New MekHQ Release 0.1.16

[Kovax]

I'm really liking the combination of new features and bug fixes in this version, it's going very well so far.

There are a number of small map issues that might need to be looked into, such as the outer 1/4 of the Outworlds Alliance not being accessable at all from the inner 3/4.

[Jayof9s]

There are a number of small map issues that might need to be looked into, such as the outer 1/4 of the Outworlds Alliance not being accessable at all from the inner 3/4.

I'll look into adding 1 or more empty systems to connect the area. We used to have a lot of unreachable planets and have added empty systems to connect them, I thought we'd gotten all of those taken care of but with 2400 planets, it is easy to miss a few spots (and this reminds me that I forgot to add connectors for several deep periphery holdings I added recently like the Hanseatic League, Jarnfolk, etc).

What are the other issues you've found?

[Sylterix]

I'll look into adding 1 or more empty systems to connect the area. We used to have a lot of unreachable planets and have added empty systems to connect them, I thought we'd gotten all of those taken care of but with 2400 planets, it is easy to miss a few spots (and this reminds me that I forgot to add connectors for several deep periphery holdings I added recently like the Hanseatic League, Jarnfolk, etc).

What are the other issues you've found?

Any chance about adding a planet or two between Alphard in the Marian Hegemony and Niops? The reason I ask is that MekHQ seems to perfer a straight line approach, and if it can't make a straight line approach, it gets as close as possible and then looks for an alternate path. Which gets really weird near the Marian Hegemony.

[Jayof9s]

Any chance about adding a planet or two between Alphard in the Marian Hegemony and Niops? The reason I ask is that MekHQ seems to perfer a straight line approach, and if it can't make a straight line approach, it gets as close as possible and then looks for an alternate path. Which gets really weird near the Marian Hegemony.

I'll look into it and may add some as necessary but one thing to keep in mind is that some jump paths are going to be less than optimal due to jumpship captains not really wanting to pass through uninhabited stars if they can absolutely avoid it. Unfortunately that sometimes requires a much longer path to get where you're going. For the most part I am only adding empty systems for cases where there would be no other way to make the journey through inhabited systems. There are certain places in all the realms that end up taking a lot longer to get to than you'd expect for that reason.

Now if you disagree and feel your captains aren't worried about being stranded in space if they blow a seal, feel free to add your own empty star systems to your copy of planets.xml to fill in gaps - it is pretty easy, just look at the examples already in there to reach the clan home worlds, etc and then play with the coords a bit until they're where you want them to be.

[Sylterix]

I'll look into it and may add some as necessary but one thing to keep in mind is that some jump paths are going to be less than optimal due to jumpship captains not really wanting to pass through uninhabited stars if they can absolutely avoid it. Unfortunately that sometimes requires a much longer path to get where you're going. For the most part I am only adding empty systems for cases where there would be no other way to make the journey through inhabited systems. There are certain places in all the realms that end up taking a lot longer to get to than you'd expect for that reason.

Now if you disagree and feel your captains aren't worried about being stranded in space if they blow a seal, feel free to add your own empty star systems to your copy of planets.xml to fill in gaps - it is pretty easy, just look at the examples already in there to reach the clan home worlds, etc and then play with the coords a bit until they're where you want them to be.

Never thought of it like that. I guess in an Era where Jumpships aren't easily repaired, taking shortcuts probably isn't worth it.

[Jayof9s]

Never thought of it like that. I guess in an Era where Jumpships aren't easily repaired, taking shortcuts probably isn't worth it.

And the problem isn't even ease of repairs but the fact that if you blow a seal in an empty system your ship may never be found because there are tons of empty systems between each inhabited system. In the fiction it is pretty rare for ships to go through uninhabited systems and even when they do it tend to be in fleets with multiple ships or in desperate situations. Which is why I'll only be adding connectors for unreachable systems and then assume that those are 'standard' trade routes or special cases like the Exodus Road that are unlikely to be traveled by a lone jump ship. But as I said it is easy to add more if you disagree.

[Kovax]

What are the other issues you've found?

There were a number of disconnected planets in other places, but I don't recall the details anymore.  I believe one of them was around the old Oberon holdings, and another in the Marian Hegemony vicinity, but I could be wrong, or they may already have been fixed in this release.  I remember doing a random planet selection within a region, and then discovering that there was no way to get there, but that was months ago.  In at least two cases, the planet had jumps to one or several others, but the entire small cluster was isolated from the IS.

I had previously noticed the OA disconnect, and verified that it still existed in the latest release because I'm doing an OA-based campaign (also noticed that the text for Lushann hasn't been done yet, and doesn't mention the Lushann Games, the Periphery's most famous alternative to Solaris VII).

[Jayof9s]

I had previously noticed the OA disconnect, and verified that it still existed in the latest release because I'm doing an OA-based campaign (also noticed that the text for Lushann hasn't been done yet, and doesn't mention the Lushann Games, the Periphery's most famous alternative to Solaris VII).

