Spawned a bunch (more than 5) at the same time and watched them go, they rarely collided with each other when driving around. They did sometimes bunch up in one destination (one time, 3 trucks drove to the loading area behind the terminal building at once), and when it happened they did get stuck on each other for a while. Even then, they'd usually unstuck eventually. I don't think there's an easy fix for this though, given that they can't "see" each other. It would be great if we had access to something like gametick, and use it to offset destination coords by a few meters, but for now, I think this is already great as it is.
I'll probably (or maybe) play around with the system later and see if I can create a different route.
@rexzion
AI plane with auto land/takeoff capability? That sounds great.
Also... holy crap. I've been hoping to see an actual coords based guided weapon.
One major drawback of this system is that you can't (easily) guide the bomb to a non-lockable plane, object, etc. (which is the main point of using manually controlled munitions in the game) so maybe a feature that lets you manually enter target coordinates might be neat, too.
@SyntheticL @FOXG
Well, here it is!
I was gonna say, "no, I'm kinda busy with other stuff" but I had all the ingredients, so here's something. Not a quad MG or the cannon on war thunder thing though, I used my pre-existing 37mm cannon I built around the same time.
Say, either this or system like this would work on ships too, wouldn't it?
You can even create a fleet that loams the map on a set course. I can't work on one yet but with sufficiently simple/low part ship builds, having sea traffic without a mod (and on mobile) seems very much possible.
I'm just throwing ideas as I come up with them, but... if you (I mean anyone, as in general you) have an amphibious craft that can beach on some land, and manage to make them stop for a while and lower ramp, you have an AI ferry that can carry your car or whatever to another location. Seems kinda fun to me
@OrderlyHippo @11qazxc @rexzion
(Let me know if you don't need or want to get tagged)
First decent prototype using B-36. I'll publish it later after I'm done making a few more modifications. This one is using original PQ-14 FT, so no waypoint system yet. https://www.simpleplanes.com/a/J9N6c0/PQB-36-AI-bomber-AIB-YG-v1
Set to fly 1700m (I think), and bomb Yeager airport's runway. Flies at around 540kph max in my usual testings. Spawn this near Wright, or somewhere between Wright and Yeager.
Bomb trigger, dropping delay, and course heavily affects the accuracy. Waypoint system will probably improve accuracy (sorry, haven't tested your modified version yet 11qazxc), but trigger needs improvement as well (it needs to adjust to current altitude). Some RNG like element might be great also, if that's even possible (can be based on speed, heading, etc.)
It's pretty fun though, spawn like 5 of them, and you get a pretty neat formation of bombers.
@C47skytrain
No worries, I'm still trying to figure out appropriate damage myself.
The reason I I lowered 50cal damage a lot though, is so it doesn't destroy tanks and other 'armored' vehicles in like 10 seconds. Default 25 damage gun could blow up a tank with 10000 hp blocks for armor really quick (.50 cap shouldn't even be able to do damage to the frontal armor of a post ww2 heavy tank, but the game doesn't have thickness value, so high HP and modified weapon damage is the best we can do now)
For a similar reason I tend to lower wing gun damage of my aircraft as well, but again, still trying to figure out what's a good value (you can also increase part HP, so you don't want to make it too weak or too strong).
Oh and yeah, I messed up the shotgun when I uploaded the thing lol It's just hidden though, so unhide and it comes back
@rexzion
Thanks, didn't expect to get a working example. Glad you made it.
Just played around with it, made some super basic modifications, and we've got our (maybe first) spawnable AI bomber.
Spawn it near Bandit, and it should drop bombs somewhere within the runway.
Now, if you strap-on a nuke on this thing, spawn some "friendly" buildings and static aircrafts you need to defend, you get an actual high-threat target that you want to shoot down over the ocean. Nice and easy custom mission basically. You can even spawn some custom AA vehicles, and make them aggro at the bomber via some means. I'm thinking, maybe put a super long range missile w/low fuel time (so it won't actually hit anything) on your enemy bomber, .
Anyway, I have a low part B-36 just for this occasion, so I'll tinker with the concept later. Looking very promising though. Needless to say, feel free to experiment with the idea if you feel like it.
Tagging since you guys might want to see it in action also. It's a proof of concept
@11qazxc
@PlaneFlightX
@hpgbproductions
By the way.. I just said in a comment on your Su-33 that I missed your old blocky afterburner, and I still do, but the big red flames that come out of this aircraft look SICK. These look so cool! Love them.
