iamthejarha
Landlubber
Various exchanges about current code and designs, and possibilities for the future with Kieron and others have given me a lot of ideas. Unfortunately, I'm not yet familiar enough with all the POTC code to implement this stuff <i>myself</i>, but I thought I'd throw them out here for everyone to mull over and see what's worth trying.
First of all, the ships themselves. The way build 11 is set up, ships of different nationalities have different stats, but not much else is dissimilar. All the ships and textures, with a few exceptions, are available to every nation. I'd like to see a bit more individuality amongst the various nations and their respective shipyards. To that aim, I rewrote my entire <span style='color:red'>Ships_init.c</span> file, allowing only certain nations access to certain ship textures, but I think it could be taken a step further, especially in the case of certain ships.
<b>Fleuts</b> are a Dutch product, and while I'll never claim to be a true study of maritime history, everything I've read so far has led me to believe that fleuts <i>were</i> used primarily by the Dutch, and weren't really copied by other nations. So why are "native" fleuts available at other shipyards? The fleut should be available only from the Dutch, and if it shows up in another nation's shipyard, it should--using Kieron's ship nationality icons--be of Dutch origin.
<b>`Men-of`-War</b> (`Man-of`-Wars?) should only be allowed to the three true "powers" of the Caribbean: England, France, and Spain. Portugal and Holland didn't really have extensive use of these ships, so why should we run across Dutch and Portugese fleets sailing upwards of `3-4` of these beasts? This can be extended to include battleships, as a `class-one` ship.
<b>Warships</b> and <b>Lineships</b>, simply put, need new names and classifications. Technically, only the battleships and MOWs would be true "`ships-of`-`the-line`," so the name of the `BP-based` ship is a misnomer. Being `class-two` ships, perhaps they can be classified as frigates, since the 'frigate' was actually a fairly broad classification for the time. The `in-game` frigate could be a "Light Frigate," the lineship a "Frigate," and the warship a "Heavy Frigate." I don't know about the true <i>accuracy</i> of such classifications, being that the `in-game` frigate has as many (or more, NK?) cannons as the lineship and warship, but it's a brainstorm waiting to happen.
<b>Galeoths</b>, from the searching I've done, never existed--or at least, were never called <i>galeoths.</i> The closest reference I've found to the ship named "galeoth" is the <i>galliot</i>, which was a very `similar-looking` ship of Dutch origin and use. As such, it should be available only <i>from</i> the Dutch.
<b>Caravels, Galleons</b> and <b>Pinnaces</b> are kind of funny cases. For the most part, I've come to gather that caravels and galleons (at least, the heavy galleons in the game) were sailed by the Spanish and Portugese, while the English and French built smaller galleons instead of the behemoths that Spain relied on. Meanwhile, the pinnace as built in the game doesn't match any description of a "pinnace" in historical terms. So, as a solution, make the `in-game` pinnace a <i>light galleon</i> made by the French and English, and increase its max cannon caliber to 24lbs, to compensate for its smaller number of cannons (24 guns vs. the Heavy Galleon's 38 guns).
In addition to these changes, the new ship ideas that jmv575 has been working on--creating new ships based on existing ship models--is something that I've been looking into as well. Because certain ship types are only available from certain nations, more ship types are a logical next step. <i>That</i> idea is still in its infancy, and I'm not sure if what I'm envisioning can be done with the current tools at my disposal (working entirely with existing model parts), but I intend to find out.
Now, I've seen requests for a <b>"paint shop"</b> in the shipyard. A <i>real</i> paint interface would be impossible, I think, but being able to buy new 'paintjobs' based on the models and textures <i>already in the game</i> should certainly be possible using an interface similar to Kieron's SelectSails interface. Prices can be set, different shipyards can have access only to certain textures for each ship type (thus creating the need to sail to certain islands to get a specific paintjob), etc. More new textures would be required to make the mod <i>extremely</i> useful, but it would be an interesting addition that could help individualize each player's game. In that vein, a new interface to buy <b>sails</b> from each shipwright should also be possible.
For some reason, I feel like I'm forgetting something, but these are some of the ideas that I've been obsessing over lately. Any feedback, corrections, expressions of (dis)interest, <b>help</b>, etc. would be wonderful. <img src="http://www.piratesahoy.com/forum/style_emoticons/<#EMO_DIR#>/pirate2.gif" style="vertical-align:middle" emoid="
:" border="0" alt="pirate2.gif" />
First of all, the ships themselves. The way build 11 is set up, ships of different nationalities have different stats, but not much else is dissimilar. All the ships and textures, with a few exceptions, are available to every nation. I'd like to see a bit more individuality amongst the various nations and their respective shipyards. To that aim, I rewrote my entire <span style='color:red'>Ships_init.c</span> file, allowing only certain nations access to certain ship textures, but I think it could be taken a step further, especially in the case of certain ships.
