Topic: Hex Editing of Starfleet executables

[TAnimaL]

3A0958: 1f // [2.554] ESG Lance maximum range x10 // 69.9

This offset requires 2.554.

Thanks Tar, I thought that was the case with the [2.554] in the line, but you had that in the offset you gave me for th PG2 op and that works in 2552. I should have asked

[d4v1ks]

Well, has been some months since i last touched in my SFC_Editor source code.
Tonight i took a look to remember how i did it to found if i could improve some little things:

- Fixed a little "comestic bug" where lowercase's chars would be saved into the exe as uppercase chars if they were declared in a offset as such.
- Added a stronger input check into the UI interface, so people can we warned faster if they write a mistake.
- Improved i hope, the redraw time of the controls...
- Implemented a new parser option into the offsets.txt. Now you can write anywhere something like:

    // Starfleet2CE.exe MD5 Checksum
    // If the number appears green in your sfc editor, then you have the right version to start editing!
    // The number is updated only when you read the EXE or save changes into it.
   
    md5 38B133B44A8AB61C6C8FFE1FFEC029B3

I will post the updated version as soon i have tested it. Will be open to sugestions on how to improve it to make a stable version to distribute with the offsets files.

[TAnimaL]

Sounds great!
Errr, at least the parts my poor brain understands

[d4v1ks]

Sounds great!

Thank you.

[TarMinyatur]

In CE, I found a primitive Engine Doubling hotkey. It doubles warp power, but not impulse power. I don't know how to restrict it to Orion (or any particular empire's) ships. A ship suffers the loss of two engine points every two turns (60 seconds at game speed 8). There is no penalty for undoubling, as in OP.

I also found a developer's hotkey called "Revive Ship". Clearly this is not meant for actual battles. It repairs all damage but doesn't reset the HET success rate. It could be useful as a tool for gathering internal damage data. Or a magic hotkey for a very inexperienced player fighting the AI.

[Corbomite]

Exeter did say that there were a lot of "dead ends" where it appeared they began a system development and then abandoned it. It was part of the reason reading the code was so daunting.

[[UFP]Exeter]

and so much was not stock sfb

[TarMinyatur]

Interesting. I hope you find out more about these two particular finds. Quite interesting.

;-)

It might be cool to design an Orion Light Cruiser with, let's say, only 15 warp and a couple Impulse engines. It would probably need to double its engines to fight, but it would be on a serious time limit. I might find the variable that determines the resulting damage to engines. Anyone remember how SFB handled warp damage from doubling? Was there a die roll involved?

I also looked at a hotkey labeled "Destroy Target" which could be The Hand of Bethke, maybe. It doesn't seem to work in CE.

I was really hoping that the Fleet "GOTO" hotkey would work, like a comparable button did in SFC1. But it is not effective in CE.

[TAnimaL]

In SFB, in rule G15.2, there is no special procedure for allocating the damage done from doubling. You actually double the individual warp engines, so you take 1 hit per engine, obviously in SFC both engines are doubled hence 2 damage points. And back in the early days of SFB, that's exactly how Orion ships were, they had to double their engines to be effective and were on a running clock. Later "General War" upgrades and expansions gave them (along with all the other races) lots of ship varieties.

[TarMinyatur]

Thanks, TAnimaL!

It seems that OP is more severe on the damage from doubling than SFB. Feels like a good chunk is destroyed each time the engines are undoubled.

What happens to doubled APR or Impulse engines in SFB?

So in SFB, each warp engine suffers the loss of one point of power at the end of each turn? CE is half that: 1 point for every two turns. But maybe this accounts for SFC's doubled internals. The first allocation stuns, the second allocation destroys.

I wonder if a ship with Center Warp in CE takes damage too, such that the ship suffers the loss of 3 power every two turns...

Did some testing in CE...

The damage is 1 point for left warp, 1 point for right warp, and 1 point for center warp each turn. SFC's doubled internals results in damaged engines on turn# 1, 3, 5, etc. and a visible loss of power on turn# 2, 4, 6, etc. An Orion ship with only Center Warp would be less affected by "overloading" the warp engine than one with L/R warp or L/R/C Warp. Interesting.   

[TAnimaL]

I don't fly Orions much in OP (or SFB), are you saying it damages more than 2 hits per turn? Overall, the effect should be pretty harshl of course in SFB you can micromanage so many settings you can track it easier (ok,  that's a sentence I never tought I'd say about SFB). You can double warp and impulse but not APRs, because there's no place to vent the excess heat.