Love the new blocky custom canopies of yours, make the aircrafts look and feel more visual consistent than with the rounded cockpit parts. Kinda miss the old blocky afterburner though, haha
@ReinMcDeer
You're probably right, it's a compromise
Are variables/part variables in general known to make a noticeable difference, (lets say on older mobile devices) though?
I know that at least in some cases, it's better to use variable setter and keep the FT input short than to have long FT on every part that uses the input (having long FT as a custom variable and shorter FT for parts input saves a tiny fraction of loading time, someone on a discord tested that for me (I think on python))
Here's a quick tip,
If you set the partCollisionResponse of a part from Default to None, that part stops taking damage from collision (like when it crashes into the ground, or hits another plane). Custom track (crawler) system tends to explode if this value is set to Default, but changing it to None will prevent that.
Info update, current wing gun damage seems to be 30. When you set damage value to 30 in xml with Overload and open xml again, "damage" parameter disappears (Overload does this with some parameters when the value is default). Doesn't happen with anything higher, or anything lower.
1)Parachute 'floor smooth/& argument' bug
Parachute with this code causes a bug where the plane spawns below sea level and game crashes. I suspect the presence of & argument or the two arguments within the activation part + parachute quirks/bugs is what's causing the glitch.
I tried another code with the '&' argument part as a custom variable (using clamp01), but the result was the same.
2)Gauge 'hide option' bug
In designer, if you set a gauge's "hide base" property to true and hide and unhide the part (with the general designer option), base shows up again (stays hidden in flight mode).
3)Beacon light activation group bug(?)
Neither the Beacon Light or Formation Light part accept FT for its activation group.
Aug 5 Update
4)Small Pylon
Top attachment point of Small Pylon cannot be attached to a fuselage block, weapons, or another small pylon (unlike its larger counter part), and probably many other. I suspect it can't be attached to anything but wing parts.
I find this rather inconvenient.
Got another one. FT related bug
iOS - Perfectly good FT stops working under certain circumstances. Might be an issue specific to certain type of parts (so far experienced this with rotators and gyro).
Haven't gotten a pin on the cause of this, but I suspect that it may have something to do with the amount and complexity of FT present in a given build. Gyro/rotators with FT that work on its own (with performance cost of the build being below 1500), when brought as a subassembly to a larger build with more stuff (higher performance cost--about 2000 to 2800), it no longer works.
FT that stops working is something like this: "clamp01(rotator current angle)) + clamp01(Activation Group) = X." Pretty simple. Or, even something simpler like "LandingGear=1."
I was using these to activate/deactivate rotators and gyros. 1 assembly of these, works fine (with 9 rotators and 3 gyros).
2x this, still fine. But when I bring this assembly to a larger group of assemblies (as a unit disconnected from the cockpit, since that's crucial to what I'm trying to do) with another 18 gyros and 39 rotators (3 gyro/9 rotators per unit, and each unit has performance cost of about 380, and only one unit is connected to the primary cockpit, rest disconnected), it suddenly stops working. It only uses part variable setter, and these variables take over when the unit is saved as sub assembly.
I'd like to submit an example of this, but the build is a WIP and I don't want to publish it yet, so this might not help much.
I'll probably submit an example once the project is published.
Also, I'll list some other things that might be related to this.
-Number of aircrafts (more than 800)
-Number of sub assemblies (more than 600)
-Available storage space on device (8GB out of about 260gb)
1. Camera related bug
When a camera or primary cockpit goes into the ocean, regardless of whether it's floating or sunk, game forcibly "Auto Orients" camera, and and skips some of the remaining cameras that are not touching the water seemingly at random.
This does not happen when a bomb or missile with camera enabled touches and or sinks in the water. Although there is a workaround in the form of aforementioned bomb/missile camera, I still find this troublesome as it limits the utility of camera parts especially for custom missiles or bombs with camera on it.
2. Parts rotation bug(?)
This might be an old bug, or even a feature, but I've noticed that Y-axis Parts Rotation does not account for the current X or Z axis rotation of the part. What I mean is that whatever the X-axis rotation value, changing the Y-axis rotation value always rotates the part perpendicular to the floor of the build screen. This causes (pretty often, especially with labels) a quite annoying situation where changing either Y rotation or Z rotation doing the same thing, and you are unable to rotate the part in Y-axis perpendicular to the part itself.
Edit
@11qazxc mentioned that (thanks!) it's a gimbal lock and not a bug. That would explain it, but I'd still like there to be a feature where you can toggle between this mode and rotation based on part orientation. It would be great if we can have two modes for all 3 axis.
3.Camera enabled Bomb/missile bug
When a camera enabled bomb or missile explodes or breaks, camera doesn't get disabled, and the bomb or missile (their models) remains intact. Sorry, don't have a working example at the moment. May be more likely to happen with bomb/missile with low explosion scale?
