
I' been working on the patrol thing also. I take a screenshot of the patrol routes in game so i have a visual to cordinate with the pos # in the system files.
Quality modding---Tweakus-Maximus---

Fri May 02, 2003 3:45 am by giskard

Patrols.

I found that the coordinates for patrols dont actually work the way they should. I thought they worked like tradelanes, eg 3 entries would make a 3 point patrol but that just made 3 random patrols. So it definately appears to be 1 entry per patrol so how they make those patrols that appear to turn around and go in a different direction I dont know. Unless 2 patrols happen to cross at the ends and it just looks like 1 patrol.

I have been guessing that patrols are actually X,Y,Z + rotation + length. So once you have the center in position and rotated it to the correct angle you just need to give it a length. But ive yet to test this theory.

BTW Rotate is a command thats sometimes mission from some ini entries but generally works with most system entries i found if you add it back in.

Giskard

Fri May 02, 2003 12:23 pm by Archangel

Hello
This is a mail I sand to someone who was asking the same questions about patrols.
Here are the few aswers I can say without hesitate :

in DATA\UNIVERSE\Li01(i will take the new york system for example), there must be an ini file called like the folder. Open it with BiniQDU (or Bini), then, when you search at path, you should see something like that :

For example, this is a patrol for the liberty navy :

[zone
nickname = Zone_Li01_path_navy1_1;<==here is the name of this part of the patrol.
NOTE : use only the short name of the faction you want (Liberty Security Force >> LSF, Liberty Police, Inc. >> LPI,...)
pos = ;<==here, it will be a bit dificult : the coordinates are X,Y,Z where Y is the high (already set at 0), and XZ are like this :

0 is the centre of the system.
So, a base in the :
-upper left corner will be : -X, Y,-Z
-upper right corner will be : X, Y, -Z
-bottom left corner will be : -X, Y, Z
-bottom right corner will be : X, Y, Z

Its hard to exlain in an other language (i'm french and only 14

! Hope you'll understand what i mean.

rotate = X, Y, Z
more dificult : I don't know how i found it and how it works but i know if you want to make an angle at 49° (for example), you must do :
49 - 90 x (-1) to find the Y value and set the X one at 90
If you take 49° as the example, you'll find 41.
But if you want a negative angle (-49°

, you'll have to take the "positive version" of your angle ( 180 + (-49) ) and apply this :
49 - 90 x (-1) to find the Y value and set the X one at -90

But there is a mystery about the Z value : sometimes it's set at 180 and sometimes 0. But, as you know, a patrol is horizontal and the Z value in a rotation is the incline..... You better no wondering about this.

shape = CYLINDER;<==it's the shape of the part of the patrol. Never change it. I don't know what it change but i prefer don't think.
sise = thickness, length;<==There is no way to change the thickness of a line but there is for the length.
sort = 99;<==Better don't change.
thoughness = 2;<==dito[i/
density = 3;<==[idito
repop_time = 90;<==dito
max_batlle_sise = 4;<==dito
path_label = navy1, 1;<==this is the short name of this part of patrol.

NOTE : Never forget that a patrol isn't build in one piece but in parts created by the centre and not from a point to another.
Here is an example :

That is all I can tell you.
Hope it will help!

Fri May 02, 2003 4:22 pm by giskard

Thanks Archangel.

I have some work to do in my Newmars system before my mods Version 3 release. I'll give you information a run and see i can get it working here.

I understand the coordinate system used in freelancer, no fear about that so I understand most of what you have said. I had not considered the center point idea. It certainly explains why it didnt work for me.

Thanks mate

Giskard

Fri May 02, 2003 7:38 pm by Archangel

That's nothing!

Sat May 03, 2003 1:00 am by NiceOne

Dear god next time could you cut some of the words out it's huge. Must be good.

