Alpha Centauri 2

Sid Meier's Alpha Centauri & Alien Crossfire => Modding => Topic started by: gwillybj on January 30, 2014, 06:19:56 PM

Title: Rocketry Stages in an edited tech tree
Post by: gwillybj on January 30, 2014, 06:19:56 PM

This is a little light-weight diversion: a question of aesthetics that doesn't affect gameplay.

In my edited tech tree, I have four stages of rocketry:

Basic Rocketry, Mercury, 3, 1, 0, 0, DocAir, MilAlg, 000000000
-> gives Missile chassis and Conventional Payload

Advanced Rocketry, Gemini, 4, 1, 0, 0, EnvEcon, Mercury, 000000000
-> gives Planet Buster

Orbital Flight, Apollo, 0, 0, 4, 3, Algor, Gemini, 000000000
-> gives Geosynchronous Survey Pod, Sky Hydroponics Lab, Orbital Power Transmitter, and Salvage Unity Fusion Core.

Space Flight, Orion, 0, 4, 5, 3, Apollo, SupLube, 000000000
-> gives The Living Refinery, Plasma Shard (13), and Solar Shade.

I've "tested" them and they work well as placed in the tech sequence, not coming clustered; there is some time between them.

The question: Do my choices for short names, wanting to use some U.S. space programs, make sense (Mercury, Gemini, Apollo, Orion), or are there others that fit better, taking the advancements into account?

I'm runnibng SMAX with the XP patch. I'll get around to applying Yitzi's patch eventually, when he's finished with the bugs and any additional programming changes come from players' wish lists.

Title: Re: Rocketry Stages in an edited tech tree
Post by: Geo on January 30, 2014, 06:30:07 PM

I'm missing the missile launcher weapon somewhere...

I consider Synthetic Fossil Fuels as the 'basic rocketry' tech in SMAC(X).

Title: Re: Rocketry Stages in an edited tech tree
Post by: Buster's Uncle on January 30, 2014, 06:31:56 PM

Orion is probably not going to happen, and is a poorly-chosen name, besides...

Title: Re: Rocketry Stages in an edited tech tree
Post by: Dio on January 30, 2014, 06:59:20 PM

According to the color coding in the .pcx files, all of the original spaceflight techs were explore techs. In addition, the "orbital spaceflight" tech was originally called satellite reconnaissance. Lastly, are their any specific voice blurbs you plan to use for these techs?

Title: Re: Rocketry Stages in an edited tech tree
Post by: gwillybj on January 30, 2014, 07:08:41 PM

Quote from: Geo

I'm missing the missile launcher weapon somewhere...
I consider Synthetic Fossil Fuels as the 'basic rocketry' tech in SMAC(X).

Unchanged from unedited SMAX: Synthetic Fossil Fuels gives the Missile Launcher, which I consider to be like the Katyusha or Nebelwerfer mobile artillery pieces, not rockets in the sense of a heavier chassis requiring static launch facilities.

Quote from: BUncle

Orion is probably not going to happen, and is a poorly-chosen name, besides...

I had a difficult time finding a suitable name for this, and went with Orion after reading http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Manned_Space_Programs, (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Manned_Space_Programs,) which does say, "The Orion capsule has been rebadged as the MPCV for deep space missions." MPCV is kind of boring, but not unusable.

Title: Re: Rocketry Stages in an edited tech tree
Post by: Buster's Uncle on January 30, 2014, 07:14:00 PM

It's only a congressional pork-barrel project at this point.

Title: Re: Rocketry Stages in an edited tech tree
Post by: gwillybj on January 30, 2014, 07:15:35 PM

Quote from: Dio on January 30, 2014, 06:59:20 PM

According to the color coding in the .pcx files, all of the original spaceflight techs were explore techs. In addition, the "orbital spaceflight" tech was originally called satellite reconnaissance. Lastly, are their any specific voice blurbs you plan to use for these techs?

I've reclassified and recolored them for my needs: Basic and Advanced Rocketry are Conquer, because they give weapons; Orbital and Space Flight are Build, because they give satellites.
At this point I ignore the blurbs, with voiceovers set to fade.

Title: Re: Rocketry Stages in an edited tech tree
Post by: Ford_Prefect on March 06, 2014, 02:00:07 AM

You should use orion for an orion drive tech. :-D

Title: Re: Rocketry Stages in an edited tech tree
Post by: Buster's Uncle on March 06, 2014, 02:01:16 AM

Quote from: Ford_Prefect on March 06, 2014, 02:00:07 AM

You should use orion for an orion drive tech. :-D

QFT!

Title: Re: Rocketry Stages in an edited tech tree
Post by: gwillybj on March 06, 2014, 04:31:18 AM

Quote from: Ford_Prefect on March 06, 2014, 02:00:07 AM

You should use orion for an orion drive tech. :-D

Expand? I'm open to any suggestions.

Title: Re: Rocketry Stages in an edited tech tree
Post by: Buster's Uncle on March 06, 2014, 04:52:20 AM

Orion is a space propulsion concept older than you or I - set the ship on top of a very thick inverted metal plate and set off a nuke underneath.  More nukes in flight as necessary.