Forgot to mention, but these are issues I've encountered on iOS. Can't speak for other platforms.
This is cool!
If you don't mind a suggestion.. it would be nice to be able to see the directions of locations outside the map. Like some kind of symbols or names that display at the edge of the map.
Hey peeps, here's a little video I made with the truck! ...that you upvoted! Now have the misfortune of being tagged! Muwahahaha!... jk, haha. Joke aside, I think you guys might enjoy it, so here it is.
@mahardika
@CRATE52PART2
@Scratchoza
@TRD6932
@Th3rmoplylae
@DEN12345
@IceCraftGaming
@X99STRIKER
@GrFrog
@PilotBug
@SuperSuperTheSylph
You are welcome:)
Yeah, once I had the basic FT and setup created, this became doing the same FT editing 24 times (+ many revisions) and manually attaching tiny detachers to the pylons on the racks, as they didn't want to connect automatically. At least it's half the effort with triple racks.
@IFVuser
Yeah. IIRC, it seemed that the damage by explosion (of explosive cannons) was either "kill block" or "no damage". Like there's a damage threshold for the block/"aircraft" being hit, and if the damage is below that (scaler below 0.5 or something, may have varied depending on block HP), it just doesn't do any observable damage. And unlike impact damage, this explosion damage didn't seem to accumulate/take away from block's HP pool either, however many times you hit it. This made HE cannon/shell with big explosion somewhat unsuited for realistic 'damage model' type system/builds.
.
As for impact damage or impactDamageScaler, yeah setting it too high makes it way too strong, and gives the shell too much 'push' force. I initially treated IDS like shell weight, mimicking the weight of real life cannon shells, but soon found out this method wasn't very good (maybe ok for ground vehicles, but ships, they just started sliding sideways when hit).
I haven't played around with it, but Monarchii did further refinement of ship damage system (that Chii and I used to discuss), if you are interested.
@LunarEclipseSP
Ahhh. If you are looking for interior, mine has even less than his (mine has a static bomb reticle and pretty much nothing else).
I might add a few more buttons for touch-screen control's sake, but probably nothing more, as interior tends to be least of my priorities. You can add interior if you want to though.
@Rb2h
Hi, sorry for my late reply.
I've checked out your drone version:)
Addition of missiles is cool, though I noticed they shoot each other. If you don't want them to shoot each other, you need to make the game think they are "dead". You can do this by triggering critically damaged state.
Take a detacher hidden somewhere on my plane, and attach it to your drone, then attach a huge wing to it. Losing this wing causes "critically damaged" thing.
@IFVuser @Rb2h
I cannot tell you how the cannon explosion damage works, but as IFVuser says caliber size changes the damage & radius, as well as explosionScaler. But it's not straight forward, and I couldn't tell how exactly it worked even with some testings.
.
I did some,pretty extensive testing on impact damage of cannon shells however, and I think I found the formula: velocity*impactDamageScaler (+random multiplier between 1 to 0.3)
If you like to see it for yourself, here's a testing contraption I used: https://www.simpleplanes.com/a/62Uzfy/Cannon-damage-tester-B-Mk1-block-mass-900000
I just searched for "simpleplanes terrain following" in DuckDuckGo for a possible future project, and this post/plane was the second top in the results. Glad I did that.
Really cool tech demonstrator, if that's the right word here. Honestly it's kinda criminal that there's very little recognition as yet.
@Monarchii
They can collide with each other and explode, but it's possible to avoid that.
For example, two cannons with same scale (no less than 1,1,1,), same barrel/base lengths, located at the exact same coords/orientations shouldn't collide with each other, although caliber might also be a factor.
.
Also, I found through testings that, when you fire a cannon, shell appears inside the barrel slightly forward of & away from the edge of the base, so there's a small 'safe space' there. And the point of shell generation moves forward/backward depending on the length of the barrel (not the part scale). And if the base length is set to 0 via Overload, shell is generated inside the base.
So there is some restrictions on the form factor of your custom gun/barrel, depending on how you set up the cannon.
.
Check out this demonstrator & text in the description, I've compiled some findings. Feel free to add or correct things. Hopefully I'll do a proper public post later:
https://www.simpleplanes.com/a/6yxz1N/Cannon-mechanic-tester
@Monarchii
Edit:
Oh wait... it's just a reference for (target/intended) damage per caliber. I feel dumb. lol
So one just needs to calculate the required IDS by dividing the target damage (as listed) by gun's velocity.
.
