Turn Engine http://www.turnengine.com/forums/ Turn Engine Forums en Sat, 19 May 2012 11:03:47 GMT vBulletin 60 http://www.turnengine.com/forums/images/styles/turnengine/misc/rss.png Turn Engine http://www.turnengine.com/forums/ Navigation V3 http://www.turnengine.com/forums/showthread.php?38387-Navigation-V3&goto=newpost Thu, 17 May 2012 21:35:54 GMT Greetings! I know it's been a while since I posted (again), had a few things get in the way of DG work, and we've been working quietly on our latest offering.

Navigation has always been an interesting topic throughout the Darkgalaxy community, with focus being placed heavily on the comparison between the two previous versions of navigation (and the general love for sectors), both myself and Zedd have been quietly reading, and evaluating what people have to say as well as what we can do as an alternative. One thing which was pretty clear, was that navigation in it's "current" form was quite limiting in a lot of ways, and I think .cox phrased it best when he said that navigation had to accomplish the following:
Quote:
Originally Posted by .cox View Post
  • It needs to encourage fighting
  • It needs to offer some protection for weaker players
  • It needs to make sense
  • It needs to leave room for strategic acting
From a personal perspective, alliance politics have always fascinated me but with the layout as it was, there were only generally alliance vs alliance in galaxy X spanning across the different galaxies in Darkgalaxy and people "claiming" galaxies screaming "Come at me bro!" which created a massive separation of the players from an alliance and combat perspecitive, and one of our objectives with a new navigation was to mix things up and make combat more "fast paced" in way which didn't so much support an alliance vs alliance mentality, but more of an alliances vs alliances mantra.

So, without further ado, I introduce to you DarkGalaxy Navigation version 3 (Screenshot is a WIP, I need to pull some new images for it, bear with me!):


"HOLY CRAP FROSTY! WHAT ARE YOU DOING!!?"
Answer: mixing it up :D

The navigation is now split into three distinct 'levels' of galaxy, with the outer ring containing numerous very weak planets, the central ring containing fewer reasonable planets, and the center (or "Dark Galaxy" (see what I did there?)) containing few very powerful planets.

The idea of this is to add several strategic elements into the game, early game, having a planet in Galaxy 1 is a preferred option for a fast resource income, however they will be hotly contested due to their output and limited number, at the same time, occupying two planets in the middle ring will provide a higher general income at the expense of PL (which is going to be tweaked to make harder to increase), with strategies reflecting around the fact that an alliance cannot be allowed to take and maintain planets in Gal1 for long periods of time. Do you bomb straight in, or do you set up around the edge, build up a fleet then take it by force? It's up to you to decide! Player, Alliance and Planet rankings will aid in decisions on which planets to annex or which alliances to attempt to conquer, communication between NAPped alliances becomes far more important, as well as general planning and strategy.

What about the outer ring? I know I've not talked about it much up to now, but it's where weaker players are going to want to be. The planets are significantly weaker than the Gal 1 planets which stronger players will be going for, but at the same time, maintaining two outer planets will give a greater resource income than one in the middle ring. This will allow smaller alliances to pick up a couple of weaker planets at the start, build up a bit and start making incursions into the middle ring, with the larger alliances focusing on Gal 1 as a primary target, taking out the smaller planets around the edge becomes much less of a priority, but at the same time, they have to watch their backs!

Home Planets are going back to being hidden, and travel times still haven't been decided at all yet (I know this will influence a lot of strategies, bear with us for the main details of this as it comes), for the duration of the beta we will be continuing our previous '6 turns to anywhere' approach whilst we discuss and iron down features (you're all also welcome to participate and help balance the game, this is new territory so we hope to keep things as balanced as possible).