<b>Fleuts</b> are a Dutch product, and while I'll never claim to be a true study of maritime history, everything I've read so far has led me to believe that fleuts <i>were</i> used primarily by the Dutch, and weren't really copied by other nations. So why are "native" fleuts available at other shipyards? The fleut should be available only from the Dutch, and if it shows up in another nation's shipyard, it should--using Kieron's ship nationality icons--be of Dutch origin.
<b>`Men-of`-War</b> (`Man-of`-Wars?) should only be allowed to the three true "powers" of the Caribbean: England, France, and Spain. Portugal and Holland didn't really have extensive use of these ships, so why should we run across Dutch and Portugese fleets sailing upwards of `3-4` of these beasts? This can be extended to include battleships, as a `class-one` ship.
<b>Warships</b> and <b>Lineships</b>, simply put, need new names and classifications. Technically, only the battleships and MOWs would be true "`ships-of`-`the-line`," so the name of the `BP-based` ship is a misnomer. Being `class-two` ships, perhaps they can be classified as frigates, since the 'frigate' was actually a fairly broad classification for the time. The `in-game` frigate could be a "Light Frigate," the lineship a "Frigate," and the warship a "Heavy Frigate." I don't know about the true <i>accuracy</i> of such classifications, being that the `in-game` frigate has as many (or more, NK?) cannons as the lineship and warship, but it's a brainstorm waiting to happen.
<b>Galeoths</b>, from the searching I've done, never existed--or at least, were never called <i>galeoths.</i> The closest reference I've found to the ship named "galeoth" is the <i>galliot</i>, which was a very `similar-looking` ship of Dutch origin and use. As such, it should be available only <i>from</i> the Dutch.
<b>Caravels, Galleons</b> and <b>Pinnaces</b> are kind of funny cases. For the most part, I've come to gather that caravels and galleons (at least, the heavy galleons in the game) were sailed by the Spanish and Portugese, while the English and French built smaller galleons instead of the behemoths that Spain relied on. Meanwhile, the pinnace as built in the game doesn't match any description of a "pinnace" in historical terms. So, as a solution, make the `in-game` pinnace a <i>light galleon</i> made by the French and English, and increase its max cannon caliber to 24lbs, to compensate for its smaller number of cannons (24 guns vs. the Heavy Galleon's 38 guns).
In addition to these changes, the new ship ideas that jmv575 has been working on--creating new ships based on existing ship models--is something that I've been looking into as well. Because certain ship types are only available from certain nations, more ship types are a logical next step. <i>That</i> idea is still in its infancy, and I'm not sure if what I'm envisioning can be done with the current tools at my disposal (working entirely with existing model parts), but I intend to find out.
Now, I've seen requests for a <b>"paint shop"</b> in the shipyard. A <i>real</i> paint interface would be impossible, I think, but being able to buy new 'paintjobs' based on the models and textures <i>already in the game</i> should certainly be possible using an interface similar to Kieron's SelectSails interface. Prices can be set, different shipyards can have access only to certain textures for each ship type (thus creating the need to sail to certain islands to get a specific paintjob), etc. More new textures would be required to make the mod <i>extremely</i> useful, but it would be an interesting addition that could help individualize each player's game. In that vein, a new interface to buy <b>sails</b> from each shipwright should also be possible.
For some reason, I feel like I'm forgetting something, but these are some of the ideas that I've been obsessing over lately. Any feedback, corrections, expressions of (dis)interest, <b>help</b>, etc. would be wonderful. <img src="http://www.piratesahoy.com/forum/style_emoticons/<#EMO_DIR#>/pirate2.gif" style="vertical-align:middle" emoid="
:" border="0" alt="pirate2.gif" />
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" border="0" alt="wink.gif" /> Actually, I based that from information I got off one of the numerous websites I've been perusing lately, <a href="http://www.geocities.com/captcutlass/" target="_blank">Brethren of the Coast</a>. This is the description of the `Man-of`-War on the site:
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:" border="0" alt="laugh.gif" /> )
" border="0" alt="w00t.gif" /> YES!!! I hate overly verbose code... Drags everything down. VERY worthwhile project, methinks! <img src="http://www.piratesahoy.com/forum/style_emoticons/<#EMO_DIR#>/onya.gif" style="vertical-align:middle" emoid="
" border="0" alt="onya.gif" />
:" border="0" alt="icon_eek.gif" />
" border="0" alt="sad.gif" /> Hope you get everything back in order soon, mate!