The other disconnects may have been fixed, none of the connecting systems were in the previous releases. If you come across any more in 0.1.16 or later versions than let me know. Several deep periphery realms I added recently don't have connectors but almost everything else should.

I'll add some to the OA to correct that. As for the missing description, there are lots of planets without them, feel free to submit any you see are missing because otherwise I can't say for sure when I'll get around to it.

[Taharqa]

And the problem isn't even ease of repairs but the fact that if you blow a seal in an empty system your ship may never be found because there are tons of empty systems between each inhabited system. In the fiction it is pretty rare for ships to go through uninhabited systems and even when they do it tend to be in fleets with multiple ships or in desperate situations.

Apparently, no one has ever thought of filing a flight plan in the 31st century.

[Random]

Speaking of repairs.  How are dropship repairs handled?

I managed to salvage a Union the other night and I can't repair it.

[oik]

As I understand, Dropship repairs are handled by Dropship Crew, specifically crew with a role of "Vessel Crewmember" they Random,

have a tech/vessel skill, which is checked against the repair being authorised.

To trigger the repair select any tech in the repair bay (i don't see vessel techs at all) choose the mode (time x3 / x4 etc) and set them to repair. The skill check and time allocation comes from vessel techs (although I can only use 480mins a day regardless).

Using Against the Bot rules the crew comes with the vessel, from the hanger select dropship and "Hire full complement should give a mix of skills for gunners, pilots and crew.

I have repaired engines, armour reloaded ammo this way so far.

[Random]

Something I have just noticed it that when I buy parts the program is using the 'Value of used Parts' multiplier from the Finances tab under Campaign Options.  As an example it's charging 1400 for a ton of MG ammo rather than 2000.  I've set the value of used parts to 0.7

[Taharqa]

Something I have just noticed it that when I buy parts the program is using the 'Value of used Parts' multiplier from the Finances tab under Campaign Options.  As an example it's charging 1400 for a ton of MG ammo rather than 2000.  I've set the value of used parts to 0.7

Nice catch. This is fixed for the next release.

[MadVoorpak]

Anyone figure out a fix for the MekHQ Ratings thing?

[TS_Hawk]

Anyone figure out a fix for the MekHQ Ratings thing?

what do you mean?

[MadVoorpak]

With the update to 0.16 I went from a D rating to an A* rating, as my dropship gives me 250 Score for Dragoons rating through taharques method

[MadVoorpak]

Found the problem and  I'll be checking in a fix in just a couple minutes.

Also, this.

[Jayof9s]

With the update to 0.16 I went from a D rating to an A* rating, as my dropship gives me 250 Score for Dragoons rating through taharques method

A fix is implemented for the dropship rating error in the SVN and will be out when 0.1.17 is released.

Though I've been meaning to bring up that the tech rating bonus is wrong as well but had to check the rules first. It should be a max of +35 as it is +5 for every 10% over 30% with a cap of 100% but on pretty much every unit I have with high concentrations of level 2 units is getting 100+ from the tech rating.

[monbvol]

Well I'm fairly pleased so far but I have run into something in converting MekHQ for my AU that there is no information for me to draw upon to clear up something.  I find I need to adjust the name generator files a bit to give the right flavors to my factions but there is no information on what each of those numbers mean and as such I can only guess which ones I need to adjust and which direction.

Assistance would be appreciated.

[TS_Hawk]

I have to go back to an earlier time in my campaign and it is not loading.  What is the problem this time?

[Sir Chaos]

Well I'm fairly pleased so far but I have run into something in converting MekHQ for my AU that there is no information for me to draw upon to clear up something.  I find I need to adjust the name generator files a bit to give the right flavors to my factions but there is no information on what each of those numbers mean and as such I can only guess which ones I need to adjust and which direction.

Assistance would be appreciated.

I didn´t come up with the name generator files, but as far as I can tell, the numbers are the relative weight given to combinations of first name and surname lists, i.e. the first number in the first row is the relative frequency of names consisting a pick from the first first-name list and the first surname list. The highly weighted combinations are all those where first name and surname are from the same culture.

[Hammer]

Well I'm fairly pleased so far but I have run into something in converting MekHQ for my AU that there is no information for me to draw upon to clear up something.  I find I need to adjust the name generator files a bit to give the right flavors to my factions but there is no information on what each of those numbers mean and as such I can only guess which ones I need to adjust and which direction.

Assistance would be appreciated.

Here is some information from the MegaMek site and Taharqa Blog about it.

http://megamek.info/forums/index.php?topic=687.0

http://taharqa.org/?p=227

[Taharqa]

Well I'm fairly pleased so far but I have run into something in converting MekHQ for my AU that there is no information for me to draw upon to clear up something.  I find I need to adjust the name generator files a bit to give the right flavors to my factions but there is no information on what each of those numbers mean and as such I can only guess which ones I need to adjust and which direction.