Terrible name for a capsule, then.  He's suggesting justifying using the Orion name with the nuke propulsion.  -Forgive if I'm telling you stuff you know, or answering the wrong question.

Title: Re: Rocketry Stages in an edited tech tree
Post by: JarlWolf on March 06, 2014, 06:01:46 AM

What about Soyuz, Sputnik, or Vostok?  ;lol  :danc:

On a more serious note, including Soviet/Russian terminology would be good; my country did after all START the space race and we were the first of mankind out there. Not to mention the first space station..

The Chinese aren't to be discounted either in this too I think; we have Yang who is Chinese and Zhakorov who is Russian, and especially on good old  ;zak; wouldn't allow all the scientific names to be purely American, now would he  ;)

Title: Re: Rocketry Stages in an edited tech tree
Post by: Geo on March 06, 2014, 11:27:55 AM

Quote from: JarlWolf on March 06, 2014, 06:01:46 AM

... my country did after all START the space race...

Germany! :doitnow,:
 ;) :P

Title: Re: Rocketry Stages in an edited tech tree
Post by: gwillybj on March 06, 2014, 12:20:31 PM

Quote from: JarlWolf on March 06, 2014, 06:01:46 AM

What about Soyuz, Sputnik, or Vostok?  ;lol  :danc:

I'm open to any ideas. I need four names for the stages (Basic Rocketry, Adv. Rocketry, Orbital Flight, Space Flight); the first two don't have to be manned, since they are just rockets (Conventional and Planet Buster).
I'm familiar with Sputnik and Soyuz. What is Vostok?

Title: Re: Rocketry Stages in an edited tech tree
Post by: Geo on March 06, 2014, 07:49:29 PM

Quote from: gwillybj on March 06, 2014, 12:20:31 PM

What is Vostok?

You don't recognize Joeri Gagarin's home during his tours around Earth???!! ;modban

(BUncle, we need an :eek: smilie)

Title: Re: Rocketry Stages in an edited tech tree
Post by: Yitzi on March 06, 2014, 08:26:23 PM

Quote from: gwillybj on January 30, 2014, 06:19:56 PM

I'm runnibng SMAX with the XP patch. I'll get around to applying Yitzi's patch eventually, when he's finished with the bugs and any additional programming changes come from players' wish lists.

That might be a while; currently it seems to have no bugs that aren't in the XP patch, though, so feel free to switch now.  (Currently the changes come some from bug fixing, but mostly from my own wish list.)

Title: Re: Rocketry Stages in an edited tech tree
Post by: Buster's Uncle on March 18, 2014, 05:08:17 AM

First Test Flight of Orion Space Capsule Delayed to December (http://alphacentauri2.info/index.php?topic=7791.msg44520#msg44520)

It's still pork-barrel with a terrible name...

Title: Re: Rocketry Stages in an edited tech tree
Post by: gwillybj on March 18, 2014, 01:01:01 PM

Thanks for the input and enlightenment. I thought some on this over the weekend and ended up dropping the space program names altogether. Now I have:
Light Rocketry: RocketL: Missile Chassis and Conventional Payload
Heavy Rocketry: RocketH: Planet Buster
Low Orbital Flight: OrbitLo: Sky Hydroponics Lab, Orbital Power Transmitter, Salvage Unity Fusion Core
High Orbital Flight: OrbitHi: Plasma Shard, The Living Refinery, Launch Solar Shade

Title: Re: Rocketry Stages in an edited tech tree
Post by: Impaler on March 22, 2014, 02:56:36 AM

If your going for 'realism' then the whole Moon-race set of vehicles Mercury/Gemini/Apollo are 1 tech level, they were after all make back-2-back with all the same underlying technology in them, they were just progressively BIGGER, not different in any technological sense.  They are all just liquid-fueled expendable rockets, likewise the Soyuz and everything else used since with the sole exception of the Shuttle and Buran.  And these were an unsafe over-reach to try to get to a full space-plane, an avenue which is looking less and less practical as expendables continue to dominate.

Their are fundamental limitations on how much acceleration a chemical powered vehicle can provide and on Earth they just BARELY reach orbit, Chinron's higher gravity likely makes it impossible for such a vehicle to reach orbit at all.  So I've always considered this to be the 'Sub-Orbital' tech, you have replicated today's tech at that point.

The true Orbital tech is probably something that combines a semi-reusable vehicle with a propulsion system based on Fusion or some other beyond chemical system.  At this point your tech is equal to what was used to build the Unity itself, though obviously you don't have the resource base to create your own.

P.S.  Buster your spot on with the 'Orion/MPCV' but I have less issue with the capsule (the nation dose need a capsule of some kind if it is to have a manned space program) then with the SLS, which is an unmitigated boondoggle, I predict it will be the American Buran, flown once and then mothballed forever.

Title: Re: Rocketry Stages in an edited tech tree
Post by: Buster's Uncle on March 22, 2014, 03:20:52 AM

Yes, congress has borked the SLS even worse.  We need the $#@!ing politicians to step the $#@! off NASA.

I feel like a peevish jerk when I point it out, but Buster is my niece.