Original text (of shame):
I'm reading back the damage section of the document. With the revised system, are you meant to use explosive round? Or is it still the basic (non explody) type?
.
I'm wondering about this because the cannon impact damage is determined only by velocity x impactDamageScaler (caliber doesn't matter), wheres explosion damage (and the "destruction power" to seemingly bypass block's HP) is affected by caliber & explosionScale in a... mysterious way.
Oh I see! Sorry for the rather unnecessary tip, haha
.
As for rotator, at least on my iOS version (1.12.203.1), they don't rotate unless something is attached to the shaft/moving bit. This goes for the basic one, joint, and probably mini too.
So you need to either attach a block to the rotator, or attach rotator to a 'base' of sort, and I think there's always gonna be some shake. Looking at your autopilot FT, former method might add too many blocks.
I use a single rotator to store altitude for my own autopilot mechanism (much simpler than yours), and with this 0 mass, 0 drag, 5000 damperMultiplier basic rotator, I experience very little shake for my use (negligible), but I can't say how much it's gonna affect your FT.
.
(Mine stores 0.01 degree (of the total 180 degs) as 1 meter, and a custom variable multiplies it back again by 100, rounds it up, then a gyro (which does the holding) uses this value as target altitude.
.
I'm not sure if the size (scale) of the rotator affects the shake though. Also, I'm not sure what you were referring to by engine power, can you elaborate on that part?
In case you are on iOS like me... I use a free file manager app called Documents (one from Readdle) to add back predecessor ID and edit FTs and such. It lets you import/export text files (including .xml used by SP), and also open and edit them.
I'm not sure if you can add back custom variables via this method, though.
I also use a text editor app called PWEditor (free) as a bulk-replacer, when I want to replace the name of multiple custom variables or the values at once. (There's a newer version but I haven't used it yet)
You just to need to
1)first import the plane file in question to the Documents app,
2)open & copy-paste the entire contents, ie. text, to the PWEditor (or any other app that does the same) and bulk replace,
3)then copy-paste that back to the plane file in Documents,
4)then finally export it back to the SimplePlanes directory in Files app.
You just gotta be careful with how you phrase your search terms when you bulk-replace. And also, always keep a back up of the plane file you are editing.
@MonsNotTheMonster
Nah, thank you for the cool build, man! x)
I really felt & appreciate the effort & attention to detail/accuracy that went into this build, and it was quite a joy to fly this plane.
Man, what a nice, great build!
The combination of simple style & accurate looks, attention to detail, functional yet intuitive features & control, and flight performance is just really great. To me, it's almost exactly the kind of plane/thing I try to build and aim for myself and love to see from other people. Like, I can probably count the times I've seen G limiter (especially for negative G) implemented on SP builds with one hand (I'm sure I've seen them, but honestly I can't recall one at the moment; I could just be forgetting all 100+ builds that had them though, so maybe I should just say "I love this feature!" lol), and airbrake angle getting automatically limited based on AGL just made me smile. Also, small but important features. Like having a cockpit view is great, and the tracer (bulletScale) of the guns made it look quite satisfying to fire the thing.
.
A couple of suggestions I would make is to add a toggle option for the airbrake using AG (so you don't have to pressing down the the throttle button), and maybe to add a hidden engine so the engine flame is visible only when you have the afterburner on. The latter especially is just my preference though. As for airbrake, "or" symbol works. Here's what I have on my build that limits brake power by half when gear down: (Brake | Activate2) * (LandingGear=0 ? 0.5 : 1).
But nonetheless... great build!
@GR0SUPRA
Thank you!:)
@WolfHunter9111
+2mm yes! loo
Spawned a bunch (more than 5) at the same time and watched them go, they rarely collided with each other when driving around. They did sometimes bunch up in one destination (one time, 3 trucks drove to the loading area behind the terminal building at once), and when it happened they did get stuck on each other for a while. Even then, they'd usually unstuck eventually. I don't think there's an easy fix for this though, given that they can't "see" each other. It would be great if we had access to something like gametick, and use it to offset destination coords by a few meters, but for now, I think this is already great as it is.
+2I'll probably (or maybe) play around with the system later and see if I can create a different route.
@rexzion
+2AI plane with auto land/takeoff capability? That sounds great.
Also... holy crap. I've been hoping to see an actual coords based guided weapon.
One major drawback of this system is that you can't (easily) guide the bomb to a non-lockable plane, object, etc. (which is the main point of using manually controlled munitions in the game) so maybe a feature that lets you manually enter target coordinates might be neat, too.
+2@SyntheticL @FOXG
+2Well, here it is!