I also got a question does anyone under stand the making of a planet or is it in this tutorial? (didn't read it yet)

[ : NiceOne :

Sat May 03, 2003 6:42 am by giskard

How about I cut out the middle of the tutorial, thats a big bit

Seriously though, its a huge topic, the previous tutorial didnt even scratch the surface. Systems have so much in them you cannot write a tutorial without attempting to cover stuff like jumpgates, tradelanes, asteriods, planets, suns, encounters, bases, characters in the bar and a heap of other stuff.

Just fly around a system sometime and thing about what you see and ask your self, does a system need it object to be fun ?

People take system building lightly, proudly proclaiming they going to make 20 before lunch but as the tutorial shows, it just aint that easy to make new ones from scratch that quickly. If you want to know the truth, its easier to build to custom ships than make systems for freelancer.

My own view is this, if the size of the tutorial puts anybody off making a system then it has prevented 1 person from wasting time on something he would not have finished anyway. A point I made clear at the top of the tutorial for those with the misguided view its is going to be easy

However, anybody who can sit and read the lot, could probably take system building in their stride because they have what it takes to make one. EG too much spare time

Lol

Giskard

Edited by - giskard on 03-05-2003 07:44:09

Sat May 03, 2003 7:04 pm by gamer4life

Hello sir, I wuz looking for modding info on fl...when I read your post for the ability to have the tutorial as a link...I did it .....simply use this html command.....<a href="http://www.respawn.co.uk/modules.php?name=Sections&sop=listarticles&secid=11">click here

that's it........where It says "click here"...you can put anything you like including font color commands etc......good luck...excellent tutorial ya got there....

freelancer................jamez.......[snchickenwingz.....gamer4life...laterz

jamez

Edited by - gamer4life on 03-05-2003 20:05:59

Edited by - gamer4life on 03-05-2003 20:07:08

Sat May 03, 2003 7:45 pm by NiceOne

Yon know I was trying to make a funny.

And here is the sad part MY SYSTEM SUXS!!! can't get to it I see the "White Light" in the tunnel and then see my desktop. can't fix that tryed so much stuff but won't work.

Peace comes to all who wish it, SO WISH FOR IT[!

: [ : NiceOne : [ :

Sun May 04, 2003 3:28 am by giskard

Thanks for trying Gamer but HTML was the first thing i tried. No go.

It just prints the html code too.

I did cut and past your example in just in case i messed up last time and it still didnt work. :/

No worries Niceone, i was trying to wrap up bad news in smilies my self. A lot of peeps are going to fall flat on their faces making systems when they find out just how hard complex it can be. No real way i can make a joke of that fact but I did try

Giskard

Edited by - giskard on 04-05-2003 04:30:20

Sun May 04, 2003 9:29 am by gamer4life

I MADE THE ACTUAL PAGE WITH ALL THE SOURCE OF YOUR POST...I DONT KNOW WHAT YOU COULD BE DOING WRONG...I DID DELETE YOU UNNECESSARY <P> PARAGRAPH COMMANDS...IF YOU WANT THE ACTUAL WHOLE PAGE SOURCE WITH AN EXAMPLE...EMAIL ME AT [email protected]

Edited by - GAMER4LIFE on 04-05-2003 10:31:09

Edited by - GAMER4LIFE on 04-05-2003 10:31:44

Sun May 04, 2003 5:26 pm by giskard

Ok it appears gamer is loosing his temper. Let me demostrate the problem using his code.

Link to the tutorial.
<a href="http://www.respawn.co.uk/modules.php?name=Sections&sop=listarticles&secid=11">click here

Edit: all i see is the html code, not Click Here which is what i should see.

BTW I'm a webmaster of 2 different websites, I do understand html code.What I dont understand is why its not working on this forum for me. I event tried Bb code and didnt have any luck.

The forum seems to strip second bracket from the bbcode so i guess thats not supported either. I need to know what the forum does support so i can fix that link so it works.

Giskard

Edited by - giskard on 04-05-2003 18:33:52

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