Below is a list of the planet distribution, and what to currently expect on planets in each ring (thanks to Iain for helping with these numbers, which are currently subject to change)
Outer Ring
Ground Space: 40-50
Orbit Space: 20-25
Abundances: 55-70%

Middle Ring
Ground Space: 50-60
Orbit Space: 35-45
Abundances: 70-100%

Dark Galaxy
Ground Space: 70-100
Orbit Space: 50-60
Abundances: 100-150%

Home Worlds
Ground Space: 60
Orbit Space: 40
Abundances: 100%

Each galaxy will have a number of systems (this makes manipulating sizes easier), for the first stage of the beta, the planet numbers are going to be quite low (general support for up to 60-80 active players or so), when things start to pick up, we'll look into increasing them. My spreadsheet currently says there are a total of 432 planets in the outer ring, 216 planets in the middle ring and 144 planets in the center galaxy.

All feedback is appreciated, let us know what you think! We're hoping to roll the first beta in the next week or two, stay tuned to here and twitter for the final dates! ]]> Announcements FrostyCoolSlug http://www.turnengine.com/forums/showthread.php?38387-Navigation-V3 500 - Internal Server Error when trying to view home planet http://www.turnengine.com/forums/showthread.php?38386-500-Internal-Server-Error-when-trying-to-view-home-planet&goto=newpost Tue, 15 May 2012 14:31:08 GMT I just re-created my account on http://alpha.darkgalaxy.com/ (old one was deleted?) and tried to view my home planet http://alpha.darkgalaxy.com/planets/ Date: 15 May 2012 14:22:31 GMT Type: class org.apache.jasper.JasperException Message: An exception occurred processing JSP page... I just re-created my account on http://alpha.darkgalaxy.com/ (old one was deleted?) and tried to view my home planet http://alpha.darkgalaxy.com/planets/

Date: 15 May 2012 14:22:31 GMT
Type: class org.apache.jasper.JasperException
Message: An exception occurred processing JSP page /game/planetlist/newPlanet.jspf at line 13

stacktrace:
Code:
13:


14:
15: 16:
Stacktrace: at org.apache.jasper.servlet.JspServletWrapper.handleJspException(JspServletWrapper.java:553) at org.apache.jasper.servlet.JspServletWrapper.service(JspServletWrapper.java:457) at org.apache.jasper.servlet.JspServlet.serviceJspFile(JspServlet.java:389) at org.apache.jasper.servlet.JspServlet.service(JspServlet.java:333) at javax.servlet.http.HttpServlet.service(HttpServlet.java:722) at org.apache.catalina.core.ApplicationFilterChain.internalDoFilter(ApplicationFilterChain.java:304) at org.apache.catalina.core.ApplicationFilterChain.doFilter(ApplicationFilterChain.java:210) at org.apache.catalina.core.ApplicationDispatcher.invoke(ApplicationDispatcher.java:684) at org.apache.catalina.core.ApplicationDispatcher.doInclude(ApplicationDispatcher.java:593) at org.apache.catalina.core.ApplicationDispatcher.include(ApplicationDispatcher.java:530) at com.turnengine.SiteManager.doGet(SiteManager.java:80) at javax.servlet.http.HttpServlet.service(HttpServlet.java:621) at javax.servlet.http.HttpServlet.service(HttpServlet.java:722) at org.apache.catalina.core.ApplicationFilterChain.internalDoFilter(ApplicationFilterChain.java:304) at org.apache.catalina.core.ApplicationFilterChain.doFilter(ApplicationFilterChain.java:210) at org.apache.catalina.core.StandardWrapperValve.invoke(StandardWrapperValve.java:240) at org.apache.catalina.core.StandardContextValve.invoke(StandardContextValve.java:164) at org.apache.catalina.authenticator.AuthenticatorBase.invoke(AuthenticatorBase.java:462) at org.apache.catalina.core.StandardHostValve.invoke(StandardHostValve.java:164) at org.apache.catalina.valves.ErrorReportValve.invoke(ErrorReportValve.java:100) at org.apache.catalina.valves.AccessLogValve.invoke(AccessLogValve.java:563) at org.apache.catalina.core.StandardEngineValve.invoke(StandardEngineValve.java:118) at org.apache.catalina.connector.CoyoteAdapter.service(CoyoteAdapter.java:403) at org.apache.coyote.http11.Http11Processor.process(Http11Processor.java:301) at org.apache.coyote.http11.Http11Protocol$Http11ConnectionHandler.process(Http11Protocol.java:162) at org.apache.coyote.http11.Http11Protocol$Http11ConnectionHandler.process(Http11Protocol.java:140) at org.apache.tomcat.util.net.JIoEndpoint$SocketProcessor.run(JIoEndpoint.java:309) at java.util.concurrent.ThreadPoolExecutor$Worker.runTask(ThreadPoolExecutor.java:886) at java.util.concurrent.ThreadPoolExecutor$Worker.run(ThreadPoolExecutor.java:908) at java.lang.Thread.run(Thread.java:662) Caused by: java.lang.StringIndexOutOfBoundsException: String index out of range: -1 at java.lang.AbstractStringBuilder.substring(AbstractStringBuilder.java:881) at java.lang.StringBuilder.substring(StringBuilder.java:55) at com.darkgalaxy.game.planets.Location.getCoords(Location.java:57) at org.apache.jsp.game.planetlist.planets_jsp._jspService(planets_jsp.java:247) at org.apache.jasper.runtime.HttpJspBase.service(HttpJspBase.java:70) at javax.servlet.http.HttpServlet.service(HttpServlet.java:722) at org.apache.jasper.servlet.JspServletWrapper.service(JspServletWrapper.java:419) at org.apache.jasper.servlet.JspServlet.serviceJspFile(JspServlet.java:389) at org.apache.jasper.servlet.JspServlet.service(JspServlet.java:333) at javax.servlet.http.HttpServlet.service(HttpServlet.java:722) at org.apache.catalina.core.ApplicationFilterChain.internalDoFilter(ApplicationFilterChain.java:304) at org.apache.catalina.core.ApplicationFilterChain.doFilter(ApplicationFilterChain.java:210) at org.apache.catalina.core.ApplicationDispatcher.invoke(ApplicationDispatcher.java:684) at org.apache.catalina.core.ApplicationDispatcher.doInclude(ApplicationDispatcher.java:593) at org.apache.catalina.core.ApplicationDispatcher.include(ApplicationDispatcher.java:530) at com.turnengine.SiteManager.doGet(SiteManager.java:80) at javax.servlet.http.HttpServlet.service(HttpServlet.java:621) at javax.servlet.http.HttpServlet.service(HttpServlet.java:722) at org.apache.catalina.core.ApplicationFilterChain.internalDoFilter(ApplicationFilterChain.java:304) at org.apache.catalina.core.ApplicationFilterChain.doFilter(ApplicationFilterChain.java:210) at org.apache.catalina.core.StandardWrapperValve.invoke(StandardWrapperValve.java:240) at org.apache.catalina.core.StandardContextValve.invoke(StandardContextValve.java:164) at org.apache.catalina.authenticator.AuthenticatorBase.invoke(AuthenticatorBase.java:462) at org.apache.catalina.core.StandardHostValve.invoke(StandardHostValve.java:164) at org.apache.catalina.valves.ErrorReportValve.invoke(ErrorReportValve.java:100) at org.apache.catalina.valves.AccessLogValve.invoke(AccessLogValve.java:563) at org.apache.catalina.core.StandardEngineValve.invoke(StandardEngineValve.java:118) at org.apache.catalina.connector.CoyoteAdapter.service(CoyoteAdapter.java:403) at org.apache.coyote.http11.Http11Processor.process(Http11Processor.java:301) at org.apache.coyote.http11.Http11Protocol$Http11ConnectionHandler.process(Http11Protocol.java:162) at org.apache.coyote.http11.Http11Protocol$Http11ConnectionHandler.process(Http11Protocol.java:140) at org.apache.tomcat.util.net.JIoEndpoint$SocketProcessor.run(JIoEndpoint.java:309) at java.util.concurrent.ThreadPoolExecutor$Worker.runTask(ThreadPoolExecutor.java:886) at java.util.concurrent.ThreadPoolExecutor$Worker.run(ThreadPoolExecutor.java:908) at java.lang.Thread.run(Thread.java:662)
]]> pxRoberto http://www.turnengine.com/forums/showthread.php?38386-500-Internal-Server-Error-when-trying-to-view-home-planet gama starts 12th May but... http://www.turnengine.com/forums/showthread.php?38385-gama-starts-12th-May-but...&goto=newpost Sat, 12 May 2012 20:52:27 GMT ..USER_LOGIN_FAILED isnt the password the same as the forums? thanks for you replies :) ..USER_LOGIN_FAILED isnt the password the same as the forums?