I was gonna say, "no, I'm kinda busy with other stuff" but I had all the ingredients, so here's something. Not a quad MG or the cannon on war thunder thing though, I used my pre-existing 37mm cannon I built around the same time.
Say, either this or system like this would work on ships too, wouldn't it?
You can even create a fleet that loams the map on a set course. I can't work on one yet but with sufficiently simple/low part ship builds, having sea traffic without a mod (and on mobile) seems very much possible.
I'm just throwing ideas as I come up with them, but... if you (I mean anyone, as in general you) have an amphibious craft that can beach on some land, and manage to make them stop for a while and lower ramp, you have an AI ferry that can carry your car or whatever to another location. Seems kinda fun to me
+2@OrderlyHippo @11qazxc @rexzion
(Let me know if you don't need or want to get tagged)
First decent prototype using B-36. I'll publish it later after I'm done making a few more modifications. This one is using original PQ-14 FT, so no waypoint system yet.
https://www.simpleplanes.com/a/J9N6c0/PQB-36-AI-bomber-AIB-YG-v1
Set to fly 1700m (I think), and bomb Yeager airport's runway. Flies at around 540kph max in my usual testings. Spawn this near Wright, or somewhere between Wright and Yeager.
+2Bomb trigger, dropping delay, and course heavily affects the accuracy. Waypoint system will probably improve accuracy (sorry, haven't tested your modified version yet 11qazxc), but trigger needs improvement as well (it needs to adjust to current altitude). Some RNG like element might be great also, if that's even possible (can be based on speed, heading, etc.)
It's pretty fun though, spawn like 5 of them, and you get a pretty neat formation of bombers.
@C47skytrain
No worries, I'm still trying to figure out appropriate damage myself.
The reason I I lowered 50cal damage a lot though, is so it doesn't destroy tanks and other 'armored' vehicles in like 10 seconds. Default 25 damage gun could blow up a tank with 10000 hp blocks for armor really quick (.50 cap shouldn't even be able to do damage to the frontal armor of a post ww2 heavy tank, but the game doesn't have thickness value, so high HP and modified weapon damage is the best we can do now)
For a similar reason I tend to lower wing gun damage of my aircraft as well, but again, still trying to figure out what's a good value (you can also increase part HP, so you don't want to make it too weak or too strong).
Oh and yeah, I messed up the shotgun when I uploaded the thing lol It's just hidden though, so unhide and it comes back
+2@rexzion
Thanks, didn't expect to get a working example. Glad you made it.
Just played around with it, made some super basic modifications, and we've got our (maybe first) spawnable AI bomber.
Spawn it near Bandit, and it should drop bombs somewhere within the runway.
https://www.simpleplanes.com/a/Ndm16c/BPQ-14-1-rexizon-autopilot-bomber-LPpAI
Now, if you strap-on a nuke on this thing, spawn some "friendly" buildings and static aircrafts you need to defend, you get an actual high-threat target that you want to shoot down over the ocean. Nice and easy custom mission basically. You can even spawn some custom AA vehicles, and make them aggro at the bomber via some means. I'm thinking, maybe put a super long range missile w/low fuel time (so it won't actually hit anything) on your enemy bomber, .
Anyway, I have a low part B-36 just for this occasion, so I'll tinker with the concept later. Looking very promising though. Needless to say, feel free to experiment with the idea if you feel like it.
Tagging since you guys might want to see it in action also. It's a proof of concept
+2@11qazxc
@PlaneFlightX
@hpgbproductions
Just, wonderful. Great job:D
By the way.. I just said in a comment on your Su-33 that I missed your old blocky afterburner, and I still do, but the big red flames that come out of this aircraft look SICK. These look so cool! Love them.
+2Love the new blocky custom canopies of yours, make the aircrafts look and feel more visual consistent than with the rounded cockpit parts. Kinda miss the old blocky afterburner though, haha
+2Oh oops, forgot to fix a mistake at the end of the Sand Island article. It's supposed to be "shot down many planes in the game."
P.S.
+2The project is faaaar from completion, and not coming out any time soon.
@ReinMcDeer
You're probably right, it's a compromise
Are variables/part variables in general known to make a noticeable difference, (lets say on older mobile devices) though?
I know that at least in some cases, it's better to use variable setter and keep the FT input short than to have long FT on every part that uses the input (having long FT as a custom variable and shorter FT for parts input saves a tiny fraction of loading time, someone on a discord tested that for me (I think on python))
+2Here's a quick tip,
+2If you set the partCollisionResponse of a part from Default to None, that part stops taking damage from collision (like when it crashes into the ground, or hits another plane). Custom track (crawler) system tends to explode if this value is set to Default, but changing it to None will prevent that.