Assistance would be appreciated.

I am going to copy the the comments I put in the java code here. This should probably be in the docs section of the release:

Code: [Select]

/**
 * Author: Jay Lawson
 * This class sets up a random name generator that can then be used
 * to generate random pilot names. it will have a couple different settings
 * and flexible input files
 *
 * Files are located in data/names/
 * All files are comma-delimited text files.
 *
 * The masterancestry.txt file shows the correspondence between the different ethnic names and their numeric
 * code in the database. This file is currently not actually read in by MM, but is provided as a reference. The same
 * numeric code must be used across all of the files listed below. Currently the numeric codes must be listed in exact
 * sequential order (i.e. no skipping numbers) for the program to work correctly.
 *
 * The name database is located in three files: firstname_males.txt, firstname_females.txt, and surnames.txt.
 * There ar three comma-delimited fields in each of these data files: fld1,fld2,fld3
 *    fld1 - The name itself, either a male/female first name or a surname
 *    fld2 - a frequency weight to account for some names being more common than others. Currently this is
 *           not being used.
 *    fld3 - the numeric code identifying the "ethnic" group this name belongs to
 *
 * Faction files are located in data/names/factions. The name that is given before ".txt" is used as the key for the
 * faction. The faction files will have varying number of fields depending on how many ethnic groups exist. The faction
 * file does two things. First, it identifies the relative frequency of different ethnic surnames for a faction. Second,
 * it identifies the correspondence between first names and surnames. This allows, for example, for more Japanese first
 * names regardless of surname in the Draconis Combine. There should be a line in the Faction file for each ethnic group.
 *     fld1 - the id for the ethnic group
 *     fld2 - the ethnic group name. Not currently read in, just for easy reference.
 *     fld3 - The relative frequency of this ethnic surname in the faction.
 *     fld4-fldn - These fields identify the relative frequency of first names from an ethnic group given the surname
 *                 listed in fld1.
 *
 */

I don't have time right now to elaborate, but if you still have questions, I would be happy to help.

[monbvol]

Fortunately for me my first choice of major before jumping to computer networking was computer programing so I think I've got most of what I was after now.  Just have to digest it a bit and do some extrapolation to get the rest.

[Random]

Ok, so I salvaged an engine and repaired it thinking that I could use it in another mech.
But instead I get this in the warehouse an it totally unusable.

1   300 XL Engine   0 hit(s), 0 tons   IS   Functional      0   9.5

I also get similar results if I buy and engine from the market.
Is this a known thing, does it happen to anybody else or is it just me?

[Jayof9s]

It looks like MHQ expects the 300 XL engine to be used for a mech or tank of the same weight (i.e. if you tear out the 300XL of an Atlasyou could only use it in another 100 ton 'Mech but not in a lighter 'Mech that uses a 300). You'll notice that when you're in the parts store it specifies a tonnage under details and vehicle engines include notation signifying they're for vehicles.

[Random]

It looks like MHQ expects the 300 XL engine to be used for a mech or tank of the same weight (i.e. if you tear out the 300XL of an Atlasyou could only use it in another 100 ton 'Mech but not in a lighter 'Mech that uses a 300).

This I understand.

The engine I mentioned came from a 75ton mech so the notation should have been.

1   300 XL Engine   0 hit(s), 75 tons   IS   Functional      0   9.5

instead it gave back a result of 0hit(s), 0 tons

I get the same notation in that 3rd column if I buy any engine from the marketplace tab and the engine is unusable, it also charges me nothing.
If I buy an engine through the Customise mech function or through the Repair Bay the engines function just fine and I am charged the correct amount.

[Jayof9s]

Sorry about that, missed that part somehow, I shouldn't respond to posts while preparing for a meeting.

Now the odd part is that I am seeing the same issue when I purchase an engine through the parts store but not when I salvage one. When I buy them I get exactly what you copied and pasted but when I salvaged an engine it shows the details properly, lists the cost, etc it also sold properly and was usable. I was also able to buy a working engine through the repair tab.

As I think on it, that may be a known issue with the parts store but since I can't recall for sure to be safe it is probably better to go post a bug report. If you are able to find a way to reproduce the issue with salvaging an engine resulting in a non-usable engine please post so that it can be fixed.

[Taharqa]

Ok, so I salvaged an engine and repaired it thinking that I could use it in another mech.
But instead I get this in the warehouse an it totally unusable.

I also get similar results if I buy and engine from the market.
Is this a known thing, does it happen to anybody else or is it just me?

Bug found and fixed for the next release.

[Netzilla]

Though I've been meaning to bring up that the tech rating bonus is wrong as well but had to check the rules first. It should be a max of +35 as it is +5 for every 10% over 30% with a cap of 100% but on pretty much every unit I have with high concentrations of level 2 units is getting 100+ from the tech rating.

I've just checked in a fix for this.