This is a mod I’m working on that will feature a race with only one ship, called Destiny (aka, ). The catch is that this one massive ship can separate into many other smaller ships. The fleet will be made up of a number of asymmetrical ships (sprite components taken from the main ship, Destiny) that can be combined to form a massive and over-powered ship (against everything except for the boss- in the final mission). At any one time, you will only have the option of either using the main ship alone or all separate component ships (Destiny can not function without all components- safe-guard against technological theft) because of the cost of using Destiny. It is your decision (to make the game more strategic). Because of their historical purpose (to dazzle lesser races), Hope weapons/ships/everything are made to look powerful- explaining the over-the-top fx present in most Hope technology.
The name of the race derives from the influence they had on their home universe and its inhabitants. The Hope were once an oppressed and shun upon race. Their presence in a xenophobic universe and the fact that they were the only known non-organic lifeform caused them to grow callous of their neighbours. Eons ago, far beyond the historical records of any other race, their home universe was stricken by a plague that only effected organic matter. Soon, the Hope became the only sentient presence. They grew bored and began running a series of reckless experiments to see if they could create organic life. There were many failures that were cast to the furthest reaches of space but a few were deemed to be “satisfactory” and were seeded throughout the heavens.
These lifeforms soon grew sentient and began to develop. The Hope took advantage of these young civilisations by letting them think that they were gods, sent down from the heavens to better their lives. Soon, the Hope grew greedy and were no longer satisfied by the adoration and blind faith that these civilisations had in them. They began to neglect those below them and use them as a slave labour force.
They had reached the peak of their civilisation and lay down their arms but it would not last long. Their failed experiments had used their time in exile to advance themselves with the sole goal of annihilating their creators. They had become the Order. This renegade fleet of mysterious ships began to invade Hope territory. They had all but conquered the defenceless Hope when a stronghold was discovered. The last of this species had used their vastly superior non-combative technologies to create a machine capable of escaping this now hostile world. Destiny was built to ensure that their knowledge would not be lost after their defeat.
With a mighty grumble, the vast ship spurred to life. It’s M-Drive activated as it began to engulf the ship in a blanket of energy and pulled the titanic super-structure into the Abyss that winded through the multiverse. What lay ahead was a new world, one of opportunity and new challenges. Upon their encounter with a “compatible” universe, the Hope deactivated the negating properties of M-Drive energy and marked the beginning of a new era of peace and longevity with the creation of a spectral type O hypergiant with an absolute magnitude of -69, around which they could construct a ring world to support their new civilisation.
This new galaxy was unusual. It was new, it contained numerous different types of universes that could not have come together naturally. The Hope theorised that though this universe was highly unstable, it would someday become safe to colonise.
[size=200]More will come later.[/size]
[size=50][/size][size=4]As the last of the construction drones departed from Destiny, the settlers activated the Attero device to prevent their new home from being discovered (generates a physical barrier between territory and outsiders made out of anti-matter. Obliterates all that enters as the barrier constantly regenerates destroyed anti-matter) and entered stasis to allow for their new home to stabilise. In the millennia that the Hope slept, the drones fulfilled their creator’s instructions. Just as the heavily defended borders… and something else about being awoken by massive weapons energy readings coming from deserters who kept the records of the order history and thought that Hope tech could be of great value. they went out to grab it, but accidenatly reactivated it.[/size][size=50][/size]
A brief overview of some features I’ll try to include in the mod (bolded text means that it is confirmed to work):
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An engine glow area that causes damage to everything that makes contact with it- Made by having a type of weapon that has aoe damage, an extremely small range, a high rate of fire and no visible firing graphic. Destiny will have an undecided number of weapon slots where the engine glow will be that are positioned in such a way that the weapons will cover the needed areas. To ensure that only a specific number of these will be used, the only engine that Destiny is able to use will use an insane amount of energy that can only be acquired within the mission budget by having a specific number of the previously mentioned weapons. These weapons each drain -y/x (y=previously mentioned energy level required to operate engines, x= number of weapon slots positioned in the engine glow) energy (in effect, generating the required energy). To ensure that the player uses engines on Destiny, the missions will require all ships to have engines.
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A ship that has a negative cost, representing a wormhole that is supposed to increase the chance of the crews surviving while retreating in their escape pods. It cuts costs as they will not have to retrain new crewmen. The downside is that the hull will have a massively negative hull integrity/shield strength/energy generation modifier that forces the player to use a doomsday device-like module (similar to that of the Unity mod) as it is the only way to generate the needed amount of energy to protect it sufficiently (with shields or armour). This will cause it to destroy your fleet if it is destroyed.
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Spotlight Turrets- (purely graphical). Turrets with a sprite that looks like light (firing graphic will also be utilised to enhance the effect).
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Epic engine effects by placing the base fx in the normal sprite but place an engine fx (ingame) that was blanked out on top of that. Partials should still appear but I can have a wide engine effect. Might also try to utilise running lights to produce some more engine effects.
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Decoy ships with no weapons but insane defences (I mean armour and shields). Will also take out a bunch of enemy ships when they are destroyed. Will also have a hull degradation rate (made by having repair modules with a negative repair rate/amount).
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Extremely specialised ships- will make it so that each ship can have a special function (by fitting modules- because of the cost, only one can be fitted to each ship). Some will use overpowered versions of weapons like missile revenge scrambler with a 100% send-back rate, impossible powerful shields or immunity to EMP weapons. Will also make it so that ships that can equip certain special function modules have crippling weaknesses (don’t worry, the enemies in missions will also be just as powerful).
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Invisible weapons/weapons fire- eg. limpet mines, flak cannons, and more that I’ll think up. This will make watching battles more dramatic and less predictable.
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Purely forward firing non-fighter ships (will have to sacrifice engine glows). Will work by having a blank ship with a weapons module. This module will have have a ship sprite as its sprite which will allow the ship that this module is fitted on to make it appear as if the ship is rotating to fire at the target. A few limitations are that you can’t have additional traditional weapons. An idea is to make a ship sprite with a circular ring missing somewhere in it. This ring of alpha will allow a separate arc shaped weapon (possible a phaser or lightning emitter or something else) to be placed in such a way that it appears to be a component of the ship that spins inside the rotating outer hull.
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There will be “special, achievement ships” that you can unlock for a certain amount of cred (so much so that the only way would be to complete the missions without the use of Destiny- the use of this ship will always result in a 0 or almost 0 profit.
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An “either Destiny OR its many bits” restriction. Lets say that the mission has a budget of x. Destiny’s hull would also cost x. An individual ship component ship will cost x/n+y (n=number of ship components, y= a value that is taken away or added to x/n depending on the power of said ship component).
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The use of pulseglow effects (from the Order expansion) to enhance engine effects.
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Example of ship components as ships: [list][*]Will have the energy generation units (red, glowy order ship component spheres with metal-ish rings surrounding it) as insanely powerful suicide ships (downside is that they will also take out your ships).
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The whole back end of Destiny as an insanely fast ship.
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Fighters as those short metallic strips that are on practically every order ship- shown here (but just the strips alone- will manipulate them to make them look better):
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[][size=200][/size] [size=100]also note that none of the above have been thoroughly tested yet and that this mod is still in the planning stages (apart from the almost finished sprite for Destiny). A shit-load of ideas will be dropped/replaced/modified before this mod will be released.[/size][/*:m][/list:u]