Love the design, works great!
+2Info update, current wing gun damage seems to be 30. When you set damage value to 30 in xml with Overload and open xml again, "damage" parameter disappears (Overload does this with some parameters when the value is default). Doesn't happen with anything higher, or anything lower.
+2@DatRoadTrainGuy19
+2It's unfinished, haven't completely abandoned it though
1)Parachute 'floor smooth/& argument' bug
Parachute with this code causes a bug where the plane spawns below sea level and game crashes. I suspect the presence of & argument or the two arguments within the activation part + parachute quirks/bugs is what's causing the glitch.
(activationGroup)
floor(smooth(SelectedWeapon="R61" & ammo("R61")=0)<1,1/1))
I tried another code with the '&' argument part as a custom variable (using clamp01), but the result was the same.
2)Gauge 'hide option' bug
In designer, if you set a gauge's "hide base" property to true and hide and unhide the part (with the general designer option), base shows up again (stays hidden in flight mode).
3)Beacon light activation group bug(?)
Neither the Beacon Light or Formation Light part accept FT for its activation group.
Aug 5 Update
4)Small Pylon
Top attachment point of Small Pylon cannot be attached to a fuselage block, weapons, or another small pylon (unlike its larger counter part), and probably many other. I suspect it can't be attached to anything but wing parts.
I find this rather inconvenient.
Playing on iPhone (1.12.128)
+2Incredible build! Works great, and the model looks very moe, and... yknow... winks awkwardly
+2Got another one.
FT related bug
iOS - Perfectly good FT stops working under certain circumstances. Might be an issue specific to certain type of parts (so far experienced this with rotators and gyro).
Haven't gotten a pin on the cause of this, but I suspect that it may have something to do with the amount and complexity of FT present in a given build. Gyro/rotators with FT that work on its own (with performance cost of the build being below 1500), when brought as a subassembly to a larger build with more stuff (higher performance cost--about 2000 to 2800), it no longer works.
FT that stops working is something like this: "clamp01(rotator current angle)) + clamp01(Activation Group) = X." Pretty simple. Or, even something simpler like "LandingGear=1."
I was using these to activate/deactivate rotators and gyros. 1 assembly of these, works fine (with 9 rotators and 3 gyros).
2x this, still fine. But when I bring this assembly to a larger group of assemblies (as a unit disconnected from the cockpit, since that's crucial to what I'm trying to do) with another 18 gyros and 39 rotators (3 gyro/9 rotators per unit, and each unit has performance cost of about 380, and only one unit is connected to the primary cockpit, rest disconnected), it suddenly stops working. It only uses part variable setter, and these variables take over when the unit is saved as sub assembly.
I'd like to submit an example of this, but the build is a WIP and I don't want to publish it yet, so this might not help much.
I'll probably submit an example once the project is published.
Also, I'll list some other things that might be related to this.
+2-Number of aircrafts (more than 800)
-Number of sub assemblies (more than 600)
-Available storage space on device (8GB out of about 260gb)
1. Camera related bug
When a camera or primary cockpit goes into the ocean, regardless of whether it's floating or sunk, game forcibly "Auto Orients" camera, and and skips some of the remaining cameras that are not touching the water seemingly at random.
This does not happen when a bomb or missile with camera enabled touches and or sinks in the water. Although there is a workaround in the form of aforementioned bomb/missile camera, I still find this troublesome as it limits the utility of camera parts especially for custom missiles or bombs with camera on it.
2. Parts rotation bug(?)
This might be an old bug, or even a feature, but I've noticed that Y-axis Parts Rotation does not account for the current X or Z axis rotation of the part. What I mean is that whatever the X-axis rotation value, changing the Y-axis rotation value always rotates the part perpendicular to the floor of the build screen. This causes (pretty often, especially with labels) a quite annoying situation where changing either Y rotation or Z rotation doing the same thing, and you are unable to rotate the part in Y-axis perpendicular to the part itself.
Edit
@11qazxc mentioned that (thanks!) it's a gimbal lock and not a bug. That would explain it, but I'd still like there to be a feature where you can toggle between this mode and rotation based on part orientation. It would be great if we can have two modes for all 3 axis.
3.Camera enabled Bomb/missile bug
When a camera enabled bomb or missile explodes or breaks, camera doesn't get disabled, and the bomb or missile (their models) remains intact. Sorry, don't have a working example at the moment. May be more likely to happen with bomb/missile with low explosion scale?
Forgot to mention, but these are issues I've encountered on iOS. Can't speak for other platforms.