Because I'm a geek and think you'd get a laugh out of it, for your consideration:

[TAnimaL]

The damage is 1 point for left warp, 1 point for right warp, and 1 point for center warp each turn. SFC's doubled internals results in damaged engines on turn# 1, 3, 5, etc. and a visible loss of power on turn# 2, 4, 6, etc. An Orion ship with only Center Warp would be less affected by "overloading" the warp engine than one with L/R warp or L/R/C Warp. Interesting.

Sounds to me like a center warp only ship gets the same damage at the same rate

[TarMinyatur]

Hmm...
Let's consider two Orion ships, identical in all aspects except for warp engine assignments of 24 warp.
 
If the ship with 3 warp engines (8 Left, 8 Center, 8 Right) doubles all of them, the cumulative penalty is 3 damage per turn.

If the ship with 1 warp engine (24 Center) doubles it, the cumulative penalty is 1 damage per turn.

The "clock" is running much faster for the ship in the first example.

[TAnimaL]

Ah, I see where you were going, I thought you meant as compared to other Orion ships., didn't see the "only center warp." This is probably why there are no Orion ships with only center warp, only 2 & 3 engine units

[matchbox2022]

Now to find a way to make the starting on the guage a little ahead of the starting point to be able to go in reverse, if its even possible.

Wow.
I gave up modding this game a long time ago, basically got what I wanted then posted it.

Took a bit of time to figure out how to do this, but after replacing all the 31 floating bits with 62 ones (310.0 in floating point mode to 620.0 in the same). I can confirm this is indeed working with no ability to change direction, however HETs and weapon fire / shields do work! (just like just before entering warp as well). I am very very impressed guys. Thanks for taking the time to rift through hexadecimals. Very hard sometimes to find that needle in the haystack.

Any ideas regarding cloaking by chance? Like a distance where a target would not appear when cloaked? Or is that hard coded the same as distance to seeing target regardless of cloak?

Hard to imagine the game I grew up on as a kid still has secrets to bestow.

[TarMinyatur]

Took a bit of time to figure out how to do this, but after replacing all the 31 floating bits with 62 ones (310.0 in floating point mode to 620.0 in the same). I can confirm this is indeed working with no ability to change direction, however HETs and weapon fire / shields do work! (just like just before entering warp as well).

Not all of the 310.0f are associated with speed. Please check the combat estimator, shown as: min - max (average), for weapons that use 310.0f to define a range bracket (nn.00k to 30.99k). Several weapons (Phaser-2, PPD, Disruptor 3 & 4, Photon) use this value. The Disruptor-3, for example, may show that it can fire at range 61.99k. Try firing disruptors at a far away planet with a Klingon D6B. If you can fire beyond 30.99k, you've found an unintended consequence.
 

Any ideas regarding cloaking by chance? Like a distance where a target would not appear when cloaked? Or is that hard coded the same as distance to seeing target regardless of cloak?

I haven't discovered the "tactical intelligence" variables. I suppose all ships could be made to disappear at range 41.0k instead of 90ish. Cloaked ships might disappear at range 36.0k. I don't know yet. I haven't tested this. Cool to think about though!

Glad you're interested in this stuff.

[RazalYllib]

Adjusting the "tactical intel" settings a little tighter, might be interesting thing to try out with min values, for example range 30 or less to even appear.

I think the gameplay would change dramatically if such a modification could be introduced.

[d4v1ks]

its a very cool option to play stealthed. 

[EschelonOfJudgemnt]

Keep up the good work guys!  Still following your efforts - it makes for interesting reading.
 

[TarMinyatur]

Adjusting the "tactical intel" settings a little tighter, might be interesting thing to try out with min values, for example range 30 or less to even appear.

I think the gameplay would change dramatically if such a modification could be introduced.

Indeed. The Wrath of Khan battle in the nebula was intriguing because of spotty tactical intel.

I think I can find the float that controls the appearance/disappearance of the 3D model (unrelated to cloak). If it consistently reveals a faraway Heavy Cruiser at 95.9k then there may be a 960.0f bracket for intel.

Using Deep Scan could be crucial in battle, since it adds 30.0k(?) to the range of the ship's sensors basically.