Cosmoteer Environment ideas
Originally I wanted to make a general environment in cosmoteer post, but this thread https://forum.cosmoteer.net/d/9634-the-missing-link-in-cosmoteer-s-evolution-environment-diversity
got me thinking about how to specifically implement these ideas and to apply them to cosmoteer gameplay. So here's a long post (thanks to a very long airport layover) where I go in depth into the topic and give lots of different examples. I would also love to see some of the other hazard/environment element ideas from others in this thread.
Nebula/Electrical/Radiation fields:
Nebula like radiation fields, halves reactor output when the ship is inside the field.
Imagine visualization something like this:
(with green lines being the edges of effect)
But with prettier colors and some more perhaps masked radiation/nebula animations or textures, idk how you go about it from shader perspective. You can probably implement it by placing random fields of dots with different radii that form the field, and maps can differ by having them and having different densities of them.
When you enter one, displays a large triangular yellow warning sign on top of the screen telling you about the effects.
Implementation thoughts:
- Fields can be created by a fields of dots with radii/strength
- To not have to check distance to every dot of every field on the map, you just need to cluster the map into sections (that are as large as the largest field radii are) and only check surrounding clusters/squares.
- To make the fields interesting you can probably use bicubic interpolation to determine their shape (and area)
- You can probably use multiple masks for generation to achieve interesting shapes
- 1. Generate dot field
- 2. Generate a much larger scale dot field that masks the other dot field
- 3. do it in as many steps as needed, output would just be a field of dots with strengths.
- 4. Can do this process separately for any effect on the map or sometimes you can combine (if you want fields to not overlap for example)
- Alternatively the fields are stored and regenerated as textures and parts check for them in their location when they update (not sure how often you update static parts)
Potential other field effects
The best kinds of effects are ones that don’t nerf everyone but only some types or styles of ships.
- (single player) can’t use FTL
- Projectiles deteriorate in power with distance
- Shields disabled (but can power immediately back up when exiting the field, so without removing power like emps)
- Slows you down
- Makes engine output unstable, hindering your maneuverability
- Fields that give interesting positive bonuses could be explored as well
The different fields can be color coded or given a more detailed explanation when you hover over them (potentially if you have different fields having different levels of effects?)
Large, varied density asteroids
Huge (much larger than normal grid) asteroids with different shape types and materials, hard to break (2-10x tougher than armor or more), movable (but extremely heavy as well).
Just their presence is huge for the game, but if in the future they give some benefits to mining them it would be even cooler.
(All of these shapes could be asteroids for example, so not too round and very varied)
Interference beacons
They generate fields, but instead of just being there they are physical objects that can be placed on asteroids for instance.
Dynamic and uneven RoD
RoD that is not driven by radius, but instead places dynamically shaped hazardous fields the further away you go from the (determined) shape of the battlefield. With closing RoD the fields would slowly fill in the map up until there is no space left (You can probably accomplish it quite easily with layered masks and multiple field maps).
(TLDR - RoD can be a field too)
In my opinion current RoD is a very uninteresting and forced mechanic that is necessary, but should be temporary in the long run.
Hazards
Apart from large map shaping effects like fields or asteroids, there can be lots of different random small hazards and localized effects.
- Lava asteroids, small asteroids with surface partially covered by lava, it’s hard to destroy, melts armour and sets everything else on fire on contact. Hard to destroy but possible, explodes a little bit when destroyed (but doesn’t damage surrounding lava) Lava can also be present on large asteroids in small patches.
- Mini turret stations that attack anything that is close, made from normal parts and (usually) embedded onto asteroids
- Hazardous debris - small parts that have many effects (ignition, explosion, impact parts - the faster you hit it the more penetration it does, similar to large cannon but static) but are much less hazardous than for example mines.
- Projectile/asteroid rain - Occasional projectiles coming from outside the map similar to large cannon shots
The map presets (and examples)
Giving the flexibility of the new environment effects you can make lots of different map presets that make for interesting gameplay in standard cosmoteer gamemodes.
I tried making presets that are suitable for current gamemodes, but there is a huge variety of new gamemodes or variations of gamemodes that can come from this.
The Asteroid knot
A circular map with one or two large asteroids in the middle, with lots of smaller ones around, players start on opposite sides of the asteroids (or around the cluster), almost no fields inside the asteroid cluster, but the further you go from the middle the more (and more hazardous) fields there are.
(Example of the random map)
Red - RoD field
Blue-green - Some kind of Nebula field (or a mix of those)
Faint circle - presumed “shape” of the battlefield (previously RoD radius)
The Space arena
Ring of asteroids with hazards around and small area to battle on. Can have an option with no hazards in the middle.
Red - RoD field
Blue-green - Some kind of Nebula field (or a mix of those)
Faint circle - presumed “shape” of the battlefield (previously RoD radius)
Orange - lava
Red - random hazards like debris/mines, turrets etc.
Supposed to be played with slowly shrinking RoD fields
Preset examples PS: these are just examples of a ton of different possible map presets that could be created given the tools and can also be applied to any potential gamemode (I wanted to also include my suggestion for simple variations on standard gamemodes but I will most likely make another post about it some time in the future).
Possibility to create map presets without installing mods
Presumably (hopefully) if you are going to create map presets you are not going to hardcode them and instead would have a scripting environment/template reader, it would be great if we had access to those and could import these into multiplayer.emphasized text
