Re: [Opengate-devel] Autogenerated Asteroids

[Gary L. <Ult...@gm...>]

eGore wrote:
 > That's all way to complicated. Ogre is able to use a so called "damage modifier" (or however it was 
called). I read in a forum thread on how to damage an object. So we would use this modifier to damage a 
perfect sphere it look like an asteroid.

If this generates a shape that looks asteroid like, then this would be very sufficient.

 > Once a asteroid was mined it will shrink and disappear.

Hmm I never saw an asteroid shrinking or disappearing in Jumpgate but I like the idea. If they disappear 
we need new ones from time to time. There are several options to bring new asteroids in the sector.

One option is to just let them appear at a random position (with some no-go areas like inside a 
jumpgate). IIRC there was a sector in Jumpgate with a huge asteroid between 2 gates. This was really 
cool if you flew like a blind pilot and just followed one gate to the next and to the next till you 
crash into it because you didn't look where you were going :-) This is the easiest way but could make 
pilots crash into asteroids because they set a course to something or are in a battle with someone and 
suddenly have an asteroid right in front of him.

An other option is to make them go to their defined random position from a far point out of the normal 
routes where usually no player is and no radar reaches. Just give the asteroid a starting speed and 
flying direction and letting it slow down like a space ship which is beeing slowed down by the drag 
factor. This could make asteroids go through high traffic areas (like between 2 gates) till it reaches 
it's defined position. Players would need to avoid the asteroids sometimes but would also be able to 
start mining while they are still moving.

A third option would be to fill a sector again while noone is looking ;-) If no player is in the sector 
the new asteroids could appear. This would lead to no crashes but maybe some sectors with high traffic 
(like thouse with a station) would have no asteroids for quite some time.

 > I'm not for adding asteroid fields or something. Just a few single asteroids.

*agreed*

Regards,
Gary

> -------- Original-Nachricht --------
> Datum: Thu, 14 Jun 2007 02:41:03 +0200
> Von: Gary Luck <Ult...@gm...>
> An: 
> CC: ope...@li...
> Betreff: Re: [Opengate-devel] Autogenerated Asteroids
> 
>> If you would like to generate random shapes by the client you should make
>> sure that thouse generated 
>> asteroids are being synchronized with the other clients (position, shape,
>> amount of ice/metal/other ores 
>> ...) or just let a game server do the generation work. Either way we would
>> have the problem that thouse 
>> asteroids never move/fly around with velocity but still change position
>> from time to time if they are 
>> beeing generated again.
>>
>> I would prefer to generate random asteroids and random postions but then
>> make the result of the 
>> generator fix. So that the asteroid positions can be saved in a xml file
>> and doesn't need to be 
>> synchronized or regenerated anymore. There was no regenerator in Jumpgate
>> either.
>>
>> Anyway ... if you prefer generating random shapes with an other
>> application but blender (it takes quite 
>> some time to generate 10 asteroids with blender even if you use the random
>> asteroid generator I uploaded 
>> lately) you would probably also run into a dead line like I did. Before I
>> created the blender-generator 
>> I tried to write a script to make the calculations but I threw in the
>> towel after 4 or 5 hours with no 
>> success. I figured out that simply moving the vertices with a random value
>> is not sufficient. You would 
>> need to move vertices randomly on a mesh of lets say 20 or 30 vertices and
>> after it make a smooth 
>> subsurface division by using Catmull-Clarks algorithm. But actually I
>> failed at an earlier step in 
>> writing the script.
>>
>> Regards,
>> Gary
>>
>> Spom wrote:
>>> Am Mittwoch, 13. Juni 2007 12:11 schrieb eGore:
>>>
>>> random amount, position and orientation should be not that problem, its
>> easy 
>>> to administrate by the server. Of course there should some "no go" areas
>> for 
>>> astros the between the gates.
>>> Randomizing the shape of the asteroid is a litte bit more complicated,
>> so we 
>>> have to define a couple of "randomization parameters" and sophisticated
>> rules 
>>> to calculate the shape. 
>>> The server generates a small pack of that parameters (maybee: size of
>> semi 
>>> axis, some lokal concave/convex points etc.)  and the client calculates
>> the 
>>> shape.
>>>
>>> I like this idea to fill some larger asteroids fields with some trivia. 
>>> Anyway, the static major asteriods, the eye catcher, still should hand
>> made.
>>> Regards,
>>> Ca
>>>
>>>> Hi list,
>>>>
>>>> would it make sense to auto generate asteroids within the game and not
>>>> within blender? I think some static asteroids should be generated once
>> and
>>>> kept. But having sectors with random generated asteroids at random
>>>> positions would be fun.
>>>>
>>>> Any thoughts?
>>>>
>>>> Regards,
>>>>   Christoph
>>>
>> -------------------------------------------------------------------------
>>> This SF.net email is sponsored by DB2 Express
>>> Download DB2 Express C - the FREE version of DB2 express and take
>>> control of your XML. No limits. Just data. Click to get it now.
>>> http://sourceforge.net/powerbar/db2/
>>> _______________________________________________
>>> Opengate-devel mailing list
>>> Ope...@li...
>>> https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/opengate-devel
>>>
>> -------------------------------------------------------------------------
>> This SF.net email is sponsored by DB2 Express
>> Download DB2 Express C - the FREE version of DB2 express and take
>> control of your XML. No limits. Just data. Click to get it now.
>> http://sourceforge.net/powerbar/db2/
>> _______________________________________________
>> Opengate-devel mailing list
>> Ope...@li...
>> https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/opengate-devel
>