+2This is cool!
+2If you don't mind a suggestion.. it would be nice to be able to see the directions of locations outside the map. Like some kind of symbols or names that display at the edge of the map.
Well made nice vehicle!
+2@Lake
+2No, no, no, nooooo! Nooooooo....
Haha
Hey peeps, here's a little video I made with the truck! ...that you upvoted! Now have the misfortune of being tagged! Muwahahaha!... jk, haha. Joke aside, I think you guys might enjoy it, so here it is.
+2@mahardika
@CRATE52PART2
@Scratchoza
@TRD6932
@Th3rmoplylae
@DEN12345
@IceCraftGaming
@X99STRIKER
@GrFrog
@PilotBug
Nice boat! I really enjoy your mobile friendly ships.
+2This is just... incredible. Thanks for this ship, i can have a lot of fun with this!
+2This is a niice looking Thunderchief!
+2@SuperSuperTheSylph
+1You are welcome:)
Yeah, once I had the basic FT and setup created, this became doing the same FT editing 24 times (+ many revisions) and manually attaching tiny detachers to the pylons on the racks, as they didn't want to connect automatically. At least it's half the effort with triple racks.
@SuperSuperTheSylph
+1So you figured it out, cool!
I can probably upload the rack later today. Will ping you in the comments when I do:)
@IFVuser
Yeah. IIRC, it seemed that the damage by explosion (of explosive cannons) was either "kill block" or "no damage". Like there's a damage threshold for the block/"aircraft" being hit, and if the damage is below that (scaler below 0.5 or something, may have varied depending on block HP), it just doesn't do any observable damage. And unlike impact damage, this explosion damage didn't seem to accumulate/take away from block's HP pool either, however many times you hit it. This made HE cannon/shell with big explosion somewhat unsuited for realistic 'damage model' type system/builds.
.
As for impact damage or impactDamageScaler, yeah setting it too high makes it way too strong, and gives the shell too much 'push' force. I initially treated IDS like shell weight, mimicking the weight of real life cannon shells, but soon found out this method wasn't very good (maybe ok for ground vehicles, but ships, they just started sliding sideways when hit).
I haven't played around with it, but Monarchii did further refinement of ship damage system (that Chii and I used to discuss), if you are interested.
+1@SuperSuperTheSylph
+1Hope you like it!
@LunarEclipseSP
+1Ahhh. If you are looking for interior, mine has even less than his (mine has a static bomb reticle and pretty much nothing else).
I might add a few more buttons for touch-screen control's sake, but probably nothing more, as interior tends to be least of my priorities. You can add interior if you want to though.
@C47skytrain @DimitriIqbal91
+1Hey guys
SnakeEye (esque) bomb finished. Finally.
@Rb2h
+1Hi, sorry for my late reply.
I've checked out your drone version:)
Addition of missiles is cool, though I noticed they shoot each other. If you don't want them to shoot each other, you need to make the game think they are "dead". You can do this by triggering critically damaged state.
Take a detacher hidden somewhere on my plane, and attach it to your drone, then attach a huge wing to it. Losing this wing causes "critically damaged" thing.
@IFVuser @Rb2h
+1I cannot tell you how the cannon explosion damage works, but as IFVuser says caliber size changes the damage & radius, as well as explosionScaler. But it's not straight forward, and I couldn't tell how exactly it worked even with some testings.
.
I did some,pretty extensive testing on impact damage of cannon shells however, and I think I found the formula:
velocity*impactDamageScaler(+random multiplier between 1 to 0.3)If you like to see it for yourself, here's a testing contraption I used:
https://www.simpleplanes.com/a/62Uzfy/Cannon-damage-tester-B-Mk1-block-mass-900000
I just searched for "simpleplanes terrain following" in DuckDuckGo for a possible future project, and this post/plane was the second top in the results. Glad I did that.
+1Really cool tech demonstrator, if that's the right word here. Honestly it's kinda criminal that there's very little recognition as yet.
@Monarchii
+1They can collide with each other and explode, but it's possible to avoid that.
For example, two cannons with same scale (no less than 1,1,1,), same barrel/base lengths, located at the exact same coords/orientations shouldn't collide with each other, although caliber might also be a factor.
.
Also, I found through testings that, when you fire a cannon, shell appears inside the barrel slightly forward of & away from the edge of the base, so there's a small 'safe space' there. And the point of shell generation moves forward/backward depending on the length of the barrel (not the part scale). And if the base length is set to 0 via Overload, shell is generated inside the base.
So there is some restrictions on the form factor of your custom gun/barrel, depending on how you set up the cannon.