thanks for you replies :) ]]> Marvel http://www.turnengine.com/forums/showthread.php?38385-gama-starts-12th-May-but... game start 12th May? http://www.turnengine.com/forums/showthread.php?38384-game-start-12th-May&goto=newpost Sat, 12 May 2012 09:14:53 GMT When does it start? thanks in advance for your kind reply. cheers, Marvel When does it start?

thanks in advance for your kind reply.


cheers,

Marvel ]]> General Discussion Marvel http://www.turnengine.com/forums/showthread.php?38384-game-start-12th-May DoW http://www.turnengine.com/forums/showthread.php?38382-DoW&goto=newpost Sat, 05 May 2012 08:28:20 GMT i was going to declare war on the alpha, in the name of all things beta. but i am too tired to do it right. so the alpha will live another day. bleh. craig delete this until i can do it proper. i was going to declare war on the alpha, in the name of all things beta. but i am too tired to do it right. so the alpha will live another day.

bleh. craig delete this until i can do it proper. ]]> General Discussion Waster http://www.turnengine.com/forums/showthread.php?38382-DoW dafuq did I do this time? http://www.turnengine.com/forums/showthread.php?38381-dafuq-did-I-do-this-time&goto=newpost Sun, 29 Apr 2012 16:07:32 GMT Attachment 18037
Attached Images
 
]]> Off-Topic S.S.Sinkingship http://www.turnengine.com/forums/showthread.php?38381-dafuq-did-I-do-this-time <![CDATA[It's very quiet around here..]]> http://www.turnengine.com/forums/showthread.php?38380-It-s-very-quiet-around-here..&goto=newpost Wed, 25 Apr 2012 00:13:18 GMT Evening all,

Figured I'd drop in and post a bit of an update, as I'm sure you're aware, since we completed the alpha things have been a bit quiet, this is mostly because we are making code changes in preparation for the beta stage, we also have a fun little surprise in the works at the moment which will be revealed once it's ready..

In addition, I've been doing a few bits and pieces of redesign, specifically to bring some consistency between the pages, for example, an entry on the planet list page now has a lot of similarities to the planet 'header' on the view page:



"But Frosty!" I hear you cry, "erm.. why?" - Well, the answer to this is simple, one thing which I frequently started noticing whilst playing about with the alpha, was that in several cases, there were different displays used to represent identical data, with massive inconsistencies between them (a minor example, on the planets list, ground + orbit were in bold, on the planet page, they weren't) it tends to detract from the 'flow' of the game, and as a designer these things grind at me a little. Of course this is all cosmetic stuff, but it's just nice things to have.

In addition, I've massively improved the look of BRs and IRs (they actually look slightly more sane now), and I'm looking to change the Copy / Paste method to something which can be handled in a slightly nicer way (the current method is a hack job thrown in just to make things easier, I plan on improving that!).

So for now, the beta approaches.. ]]> Announcements FrostyCoolSlug http://www.turnengine.com/forums/showthread.php?38380-It-s-very-quiet-around-here..