.
Check out this demonstrator & text in the description, I've compiled some findings. Feel free to add or correct things. Hopefully I'll do a proper public post later:
https://www.simpleplanes.com/a/6yxz1N/Cannon-mechanic-tester
@Monarchii
+1Edit:
Oh wait... it's just a reference for (target/intended) damage per caliber. I feel dumb. lol
So one just needs to calculate the required IDS by dividing the target damage (as listed) by gun's velocity.
.
Original text (of shame):
I'm reading back the damage section of the document. With the revised system, are you meant to use explosive round? Or is it still the basic (non explody) type?
.
I'm wondering about this because the cannon impact damage is determined only by velocity x impactDamageScaler (caliber doesn't matter), wheres explosion damage (and the "destruction power" to seemingly bypass block's HP) is affected by caliber & explosionScale in a... mysterious way.
@griges
Oh I see! Sorry for the rather unnecessary tip, haha
+1.
As for rotator, at least on my iOS version (1.12.203.1), they don't rotate unless something is attached to the shaft/moving bit. This goes for the basic one, joint, and probably mini too.
So you need to either attach a block to the rotator, or attach rotator to a 'base' of sort, and I think there's always gonna be some shake. Looking at your autopilot FT, former method might add too many blocks.
I use a single rotator to store altitude for my own autopilot mechanism (much simpler than yours), and with this 0 mass, 0 drag, 5000 damperMultiplier basic rotator, I experience very little shake for my use (negligible), but I can't say how much it's gonna affect your FT.
.
(Mine stores 0.01 degree (of the total 180 degs) as 1 meter, and a custom variable multiplies it back again by 100, rounds it up, then a gyro (which does the holding) uses this value as target altitude.
.
I'm not sure if the size (scale) of the rotator affects the shake though. Also, I'm not sure what you were referring to by engine power, can you elaborate on that part?
In case you are on iOS like me... I use a free file manager app called Documents (one from Readdle) to add back predecessor ID and edit FTs and such. It lets you import/export text files (including .xml used by SP), and also open and edit them.
I'm not sure if you can add back custom variables via this method, though.
I also use a text editor app called PWEditor (free) as a bulk-replacer, when I want to replace the name of multiple custom variables or the values at once. (There's a newer version but I haven't used it yet)
You just to need to
1)first import the plane file in question to the Documents app,
2)open & copy-paste the entire contents, ie. text, to the PWEditor (or any other app that does the same) and bulk replace,
3)then copy-paste that back to the plane file in Documents,
4)then finally export it back to the SimplePlanes directory in Files app.
You just gotta be careful with how you phrase your search terms when you bulk-replace. And also, always keep a back up of the plane file you are editing.
+1Oh wow. Hinge rotator for the exhaust is pure genius. I love it.
+1Looks great! Gotta play with (against) this later.
+1Looks great and fun to fly & play with. Love the camera aim gun.
+1Nice modification on the original!
@MonsNotTheMonster
+1Thanks!
Hey, one question, would you mind if.. or rather could I publish a custom weapon with this plane? As a successor to this, with proper credit and all.
+1@MonsNotTheMonster
+1Nah, thank you for the cool build, man! x)
I really felt & appreciate the effort & attention to detail/accuracy that went into this build, and it was quite a joy to fly this plane.
Man, what a nice, great build!
+1The combination of simple style & accurate looks, attention to detail, functional yet intuitive features & control, and flight performance is just really great. To me, it's almost exactly the kind of plane/thing I try to build and aim for myself and love to see from other people. Like, I can probably count the times I've seen G limiter (especially for negative G) implemented on SP builds with one hand (I'm sure I've seen them, but honestly I can't recall one at the moment; I could just be forgetting all 100+ builds that had them though, so maybe I should just say "I love this feature!" lol), and airbrake angle getting automatically limited based on AGL just made me smile. Also, small but important features. Like having a cockpit view is great, and the tracer (bulletScale) of the guns made it look quite satisfying to fire the thing.
.
A couple of suggestions I would make is to add a toggle option for the airbrake using AG (so you don't have to pressing down the the throttle button), and maybe to add a hidden engine so the engine flame is visible only when you have the afterburner on. The latter especially is just my preference though. As for airbrake, "or" symbol works. Here's what I have on my build that limits brake power by half when gear down:
(Brake | Activate2) * (LandingGear=0 ? 0.5 : 1).But nonetheless... great build!
@Ngoc83619
+1That's a B-36 I made before, you can find it among my published builds.
@Ngoc83619
+1Thank you for the kind comment, glad you liked them!:)